The HoneyDew with Ryan Sickler - Eddie Bravo - HoneyBravo

Episode Date: October 17, 2022

My HoneyDew this week is comedian, Eddie Bravo! (Joe Rogan Experience, Tin Foil Hat Comedy) Eddie Highlights the Lowlights of his absent father, his abusive stepfather, and not fitting in in school. SUBSCRIBE TO MY YOUTUBE and watch full episodes of The Dew every toozdee! https://www.youtube.com/rsickler  SUBSCRIBE TO MY PATREON, The HoneyDew with Y’all, where I Highlight the Lowlights with Y’all! You now get audio and video of The HoneyDew a day early, ad-free at no additional cost! It’s only $5/month! Sign up for a year and get a month free! https://www.patreon.com/TheHoneyDew  SPONSORS: Betterhelp - Get 10% off your first month at https://www.Betterhelp.com/HONEYDEW  Liquid I.V. -Get 15% off when you go to https://www.LiquidIV.com and use code HONEYDEW Crowdhealth -Go to https://www.Joincrowdhealth.com and use code HONEYDEW to join for just $99 per month for the first 6 months

Chicago, you're up next. November 11th and the 12th. Grand Rapids, December 9th and the 10th. Get your tickets to those shows on my website at ryansickler.com. The Honeydew with Ryan Sickler. Welcome back to the honeydew, y'all. We are over here doing it in the Night Pant Studios. I'm Ryan Sickler, ryansickler.com. Ryan Sickler on all your social media. If you are watching this show on YouTube, thank you very much. Please hit that subscribe button.

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You sign up for a year, you get a month free, and it's the honeydew with y'all. And I highlight the lowlights with y'all, and y'all have the wildest fucking stories I've ever fucking heard. All right? It blows my mind every fucking week. All right? So if you or someone you know has that story, it's got to be heard. Please submit it to HoneydewPodcast at gmail.com. We'll hopefully get you on and do an episode together.

All right? The tour continues. Chicago, I will see you guys November 11th and 12th. And Grand Rapids, December 9th and the 10th. All right, y'all. That's the business right there. You guys know what we do here. We highlight the lowlights.

I always say these are the stories behind the storytellers. Very excited to have this guest on this week. First time here on The Honeydew. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Eddie Bravo. Welcome to The Honeydew, Eddie Bravo. Thank you for having me. Dude, thank you for being here. Am I close enough to the mic?

Yeah, come on up and get in with it. Before we get into anything, please plug, promote everything you'd like. All of it. Me and Sam Tripoli, we do a show called Tinfoil Hat Comedy. We tour around the United States. We got Fresno coming up, Calusa Casino coming up. That's in the first weekend of

December. And then we're trying to set up Denver and Salt Lake City. That's in the works right now. That'll be sometime in November. If you're interested in jujitsu, 10thplanetjj.com. That's where you could find all my jujitsu information.

And, oh, and I have a podcast on Rockfin. It's called Look Into It with Eddie Bravo. I got about 23 episodes. The first eight are free and it's behind a paywall, but I'm only interested in doing podcasts for people that want to support me. You know what I mean? If you don't want to support me, then that's fine. I don't need your attention. I want to save my energy for people that really want to hear what is on my mind. And if you don't, if it's too crazy, ignore me. That's it.

Great. But we do give out free episodes, though, after the first eight are free. And then from nine through 23, Rockfin is awesome. It's like the Netflix for podcasts. You pay, I don't know what it is, nine bucks and you get everybody's podcast. Oh, is that right? Yeah, you get everybody's podcast. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, it's awesome. It's awesome. There's so many great podcasts. You get them all, just like Netflix, but for podcasts. Well, look, I've been following you for a while through comedians like Tripoli and those guys that I know. And I've been a fan of yours, so I appreciate you coming on. And I first just met you recently, officially, at Tripoli's show. Yeah, you blew me away, man.

You blew me away. I was like, who the fuck is that dude? I've never seen you do stand-up, man. I never even heard of you. And I inquired, and I'm like, damn, Ryan Sickler. Okay. And then I i inquired and like damn ryan sickler okay and then i went backstage and we started rapping changed numbers and boom here we are here we are yeah you actually said you went out there and watched me and i was like oh fuck i was waiting you were great yeah dude thank you that made me feel good um so look i want to talk to you about your life i mean

i don't know anything about you so So let's start at the beginning. Where are you from originally? Here in Southern California? Born in East L.A., actually, but was raised in Orange County, Santa Ana. That's where they put all the Mexicans. You said put them. That's right. Yeah, yeah.

They didn't know what to do with them because all the white people from L.A., they left L.A. south to Orange County. That's the new spot. Too many Mexicans were infiltrating L.A., so the white people said, let's go to Orange County. They took off. They went Laguna Niguel, Newport Beach, Costa Mesa. They're like, oh, shit, this is awesome. But they needed to bring some Mexicans to clean the goddamn houses, you know, and cut the grass and build shit.

So they designated Santa Ana as the servants, the workers. Wow. All right. I hear you. Yeah, yeah. That's like where you all live. You can clean and work here, but you can't live here. Yeah, you're going to live in Santa Ana.

You're going to live right over there. You're going to live in Santa in santa it's still orange county you can tell people you live in orange county you don't have to get all detailed you just say orange county you benefit from it so tell them santa ana though there would be some white people that lived on the edge of santa ana that'd be where with my family would have been like the northern northern edge. One in and one out. That's where we'd have been. The northern edge of Santa Ana. That's definitely where we would have lived. Bordered a white city, Tustin and Orange. Tustin. Tustin and Orange.

I know the jewelry exchange in Tustin. White cities back then. I mean, those were good cities. Hilarious. But Santa Ana, the part of Santa Ana that bordered those nice cities. We had a few blocks in Santa Ana. So your mail said Santa Ana. You lived in a nice house.

And it was like, damn, you live in Tustin. Those people didn't, even though on their mail it said Santa Ana, they said, fuck that shit. This is Tustin, dog. I live in Orange. They would lie. Yeah, yeah. Because technically they kind of did because you could tell it didn't belong. So do you have brothers and sisters?

I have an older brother, younger sister. So three of you and then your parents, were they together growing up? Did they split? The neighborhood I grew up in was mostly single moms with their kids. One by one, all the husbands left on our block. Just one by one. Is that right? Oh, yeah. That's not funny, man.

Dude, they all left. And all the kids on the street. Where'd all the pickup trucks go? They left for good, man. That was one couple that stayed together to the end. They were like the king and queen of the block. Macario and Socorro, Calván. Both of them, man.

They were like the king and queen of that street. And we had a church, dude. We had a church. We lived by a church. Big-ass church. Our Lady of Pilar. And so one by one, except for Macario and Socorro, except for them, everybody got divorced.

Nobody made it. But the moms all stayed. The moms stayed. And the dads were like, we'll go do. Yeah, the moms never left. The moms stayed, dads left. And then all the kids that we were all just like wild, little Mexican kids into hard rock and heavy metal.

So you had a lot of kids in your neighborhood at the same age and everything. No, not exactly. I was part of the younger crew. My brother was four years older than me and he had his crew. If I was 10, he was 14. Big difference between 10 and 14. You're right about that. So my brother, there was a few 14-year-olds.

And there was only like two or three 10-year-olds. And then there was like some 18-year-olds. They really didn't hang out with us that much. And then the 22-year-olds, you know, who lived in the back shed. You know what I mean? They got divorced too. So there was a bunch of levels. I was part of the younger group. Everybody got divorced. And then

it ends up, we end up just like playing football on the streets and we're just monitoring whose mom is dating, whose mom has a new boyfriend. And what kind of car is he driving? Look at your mom's boyfriend's car! Look at your mom's boyfriend!

And then you just talk shit. Your mom's boyfriend's car. Look at your mom's boyfriend. And then you just talk shit. Your mom's boyfriend. My best friend. Motherfucker got a Fiero. When's the last time you saw a Fiero? My best friend's mom dated this fucker. You know, because every now and then, my mom was kind of hot. So she even dated like a dude from the California Angels back when they were the Juan Benicas.

My mom dated that dude. Really? Yeah, my mom was a little hottie. So when my stepdad finally left and left her alone with three kids to raise, that was my stepdad. That was my older brother. We'll come back to that. I got you because I want you to explain it. It's complicated.

All right. My mom and dad, stepdad, a lot of weird shit. But not weird. Typical, actually. But my friend's mom, damn, she scored. She got a boyfriend that drove a big-ass truck driver. And he was all a Mexican guy, but Americanized, kind of. Born in Mexico, but been out here for like 15 years.

Got a good job truck driver. And he was all about Peterbilt. Like it was just, you know, he was just like Peterbilt belt buckles. So he had like a decent car. Like he had a Camaro or some shit. I'm like, oh shit. Matt's mom's coming up. And we were like, oh shit.

Matt's mom's coming up. And we were like, oh shit. And he was like so proud that his mom got a boyfriend with a job. That's a relief for him too. He doesn't have to be shit on. Because he never had a dad. Just like me. My dad was always gone too. Everybody's dad was gone.

So his dad was gone. Everybody dealt with it in different ways but he loved his mom's new boyfriend so much he started he wore he got a peterbilt dude he had like peterbilt uh like toy trucks and shit he was all about it dude he was so proud he felt like he had the best mom on the block. He's like, oh, Peterbilt's the best. So every time we go to go to Peterbilt, oh, that's a Kenworth. And then he left her. He started taking his shit down.

That's when you all should have worn Peterbilt. He'd go, where's a Peterbilt shirt on. We're all Mack trucks now, man. Yeah. So it was a lot of that shit. Great, dude. All right, so let's go back for a second. Your biological father, he was around for how long?

Okay, so my mom, 18, is dating. See, I said my mom was fine. Even though we were all poor. Her mom and dad, my grandma and grandpa had 10 kids. She was the second oldest. 10 kids, dog. My grandma was having kids when my mom was having kids. I got aunts that are the same age.

I got an aunt like my sister. She's a year older than me. I got an aunt that's two years older than me. Do you call her aunt, though? Yeah, she's my aunt, but we're like sisters. We grew up together. We were like best friends growing up. And as I got older, they were always trying to get me laid. They were always hooking up with their

friends. They go, we got another one for you, Edgar. We got another one. So they'd like take pictures of like my pictures of me and show them to girls at work. And then try to, they're always trying to hook me up. It was awesome. That's great.

My aunts were the hookups dude. They loved it. They enjoyed getting me girls. But anyways, my mom is 18. She starts dating this Porsche mechanic, Mexican Porsche mechanic. That's my stepdad.

Okay. Like Newport Beach, the best mechanic at Newport Beach. So my mom was, you know, we were poor, but she was fine. All right? Not going to deny that. She nabs a dude that was making great money, top Porsche mechanic at Newport Beach, but he's an asshole. And he's a wife beater. And he's a fucking, yeah, just a fucking piece of shit, right?

So he gets her pregnant. My grandma and grandpa hate him. Everyone hates him because he's just a dick. And she has my brother, Alfonfonso his name is alfonso bravo my stepdad's last name is bravo that's where i get bravo his name is alfonso bravo my mom says maria and they they end up getting married she gets pregnant nobody in the family likes him he's a dick uh when my sons or my brothers, too, they get a divorce. He beats the shit out of her.

Wife beat her. So now she's back at my grandma's with my brother. Now she's a single mother. And then my mom always wanted to be a singer. She always sings with mariachis. Anytime you see mariachis, my mom's going to get there and start singing. My mom always wanted to be a singer. No matter what, even if you're at a restaurant and they show up she'll figure out a way to get it

it used to embarrass me when i was like 12 i'm like no mom not the mom like this oh my god i'm all pissed off but then i learned to love it i was just just, I was a fucking asshole. I'm probably still an asshole now, but I was an asshole when I was a kid. Just, and, and maybe I had something to do with this story, but anyways, so now my mom's going out. She's living with her mom and dad,

with my grandma and grandpa, with all the kids. And now she's partying. My mom liked to party. Well, she's still only like 2021. She's like the party. My mom would party and she's 70.

She used to party. She was the party starter. She's always dancing and always wanted to sing. She's just – and she goes to a club in Santa Ana. And the club promoter, my dad, he's a club promoter for Mexican bands. He'd bring in Mexican bands. Like he was friends with Vicente fernandez okay my dad was bringing mexican bands into santa ana and into downtown la so when he was down in santa ana bringing mexican bands for all the mexicans down there

my mom went to the show he married five kids no promoter married five kids your truck driver during the day delivered industrial size uh like condiments to restaurants that he drives not quite a semi not peterville it was one like a bobtail he drove like in between i don't know it wasn't peterbilt but it was essie reikhoff it was like they're all over la they're green they're green I still see them, but that's what he worked for during the day, but at night he was a club promoter. He meets my mom and he's like, he's married five kids. He meets my mom and he's like, oh shit, I gotta get this one VIP. So he just like takes her to the VIP and he's like,

you know, falls in love with her, tells my mom that he's going to divorce his wife. He's got five kids. And she's like, you know, okay. He's like super charismatic. She's super charismatic. Everybody loved my dad. Like he got in with my grandpa, my mom's dad.

And they were just like, you know, he was like 13 years older than my mom. So he'd hang out with her dad. They'd be like doing tequila shots, playing cards all night. You know what I mean? And so they got along great. Now all of a sudden my grandpa hates her first husband, Alfonso Bravo, but loves my dad, Pedro Cano. Cano is actually my real last name.

Okay. But I was forced to use my stepdad's last name. Kano is actually my real last name. Okay. But I was forced to use my stepdad's last name. So now my dad gets my mom an apartment in downtown LA, right there off Hoover and Olympic. It's still there. That apartment complex is still there. It's crazy shit.

I lived there till I was three. And I thought, I had memories of it. I'm like, I wonder if my memories are right. Then when I was like 28, I went back there. Boom, I found the spot. I'm like, oh my God, I remember it. What does that feel like? It wasn't even a dream.

It's exactly the way I remember it. I was three. It was weird. But anyway, so my dad now gets my mom an apartment in downtown LA from Santa Ana. She has a two or three-year-old son. My brother's about two or three. He still is married with five kids. He gets my mom pregnant. He's trying to get a divorce, but

his wife wouldn't divorce him. She felt like she was super religious and thought like she was going to go to hell if she got a divorce. So she wouldn't grant him a divorce. So he decided to torture her and say, hey, I told her all about my mom, his mistress that he's seeing. Oh, announce that I'm going to be gone for a while. My mistress got pregnant and I'm going to have a son. That was me. So my dad was evil.

My dad was evil. He was telling his wife about the affair he was having with my mom. And my mom the whole time was thinking he was going to divorce her, and they're in love now. She's young. She's like 22 or something at this point. But it got to the point where he wasn't getting a divorce. He was kind of digging having best of both worlds, right?

So it didn't work out um now do you do you remember him at all coming around you said you lived there three yeah yeah i do remember i remember walking in on him taking a piss and and you know you know there's everyone's got a story like that when you walk in on your dad taking a piss and his dick just seems like tremendous like a couple weeks ago for the first time my son's 10 and for the first time he caught me running like out of the shower naked and he was just i could tell he shot and i was thinking i go is this his moment when the first time he saw his dad's dick? He'll be telling this later. For sure. He's telling that later. I just remember my dad was standing like this. The door was open and he's like this.

And he looked over. I'm like, what the fuck is that? So it didn't work out between my mom and my real dad. So now she's got two kids, two sons, four years apart. And she goes back to Orange County, back to Santa Ana. But he's got six kids now. Yeah. So does he just bail on you and your mom altogether and just stay with that family?

Or do you, does he? Exactly. So she goes back. It didn't work out between them and now first husband's tracking her down, found out about this new shit. She's been, he's trying to, he wants her back. So now my mom is back at my grandma's house.

She's got two sons now and we're living at my grandma's. At this point, three, four. He was around. He was doing both families until I was like two or three. He was doing it for a while. And my mom and dad. And did they still like him even though he wasn't given the divorce? Your grandparents.

Remember, you said they liked him, but they didn't like stepdad. Did they still like him? My grandpa and my dad, they just got along. You know what I mean? It's a common problem for Mexican men, managing multiple families. It's not uncommon. You got a family in Mexico. You got a family.

You sneak across the border. That's what my grandfather. I didn't even think about that. Family here, family there. Yeah. My grandma and grandpa's story, how they crossed the border, that's another story. But now my mom is back at my grandma's house, grandpa and grandma's house. And I'm like three or four.

My brother's like seven. And they get back together again. First husband, Alfonso Bravo, the dick. And my mom's dating. The wife beater. Wife beater. They start dating each other again. And I really don't notice.

I'm at my grandma's and I'm hanging out with my aunts. They're my sister. I'm having a great time. And then original husband gets mom pregnant again. This is your sister. This is my sister. So now I'm in the middle. I got an older brother and a younger sister.

So you got the same dad. I was just, wow. I was, uh, the bastard child. Yeah. In the middle there. Yeah. So now, but wait, were they married again when he got your mom pregnant with your sister? That's where it gets fucked.

Is once she got pregnant again, they decided to try to make it work again. So now I'm five now when they decided to make it work again. So from between the ages of five and 10, I lived with my stepdad, the shitty motherfucker. And is he still that way? Is he still a piece of shit? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. He's a piece of shit.

But when I turned 10, he beat my mom up one last time and then bailed to Mexico. But I'll never forget that. There was a lot of crazy shit that happened during. Did you ever have a physical altercation with him? Dude. I mean, you had to at some point start feeling your own strength. He made a lot of money. He was, like I said, he was a Porsche mechanic.

Yeah. Not tall. He was like probably 5'7", 5'6". But he did lift weights and he was stocky. He was into lifting weights. Porsche mechanic. Had some white friends. You know what I mean?

He was blowing up, dog! You got a white friend? He would be trimming down. That is hilarious. You got a white friend? He would be trimming down. Oh, that is hilarious. So from the ages of five to 10, I'm living with my stepdad.

And I'm forced to use the name Bravo in school. Because my mom was like, she didn't want nobody to know. She didn't want, she's like, you're fucking Bravo now. I see. And back then, they didn't keep records that well. Because my birth certificate says Edgar Alberto Cano. There's no Bravo in it at all. But with that birth certificate, Edgar Alberto Cano, my social security says, Edgar Bravo.

My mom just went, when we signed up to school she just put you're Bravo now bang she goes nobody needs to know shit and I'm like damn I hate this motherfucker and I gotta use his name

damn fuck this motherfucker I hated Bravo I'm like and as a kid Bravo is a is a shitty name

because anytime people kids are so stupid in what they think is funny and like they say Bravo hooray yay hooray, yay, bravo. Non-stop. You know, it's like, yeah, I'm like, dude, that's so not funny. But it was annoying as fuck.

And the first day of school is really the only time the teacher would call out your name. Because after that, you'd have a seating assignment. She would take roll. She would just look at your shit. She wouldn't call anybody's name out. But that first day, she's going to call your your name. Because after that, you'd have a seating assignment and she would take roll and she would just look at your shit. She wouldn't call anybody's name out. But that first day, she's going to call your name out. And I was so self-conscious of Bravo. I'm like, what a dumb fucking name.

I want to change my name. I transferred myself to a white school without my mom's knowledge and used my original name. I'm going to fuck this. I'm not going to use this motherfucking Bravo name. And I transferred myself to a white junior high. Yeah. And then when my mom found out,

she never went to no fucking PTA meetings or not. She didn't give a, she never went to my school once, but when she found out I'm at a new school, my last name is Conno, not Bravo. My mom, she grabbed me by the fucking ear, dude, and dragged me like a caveman.

Dude, she went inside that school. She goes, show me where this fucking school is. We went to the white side of town, almost in Tustin and Orange. How'd you even get away with that? My aunt lived in the area, that district. So I used my aunt's address. And then I just signed everything. I just forged everything. Because when you sign your mom's name, when you ditch class and you have to have a doctor's note.

Or, yeah, it's the same shit, dog. We can go to court. You want to go to court? It's the same one. But anyways, when my mom found out she dragged me to school she fucking kicked down the principal's office she went then she goes where are your fucking files dogs you'll pull the we got to change his fucking name right now he's not conno he's bravo and And I'm like, oh my God, how embarrassing. My mom freaked

out. So she let you stay at the school though? You just had to have the last name? Yeah. But I had to keep Bravo. Now let me ask you this question. I know we're going to jump ahead for just a moment here. When did you finally accept Bravo? When did you embrace Bravo? When did it feel good to be Bravo? Dude, I hated it so much. But my step, my real dad, you know, he didn't really give a fuck anyway. I'm like, how could you not give a fuck about, I would see him like once a year. And he'd come by and show up to my school, give me a $100 bill in front of all my friends at school. I'm in like second grade. I got a $100 bill. So'm in second grade. I got a $100 bill. So he would do

that. And he was only in town to bang my mom. He just wanted to hang out with my mom. So he would show up. He'd go, get all you. You guys, you want to go to the movies? I'd go, hell yeah, I want to go to the movies. You want to go see Shogun Assassin? I'd go, hell yeah, I want to go see. You want all your friends to go too? I'd go, yeah, go get

all your friends. So he'd get all his friends and go too? Yeah. Go get all your friends. So he'd get all his friends. Or we'd get all my friends. And he'd pay for everybody. We'd go to movies, see Shogun Assassin. And meanwhile, he's hanging out with my mom. He'd take us all to Disneyland just so he could hang out with my mom. He didn't give a shit about me.

And I was like, damn, you know what? As long as he's paying for all this shit, going to movies, I'm like, fuck it. he didn't give a shit about me and i was like damn you know what as long as long as he's like paying for all this shit going to movies i'm like fuck it i don't give a shit he ain't like i was like yeah you ain't shit but you want to give me some shit you can give me some shit i'll take it yeah yeah you want to give me i went to uh his truck i went to work with him one day and we did a truck delivery all the way down to san diego and back did that once he showed me oh he was my son oh only time we did that and he'd come by now and then um yeah but how did he feel about you being bravo he didn't give a shit he never even brought it up he didn't even bring it up but the day bravo um left uh the family me and my brother we coming back from a boy scout trip. There was like Mexican Boy Scouts, man.

And we went to like Joshua Tree and shit. And when we got back, she was beat up. We're like, we're in our Boy Scout uniforms. Like, what happened? And she explained to us what happened and her hair's all fucked up, black eyes. She's all fucked up. He beat her up.

He dragged her out. He dragged her by her hair's all fucked up. Black eye, she's all fucked up. Man, he beat her that bad. He beat her up. He dragged her out. God, man. He dragged her by the hair to the front yard. And they called the cops. They arrested him and everything. He got arrested. But me and my brother, that was his real dad. And my brother didn't like him.

Right. That's his biological father. And your sister. When our mom was telling us this, we were like, holy shit. So he's not coming back at all? You just take one for the team, mom. She goes, no, no, no. And I'm like, oh, shit, like a hunji?

And she goes, yeah. And I'm like, oh, mom, love you, mom. Oh, you need anything? And then me and my brother walked down the hallway. got in our room dude we were jumping in our fucking bed and super slow-mo dude we knew we were free dog we knew we were free that guy that guy was a tyrant like we couldn't do shit now was he ever hurting you kids did he he ever beat you guys, or was he just taking it out on your mom? And what was he, a drinker? What was his thing? He drank, and he smoked weed.

And I could understand where he's coming from a little bit, though. You know what I mean? I wasn't his real kid, and he had to support me. You're like, I get it. You know, I get it a little bit. You know, I never called him five years between the ages of five and 10. Never called him dad. He never called me son.

Never said we never, but he was, he would do stupid shit. Like I just wanted to get to school in the morning. So I'd wake up early. My brother was always waking up late. He's always like, I want to get the fuck out. I want her to go to my grandma the morning. So I'd wake up early. My brother was always waking up late. He's always like, I want to get the fuck out. I wanted to go to my grandma's house on the way to school and watch them fucking land at the last segment in the sea monsters.

And then I go to school. So I got up early, go to my grandma's eat cereal there. Cause it's on the way to school. My grandma's house, she lived right down the street. So I'd be up and he was up and and he didn't just beat me for anything like if i did something fucked up he would fuck me up okay but

i was scared to death of him but like if we were eating just like this he would just do this to me and i'd be eating my throne he'd just stare at me he would just stare at me wouldn't even just wouldn't be eaten he would just just stare a hole through me and then i'd get up and the kitchen's over here and here's the doorway and he would get out to block it he would oh he said shit so then i would go out the front door all the way around the side of the house through the back door just to put my fucking uh fruit loops bowl away you know what i mean it was like that so know what I mean? It was like that. So it was like that.

Like he was like that. He wasn't like just beating the shit out of me, but he was just a lot of mental shit. Yeah. And one day me and my brother used to steal NFL pencils from the department store and then sell them for 10 cents at school. We used to hustle, you know,

what do you need? Cincinnati Bengals? Boom. Here you go for 10 cents at school we used to hustle you know what do you need a Cincinnati Bengals boom for here you go 10 cents man we we used to make some extra cash you know and one day but we used to steal the pencils yeah of course you steal any money we steal them and then you sell them at school so one day me and my brother you know we um we we need to uh restock our inventory and we're at a department store new berries in santa ana and uh he gets caught i didn't get caught he got caught because we're not going in together we go separate right boom and we're just bam he gets caught i fucking leave the storm like oh shit he's fucking busted. Oh damn, damn, he's busted. They took him upstairs to the office where they, you know, where they talk to you.

And I didn't know what the fuck was going on. I'm waiting outside the store going, fuck, fuck, fuck, what's going to happen? Shit. My stepdad's going to fuck us. Oh, now we gave him a reason. He just, he needed a reason. Yeah. I'm like, oh shit.

Oh shit. And I'm waiting out there and it's getting late. And then a guy comes out and goes, are you with Alfonso Bravo? And I'm like, yeah. He goes, his parents already picked him up. I'm like, oh, shit. So I run home. Dude, I run home, dude.

I'm running home fucking full clip, dude. I'm just running full clip, dude. I'm like, what's going to happen? What's going to happen? The whole run of anxiety. Is he going to throw me under the bus? Is he going to fucking? So, dude, I get to the house.

Oh, my God. I look in the living room, and I hear them wait. There's like a living room when you walk in, and then you make a right, and then there's a long hallway, and our room is at the end. And then there's a room in between, and then another hallway. So there's like all the doors were open. So I could see all the way down the hallway. So I walked into the living room, and I went, oh, shit.

My brother was like without a shirt like this against the wall. And my stepdad, do you remember that scene? Do you remember that scene in The Shining where there's like some old, like some weird shit's going on and I don't know who it is. Someone's going through the hallway

and they open the door and there's like a man like sucking like some furry's dick. And then he goes like that. And it just, it was like that. It's like scary shit. He's whipping my brother. Whipping him.

Yeah. Whipping him. Like fucking roots. Shit. He's ripping him. Roots. And then, and I'm down the hallway and he looks like that. And he goes.

Oh, God, dude. He looked at me like, this is going to be fun. Look, he's thanking you. Dude, he just got done whipping his own son. Yeah. Like a slave. You're going to get that. My brother, dude, he was made fun of at school in P.E. when he had to take off his shirt.

It was that bad. He fucking whipped the shit out of him. So as soon as he sees me, he does that. I was like, oh, man. This is like fucking Christmas for him. First time ever. My mom fucking jumped in between us. He just went to grab me. And I'm like, oh, shit.

My mom jumped like fucking big John McCarthy, dude. She jumped in front of us and fucking pulled us apart. She goes, no. And he didn't even fight it because he knew. He's like, she's doing me a favor because I'll probably kill him and go to jail. So my stepdad, because my mom said, no fucking way. After what you did to your own son, you're going to kill this motherfucker. You will.

Yeah, you'll kill him. So apparently, my brother told him that we both did it. So he just couldn't wait to whip my ass. way after what you did to your own son you're gonna kill this mom you will yeah so apparently uh my my brother told him that we both did it so he just couldn't wait to whip my ass but my mom fucking stepped in cock blocked and then she whipped my ass i was like crying instantly oh yeah that that was that was scary and he didn't pursue it. He understood what that meant. My mom just fucking saving my life. So he splits, and then what? We're wild on the streets, me and my brother.

But does your mom, she doesn't bring another guy in? No, no. Settle down. My mom, every day she said, I'll never get married. But she's still what? In her fucking late 20s, early 30s at this point? Early 30s. Early 30s. Early 30s.

Young. And she was all about, I will never get married again. I will never get married again. And she never did. Never got married. Almost one guy. Never got married and would always talk about it. And then one guy almost got her to fucking reconsider.

Nico. Nico got her. He was like fucking. So now me and my, I'm like 13 and my brother is 17. And we haven't had a dad. It was just my mom and us and we're on the streets. We're fucking thieving. We're trying to fucking, we're trying to just hustle and survive

my mom didn't have any money she made 150 a week trying to support three kids doing what what was she doing she did like electronic stuff like you know an assembly line putting electronics together and shit like that she worked hard she worked hard and she loved overtime If she can get to work on Saturday, oh, she loved that shit. Oh, man. And then on Fridays, every goddamn Friday, when she got home from work, 530, we're going to McDonald's, dog. We're going to McDonald's. That was just heaven. Yeah, man.

It was just like McDonald's was everything to us. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Life can be overwhelming and many people are burned out without even knowing it. Symptoms can include lack of motivation, feeling helpless or trapped, detachment, fatigue, and more. I know I get run down. I don't feel like doing anything. I don't feel like talking to anyone. I don't feel like going anywhere.

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Are you getting in trouble? Are you getting locked up? Are you staying out of trouble? Are you just getting by just enough? Are you staying out of trouble? Like, are you just getting by just enough? I never got locked up as a teenager. Well said, well said.

No, but really, I've only been arrested and put in jail once. And that was just for like 10 hours. I got, it's a long story. That's another story. But I didn't do anything wrong. I had a gun on me, but I was working. And I could, I used to manage a chain of check cashing stores. Oh, man.

Yeah. Yeah. You're crazy. Yeah. Yeah. That's scary as fuck. i had a friend that was a bail bondsman and these people used to come in like that shit and i'm like they're all yeah during the riots dude i almost got killed during the riots damn dude yeah the riots man so man i

don't even i mean there's just so much to Basically, throughout all that shit, once my stepdad was gone, me and my brother were wild on the streets. We were wild on the streets. And then we were all into rock and metal, and I wanted to be a rock star or a football player. That's it. That's all it was, football player or rock star. Or a football player.

That's it. That's all it was. Football player or rock star. And the football bug got into me when I was eight, nine, when the Rams went to the Super Bowl against the Pittsburgh Steelers. I was a Steelers fan at first just because they were so popular. And I drew a picture of the super bowl like i can't draw worth a shit but i drew stick figures and i was so proud of it of like you know a pass that lynn swan caught and you know uh do you remember that super bowl yeah i i think it

was vince farragamo was playing quarterback for the Rams. But anyways, and then my brother, four years older than me, and just like a large percentage of siblings, the older brother sometimes gets off on humiliating a sibling, you know what I mean? And he liked doing that. My brother liked doing that. He loves me to death, and he's proved to me that he loves me. But he also made me cry, and he also made me pray to God

that he would die and shit like that. You know what I mean? I'd be like, please kill him. Please kill him. Please kill him. God, God, kill him. please kill him please kill him god god kill him you know i would i would pray to god to have my brother killed uh he would embarrass me he's like you know we're a bunch of fucking kids on the street and i'm like on the uh i'm hanging with the youngest uh of the crew and he's older so

they like make fun they like making fun of the young kids. But I played peewee football at nine when I was nine years old. I had a friend who had both parents together on the other side of town, and we became friends, and they paid for my football. So all of a sudden, I'm in like peewee, and we're playing tackle. It's weird because peewee football is like your third, fourth, and fifth grade. And you're playing with fucking helmet and shoulder pads and everything. But when you get into junior high, sixth, seventh, and eighth, now it's flag football. It's not tackle football in junior high out here.

So when I played tackle football everybody's same size everybody's same size at nine you don't start really separating until you're like 11, 12, 13 that's when you start

you know you start figuring out who's the short guys and who the who the big guys are so at nine shit I was playing

defensive lineman and middle linebacker so you get delusional you know you get delusional like shit like I felt like and i was pretty good at nine i was going after my i loved football and uh so i thought okay i'm gonna be a football

player or a rock star it's gonna be one of them whichever one comes first instrument or you're gonna sing or uh in the beginning i was playing drums because nobody on the block wanted to play drums and and i'm like okay i guess i'll fucking play drums we need a band so it was more about i didn't want to be a singer my voice sucks um i know i knew i couldn't be a lead singer or anything like that i do i do background vocals and shit i'll do like a line here and there in the music i produce because i never stopped producing music i'm about to put an album out real soon oh yeah but um uh back then it was just like i saw kiss meets the phantom of the park on mbc at eight i saw that show and i saw all those

fans screaming for them i go i want people screaming for me like that you know what i mean and uh so i want to either either a star football player. So when I get into sixth grade, sixth grade is where everything started to change. The first junior high I went to was mostly, at junior high, you had to claim a gang. You don't have to be in the gang. You don't have to gang bang. You don't have to kill nobody. I was going to ask you about a gang. But you ought to claim a gang. You don't have to be in the gang. You don't have to gang bang. You don't have to kill nobody. I was going to ask you about a gang. But you have to claim.

When we're on our block, everybody's listening to Rush, Kiss, Def Leppard. We're listening to like Ozzy, Van Halen, the police. But when you go to school, you got to pretend like you got to dress the part. There's like gangbanger clothes. And on your peachy folder, you better write either middle side or F Troop. One of them. And what were you guys supposed to do? And I, either F Troop or middle side.

I didn't want to do it. I'm like, I'm going to claim no gang. My brother said, just fucking do it. Because my brother had to claim middle side. You got to know the sign and everything. Boom, boom. You know? But he wasn't a gangbanger.

As soon as he got, he would go to school in like cholo weed shirts or like, I don't know if you know, but they're like gray and black stripes across like this. They have brown ones and they have black and gray ones. I think they're called weed shirts, but cholos and gangbangers were. My brother used to wear, he wasn't in a gang,

but he would claim it. And if he had to fight, my brother could fight. He would, but he just, we just want to get back to our block where we could be ourselves. Right. You know, and I didn't want to play that part. So it was weird because in elementary,

you don't have to claim no gang, but now it's sixth grade. I'm like, fuck that. And I was dressing like a surfer-ish with lightning bolt shirts, Ocean Pacific. You remember that Ocean Pacific? Oh yeah, OP. Yeah, that's what I would wear.

And the gangbangers at the school would like, man, why are you acting white? You're masking, man. You're masking. The black guys would tell me that shit too. And I'm like, no, I'm just a me. And like I said, I had two aunts that were older than me. So now I'm in sixth grade.

I have an aunt that's in seventh grade and an aunt that's in eighth grade. And they're all chola. They're all playing the game. They're not cholas. Your aunts are in seventh and eighth grade. That's real shit. Hilarious. That's real shit.

I got one aunt in the sub. I thought you were going to say her age. Like she's 27th grade. That is too much. So I'm in sixth grade. Patty's in seventh. Alice is in eighth. Aunt Patty and Aunt Alice.

Yeah. And they're super popular. They're beautiful. but they're dressing like a chola they play the game they crease their their cords and they're dressing like cholas at school but they're not gangbangers but you got to claim it it's kind of like a fashion almost they just you just go with it it's fashion you know no one will fuck with you and uh because patty and alice because Patty and Alice were so popular at that school, like their girlfriends, like, oh, look at their nephew. Look at Edgar, the little, they're Patty's nephew.

So the seventh grade girls, they thought like, oh, you know, so I started dating a seventh grader. I'm a sixth grader. That's a big deal. Dude, seventh grade chicks never date sixth grade dudes. That just doesn't happen. But since my aunts were so popular, they thought it was a way to get closer to them. So I'm dating this girl named Sabrina.

And I'm a sixth grade. And meanwhile, I try out for the fucking flag football team. And they cut me like right away. Like immediately they cut me. They go, this motherfucker way too slow. I didn't realize how slow I was. They're like, damn. And I tried out in vans.

I was running over the 40 yard dash in vans. And I was slow as fuck. I had good hands and I had moves, dude. I could juke a motherfucker. I just have no speed, no explosion. I'm going to make you miss. But if you just turn around and not give up, you can catch me. You can catch me for sure. I'm not outrunning nobody.

I'm not outrunning girls. Girls are faster than me. Everybody's faster than me. But I can catch, dog. I got good hands. Just slow as fuck. So they cut me. I'm like, oh, shit.

So I spun it in my own head that y'alls are pussies. You guys are playing flag football. I don't do that shit. I play tackle. I just did peewee football, dog. So that's how I saw it. I'm like, wait till we get to high school, ninth grade, and I'm going to show you what's up. Once the helmet comes on, I saw the pants. Shit.

Okay. Keep playing this pussy ass fucking flag football. That's how I saw it. So I, I put, okay, football going to be on hold until I get to high school. Cause it's bullshit.

So I break up with Sabrina for a sixth grader, Margaret. Sabrina loses her shit. No fucking sixth grader. Don't break up with me. You're lucky. I even dated your stupid ass.

I only dated you because you're a fucking aunt. You know, so she's pissed. Your aunt. Yeah. Who's got science class with me. That's so good. That's so good.

So now she's like sends goons to fuck with me and beat my ass. Now there was a fucking hit on me in sixth grade. I'm like, oh shit. First, the guys couldn't wait to have a reason to fuck me up because I'm a Mexican guy dressing in Ocean Pacific shirts and I'd have like a mini ghetto blaster

with only one speaker. I couldn't afford the one with the two speakers. But the one with the one, you could buy a gem coat. You know what I mean? It's like 18 bucks. But I would still have it on my shoulder. I'd be walking during recess. I would just go out in the fields

and just be listening to Ozzy and Judas Priest and shit. And they hated me. They're like, this guy is not playing the game. So once I broke up with Sabrina and these guys took me behind the fucking PE building were about to fuck me up. I start crying and shit and they felt sorry for me, you know,

because I just fucking like I wasn't going to fight that there's like seven of them and they wanted to beat me the fuck up and I just started crying so much. They just left me alone and I'm like, oh shit. I got to transfer myself to another school. You got mom's sling.

Dude, I got to get the fuck out of here, dude. I go, I got to get out of here. So I had an aunt that lived in this one school at the edge of Santa Ana by Tustin and Orange. It's still Santa Ana called Willard Intermediate. And they had a lot of white people and Mexicans that were whitewashed, right? No gangs. There's no gangs at this school. I go, I got to get to that fucking school for seventh grade.

So I use my aunt's address and I fill out all the paperwork. All I did is tell my mom, I go, mom, next year, I'm going to go to a great school. It's all the way by Tustin. She goes, okay. She was like, she thought it was great news. And that's all. She didn't say, do I need to sign anything? She's got her job to worry about. So then she freaked out when she found out I'm Conno. I'm Edgar Conno at this new school. She freaks out, busts down the principal's door, gets all the paperwork in order, embarrasses the shit out of me. But now I'm at this new school. And now I'm at a school where I have no fucking friends, dude.

I went from being like too fucking popular in sixth grade to now nobody knows me. I have one friend there from first grade, Lee Mays, like Jeff Spicoli. You know Jeff Spicoli? Yeah. From Fast Times? Of course. He was Jeff Spicoli. Okay.

Long hair. He had cropped up on top. Super metal dude. It's like 1983, 84. And he's super Jeff Spicoli, surfer metal dude, half Indian, half Mexican. But he never comes to school. So when he's not there, I got to sit at lunch and at recess, like by myself, because everyone's got their own cliques.

And I'm not going to go up to the clique and go, hey, I'm the new kid. I had too much pride. And I was a big pussy. It was just too like, dude, what am I going to say? I'm going to, so I just sat by myself and that's, that hurts so much, man,

sitting by your fucking self. And then everyone, everybody knows who the loner is. Everybody knows who don't have no friends, but when Lee would fucking just show up to school and not smoke weed today and just show up to school, like I'm a responsible human being. So I could have someone to, I just need someone to sit next to me and not smoke weed today and just show up to school like a responsible human being. So I could have someone,

I just need someone to sit next to me and everything's cool. Whenever he got, whenever he did go to school, Lee Mays, he would just sit next to me. I felt great. I'm like, we're talking,

I'm just bullshitting about fucking, you know, black Sabbath, you know, kiss. We're just talking metal and shit. I'm like, fuck,

thank God he's here. Cause during school, I don't, you know, no one gives a fuck. You're just sitting at a desk that was assigned to you. And, you know, nobody knows who the loner is. But at lunch, they know who the loner is. They get everybody out of the school. And you're in the lunch area. And they only let people in to use the, to go, to use the restroom inside.

So I always used to, Lee didn't show up. Lee Mays didn't show up. I'm using the fucking restroom and I'm going to take a long ass shit. I'm going to kill as much time. I would just be sitting there and that was no internet. There's no phone. You just sit there, dude. You just sit there, look at my folders. I'm just like'm just like killing as much time as possible because it's excruciating sitting by yourself at lunch it's fucking excruciating everyone's having a good time they're on their clicks and uh and i after second period every day is when they they hang up the list of people that they didn't make it to the school and i'd always check that should i go up to the list i'm like fuck he's not here god damn

it you fucking you would know yeah so I would know go god damn it you know and then um I'm just a total fucking lone everybody knows it and it's excruciating I just need Lee Mays there as long as he's there and then in junior high every junior high got one girl who just developed her titties quick. Every junior high got one Angel Bade, big double Ds. And then there's one that has full Cs, Denise Rosen. She had full Cs. And then everyone else, no titties. Remember that?

Oh, yeah. I dated one of the girls that had titties. Yeah? Nobody had titties in junior high. Nobody had titties in junior high. It might be different now with all the hormones that they're putting in the milk, but back then only one girl had boobs, two girls, double D, Angel Bade, Denise Reed, double D, Angel Bade. And she was pretty too. So she's the most sought after girl in the school. And the most popular guy in school is a half white, half Samoan named Donovan Mauga. Superstar, totally whitewashed, half white, half Samoan, but wears all the latest preppy clothes. Super athlete, fastest guy in school.

Second fastest. Him and Royal Wilbon, like there's two black guys in that school and they were fully whitewashed. Royal Wilbon was fucking insane fast. But Donovan Malga, he was like, he was just the coolest motherfucking guy in school. And he was making moves on Angel Bade.

He was falling in love with Angel Bade. He was making some moves. And Lee fucking Mays was making moves on Angel Bade, too. He was barely there. Yeah, but they had a class together. And now Lee Mays is making moves on Angel Bade. Angel Bade kind of thought Lee Mays was kind of cute. And Donovan Mauga found out.

Donovan, I swear to God, this is all true. This is middle school again, junior high? We're in seventh grade now, middle school. Middle, we're all in seventh. Donovan Mauga found out Lee Mays was making moves on her. During recess, he went up to him, took him down, mounted him. I didn't even know what the mount was. I just said, dude, he sat on his chest and just beat the shit out of him.

While I was standing there. Like a Christmas story? Just fucking wailing. Donovan Mauga terrified. He was terrifying. Number one athlete. And now he's sitting on my only friend's chest and just raining. Like, dude, it was like Patrick Smith and Scott Morris, UFC two. It was brutal.

Opened up his face. He was fucked up. And everyone's just cheering on him. By the time the principal got through, they pulled them both off. And I just stood there. I didn't do shit. I was just terrified of Donovan Malika. This guy was, what am I going to do?

You know what I mean? You're going to get beat too. That's what the fuck you're going to do. That's what you get for fucking, Angel Bay, dog. You're going to go with Angel Bay? What are you thinking? I'm going to go with Angel Bay. What are you thinking?

And after school, I finally, after they let Lee Mays out, he came out. I was talking to him in front of the school. And he had, dude, he had like Motley Crue, those aviator shades on. Long hair. Dude, he could have been in a band in seventh grade. Long hair. It was all cropped up. And he had these big rock star glasses on but you could see under like he had the good he was trying to cover up all the fucking scar like dude he ripped his face apart he was all fucked up and he's just standing there i'm like what's gonna He's all, the worst possible news ever. He can give me

the worst fucking possible news. It's like, my mom's going to transfer me to another school. I'm like, no, no, we can work this out.

We can make this good again. Come on, dog. Let me talk to your mom. Where's your mom at? We can't do this. No, dude.

He goes, no, man, I gotta, I go, dude. He goes, no, man. I got to go. I go, no. No, dude. We can make this good.

This poor girl's big titties drove this boy crazy. And he got his hands beat. Now he's transferred. Now he's gone. My only friend. So now it's fucking death, dog. Lunch is, it's excruciating. It's a nightmare. I'm like living in a twilight zone when it's gone. My only friend. So now it's fucking death. Dog lunches. It's excruciating. It's a nightmare.

I'm like living in a twilight zone when it's lunch. That's my worst. That's my least favorite part of my life. Oh, of my life. So during that, I mean, all that shit's going on.

That's the least favorite part that back then, that moment. Being alone. Yeah. And everyone knowing you're alone in front of everybody it forget about like you don't a kid that that age doesn't know what's going on in the world has no perspective there's people in liberia like kids that like are eating hearts and shit and like killing people and seeing insane stuff but as a kid you don't know that shit you're just

in your little it to me that was hell yeah i was in hell and meanwhile i tried out for the football team there too donovan maga star dude they cut me even quicker you're already cut you might as well just go home right now so but i told them, you know, what I told all my friends back at the neighborhood, I told them that I made the team

as second string quarterback. I didn't want to get too crazy. I said, yeah, I made it second string, but they kicked me off the team because I got in a fight. Just made it all up. Made it up. I couldn't face my friends on the block that were still going to the other school,

the gangbanger school. I said, yeah, I made the team, but goddammit they cut me because I got in a fight. I was second string quarterback, dog. They were going to give me a chance. So now I'm a, dude, I'm such a loser, dude. I'm a loser in seventh grade at Willard. And I'm such a loser.

I had to lie to all my friends and my brother, everybody, my family. I made the team, but they cut me because I got in a fight. You told your family. I told everybody, dude. Everybody. So now Lee Mays is fucking gone. Donovan Mauga is like with Angel Babe. Now you see him walking around and shit.

Donovan Mauga, Angel Babe. So, and I'm like the biggest loser ever. Everybody knows that. Like, I don't have a friend now. Everyone knew that. Like, that was my only friend. And then in drama, I took drama. I just wanted like the easiest.

Learn a lot about. Yeah. So in drama, I start like making friends with Nicole Anaya, cheerleader, hot. And in drama, we're like,

there's one time where we're like, I was supposed to get in a circle and hold hands and I'm holding hands. My hands are sweaty as fuck. Her hands are sweaty. I'm like, oh my God, I can't believe I'm holding hands with Nicole. hands are sweaty as fuck her hands are sweaty i'm like oh my god i can't believe i'm holding hands with nicole and i she's like cheerleader and she her ex boyfriend in sixth grade donovan malcolm nah yes while i was at the other school while i was at

that other school in sixth grade they were dating moving through Donovan Malga moving through this school. They broke up. Now he's with Angel Bate. So I'm like thinking, oh shit. He used to go out with Donovan Malga. He goes, yeah, but that was last year. I'm like, oh fuck. Oh, I guess, you know,

that was last year. And he's got Angel Bate now. Hmm. Okay. So then we just, little by little, she became my girlfriend and nobody knew and I would walk her home. She's super popular. I'm the biggest loser in the school. Now I'm secretly dating like top three girls in the school. And I thought, okay, Donovan

Maher, like I was like in the back of my head, I'm like, how could he get mad? He's with Angel Bad. How could he get mad? But when we started just holding hands at school and walking her to class and everyone was just like, I'm walking down the hallway. Now you're doing, now you got more comfortable. Holding her books, holding her hand. And she's proud. She's like into it too.

She's like, I'm dating the biggest loser in the school. And I don't give a shit. She had a lot of courage. She was brave. You just said I'm dating the biggest loser in school and I don't give a shit. Dude, she was brave. So I could feel the stairs walking around school. People were like, what the, what?

What is going on? Nobody could. And it was such a surprise to everybody that Donovan Malga, it dropped his stock. The fact that she was dating me lowered the value, dog. So he couldn't take it. He couldn't take it. So he was like, he felt like the only thing he could do was kick my ass. So he started telling everybody that he was going to fuck me up.

And dude, I was terrified. People were coming. I'll never forget. Greg Ailes said, dude, just to let you know, man, Donovan is planning on fucking you up. Just letting you know. And I was like, thinking about what he did to Lee Mays. I'm like, oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Donovan Mogg is going to fucking kill me. It's your 3 o'clock high right here. Oh, dude. He's ready. And do you know when it's coming? I don't know when it's coming. I don't know when it's coming. He was letting it drag out.

I was like, please just do it. He ain't like, this Saturday. No, no. He goes, people just kept saying, Donovan's going to fuck you up. So he had people get in my ear. Donovan told me to tell you he's going to fuck you up. I'm like, oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Oh my God. Oh my God. And in seventh grade in English class, we had this assignment to write a letter to ourselves that we're going to read after we graduate high school. Okay. So we write out like what's going on in our lives today in seventh grade, and then our self-addressed envelope sent to my grandma's house. You put an address that is probably going to be there when you graduate. And then they send you the letter and then are put, you know, self-addressed envelopes sent to my grandma's house. You put an address that, you know, is probably going to be there when you graduate. And then they send you the letter. And then you read, you're like 18 years old and you're reading some shit you wrote when you were 14.

That's cool. So in that letter, dude, in that letter, I was like, Donovan's going to kill me. That's in that letter. It's in the letter. You were terrified. I'm like, I don't know when it's going to happen, but it's going to happen for sure.

I'm just waiting for him to do it. I'm terrified, dude. I wrote it all out. It was like a diary of like with truth. And then, um, one day I'm in the bathroom and I'm taking a leak.

And I zip up my pants and I turn around as I'm about to walk out the bathroom. Donovan and his best friend, Jaime, they both walk in and we pass each other. And I'm walking out of the bathroom and they're walking in. And right there, I just stopped. And I said, let's get this fucking over with. All right. No one's around. I went back into the bathroom, just looked in the mirror.

So there's like a mirror that's like, it goes down diagonal like that. And then behind you are the stalls. So they're pissing and facing that way. And I'm, you know, you walk around with a comb. You're watching your back. I'm just combing. I'm just watching them take a piss. I'm looking at their backs, boom.

And they're like, Jaime's like, Jaime's like, fuck them up, dude. Fuck them up. Fuck them up. Oh,

you hear him saying that. Yeah. And then, Don, I'm like, shut the fuck up. Shut the shit up. This is perfect.

No one's going to see. This is perfect. And then, shut the fuck up. And I'm just like this, combing my hair, just waiting to get fucking just sucker punched. Just combing my hair,

going, let's just get this over with. This is perfect in here. No one's going to see shit. Boom. punched. Just combing my hair, going, let's just get this over with. This is perfect in here. No one's going to see shit. Boom. And I'm combing. I just didn't want to have it done in front of my girlfriend. You know what I mean?

I go, that's hard to come back from. So then they just walked out of the bathroom and left. And I'm just sitting there combing my hair. I'm like, what the fuck happened? Turns out Angel Bade found out Donovan Malga was mad because his ex-girlfriend was going out with me now. She's like, why would you want to fuck him up? She goes, if you fuck him up, we're done. Angel Bade saved my life.

Fuck yeah. She saved my life. She said, you leave him alone or we're done. Found that out. That's great, dude. Oh, dude, she saved my my life. She said, you leave him alone or we're done. Found that out. That's great, dude. Oh, dude, she saved my goddamn life. And then after that, I got accepted. And, you know, little by little.

Eighth grade was great. What was high school like? Were you an athlete in high school? Did you go back to football? Yes, I went back to football. Did you make it? Yes. Okay, all right.

But everybody makes it. No, everybody makes it But everybody makes it. Everybody makes it. Everybody makes it. You don't get cut in high school. I got you. So, dude, I made it. They didn't know what to do with me.

I made it. All they could think of was like, I'm slow as fuck. Like a little fullback or something. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, dude. You got to understand. You said you had good hands. I had good hands, but I was super slow and small. Slow and small.

So all they could think of is putting me as a backup wide receiver. And they never played me because I swear to God, in ninth grade at Santa Ana High, we had the greatest freshman football team of all time. I put that freshman football team against any, all those guys, for some reason, all those ninth graders could have played varsity, but they didn't.

They just kept them as freshmen because they were true freshmen. They could all play varsity, right? They were fully a Royal Wilbon. He was the wide receiver from the black guy who was at Willard in 7th grade him and Donovan Mauga

were the stars Royal Wilbon when he touched the ball nobody could touch him he was so fast he was so quick every game every game

was like 55 to nothing they were all blowouts everything was just a complete massacre a blowout and I was just a complete massacre, a blowout. And I was Royal Wilbon's backup. So you were never good.

They never took him out. Even at 55, nothing or nothing, putting your ass in. Yeah, but they put me in for one fucking play. Like during the season, they put me in for one play. But my rival was a wide receiver on the other side. He was the other backup wide receiver. They put both the backups in. And he wanted, so the play was to me, just five and out to the sideline. So he was fucking jealous that it was coming to me. He was pissed off because this is

the only time we're coming in. And he lined up offsides or whatever, but I did catch a ball and gained like two yards and I went out of bounds and shit. And that was it. But the play got called back because he was lined up like in the neutral zone or whatever, something like that, some kind of motion or some bullshit. And that was it. And then the last game of the season,

halftime against Santa Ana Valley, halftime, it's 50 to nothing. We're destroying them. There's only one half left in the game, in the season. Just one half. So at halftime, it's 50 to nothing. We're destroying them. There's only one half left in the game, in the season. Just one half. So at halftime, the coaches said, hey, we're going to let all the,

because that was a bunch of scrubs like me that never played, ever. We were just, dude, I had a jersey. I had game day. I'd be walking around high school. 88, dog. It was 88. I'm a known, you know what I mean?

I'm like, I never played, but I had that jersey and I could walk around with it because I was on the team. Broke as fuck. Had cleats that didn't fit. Oh, they were too small. After every football practice, I would be by the pool,

the high school pool, just dipping my feet in the pool, dude. The cleats were too small, and they were plastic as shit. They were like the worst because they were like 13 bucks. We bought them at a liquor store. And so the last game, they said we're going to let, dude, they were going to let all the scrubs start offense and defense

for this whole second half. I get to start wide receiver and fucking quarterback and a defensive back. They were just going to let us play. We were up so much by halftime, like 50-something or nothing. So I was going to get to play the whole fucking game, the the whole second half so opening kickoff in the second half we kick it to them and we're all running going after him i'm the last motherfucker that right and the first guy

wraps the dude's legs up second he's still standing and then another guy just flies like fucking super fly snooker and just hits him on top. The dude with the ball braces himself with his arm and pops his elbow off. So he's laying there and his elbow's dislocated. They call the ambulance and by the time the ambulance got there, the other team just forfeited the game.

You didn't even get the flag. You didn't get the flag. Just the kickoff. And that was it. The ambulance took forever to get You didn't even get the black. Get the black. Just the kickoff. Just the kickoff. Special team. And that was it. The ambulance took forever to get out there, dog. They took forever, so they forfeited. And the sun was going down.

We didn't have light. Oh, fuck, man. So that was it. That was okay. I'm done. I'm going to be a rock star now. Now it's 100% rock star. At first, it was, whichever I'm done. I'm going to be a rock star now. Now it's 100% rock star. At first it was, whichever one hits first.

I was so confident I was going to play football that when that rival league, the USFL, remember that one? There was two. There was NFL and USFL. We had a Baltimore team, the Stars. There was New Jersey Generals, Chicago Blitz.

Trump was part of that. Was he? Yeah, I saw like 30 for 30, and they said that he was trying to buy a team or had something to do with that. Yeah, yeah. So I was so confident when people would say, would you play for the USFL? Or you're only going to play in the NFL? I'm like, you know what?

Whoever pays me the most, you know? I'm so confident. They're like, you're slow-witted. It depends on the contract, you know? I'm still calling. You're slow, I think. It depends on the contract, brother. All right. So, yeah, we have a lot. You're going to have to come back and do another episode with me.

I want to talk about you being a dad now because you grew up without your father. You grew up under the roof of an abusive stepfather who's also your brother and your sister's fucking dad. So how many kids do you have? You said you have a son, right? Yes. Just one? Just one kid? All right.

And how are you as a dad? Are you honest with him about your upbringing? You know, my dad, he was never around. He would come by, take us to the movies. I went to work with him one day. He was a truck driver. So whenever he would pass through Orange County from LA to go to San Diego, he would check to see what my mom was doing or something. You know what I mean? And my mom was in love with him. My mom, even to this day, she's like, man, I should have stayed with your dad. Is that right? Yeah. She just has a thing for my dad. And then my dad comes by when I was 14 out of the blue just to drop in and see what my mom's doing, give me some money. I'm 14 years old.

And when he dropped by unannounced, my mom's roommate, I thought it was her boyfriend, but it was my mom's roommate. She was living with a girl named Letty. And me and my brother were in one room, my mom and her friend who just got divorced were living in another room. Her boyfriend was eating breakfast downstairs with me. So my dad walks in and my mom's making the breakfast, but it's her friend's boyfriend.

My dad walks in and we're like, hey, what are you doing here? And he goes, let's go get something. He grabs me and goes, let's go get something to eat. He takes me to Eight Salt Fish and Chips, and he tells me this is the last time I'm going to see you. I said, like, I didn't give a fuck because he wasn't around anyways. He never told me he loved me or nothing like that. He never said, I love you, son.

He would just come around and give me, you know, see if he could hang out with my mom. That's what he didn't want to get to know me and shit. So he said, this is the last time I get to see you. It's obvious that your mom is moving on. You know, he had it all wrong. That wasn't even her boyfriend. I thought it was when I, when I remembered it, I thought it was, you know, even if it was my mom's boyfriend, you know, he, um, the exact same thing would have happened. Uh, he decides to tell me that he's not going to come around no more. He doesn't want to interfere with,

uh, my mom and her relationships. So he, he gives me a, um, like, it's like deathbed confessional type shit. He goes to that two things.

I remember he told me. He goes, this is like the last thing. Let me give you some like advice. And is this the last time you saw him? No. Okay. It was for 14 years though. For 14 years.

But he said, when you get married, make sure your wife is at least 15 years younger than you. Because women age quick. They age faster than men. He told me that. because women age quick. They age faster than men. He told me that. I was like, before I leave, before I leave you forever,

I'm going to give you a couple bits of advice. And then the other one was, always be nice to kids, because they grow up real quick. And then he was gone. So then I didn't see him from 14 to 27. So between 14 and 27, it was just all music. It was just like, I'm trying to be in a, like football ain't happening. So I went all in on music,

moved to Hollywood with my buddy James and John to conquer the music business when I was 21. I lived in Hollywood since 21. 24, 25, still trying to make it, working check cashing, just working odd jobs. Started working at a strip club after check cashing, became a strip club DJ while I was in Hollywood, trying to get a record deal.

Now I was 25. I didn't think I would ever see my dad again. I hadn't seen him since I was 14. Now I was 25. I didn't think I would ever see my dad again. I hadn't seen him since I was 14. Now I'm 26. I still haven't seen him. I would have dreams that I see him and I wake up. I'm like, fuck him. Whatever.

He didn't give a shit about me, so fuck him. But I always had him on my mind. And then out of the blue, I'm 27 and my aunt calls me. And she goes, your dad's at your grandma's house. Come on down. I'm like, oh, shit. So I drive down to Orange County from Hollywood. Does he know you're coming?

Yeah, he knows. So my mom is going to meet us there. We're all going to my grandma's house. And, you know, he was tight with my grandfather, but he had disappeared for so long. So now he's there. And my aunt's like, your dad's here. Come on down. So the whole drive, I'm like, I'm just going to let bygones be bygones.

I'm just going to be cool. I'm not going to give him any attitude. Fuck it. He's back. I'm going to, I just want to get to know him. You know, I want to, you know, get to know my dad. Yeah. I'm not going to, I'm not going to give him any shit.

I'm just going to be totally fucking cool. So I get to my grandma's. Totally cool. We're all there. We're just shooting the shit. My mom's there. My mom's all happy. Like I said, my mom always had a thing for me.

Even to this day, she'll still say, I should have stayed with your dad. He was so good to me. I'm like, really? He was married with five kids. For real? It gets worse, though. It gets worse though. It gets worse. So she,

so we're like, Hey, let's go to, let's go get something to eat. So we go to Black Angus on, on Tustin. And we're all, it's me,

my mom and my, and my dad. We're fucking, damn. I thought the motherfucker was dead. Maybe like shit. Haven't heard from him in forever. Like, God damn.

Never expected this like 14 years later. Something like that. From 14 to 27. 13 years. 13. And now I'm like, he's here. He's like right in front of me. Holy shit.

God damn it. He's right in front of me. Holy shit. And I'm telling him that, you know, I'm in Hollywood. I'm trying to get a record deal. It's, you know, got some producers. We're going to make it work. We're going to blow up.

Go shit. Okay. And then I decided, you know, I just wanted to ask him, why now? Why did you come by now? What were you thinking? And the right answer would have been, I just to see uh what you were up to it's been so long i just wanted to see how you how you developed and man you know i think about you even though i wasn't around you know um but he didn't say that shit he said i was passing through town

doing some deliveries i wanted to see if your grandpa was still cool with me deliveries i wanted to see if your grandpa was still cool with me and i was just like that you wanted to see my grandpa was still cool with you huh and then right there i'm like i'm never gonna see this motherfucker ever again right there i'm like i got my mom's over here right here she's begging for my time and i'm always telling her i don't have you know i'm busy i'm busy and now i'm trying to spend time with this motherfucker. If I'm going to give anybody my time, it's going to be my mom. Yeah. At that point.

And I just like, I didn't give a fuck what he said at that point. I'm like, you're dead to me. I'm like, fuck this motherfucker. And have you seen him ever since? Well, this is what happened. Has he met your son? This is what happened. He goes, hey, your step, your half brothers and sisters, they want to meet you. Can I give them your number? I number i said yeah give them my number so they he he um gave them my number

and uh then he called me and left a message on a voicemail back then um and said hey let's go get some lunch and you know what I was thinking I was thinking I wouldn't be saying that because I DJ at a strip club because that's what I was doing at that time he wants to go see some

like does he want to get does he want to use me for some pussy that's what I was thinking that's the first thing I thought I don't blame you so now you want to hang out right

no I told you that I'm working at a strip club DJing so I never responded i just let it go i said fuck that i'm done that's good you set a boundary yeah i'm like i don't need that shit i'm good i'm fine but his uh my half sister and brother or they got a hold of me and we went to old spaghettiaghetti Factory on Sunset and just hung out and I met him.

And my sister goes, you know how many kids your dad have? I said, six. I go, try 19. No. I said, 19. He's got 19. 19.

Dude, he was spraying everywhere. He was a truck driver, getting everyone pregnant everywhere. 19. 19? Dude, he was spraying everywhere. He was a truck driver getting everyone pregnant everywhere. 19. 19. Jesus Christ. So at that point, it made me feel good. Yeah.

Because before, I was like, how could he not care about me? Like, it's possible to have a kid and not give a shit about them? He never told me he loved me. And like, I was afraid to have kids because I thought I'm going to be like that. And if I'm like, my worst nightmare is that my kid feels about me the way I feel about my dad. That would like make me want to kill myself. You know, so I'm like 19.

So I thought, oh, no wonder. No wonder he doesn't give a shit about me. There's too many kids. You can't give a shit about all of them. So I'm like, damn, he had a bunch of them. I was just one of a bunch. So it made me feel better about myself. Yeah, I hear you on that.

I felt a little better. And then I never saw him. How many of them have you met? Just two. Just the two. And then another one, we DM each other on instagram every now and now and then sylvia uh but i never really um you know because i got my my uh brother and sister that i grew up with and i don't barely give them any time like if i'm gonna if i'm gonna give someone time i'm gonna give someone time that

i grew up with and was there for me you know what i mean and uh and not that i don't want to meet my other i got a lot of half brothers and half sisters all over the place uh and not that i don't want to meet my other i got a lot of half brothers and half sisters all over the place it's not that i don't want to meet them it's just that um you know i'm a son of my own now i got i'm so goddamn busy it's hard to start like new relationships it's very hard it's very it's very hard and um you know i should be spending more time with my sister and my brother and you And so there's that too. Isn't it wild? Because for me, my mom was your dad.

And it blows me away that I'm the same way with my daughter. So we're about the same age when we had kids. So I'm three years behind you. Yeah. And your son's 10. I was 40 when I had – I was 41. I was 42 when I had my son yeah so i'm

right there with you and um yeah it blows me away though i mean every time i look at i'm like how the fuck could you hate your own kid yeah how could you not want to see your own kid yeah you didn't have 19 of them yeah but you know what but then you have to draw on those terrible times so you can say, I want to correct that, break that cycle. I don't want to be like my dad. Well, I found out the second he was born that I wasn't like my dad. And I tell my son, I love him every day, multiple times. Every time I see him, he just, he just bows down and I kiss him on the top of the head and just give him like 25 kisses before he goes to sleep.

Tell him I love him multiple times. And we'll, it's like it gets to a point where it's goofy. It's like super goofy. Like when I'm ready to go to work, give him his kisses and tell him I love him. I love you. He goes, I love you. And then as I walk away, I love you. I love

you. I love you. Until we can't hear each other and I'm up the stairs. I love you. I love you. I love you. And then as I walk away, I love you. I love you. I love you. Until we can't hear each other and I'm up the stairs. I love you. I love you. I love you. It's like goofy. And it's like, but I don't give a shit how goofy that is. I'll tell him I love you all day, every day.

I'm just so stoked that I'm not like my dad. Oh my God. I'm not trying to not be like him. I'm not like him. I love my, my son is everything to me. Yeah. My son is everything. He's my, my whole life revolves around him. That's great.

And, you know, trying to bring him up as best I could. You know, I'm trying, you know, I'm not perfect, but I, you know, I'm doing my best and I love that. I love being a father. You know, when you, when you have a kid, like every year you get older, sucks, right? You know, 52, I'm like, damn 53 and then 54 and 50, like, but every year you, you, you get older, your son gets older too, or your kids get older. So you get to experience them at that age and then like now 53 but he's going to be 11 now 54 but i get him at 12 so um you do live through your kids like i do like i'm like like i do i don't i mean i i don't know if you if i'd say i live through them vicariously but that's my flesh right there. Like, you know, the second he was born,

you know, I had something to die for. He didn't know me from hole in the wall for the first year. He didn't know. He knew his mommy. He knew that titty. He knew that titty real well, but he don't know his dad.

Like when you're like two months, you don't know who your father is, but it's mind boggling how quickly you would give your life for him. Like if someone said, you and your son, boom, right now, I'm like, bitch, of course me. Like not even, there isn't even a thought. It's crazy how there's, living with someone you would die for is important.

It's super important. When you're living and you have no one that you would die for for like you would just pick them over you anytime if there was like a choice of death i think um i think you're not uh living to your full potential i mean i i'm not talking shit on people that don't have kids, but unless you're a shitty person, if you have a kid, it's just, you realize like, damn,

I didn't know I could love this much. I didn't know love can get that high. I always thought, you know, love was right here. Yeah, I could love this. I could love that.

And I love my dog and I love my cat. But when you have a kid, it's like, you're like, oh damn, you just turbo charger of love unconditionally. It's a lot scarier when you have someone you would die for. You're vulnerable.

There's someone that could say anything happened to them. It would just destroy you. You know what I mean? There's like the kryptonite this weakness you know um you know there's that's the downside but um it it wouldn't be so amazing if there wasn't that you know if there wasn't that like yeah you're vulnerable but it's the meaning of life like you were you were someone's kid like to not have i mean people that are i know i have friends that are they're um they love their animals and their pets to death and but they don't want a kid that they got this enough i got a dog and i got a cat that's enough but um anybody that loves animals that much for sure gonna be great parents i agree with that's the one thing like because uh

because you have love in you it's not about what you're loving it exists in you yeah if you love your dog like it's like it's your best friend or it's like it's part of you uh if you had a kid whoa you would be a great mother i agree that's a good sign anybody it's good with pets and good with animals they're gonna make great parents you're gonna be a great mom kirsten for sure she will all right first of all this has been a fantastic fucking episode thank you i got to learn a lot about you um now i mentioned to you before off mic um i would ask you advice you'd give to your 16-year-old self. So after everything we've talked about here today, what would you tell 16-year-old Eddie Bravo?

If that was like – Because here comes your son in six years. could tell my 16 year old self, if I give him some advice, I, if that was for real, I wouldn't say shit to him because I wouldn't change anything for the world. Cause if anything got altered in my life, I will probably wouldn't have my son. And,

uh, I wouldn't take that chance. Like if I gave him some advice that might just lead him a whole different way, maybe a more successful way or whatever. But then that means my son doesn't exist. So if that was reality, yes. Like, you know, for a joke. Stay the course.

As a joke. No, not a joke. It's for real. Okay, for real. I want to say true. Then just stay the course. Stay the course. That's great advice, though.

Yeah. That is the advice. For a joke, I would say, dude, AIDS is fake. You don't have to wear condoms. Throw that rubber away. I remember this one time as well. Or just remember, after you have raw sex, take a piss right afterwards. Great advice.

Trust me. One more time, promote everything you'd like please look into it with eddie bravo on rockfin um the free episodes are available on itunes as well and rockfin um go to samtripley.com for uh the latest in tinfoil hat comedy shows that i do with them it's me and sam and all the info is on Sam's website. He's the main dude. I just opened for him. And what else, what else?

Hook Thieves is my current music project and we're about to drop an album. It's a parody comedy album. Acoustic piano, just goofy ass shit a lot of um scamdemic material in there uh that's how the old album came came along was during the scamdemic man i just spent a lot of fucking time writing music and writing just stupid lyrics about the stupid shit we're going through that's coming out uh what else i guess that's it what do you want ig like what's your at eddie bravo 10p 10p uh at eddie bravo is not me and at eddie bravo 10 is not me that he's got a it's you got to put the 10 P. There's imposters out there.

I know it. Brother, thank you. Thank you for coming on. This is a great episode. Appreciate it. As always, RyanSickler.com, Ryan Sickler on all social media. We'll talk to you you next time.