The Dogg Zzone by 1900HOTDOG - Dogg Zzone 9000 - Episode 256, Yo-Yo Man with Dan McQuade

Episode Date: December 3, 2025

This week Dan McQuade shares his start into the world of cursed media with an instructional Yo-Yo VHS Variety Show featuring the one and only Yo-Yo Man, Tom Smothers! Also featuring the Yo-Yo Master. Don't confuse the two, they absolutely hate each other and will flip out on you. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Robert will go to jail if you don't buy his book. I know what you're thinking... This is NOT the time to be a wise guy. BUY HIS BOOK. https://linktr.ee/killyourimaginaryfriendd

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Welcome to the Dog Zone 9,000, the official podcast of 1,900 Hot Dog.com. We are keeping alive the ancient tradition of comedy articles. We have talented writers doing a new article every weekday. The only way you can support us is by going to Patreon.com slash 1,900 Hot Dog to sign up.

It's the best deal in jokes. It's the only deal in jokes. End of Ed. I'm Sean Baby from the internet. And my co-host holds the record for most ties and no contests in the World Full Contact Hunk League. He's the great Robert Brockway. I was hoping I was going to win them all from now on. Now that we've broken the streak, but now I got my one day in the sun. I'm right back in the shade of them buns. Here's a Brockway fact.

Dick Smothers is my porn name, but it's really illegal, really illegal for you to look that up or watch any of them. In fact, never mind, no follow-up questions. I read the police report. Our guest is a journalist and co-founder of Defector.com. We love having him. He's Philly's own Dan McQuaid. Welcome back. Hey, thank you. I'm very glad to be on once again. Yeah. What are you up to these days? So I have a couple updates. Unfortunately, not all of them are great. But, yeah, so I wrote, I've known for a long time for over a year, and you, Brockway and Sean have known for a long time, too. I sort of told a lot of people in my personal life and not, but not publicly with my readers. I have, I'm living with neuroendocrine cancer of the

pancreas. It is a chronic, possibly incurable cancer that I will name. now have to live with for the rest of my life. But also, I think it's going to be cool. Not cool in the sense, but like, I don't know, like, I'm going to, like, I'm going to die something else before this cancer kills me at this point. I always say this about you, that you come with such a combination of good and bad news, a violent combination of good and bad news. And escalating. Yes. Yeah, so I just wanted to share with people about my You can go to Defector or, I don't know, probably if you Google, like, Dammequake cancer. You'll find a little thing I wrote about it.

People told me it's pretty upbeat and uplifting. That is credit to my wife, who, after reading the first draft, said, this is too sad. You need to redo it. So she is a great editor. She said your cancer story was too sad? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, okay. The kids want to laugh.

I would take that note. I went and read it again, and I'm. I'm glad that I read something that was a bit more upbeat. Yeah, but I'm doing well. I had radiation, and I had three surgeries in the past year, where they went into my liver and killed tumors. And I am doing much better now. I get a monthly shot that basically keeps the original tumor in my pancreas dead.

My organs have far fewer tumors in them now than they did a year ago. And I'm doing very well. I look, I look good. Fucking fantastic. Yeah, it's all good news. And I sold a book. I'm writing a book for Barrowhouse, which is a literary imprint. It's based around here in Philly, and it is about shopping malls.

And unlike Brockway's waiting until he's contractually obligated, I don't even have a title. I don't really have like a clear like thesis the book proposal was like several things I've already written and two paragraphs which is great because I've written like 50 page book proposals

that have not been picked up so I'm glad that the one that I did had to do much less work on is the one that finally sold and I'm glad that there's no like Dammequay dating memoir out there no those lawyers have been a

love you so much. I bet I bet the next time I'm in a meeting they're going to be like have you said you heard this from Dan McQuaid he's he's promoting and it's not even a title he doesn't have to he has cancer he's not a book yet yeah and he's doing it with cancer what is you're like you making my life difficult you know you come on this podcast and you make my life difficult I didn't make you watch anything long this time that's the first it's the first time I thought like I'll accept we do appreciate that we do appreciate that This was like 28 minutes. I think a lot of, not a lot of notes for the 28 minutes.

Oh, really? I have way more than one might expect. Yeah. You always come with the research. Yeah, I have some really good research about some of the people in this video. And it is, it is more than I thought it. I didn't like the vibe of Yon Master. Before we get going, Brockway, does that count us a plug?

You mentioned in your book or do we need to officially plug to it? No way. My fucking lawyers are going to let me get away with that. After Dan, after Dan's show up here, after your big brother is a lawyer coming into the Thanksgiving family reunion? No. No, I have to plug my book. My book is called I Will Kill Your Imaginary Fred for $200. I guess I'm going all out for this one. I just got my very first starred review in Publishers Weekly. They loved it. That's kind of a big deal to the kind of people that. Yeah. That's awesome. Oh, congratulations. It's a huge deal to people that read publishers weekly. Which is, you know, I mean, it's booksellers and stuff. It's cool. It's cool. It's coming out January 27th, 2026. You have to pre-order it because I fucked up. I'm not going to get into it, but I fucked up.

And I'm going to prison if I don't sell enough books. And if I go to prison, Dan's going to prison, too. I have a lot of blackmail. Yeah, wait a second. He has cancer. Are you going to send him to prison with kids? answer? No. You have to buy my book, uh, and not his because you can't yet, only because you can't yet. Buy mine instead. Save up some more money. Buy mine a few more times along the way.

And then when his comes out, buy his. Uh, I'll, I'll surely be free by then. I'll be free or I'll be free. I'll be free one way or another. Baby, I'm not, I'm not getting caged. Uh, that's my plug. I wouldn't say it's a good plug, but it's a powerful plug. I think it. Well, hold on. I, I, I, I, I mentioned the good review. That's a positive. I did threaten a man with cancer. That's kind of a negative. I threatened suicide again. I said I'd stop doing that. Yeah. I feel like we don't need to itemize it. I think people know what you did wrong. But I also think they're going to pre-order your book. Yeah, that's all the matters. Is threatening a man with cancer along with like the tone of the book? I'm sure. That's in the book. If you loved me doing that. The book's all about that. If you didn't like it, it's about something else. All right. I do love your book. I agreed with that reviewer. Sorry for the sincerity. It's a great book. I don't know what to do with that.

Yeah, just let it sit with you. Fucking explore how that makes you feel. All right, we are doing media origin stories of our favorite guests and dear friends. And Dan, your life was changed by a film I'm actually familiar with. It's the 1988 straight-to-consumer VHS tape, the Yo-Yo Man instructional video with Tom Smothers. Yeah, I had this as a kid, and I never really. did the yo-yo but I remember watching this a lot because I just found it really funny watching it again I can sort of tell why like five-year-old me found it really funny and in other

ways no but I did for this I thought I was going to do like a whole bit where like I was going to try to learn the yo-yo and I tried a bit this week and I am not any good so I could barely get it back up into my hand consistently so it's a real specialized skill like once you get it you can do most of the tricks from this video most four out of the nine i would say but like yeah i think the smothers brothers were sort of like tailored for five-year-olds uh if you're not familiar with the smothers brothers uh it's a stage performance duo uh if you're too young to remember there it's like if ned flanders uh and mike pince formed a comedy troupe uh and fun fact smothers It's not the real name, but it is the way each of them lost their wives.

One of them has a yo-yo, and the other one has a cello. The cellar does not come into play today. He never plays it once this entire video. I actually saw this video all the time because it's a Kodak video program video, and they had a whole line of straight-to-consumer VHSs like this, like the ultimate roller coaster thrill ride and Isaac Asimov's I-Robot. I have all these weird medias and all. all of them advertise this video.

So I probably saw the ad for this 50 times before I ever watched it. Was it always the same ad or could you piece together one of those situations where you could piece together the whole video based on just having seen 30 different ads? No, it was the same ad every time. I think what I like about it is a couple weeks ago we talked about Fred Williamson and his nickname was the hammer. And I always thought like that was a high stress nickname because like he was a martial artist and a football player. So he's like never met a guy, never been. in a situation where every other guy was not competing for that nickname, right?

Like, he's met a lot of guys like, no, dude, I'm the hammer. Yeah. And I think that's probably five times worse for the yo-yo man. Like, if you go to yo-yo convention, 75% of the men there answered to yo-yo man. And, like, they're the yo-yo man for where they're from. When I was searching old newspapers, like, I found a lot of yo-yo men. Yep. impossible to work through all the yo-yo-man results.

I found two different people who there were articles about them, about how, like, yo-yo-man goes to school, does performance, but is it just to sell yo-yo's? And it's like, well, kind of, yeah. He probably also gets paid for his appearance, but, like, yeah. But I found, like, two different, like, in the 70s and the 90s, I found very similar articles about two separate guys. Now, were your schools also plagued by these guys?

Like, I saw it a lot in pop culture, but, like, talking to other people about their childhoods, I feel like it was every week at my school. There was somebody there. I remember there was a hacky sack one. I remember there was a kushball one, a kushball assembly, a yo-yo assembly. Like any grifter that wandered through town, they were like, you're coming to school, buddy. yeah dude yeah you had that okay yeah i went to catholic school i feel like we mainly got like lectures on like why to stay a virgin and uh like anti-drug stuff because it was the like 90s

and did they sell you the kids rhythm methods afterwards like what do you sell they did not we had this guy the the most memorable speaker we had at my high school was big al who was a guy who was a guy who used to play for the Harlem Globetrotter's opponent, the Washington Generals. And he told us that, like, if we, he's like, if you do drugs and he like squashes a basketball. Take it from me, professional loser, big out. Yeah.

You'll end up like me. And his gimmick was that his, his catchphrase was do hugs, not drugs, which was like kind of weird from the former basketball player. Like, I feel like you could do like something better. Like, yeah. not that I can come up with like dribble away the drugs I don't know but I guess it worked because he's like the main person who I remember from any assembly I know he the one thing that I remember we made fun of him about is that in his speech he was like and then I got a call that would change my life I picked up the phone and all I heard on the other side was your mother is dead and we were like that's how the phone call started they didn't even say like hey is this Al you know I'm sorry we were looking for Big George big George big George also from the Washington Generals. Just pass that along.

Pass that along in the locker room. I think it's a beautiful message to stick with you, though. Hugs not drugs. Yeah, I mean, it has. The first time we got fucked up together, you just wanted to snuggle him. Like, what are you doing? He's like, this is how you get fucked up, the Big Al way. And I was like, this rules.

I have a clip of the intro that maybe we should, just to help get the tone at the right spot. Let's all be like the yo-yo man. Rocking a bay from the palm of your hand Around the world Then do it again All the falls you know you can Round the corner

Baby in the cradle Loop the loop Now do it if you're able Shoot the moon It's not too far In a flying sauce You'll find your soul It's a little bit of heart

But never say die Cha-cha baby in the play of an eye Whatever you are Don't ever get low Keep on trying and just say yo Yo Yo Hi I'm Dick Smothers

All right I don't want to be like a Pop Culture apartheid guy But That's not a great sentence to start with But I just don't think Anything with a Smothers brother Should have a rap breakdown

Like I think those are different areas In culture that should not meet yeah i was kind of surprised at how i was not as embarrassed to hear that as i expected to be like i was embarrassed but even though they said just say like they said just say yo and i didn't want to like run out of the room and never watch i think they said juggle the balls i can't be sure but they said it's pretty embarrassing uh yeah i hear your point But I hear Dan's point that it's, it could be more cringe, but it's pretty bad. I think that's how I felt about the whole video.

It's like, you know, there were a million of these, like, instructional VHS tapes. I'm sure, Sean, you have, like, 500 self-defense ones that are each one, like. That's probably, like, the one I have the most of, but I do have several yo-yo videos. Less useful than the last. Yes. But this was made by people who, like, used to have a show on network television. So it's way more competent. You laughed at me when we were DMing about this,

but I do remember being a kid and watching Smothers Brothers, because that's the kind of thing my family would have put on and being sincerely excited when fucking yo-yo man came out. All right, it's a yo-yo-man segment. That's what I don't, that was what I did not get about this, right? Tom Smothers is the yo-yo man, as the song has just kindly informed us. But there's also a yo-yo master in this. And he ascends, like, descends from the heavens to ostensibly, it's not like he teaches the tricks to Tom Smothers, because he'll do him once and then Tom Smothers will do them flawlessly next to him.

So they're both like, you're both the yo-yo, like, boss, you're both the boss of yo-yo? Because that's not how this is, it's supposed to be the yo-yo master comes down and we have the dipshit, right? We have Tom Smothers playing the dipshit being like, but I can't yo-yo. No, anybody can learn it. And then you watch the dipshit learn it. And you're like, maybe that's not so hard. Maybe I could do it. No, it stinks of ego.

That's obviously how they should have done it. But Tom's like, no, I'm the fucking greatest yo-yo man. Okay, so that's not just me. Because this felt like how the Rock and Vin Diesel both have it in their contract that they can't lose a fight so that every fight is pointless. They're like, do you like, yo-yo man and yo-yo master? We're like, I cannot lose at yo-yo. I'd be shocked if it wasn't something exactly like that, yeah. Yeah, the skits at the start, he, like, doesn't know how to yo-yo, and then they, like, go that thing where he meets the yo-master, and he just, like, instantly knows how to yo-yo all the tracts.

Yeah, I think Yo-master is more powerful than him. Yo-master, like, comes from the stars, whereas yo-yo man's just, like, a good yo-yo guy. But they can both do equal tricks. Yes. I think there's one that the yo-master does, and we don't see the yo-yo-man. do. And you just see Tom Smothers in the back, putting the hell out of his assistant.

Tearing him on. It's pretty clearly the Yo Master is like a higher tier of yo-yo guy. But also, this feels like really ancient yo-yo tricks. Like if you look at yo-yo competition now,

it's like, these guys are fucking crazy. I did watch like a YouTube video of like Yo-Yo 24 national championships or whatever. And yeah, it was a, quite a bit more advanced than the yo master.

I think I brought up yo-yo's when we were talking about Eurovision on this very podcast because I'd watched a video like during my research. And I was like, these dudes are like levitating. They're taking it off the string and it's like floating it through the sky. So I don't know. Right. This video to me looks like it's like finding a skateboarding video where they just teach you how to safely put your skateboard on the floor and then like over the course of a

half hour, work up to standing on it with both feet. Like, it just feels like such beginner-level yo-yo tricks. And I remember being a child with a yo-yo, being able to do a few of these, you know, like around the world, once you get it going up and down, around the world, you're 10 minutes away. Yeah, I got the sense, like, watching it. I think that might have just been the competency of the yo master. But, like, they showed me those. And even as an adult was like, well, I can do that.

Maybe I should get a yo-yo. Just to see if I can do that because they make it look so easy. but like I know that would end with me with like halfway hog tying myself and breaking my teeth out. It's like a real like lonely indoor kid hobby because the learning process is like you you do a yo-yo and then it doesn't work and then you have to restring the whole fucking thing and that's like 40 seconds and then like that's your day like just restring a yo-yo. I remember doing that when I was a kid. I got a yo-yo and I like tried out and it went it went down and that was it. I never brought it back up again. It went down once, and then I realized I'm going to have to restring this.

And I was like, that's enough. There's too much to do now. I was in the woods. I was so far in the woods with no computer that, yeah, that's a good time for a child to learn a yo-yo. It would never happen today. Thank God for video game brain poison. Thank God for it. Thank God.

I have a clip. They start with like a history of yo, and it's sort of like a, I don't know, like I guess you call it comedy uh i'm gonna play a little people have asked me where did the yo yo come from very good question where did the yo yo come from well no one knows for sure but according to the yo-yo man the evolution of the yo-yo first began a long long time ago when a man was caught observing a frog a lot of visual gags here but you'll get it the frog had a very unusual tongue he thought maybe that tongue could be used for a lot of other things and flicking flies and insects,

he said the tongue went real far out, back and forth. So he held the frog by his long tongue and bounced him up and down. Then he tried around the world. Around the world worked pretty well, too. Yo-yo man looked at the frog and said, it's great fun, but not for you, right?

The frog agreed, and we finished with the frog. Now, the next step, isn't that right, yo-yo man? He said yes, of course. now. Okay. Hot crowd for the Smothers Brothers Brothers. That laugh track is so fucking greedy.

Holy shit. Yes. Seriously. Everyone is dying. If you listen close, when he says like a man was caught, a couple of people start cracking up there. He hasn't not got to the setup to the punchline yet.

That's like a half like through the setup. You're like, somebody caught him. And just for historical clarity, what is the punchline for that setup? Staring at a frog? Yeah, yeah, he looks at a frog Yeah

And that was that fucking slayed That guy laughing at the man being caught He fucking died When he learned that he was caught staring at a frog It's just I think that's why a five-year-old I think likes it Like you're being told

This is the funniest thing you've ever seen You're five you're like yeah Most people know not to get that greedy Like a laugh for this kind of video It's like polite chuckle at best And they put in They put it in fucking showtime At the Apollo up here

And it's like, no. And there is a studio, the crowd there. I think they should have shot of it. It's not a big one. Yeah, they do show it eventually. I mean, I think these clips on stage are just from a like new Smothers Brothers comedy hour show. I think what's funny about this is like this show in the late 60s or maybe early 70s

was canceled because of it's how controversial it was. Like satire of the Vietnam War like talking about. Oh, okay. Racism. And they like, it was like, there was like, that was the show where like the Who did a performance, where they like detonated too much of an explosion on stage. Damn. Yeah.

It's like, it seems so wild that this like vaudeville act was somehow so controversial that it got canceled. But it did. And then the Bill Hicks. 20 years later, they were doing yo-yo. instructional the exact same act that got them kicked off the air yeah you cannot say that about frogs like bouncing his long tongue up and down we know what that means uh they keep going with the little sketches um so the yo yo man meets like a kid and it's real weird it's just an unattended child

he runs up to him and the kid thinks he's a loser and then he says he meets a beautiful woman he says can I go home with you beautiful woman and she's like no and then he meets Richard Nixon I want to say but they didn't get a Richard Nixon impersonator and they don't call him Richard Nixon by name so I got Nixon from it too because of the peace sign but otherwise that's just a drunk hobo and then he discovers the yo master that a cloaked nerd from the stars comes down and now it's a hard pivot away from fun like they're no longer doing sketches in fact the next thing that happens I wrote down he reads the entire table of contents to us.

We'd learn how to string a yo-yo. It is so slow and deliberate, like a really effective way to teach someone how to string a yo-yo, which... There's one part where he puts the scissors back in his pants and, like, stabs himself in the dick, and then they just move on instantly with no explanation. Right, but that's the only fun you're allowed to have for, like, the next 10 minutes. Like, that was it. He doesn't do that for every step.

We only see the... Like, there's a part, you know, they're doing these, like... They do this throughout where, like, the yo-o-man and the yo-master will be both on the screen at the same time. like superimposed on on one another we get that once in the like setting up the yo-yo thing but it's just the yo-yo man twice and it's for the string replacement section which they say you should do every few days that's fucking crazy which seems like too much how much are you yo-yoing yeah that's assuming eight to ten hours a day of solid yo-yoing which is like the yo-master

considers a conservative he's like let's that's a day of off, sure. You should call a doctor if your child is yo-yoing eight hours a day. Yeah, we have doctors for that now. It's true. You took too much Tylenol, they say. Okay, so yo-yo man is from the stars. He looks like you'd expect. He's got yellow shoes, red pants, turquoise suspenders that fucking play havoc on their green screen, a yellow blouse and a Rafi face. He looks like a hot dog magician is what I have in my notes. Yeah, he's like Hulk Hogan or Ronald McDonald, like a taller, but a big dork. I just wrote down he looks like a Slovakian immigrant, but from the Slovakia that's in

space, like a different planet's Slovakia. Right. Yeah, like if they made a Star Wars for 50 bucks, a Slovakian Star Wars, this would be their C-3PO? Yes, there it is. Slovakian C-3PO from Slovakian Star Wars. So this yo-yo, this yo-master is named Daniel Volk. Okay.

And I will talk more about him like after the stuff. That sounds like crimes. Because I have some good stuff about him afterwards. But let's me and Brock, we're going to say our guesses on the count of three. One, two, three, sex crimes. Strangling children. No, no sex crimes I could find, which is... Oh, I didn't rewind out, though.

But it might even be stranger than... But anyway, he worked for the Duncan Yo-Yo company and did, like, demonstrations. Okay. So I assume he might be the guy who would come to your school. Yeah, he was the guy that came to school, for sure. Or a guy with exactly as much to lose as him, the exact same vacantness behind the eyes. I live in a van. my life has yo-yo's.

I guess when they get two tricks in and yo-yo man's like, I'd like to try that myself. And then the yo-master vanishes, but then he comes right back. I don't understand. It does feel like this was a totally different story. And then Tom's mother's like, dude, I'm the best yo-yo guy fucking chop something together that makes me look cool. Because there is a lot of scenes where they're clearly not together. And I thought at first, like, maybe this is for yo-yo safety. But I think maybe they created a new story with their foot.

because of internal struggles. Yeah. Not enough room on the stage. Like, they were both trying to do a trick. Their strings got tangled. Big blowout. Just stormed off. Their lips touched.

I think that's how you touch tips as a Yo Master. I took a clip of this just so you can kind of just get a vibe of it. Let's watch the YoMaster up close slow motion. Now, he has so much spin on it that he's going to do, you could count them four and a half cha-cha-chas. Four and a half cha-cha-cha-chas. Yeah, seriously. Hey, here he goes.

Start counting him. Oh, here they come. The Rock, the baby Chach-Cha-Cha's. Are you counting? Four and a half. Watch this release, up, out, and away, and with an overhand grip, great catch. So it's fucking riveting. We don't actually see him count.

it when they say great catch it's like off the bottom of the screen and you got a little bit of the calypso remix of the yo-o man song in there which i love this is the rocking the baby where they say the most famous of all yo-yo tricks the yo-yo man gets more requests for this trick than any other and then i thought about it and i was like yeah that seems right this like i feel like i've seen this before i thought about it and was like people request tricks like you're shouting out You're shouting out the hits at the county fair, Van Heelan playing at the county fair? State Fair, I guess, for Van Halen. Sometimes you get a look inside like a celebrity's private life when they say things like that.

And you're like, yeah, that's kind of sad. Are we moving on from this section? Because I have a bet with myself. Yeah, I think we can move on from this section. I just lost the bet. The bet was that Sean was going to do the four cha-cha-cha's and the Dennis Miller voice. I guess. Yes, you win the bet.

Rock the baby, chach, chach, chat. It doesn't count because you brought it up. Four and a half chach chas. Oh, that's funny. Because rock the baby is, it's kind of the, it's got a Dennis Miller rhythm to it. Oh, you're right, it does too. Yeah.

Rock the baby, four and a half chach chas is a great one. The only other big note I have for the, like, explanation of the tricks is before over the falls, they have like, they're playing the little like, do do do do do like jingle and then they have a scream of someone dying going over a waterfall so I like that

that was funny yeah that is pretty funny they do get back to the stage show and he's doing the rocking the baby with the frog and it's like a 20 minute Flintstones joke because they're still doing like the what if he had a yo-yo but it was like a caveman version of the yo-yo yeah and again crowd going crazy

This was what made this insane to me. Like, everything else up to this point is like, yeah, it's fine. I've seen videos like this before. It's weird that they existed, that this was like a thing our culture did. It was only when they cut back to the variety show in the middle of a joke. Like the setup, the setup for the frog thing long gone, he just happens to be doing something that's related. So the implication being, holy shit, the variety show has been running this whole time and we're cutting away from it. Yeah, dude, that's a whole, that's a jump scare.

They're doing a half-hour variety show, and we're going to cut in when we have time. So the yo-yo man has completed the nine basic tricks, and he gets to request any boon from the yo-master. I have a clip of this. In honor of the yo-yo man's completion of the nine basic yo-yo tricks, did he ask for gold, silver, or other material goods? No, he did not. He simply asked for and received his very own suspenders. That's right. Suspenders.

I have no idea why he wanted these suspenders. But then again, they made him so happy. Congratulations, yo-yo man. Congratulations. Okay, so this is like, have you ever seen the Han Solo movie when they ask him his last name? And he says, I want suspenders. This moment is the origin story of my famous suspenders. That's what this was like.

See, I thought it was like a cultural thing. Like, now that the suspenders have been passed from the yo master to the yo man, now the yo master can finally die. He can finally come. And die from it. His species dies after mating. Jesus. All right.

So now they play the Cool Island Calypso remix of... Full Calypso remix. He just does little tricks with cute names. The lyrics include spreading my yo all over the land. That's in my notes. Wait, so the lyrics are, well, I want to be like a yo-yo man, spreading my yo all over the land with a goofy dance and funny clothes he's making them laugh wherever he goes it sounds like a song making fun of Elon Musk

yep have you been following the the groc stuff the last couple days I know we don't usually talk about stuff like this but it I crack up so hard yeah every question is like oh he's better than LeBron James at basketball he's better at yeah and it took like half a second for people to clock this and put in stuff like who's the best piss drinker in the world and the robot's like oh for for sure Elon Musk sucks down the piss like nobody else with this 80 hour work ethic because it's Elon it's it's it's AI it's always the same like cadence it's the same structure to the argument so it's so funny how it used like you can see it twice and then the third time is the piss drinking right you can see it when they're like

who's the best running back, who's the best in the NBA, who's the best piss drinking, and it gets the same format, same bullet points. Even down to the end where it's like, the professional piss drinkers might be able to down a leader or two. But thanks to his business acumen and versatile skill set, the true pissmancer, that's good old Elon. Like every time it comes up with a little summation at the end. It's wonderful.

It's so good. Someone made the point that, like, given the amount of money and time and scope of it, it might be the most embarrassing thing a human has ever done, which is, I think. Not only showed it, but forced it on the world. Yes. If I had done something like this, a private little robot to make me feel good about myself, you wouldn't be able to beat it out of me. Yeah, like, it's supposed to be private. Like, isn't that, like, why lonely people use, like, chatbots, it, like, gives them a, it can be able to. give them a friend. I mean, I know people also use it to like get a recipe or whatever.

Well, they also use it to go insane. Yeah, yeah. Right. But like you want that. Like I don't get how Grock is like a public chat bot. Like no, no, if I'm talking with the chatbot, not that I do like, I want it simply to flatter me. I don't want it to flatter Elon Musk, which obviously is what this public chatbot is built to do. I think I knew it was, I guess I always knew Elon Musk's been an idiot, but, like, he told everyone about this little anime girl. He's like, dude, you're not going to believe this feature. This anime girl will tell you you cool. And I'm like, oh, dude, no one should know you ever fucking fuck this.

And you just fucking blasted this to the entire world. And it's like, they've had this technology since like 1994, man. Like, you've been able to have an anime girl tell you you're cool since like at least Nintendo 64. I have seen him on the Dreamcast if I need to talk to a robot. I took a clip of him now. He's fully in the state of Yo, and he's enchanting everyone, and they get real weird with it instantly.

All right. I am a superhero. Now, when he meets a small child, the child is enchanted. Look at that. Mercy, me. Look how enchanted that child looks. He's becoming very enchanted. Very good, Yo-Yo, man.

It's working. When the yo-yo man meets an attractive young woman, she's enchanted as well. Look how enchanted she looks. Oh, the yo-yo man. That's straightened your string, won't it? Stay here, yo-yo man, you have more to prove. And now when he meets that sour old political loser, he's also enchanted. What's this?

Wait a minute. No, he's not enchanted. It's not working. Try it again, yo-yo man. Please don't fail. try it again yo-yo man go a second time a he kicked him an ass the yo-you-man did it congratulations joey man you've gotten them all into a state of yo so everybody remember just stay loose state cool stay in the groove and of course just say yo i got some questions yeah stay in the groove just say yo i can explain the state of yo

because i found a newspaper art i found the san francisco examiner wrote about it. Okay. When this video, I bet it's sold really well because there were like lots of articles about the yo-yo boom and how the Smothers brothers were a huge part of it from their show. Duncan Yo-Yo said that between 86 and 88 sales of their yo-yo's sword 1,400%. Wow. And they didn't really want to credit Tommy Smothers, but they did. But they did. But, But the PR person admitted he was like, we don't really want to credit him because we weren't able to come to a deal with him

to sell his yo-yo, some other companies doing it. But I guess we have to admit he's really helped the, like, the yo-yo. There is a man named Stuart Crump, who started a yo-yo newsletter. If you said, hi, my name's Stuart Crump, I'd say, sir, I know you have a yo-yo newsletter. Yeah, exactly, exactly. a woman who ran a shop down in Rojoboth Beach, Delaware down the shore, said, people come in and say, I want the yo-yo Tom Smothers using because I'm a fucking asshole.

He's got the air Jordans of yo-yos. What's great is that one of the articles about how big yo-yos are now is there's a company that makes an automatic yo-yo. The one that I was a kid later was called like the yo-yo ball, and it just automatically comes back. up which okay right so the guy who owned the company that made this automatic yo-yo said video games will come and go they're here today and gone tomorrow but the yo-yo whether it's an eight-year-old kid or a 60-year-old guy at one time or another everybody's had a yo-yo name one way he's wrong yeah this that article like right after that the article is like it's like the yo-yo's popularity has probably peaked among on this fat already so the article at the time was like no this guy's

wrong nintendo is bigger prediction didn't survive publication so i said before that the yo master has this guy daniel volk the state of yo comes from a different guy tom coon who's a dentist and he taught smothers most of the tricks not the yo master uh the examiner's story uh says that he He studies Tai Chi also. Okay. And here's like a little clip from the article, like about the state of yo. Explaining the state of yo, Kuhn says, I don't know how metaphysical you want to get. But the state of yo is a meditative state.

Your concentration is totally focused. Just like when Jack Nicholas swings at a golf ball. It has to do with the quality of your attention. Kuhn, 44, who's been mastering the state of yo since he was a kid, says, when you get into it, you discover all sorts of things about how the yo-yo behaves, how it interacts. It's like you're playing with physical laws. You stop time.

The string is not a string. It's a line. So that's what the state of yo is. Wow. Hearing that in Matthew McConaughey's voice. Can you tell how good I'm getting it reading because I read to my son all the time? I feel like I'm getting into the groove of the- Very good.

Yeah. Great reading. So that guy's a fucking asshole. That's someone who has stared at a yo-yo too long. It says he has 500 yo-yo's in that story. Yeah. I'm not wasting my time. This is important.

This is, I need to share this with someone. And then he finds out he only has like 70 words worth of wisdom to say about it. Yeah. The string's not a string. No, listen. It's a line. A line to what? Eternity?

So the Yo Master, this video came out in like 89, maybe late 88. he's the yo master in this thing you know he had worked for duncan yo yo yo to like do demonstrations and sell yo-yo's he also owns about 500 yo-yo's so he's talked to in 1993 so like four years after this video comes out and it says that he invented national yo-yo day in 1990 and so here's how this column in the valley sentinel by charles Walls opens. Is this going to be an ironic column the Yomaster asks? You're not going to make fun of me, are you? Oh, no. Oh, what happened to him?

Make that the first sentence of his story. I hope he has a little yo-yo with that printed on it so he can just like throw it down and like draw their eye to it. You're not making fun of me, are you? And then if they are, he just pulls the yo-yo back up and goes. Mm-hmm. Fine. This is 19.

this is June 1993. And in June 1990, he had invented National Yo-Yo Day. And here's the next sentence in the article. After assuring him that we take yo-yo's and yo-yo-trick experts as seriously as the next guy. All right. So you are going to make fun of him.

Yeah. Yeah. Fuck you, man. He is going to make fun of him in the very next sentence. The Yo-master admits that he had completely forgotten Sunday was National Yo-Yo Day. Three years after inventing it. God damn.

Man, if that guy doesn't celebrate. And then there is a later part in the story that talks about how he lives in San Francisco. He does occasional trick demonstrations, and he makes his living as a professional performer who uses yo-yo's, paddle balls, and spinning tops in his act. And here's the key next sentence,

four years after this video. Actually, not many people call him the yo-master anymore. Oh, only four years. Not as many as he'd like, anyway. So I looked it up. I was like, what do people call him? him then he was bouncing dan the paddleball man and he would do like four paddle balls at once as part of his act okay there's a postcard on ebay if you would like to purchase it i have added it to my watch list

so hopefully he'll give me an offer and a little bit of a discount so don't buy this for me i i'm all right i'm going to say being called uh bouncing dan the paddle ball ball man and that counts as a sex crime, right? Yeah. Yeah, I was right, technically. Yeah, I'm going to count that. You have, just like a sex offender, you do have to go door to door when you move.

To say that you're bouncing, Dan. Right, like you haven't committed a sex crime, but you have to, you have to comply with the law as if you have. You do, and they have to say, oh, I was hoping you were just a pervert or something. That's actually worse what you just said. Mm-hmm. And when someone says it's nice to meet you and they use your professional name, you are legally

obligated to say, you're not making fun of me, are you? Turn around your paddle that says on the other side, are you? Anyway, that's all the research I did. I'm very happy that I was able to find all these funny quotes. Yeah, that's fantastic. Always coming with the great research. I love to go to Portland Saturday Market when I was a kid. And there was always jugglers there that were like, we're on the, the cusp of

making it right so you'd see like a juggler at portland saturday market then you'd see him in a kit cat commercial like i fucking know that guy i feel like uh bouncing dan the paddleball man really should have passed through there the fact that i don't know who he is is like if you search on like youtube there is a commercial he's in for like i don't know some sort of wireless company where he's like doing his paddleball tricks a wireless company that late in the game yeah i know that sounds surprising. I guess like San Francisco, maybe it was a local ad, like a local wireless company. I don't know if there's...

Paddle balls are timeless. Nintendo will come and go. Paddle balls are forever. Yeah, paddle balls, even more timeless than the yo-yo. So much has been stolen from us in this society that just the words that you said, he made his life in San Francisco purely as a performer doing yo-yo's and paddle balls. You fucking kidding me? He's got a too much.

million dollar brownstone off of this fucking boomer asshole it's living right by golden gate park yeah i mean i see i see like assholes complaining about the state of san francisco online all the time i mean this guy isn't doing his act anymore as far as i know it seems better now he retired with that sweet paddleball money yeah there's a part in this video we haven't talked about where uh they cut to space and then it spells yo yo with like his body it's like a too many cook's gag it looks like being ripped apart across the cosmos well there's also a part where he's like atop the new york city skyline including twin towers like he's maybe like two thousand feet tall uh doing his yo-yo tricks and the yo master like plays for a crap for like an infinite crowd

like at the end of the uh grabowski shuffle video right with the same level of special effects he could have stopped 9-11 if it was true i do i did take the their final song. It's four and a half minutes long. So we'll just go out on it. Sweet. If you guys want to like go get a drink, I'll meet you back here for the bonus. Let's play it.

Hit that final yo-yo song. The cool island yo-yo song. I'm staying right fucking here. Oh, yeah. Hope you enjoyed the dog zone. It's like the end S&L. We're all waving. Right. Here's a tiny baby in a little cradle.

And now the Eiffel Tower. monkey at the stream the Texas star a man on a flying trapeze well I want to be like a yo yo-yo man all right it's weird when he says it oh god it's so gross he's a coward for only doing 20% of the Jamaican accent The two-handed loop-to-loop. I would like to see the people recording this, like that behind-the-scenes footage of the baby-back ribs commercial.

Yes. Like, them getting all into the same. Nodding at each other when they get it. Yeah, you got it now. Yo-in-all-day, if I can. If I can. Riding the horse.

Yo-in-all-day. Never say nothing don't matter to him. Yeah, so I watched it like 10,000 times as a kid. Rock the baby in the Eiffel Tower. I like how quickly the tricks start this meeting where they're like, all right, we're walking the dog a little different. All right, we're doing the baby, a little difference. Yeah, rocking the baby in the Eiffel Tower, you realize, okay, you are adding, like, asterisks to existing tricks. This is nothing, dude.

It's called dog jumping through hoot. Let's watch that again. Ooh, let's watch that again. Like, there are no instructions. for these tricks. These are way too hard. One more time, you'll master.

Are you making fun of me? Here comes the scary spider web. This spider web is especially good for enchanting children. The spider web is barely a yoke. yo-yo trick. He just like stops yo-yoing and tangles his fingers up in a bunch of string. And milk the cow is lewd as fuck. The last time I can find an ad for Bouncing Dan the paddleball man having performed is 2005. Oh, my God.

At a circus show that also included a tribute to Aretha Franklin. Yes. So we got that brand still, maybe. He really cares a lot about respect. Yeah. Once again now. Let's see that again. Not too far

Not too far At one point He said around the world Was his favorite trick Because it's like going around the world Yeah In a lot of ways It's a metaphor for what it is

I don't want to get too metaphysical here Whatever I got said On a string But it's the cadyo I think we're all in the state of you now It's all be like a yoh Oh, Calypso rap right down.

I want you to play it again. Two of the time you know you can't. It's a little bit hard but never say die. You can criss-cross, baby, in the blink of a line. Don't ever ever get low. Keep on tried and just say yo. You want you to play this for like Kendrick Lamar and be like, this is what you do, right? You're both rappers.

We did it. We listened to the whole song. One-900, hot dog. 1,900, Frankfurt. 1,900, Frankfurt. Our podcast canals, and with maximal in shawl. Like Frankfurt podcast? Correct.

Yeah. The craft is nitratis not only. Shicked you in the Huntersau, Theo, a stander. Come, John, you know, now. 1,900, Frankfurt. 1,900, Frankfurt. 1,900, Frankfurt. 1,900, Frankfurt.

1,900, Frankfurt. Once gone new, you know, and new, yeah. Yeah, 9,000. Please welcome once again. Come once again 1,900 hot dogs, very own in-house comic, the overly specific insult comedian who makes things to real. It's Mr. Jimmy Juggles. Hey, thank you, thank you.

It's lousy to be here. Got a lot of Supremes in the audience tonight. Look at Aaron Crosston here. Hey, you look like you don't get a nice. enough colonoscopies. Like you're gonna die of ass cancer at 54 just when you start really getting comfortable with who you are. Oh, what's the matter? A little too real for you? Yeah, I know. I'm working on that. Hey, I see Adrian Hesbrook. Hey, I see Alex Nolenberg. Look at this, it's Alpha Scientist Javo. Hey, and Andy, I see you back there. I

once went on safari with this guy and I watched him kill a white rhino so he could powder and snort its horn he was so sad when it did not give him an erection I wasn't supposed to tell nobody that oh it's a very serious crime oh oh hey it's Armando Nava I see Autumn Armstrong Berg I see Bim Talser oh Brandon Garlock I know you ain't got enough in your retirement Hirement fun. You're blowing it all on Funko Pops of obscure movie monsters, and your elderly self is gonna curse you for it. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, that one's a sprinkler. It was supposed to be a sprinkler. It's summer. I'm trying something. Brian Saylor, I see you there. Brock Way famously loves the meat millie.

Hey, Sarah, I'd see Chloe here. She got a face only a mother could love. Could. But, but did not. Oh, keep seeking that validation from cam girls and escorts, babe. That's you. That's what you do. That's not me. Why would you think that's me? That's you. I only say true stuff about you. Like, uh, like, uh, like a common sense here. He looked like he got one of those ironic names. Like calling common sense's mother, Mrs. had a positive influence on common sense's body dysmorphia. Whoa! Hey, come on, it's just a joke. There's no truth to it. It don't mean nothing about neither of us. All right? I don't wish I was a small, frail, pale man, racked by consumption. Like, that's, I'm happy being big and healthy. That's what I like.

That's what I like. Don't question it. Here's Craig Lemoyne. Let's move on. Here's Craig Lemoyne. I see Dan B. I see David Scholl. I see Dean Costello. I love this guy. Dean Costello, he once watched someone he loved Drown, and he was too scared to help him, so he sold the song rights to Phil Collins. You guys got to stop trusting me with your secrets. Oh, sorry, I hiccoughed while doing that one, and it came out weird. That won't happen again. Delta, Fox Trot, Devin the Rogue Supreme, Doug Redmond, Dusty's rad title, Edgar Matthias,

you look like you find comfort at night by telling yourself nobody was. remembers the embarrassing stuff you did, but I've heard it. It's all anybody talks about. Oh, back to normal O's. Oh, it was a one-time fluke. Just like all your exes say about you, Elizabeth Shope. Oh, all right, I see Elliot Watson here. He's all right. I'm all right too. I'm glad I got my normal O's back. I was not just testing the waters for a new and scary change that I desperately want to make in my life. Not like Eric Christianberg. Look at that ball cap. They call this the receding hairline special. Oh! I got fancy shark. I got Gareth. I got Jello. I got good Satan and all his hot witches over here. Oh look at this. It's Greg Cunningham. Greg Cunningham,

you work so much. Your kids are going to have trouble remembering your face after they leave for college. Oh, that one's about you. That's not about something haunting my kids said to me. All this stuff's about you guys. Hey, Haraka, hey Harvey Pengweeney. Oh, I'd love to see you here, Honk. Hey, Jabberal Aiden, James Boyd, I got Jared Clack. I got Jared Mountain Man. Oh, I got Jared Ruiz. Hold on. Jared Ruiz here. He's going to wait until everyone's gone for the night, and then he's going to go around and lick all the seats of the people who didn't laugh at my jokes. That's what he's gonna do. Oh, he likes the taste of failure. This guy does. Not me. Jeff O'Raskey, John McCam, and I got John Minkoff. Hey, you smell like extramarital sex,

my man. Everyone can smell it. Even your wife there next to you. She just don't have the courage to disrupt her whole life because she don't know. She's worth 10 of you because she's too fucking stupid. Oh, I got you both. Oh, I'm sorry. They're was again. That's, uh, that's weird. I don't know what's going on with that. Okay, I got, I got, I got Joseph Searle's here. I got Josh S. I got Joshua Graves. I got Justin B. I got Ken Paisley. I got K&M. Hey K&M, your AI girlfriend called. Just kidding. No, she didn't. Oh! There we go. That's the normal one. That's okay. Everything's normal. I'm not learning nothing about myself up here. Okay, okay, we got Kamutsas, we got KVH, we got Lane Haygood, we got Lisa

Lisa worries she's the weird girl at work because she never gets invited to nothing Don't worry Lisa they don't think you're weird they don't think about you at all Oh, normal one again, all right we got it, we got it M Jahi Chappelle Mark Mahoney Matt Riley, Max Broy Mercenary Sissidman, Michael Lair, a Mojou you can't Carry yourself like you're not the hero in your own story. Oh, that one seems gentle at first, but it will haunt you. Some things, they just, they just haunt you.

Um, Mort, I got Mort here. I got Mr. Bob Gray. I got ND. What does ND stand for? Non-descript? Oh, that one's on purpose. It's a callback to that thing I did earlier. I'm owning it, okay? I'm owning it.

It's just a joke. Neil Bailey, Neil Bailey liked that, oh, right? Right, Neil Bailey liked it. He likes that pop stuff, am I right? Ha ha, I hate that stuff. He loves it though. Neil Schaefer, I got Neku104, I got Nick Levino, I got Obsolete over here. Now Obsolete, he's like Neil Bailey. This is someone who wants to prance about in a powdered wig. I can see it. I can see it, obsolete.

Oh, that's me doing an impression. That's an impression of Obsolete. That's not me. Ornry Weevil. I got Ozzy Olin. I got Patrick Herbst. I got Peewee's uncle. I got rebrandrew I got Red Wine Time Red Wine Time probably got a secret storage unit full of ruffled shirts and tights Sometimes they sleep in there

Just to be physically closer to the person they think they are inside Oh that's what you do That's what you do red wine time Hey Ria I got Russell Bowman I got Sam Kopnik I got Sarkovsky Look at Sean Chase I got seed over here

Hey Space Champ fan Space Jam fan now this is a guy who sees a old-timey fop or dandy put on his white face makeup and paint the little moulon and he's like ooh that's me that's the way I wish I was oh I got you I know that's how you are hey spotty reception a super knot tater's tails Thomas Cavatzos oh who do we got here you know how sometimes you can see a man you take one look at him and you just know you just know this guy this guy likes to titter I got you Thomas I got your tittering ass

Mimi Leahy, Toasty God, Tommy G, Velo, Victor Malavakin, Booster. Oh, don't sink down in your seat, now Booster, I see you. I got you, I know you. You think you're some strong, independent woman, but I know you're tight. I know you're tight. You live your whole life just hoping. Oh, you're just praying. Some big, strong man comes along and calls one of your quips, Rybalt.

That's you. That's what you hope happens. That has nothing to do with me. I can just see it on your face. Waylon Russell, Yvonne Clapham, Zach and Ava, I'm looking at John Dean here. And I just know this guy sees old-timey fops and dandies in movies and he don't know. He don't know. Are they a German thing?

Are they French or English or something? Are they just kind of all Europe rolled together into like one stereotype that maybe never existed at all? But that don't matter to John Dean because every time he sees them boys mincing and press. He thinks, that's me. That's not the me I am, but is the me I should be. And he goes, and he becomes an insult comment, because that's what they say the men do. That's what they say the modern-day man equivalent is of that. But it just unfulfilled, you know, it doesn't, it's not enough for John Dean.

He thinks, he's like, I'm Oscar Wilde up here, you know, telling it like it is, and everybody, everybody laughs and joins in and calls me pretty. And it never quite happens that way. Does it, John Dean? It's not the same thing being an insult comic as it is being a real, being a fop with a savage wit. I see you, John Dean, all over your face, man. It's all over your face that you wish that was what you were. That's you. That's what you are.

It's a joke. It's all a joke. It's just, there's no truth to it. There's no truth to it, man. Oh.