Narrator/Host 1 (1:03)

The Knot brings everything together in one place. Vendors who get your vibe, a custom planning checklist, guest list tools, and a free wedding website that syncs with it all. So instead of juggling a dozen apps and spreadsheets, you can actually enjoy getting married. Get started@thenot.com audio the Knot let's plan your wedding together. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Listening to this podcast Smart move. Being financially savvy Smart move. Another smart move Having State Farm help you create a competitive price when you choose to bundle Home and auto bundling. Just another way to save with a personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings and eligibility vary by state.

Narrator/Host 2 (1:54)

Foreign.

Kevin Allison (2:02)

Hey folks, this is Risk the show where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. I'm Kevin Allison and every Thursday we release these special episodes where we look back at content from our earlier years. Just a quick reminder that my next online storytelling workshop starts April 8, 2026. Beginners seasoned pros People who want various sorts of stories for various sorts of different reasons. Everyone is welcome. Just email me at kevinriskdashow.com and I'll give you more info. Now. This week, an episode that premiered in December of 2013. It's an episode we call Impulsive.

Narrator/Host 3 (3:23)

Hello, kids.

Kevin Allison (3:24)

This is Risk, the show where people

Narrator/Host 3 (3:26)

tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share.

Kevin Allison (3:29)

I'm Kevin Allison, and this is Gawk Ben behind me. Now, you wanted it, you got it. Gawk Ben.

Narrator/Host 4 (3:39)

Jackass.

Kevin Allison (3:41)

Today's episode is called Impulsive. Three very different stories where people make sudden, unusual decisions and things get kind

Narrator/Host 4 (3:52)

of out of hand.

Kevin Allison (3:53)

In a little bit, we're going to hear from a fellow named J.J. who took a workshop with us at thestorystudio.org,

Narrator/Host 3 (4:00)

but before that, we're gonna start with

Kevin Allison (4:03)

writer, actress, comedian Lauren Cook, who told this story at the Risk Live show in Los Angeles. We call it Casual Encounter.

Narrator/Host 2 (4:27)

So when I was 25, two really significant things happened. First, both of my childhood best friends announced that they were getting married at about the same time. And second, my boyfriend at the time, Ryan Bomba, dumped me. He invited me to a rock in Central park, and he said, lor, Sometimes I just. I want to be with someone who has a 401K. And so when he said that, I was surprised. Ryan, this is a side note. Ryan was the type of guy who literally, his catchphrase was, you may be the bomb, but I am the Bomba. There was a lot of shitty wordplay. I was not anticipating that I would be the one getting dumped. So I was, as I said, I was sad and mad and angry. And eventually I felt like I was getting all these signals that I was behind. I was falling behind. Like, I wasn't making the milestones that I needed to with my best friends and with a career. And so I came full circle and I was like, yeah, I need to get a 401k right away or no one will ever love me. And so I turned, you know, I went online, as we do, and so I was on, like, OkCupid and LinkedIn for my two goals, and neither was working. Fuck online dating. Really hated that. The whole thing was just an uncomfortable interview. So all of this is just background, guys. This is just background to justify the fact that I started spending a lot of time on casual encounters, Craigslist. And you have to justify that as a straight person. This isn't Grindr. For the gay men out there, Casual encounters is the bottom of the barrel. Casual encounters is the. The perverted, maybe violent bottom of the barrel. But. And, you know, and that's not to say that people don't dabble. I think a lot of people dabble. Dabble will do ya for casual encounters. But I spent a lot of time there. I had, like, a designated email address for exchanging pictures and I would, like, have dirty jets at work. It was all. I never met anyone in person because I didn't want to get stab raped. But I, you know, it was fulfilling some need because I kept doing it until one day, one day I read a post that caught my attention and it said, will you be my date? And I remember thinking like, oh, brother, this is going to be like, will you be my date to lick my balls while my mom licks my ass or whatever the rest of them say. But it was. It was, will you be my date For a legitimate date. This guy, his name was Elliot, his friend was getting married that very weekend and his date had dropped out and he bailed on him. And so he needed somebody in three days to step in and go to this wedding in New Jersey with him. And I was sort of like, well, I'm free this Saturday and every Saturday. So I failed to mention when I was so sad, when I was sad about the breakup. I put on about 15 pounds, which is part of the reason that, like, regular online dating wasn't working for me. I was feeling really, really shitty about myself. As I'm exchanging emails with this guy that I met on casual encounters for this wedding, I just, we're making these plans and I started thinking, like, wait, he seems cool. Like, he seems really cool. Like, he's just like me. Like, all his friends are getting marri and he's just been disappointed by this ex. And I don't know, this might be the romantic story we tell our grandchildren. And I pictured him like, a lot like Paul Rudd. He wrote emails like a Paul Rudd. And so I wanted to ask him for a picture, but I didn't want to be shallow, but I was like, super amped for this wedding. So cut to the day of the wedding. I get ready to meet my husband. And Elliot was five' four at the very tallest. He was over 45 years old. He had slicked back hair and he rocked a lot of rings. He looked like my cousin Vinny. Or like if somebody from the Jersey shore, like their sick dad maybe, like if Ronnie's dad had leukemia, that was Elliot. So. But right away he kisses my hand and he, like, pulled out the chair and he sort of turned on the charm and it was a little over the top, but it was kind of working. Like, I had been binge eating and crying in public and this was like the first guy to show me some attention. And plus, the gears were in motion for this whole Wedding. So I was like, okay, I'm gonna make this work. Eventually, we get into the rental car, we have to drive to New Jersey, and Elliot hands me a flask, which I was super on board with at the time. So we're drinking on the way up, and he leans over and he said, you know, we should probably coordinate our lies. He didn't want to tell all his friends that he had met me on Casual Encounters. Shocker. So I was like, oh, right, yeah, I hadn't thought of that. Okay. So we decided that we had met at work. He owned a company, and I was one of his clients, and. Okay, okay. And then it clicked. Like, oh, my God, I can lie through this entire evening. Like, I don't have to go there and tell them my sad story about, you know, being dumped and having. I was temping. I was getting paid, like, $12 an hour. I can go and just say whatever bullshit spews right out of my mouth. So the minute we walked in, I was on cloud nine, because not only did I have a huge, long list of lies that I was dying to tell these strangers, but I had this great audience because all the people at the wedding already knew each other. They were all friends already. So I was the new mysterious lady. So everybody kind of wanted to get to know me, you know? It was like, I used to be a lesbian. I was also an acrobat. I was a lesbian acrobat. We all lived together. That's how it worked. And by dinner time, I was hitting it out of the park. All of Elliot's friends loved me. I was telling lots of stories. And then I got up, and I was rolling solo, and I made friends with all the bride's family. I made friends with all the groom's family. I was, like, having one on ones, like, exchanging phone numbers. If there had been a president of this wedding, I was lobbying hard for that position. When the dancing started, I was dancing with the bride, and then I was dancing with the grandma of the bride. I'm like, I'm certainly all over this wedding video. I felt like I suddenly had a room full of best friends, which was exactly what I was missing. And at about the 11th hour of the wedding, when the only people who are left are extremely, extremely drunk, I excuse myself to go to the bathroom, and out of the blue, one of Elliot's friends, Danny, pops up. And Danny is a really attractive guy. He looks like Mark Wahlberg. He asked me if I wanted to do some coke, and I. I'm, like, really notoriously bad. At snorting things at all. Like, I'm a big nerd about drugs in general. And my first reaction was to be like, but weddings are for families. Like, why would we. But in that moment of, like, pretending to be this exciting lesbian acrobat, I was like, yes, please. Thank you. And so I took the little bag that he gave me. The second time in my life that I'd ever been in contact with cocaine. I go in the bathroom, I come back out, I'm like, I nailed that. I nailed that. Danny was there waiting, and he had three friends around him. They're all looking at me very expectantly. And he was like, did you do it? And I was like, yeah. And he goes, do you feel good? And I was like, yeah. He goes, where's the rest of it? And I said, what do you mean? I did it all. Because I really believed that that little baggie was my portion. Like, I thought I had. It never occurred to me that they. So slowly I'm processing that these four guys, I have popped, polished off enough coke for them to do for the whole rest of the evening, and they are not happy with me. One of them, like, punched a wall. And I'm also. You know, I can see my heart just beating out of my chest. Like, am I gonna die? Am I gonna. So I need to go find Elliot and tell him what happened. But right away, it sort of felt like somebody turned the lights on. Like, I started seeing the entire reception in this very different way. And so I'm looking for Elliot. I find the bride. And the bride has. Her dress is torn. She's smoking a cigarette. One of her eyelashes is on her cheek, and the other eyelashes on her eyebrow. And she's like, bitch, thank you for coming. I'm so glad you came to my wedding. You know? And then, like. And then there's two old ladies whose nipples are exposed, and there's a guy who had emphysema. Like, he had, like, an oxygen tank, but there was also a nitrous tank right near that. It was, like, just too much for me to handle. And so I kind of. I rush to find Elliot. I go back to the hotel room where he was staying the night, and I tell him what happened. I'm like, your friends are mad at me. Is this like Pulp Fiction? Am I gonna die? And he came to exactly my tits. Like, that's what. And he put his hand. He held my face in his hands, and he said, baby, it's okay. I've got more coke. And then he started rubbing my back which was kind of comforting. And that was nice. And then he started rubbing my ass. And then I was like, oh, this is that moment. It felt very spring breakers. Like, I knew that I was the girl who wanted to get on the bus and go home. Like, I had had a blast. This was fantastic. But it was time to go home. And so the only thing that was preventing me from going home was finding my sneakers. I had to find my sneakers. And so I started aggressively looking around the room for my sneakers. And just as aggressively, Elliot is trying to take my clothes off. And so we were doing this sort of bizarre cat and mouse game. Luckily, he was quite a bit smaller than I was. So he would try to, like, throw me on the bed, but I would just sort of step to the side, and then he would fall on the floor. And then I would, like, go over to that corner. And the same thing kept happening. Like, slam his head into the wall. And eventually he just full on licked the whole side of my face, like, all the way up. And that's when I grabbed my bag and I ran down the hall barefoot, left my shoes behind, and I was like, thanks for everything. And then I called a car and I threw up in my purse on the way home. I really was so proud of that, too. I was like, not one drop spelled. And I never saw Elliot again. But he did text me and call me for about six months, and he really wanted to, like, catch up and give me my shoes. And eventually he resorted to offering me a job because he owned a company, and the job came with full benefits, including a 401k. But I didn't take it. I didn't want that stupid job. Okay, that's it. Thank you,

Narrator/Host 4 (17:30)

Sam. So I was born and raised in Brooklyn, in the Bushwick East New York section of Brooklyn. And my family was a family of immigrants. They were Jamaican. So at this time in the 70s and 80s and 90s, you know, you had a lot of immigrants in New York City in general, but you had a lot of black immigrants from the Caribbean in different parts of Brooklyn, particularly Flatbush, Crown Heights. Bushwick was another area that you had a lot of big influx of immigrants coming to live and buying, like, homes and apartments, et cetera. So that's kind of where I was raised. This is the 1980s, this is the 80s, and crack was, you know, abundant in the neighborhood. It was abundant in the area for me. I grew up around drugs in general because my father hustled, and I had several other relatives who played in that space. So I knew about it, but my mom would tell me real simply, like, life is about choices. The time you take to choose to go to a party is the time you could have been studying. The time you choose to go hang out in the corner is the time you could have been doing something else. So when something bad happens, she would always reflect back on choices that's made. And, you know, when you're young, you can sometimes you can rebound from some choices, but you can't rebound from them all. As I went to school, you know, my mother, being the Jamaican woman that she is, she had a lot of pride in education. She didn't finish school, but she went to college. And for the most part, she had a blue collar job her whole life. So growing up, you know, it was just her, myself, and my other sibling. And she ended up remarrying when I was about 15 to somebody else. 15, 16. But the guy should be remarried. He wasn't, to me, a very stellar example of what a man should be. So that's kind of the neighborhood that I grew up in. A lot of things kids shouldn't see. A couple people killed a few people. There's a guy in my neighborhood named Shushan, he was notorious for being a bad dude. He was a robber, a drug dealer. You know, he shot a few people at the time. So he had a reputation in the neighborhood, went to jail, came back home, you know, so it was easy to fall into that mix because in that kind of neighborhood, they always looking for somebody that's young, that's tough, that got heart, that's not scared of doing certain things, you know, to put on a team with them, you know, because you, when you're young, you get less time or, you know, your perspective of risk is different than when you're an adult. You don't have children, you don't have responsibilities. So, you know, your perspective of risk is super low. And the reward for you is a lot higher. Especially when you're growing up around certain things where, you know, your life expectancy is very young, is not to live past 25. And you don't see a lot of wealth in your household. The people that I hanged around, you know, the majority of them, I would say, did not go to college. The majority of them, I would say they went to high school. And probably high school was probably it. Every person that taught me and I went to public school generally look like you. When I say look like you were, you're white and I'm black. Everybody that went to school with me, now students though, were generally black, Latino. So thank God I did very well in school. You know, highest SAT score in the school's history. I was very. I had a very good memory. Wasn't very good at doing work, but I had a good memory. So I could pretty much. If you would tell me something, I could pretty much retain it during test time. So when I got to college, it was a very rude awakening, because it's too much information for you to remember. I went to a small school in Connecticut called Wesleyan University. Very good academic school. But, you know, that first year was a rude awakening because now everybody around you is white, and everybody that goes to school with you is white, and everybody teaches you is white. Different dynamic, right? And then you're also meeting black people now who also didn't grow up in the kind of lifestyle that, you know. You know, I had to. I had to essentially learn how to study. Learn how to read and learn how to write all over again. You know, when you come from what I come from, and then you get exposed to that kind of lifestyle when you get exposed to going to school with, like, Dustin Hoffman's daughter went to school with me and Governor of New Jersey, Christine Whitman, her daughter went to school with me. So, you know, you go into school with these people, and it's like, okay, you've seen that moms and dads pick them up in, like, limousines or town cars during homecoming or whatever the case is. And you're like, wow. So when you get that exposure now, it's kind of like, okay, I can't. I'm not gonna go back to that. I gotta make something of myself. When I got out of college, leaving college, I had to figure out what it is I wanted to do with my life. And I decided to go work on Wall street, and I could have got an apartment with some buddies or some friends of mine, but my mother, you know, she lived in a brownstone in Brooklyn. It was kind of like, well, I got this house, My tenants are moving. Why don't you live upstairs and just pay me rent rather than give it to somebody else? So for me, it was kind of like, yeah, I know.

Narrator/Host 3 (23:09)

Home.

Narrator/Host 4 (23:09)

I could go home. It's not a big deal, at least for me. I always heard the thing about called black flight, where you would hear, once you people got educated and started to make some decent living for themselves, they would never come back and return to the communities that they came from. And I didn't want to be that guy. I didn't want to be the guy that was Removed from his community. Like, I couldn't empathize with what still was going on in these urban environments. And I didn't want that to happen to me. I still to this day don't want that to happen to me. So as a result, you know, I decided to, you know, I can come back, I'm single, I could, you know, I can. This is not a big deal. And some people who, I won't say jealous, but they don't appreciate kind of what you accomplished to them is not really a big deal. It's like, all right, why you came back home. So. And you come back home and then, you know, you get back into this mentality of surviving, living for today, not for tomorrow. You get. I got. And I can't speak for everybody, but I got caught up again. Once again, you start hanging around with the same folks who are not doing anything. They're thinking very small. So even though I was working and when I came home on the weekends, I would see some folks because you work as a banker, you're not really coming home, you're working 60 hour weeks, right? When you did get home, when I. That little free free time I have, you're seeing folks and they talk a little bit of shit and it's all right, some of them did, some of them didn't. But I was pretty respected, you know, I had a decent amount of respect in the community I was from. I say I was a good fighter when I grew up, I used to have against a lot of fights, so fist fights. People knew, you know, I'm protect myself. But you still have some people who, you know, I'm gonna call them haters, but a little bit of hater. One day I happened to come home from work early and as I was walking past that street, I happened to see some guys that I knew, like I know pretty much all my life. They have. A couple of them was outside the car, a couple of them was inside the car talking. So they started a conversation like, hey, what's going on? What you up to? Just shooting the. Like we normally do. Because I play basketball, a lot of these guys on Sundays, so they see me in the park, you know, I mean, I still was in the game community. And as we was having this conversation, you know, this guy wasn't involved in the center of attention anymore. Now to give you some perspective on Shushan's temperament, his name was Shushan because he was real dark and like I would see or hear stories of what things he would do. For example, he might see a Party outside and can't get into the party and then shoot outside so he could shut the party down. He's a guy that, if you had Julian and you were young, he would try to rob you for your jewelry and stick you up. He had been shot multiple times. He has shot multiple people. He's been in jail several times. So at the time, I was about 24. This guy's probably like 34, 35, so about 10 years older than me. But his reputation was that of someone who, you know, was a very dangerous person. He told me to shut up first. This was what they call. He told me, shut up. Like, what are you doing over here? Why don't you. You don't belong over here. That was the exact word. You don't belong over here. What are you doing over here? I looked at him and I'm like, what? Like, you my father, I could still do what I want. I'm a grown man. You a grown man. Like, I ain't talking to you. Mind your business. And his friends start laughing at him in the car once his friends start laughing at him. You know, I think he was offended. He was like, yo, you know what I do to you? You know I hurt you. And I looked at him, I'm like, so come do it then. Since you. You just big and bad person. Like, I'm not scared of you. I know what you're capable of, but that doesn't mean that I can't do the same thing. I'm not scared of you. So he comes at the car. He, like, reached as if he had, like, a weapon. So I had a bag, because I would always carry around my laptop computer with me. The bag that I was carrying at the time, I dropped it on the floor. I looked around. I was like, okay, what you got a knife or something? And he didn't have a knife. He was just trying to scare me initially. But then he approached me. He swung at me. When he swung at me, I boxed. So I knew. My immediate instinct was to fight back. And I hit him a few times. And as I was getting the best of him, he said, open the trunk. Open the trunk. As if he was going to get his gun. That's when I realized, okay, this is not a game anymore. But I was so upset because I hadn't been around that level of intensity in a very, very long time. So I ran. I ran from the street that I was on.

Narrator/Host 2 (27:21)

He.

Narrator/Host 4 (27:22)

When we were talking, we're talking pretty much on the corner of a block that I lived on. So I Had to run around them. I ran to my house. Now, growing up, I always kept a gun in my house. I've owned a gun since I was 16 years old. I own a 9 millimeter legally, since I was 16 years old, I never had to use it. I've always had it. And I shot it a few times and you know, but never at anybody. But in my kind of neighborhood, you got to make sure you always have something like that because you always hear stories of folks, houses getting broken into or. So this is the time I had to go use it. So I went to my house, dropped my bags and the level. I was so angry that I pretty much forgot about everything that I, that I had going for me. And I began thinking about, okay, how am I going to get away with this murder that I'm about to commit? I got the gun, I got some black gloves and I ran outside. And it was about 5 o' clock in the afternoon, late August, broad daylight. So when I ran down the street with the gun in my hand from my house, I was headed back toward where the car was. And he had to see me. He didn't have no choice because he was there. When he was there, he knew I was gonna come back. Because that's what people like me do. And that's what people like him do. They come back because that's what, you know. So when Peyton told me come out with the gun and he ran toward me, he knew already that, okay, this is gonna be a real ugly situation, real, real quick, and ran in front of the gun. Peyton is a good friend of mine. Actually he's a brother, older brother of one of my friends that I grew up with. And Peyton also sell drugs out of state, so drugs in New York. P had been in jail for a couple times with. But I grew up with Peyton a lot, so I knew him very well to the point that, like, you know, we would play basketball together. I talk shit, Tony, talk shit to me. And he said, don't do it, don't do it. You're gonna lose too much. Don't do it. It ain't worth it. And as I was shaking with the gun in my hand, I told him to move. I said, peyton, move out the way, move out the way. And he wouldn't move. He said, don't do it, don't do it. He ain't worth it. You gonna shoot him or he gonna shoot you? Like it ain't worth it. You don't really want to do this. And he didn't believe I was Gonna shoot him. So he moved out the way. He's like, you're not gonna do it. And I started to point the gun, and I was gonna press the trick. He said, no, no. He grabbed my hand, and I pushed him away. And he grabbed my hand again, and I hit him. I was gonna shoot him. He's like, you really don't want to do this. If you do this, just recognize there's no coming back from this. You don't want to be like this. This is not you. And he grabbed my hand, and I saw people look at me look on the street. And he pushed my hand down. And I was furious because I was real, real close to shooting him. And I felt like I should have still shot him anyway, and I didn't do it. And he. And he walked me back to my house. He was like, yo, go in the house. Go in the house. Put the gun away. Go in the house. And I went in the house, and I went upstairs. I went to my roof, and I looked on the roof and was like, okay, where can I hide the gun just in case somebody calls the cops? And I hid the gun, and I came back downstairs, and I stayed in my house that night. And I was furious because I was real, real close to shooting him, and I felt like I should have still shot him anyway. I was probably more upset about that. For the first three hours that I was in the house, I was probably more said that he didn't let me do it. Then after that phase of rage, I was in a state of shock, like, wow, I almost shot somebody. And I would have been in jail right now, or I would have to figure out, like, put the gun on him, and think through the rationale of how I got away with this. And I prayed to God and I said, God, I gotta make some choices, because if this is gonna happen to me when I'm in this community and I need to leave at this point. And lo and behold, a month later, I went to a seminar about business school, and I ended up applying to grad school. I applied to Harvard Business School, and I got in, and I left subsequently, the next year. We live in a society where a lot of men, they only have pride. And pride is a dangerous thing. It's important to have pride. Pride in your work, pride on how you carry yourself. But on the flip side, that pride can also get you in trouble. And a lot of people right now are in jail because of pride in the community where I live, once again, right, you can't be. Could be considered, quote, unquote soft because then things will consistently happen to you. It's almost like getting bullied. You can't get bullied because when the first time you get bullied then everybody's gonna get try to bully you no matter what age you are. And even now as an older man sometimes now I could probably let things pass because I'm a little bit more seasoned, I'm a little more mature. But at that particular time, 23, 24, you still live in the mentality even with a college education that it can happen, it can happen and I could lose all of this in a split second.

Narrator/Host 3 (32:10)

Foreign.

Kevin Allison (32:15)

Hey folks, It's Kevin in 2026 again. If you love Risk, please help us elevate the profile of the show, help us attract more people to be listeners and shout down the haters by writing us reviews and giving us five star ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or or podchaser. Those reviews are super helpful. They do end up helping us keep the show running. So thank you so much for your support. This episode of Risk is sponsored by BetterHelp. We're taking a moment to celebrate women and all that they carry at Work in Relationships in Families. March includes International Women's Day and between caring for others and managing unseen responsibilities, women's emotional well being can easily be overlooked. Take a moment to celebrate a woman in your life who's had a lasting and memorable impact on you, and let's all reflect on the roles we play, the expectations we place on them, the pressures they face. Feel therapy can help create balance, set healthy boundaries and support overall well being for everyone. Now at Better Help, their therapists work according to a strict code of conduct and are fully licensed in the US BetterHelp does the initial matching work so you can focus on your therapy goals and find someone who's good for you and and if you aren't happy with your match, you can switch to a different therapist at any time. With over 30,000 therapists, BetterHelp is the world's largest online therapy platform, having served over 6 million people globally. With an average rating of 4.9 out of 5 for a live session based on over 1.7 million client reviews, your emotional well being matters. Find support and feel lighter in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off@betterhelp.com risk. That's betterhelp.com risk.

Narrator/Host 1 (34:38)

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Narrator/Host 3 (35:08)

This episode is brought to you by White Claw. Search Great podcast. Pick friend.

Narrator/Host 4 (35:12)

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Narrator/Host 3 (35:13)

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Narrator/Host 4 (35:22)

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Narrator/Host 3 (35:26)

Unleash White Claw Surge. Please drink responsibly. Hard seltzer with flavors 8% alcohol by volume. White Claw Seltzer Works Chicago, Illinois. Here you walk through the garden. You better watch your back but I beg your pardon what? I'm staying there. Outside if you walk with Jesus, you'll save your soul. You gotta keep the devil down in the hole. This is Risk. This is the Blind Boys of Alabama behind me.

Kevin Allison (36:15)

Now one final story today from one of our favorites, Mr. Danny LaBelle. He told this one at the Risk Live show at the Nerd Melt Theater in Los Angeles. We call it Fat Darn Cat

Narrator/Host 3 (36:32)

Way down in the Hole. We're down in the hole. When I was 19 years old, I moved to the Upper east side of Manhattan, started college, started comedy, and was selling light bulbs to businesses door to door to make money. And I didn't like that much the light bulb part of that. I don't like the college part much either, but doesn't feed the story. I so I was looking for something else. I wanted to figure out another way to make money. And I really didn't want to have a day job. And I came upon a specie of hairless cat known as the Cornish Rex at a pet shop on Lexington Avenue in 78th street called Pets on Lex. And I had an idea. A light bulb went off. You could say. The cat was $2,000. And I remembered a conversation with a friend of mine recently was saying, you know, they'd love to have a dog, but their ability doesn't allow dogs and they have cat allergies. And this is a hypoallergenic hairless cat. And I started thinking, there's probably a lot of rich people on the Upper east side of Manhattan in this predicament. And I could probably become pretty successful breeding these hypoallergenic hairless cats, and I wouldn't have to sell light bulbs anymore. I devised a whole plan. I started walking around the doorman buildings on Central Park East. I noticed they all have bulletin boards, like, somebody's got a couch for sale. And I noticed some people had, like, English bulldog puppies for sale. I'm like, oh, I'm gonna beat those motherfuckers. You know, just wait till I unleash these Cornish rexes. I approached several doormen with a business proposition before I started to feel out the waters where I'm like, you know who all the lonely people are who would be cat ladies if they didn't have cat allergies. I got a new hot product coming in. You pitch the cats to the right people, make the connections for me. I give you 10% on every cat sale. That's a good deal, right? And a few doormen were like, yeah, I could do that. You know, I was like, this is this I can't fail pet shop selling them for 2,000 bucks, have seven of them in a litter. $14,000. That's math, folks. I had $1,000. I had a friend named Dave. I said, dave, I need another thousand to get this started. Then we'll save up. We'll get another cat. We split the money. What do you think? My friend Dave's kind of an idiot. So he said, yeah. I mean, not more so than me. We're both idiots in this story. So Dave and I go to Pets on Lex, and we buy a Cornish rex and we name it lex. It's getting Dr. Seussy, folks. And upon this Lex there is put a hex and I. So we asked the guy, we're preparing to buy a female. We bought the male. We said, when are you going to have some females in? The guy says, two weeks. And really that's enough time to raise whatever we need. And that's great. He says, yeah, come in two weeks, we'll have a female. In the meantime, we bought the male, brought it back to my apartment. It proceeded to hump the shit out of everything I owned. I mean, it was the horniest cat in the world. And I was thinking, like, it was great for a cat breeding business. I was at first very excited. I was like, this is the stallion right here. This guy, he's a stud. We're gonna have so many kittens. I'm gonna be a millionaire. And that was like, day one, and then day two, the pillow was sticky. And then it kept Going and going. I'm like just counting down. Two weeks. Two weeks. We're getting the money together. We're gonna get this. With this female, he's gonna have something to fuck. It's gonna work out, you know, in the meantime, everything I own is getting covered in kitty cum. Everything. Two weeks go by, we have the money. We show up at Pets on Lex, two eager entrepreneurs ready to start their lives in the cat breeding business. This is right at the height of cat breeding too, folks. Before everyone was doing it. And the guy says, hey, listen, we hit a bump in the road. Well, it is a bump because technically you'll find out the breeder got breast cancer. And that's a bump in the road. It's not the road, but it's a bump. All right. He tells us the breeder that he gets the cats from is in Hungary, which is, you know, I guess he was keeping it local and. And she had just found out she has breast cancer. He's like, she's got to take care of that first before she ships out. That's a reasonable thing, right? She's a. Before she ships us any more cats. The business, her business has been put on hold because of the breast cancer diagnosis. So we're like, well, what are we supposed to do, you know, we gotta get a female. He's like, I don't know when the next female's gonna keep coming in and checking back with me. In the meantime, I recommend you guys look elsewhere. So we did, and we could not find another Cornish rex in the tri state area. And we weren't ambitious enough to leave the tri state area. We were looking especially to color match them because we're like, oh, nobody's gonna want a multi colored, hypoallergenic, careless cat. You know, time goes on. Cat is relentless. Everything I own is now covered in catcom. Everything. And I start saying, dave, you know, we're business partners in this. You know, I think maybe you should take the cat for a little while over to your place, switch up the responsibility. And I think that's part of being part of this kind of business. And he's like, dan, I'm not taking the cat. That's how he talks. Good impression. If you knew him. Dan, I'm not taking the cat. This is your idea. It's your responsibility. I'm like, yeah, but you stand to profit 50% of all that great cat money that's coming in. You know, that's not fair. He's like, I'm not taking the cat. No, it's not happening. I had to stand up for myself. I'm like, dave, if you don't take this cat soon, I'm getting him neutered, and the whole business is done. He's like, I don't care. You'd never do it. I'm like, don't call my bluff. But I didn't want to do it. You know, it's a big investment. So I kept giving him extensions, extension and extension. I'm like, three more weeks if you don't take this cat. And he's blowing right through these extensions. He's not even showing any signs that he might take the cat. One day, I hit my breaking point, and I got that cat neutered. Business over. Business over. But I still had a cat. And he hated me. He hated me from the start. When he came back to my crappy apartment, and he's like, this is not what $2,000 cats are supposed to live in. He's like, I'm not supposed to be slumming it with this guy. Then I think he figured out he was part of a hairbrained business scheme. Then I cut his balls off. Then he was part of a failed, harebrained business scheme. This cat hated me. As soon as he couldn't ejaculate all over everything, he started peeing all over everything. I. I would bring my laundry back. I'd fold it at the laundromat, Bring a whole nice, neat, clean pile of folded laundry, put it down in the room for a minute, come back covered in cat piss, covered. And he'd just like, look at me. Like, fuck you, man. The other reason we named him Lex is cause he was evil. It was a Lex Luthor reference. So me and the evil cat lived together for quite some time. Four years. And he traveled with me to several apartments. We got kicked out of the Upper east side, moved to the Upper west side, lived there for a while, moved to midtown, lived there for a while, moved to Brooklyn. We're now in Bushwick. And I just moved in with my friend, and his apartment is infested with roaches. I'm like, how do you live like this? He's like, eh, it doesn't bother me at all. But I'm telling you, there were, like, hundreds of roaches, like, running around like, they. They. They weren't even nervous of humans anymore because he'd been living with them peacefully for so long. They'd become desensitized. Like, you walk in, they come right up to you. They're human friendly. So I'm like, well, I want to get rid of these roaches. He's like, well, I'll call the landlord, call her up. She sends over the most ghetto team of exterminators. I don't know about exterminators or how it's supposed to work, but I'm pretty sure how it's not supposed to work is that two guys show up, and one of them looks like. Like Jesse from Breaking Bad. And the other one looks like big Pussy from the Sopranos. And the kid that looks like Jesse's got a little bottle of chemicals and he's spraying them and he's yelling at the big dude, stop, man, stop. Why aren't you stomping? And the guy's like, I'm fucking stomping. And he's river dancing all over my kitchen, smashing roaches to the point that I had a picture on the wall that actually fell and the glass shattered from the frame. Anyway, when they got there, they're like, oh, you got a cat. You probably shouldn't have that cat here because you know these chemicals are deadly for animals. You better get them out of here right away, you know. I was like, oh, he's pretty sensitive. He doesn't even have hair to block him from the chemicals. My friend Genevieve, Genevieve had just not long before that, loaned me $300. So I was like, ah, that's a friend who does favors, you know. I was like, hey, Genevieve, you want to watch my cat for a little while? And she's like, oh, yeah, I'd love to. So I bring the cat over to her place. He's chilling there. The guy says, yeah, leave it for, like, you know, about a week and let the chemicals set in. And Genevieve was like, cool, cool. I'll chill with the cat for a week. During that week, I get a phone call that I can do a month in the uk Three weeks after that week. So I was like, oh, yeah, I'd love to do a month in the uk. Genevieve, I call her up, I'm like, hey, what's happening? She's like, oh, I'm loving having this cat here. I'm like, would you like to hold onto him for a little longer? I just got booked in three weeks for a month in the uk. I'm gonna have to find someone to watch him then, anyway. It doesn't make sense, all the back and forth. So she goes, yeah, I'd love to. Yeah, I love having a cat. This is great. Okay, cool, cool. Go out to the uk, do the shows. I come back, I'm Like, Genevieve, I gotta get that cat back. And she's kind of, like, never around when I want to get the cat, you know? Like, I call her up, I'm like, oh, when should I come by? She'll be like, three o'.

Narrator/Host 2 (48:02)

Clock.

Narrator/Host 3 (48:02)

I get there, her doorman's like, oh, she's not home. I don't know. We just couldn't coordinate for some reason, you know? Then I get another call. You want to come back out to the uk, do another month? I was like, when they're like, in another few weeks, I go, oh, shit, Genevieve. I left her a message. I got another booking in the uk. You want to hold on to the cat? Then she calls me right back. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no problem. No problem. Easy. The next time I come back, she's like, completely, like, off the grid, you know? I'm like, now I start to suspect some foul play, you know, a cat napping is underway. So I run into her at a comedy club. I'm like, what's going on? I've been trying to get Lex back. You know what's happening? And then she, like. She drops it. She goes, oh, you're not getting that cat back. You're not a good cat owner. He doesn't even like you. He needs a stable home. I was like, it's not your decision. It makes a $2,000 cat. That's an investment I made. You can't take that cat. And she's like, well, you're not getting him back. And I don't like when people walk all over me, you know? I was like, there's no way she's just gonna steal my cat. I can't stand for this. I'm at home, I'm stewing about it. I'm like, this is not right. How am I powerless? I can't be powerless. How do I get in? I gotta break in and get my cat back. I was like, I can never get in. It's a doorman building. And I concoct one of the stupidest plans I've ever come up with. Here's a detail I left out about my friend Genevieve. She's a sex addict, and she's open about it, so I'm okay sharing it. We used to hang out Sunday nights at a place called the parlor on 86th Street. And they had karaoke. It was a big hookup scene. You could hook up with a lot of people there. Every Sunday night around 1am she'd take another guy back up to her apartment at the end of the night. So I Know what kind of guy she likes? Because we've been friends for a long time. I was like, I just gotta plant a guy in there. I can get this cat back. So now I start going around. She likes hairy Italian Brooklyn guys. So I start hanging out at Carmine's Pizza in my neighborhood. And I'm approaching guys. Very awkward. Hey, buddy, you got laid recently? Yeah, they get all offended. You know, they're very homophobic, these hairy Italian guys. They think I'm hitting on them or something. Hey, hey, hey. Whoa, whoa, whoa. I go, no, no, it's not me, man. I know a girl. She'd have sex with you, no problem. Get the fuck out of here. Fucking weirdo. Leave me alone, man. I actually found a guy after a comedy show came up to me. He was like, hey, man, pretty funny, bro. He came to me, I was like, oh, this is a good opportunity. I'm like, hey, you got laid recently? You have a girlfriend, huh? He goes, no, no, man, it's been a dry spell. I'm like, I know a girl who'll you. No problem. No problem. He's like, all right, give me your number. I'm like, eh, it's not as simple as that, you know, It's something I'm going to need you to do for me. I'm gonna take you down to the parlor with me on a Sunday night. 1am rolls around, I'm gonna point a girl out to you. I'll tell you what to buy her to drink. I'll tell you what to say to her, what compliments she likes and everything. Then you go back up to her apartment, guaranteed sex. I promise you, if you're confident this sex is gonna happen, then it will happen. Once she falls asleep, I'm gonna need you to steal my cat back from me. I'll be waiting downstairs in front of the lobby with a getaway car. And the guy's like, yeah, all right, I'll give this a try. Go to the parlor. 1am comes around. Me and Genevieve are there. You know, we're okay pretending that I'm okay with the fact that she stole my cat. You know, look at the guy. I'm like, now's the time. Make the move. You know, he swoops in. Beautiful, flawless, perfectly. They're hand. They're. I'm watching from afar with a devious smile, you know, buying her drinks. Charming. They leave, go back to the place. I'm like, this is great. I call my friend Dave, who I originally went into business with because he didn't like Genevieve he hated her. So he was back in, you know, he's like, darren, that's our cat. Got to get that cat back from Genevieve. She doesn't deserve to have it. That's half my cat. Dave and I are waiting with the getaway car into the wee hours of the morning, and I'm texting this guy, hey, what's going on? I'm downstairs. Where are you? Bring the cat. No reply to any of these texts. And we're like, well, maybe he fell asleep. I don't know what the hell's wrong with this guy, you know? Finally, we give up. The next day, I'm calling him. He's not answering his phone. And I was persistent. I just kept calling him and calling him until he finally was like, what? What do you want, bro? I go, what happened last night? He goes, bro, you're a weird guy. I don't want to get involved in the cat thing. I go, what happened? You get laid? He goes, it's not important. She's a nice girl. I like her. Like, what do you mean you like her? You fell in love with her? He goes, look, it's not important. I don't know. You gotta work it out with her. Some strange shit. I don't even know about whose cat that really is, you know, I'm gonna see her again. I don't really want to be involved as the guy who took the cat. I think we might have something here. Like, you don't have anything here. She's a sex addict. You're one in a million. I was getting her so mad. You got nothing here. He's like, alright, just don't call me anymore. He hangs up. In his defense, I was a maniac in this story. You know, It's fair to say I was slightly out of my mind. I'm sitting at home, I'm trying to concoct a plan B. She calls me up. She's like, I know what you tried to do. I'm like, what are you talking about? She's like, he told me, the loser that you sent up there with me, he told me the whole thing about how you were trying to get him to take the cat. I'm like, he told you all that? She goes, yeah, after we slept together. I go, you slept with him? And he tells you that. She goes, I don't want anything to do with him anymore. I don't want anything to do with you anymore. I'm like, this idiot blew it for both of us. You know? He really. I'm sitting at home. I'M like, this is fucked up. I can't. I'm running out of ideas how the hell to get my cat back. And then it starts to dawn on me. I don't know if I really want that cat back. I started thinking how much of a pleasure it was not having that cat. In fact, it was really just about the fact that I didn't like that she took the cat against my will. I'm sure if she would have even just asked me for the cat, she could have had that cat. But. So I was like, you know what? She could keep the cat, but I didn't want to tell her. I didn't want to give her the satisfaction. That's where I was at until a few months later, when Christmas time rolled around. She put up a picture on Facebook of her and the cat in Santa suits. And I don't know, something about that warmed my heart. I never saw that cat look so happy. Cat really was where he belonged, living with a girl from Greenwich, Connecticut, in a fancy Upper west side apartment. He wasn't slumming it anymore. He was dressed up, Ready to entertain for the Christmas party. He should have never been with a Jew in the first place. It was a waspy cat. That's when I called her up and I said, hey, listen, you know, saw the picture, no harm done. You can keep the cat. And then she's like, is this a ploy? Is this a scam to get. I go, no, no, no, no, no. This is for real. I'm even thinking about getting a dog. My neighbor Blanco at the time, Ecuadorian gangster across the hall, had a litter of pit bull puppies, and I was seriously considering getting one. The only reason I wouldn't is because I was thinking, I might say, still get that cat back somehow. And then I couldn't have the. I was like, this is a stupid thing, you know, keep the cat. So she goes, all right, come. Come to the Christmas party then. You know, no harm done. I come to the Christmas party. It's the first time I'd seen the cat in a very long time. He looked at me like, fuck you. I'm telling you. He went right up. Jumped on her lap in his little Santa suit. He didn't want it. Not nothing to do with me at all. I was like, oh, yeah, that's right. That cat never really belonged with me in the first place. Time went on. A few years went on, and Genevieve and I remained friends and saw the cat a bunch more times. And one day she called me up crying. She's like the cat's got a heart blockage. Some kind of a heart murmur affected the cat, and his back leg stopped working. And she brought him to the vet. The vet said that there was a surgery they could do, but the chances of it surviving the surgery were very low. And the surgery was $5,000. And even if it did survive, it might reoccur right away. It would have to be on all kinds of medication for the rest of its life. And she's like, what should we do? So I'm back in it now. I'm like, what should we do? She's like, this is our cat shit. There's a $5,000 vet bill. I'm back in it, you know, now it's our cat again. So we really thought about it, and it was emotional, you know, and we decided to put the cat to sleep, which was really hard. We were both crying on the phone together. It was like the end of an era. She got the cat cremated and put it in an urn, which is very strange. That's particularly weird behavior for anybody to have a cat dust on their shelf. I moved out here to la. She shortly after moved to la, went to visit her recently. There's Lex on her shelf. She still carries him around with her everywhere she goes. And I told her, I said, I might tell this story and how do you feel about that? And the only problem she had with this whole story was she's like, you better tell people that. I still say you owe me $300. And I'm like, you got a $2,000 cat for me? She wants to take it to Judge Judy, and that's not important, but we might do that. I think that'd be funny. I. But anyway, that's the story of Lex the cat and how I am a failed cat breeder. Thank you, guys.

Narrator/Host 2 (59:28)

Why don't you ever want to play? I'm tired of this piece of string. You sleep as much as I do now and you don't eat much of anything. I don't know who you're talking to. I made a search through every room but all I found was dust that moved and shadows of the afternoon and listen by those bitter songs you sing they're not helping anything. They won't make you strong.

Kevin Allison (60:08)

That is all for this week, folks. This is the weaker Thans behind me now. Folks, today's the day.

Narrator/Host 3 (60:17)

Take a risk.

Narrator/Host 2 (60:36)

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Narrator/Host 4 (61:11)

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Kevin Allison (62:00)

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Narrator/Host 1 (62:13)

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