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Speaker 1: Hi. I'm Vanessa Beyor and this is my brother Jonah. We're two siblings who love to talk about our childhood and nostalgia and how it shaped us into the people we are today, who are pretty confident without being cocky, if I do say so myself. Welcome to how did we get weird? Shown up? Speaking of confidence, I just wanted to bring us back to the time when I was in eighth grade and you were in tenth grade. Okay, And I don't know if you remember this, but an announcement came on the PA at our high school at the end of the day. Our high school is eighth grade through senior year, and it announced the homecoming court from each grade. This means kind of the homecoming queen and king of each grade. Okay, who announces the eighth grade homecoming court? But you're sis right, I don't remember that specific a moment, I'm sorry to say. I thought it was more of like an assembly. Maybe no, it was over the PA. Well, then an assembly happened where we were honored and where Okay, So just to put things in order, just to make a timeline for you, So, yeah, I was voted eighth grade homecoming court it was very extremely cool. Now, Mom told me years later that you came home from school that day. You obviously don't remember this now, and you were like, mom, Vanessa's homecoming court and you were really impressed, which I think so sweet. Now I will say this, Marla Greenbaum, very cool still to this day, very cool person who is in your grade? Wait? Was it in ninth grade when I was homecoming court? Actually, now I'm thinking I was in ninth grade. Okay, get it together, Vanessa, But either way, I was homecoming court. I think it was actually ninth grade. Now I think it's ninth grade. I take back eighth grade. And Marla let me borrow all these shirts to where to the big assembly where the homecoming court of each grade got to come out and like wave to everybody. And I remember I tried on all of her shirts and none of them really hit me. They were all too cool for me, and I ended up wearing my own shirt. But it was so cool to borrow Marla's shirts and very cool of her. In a shout out to Marla green Vom that's I believe it's her last name now for letting me borrow her shirts. But Jonah, I just think it's very sweet that you came home from school that day and you told mom about it and you were so excited. Yeah, I mean that's very sweet. I mean that sounds like the opposite of the stuff I would be into in high school. It's like, you think that, but then when it actually happens, you're like, wow, I actually think this is cool, even though I'm Jonah and I'm so anti all the like who cares about homecoming and stuff? But then your sister gots homecoming court and you go, this is cool. Okay. I was in ninth grade. You were in eleventh grade. By the way, I think, all right, well, yeah, I don't remember that, Vanessa, But really you were impressed. Okay, I believe I was impressed. I believe it's impressive. So sure, I'm sure I was. Congratulations. Thank you. So I feel like you must have congratulated me back then, but that part I don't remember. So thank you for a congratulating me in this moment. Okay. Our guest today is a stand up comedian, actor, musician, and writer who you may know from Mabel's Mister Show. Comedy Central is a Sarah Silverman program. The Big Bang Theory or from any one of his many live shows and comedy specials. Please welcome Brian Posy. Hey, Brian, how's it going. Thanks for having me? Good good. Were you ever in the homecoming court in high school? I've heard of it, I'm aware that it was a thing, and I've seen movies where people are in it. Yeah, yeah, no, no. I barely made it out, and the first couple of years were rough. Yeah. I was the sad kid in the John Hughes movie that you feel really bad for. Then I sort of pulled it together, but I was never homecoming ad Jason at any point. Were you kind of anti kind of like me? Anti establishment? Listened to a lot of countercultural music, that kind of stuff. Yeah, And I dug in like I was a heavy metal kid. And then I hung out with the skateboarders and the weird kids and the punk rock kid. And I failed pe because me and this punk kid refused to run laps, so we got f's, we got automatic fs for the we dug in. So for the whole rest of the year we would just walk laps while everybody ran around us and like yelled stuff at me and the punk kids. So that's where I was and sophomore junior year. But senior year I pulled it together my best friend. Through having to go to summer school, I became friends with probably the most popular kid at our school, and he was like the weird kid to be most popular because he was actually cool and a funny guy. But he was like head of the wrestling team, so everybody loved him. And he was good looking, so he was easy on the eyes. Everybody gave him a pass. And then so my senior year was different. I was suddenly going to these parties and he's like posting, school will leave him alone, you know, and I had he was like Charlie Sheen and I was like, Lucas amazing. Yeah, that's incredible. And then so your senior year did you go to like the school to homecoming, the school dances and stuff. Didn't go to prom, but I went to everything else. Yeah, things that I hadn't previously been invited to before. And then I went cruising with these guys and their Camaro and listened to the band the cars and stuff like that. Even though I was, you know, a Judas priest and Metallica kid or whatever, you're kind of more alternative friends, how did they take all of this senior year? Oh, they were supportive. It wasn't like Can't Buy Me Love, where where I had to make a choice. Yeah. I don't know if you know that movie, No I do. I was thinking of that, and I guess mean girls. I was like thinking, like the main character has to choose between like the popular kids and they're old friends. But it sounds like that's that. It wasn't like that because I was still hanging out with the metal kids. I didn't abandon them or anything. We were still going to record stores and you know, on shopping and looking for new vinyl and that kind of thing. But yeah, did you try to convert the more popular kids to like throwing like Fear of the Dark or some old Maiden record or like this is actually pretty cool? Huh? Well I did, yeah, because so my friend Joel did wrestling kid. He got us because he was so popular. We got to be DJ's my senior year. So we would play music at school in the beginning of school and then during the break and lunch, and then we would play at the end of the day. So he let me play half the music and okay, so I was constantly turning him onto things. He's like, this is the B fifty twos, and I'm like, this is the Anthrax, Like, let's do this. My favorite moment of that time was I played the whole I don't know if you're familiar with the Rush twenty one twelve, the whole first side is one song, yes, essentially, So we played this twenty two minute epic during lunch break while we were drinking whiskey. Last seven to eleven, big gulps. That's probably my favorite moment from high school. Yeah, I did a similar movie. I used to do this DJ night in New York and we'd always played the No Effects song on the Decline, and it's like in fifteen or seventy minutes, and we just put it on. It's really long. That the longest punk song. Yes, it might be. It's like a whole ep it's just one song. But you could put it on and you could just walk around leave to booth like you had plenty of time to hang out, right, Joannah, I feel like I sometimes would come to that DJ night that you did, and you would let me guess DJ once in a while, and the only songs that I recognized were ransom songs. Yeah, those songs are staples Staples. So, Brian, what did you do after Let's take us through your senior year. You pull things together, you graduate, and then like, what did you do once you graduated? Since I had barely gotten out, I wasn't really prepared to go straight to a four year college, so I did the junior college thing. I did one near me in Santa Rosa, and then I moved up with my grandfather in Sacramento and that's where I went for like a year and a half at a junior college up there, and then started stand up around that same time. Wow, but he said, like he if I was going to live with him, I had to go to school and I had to have a job. So that's how it started. You're from near Santa We have cousins from Yukaia, which, oh, yeah, I know Yukaia. I grew up in Sonoma, Sonoma, the little doorstown, and yeah, it was a weird place to grow up, but yeah, I'm glad I did. I mean, it was super beautiful, but it was really strange to live in a doristytown that would just fill up on the weekends. And yeah, yeah, so you started doing stand up, like around your time in junior when you were in junior college. Yeah, twenty okay, okay, And what was that sort of Were you like just going up at little clubs and stuff like that, or were Yeah, I didn't even know what to do. But I was watching a ton of comedy and it was, you know, because it was everywhere it was we had cables, so it was HBO and it was all these smaller stations and you know, different all different types of stand up and I was watching a ton of it and I was listening to it Eddie Murphy and Sam Kennison, and it was really through a friend. I had thought it was something I could do, and a friend that I worked with, ed McDonald's of all places, like thought I was the funniest guy at that McDonald's. And he was like, which is quite a feat, but he was like, you know, you should do this, and I was like, you think. And then that's when I started working on bits. And I wrote bits for about six months because I called a comedy club and they were like, first of all, you can't come here if you've never done it, like you have to go to an open mic. And I was like, what's that? Where do I go, and luckily they were patient and told me instead of just seeing f off or whatever, you know, they walked me through it, told me where to go in my small town, and there was a place in downtown Sacramento and a basement, and that's where I started. I went to a It was a Wednesday night, the regular comedy night, and the first time it went well, and I went back the second week and tried all new material and I tanked and then went, well, I'm going to do this again, but I'm going to do the stuff I did the first time and just work on it. Yeah, and that worked. Wow. What kind of comedy were you doing at McDonalds? Were you like jokes inside the McDonald's or about the customers or I thinking, Yeah, I was just a smartass kid. You know, I had long hair and they let me keep it under my hat, and I was just that kid. I was already you know, I on my breakes. I would skateboard in the drive through, and you know, I was just a kind of an idiot, but I had a good time. And the other kid I worked with was my best friend. There was a total metal head too, so we were just like the two you know, Bill and Ted guys at that job, and yeah, everybody, the weird kids that like like Mariah Carey or whatever thought we were weird and you know, but funny, what was a first kind of metal show you saw back then? Well, the first band I saw was a band called Yant and they're a Bay Area band but they're huge. They're still around. But that was the first one that my mom let me go to. And then a journey was they did these shows called Day on the Green where it would be an all day show in a you know, in a stadium, and they were headlining one of those, and I went for this band called Triumph, which was a Canadian three piece kind of hard rock band that were not like Rush, but compared to Rush you know a lot. Yeah, but that that was my second band, wow, and it was a huge, like all day. Yeah. We've had some pretty metal guests on this show, actually our mutual friend Joe Truman. We've had on Randy from Lamb of God, and I love Randy. Randy's great. And then I don't know if you know this, we mentioned every episode. Our cousin we found out was Ricky Rackman, who's been on the show No Way I know Randy, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, I've known him just through the years and you know, and we've been yeah, in the same room as each other, and we never really met, but we I finally got to do head Banger's Ball. They were doing it again last year, and it was we both had a you know, total uh smooth fest because we were both fans of each other, you know, like we grew up hearing that we were maybe cousins with him, like from our great aunt, and then we never kind of believed it or thought it was true. And then like a year ago, I messaged him on Instagram and I like gave him names of like our fans, and we realized we were cousins. Now he's come on the podcast and stuff, but we talk about him being our cousins so much and we're so excited about it, and it feels like we're always like boasting about him and stuff. He's always been so lovely and so but I also feel like get the feeling he's not nearly as excited RIGHTS were to him. But it's funny, you know, like we grew up like watching Headbanger's Ball and stuff, so we were like so cool. I would take over parties when that was on. Like I would be at a party on a Saturday night and the TV wasn't on Headbanger's Ball, I would turn it on Headbanger's Ball and beat that guy. Look, this is what we're listening to. Now, don't touch it. There was a moment of time when I was really obsessed with this one episode of Say Yes to the Dress, which I don't think probably either of you has seen a ton of episode exactly that. I don't think I've seen a full app But no, there's an episode and I used to have the season and episode number memorized. But the title of the episode is this is My Fiance and this is My Wife. And it's about this sort of like lightly polygamous couple that comes in to get a wedding dress for like the fiance of this guy who's married to this woman. Anyway, it's a whole thing, and it's such a funny episode because they edit it in such a way that they make both of the women that are either married to or getting married to this guy look absolutely insane. And also the people working at Kleinfeld at the Bridal Store are so not like cool about them being polygamous, Like they're like, can you believe it? Like, let's I want to go look at them, like they're so like it's so funny, Like everything about the episode is so funny. And then there's obviously they you know, they follow three couples. That's the structure of Say Yes to the Dress. But anyways, the other two couples are like pretty funny too for their own reasons. I mean, there was a period of time where any party that I would go to this is probably and when I say a period of time, I'm gonna say five years ago, any party I would go to, I'd be like, can we watch this episode of Say to the Dress? It would totally bring like the interview of a party down. And in the half hour show, you know, it's like everyone's kind of like okay, but I really think it's one of the best episodes of reality TV that like exists. And so I always felt but to make people invest a half hour, yeah we're watching this at least with that Bigger's ball was like on in the background exactly, this is like no, no, no no, no, you have to pay attention, Vanessa. People start talking at the party, would you tell them to be quiet. Honestly, I think out of respect for me and my level of excitement for the episode, they sort of would stay quiet, like they sort of would watch it. Yeah. Did you find they didn't invite you to parties after that? Or you know, I haven't talked to a bunch of those people. Yeah. Bridget Everett, who's been a guest on the show, definitely did that at her. You know, do you know Bridget Bryan? Yeah, yeah, she's the greatest. She I definitely doused at it, like I think her holiday party one year. Brian, do you get into any reality shows? Do you watching that kind of stuff? I have? I'm not like an alpha guy, but you know, the ones that I've liked the most are like ones that feature alpha guys. Like I'm watching this reality show on net LIGs. It was called Physical one hundred and it's crazy. It's so it's one hundred Korean people and they're all buff in different physical shape but they're all like summer like firefighters and like stuck people and throw in shape, which I'm not in any shape, but they do all this intense stuff and I love it. And things like that are like naked and afraid if you throw or you throw a bunch of like people up in the woods, like, yeah, don't die. You know, I'll watch a show called Try Not to Die. I'll watch that in a second. And the one I just watched, which my wife walked in and goes, what is this? It's by the same guy that gain, a white guy who I barely know. But I'm not a UFC guy at all. But I used to watch this UFC reality show that was called The Ultimate Fighter. I wouldn't really watch the actual matches, but I love The Ultimate Fighter because it's basically the real world with like twenty crazy roided up dudes just like and they're fighting, they want to heal each other, and it's super nuts. It's like all the stuff you wish the real like people put their fist through walls and stuff and like getting in arguments and that I've found super enjoyable. And now there's a new one. It is slap fighting. What it's people that do you know what slap fighting it's? I mean, is it well? How it sounds? It's all it is on the face, Yes, And it's hard to watch because they knock people out like they're there and you're watching people get head injuries basically, so that when I started, I was like, I think I like this, and then I saw a couple of people take hits that might stick with them for the rest of their lives, and I was like, I don't know if I do like this show. Sorry, So slap fighting, are there rules like your hand has to be open or something. Yeah, it's really new in our country. It's been huge and rush and that's where Dana White found out about it. He was watching all these viral videos of Russian dudes just destroying each other like an abasement somewhere, just like one hit and then the guy gets his hit. But if you knock him out, obviously he's not going to hit you back. So it's really about who gets to go first. Sometimes the guy is guaranteed to knock the other dude out, so it's just I hope I get to go first. If not, I'm losing that. It's crazy. It's crazy too, because like wrestling is so not fake. I know, those guys have to be in like really incredible shape, but it's like planned out kind of right, or at least the un UFC is different. You have CSMMA. That's right, that's real. Right, Yeah, and it's so not me. Yeah, I have not thrown a punch ever. Yeah, I've been hit, but it's not something I enjoy. But I love watching guys do that because I'm also a big action movie nerd too. Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to see the version of slap fighting. That's if it became like ww is it wwew it became like wwe because fake slaps have been a part of acting for such a long time, where somebody slaps and the other person just it's like a thing that happens so much in movies and TV in a fake way, right, it's just so funny that I don't know, yeah, CA and soap operas and stuff. It's just such a big thing. I wonder if they would do like a league of the fake I don't know. Anyways, I'm very disturbed by the slap fighting thing. But it is disturbing. And that's what my wife was like, that's you can't horrible, and I was like, no, you're right, you're right. But we had just watched Milf Island together, so I was like, you can't. Oh you mean milf manner. Yes, sorry, Milf Island was a sketch one thirty Rock. It was a bit on thirty Okay, okay, okay. Do you do this where your brain farts and then you force other people to brain fart because you can't communicate enough to where now they're like, I don't know what that is either. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The thing that I look at that I'm kind of embarrassed about, and me and my friend Brian talk about is some of these like metal gossip sites like Blabbermouth, where it'll be like, oh yeah, Michael Sweet from Striper weighs on and should bands these backing tracks, and then it's like a blurb that one of these guys says apparently there's like a thousands of metal podcasts when these guys are on, and then they reprint it with like a headline to get you to read, and it's like, you know, yeah, well there's also I do I read that? And I love when they make like somebody will say something political and then they'll oh, yeah, really, pylon, because if you're a musician, you're not supposed to have, you know, an opinion about politics, of course, of course, yeah no, yeah, but it's like they will find the most obscure things and making it like six stories. Yes, Oh my god, so incredible. Yeah, I didn't even know. Well, we're gonna take a quick commercial break and we'll be right back, and we're back with Brian Possan. So, Brian, you gave us a lot of incredible topics to discuss today, and the one that me and Vanessa came back to was nerds candy, And so we're just wondering why that was on your list, what your formative memories are of nerds, what's your relationship well being a nerd. It was the first time there was a candy for me. It felt like and I always picked their nerds making it too, so it was like our foodoo, candy for us by us. No, but I mean I've stuck with it. I remember it coming out. It came out in the eighties and it was super addictive, and I love any kind of candy where you're like, I can have just a couple of these, or I could have a thousand at once, you know what I mean. There was there was the option of just dulling them out because they had those two little things on the top. One side was strawberry and one side was grape, and you could just so I'm just gonna have a couple of little grapes and then then you'd open them both and you'd be chugging both at the same time, and then it's empty. Yeah, and you're like fired up for the next six hours. Yeah, did you know? I guess they did an episode. Okay, so just to give you a little background on nerds, they were launched in nineteen eighty three. Yeah. They usually contained two flavors per boxes. You were saying. They did an episode of that show Unwrapped about nerds, and the factory workers said, basically, we start off with a sugar crystal and we just keep coating it with more sugar, which makes sense. It's just basically one piece of yes one crystal sugar just covered with more and more and more sugar. And that they figured it out. Yeah. Yeah, it was like a pop rock without the It wasn't flaky like a pop rock. Yeah, it was more solid. And then it also didn't scare you, like are you eating nerd like around the house or at the movies or hanging with at work at work at record stores like full of caffeine, Like I would combine Nerds with Skittles with like red cooke all day you know, just drinking original coke all day and then wonder why I couldn't leap at night totally. Now do you remember they had a competitor called Dweeves? Do you remember Dweebs? Yes, not a Dweeves fan. Plus, I would never call myself a dweeb, you know what I mean? Like Nerd became cool, dwe was just it's more derogative directory. It's also such a direct rip off. It's like when sketters to compete with Tom's. It's like, can you guys hide it a little more? Yeah, it just feels so. But yeah, I guess they were similar to Nerds, but they were less sour and bigger in size, and they contained three flavors instead of two. So it sounds like they were trying to out nerd Dweebs, or they were trying to out nerd Nerds. They were only on the market for a very short time, and then the other candies that were competing with Nerds were as you mentioned, pop rocks, candy buttons, and Mike and Ikes, which Mike and Ikes are still around it Bigger knikes are still big, are candy buttons. Like the things that were like on paper. Yeah, it was like you're doing the dots of acid to get the paper and then yeah, take the candy off and yeah. Yeah. I was never a fan of those. No, I never liked how they tasted, but they reminded me so much when I was a little kid. Like I'm sure they still have these, but they used to have these like sheets of stick on earrings that were really small, like little like stickers, and they like those candy buttons and so Okay, I think because they reminded me of those, I always thought that they would taste better than they did. Like, I thought i'd like them because I liked the earrings so much, But it turns out just because something looks nice because they're similar shape, they're not the same thing, right, Yeah, yeah, Brian, there's a lot of different spinoffs of nerds rope. Nerd rope, That's what was just about to ask about. I don't know if nerd rope is still around, but I would it was around big time. I would eat a nerd rope. Yeah. What about sour nerds? No, I never got into them. I mean, okay, I like sour patch kids, but sour is not my favorite flavor. Yeah, when I'm feeling candy. Yeah, fair enough. And I'm not even a big I like chocolate, but I think it goes back to that sugar high of like I mean, I still will go to Skittles, and I was still you know, yeah, if I see Nerds in a store, I'm like, oh yeah. I recently was handing out Halloween candy on Halloween, you know, on Halloween and the kids we had Nerds Rope, and the kids were going absolutely bonkers over a Nerds rope. People are really It started in two thousand and one, the Nerds Rope. That's when they came out with it, and it has been a big hit ever since. And if you go on the Nerds website, the things that are currently available are the Nerds Rope, the Nerds candy, big chewy Nerds. Have you ever had those? No, I want it. I'm going to try him now. These are a new thing. And then the newest thing from twenty twenty one Nerds gummy clusters. And I think those are like blow pops, like I think they have gum in the middle. Oh, okay, I don't know, Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. And then of course every Easter Nerds has their jelly beans come out seasonally. I don't know about Nerds gummy clusters. I don't know. That's not something I you know, yeah, that's not what I go to Nerds for. Yeah, exactly. And then it sounds like a lot of work. And then you got it hanging out in your mouth, and then and then you're the guy yeah with the you know, you're the grown person, yeah, with the with the pop yeah in your mouth. The most incredible Nerds spinoff I found in our research was the Nerds cereal. Did you remember that at all? No, there was a Nerd cereal. I'm looking at it now. It hit one side grape, one side strawberry, and you can mail in an offer for a bowl with like a divider in half so you could divide it like real nerds in it. Did they or was it flaky puffy nerds that made to look like that's a good question. I don't know. It was me sugary cereals, but that's that's a different level of sugar when you're when you're just boring Nerds. I don't know if it's just like flavored corn stuff or if it's just actual just Nerds. One of the first. I think it was Comedians, a comedy the movie The Pattent we did of us touring. At one point we'd go to a rest stop and I get nerd rope, and for a while people would bring me nerd rope at a comedy club. So wow, if you want to start that back up listeners, come seeb dancer Bransame dot com. I would love nerd rope. Did you have a favorite flavor with the nerd stuff? I mean, I don't mind the watermelon, but I prefer straight up strawberry and grape. Yeah. Yeah, those are so traditional. Yeah yeah. There used to be a ton of different flavors that they've tried. But then they've also done gumballs bubble gumballs, which seems similar to kind of their new product. And then they also have done like Jumbo Nerds, which is like a box with multiple All this stuff is sort of like come and gone. And then they sometimes make seasonal flavors, including spooky Nerds for Halloween, Frosty Nerds for Christmas, Valentine's Nerds for Valentine's Day, and hopping Nerds for Easter. When't they have these spinoffs? I always picture I know it's way more high tech, but I always picture just an old school guy, like we've got to come up with another you know. Yeah, I know it's not like that at all, but I see things as sketches in my head. So it's always like old timey, you know, the guy at Nerds headquarters. The Valentine Nerds seems like a tough cell as like getting that as a Valentine's Day gift for someone. Yeah, what do you mean? Like, I feel like my wife would be pretty bummed if or some I was like, no, these are Valentine's Day Nerds, right, I don't know if you're a nerd. I guess it's but you gotta get him something else too. You gotta get him something else too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like the kind of like joke part, like I know you love nerds, so here's these, but also here's like a beautiful scarf. Right, do you still eat a lot of candy these days? Or what's your what's your? What do you say? I'm just curious if Nerds are still in your life or been replaced by anything else or right they are at airports when I'm on the road. Yeah, that's something I'll grab definitely. Yeah. Do you have a new like favorite candy that you've discovered more as an adult, Like I know, for me kind of, I guess when I was in high school into college, I you know, kind of quite an international teen, I discovered Kinderbueno, which is they hate oh yeah, yeah, fars. That's sort of a more sophisticated a European candy with hazelnut in it. No, it depends on how high I am after my show and how extensive the selection is. At the Courtyard Marriott, whatever kind of candy they have there, it's usually winds up being Peanut m and M's, Skittles, Snickers a go to, and then I'll throw them all on a bed and cry. Have you have you ever like when you do stand up and stuff? Do you ever put nerds on your any candy on your rider and you can't write? Get good? There's a there's a couple of clubs that really act. We have a cool selection. This the Tacoma Comedy Club and the Spokane Comedy Club. They're all run by the same people, and they have this crazy it looks like a snack bar at an old movie theater, and they have like Rocky road, what's your McCall? It's all these you know, not your regular go to candies. And then I'm always like, how long have these been sitting here? Because right, right, right right, A lot of comics don't eat this kind of stuff, you know, because there's so many of the Joe Rogan type comics that would never eat candy because they're on some crazy workout thing. You know. Well, similarly, I don't know if you've ever gone for a meeting at Netflix. I feel like Netflix, yeah, an incredible candy selection, and I whenever I've been there, I've been like, am I going to be there? I guess I'm gonna be the only one to like to take a bunch of this stuff. But also like I'm not too proud, like I'm gonna they make you really want to work there, Like you walk in and you're like this is the coolest place ever, and and then you go pitch your show and you're like, well that's not happening. But they have a really nice area downstairs. And I always whenever any kind of company I'm Matt has bars like like nutrition bars, like a balanced barkind I'm like, you guys, you guys are really classy, like you're spending right. But to me, I'm always like they're kind of judging me, and they're telling me how to eat right, right, right, Satty, put down on Skittles and try one of these. The thing I remember from being at Netflix was like taking a ton of M and m's in the lobby and like being like, am I the only one? No? I do that too, Okay, you're not. Are you putting the eminem's in your hand or you put them in a bowl or you know, I put them in a cup. Mind your own business, don't worry about it. In my cheeks, in my pockets. That's why guys wear cargo shorts. You just fill them up and bring a bunch of beats. I mean truly. Whenever I do any kind of live show, I always have a huge empty bag with me and then I just leave with so much stuff and I put something on top that makes it look like it's like papers in there or something. Yeah. Yeah, it's so funny because me even s are so similar because we had dan As in the podcast and I used to go the vice offices and just load up on free snap and it's like I feel like, just take stuff you don't even really want and just force yourself to eat it. Yeah, And it's like, do most people do that or is that just like a weird thing. I don't know, because I kind of do it, so I do. Okay, Yeah, I guess we all do it. Maybe it's not that strange. When people don't do it, I feel like they're so classy. And I'm also like, I will never be able to fully relate to you, though I appreciate that you exist in the world, but you're not the same as me. At these comedy clubs, I was saying that, you know, I'm leaving at the end of the night. Every night I took a handful of stuff. I'm like, yeah, this stuff isn't going to eat itself, but better. Yeah. When I used to do touring stuff in Chicago with like Second City and stuff, I was taking waters these water bottle you know, they're not going to drink themselves, as you say, and look, you gotta stay hydrated. All my band friends have at least one guy in their band who overdoes that. Though he's taken the condiments and he's he's taking everything, you know. I can think of a few guys like that. I think there was a time when I was kind of that guy, even as a famously took the TV remote and here before I at one time I was understudying a touring company for Second City, and we in Chicago. We were like on tour somewhere. I had brought all these like water bottles and snacks and stuff back to my hotel room and I was just packing it up to get back into the van. And then when I got home, I was unpacking it and I saw that I had taken one of the TV remotes from the hotel room. It was a like Jonah's laughing so hard. It was I think a low point. But I was going to call them and tell them, and then I thought, look, they have universal remote. I will be embarrassed. They will be embarrassed talking to me on the phone about like there's nobody wins, right. So I just let it go. But it was truly like it should have been a wake up call. And then I just continued taking so much stuff from every show. I would do if you were high, or you had just in a show, or you were like when I post show, to me, that's the time to really down candy or any other snacks. If you could pick any candy, would it be Nerds? That's kind of my ultimate question to you about nerds. No, No, because I have those other go toos now, yeah, so nerds are more nostalgic kind of to you. Yeah, yeah, But if you had to pick a candy today, what would be like? The one candy? I also like See's candy. It's just good, but I will destroy a whole box and then hate myself for an entire wop. So yeah, I don't know. I'm trying to get away from that. I'm actually losing. So but yeah, it would be Snickers or one of the other ones, one of the go toos, and I can just eat pem's all. That's what I was going to say to me, M and M's regular or peanut or even honestly peanut butter. Have you had the bag that's got all three and you know you don't know what put it in your mouth? My friend one who I talked about a lot here, and my friend Alex Fox and I we will get together and we will just eat tons and tons of M and ms and try different eminem flavors. And it's I've tried pretty much all of them, even the ones that Tucker Carlson hates. Well, yeah, he doesn't think they're sexy enough. I think he doesn't want to have sex with those eminem's but a weirdo. Yeah, so it's amazing. Sorry, I don't want to get it is amazing. It is amazing. Yeah, it's we've talked about it on here. It's yeah, I almost said I don't want to get political, but that's not politics that when you're talking about him, it's not even politics. Really odd, that's just weird. Yeah, yeah, totally. All right, Well, so fun, we love nerds, and speaking of we'll be back with these three nerds after a commercial break. Nice, all right, and we're back, so Brian, right now, we're gonna play a quick game with you. It is called legit moan or unnecessary groan. Legit moan, necessary groan. This segment was inspired by a now defunct column in our local newspaper growing up, the Cleveland Plane Dealer, called Monday Moaning. We used to read We're every Monday. The paper would print extremely petty complaints the readers had. I was able to kind of dig back into the archives and find some We used to read these as kids all the time. So we're going to pick three basically, and at the end we'll decide if each of these are a legit moan or unnecessary groan, like if they're a legit complaint or they're a little superfluous. Okay, hey, I can read the first time you kick us off in US. Okay, So this one is from Westlake, Ohio, and this is probably like it's around like twenty ten. This was submitted. Okay. It is so aggravating to turn the TV on any time of night or day to be greeted with some lawyer or law firm or college commercial. Why am I paying every month to be advertised to? Right? Do you think that's a legit complaint or no? No, I can't even get my head around that. Their arguments, well, it seems like they don't understand how like capitalism or like business. Yeah, I think they don't understand advertising exactly, Like, oh, I'm paying for TV? Why are they advertising? This is something I'm paying for already? Right, But now they kind of don't. But although some are again bringing it back and I'm like, I thought I got Hulu without the ads, but who knows, right, Yeah, like that's how TV works, Like you want the souls and they helped fund Like you, paying a loan is part of it. And if you want to pay for like a premium channel that doesn't have commercials, that's a separate thing. But regular cable does have commercials, and that's maybe she just got cable. Maybe there's another one where she would retracts. She's like two weeks later, I'm sorry. Now I just everything I watch as commercials. I didn't know. I'm so sorry. I think it's so funny that they're mad that it's a college commercial, like which I guess a movie advertising college in their life. Look, I don't want to get preached out about getting a higher education. Don't tell me what to think or do or how to think better. Yeah, very I'm greeted with some of the lawyer, law firm or college commercial like what about what? Like they're grouping list together. But then it's also like, are you bothered by the other commercial about products? Which are most commercials? Yeah? Right, the bulk of commercials which are not these things. Look, I'm glad this person had an outlet, but I think we all agree that this is an unnecessary groan. Yes, Jonah. Next up this one the city isn't listed. The moan is. This moan goes out to the people that I waited on at my restaurant job on Wednesday, July seventh, despite my best efforts, and I was extremely busy. They delayed me taking their order. You deemed yourself more important than everything else going on in the world, and they decided that on a thirty nine dollars tab they only left me a tip of forty six sense I sure hope that made your day, Brian, What do you think that's legitimate? Yeah, at least they're not getting tipped. Well, I don't understand the other complaint. They were mad because it took so long to get their order. That's kind of issue with these things sometimes these people that write into this have a hard time kind of focusing their complaint. I think this stuff about I was extremely busy, they delayed me in taking their order, and then you deemed yourself more important than everything else going on in the world. That feels, okay, like I'm not really on your side now when this person said that on a thirty nine dollars have they only left me a tip of forty six cents? I'm going to come full circle here, then, I feel like, oh, I understand that complaint forty nine cents is so rude. But then if you like kind of read between the lines here this person's attitude, like the way that this person kind of views them saying you viewed yourself more important than everything else in the world, Like I do wonder if these there's more to this story. There's more to this stuff. Yeah, exactly if there's the other side of somebody going, look, I was having trouble deciding on what to get. You kept harassing me. Apparently your time is way more important than my time as a customer. I'm so sorry. So I tipped forty six cents to be a jerk, Yeah yeah, and make a point. It might be nice to get the complaint out of the customers and see what they experienced on that. Yeah. Yeah, I'm with Brian and you. I think I think there's more to this story. But yeah, they think these customers deemed themselves more important than everything else is going on in the world. Sounds like that sounds like a big judgment call just because they were like, we need another second to look, yeah, like we get that you're busy. Yeah yeah, yeah, so I think, yeah, but I do reach. It's a reach, but I do think the forty six cent tip is pretty harsh. I mean, it's like that, totally, totally. It's thirty nine dollars and you gotta you're trying to make us pretty. That's absolutely not okay, you gotta tip people. But I also would say, if I was going out to eat, I wouldn't necessarily want this person to be my server, just because it seems like they might have of their own kind of inner personal stuff going on. Yeah, okay, all right, Vanessa. When I read the last one, sure, okay. This one's from Lakewood, Ohio to the man walking a dog in Lakewood Park while we were watching the sunset, just so snarky. Okay, No, we did not think it was cute that your dog peat on our bike. Another reason not to have dogs allowed in the park. You could have pulled him away from the bike. Oh my god, Brian, what do you think as a dog owner? I'm gonna pee on them forgetting mad at the dog doesn't know. Also the fact that they we were just watching the sunset. It makes me mad and I don't know why. Yeah, I know, I know. Well, because it's also like it's not your alpha Romeo. It's your likes your mountain bike, Like, what's the You're grinding it over gravel, right, but you're also doing something you could kind of do anywhere. Yes, yes, but you went this is my this is my sunset area. Yeah, and you got into my space where I'm watching. You know, I don't Yeah, yeah, I agree, Big Old Park. I also wonder if the owner of the dog was like, I'm so sorry, like laughing in that, you know, like that's rocky or whatever they do. It's not funny. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we did not think it was cute that your dog pete on our bike. I thought that the person laughed. I made the person laughing, but I think the owner said that they anyways, it was like, isn't this dog cute? And look, I just think you left your bike out, you're in the park, you're watching the sunset. You know. I think this person maybe might need a little bit of an attitude adjustment. Yeah, yeah, yes, I think they need to. They're creating some drama because their license pretty boring. Let's go to the park and watch a sunset, Like yeah, yeah, I don't know if you're so scared of dogs peeing on your bike. Maybe watch the sunset from home anywhere. Yeah, literally anywhere and everywhere anywhere else, or walked to the park or drive then you won't have a bike there to bepd on. There's a whole lot going on. There's a whole lot going, lot going on. Yeah, once again, I feel like we're not getting the full story. But I think we're all going to call this one an unnecessary grow At least these other people have kind of tried to end their complaints with like a little bit of a wrap up sentence. This person's last sentence was you could have pulled him away from the bike. Learn to write much. Look, and yeah, they're still thinking about it. They're writing letters anonymously. I mean, it's it's they can let it go. I think they can let it go. Okay, So I think this is two unnecessary groans and one legit moan, and the legit moan being the middle one, which is the tip. And yet we still aren't totally one hundred percent with that person, but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt. That tracks incredible, well, Brian. This has gone very quickly, and this feels like we just started. But it's time to wrap up and ask you you know where people find you, your tour, your your social media media, all of it. I have a new special that's everywhere, and I know it's people got charged some places, but it's free right now on YouTube. So do that and then don't complain about paying for it somewhere else. Okay, But Brian Pisin dot com, I do most of my social media and then the rest of it's done by my buddy since high school. But tour dates are out there and I'm doing a fair amount of touring. I'm going to be at Moontower in Austin. Oh great too, Yeah, yeah, that'll be great. I'm very excited to check out your comics series The Acts with Joe Truman as well. That looks incredible. Yeah oh yeah, yeah, that came out great. It should be in a like hardcover at some point. And then I've got more books coming through through Image Comics next year, another one with Joe called Rifters That's about Time Cops. And then I wrote a skateboarding comic book called Grommets with another buddy of mine. Amazing. Yeah, I can't wait to check those out. Yeah, well, thank you. That was so much fun. I think for having me. Thanks so much for being here. Thanks everyone for listening. If you enjoyed that, please subscribe to the podcast and keep an eye out for next week's episode of How Did We Get Weird? We will discuss more stories from our childhood and cultural touchstones like nerds. Thanks so much, Brian. This is great. Thanks guys, Thanks Brian,
Speaker 1: Hi. I'm Vanessa Beyor and this is my brother Jonah. We're two siblings who love to talk about our childhood and nostalgia and how it shaped us into the people we are today, who are pretty confident without being cocky, if I do say so myself. Welcome to how did we get weird? Shown up? Speaking of confidence, I just wanted to bring us back to the time when I was in eighth grade and you were in tenth grade. Okay, And I don't know if you remember this, but an announcement came on the PA at our high school at the end of the day. Our high school is eighth grade through senior year, and it announced the homecoming court from each grade. This means kind of the homecoming queen and king of each grade. Okay, who announces the eighth grade homecoming court? But you're sis right, I don't remember that specific a moment, I'm sorry to say. I thought it was more of like an assembly. Maybe no, it was over the PA. Well, then an assembly happened where we were honored and where Okay, So just to put things in order, just to make a timeline for you, So, yeah, I was voted eighth grade homecoming court it was very extremely cool. Now, Mom told me years later that you came home from school that day. You obviously don't remember this now, and you were like, mom, Vanessa's homecoming court and you were really impressed, which I think so sweet. Now I will say this, Marla Greenbaum, very cool still to this day, very cool person who is in your grade? Wait? Was it in ninth grade when I was homecoming court? Actually, now I'm thinking I was in ninth grade. Okay, get it together, Vanessa, But either way, I was homecoming court. I think it was actually ninth grade. Now I think it's ninth grade. I take back eighth grade. And Marla let me borrow all these shirts to where to the big assembly where the homecoming court of each grade got to come out and like wave to everybody. And I remember I tried on all of her shirts and none of them really hit me. They were all too cool for me, and I ended up wearing my own shirt. But it was so cool to borrow Marla's shirts and very cool of her. In a shout out to Marla green Vom that's I believe it's her last name now for letting me borrow her shirts. But Jonah, I just think it's very sweet that you came home from school that day and you told mom about it and you were so excited. Yeah, I mean that's very sweet. I mean that sounds like the opposite of the stuff I would be into in high school. It's like, you think that, but then when it actually happens, you're like, wow, I actually think this is cool, even though I'm Jonah and I'm so anti all the like who cares about homecoming and stuff? But then your sister gots homecoming court and you go, this is cool. Okay. I was in ninth grade. You were in eleventh grade. By the way, I think, all right, well, yeah, I don't remember that, Vanessa, But really you were impressed. Okay, I believe I was impressed. I believe it's impressive. So sure, I'm sure I was. Congratulations. Thank you. So I feel like you must have congratulated me back then, but that part I don't remember. So thank you for a congratulating me in this moment. Okay. Our guest today is a stand up comedian, actor, musician, and writer who you may know from Mabel's Mister Show. Comedy Central is a Sarah Silverman program. The Big Bang Theory or from any one of his many live shows and comedy specials. Please welcome Brian Posy. Hey, Brian, how's it going. Thanks for having me? Good good. Were you ever in the homecoming court in high school? I've heard of it, I'm aware that it was a thing, and I've seen movies where people are in it. Yeah, yeah, no, no. I barely made it out, and the first couple of years were rough. Yeah. I was the sad kid in the John Hughes movie that you feel really bad for. Then I sort of pulled it together, but I was never homecoming ad Jason at any point. Were you kind of anti kind of like me? Anti establishment? Listened to a lot of countercultural music, that kind of stuff. Yeah, And I dug in like I was a heavy metal kid. And then I hung out with the skateboarders and the weird kids and the punk rock kid. And I failed pe because me and this punk kid refused to run laps, so we got f's, we got automatic fs for the we dug in. So for the whole rest of the year we would just walk laps while everybody ran around us and like yelled stuff at me and the punk kids. So that's where I was and sophomore junior year. But senior year I pulled it together my best friend. Through having to go to summer school, I became friends with probably the most popular kid at our school, and he was like the weird kid to be most popular because he was actually cool and a funny guy. But he was like head of the wrestling team, so everybody loved him. And he was good looking, so he was easy on the eyes. Everybody gave him a pass. And then so my senior year was different. I was suddenly going to these parties and he's like posting, school will leave him alone, you know, and I had he was like Charlie Sheen and I was like, Lucas amazing. Yeah, that's incredible. And then so your senior year did you go to like the school to homecoming, the school dances and stuff. Didn't go to prom, but I went to everything else. Yeah, things that I hadn't previously been invited to before. And then I went cruising with these guys and their Camaro and listened to the band the cars and stuff like that. Even though I was, you know, a Judas priest and Metallica kid or whatever, you're kind of more alternative friends, how did they take all of this senior year? Oh, they were supportive. It wasn't like Can't Buy Me Love, where where I had to make a choice. Yeah. I don't know if you know that movie, No I do. I was thinking of that, and I guess mean girls. I was like thinking, like the main character has to choose between like the popular kids and they're old friends. But it sounds like that's that. It wasn't like that because I was still hanging out with the metal kids. I didn't abandon them or anything. We were still going to record stores and you know, on shopping and looking for new vinyl and that kind of thing. But yeah, did you try to convert the more popular kids to like throwing like Fear of the Dark or some old Maiden record or like this is actually pretty cool? Huh? Well I did, yeah, because so my friend Joel did wrestling kid. He got us because he was so popular. We got to be DJ's my senior year. So we would play music at school in the beginning of school and then during the break and lunch, and then we would play at the end of the day. So he let me play half the music and okay, so I was constantly turning him onto things. He's like, this is the B fifty twos, and I'm like, this is the Anthrax, Like, let's do this. My favorite moment of that time was I played the whole I don't know if you're familiar with the Rush twenty one twelve, the whole first side is one song, yes, essentially, So we played this twenty two minute epic during lunch break while we were drinking whiskey. Last seven to eleven, big gulps. That's probably my favorite moment from high school. Yeah, I did a similar movie. I used to do this DJ night in New York and we'd always played the No Effects song on the Decline, and it's like in fifteen or seventy minutes, and we just put it on. It's really long. That the longest punk song. Yes, it might be. It's like a whole ep it's just one song. But you could put it on and you could just walk around leave to booth like you had plenty of time to hang out, right, Joannah, I feel like I sometimes would come to that DJ night that you did, and you would let me guess DJ once in a while, and the only songs that I recognized were ransom songs. Yeah, those songs are staples Staples. So, Brian, what did you do after Let's take us through your senior year. You pull things together, you graduate, and then like, what did you do once you graduated? Since I had barely gotten out, I wasn't really prepared to go straight to a four year college, so I did the junior college thing. I did one near me in Santa Rosa, and then I moved up with my grandfather in Sacramento and that's where I went for like a year and a half at a junior college up there, and then started stand up around that same time. Wow, but he said, like he if I was going to live with him, I had to go to school and I had to have a job. So that's how it started. You're from near Santa We have cousins from Yukaia, which, oh, yeah, I know Yukaia. I grew up in Sonoma, Sonoma, the little doorstown, and yeah, it was a weird place to grow up, but yeah, I'm glad I did. I mean, it was super beautiful, but it was really strange to live in a doristytown that would just fill up on the weekends. And yeah, yeah, so you started doing stand up, like around your time in junior when you were in junior college. Yeah, twenty okay, okay, And what was that sort of Were you like just going up at little clubs and stuff like that, or were Yeah, I didn't even know what to do. But I was watching a ton of comedy and it was, you know, because it was everywhere it was we had cables, so it was HBO and it was all these smaller stations and you know, different all different types of stand up and I was watching a ton of it and I was listening to it Eddie Murphy and Sam Kennison, and it was really through a friend. I had thought it was something I could do, and a friend that I worked with, ed McDonald's of all places, like thought I was the funniest guy at that McDonald's. And he was like, which is quite a feat, but he was like, you know, you should do this, and I was like, you think. And then that's when I started working on bits. And I wrote bits for about six months because I called a comedy club and they were like, first of all, you can't come here if you've never done it, like you have to go to an open mic. And I was like, what's that? Where do I go, and luckily they were patient and told me instead of just seeing f off or whatever, you know, they walked me through it, told me where to go in my small town, and there was a place in downtown Sacramento and a basement, and that's where I started. I went to a It was a Wednesday night, the regular comedy night, and the first time it went well, and I went back the second week and tried all new material and I tanked and then went, well, I'm going to do this again, but I'm going to do the stuff I did the first time and just work on it. Yeah, and that worked. Wow. What kind of comedy were you doing at McDonalds? Were you like jokes inside the McDonald's or about the customers or I thinking, Yeah, I was just a smartass kid. You know, I had long hair and they let me keep it under my hat, and I was just that kid. I was already you know, I on my breakes. I would skateboard in the drive through, and you know, I was just a kind of an idiot, but I had a good time. And the other kid I worked with was my best friend. There was a total metal head too, so we were just like the two you know, Bill and Ted guys at that job, and yeah, everybody, the weird kids that like like Mariah Carey or whatever thought we were weird and you know, but funny, what was a first kind of metal show you saw back then? Well, the first band I saw was a band called Yant and they're a Bay Area band but they're huge. They're still around. But that was the first one that my mom let me go to. And then a journey was they did these shows called Day on the Green where it would be an all day show in a you know, in a stadium, and they were headlining one of those, and I went for this band called Triumph, which was a Canadian three piece kind of hard rock band that were not like Rush, but compared to Rush you know a lot. Yeah, but that that was my second band, wow, and it was a huge, like all day. Yeah. We've had some pretty metal guests on this show, actually our mutual friend Joe Truman. We've had on Randy from Lamb of God, and I love Randy. Randy's great. And then I don't know if you know this, we mentioned every episode. Our cousin we found out was Ricky Rackman, who's been on the show No Way I know Randy, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah, I've known him just through the years and you know, and we've been yeah, in the same room as each other, and we never really met, but we I finally got to do head Banger's Ball. They were doing it again last year, and it was we both had a you know, total uh smooth fest because we were both fans of each other, you know, like we grew up hearing that we were maybe cousins with him, like from our great aunt, and then we never kind of believed it or thought it was true. And then like a year ago, I messaged him on Instagram and I like gave him names of like our fans, and we realized we were cousins. Now he's come on the podcast and stuff, but we talk about him being our cousins so much and we're so excited about it, and it feels like we're always like boasting about him and stuff. He's always been so lovely and so but I also feel like get the feeling he's not nearly as excited RIGHTS were to him. But it's funny, you know, like we grew up like watching Headbanger's Ball and stuff, so we were like so cool. I would take over parties when that was on. Like I would be at a party on a Saturday night and the TV wasn't on Headbanger's Ball, I would turn it on Headbanger's Ball and beat that guy. Look, this is what we're listening to. Now, don't touch it. There was a moment of time when I was really obsessed with this one episode of Say Yes to the Dress, which I don't think probably either of you has seen a ton of episode exactly that. I don't think I've seen a full app But no, there's an episode and I used to have the season and episode number memorized. But the title of the episode is this is My Fiance and this is My Wife. And it's about this sort of like lightly polygamous couple that comes in to get a wedding dress for like the fiance of this guy who's married to this woman. Anyway, it's a whole thing, and it's such a funny episode because they edit it in such a way that they make both of the women that are either married to or getting married to this guy look absolutely insane. And also the people working at Kleinfeld at the Bridal Store are so not like cool about them being polygamous, Like they're like, can you believe it? Like, let's I want to go look at them, like they're so like it's so funny, Like everything about the episode is so funny. And then there's obviously they you know, they follow three couples. That's the structure of Say Yes to the Dress. But anyways, the other two couples are like pretty funny too for their own reasons. I mean, there was a period of time where any party that I would go to this is probably and when I say a period of time, I'm gonna say five years ago, any party I would go to, I'd be like, can we watch this episode of Say to the Dress? It would totally bring like the interview of a party down. And in the half hour show, you know, it's like everyone's kind of like okay, but I really think it's one of the best episodes of reality TV that like exists. And so I always felt but to make people invest a half hour, yeah we're watching this at least with that Bigger's ball was like on in the background exactly, this is like no, no, no no, no, you have to pay attention, Vanessa. People start talking at the party, would you tell them to be quiet. Honestly, I think out of respect for me and my level of excitement for the episode, they sort of would stay quiet, like they sort of would watch it. Yeah. Did you find they didn't invite you to parties after that? Or you know, I haven't talked to a bunch of those people. Yeah. Bridget Everett, who's been a guest on the show, definitely did that at her. You know, do you know Bridget Bryan? Yeah, yeah, she's the greatest. She I definitely doused at it, like I think her holiday party one year. Brian, do you get into any reality shows? Do you watching that kind of stuff? I have? I'm not like an alpha guy, but you know, the ones that I've liked the most are like ones that feature alpha guys. Like I'm watching this reality show on net LIGs. It was called Physical one hundred and it's crazy. It's so it's one hundred Korean people and they're all buff in different physical shape but they're all like summer like firefighters and like stuck people and throw in shape, which I'm not in any shape, but they do all this intense stuff and I love it. And things like that are like naked and afraid if you throw or you throw a bunch of like people up in the woods, like, yeah, don't die. You know, I'll watch a show called Try Not to Die. I'll watch that in a second. And the one I just watched, which my wife walked in and goes, what is this? It's by the same guy that gain, a white guy who I barely know. But I'm not a UFC guy at all. But I used to watch this UFC reality show that was called The Ultimate Fighter. I wouldn't really watch the actual matches, but I love The Ultimate Fighter because it's basically the real world with like twenty crazy roided up dudes just like and they're fighting, they want to heal each other, and it's super nuts. It's like all the stuff you wish the real like people put their fist through walls and stuff and like getting in arguments and that I've found super enjoyable. And now there's a new one. It is slap fighting. What it's people that do you know what slap fighting it's? I mean, is it well? How it sounds? It's all it is on the face, Yes, And it's hard to watch because they knock people out like they're there and you're watching people get head injuries basically, so that when I started, I was like, I think I like this, and then I saw a couple of people take hits that might stick with them for the rest of their lives, and I was like, I don't know if I do like this show. Sorry, So slap fighting, are there rules like your hand has to be open or something. Yeah, it's really new in our country. It's been huge and rush and that's where Dana White found out about it. He was watching all these viral videos of Russian dudes just destroying each other like an abasement somewhere, just like one hit and then the guy gets his hit. But if you knock him out, obviously he's not going to hit you back. So it's really about who gets to go first. Sometimes the guy is guaranteed to knock the other dude out, so it's just I hope I get to go first. If not, I'm losing that. It's crazy. It's crazy too, because like wrestling is so not fake. I know, those guys have to be in like really incredible shape, but it's like planned out kind of right, or at least the un UFC is different. You have CSMMA. That's right, that's real. Right, Yeah, and it's so not me. Yeah, I have not thrown a punch ever. Yeah, I've been hit, but it's not something I enjoy. But I love watching guys do that because I'm also a big action movie nerd too. Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to see the version of slap fighting. That's if it became like ww is it wwew it became like wwe because fake slaps have been a part of acting for such a long time, where somebody slaps and the other person just it's like a thing that happens so much in movies and TV in a fake way, right, it's just so funny that I don't know, yeah, CA and soap operas and stuff. It's just such a big thing. I wonder if they would do like a league of the fake I don't know. Anyways, I'm very disturbed by the slap fighting thing. But it is disturbing. And that's what my wife was like, that's you can't horrible, and I was like, no, you're right, you're right. But we had just watched Milf Island together, so I was like, you can't. Oh you mean milf manner. Yes, sorry, Milf Island was a sketch one thirty Rock. It was a bit on thirty Okay, okay, okay. Do you do this where your brain farts and then you force other people to brain fart because you can't communicate enough to where now they're like, I don't know what that is either. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The thing that I look at that I'm kind of embarrassed about, and me and my friend Brian talk about is some of these like metal gossip sites like Blabbermouth, where it'll be like, oh yeah, Michael Sweet from Striper weighs on and should bands these backing tracks, and then it's like a blurb that one of these guys says apparently there's like a thousands of metal podcasts when these guys are on, and then they reprint it with like a headline to get you to read, and it's like, you know, yeah, well there's also I do I read that? And I love when they make like somebody will say something political and then they'll oh, yeah, really, pylon, because if you're a musician, you're not supposed to have, you know, an opinion about politics, of course, of course, yeah no, yeah, but it's like they will find the most obscure things and making it like six stories. Yes, Oh my god, so incredible. Yeah, I didn't even know. Well, we're gonna take a quick commercial break and we'll be right back, and we're back with Brian Possan. So, Brian, you gave us a lot of incredible topics to discuss today, and the one that me and Vanessa came back to was nerds candy, And so we're just wondering why that was on your list, what your formative memories are of nerds, what's your relationship well being a nerd. It was the first time there was a candy for me. It felt like and I always picked their nerds making it too, so it was like our foodoo, candy for us by us. No, but I mean I've stuck with it. I remember it coming out. It came out in the eighties and it was super addictive, and I love any kind of candy where you're like, I can have just a couple of these, or I could have a thousand at once, you know what I mean. There was there was the option of just dulling them out because they had those two little things on the top. One side was strawberry and one side was grape, and you could just so I'm just gonna have a couple of little grapes and then then you'd open them both and you'd be chugging both at the same time, and then it's empty. Yeah, and you're like fired up for the next six hours. Yeah, did you know? I guess they did an episode. Okay, so just to give you a little background on nerds, they were launched in nineteen eighty three. Yeah. They usually contained two flavors per boxes. You were saying. They did an episode of that show Unwrapped about nerds, and the factory workers said, basically, we start off with a sugar crystal and we just keep coating it with more sugar, which makes sense. It's just basically one piece of yes one crystal sugar just covered with more and more and more sugar. And that they figured it out. Yeah. Yeah, it was like a pop rock without the It wasn't flaky like a pop rock. Yeah, it was more solid. And then it also didn't scare you, like are you eating nerd like around the house or at the movies or hanging with at work at work at record stores like full of caffeine, Like I would combine Nerds with Skittles with like red cooke all day you know, just drinking original coke all day and then wonder why I couldn't leap at night totally. Now do you remember they had a competitor called Dweeves? Do you remember Dweebs? Yes, not a Dweeves fan. Plus, I would never call myself a dweeb, you know what I mean? Like Nerd became cool, dwe was just it's more derogative directory. It's also such a direct rip off. It's like when sketters to compete with Tom's. It's like, can you guys hide it a little more? Yeah, it just feels so. But yeah, I guess they were similar to Nerds, but they were less sour and bigger in size, and they contained three flavors instead of two. So it sounds like they were trying to out nerd Dweebs, or they were trying to out nerd Nerds. They were only on the market for a very short time, and then the other candies that were competing with Nerds were as you mentioned, pop rocks, candy buttons, and Mike and Ikes, which Mike and Ikes are still around it Bigger knikes are still big, are candy buttons. Like the things that were like on paper. Yeah, it was like you're doing the dots of acid to get the paper and then yeah, take the candy off and yeah. Yeah. I was never a fan of those. No, I never liked how they tasted, but they reminded me so much when I was a little kid. Like I'm sure they still have these, but they used to have these like sheets of stick on earrings that were really small, like little like stickers, and they like those candy buttons and so Okay, I think because they reminded me of those, I always thought that they would taste better than they did. Like, I thought i'd like them because I liked the earrings so much, But it turns out just because something looks nice because they're similar shape, they're not the same thing, right, Yeah, yeah, Brian, there's a lot of different spinoffs of nerds rope. Nerd rope, That's what was just about to ask about. I don't know if nerd rope is still around, but I would it was around big time. I would eat a nerd rope. Yeah. What about sour nerds? No, I never got into them. I mean, okay, I like sour patch kids, but sour is not my favorite flavor. Yeah, when I'm feeling candy. Yeah, fair enough. And I'm not even a big I like chocolate, but I think it goes back to that sugar high of like I mean, I still will go to Skittles, and I was still you know, yeah, if I see Nerds in a store, I'm like, oh yeah. I recently was handing out Halloween candy on Halloween, you know, on Halloween and the kids we had Nerds Rope, and the kids were going absolutely bonkers over a Nerds rope. People are really It started in two thousand and one, the Nerds Rope. That's when they came out with it, and it has been a big hit ever since. And if you go on the Nerds website, the things that are currently available are the Nerds Rope, the Nerds candy, big chewy Nerds. Have you ever had those? No, I want it. I'm going to try him now. These are a new thing. And then the newest thing from twenty twenty one Nerds gummy clusters. And I think those are like blow pops, like I think they have gum in the middle. Oh, okay, I don't know, Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. And then of course every Easter Nerds has their jelly beans come out seasonally. I don't know about Nerds gummy clusters. I don't know. That's not something I you know, yeah, that's not what I go to Nerds for. Yeah, exactly. And then it sounds like a lot of work. And then you got it hanging out in your mouth, and then and then you're the guy yeah with the you know, you're the grown person, yeah, with the with the pop yeah in your mouth. The most incredible Nerds spinoff I found in our research was the Nerds cereal. Did you remember that at all? No, there was a Nerd cereal. I'm looking at it now. It hit one side grape, one side strawberry, and you can mail in an offer for a bowl with like a divider in half so you could divide it like real nerds in it. Did they or was it flaky puffy nerds that made to look like that's a good question. I don't know. It was me sugary cereals, but that's that's a different level of sugar when you're when you're just boring Nerds. I don't know if it's just like flavored corn stuff or if it's just actual just Nerds. One of the first. I think it was Comedians, a comedy the movie The Pattent we did of us touring. At one point we'd go to a rest stop and I get nerd rope, and for a while people would bring me nerd rope at a comedy club. So wow, if you want to start that back up listeners, come seeb dancer Bransame dot com. I would love nerd rope. Did you have a favorite flavor with the nerd stuff? I mean, I don't mind the watermelon, but I prefer straight up strawberry and grape. Yeah. Yeah, those are so traditional. Yeah yeah. There used to be a ton of different flavors that they've tried. But then they've also done gumballs bubble gumballs, which seems similar to kind of their new product. And then they also have done like Jumbo Nerds, which is like a box with multiple All this stuff is sort of like come and gone. And then they sometimes make seasonal flavors, including spooky Nerds for Halloween, Frosty Nerds for Christmas, Valentine's Nerds for Valentine's Day, and hopping Nerds for Easter. When't they have these spinoffs? I always picture I know it's way more high tech, but I always picture just an old school guy, like we've got to come up with another you know. Yeah, I know it's not like that at all, but I see things as sketches in my head. So it's always like old timey, you know, the guy at Nerds headquarters. The Valentine Nerds seems like a tough cell as like getting that as a Valentine's Day gift for someone. Yeah, what do you mean? Like, I feel like my wife would be pretty bummed if or some I was like, no, these are Valentine's Day Nerds, right, I don't know if you're a nerd. I guess it's but you gotta get him something else too. You gotta get him something else too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like the kind of like joke part, like I know you love nerds, so here's these, but also here's like a beautiful scarf. Right, do you still eat a lot of candy these days? Or what's your what's your? What do you say? I'm just curious if Nerds are still in your life or been replaced by anything else or right they are at airports when I'm on the road. Yeah, that's something I'll grab definitely. Yeah. Do you have a new like favorite candy that you've discovered more as an adult, Like I know, for me kind of, I guess when I was in high school into college, I you know, kind of quite an international teen, I discovered Kinderbueno, which is they hate oh yeah, yeah, fars. That's sort of a more sophisticated a European candy with hazelnut in it. No, it depends on how high I am after my show and how extensive the selection is. At the Courtyard Marriott, whatever kind of candy they have there, it's usually winds up being Peanut m and M's, Skittles, Snickers a go to, and then I'll throw them all on a bed and cry. Have you have you ever like when you do stand up and stuff? Do you ever put nerds on your any candy on your rider and you can't write? Get good? There's a there's a couple of clubs that really act. We have a cool selection. This the Tacoma Comedy Club and the Spokane Comedy Club. They're all run by the same people, and they have this crazy it looks like a snack bar at an old movie theater, and they have like Rocky road, what's your McCall? It's all these you know, not your regular go to candies. And then I'm always like, how long have these been sitting here? Because right, right, right right, A lot of comics don't eat this kind of stuff, you know, because there's so many of the Joe Rogan type comics that would never eat candy because they're on some crazy workout thing. You know. Well, similarly, I don't know if you've ever gone for a meeting at Netflix. I feel like Netflix, yeah, an incredible candy selection, and I whenever I've been there, I've been like, am I going to be there? I guess I'm gonna be the only one to like to take a bunch of this stuff. But also like I'm not too proud, like I'm gonna they make you really want to work there, Like you walk in and you're like this is the coolest place ever, and and then you go pitch your show and you're like, well that's not happening. But they have a really nice area downstairs. And I always whenever any kind of company I'm Matt has bars like like nutrition bars, like a balanced barkind I'm like, you guys, you guys are really classy, like you're spending right. But to me, I'm always like they're kind of judging me, and they're telling me how to eat right, right, right, Satty, put down on Skittles and try one of these. The thing I remember from being at Netflix was like taking a ton of M and m's in the lobby and like being like, am I the only one? No? I do that too, Okay, you're not. Are you putting the eminem's in your hand or you put them in a bowl or you know, I put them in a cup. Mind your own business, don't worry about it. In my cheeks, in my pockets. That's why guys wear cargo shorts. You just fill them up and bring a bunch of beats. I mean truly. Whenever I do any kind of live show, I always have a huge empty bag with me and then I just leave with so much stuff and I put something on top that makes it look like it's like papers in there or something. Yeah. Yeah, it's so funny because me even s are so similar because we had dan As in the podcast and I used to go the vice offices and just load up on free snap and it's like I feel like, just take stuff you don't even really want and just force yourself to eat it. Yeah, And it's like, do most people do that or is that just like a weird thing. I don't know, because I kind of do it, so I do. Okay, Yeah, I guess we all do it. Maybe it's not that strange. When people don't do it, I feel like they're so classy. And I'm also like, I will never be able to fully relate to you, though I appreciate that you exist in the world, but you're not the same as me. At these comedy clubs, I was saying that, you know, I'm leaving at the end of the night. Every night I took a handful of stuff. I'm like, yeah, this stuff isn't going to eat itself, but better. Yeah. When I used to do touring stuff in Chicago with like Second City and stuff, I was taking waters these water bottle you know, they're not going to drink themselves, as you say, and look, you gotta stay hydrated. All my band friends have at least one guy in their band who overdoes that. Though he's taken the condiments and he's he's taking everything, you know. I can think of a few guys like that. I think there was a time when I was kind of that guy, even as a famously took the TV remote and here before I at one time I was understudying a touring company for Second City, and we in Chicago. We were like on tour somewhere. I had brought all these like water bottles and snacks and stuff back to my hotel room and I was just packing it up to get back into the van. And then when I got home, I was unpacking it and I saw that I had taken one of the TV remotes from the hotel room. It was a like Jonah's laughing so hard. It was I think a low point. But I was going to call them and tell them, and then I thought, look, they have universal remote. I will be embarrassed. They will be embarrassed talking to me on the phone about like there's nobody wins, right. So I just let it go. But it was truly like it should have been a wake up call. And then I just continued taking so much stuff from every show. I would do if you were high, or you had just in a show, or you were like when I post show, to me, that's the time to really down candy or any other snacks. If you could pick any candy, would it be Nerds? That's kind of my ultimate question to you about nerds. No, No, because I have those other go toos now, yeah, so nerds are more nostalgic kind of to you. Yeah, yeah, But if you had to pick a candy today, what would be like? The one candy? I also like See's candy. It's just good, but I will destroy a whole box and then hate myself for an entire wop. So yeah, I don't know. I'm trying to get away from that. I'm actually losing. So but yeah, it would be Snickers or one of the other ones, one of the go toos, and I can just eat pem's all. That's what I was going to say to me, M and M's regular or peanut or even honestly peanut butter. Have you had the bag that's got all three and you know you don't know what put it in your mouth? My friend one who I talked about a lot here, and my friend Alex Fox and I we will get together and we will just eat tons and tons of M and ms and try different eminem flavors. And it's I've tried pretty much all of them, even the ones that Tucker Carlson hates. Well, yeah, he doesn't think they're sexy enough. I think he doesn't want to have sex with those eminem's but a weirdo. Yeah, so it's amazing. Sorry, I don't want to get it is amazing. It is amazing. Yeah, it's we've talked about it on here. It's yeah, I almost said I don't want to get political, but that's not politics that when you're talking about him, it's not even politics. Really odd, that's just weird. Yeah, yeah, totally. All right, Well, so fun, we love nerds, and speaking of we'll be back with these three nerds after a commercial break. Nice, all right, and we're back, so Brian, right now, we're gonna play a quick game with you. It is called legit moan or unnecessary groan. Legit moan, necessary groan. This segment was inspired by a now defunct column in our local newspaper growing up, the Cleveland Plane Dealer, called Monday Moaning. We used to read We're every Monday. The paper would print extremely petty complaints the readers had. I was able to kind of dig back into the archives and find some We used to read these as kids all the time. So we're going to pick three basically, and at the end we'll decide if each of these are a legit moan or unnecessary groan, like if they're a legit complaint or they're a little superfluous. Okay, hey, I can read the first time you kick us off in US. Okay, So this one is from Westlake, Ohio, and this is probably like it's around like twenty ten. This was submitted. Okay. It is so aggravating to turn the TV on any time of night or day to be greeted with some lawyer or law firm or college commercial. Why am I paying every month to be advertised to? Right? Do you think that's a legit complaint or no? No, I can't even get my head around that. Their arguments, well, it seems like they don't understand how like capitalism or like business. Yeah, I think they don't understand advertising exactly, Like, oh, I'm paying for TV? Why are they advertising? This is something I'm paying for already? Right, But now they kind of don't. But although some are again bringing it back and I'm like, I thought I got Hulu without the ads, but who knows, right, Yeah, like that's how TV works, Like you want the souls and they helped fund Like you, paying a loan is part of it. And if you want to pay for like a premium channel that doesn't have commercials, that's a separate thing. But regular cable does have commercials, and that's maybe she just got cable. Maybe there's another one where she would retracts. She's like two weeks later, I'm sorry. Now I just everything I watch as commercials. I didn't know. I'm so sorry. I think it's so funny that they're mad that it's a college commercial, like which I guess a movie advertising college in their life. Look, I don't want to get preached out about getting a higher education. Don't tell me what to think or do or how to think better. Yeah, very I'm greeted with some of the lawyer, law firm or college commercial like what about what? Like they're grouping list together. But then it's also like, are you bothered by the other commercial about products? Which are most commercials? Yeah? Right, the bulk of commercials which are not these things. Look, I'm glad this person had an outlet, but I think we all agree that this is an unnecessary groan. Yes, Jonah. Next up this one the city isn't listed. The moan is. This moan goes out to the people that I waited on at my restaurant job on Wednesday, July seventh, despite my best efforts, and I was extremely busy. They delayed me taking their order. You deemed yourself more important than everything else going on in the world, and they decided that on a thirty nine dollars tab they only left me a tip of forty six sense I sure hope that made your day, Brian, What do you think that's legitimate? Yeah, at least they're not getting tipped. Well, I don't understand the other complaint. They were mad because it took so long to get their order. That's kind of issue with these things sometimes these people that write into this have a hard time kind of focusing their complaint. I think this stuff about I was extremely busy, they delayed me in taking their order, and then you deemed yourself more important than everything else going on in the world. That feels, okay, like I'm not really on your side now when this person said that on a thirty nine dollars have they only left me a tip of forty six cents? I'm going to come full circle here, then, I feel like, oh, I understand that complaint forty nine cents is so rude. But then if you like kind of read between the lines here this person's attitude, like the way that this person kind of views them saying you viewed yourself more important than everything else in the world, Like I do wonder if these there's more to this story. There's more to this stuff. Yeah, exactly if there's the other side of somebody going, look, I was having trouble deciding on what to get. You kept harassing me. Apparently your time is way more important than my time as a customer. I'm so sorry. So I tipped forty six cents to be a jerk, Yeah yeah, and make a point. It might be nice to get the complaint out of the customers and see what they experienced on that. Yeah. Yeah, I'm with Brian and you. I think I think there's more to this story. But yeah, they think these customers deemed themselves more important than everything else is going on in the world. Sounds like that sounds like a big judgment call just because they were like, we need another second to look, yeah, like we get that you're busy. Yeah yeah, yeah, so I think, yeah, but I do reach. It's a reach, but I do think the forty six cent tip is pretty harsh. I mean, it's like that, totally, totally. It's thirty nine dollars and you gotta you're trying to make us pretty. That's absolutely not okay, you gotta tip people. But I also would say, if I was going out to eat, I wouldn't necessarily want this person to be my server, just because it seems like they might have of their own kind of inner personal stuff going on. Yeah, okay, all right, Vanessa. When I read the last one, sure, okay. This one's from Lakewood, Ohio to the man walking a dog in Lakewood Park while we were watching the sunset, just so snarky. Okay, No, we did not think it was cute that your dog peat on our bike. Another reason not to have dogs allowed in the park. You could have pulled him away from the bike. Oh my god, Brian, what do you think as a dog owner? I'm gonna pee on them forgetting mad at the dog doesn't know. Also the fact that they we were just watching the sunset. It makes me mad and I don't know why. Yeah, I know, I know. Well, because it's also like it's not your alpha Romeo. It's your likes your mountain bike, Like, what's the You're grinding it over gravel, right, but you're also doing something you could kind of do anywhere. Yes, yes, but you went this is my this is my sunset area. Yeah, and you got into my space where I'm watching. You know, I don't Yeah, yeah, I agree, Big Old Park. I also wonder if the owner of the dog was like, I'm so sorry, like laughing in that, you know, like that's rocky or whatever they do. It's not funny. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we did not think it was cute that your dog pete on our bike. I thought that the person laughed. I made the person laughing, but I think the owner said that they anyways, it was like, isn't this dog cute? And look, I just think you left your bike out, you're in the park, you're watching the sunset. You know. I think this person maybe might need a little bit of an attitude adjustment. Yeah, yeah, yes, I think they need to. They're creating some drama because their license pretty boring. Let's go to the park and watch a sunset, Like yeah, yeah, I don't know if you're so scared of dogs peeing on your bike. Maybe watch the sunset from home anywhere. Yeah, literally anywhere and everywhere anywhere else, or walked to the park or drive then you won't have a bike there to bepd on. There's a whole lot going on. There's a whole lot going, lot going on. Yeah, once again, I feel like we're not getting the full story. But I think we're all going to call this one an unnecessary grow At least these other people have kind of tried to end their complaints with like a little bit of a wrap up sentence. This person's last sentence was you could have pulled him away from the bike. Learn to write much. Look, and yeah, they're still thinking about it. They're writing letters anonymously. I mean, it's it's they can let it go. I think they can let it go. Okay, So I think this is two unnecessary groans and one legit moan, and the legit moan being the middle one, which is the tip. And yet we still aren't totally one hundred percent with that person, but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt. That tracks incredible, well, Brian. This has gone very quickly, and this feels like we just started. But it's time to wrap up and ask you you know where people find you, your tour, your your social media media, all of it. I have a new special that's everywhere, and I know it's people got charged some places, but it's free right now on YouTube. So do that and then don't complain about paying for it somewhere else. Okay, But Brian Pisin dot com, I do most of my social media and then the rest of it's done by my buddy since high school. But tour dates are out there and I'm doing a fair amount of touring. I'm going to be at Moontower in Austin. Oh great too, Yeah, yeah, that'll be great. I'm very excited to check out your comics series The Acts with Joe Truman as well. That looks incredible. Yeah oh yeah, yeah, that came out great. It should be in a like hardcover at some point. And then I've got more books coming through through Image Comics next year, another one with Joe called Rifters That's about Time Cops. And then I wrote a skateboarding comic book called Grommets with another buddy of mine. Amazing. Yeah, I can't wait to check those out. Yeah, well, thank you. That was so much fun. I think for having me. Thanks so much for being here. Thanks everyone for listening. If you enjoyed that, please subscribe to the podcast and keep an eye out for next week's episode of How Did We Get Weird? We will discuss more stories from our childhood and cultural touchstones like nerds. Thanks so much, Brian. This is great. Thanks guys, Thanks Brian,
