Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers - BROOKS WHEELAN Went to Noah's Arc in the Wisconsin Dell's

Episode Date: June 9, 2026

This week on the pod, Seth and Josh welcome comedian Brooks Wheelan! Brooks talks about growing up in Iowa with few family vacations, spending summers on his grandparents’ farm in Missouri, and taking memorable trips to the Wisconsin Dells. He shares stories about not seeing the ocean until he was 21, discovering travel later in life, and finding himself on adventures everywhere from Corsica, where cigarettes became currency, to an 18-day rafting trip through the Grand Canyon. Plus, Brooks talks about his new comedy special "Alive in Alaska," and he's out on tour with Seth! Watch this episode on the Family Trips YouTube or Spotify, or listen wherever you get your podcasts! Support Our Sponsors: Article:Article is offering our listeners $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. To claim, visit https://www.article.com/discount/trips and the discount will be automatically applied at checkout. BluelandMake the switch today! Get 15% off your first order by going to https://Blueland.com/trips. Aura FramesFor a limited time, listeners can get an exclusive 35 dollars off their best-selling Carver Mat at https://on.auraframes.com/TRIPS. Promo Code TRIPS. Promo Code TRIPS Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, Baji. Hey, Sufi. How are you? I'm good. That's good. I had a punk weekend. Yeah, you sure did. It was punk-tastic as a goes.

Yeah, I heard. I talked to them on their drive home. Excellent. Yeah, you said it was a great time, and they said it was a great time. And yeah, that just sounded awesome. It was very nice, you know, the kids just, they're a little bit older, and they don't need the full punk's attention. and the punks obviously enjoy a down hour here and there.

Don't we all? Yeah. Also, the punks are... If the punks aren't moving, they are dead quiet. Like, you would have no idea they're in your house. Now, the minute they get up, it's fucking the elephants on parade. But, you know, the amount of that I'd be, you know, the kids would be outside and I would think, did they go home and then you would just find them in another room like doing their puzzles.

Yeah. Yeah. They're like a moment in Widows Bay that you might not expect. Yeah, yeah. And there's just like two people sitting there, which I've been really enjoying, by the way. Just a little shameless play. Shout out. Shout out to Widows Bay, which is exceptionally good television.

Yeah, they're great. They're a couple of little Alan Turing's doing their little puzzles trying to crack the codes. Yeah Just Just constantly constantly working on it Yeah But what did you guys do

What did you guys get up to? They were there It was very fun They were there When me and the boys got up They had arrived earlier than I did And dad said He'd already been playing

Like an hour of hide And go seek with Addy There aren't that many places to hide No I know But it was very sweet To show up And she had no interest in me arriving or the boys arriving.

It was just she was holding Ponghiari's hand and just walking them around telling them it was time to play. So again, as a parent, your dream is to watch your parents and your children connecting, and they really were. Yeah. Now, if I went to a new place, you know, I've talked on this trip and we didn't do this, but I went to this, you know, vacation or this birthday weekend

out in Palm Springs and we were in this big, huge property, I think it would be very fun to play hide-and-go-seek sort of as a throwback as myself today. But at what age does hide-and-go-seek sort of fall off the radar? Because your boys don't seem into it, but Addy is still so into it. So into it. But the thing is, as a parent, you don't want to play it

when your kids are actually good at it. Right. You don't actually want to be seeking. You know, the great thing about Adi is you kind of count to 20. then you give yourself a minute and again, like there's never a time where she's hidden from view when you walk into a room.

Yeah, you can always see. But yeah, so I guess is that when it flips? Is when they get to an age where they figure out how to hide? When they're too good at it, you try to steer them towards other games. Yeah.

We played, oh, you know what we've been playing, which is an absolute blast, is Clue. Oh, yeah. So Clue has come into the rotation. The only downside of Clue. Have you played Clue in recent years? There's a newer card game version of Clue that I've played. Yeah.

But I haven't played Clue proper in years. For those who don't remember, you know, it's basically an elimination game where you're trying to, you know, through your questions, you know, eliminate enough of the suspects, the rooms, and the weapons to make a guess. And when you make a guess, it goes to your left, and the person with their cards either shows you one of the things you guessed

or they say they don't have anything. And if it goes around it, everybody says you don't have anything. Then you feel pretty good. Mm-hmm. And then you make your guess. Yeah. I've had so much fun playing clue. Not one time have I made a guess

and then I look and I'm like, wait, does somebody have a knife? Because I, you know, again, I said knife and now all of a sudden, knife's not there. And Ash, six times in a row, was like, oh, yeah,

I do have that. Sorry, I didn't see it. And again, not 14 cards in his hand. Three. And then, so I tell,

we play Clue, and I really, I say to the boys, like, let's work really hard, you know? Like, and again,

probably part of this is, you know, we come from a, a card playing family, a board game playing family. I want to show off to mom and dad that,

like, I'm raising my, boys right that they like so I'm really like focus look blah blah blah anyway I finally get around and make my guess and once again it happens and I'm like who has does somebody have rope and punkyieri daddy boy's like oh I got rope so one of these days I'm gonna have the satisfaction of getting the end but yeah but that was good we yeah we played clue we played some baseball outside you know oh yeah dance says the boys are very into baseball.

They're very into baseball. If I can say, he says two things. Because you play offense and defense and baseball. What do you think dad thinks their strength is? Offense. Yeah. Yeah. Because he also says, they can't catch shit.

That would be one way of saying it. That would be probably the most efficient way to say it. Ash can hit the ball. He can really hit it. But they can't, those boys can't catch shit. I have a, you know, we got them there. You know, we went to a proper Paragon Sports in New York, which is sort of a famous sporting good store. And, you know, I really did have the dude and a really good service there, get them the right mitts.

And I got to be honest, I think the mitts are like too small for baseballs. Like, you know, we're not playing with little baseballs. Yeah. And I feel like that's one of the issues. Now, Dad might take issue with that and say the mitts are not the problem. Are they missing the ball and it's like pinging off their foreheads? No, fortunately not. I will say they're playing with enough fear to never put their foreheads in the path of the ball.

Right. You know, we're not, they haven't ever played on a proper infield. So I'm hitting ground balls to them as well. And it is that thing when you do it on grass, some pretty janky hops. Still, they're very bad at that. And the other problem is, like, you get out there and it's so fun to just, like, for me, to throw balls and have ash hit balls. and there was a batting cage in our town, and so they sell like old baseballs for a buck a pop,

and so I bought like $20 with the balls, so we have like a ton of baseballs. It's so fun. All I want to do is like throw the ball, have them hit the ball, or just hit them grounders and have them, you know, field grounders. All Ash wants to do is a full game. And I'm like, we have four people.

And he's like, set up the bases. There's ghost runners. What are the rules? I'm like, ugh. And I'm, it's bad parenting. The amount I turn into like, Ash's friend in a bad way when we play baseball, where I'm like, it doesn't matter. Stop it, just lets play.

And the amount I'm like, oh, fine, I don't care, whatever, I don't care. Well, I mean, you and I, in your boy's defense, we used to play wiffleball just one-on-one, and we made that work. One-on-one wiffleball is the dream. But again, that's like, they don't want that. They don't want to like, because I'll even say, like, if you're, hit it. Here it's, you know, it's one point here. And they're like, no, no, no, I want to run the bases.

I'm like, we don't have a first baseman. And then I'm like, all right, but then we have to play pitcher's hand for first base. And they're like, that's not fair. I'm like, I don't care. However we want to play it. And then they're like, what's the score? I'm like, you tell me. I'm not also the scorekeeper.

You tell me. So obviously, I'm doing a good job. Yeah, sounds like it. And then I'm trying to think of what else we did. We went over to a friend's house, which was really lovely. Going back to our childhood and dad teaching us how to play baseball, there was, and I know your kids are money motivated. Yeah.

But we used to sort of do that. You'd get hit 10 grounders in a row. If you could catch 10 grounders clean in a row, that was a dollar. and that was huge. Yeah. But that does require, I feel like a proper infield or some dirt so you can...

And I said, like, let's go to a Little League field. The problem is, you know, it just the whole... Even though they love playing baseball, the clock is immediately ticking. And so there's... It's just safer to play it in the backyard as opposed to,

like, let's load up the car, let's go 15 minutes away to the Little League field, then you get there. I mean, Axel, basically, his purpose... permanent state is the cusp of quitting. But yeah, it was also last night, this is my other, sorry, one more story about Ash,

which is, he's, you know, it's last week of school for him, and he had a book to finish. And so last night I put Axel to bed and I like check it on Alexi. And then I went downstairs and it was like 8.30. and I walked into like our family room and Ash was just sitting reading in the dark like I can't like all

and I was like bud you want to put a light on he's like oh yeah that'd be great so I turned the light on and then I'm like I'm so proud of you for it's like I actually take it back I think it's like maybe closer to 9 o'clock at night okay and that's right around

his bedtime but we've talked about he has to finish this book tonight. And he's reading, and I'm just so proud of him. I'm like, oh, bud, that's great. I'm so glad you're reading. He goes, yeah, you know, I got to get it done by tomorrow. I'm like, great, good for you.

I'm like, how many pages do you have left? He goes, 140. He does take after you. And I'm like, dude, what's your plan? And he's like, well, just keep reading. And he was like, then he was like, do you want to, he goes, would you stay in the room with me? I'm like, of course.

And so then I'm like doing a little math. I'm like, I'm like, 100. And I mean, it's not like gravity's rainbow or anything. Like, you know, it's a kid's bug. So I'm looking at the pages. I'm like, all right, 140, you know, what's he reading? And so I'm like, doing the math. I'm like, I'm going to wait 10 minutes and see how many pages he has left, you know,

do the math of how long it's going to take 10 minutes past. I'm like, how many pages do you have left now? He's like, 135. I'm like, oh, what are we going to do here? So, you know, I'm kind of famously fast. talking speed reader dude. Yeah, yeah. And I'm like, Ash, we're going to the kitchen.

So we go to the kitchen. Because again, the light, and even with all the lights on, as you know, my sister-in-law, who's an incredibly accomplished designer and has purchased all the lamps for our home, they're all like five-watt lamps. Yeah. Like, even the moths are like, we're going to go elsewhere. Yeah. Ash could be forgiven if he thought the lights were on.

100%. dark. Kitchen's the one example, exception. So I go to the kitchen, and I'm just like, I'm going to read you this book as fast as I can. And he's like, okay. So I'm just jamming through the book, just like so fast. And I keep stopping and being like, are you following the book? Are you following?

I'm like, what's the last thing that happened? And he really is. He's stayed with me. But he's also like, I'm going to go get some ice. I'm like, what? He goes, I just want to suck on some ice. And I'm like, fine, whatever we need to do, get through this book. And then I'm reading this book.

And by the way, my throat's getting sore. I'm like, and he's like, and finally I'm like, you gotta stop doing that, man. Yeah, just got to suck. And he goes, what if I do it like this?

And then he just sucks on it really quietly. I'm like, fine. Anyway, all of a sudden it's 10 o'clock at night. There's like 50 pages left of this book. And, you know,

Lexi's like, he's got to go to bed. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I know, I know, I know. So he's like,

we'll finish in the morning. And I'm like, oh, we're not going to finish in the morning. So instead, this is how awesome my life is. Ash goes to bed and I finish his kids' book.

Also, I go up to bed, I get in bed, I turn on the light to read it, and Alexi's like, that light's too bright. She's like, I'm going to bed too, and I'm like, fine. So now I'm back in the kitchen. Reading your book. Reading a book, like a fourth grader's book so that I can Cliff Snow at breakfast while Axel's there. And then I tell Ash the exciting conclusion of this book and that Axel's like,

like, oh, that book's great. You have to weed it to me. I'm like, I don't want to read it again. But we got it done. We got it done, Pashi. Well, that's good. This episode, you're running mate. My running mate, who I just saw on Sunday at the Beacon Theater, Brooks Wheeling. Is this a fun episode? You know, I listen back to these because of writing the song. And gosh, this dude, He's got some stories. He's such a good vibe. And he's great, I mean, I'm on trips with him more than outside of my family. He's who I'm tripping with the most these days because he's my fellow road dog.

And he's a winner. He's Brooks Wheeling. And he's from the great state of Iowa. And he loves comedy, but he cares the most about college wrestling, which I don't think comes up. I can't remember how much. It comes up. It comes up. Yeah.

Enjoy. And, yeah. I also, one of the other great things about the punk is visiting is, you know, it's like a three-hour drive. And so they always show up having just listened to three episodes and then they leave. Like, it's so funny, they were literally driving out on the, they were driving past me. I was on the front steps and they were driving past and the window was down. And dad's like, how's Billy Eichner? And I was like, and I want to be like, you're going to listen.

Just listen. He also, when they're caught up, he's like, there's no. I don't know, I think we're caught up but I'm like, yeah, he's like, all right, well, you need to put more out. And it's like, they come out once a week, bro. Yeah, dude. And then like, yeah, a bonus listener episode

once a month, so that's the deal. It's like him, like calling up the Boston Globe being like, I finished the puzzle. Like, sorry, man, the next one's not till tomorrow. But I'm done. Yeah. He's definitely finished the puzzle, Boston Globe. All right, love you, Pajie.

Love you, Sufi. Family trips with my brothers. Brooks, it's so good to see you. Yeah, dude, so good to see you guys. This is great. You're like my, basically, my road trip buddy now. So I'm, like, going on more trips with you than my actual family. That is very true.

That's happening. We've really had some adventures. We've had a wonderful time. Yeah. Last time I saw you, Brooks, you were in Arizona, and you guys had, I think, Seth, did you pick Brooks up in L.A. and then you guys drove to Palm Springs and then drove to Palm Springs, met Brooke, and then we drove from Palm Springs to Scottsdale. Just like listening to tunes. Yeah. The fix that we have were now we drive from one place to the other makes it so much more fun.

Yeah. Because we were going to fly from Palm Springs to Phoenix and then we were like, or we'd just drive four hours and listen to music. And that was the move. Also, there's that thing. I'm, you know, by the way, this is a very unfair, bounce on you, Brooks. But I feel like early morning Brooks at an airport, I'm trying to avoid. Yeah, that's... That's fair.

I was just somewhere with Catherine, my girlfriend, and I didn't realize it, but she just started video recording because it was like 7.30 in the morning I was playing Fat Lipp by 7.41 explaining a movie I had about high school. And it was so loud and jarring, but I didn't realize

until she played it for me later. And she goes, this is what it's like when you wake up. That's a lot. I'm sorry. So do you hit, you hit the ground running when you wake up? You're not a slow wake up?

The panic starts right away for me. Yeah. I'm up and out of. You, uh, you also, I feel like I'm always worried you're like not going to be at the door, like at the time we, uh, we say.

And the reality is you're, you've been up for like an hour. You usually have a coffee. You just look like you just woke up. That's true. Yeah. I have a resting look tired face. Your resting face is full frazzled.

Yeah, yeah. I'm like, oh my God, what happened? You're like, this is me when everything is gone according to planning. Yeah, this is great. I'm feeling great. We did have to get up at like 3.40 in the morning when we were in Phoenix. That was rough. Yeah, what was that?

Was it to get home, right? Yeah, that was leaving. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, because we had a show in New York that night. Yeah, yeah. Also, we were both, we were doing a show in a casino, Josh, We'd seen you.

We'd seen both you guys' parents. And Seth and I were, like, walking back, bragging to both of our, to each other about how it's nice that we didn't gamble and we don't have the urge to gamble, said goodnight, had left my key, immediately went to get a new key, and on the way back lost $200 on your left. It was like 10 seconds after we just bragged. And I texted Seth, I go, I'm down 200. He's like, that's fair.

That's fair. It's literally like the cards saw you going back alone. and they're like, hey man, you get rid of your loser friend? You want to take a little spin, Brookesy? Yeah. I mean, I lost 200, so did my father, so did my mother. So, yeah. Yeah, that's how they get you.

And again, as a younger man, when I would do casino shows, it was a suckers' bet because I would obviously get paid handsomely for doing stand-up and then would just slowly bleed it back to the people who had arranged for me to come. Absolutely. And, like, there's this one casino. I don't say where it is, but it's in Connecticut. And it is, it's the only, that's the only thing around for, I think, 200 miles. Would you say, like, Wolf Forest? Would Wolf Forest be a good code?

I would go close. It would be very close to that. And I was just trapped there. It was like one of my first gigs. It was like four days in this casino. Nothing to do. I left down, after being paid, I left down $1,000. After being paid. And I was like, I think I got to kill myself.

You, you Brooks are famously from Iowa. Two older brothers. And your siblings are like my children, all bees. Oh, yeah, yep. My brother did it again, too. He's got three L's, Lincoln, Landon, and Layton, and we're Brad, Brett, and Brooks. Yep. And, yeah, you have a good joke about it, about how it is the meanest thing you can do to your parents.

It's your grandparents. Yeah, they're the ones who are just like, what? I can't. I don't want to. Yeah. But we also had a, there's a, I mean, I guess it wasn't the Wheelan side of the family that we saw on our drive across Missouri. But we did, we did St. Louis into Kansas City. We stopped midway at Columbia, Missouri, home of Missouri, a home of Missouri.

And you said we were meeting one of your cousins for lunch. And there were 15 people there. It got leaked. It got leaked. That I think if it was just me, we would have met one. But it got leaked that you were going to be there. So 15 plus a couple friends showed up. Yeah.

And it was actually really fun. It was great. Where do you guys go for a lunch like that? How do you do a 15-person lunch? What's your venue? Well, this is the dream of being on the road with Brooks. Brooks has the answers. I actually, I have a lot of cousins who went to University of Missouri because they're all from Jefferson City.

And so for this one, I just texted them, where's a great spot that we could get food? And they were all like, shoot, I forget what it was called, but everybody had the exact same answer. It was like, gotcha. I don't know, or coals, not something like that. Yeah. It's just a little hamburger spot. It reminded me of, remember that place we used to go to? What was the play?

Dagwoods, remember that posh? Oh, yeah. In Lansing, Michigan. So it just felt like a place, like the wood, it was like the softest wood. Yeah. You know, at the table? Like, you could just press your thumb down and leave a print. Absolutely a pool hall that serves chili in a college town.

That's where it was. It was perfect. Yeah, it was really good. We knocked out our burgers. and we're on our way. But there's a lot. There's a lot of you. Also,

there's many, many, many cousins. Wrestling stock. Everybody looks like they're ready to wrestle. And I'm talking about like a collegiate wrestling, like singular wrestling. My cousin who was there, he just got fourth at the Missouri State tournament, a little stud.

He's good. Yeah, they're intense guys. My uncle on that side, coolest thing could possibly happen when I was like seven. He was on American Gladdy. and won like five episodes. Wow. Yeah, it was, when you're seven and you're literal, your uncle is crushing laser, it's very

exciting. Yeah. That's the dream. Also, Brooks is the first person I know who follows, uh, and wants to watch college wrestling and posh. It will not surprise you. This is not often on the, uh, big screen at the sports bar. Brooks, no.

Brooks is, like, like, watching it. His, like, his computer's hooked up to like a smaller computer. He's like, watch it. It's real pay to play. You got to pay to play to watch. Yeah. But it's, it's been very fun. I've been with Brooks during some, some cool pins. Oh, yeah, you watched this kid, my brother coach, Ryder Block. He penned this guy who ended up getting, Ryder ended up getting six at the NCAAs, but he pinned the guy who got fourth at the NCAA. Very incredible. And Seth was there. And he just got off stage. I don't know where we were, but I was like, you got to see this pin, Seth. And he's like, okay. Oh.

Okay. But it was very, you do a very good job of, you would be a very good color man for that level of wrestling. I got very, by the time the pin happened, I was very invested and very excited.

I also understand what not to show people, you know, I'm only showing you touchdowns. I'm not showing you some of these boring stuff. Not a lot, not just like long grapples. You know, there's no appetite for the grapples.

I'm not showing you a double overtime one-to-one ride out. That's not what anybody wants to see. Hey, we're going to take a quick break and hear from some of our sponsors. Support comes from Blue Land. Hey, Bashi.

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You, uh, all right, so you're from Iowa, you, if anybody follows your Instagram, uh, you are living the most, uh, trip-heavy existence. You go to the most incredible places. You're an outdoorsman without peer, as far as I know. But was that the kind of vacation you were taking as kids? No, no.

Right now, as soon as we get off of this, I'm in Louisville. I'm going to the Kentucky Derby in like 45 minutes. Wow. I'm very, very excited for that. First time. First time. It kind of seems strange to me that you haven't been like 20 times. I'm not a big animal cruelty guy.

Interesting. So, yeah, I'm not nuts about it. It's just my girlfriend's from Louisville, and she's like, let's go, it'd be fun. We'll see my friends. I go. Sounds great. But it is, I will say, I mean, just as we record this, it's Tuesday.

So you know the Kentucky Derby is not today, right? It's a week. Turns out it's week. We're going, so today is 5'0 Tuesday. Okay. For the locals. Tomorrow is Wednesday. They go every day.

So we're here for Derby Week. Gotcha. Gotcha. I see. Okay. I just didn't want you to get there and be like, well, wait, when's the Kentucky Derby? because yeah that's what I did ask I asked Catherine since this is Tuesday and not the real one on Saturday are these horses fast at all and she said they are yeah they're gonna be fast

where will you watch it from are you gonna be in the infield or is there is those those days are behind um she she's she's been going she said she'll show me all the all the all the ends and the out she like grew up going like as a high school kid like getting arrested here so yeah at the derby it's a good place to get arrested yeah yeah at the infield uh they got a jail in there and everything. Little horse jail. The inmates. Wait, no, what do they call them?

Who runs jails? The prison guards are horses. The prison guards. Oh, that's fun. Yeah, yeah. But to answer your question, no, did not grow up going on any trips. Never really left Iowa or Missouri.

And so I think maybe that's what the reason I go on all these trips now is I can. But were you like, I mean, I would have guessed that you camped as a kid, like, because you're, I mean, you seem like a man. No. Really? Never. No, I grew up in the woods, like way out in the woods outside of Manchester, Iowa. So I always thought, why would I camp? I already live camping. I wanted to go to cities. Right. So it's like, you just want what you don't have, you know? Yeah. So yeah, never, never traveled, like, would go to Missouri in the summers to farm. Like, that was our vacation. Because your family, your family had a working farm. Yeah, yeah. So we'd go there and we would help on my grandparents farm. My whole life I ever went on. I went on two vacations in my whole like growing up,

both were to the Wisconsin Dells, which was, I don't know, four hours away. Yeah. But like if you, if you asked me how far away it was based on how much my dad flipped out and got mad, I would guess a four-day, like, horse ride. It was.

Yeah. It was, yeah. I thought we were going to the moon with the stress that he would bring. So did you, you went twice, Were you excited the first time before you saw the Dells? Was this a sort of trip, a kid from Iowa was psyched about?

Yeah, the Wisconsin Dells are the water park capital of North America. I don't know what's going on in Asia, probably some pretty sick water parks. But it was the most exciting thing that I've ever been a part of. It was incredible. We went to Noah's Ark, which is the biggest water park in North America. They had a new ride there called Black Thunder. I still think about it. It was awesome.

Describe Black Thunder, what goes down? you go down. You go down very fast. It's a black tube, and it's just got thunder sounds. But then on the inside, there's like lightning. So like, you'll be going through pitch black and then out of nowhere, it's just like, and like, so it lights up.

It's like you're in a storm, and so you can't see anything. And like, you know, I was 10 and I was like, I swear to God I got air in there. I'm not even joking. My head touched the top of the tube. Like, it was the most fun thing I've ever done. Also, the first time we went, my dad was stressed about money, and there was Arby's was doing a five-for-five deal.

And so we stopped in Dubuque, Iowa, and he got 50 Arby's roast beef sandwiches. 50. And he put him in a blue cooler that just the ice, like, it was like a heater for ice. It turned into a tub right away. And so the Arby's got so wet. And the plan was to eat these 50 Arby's roast beef sandwiches for the trip, for the whole family. Oh, my God. And so we all had it for lunch.

And then at dinner time, we're like pulled over the side. And my dad's like, all right, time for dinner. He goes to open up the Arby's. My mom goes, Jim, this is fucking crazy. And they were, they were observably bad to eat at that point. Yeah, but he wouldn't admit this was a bad idea. Right. So he, we didn't have to eat it anymore, but he's like, fine for me.

He ate wet Arby's for the rest of the week. Just despite everybody, you'd be like, I don't know what you guys are talking about. Just gagging on Arby's. I like that his esophagus was Black Thunder for the Arbyes. Just like that. That was like just water slide Arbys. Yeah, so that was fun. I remember also on that first trim, I remember both of my brothers got to bring their girlfriends.

and I didn't get to bring up anybody. So that was pretty weird looking back that they were just hanging out, and my parents were hanging out, and then I was just running around Noah's Ark having a blast. But the other crazy part about my family and vacations is before I was born,

I'm the youngest. They had gone to Disney World twice, all of them. Actually, one time after I was born, they left me. It was like two. And they're like, we're not going to bring this guy. This guy sucks.

So they had gone to Disney World twice, and my house was covered in photos of my brothers and my mom and dad at Disney World. Like with like Chip and Dale holding my brothers and my mom and dad smiling. And I only know these people as miserable Iowa people. So I would like, they'd gone places. And I asked my dad for real when I was like five, I was like, why don't we go to Disney World anymore?

And he said, because we had you. We can't afford it anymore. We're a perfect family for four. Now we got five. We can't do Disney World. anymore. And that doesn't make your brothers love you. No. Right? They were pretty upset. Yeah. How much

younger are you? Four years. Not insane. Okay. What's the gap between the first two boys? Two years. Yeah. So, but you do seem like an afterthought and then your dad has made it demonstrably clear that you were. Yes. You're like, here's the thing, Brooks. You've got to be as charming as

Chip and Dale. Yeah. Yeah. I'm like when the Rugrats had Dill. How old were you on that first trip to the Dells when your brothers are bringing girlfriends? I would have been like 12 probably, so they'd be like 16 and 18. Okay. I remember also on that trip, they each, you know, you can go dress up like old-timey, like a Western guy and get like an old Western photo.

Yeah. Both my brothers wanted to do that with their girlfriends. And I wanted one too. And my dad was like, well, just jump in one of your brothers in his girlfriend. So there's one of my brother and his girlfriend, and he's the oldest one. He's like, he's not coming in mind. And then my other brother was like, Brett, he was nice. He was like, he can be in mind.

So it's him and his girlfriend as cowboys. And then I'm just in the back with a gun. We have one of those that I feel like still in the bathroom at home. Yeah. And I'm in a dress. I wanted to wear like a full, like what are it? Not flappers. I don't know what they call those dresses back of the day.

Yeah. What? Where? You know, like those western saloon dresses. It was real like deadwood sort of dress. Yeah, but why did you pick? Why did I want to be a dress like an address? I don't know. I think I thought it would be like attention grabbing.

I was trying to like make headlines, you know. And I was a dude and I remember Seth is like stealing. We borrowed like a credit card from mom and dad. And Seth was like stealing money from. Yeah, I'm like stealing money from you. That I remember dad thought that would be like priceless. I remember a lot of coaching. Larry was 100% behind it.

Yeah, but so wait, so your parents are all, you're all four in this? No, it's just the two of us. But dad was like, this will make this a priceless moment. You're going to be like robbing Josh. And so Josh has a real like, wow, wow face. Josh has given sort of Larry David end of curb face. That's good stuff. And I'm, yeah, before Larry David was doing it.

Yeah, we were just full, yeah, I probably got it from that pick. Absolutely, yeah. So second Dells, how long a break? Was it one year in between, do you think? I think two years, probably two years. And it was less great because, you know, we'd done it. But it was, you know, 14 versus 12 out of water park is a big difference there. You know, I've seen Black Thunder.

I know what it's bringing. I'm excited for the plunge. But yeah, we went. I remember that time I got yelled at because I wanted strawberries and some lemonade that I got. And my dad's like, he's got to have strawberries in the limited. And we went to like, oh, I remember on that one, I did, we went to, we went to like a bar that was having karaoke. First time I've ever seen karaoke ever.

And it's like a real bar. It's not like a family bar. It's not like senior frogs. Just a bar in the Wisconsin Dells. And I karaokeed the Hanukkah song by Sandler. Wow. Wow. Yeah.

To a 14-year-old, to a bar of people who are not, they don't think this is funny or cute. They're like, what's he doing in here? He shouldn't be here. And I can't read the words fast enough. I'm bombing. It was terrible. It's interesting because we just played that song for our kids who do celebrate Hanukkah. And you realize among the Adam Sandler work, like that is a super catchy anthem, but less jokes for a kid.

you know, they don't get like, you know, Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock, like a rod crew he converted, like, or I bet his agent is. Like, there's, like, the joke, whereas my wife played a piece of shit car for them. And I, it's the hardest I've ever seen them laugh. It's the best. They were, like, they were shaking so hard. I thought they were going to, like, literally, like, David Banner into the Hulk out of their car seats. Truly, I remember when they're all going to laugh at you can. out, you know, we couldn't have it at school. Absolutely not, you know. But we had it on a

compact disc and like, we were listening to it at recess, like truly laughing. There's no better laugh than when you can't laugh. So it was just like trying to hold it in because they're like, we're listening to Adam Sandler for laughing. Dude, it was, that stuff was the best. Yeah. Where do you, are you guys in a hotel room? Are you spread out when you go to the house? All, all, everybody in one hotel room. Even the girlfriends, even when they were there? girlfriends. I'm pretty sure. Wow.

I don't really see, I don't really see splurgeon on two rooms. There's, you know. So are there some sleeping bags on the floor then? Or like, how do you? One million percent. Yeah. One million. I remember the first time I got to sleep in a hotel bed.

I was like 23. It was, I was very, very hotel floor. I was a hotel floor boy. They said a cot is extra and your dad made you sleep on the wet Arby's. He's like, basically a mattress, bro. he's a little guy. It's a little coughing. It's fine.

We can get in there. But, but yeah. So we also, I went, one time my dad drove us to a NASCAR race. That was, that was fun. We went to Michigan NASCAR race one time. Did you, when you talk about your summers, like, how long would you go work on the farm? Was that like a week vacation or was it longer?

Yeah, it would be however much time my mom had off, you know, so like maybe two weeks we'd go to Missouri. Would you look forward to that? Yeah, very much so. going to Missouri. Even though it seemed labor intensive or it sounds labor intensive. But it was, but like it was a cool farm.

It was a dairy farm versus like Iowa is all like hog farms. Right. And so like farming there is like fun. You got like, you know, 50 cows you're just dealing with and my grandpa's milking and like my cousins are all there. So very much enjoyed that. But that was a seven hour drive. And you know, I would think about that drive like four months out.

I'd be like, oh, my God. I got, we're going to seven hour in the back. It's devastating. And I had, you know, I had children brothers and they would play this game when we were on long drives called snake, which was just that middle belt buckle.

It was a snake that eight knees. So it was, this snake loved joints. It would just attack joints. Was there any music in the wheeling car? Yeah, but it was all like with my oldest brother and my dad,

like they would play this game too where they would try to guess the music first. And I was pretty far behind an age. So unless it was literally Adam Sandler, I was never going to get it. It was like, so they were listening to the radio and playing name that too. Yeah, like pressing next and being like, oh, fucking ACDC, you know, or oh, oh, Tricia Yearwood. And I couldn't even, I couldn't keep up with it at all. So there's a lot of me in the back, praying that we would somehow get on a joke station. You talked.

I mean, I, you know, again, we're on the road together. You're very funny material about your family. Based on that and based on what you've said earlier in this podcast, your dad over the course of a seven-hour drive. Like how many times is he kind of losing his ship? None because we were afraid he would, so we didn't talk or anything, you know? I mean, like, when I'm getting. when I'm getting the belt buckle to the knees, I got to eat that.

I cannot make a noise. Otherwise, then he will lose his shit. So yeah, I was just, you know, it's seven hours of just the tensest silence.

What's your mom doing? Your mom's just like, is your mom chill up there in the passenger seat? Yeah, it was kind of the thing where if you had to pee, you told,

you whispered it to my mom. You sent like a smoke signal to her. So she would then be like, Jim, have to pee, so then he couldn't say no to her peen. He could say no to us. So I was like, I had a free to pee. And she's like, Jim, I got to pee.

He's like, ugh. That's the way. Full up. So what were your responsibilities on the farm? What kind of stuff were you doing? I honestly, if you ask, I was pretty young, but I was mostly just hanging out, like, while my grandpa drove around on the tractor. Like, he had like this old Alice Chalmers tractor.

I would sit on the side, and I would let my feet dangle. and there was these massive wheels and that my heels would just get kicked by these treads on this huge tractor that I'm sitting on that if we hit a bump, I'm falling into like some sort of torture device.

I would be killed within I don't know, one second. And it's not like people hadn't fallen off the fucking tractor and got run over. This is consistent on this farm. People are getting run over all the time. But since this is my mom's dad, she's like, he knows what he's doing.

I was like, I don't know if he knows what he's doing. But it was really fun. It was cool hanging out there. I remember one summer I was there on my birthday. It was in August. And a calf was born. And I was jazz. I watched this cow get born.

They had to like put a rope in and pull it out. It was crazy. Wow. Like, it was like coming out the wrong way. So it was just like, my uncle's pulling a cow out of another cow. And I'm like, I'm turning eight. And I'm like, Jesus. And I remember my grandma was like, oh, it's your birthday.

You can name the cow. And I was like, oh, sick. B.J. Armstrong is my favorite Chicago Bowl. He played at Iowa. I'm going to name it BJ Armstrong. I'm turning eight. I bet my grandma's 60 at the time. She's like, no, I hate that name.

We're not naming the cow, BJ Armstrong. She's like, we're going to name it Brooks. I go, what? Also, just telling me its name is B.J. Armstrong. I don't live there. Just be like, yeah, sure, BJ Armstrong. I like that the punishment for a kid is like, if your name's bad enough, it's your name.

So you get one shot. If we hate it, it's you. It was so quick. No, that sucks. You're going to name it Brooks. What? And then, like, I'm not even joking. So that would have been in the summer.

We went back at Christmas and I was like, where's Brooks? Where's my cow? Where's Brooks? And my grandma was like, what? I don't know. And, like, completely not even named it that. I was so disappointed.

I was like, I have a cow. And she's like, Don't we know. We were just being nice with your birthday. Did you ever take a trip without your parents back to the Dells? Or have you just gone the two times in your life? Just the two times of my life. I would love to go back. I really genuinely

like I really want like a white lotus that happens at the Wisconsin Dells. Like I think that, like I want to make that sort of a show. When I was 21 was the first time I ever saw the ocean, me and my friends drove to Myrtle Beach from Iowa City. Wow. Just through the night. Just had to get

there. And when we went swimming in the ocean, it would have been so cold. I can't believe how cold that must have been, but we'd never seen the ocean. So we all just jumped in with like boogie boards. We're spoiled being, you know, East Coast kids whose mom grew up in, you know, like a coastal town that we used to go visit. But like, what's it like when you see the ocean for the first time at 21? Is it like, I mean, have you seen it so much in like film and television that it doesn't blow your mind? I mean, I'd already had a tattooed on my body. I already had had a seascape tattooed on my body by this point, because I just was obsessed with going to the ocean. You know, my whole, like, surfing looks so cool.

It looks so cool. And I live in Iowa is, I also kind of think Iowa, I'm a little frustrated that my parents decided to raise a family there. Because it couldn't be further from anything that I found cool. You know what I mean? Like, it's great if you like it, but I was like, I really want to go to the mountains or the ocean. They're like, they are forever away. So the first time I got to see the ocean, I'm pretty sure I was with my girlfriend

who we grew up together and we cried. Like, oh my God, like it is truly the coolest thing I'd ever seen. And it took me maybe, I'd say, then I moved to Los Angeles not long after that. It took me like maybe five years before every time I saw the ocean I had to go jump in. Like no matter what.

Yeah. I didn't matter if I was going to the beach or not. I was like, there's the ocean. We got to go get in because we can because this is a possibility. So, and then when I moved to Los Angeles, I had a job as a biomedical engineer at this company in Irvine called Edwards Life Sciences. And Irvine is like 15 miles from the beach, probably, in Orange County. And it was a really good job.

They hooked me up with like a realtor to go, show me around and like pick a, pick an apartment. And they gave me a signing bonus of $7,500. And my like starting salary was like $80,000. I had made $0 in my whole life. So I was like, this is incredible. I'm really rich. And so the realtor was taking me around to nice apartments, like around Irvine. And I was like, ah, no, I want to be by the ocean.

And she's like, okay. And then we went to Newport Beach and she was like, here's this. I go, ah, you got to see the ocean. I want to be able to see the ocean. She's like, it's like, it's like over that hill. Like, I got to see it. So then she was like, I think I know like this trap house you might like. So it was on beach and PCH in Huntington Beach called The Breakers.

And I was like, it was so much worse than anything she had shown me. But I was like, I love it. I was the ocean. It's right there. And so I moved there and met a bunch of real psychos who also were excited about the ocean. And that was great. And so what was your commute to work every day based on the fact that you had to be the ocean? Like an hour of hell.

Right. It was brutal. Yeah, that doesn't seem like, that doesn't seem like, early. Irvine to Huntington Beach, you never, you don't picture people being like, oh, that's a, that's a super easy drive. No, it wasn't too bad. But then I would drive from Irvine to Los Angeles after that to go to work. I mean, to go to do stand-up. And that was, that was brutal. I will tell you this story about engineering. The first time I ever, I also never flew on an airplane until I was 22. And the reason I did the first time was I was going to college for engineering. and I just did the career fair, and I just gave my resume to a bunch of different people.

And I got an interview with this company called Schlumberger, which is, it's an oil refinery company located in Dallas, Texas, that will accept all types of engineers, mechanical, biomedical, I was also working in like cardiovascular biomechanics. So that was tubes, which oil fields are, you know, tubes. So, like, I had a good reason that I could possibly be able to work there with fluid dynamics. But I didn't want to work there because it was in Texas and an oil industry. I didn't want to do any of that. But I did want to fly on a plane and they were willing to fly me on a plane to interview in Dallas.

And I was like, cool, I'll come out. I never flown a plane. It was so sick. We fly to Dallas from Cedar Abbots. And I land and I'm like, amazing. But then I have two days of interviews and I'm like a, I don't want to, I want to make people happy. So I try really hard in my interviews. You know, I'm doing my best.

And I realized on the last day that if they offer me this job, I probably should have to take it. I might have to take it because it'll be a good paying job. And I don't have any money. And I went to college for this. So in the last day, my exit interviewer there, they were like, tell us why you're a slumberger person. And I was very honest with myself. And I literally told him, I go, please don't give me this job. Like, and he was like, I'm sorry.

What? I go, I don't want to live in Dallas. And he goes, what? Why did you always know? And I was like, yeah. And he was like, why did you come out here and do the interviews? I was like, I never flew on a plane. You guys flew me on a plane.

And he was like, oh, my God. I do. I will say there was a hundred different ways to do it than the way you did it. With that said, I feel like the way you did it. With that said, I feel like the way you. you did it, allowed that guy to go back to his boss and be like, I think we just dodged a major boy. They're like, did he take the job?

He's like, no, but I think we're all right. He just gave up two days of his life for a plane ride. It was cool. I never flown in the sky before. Yeah. Hey, we're going to take a quick break and hear from some of our sponsors. Hey, Bali. Hey, Sufi.

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Going back to that Myrtle Beach trip real quickly. So you got a bunch of friends and a girlfriend, and that's how you make that drive? Yeah, there was probably like 20 of us in like three cars. By the time we got to Davenport, we'd all split up somehow. Like, we're like one hour into the drive, we're like, where is everybody? My buddy, my buddy Chase, my buddy Chase was driving his mom's van and we were in his mom's van. It broke down in, um, in Fredericksburg or somewhere in South Carolina. His mom's van broke down and he goes, fuck it. And we all just got, he left it on the road and we all got in a plane and flew home. When we got back to Iowa, his mom's like, where's my van?

He was like, oh, it broke. You can't just leave it? Wow. So then, yeah. But that trip was crazy. That was a really fun. That was a full spring break, senior frogs trip.

So it was like, it was not, it was planned. This was not like, like, Cedar plants last minute. Somebody's like, let's get in the car right now.

It was totally planned. We had like Airbnb or whatever it was at the time. And it was really, really fun. I remember a different drive with that same group of friends one time.

We were going to the Irish, Southside parade in our freshman year of college. And my buddy Steve, he's like, I'll drive and we're like sick. And we get in the car to drive to go meet my other friend Pat's house. And we're like coming into Chicago, like maybe a half hour out. And I was like, all right, let's get the map quest out, like pulled out the map quest. And then I look at it. And I realized Steve had just map quested to Chicago.

Like just typed in Chicago. And I was like, what the fuck? This isn't Pat's house. We're going to the bean. So we had to like pull over, call Pat. It was, yeah. Yeah, Chicago is a sprawling city. You are not.

It was one of the last times they still had the Southside Irish parade. Did you guys ever go to that? I never did. No. Yeah. Oh, it was gnarly, man. It was the first time I was ever like with Chicago kids who grew up in Chicago. We were, we were 18 and 19 freshman in college.

First time I've ever seen this happen where we were walking down the train tracks. And my buddy Pat's like, ah, fuck. I go, what? He goes, we got to go fight these guys. And I'm like, we do? And he's like, yeah, they went to Brother Rice, dude. Fuck Rice. So then they fought on the train tracks.

Oh, my God. Yeah, they were real Southside guys. They're crazy. You, I remember we tried to do a show together once called Best Day Ever. And the idea is that you would go to different towns on their, what they consider. their best day of the year. Yeah. Like being a parade,

be at a festival. And you've kind of made this a staple of your life. Where are some of the places you've gone on, on their best day that you've loved? Oh, that's such a good point. Like, I mean, 2013, 14, 15 was like peak comedy. Stand-up comedy was cool with indie rock. Yeah.

And so I went and performed at a lot of festivals, like Bonaroo. outside lands like Sasquatch. So all of those festivals, like Bonaroo truly for me is the most fun three days I've ever had anywhere. I might not be the same anymore, but like back in the day,

that was truly like the coolest. I really want to go, I haven't been, but I want to go to the Pamplona, like for the Bulls. That looks pretty fun. I think you would be really good at that. Yeah, there's a tomato festival there.

I'm trying to think what like cool, cool stuff I've seen. I'm not a planner. So really it's only if I'm there and something's happening is I'm like, oh, sick. Well, I remember once we were in Columbus, Ohio, and I've gotten better because this was like a couple weeks before my special. So I was like very, like, dialed in and like didn't want to do anything during the afternoons. And I've gotten a lot better being on the road with you, like taking advantage of the day. Yeah. Whereas you were like, hey, it's the pride festival in Columbus.

And you just like, I remember we checked into the hotel and you're like, I'm going to go find the parade. And you just, like, walked out into the city. Yeah, yeah, fully. Yeah, I think it was like, ended up on a float, Ferris Bueller style being like, woo! Like, yeah. I mean, pride parades in smaller towns are the best.

There's so much fun because, like, everybody's really jacked up, you know. Oh, my God, I was in Nashville with my dad recently. And it was Nashville's Pride Parade down Broadway, the main strip, and a lot of conflicted men watching that. A lot of that looks fun, but I don't know about that. It does look fun.

No matter where you land, you're like that. Yeah, exactly. It looks fun. I think Josh will enjoy this. We were driving into Scottsdale, and I was doing what he do, looking for a place that sold baseball cards. Well, can I tell what I think you're going to tell real quick?

Yeah, yeah. Oh, well, there's a couple things. Well, I just want to talk about how us pulling in Scottsdale. Seth had picked up the car in LA, met me in Palm Springs, and then we'd driven to Scottsdale, having the best time, chatting, listening to music.

We're in the middle of Phoenix. It's like eight lanes of highway. We're as far to the left as we can be. It's going to take us two miles to merge to the right. And then Seth goes, Seth goes to me. He's my friend, my old boss, I really look up to Seth. I think he's really smart.

guy. He goes, you think I'm almost out of gas? I look over. The needle was below the E. I didn't know it could go. It wasn't touching it how far down it was. And I go, we got to get gas, man. We are so far in the middle of a highway. Like, if the car goes down, we're, we have to call like a helicopter. It was fascinating that you did not think to get gas. Yeah. We managed to get it. It was the longest I've ever had a conversation with somebody while I was filling up a take gas. I feel like, I feel like, it was fascinating. I feel. Like, you could have listened to a full chapter of a book on tape. It was like, you also, didn't you go from, from LAX to Palm Springs to Scottsdale on a single tank of gas? Yeah, it was not. Yeah. It was crazy. It made me not. I don't believe the fuel gauges anymore.

I'm like, you can go forever on that thing. I think gas is a lie. We then, uh, posh, I was like, oh, I'm going to try to find a baseball card store. And then we realized there was an actual, what would you call it? Like, a baseball card show. Like a baseball. It's like a show. At the stadium.

So we, like, parked at the, where the Diamondbacks play. And Brooks got to see me walking around a baseball card show. Well, also, Seth goes, I really hope that it's not all, like, Pokemon nerds. Which made me realize that in the card collector worlds, there are hierarchies. I'm like, you're all doing cards. You're all nerds, man. Yeah, yeah. You're like, we're going to be bullied different card guys.

But it was a lot of Pokemon stuff. I do agree. But I like the Pokemon, though. So I was excited for the Pokemon stuff. Brooks took a video with me walking in the baseball card show. And then he posted it on social media. What's the happiest I've ever seen you? Yeah, you basically wrote this happy I've seen it.

And how did I respond when I saw that you posted on social media? I mean, I could pull it up because it's pretty funny. First time you've ever kind of yelled at me. Let me find it, but it was, it was basically like, my wife can't see that. He goes, he goes, so we're, we're such, I have such a good friendship with Seth that, like, we're never mad at each other.

We're both just kind of like hanging out. So it's the first time he's ever like, I get out of nowhere. I'm talking to Catherine in the phone. just a heated text exchange. Dude, you can't post. Dude, you can't post. Then a T, nothing.

Take it down. So you're just scrambling. And then the next line, I don't respond right away. My wife can't know I went to, all caps. Baseball card show. So I feel bad. I go, down, down, sorry. You go, immediate divorce.

She gets all the cards. Yeah. It was very good times. But we've had our adventures. It's really fun. And we've got, I should say, I mean, what a nice time to shout out. Brooks and I are going to be in Denver.

What is it? May 8th. May 8th, I think. And then I think our most fun drive yet, we're driving to Albuquerque. Yeah. And we have a show, Albuquerque. May night.

We can listen to some Billy the Kid podcast. Yeah. Something less fun is. this might come out after that. That would be the least fun. You're right, Posh. That would be the least fun. But I will say

Brooks is going to meet a lot of Alexi's family. Oh, yeah. It's going to be my in-laws, Alexi's aunt, cousins. So it's going to be fun. I feel like I'm going to do for you what you did for me in Missouri.

It's going to be a blast. I can't wait. To my cousin's credit, my cousins all, what was so nice about Seth, meeting my cousins is my cousins. They're really nice. They're wonderful.

I love them. Hardcore Republicans. Hardcore Republicans. And so it was nice for them to meet Seth where they're all, like, basically whispering after he left. He was, he didn't bite. Like, they couldn't believe he didn't have horns. Like they, and let me say as well, they were so lovely. And then we saw him for lunch and then a bunch of them came to the show.

And after the show, they were being so nice and so complimentary. And then Brooks, who's just like a total shitster was just like, like, Uncle Dave, what did you think about Seth's jokes about Trump? Like just immediately. I literally go, I go, Travis, why don't you tell Seth your political leanings? And then my cousin, he just goes, I wish you just, I wish you went after both sides. It was a really, really funny way. He was, everybody was in on the joke. And it was a nice reminder of times we used to live in.

Yeah, I mean, that's just it. It was truly a really fun time with people who got, like, you know, who cares very funny. We're having a fun time. Yeah, everybody's having a fun time. It was the best. It was like 2010, it felt like. What is your, of the, like, I remember you were in, were you in Switzerland recently? Were you, I feel like a couple years ago?

I was in the French Alps in Corsica not that long ago. Right. Which was, that was a real seat of my pants. The person I was dating had it. We were in New York. I was doing the show with you and John Oliver at the Beacon. And then the girl I was dating, she had work in London. So we just went from New York to London

And then literally in London She had French cousins She was French and she was like Do you want to go to like I was reading this book by John Crackauer called Eiger Dreams And in it he goes to Fuck

It's in the French Alps It's like the main town I don't remember But Chamonie he goes to Chamonie And I was like you want to go to Shamany And she was like I have cousins To live in Chamonie So we just flew to Geneva

got on a train, met her cousins and Chamonie, goofed around the French Alps, lost my wallet backpacking through the French Alps. That was pretty exciting. But still had my passport. Then we flew to Corsica, which it was one of the coolest places I've ever been. But I'll tell you what doesn't accept a lot of Apple pay, Corsica.

Wait, will you tell John, how did you pay for lunch in Corsica? Cigarettes. So explain. Okay. So we go, we get to Corsica. we get our rental car. We're lied to so quickly by a 12-year-old who's renting cars. It's electric car.

I go, I'd rather have a gas car. She's like, we don't have any. Corsica is the capital of electric car charging stations in the world. No, it's not. I think there's like 12 on the island everyone jockeys for. Half my time in Corsica was trying to charge. my car with other people who'd been swindled, just fuming. But so we get this car also allegedly goes 300 kilometers on a single charge,

maybe 40. It went maybe 40. And so I'm stressed and I'm hungry and we stop at this little town to get a sandwich, like a baggett. And like I should have known right away. Like the cash register is like, you know, a 1920s casino cash register. but not in a fun way, like a real way. And I was like, Kaching or whatever.

And I'm like, oh, my God, there's no way this guy is going to accept my phone for money. And then he finishes the sandwiches. I don't speak French, but Sophie did. And so she's talking to the guy, and she's like, he's pretty upset. He just made us, you just watched him make the sandwiches, and now you can't pay him.

And I was like, ah, I know, I don't know what to do. And so he was like, he had a good idea. He had a good workaround. He was like, there is like a town down the road, go to the gas station. They'll accept Apple Pay. Buy me two packs of cigarettes. Come back. I'll trade you a pack of cigarettes for a sandwich to bring back two packs.

And I was like, incredible. I did that. But then I bought a bunch more cigarettes and everyone in Corsico will give you shit for cigarettes, it turns out. It's like, it was great. I bought like so many sandwiches with cigarettes. And I got better at bartering. I'm like eight cigarettes. How many cigarettes is a sandwich?

And it truly, it was amazing. It was really, really fun. And so despite maybe the lack of Apple Pay, but the cigarette pay alive and well, and lack of charging stations, you loved Corska. Corsca's one of the coolest places I've ever been in my life.

Like, there was, it's always great when no one, I didn't see one American the whole time. It was kind of like where French people go. I felt like Francis Puerto Rico, where it's like, it's part of, France, but like the people there are like, we are not part of France. And they're pretty intense and they're rad. And the best cliff jumping I've ever seen. I'm big on jumping off cliffs into water. That's my favorite thing. Did you do some cliff jumping yourself?

Yeah, yeah. It's called Piana della Clonks or something like that. The Clonks of Piana, which is where I went. Just ended up finding an Airbnb there and stayed. Like that's also how I do vacations them. I don't plan ahead, but if I find something good, I'm like, why would we leave here? awesome. We're chilling. The clonks is also that Corskin movie where the one actor plays the whole family, right? Probably. I don't know. It was good. Oh, wait.

That's good stuff, Seth. That's good stuff. That's really good. It's not good stuff. But I will tell you, that is a real reminder how much more tuned in Josh is to my terrible setups. Well, I was saying if it was just clonks, but it's kalonk. So I was saying kalonk. Oh, yeah. Got it. To me, that sounds like, that's the sound of like a body that's supposed to be hitting the water and it hits a rock instead.

Yeah. Oh my God, dude. I was trying to impress some teenagers so bad. I was jumping from so high off these fucking rocks that in the morning I think it felt like I was in a bad car wreck. Like I was like, oh my God. Like my neck was goo. Because of how you hit the water? You hit the water so bad? I mean, I just kept going higher and higher and higher and I don't know what I'm doing, you know?

So I'm just like, you're catching your arm bad or something. You know what I mean? But then there's also, we called them like, yeah there's a kid there I call the king of the teens this guy's doing backflints he's doing gainers so I was just trying to outdo the king of the teens which is a terrible instinct at your age yeah no no yeah I'm like almost 40 and like not like at no point like athletic no like it's it's it's important it's literally technically

impossible for you to be the king of the teens and yet you're still yeah yep yep yep but falling isn't an athletic sport so you can fall you just got to have the courage to jump baby And then once you're in the air, you'll figure it out. You'll figure it out. You fundamentally just told us the opposite. I was hurting bad, man. You can over-rotate.

You can over-rote. Are you, were you always, like, have you always had this, like, love of jumping from high places? The first time you saw it as an opportunity, were you like, I'm in? Yeah, we would grow up, like, jumping off bridges into rivers in Iowa. Like, that's big, like, big jumping off bridges and rivers. Are you a feet-first jumper, I'm guessing? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, okay.

Yep, yep. I'm not insane, you know. I'm not the king of the teens. Yeah, the king of the teens, you know, it absolutely does that. I'm very excited. It's so fun to talk to you, Brooks. I can't believe I get to see you again in just under two weeks. Looking forward to it.

Yeah, I'm excited. Here's what I'm really excited about what we're going to do. We're going to be driving through Billy the Kid territory, like Lincoln County. New Mexico. So you know we got to stop at some restaurant that's Billy the Kid themed. It's going to be amazing.

We're going to go. Let's do a... Let's get an old-timey photo with you and a dress stealing out of my wallet. Oh, yeah. That's probably a really good idea. We also have to... We're going to stop in Santa Fe.

We're going to eat at one of my favorite places. Obviously, we've talked a lot about I want strands.com on my other podcast. But we were posh. We were in Kansas City. Great Food Town. Oh, my God. We talked about this on my other podcast.

But, uh, we went to this restaurant. It was a, what was it, a noodle shop? It was recommended. It was a noodle shop. It looked really good. It smelled really good. We were hungry.

We purposely didn't eat all day so we could have a nice dinner. We four went because we did two shows in Casey, a four and a seven. We were like, let's not eat in between because that's not like dressing room food, no matter how good it is, not rewarding. And then after the show, we had a lot of guests. We were like super, it was nice to talk to. We didn't rush out. and then we get to this restaurant

and we forget, you know, it's not New York City, it's Kansas City, and we walk in to the noodle shop and the Major D very kindly he's like, oh, we just shut down the kitchen and Brooks was like, oh, can we? And she's like, no.

And she like double-checked. It was 10.01. And I didn't feel good about what I did. Yeah, I felt even worse. Brooks goes, yeah, I threw Seth under the bus a little bit. Brooks goes, do you know who he is? And she was like, yes.

and he was like, and it doesn't make a difference? She's like, no, I'm sorry. And he goes, okay, okay, but I'm the one who said it, right? Like, you can never say he's the one who said it. I did was like, he did not say, do you know who I am? I actually don't know this guy. I can't believe he's in here separate from me. No, I had your back being like, I really feel bad that I did that,

but please do not tell anybody it Seth said, do you know who I am, I want my noodles. Yeah. And then we ate across the street in a too fast, too furious movie. Truly. None of the stars. Yeah. None of the stars.

Just like guys, like just revving cars and motorcycles. Like in a little hamburger shop, like right next to the parking lot. It was the loudest. Also, Brooks got the weirdest sandwich I've ever seen. It was the most stressful. It was more stressful than watching my dad eat the RBA sandwiches. Like, it was so stressful to eat there. Also, we were standing in line behind a woman who had been at our show and very kindly was like talking to us for a long time.

And then like, but like too long. And then I was like, because they were like, there was, I was like, oh, do you need to order? She's like, oh, no, I already ordered. And I'm like, oh, you're really standing in a line position. I was like, what did you think we were doing then? Right, right. Yeah. So, yeah.

So we had to loop around, make our order. So I got a hot, I got a coni dog. I got a coni dog. And I'll send you a photo of it because it's so fucking crazy. Coni dog. And they know, what do you want on? I go, everything. Coney style.

It was, they did not warn me of how this conied hot dog was going to come, which was three half slices of a hot dog. Three, not, it was one and a half hot dogs, but on a hamburger bun in a star shape. And they just was like, here's your, here's your hot dog. Brooks was so spun out about where the other half of the second hot dog was. I want a life's great mysteries. Yeah, Brooks was just like, he couldn't. get over it. It was a bad scene. You know what I thought about the next day that I was like,

that was really crazy that we did that. We walked through the Fast and the Furious parking lot back to the hotel. And there was a like a crevice that we squeezed through, which were two cars that were on. Yeah. Like bumper to bumper like ready to just drive into each other. We're like, just

going to squeeze through real quick. You guys don't mind. In the middle of a race, I'm like, we really could have got hit there. They were like trying to back one car up and we were just like, it was a real show of masculinity from us that had no reward. The other thing, I haven't told Josh this, and I'm happy to say he did not leave the mark I wanted, we had a real quick turnaround of like, let's drop our bags, which, by the way, we shouldn't have done. We should have gone straight to the noodle shop.

But like, let's drop our bags and then me to the noodle shop. And I walked in, it was a nice hotel room in the city, nice hotel. And I walked in and there was, if you can picture Josh in the bathroom, the toilet part of the bathroom, had a shower door, like a glass shower. door. Like, you know, like, but like, it was weird because, like, I know, like, sometimes in an en suite bathroom, there'll be a door to the bathroom. But, like, an all glass door seems crazy because, like, what, yeah, what end?

Right, precisely. And I thought, I, when I went into my room, I kicked, I kicked that glass door because I also was, like, didn't see the door. So I, like, kicked it with my, on accident, like, hit it with my foot. And I was like, oh, I got to, I wonder if Seth had this problem. And then I came out with the biggest welt on my forehead. He ran face first into it Fucking face first

And like Poshy Saw stars Like literally had to like Hit it so hard Made a that made the Cachonk Like the Corsican Cliffs Just crashed my head

Had to sit on like the edge Of the tub being like Will Brooks know to get a doctor If I don't show up When you saw stars Did they have three halves of a hot dog in between. Yeah, it was a hot dog show. Yes, yes, yes. Um, no, you, you were, you were, it was crazy. That's what I knew like you're, um, you can tell like guys, like guys,

I guess, who had dads who would fly off the handle a little bit. Uh, and I feel like the kids of them are either go same or nothing bothers them. You hit your head in a way that our dads would have gotten a hammer to that door. You know, they would have shattered that door. And you were just like, ow. I was very much, right. I was, I was, I was, I took. I was, I took blame, whereas my dad would have blamed the door. Yeah. Even though I do think the design was faulty, like, you still can't walk into a door in your, in your bathroom like that. No, it didn't make any sense for that door to be there. It doesn't make any sense. Right. It's like, so what, to what end? A glass door. So now you're

with somebody and they're pooping, but you can, like, see them. Also, it's not like a, it's not like a sealed smellproof door. Like, no, nobody wins. It just goes up and over the top. Yeah. All right, Brooks, Before we let you go, Josh is going to ask you our speed round questions. Okay. All right. You can only pick one of these. Is your ideal vacation relaxing, adventurous or educational? Adventurous.

100%. Yeah, of course. What's your favorite means of transportation? Trains. If you can take a vacation with any family, alive or dead, real or fictional, other than your own family, what family would you like to take a vacation with? It's always sunny Philadelphia family Great Great

If you had to be stranded on a desert island With one member of your family Who would it be? Yeah, my god Oh, pass, pass What is your dream destination For a family vacation? I really want to go to Southeast Asia

I want to go to Vietnam Yeah You are from Manchester, Iowa, is your hometown, correct? If you had to get more families to come visit Manchester, Iowa, what would you tell them about your town? Nothing. I would give them... If you wanted them to visit, you can't tell them what it's like.

You got to trick them. If you want to get people to visit Manchester, you've got to lie. You know, say, oh, my God, it's a... It's like a Santa's workshop. They do a Santa's workshop. Yeah, yeah. I mean, maybe I'd tell them about the pet shop called the fish shack that has a bird named Peaches that if it's out, it does bite. And so, you know, when you're little, you open the door to the fish shack because you want to look at a fish.

You go, is the bird out? And if it is, you, you know, you don't go in. And it's out most of the time. All right. Very good. Seth has our final questions. Have you been to the Grand Canyon? Yeah, I rafted down the Grand Canyon 18 days, 230 miles. I knew the answer to me.

You almost died, but it was worth it. Almost died, it was worth it. But honestly, I, here's what, I know that you have the problem with the Grand Canyon. I agree, like, from the top, Grand Canyon, interesting, cool, fine, very whatever. I'm very, what, I was very whatever about the Grand Canyon until I did an 18-day rafting trip through it.

with some pals and no guide. And after that, I was like, this is one of the coolest adventures I've ever been in. But I agree, just to look at it, what are you going to do? You can see a photo, that's fine. Yeah, yeah. All right, great.

Well, you, of course, and I was surprised here, got the most out of it. So very impressive. Yeah. And now, based on that review, I imagine Seth is just looking at his calendar, trying to find 18 days.

Oh, nothing makes me book a trip more than almost died. Well, honestly, that was for the, it was for the SNL 50th. I literally, the SNL 50th was happening. And I had to choose between going to that, going and having the most anxiety I could possibly have in my life, or almost dying in the Grand Canyon. I was like, I'm going to almost die in the Grand Canyon. I really thought about it.

I was like, I think the Grand Canyon will be better for my brain than the S&L 50. You're like, I like my odds better. I'm going to take the Canyon odds. Yeah, exactly. All right, I'll see you in like 10 days, Brooks. Yeah, Josh, I'll see you in L.A. Also, I do want to say one thing that's fun about being friends with both of you is one time I was recently with Seth and I don't know let's say we were in Columbus and like I said bye by by you go to New York. I go to L.A. And then I was in Franklin Village by UCB, which and then I heard

who I thought was Seth arguing about the Steelers, which is a thing that he does. And I'm like, no, I just saw him get on a different plane a different way. I turn around it's Josh. That was your, I was just like, oh, yeah, you guys. It was very fun to see you both in the same day, and it really confused me. Yeah, that's what we do. We cover the coasts. Yep. All right, I love you, buddy. Love you guys.

You're the best. Great. See you, Seth. Bye, Josh. Thank you, thank you. Family chips, brothers. Never got that some bullshit. All the same.

He was psyched, but had to be old. Couldn't make his dad angry Or his temper would That's a slumberjay