Endless Thread - Enigma in Sweatpants

Episode Date: September 9, 2022

Endless Thread producer Quincy Walters profiles IG Bum, a mischeivous online content creator who has achieved viral stardom. But who is IG Bum when the cameras stop rolling? ****** Credits: This episode was written and produced by Quincy Walters. Mixing and sound design by Emily Jankowski. Ben Brock Johnson and Amory Sivertson are the co-hosts.

Support for endless thread comes from Mathworks, creator of MATLAB and Simulink Software, to design and develop engineered systems, accelerating the pace of discovery in engineering and science. Learn more at Mathworks.com. Support for WBUR comes from Is Business Broken, a podcast from the Mayrotra Institute at Boston University that explores questions like, why is innovation in healthcare so hard? Is ESG just greenwashing? And, of course, is business broken? Listen, wherever you get your podcasts. WBUR Podcasts, Boston. Hey, hey, Emery. And greetings producer, fellow producer, Quincy Walters.

Hello, everyone. So, Quincy, you have what we might call a profile for us today. A profile of a man that I didn't know until you started talking about. a poop bucket video? That's right. If you're eating lunch, folks, we apologize, but this also involves my former true urban landscape love, NYC, where all kinds of crazy stuff goes on right next to normal stuff like eating lunch.

So if you're in New York, you can probably stomach this one. Also, you might know this guy, or at least know of him. This is an influencer in New York who has really been on a meteoric rise to fame over the last few years. His best known work is this poop bucket video, which went super viral. It shows a packed New York subway tunnel with people walking from one train to another. And there's like a metropolitan transportation authority worker mopping the hallway while commuters go by. And then this man who's in tattered sweats and a t-shirt gets involved.

We all watched this video together some weeks ago. Oh, God. There's a guy mopping. and then this guy just sits down, pulls down some gray sweatpants, sits down on the mop bucket, and starts presumably taking a dump. The guy who was cleaning approaches him

and they like fight over the mop. And the guy taking a dump, throws the mop down, and then he gets right back to business. This video definitely had a moment. Everyone saw it. But not a lot of people really knew whether it was real or staged or what. But our PI, our podcast investigator, Quincy Walters, was on the case.

A right-wing blogger quote tweeted it saying this is Bill de Blasio's New York City, and that went viral. The moment was also featured in a recent episode of MTV's ridiculousness. Let's take a look at public poofies. And as more of this man's videos surfaced, so did his, influencer identity. I came across this guy who goes by IG Bum on Instagram and TikTok. IG stands for Instagram. His real name is Esteban Tino Romero, but he just goes by Tino.

And a lot of his posts are captioned with Homeless Man does such and such. Homeless Man plays the piano at Macy's. Homeless Man does dance at Yankee Stadium. Bum crashes Jewish Wedding. Over the last year and a half, two years even, Tino has become a true social media celebrity and a really unique celebrity in the social media influencer economy. He's referenced by famous rappers, by right-wing pundits, and police officers in New York who take selfies with him. Unfortunately, Quincy was able to get to Tina before he got too, too famous for us,

according to what Tino told Quincy. Correct. Okay, we just got in. You just, you guys, by the skin of your teeth. Timing is over the whole lot. Oh, what? Excuse me? Speak to madness man, all right, buddy?

Yeah. Leave me on. How much of that? Yeah. They say, like, the most important part of comedy is timing. Timing, so I don't know. You guys got it in in Boston. I'm no comedian, but.

Oh, no, you're pretty funny to me. I don't know how to take that. So, Quincy, did this guy defecate in the bucket? Yeah, and is he really homeless as he appears to be pretending to be, maybe? Is this guy for real? I'm not quite sure he knows himself, which could be interpreted in multiple ways. A few months back, I've spent the day with Tino in New York City to try to understand who he is and why he is. Because whether you view him as a Shakespearean scoundrel or a surprising branding genius,

Tino's social media star is rising, and he's not like the others. He's not creating perfection on a plate or spurring a dance craze. He's an agent of chaos. I'm Ben Brock Johnson. I'm Amory Severson. And I'm Quincy Walters, P.I. Podcast Investigator, and you're listening to Endless Thread. We're coming to you from WBUR, Boston's NPR station.

Today's episode, TikTok's comedic enigma in sweatpants. It's raining when Tino comes out of his garden-level apartment in a somewhat rugged-looking corner of Bushwick in Brooklyn with his signature sweats. No shirt. You really don't wear a shirt in real life? It's just hot lately, though, right? Yeah, yeah. From 40 to 80. That's my colleague, Megan Cattell.

I'm sorry. Are you guys uncomfortable? No, I'm fine. Are you? Yeah, I'm fine. Yeah, are you sure? Yeah. I'm sorry.

I could put a shirt up. Humidity also went from zero to 76%. In like two days, it's ridiculous. Oh, see? There's numbers to do this game. Okay. In a few minutes, he'll put on a purple shirt that says, Legends Never Die, and it has an image of an older Kobe Bryant

putting his arms around the shoulder of a younger version of Kobe. Anyway, he takes us to his front door, there's trash in front, and it kind of smells of urine outside. And I guess this whole thing maybe isn't. an act. But he opens the door and I gotta say I wasn't expecting what I saw. Okay. Thank you. Oh, wow. This is nice. Not bad for homeless. Should I take off my shoes? Oh, no, no. I know. Keep them on. Not bad for a homeless guy is kind of an understatement. This sprawling, sparsely furnished apartment has pristine hardwood floors, exposed brick walls,

A random man, we later find out as his roommate and friend and nephew and personal chef and former cinematographer, is cooking steaks in the kitchen on new appliances. How long have you been in this space? I've gone to four years. Four years? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So you've been, like, living, but I thought you said you were a homeless. Yeah, yeah. You know, it goes and comes. You know what I mean? It goes and comes. I've managed the last four years to hold it down to the thing. Always homeless at heart. An empty bedroom has a decorative fireplace.

Tino says a pretty lady TikTok collaborator used to stay in there. They used to do things like the silhouette challenge together, this TikTok trend where a person goes from clothed to naked behind a filter in the app and an innocuous Paul Anka song transitions into a sensual doja cat beat drop. Tino says she, wanted to do solo content so she moved out. He says it's a sensitive subject. Weeks later, Tino will get annoyed when I ask if he could put us in contact with her. I reached out to her on my own. I got no response. Tino takes us down into the basement. He's an amenable kind of guy who

feels at home wherever there's weed, food, and heat. He says he's been a squatter. He's couch-served. He's been homeless. He lived with his mom up until a few years ago, but had to move out. because she stopped letting him smoke weed at her place. Anyway, this basement, it's got to be about a thousand square feet. It's got shiny white porcelain tile floors, a clothing rack of outfits and props. There's a broken-down black plethe futon in a corner resting on pink and black milk crates.

And the focal point of the room seems to be Tino's bed. Creative stuff that, you know, that happens in my daily. This isn't like a porn student. is it? I wish. No, no, no, no. Not yet. Not yet.

Not yet. We miss around with, like, you know, porny stuff, but, you know. But then being the old guy, I'm like, hey, stop it. No, let's get to work and get viral. But yeah, it's fun, you know. We use every inch of this basement upstairs. We've done a very, very famous bed, you know.

What is it famous and viral? It's just because... A viral bed. doesn't sound very good. In Instagram, it does. The bed does seem to be a reoccurring character in a lot of Tino's content. It seems like a third of his videos.

Is him on the subway. The other third is him in random places around New York City. And the final third take place in or around that bed. In one video, a young attractive woman is in this bed with a young attractive man. Hold on, hold on, hold on, I need my pills. And the camera zooms in on the woman who dumps the pills on the floor. Yes, I do, I need them.

No, no! The camera zooms out, and now Tino has taken the place of the young man. 51 years old, Tino's an unlikely multi-social media platform sensation. Pretty women, 30 seconds, I can do that. But the internet seems to love his zany shenanigans. And he seems to have harnessed whatever magic. got him here. He says that notoriety has spilled out into the real world. He says he's got teenagers recognizing him in McDonald's. People recognize him on the subway, which gradually it makes it

harder and harder for him to shoot these videos quickly. I found out about him on a Twitter thread. The irony here is that Tino doesn't know how to use Twitter that well. The videos cross-pollinate to multiple platforms, so he doesn't really have to worry about it. Anyway, there was a video of several tough-looking muscular dudes on a subway, looking like they were about to fight each other. I know you're not talking to me like that. I know you're not talking like that. You're going to talk to me like that?

What? What's you going to do? But then it turns into a dance-off, and a few seconds later, Tino rushes in, out of nowhere, shirtless, in ripped dirty sweatpants and tells the guys to get out of his train car. Then he does a flip on the railing as coins fall from his pockets. I think it's safe to say, though, that he's really proud of the bucket video because it got him the most likes and had the most impact. When that video went viral, people thought it was emblematic of a New York City in decline.

Antino thinks that video reflected badly on former Mayor Bill de Blasio. I'm probably one of the reasons why he's no longer in the administration. Yeah, because, you know, shit hit the fan when that video came out because it did point out some of the... flaws in the system and, you know, and I find mayor, you know. De Blasio was wildly unpopular. The fact that they liked Trump wasn't like DeBlasio, should tell Bill de Blasio something. I think he's very courageous because nobody likes him that I know.

Nobody likes him that I know. But New York City mayors can only serve two terms. So de Blasio would be gone regardless of Tino's antics. Mayor de Blasio is running for Congress. We tried to reach the team via Facebook and Instagram, but we haven't gotten a response. There's no press contact on his website, which is kind of weird. So did you really shit in the bucket? Ah, a million-dollar question there.

Well, you know, there'll be a tell-all book one day, well. But also, like... We'll talk about that shit. Let's talk about that shit. a memoir. For all of his jokes and stoned influencer content, Tino does seem to have

a motivation to prove something to his family. He says he wants to make his mother proud. He says she lives in the projects not too far away, but he doesn't go over there anymore. I separated. Oh, no, I'm sorry.

Oh, no, no, but I still love her. It just can't, you know. Maybe when I get some money now, now I could go back. All right, why are you one now? His mom isn't the only family member he doesn't see. He has kids that he doesn't really have a relationship with. These days, he says it seems the only people who want to get close to him

are people who want a piece of his clout. He says his phone rings a lot. If aspiring influencers want to amass followers fast, they DM him or text him or call him for a collaboration. I mean, it's not fair because I had to work my hassle off to get to where I'm at, But, you know, go ahead. Come on, leeches. Go ahead.

Just, you know, tag me, collab, whatever you want to do. Go ahead. Just take my people, whatever. Take the girls I work so hard to get. Whatever. Tino seems to be referencing his supposed magnetism for the opposite sex there. He says there are leeches and there are flakers too, people who want to aggregate his success and audience, but who are unreliable.

If he could choose, Tino says, he wouldn't deal with. with this Kakamemi influencer stuff. He kind of wishes he could be famous for singing. That's his first love. So made a song called Me Yama Panama. His other love is Panama. Yeah, I just go, Me Yamambana,

Me Yamama Bana, Me Jama, Me Jama, Me Jama. So you've got your Panama hat on. That's where you're from. Can you talk a little bit about that? Yes, yes. I'm one of many immigrants that come for a better life. Well, my mother did.

I came to mess it up. But, yeah, yeah, I'm originally from Panama. He moved to America about three decades ago. And on the day we meet him, Tino's preparing to host an event downtown to promote local Panamanian American comedians. And he's hoping his growing internet following will allow him to help get publicity for them. Because, you know, I've not been able to do anything for Panama, so when I can put it out there on a flyer, do a show in a little venue, which is very little, I try to. It makes me feel like, that's doing something for Panama.

I love you, Panama, you know. More on Tino's love for Panama, his run-ins with the police, and his busy influencer schedule in a minute. At Radio Lab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science. Neuroscience, chemistry. But we do also like to get into other kinds of stories. Stories about policing. Or politics. Country music.

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Discover how the magic is made at WBUR.org. Creative Studio. Despite the popularity of his bucket video, Tino's rise to internet infamy didn't happen overnight. Like Shakespeare's mischievous troublemaker fall staff, Tino's been a character in other plays before this latest attraction. I've poured over old podcast appearances where he's being skeptical about the impact of social media and talking about his attempts at stand-up comedy.

looked at his old accounts before they disappeared and talked with him about the dicey nature of his moniker, IGPum. It seems like Tino has been searching for the right venue for his brand of Tom Foolery for a while. It's finally starting to take off. Social media is the new TV, because I've never been on TV, but social media TV, I definitely have.

And that's the reason why these kids are losing their mind when they see me, which is a beautiful thing, no complaint. These days, he keeps a busy schedule. He records content between the hours of 1 and 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, unless it's a night shoot or a weekend shoot. It's basically his job. When we spoke, he said he hadn't figured out how to monetize, but usually gets paid from collaborations through cash app or Venmo or WhatsApp.

Now an agent handles business inquiries. We reached out to the management company to get more information via email but didn't hear back. But after a few hours of phone tag, a few weeks later, I reached his agent. She didn't want to be recorded, but she says the company's email inbox has about 150 requests from small businesses for Tino to, quote, make a spectacle in or in front of their stores. The rate starts at $250. It sounded like she even got a couple of requests during our call.

Really, the reason I got interested in. in meaning Tino wasn't his collabs, though, or the infamous poop bucket video. It was more about a message he was putting online about an apparent influx of police presence in the city, in subways and homeless encampments at the behest of the new mayor Eric Adams. But Tino's real-life run-ins with the police have been mixed. Alex Montenegro, Tino's roommate and personal chef, who was cooking in his apartment when we first arrived, tells a story about them going to an engagement in Atlantic City. We had two cops that stopped us on the way there.

Mind you, all they want to do is take a picture once they realize who's in the car. Oh, really? Wow. Tina Remed us, yes. Have cops been antagonistic to him when he's filming, though? That I don't know about, but when I see that love from the NYPD, especially when all them controversies are going on with the NYPD, PD, what more can I say?

What more can I say? Like, yo, we just want to take a picture with you. When you ever had a cop pulled you over and say, oh, I just want to take a picture with you? The more I learned about the man who problematically calls himself IG bomb on Instagram, the more it seemed like his online persona didn't match his offline one. But the online persona is so popular. Is that your phone? Is it? Literally.

Oh, yeah. Is it? If it's like a business call, I'll call you back, Chair, I'll call you back. Yes, yeah, he's fine. No, it's another. Is that a... But I blocked him because I'm emotional. Tino's full of odd comments like this.

And it's hard to tell if they're cracks in a facade, showing his true character, or if they're red herrings. He says the person who called him is a flake. They were supposed to collaborate, but the person bailed. But is Tino actually emotional? seems that way in some of his videos, which often involve him yelling or doing something kind of out there. But then he's nonchalant about things you'd think he'd be emotional about, his kids, his mom. He's definitely hard to pigeonhole. I'm also not always sure that his art is purely absurdist or silly. Sometimes it seems like Tino is touching a nerve on larger New York City issues, like

the availability of public restrooms or how the city treats unhoused people and subway performers. I reached out to the NYPD about Tino. He's been on social media posing with the police. I didn't get any response, but I did get a nibble from the mayor's office. Turns out a friend of a friend had the mayor's deputy press secretary's cell number on hand. Hey, Chris. Oh, sorry, Charles. Sorry, hi Charles. How are you? Charles Lutvac is the mayor's deputy press secretary, and he asks if I want to speak to the mayor,

but before that, he wants to know more about what this story is. Yeah, so this is going to sound really goofy. But there's this, I guess, TikTok influencer in New York, who's kind of like rising in popularity. And I don't know if you saw it, but a couple of years ago, there was a video filmed in a, subway station where a man pooped in a mop bucket. Are you familiar with that incident?

The mayor's deputy press secretary says, thankfully, he's not familiar with poop bucket gate. And after telling him what the story is about, it seems like the initial offer of speaking to the mayor is no longer an option. Tino's phone rings again. It's the guy he says he blocked for flaking on him. And Tino explains to the guy why he's upset. But bro, you gotta give like a text or something back just to say like, yo, you know, I'm gonna get back to you, whatever.

But the no nothing, especially when I'm calling you and texting you, that's high anxiety shit. Like I gotta talk to him. I want to explode on somebody. The man on the other end of the phone says he's been battling depression and it's been hard for him lately. And he's been melting down and he knows Tino's dealing with a lot too. Ah, Dan, so we both were going through it. The guy on the other end, his name is Cheo Williams, and he's also a comic in the city.

I know him from comedy. You know, this niggas looked like that since 97. He hasn't aged a day since. Yeah, no, we met through comedy. Like when I first started stand-up, he was already in the scene pretty hard. And connected with the underground scene. And how do you think about his like, you know, newfound celebrity, I guess?

I mean, how do I think about it? I think it's fucking coolest shit. I mean, I've always said this niggins should have been bigger than where he is now. So, I mean, I've always seen this nigger as a fucking crazy motherfucker that people need to know around. for, I mean, Tino, how long I've been saying that shit for? Yeah, yeah, yeah, 1997, whatever you said? Tino seems to be in a continuous cycle of adaptation. Back at Tino's house, some more seemingly random people have appeared.

There's Alex, the guy cooking, and now there's a young guy with model-like bone structure and wearing a du rag in the kitchen, icing his chiseled face with frozen vegetables. I couldn't see any injuries, by the way, and a lady sleeping on a nearby couch. The young guy has been contemplatively staring at the brick wall. His name is Raphael German. Raphael discovered Tino online. Me and my little brother was watching, you know, some random video, and that's when I saw one of his videos that he did that got us crack enough first thing in the morning.

Raphael didn't know what Tino would be like in real life. And now it seems Raphael feels like Tino changed his life. Because before arresting, he was having the conversation, he was like, yeah, it's true. You should become an actor and a comedian at the same time. I'm like, oh, okay. I sat back and I looked at him like, I kind of shocked me like how I get to me a famous comedian for the first time and got that and received.

that blessing message. The woman on the couch wakes up. She says she's not really online, so she didn't warn Raphael that they were going to meet a celebrity today. She says her name is Ocean, and she calls Tino Pops. Pops, you know, when you start becoming a millionaire,

you want to fund me and my projects, not me, but my projects, because I'm all about sustainability and giving back on women empowerment and empowering the youths. The youths, though, are on the place. platforms. And as Ocean says, she is not. Have you noticed the people in public, though, responding to him?

No, I don't. I'm sorry. I'm like... Oh, you just come over here? Maybe it started last year. I'm not so sure, but I wouldn't have done it. It's possible that Tino's stories of being recognized on the street are apocryphal. Still, it seems he's got this orbital magnetism. People are drawn to him. And maybe that's what made him so popular so fast. He says he just tries to do what's fun, and he thinks it's cool that other people are fans of what he does. Because I love giving life a chance.

Like, you guys coming over and just, you know, whether to talk. I mean, I like that. I'm like, you know, and they don't think it's a good idea. That's a really beautiful sentiment. Yeah, yeah. I have a product of giving life a chance. Good or bad. What do you mean by that?

Like, just get into a situation where maybe we'll be. It wasn't the best thing to choose to go do it. But it's like, give a life a chance. Like, hey, I won't know if I don't do it. Alex, the guy cooking steaks, says it's probably because he's a humble person. And Tino reacts to this. Wow. I don't even, yeah, I don't know.

I mean, you know, it's just one of those things. Like, I know I'm not going to say like I'm the shit ever because it's like. In that silence, Tino is crying, literally, silently, crying that cry where you don't know whether to comfort the person or just give them the space and silence to cry. It came out of nowhere, like a sun shower. Behind him, handwritten puns on construction paper and notebook paper are taped to the wall. You okay? Tino eventually composes himself in a show-must-go-on manner. You have to be. Let's just go.

He gets his outfit on. It's a black suit, a white button-down Cuban-style shirt, a straw hat with a Panamanian flag wrapped around it, and hiking boots. And he's literally almost unrecognizable. By the way, the MTA said they would not comment on Poop Bucket Gate or, the trend of people who film hijinks in the subway. When we asked why, we didn't get a response. Anyway, Tino said I'd be able to see all the people who recognize him. It would make for a good scene in this podcast.

But right now, it's not a podcast. It's real life. And we have to take an Uber because we are running way behind schedule. And who knows, maybe the Uber driver will recognize him. Excuse me, sir, driving the Uber. Do you know who that guy is? Have you seen this guy before? Have you seen him before?

No. Okay. We get to the venue, El Carnival Restaurant. It's in the Lower East Side. And no one's really there. There are a few of the comedians performing tonight and the family members they've brought along, like David Ray Martinez and his 14-year-old son.

He says he's been friends with Tino for a decade. and he thinks it's cool that his teenage son is a fan. My son showed in one of his videos. He's like, oh, look at this guy. He's homeless and he does this crazy stuff. And I was like, he's not homeless. That's Tino. That's my comedy.

He's like, oh, my God, why are your friends famous and you're not? And I was like, well, it took Tino a long time to get there. You know, everybody has their different journey. And I told him, my son, I was like, I have been raising you. for a long time. So that's why it's taking so long. So... David says it's about time Tino got some recognition, because while he may not be unhoused now,

he's had a lot of challenges to get to this point. And he thinks Tino's viral magic has to do with Tino making content that sincerely reflects his experiences and adds just the right amount of absurdity or imagination. I think he's bringing his self to the role, which is what makes it funny because it's like he still wants the stripper, you know, like he want a beautiful lady, you know. So he's still bringing himself to the character and just mapping it on to being homeless. Because people do look at people who are homeless as in they don't have want to needs or want to have fun or things to do. but it's like, no, like, come on, we're human beings.

We all want the same things. I think what David is trying to say is that as human beings, we want to win. We want to be validated. That might not exactly come in the form of dating a stripper, per se. But anyway, David says Tino's been a cheerleader. Yeah, just a really good person. and would always be encouraging to people to keep going in comedy. You know, so, yeah.

Tino tells us to go to a corner of the restaurant, a tad out of sight, so that people passing by know there's still room. Many minutes after the performance was set to begin, Tino asks us to actually go back so that passers by maybe Lourden from FOMO. There weren't a lot of people, maybe 15, about half were performing.

It's not quite the turnout Tino was anticipating. But I had a couple of good laughs. One comedian, Andrea Pascacio, she told this joke or story about, like, this padding or something for her bosom falling out on the train, and she pulls it from her blouse and holds it in the air on stage. It got glare on the back. You live like chicken breath.

I laughed so hard. my guts hurt, and I cried. Several comedians later, it was Tino's turn. He was going to close out the night. Hours ago, I wondered what the stand-up set of a 51-year-old man who didn't know his social media handle is widely deemed offensive would be like. Earlier, I had told Tino that the term bum had kind of fallen out of fashion.

He told me he was bringing it back into style. So, imagining his stand-up approach, give me anxiety. I'll say that like all the other moments up until this one, it was hard for me to discern fact from fiction or a story from absurdism. But my daughter graduated Penn State, you know what I mean? Penn State, yeah, yeah.

Very proud of that. You know? It's funny because I got to have a, you know, I'm State Penn, you know what I'm saying? Me and my daughter are like kind of in sync. You know what I'm saying? Shit. Oh, what about my life, man. I've been single as fuck.

Hey, what's going on, man? While he was on stage, someone told him he should get an only fan, you know, a platform where people make homemade adult content. And he responded by reflecting on the evolution of porn. It used to be so hard to record a porn, you know? But now you young ladies, that niggins just like, yeah, put your phone and put it. And I just still show my face. Just don't show my face, but you can do whatever. I'm like, I'm like, I'm not.

What was that when this shit was happening? You know what I'm Vince? Yeah. You got to remember back in the days of porn how you had to record women, right? Oh, you don't, I'll remind you, all right? You have to, first time, you had a fucking big-ass catcorder, right? You have to hide in a corner, right? They put a blanket over it, right?

Nobody laughed at this attempt to joke about surreptitiously recording women without their consent. And that awkward silence validated my anxiety. Tino might want to stick to the skid humor. Tino says he's happy he got to showcase other local Panamanian comedians, but he can't help but feel a little hurt by the turnout. He had hoped his internet popularity would bring out a lot of lot of people. But as the thin crowd dispersed, Tino leaned against the bar saying bye to everyone and drinking a tropical drink he doesn't remember ordering.

What was the question? How are you feeling about the turnout? Oh, the turnout was, it was the thing that affected me pretty much because I'm like, all the yes that you get online, all that I'll be there, all that, you know, and I'm, you know, You know, it was in my head the fact that, like, wow. So when they tell you that, you know, like, I'm still at this level of, like, when people still are telling me they're showing up and they're not showing up. I mean, I know we had the rain and we had, like, the elements against us or whatever. I still want people, you know, to come.

And, you know, I like to be shown love, you know, because I would show love. Earlier in the day, Tino told us that he turned to comedy when his mom left him and his siblings in Panama to pursue the American dream. It was a survival tactic. Like, hey, you know, my mom is not here. Hey, keep a smile on your face, you know what I mean? Because, you know, hey, you're trying to survive until she gets back. And tonight, it's like comedy, that survival tactic, stood him up or something. At least that's what it looks like as he silently sips.

the pink drink with an umbrella in it while wearing his suit. The following morning, he'd hop on a plane and send me a picture of him shirtless in ripped and dirty sweats doing rock and roll hands in the aisle as flight attendants and passengers huddled together and look on.

In the weeks that followed our interview, I had a few follow-up fact-checking questions that Tino kind of evaded. I asked if any of his kids would be willing to lend their voice to the story. He said he told his daughter about my request and she thought it was silly. When I asked if he had the contact info for his former roommate collaborator, he told me I was

becoming a madman and told me let's stop and use what we got or else he's done. But in the true winsome, lusome rhythm of life, Tino messages me back to apologize for his crankiness. He sent me a link to his newly launched Bandcamp account. On the one hand, it's honoring what he's always wanted to do, sing. But on the other, it's like another tentacle of Tino's enigmatic comedic empire. So, Quincy, there's a bit of a post script here. Would you like to read the extremely viral tweet that went out?

Yeah, this tweet went out on August 29th. Okay. It's got over 30,000 likes. and it's a tweet from a woman who says she's got a screenshot of Tino's Instagram page. And it says, this man is literally an actor and a former stand-up comedian.

He has representation. He has an Instagram with 36,000 followers. He acts homeless and is constantly up to antics like this and further stigmatizing and otherizing houseless people in NYC. nasty work. Wow. So the Tino mystery continues, I guess.

Yeah, it does. Although I, you know, I don't know if many people know, or at least, you know, according to what he tells us, he has been unhoused. So, and as the story kind of shows. But maybe, you know, there is something to be said on potentially capitalizing on. that plight, if you will. But, I mean, that's kind of like, I don't know, that's the nature of the internet, maybe. There's a lot of gray.

It doesn't always conform to what makes sense. Ain't that the truth? Endless thread is a production of WBUR in Boston. Want early tickets to events, swag, bonus content, my price structure for collabs, Ben's Facebook campaign website, join our emailing list. You'll find it at WBUR.org.org slash endless thread. This episode was written, reported, and delivered with Panash by Quincy Walters.

To a couple of Agog co-hosts named Amory Sebertson and Ben Brock Johnson. Editing help from Jeb Sharp and the rest of the team, Dean Russell, Nora Sacks, Grace Tatter, Kristen Torres. Our web producer is Megan Cattel. Our show is mixed and sound designed by the great Emily Jankowski. Endless Thread is a show about the blurred lines between digital communities and maybe pretending to defecate in a bucket, IRL for internet points. If you've got an untold history, an unsolved mystery, or a wild story from the internet that you want to tell us, hit us up.

Email Endlessthread at WBUR.org.