The Harland Highway - 913 - CRAZY news story about CRAZY creatures. Vegas shooting follow up. Question of the day!

Episode Date: October 19, 2017

913 - CRAZY news story about CRAZY creatures. Vegas shooting follow up. Question of the day! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, hey, it's the Harland Highway. Hey, everybody, it's Harland Williams here. And this is the Harland Highway podcast, and Floyd and Snargett in. Hey, how's it going, everybody? Great show today. The Harland Highway Question of the Day. Oh, my God, it's such a good one today that it balloons. One question of the day actually balloons into three questions of the day.

It's like one of those dragons with all the heads on them. It just gets out of control how it ballooned. So wait, do you hear the Harland Highway question of the day? Also, a crazy news story that might make your hairs stand up on end. It's a little bit creepy. It looks like a new creepy creature has been discovered on planet Earth. I mean, it knew it was here all these centuries and millions of years, but I guess scientists didn't know, and now they've discovered it.

So wait, do you hear what it is? Also, a follow-up phone call from one of our pavement pounders talking about my podcast I did about the shooting in Las Vegas, kind of a more serious tone to that one, but a really great response from one of the pavement founders and his concerns and his views about how we are as a society and how the shooting events that happen changed. us. So let's get into it. Here we go. This is the Harland Highway.

Put on your seatbelt. It's about to get bumpy. Oh, how perfectly awful. I get my kids above the waistline, sunshine. When will they take the bandages off? We don't know who we are. We don't know where we are. You're riding down the Harland Highway. Let me tell you, you're starting something here that that's what you should be frightened of. Oh, fuck yeah, bud. Just leave us alone.

Sit down, strap in, and shut up. What's going on? What's the matter? I thought maybe if I could kill him, I could make him stop. My mother never breastfed me. She told me she liked me. He's a friend. Who are we? This is the Harland Highway. What? It's the Harland Highway.

It's a cup. All right, here's something to scream about. I think we have to start the show up with a crazy news story, Raj, because, yikes. Yikes, almighty. Let me just read this headline and we're going to get into this crazy news story to kick off the show. Okay? Play the theme, Rodge. Play the crazy news story theme.

And then I'm going to tell everyone all about it. The Harland Highway. Crazy news story. That's weird. Wow. That's strange stuff. Okay. Crazy news story. Roger, play the little movie clip.

Play the little clipy thing we dug up. Yeah, hit it. Firstly, what about you? ruses. Rodents of unusual size? I don't think they exist. Well, rodents of unusual

size apparently do freaking well exist. Listen to this crazy new story headline. Enormous coconut cracking tree dwelling rat found in Solomon Islands. I love that.

Not only is it enormous, but it's a coconut cracker. Yeah, we got us a coconut cracker up there, boys. Yeah, no, no, that's a full-on coconut cracker right there, yeah. An 18-inch rat. 18 inches, good Lord. That's over a foot long, man. Yikes.

An 18-inch rat that lives in trees and is able to open coconuts with his teeth has been discovered in the Solomon Islands. Well, a note to my travel agent, check that exotic locale off my bucket list. I don't need me no 18-inch rat chewing coconuts sneaking into my cabin at night. The rat known as Eromis Vika has been particularly hard to find becoming the first rat discovered in 80 years. Really? Are we, is that something we were doing? Is that a thing? Are we looking to discover more rats? Man, it's been 80 years, man. I just know. I just feel it in my soul that we're going to find another rat.

I mean, you know, I've been looking a long time, but I know that out there. I mean, I'm never giving up. And even if we find a new rat, I mean, we can find a rat that's 18 inches long and crack coconuts with its teeth. Even if we find something that fantastical, I'm still not going to stop looking for rats. Good Lord. This new species is pretty spectacular. It's a big giant rat, the official said in a press release. It is the first rat discovered in 80 years, and it's not like people haven't been trying. It was just so hard to find.

Who are these people looking for rats? Hey, what do you want to do today, man? Well, you know, I haven't seen or heard of a new rat for almost 100 years. I mean, we're right at the 80-mark threshold here. And if you're asking me what I'd like to do today, I'd like to go out and look for some new rats. I mean, I don't know what. Say no more. Say no more.

I want to look for new rats, too. For comparison purpose, a normal American rat weighs around 0.44 pounds. Solomon Island rats can weigh as much as 2.2 pounds. Hey, the upside is finally something on the planet that isn't as fat as Americans. How about that? Can we get a round of applause for that? Yeah. Big round of applause that finally,

not as fat as Americans. This rat is approximately a foot and a half long from its nose to the tip of its tail. Good Lord. Officials had heard rumors that the creature existed since their first trip to the islands in 2010. Scientists questioned whether they would ever find the rat and was not sure if it was really a new species

or he was just looking in the wrong direction. One of the scientists said, I started to question if it was really a separate species or if people were just calling regular black rats, Vika, which is the new rat. This sign had added, if you're looking for something that lives on the ground, you're only looking in two dimensions,

left to right and forward and backward. If you're looking for something that can live in 30-foot-tall trees, then there's a whole new dimension that you need to search. Oh, my. Signed has eventually teamed up with so-and-so and so-and-so and finally found the creature as it was running away from a fallen tree. He said, as soon as I examined the specimen, I knew it was something different. There are only eight known species of native rat from the Solomon Islands.

Only eight? Okay. And look at the features on its skull. I could rule out a bunch of the species right away. Wow. The Solomon Islands have become a hotbed for research scientists looking to make new discoveries. The country, and you're probably all wondering, where is this giant rat island? The country is located a thousand miles northwest of Australia and is biologically isolated,

with more than half of the mammals living on the chain of islands found nowhere else on Earth. Good. How about we keep them there? So there you go, man. You got your coconut cracking tree-dwelling rat found a foot and a half long. Now, for those of you people that are into the coconut water craze, like you're all about the coconut water. Like, you know, you want to stay hydrated,

but regular groundwater isn't good enough for you. like you need elevated water from like a coconut like why don't you go get one of these giant uh coconut cracking rats and you know start you know get them to crack your coconuts sounds like a good name for a band coconut cracking rat i think i'll start a punk band called the coconut cracking rats so anyways i thought you might want to have a rat update because you know we really haven't found anything new in 80 years i mean it's just a wonderful news that we have a brand new rat that we can add to our collection i mean hopefully we find more fucking rat soon i mean my god right geez so there you go the harlan iway crazy coconut crack

news story. Oh, it's lovely. It's just lovely. What's that, Raj? Yeah. We have a phone message from someone talking about my whole thing about the vaguest thing and going out in public and being scared and hiding and all that. Yeah, yeah, I want to hear that. I want to hear that feedback. That's cool. Yeah, play the message. Hello? Hello. Hi, Erlin.

It's Chris from Halifax. Just got finished listening to your latest podcast there. And I'm in agreement with most of what you're saying, you know, about praying and whatnot. I grew up praying and being in that kind of environment. You kind of got away from that a bit. I'm finding it again now. at 56 but like you said

anything and everything done with with good intent I guess and love can't hurt and I believe enough of it will push on the evil

trying to take us over you know I've been going to concerts and playing in rock and country music band since I was 13 I'm 56 now and I'm creeped out

going to any event that is in a crowd this is part of what these people that do these things want they want no human interaction no socializing no celebration of life

okay personally I would rather be dead than cave into that darkness that they're trying to spread in the world so even though I'm mindful of it I'm going to keep on living and doing what I'd like to do and I suggest

everybody else be careful but don't be afraid to go out and live your life because if you do that then they've won so that's all I got to say you can tell me oh Lord Tundra Jesus Airby

it's Chris from Halifax I love Halifax great city out on the eastern side of Canada over in the Atlantic provinces I have had some Good Times in Halifax. Let me tell you that.

But to your point, Chris, a very heartfelt message from Chris. You can hear the emotion in his voice. And I appreciate your thoughts. And I guess to a degree I concur about the whole, well, if we alter our behavior, they win. Right? Which makes sense on the surface. But then does it make sense if you. do go out to a concert and you and your family are blown across a wall and look like

raspberry jelly, you know, then who wins? You definitely don't win. You and your family definitely lose. And so it's very courageous and it's very emboldened of us to say, oh, I'm not going to change my lifestyle. I'm not going to change my tactics or my behavior because if I change anything, These people will win. Well, you know, I don't know that by changing our tactics, they win.

I think they win if maybe we don't change our tactics. Because if we just keep carrying on like it's business like usual, I mean, this isn't a situation where someone's egging our house or playing a practical joke. We're living in a world where people drive 18-wheelers through Christmas carnivals and drive people off of boardwalks and blow up marathons and shoot up nightclubs and concerts. And so to just make a blanket blind statement like, well, I'm not changing my behavior.

Well, guess what? That's probably exactly what they want to hear. The bad people want to hear. Oh, great. You hear that? They're not changing their behavior. They're still going to be sitting ducks. All right.

Good. Cool. That makes our job easier. We can kill more or more. So I get the sentiment, Chris, that you're saying. It's like, you know, we don't want to bow or kowow or in any way appease these evil people. We don't want to alter the way of life that we have. We don't want to change things.

We don't want them to think that we're cowering. And so we can continue to just walk around. and act really courageous and act really strong and noble. But like I said, that just makes it all the easier for them to pick us off, right? So what if we still attended these things and went about our daily lives? And I think what I was suggesting in my last podcast is that we do have to modify our behavior. We do have to change our behavior in order to not let them win. because when you have an enemy,

when you have someone that's trying to hurt you and you just keep carrying on in a pattern that they understand and they know, then you become what we call a sitting duck and you become easier and easier to pick off. But if you alter your behavior, if you change your behavior, if you adjust to their tactics,

and you kind of counteract their tactics, well, to me, that's just being smart. And I'm not saying you have to hide in your house. You have to hide in a shell. You can't go out. You can't attend any social function. But I think we as a society, as a government, as whatever our security apparatus or operati is,

or whatever the term is, we have to start tweaking it. We have to adjust so that we're, We're not sitting ducks. And I don't think we can just go on like business as usual. Well, they're not going to change me. I'll show them. I'll show them.

I'm still going to go to the big crowded concert. And I'm still going to go to the Christmas fair on the mall. And I'll show them when I'm blowing up in a million pieces. Hey, everybody. Who wants to have better sex? No? Yes. Yes.

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Don't throw your back out. This is a true story. It happened right here in my town. One night, 17 kids woke up, got out of bed, walked into the dark, and they never came back. I'm the director of Barbarian. A lot of people done. in a lot of weird ways You're not going to find it in the news

because the police covered everything all up on August days this is where the story really starts weapons So even though your instinct is to be defiant and to resist and to not want to adjust to accommodate their evil maniacal ways

you have to ask the question in all seriousness. If you don't adjust, are you foolhardy? Are you setting yourself up to become a victim all that much easier? Are you becoming, are you basically walking out there as a target? So the point of my previous podcast was I think we all have to shift our thinking. we all have to get tactical. We all have to have an escape route. We all have to figure out, you know, how to roll along the ground and pop up behind a chair and then roll along the ground again.

Or maybe we need to be prepared to throw a chair across a crowded room and hit a gunman in the head. Or maybe we have to kind of try and imagine where their blind spot is and do a running, leaping tackle and grab them around the neck and smash their head into the ground. And so these are things that we have to start getting into our heads. We have to start thinking about fighting back and defending our children and our loved ones and ourselves. And by no means do I subscribe to the notion of everyone just hide in a hole and never come out and enjoy life. But I think I was really getting at we've got to modify our behalf

But don't look at that as a shameful thing. Don't look that as a defeatist thing. Look at that as a triumph. Look at that as being smart. Look at that as outwitting and out maneuvering the enemy. And so now when these guys shoot into a crowd or they try to start a disruption, instead of a bunch of paralyzed people that look like deer and headlights, instead, we've got a room of 3,000 people that have already kind of, you know, pre-played this scenario in their heads and have somewhat of a reaction to it. Instead of just standing there and letting the bullets riddle their bodies, maybe the minute they hear gunfire or the second they hear gunfire, people are ducking and rolling and hiding and figuring out where the source came from and not standing around and go, gee, it sounded like firecrackers. I just thought a car was backfiring, so it took me about 10 minutes to figure it out.

Gee, you know, I thought the speakers were malfunctioning. No, no more of that thinking. The minute you see anything erratic or hear some kind of popping noise or anything that simulates a gun in any ways, you go into your brand new protective self-defense mode. And that's what I was encouraging people to do. to get into that mindset so that we can keep going out, but we're ready, we're battle ready. And unfortunately, we don't want to do it, but let me ask you this. When you go into the forest camping, do you spray your body with bug spray so you don't get bit by mosquitoes

or do you just walk around with your top off and say, come get me, boys? No, you do something to defend your body, to defend your skin, to combat the nuisance, combat the assailant, in this case a mosquito. So now we have to go out into the world, into society, with some sort of invisible repellent, you know, ISIS repellent, or radical Islam repellent, or whoever the terrorist group is repellent. And it's in our heads.

It's not a physical spray, but it's a thought pattern in our heads. It's a plan of evasive maneuvering. And so that's what I'm encouraging, Christopher. And I hear you, man. Nobody wants to alter their behavior and give up our way of life. But we just have to get smarter about it. You know, remember the phone that used to hang on your wall when you were a kid, the telephone? And now what do we have?

We have smartphones. And what are smartphones? They're the same thing. It's a phone, but they do so much more. They've advanced. They do more things. they think for us, they talk to us, they, you know, and so that's what we have to do as people. We can't be the phone hanging on the wall.

We've got to be the smartphone when we go out into the world now. So there you go. So hopefully Christopher that helps. And as I said, I appreciate the passion in your voice, and I can appreciate the frustration in your voice. And it is sad. And you as a performer and someone who performs live music in front of crowds, You probably feel this even more than a lot of us. So hopefully these words, I'm not chastising it.

I'm not condemning or insulting. I'm hoping to put you in a mental state where maybe you can see that we can create new practices for ourselves as human beings and implement ways in which to survive these horrors that are becoming so commonplace almost every freaking week. in our world now. So let's become smartphones. Let's get smart and let's keep enjoying life. Thank you for the call, Christopher, and someday lets me on you go jigging for squid thereby.

That's East Coast Halifax talk. Most of you won't understand it. But Chris knows exactly what I'm talking about. Jiggin for squid thereby. All right. Thanks for the call, Chris. All right, here it is, and it's one I think we've all wondered about, I think this is a universal question,

except in places where they don't have stores. Like, if you're out in the outback of Australia, like if you're out in the middle of the outback, right? And you don't have like a local mole or whatever bloke, right? Then you're not going to worry about this question of the day. But if you're out in the outback, I'm guessing you don't even have a computer or the internet, so you're probably not listening anyhow. But here's the Harlan Highway question of the day.

Why is it that nobody ever does anything when you walk out of a store, a grocery store, a Home Depot, a clothing store, a apartment store, and somehow you set the little alarm off or somebody sets that little, you know, that little theft, anti-theft alarm off. because the stores hide little devices inside the merchandise in the boxes or they staple them to the clothes. You know, you've seen those big, ugly plastic things, they stick into your clothes, they bag them and tag them. But why is it when you go out the door or someone goes out the door and this alarm goes off? Everyone that's a consumer stops and looks around and you kind of wait and you're like, oh, what's going to happen next? I think I accidentally triggered the alarm. I guess I'll stand here and just look around and feel like a suspect

and have everyone eye me up and down while I stand in the middle of the sliding doors, frozen like a deer in the headlights, while all the other non-shoplifting consumers, stare at me and judge me and convict me of theft. And meanwhile, you've stolen nothing. First of all, maybe that's another question. Why do we trigger them off when we clearly haven't stolen anything? And then second of all, why is it nobody shows up?

Here's where it really got me. The other day, I was at a big fancy mall. And I don't know if I was wearing a wacky belt buckle. I don't know if it was my cell phone. I don't know if I had lead underwear on. I don't know if I had swallowed a bunch of coins in my sleep. I don't know if someone drugged me and did some illegal surgery on me and put a titanium bar in my body.

But out of like the six stores I went into, I triggered the security alarm walking in and walking out. And the person I was with, when we got to the other stores, they went in ahead of me, nothing. But then when I walked through, here comes powder. You know, here comes Johnny Electric. For some reason, and I've never had this happen before,

I was triggering the alarms. And so I'm like kind of stopping. I'm slowing down. I'm like, okay, I guess I'm going to, I have to explain myself. Is someone going to pat me down? Is someone going to body search me? Am I going to get a cavity search?

Am I going to get a cavity search here at the gap? I guess that's fitting. The gap? A cavity search? I don't know. Are they going to check to see if I'm smuggling pants or loafers out in a most inconspicuous spot? Are they going to check my bags?

Are they going to... And here's what happened. No one batted an eye. Nobody looked up. No one from the store came running. You ever see when someone walks out on their check at the cheesecake factory? Suddenly waiters turn into like Olympic sprinters. I mean, they go running down the street with an apron on

and a menu in their hand and a pen in their hair. It's like Hussein Bolt out of the cheesecake factory, right? Suddenly some fat pimply kid who failed gym class in high school is now setting an Olympic speed record out the door of Applebee's because his lousy customer took off without paying the $4.99 check for a whole meal. I mean, you never see anyone get away with that, but, but, but, Have you ever seen anyone bat an eye when it comes to walking out of a department store or a clothing? They just stand around.

They don't even walk to the door. They don't even. And I'm wondering, are these people trained? Is this whole shoplifting alarm system just a futile exercise in sound? I mean, what are these people doing the work there? Oh, there goes the alarm. So anyways, Karen, how we do that? your weekend? Really? No way. David has what? Oh, hang on. Let's come. Let's go in the back because

that, that alarm is, it's, it's noisy. It's interfering with, with our conversation. I mean, what is going on with the alarms? And then, and then you got to remember, the other thing that kind of struck me is, well, who's managing the clothing store anyway? And, you know, a lot of times it's women. It's women of all kinds and sizes, fat women, skinny women, beautiful women, not so beautiful women. And, you know, if a big truck driver decides to walk out with a pair of jeans, um, excuse me, sir, our alarm went off.

Yeah, so? I hope you enjoy your jeans. That's what I thought you were going to say. And the other side of it is a lot of times in these clothing stores, you get like kind of effeminate men. Not all of them, but a lot of them, let's be honest. I don't know if they're gay. I don't know if they're straight,

but there's a certain level of femininity going on. I mean, is that the guy that's going to chase down the alarm? Excuse me, sir. Oh, my God, I'm sort of breath. If you're wondering why I'm skipping after you, our alarm went off. Excuse me. Could you just hold me while I catch my breath?

Our store alarm went off, sir, and I see you're wearing a pair of our shoes? Well, what makes you think that? Well, because the tag's still on them, sir. If you could just sit down, and I've got a shoehorn here, I'll gladly take them off and then polish your feet, and would you like me to do your nails before I return? turn to the store and buff those corns? Yeah, all right, why not?

If I can't steal the shoes, I might as well get a pedicure. Certainly, sir. I mean, so what's the point? So it's like a whole bunch of questions of the day falling into one. Why do they have the damn

security beepers? Why doesn't anybody do anything about the beeps when they go off? And who's going to do anything about the beeps when they go off? So there you go. One Harland Highway Question of the Day turned into a triple header. And now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get to the mall and steal myself a pair of new pants.

The Harlan Highway Question of the Day. The Harlan Highway Question of the Day. And so we'll leave it right there. We'll hang it up, so to speak, and let you ponder. And, you know, maybe you have the answer, because I certainly don't. That's why we ask these probing questions, boys and girls. A quick announcement. Schedule changed to my stand-up comedy schedule.

I was scheduled to work in Burbank, California, on Saturday night at a club called Flappers in downtown Burbank, in case you were listening to the show and you were thinking of going. That date will be most. It got canceled, and we'll pop up at Flappers another day. But just so, you know, Saturday, October 21st, there will be no show for me at Flappers. But as fate would have it, I will be working at the Comedy Store on Sunset Boulevard at 7 p.m. on that night instead. So Burbank got canceled, and now I'm in Hollywood.

So 7 o'clock, the world-famous comedy store in the main room, and that'll be a great show, 7 o'clock on Saturday. And then don't forget the following weekend, October 28th, yours truly is doing his only the second time I've ever done the Harland Highway podcast live. And that's going to take place at the Tempe Improv in Phoenix, Arizona. So I'm going to be doing an hour-long podcast, which is kind of double what I normally do. And then after the podcast, I'm going to do like a half-hour, 45 minutes of live stand-up comedy.

So it's going to be a double bubble, baby. So get your tickets online at harloweems.com for the Harland Highway Live at the Tempe Improv, October 28 next Saturday. And then the following weekend, yours truly is in Buffalo. New York at the Helium Comedy Club. That's going to be November 2nd to November 5th. November 2nd to 5th, the Helium Comedy Club in Buffalo. Great club. I've been there once before.

And then November 16th to the 19th, yours truly in San Jose, California, at the Improv. So some great shows coming up. They're all at Harlow Williams.com. You can book your tickets right there online. Okay, also while you're there, you can contact me. If you want to write me an email, feel free. We have a contact link there. And if you want to leave me a phone message,

like our friend from Halifax there, by, the guy earlier, the guy that left the sweet message there by about, you know, going out in public there and stuff and whatnot and chigging for squid thereby. You can leave me a phone message. I might play it on the show. 323-739-43-33-30. 3-23-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-30 is the number.

Also get our free app. We have a free app on your cell phone. Just type in the Harland Highway podcast in your cell phone app store. And boom, you get that app for free. You get the 50 latest episodes. And if you want the whole library of the Harland Highway for $20, you get the whole library almost a thousand episodes. Are you kidding me? We're coming up on a thousand episodes.

So you get the recent ones and the whole library for only $20. So check that out. And if you are a premium member, I'm going to be posting a fun show that I did or I did my whole stand-up comedy routine. with a British accent. That's coming up for premium members only. I think I'm going to post it, actually, this Friday. So this Friday, if you're a premium member, you will get to hear me do my whole damn comedy routine.

I decided to do it in a British accent. It's really silly and ridiculous. So hope you premium members enjoy it. And if you're not a premium member, you have time to do so right now. go to Harlow Williams.com and sign up, baby. What else can I tell you? Check out our store at Harlow Williams.com.

And don't forget to watch Puppie Dog Pals, my Disney show, my animated show. It's doing great. We have been picked up for a second season, and then it just got announced that Disney's ordering some extra episodes because they're so happy with the show and all the toys are coming out.

Oh my God, I just bought my new puppy dog pals play dog house. I can't believe it. I created this show like years ago, and now there's like a plastic toy dog house with a slide and a ferretter and a teeter-totter and the little dogs play around in the house. It's hilarious. I just almost can't believe it. It's so cool.

So if you've got kids, check out puppy dog pals on Disney Jr. And I think that's it. I think that's it for now. I mean, there's always more announcements, but I don't want to overload you boys and girls. Just do me a favor. Tell your friends about the highway. Let's get them on board.

And let them enjoy the wackiness that is the Harland Highway. So there you go. Hope you had a good time here today, folks. And that's it for today. Until next time, chicken. Shao-Me, baby? Thank you. Thank you.