Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 380 - Kentucky Fried Suck!

Episode Date: December 25, 2023

For this year's annual, inspirational episode and wrap-up, I share the surprisingly inspiring and entertaining tale of Colonel Harland Sanders, man behind the KFC empire. Then I go over what went down in Bad Magic 2023, and what I'm hoping to do in 2024. Hail Nimrod and THANK YOU!  It was such a good year and thanks to your continual support, I am more excited going into the next year of Bad Magic than I've ever been. Hope you had a great 2023, and really looking forward to 2024!  Thank you for listening this year!! Watch the Suck on YouTube: https://youtu.be/C8Ftc_wADm4Merch: https://www.badmagicmerch.comTimesuck Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89vWant to join the Cult of the Curious Private Facebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" to locate whatever happens to be our most current page :)For all merch-related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste)Please rate and subscribe on Apple Podcasts and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcastWanna become a Space Lizard? Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcast.Sign up through Patreon, and for $5 a month, you get access to the entire Secret Suck catalog (295 episodes) PLUS the entire catalog of Timesuck, AD FREE. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch. And you get the download link for my secret standup album, Feel the Heat.

What do you think about when you hear the words Kentucky fried chicken me? I think about being a little kid and about how Kentucky fried chicken was a special fast food treat fast food that felt like a good sit-down restaurant food to little meat It wasn't a fast food restaurant within a hundred miles of where I spent most of my childhood and back when I was in grade school in junior high for Shopping trips for things like back to school shopping, or for buying Christmas presents. My mom, sister Donna and I, maybe my grandparents mom, sister and I, would drive two hours North O'Riggins to Lewis and Idaho. The big city, the big city of, at that time,

still less than 30,000 people. Plenty enough people, though, especially with the smaller sister city of Clarkston, Washington, cross the river, and all the students from Lewis, Clark State College for a bunch of fast food chains. There was McDonald's, the no longer their skippers, and W. Routbeer, Taco Time, not Bell, Taco Johns, still not Bell, Taco Bell, Subway, Arby's, one of the stores with the old big ass Cowboy hat signs, Domino's pizza, pizza hut,

little Caesar's, several others I'm sure, and Kentucky fried chicken. Delicious. Oh man, we grab a big family style bucket, full of, I don't even remember how many pieces of fried chicken. Original recipe style, and I was allowed one drumstick and one piece of breast meat. And then there were the biscuits. We each got one, holy shit, little packets of butter

or some chemical equivalent of butter Packets of honey to drizzle all over them makes my mouth water thinking about it right now We'd also get a side of mashed potatoes and gravy instant mashed potatoes. I know but good instant mashed potatoes Made up a dehydrated potato flakes powdered non-fat milk a little bit of who knows what was a little container of that Delightfully salty brown gravy. I always I always made sure we got mashed potatoes powder, non-fat milk, a little bit of who knows what was a little container of that delightfully salty brown gravy. I always made sure we got mashed potatoes. And for vegetable, well, who gives a shit?

I think we got corn, not that I cared about it. I just wanted the delicious chicken, soft, lectable biscuits, and mashed potatoes and gravy. And dessert, little bucket parfays, baby. Sadly, those little buckets discontinued in 2012. Damn you, Sarah Lee. Damn you, mind calendar. Sarah Lee produced these parfaits until the two companies stopped doing business together

that year. The cups came in three flavor options, right? Some locations, most only offered to strawberry, shortcake, or chocolate. Caramel Apple was the third wild card. I always got the chocolate. Little plastic cup with graham cracker crust crumbs on the bottom, then a big midsection of chocolate pudding, then whipped cream with a few chocolate sprinkles tossed on top,

and aluminum foil to seal in all the freshness and flavor. I love those things so much. I could have eaten my weight in them. They were a perfect ending to what for a time was probably my favorite fast food meal. Definitely one of my favorites. Years later, I would eat some nostalgia when I'd share in some KFC with my kids Kyler Monroe in Santa Monica. There was one near our apartment and sometimes I'd grab a bucket. We'd head to the beach or to the park and Kyler Monroe and I would have a little picnic and feast. And later Lindsey may be joined for like one or two times.

She's not a big fast food fan, her loss. When Rowan, she was about four years old, went to this funny phase where she loved KFC. Always wanted the drumsticks and she would devour them like a feral wild animal. Like for this brief period of time, she would eat everything except the bone, all the breading, all the meat, she would eat all the gristle, just be gone. Just a polished little chicken bone would remain. I have a lot of good memories of KFC. And I have ultimately one man I never met to thank for them all.

Brad Pitt, the man behind the chicken, the beautiful fried chicken maestro who not only came up with America's favorite fried chicken recipe, but also a man who transcends notions of sexuality. You can be straight, but still want to sleep with Brad Pitt. It doesn't make you homosexual. It just makes you a Brad Pitt sexual and everyone is a Brad Pitt sexual. You can deny it all you want, but I won't believe you. And neither will Brad, if you ever chooses to seduce you, which he will. seduce you, which he will. If he chooses, it'll happen. And of course, Brad Pitt is not the man behind the KFC brand. He's not the Colonel. Harland David Sanders was the Colonel, Colonel Sanders. And I forgot if I ever actually knew how inspiring his story of creating KFC truly was until just recently. Did you know that his dad died when he was just five and his mom wouldn't remarrymarry for seven years?

And during that time little Harlan would take various jobs to help provide for the family. And he was also put in charge of cooking for mom and his little brother and little sister. By the age of seven, he was said to be skilled with bread and vegetables, getting better with meat, and he'd go on to cook for others for the rest of his life. He and his siblings would oftentimes have to forage up their own food while mom worked away from home for days at a time at a tomato cannery. Did you know that Harland, when he became an adult, would bounce around from job to job and profession to profession for decades.

The Indian and native worked as a lawyer in Little Rock, Arkansas for a while until brawling with one of his clients in the courtroom destroyed his reputation. And that wasn't even the first time he switched careers due to getting in a fist fight. Did you know he later got into a shootout with another gas station owner shortly after opening his first place to eat a shootout that left a man dead or how at the age of 65 he nearly went bankrupt or how he traveled around the country in his mid 60s looking for suitable partners to sell his special fried chicken blend of 11 herbs and spices unable to afford motel rooms he often slept in his car.

Colonel Sanders did not achieve lasting financial stability until his late 60s and early 70s after working for over six decades and he didn't semi-retire until the age of 73 when he sold the Kentucky Fried Chicken Corporation for $2 million and then got a salary to be a brand ambassador for the rest of his life For this year's inspirational year-end suck. I searched for a story of someone finding success late in life after many many failures Someone who refused to give up no matter how many times they had to start over. I wanted to find a symbol of tenacity and grit and perseverance. Someone who didn't find consistent success until he was at an age where most people were already done working. Someone who just kept fighting long after I'm sure most people would have given up. That's a story that hits a lot different than someone finding success at 18 or 30 or 40,

even 50. Someone hitting their stride in their 60s and not really cashing in until the 70s, that's a story that I think should inspire damn near everyone who hears it or at least entertain everyone who hears it. So let's hear it. Time for Kentucky Fried. Biographical. Everyone's path is different in life.

Please don't give up on yours just because it doesn't look like you think it should. Annual year in review and also look to the future edition of Time Suck. This is Michael McDonald and you're listening to Time Suck. Happy Monday, meet sacks. Welcome or welcome back to the cult of the curious. I'm Dan Cummins. Sir sucks a lot. Level six light worker. Sad boy saw salesman. I wish I was a giga chat, but probably a Melvin and And you're listening to Time Suck. Hail Nimrod, Hail Lucifina, praise be to Good Boy Bojangles and Glory be to triple M. We made it. Last episode of 2023, but I'll continue to happy holidays to you all. Hope you had a good Hanukkah, which I do know came early this year. I don't, I don't do great with holidays, remember holidays, and I definitely don't do great with

moving holidays. Why can't all holidays stick to a specific date? And maybe also have the name and date, right? Like the name of the month and then date in the name. Like I never forget the fourth July. It makes it very easy, right? I wish Christmas was like Christmas December 25th. Thanksgiving, November, you know,

don't just like four thursday just pick a date. Anyway, happy New Year's Eve, happy New Year's Eve December 31st, and then on New Year's Day, January 1st, already another time so coming out. A lot to talk about today. If I, if my voice sounds a little different, yeah, I got a little cold, but you know what? I'm not gonna stop me. If Harlan Sanders could persevere through all he did, I'm pretty sure stop me. I'm hardly Sanders. I can persevere through all he did. I'm pretty sure I can record something with a scratchy voice and stuff he knows. Yeah, let's talk about fried chicken

and so much more. Let's get Kentucky fried. He-he-yeah. [♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ You're gonna spend the first half of today's episode telling the tale of the Colonel, which will be done almost entirely in a timeline starting with this birth. And then after a little recap of the Colonel's life and why I chose again to tell his story

today, we'll transition to look back at this year's episodes and also at the wet hot bad magic summer camp, my standup shows, what a cool online community we have, even when they're fighting, why I chose to end the secret suck, Sunset the Time Suck app and take a break from touring this next year. We'll look at head at what I'm hoping will come up in the bad magic community this next year. Now let's jump into our Kentucky fried timeline. After I do address some defamation and labble. There are rumors that the Colonel was racist and they are from what I can tell totally unfounded. Most seem to come and I'm not making this up from this fucking weasel Papa John. Seriously Papa John's founder John Schnappner. He tried

to throw Harlan Sanders under the bus when he got in trouble when John got in trouble for dropping end bumps saying that while Harlan never got in trouble for saying that word Except you can't find anybody else You know like some fucking figure out there other than John Schnappner who said that he did that and John and Harlan were never close because Harlan died when John was 19 years old So how the fuck would he know what Harlan was privately saying unless it was just rumor hearsay So fuck pop it, John. There were also rumors that Harlem was involved in the KKK. Nope. Those were actually investigated, pretty serious accusation. Zero link, like literally zero has ever been uncovered. It appears in true nonsensical, historical, revisionist,

let's tear people down who are fucking probably better than ourselves for no good reason fashion that largely because of his look, because of the outfit he wore, the white suit worn by a white Southern man, the mustache to go tea. A look suggested by a TV producer, by the way, because that look is reminiscent of how some emphasis on some plantation owners used to possibly dress people started assuming all sorts of bullshit about Harlan Sanders. But when you do some digging, he was actually incredibly modern for his day.

An employed a disproportionate amount of women and non-white people and generous with his pay. He was a fucking hothead, he was a huge hothead. But the rest of the stuff seems to be a bunch of bullshit. So forget that bullshit if you indeed heard it, if Harlem was alive now and heard you talking shit about him, he'd probably fucking knock your ass out, because he was feisty.

That's definitely true. So let's suck this guy in this Kentucky Fried timeline. Shrap on those boots, soldier. We're marching down a time Fried timeline. Shrap on those boots soldier, we're marching down a time, time, time line. Awesome, September 9th or 1890, not 1980. 1890, Harlan Sanders, the oldest of three Sanders children, was born to Wilbert and Margaret Ann Sanders of Henryville, Indiana, little farming community in the southernmost part of the state that now sits less than 20 miles from the outer suburbs of Louisville. Harlan is the little 2000 person-ish-ish areas,

second most famous resident behind award-winning bluegrass-fiddler Charles Michael Cleveland. Or the kernel is way more famous than Charles, but Charles is pretty impressive. Born completely blind in 1980, a childhood ear infection, costume 80% of his hearing in one ear, and he's still on to win a, uh, be a Grammy non-nominated fiddler, who's appeared on the Granile Opera and I'm Prairie Home Companion. So, you know, maybe looking at Charles Michael Cleveland's music. Why not? Backing up almost a century to harvest childhood, the Sanders family grew up dirt poor,

but not anymore or less poor by the standards of the time in the place than most of their neighbors. Henryville was a community of mainly very low income farmers at the end of the 19th century, laboring on roughly 100 acre plots for what amounted to basic sustenance. The Sanders lived in a four room house, about three miles east of Henryville,

a census designated place that first got a post office in 1865. The area probably didn't have much more than a post office, some churches, bar or two, and a general store when Harlem lived there. The unincorporated area named Henryville in 1853 to honor Colonel Henry Ferguson, a Colonel in the Pennsylvania of Maryland. The unincorporated area named Henryville in 1853 to honor Colonel Henry Ferguson, a Colonel in the Pennsylvania militia.

No shortage of Colonel's in the suck. It's been too long since we've had at least two Colonel's in one episode. This Colonel purchased the land on which a Henryville was established and helped persuade Pennsylvania railroad officials to run a line through Clark County. Taken an educated guess, I guess no more than 500 people. Living in Henryville when Harlem was born. There's no census info since the town was not incorporated. Harlem's younger brother, Clarence Edward born in 1892 and then his younger sister,

Violet Catherine. I like these names. Born in 1895. Harlem's dad Wilbert said to be a mild affectionate and hardworking man. A good dude and a great dad. He worked the family's 80 acre farm until he broke his leg badly in a fall, unable to handle the rigorous work of farming now because you know, they didn't that. They didn't fix broken lakes quite as well back in the late 1800s as they do now. Wilbert had to find a job as a butcher. He worked out a Henryville in 1894 and 1895.

And he would have probably kept doing that. But at some point in 1895, Wilbert died just five years after Harlan's birth, leaving two sons and a daughter in the care of his wife a lady described in a biography on the colonel as being stouthearted, fatalistic, devoutly religious. And now she's in the unenviable position of being widowed at 30 with three young mouse to feed in rural Indiana Not much known about Wilbert's cause of death Perhaps he just fell ill as many did back then with some virus that took him down in the prime of his life Maybe he chucks on a chickenbone. That'd be pretty fucking weird. Who knows Also, don't hear the name Wilpert much anymore. Please after hearing this, if you know anybody who goes by will, start referring to them

as Wilbert. If they say their birth name is actually just will or that their legal name is William and they chose to go by will instead of bill, please refuse to accept that. Insist that they are in fact a Wilbert and it's best to stop fighting it. It's a noble name. Maybe not a name fit for a king, but at least a name fit for a guy who would probably taste the king's food before he took a bite to make sure it wasn't poison or something. Anyway, the standards struggled greatly in the wake of Wilburts death.

It was already especially hard to make a living as a farmer in 1895 in the wake of the panic of 1893. The worst depression the US had faced as a young nation. A variety of complex factors led to the so-called panic, including railroads expanding too quickly, taking on too much debt to do so, and also a great number of Americans taking their money out of their banks due to fear over financial turmoil in London, Argentina, and elsewhere abroad leading to economic troubles in America. People with so much money, banks did begin to go under, which led to a panic, right?

This vicious cycle of more people withdrawing more money, leading more banks to collapse, leading more people to withdraw more money, leading more banks to collapse, and so on. America's farmers arguably took the economic hit the hardest. They were now subject to high interest loans by remaining banks. Banks quick to take possession of their farms when payments weren't made on these high interest loans, and properties were foreclosed upon and sold, which felt more like theft, and they'd be quickly auctioned off to opportunist real estate speculators. For about two years, the rest of 1895, all of 1896, much of 1897, Harlan's mom Margaret

Ann, aka Maggie, barely kept herself from her three kids fed by sewing and doing housework for others in the community. She wasn't able to farm the land herself and farming wasn't profitable enough at that time to be able to hire someone else to do it and have it be worthwhile. In 1897, when Harlan was seven, Maggie got a full-time job in a nearby tomato canning factory a job just far enough away With work days long enough that you would often not come home at night But instead stay in some sort of employee dormitory and this was when as I mentioned up top Harlan first learn how to cook right little dude by the age of seven

He's the man of the house. He's in charge while mom is away. He does pretty well He'd already been cooking for a couple of years. You know, he started like five and he's baking bread, cooking vegetables is okay with meat. Funny that the man now synonymous with fried chicken was initially better with bread and vegetables. Also, can you imagine being in charge of your siblings when you're seven fucking years old?

We've come across stories like this in numerous other sucks and I know I always react with the same level of shock I know stories like this were common at the time, but it's it's crazy to me Like what were you doing at the ages seven? Me I don't think I had any chores yet outside of maybe having to make my bed or keep my room kind of tidied up like put my legos away I only start riding a bike, you know, or I'd only started riding a bike a year, maybe two years earlier. I was playing with he-man figures in the bathtub still taking baths instead of showers. Probably still using Johnson and Johnson, no tears, shampoo,

so I didn't burn my little baby eyes and cry. I was building castles out of Legos, playing centipede and chopper command in my Atari. I mean, I'm sure it could have made myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but I don't think I could have even boiled water and make mac and cheese yet. I certainly was not helping to take care of my little sister, Donna, on any level who was two. No fucking way. She would have died within a couple days if I was put in charge of taking care of her. The Colonel will many years later love telling the story about the first time he took over the kitchen baked a loaf of bread, a top of hot wood stove, and then

proudly presented it to his mom at the canning factory. Other women on the line, all hugging and kissing him. And I have no such memories from that from that age. A Harlem would also work to get the family some money. Again, when he's seven, he would start clearing brush and scrub wood for neighboring farmers, a few hours here, a few hours there, kind of worked the prisoners on a chain gang might do. And 1900, little Harlem now 10 is working more hours doing this grunt work. And he gets fired by a neighbor for slacking on his brush clearing duties. He was caught lying on his back, daydreaming, listing to the sounds of nature, and Mama Maggie was furious. The colonel would later say that she told him,

I'm afraid you're just no good. Here I am, left alone with you three children of support, and you're my oldest boy. The only one that can help me, and you won't even work enough, so somebody will keep you. I guess I'll never be able to count on you. Ouch!

Then in a moment of extreme stress and frustration, she added cruelly, it looks like you'll never amount to anything. He's fucking ten! Nevertheless, he would carry the shame he felt upon hearing his mom tell him that for the rest of his life. Wanted to prove mom wrong. He wasn't lazy, wasn't quitter, he was going to amount to something. He would amount to a lot.

He would just take, down along and winding road for many many years to get there uh... month after his dismissal he was already back at work do you know what he was uh... or during what was supposed to be summer break from school excuse me this time working as a cullie aka laborer uh... for another man named Henry monk

who probably had the biggest farm in the area at that time. Sanders, this little kid, will be up before dawn, plowing Monks ground with a team of fucking mules from most of the day driving these mules, then he'd feed water, milk the cows, which inevitably occasionally kicked him. He'd work until 10 p.m. some days, getting his first calluses, blisters, learning the value of a hard day's work and the approving words of Kentucky historian John Ed Pierce, Harlan returned home with the new sense of dignity and more money than he'd ever had. He had learned now what it was like to be on his own to do a man's work, make a living.

After that, school seemed childish and a waste of time. By the age of 12, Harlan would be done with school. There was just no time for it. As poor family, they needed the money, and he did what was needed. He'd feel a little embarrassed about his lack of a formal education for the rest of his life, but he shouldn't have. Life circumstances just did not allow him to, you know, get the education he desired. Also when Harlan was 12 in 1902, his mom married a man named William Brottis, and the

Sanders family moved 80 miles north to Greenwood, Indiana, just outside Indianapolis. Not much known about William, other than he seemed like an asshole. Sanders and his only brother would both have a tumultuous, terrible relationship with him. His sister, possibly also, didn't care for him. Sources don't say how the two got along. Harlem and William, another Wilbert perhaps. Got along so poorly that a 1903, before Sanders turned 13, he left home,

mostly to get away from his stepdad, went to go live and work on another farm. So at the age of 13, done with his farm job, he then moves into Indianapolis to take a job painting horse carriages. Then when he's 14, he returns to Southern Indiana to work again as a farmhand for a couple years. 1906 at the age of 15,

this guy's got quite a work resume for a 15 year old. Harlan takes a job working for an uncle of his and new Albany in Indiana, 20 miles away from his hometown of Henryville and just outside of Louisville, where he would take fairs for a street car company. He learned how to chat with customers and make change. He was personable and well liked, and he was grateful to be done with the back breaking

work of laboring on farms, but even tougher work lay ahead. Tenjans were brewing between the US and Cuba while Harlan worked in New Albany, and when a call for volunteers came, he jumped the chance and he joined the army, had to falsify his date of birth in order to do so, since he was too young to join without parental And when a call for volunteers came, he jumped the chance and he joined the army had to falsify his data birth In order to do so since he was too young to join without parental permission Before he left he he moved up to work in as a street car conductor for his uncle He'd work a lot of different jobs over the course of his life and it seems like whatever the job was He applied himself and did rise quickly through the ranks

Might not last long might leave on bad terms, but also did seem to work really hard. Harlan's experience in the military was brief and dismal. He would later say that he spent most of his brief time in the army being seasick or shoveling mule shit. So that doesn't sound fun. Less than a year's time, he's honorably discharged. In early 1907, sent home with the Cuban pacification medal.

He'd lost 40 pounds, often already wirey framed down in Cuba, and the now real skinny, 16-year-old landed in New Orleans, where he would catch a freight train a little while later up the Mississippi River, see St. Louis for the first time, and then see a lot more places. The feeling of riding the rails was addictive for Sanders, and for a few months, he traveled all around the South eventually arrived in Sheffield, Alabama, a little town this part of the Florence Muscle Shoals Metro area along the Tennessee River, where he had some family. His uncle worked there for the Southern Railway and he got the 17 year old Harlan to first the many railroad jobs of position as a blacksmith's helper. This

was a railroad job that wasn't anywhere near a train and a brutal job at best. Made far worse in the Colonel's later recollection thanks to the blacksmith being a real mean old son of a bitch. Harlan's little brother Clarence now 15 met up with him in Sheffield after leaving home to just like Harlan get away from their stepdad. So Willie must have truly been a mean bastard. After just two months in Sheffield, not sure about Clarence, Harlan though, moved 80 miles south to Jasper, Alabama, where he got a job cleaning out the ash pans of trains, real grunt work from the Northern Alabama railroad where they would finish their runs. Just more hard physical labor.

Sanders progressed to become a steam engine stoker aka a fire man and worked that job for nearly three years until he was fired for quote in subordination after he got sick in 1909. Quickly found a new job in Jasper with the Norfolk and Western Railway working again as a fire man. Also in 1909, Harlan Mary's one of the first girls he ever went on a date with. 21-year-old Josephine King, when he was still 18. He met her outside of a movie theater. They dated for just a couple of weeks. Then they got married on June 15th. And they'd stay together for the next almost 40 years.

A not very happy 40 years as Sanders would later recollect. They seemed to have married less than a love for one another and more out of a sense of, well, that was what you're supposed to do, you know, when you get along well enough for somebody, you want to have sex with them and you get married. Because that's just what people did. Lucifer doesn't feel like it was a great time to be alive compared to now. Just over nine months after marrying, March 29th, 1910, the first of the couple's three kids is born, Margaret Josephine Sanders, like named after her mother and her grandmother. The colonel said to have said to have had quite

the libido, an energetic passionate man in many ways, and he didn't take long to get pregnant. Two years after the first child, April 23rd, 1912, Harlan, Jr. is born, took him a little long at the second time. Josephine might have been like, dude, get that thing away from me. I'm breastfeeding right now for fuck's sake. Something like that. Shortly after Jr.'s birth, Harlan found a better job again as a fireman this time for the Illinois Central Railroad

and the family now rec located to Jackson, Tennessee. There, the Sanders family went through some kind of marital problems that Harlan would never discuss in detail. He just said that his job required him to frequently travel often for several days at a time. And after returning home from one work trip, he walked into an empty house. The way he told it, he didn't even realize his wife was that homesick. He was shocked, right? She just took their kids, moved back to Jasper without having a conversation with him about it.

Now that would be shocking. Think about that back in the days before cell phones or GPS tracking. Back when less than a third of households even had a landline telephone. You just show up at home and your family is just gone. Scramble over to the neighbors or whoever, your spouse's friends with,

to try and figure out where the fuck they went. Then having to hop on a train or maybe hop into a Model T driving, but probably not because most people didn't even have cars yet. They were still impractical to take long distances because there weren't that many gas stations. And then when you show up to wherever you think they've gone,

which is probably days, if not weeks later, you still don't know for sure that they're there until you actually lay eyes on them. Right, I mean, you'd be used to it in a sense that's just the way things were back then, but God, that would be way more stressful than it would be looking for somebody today. Well, Harlan traveled back to Jasper with the intention to kidnap his own children and bring them back.

When as far as he hid in the bushes of his in-laws, we then thought better of it, ended up talking things out with Josephine and she agrees to take their two kids and move back into the family home in Tennessee. We're harland now, needs to work to get a job that doesn't require so much travel. While he continues working as a fireman for the time being, he also started studying for a law degree at night, taking classes through the Sal extension university. He was inspired to become a lawyer after reading about clearance Darrow. A man considered by many legal analysts to be the greatest American lawyer of the 20th century.

We met Clarence in the Leopold and Loeb, perfect murder suck episode 335 that came out this year back in February. Darrow would reach the height of his fame in the mid 1920s. Hopefully his name is pronounced Darrow. I think it's Darrow. For his work in the Leopold and Loeb trial and also the infamous scopes monkey trial. I'll go into school. Harlan got fired from his job at Illinois Central Railroad for getting in a quote brawl with a colleague. He was a he was a spicy meatball. He probably been in a whole bunch of brawl's prior to this. The word brawl comes up a lot in biographies of the kernel. Dude was not afraid to throw hands at all.

After he got fired, he kept studying the law and took a new job as a fireman for the Rock Island Railroad base in Chicago. Had to move for work. His wife, two kids, now move back to Jasper for a bit to live with Josephine's folks, where they will stay until he starts making money as a lawyer. Shortly after taking a job for the Rock Island Railroad, he has enough legal education to move and now practice law and Little Rock Arkansas, where apparently you did not need to pass the bar exam to be a lawyer at that time. Pretty much anyone with just a bit of knowledge of the law could round up some clients if they had enough salesmanship and just work as a professional attorney. There was very little qualification like like legal qualifications needed.

Josephine and the kids moved a little rock to join Harlan after he made a whopping $2,500 bucks following signing up a bunch of clients thanks to being the first lawyer at the scene of a train wreck. That was a small fortune at that time somewhere around $75,000 today. Harlan would now practice law and little rock for about three years. And then his law career came to a swift and dramatic end. I love this. When he punched out a client of his in the courtroom during trial in front of the judge who had him immediately arrested in charge of the salt. And then he was not exactly welcome to practice law in Little Rock after that. Sanders would later say he quote, knocked himself out of a job. I just imagine like whoever he knocked out,

seen one of his Kentucky fried chicken commercials on TV decades later. Honey, come here quick, it's a guy told you about. Oh, he's back on TV, that son of a bitch, was supposed to help me stew my boss for not providing a safe work environment. And when I told him, I don't think he's making a good case for me, knocked me out in front of the whole goddamn courtroom.

Now that hoheaded prick's making millions sling a chicken. Well, strange world. Actually, I wanna believe that he found out that he was like a pedophile or a wife, or something. And decided he wasn't gonna represent him anymore, and that led to an argument, and that led to Harlan just whooping his ass. Harlan was a good-sized guy.

Around six feet tall, lean a mean 200 pounds, and he was said to be tough as nails. No one fucks with the kernel. No one. Before jumping ahead now to find out how Kissander's recovers after fucking up his career as a lawyer. Time for the first of today's two mid show sponsor breaks. Thank you for sticking around. Huge thanks to anyone who has used our landing pages or codes to save money this year. Every time you do, you do help us stay sponsored. Now let's check back in with the colonel going through one of several low points in his life. It's 1915 now, 25 year old

Harlem. It feels like he should be 45. Basically, how many jobs he's had already had already. He has to move back to Henryvilleville indiana and live with his mom who's moved back to obviously uh... after apparently divorcing harland stepped at i i think uh... i don't think based on some record searches that margaret and william bradis maggy and billy wherever actually legally married scandalous so i'm making some assumptions here but I think that they're done now. One of the many low points in Harlan's adult life, he's feeling like a huge failure, right? Mom's words looks like he'll never amount to anything,

probably ringing in his ears. Back in Henryville, Harlan gets a job as a laborer for the Pennsylvania Railroad. Feels like he's moving backwards in life. After staying several months with Mama Maggie, in 1916, the Sanders family now moves to Jeffersonville right across the Ohio River from Louisville. After Harlem gets a job selling life insurance for the prudential life insurance company, another big career switch, right?

The childhood farmhand, former street car conductor, railroad man, then lawyer, now a life insurance salesman at age just 26. On October 15, 1919, the couple's third and final child, Mildred Marie Sanders is born. And right around that same time, Harlan gets fired for insubordination. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. Right, at least it's not a brawl this time,

not to be known. Luckily, he was not a quitter. Every time he got knocked down, he got right back up again. Did you know that the Chumba Womba song, Tub Thumpin was written about Colonel Sanders? I get knocked down, but I get up again. Never gonna keep me down. I get knocked down. It's fucking Colonel Sanders. So they were talking about or they weren't, but maybe could have been.

Back to that song is about somebody drinking way too much. In Harland, with a T totally, he was not much of a drinker. Harland does quickly get another sales job with the mutual benefit life of new Jersey company, based in Louisville. It's a fucking weird, I think just like they had an office based in Louisville, even though the source says based in Louisville. I don't think a company called the mutual benefit life

of New Jersey, whatever, you know, national headquarters in Kentucky. Who knows? And then following, selling more insurance, this dude drastically switches shit up and jumps into another completely different career field. Farmhand, street car conductor, railroad man, lawyer, insurance salesman, and now, riverboat captain.

Almost actually. 1920 at the age of 30, Sanders who'd made a bunch of business contacts when he joined the Rotary Club, after moving to Jeffersonville and selling insurance, well, he raises money to launch a ferry boat company, operating a single boat on the Ohio River between Jeffersonville and Louisville. He saw a need and just went for it. Far from the last time he'll do something like this.

There was a ferry already, but it was slow and outdated and there was easy enough demand for a competitor. So, Harlan hits up everybody notes, sells shares to raise money for a fairy company that he'll incorporate. Once he has a necessary capital, he buys a boat called Froman M. Coots, weird fucking name, then less than two years later, sells his shares in the company for $22,000 equivalent to around $400,000 today. So well done, Colonel.

Colonel's back, baby. He's kicking ass again, more than ever. Ultimately, this business venture gambler took most of that fairy money and used it to establish another company manufacturing something so random again. Do you care to guess what it was? I'll give you two clues that will not help you.

It's not fried chicken and has nothing to do with the railroad. Lamps do just randomly jumps into the lamp game. Harlan opens up a lamp company that makes specifically a settling lamps. So now it's farmhand street car conductor, railroad man, lawyer, insurance salesman, ferry owner, lamp magnet. But right after he opens his business, Delco, a tech company and subsidiary of General Motors makes a small electric generator that does a much better job providing light to the same people that we're going to buy his lamps. And they also sell it on credit. And so now Harlan loses his ass. Just like that, he's out of the lamp game

Harlan loses his ass. Just like that, he's out of the lamp game forever. 1923, the Sanders family moves again to Winchester, Kentucky, just outside of Lexington. And what does he do? Something totally unrelated to all the shit he's done already, of course. The family moves to Winchester after Harlan gets a job selling tires for the Michelin tire company. So, you know, kind of, I mean, I guess not totally different, because it's also a sales job. But now it's farmhand, street car conductor, railroad man, lawyer, insurance salesman,

fairy owner, lamp magnet, tire salesman. He's only 33. At the age of 33, he quickly becomes the top tire salesman in Kentucky. And the very next year, 1924, Michelin closes a major manufacturing plant and they fucking lay them off. Son of a bitch! He gets stuck down. He's out of the tire game forever. And after losing his job, he totals the family car in an accident that leaves

him with a nasty head wound, badly split in the scalp. And now soon the Sanders family will have to move again. Without a car now, he's hitchhiking around Winchester, looking for a new job. Another low point in his life. He gets picked up just by chance by the general manager of Standard Oil of Kentucky. The two hit it off, and that guy asked him to run a standard oil gas station in Nicholas ville, Kentucky, 30 miles west of Winchester, also just outside Lexington. I love it. Farmhand, streetcar conductor, railroad man, lawyer, insurance salesman, ferry owner, lamp bag, entire salesman, now gas station manager.

And he was in the army for about a year. Dude was packing a lot of lives into one life. In Nicholasville, Harlan runs a gas station for the next five or so years. And according to one of his biographies does not take any shit from unruly customers or would be robbers. He makes a name for himself around town by getting into quotes several brawls in Nicholasville. Colonel was a scrappy son of a bitch. When he became the face of KFC decades later, I met a whole bunch of people had moments of, oh, we damn, that's son of a bitch. He'd fucking bust of my jaw. Now he's a chicken king. The station of Nicholasville makes a Sanders family good money enough to send their oldest daughter, Margaret,

Maggie, the college 1928, and the colonel is now 38 years old. Life going great for the colonel. Best it's ever gone now. But then in 1930, the US enters a little period of oh, economic disaster. I'm guessing you've heard of it. The Great Depression. Businesses start closing left and right nationwide, even good. Well-run businesses that were kicking ass just months earlier. And 40-year-old Harlan service station is one of the casualties, right? And he's back to square one again. Luckily, within a few

months, the Shell Oil Company, familiar with the success of his Nicholasville station, offers Harlan a job running one of their service stations in North Corbin, Kentucky, a town of a few thousand people next to Corbin, town of less than 10,000, about 85 miles south of Lexington, about halfway between Lexington and Knoxville, Tennessee. At this new location, you will not have to pay a franchise fee or rent, but will instead pay the corporation a percentage of his sales. So he'll only make money if the station makes money. And the salesman in Harland loves this incentivization.

And it will lead over the course of many years to his Kentucky Fried Chicken business. Here in North Corbin, Harland will get in a bunch more brawl. And he'll participate in a shootout that leaves a colleague dead a Gas station turf war the most unexpected moment I came across looking into his life Who knew there would be so much violence in a Colonel Sanders suck. Oh fuck yeah, bro I find a very entertaining Sanders new station is just off of highway 25, which was a very busy road at that time.

It was the main thoroughfare in the area prior to the construction of Interstate 75, which didn't start being built in the area until the 60s. It was a great location for a gas station, but there was already another more visible station, more established station right across the highway ran by a guy who will meet in a second, who was also a very fiery dude.

This other location will be a major challenge for Sanders, but initially a bigger challenge was how tough just the neighborhood in general was. Sanders station was located in what was called Hell's Half Acre by locals. Owing to the infamous frequency of fights and gun battles, the area was a hot spot for bootleggers and Some loosely organized crime figures

Luckily the Colonel gave no fucks Luckily he was good at kicking ass as good as he would later become at frying tastiest chicken During his time in North Corbin Sanders kept a loaded handgun under the cast drawer and a loaded shotgun He called his hog rifle next to his bed at home And he'd bring that handgun with him cast drawer and a loaded shotgun he called his hog rifle. Next it was bed at home. And he bring that handgun with him into a gas station turf shootout. The man who ran the station across the street was a local tough guy named Matt Stewart. Also known for not taking anybody shit. From the time Sanders moved in, these two fiery businessmen seemed destined for a showdown.

Sanders right after taking over his new business, well, he painted a big sign on a railroad wall near the highway, directing traffic getting off the highway over to his gas station and Stewart didn't care for that. He was livid. So he quickly responds by painting that sign over and then writing information, directing traffic back to his place. Now Sanders is livid.

So he pays Stewartward of visit. Tell Stewart, if he ever does something like that again, he will quote, blow his goddamn head off. That's a Colonel Sanders quote. Not the type of quote I initially expected to find, right? The nice grandpa looking dude with the white suit mustash go tea glasses. When he was a younger man, once told a competing gas station manager that he fucked with the sign again, he blows goddamn head off. Well, following that threat, Sanders goes and repaints the sign back to the original directions he'd put up there. Then Stewart, not afraid of Harlan, despite the threat, is soon spotted again, back at

that railroad wall, painting over Sanders sign. When word reaches Harlan, he is conferring with two shell officials, his district manager, Robert Gibson, and a local shell supervisor, H.D. Shelburn. These guys were also apparently not men you fuck with when it comes to gas station money. These three dudes all grab fireharms, jump into a car, speed down to the sign with a shootout on their minds. When they get near the spot steward. He's up on the ladder, Peyton Harland's instructions over. When he hears them approaching, he hops down off the ladder, grabs his own gun that he had ready for this. And he just opens fire. No one seems certain who shot first, but Bullets flew. They were not warning shots. These guys are not fucking around. The Shell District Manager takes three to the chest. Dies almost

instantaneously. Dude dies. Over gas station advertising, fucking argument. Sanders, after emptying his own handgun, runs into incoming gunfire, grabs Gibson's gun out of his dead hand and starts shooting again. The shit's insane. He and Shelburn quickly flank Stewart, who's hiding behind a wall.

The future Colonel finds an angle, shoots Stewart in the shoulder, shoulder at almost the exact same moment the showburn shoots him in the hip. Stewart then supposedly cries out, don't shoot Sanders, you've killed me. And this really weird battle is now over. Sanders luckily did not kill Stewart. He will survive the shooting and Sanders will not go to prison for murder, but he will go to jail. When the police show up, they arrest everybody and the case goes

to court. When all of a sudden, done, Sanders and Shelburn will have their charges dismissed, and then Stewart will be given 18 years in prison for murder. Then two years later, Stewart is appealing his conviction and is shot and killed by a deputy sheriff who it was rumored having paid by the family of the slain Robert Gibson to kill him. Life fucking wild in North Corbin. So much drama in the NK's NCK. Damn, I messed it up. I was kind of flip that LBC.

The Colonel was a fucking gangster. How do you not want that turf war? They would very likely not be KFC today. One of history's many, many weird moments. So with his competition first in prison, then literally dead. Sanders knew business now flourishes. He took care of all the new customers. He was getting, turned many of them into regulars. His station was the first in the area to offer oil checks, free air pumping, other services, still novel and most to Kentucky. He and Josephine also quickly noticed that many of the drivers who come through are asking, you know, where they can find something to eat.

And there wasn't much in the area at that time to direct folks to. So excuse me, Sandra sees another opportunity. Just like he cooked for a sibling when he was a little kid, well, he's been cooking for his own family now. And sometimes he'll invite travelers to come in and join them if he's made extra. And it now occurs to him why not make some extra food money on the side, right? And it's also the depression, everybody's looking for a little hustle. There's a small room he wasn't using attached to the station, so Sanders buys some linoleum on credit for 16 bucks, moves the family dining room into this room, and now has a cafe.

Farmhand, street car conductor, army man, railroad man, lawyer, insurance salesman, ferry owner, lamp magnet, tire salesman, gas station manager, gunslinger, now short order cook. Harlem would have food ready at 11 a.m. since most people in the area, eight months between 11 and a little past noon, if no one came in and asked for food by noon, well then the family would eat it. If people did show up, well they'd sell it to them and then make themselves more food later. Sanders made all his southern favorites, ham, biscuits, greens, of course fried chicken, cooked in a big skillet like all good southern cooks. This was the first form of what would

eventually become his Kentucky fried chicken. We got a ways to go. Rather than afterthoughts, to a full tank of gas, the food itself was good enough to soon become a customer draw. So much so that Harlan changes the name of his business from Sanders' service station to Sanders' service station in cafe. Then, as the food business continues to expand, changes it again to Sanders' cafe and service station. Later, when a four-room shack next door goes up for sale, Sanders takes it over and turns it into a little motel restaurant called Sanders court and cafe. Right, this is all going on during the Great Depression. 1932, back enough a little bit. Tragedy strikes Sanders family,

when their only son, Harlan Jr., at the age of just 20, perfectly healthy, just a week or so before, dies of blood poisoning he gets during a routine hospital visit. Harlan barely has time to grief. He's a cook, he's the business owner, he's got to keep working to keep everyone else fed. It seems like he will reflect more on this loss later in life when he will lament that he would have never sold off his business to investors if his son would have still been alive as his dream was to hand over the business to him. Speaking of business, despite this strategy, Sanders' little business does so well that in 1935,

he becomes a colonel. In honor of being still upon him by the governor, Ruby LaFoune, who had visited his motel gas station in Cafe, what a name he had, guess you know, whenever referred to him as LaFoune, the buffoon. Let me explain really quick how the title of Kentucky colonel works. I've always wondered actually, not always. It's not like I fucking stayed awake at night as a kid. What does it work? But I've thought about it. It's the highest

honor the state of Kentucky can bestow upon a resident. It's a lot like how the king or queen of England can grant somebody nighthood. It's just a nice honorary title. You don't get any extra legal abilities or anything. You don't get any extra legal abilities or anything. You don't get to shoot fireballs, you don't get to be wizard. The Kentucky Colonel title awarded by the governor to civilians age 18 or over for noteworthy accomplishments, contributions to civil society, remarkable deeds, or outstanding service to the community, state, or nation. And it's not a super rare thing actually. since 1813, over 350,000 people have received the Kentucky Colonel Commission.

A lot of kernels, Roman around Kentucky right now. Probably have a few kernels listen to this kernel suck. So it's cool, but it's not like he was thrown in parade or anything. He got a certificate in the mail, had the option to ask to be referred to as a kernel, which he will clearly choose later in life. For the first years of his cafe's operation,

Sanders food, not a huge source of income, more just a way to keep people coming back, get gas and repairs, whatever. Motel was pretty profitable, but then by the mid 1930s, the food itself was the Sanders main source of income. And the most popular item on the menu was fried chicken, which was a big dish in the South at that time amongst both white and black southerners,

but not a restaurant dish when Sanders started making it. It was poor people's food and food almost always only cooked at home. Possibly without really knowing it, Sanders attempted to mass produce this venerated dish, you know, years later, essentially the national food of the American South before anybody else did. In 1935, the Colonel's chicken gets a major exposure boost. Duncan Heins, a product of Kentucky, and a nationally known food critic. The Duncan Heins, who later will have a line

of baked good products, you can still find today at the grocery store. I mean, who doesn't love a delicious Duncan Heins cake of brownie mix or the frosting? Well, he wrote about Sanders' cafe in his 1935 book, Adventures in Good Eating, which was the nation's first road food guide to the first like travel guide around food. Sanders' cafe, according to Hines, was a very good place to stop and route to Cumberland Falls and the Great Smokies. Notable for sizzling steaks, fried chicken, country ham, and hot biscuits.

Not in incredibly detailed writeup, but a national writeup nonetheless. Sanders was a little bit upset that Hines didn't write more about him in years later when he runs into the food critic and fellow entrepreneur at a convention, he will pistol whip him and permanently disfigure him. Or not do that, but it feels like

that's something he could have done. Over the course of the last few years of the 1930s, Harlan does well enough to buy another motel in Richmond, Kentucky. Also opens a furniture store and a plumbing supply store. Dude, clearly love to stay busy, always looking for another deal. July of 1939, businesses had been steady for,

or business had been steady for years. And with the US economy beginning to emerge from the Great Depression, July of 1939 businesses had been steady for business had been steady for years and with the US economy beginning to emerge from the Great Depression, Harlan feels like it's the time to expand business into a new state. So he and his wife purchased a motel almost exactly 200 miles away in Asheville, North Carolina. But then few months later, November of 1939, their original motel, gas station, cafe, and North Corbin, their main money maker burns to the ground. More trials and tribulations for the colonel.

Dude, 49 years old. Just about a few new businesses. He's trying to figure out how to run and make profitable, and now his money maker burns to the ground. July 4th, 1940, Harlan will reopen his original location as a motel with a 140 seat adjoining restaurant. And here at the Harlan Sanders Cafe, Harlan will perfect the recipe that we'll later make him famous.

He was given some strong incentive to make it really good. Right as this dude was getting himself and his family out of the depression, the US enters World War II. And with over 10 million American men in listing or being drafted and with a gas ration and other rations in effect tourism dries up. I damn it. In 1941, due to this, Harlan forced to close the new Asheville motel. There's just not enough people traveling to make it a fucking profitable business.

He had just bought it less than two years earlier. Loses his ass on another business venture that doesn't work. It wasn't his fault. Also loses the Richmond hotel. Can't tell for sure what happened with his furniture store or plumbing supplies store, but he may have lost those as well because they're not talked about again. Also not making enough money at his Corbin restaurant

to pay the bills. So leaving his wife behind in Kentucky, he has to travel across the country to get a job in Seattle as a short order cook and restaurant supervisor at a place called Twin TPs, which was a well-known downtown restaurant Seattle until it burned down in 2001. And he'll work there for 10 months, just paying bills. And while he's away, he left a woman who had been working for him for a few years, Claudia

Letington Price in charge of the North Corbin Cafe. Josephine never really loved working in a restaurant. And by this point, she was able to step away. And Claudia may have been doing more than just helping the Colonel run things business-wise by the time he went to Seattle. She may have also been offering the Colonel some free rides on her bike. Scandal! The two had an ongoing affair for years, not sure how many years, and will later marry, more on her in a bit. Following this time in Seattle, and later 1942, Harlan will run a few cafeterias for the government. And I love this random trivia, including one in the new government town of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where materials were being

developed for the Manhattan Project. How random, right? A Colonel Sanders before he was a household name might have very well cooked up some chicken and more for major general, Leslie Groves and others working with Oppenheimer to make the atomic bombs that would end World War II. By the time Harlan returns to Kentucky, in either 1943 or 1944, he has refined his secret chicken recipe of 11 herbs and spices. Same recipe still used today by Kentucky Fried Chicken locations around the world. He's been whipping up chicken that was finger-licking good. As a company now advertises, has been for years. But it wasn't until the 1940s that he really figured out how to cook this chicken up, not just consistently, but quickly. While working in Oak

Ridge, he had the idea to fry chicken via nuclear fission. Working with a small nuclear reactor, he built this backyard. He would be able to fry 100,000 chickens in less than one second, built in his backyard. He would be able to fry 100,000 chickens in less than one second by splitting a single hydrogen atom. Or of course not. I do love the idea though, that part of the secret of the old KFC recipe is nuclear reactions.

He really did come up with a cool new way of making fried chicken though. It was very novel. He'd initially pan fried his chicken for years, which I said earlier with the traditional way of frying chicken in the South. But doing that, it wasn't fast enough to make things as profitable for himself and as reliable for his customers as he hoped.

If he pan-fried chicken after an order was put in, well, the customer would have to wait you know, about 30 minutes. If he cooked a batch in advance, he almost always had extra chicken to throw away a closing time. And as the day went on, of course, it didn't taste as good. Anyone who's ever had fried chicken for leftovers knows, you know, it just doesn't taste the same at all after a few hours.

Although I do actually love grabbing a piece of cold fried chicken out of the fridge. But not for everybody. So Harlan first experiments with what was called French fry and at the time, immersing chicken in a wire basket and deep fat. This cut cooking time and half down to 15 minutes, but also produced chicken that was dry, crusty,

and unevenly done, which was no bueno. So sometime between 1939 and 1945, sources very wild, I'm not sure the Colonel knew himself. I'm not sure he could remember exactly when. He started messing around with frying his chicken under a pressure in a new fangled utensil at that time called a pressure cooker. And eventually he arrived at just the right balance of pressure, cooking time, meat, fat

and fat filtration. The pressure method he employed sealed in the chicken's flavor, preserved his moisture and gave it a soft finish, neither greasy nor crusty, and did that in eight or nine minutes. So winner, winner, literally chicken dinner. This method was perfect for getting quality chicken out quick to hungry customers and it reduced the need to throw away chicken at the end of the day 1947 now 57-year-old Sanders has made it to World War 2 perfected his chicken recipe the economy's good businesses booming Personally, though, he's having problems his marriage to Josephine has been on the rocks for years

And it was never one that seemed to leave either person tremendously happy or fulfilled. They've now been married for 38 years. Josephine, quiet, subdued, not a big people person. Harland, big personality, fiery, passionate, big people person. In addition to almost polar opposite personalities, according to a number of sources, it seems the main two problems in their marriage where Josephine not enjoying cooking or the restaurant industry on any level and apparently not as sexual of a person as the Colonel or maybe she, you know, he just shouldn't do it for her. Their kids would

even speak to this later. Colonel Sanders daughter Maggie wrote in her book the Colonel secret 11 herbs and a spicy daughter speaking of her dad's mistress and second wife Claudio who we met earlier it was evident from the beginning that her presence would create turmoil mother refused to accept that she alone cannot satisfy father's physical needs is the weird shit to write about your dad which from the very beginning of their marriage had seemed excessive to her. Neither promiscuous nor a hormonger, father nevertheless had a libido,

which required a healthy willing partner. You found one in young Claudia. Claudia's nephew, Don Leddington, would say of Harlan's needs. A lot of interesting people commenting on this. If Josephine wasn't interested in that part of his life, obviously he didn't just forget about that part. He found when he needed to find another place.

And there are other people who commented on the lack of sexual compatibility between these two. Interestingly, despite common knowledge of the affair between Claudia and Harlan, no one seems to fault him a bunch over the affair, which I think says a lot about what people thought of Harlan and Josephine's marriage. So in 1947, when Harlan's 57, the two-gitter divorce, despite the affair, seems to have been

a pretty amicable parting. That may have been largely due to their finances at the time. The Corbin business was thriving. There was enough money for Josephine to be set up well for her retirement and for Harlan and Claudia to live their lives also. Now in 1949, Harlan, 59, Claudia, 47 get married. And the next year, 1950, Harlan truly starts to morph into his colonel persona.

He'd lost his first Kentucky colonel commissioning paperwork and in late 49, he'd got recommissioned again as a colonel and now he starts taking this commission real seriously. Groza mustache, Groza Goatee, lets the hair on his head grow out a little bit longer than he previously kept it, made a string tie out of Gross Gain ribbon, and he starts introducing himself as Colonel Harlan Sanders. And apparently friends and associates, even though they went along with it, they first

thought he was just joking. And then later realized, oh, this is something that's going to stick. We used to ask him when he was going to change the name of his place to Colonel Sanders Court and sell Colonel Sanders fried chicken. Finally, I think everybody sort of accepted it. A Corbin friend told one of his biographers. The re-Christian Colonel Sanders will eventually even go so far as to have his beard bleached and wear a white suit to complete the persona.

Which is pretty strange, right? I mean, to change your persona that way? What if you're partner to that, right? Or your dad? I just picture Kyler coming home from college for Chris' break. And suddenly I'm dressed up in 18th century aristocrat clothing.

And then when he starts, you know, cracking up, I'm insulted. The Baron does not accept your interlinked mockery, young squat. I challenge die to a duel. And toss him one sword, I insist another. While a bit weird, life also good for the Colonel.

He's in love, he's got his white mustache and goatee, consider himself an actual Colonel now. He's even driving around town and is shining new white Cadillac. Then in 1952, at the age of 62, he first franchises his secret recipe. He franchises the recipe to Pete Harmon of South Salt Lake, Utah, owner operator,

owner proprietor of one of the city's largest most successful restaurants to do drop-in. Harlan met Pete in 1951 at the National Restaurant Association's annual convention in Chicago, the two of them bonded over a disdain of both alcohol and smoke and cigarettes. There's a real thing, this colonel hated a drunk and loathed a smoker. We all have our things, I guess. Maybe a step dad was a drunker to smoker. In the first year of selling Sanders product, restaurant sales for Harmon more than tripled.

With 75% of the increase coming directly from sales of fried chicken. For Harmon, the addition of fried chicken was a way of differentiating his restaurant from competitors. Right in Utah, a product hailing from Kentucky was unique. It was It evoked imagery of Southern hospitality. Don Anderson, a sign painter hired by Harmon was the one who then coined the name Kentucky Fried Chicken. After Harmon's initial success, he'll want to keep working with the Colonel and he'll partner with Sanders for the rest of his

career. Later doing things like developing and preparing the KFC system for franchising. I worked to develop training manuals, product guides, other claims to famer, development of the bucket packaging, and the emphasis on the finger-looking good model. He'll also later convince several other restaurant owners to franchise and Sanders will make four cents a chicken, equivalent to about 44 cents a chicken today. He won't, however, get into a gun fight or even a brawl with Sanders. So they were apparently they weren't like that close. Before all this business expansion, though, life throws Sanders another unexpected curveball, another big setback and low point.

1955 in anticipation for construction of interstate 75 that will be cut into Corbin, Kentucky, the next decade state highway 25 that highway where Sanders restaurant was located next to an exit is rerouted. And the rerouting means that Sanders cafe has now several miles off the beaten path. And it fucks his business up enough to basically destroy it. Right. Sanders tried to stop the rerouting by gathering up an armed posse riding on horseback, of course, in a civil war officers uniform with the Colonel lead the charge to the homes of several county officials killing some and Tari and further than others, but the government refused to bend his will. So eventually, I had

to lay down a sword or he was just really bummed about the whole situation. Yeah, business low down so much he was forced to sell his beloved restaurant within months of the change at the age of 65. Now the restaurant tour doesn't have a restaurant. Sanders will later say this uh, you know, might have been the lowest point in his life. He worked so hard for so long he did about, you know, a dozen different careers, huge highs, a lot of lows. And he was banking on his always busy, Corbin restaurant, given him and Claudia one hell of a retirement, but now after losing money, getting rid of his failing business, he's nearly broke again. This all hits the colonel so hard. He start smoking

crack. Yes. Crack. And within a few months, he's trading his precious fried chicken for crack and allies all around North Corbin. And on days he doesn't have any chicken, the colonel is giving up his sweet, sweet ass for that sweet, sweet crack. And it's rumored that in the late 50s, damn near everyone living in North Corbin took at least one spin riding the colonels very used bicycle. Or maybe the news didn't hit him that hard maybe the crack didn't exist yet But he was sad He had a little bit of savings left Social Security check of a hundred and five dollars a month He had a smattering of restaurants in Utah selling a chicken for four cents a you know a chicken

So does you know a special recipe? But it's only enough to barely pay the bills. He has no more employees It's just he and a second wife Claudia and now for a brief time the two of them will whip up his original blend of 11 herbs and spices at home and ship it to the few restaurants Pay to sell his chicken Now what does Sanders do at this point is he give up because he accepts his lot be the guy who used to be a chicken slinger No, he gets to work again His wife will later say that she wasn't worried She figured he would come up with something else

You know even if he was worried She said the colonel might say he didn't know what to do But we who knew and understood him knew that it wouldn't be long before he would know exactly what to do I love her faith in him And now before seeing how Sanders makes his biggest comeback yet time time for our last mid show sponsor break of the year. And I'm back. Thanks for not leaving. Don't you leave me? Uh, now we return for the Colonel's big chumbo, Wamba tub thumpy moment. Sanders head into his late 60s now comes up with a new plan and soon he'll be hitting the road again.

He makes a bunch of phone calls and goes over all the contacts he'd made over the years in the restaurant industry to find places he thought would be best in the country to sell his chicken. And then he hops in his car often alone drives all over America to sell them on his secret recipe. The salesman's back. Right. Sometimes cloudy comes with him. Despite really needing to make some money, the two of them won't just accept anyone.

They try and think long term refused to act desperate even at this point in their life. The colonel will later recall my wife and I went way over in Illinois once. It was 1500 miles round trip. We got in there just after dark and as soon as I looked at the daggone place I was afraid the trip was for nothing. I got out of the car, went around and see what the back end looked like. They had a glass door in the kitchen I could see in and I knew immediately. I didn't want to put the chicken in there. So I went back to the car and we come on home. The owner don't know yet today that I ever did see that joint.

I love that at this point, still focused on quality, right? This chicken was his baby. He wasn't going to give it to just anybody, not even when money was tight, right? When traveling alone, he'll now sleep in the back seat of his catalog to save money. Also in the back of his catalog, her bags a season flower, his precious pressure cooker, some material branded with the word Kentucky Fried chicken and a few bottles of aspirin because a lifetime of bus and his ass has left him with a pretty serious case of arthritis in his hands.

He'll dawn a black suit for these early trips. He'll start wearing the white suit in a few years, looking a lot like the image of the colonel we think of today. One of those fist bites helps start arthritis too as to Dave Thomas who would later go on to become the founder of Wendy's. Remember, he's meeting the kernel during this era. He recalled, I never had seen a black suit like that in my life. The code had long tails and fitting perfectly.

His graying go T was perfectly trimmed and he carried a gold tip cane. Colonel Sanders was one of a kind. He introduced himself and asked if I knew him. I pretended I didn't, even though I knew all about him. He sat down over a cup of coffee and he talked to me like an old friend. I've never met a better salesman. When he left, I had a sense this man

was going to change my life. Maybe this Colonel in a white Cadillac had something. Thomas would also add, food is a personal thing and it's tied closely to family life. People want to know the values of the person who's ladling out the goods. Harlan Sanders stood for values that people understood and liked. Colonel had really learned how to leverage his persona and went to great lengths to present himself as an exaggerated, large-than-life Southern caricature now. He was a showman.

He emphasized his humble, down- down home origins played up his country Lingo dropping extra dead gumbets and don't you seize in conversations Acting his own as his own publicist. He also talked his way under all kinds of local TV morning shows around the country to promote his brand Once booked as a guest he would put on a cooking demonstration with his pressure cooker and wearing his suit with his gold-tipped cane He'd hand out drumsticks to the audience. When a restaurant shows to adopt Kentucky Fried Chicken, the Colonel would make a public appearance, sometimes even bring along Claudia in a full dress, antebellum ensemble and introducing her to customers as the Colonel's Lady. On these memorable occasions, he would cook the chicken himself in the back. Then he'd later remember when I got a supply of orders ahead i go out and do what i

called a little carnal and i take off my apron dust a flower off my pants put on my vest long tailed coat gold watch chain and go out into the downrope and knock motherfuckers to the ground no he talked to the guest i would love it if he just fucking knocked a few people out at these things uh it was during the early years of him hustling around like that when some TV producer told him that a white suit would pop better on TV, really make him stand out. It would give him a visual signature, you know, more unique in a business where image is so important.

And he obviously took his advice. In the late 50s, Sanders was like a traveling evangelist and his gospel was fried, fucking chicken, baby. By 1960, the now 70 year old chicken slinger had more than 200 outlets for his chicken extending all the way up into Canada. He and his wife Claudia bought themself a new big white house in Shelbyville, Kentucky in between Lexington and Louisville.

They had a new restaurant and headquarters in Shelbyville as well, a small staff including an accountant and Harlan was known to drive around town in a gold rolls Royce with the words Kentucky Fried Chicken painted on both sides. Oh my God, I love it. Roll around in his rolls, walk around with his cane like some sort of fried chicken peop.

Yo, yo, yo, suck with Pimp I will just chicken Joe. I gotta admit, while I crib some of my drip. So some of my flow. White suit, gold tip came. A rose back in 1960. Clearly the Colonel was OG Pimp, not just some hip for the sticks, yo. Sanders flexing on his chicken fry success.

Dressed like a shotgun loving dirty South version of Elliott Ness. Colonel never got into the sex game as far as we know, but with his swagger and charisma, he would have been a legendary pimped show. Put some respect on the Sanders name. Pimp with the chicken game and I am playing. You dig, feel me?

You hear what I'm saying? Well, thank you chicken Joe. Always nice when he stops by. Now thanks to all his tireless self-promotion, people wanting to sell the Colonel's chicken or come into him and set a hymn having to drive to them. One of the couples who will come to him were Earl and Winifrede Smolly. The Colonel would change his life in the best of ways.

An example of many lives they'd changed. How it illustrates how popular the Colonel's fried chicken was, how powerfully it could increase the profits of various little mom pod diners, roadhouses, random restaurants across America and Canada. In 1969, the New York Times would run a profile in the small east, incredibly hard working, both had been brought up on farms, just like the Colonel. They'd been grinding away to tiny mom pod restaurant in Warsaw, Indiana for years, and it barely supported them. When they met the Colonel, Earl was working around 65 hours a week,

getting them before dawn to clean and prep the place, then staying until closing, went and freed worked 45 hours and raised their kids. From 1957 to 1963, their place would gross between $45 and $55,000 a year. But after expenses, the two only actually took home about $3,000 a year total, right between them both. Then in 1964, they borrowed $20,000 to buy franchise rights for KFC, huge risk for a couple only making $3,000 in profit a year. Well, that gamble pays off big time. Within 10 months, they paid

all that money back. They're very first year selling the colonel's chicken. They took home after expenses of profit of $30,000 Literally 10 times the money they made the year before and that story not an exception Right, it was the rule and how cool is that the kernel not the only person by far getting rich off of his chicken With stories like these Harlan did not need to be a traveling salesman for KFC, right as I mentioned is chicken the success It's bringing his business partners doing all the talking he needs. Now you had to apply to be a partner, right? Like the smallies, you had to pay an increasingly costly

franchise fee. Navigating all of his expansion for the colonel is getting tricky as he starts to go into international waters more and more outside of Canada in his 70s. Mostly the colonel is doing this, by the way, he's in charge, but he does have a good staff to help him. And no one on his staff was more important than Pete Harmon, right, the guy who first bought his recipe brought it to Utah.

Pete is his business partner, Harmon, the unheralded hero of the Kentucky Fried Chicken story, the company's virtual co-founder, a quiet and unassuming man, more than anyone else, he was the architect of Kentucky Fried Chicken Incorporate. He was the one who thought the business should just be called Kentucky Fried Chicken. He conceived of Kentucky Fried Chickens as standalone restaurants would push the kernel away from attaching the company name to a random assortment of very different kinds of cafes

and restaurants with different menus. He would move the company into what it looks like today, uniform menus, stores that look the same. Also, as I mentioned, invented the bucket, which after the kernel himself, you know, probably the chain's most recognizable symbol. And the guy who created the slogan finger-looking good, which became synonymous with the brand as much as the kernel himself. He'll remain a top figure in the hierarchy of the company when it moves forward through future various corporate owners. Going back to 1964, the company's rapid expansion has led to more than 600 locations. And while now thriving financially, the Colonel's annual profit before taxes is running around

$300,000, roughly $3 million today, but Harland is fucking tired. So he sells he and Claudia's company for two million. Might not sound like a lot for all he's built, but that equates you about 20 million today. And he'll never have to worry about money again now, right? But he keeps working. He likes to work. He just didn't want to work all the time.

He once said, work, don't hurt nobody. Work is wonderful for you. You'll rust out quicker than you'll wear out. Hail Nimrod. You can work too much. As I've always known in some level and found my own personal limit this past few years. But also, I do think some amount of work, right? Volunteering least everly, diving into a hobby, something staying active, right? It keeps you younger. Harlan wanted to sell his company for years before

he did. His daughters weren't interested in running the whole thing. And with his son, Daddy had no one to pass it down to. He knew to become too much for him, but didn't want to sell to just anybody. He wanted to sell to the right person. Well, that right person would turn out to be John Y. Brown, Jr. an aggressive young Kentucky lawyer, then only 29 years old.

A man who will later become governor of Kentucky. Brown was tall, handsome, bright, athletic, persuasive, just like the Colonel, Charm and his hell. The senior Brown was a prominent Kentucky lawyer and politician, also the son of a tenant farmer, and he had taught his son, John Jr. the same devotion to hard work that Colonel Sanders learned two generations before. At the age of 16, Brown was earning $700 a month selling vacuum cleaners door to door. Fucking love it.

Doing that at 16, right? We got a hustler. As a freshman at the University of Kentucky, he became a salesman for encyclopedia Britannica, made $500 during his first weekend on the job. That dude was slick. Working all through his years in college and law school, he eventually becomes a district sales manager

for Britannica, supervising the work of 30 men earning $25,000 a year. Also on both the golf and swimming teams in his spare time. After graduation, he turns down a sales job that pays $75,000 a year, a lot of money back then, like crazy money, turns it down in order to go into practice with his father. Then the young sales genius and the old fried chicken genius

get together in June of 1963, when the colonel asked Brown to go with him to, excuse me, the colon Colonel asked Brown to go with him to excuse me, the Colonel asked Brown to come work for him full time as his attorney and Brown turned him down. He wanted to work with the Colonel in a very different way. The two men fell into polite conversation about the Colonel's favorite topic, fried chicken. Though the Colonel was well, you know, well known throughout Kentucky, few people outside

the food business realized at this point, the true extent of his success. Brown didn't even know how quite how successfully was. He was amazed to learn that the Colonel had hundreds of franchises scattered around the country and Canada. When I heard that, he said years later, I imagine that he had salesmen everywhere. I said, well, Colonel, how many salesmen do you have out there in the field? And he said, Oh, we don't solicit. We don't believe in solicitation. I was flabbergasted. It was a one-man operation. The kernel was the whole show and with my sales background, I began to think what you could do with this business if you had a really aggressive sales program. By the end of

their conversation, the kernel was considering letting Brown take over the franchising of a new chain of barbecue joints. The kernel wanted to launch, right? In his 70s, still tossing out new ideas, not content with just the success of KFC. Dude had a fucking motor on him that would not quit. Brown quit the acquired financial backing from Jack Massey, multi-millionaire business in a Nashville, instead about opening his first store and studying the barbeque business. But by October, he concluded that barbeque only had regional appeal and that the real money was in chicken

Accordingly, he and Massey decided the thing to do is to buy out the kernel Franchise this chicken in a real way uniform restaurant uniform menus Right like his business partner harmond thought about the way we see chains today the way McDonald's was already popping off back in the 60s When the two men called the kernel and Shelbyville in October of 1963 and made their offer, the Colonel answered without hesitation that a sale was out of the question. And then he made mildly disparaging remarks about city slickers. Brown and Massey argued that the Colonel should have time to enjoy his life now. That if he died before selling out, much of his estate would probably go for taxes. They offered him $2 million, some stock of the new proposed company, and a continuing relationship with KFC as the company's advisor and living image

They promised that quality control would be number one priority. They swore no one would ever tamper with his precious chicken recipe The kernel was still hesitant He knew the proposal was logically sound but didn't feel right Right, can a father sell his child? For the next several weeks the kernel meditated while brown would him. Brown, man, I love this guy. Chris Cross the country, talked to the Colonel's daughters, grandchildren, nephews, preachers, bankers, accountants, franchises, everyone who was close to Harlan or would be affected by the sale.

He wanted to work with the Colonel that bad. He knew this was the once in a lifetime opportunity. Finally, on January 6, 1964, the Colonel gives in signs of contract the deal completed on March 6th when stock is transferred and the Colonel given a down payment of $500,000. Under the terms of the contract, the Colonel would retain rights to Canada and the new company would get the rest of the world minus England, Florida, Utah, and Montana. Four areas that the Colonel had already assigned control of to existing business partners like Pete Harmon, who's run Utah, and his daughter Maggie, who's in charge of Florida.

In addition to his two mill, the Colonel will receive a lifetime salary of $40,000 a year soon increased to 75,000. In addition to organizing a management team recruited largely from among existing franchisees. It's nice that they rewarded loyal early adopters. Brown took four steps shortly after the sale that will prove important in the company's subsequent growth. First, he promotes the shit out of the kernel. Professional wrestling was just started to become a major draw around the

country. Despite his advantage, thanks to a consistent weightlifting regiment and high protein, mainly chicken breast based diet, the kernels fucking strong. And he still knows how to brawl so the kernel will crisscross around the country in a twenty city series of matches where he will battle superstar billy gram predecessor to whole kogan rick flare stone cold steve austin and more sunday sunday sunday in the core micken tuck you are in off i seventy five next to the holiday express near Bubby's barbecue

Superstar Billy Graham Matthew evangelist, but the man with bigger biceps then the almighty himself faces off in a last man standing cage match against the Kentucky Brawler hair trigger Holland the Colonel Don't miss the most important wrestling match roll through Corbin Kentucky all year. We'll tell you the whole seat But you only need the edge. Okay, maybe Brown didn't use the Colonel in that kind of promotion. Missed opportunity for sure.

The Colonel made himself a center of a minor celebrity right years before as we went over when he grew up in mustache to go tea, adopted the all white outfits, but he still hadn't fully explored his promotional possibilities. Brown felt that the possession of a symbol who was both authentic and alive, unlike Betty Crocker, for instance, was one of the company's greatest assets.

So we hired a big public relations firm, big PR firm in Manhattan. And the colonel now starts popping up on the tonight show, the Merv Griffin show, other network programs where he holds his own. Right? The colonel feared no man, uh, he did not fear the spotlight either. A second brown decided that the company must have a vigorous, unified advertising campaign, local and national. Third brown negotiated new contracts with franchisees under the company, uh, under which the company received a percentage of franchisees sales instead of five cents, the going rate for every chicken cooked at this point. Uh, this served to protect the company against inflation, also gave it a cut on the sale of such accessory items as salads,

beans, delicious little bucket parfaits, damn you, Sarah Lee. Fucking submit already to the fucking kernel. Finally, very significantly, brown hauled the franchising of existing restaurants and insisted all new outlets be take home units housed in free standing buildings and standardized in both appearance and menu and the new free standing buildings can touch it fried chicken as a brand will become more visible to the public. A takeout format will suit the increasing number of American housewives who are often in a mood to eat dinner at home without cooking themselves. The Colonel do to retain in the right to run his Canadian franchises, he

in Claudia, uh, buy a second home outside of Toronto and they'll live part time there until the Colonel passes away in 1980. Uh, he will sadly die in a gun fight. Some other fucker thought they could advertise their fried chicken restaurant was in a mile of one of his franchises in Edmonton, despite him publicly letting his Canadian competition know that he was Canada's chicken king. And anyone who didn't agree would risk the Colonel blowing their goddamn head off. The man the Colonel battled Wilbert Crow on a proprietary of crows hot and tasty bird flesh bought his or brought his five sons a true murder of crows to a fight that was supposed to be a one on one man to man situation.

The Colonel took out three of his kids wounded Wilbert fighting still despite taking eight shots to the arms legs neck and torso, but then Wilbert son billbert crow gunned down the Colonel left him for dead in the streets Edmonton where they still have a statue today or that was fucking crazy or the Colonel had been battling leukemia for months and died in pneumonia in the hospital December 16. Before his death for much of the last 15 years of his life, he would travel on an, excuse me, an average of 200,000 miles a year. Flying, not driving, and often with Claudia, as the KFC brand ambassador. He'll appear in dozens of commercials, countless parades, ribbon cutting ceremonies, festivals, TV shows and more.

And then Sanders was buried in his characteristic white suit, and black western string tie in the cave hill cemetery of Louisville. About 1200 people attended the service. His wife Claudia will die 16 years later, December 31, 1996 at the age of 94. And by the time of Sanders death, there were an estimated 6,000 KFC Alice in 48 countries worldwide with 2 billion in sales annually. And since his death numerous comics and actors have portrayed the kernel in dozens of additional commercials such as Saturday Night Live Alums, Darryl Hammond, and Norman McDonald, comic Jim Gaffigan, actors George Hamilton, Rob Riggle, Billy Zane, Jason Alexander, Ray

Leota, Rob Lowe, even country singer, Riva McIntyre. The kernel has entered the DC comic universe with three issues in a DC KFC collaboration. The Colonel's likeness has also truly entered the wrestling ring a few times, the WWE. They're in the 2016 Summer Slam. A promotional ad featured Dolph Ziggler dressed as the Colonel beaten up the Miz wearing a chicken suit. Then in 2017, both Sean Michaels and Kurt Angle dressed up as wrestling versions of the Colonel for some hats. And Sanders was a playable character in WWE 2K18.

And there are tons of other Colonel, pop culture moments leading up to the present day. Now let me pop out and share a little more info and recap the Colonel before going over the year in review. and recap the kernel before going over the year in review. Good job, soldier. You've made it back. Barely. BAM! Colonel Sanders, I'm guessing when his name popped up in your podcast feed

or when you came across this video on YouTube, you had a little like, is this a joke moment? Titer thought I was fucking around. When you first saw this topic, pop up on Dropbox, like, KFC, KFC, I'll admit, it is a weird choice, but I'm glad I picked it. It's highly unlikely that you're gonna waltz through a long life without ever having any major setbacks,

right, without any big failures. And I've heard as I imagine, you've heard also, you know, some version of, it's not your failures that define you, but how you respond to them. And I do think there's a lot of truth in that. Harlan Sanders' life was absolutely defined by how he responded to so many setbacks. That being said, I am also very aware

that you can't successfully respond to any at all adversity that comes your way. I'm not gonna preach that hollow, feel good, bullshit to you, you know, you actually can't successfully respond to any at all adversity that comes your way. I'm not going to preach that hollow feel good bullshit to you. You know, you actually can't do anything you want. I hate those motivational, you know, poster phrases like you can do anything you set your mind to or you can achieve anything, you know, you put your mind and work hard to. No, sounds nice to say things like that means at, at least to me, absolutely fucking nothing. If you're born blind, you're never gonna become an NBA All-Star point guard.

No matter how hard you work. No matter how bad you want it. It's never gonna happen. If you're born deaf, you're never gonna become a big time music producer, guidance, mixing albums for the best-selling artist of your day. If you're paralyzed from the neck down, you're never gonna dominate your weight class in the UFC. It's fucking ridiculous. And I use those extreme examples to make it perfectly clear that not everything is possible for all of us. And I think it's cruel to tell anyone otherwise and set them up for failure and heartache. There are absolutely

limitations to all of our aspirations. There is a difference between admirably chasing dreams and foolishly wasting time chasing pipe dreams. For a less dramatic example, I was never going to be a track and field star. Even if that would have been my dream, no matter how much I would have busted my ass, it was not going to happen. I was never the fastest get on the playground. Even if I had the best coaches in the world training me on perfecting my stride, getting my workout and diet, you know, perfect to maximize my body's potential. I just don't see how I, how I would have ever become the fastest dude around. I don't have the right genetics for that. And I can spend hours talking about all the other things. It would be impossible for me to accomplish.

And everybody listening, there are limitations for you as well. There are things outside your control. You simply cannot overcome. But also, I think we do have the ability to dramatically improve our lives. In many ways, if we just keep getting back up when life knocks us down, right, to the best of our ability. If we keep trying, if we keep refusing to give up in rational ways, right?

You know, and if you push really hard to become a CEO, maybe you won't become a CEO, but maybe you will reach the levels of upper management. And you know, you got further than you would have if you wouldn't have tried to go further than that. You know, I do like that saying shoot for the stars aim for the moon, which can be interpreted as suggesting that if you fail to achieve your goals, you will still be better than where you were before, you know, before, thanks to trying to achieve them. I think our lives are largely defined by how we respond to adversity.

You know, how easy is it for life to knock you off your path? How difficult do you make it for life to knock you off your path? Responding to setbacks with tenacity, grit, perseverance, to adversity might not help tell the story of your life, you know, that ends up with you becoming some sort of luminary in your field. Your life story might not end up reaching the latent life dramatic against all odds, success of the kernels, but getting back up when you get knocked down will for sure take your life to greater heights, then just laying down and accepting defeat. Think about how many times Harlan could have just given up. When he blew his chance at a career as a lawyer by literally beating up a client in front of a judge,

after studying at night for years to get enough education to be a lawyer, then he had to take his wife, kids moved back in with his mom, get another labor job, working for the railroad to barely provide for them, that setback could have easily led to him not wanting to take any big swings again.

And I'm not talking about the haymaker, he'd probably through with that client. He could have easily just settled for life working the railroad, even though he clearly didn't love it. Just kept his head down, worked, not bothered, were going through the growing pains that come with switching up professions. Because change is hard. It is stressful,

which is why so many avoid it. But Harlan didn't. He kept embracing change, kept taking chances. Like when he, you know, took all that money he made on his big fairy venture, quickly lost it on a gambling, or on a he, you know, took all that money he made on his big fairy venture quickly lost it on a gambling or on a gamble. Excuse me, making lamps. That could have left a such a sour taste in his mouth that he would have been too scared to ever bet the farm on some big entrepreneurial idea like that again, but he kept swinging.

Right, he kept running into dead ends and then kept on pushing past them. Think about when he lost his job selling tires. Surely after that. And got in a car wreck. Now he's hitchhiking around, looking for a new job. You know, if he would have had some woe is me, fucking the world's against me attitude, what do you do?

I just can't win. Do you think that when he was picked up by the general manager for standard oil in Kentucky, that dude would have still offered him a job, running the gas station? Oh, fuck no. Right. You don't get a job like that out of pity from a stranger. You get it because you have the balls to really sell yourself.

He got it because he kept his head up kept believing in himself. Even when he was down, he jumped into an entirely new profession. Again, fought his way literally at times in that job to success. And because he busted his ass and made a bit of a name for himself, when the great depression quickly then took that job away from him, he got another chance with another station. Instead of feeling sorry for himself, leaning into all of his losses,

he clearly still had a hope that this next time, things are gonna be different, right? Things are gonna work out better this next time. He busted his ass again, maybe took shit a bit too far when he got into a gunfight with another gas station owner, or who knows Maybe that guy was a real bully and that's what he just had to do to survive during the dog eat dog years of the depression

Or the next few decades he'll take shots on motels restaurants other businesses. He'll lose he'll win Then when he's 65 after you know so many failures and a bunch of success as well after working his ass off since around the age of five Thinking he was finally set. he gets knocked down by life again. Right? The business, he bet his retirement on, gets taken out from him. Right? Taking away from him by the upcoming arrival of the interstate. He could easily quit at that point. Right? Just said, fuck it. Lived modestly on a social security checks, some small kickbacks from a few restaurants buying that blend of herbs and spices that heinous wife would whip up at home. And who would blame him?

And if that was enough for him, then more power to him, but he didn't just want that. He didn't feel that was enough. It wasn't going to give him his wife the life they wanted. So he responded to that setback by fighting yet again, by getting back up again and continuing to try. He spent money he didn't really have,

driving around the country and his Cadillac, sleeping in the back seat, selling his pressure cook pressure cook fried chicken all around the US and Canada. He gambled on himself again and it finally worked for the long run. The boy born a dirt poor farmer who had to start acting a lot more like an adult than almost anyone listening to this I imagine when he was just five years old when his dad died. He fought for what he wanted his whole life and finally achieved true lasting financial security in his late 60s. Harlan didn't build a fast food empire because he was lucky because life was easy for him because it wasn't. He built it by refusing to give up and I do respect that so much. So going into 2024, what do you want

to accomplish? Right? What adversity, if any, are you going to accomplish right what adversity if any? Are you gonna respond to what goals feel somewhat realistic to accomplish what goals suit your skills and passion? You know part of Harlem success His secret blend Was how passionate he was about his product right in an article published by the Louisville Courier Journal on October 8th 1975 he told journalist Dan Kaufman my god that gravy is horrible Over 8th, 1975, he told journalists, Dan Kaufman, my god, that gravy's horrible. They buy tap water for 15 to 20 cents, a thousand gallons, and they mix it with flour and starch

and end up with pure wallpaper paste. And I know wallpaper paste by God because I've seen my mother make it. There's no nutrition in it, and they ought not to be allowed to sell it. The crispy fried chicken recipe is nothing in the world, but a damn fried dough ball stuck on some chicken.

His own company would sue him for lival for that one. But I love it. He was 85 years old when he said that. He cared that much about his precious chicken. He didn't like when somebody was fucking it up. Right, it was that passion to do things the right way that I imagine really drove him in life. So what are you passionate about?

How hard are you willing to work to realize the dream of whatever it is you're passionate about? and it doesn't have to be dominating some field by the way don't feel forced to dream big truly don't give into that weird second places for losers bullshit mentality if your dream is to have a steady nine to five with good benefits a pension you don't have you don't really love it but it allows you to not work in your seventies and it allows you to spend nights and weekends not thinking about work and doing other things you do love. That's awesome.

If your dream is to make it all, or make it to all, excuse me, or almost all of your kids basketball games, because you know, you want them to remember you cheering for them later for the rest of their lives, that's a great dream. If your dream is to rescue a few dogs from a shelter, give them amazing lives, awesome. If your dream is to be the rock,

your partner needs to lean on and be known amongst your friends as somebody who shows up for them when they're at their lowest, I love it. Whatever the fuck your dream is, when you hit some setbacks and you probably will because, you know, well life, I hope stories like Harlan's pop up

in your mind and help you along your path. That was the main reason I wanted to share his story with you. And also, you know, I was drawn to it. I needed to hear it too. I needed to hear a story of somebody who makes it and loses it, then makes it again, then loses it, then makes it. Somebody who refuses to give up on the dreams. I spread myself bit to thin, way too thin at times, he's past seven years, chased my own dreams, on my own journey, and I kind of lost my mind a bit behind the scenes

this fall. And I was worried that I kind of fried my engine, fuck myself for a little bit. You know, 46 years old, I was suddenly feeling very old and worn out beyond that number. Like maybe the amount of grit and determination I'd always felt I had was not gonna reach the same levels that it used to anymore, because I broke something. My response to some exhaustion, to some true,

did I just fucking ruin something in my head, level of burnout was to cancel a big 50 city stand-up theater tour that I've been working towards for a long time and to let go of the secret suck which I've loved the weekly show for the patrons that allowed all this to work. Those moves can look like the moves as somebody on their way out of the entertainment business. And it did feel like that to me in some moments, right? Both moves, scary as hell. But I don't think I'm about done with this business.

In addition, just getting some needed rest and recharging, I did what I did, you know, because just like Harland, I do care about my product, right? I don't want my word gravy to taste like wallpaper paste. It is a privilege to be able to do this professionally and I do not take that for granted. Bad magic has become my Kentucky Fried Chicken, my baby, and I want to protect it. My love stand up.

I love the secret suck. But right now, I do love time suck more. Because without time suck, there would be no stand up theater tour. There would be no secret suck. This is what everything else for me is built on. It's the engine that's driven everything I've worked on for a while now. My life changed a lot these last seven years and that started with this podcast with these weekly episodes and you listening to them and I've not lost sight of that.

They would not be scared of death without time suck. And without time suck and scared of death, there would be no big multi-charity donations, no bad magic giving tree contributions. We wouldn't be able to employ the cool people that we do, the great team that we have. And all of that matters to me a lot. But also, I did, you know, excuse me, I need to believe that if all of this did go away, I could build something else, right? I need to instill that type of confidence in myself. Because if I believe that, and I keep working on this podcast because I love it and don't

feel like I need it, like that I'm not desperate about it. Well, it'll be that much better. I won't squeeze the fucking life out of it at a desperation. I met Harland had that kind of inner confidence. That's so important. Give your current project and current dream your all, but also believe in yourself enough to think that if that dream dies, you do have the grip that's nasty to build something else, to start again. So that was also why I chose to tell Harland's story. I hope that you'll be you do have the grip that's nasty to build something else, to start again. So that was also why I chose to tell Harlan's story.

I hope that I can take some of his energy, right, all the way to the end of 2024. And now I think I fully segue into the year end wrap up and look ahead portion of this episode. After just starting to get a taste to having a bit less of my plate and feeling more rested, even though I have a little cold right now, obviously. I can tell that the episodes, they just feel a little better. I've gotten feedback from a lot of you. The episodes the last month or so, there's something different about them.

It feels better, which is important in an increasingly competitive podcast landscape. I'm looking forward to living a more well-balanced and thus happier life and then being able to present more well-balanced and thus happier life and then being able to present more well-balanced happier content, right? Week after week. I'm taking this recharge seriously. I'll be meeting with a creative consultant, somebody who specializes and balancing back from and preventing burnout in the first quarter of 2024, to try and become the best version of myself, both in work and in life that I can be.

I'll be starting to work out plan with a friend and trainer to get in better shape, physically because I feel better physically, my mind is sharper. I'll be meeting with my step sister who's a dietitian or maybe nutritionist. Emily's a smart food person of some sort. To get healthier, think clear, have more energy throughout the day. Key for kicking out weekly, weird, well-researched papers. Okay, before talking more specifically a bit about what I hope is gonna come next year and beyond, let's take a little trip down memory lane. This was so fun for me, hope it's fun for you.

Look at some fun stuff that happened here in 2023. My favorite next part of the section is the episode, but first I wanna thank a bunch of you for coming to support a big stand up, but first I want to thank a bunch of you for coming to you know support a big stand-up bucket list box I got to check off the burn it all down theater tour was so much fun. I got the headline my own theater tour and enough you came out to sell out almost every show Spokane, Boise, Sacramento, Denver, Philly, San Antonio, Dallas, Kansas City, St. Louis, Seattle, Pontiac, Michigan. Oh man, Indianapolis, Columbus, Ohio, so many good memories.

I will treasure for the rest of my life. So many cool venues and fun shows. It was actually supposed to be a trial tour to get a bigger tour later. And I did get that bigger tour offered, which you know, I said I postponed indefinitely for the time being, but you know, still cool to get it.

And also cool for the support Outback presents show me and not penalizing me for postponing dates and being incredibly kind about the whole thing. Give me an open door to pick updates with them in the future of Brian Dorfman, best concert promoter and all of comedy. He owns Zane's in Nashville, one of my favorite clubs. If you're in the Nashville area, go to that club. Not only are you going to see a great show, you're going to be taken care of by a well-trained staff, you're supporting one of the best dudes in comedy

and his brother, Andrew Dwarfman, might be an even better guy. No knock on you, Brian. But your brother's a fucking angel of a human being. I love those guys. The theater shows I did in the club shows, where I was supposed to be preparing material for a new hour, also a great reminder of how important TimeSuck has been to everything else.

When I've tossed out Hail Nimrods to start these shows, it feels like 90% of the audience says it back. No people these shows, they're not really yelling out old stand-up bits for me to do. They're yelling out references from TimeSuck consistently. I noticed that, and it factored into me making sure that I don't get so burned out that I fucked this show up. The next super cool thing career-wise this past year was the release of the special, trying to get better on YouTube.

So many of you have watched it. It came out back in the end of August, has over 720,000 views as I record this. My goal was a million views in the first year of release and it feels pretty possible. It's not, you know, very likely that that's going to happen now. And the comment section underneath the video, 90% of the comments, again, are time suck references. If I was looking for signs of where I should put most of my creative energy in 2024, I could not get more indications to focus on time suck.

Speaking of time suck, let's go over the episodes before I talk about wet hot bad magic summer camp or more. First episode of the year was 329 Dungeons and Dragons. What a fun one. We announced tickets going on sale for the second annual wet hot bad magic summer camp that episode out of Dungeons & Dragons came the suckverse generic action figure toy line starting with fighting man. Oh, fighting man, I am a fighting man. Watch out for my melee sword. This is my defense shield.

Goblin droll, elf wizard, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight. And I know that's not the original music I used. I was grabbing music quickly right before I recorded that episode originally bounce it from track to track find it trying to find the right vibe I thought the tracks I was looking at most of them were royalty-free but then whoops grab the wrong one the last second sorry 8-bit universe thank you though for being so cool to let us keep the original track for the first episode putty and juju also made a little cameo first in a long time in that episode.

He was in a two-dead of Pudy. Next we covered Amanda Knox. I assumed like, you know, with Casey Anthony that she'd gotten away with Murr or at least kind of gotten away with it since, you know, she went to prison for a few years. A lot of the press made her look so guilty. No, real-roaded by a very corrupt Italian judicial system. And I loved being surprised by that. That episode was when I finally let all of you know

that I am in fact fluent in Italian. A chalbella, eh, Sant'Oriore, Sant'Oriore, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh,

eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, Idol, Masterclass. Next we traveled back in time to the days of Julius Caesar. And it was there that we met Derek Skete-Skeet-Mullet. Yeah, yeah, yeah, how the fuck is this dog? Focus, it's, David, it's tough to say.

Also, easier to say, that was where all the hot, hard, father daddy talk started. Did you have any idea you were gonna get so much hot, honky, father, daddy action to start 2023 so many daddies, the daddies of your dreams, call one night hundred hot daddy to talk to real nude rock hard father daddies today. Next was the trash bag killer Patrick Kerney, where he heard about a new AD&D realm or a campaign, excuse me, called Nimrod's realm.

That polish it, still alive on death row with the age of 84. Still won't confess to the murder as he's committed. Then to start February, we learned about the Sylvainians, a sex cult based in therapy. I was a new twist. We drank some therapy Whipple in that suck and learned that Antonio Banderas, who I know is Spanish, opened up Antonio Banderas, a father of that is Italian Bistro on male strip club. Next we went historical again, learned all about China's Tiananmen Square massacre and protests, nice little reminder, not to take free speech for granted. Another reminder of how horrific and impressive China's government can be.

Then we mixed up history and true crime with the Leopold and Loeb, perfect murder suck, where we learned all about the ubermensch, and where we reminded how dangerous, gin and jazz really are. If you're listening to jazz, while drinking gin, you might as well just straight up sell your soul to Satan. Don't fuck around, wind up with some dementia, jazz mania. Following that true crime, Caper, we stayed historical with the incredible tale of the Night Witches. That's one of my favorite episodes. Hail to the arena. The tale is some brave Russian women, bombing the shit out of some Nazis in World War Two, with some shitty equipment, rest in peace, Marina Roscova, all the

other brave bomber and fighter pilots whose courageous actions we discussed. Women who proved themselves as every bit as fearless and formidable as their male military counterparts. Next we went over the largest private theft in American history, the biggest art heist in modern world history, the $600 million Gardner Museum robbery. Still haven't recovered that stolen artwork. Still so many suspects, basically all of them dead, who knows if the art will ever turn out. We then jumped

into March with the three-mile island nuclear disaster where we learned that nuclear energy, actually pretty safe, maybe our best bet for clean, reliable energy. And more importantly, we met another member of the action Hero People set, Atomic Man. Who from the makers of fighting man, flying guy, warrior woman and attack cat, it's Atomic Man. Atomic Man is from the future. Atomic Man has a laser gun, an X ray vision. Atomic Man can shrink himself vision Atomic man can shrink himself Atomic man can big himself

He can melt your face with radiation gas Yes his gas is radioactive Anykir is nuclear weapons in his Atomic man Fanny pack, I said noops Noops in this Fanny pack, I said noops Noops in this Fanny pack I said noops noops in this fanny pack I said noops noops in this fanny pack Field of future with the atomic man be the future with the atomic man. Ah, it's hard to go back in So all these all these fucking songs all these melodies, but that was pretty cool And then back to some true crime after that with the quasi-culti episode of the death angels

We learned all about Yakub, the nation of Islam, twisted racist teachings that led to a group of guys in the Bay area, thinking they killed a bunch of white devils, AKA just random innocent white people, was gonna help bring in about an era of black supremacy. It did not. Black supremacy, white supremacy, all the supremacy talk, just a bunch of anti-team meets sack bullshit.

Next we dug into some full evil, secret society illuminati shit, by exposing the Skull and Bowen society for who they really are. Some rich kids making themselves feel extra important by sharing secret handshakes and rituals, doing a lot of networking with other rich kids to help ensure that they make more fuck loads

of family money after graduation. It was fun to bring back to it into the internet segment with that one, right? Hadn't hit that button in a while. It is. It will be into that. It will be. Then we got into a big two-parter.

The last two-parter we've done. The second part just, you know, sadly never gets enough downloads to justify continuing with two-parters I'm afraid, but who knows? Maybe I'll try one again someday. Not all of you agreed that we should have spent two weeks on the curling killings and Jeffrey Lungren, but damn it, there was just so many juicy details to his insane story. We've covered a lot of people, giving up everything to go live on some cult compound, but we had not covered anyone who agreed to go live in the woods with their husband and co-leader and be shit on by them. Oh, Skidmark. Sad, sad Skidmark. A Lungren, such a low rent cult leader, right? Fleas in his followers so

we could occasionally go eat some cheddar biscuits at Red Lobster. And still some people thought he was God's most powerful prophet. The dude who watched Rambo to prepare for a heavenly military siege. Also, we added Prophet Jeffrey to our action hero people set, so that was pretty fun. I mean, maybe my favorite member of the action hero people team. Do you want to get pooped on? Yeah, you want to get pooped on. Do you want to get pooped on? Yeah, you want to get pooped on. Do you want to get pooped on? Yeah, you want to get pooped on. But you don't want to pay too much for a name. Brand profit.

Save your money and buy profit Jeffrey for half the price he can shit on your tits. Do you want to get poops? Don't come on, that's a pretty funny one. That's a easier one to uh, to jump back into. It's got a better melody. I'm pretty proud of that song. Following Lundgren and Skidmark said, but very entertaining tale, we went over some of New York City's rough and rugged early days, looked at how decades of corruption, anti-irage immigration sentiment

helped lead to the rise of the so-called Irish mob. I still cringe when I think about the type of hand-to-hand combat, some of those tough old Irish gangsters engaged in, right? During the early, excuse me, early days of Manhattan's long run with organized crime, fucking brick bats. Just tossing a brick into a sock and swinging that shit as hard as you could into somebody's face. Just smashing somebody's face. Just smashing someone's face back in the days before cosmetic surgery.

I've had some dudes walking around five points. I had some hardcore facial disfigurements. Also, my favorite edition of Whipple might be the Irish mob edition. From there, we covered the Bible Belt Strangler. I'm still wondering if my dad was behind those redhead murders. Right? Dad watched so important. We learned how many unsolved murders there are often, you know, or in that episode, back in the 80s, the FBI believed there was over 750 US highway murder victims

alone just in the US. Murders were no one had been arrested. From there, we met Mr. Terry Blair and again asked ourselves are some people just born evil. The prospect killer born into a family tree of so much fucking murder. Right? Growing up around Kansas City's prospect, Avinus certainly did not help push Terry away from a life of crime.

But this guy, man, his mom killed his stepdad. Six months later, his brother killed somebody in a robbery, then not long after that, killed another person. Then his sister helped kill a man, then killed someone else a decade later Another brother of his sexually assaulted woman and beat her so badly he thought she was dead and More of his close relatives also would go to prison for various sexual assaults murders and other serious crimes Most murderous family. I think we've come across No wonder Terry is still able to speak so casually about his own murders today from prison

No wonder Terry is still able to speak so casually about his own murders today from prison. We also met Suck First lawyer, Rooster Bogle in that episode, the man who told his kids essentially that they were cocking, doodling! We then exploded into May. With the story of the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, learn all kinds of volcano-related information like how Angelina Jolie has an uncle, Barry Voit, who was a respected geologist who looked at how dangerous Mount Say Helen's was before erupted. Did not know a volcanologist was a real job before that episode.

And none of us knew about the science of massive eruption boners before that episode because I made that up in that episode. When I think of that episode, I think about Harry Truman, who died on the mountain. How his death seemed fitting, right? He loved that mountain, had already lived a a long healthy life to the age of 83. And I think he was glad to die there rather than leave the only home he ever cared about with her way. Next we return to the world of true crime with the story of Martha Beck and Raymond Fernandez the lonely hearts killers dating match made in hell. My favorite part of that episode had nothing to do with Ray and Martha and everything to do with some early 20th century Russians

Trying to find you know marriage by posting ads in Marriage newspaper Braknaja Gazeta Between 1906 and 1917 You remember the guy who wanted to marry a rich lady who would support his music and he didn't care how old she was Young very handsome intelligence Georgia teacher tall healthy strong musician specializing violin want to marry rich lady who would give him an opportunity to finish musical education age does not matter or the rich lady who desperately wanted some deep decking very interesting lady

blonde with dark eyes with capital want to get, only to man who has at least one feature, but a well-endowed one. We then return to my favorite category. Cult, cult, cult. And learn that long before the counterculture revolution, Southern California already at cult hotbed. When we explored the formation and teachings of the fountain of the world, cult, Christian of Enter, aka Francis, Francis Penswick, aka the Prophet

who had a real problem paying child support. The man who taught us all about the power of the holy, holy beable. Hello, true seeker. Greetings, worshiper. Blessings and glory, I hope that our heart is full. You are no doubt familiar with the Holy Bible, and perhaps also with its teachings. But are you familiar with the Holy Beable?

Perhaps you've prayed to God, but have you prayed to God only in the holy Bieber. Will you find the true word of God? Sounds pretty fun. Next up, maybe the least listened to episode of the year, but one I personally found fascinating in its examination of how US imperialism, really fucked up over, or really fucked over much of Latin America.

Also some big produce conglomerates could make a whole bunch of fruit money. The 1928 banana massacre, not the 1994 banana massacre that I took part of in a grocery store bathroom. In this episode, we discuss how connected to global economy is, how hard it remains to this day to enjoy low-cost goods in this country that don't come at the direct expense of exploiting the fuck out of other

meat sacks and other nations. We then finished out May with more true crime, the brutal story of the Hillside Stranglers. Right? That story was where I came across the words, stored detective. Words that gave birth to the suckvars, it's a very own store detective sunny Hollister Detective sunny Hollister hit me text. Thanks for letting me explain how I'd solve all these crimes faster than you can say Bang bang chicken shrimp Until next time you keep listing the true crime and I'll keep stopping it

Stay sunny everyone Following the hillside stranglers was a story of Brian Wells, the pizza bomber. I love a weird story and this story was super weird. Port Brian was not working with a lot of stairs, was really taken advantage of by a strange, sad, terrible group of misfits used as a weird pond in the most ridiculous and convoluted bank robbery scheme I've ever heard of. And then there was our Kelly, Mr. piss on you himself. I don't think we've ever had an episode that downloaded faster in the few weeks, first few weeks of release.

What a predatory dirt bag, fucking around with teen girls, sexually abusing teen girls for so, so long, doing it blatantly and in the public eye, making sex tapes, not seeming to care. They were getting leaked and spread around, making our, our paying off parents picking up teen girls and McDonald's doing that shit in front of everyone like he was above the law and it seemed like he was until finally he wasn't some brave women refused to have their stories remain silenced and now he will die where he deserves

to prison. Can't believe some people still trying to defend that sadistic pissed non teens pedophile well I guess I can't't believe it I mean the world's never been short on ignorant people and Then an episode that really pissed off a lot of people the crusades I'll be honest. I was a bit surprised by the backlash backlash I shared the facts like I do in all the episodes and I shared anger over meat sex being abused murdered and exploited Like I always try and do but because the culprit this, this time was organized religion, specifically Christianity, suddenly to many suckers, I was a hate-mongering asshole. All fun and games until the laser gets pointed at a set of beliefs that you hold near and dear, right? Maka crazy cold for acting and abusive

and in human ways, almost everyone's on board because, well, almost everyone is not in that cult. Apply that same perspective to a huge belief system and now it feels personal, which I do understand that episode and a few others. Good reminders for me. Sometimes if I as the messenger don't want to get shot, I need to take more time and think about how I present my points, try to deliver them with a bit more honey and a little less vinegar. And then the last episode for the first half of the year, was a reminder about how you

just can't rehabilitate sexual predators. Some lines went crossed, I do think, change people in ways that cannot be unchanged. And Viennitz, Jack Unterveger, crossed those lines in Europe before he was released from prison and then went on a brutal rape and killing spree here in the US. And then oh boy, another episode, they got me in a lot of trouble. Band the witch! The witchcraft suck, 355.

Thousands and thousands of people have been killed for being thought to be witches. Was a single one of them ever killed for actually having dark powers? Or were they all killed over either religious paranoia or by conniving motherfuckers using religious paranoia to justify having someone killed so they then could take the property or for some other very much of this world reason.

Since no witch has ever sorcerered their way out of a hangman's news or away from a fire lit to destroy them, I'm gonna say all witches have died needlessly. Will we ever have all stopped fearing the outsider, the other? You know what today, I think we will. As superstitious as we still are, we are far less superstitious than we used to be. There's been a lot of progress we can feel good about. Also, we got another action hero people set figure in that suck, old witch lady with their magic potion gravy.

Following a few touchy episodes, we returned to a topic almost no one ever seems threatened by. Serial killers. We looked into the drenched mind of Jerry Brudos, the shoe fetish slayer, where we learned that maybe, if your little boy wants to toss on some high heels and prance around the house, maybe don't go off on him and burn the shoes unless you want him to become

a sexually motivated slayer. Remember, Jarebearer's crazy ass plan? He wanted to find some place where he could set up what he would call an underground butcher shop, with a bunch of cells where he'd keep women women captive and there would be a huge freezer room Where he would freeze the bodies of women he had to kill for not doing what he wanted or women he grew tired of And to find women to fill this place up He would literally take a bus and drive around you know like the Portland area

Round up these women bring them back to his torture complex Get them all set up in their cages. Then it would choose which ones he wanted to use for his pleasure. He would take them out, rape them, maybe also shoot them, stab them, beat them, torture them sexually, and no one would be the wiser. Oh, and he'd take a bunch of pictures of them for his horror photo collection. And when he was finally done with them, he would take him to his freeze room and freeze them in the position that he found the sexist.

So they would stay in that position to arouse him forever. Like he actually thought all of that was a plausible plan. Luckily it wasn't. He got caught, thankfully, and then he died in prison. Following that idiot, a bunch of follow up, a bit of follow up, excuse me to the Irish mob episode with the story of Whitey Bulger. So many fucking nicknames. Tony Salami legs McNeil, Jimmy Jazz hands O'Reilly.

Mickey Shepard's pie with a little too much butter in the potato skill Kenny. Larry Brick Badmick, sweetie Johnny Pork Chops, Fat Donnie, Greece Weasel, Tails Quinn, Frankie makes a better pork chop than Johnny Pork Chops Mc Murphy, Willie Animal Crackers McGrega, Barry Donnie don't let him kick your uncle Orion, skinny Vinny, regular size Patty, tiny Tommy, not quite tiny, but I have a hard time just to find calling him a normal sized guy, Gary Walsh, Denny Encyclopedias and shit Flynn, Jackie Google's a shit outta shit, O'Connor, fat Kenny Moore, even Fat and Mikey Wallace, holy shit we gotta get you on a slim fast, you fat fuck dickie Duffy,

too skinny Tony counting him, seriously, eat a fucking sandwich already, Randy McMahon, Lenny Pork Cutlets Malone, and Jump James Johnny Jamie Juneau project life Johnson I may have made up those nicknames but they were inspired by so many real nicknames I found ridiculous. Next we spent some time talking about how safe flying is ironically in the episode about the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia flight 370. Spoiler alert if you skip that one it crashed into the fucking ocean. Also, we met the legendary Dick West, and that suck, the CNN correspondent who was arrested in New York City Central Park at 340 in the morning with some Methodist pocket, a rope

around his neck connected to his cock and balls, and a sex toy in his boot. Meth, you never disappoint. Then we finished out July with some shakes via we learned so much about the bar like how hard it must have been to be a playwright in an actor when it was common for people to literally take a piss and or shit in the audience during performances and people would actually throw stuff at the actors on stage or even walk on stage and disrupt the play and theaters were regularly shut down over outbreaks of the

plague. What a time to be alive. We also met the most prolific serial killer the world had never heard of. Billy shakes the monster killing women between London straight for the point of even and then skinning the flesh from their hands in order to make the Cobblves much ado about the Satan Following some silliness with Shakespeare we got serious with the sad but very important story of Emmett Till I got some negative feedback from a few idiots over that one good riddance apparently Apparently, some red, you know, me as being woke because they're fragile, small-minded, easily shook people. He's don't like to hear real history involving white people not looking good in America. I think it's important not to forget the sins

of our past and hopes that we it'll reduce how frequently we repeat them, right? Important to remember that it wasn't so long ago that right here in America, a young black man, a black child could be murdered for daring to touch a white woman's hand when he's handing money to a cashier and then cat calling at her when she leaves her store. Following week, we got weird again. With the tail of the UK's Jeffrey Dahmer, Dennis Nielsen, I still laugh when I think about that weird creepy fuck pretending to pass out in front of people and hopes that they would truly think he was unconscious

and then would take the next step, a big step of molesting him. Do you remember my Scottish, but really that Scottish at all, maybe kind of Australian, maybe just kind of its own thing, accent for dentist, is the exact same accent is Billy Shakespeare's? I don't know. Oh no, please don't take my pants off.

Please don't take off my pants, but really, I take them off. Let's take your hard penis and my butt hole, after lubing it up all nice and good, then hammer away while I moan, and then it come in my sleep, because I would still be asleep for all of that. And I would never know you did it, and it would be our secret.

Now, I'll never tell a soul, and you can do whatever you want. I can be sound asleep, whenever you want to plan to my treasure. We then took a big left turn. Following that, I got political with the story of Watergate, the scandal that destroyed faith in American politics. Nixon actually, I'd be grudgingly admitted, did some really good things during his political

career, but also, uh, damn, he took shit too far when it came to attacking his political enemies. Remember how to was White House plumber, Crownies considered trying to assassinate a journalist critical of Nixon, Jack Anderson, by rubbing down his steering wheel with LSD, hoping he tripped to the point of driving off the road and dying in a crash. What the fuck? After Watergate, we had a big episode about a cult that's my knowledge. No one else has done a big episode about.

That'll fit. The National Labor Federation. That was a great fine, Sophie Evans. You remember, you Hennie O'Parente, aka Jerry, Jerry D, the man who quoted Fidel Castro and Che Guevara as he abused people who originally thought they were just volunteering for one of many different organizations tied to labor unions. Then he sexually exploited some, took the money of many, all under the guise of preparing for a communist takeover of the United States. But then when the revolution was almost upon us brothers,

when the capitalist pig feds raided his New York city compound, that's their little bit through himself down the dumb way to shaft and broke his fucking leg. Following that wild story, we'd tone things down a bit and we talked about libraries. Suck 364, the mystery of the great library of Alexandria. So many scrolls, so many emails, flowed in from me, Zach sharing stories of how important libraries are and why we must continue to fund them.

Also, we learned in that episode's idiots of the internet that some people think incredible knowledge that used to be stored in the ancient library of Alexandria has been lost forever, like spells on how to shoot fireballs. User or YouTuber, Richie, a pill posted the library of Alexandra also housed the knowledge of magic that we used to be able to perform things you see in medieval fantasy, such as the magic and skyrim used to be real. If the library of Alexandria had never burned down, we could be casting spells, throwing fireballs, teleporting, levitating objects, et cetera. So many wizard fireball comments now under my stando special on YouTube. And I love it so much. Thanks to anybody who left one of those. Following that off the beaten path episode, we return to the staple of serial killing with the story of David Carpenter,

the trailside killer, the wannabe seller of adult novelty keychains. I brought back Captain Whisk or horn to help David move those keychains. Hi, all. Susperina away. Like Jack Winterveger, Carpenter showed violent tendencies long before his final killing spree should have never been released from prison for previously committed sexual crimes. Next up, another atypical subject, one of my favorite episodes we have ever done, suck 36 3606, black holes, and the nature of the universe. The singularity. The center of a black hole, the theoretical point in space which has zero volume but contains all of the object's mass.

A point inside the event horizon. A place where nothing, not even light, can escape a black hole's clutches. A place where matter is compressed down to an infinitely tiny point and all conceptions of time and space completely break down, a place outside of space and time. Still think about that, right? So fucking mind bending, so magical, a place to me that helps bridge the gap between science and the potential existence of a divine creator, a god. I did not expect that to be the most spiritual episode for me so far. Look it up the stars into the heavens so to speak right?

It's always felt magical, but it's felt more so ever since that episode. I can get lost reflecting on that episode. Time to move on to a not so magical suck. The bloody briley brothers. So glad I was born into a family with my older brothers. We're lint. We're not not Lynnwood and James, right? siblings even their parents feared. Mom, bounce, dad started padlocking his door shut at night from the inside. More than just a serial killer episode, it also featured a crazy prison escape.

Lynnwood and James orchestrated the largest death row escape in US history. Good thing those guys were too cocky to stay hidden once they escaped, had they snuck out of the country instead of You know going to Philly to live with their uncle They might not have been caught until they inevitably would have started killing again Following that was the Korean War first shots fired of the Cold War that led to so many other topics we've covered a

Crazy bloody major war that due to being sandwiched between World War 2 and Vietnam has never gotten the historical attention It deserves despite the ongoing efforts of John Bon Jovi to bring attention to the war through as many many hit songs all of which were written about that conflict. I'm going down in a blaze of glory Lord I never drew first but I drew first blood I'm no one son call me young gun. One of many bio-jobby classics. Next up was Larry Hall, probable serial killer, definite creepy-ass grave digger who got way into way two into Civil War reenactments. Definitely a guy who I wish wrote a lot of civil war stuff letters from prison to a lady

that he does not have. August 27th, 1863. My dear is Claire Bell. I find my spirit low and my body overtaking with rage today. I hope to write you as a general, general burn sign. But alas, I remain Lawrence. Am I still very sexy, yes I I'm still extremely cool of course, but I'm also still but a Colonel. I fear I've grown my mutton

chops for not. I do however continue to wake up only to dry linens so that's very nice. I'm a good boy who goes peepee in the potty. Please pass along that information to mother and father Followed in their bear we looked into some communist revolutionaries My old old Jerry D dreamed of emulating and our suck on the Cuban revolution How sad for the people of Cuba that they were exploited throughout the imperialist intervention or through imperialist intervention and foreign Subjugation for so long that handing the country over to a dictator who was one of their own, like Fidel Castro, seemed like a decent idea. And how strange that when he was fighting his revolution to take over Cuba, he didn't actually have at least publicly reveal his desire to make his

nation a communist stronghold. Bajango's blood pressure ran pretty high in that episode. Sadly, the revolution in the long run did not make life any better for the average Cuban. Consistent access to electricity, drinkable water, enough food shortages, you know, other basic necessities remain problems for far too many Cuban citizens. I should have said too many food shortages is not enough. Just enough food shortages. The following week we took a peek under the banner of heaven. To explore the school of the profits, cult killings. Brenda Lafferty paid such a terrible price in that episode for standing up for herself her daughter

Sister-in-law's and refusing to accept the twisted religious teachings and personal revelations of her two fucking insane brother-laws Ron and Dan Laffordy who would convince themselves they were preparing God's chosen people for the apocalyptic return of God on earth. The concept of continuous personal celestial revelation, it has led unsurprisingly to so many people mistakenly believing that they are communicating directly with the Almighty and ruining not just their own lives but ruining and or ending other lives in the process. That episode is also where I began to reveal my frustration with my wife, Lindsay, who constantly refuses to submit to my righteous patriarchal authority. Next we finished, October, with a medieval suck, a little blend of history and true crime, with the look into

the possible crimes and life of Jildere, contemporary of Joan of Arc, maybe very prolific serial killer, the first true serial killer We know of in the modern sense of the term. I can't believe I was still able to record that episode after falling out of bed and landing on my bone Or that week and bending it to a perfect 90 degree angle That's fucking hurt and it ruined my sex life for a while. We met a demon a demon named Baron that week a demon I've called Barry ever since Barry the demon sounds friendly Sounds like a demon who gets your soul because you know you fuck up And think he's really nice how evil could Barry be

Followed in the possible witch hunt of the trial of shield array or maybe he really was a vapor and mutilated of children We explored Chicago's Tylenol murders on September 29th 1992 Seven people in the Chicago area died shortly after ingesting Tylenol capsules, poison with highly lethal potassium cyanide and millions have been a bit nervous about, you know, being randomly poisoned by a stranger ever since. Those murders would change the way we package medicine and more in the US forever. Hate that it happened. Hate that no one ever went to prison for those murders, but love that today we have sealed bottles of aspirin and more so we can feel safer regarding the possibility of a murderous maniac tampering with no poisoning,

something we grab off a store shelf, take home and pop in our mouths. Following that suck, we jumped into what became an unexpected fan favorite for 2023, at least unexpected to me, our suck on the duggers. I had no idea. There was so much fascination around how wholesome Jim Bob actually is not. I also didn't realize prior to really looking into them that they were connected to the teachings of Bill Gothard's the Institute and basic life principles and how those teachings are super fucked up. We learned how evil drumming is in that episode and how women really need to protect their

bicycles. I mean, what man is going to be excited to ride your bike if every Tom Dick and Harry and town is already taking a first-pin scratch up the chain guard and bend the handlebars crashed into a ditch Also if you really care about saving yourselves from marriage ladies, please stop using tampons don't ever fucking put them in You're supposed to keep according to the teachings everything out of your puts until your husband's dick The following week was mostly about looking for a little bit of a dead giveaway

Which is do we didn't have blue that girl was in that house Please help me get out dead giveaway Please help me get out. Dad give away. My dad gave away. The Southern terrible is going on in your neighborhood. Oh, Charles Ramsey, please be out there somewhere living a happy life. Also, I hope Amanda Berry, Gina, Dei Jesus,

Michelle Knight, continue to thrive despite the hell on earth. Ariel Castro put them through when he held three girls as his sexual prisoners in his statistically modified Cleveland home. That episode was intense and I found myself getting more angry at Ariel than I have it various serial killers even though he never murdered those women. I was just such a piece of shit. We finished up November with an episode debunking the protocols of Zion and I got to say pleasantly

surprised with the lack of shitty emails sent in over that. I assume there are a ton of crazy anti-Semitic comments on the YouTube video and I'm not going to check One old piece of Russian propaganda has done and continues to do so much harm in the way of stoking the fires of anti-Semitism That continued to burn around the world So sad that so many continue to present the repeatedly and thoroughly debunked protocols as historical truth Following that suck we traveled to South Carolina's low country Examined the terrible crimes of Alex Murdoch, but pronounced Alec Murdoch.

I get now, why there have already been so many docuseries done on that wife and son killing dirtbag former solicitor, the tale of a son's Paul, of his son Paul's drunken boat accident, the murders that have surrounded the family for years, it all has played out like a real life soap opera. Almost caught up now. Just a few weeks back, we jumped into a story set largely right here. And I know that has also received a lot of press coverage, the sick tale of Lori Valow, Chad Debel, and all the zombie light worker apocalyptic fringe, FLDS based bullshit that led to a lot of people around Lori Dine, like her husband, two kids, and guy she was having an affair with his wife. It was nice though to get a nice guy from that episode regarding how to evaluate the people around you as being either light workers who go along with you and never talks shit and always help you. Or are they demon infested zombies who thwart your every fucking move?

Look at you Lindsay or should I say Teddy Bartzabi demon. And finally, last week's episode, it just doesn't torment every move. Last week's episode on the in sales, has I recorded this? It just came out. It had already come out for the, the patrons and, woo, I don't think an episode all year has gotten the, the private Facebook groups fucking fired up. A lot of people worried about a take on an episode they hadn't heard yet So I can only imagine as I record this right now if there's more

outrage and chatter about this this in-sale episode or less So many new fun terms learned that one Chad Tyrone giga Chad Stacey Becky wrist-celled wrist-mog Skullmogged height-celled Who could forget all the talk Ristseld, Ristmog, Skullmog, Heightseld. Who could forget all the talk about getting most knuckled dick-mogged? So glad I have a fuckable Ristseist, barely. But still, this low-tier, normy Melvin will take it. And at least I have a huge skull. I'll Skullmog the shit out of any in-sell fucks upset with that episode.

Also, what a scary bunch of sad clowns. Alright, come on guys, stop taking any woman on Earth owes you even the time of day. They don't. Wake up. Start realizing that the reason women are not romantically interested in you probably has a lot more to do with your personal choices and how you've taken care of yourself

and the outlook you choose to have on the world around you than it does with your wrist or skull size or interpupillary distance. Get the fuck out of here. Get out of your basements. Now, if you're computers, all right, go take a dance class or some therapy. Go to the gym, get on some dating apps. Shut the fuck up with your victim mentality bullshit. And now, after covering the kernel, all done with being curious for 2023 here. And I look forward to now seeing what we're going to cover in 2024. Before talking about the year ahead, I do want to talk a bit more about 2023, starting with summer

camp. The 2023 wet hot bad medic summer camp and equinox Pennsylvania. Holy shit was at a blast. Huge thank you first off to every space, lizard bad magician and meat sack. Who bought a ticket and showed up. Over 500 of you attended. It was such a memorable time. More memorable for some of you than others. I heard about a few orgies and a pegging party of some sort. Hey, you know what? Hello, Zafina. I just hope you're safe and that all involved had a great time.

Also, did anyone not sneak in some psilocybin mushrooms? But seriously, thanks to all of you who not only showed up but brought a great attitude, a willingness to accept new people into your friend groups, try and make sure that everybody had a blast. It was such a supportive group of people. Also, thank you to the staff at Camp Nou Council, especially Massey, Hannah, Joey, Aronka, handsome Tom. Holy shit, you people run a well oiled machine. Every detail was thought of the food. The sound systems for the karaoke jam, the bands, live-scared-a-death, stand-up show, drag show, everything, the scheduling, the app full of activities. Another big thank you to Black FIP, yeah, Black FIP productions,

Jamie and Elliot screening a preview of the future bad magic documentary or docu-series. Was a little crazy to watch myself wear out on screen over the course of several years of footage, and to hear people on camera talking about worrying for years that I was working too much. I do think seeing that for sure pushed me towards taking a break from touring. So thank you. I needed to see it.

They are great guys and wonderful filmmakers if you need any filmmaking done by the way. Also a big thank you to Chad Daniels and Kelsey Cook, comedy's new power couple for green to attend, be part of our big standup comedy jam in the barn. Chad has a new special. I've just been waiting to watch before enthusiastically plugging it because I know I love it. It's called mixed reviews on YouTube right now. That was one of my favorite standup shows ever. Also, in part to Harry Riley and Doug Mellard thank you to awesome comics, great friends coming out for the show just to hang and have a blast. Thanks to Will XX, his son Diego, fellow artist Lauren for kicking out a bunch of cool cult

tattoos, being awesome people. Big thanks to Jason Hall for everything you did as well behind the scenes. Love you man. Huge thanks to Queen of Bad Magic Lindsay for spearheading it all. After last year's debacle, I was honestly ready to be done with camp, but Lindsay went full kernel sanders and fucking shot somebody to the gas station across the street or wanted to bounce back and do it right.

But she really did, she put in a lot of work. I'm so glad that she did, so glad we had that. We will not be doing summer camp in 2024, you know, recharging this year, but are doing it in 2025. We'll be offering tickets in 2024, you know, recharging this year, but are doing it in 2025. We'll be offering tickets in 2024 to give people more time to save and plan. And we will be doing it in the same location. And here is why that camp is literally the only camp in the entire country that does

exactly what they do. The only one that has a giant staff specializing in custom camps, they can accommodate over a thousand people. They are building more premier housing options in 2024, so people in 2025 can choose to upgrade to their own private quarters. If staying in more traditional cabins isn't your speed, all the options they have, a badass app with a map of the camp and itinerary of activities, the ability to sign up for various activities. That doesn't exist in other locations. They have a liquor license, conserve alcohol. They have a massive kitchen, can feed hundreds, and feed you well at the same time. They can provide an all-inclusive, resort-like experience

that also is still like a kid's summer camp. It's a very rare thing that they do. I know it would be nice to bounce back and forth between the east and west coast, maybe go to the Midwest, but we just can't replicate all that they can do with that camp anywhere else. I hope it becomes an annual or every other year thing for a long time after 2025, but it only will remain if you come. So, you know, you know, come be a cult member for a weekend, you'll love it.

Next item of business, why I chose to sunset the time suck app, which I still need to do, still need to dictate exactly what I want To say that it's no longer a working app Uh, I've been pretty aware that I've been spread myself, you know pretty thin for years now And then this year I just hit a wall of exhaustion unlike anything I've ever hit before And I realized if I didn't make changes the quality of all this would degrade rapidly and my enjoyment would too And it would just end

So letting go of the app and app I love was done to give me just one less thing to oversee, more time to focus on what most people like, which is the weekly podcast content that drives everything else. The app is awesome, Bitlixer did a fantastic job, huge thank you to Chris and Zach,

but they're just two guys. And we're a small staff, mostly focused on producing content. I realized it made a lot more sense to lean more on the Patreon app, because it keeps getting better because they have a massive team of developers, millions of dollars to spend on it. They have a huge team of customer service reps for when you have problems. You know, it makes sense to lean on them rather than to try and do too many things ourselves.

That's just been a big thing I've learned in the last couple of years. I used to dream of turning bad magic into this standalone network where we'd have this big app, it host all these other shows, but I finally had to accept, I'm never gonna have time for that. And honestly, don't have the interest. I've learned a lot about myself these past seven years. I've learned that my passion is not in management.

I don't want to work with a bunch of other creators and deal with their frustrations and complaints when they're not getting the downloads they want or when the app has some kind of problem, I don't want to deal with backlash for what they say for my own fans. I don't want any of that fucking drama. It'll only take away from my ability to keep kicking out episodes and I feel good about every week. Some people love to collaborate and demonstrate.

I prefer to work on this stuff solo when I'm polishing it up and getting it ready to present. I'm not a big networker. I'm an polishing it up and getting it ready to present. I'm not a big networker, I'm an introvert, actually. I love telling stories, I love hearing how they affect you. I think that is what I'm best at and want to spend more time doing what I am best at. Internally, I'll be handing over most administrative duties already have to Lindsay, she is a boss bitch.

She's good at it, she's love taking charge. And while I'll still have, you know, final creative say, you know, this needs to be my voice She's better at almost everything else and that'll allow a weirdo like me just to spend more time crack myself up over weird shit That our researchers have found or some stupid new bitter gag that I want to share with you Now I'm not trying to take over the podcast game to become the next all things comedy I just want to try and keep you entertained. To the point that you share this weird shit

with enough other people that we get to keep doing what we're doing for hopefully a long time. Because when I'm not exhausted, holy shit is all this so much fun, so much showbiz. In place of the app, we're launching a new website that Logan has been designing, badmagicproductions.com, that will link to landing sites for time sucks, scared to death, my stand at the merch store,

it'll showcase what charities you don't need to do, future projects, lots of stuff. You can listen to episodes from the site, watch YouTube videos, find contact info and more, just like a one-stop shop. For all things bad magic that'll be coming out in the next few weeks. Also with letting go of the app and streamlining things,

our team here can spend more time creating clips for social media in order to keep getting the word out about what we do in a more competitive podcast landscape, which is important. We got a fucking fight like Harlem Standards, or maybe not quite that hard, but almost to stay relevant, find new listeners, replace those, and don't have time to listen anymore or have moved on for whatever reason. Maybe they're furious about my attack on Inseldom. And after hearing a lot of feedback from any of you about how your favorite episodes are for whatever reason. Maybe they're furious about my attack on in seldom.

And after hearing a lot of feedback from any of you about how your favorite episodes are the ones where I'm the most excited about the topic. You know, it just finally made sense to get rid of topic voting. After over five years of taking whatever space lizards gave me twice a month, I think I now have a good idea of what topics I can do a good job with and what topics I struggle with. So thank you for that so much. You space, so there's taught me so much. You've challenged me in the best of ways. Truly have shaped the style of time, suck forever. I will always be grateful. And I will keep looking at your recommendations

when you message us on Patreon or email us at both janglesatimesuckpodcast.com or DM on the socials. I love hearing about something I would have, I would love to suck that I hadn't heard of and finally with patreon Huge thank you to the majority of you who chose to stick around after the end of the secret suck That has meant the world I'll start releasing random bonus content for you in 2024 by the way in addition to your early release add free episodes

I've planned for some silly stuff and I'm glad you're loving access to the entire time suck catalog ad free, by the way, and the early releases. You know, because you do get that, if your spaces are now, in addition to getting a 20% merge credit, you know, you get access to the entire back catalog of the secret suck, and you have 20% of your support go in straight to charity. Despite the ads we get, patronage still very important to us,

because we carry a lot more overhead than other comparable, you know, sized podcasts that I know of. We got two full time, do a little bit of everything guys in house with Tyler C, suck Ranger, and the summer camp party starter and Logan Keith, the art warlock designer of almost everything we do here that is visual. We have two full time researchers with Sophie Evans and Olivia Lee and now working part time with the new kick ass researcher Molly Jean Box. There is the suck dungeon lease continual equipment maintenance upgrading payroll taxes

insurance on and on. We could kick out some content with a much smaller staff, but not as much and it wouldn't feel the same. I could go back to recording episodes at home, but we'd lose a lot of the extra things that we just can't do without a staff like camp, cool looking video versions of the shows, I have to scale back an amount of episodes. I have planned for next year the size of the sucks, the depths of the dives would change due to time constraints without research help, etc. So again, thank you. I hope I can make you want to stick around for the entirety of 2024 and I want to find some new spaces as well. And last thing about

our space letters, oh my God, the charity donations in 2024 between January and November, right? Before including the Giving Tree, bad magic donated thanks to you, $156,244, the charity's like sustainable elements, Hill Country Humane Society, the DNA Doe Project and Big Table. And then for our Giving Tree, as I record this week

before Christmas, donations keep coming in. Too late to use giving tree, as I record this week before Christmas, donations keep coming in too late to use some of them to buy for this year. So we're seeding a still unknown amount towards next year's giving tree already. Over $18,000 came in directly from Lister's in addition to the patron donation and in addition to our matching donation. So rough numbers together. We all did over 190,000 in charitable work through bad magic, not counting, putting almost 22,000 into the scholarship. So well over 200,000 overall. Speaking of scholarships, we never got around to congratulating our 2023 inaugural recipients. Arianna Lowe, Naomi, Janine and Isabella Morales. Each of these bad magicians awarded $5,000.

I hope it has helped your journey in higher education. So proud of you. Big thanks to St. Jen and Lindsay's mom, another person, your patronage, employees. She did such a great job working on this scholarship with Lindsay. And the lifetime total of charitable contributions, including scholarship money is now almost exactly $750,000.

So thank you, thank you, thank you. Finally, to personalize how much the Giving Tree helps meet SACs. Here's a post from Giving Tree recipient, Jason Neiber, sent a heartfelt message expressing gratitude for the bad magic community. Jason wrote, good morning. This message might seem kind of random and arbitrary,

but I wanted to send it nonetheless, at least to express my gratitude. I have listened to both scared of death and time suck for about three to four years now. Y'all's humor and positivity has helped me get through a lot. My daughter and I were actually recipients of a giving tree present in 2020, when my family was dislocated and struggling due to her cane lora. The reason for this message is just to say, thank you. Thank you for continuing to do what you do, bring joy to so many people, and even solace, in some cases. My daughter has since been diagnosed with nonverbal autism, and I've also had to take on the mantle of single parent in the times of 2020.

The work that y'all do has provided a mental haven for me, and I can express my gratitude enough. My daughter and I listened to the appropriate episodes, and I sold the ones that are a little less appropriate for the little one. Please understand how much help and support you provided, even though y'all don't see it on a daily basis. I will truly forever have y'all in my heart and will have eternal gratitude for what y'all do. All hail Lucifina and I hope everyone over Bad Magic has a wonderful day. Jason's words reveal the genuine. Life changing impact, the humor, positivity, community can have in people's lives. It's a heartwarming testament to the magic of giving. And it encourages all to continue spreading kindness

and connection even in the vast expanse of the often negative as fuck online world. Hail Nimrod and made the spirit of curiosity and compassion thrive within this community in 2024. Let's talk more about community now. Do you have any idea how many cold or the curious Facebook groups we have now? It is fucking insane.

And these aren't ran by us. Right. There's just a bunch of subgroups ran by other cool meat sex. You can check out Colt of the subgroups to get a rough idea of what's out there. I'm hoping to do a better job of doing a better job promoting all this in 2024. There's the Cook to the Curious, the Godhead, the Colt of the Curious, uh, Curious Commun. Colt of the Curious Book Club, Curious of the Colt, uh, Colt of the Curious disc golfers, Colt of the curious, uh, curious commune, cult of the curious book club, curious of the cult, uh, cult of the curious disc golfers, cult of the curious brain

trust, cult of the curious mental health, cult of the curious dads only Nimrods logistics, cult of the curious truckers, cheeky tealers adventures, Luciferina bound, Luciferina's libations, hail Luciferina, NSFW social club, Nimrods chicken skin devil bat bow jangles pets Colt of the curious bow jangles brewers time suck metalheads creeps and peepers Which is you know they've been scared to death one Nimrod's chariots Nimrod's forage Nimrod's tattoo club

Right, Colt of the curious musicians Colt of the technically curious Luciferna the fast and the curious Curious pagans witches and heathens Colt of the Curious Plant Lovers, Meet Sack Marketplace, Nimrod Stocktalk, Colt of the Kink bikers for Nimrod, LGBTQIA Plus, LGBTQIA, Colt of the Curious Safe Space for LGBTQIA Plus, Time Suck, Colt Pokemon, and that's not even fucking half of them. Hail Nimrod at Holy Shit. Plus there's the Amazing TimeSuck podcast Discord,

TimeSuck subreddit, and in 2024, hoping to add a new community on Patreon that they've just developed as an alternative to a private Facebook group where we can foster even more community. Don't have details yet, but it's on my first quarter 2024 to do list. It might be a really cool place

where hopefully we can open it up for like, I don't know, free trials or maybe keep that part free. I still got to figure it out. But I liked it, unlike Facebook, there's no bots monitoring it. And it's truly like a free speech, haven with no political leanings. Yeah, just so many great people

out there online helping each other out. We want to keep it going. And let me share an example of how much these communities mean to people one of Tyler's current duties Now that he's not spending hours each week with secret suck curation is to look for stories Just you know like this next one for me to know about and sometimes share And we have permission to share this one by the way don't want you to think we're gonna share your personal business without asking Back on November 4th 2021 Hector Ramirez joined the Coltothecureus, Dad's only group,

asking for advice about his daughter's skipping school. Hector's heart felt, heart felt plea on the Coltothecureus Dad's only Facebook group and frustration with his daughter's continuous school truancy struck a chord with many as he grappled with feeling powerlessness. And Hector posted, fuck, I need advice. My daughter won't stop skipping school. She's already granted from everything and everyone. I have no ability to stop her from skipping classes

and the school seems to not do anything to help even though they have truancy offers on sight. I'm so angry and lost. In response, very quickly, bunch of fellow-fathers offer a range of advice. Adam McLaughlin emphasized understanding the root causes behind the truancy instead of punitive measures writing Hey, bro, you can't punish her scare goes away. You need to find out. Why is she leaving?

Does she hate school? And she bullied is she getting high? Rebellion find the reason then you have shot at a solution That's great other other fathers in the group like Robert Bailey offered a more controversial approach Robert wrote all, sounds harsh, but you're gonna have to punch her in the face. Sorry, there's no other way. Obviously joking, little humor to lighten it up. I like that too.

Brady, Kaylee Smith posted a bold tactic to expose the potential consequences of true and see, saying, drive her ass to a gathering of homeless people and show her what will happen first hand. If she isn't conscientious about her future, at least a little bit. After that her future is in her own hands. Either way she will do what she wants to do but it's your job to at least educate her decision making the best you can. Do it with love, now with anger. Tell her this is where you're so tell her this is what you're so concerned about. Her life

becoming this as you point to homelessness conditions. Jason McKenzie emphasized creating a safe space for open dialogue, writing, establish a conversation where anything she tells you will not get her in trouble and the hard part is actually following through and find out what is going on so you can help her to better life choices. Probably won't happen at once. Now what was the outcome of all this with Hector's daughter? I don't know. We don't need to.

It's not important to the point, you know, I'm making here. The point is Hector asked for advice. Other community members stepped up immediately, did their best to give him that. This shit happens every day, literally in these groups. So cool to see a bunch of different meat sex, who oftentimes have never met in real life, do what they can to help each other. Another meat sack, who I won't name, because we don't have permission to use their name, recently was going through it. Things got so tough. They needed help with their utility bill.

And they posted in the cult of the curious three out of five stars about how they had never made a post like this before in their life, but didn't know where else to turn. How they were worried about losing heat, how that would affect their kids. They'd heard about the cult, rallying to help people in dire situations before they were very humble, timid about the whole thing Mostly just were asking where they should try to get help Can you point me in the right direction? And they left their Venmo information Less than 10 minutes later six to be exact

They had more than they needed they thanked the cult explained that the extra money was going towards Making sure their kids were getting what they wanted for the holidays held Nimrod This shit happens all the time in this community and I'm very aware of how special and unique that is. So excited to try and do more lean on staff more to highlight these stories. And I won't be doing that out of vanity, right? These stories aren't about me, they're about you.

I just wanna share more of them because I know that stories like that will resonate with more good, helpful folks. And you know, more people who need help, the more I can encourage and help inspire these people to get into our community by sharing these stories to create more positive change, the more no change will come. Thinking again about how my time truly is limited and how I should protect it and use the best of my ability, I think of an analogy of having a garden and a limited amount of water to use on it. I only have so much in my bucket each day. If I try and water too many plants, they'll all die. If I pour all the water on only one plant, well, then obviously only one lives. So I've thought about how many plants

can I not only keep alive but have them thrive. In a 2024 outside of weekly podcast content, I want to pour more water on our community through highlighting cool shit going on in order to help it grow and thrive and keep these stories coming Also in 2024 and just a few weeks going to be giving you more content every month Twice a month is the goal. We'll see how it goes Taking a lot of uh, you know, uh travel and creative heavy lifting off my plate You know letting go of stand-up for a while letting go of weekly secret suck recordings and prep I'm gonna try and replace some of this with two mini sucks each month. Just a little, maybe 45 minutes to an hour, long episodes,

that I currently think will drop on Friday. Some Fridays, not every Friday. No segments, no updates, no announcements. A little bit looser, conversational style. I'll share stories that might be reminiscent of the type of topics, you know, we've already covered, or maybe not. Stuff that may not have enough meat on them for a three hour episode, but plenty for 45 minutes or 60 minutes. And I want to add to the variety of the overall catalog. We're going to improve my storytelling skills in a different way, not fuck with the style of the Monday episodes, but also shake things up to keep the creative juices flowing. And I don't have any info, you know,

other than that to share with you about this at this moment. But you'll see something. Pop up in your feeds here in just a few weeks and I hope you enjoy it. You know, if you don't, well, I guess, you know, I'll reduce their frequency or replace it with something else. If you do enjoy it, you know, kick them out as often as I feel inspired. Hopefully twice a month, but we'll see. And then I'm going to, I'm planning on doing something similar on scared of death. See how that feels as well. And if it all feels good and then manageable and fun, maybe I will finally release a new show, a fictional series.

I've jotted down notes about for years now. Just a little seasonal show. I can do a beefed up audio book. Who knows, you know, short episodes, but serialized. All depends on how much you know, short episodes, but serialized. All depends on how much you know, creative water. I feel like I have to spread around on all these fun little podcast plants. And it depends obviously on how many of you keep listing and keep spreading all of this

to others. Okay, I finally feel like I should wrap up now. I can talk forever about all this. Thank you, thank you for a great year. Thank you for supporting me, allowing me to take a year off the road, for giving me the opportunity to feel so excited about great year. Thank you for supporting me, allowing me to take a year off the road, forgiving me the opportunity to feel so excited about next year. Despite running out of gas,

it was actually a relatively drama free year. And I mostly just feel grateful for it, right? Sure, there were a few bumps along the way. They're always are. You know, it can tend you to fans getting mad about this or that. Former employees bitching about this or that as well. But after doing this a little while now,

I realized that's inevitable. It's just life. And it's nothing I even feel as worth digging into the specifics about. I've learned this spending too much time talking about certain forms of negativity. It just breeds more drama and negativity. So I must stay positive. And I do feel positive. I'm excited to get to keep doing what I love, keep trying to entertain a fan base that I truly believe is good or or a better group of kind funny rough around the edges in the best of ways diverse amazing empathetic thoughtful group of people than any other fan base.

This is the fucking best cult and I'm so grateful to be your reluctant weird nonprofit not actually trying to ride your bicycles leader. Also excited to sleep my own bed of bunches next year. Spend a ton of time with Kyler when he's home from college. Go to a bunch of Monroe's basketball games. Go on dates with my best friend, amazing business partner, beautiful wife Lindsay. Throw the ball around more in the yard for Penny Pooper

and Ginger Bell. Work out on a regular basis with my friends in the gym. To stop canceling doctor's appointments, finally fear what the fuck is going off my truck. So many warning lights come on every time I start it now. You know, to pour in some water into friendships, I've spent too much time ignoring or taking for granted, to catch up and watch in friends' specials.

Amazing TV shows I've missed. See you in my grandma more, all kinds of stuff. I'm looking forward to managing my life a bit better, carving out more space to enjoy this amazing ride as it happens, otherwise what's the fucking point? If you're lucky enough to be able to provide for your children to set yourself up for retirement, to have a fulfilling career and great family and friends,

what is the next thing you should probably focus on if you're not already focusing on it, enjoying your life? Good or bad, it's not gonna last very long. So don't take it for granted. I mean, hopefully you can enjoy it while you handle your responsibilities. Hopefully you can find little moments of light even when it seems dark and dreary.

But if you can't even enjoy it, you know, when it's going really well, a space I've spent too much time in, but then maybe it's time to slow down, reevaluate. Nimrod only gives us one set of spins around the sun for sure. Don't let them pass them, pass you by. You magnificent, beautiful bastards. Let's get to the takeaways now. And then just for this week, for this eight typical episode,

there will be no time sucker updates. This whole second half already felt like a massive update. I'll return to those next year, as in next week. Time suck, tough, five takeaways. Number one, Harlan standards, the KSC kernel, shot a man they matched to it in a gas station turf war during the Great Depression and North

Corbin, Kentucky. The Colonel did not fucking play when it came to business. Number two, one of the Harlan's last acts as a lawyer, if not his very last act, was to beat up one of his own clients in court in front of a judge and little rock Arkansas. Number three, what a year? Sonny Hollister showed up. I flexed my Italian fluency. We learned a lot about women's bicycles. Spent a lot of time talking about generic action figures. Deep dive, everything from a history of witchcraft.

To the life and crimes of our Kelly. To how Jim Bob Dugger, maybe doesn't have the best most wholesome beliefs. To John Bond, Jovi's Korean War songs, and more. And number four, oh, how about this one more time. And we didn't have a clue. This girl was in that house. She said, please help me get out. They gave away. Number five, new info. Harlan Sanders, very protective when it came to guard

his secret, original Kentucky fried blend of 11 herbs and spices. No one ever leaked the recipe when he was alive. Probably afraid he punched him out or shoot him. But in 2016, a reporter was shown a handwritten recipe from a family scrapbook. If you want to try and make some KFC at home, here's that recipe.

Two third teaspoon salt, 1 1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1- one teaspoon ground ginger, three teaspoons white pepper, all those spices get mixed with two cups of flour to create the iconic KFC breading. Then you dip each piece of chicken in water for seven seconds, dry it for seven seconds, roll it in the mixture seven times before shaking out the excess flour and frying it in a pressure fryer.

Clearly, Harlem likes number seven. KFC has denied that this recipe is authentic, but if it is authentic, but if it was authentic, were they actually going to admit that? I don't think so. Time suck, tough, right takeaway. Thank you for listening to the final bad magic production podcast of 2023, scared to death, time suck each week. Please don't get into a gas station shootout this week. Maybe talk to a lawyer. If someone's fucking with your sign instead. Just keep frying your chicken and keep on sucking. No goofy little post show ending stilliness this week.

Just more gratitude. Uh, yeah, thank you truly for a great year. You gig a chat and gig a stacey big dick big lady wained mother fuckers. I hope you have an incredible 2024 coming your way. I hope you fight like Harlan Sanders, whatever it is you're hoping for. Hail Nimrod, Hailosafina, be sure to pet whoever your bow jangles is if you have them and keep kicking out the good time,

James, triple in. Thanks everybody.