The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 725 - The Possum Open Mic with Mike Bridenstine

Episode Date: March 17, 2026

Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds are joined my Mike Bridenstine, who reads a story from his book, Kansas City Comedy about a possum incident. Mike's book is here. (link supports independent bookstores) SOURCES TOUR DATES OFFICIAL MERCH   Square

The Dallup will be on tour in March 2026. We are going to be in Buffalo on March 22nd. Then on the 23rd, we'll be in Syracuse. Then on March 24th, we'll be in Boston at the Wilbur. Then on the 25th, we'll be in Bridgeport, and 26th the Gramer City Theater in New York. And then on the 27th, we'll be in Albany. And then on the 28th, we'll be in Pittsburgh. And then on the 29th, will be in Philadelphia.

And then on the 30th, we'll be in Washington, D.C., at the Lincoln Theater. Why would you name a theater after Lincoln? Anyway, that's our March 2026 tour. Go to dolloppodcast.com slash tour for tickets. You're listening to the dollop on the All Things Comedy Network. This is an American History podcast where each week I, Dave Anthony, read a story from American history to a

Goober. Gareth Reynolds, not a goober, who has no idea what the topic is going to be about. All right. Is this, so I forgot the, I forgot to bring a story. I don't know a story. What do you mean? You don't just have an extra one? I mean, something happened to me on the way here that was fun.

I think we'd need more than that. Not necessarily. Should we try it? guys, I have fantastic news for you. Who are you? I'm Mike Brydenstein. Michael Brydenstein? Yeah.

Oh, he just did the pastimes. Oh, you were on the pastime. Do you guys remember me from the pastime? Yeah, yeah. We had a good time. Yeah, yes, I don't know. I heard you guys might not have a story this week. How did you know that?

We're in the middle of figuring it out, Mike, so we don't need you to... No, no, no. Yeah, it's a good thing to run in. I have a solution to the problem. Mike, we're actually in the middle of kind of figuring... Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go ahead and figure it for a little bit. I just come back to me.

you need something. I don't know if we have it. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, I have a story this week. Oh. How do you have a story? I have a story this week. You're going to read it to Dave and I?

Yeah, I guess that was, we should do that. How I'll read it to you guys for a change. Okay, let's try the, let's try the, do the intro. That's fascinating. You start it then. Okay. So this week, I, Mike Brydenstein. You got to be like, welcome to the dollop.

Welcome to the dollop. Go do it into the camera. No. Do it. Okay. I want to welcome you guys to the dollop. I had, okay. Have you have been welcomed?

No. never. I mean, every week, usually something else happens. But this week, I, Mike Brydenstein, read a story from history

to you, Dave and Gareth. You have no idea what the topic is going to be about. Yeah. And this is from your book. This is from my book, Kansas City comedy. Oh, that's great thing.

People get Kansas City comedy. Go to the internet on the bad places owned by the bad people. Listen. We're all working with the bad people. You all have to work with the ads.

And you wrote this. I wrote this book. And you kind of soft pitched it to us on a pastime. And we said to you, if you ever want to come in and read this, walk us through this, go ahead. So let's do a dollop. Okay. There's more than one story I had.

I want, yeah, there's, there's, there were definitely more than one story I could have done, picked here. Okay. From his book? This one is. Okay. This is probably the four craziest stand-up stories I've ever heard. And this one you're about to hear, I believe to be the craziest thing I've ever heard in stand-up comedy. I would also foreshadow by foreshadow, but I would also say it is the best written feel of a open mic that I've ever read by far.

I appreciate that. That's tough to hear. People should probably. probably not read that because if you could actually experience that through words, it's not great. It's a nightmare feeling. Well, this one will make you not want to go even more to an open mic. Yeah. Kyle Parris made a list of all the items he'd need for his big open mic performance at Stanford's.

He got a towel, dishwashing gloves, a hula hoop, his vacuum cleaner, and his trusty igloo cooler, which he'd lined with trash bags. Can I ask you a question? Well, first of all, let me know when a weird thing happened. And second of all, what year are we talking? 2001. Okay. This is July 2001.

This is the worst thing that happened in 2001. Do you remember these guys who would bring props to the open mics? You know, I remember a, no, but I do remember one time watching a ventriloquist get ready. This is kind of like that. And it was like, there were like three people there. And I was like, ooh, and like watching him put it on his hand. I was like, I mean, what I'm doing is sad. but that's pathetic.

We had a guy that would come in a lab coat and sometimes a cooler. Are you serious? Yeah, yeah. You always remember, it registers as trauma, so you remember the early ones. That's right. Oh, yeah. Then he put on a jacket and tie with his jeans instead of dress pants and loaded all his props into his blue Dodge caravan.

On the way to the club, Paris realized he'd forgotten to buy ice for the cooler. And as he tells it, it was too late for him to go back for ice or stop anywhere else to buy it, especially now that he had road kilter. find. Are you having any problems right now? Are there any red flags coming out for you? I love the, yeah. I mean, he's on his way to the mic. He's on his way to the mic. So you'd think you'd get the road, like, where is this again? This is in Kansas City. Okay. So I guess there is roadkill. It's like likely, but I'd still think earlier in the day you'd get that done. That's Kyle, what Kyle looks like. Kind of looks familiar. Okay. At the time, Paris was living,

in Warnsburg, Missouri, a 50-mile commute to Westport. Westport is the neighborhood in Kansas City. And on that drive, he started looking for dead animals. The first two times Paris pulled over were unsuccessful. One time it was a dead cat and it was too mangled up so I couldn't use it, Paris said. And I pulled over and it was another dead animal. I forgot what it was, but it was too mangled up. It was in half and I can't do that.

So the third time was the charm. It was in half. You imagine watching a guy look at Roadkill and walk away? way you'd be like what just happened to him I don't know I feel like that might happen a lot out there's there's a vice art there's a vice piece on this english guy yeah and he's like walking he's like well the problem is you can eat a tall and you've just got a try with you haul like he's like skunk i've got skunk right here yeah there's definitely people to eat roadkill that's a thing yeah i mean

look i mean it's if it's fresh it's ground okay it's a ground ground beef if it's not fresh I got bad news for you, Dave. It's not fresh. Halfway to the club, Paris found a dead possum that he deemed suitable. Although at the time he thought it was a ferret. Easy mistake. Well, when anything you run over, you're like, is that a mink? They don't look anything alike.

No, but squish. They don't have the same hair. A ferret looks like roadkill if it was brought back to life in like a ceremony. Like ferrets, you're like, its face is intact. Talk about the ceremony. Yeah. You've seen Weekend of Bernie's 2, right? Very similar by the way.

Regardless, he took out his dishwashing gloves, stuffed the animal into his trash line cooler, loaded it back into his van, as made his way to Stamford's for their standard pre-show meeting with all the comics. That's crazy, too. I didn't catch that that he lined it with the trash. Yeah.

It's also the fact that there's a pre-show comic meeting is amazing. Sometimes. Guys, you're in the big leagues. This is an open mic. Some clubs do that. I've never seen that. Yeah, they explain it. Yeah.

There's rules. I mean, I always feel like the host walks you through it. The host usually goes up and be like, there's the light. Shut up. The light, respect. You have one minute. For Andrea Kaspari, this particular night made a huge impression because it happened to be her first open mic in Kansas City. Before the show, according to Kaspari, 25 to 30 comedians crowded into the basement of the club so that the new comics could learn the running order and the rules.

Comics get three minutes in the light. Yeah. And we'll come back from the room telling them. when it's time to wrap it up, that sort of thing. And to the best of her recollection, Paris drew number three in the running order, and she drew number five. I was trying to soak it all in, Kaspari remembered. That is, I think that's an important detail of the order.

So, yeah, it is. Yeah. I'm one of very few women, and I see this really odd, super tall, really angular, crazy-looking guy. His hair was very poofy at the time, and he kind of had a longer nose, little weasel teeth. Let's just not. Like roadkill. It looked like road killed.

Can I just say about the list? We had a really great open mic San Francisco where the woman who ran at Rebecca, the Holy City Zoo, she would come up with who went where and you would know if you were doing well and ready to move off from open mics because you would get better spots

and people she thought had no hope ever, they would get the worst spots and eventually go away. Yeah, you know, there are good open mics. There are. Like there's one they do at Acme and they always are like fucking bangin. But it is, for the most part, it is a really, it's just so you can, it's a step up from doing material in front of the mirror.

Well, and there's a lot of people working out shit that they're never going to be competing. They're never going to do anything. No. No. Okay. He's a strange looking dude. And I see that he has an igloo cooler with him. That's a very strange thing to see.

What is the point of a cooler if you have no ice? He has a trash bag. At this point, like you could... What's in the cooler? The roadkill. Okay, so that's the point of the... But you have a track... Like, there's no...

It makes sense if you think about it. The cooler is a container for... The ice is the advantage of the cooler. It's going to make sense. Okay. The cooler was well known in the Kansas City comedy community already. There you go. For a long time, comedian Chris Porter said,

every Thanksgiving, Kyle would come in with a full turkey. His big schick that he had a public access show, and that was his premise for every bit. We didn't have YouTube yet, Paris explained. We had public access. So in this public access themed bit, Paris would introduce himself as the host of a cooking show. He would say that something to the effect of every Thanksgiving, we cook turkeys for our families, but our most important family members get left out.

And I'm talking about our pets. So tonight, I'm going to show you how to make a wonderful Thanksgiving turkey for your pet. And that's when Paris brought a thawed out turkey out of his cooler, placed it on a baking tray on top of the stool, and then he would pull out a can of dog food, eat a little bit of it with his hands, and then stuff the dog food inside the raw turkey. Then he would take out the cat food and do the same thing.

Yeah. Which grossed people out, but made some people laugh, Paris told me. That was part of the joke. Holy shit. I mean, that's an open mic? This is at an open mic. If I, if you, I would start going to open mics again if there was a guy eating dog food.

It gets much worse. This is the kind of shit that happened at San Francisco and Mike's all the time. Oh, God. This is like, this, the guy would have fit in perfectly in San Francisco. So far, if I'm a manager, I'm like, look, he needs work, but I love the seeds. There's some elements here that this case. Now, I want to make sure that the dog food and cat food are deep enough inside the turkey

that it bases in with all the turkey juices and increases the flavor, he would tell them probably disgusted audience. Yeah. And then Paris, only making matters worse, would pull out a dillado. Sorry. A dillado. They're going to get mad at pronounce that one right. Pull out a dildo and proceed into me.

Is that because you can't say dildo because they'll sue you? I've got to be very careful here. My lawyer told me that has to be a dillado. It's an Italian dildo. It's a dillado. I put it up and on my purse. I. It's a dillado.

Come on. You pull out the dildo. The dildo. Say when. When? He pulled out the dildo and proceed to push it in and out of the turkey. I mean, so he is fucking a turkey with dog food innards? That's right.

Just as you'd think it up with... The sound. That's one of those things, too. If you were there, you'd be watching it. I mean, the beginning was funny. This is a war crime. Like, it was funny when he ate dog food. Now I'm watching...

He was playing the whole thing. whole thing deadpan as if it was a normal kitchen kitchen tool and then he would take the dildo out of the turkey and lick it as if it were a wooden stuff. Oh, for fuck's sake. Hell yeah. This was an annual tradition at Stanford's for years after all, a description of which actually made it into the Kansas City Star in August 11, 2000. See, it's popular. By the way, that is one month to the day before 9-11. So, one month and a year. Oh, oh, sorry. Yeah, yeah. All right. Comics loved Kyle, comedian Dean Bowes said, and I think Kyle's a goddamn genius. But audiences

don't always get him, and certainly not in a comedy club setting. He just scared people a lot of the time. You could definitely so did Andy Kaufman. There's a lot of those at open mics. So did Andy Kaufman. Over the years, Paris

had other well-known bits involving this igloo cooler. For another off-mentioned act, he would wear nothing but women's underwear, climb a stool, and then jump into a pile of five or six pies. All of which emerged from the cool. Who runs the club? Okay, so this is,

it's run by the Glazer brothers who were just out and out criminals. So that, but, because I'm just thinking like, as far as cleanup, yeah. See, that's why I think most clubs wouldn't allow this because the cleanup of the pies, he must have put something down. Put a tarp down.

Even then, though, you'd be like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hey. Yeah. You have five minutes. How much of it is pie set? Because this was like a restaurant, too. Oh, really? Are people eating during this? People are eating downstairs. Yeah, the stairs, right. Yes, okay. Still. I just writhed around in the pies, Paris

explained, and then I got up and slipped, got up again and slipped, had chocolate hanging off my ass, so it looked like a turd coming out. So it's, that's the comedy. If he brought the cooler, Porter said, you knew it was on. I love Chris Porter watching this. Porter was there for the big story. So aware of this after the pre-show meeting, Paris decided to put the cooler back in the van for the time being.

and he wanted he wanted to bring out he wanted sorry he wanted his big act to be a surprise sure this was july in kansas city and it could have been over 90 degrees that day as baseball great itchro suzuki famously told bob cossus in 2003 august in kansas city is hotter than two rats fucking in a in a fucking wool sock well in july in kansas city is even would be a great also a good roadkill replacement it feels like he had time to get ice yes i feel like he had time to get that I think there was time for ice. I think people asked him. I mean, it's literally at a gas station, that is a 38-second transaction if you play your

cards. I think he just didn't think about the ice. Really? It's a different time. Now it's all we talk about. Yeah. July and Kansas City is even hotter than August and probably much hotter inside the van where there was no ice in the cooler.

The show started around 8.30 p.m. So Paris had time to hide his vacuum cleaner. The vacuum cleaner is brought up on stage. There was time to hide the back. There's time. There's time to hide the bag and clear. No ice was a choice. No ice was a choice.

I agree. No ice is a choice. He hit it behind the curtain before people started coming in. The size of the crowd varies wildly in people's memories. Club manager Ron Miron's guest around 50, with up to 30 comics on the lineup, plus the Sanford staff. It seems like 50 is a decent guess. Either way, it was an intimate club, which gave the feeling of a packed room.

Wherever Paris was on the lineup, he went back out to the van, to retrieve the cooler. When he opened the van, Paris remembers smelling the outside of the cooler to see if there was an odor. And since there wasn't, he assumed everything was fine and dandy,

went back upstairs with the cooler in tow, and waited by the side of the stage until he was introduced. It's like an igloo ad. I mean, essentially he's been, for a little while, he's been very, very slow cooking roadkill. It's very, very slow.

Brazing. And it's falling off the bow. I don't think this gets to the brazing level. It's also so funny that Kansas city barbecue. It's like, tendenizing. Oh, you're going to let it sit in there for a little while. I had my suit on, Paris told me, I had my cooler in my way. He's really into this suit.

I want people to picture it. And the hula hoop. By the way, the hulu. We've all forgotten about the hula hoop now. We've really been focused on. There's so many moving parts. On the tomb. And I had my gloves on top of the cooler. Sure. The host was a friend. of mine named Dean Bose. And I remember he announced

me like, oh, ladies and gentlemen, comics in the back, guess what? Kyle Paris has a cooler. That is everybody gets excited. Comics in the back is really. It's about to get weird. It's the audience outside of the audience. There to make you feel terrible or there to.

I mean, that was when Brody was very like comics in the back would watch Brody Stevens be like, I don't care what. Their reaction was your it was like a gift to you to watch people watch someone as well. Yeah, and this guy is playing to the back of the room.

That's 100%. I don't know who he's playing. I think everybody, there's, it's tiered reaction. It's like the first time you do comedy in a theater, you're like, it's traveling. Like he was probably, right? I'm getting gasps and then people are pissing their pants. After the introduction, an extremely nervous Paris walked on stage and laid the towel down over the stool. I said, hey, I'm Kyle Paris.

I'm an animal trainer and I got a ferret with me. And we're going to do some tricks for you. We're going to do some tricks for you, Gareth. That's the key. Comedian and witness, Amy Clark remembers Paris referring to his animal as Mr. Jingles. That's when Paris first opened the airtight cooler and was knocked back, not only by the pungent stench of death it released, but also by the heat coming off of the decomposing possum.

It was... Mr. Jingles. I mean, someone can't explain this. I probably should look this up, but it had, it had, uh, it had cranked up the decomposition because of the heat. So it was like, yeah. It was like fast decomposing because of the... Yeah.

It's a fast forward button. Yeah, yeah. And it's also, and it's also... It's also... Well, it's also sealed, so it's not getting air. Yeah. So it's like... Really gunking up in there.

It's like, it's a... I mean, you know what it's like when someone takes a shit and then they like close the door and you're like, your plan is flawed. You've really created a mausoleum of stick for some reason. You're like, was no window? How does it work? You're like, not like this. I can tell you you've been traveling with Luke.

I was going to say, Luke's move at times. I'm like, walk me through the pitch here. That it lives longer? Not a win. I opened it up and the heat in that place went up like 10 degrees. I'm not even kidding. I didn't know that decomposing things gave off heat. It's really, it makes sense.

Well, you know what? You've taken it from Earth to a container. So you are going to the year. We're finally learning. This thing was probably days old. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So.

And then there was the stench. But I'm a professional. I'm going to go through with this. He started. He started the bit. He's on stage. He started. You can't go like, never mind.

You guys have a DMB later? Put it back in it close. Why did they stop at D at the DMV? I'm weird. Dating is hard. Dating's weird. You ever been on a blind date? I went on a blind date with a deaf lady.

What's in the cooler? It doesn't matter. It does not matter. You guys don't want to know. We are not talking about the cooler any longer. Paris was not the only person suffering. What did they got in the back of Target? What's that like a magical jungle?

They're going to go and back and find the shoe? The front row began covering their mouths and noses reacting audibly and disgust to whatever the fuck was in that cool. Parris said he could see their eyes watering within seconds. It's like Hell Gallagher. It is Hell Gallagher. I need you to think of something right now. What's part of this equation that he hasn't used yet? The hula hoop.

The hula hoop is. He hasn't used the loop. He hasn't, but I am right. He's only said, but. he uh the road kill the vacuum

the vacuum the vacuum it's funny because in my head I assume the vacuum was there for post show and that's when and that's when he reached in retrieved the body of the dead animal

and set it on the stool by this point the sting could hit the second row he told me uh I can't believe he could he could he could get through that like yeah

well he's got experience I know, but you're still probably gagging from the, like, you're right next to... This truly, it is for maybe three people in the audience and for the other comics. I mean... Yeah. Yeah. Tom Becker said when he picked it up, there was juices and shit that drained on the floor. Chris wasn't that old.

Well, I think, again, I think the container helps you. The container definitely, yeah. It's recomposing. It's like, it's been crockboding. Chris Porter was at a... table in the back of the room with other comedians when the possum was revealed. We're in the back going, is that real? He told me.

But then the people in the front row immediately started to vacate. And then we saw people get up and we were like, probably real. Oh, my God. And then you see the blood drip from the mouth of this fucking dead possum and we're all in the back like, oh, it's real. Oh. He is just testing the balance. He's like, what, what can I not do at this club? Yeah.

I went at this room above a restaurant. Going along with a bit as real. written, Paris exclaimed, oh my God, my ferret is choking. And then he retrieved the hidden vacuum cleaner from behind the curtain. Oh, my God. And I want to say, no matter how many times I've heard or thought about this story, the fact that he used a vacuum cleaner at all for the next part of the performance will forever boggle my mind.

Yeah. Yeah, seriously. Honestly. He pulls out this vacuum porter said, shoves the nozzle down the gold of the beast and flips the thing on. A lot of people don't know this porter continued. When a vacuum sucks, it also blows out somewhere. So the odor from within this rotting animal is now being expelled at 110 volts through the entire comedy clip.

Oh, my God. Like. You ever heard that story? Will Farrell, when he auditioned for S&L and he kept meeting with Lauren Michael. Did he do this? No. No. He had a briefcase with a fake million dollars in it.

And he kept thinking at one point he was going to like put it on Lauren Michael's desk as like a fake bribe. and I think he brought it into two meetings with him and he never, he was like, no, I'm reading the room. Yeah, yeah. I'm like, he just would walk out with the briefs. So he's, like, he's shown up with a briefcase. It's weird. But it was better than putting it on the table and having Lauren Michaels be like,

this bit bombed. So you never, that's the vacuum in this story. The vacuum is, it's there. People are vacating. You don't need the vacuum. Yeah. Yeah, the vacuum. There was, we've already gone past a step too far, but the vacuum is.

You audible on the vacuum, you go, I brought it, I'm not using it. Yeah, I'm better, yeah. It's already, I'm in a weird zone. That thing stunk more than I expected. Yeah. Immediately, Beau said a cloud of stench explodes out of this thing and whaffs through the comedy club. Brendan McGowan has said it's not unlike the Ark of the Covenant being open in Raiders of the Lost Ark and the Sounds of the Concord being, begin killing Nazis. All of our orifice were being filled with dead possum bloat, Clark said.

Stanford and Sons was like a firebox, up a set of stairs, only one exit, I don't think any windows, and restrooms are in the back, thank God. But there's no good air exchange in this space. It's a trap space. Like a lot of comedy clubs are. Like, there isn't... That's part of the reason you want to be in a basement. Yeah, so it's like... You need to be trapped. It's the worst place to release.

Awful. It's a cloud of dead animal. It is. I mean, this is like the opposite of what the Ghostbusters do. And once it hit them, all hell broke loose. Some people couldn't breathe and were coughing comedian Tim Gaither said People started running to the bathroom parricks said yelling oh my fucking god We ran out like there was a fire porter agreed

Tables literally flipped were lifted and flipped Clark said I mean it is it is full pandemonium they have fully yes yeah it's like someone pulled out a gun Yeah it is it's like people are fleeing the seat there had a gun has gone off I ran to the green room, memory, said, we barricaded it so people couldn't come through and let the smell in. That's the move I get. I would absolutely barricade the back door. Everyone is freaking out, Kaspari said. People are running.

Half the place clears out. They either leave or go vomit in the toilets. There's at least three people actually sick, Johnny O. said. Then the light goes on. Yeah, two minutes. You have 30 left. Have you ever that when you get hit by a smell so bad that it feels like it's, stuck on you? Have you ever had that where you're just like, I can't get it?

When we had the, when we, the person on our Patreon, our buddy Luke will eat things that people send in. Okay. And then sometimes, they vary. It's very strange. We don't know how we got here. But one woman sent in stinky tofu, I think from China. Yeah. And we were like, whatever. And we had to pull over and like leave the, it was. Well, he, he took it out of the box and we were already like, He hadn't opened it up. He haven't opened up the container yet. And we were just like, and then he was eating it.

And when he opened it, I almost threw up. It was crazy. And we pulled over and we like left the doors open for 15 minutes before we felt okay. So yes, that would be the only time. Yeah. But even then,

that's not, that still wasn't as bad as what I'm talking about. That's not rotting. Yeah. It really feels like it's stuck on you and you can't get rid of it. Yeah. In a good way. No,

no, I don't think you know. Oh. At least three people were sick, Johnny O said. About three rows back, a pregnant, there was a pregnant woman, Beau said. She gets a face full of stench, runs to the restroom, puking so loudly we can hear her. But that could have just been morning sickness. They do be puking.

The baby came out of her. Does anyone have a cooler? Is that how doctors induce labor? There you go, ma'am. It's like spelling salts. Welcome back. It's a girl. And this is some distance away.

Everybody else is running out of the club. Kansas City might be a fun time to mention now. It's also known as the City of Fountains. I thought I'd throw in that back. No, it isn't. To whom? It's one of their many nicknames. Here we are.

Chiefs Broncos in a head-to-head matchup. Let's see how the Broncos move from mile high to the City of Fountains. Huh? City had known for their fountains. Before we go to commercial, let's just show two of those fountains. Whenever I think of Kansas City, I think... Beautiful fountains. Barbecue and fountains.

A lot of fountains. There's nothing like getting your barbecue and heading down to the fountains. That's where people got to wash their sticky hands off in the city of fountains. The pregnant woman said she didn't go back to another comedy show until Nate Brigazzi came to the city of fountains in 2024. Different vibe. 2020. She stayed away for 23 years. 20.

How fucking. If you could, if you could, like, if we could Truman show her life just for, to like get to Nate Bargatty and be like, it's very important that you throw this possum on the stage. We're trying to ruin this woman's life. The club's manager, Ron Mirren, told me that he hated open mic night anyway. And he was in his office when he heard the commotion. I just started hearing screaming, he told me. And I heard a table get knocked over. And in the time it takes to get out of my chair and jump up to see what's going on, you could already see.

smell this dead possum going through my comedy club. The fact that this has ended up in a book. I mean, like, this guy just was like, I've got an idea. And he's created an evening to remember the manager's like, I'll never forget it. This is why if you're an open micer, you need to have an open mic or friend and you need to talk to each other about what you're planning to do. Here's what I was thinking. Because I can't tell you how many times. Because we had, I had a, Ray James community in San Francisco.

He has something in a bag before a show. And I'm like, what do you have? And he's just like, he was, he was disturbed. And he finally admits that he has a dead cat. And I'm like, and he's like, I'm going to pull it out on stage. And I'm like, no, you're not. And we were just like, dude, that's insane. No one's going to enjoy that.

He just found a dead cat on the fucking street. I can't believe that. There were multiple people who were like, I got it. And then we, he ended up, so we talked him out of bringing up on stage. And then he's like, I got to do something funny with it. And we're like, no, you don't. What am I going to do? Just let life exist?

He put it into a newspaper box. So this guy, Kyle Paris, told comedian Emery Emery, he was going to do that. He did. So, and Emery, Emery had faked being in a wheelchair for two years. And Emery's like, don't fucking do this. You're out of your mind. That's another story in your book. Yeah.

So that's the one I remember you talking about. Yes. So he had one. He was told not to do it. By Emery, Amory. A guy who, who pretended to be in a wheelchair for two years and that is special.

Well, he was doing that. He stood up. Stood up and got, and then he stood up. Yeah. He was to reveal. This guy who faked.

But he didn't just fake it for no reason. It was a comedy experiment. Yeah. Showing how crowds would react to someone. Because he was getting a lot of standing ovation that he was not getting as like a stand-up. Stand up. I, I, yes.

Even, that guy was like, no. Yeah. Yeah. He goes, you're, you're fucking crazy. That's what he said. The guy who faked him being in a wheelchair for two years. Was like, no. Not just to the audience to all the other comedians.

No. Yeah, that would be, I mean, really, it's just, it's like Trump being like, that's disgusting. Okay, so this guy, so this the manager still talking, he goes, I get to the door. and Kyle's still unhooking the possum from what's this manager like this manager according to everyone was ticking time bomb of fury and anger there's a lot of drugs going through the club at the time

and this guy hated Kyle and open mic night with like everything the idea that he hated Kyle already and the open mic night and Kyle's like don't worry this guy goes on to open a club in Michigan and he purposefully does not have open mic night because of Kyle

that's so great Nah, you know how it works A bunch of comics show up One of them's got a possum, pandemonium There's always a possum There's a baby A woman, a pregnant woman Pre-betterly as a child

But of course he doesn't like Kyle Because Kyle's been coming in And fucking jumping in pies Like yes That's the comic you don't like You miss those days after this Weren't you doing pies Everyone who was telling me

This story later Kind of had like fond memories of it Except for this manager guy He's still very angry. Yeah, because everyone else has a comedian mind and this guy's... Well, it doesn't the difference if it's your house. If it's your house where the thing happens, it's not as funny.

Yeah. That's about the time the woman vomited right in front of Mirrens. He's the manager. And he just saw Red. According to Emery, Mirrens was a ticking time bomb back then. Anyway, I'm not going to lie to you, Mirrens that told me, I'm not the biggest Kyle Paris fan in the world anyway, but I lost it. And I started screaming, I'm going to fucking kill you.

Put me in the cooler and bring me out in four days then. He comes out of the back, Boas says of Marens, grabs me by the shirt and says, Dean, get him off stage. I need him out of here and tell him he's banned. Amazingly, while all this is happening, Paris was still fully committing to the bit trying to make it work. He was just looking around like, but wait, there's more, Clark said. It's so great because that's exactly how I would expect this to go with a guy like this.

it's exactly i mean you forget he's still on stage yeah and he's got to do his time performing he doesn't he hasn't gotten the light yet you do your time the light person threw up with nobody wanting to go near the stage the comics time to get off the stage light was being frantically waved at paris from the back so paris decided against throwing the animal against the hoop oh so it's i talked about it earlier in the book but he was going to throw it through the hoop like it was a trick throw it up again and have it hit the ceiling but he decided against that. So there is

some level of editing. Yes. The vacuum was, he was like, that's good to go, but he's like, I don't know if it should do tricks. Exactly. People might not buy it at this point. I might be pushing it. Also, nobody's in here. There was blood coming out of his mouth

and shit, Paris told me, so I went straight to the ending. I picked up a pint glass and launched it at the fucking stage and I missed his head by, I guess, barely a foot, Marend's remembered. And I'm screaming. if I get to you, you're fucking dead. With all the chaos.

The greatest show you'll ever see. Oh my God. Don't you wish this? Just to be sitting in the back, be like, I hope he gets him. I want to see him kill him. Don't you wish their iPhones?

Oh. It's almost worth it. It's like the video of the guy getting hit by the guitar. Oh, yeah. I looked that guy up too. That's hard to find. Yeah, that is hard to find. That was in like Louisiana.

He's like, oh, you want to talk? And he's like honky. Tong Manz him. No. He hits, he hits the, so it's a heckler. He hits the heckler of the guitar and he pulls him back and the guitar is like in half and he's like, he deserved it.

And this lady's like, no, he didn't. She's like, what do you think, folks? He came at me and they was like, that was unnecessary. And he goes, well, shows over. Because the guitar is smashed on a head. He came at me, folks. And they're like, no, he didn't. No, he did not.

That's our friend. You saw them, folks. Oh, man. You got to be 100% when you do that. That's going to work. With all the chaos and carnage and flip tables, broken glass, and threats of murder and actual vomit all around him, Paris said,

good night to what was left of the trapped or stampeded Stanford's crowd. And then he grabbed the late Mr. Jingles' paw and made it wave goodbye to the audience. Wow. He, because he had thought of this bit in his fucking head for a long time, And it was always, always closing with Mr. Jingles waving. And so he couldn't not do that. Goodbye, everybody.

Even though all of this is happening, he couldn't. He committed. Have a good night, everybody. A glass got thrown at your head and like, goodbye. A glass gets thrown at your head and you keep going. Mr. Jingles out. I'm going to kill you if I get my hands on you. Goodbye.

Have a good night. I have to give the cheerful goodbye. Retailing that part of the. story still makes Paris chuckle all these years later. But not necessarily at the right part. The possum's tongue was hanging out of his mouth, he laughed. He doesn't know why it's funny. And the act was over.

Being as sanitary as he possibly could, all things considered, Paris dumped the dead possum corpse as well as the towel and the gloves back in the cooler and close it up tight. The new plan was to get the cooler, its contents, and the stench out of the club as quickly as possible. But in the process, Paris moved the mic back into stand in place for the next comedian, which, I mean, the consideration and stage etiquette in that moment is also blowing my mind. Next comedian. He's a pro. He's a pro. You put the mic back. The show is over. The shit is the guy who leaves the fucking mic there. You put the mic. Open mics are over. No, it's not. All right. Should I bring up the next guy or is the MC going to do it? You can love this next guy.

As soon as he saw me touch the mic stand, Paris said, The next comic Tom Becker yelled out at the top of his lungs. What the fuck is he doing? Oh my God. And I get it, Paris said. He was not thinking straight. So I knew there was blood and germs all over and all kinds of shit on my hands. Although there wasn't.

I had my gloves on, which I took off. See? It was literally an emergency situation. But Becca there is yelling, what the fuck you're doing? As in you're putting the mics tan back. Like everything's normal. and he thinks it's about the blood and guts

but it's not about the blood guts. Probably about all of it. He's probably like, please, you've done enough. How tall is the next guy? I can adjust it so he can do it. Okay, whatever. It was literally an emergency situation, Mirren said, people are trying to find a way out of this comedy club

by any means by any means possible because of this. And most made it to the back entrance, which was just a back hallway to a radio station and then down to a parking garage. And that's the way Kyle decided to flee to get away from me. Paris rushed the hot cooler of death, as Clark called it, out the back of the club.

People parted for me like the Red Sea, Parrish, remember? He went down the back stairs across the street through the trash bag with the animal, along with the towel and gloves, into the nearest dumpster. Gareth, the dollop is brought to you by Square. Oh, I did that really long. What is Square, you asked, Gareth, because you're just a little scared, confused. use boy. The easy way for business owners to make payments, book appointments, manage staff, and keep everything running in one place. It doesn't matter if you're selling lattes, if you're

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No, I don't agree. I mean, you get a roadkill Moses is coming through. So let him do his thing. The cooler was fine, Paris. assured me. I don't agree. It wasn't all that bad. Yeah, no.

If he's telling you that story, you're like, don't you brought the beers in? No. No. Meanwhile, Mirrens was still trying to find and then murder Paris. I do remember Tom Beckett trying to hold me back, Mirren said. I tried to chase Paris down and I'm screaming, you are never setting fucking foot in my comedy club again. And I tried to find him on the street.

And I did ban him for life. I've never seen Mirrens more pissed, Dean Bow said, because it created a headache for him. Like if it got out that Stanford's had this crazy comic do this thing, the boys would not have been happy. And that would have been Craig and Jeff Glazer. They're the owners. So Ron was just trying to make sure that this didn't turn into the public, turn into a public relations nightmare. Also, I would think health code. Yeah.

It's a rest of us. So there'd be a health code. I mean, you can't. Yeah. All of this probably happened in under three minutes. That's what's insane. That's awesome. Of course it happened really fast.

That's a lesson in time. You can make time travel. as possible. He slowed down time. He slowed down time. After, and still, after all of this chaos, the show somehow still went on. That's crazy. And when I asked why on earth they would continue, everyone familiar with Stanford's reacted like I just asked the dumbest question in the world. Obviously, the checks hadn't been dropped yet, Porter explained. Now does it make sense? That does make sense. I just don't know how you, I mean, there's a break. that's called the forced intermission.

There is a break. How do you get people back in? I would pay my tab at the door. I wouldn't come back in. I'd be like just... Can I throw my... I think you would just be like, you guys don't have to pay.

This is what you just went through. But it sounds like the owners were not those type of guys. No. No. There were still bills that hadn't been paid, Kaspari agreed. You're so naive thinking the glazers

are going to stop. This thing could be on fire, but we're still getting checks to the tables. Fire might not be a bad idea. Just to burn it down. Yeah, burn it down, cook it up a little. after Paris is set

the staff got to working on putting things back in order I turned to the thermostat way down to try to suck all the air out that night's I mean another person is about to be like okay so

that was weird and that is the end of the road kill okay but anyway we're going to keep the mic going there's just 31 comics left And then we opened the back door, the back door, put a fan in there. But I mean, it was pretty horrendous. Ron was like, well, we got to finish the show, Beau said.

And I'm up there trying to figure out how we're going to do it. And I'm joined by onstage by a comic named D.C. Young. And I believe Keith Rainey, and we're both equipped with these industrial cans of Lysol. And we're just spraying everything down. So that, that to me is the worst. That smell of like Lysol hiding a horrible smell is just the worst. Lysol is terrible. Didn't Lysol start as like,

I seriously think Lysol's, I can't remember what it started as, but it's like a birth control. It's like Lysol's original premise was, It's something fucking crazy like that. They're like, this smells pretty good. Yeah, exactly. It's like Shantam, I took Shantix to help quit smoking once they're like, this depression drug has people quit smoking.

And then they're like, it's a quit smoking drug. Wow. But it's some weird shit like that, but it's also so, terrible, Lysol is a terrible product by every metric. But even then, you'd be like, get it ever, put it all over my body. Well, it was originally created to stop the spread of cholera, but by the 1920s, the company aggressively promoted the product for varied uses, including feminine hygiene. Yeah.

Wow. It's like, it's like, we're just a lot. Yeah. And then everyone was like, excuse me, my labia has lumps. And they were like, it's for bacteria. It's quit smoking. It's quick smoking. Use the lights and stop smoking.

Okay. About 30 minutes after Paris has said, Dean Bose was tasked with restarting the show, which he did in a hurry. I went up and I specifically said, Kyle Paris, ladies and gentlemen. That is perfect. That is perfect.

And a round of applause for our Lysol, gentlemen, Keith and D.C. And then he brought up the next person. And there was no way that we were going to do well in that moment. It still smells like roadkill and knockoff brand Lysol as well. Just the fuck. I was at a toll booth the other day. Dating is hard.

Dating is so crazy. You ever done that? I don't know a blind date with a deaf girl. She hadn't. Oh, fuck. Okay. Let me just go down to the closer here. It's just this myasma that's sort of floating out.

there. But because Becca was a pro, he trusted him to get the room back. No. So put up your big hitter. The pro. Not happening. Put up your big, yeah, put up your big guy. Can you imagine? Man, I'll tell you what, if he brought that possum out there, you could end comedy that evening. He's like, I'm doing it. I'm actually a ventriloquist. The stench is just sitting up, still up there, Rebecca said, and I'm up there and I'm like gagging while I'm doing the damn thing. And I won't say that I killed, but I at least got them focused and laughing a little bit. I road killed.

Road killed. Oh, look at you. Look at you. Over time, patrons and comics started trickling back into the showroom from the downstairs bar. Paris remember is being shocked, turning to another comedian and saying, fucking nobody left, everyone's back. That to me is the craziest thing because what is going on with that audience? Where's your self-respect? That's crazy.

Right? First of all, I wouldn't have left, but that's different. I would imagine most people would leave. I mean, you know, you talk about politics now. You see like three people like, we're going to get out of you. But I guess there now is a curiosity of like, what are they going to do after that? How do they recover? Yeah.

How do they? Yeah. Everyone who's back that is except for Kyle Paris. As he tried to reenter the club, he was stopped by another comic. For what? Oh, because I killed? What? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

What? I still have a minute on the clock. He does, right? Yeah. Yeah, I think it's finished. I'm owed a minute. I'm here to reclaim my time. Look, I'm going to do observational stuff.

He was informed that people in the showroom had vomited, that Mirrens wanted him banned from Stanford's for life and wanted to murder him. They told me his face was so red with anger that he probably would have beat this shit out of me, Perry said, but here's my problem. My vacuum was still on stage, which is no longer usable. If anything in the story can no longer be used,

it is the vacuum. It is a word shape of the cooler. I think we got a four-way tie. The possum, the cooler, there's a lot of stuff that died that night. But the vacuum, it's just, it's going to... You tell another comic, you go, can you go get the vacuum? Get the vacuum. That's all you

Well, when am I going to get my vacuum? Dude, what the fuck are you talking about right now? Well, I'm not going to wait around for the show to end. If I can't, my vac. Get out of here. He's lucky the manager didn't take the vacuum and put it in his ass and turn it out. Oh, yeah. Without a question.

Oh, yes, the fucking vacuum. The instrument of destruction itself was left at the scene of the crime. And so Paris decided to wait until someone could retrieve it for him. He sat alone outside on the backstairs of the club while, His performance adrenaline dissipated, and the reality of the situation slowly started sinking in. So that's kind of what one of my questions was going to be is this. It's almost like it wasn't performance art. He now is going, I fucked up.

Yeah. Because you're going to die on that hill mentally for a while, but you're alone in a parking lot waiting for your possum vacuum. And you're like, all right, that wasn't good. yeah it's like he's sobering up because you have that rush and it's gone and I like when he's been on stage and in the spotlight he didn't realize that people in the audience were getting sick as soon as I heard that as soon as I heard that

my heart sank Paris remembered and on top of that now I know I'm banned for life which I knew I deserved you know Kyle's a very sensitive dude Porter said and a very emotional guy and he gets easily affected so Ron screamed at him and yelled at him and for someone like Kyle who's such a glass at his head threatened to murder him. Threaten to murder him.

So for Kyle, such a sweet soul, I'm sure that this was devastating. I didn't really think the possum was going to stink as bad as it did. It's a dead animal! There's like a, did something die in here? There's like a dead animal saying. Like, did something die? Who died in here? Why is it great?

Is it hilarious and great? That's awesome. Well, okay. Like, he went from Earth. open to cooler closed to room closed so he did it definitely got amplified in that process the smell so he probably was like look little stink funny show stopped for a half hour oopsie he really the moment that i go back to is when he went out to the car instead of sniffing the outside he He should have cracked it.

He sniffing the outside is that's like a commercial for what coolers do. Yeah. Possum in there. I can't even smell it. Our little secret igloo, you're right. You crack it. You fucking. Yeah.

Tupper wear it. Because why not? Because the bit has nothing to do with smell. No. It's about the look. Your trained animal is dead. Yeah. Yeah.

The bit is not. That pregnant woman might lose it. I knew there might be a. chance. I just didn't realize how horrible the smell was going to be. He was on the corner, like crying, Gather said. That open mic was his whole life, and I'm like, dude, you're fine. They're not going to ban you. They say that shit all the time. The image of an emotionally shattered Kyle Paris on the back steps of Stanford's waiting for his vacuum cleaner is something that is stuck with the comics who witnessed it. After the initial version of Paris's story, I heard years ago, it included a part where he looks up in someone

and says, I just really thought it would work. It's tough. Which is probably just a comics embellishment, but it actually seems to reflect Paris's thinking. I can really, that's what I would think he would say in that moment. Yeah. It'd be funny if he was like listening back to it. Like, okay, so there's a couple tweaks.

They've given me a lot of notes. There's a couple notes for sure. He was hurt, Beau said. I mean, he did not intend to do what he did. That was clear. He was absolutely kind of broken. in because he knew it was going to cause him problems with the club. As Paris grew increasingly distraught on the stairs, he convinced himself that his comedy

career was over, or that he could be in trouble legally. This was still a restaurant after all. Yeah. But an hour or so later, as the show was letting out, Paris could see and hear audiences' members leaving Stanford. And according to Paris, the first audience member that come outside asked, what happened to the possum guy? Yeah.

What did happen to the posseum day? Yeah, but not in a life. That guy deserves a one-man show. And like, is he okay? That's where this ends. He has a one-man show that runs in Branson now. He opens for Vagazzi. That's how they got it.

That woman goes to see it. All right, there's just a couple openers before we bring Nate out. Oh, sweet God. Good news, bad news on the Bagotsie. How are you? We have a special guest tonight. It is the baby that was in the woman. He's now 20 years old.

Introducing to my friend Mr. Jingles. He's still got the exact same. Yeah, I'm like gelton. It's just like bone dugs. Just like glued together. What is this? I guess I'm a little bit too. This got a lot of work to go.

When audience members saw Paris on the stairs, they started walking towards him. And much to his surprise, they weren't angry. They said, dude, that was awesome, Paris told me. I think that you could tell how, I think they could tell how dejected I was. this was the weirdest compliment I've ever gotten in my whole 25 plus year career doing comedy people came out to me and they said you made me vomit but it was awesome I now I kind of get this I also I don't think they were doing that because he was dejected I don't either I think they earnestly you you wouldn't you would not go up to someone no audiences don't fucking

bullshit you like that they to say it it was awesome they lived through the crazy experience they're ever going to have. A traumatic event. And they're like, fuck yeah. Yeah, like I can't, they have a story to tell. That is a real high.

Every person in that audience is telling that story today. Yes. Yes. Some to the police. The only guy that lit into me, Paris continued, was Tom Becker.

He read me the riot act, as was his right. I get it. He came up to me and said, what the fuck was that? What are you fucking thinking? You're fucking, you are fucked in this town.

Your career is fucking over. You ain't, We're going, you're not, get out of the city of fountains. When the show is over, a comedian finally brought Paris's vacuum. He didn't know what to say, Paris told me before adding, that was the longest drive home after the show. Oh, alone. 50, 50 miles, you said?

I bet he probably had the fucking possum still in there. No, he threw it out. He did. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah, right, right. When Paris got home, he disinfected the cooler and the vacuum cleaner hose as best he could. And he's kind of. But it's not the hose.

It's the inside of it. The inside, yeah. Yeah. That thing's ruined. Ruined. A sad, sad cleaning session. And they just kind of went up.

Because I actually want to see the next time he tried to clean his house. Oh. Because you know, that had to happen. Or you go outside. Did you let it run for like an hour? Like a generator. Get that possum out of it. And then he just kind of went on with his life.

The next night he had back to another open mic away from Stanford's, where he was obviously the talk of the scene. I started hearing all the stories about what happened the night before Paris said. The comics were not mad at all. They were actually laughing about it. Oh, my God. Yeah. Like they were telling me stories like people vomited on the floor,

slipped in their own vomit, which still makes me laugh. Someone's going to write a book about this. I don't think so. No way. Then a comic goes, was that the first possum you saw on your way to the club? Justin Leon remembered asking. He said, no, I stopped at three different carcasses, but they weren't funny. They weren't funny.

Paris called the club to apologize, but it didn't really help a situation with the salty GM. We had to spend a... Do you think he had a plan for if he didn't find the right roadkill to just do a different bit? I think he probably would have repeated a bit that he'd done before. Yeah. About how he went on a day with blind day of the devil.

Yeah, right, right, right. He had time for ice. He did have time for ice. He stopped multiple... He did have time. He had... He had... couldn't get ice. It was a choice. Ice, he just was like, I don't need it. Yes, it was a choice.

I would guess that someone's like, why didn't you get ice? And like, later on, he was like, I didn't have time. Hey, you know where a place that has ice? The fucking place where you're doing the show. Yes. Yeah. Can I get a picture of ice? Yes. Yes. We had to spend a few hundred dollars trying to get the smell out, Mirren's explained. There's no windows in this place and hardly anything for ventilation. We had the worst time in the world getting that cleaned. I mean, I think, I think they brought in a service master team and it still smelled like dead possum on wednesday no making that call so we had a guy uh he brought a um a possum up on stage and then he ran a vacuum through it okay is this uh open mic yes yeah okay thank you sure yeah it took a good week or so to get out even craig backed me craig is a crazy owner that paris was banned for life for that shit

several of the comics from the scene were adamantly against the banishment and there was a few that began pleading Paris's case to Mirrens by saying how bad Paris felt about the whole thing. I did not give a fuck, Mirrens told me. I'm going to point blank tell you I did not care. I sat down and I told my staff in every comic down in that place and I told them, if any one of you ever bring Kyle Paris into this club, you will never work in my club again or set foot in it. And I told my staff, if I'm ever on vacation, if I ever have a day off,

and I find that any of you let Kyle Paris in, you are fucking fired. That's a banning. I mean, that's how you ban. That is how you ban someone. Yeah, that is. Nevertheless, the comics persisted. Everybody sincerely liked Kyle. But after only six months, Mirrens finally relented.

There was no official word saying your ban is officially six months, Paris told me. But it just turned out, I waited for about six months to make another attempt back. Maybe half a year is enough time to pass before the angry parties can calm down. Maybe it was the fact that, I don't know, fucking 9-11 happened, just two months after Paris is set. and probably put a few life things into perspective for everybody involved. But whatever the reason,

Perez came back to Stanford in early 2002, and he returned wearing his best joke yet. When he came back, Porter told me it was a white t-shirt, and in marker he'd written, no dead possum. Oh, my God. What a return. Holy shit. Good Lord.

And then so you, you taught, what is his perspective? of, I mean, is he still doing stand-up? He does, he lives in Chicago now. So I first heard this, I lived in Chicago and he moved there. Okay. And we were, Chicago was filled with crazy people. Sure.

And we all looked at this guy like he, like, he was the weirdest guy we'd ever seen. Sure. And so someone, this woman, Amy Clark moved at the exact same time as him and goes, you want to hear a crazy story about this guy? And we're like, yes. And then she told us this thing. So a lot of people were like, thought it was the greatest thing they'd ever. heard.

Yeah. Like, to me, it was just like, these guys all, so I went back to Kansas City for the release. City of Fountains. City of Fountains. Yeah. Had to go to City of Fountains for the release of the book. They all were celebrating it. We had him go up on stage with a little cooler and bring on a stuffed animal.

And everybody was acting like it was like the greatest night of their lives. Because we just hit 25 years of the 25th anniversary of this event. Yes. Fuck me. The only person that's still mad is Ron Meehan's the owner. But when I told him about the no dead possums thing, I heard him on the phone laughing. And he goes, that's the only time I've ever laughed. Anything, Kyle Parris is.

That is really an amazing. Yeah. By the way, this guy would crush the social media era. Oh, my God. That is a TikTok would be an absolute. I don't want to give him any ideas. It's not in here because Dave crossed it out. but the last line of that chapter is this woman,

Andrea Kaspari being like, can you imagine if we had like phones, like to get the crowd's reaction again? She goes, she was like, you've seen Matt Rife. Oh, that'd be fucking great.

And then I also took out something because there was a, but there was a girl there who was her first, first time at the show. And she didn't, she went up two after and she didn't bring it up. She has a quote in there. Yeah, she's fifth and he's third.

Yeah, and she's so she goes up and does, she's still mad. She never addressed it. She went up, she was like, hi, I'm Andrea and here's what's going on with me? But she never's like, what the fuck was that or anything? That would literally haunt me. My mom wanted me to go to college, but I made a weird choice. I decided to get into a relationship. It feels like everybody's still thinking about the possum.

But just launches into material. Wouldn't it haunt you to this day if you had never brought it up? It would haunt me to this day if I, if that, even though it's your first set. Like, I would still be like, Like, I cannot believe anything. What's funny about them is she, Andrea Kaspari, still does comedy, and Kyle Parris, they are literally best friends now. Really?

That situation kind of bonded them. Trauma bond. They trauma bonded together. She's like, I don't know. I just wanted to kind of know what was going on with this guy. And they call each other every day. They say, I love you when they hang. She's married and he lives, they live in different cities.

Oh, my God. They're best friends. I ate dinner with them at a barbecue place in Kansas City. I got to go. You like to slow cook? I got a funny bit. You know, did the Dolpotham. What?

Yeah. Yeah. I tried not to think about it the whole time. I tried not to picture it. What are some other stories that are in your book? Well, I have the first story that I ever, the first show that I ever went to was Norm McDonald at a Hanchard Auditorium in Iowa City. And it was billed as family.

I was a teenager. I went with my mother and like a bunch of kids. I had overprotective mother. And I went with these kids from high school. And Norm walked 80% of the crowd. Oh my God. Yeah. Like he was doing like, yeah.

I've done this bit so many times. Like, but he goes, yeah, I used to jack off to porn more than I fucked my wife. Like, and there's like kids and like old people there. It's like, I saw this beautiful woman get fucked by a pig. Yeah. And like, he did like people were just lining out. He's like, can you imagine like the like you got to, you know, director says like cut and you see this woman at a bar and you ask her out? She fucks pigs for a living, yeah?

Now imagine you're the pig. And the director says, you got to go back to fucking your big fat pig wife. And like, I am howling. Like, so that's the first stand-up show I ever saw. Uh-huh. And so I'm trying to, I was in this book, I was trying to figure out, like,

what is the most infamous stand-up story? The guitar guy gets brought up. Kramer at, or Michael Richards at the Laugh Factory. I found out my great-uncle was the guy that fired Richard Pryor from the Aladdin. Oh, my God. I didn't he died before I was born I didn't know anything about this guy um so then there's emery emery in the wheelchair the owners of this club have like they were criminals and the guy wrote a book about like all his crimes and then tried to get a movie made out of it and a lot of people died in the process of him trying to prove that he was a criminal like it's just and so to me I was like the emery emery wheelchair thing the Kyle paris like and this also happens to be where like sinbad started and Eddie Griffin and Nikki Glazer. And I was like, all of these are like super fun.

I'll just make like a little book and then try to decide like what the most infamous stand-up story is. And is it all Kansas City based? Three of them were Kansas City. So I was like, I'll just do like a little history of the Kansas City thing while I'm there. And it was, it ended up,

I didn't do stand up in Kansas City back then. I knew Porter and I knew Nikki and I knew, Kyle. Chapter 6, the possum. Yes. The wheelchair is Chapter 5. Have we done a full episode, Dave? Do we want to hear some of the wheelchair?

Yeah, we've done, you know, we can't do it. If we do the wheelchair, it would be a different episode. Well, and people can go find it on Satan's website. Satan's on Satan's website, yeah. It's really phenomenal. The idea that Chris Porter was there for that. Isn't that funny? Yeah, I can only imagine.

It's also funny how well, like, like, it's funny to imagine Chris Porter, like he loved the guy oh i well yeah because he's a very uh sweet individual so there's i understand him being like look you don't understand but also to just be like successful comedians in the room that night be like jesus bro what are you doing right now man yeah um well yeah so what do people just people can look up kansas city comedy yeah it's uh it's on the things and porter did the forward to it. Very nice of him to do. Well, Mike Bridenstein, thank you very much, and this is a very

unique episode, but it deserves a platform. It really does. So, uh, way to go. And let's show, and people can use promo code Dollop. Yes. No, they can. They probably. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, man, that was fucking great. Hey, what's up, dollheads? This is

Gareth Reynolds from the Dalop, the podcast you're listening to. Hey, I've got some very exciting information. If you like movies and you're in the San Jose area, I made a movie. It's called Give It Up, and it will be at the Cinequest Film Festival. You can go to Give It Up Film.com for tickets and information. It'll be March 15th is the main screening. So go to Give It Up Film.com.

Also, if you like stand-up comedy, February 4th, I'll be in Spokane, February 5th, Bend, Oregon. Then I'll be in Portland, February 6th, and February 7th. Three shows that night. then I'll be at Flappers and Burbank, February 21st, Bakersfield, February 27th, for two shows. I will be in Albuquerque, New Mexico, April 19th, Tulsa, Oklahoma, April 21st, Bricktown Comedy in Oklahoma City, April 22nd, Dallas, Texas, April 23rd, Tyler, Texas, April 24th, finally. Houston, April 25th, two shows, Austin at the Great Cap City, April 26th, and then San Antonio, April 28th, and Tucson, April 29th, gareth reynolds.com for tickets and information, but also if you want to go see my movie and you're in the San Jose area, give it upfilm.com.