Showing up

Showing up The Reckon Yard Podcast · Jul 19, 2026

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79:03

Place

Culver City

Culver City is a part of Los Angeles. The hosts are talking about where car shops and car culture were based there.

Place

Jefferson Speedway

Jefferson Speedway is an old nickname for Jefferson Boulevard. The idea was that people would test their cars there, right outside the shops.

Company

Edelbrock

Edelbrock is a company that makes performance parts for car engines. Here, the host is saying Edelbrock was located in that area back in the day.

Brand

Shelby Plant

Shelby is the famous performance name associated with high-performance cars. The host is saying there was a Shelby factory/operation in that area.

Person

Ed Iskendarians

Ed Iskenderian is a well-known name in the performance-parts world. The host is saying his business was part of the car-shop scene in that area.

Brand

Camfather

“Camfather” sounds like a nickname for someone famous for performance camshafts. The host is listing recognizable names from the classic hot-rod community.

Concept

hot rotting

“Hot rodding” is car culture where people modify cars to make them faster and cooler. The host is saying that area was where that scene started.

Term

tarmac

Tarmac just means the paved surface—usually asphalt. When rubber is melted into it, that usually means tires were spinning and getting very hot.

Car

The Chevrolet Suburban is a large SUV made to carry lots of people and gear. It’s often used for towing and everyday family use, but some owners modify them to make much more power than stock. That’s likely why it came up in the episode.

Car

Chevrolet 67 Chevrolet

Term

hand-stamped fenders

“Hand-stamped fenders” means the metal fender shapes are made using stamping tools, but with more manual work. It’s the kind of detail that suggests the car was built with extra care.

Concept

restomod

A restomod is when an old classic car is updated with newer technology so it drives better. Here, the speaker says this isn’t being treated as a restomod.

Car

68 Mustang

“68 Mustang” means a 1968 Ford Mustang. The speaker is saying this one looks like the classic, but it’s been updated with newer parts so it drives more like a modern car.

Car

Testarossa Testarosa

The Testarossa is a sports car made by Ferrari. It’s famous for its distinctive styling and for being a collectible classic. The episode likely mentioned it because it’s an impressive car to spot in person.

Term

brakes are treacherous as hell

They’re saying the brakes don’t feel trustworthy. That could mean they’re too sensitive, inconsistent, or not easy to control smoothly.

Term

power band

“Power band” is the range of engine speeds where the car feels strongest. If it’s “crazy” or “chirpy,” it means the car really wakes up in a specific RPM range.

Place

BW Museum

They’re talking about a museum Brian got them into. It’s the kind of place car fans go to see cars and automotive history up close.

Place

Rusted old memories buried in dust

Through the wreckage of dreams

I'm trying to trust each faded sign

Whisked stories of old, of laughter

And heartache of love that grew cold

Are you really digging for peace

Or is that just a lie

Tell to help you sleep

Sure that you really want

Truth behind all the stories they go

Welcome to the wrecking yard

I'm Jerry Wayne Longbear

And y'all, presumably still y'all

All are welcome here in the church

Of internal combustion

We just asked that you show up with open heart

Oh my goodness

I feel like I hadn't seen y'all in a month of Sundays

We didn't make it last week

I took all my stuff with me to California

I was going to record the podcast in California

And uh

Boy, just everything in the world

Didn't get in the way of that

And just not let that happen

So I just gave up on it at some point

And then I was going to work on it this week

And try to get it done for you this week

And honestly I was just exhausted

I better run around playing catch up

Marketing for the next shows

And uh

I have not had

I had a couple drinks other night

And I played forza with my cousin a couple times

And that's about all the down time

Everything else has just been working

So uh

We are a week late here

With episode 105

And that's alright because

Sometimes it just has to be

You know, sorry

I had to, I forgot

I had torn my whole studio apart

To go to California and take everything with me

And then uh

Got up and got ready to film this morning

Realize I had to put the whole day of going to the studio

Back together so

There are tools everywhere, everything is a mess

But

We got some good coffee

And a good PMA

Positive mental attitude

And it's uh

It's about 90 degrees in the shops

And my face is a little red

But Eric and Esther is being really noisy

Right now and it's screwing up the audio

Let's just get into it

How about that

We got some gifts and stuff to go over

Today

Some cool things have happened

First I'm going to start with Timer

This is my

Kind of a long show

Today

This is

First of all

Just don't want to send a big old shout out

To uh my sponsors

Outlaws and gents

Men's grooming products

You can find them at outlawsandgents.com

If you use the promo code

JWbeard

You're going to get a discount

At your checkout on certain items

Beard items

And

I'm really happy with the products

I've got them on right now

I was feeling pretty this morning

They were fussing at my beard

But uh they were helping me combat

The dryness of

Southern California too

I was glad I had them out there

Good lord I dried out bad in that weather

Not as bad as Fort Collins

Man that's a whole other thing

I'm not going to be going back to Fort Collins

Because the club owner at Fort Collins

Really put the screws on me

When I was up there

And uh we've been trying

This dude's been ducking us for a month

Ducking phone calls and emails

For a month from me and my manager

Since the shows at Fort Collins

Finally get him on

Get him an email

Uh and

Him give the lamest

Explanation

For why he ripped me off

As he did

So I'm not going to be doing business

With that man anymore

And I had to advise

Other comics to

Make sure you got everything in ink

With the com before

If you're going to do business with them

Because they changed the deal on us

And didn't bother telling anybody

And never bothered to put that in writing

Or anything

It's always something in this shit

I mean half time you do make money

You gotta fight to get paid for it

It's a god damn dick

Anyways

I didn't mean to go off on that tangent

Let's uh

Hmm

I'm starting to think I should have brought

That error tradition

A little warm

Also

Let's uh

Man I got off track thinking about that

That pissed me off so bad

Sorry

It's just not, it was yesterday

We were dealing with all that

Also shout out to my sponsors

With the world of Outlaws

Race car series

I'm going to my next race

With them very soon

I'm going to Bap Speedway in Pennsylvania

Here at the end of this month

I believe it's July 29th

And if you use code

Woojerry

On events I'm attending

You'll get a discount on your tickets

And we're going to do a meet and greet

And somebody asked the other day

If I was doing a meet and greet

Always at the racetrack

And I just walk around and

Talk to people man

I have more conversations just walking around

And track talking to people

They'll see me and be like oh man

I heard you're going to be here or whatever you don't

It's always the best

This week

You can catch me Tuesday

In Tulsa

At the breakdown

If I can remember all this

At the breakdown comedy club

In Tulsa Tuesday

July 21st

Wednesday

July 22nd

I'll be in Oklahoma City

At the breakdown comedy club

And then July 24th

Thursday

We'll be at Hyenas and Fort Worth

And Friday

Saturday

Oh, Walnut Springs

My old buddy John Clay Wolf

Some of y'all radio listeners

Might have heard me on the radio with him Saturday

Talking about an upcoming show with him

So we're going to Walnut Springs

And then Saturday night

Has really turned into

Something kind of crazy

So I've written a whole show

About cats

And I'll feel you

I've written a whole comedy set

About how I became a cat person

Different cats that don't in my life

And I'll feel you

And

The first show is

I think just about sold out

We got six tickets left

So we've added a second show

And that's in Spring, Texas

At the Hop Scholar Elle House

And that's a specialty show

It's called The Beard and the Baby Cat

And it's just going to be me

Making a lot of jokes about cats

And talking about Ophelia

If you're not into that

You don't want to come to that show

This is

Just telling you what it's going to be

But I think a lot of people are really going to like it

And it's kind of a weird thing nobody's done before

So I think it's going to be fun

Let's get into

This trip to Southern California

It has been

A whirlwind

We flew into L.A.

Grabbed our rental car

And made our way to Hollywood

And we were staying

We were staying on Sunset Boulevard

In Hollywood

On Sunset

When you come from

L.A.X. You got to drive through Beverly Hills

All that shit

And I was using Waze

And it was taking me through neighborhoods

Because traffic was so bad

Let me just

Preface this and say

For this whole episode

I have talked so much shit over here

Every time somebody is like

Oh, you're gonna have bad traffic

Watch out, traffic is going to be bad

Oh, you're going to Chicago, watch out for the traffic

Oh, you're going to Washington, D.C.

Watch out for the traffic

Man, like I live

In the fourth largest Metroplex in the world

Houston earns it

Stripes with traffic

Earns it

Los Angeles humbled me

That place, y'all win

Los Angeles wins

Worst traffic in the world

I've never been anywhere like that

And parts of it were like Houston

You know, if you try to

So I had to do a show in Brea

On Wednesday night

And I looked

On the map and it was like 25 miles

Away from my hotel and I was like

Oh, that's gonna be like 30, 40 minutes

You know, a little traffic

Bro, when I put it into Waze

It was an hour and a half to go

Like 28 miles

What the hell

So we left early

To make sure and it took every

It took a little more than an hour and a half

To get to Brea

Which Brea was kind of cool, it was kind of like

Had a small town feel

The other cool things

Because it's my birthday week

We stayed in the same hotel

My brother and Sarah

Me and I

I just, I always want to call

I stumble

Introduced Sarah because I call her my sister-in-law

I just don't even like my sister

Joey and Sarah came

To be there for my birthday

Week and they wanted to see the comedy store

Show

And so they flew in and we all stayed at the

Hotel Ziggy right there on Sunset

This is Hotel Ziggy's like this

Cool

It's a little overpriced

But it's a neat little place

To stay, they got a nice pool

They got a nice area, they got live music

Stuff going on

It's kind of hip

They had this cool chandelier

Made out of

Speakers

Hand made out of old speakers

Magnets and stuff out of speakers

Pretty slick looking

And

A metal statue of a dude

Like shredding on a guitar

It's pretty neat

I immediately walked up to that metal statue

It was like my pap hall would lose his mind

About all the nuts and bolts

That y'all used

I mean to make that statue

Is probably like 12

12-fold your cans

Full of nuts and bolts

Maybe 13

Yeah, my granddad would have lost his mind

But it was cool shit

The artwork was amazing

So we get out of Brea

We do this hour and a half track out to Brea

I don't know anything about Brea

Honestly when they originally booked these shows

And they were like hey we're gonna do a show

In West Hollywood

We're gonna do a show in Brea

And I was like both those are in LA

Most of my contracts

Most of the time say I can't even do a show

Within 60 miles

For 60 days

You know

These shows are 25 miles apart

I'm like this is gonna be

It's gonna be hard to sell two shows

25 miles apart

I just didn't know

But people up there

The traffic is so bad

They just don't go places

So if you're in Brea

If you go see comedy you go to the Brea Improv

You don't drive over to the Laugh Factory

And Comedy Store and all that

It's just not really done

But you know

Everything's about location

Somebody kept saying everything in LA is about location

It really is

Because those people just stay in their area

And Brea had kind of like a small town vibe

To it

It was kind of cool

And I was already feeling that

And when you drive into the like the main drag

In Brea

I don't remember what streets called

That's where the improv is on that street

And you park across street from there's parking garage

And they had this big ass

Marquis

Like huge

Biggest Marquis I ever been on

Big old square LED Marquis

Up in front of the building

Facing the corner in the street

And it was going through all the comics

Going to be there and then it would hit mine

And it would show my face on there

So we parked the car

And we run down there real quick

Because Rachel wanted to get a picture of it

And I was all excited too

I wanted to see it from the street

This whole trip was all

First times

Milestones

But I ain't never seen my face on a Marquis like this

I mean

My head was about six foot tall

It was a big old damn Marquis

And so we're waiting

On the corner

Across the street from the improv

And this couple had walked up right here

I just kind of seen them out of my peripheral

And we were waiting

And when it flashed and showed my picture

I got overly excited

Turned around I go look that's me

And they go we know we're here to see you

And it was this wonderful lady named

Becky and her husband Greg

And she had brought me a

Birthday card with money in it

Like my memo used to give me

Every year and it was just so sweet

And so nice

And they were a lovely couple

And we walked all the way

We walked to the improv talking to them

And they were really excited

To get an opportunity just to BS

A little bit on the way over to the club

And got in there

Of course the brand improv treated me

Amazing

They were so happy I was there

They were really excited it was my birthday

Everybody walking through there

Is telling me happy birthday

Everybody works here you know

And I'm talking to everybody

Getting to know everybody's name

I always go around and talk to the staff

And introduce myself to all the staff

Shake everybody's hand

That kind of thing

I always like to leave a good impression

On the staff of every club I go to

Because

They can be the determining factor

Whether you go back to a place or not

Staff can be your best friend at a club

And there's the hardest working people

There's the bar staff

And the

People out there

Trying to keep all this stuff

Organized and running

They're hard working

Get back there

Chris wasn't with me in Brea

So they

Hired a local

Comic to open

And she came in the green room

She was really cool her name was Samantha

Hell

Just really nice easy to get along

With the manager

The manager was really nice

I think we had

68 tickets sold on Wednesday

Night which made me feel that was pretty good

For a frickin Wednesday you know

And

It was a nice little crowd out there

My agent stew had shown up

Watched the show

He's never seen my show before

So I'm excited I'm hoping it goes well

In front of him you know

When I got in the green room they gave me a cake

It was like a three level

It was like three containers

And each had a different cake in them

And I don't remember there was some kind of

Special cake Rachel told me

She said she got 11 time for her birthday

But I don't remember

Anyways it was like a red velvet cake

Some kind of

Little chocolate cake

And a confetti cake

And it was like a birthday cake

But there wasn't no silverware with it

So I just left it tied up in the bag

And I opened this in the green room

We'll take it back to the hotel

We'll get a little sweet tooth later

We can dig off into this cake

I find out a lot of girls on stage

Opening for me Samantha

She's on stage opening for me

And I find out that

She's doing a bit

And I find out that she is

Her grandfather

Arthur Hale

Got played to Skipper

On Gilligan

Gilligan's Island

I couldn't take the name of the show

She had a funny bit about it

She said my grandfather starred on the first episode of Lost

It was called Gilligan's Island

And it was something along those lines

It was clever

So I got to talk to her a little bit about that

After the show I thought that was really cool

That Skipper's granddaughter opened for me

That's a very improv

The show went fantastic

It was a good bunch of people

After the show

Got to meet

Did pictures, did meet and greet

And most of the people

Stuck around for the meet and greet

We had a pretty good sized line

My buddy Brian Benedict came

He used to be the head designer for Hot Wheels

He left Hot Wheels

He's not with him any longer

Him and his wife and their friend from Canada came

And we hung out with them a little bit

After the show

And then made our way back to Hollywood

Which still even that late at night

Took an hour

Live to Hollywood

It is my birthday so we just have to go

Find us some fun

So we just start walking down Sunset

And

There's not many places left

That are still serving food that are open

We were walking down Sunset

We were looking for food

This is after me and mama done been

To the cannabis store

And I then

Bought all kind of little baits

And edibles and such

Minute we got back from

Brea I took a edible

Because I was like it's my birthday

And everybody else is having drinks having a good time

But I was driving all night so I was like

Man I'm gonna relax and cut loose now a little bit

In the stress of that first show

I was really worried about the sales at the Brea show

Because they

Weren't looking good until we got a little closer

To the show and then we did better and I thought we were going to do

And still I need to do better

In that order to keep this tour going

But

My agent was really cool afterwards

He hadn't seen my show so he was like really excited

He was like

And he even had some good ideas

And we were all talking about it

He's like

You know the Diamond Jim thing

He said unless people know that reference about you

It doesn't really match up the tour

He said but I think there's like a better way

We could sell the tour

Anyway so we've been thinking better names for the tour

Or thinking about calling it

Stories from the screen porch

Something like that

That'll let people know a little more

This is a story, you come in

Unless you're gonna see a show

In fact

I started the show

I wrote this kind of Faulkner-esque poem

About where I was born

And I've been starting the show with this

Sort of Faulkner-esque poem

Kind of getting the crowd going with that

It's funny

But yeah so we're trying to figure out

Maybe there's a better way to brand that

Or put that together

Anyway so we get walking down the sunset

And we find this restaurant

It looks terrible it's clearly Texas themed

It's something chop house

Chop house ranch

The ranch chop house

Some shit like that

They got these fake mannequin cowboys

Sitting around a campfire outside

Right

Like it's a whole vibe

And you go inside and they got a mechanical bull

And music was really loud

And we were just kind of looking kind of quiet

But the weather's so much better there

You can sit outside in the evening

It's nice and cool

Like 70 something degrees

So we're going to sit on the patio

Food's amazing

Like this place may be a theme restaurant

But clearly the guy working in the kitchen

Does what the hell he's doing

It's like

It's just regular food

It's nothing crazy I'm just getting like eggs and bacon

But it's like the best eggs and bacon I've ever had

You know

And everybody's really happy with their food

We have a good time

They brought us a platter

To make s'mores with

And their little fake campfire

Which was hilarious

By then my edible

Had fully kicked in

And I was trying to grasp the fact that

This whole like where our hotel is

Across the street is the comedy store

And I don't want to go in there

Before it's my time

I won't go in there on my time

My night when I'm invited

But I'm walking by

And it just feels crazy

Like y'all just don't

I've been reading about this place

Since I was a teenager

I've been hearing about this place

Since I was a teenager

This is the base route

This is stuff me and Chris Shaw have talked about for years

Like we were making a comedy store

This is like one of those things

It ain't the rhyming but it might as well be

The rhyming of the west

But it's a mecca

For comedy

Some of the greatest stand up comics

You have heard of

And some of those you've never heard of

Went through those doors and looked at club

And walking by

That night of my birthday

It's just right there

I'm walking to my hotel with Rachel

And brother and Sarah

We go back to hotel, we have some drinks

Get

Next day

Go grab a

So next day

Thursday

I didn't have a show Thursday

But we had

In the morning

My buddy Vinny

Can talk about Vinny a little bit

Vinny found me on the internet

A couple years ago

And Vinny is one of my biggest

Supporters

As far as somebody who's got a voice in the business

Vinny works for a big

Agency that represents

Forza and Rockstar

And

Ford and just

A lot of automotive stuff

A lot of racing stuff, everything

Vinny is who got me hooked up with

Hot Wheels as a judge

Vinny's who invited me to that

Vinny runs all Hot Wheels stuff

Vinny introduced me to Brian Benedict

That's all Vinny

Vinny's tried to get me Ford commercials

Vinny's tried to do

Everything for me

Vinny's one to have in the corner

And he's just been in my corner since I met him

And he's just the coolest guy

I just really genuinely

Like hanging out with the dude

So Vinny has arranged for me to go do this podcast

Called the Smoke Entire Podcast

Now I might have to admit my ignorance y'all

I didn't know anything about the Smoke Entire Podcast

I looked it up

Just to kind of read about it

And watch a couple episodes of it

And I was enjoying it

And I found out it was the largest automotive podcast

In the country

And then I had to get up Thursday

Drive over to Culver City and go do this podcast

And once again

That was 10 miles from the hotel

Took about 45 minutes to get over there

You know, I left early

And

Their podcast studio

He built this thing, I can't remember what it's called

I think it's called Western Collectors

Something like that

But it's basically he built this building to store cars

For all the dudes

With badass cars that don't have room

To store them

And that part of Los Angeles over there in Culver City

And also

Where this is at

Is right off Jefferson

Jefferson Boulevard

Which they used to call Jefferson Speedway

Back in the day

Because in the 40s, 50s, and 60s

This is where Edelbrock was

This is where the Shelby Plant

Was

This is where Ed Iskendarians came

Shopped, the Camfather was

It's everybody in hot rotting

That you've ever heard of

They started out right there on Jefferson Speedway

They said

They did a road construction project

They called it Jefferson Speedway

Because they'd all test their cars out there

In front of the shops

They said they did a road project in the 80s

And were breaking up that road

And it looked like they were breaking up tarmac

Because there was so much rubber

Melted into the pavement

I thought that was pretty cool

This building

They built is insane, right?

Because it's in the earthquake area

But it's got a basement

It's got three foot of concrete

And it goes down and then there's a basement

And the basements were

That's where the wild shit was

That's where the muscle cars

And the cool stuff was

They had this like thousand horsepower

Like 67 Chevrolet Suburban

Down there

That was just out of this world

There's a company out of Florida

Revolo

I can't remember the name of them

Company out of Florida

That are building brand new

1968

Mustangs

I think they also do Blazers

Like 68 Blazers

But like hand

Stamped fenders

Everything assembled by hand

But it's a new car

It's got a late model engine

And everything

It's not a resto mod

It's an original car

Zero miles

Modernized 68 Mustang

It's crazy to look at

I got to kind of mess around and check it out

All the cars in there are cool

Even upstairs they got them

Four deep porches

Ferraris

There's even an old Testarosa back there

I mean it was cool

He had

Like an 84 Honda

Turbo motorcycle

In the front there

But he told me he didn't ride it

Because he said the brakes are treacherous as hell

He says it's got the 80's

Chirpy power band

Crazy power band but the brakes are kind of

Advised so he didn't really care to ride it too much

I didn't know who this dude was

Matt Farah and Zach Clapman

And I didn't

They weren't in my wheelhouse of people I knew about

And

I kept thinking Matt Farah's name seemed familiar

And I realized he writes for like

Hardin Driver

And Road and Track Magazine

This is who this guy is

Right?

So when I get it on the pot

First I'm like Vinny thank you

You've hooked me up, this is incredible

For me to be on the show

With that kind of reach and everything

But not only that it was fun

What I got

I had more fun on that podcast than I've had

In a long time

That's probably the best interview

What even an interview we just had

We just chopped it up and had fun

And I got to tell some stories

They were both just fanta

I just had the best time hanging out with them that day

And got done with them

I had to run back

Over the hotel, pick up Rachel

And Joey and Sarah

Because Brian

Got us into Fluffy's

BW Museum

And so we had to drive out to Long Beach

Which was a whole other adventure

Right? Cause driving to Long Beach

Took like an hour and a half

Get to freaking Long Beach

But I got to drive, there's this big blue

Big blue bridge in Long Beach

Called the, I think it used to be called

The Gerald Desmond Bridge

But this blue bridge if you've ever played

Grand Theft Auto 5

Online, this blue bridge is where

All the best battles online

Happened, this is where like

Driving over that bridge and the fact

Nobody was waiting on a flying jet ski

To blow me up was pretty cool

You know, cause I was just sure

As many times I've driven over this bridge

In this game and gotten into battles

With other players

It's just a fun place

I was just super excited we drove over

And didn't get blown up cause

It was nothing like the game

But it was really cool driving over that bridge

I was like, Fred's like

Oh, you really like bridges? I was like

No, but I like this bridge, I've had a lot of fights

On this bridge, I'm usually going about 120

When I come over, we were in a Volkswagen

Tiguan so we were not going 120

I don't even know if that car goes over

60 cause I never got the opportunity

To go faster than that the whole time

I was in Los Angeles

And

Fluffy's garage is the stuff

Fluffy's garage

Like changed like

This man made all that being funny

And it's the most incredible

Thing I've ever like

I've seen some car collections

But nothing like this

You know, I'm a VW guy

I've never even seen a

23 window bus in person

He's got three of them

He's got 21 window buses

He's got a docket to

Transporter

Karma gear

Couple Beatles

They weren't all at the garage cause they were doing

Some moving around with cars and stuff

Fluffy lives in New Bromphills now

And so a lot of his cars

Are in New Bromphills with him

But he was on tour in Florida

He was actually with my buddy

So I didn't get to meet Fluffy

Or hang out with Fluffy

But his right hand man won

Gave us the grand tour

He's got these two aquariums

Built out of old

Sections of VW

Microbuses

Man, I bet them aquariums is

$100,000

They're crazy

I don't know nothing about what aquariums cost

Hit a

87 Monte Carlo SS

With like

106 miles on it or something

Shit like that

Even the air dam underneath it wasn't scratched up

The car was perfect

And he drives all his shit

He's got DeLorean

He's got a real low miles

Big body Impala

Like a 96 Impala Super Sport

He's got an older

First like a 66 Impala

Yeah, I remember

I had a couple other cars

I was there for the Volkswagen

I spent the entire time just walking down that road

And one was like

Open door, get inside, whatever

Man, I got inside one of them

The key was sitting in the seat

Baby, go distract one

Taking this thing for a run

They're beautiful

And underneath

Every one of them Volkswagen

There's a piece of cardboard for leaking oil

Because no matter how much money you got

You can't stop a Volkswagen from leaking

I know those people claim they can

But

That was proof

Man got enough money to have Volkswagen designing

My new engine that doesn't leak

And his Volkswagen still leaks

One dude that like restores them all

And goes through them

Got a mechanic on duty there

He was working on one of them

I went and hung out with him for a little bit

It was amazing

They took us in his office room

And it's just all his awards

Everything, all the sold out shows

He's done

He's such a WWE

Fan, WWF fan

That when he sold out

Dodger Stadium, WWF

Made him his own belt

It has a little hangout area

With his little couches

There's a Ric Flair wall

It's like a mural with Ric Flair on it

It says woo

Or something above it, like the woo factor

Yeah cool

The whole place used to be a warehouse for his merchandise

And he outgrew it

Because his merchandise became so big

He had to like

Squad goals, you know what I mean

Like it was crazy

So much wrestling memorabilia

So much marble, he's a marble

I found out, they were going to give him a part

In one of the DC movies

And he didn't take it

Because he's such a die hard

Marvel fan

He didn't take it because he's such a die hard

Marvel fan

He said one of his fans

Think he sold out

Anyways, it was insane

Insane experience

It was a cool experience with my brother

Honestly I was so struck at everything

I could

Rachel was taking pictures of me

And I was just enraptured

Getting to see vehicles I've only dreamed about

They were just

And he did it all by being funny

It was really cool

Really

Thankful for his hospitality

Let me check that out, that was really cool

To have a little private moment

With his collection

See it all

We got back over Hollywood

For some latest shit

Funny, we went to a CVS

My brother drinks

Joey drinks like a fish, I love him

But he does, he tears it up

And we go into a CVS

And it's funny

Because I'm walking through there

I was looking for something I needed for my contacts

And Rachel had to get a couple things

Of course Joey and Sarah were going to get a couple things

And I'm walking through the CVS

And I hear the little voice come over the speaker

And go

Customer service needed on the liquor aisle

And I had two thoughts

I go holy shit, CVS sells liquor

In California

And then the second thought was

That's probably my brother

And I walk around the corner

And there's my brother and my sister-in-law

Standing right on the liquor aisle

I was like, alright

That had to

Of course

I got me a little

Evan Williams

They got some vodka

And some Tito's

Went back over to the hotel

Hung out for a little while

The whole time we was wanting this

I left part of the story out

I screwed up

That was the night before

So the night before at the chop house

We leave at the hotel

I was like, damn they didn't give us some

I wanted to eat some of that cake

And they didn't give us no damn silverware

So I just tore a piece of that red velvet cake out

And it was so good I was like, damn I want some more of this cake

So I tell Rachel

And by trashy way

We get to the chop house

I'm like, hey, stick a couple in forks

And you purse

So we got some forks

We go back to the hotel room

And we dig in that cake

Got my little edible going

Feeling pretty good

So Rachel real slick

Has a fork stacked inside of there

My brother was like, what's she doing?

I was telling him that we were laughing about

He's like, you know

They probably just give me some silverware

If I ask for

It's like, yeah, probably I go, okay, right

Don't steal the silverware

And she's like, I'm going to kill you

She's put us back

I was like, no, no, I was being weird

I'll just ask them for some silverware

Well, then we keep hanging out there

I forget to ask them for the silverware

So we get back to the hotel

We still ain't got no damn silverware

So we're at CVS

Rachel buys a pack of plastic silverware

So I'm not asking her to steal any more

From restaurants

We went to eat that out

We went to a place called Carnies Diner

On Sunset

It's old and famous

And they had this really cool display

Done over it for the Minions and Monsters movie

And so the way they have

To advertise in Hollywood is so

Crazy because it's so

It's weird being in a place

Where everybody's trying to do

Everybody's clamoring for attention

And

It's like a door

All the time of everybody clamoring

For attention

And so like to advertise

They have to go to crazy links there

Because everything's so satchel

Everybody's doing something

Everybody's got a podcast

Everybody's, you know what I mean

They have to really work to advertise there

So like the movie advertisements were insane

So we go over the diner

Diner food was amazing

Jay Leno recommended the hamburger

I got the burger

The burger was badass

Yeah that shit was really good

We're walking back to the hotel

We're going to have some more drinks

I already had my little edibles

Kicked in and everything

I said watch this this is going to be funny

And Rachel videotaped it

But I walked up to the doorman

Of the comedy store

And he's kind of a big dude

At pony town

I said man what they got going on in there tonight

Just like I was a tourist

And he's like nothing but funny business

I was like man you think you can give me on stage

I'm pretty funny

He said get you on stage no

But I can get you a ticket

Get inside and see the show

I was like was there some kind of test

You got to get on stage

He said yeah it's open mic every Monday night

And I was laughing

I said man what's your name

He said Ruby

My dad was an asshole and gave me a woman's name

I was like well I think it's cool

I shook his hand and walked off

Rachel videotaped that whole thing

We go back to the hotel

Have some drinks

Get up next morning and we walk down to Mel's diner

The other kind of famous place

I'm really bad at myself

Because I went to Mel's diner twice

And they had these little paper trucks

They look like a patchy

These little patchy pickups

Or maybe old Ford pickups

And they were like made out of cardboard

Of paper I assume they're for like delivery

Or something

Or food packaging

But I meant to ask them for one of them trucks

Both times and I forgot

And I'm sad I didn't

It's Friday now

We hang out at the pool

Our buddy Lou gets into town

Before the comedy store show

I gotta tell y'all

A little bit about Lou right now

Lou reached out to us a while back

And has become very dear

To both me and Rachel

He wanted to help me with my book blurbs

He saw my video about my book blurbs

He's like I've been following you a little while

You seem like a genuinely nice person

And I happen to know

Somebody that knows Attica Locke

Attica Locke's gonna read my book

Because of Lou

Lou's

Retired Navy

I don't remember who's officer

But he's a retired naval officer

And he's married to a dude

Name Mark Shaman

Who I didn't even

I had to like look up

But Mark Shaman is like the

Composer for every movie

Ever

Right like every Rob Reiner

Movie Mark Shaman did the music for

He wrote the musical Hairspray

Helped write the South Park musical

He's just this brilliant

Musician who's been around Hollywood

For years and has

Done so many musicals

He's just really incredible

Really

And knows everybody in the business

Hangs out with Billy Crystal

And Martin Short because

Lou has promised me

I'm gonna meet Martin Short when I get up to New York

We'll see that would be really cool

I love Martin Short

But Lou

Not only helped us out with

Finding some better advertising

For our LA shows

Like doing some like Geofence

Advertising with a friend of

His that has a company

That helped us out a lot

But Lou also

Helped me get my book burnt

But Lou flies out

From

New York

To LA

And then brings a bunch of his friends

He come and hung out at the

He just got a room at the hotel with us

And he come and hung out

With us a little bit before the show

When he got into town

And gave me a card

For my birthday and when I opened it

It was offered

To take me go see Chris Stapleton

So I had a night off in San Diego

And he was offering to take me see Chris Stapleton

That night off I had in San Diego

And I was like

Hell yeah dude that's really cool

Then he brings a bunch of people to the show

When you walk over to the comedy store

I'm bundled nerves

I'm all anxiety at this point

I'm going in this place

I've built up so much in my head

I start walking up the driveway and they yell at me

Because you're not supposed to walk up the driveway

So I had to go around and go back through the door

And he's checking me out

And it wasn't Ruby I was sad

I was like damn it I was hoping I'd mess with Ruby

But

They send me around there to the belly room

We meet the

Programming director Samantha

She's awesome

She takes me around shows me the green room

All that stuff

First of all

Senior name at the comedy store is like

I ain't got all the words for it yet

Right like it was just

Markable

Like easily

Like just insane

I'm bundled nerves I don't know how I mean

I know we got a pretty full room because

They did a low ticket morning the next day on ticket sales

And they were trying to sell some more tickets

And we had a pretty full room

I would say 70% of the room was full

And

Chris gets there of course we have big

I hadn't seen Chris in a couple years

And y'all know how close Chris is to me

But

Chris had a little bit of a fallout

About a year or two not really a fallout

But a misunderstanding

And it was on my fault it was my fault

And

So it felt nice to like

Like this that was why I asked him to do the comedy store

I asked him to do the comedy store because

There's literally nobody else I wanted to

Do it with

It was Chris, Chris is who I want to do that with

This shit we talked about for a long time

How we were going to take care of each other when

Seeing him in that space

Was incredible

They bring him on stage

And

Man he's just killing it

And we hired a photographer

Young lady that works in the area

She's gonna come out and take pictures

She's snapping photos of me in the green room

All that and we gotta do a photo shoot

After the show

I'm all anxiety Rachel took pictures

Of my face before and after the show

And it's night and day difference

Before the show my eyes are scorched

I'm in high anxiety mode

Right

I also found out right before

The show that my aunt was there

And

Man and Lori's lived out in Los Angeles

For a long time

And I haven't talked to her in a while

The last time I talked to her was right after her daughter died

Her oldest daughter died of liver failure

Not Rishanda, this is my other little cousin

For example, wrecking yard takes victims

Her oldest daughter died

A couple years back

And that's probably the last time I talked to her

And she didn't sound good but

The thing you have to know is Aunt Lori was like my big sister growing up

Aunt Lori's younger than Uncle Bob

She's the youngest

And she lived in her house

And I lived in a house with her

And she was always around

I think maybe

89 years older than me

Something like that

She was like my big sister growing up

She used to pick on me

But she was like my big sister growing up

She used to babysit me all the time

And y'all know

Because y'all have heard stories

She went down a rough path

She got off in dope and shit

She's been arrested and she's been in prison

She was cleaned up for a long time

But

I kind of heard through the family

Like after

After

After her oldest daughter died

She kind of

Her other daughter moved out there with her

And they both kind of went off

The rails

And things got bad

And that's last I'd heard

And then I heard at the last minute she was coming to my show

I didn't know she was coming

I would have had tickets for it

I would make sure

Somebody texted me or something

Somebody told me she was there

And I was like

What the hell

And

Chris kills him

Chris just beats him up for 30 minutes

Just doing Chris things

First time I saw Chris I thought he was going to be a star

I still believe that

He's one of the funniest, most unique acts out there

There's a couple acting up

Kind of close to the front

But

My ears are so bad I can't hear stuff

So I don't do crowd work and mess with people from the stage

Really because I can't hear what people are saying

So I get up on stage I start doing my spiel

And everything and then there's this disturbance up here

And then it ends up taking like

A good minute and a half to get it all straight

Security has come in

These two people get to shove in

And I don't even catch it everything

I've watched the tape bag

I've got video from all these shows

I've watched the tape bag and I still can't figure it out

Apparently these people were being disruptive

The entire show

And somebody else just finally got fed up with them

And it just got out of hand

You know

Which sucks

It's not how you want to start your show at the comedy store

With a UFC event going on

In the front row

They're never going to bring a hillbilly to Hollywood again

But let this happen

We got it all

We defused the situation

They got rid of the problem people

And

The show goes amazing

I beat the hell out of them

Buddy Venny and his wife sitting in the front row

Brian Benedict

Almost everybody in that room

Lose over here on the bench

Got all his friends

One of his buddies

Got rights

Batman

Cartoons and stuff

Everybody's somebody in there

Everybody's somebody in Hollywood

And it was just crazy man

We just had this pack room

I had this beautiful set

Get done golf stage

Can't do the meet and greet up there

Because they got another show that's going to happen

So they got to turn over the room

So we got to go out on the patio

Do the meet and greet

I'm trying to get out there

Also got to go do this photo shoot

With the photographer

And I'm just overwhelmed

I'm swimming

I just killed it

At the comedy store

I got people taking pictures

Martha Kelly

Sweet Martha Kelly and her husband

They got to hang out with me and Rach

We got to see them

She of course brought me a wonderful

Birthday surprise

With some cookies that I ate on the train

To San Diego

They were really good

And

One fan

A little overzealous

There's a lady

And I know she meant well

She had me no harm

But she was just a little overzealous

And it was making me a little uncomfortable

And I tried to diffuse a couple times

And she was like I just want to kiss you

And I'm like well you're not going to do that

You know

That's not going to happen

And

She eventually calmed down

And it was better

And then of course I had some other people

Want to take photos and stuff

And then I looked up and there was Aunt Lori

And my little cousin Bridget

And

They didn't look homeless

They were clean clothes

Obviously she bought two tickets to the show

That I didn't know about

But when people use fentanyl a lot

They get this thing

Called the fentanyl crouch

Where they hunch down like this

And it's because it affects those muscles

That keep your posture upright

And both her and my little cousin are hunched up

Bad

My cousin's got a big knot on her face

They didn't look good

They

And we talked a little bit

But

She seemed kind of confused

And I hated myself in that moment

Because I felt guilty

Because

I didn't want to see her

I'm having my moment

My night

And I want this reminder

Where

I felt guilty because

For a split second I was glad my mother was dead

So she couldn't see her like that

Because my mom drugged her baby's sister out of crack houses

And stuff trying to save her

Her whole life

I felt guilty because I didn't want my friends to see her

I felt guilty because I felt ashamed

And I talked to her a little bit and hugged her

And she just felt like a little bird

When I hugged her

And I tried to hug my little cousin

She kind of like held my hand a little bit

Mumbled that she was glad

They got to see me

And then I had to go take pictures

For this photographer

And they, I don't know where they went

They left one of my friends

They saw him across the street

Just run out in traffic across the street

And then I'm going to take pictures of this photographer

And all I'm thinking is

I'm never going to see her again

She just

I recognize substance abuse

And I recognize like how bad it get

She's not good-checked

My little cousin's not good-checked

And it's a particular helplessness

When there's like, you know there's not

Thing in the world to do to fix this situation

There's a picture of me

That lady took me on the stairs

Of the comic store

And I could see it in my face

Like I'm

What I'm thinking about

And then the next picture is

Rachel's got her arm around me on the stairs

And my face looks totally different

Because now I'm like, you know what

I'm going to have to unpack all this later

I can't do this right now

But it like struck me

Because it's like

My career didn't take off

Until I started doing this podcast

Where I started talking about my family

I started talking about my life

And I spent so many years when I was younger

As a comic trying to avoid that

Trying to not be attached

To East Texas

Trying not to be who I was

Because I thought there was something wrong with it

And then when I leaned

Into finally being who I am

That's when my career really starts taking off

I started doing this podcast to get the book deal

And all of a sudden I'm getting all these shows

And it all goes back to the Wrecking Yard

And there's the Wrecking Yard

Staring me in the face at the comic store

She's right there

She's right there at the Wrecking Yard

Showing me it's not done taking people

I used to say man we're cursed

Those of us that live on Sexton Road

We're cursed

And it was right there

Like there's no

Different location

Doesn't get you

Doesn't stop who you are

It's right there

All of this is connected

All of this goes back to the Wrecking Yard

They had something funny

Where we were taking those pictures

We had heard Polly on stage

In the main room up in the green room

There's like a thing where you can peek out

And listen to what's going on in the main room

When we hear Polly on the stage

Polly sure

While me and Rachel are on the stairs taking our pictures

I hear Polly go who's taking pictures of the stairway

Because he sees a photographer

And he pokes his head in to look at it

And I go

And I just go hey Polly how you been

And he goes it like disappeared

I don't suspect for a minute he recognized me

But

Rachel was like oh my god you just talked to him

Like y'all know each other for years

I was like here's the deal baby

Once I've seen another man's penis

I feel like I have rights to say hello to you

And so now I'm going to tell you all this story

It's really not even that exciting a story

But years ago I got asked

By a guy named Joel Pace for the comedy zone

To drive to Lufkin, Texas

And open for Polly Shore

At the electric cowboy

I may have already told y'all this story

It's really not that exciting

Polly basically Polly was a dick to me

I get there

I'm doing this thing for free

Supposedly because comedy zone is going to give me all this work

After this

And it's a whole sketchy thing

And I get there and

Polly's manager takes me on a bus to meet him

And Polly is getting

A mouth hug

On his penis

From young lady

And he just kind of looks up at me

And Warlock was like

Hey this is your opener Jerry Way

And Polly goes I don't give a shit

That was my meeting Polly

And then we did the show

And

I gave it everything I had

Because I wanted to blow Polly Shore off stage

And it was Lufkin so it wasn't hard

It was my Polly Shore story

But I feel like after I've seen you in that position

I can say hi to you

I don't give a shit

It was the night of milestones

And Chris

We went and did karaoke afterwards

And I was just in space

My brother

However is karaoke king

I had no idea

Joey's kind of been uptight

The whole time we've been there

Joey got a couple drinks and he met the karaoke

Joint and started doing hip hop

And Polly's on Broadway

And

I don't know where this Joey come from

Joey came alive in the karaoke room

He was quite entertaining

He's karaoke king

Of course next day I gotta go to San Diego

I gotta catch a train to San Diego

Right to drop you off the train station

I bought a business class ticket

It's a little nicer ticket

It wasn't that much more expensive

And so I get up on the train

I don't know where I'm going

I've never been on train before

So I'm trying to make sure I'm on the right side of the train

So I can see the ocean

So I'm looking online

I'm asking questions about it

And Google trying to figure out which is the right side of the train

And I still picked the wrong side of the train

Because the train takes off and I'm going backwards

And I thought I was on the right side of the train

I didn't bother to look where the engine was

I didn't know I'd sat in the economy

And I was sitting there and

Just minding my own business

The economy was fine

The train travel was nice

Plenty of room

Conductor comes down

Reads my ticket

He goes you're in the wrong car

You're supposed to be in business class

Two cars up that way

I said man I don't mind

You know I'm comfy

And the dude gets mad at me

He goes no this is a full train

One ticket per seat

Every seat is sold on this train

You gotta go business

I got kicked out of Gen Pop

Because I was too fancy

I had to go business class

Which is even nicer

Seats are more comfortable

This man and his wife got off the train

The next stop and I snagged their seat

So I'd be on the right side of the train

So I could see the coast

But when I was trying to get into that business class train

I'd never been on a train like this

Going down the tracks before

And I kept trying to open that door

If I opened that door it would slam shut

And then I finally found there was a button

You pushed it the whole interlock door opens

And then when I got out in the interlock

We went over a bad piece of track

And the train turned sharply

And I was not prepared

For all the sideways movement

And my big ass pinballed off

The inside of that interlock

Like a bidget game

Dropped my bag

And then I pushed the door

Over the business class

I was thankful those people didn't see me bounce

All over the train

I was like I'm glad that happened in the interlock

Get down to San Diego

Lou picks me up from the train station

Driving at the hotel

He got a room in Crown Plaza too

Where we were staying

And I went

Took a nap, chilled out

And then we went and saw

Chris Stapleton

Chris Stapleton is amazing

I never seen Chris Stapleton live

So I liked a lot of his music for a long time

And I'm really hung up on that

He opened the show with it

Bad as I used to be song

From the F1 movie

I've been really hung up on that song

Since I heard it jamming it

Real boozy

I'm telling you

It was like watching Uncle Bobby's clone

Like if you want to know what Uncle Bobby looked like

When he was performing

Just watch Chris Stapleton live on stage

The voice

It's everything

Like you cannot

After seeing this man live

I kept waiting for him to play with his finger out

Like he broke

Like he got his finger shot off

You know what I mean

If you ever watch that man perform live

I'm 100% convinced that

Me and him are going to be in a room one day

And I'm going to be like

Do you remember Bobby Clark Jr

He may not know him by name

But I'm going to describe that man

He's going to tell me where he saw him

There ain't no way

He ain't never seen that man perform

Bobby had his little

Sten out in Nashville

And it was all about the time

Chris was getting started

Making his name

You know, the songwriter and shit

It was like watching Bobby Jr's clone

It was an amazing show

Had a good time hanging out with Lou

Next day

I forgot San Diego

It was all the top gun shit

And so me and Lou go down to the

The dock down to the coast there

He's a Navy guy

So he showed me all the naval base

He was trying to get us onto a submarine

But they had everything out doing

Exercises

So there was nothing in

Nothing to even look at except the USS

Midway old aircraft carrier

But Lou endured all my

Top gun nerdery

Bought me lunch at the little cafe

Where they filmed all the goose

And Maverick scenes

And Meg Ryan scenes

And they even have the piano

It's a tiny little place

Great barbecue joint though

Great barbecue

Fantastic barbecue

And burn ends for top notch

And I feel bad because Lou's kind of a new friend

And I was embarrassed

But I really wanted to get a picture of me playing that piano

And I didn't because I was

You know, with a new friend

I didn't want to think I was a dork

But now I wish I had gotten that picture

Better make it back to San Diego

Well

We only sold 30 tickets to the San Diego show

It was light in there but almost everyone of those people

Was wrecking our people

In fact

One couple showed up in the shirts

And the shit was so cool

And they wrote me a lovely letter afterwards

And

It was just fun

John Knopp came out and it was just

I got to really

Put some names

Some faces and names together

And meet some people who have been communicating through the podcast for a long time

And it was

There's nothing short about standing

And

You know, his wife told me that

His grandfather had passed

And that my podcast had helped him a lot

While he was going through that loss

And that's the shit

You know

That I keep, that's the thing keeps me going

Bye home next day

Frickin' Lou gifted me

A united club pass

It's like a year long pass

So like I can hang out in the united lounge

I took a couple gummies, went and sat in the united lounge

I brought home all kind of stuff

In my bag because I was like

It's illegal here

It's illegal in Harris County

If TSA wants to be dicks about

We'll see what happens

But I bought that clear pass

And TSA pre-check so I'm getting through a lot quicker now

It was a trip, I'm exhausted

I'm exhausted

And

I think we're going to wrap it up right there

I don't have the wallet bottoms for you this week

I got a special one coming for you next week

But it's just not ready yet

But I got a package in the mail

I wanted to tell y'all about it

It's a big old box

And I opened it

Of course it has all this

Stuffing

But I wanted to read this letter to y'all

Because this letter is like the reason I keep doing stuff

Like I do

The first line of the letter is

What deserves my fire

Jerry a couple weeks ago

I decided to sit down

And write your letter

It quickly turned into a short essay

I tried cutting it down to something a bit more manageable

Without losing context

But it just didn't job

What it boils down to is this

What deserves my fire

And what deserves my silence

Became my mantra towards the end of 2025

I was in a very dark place

Due to events that both mentally

And physically crippled my work crew and family

I lost faith in the people I worked for

I felt helpless when I couldn't fix something

No matter how hard I cried

Or hollered or fought

But you were there in my ears

Telling me you were rooting for me

That's all right for men to feel lost sometimes

Your words more importantly

Your pauses helped to keep me pushing

Things are finally turning around

I want you to know

That who you are helped me through it

You're a constant in this world that brings laughter

Tears happiness and quiet strength

What you do in this world makes a difference

And I sincerely thank you for it

I'm not going to put this man's business on the street

I'm not going to tell you his name

But he did say he's coming to see me in St. Augustine

I'm pretty excited about it

And he said as a gesture

A gesture of brotherhood and appreciation

I've sent you a couple things

Assigned cue ball from Texas's

Own son Jeremy Jones

The 03 US Open 9 Ball Champion

And captain of the US

Moscone team

That must be what this is

But it's full of

Oh, oh, oh

Okay, well now it's a scuffed up

Signed cue ball

Man, I was

Jacking around with that thing, couldn't figure

Oh, it's all right

Don't want to touch it too much though

Well, that's cool

I don't know who that dude is

I might have to look him up

But he must be a pretty bad ass pool player

Well

I had to find a good spot

That's pretty cool though

What's his name? Jeremy Jones

That's very cool

What else is in there?

A brick from the original Sony's

Barbecue pit that was recently demolished

And rebuilt

I don't know where that is, so I have to look that up

And just for kicks

Oh, I remember these

It's what

Avon used to make these car

Perfume bottles

Or clone bottles

I'd never seen a Volkswagen though

Avon Volkswagen, wild country aftershave

Man, I wonder what year that's from

I hadn't seen one though in a long time

I used to have a friend that had a collection of them

I've never seen a VW

Thank you, brother

That's really cool, I had to find a good spot

To display that

Anyways, that was a nice letter

So things like this that keep telling me

I'm going the right direction

Even though we didn't do great

Financially in California

I think it's going to get better

I wish ticket sales would pick up

This week for Tulsa

In Oklahoma City

When Adam and Rachel first started

Talking to me about doing poetry

And people were calling me a poet

And I was like, I don't really think

That's what I am, you know

I just always kind of thought of poetry

It was kind of fru fru

Kind of

A little high brow for my taste, you know

And Adam encouraged me to get out and start reading some poetry

And I found

This man named Jim Harrison

That wrote Legends of the Fall

And some other books

But he's been a poet his entire career

And I found his poetry

And kind of fell in love with Jim Harrison's poetry

Because he's just so honest

And unflinching in the things he says

And the way he puts words together

And so

From birthday

Adam and

Lauren, his wife

Or his partner

And they sent me

Complete poems

Of Jim Harrison

And so I thought I would

Read y'all one

That I selected that I was reading last night

That I really liked

It's called Lost Medicine

It's by Jim Harrison

Lost my medicine bag

From back when I believed in magic

It's made from a doe's stomach

And holds a universe

Grizzly teeth

And claw, stones from Tibet

The moon, the garden, the beach

Where the baby's ashes are buried

Now I expect this bag

To cure my illnesses

I can't walk

And skin on my back

Pulsas and moans without a mouth

The gods exiled me

Into this loneliness of pain

For their only good reasons

There's Adam texting me about line breaks right now

It's like you can hear me read that poem badly

Anyways

If you do like poetry

You don't know about Jim Harrison, man

Check out some Jim Harrison

I've become a really big fan

He's passed on some years ago

But

Incredible, incredible poet

Let's do some testimonials

Real quick

Oh, our buddy Amy

Thank you for airing this episode

This is about last week's episode

It's one of America's trickiest problems

It's tough to solve because of

Nimbism for affordable housing

Mental health problems that have no easy

Solution that eventually lead to drug issues

I live about a half mile from a tent city

Every time I drive by

I always think of how easy it would be

For me to end up there

And I lost something trying to

My husband and I live month to month

And

If he lost me or if I missed a paycheck

Or two, everything could easily unravel

It's that easy in 21st century America

What I wanted to focus on was

Misunderstood drug use

What people don't consider is the seed

Of the majority of chronic drug use is trauma

It's all about numbing that emotional pain

I know when I go back home

To visit, I get triggered

When I come back, I'm a wreck

That's when I smoke too much weed

Totally out of character, I mix it with alcohol

If I didn't have a wonderful husband

Dig me out of that hole in the help of

That would easily be in the tent

I never tried fentanyl or anything heavy

Like heroin, but in times when I'm triggered

They sound like a welcome companion

I don't believe for the most part drugs are a choice

They become a cycle to put a bandaid

On mental pain

For the most part, this country is grossly

Lacking and providing that much needed

Mental health care

Also, we have to learn to break the stigma

Behind getting help for our head

And realize that our bodies are one and the same

I would not stigmatize someone for taking care

Of diabetes for lack of producing insulin

And why stigmatize someone

For seeking help for a serotonin imbalance

Caused by genetics and trauma, PTSD

C-P-T-S-D and generational trauma

That's a big hump to conquer

I agree with you 100%, Amy

I just see my aunt in that situation

I realize that that's just always

Going to be her situation

My mom literally drug her out of drug houses

Trying to save her

It's just, it gets old

I'm not a religious man but so many times

I hear you speak on so many real human experiences

I find myself saying out loud, Amy

You're always sourcing wisdom, humility

And human, thank you brother

I'm not a religious man either

I know I talk about Jesus and stuff like that

Because I do believe in Jesus

As teachings

But I'm not per se what you consider a religious man

I don't subscribe to any religion

And my beliefs are not 100% dogmatic

My beliefs are constantly evolving

That's Scott Johnson

Thanks for helping us consider the big questions

Out there on a happier note

Hope you have a great birthday and amazing trip with your wife

And some great shows out in California

That was the thing I didn't talk about

That was amazing

Was I don't know

The last time me and Rachel

Taken a trip like that

And getting my wife to myself for three days

Just to be us again

Was amazing

This all started because we liked

Being around each other

And untethered, we had the time

By our lives around each other

It was a wonderful

Very sexy weekend

We had a good time

And I'm really sad I gotta leave

Or go to Oklahoma this weekend

Because I haven't been home long enough

My taste

Let's get out of here

Wrap this thing up

We called this episode showing up

Because

The whole time

All this stuff was going on all week

I was worried about it

I had a bunch of LA friends that were going to come out

None of them showed up

None of them

None of them showed up

People I've known for a long time

Comedy

Industry friends

None of them showed up

And I let that get in my head

The ease at which I slip into bitterness

Is bothering me

It's gotten worse as I get older

And sometimes

When I meet an older soul who is bitter

I wonder if it snuck up on them too

I was out there in LA having the weeks

Of my life doing shows and places

I previously only dreamed of

I should have been on top of the world

And it was for the most part

But I kept letting stuff sneak in

Worrying about text messages I got

From friends with lame excuses

About not being there

About people who didn't show up for me at all

Friends

Who I honestly shouldn't have expected

To be anybody but who they've been

The entire time I've known

And the whole time I'm worrying about this

I am surrounded by folks who do show up for me

Rachel

Who always shows up for me

My brother who has always shown up for me

Sarah

They show up for me

Vinny

Vinny goes to bat for me every chance he gets

He's tried to get me major commercials

And all my connections to Hot Wheels

Vinny

Vinny shows up for Chris

Chris has shown up for me

The entire time I've known him

Which is nearly two decades

Lou's a new friend

But showed up for me in a big way

With his friends at my show

Hell

My aunt

She's more like my big sister

She ain't in good shape

She's clearly struggling with substance abuse in a big way

But she put aside that

To buy tickets for her and the daughter

And show up for me

It's always easier to lean negative

That's why you gotta fight it every day

Because negativity

Is seductive as hell

And once he gets a toe hold

It'll have a death grip on your heart

Before you know it

Epitetus said a wise man doesn't agree

What he doesn't have

But rejoices in what he does have

He ain't just talking about possessions

People

It's what's in your heart

Look around in your life

Who really shows up for you

The ones you take for granted sometimes

I'm rooting for you

And I'm almost sure

If you look around and take a hard audit

You're gonna find more folks

Than you've been thinking about

I'm JW

And I love you

Oh my goodness

It's hot in this garage y'all

I'm cooking this over 90 now

I'm over here swimming

I'm about to take a shower

As always

Thank you guys for sharing your Sunday with me

I'm sure we can get to the Wally Bottoms Day

Got a big one coming next week

Sorry I missed the week on y'all

But I was just exhausted

And technical difficulties

At some point you gotta throw your hands up

And say I'll try again next week

And that's what had to happen

I love you

I really am rooting for you

I'll see you next week

0:00

79:03

Culver City

Jefferson Speedway

Edelbrock

Shelby Plant

Ed Iskendarians

Camfather

hot rotting

tarmac

Chevrolet Suburban

Chevrolet 67 Chevrolet

hand-stamped fenders

restomod

68 Mustang

Testarossa Testarosa

brakes are treacherous as hell

power band

BW Museum

Long Beach

Gerald Desmond Bridge

Volkswagen Tiguan

car collection

Volkswagen Bus

Transporter

87 Monte Carlo SS

air dam

Delorean DMC-12

Chevrolet Impala

leaking oil

About this episode

Original notes