190 - Cristina Mariani Talks Kill Tony, Joe Rogan’s Comedy Mothership & Theo Von | Unsubscribe Podcast Ep 190

Summary

Unsubscribe Podcast Episode 190 Summary

Title: Cristina Mariani Talks Kill Tony, Joe Rogan’s Comedy Mothership & Theo Von
Release Date: December 9, 2024
Hosts: Eli Doubletap, Brandon Herrera, Donut Operator, Christina Mariani

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1. Welcome and Introduction (00:00 - 02:19)

The episode kicks off with the hosts engaging in their typical humorous banter, setting a lively and informal tone. Cristina Mariani joins the conversation, adding her unique perspective to the mix.

Notable Quote:

• Eli Doubletap [00:22]: "Well, it was nice knowing a gentleman and lady for once on the unsubscribe."

2. Discussing Guest Cristina Mariani (02:19 - 07:15)

Cristina Mariani shares her experiences performing on the "Kill Tony" podcast, highlighting her rapid progression in the comedy world. The hosts express admiration for her ability to handle tough crowds and deliver impactful jokes early in her career.

Notable Quotes:

• Donut Operator [02:32]: "She gets it."
• Brandon Herrera [07:05]: "My first Kill Tony, I was super, super nervous because I was only three months into comedy."

3. Navigating Comedy and Overcoming Nervousness (07:15 - 16:12)

Brandon Herrera discusses his journey from being an insurance underwriter to pursuing a career in comedy. He emphasizes the importance of pushing oneself out of comfort zones to build confidence. The conversation delves into the challenges of performing live, dealing with nerves, and adapting material based on audience reactions.

Notable Quotes:

• Brandon Herrera [07:30]: "I'm just gonna do it or else I'm just going to stay at the level I'm at."
• Eli Doubletap [08:56]: "But when I get in front of 100 people, my nerves go crazy because I know you don't have an editor."

4. Experiences with "Kill Tony" and Live Performances (16:12 - 27:25)

The hosts recount Brandon's experience on "Kill Tony," where he successfully delivered his set despite initial nervousness. They discuss the dynamics of live comedy shows, the fear of failing in front of an audience, and the growth that comes from repeated performances.

Notable Quotes:

• Brandon Herrera [17:42]: "I just signed up. Like, I write my name, and then they pull it out of a bucket."
• Donut Operator [18:26]: "I've done a lot of."

5. Writing Jokes and Adapting Material (27:25 - 38:19)

Brandon shares his process for writing jokes, drawing inspiration from personal experiences and current events. The conversation touches on the importance of reading the room and tailoring performances to different audiences. They also discuss the strategies for handling jokes that may not land well with certain crowds.

Notable Quotes:

• Brandon Herrera [35:28]: "I don't know, it's kind of like the whole Hulk thing, except I turn into a dinosaur."
• Eli Doubletap [36:08]: "I love the gays. My little brother's gay and but we grew up Catholic, so he got lucky."

6. Future Comedy Plans and Personal Growth (38:19 - 58:56)

The hosts talk about their upcoming comedy shows, including Brandon headlining at Big Laugh Comedy in Fort Worth. They emphasize the continuous journey of self-improvement, the role of self-help books in personal development, and the significance of setting boundaries to manage anxiety and build confidence.

Notable Quotes:

• Brandon Herrera [34:03]: "I need to do something challenging."
• Donut Operator [90:22]: "If you don't communicate that because it's hard sometimes your average person hates saying no."

7. Superpower Segment and Light-Hearted Banter (58:56 - 79:56)

In a playful segment, the hosts imagine themselves as superheroes with unique powers paired with quirky offsets. This segment showcases their creativity and humor, leading to amusing exchanges about their imagined abilities and the humorous limitations that come with them.

Notable Quotes:

• Christina Mariani [70:11]: "I can fly, but I have to shout racial slurs the entire time."
• Donut Operator [73:00]: "I can never permanently die, but I am constantly myself."

8. Closing Remarks and Final Banter (79:56 - 99:06)

The episode wraps up with the hosts reflecting on their experiences, sharing humorous anecdotes, and discussing their preferences in books and personal development resources. They emphasize the importance of continuous growth and pushing past fears to achieve success in comedy.

Notable Quotes:

• Brandon Herrera [87:46]: "I've done all self-help books. Like a year worth of self-help books."
• Eli Doubletap [93:06]: "People who are doing shit you're afraid of and recording that is actually phenomenal."

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Conclusion:
Episode 190 of the Unsubscribe Podcast offers an engaging and candid look into the world of comedy through the experiences of Cristina Mariani and her fellow hosts. From navigating the challenges of live performances to personal growth and creative brainstorming, the episode is rich with humor, insights, and relatable anecdotes. Whether you're an aspiring comedian or simply a fan of candid conversations, this episode provides valuable takeaways on overcoming fears and embracing the comedic journey.

Transcript

[Donut Operator]

Welcome to the podcast.

[Brandon Herrera]

Do people ever jump off the mountains to themselves?

[Donut Operator]

Look at me.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, ptsd. Move on.

[Brandon Herrera]

My little brother's gay, but we grew up Catholic, so he got lucky.

[Donut Operator]

Okay, we're good. Oh, yeah, we're doing a shot first. Just out the gate, going hard.

[Eli Double Tap]

Dear God.

[Donut Operator]

I know.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, it was nice knowing a gentleman and lady for once on the unsubscribe.

[Donut Operator]

I know.

[Eli Double Tap]

Everyone calm.

[Donut Operator]

Calm down. After a grill, everyone turns it off. Okay, that wasn't bad tequila.

[Eli Double Tap]

That was good whiskey.

[Donut Operator]

Loved it. That was great.

[Eli Double Tap]

So do we even have good whiskey here?

[Christina Mariani]

I think I brought some. No, Ryan brought a bunch of whiskey to my skate shop.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like, really nice whiskey Macbeth.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, that's cool.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's really cool.

[Donut Operator]

It wasn't Ryan. It was a fan. Sent it to Ryan for to drink on the podcast. We just didn't get it until a day later.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, that's really nice.

[Christina Mariani]

Okay, nice. Thank you, fan.

[Donut Operator]

Thank you, fan. That's his name. Dude, it took. Okay? It took. I think we watched your set in shot show of January, and that's where we set that up. It's like, man, you should come on the podcast. It's almost shot show again, and Christine's like, I got time. I opened up my schedule finally.

[Brandon Herrera]

That wasn't it. I'm just nervous to do podcasts.

[Donut Operator]

Why?

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know. Because it's vulnerable.

[Donut Operator]

I think being on stage is. Cody, open us up. We'll go into that. Go right into this.

[Eli Double Tap]

So we do.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, yeah. Three, two, one. Oh, yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, count of three. Sorry.

[Donut Operator]

Pounding alcohol. I'm gonna here. 3, 2, 1.

[Eli Double Tap]

Hi, everyone.

[Christina Mariani]

Welcome to the unsubscribe podcast. I'm joined today by Eli Double Tap, Christina Mariani, Brandon Herrera, myself, donut operator. Thank you so much for being here. Oh, my God, there's a girl.

[Donut Operator]

What the.

[Christina Mariani]

We don't want to make her uncomfortable or anything.

[Donut Operator]

Brandon, get away.

[Eli Double Tap]

Scare.

[Donut Operator]

Scramble away.

[Eli Double Tap]

I just love how. But we were at the. I think it was the Burbiz events because it was House of Blues in shot show, and we all loved the set. It was a very, very good performance. But we were all just like, man, if anybody understands autism, it's her.

[Donut Operator]

She gets it.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, yeah. She's going to drink a little more.

[Donut Operator]

The love your jokes were. You caught all of us off guard. This is at a veteran comedy show, and you set the fucking tone, period. And you just. Was it family? That's military or.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I just hate veterans. Yeah, okay. Just the homeless ones.

[Eli Double Tap]

I was just kidding.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I'm sorry, I should have said that. I panicked.

[Donut Operator]

This is going to be a great.

[Eli Double Tap]

I just immediately pictured you rolling up your windows like at a four way stop.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, no, I run the red lights.

[Donut Operator]

Hates homo.

[Christina Mariani]

No, no, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

I do worry about walking on it. He's limitless.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, that was fucked up. I just. I don't know. I read the situation a certain way and. Can we cut this part out?

[Donut Operator]

You're like, I'm so nervous.

[Eli Double Tap]

Did you say the N word again?

[Donut Operator]

Again? Don't say that.

[Brandon Herrera]

No.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, my God. This episode is gonna be great.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm genuinely curious, though. What, like, kind of brought you in with Burbiz or like the veteran community?

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. How did that happen?

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, Justin, he governor. Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Justin.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. He asked me to come open for him because he headlined that show and.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's right. Yeah. Justin's a good guy. He's doing Kill Tony now.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, he just did one. He's doing. I mean, you open because you, like, you've met Justin. Justin's a homie. He's done Naked and Afraid fighting. He's the one that mooned act man when act man was on last time. Like, Ackman is not used to that. And we look over and there's just an ass just hanging out. I was like, what the fuck?

[Eli Double Tap]

The Naked and Afraid bit?

[Donut Operator]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Probably a little too much.

[Christina Mariani]

Did I ever tell you guys, like, I helped him do his audition video for Naked and Afraid?

[Eli Double Tap]

Actually while we were filming one of my videos.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah, he was. Yeah. Brandon was filming a video at the range when we had the black rifle range back then. And Justin calls me and he's like, that's how he talks.

[Eli Double Tap]

He's.

[Christina Mariani]

Amen. I don't know much about video stuff. I want to audition for this show Naked and Afraid, and that's how he talks.

[Donut Operator]

But we went and I helped him, like, what ethnicity?

[Christina Mariani]

I helped him start a fire from nothing and recorded it for him.

[Donut Operator]

Go back to the Mexican accent. I like that. It's just really lucky that's how you talk. It's me. Welcome to the podcast. Go from there. Like, what the. I did not know that Justin, great friend. Brought you on for a set that then got our attention. Like, we all were applauding and dying laughing because holy fuck, like, there is a line. And then when you cross that line, like, out the gas.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like, you went from the gays to 9:11 in four minutes.

[Donut Operator]

That's not a joke.

[Eli Double Tap]

Kind of impressive.

[Christina Mariani]

My favorite combination.

[Donut Operator]

No, go.

[Brandon Herrera]

Thank you. I'm so sorry.

[Donut Operator]

I just, like like, thank you.

[Eli Double Tap]

What's funn?

[Donut Operator]

I want to thank God for the 911 joke.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm already calling it. There's a lot of people out here who are not familiar with your content, your style, and they're just thinking, like, God, the guys are making her so fucking uncomfortable.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

This is why we don't have women on unsub.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I just have to warm up. I'm sure I'll, like, you know, booze is for.

[Eli Double Tap]

We bully.

[Christina Mariani]

Welcome to unsub.

[Eli Double Tap]

We bully women shadow boxing outside the battered women's shelter.

[Donut Operator]

That's the title of the episode. We bully a woman. We don't even put her name or anything on the episode title. It's like, man, you guys did me dirty.

[Eli Double Tap]

Featuring a woman.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Eli Double Tap]

That actually would be very funny. We won't do that.

[Donut Operator]

But that Photoshop her cooking or something.

[Brandon Herrera]

With a black eye.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, my God. She's adding to that thumbnail. It's perfect.

[Christina Mariani]

Congratulations, though. Women aren't funny.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, Jesus.

[Christina Mariani]

You're doing a great job.

[Brandon Herrera]

Thank you. You too.

[Donut Operator]

I don't know how to take that. Holy shit. So you have nerves going into, I'm assuming, a lot of stuff. You're like, ah, I.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, yeah, I think I've gotten a lot better. Like, my first Kill Tony, I was super, super nervous because I was only three months into comedy. But you're talking just, what?

[Donut Operator]

Fuck, yeah, dude.

[Christina Mariani]

Did you kill Tony in three months?

[Brandon Herrera]

Mm. And so I was really nervous, but I feel like I've mellowed out. I think I'm just nervous because this is like my. One of my first podcasts that I'm doing.

[Donut Operator]

So it's the tiny one, so you don't have to worry. No one watches this.

[Eli Double Tap]

Dude.

[Christina Mariani]

If you guys don't know what kill Tony is, it's like professional comedians get up and they have kind of a. They got their table. It's kind of a panel of like. Like, comedians, proven comedians. And they roast a comedian set. And so she was one of the comedians that they were just sitting up there roasting after three months of doing comedy.

[Eli Double Tap]

How was it?

[Brandon Herrera]

It was good. I. I had a good set, so they were pretty nice to me and I was shaking. They saw how nervous I was, so they were like, oh, that was good. It was. Yeah, it was a good experience. And, yeah, you learn.

[Donut Operator]

I will let you know from our side of it, like, stand ups. One thing is like. Or a live audience is absolutely terrifying. Sitting down in front of cameras. Do this all day. No one like, no Problem. But fuck, the second you're in front of a live audience, you're like, oh, wow, this is way. Hi, everyone.

[Brandon Herrera]

I feel like I'm the opposite now. I feel like now doing this with cameras is more nerve wracking than going on stage. Like, I feel like I've gotten a lot better with my nerves on stage, but.

[Eli Double Tap]

Interesting. Yeah, I always bullied myself about that because I'm like, look, I. Not to make it worse, but I'm thinking like the amount of views that we get and things like that, like we're in front of entire football stadiums full of people, any given thing we post. But when I get in front of 100 people, my nerves go crazy because I know you don't have an editor. You know, you, whatever you say is what people remember. And for whatever reason, that freaks me out.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. But it's like in the moment, so you know that. And also the phones are locked up like at Mothership where I perform. So that makes it a lot easier because nobody can like catch you being, you know, what.

[Donut Operator]

Go on, expand. Being what?

[Brandon Herrera]

Sometimes, you know, something slips out that you're like, I need to chill.

[Donut Operator]

You know, the car has audience.

[Eli Double Tap]

I don't know what that is.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, exactly.

[Eli Double Tap]

Could you explain that?

[Brandon Herrera]

No.

[Eli Double Tap]

We had a couple things in our live shows that like, we're part of the set list that we're like, oh, man, I'm so glad we're not doing this on an actual episode.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, those are definitely hold back. And then what going on Kill Tony? Like your first time, you. How many live shows did you do at that point? Because you're saying three months. But how many shows?

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, probably like one or two shows. Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Holy.

[Brandon Herrera]

But it's only a minute on Kill Tony. So I could, so I could really like, perfect that one minute that I wanted to do.

[Eli Double Tap]

They only give you a minute on Kill Tony.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. But then Red Band asked me to do Secret show and that's like eight or ten minutes. So then I had to like kind of come up with that much time, like between. And it helped me, like come up with material faster.

[Donut Operator]

What was your. Like, what is your process? Because I know you have. I mean, everyone does have a different process for writing a joke. You have Dave Chappelle, he's like the fishbowl. And he made that an entire segment. He's like, I'll pull something out and I will make a punchline out of that joke or that phrase or that word. And that's how I build a set around.

[Eli Double Tap]

Never heard that. That's pretty cool.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, it's really good. That's how he got like. So I kicked her in the. Like. That's one of the running jokes I'm sure you've seen.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, yeah.

[Donut Operator]

He, like, built up to any. Narrates it perfectly. Are you doing the same thing for me?

[Brandon Herrera]

It's like, kind of like, I'll get an idea just randomly. That's kind of fucked up. And I'm like, that's kind of funny. Expand on it. Like, I'm going through a breakup right now. So PDA is really bugging me, like, kind of seeing other people. Pdaing. This is bad. This is really bad. But. And then I. And then I'm just kind of thinking, like, what if I'm so dumb that I think is pda? And then. And then I'm just like, God, that she's pissing me off. She wants me to see. She's blowing a whistle. And so then I, like, kind of make a joke out of that. And it's.

[Eli Double Tap]

To be fair, it's you that's really up.

[Brandon Herrera]

I didn't want to say it.

[Eli Double Tap]

To be fair. It is a unilateral PDA kind of, right?

[Brandon Herrera]

It's like, God damn, I'm kinky. But, like, I don't even. Like a gun to my head, so it's like, really fucked up. But see, this is not. This. I shouldn't have said that.

[Donut Operator]

Just walking by and you're like, show off.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, exactly.

[Donut Operator]

Blowing your window.

[Brandon Herrera]

It's like, God, I see I'm alone.

[Donut Operator]

Look at me.

[Eli Double Tap]

Now I have to wonder, have you ever seen an episode of Unsub?

[Donut Operator]

Jesus Christ.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yes, Kind of. I've seen clips.

[Christina Mariani]

I don't watch your podcast either.

[Donut Operator]

It's okay.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't have one. I hope that.

[Donut Operator]

You don't have A what? A YouTube? I've watched it.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, clips, yeah, but it's just jokes. It's just stupid jokes like that. Like, stupid misinterpretations that. Yeah, sorry. I feel like that was a fucked up one.

[Donut Operator]

No, no, that is. You're just starting, right in Scrape for service. Like, everyone's like, that's why I ask.

[Eli Double Tap]

Because that is a very unsub level of.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, but it just, like, pops into my head and I'm just like, that would be so stupid if, like, you were dumb enough to, like, mistake. Mistake those things, you know?

[Christina Mariani]

Can I tell them about what we were talking about before time.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, okay.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, no, wait, What?

[Brandon Herrera]

I mean, it's.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, you weren't even here for this?

[Donut Operator]

No. But now I'm the classy belt on 90s children.

[Christina Mariani]

Cartoon land before time. The dinosaurs eat the star leaves and all that stuff, right? The. The cute little dinosaur, Ducky, the actress, her father, her and her mother. And they himself was like a double, you know, double homicide type situation. Shot them.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's hilarious to you?

[Donut Operator]

What was it? Ducky should have ducked Ducky. Jesus.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know. I think it was Connor.

[Eli Double Tap]

It went completely quiet and she's like, damn, I wonder what she did.

[Brandon Herrera]

But I was seeing. I wasn't gonna say that here. I mean, you said us stuff too.

[Christina Mariani]

Don't put this back on me, Bobby.

[Donut Operator]

I just like put that even on me. Ricky Bobby comments are like, she needs to be back.

[Christina Mariani]

What do you think about veterans.

[Donut Operator]

Just going to Deep Topics?

[Christina Mariani]

Oh, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm gonna warn you, if you have a political career, don't continue that sentence.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I was just thinking about this earlier. Do people ever jump off of mountains to kill themselves?

[Donut Operator]

I'm sure it's a rare thing because it's harder to jump off of a mountain because usually it's like a descending.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, I just feel like. Cuz I just climbed a mountain this week just to feel better and I'm like, when you climb a mountain, you don't feel bad anymore because you feel accomplished. So I just think like, maybe you should climb a mountain and then jump off if you still want to. But I guess to answer your question, they can't because they don't have legs. Probably.

[Donut Operator]

What do you think about veterans? Well, first off, you should climb a mountain because I felt good after that. And if you don't just jump off?

[Eli Double Tap]

No, I just sting at the bottom.

[Donut Operator]

American flag, eagle swoops in.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm just crying at the bottom of a mountain. That one didn't really land. But you know, now I have no arms. Literally.

[Donut Operator]

Eli. I'm a ghost. What are you doing?

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm here to tell you about Ghost Bag.

[Donut Operator]

Is this an ad?

[Eli Double Tap]

It might be an ad.

[Donut Operator]

Why are you in my bedroom? I don't know.

[E]

Scoot over, let's talk about it. Every ghost Mattress has a 20 year warranty. Some even have a 25 year warranty and you can try them out for 101 nights worry free. If you don't like it, just send it back.

[Donut Operator]

I don't like this.

[E]

No hard feelings. One of our favorite things about Ghostbed is that it has cooling technology. So if you get hot at night like we do down here in Texas, it's a lifesaver.

[Donut Operator]

I'M uncomfortable, but you're not hot, are you?

[E]

I'm uncomfortable, but you're not hot, are you? Ghostbed also offers bundles, so they have everything you need. Just choose one of their four mattresses and pick your bundle.

[Donut Operator]

Why are you doing this to me?

[Christina Mariani]

Four mattresses.

[Donut Operator]

Four.

[E]

Right now, Ghostbed is offering 50% off all their products. Just use code unsubscribe at checkout or go to ghostbed.com unsubscribe please.

[Donut Operator]

Buy some Picasso.com, unsubscribe.

[E]

I'll be under your bed if you need me.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't think veterans should themselves.

[Donut Operator]

Hot take, hot take, hot take.

[Brandon Herrera]

I think they should be happy.

[Donut Operator]

Why don't you just be happy?

[Brandon Herrera]

Guys, I'm so sorry. I don't know. I really admire what they do and what you guys do.

[Donut Operator]

Thank you. Brandon, shut up.

[Eli Double Tap]

No, the amount of people. I did a meet and greet at the GOA convention in Knoxville. The amount of people that walked up to me, it was like, kind of like, I, like, bring in the handshake. Super close. Like, hey, Elydra. Like, it was, by the way. And they do that real quick. Like, fuck you, unsub viewers. You know who you are.

[Donut Operator]

We have started. Break.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's forced valor.

[Donut Operator]

That's a new shirt. It's like, ptsd. Why don't you just be happy? And it's your face.

[Brandon Herrera]

Like.

[Donut Operator]

Just forget about it. Yeah, just forget about it. Is war that bad?

[Eli Double Tap]

Ptsd.

[Donut Operator]

Move on.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, it's just awful.

[Donut Operator]

It's just the worst messaging ever.

[Christina Mariani]

Smiling. It says, war is heck.

[Donut Operator]

She has, like, a military helmet. War is heck.

[Eli Double Tap]

Holy veteran. Let them eat cake.

[Donut Operator]

So you were like, okay, I've done three sets, and now I'm ready for Kill Tony. Wild idea. Did they ask you or did you prep for it or did you try out for the show?

[Brandon Herrera]

And, like, okay, I just signed up. Like, I write my name, and then they pull it out of a bucket. So I was signing up for probably a month, and then they pulled my name, and then I got to.

[Eli Double Tap]

So you were two months in.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Before I started signing up, because I knew the minute I wanted to do, so I, like, wrote it out.

[Christina Mariani]

So you were seriously, like, I want to do comedy now. Kill Tony should be one of my first things I do.

[Brandon Herrera]

Everybody was talking about it. Everybody was like, kill Tony. Kill Tony. And then everybody was telling me not to sign up until I was at least a year in. And I was like, but I have a minute. Why wouldn't I sign up? I think it's Funny these losers.

[Eli Double Tap]

I think I want to do a podcast. Hey, Joe Rogan. Holy shit.

[Donut Operator]

Do you want to be my first guest, Joe Rogan?

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, but it worked out, like, I guess it could have gone really bad, but I don't think I would have. I'm too nervous to put myself in a position where I feel like, oh, this wasn't gonna go well, you know, so you refine.

[Donut Operator]

What was that bit? Your one minute? Like, hey, I have a one minute to capture. First off, amazing job. Geez. None of the people at this table would probably right now sign up for a Kill Tony event.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, but I was going through something. I was like, going through something. I was going through this whole phase of my life when I started doing comedy where I was like, I'm gonna do scary things, you know, so just.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like the rest of us. Trauma made you funnier.

[Brandon Herrera]

I. Yeah, I mean, I. I mean, I didn't go into the war or anything like that.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm like, neither did I. Oh, really? No, she. She looked up Chat GPT.

[Donut Operator]

I know, she's like, brand. Is Brandon a veteran? It's like he was a Marine. He served. AI is now tricked that he's a veteran.

[Eli Double Tap]

So I did one Veteran Day episode, Veterans Day. And I, unbeknownst to me, I was just going on with like two of our veteran friends. Eli decided to rewrite my life cannon at that point and try to force valor upon me. So I was never in any branch of military service. People get really mad about that now. I've never claimed anything otherwise, but thanks to this fucking dickhead, now even Chat.

[Donut Operator]

GT says he served in the Marines, he has medals, he's a decorated war hero. Like, AI is like, Brandon is a hero.

[Brandon Herrera]

And the Marines, out of all of them.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'd like to think I could have scored higher on the ASVAB than that.

[Donut Operator]

Just eat crap.

[Christina Mariani]

Generate an image of Brandon Herrera. It's him in a vet, like a plate carrier.

[Donut Operator]

And always dog tag, dog tags.

[Christina Mariani]

And he's like, in the streets of Felucia, dude.

[Donut Operator]

AI is just fully like, that is a war here.

[Eli Double Tap]

My joke is always like, I never did any branch of military service ever, Internet. But I did a 25 year tour in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

[Donut Operator]

So, like, it's. That counts, right?

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah. Fort Bragg. Jesus Christ. I hear they gentrified it.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, that's a new name of.

[Christina Mariani]

Well, gentrification is fucking awesome.

[Donut Operator]

What is it called? What's Fort Bragg called now?

[Eli Double Tap]

Fort Liberty. But I refuse to say that.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah, it's.

[Eli Double Tap]

I Went home recently. I went back. I still hate that place, but I went back. Everything's Fort Liberty now, and it was frying my brain. I don't like it.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, see, I didn't even. I know. They started naming the bases different stuff, and I was like, oh, yeah, that's a thing. Now I forgot about that whole thing.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm just upset they couldn't have named it after something like. They couldn't have named it after somebody really cool. They just went, like, the generic. Like, you hired a marketing intern. 30 bucks, like, for Liberty. Liberty. So cool.

[Donut Operator]

Chat GTP coming up with the name.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes. Long story short, no. Yeah. We're in the same boat. Neither of us have ever. Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay.

[Eli Double Tap]

These guys did well.

[Brandon Herrera]

What branch did you guys do?

[Christina Mariani]

That was Navy. Army.

[Donut Operator]

Army. It was fun. I don't want to recommend it. Good choice. Not doing. Not doing it again. Never in a thank you. All that served now. I would never do that again. I'm like, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

Eli actually went to war. War.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. Those fun times I got over, it was just a mile. Like, whatever your catch is.

[Brandon Herrera]

Just be happy.

[Donut Operator]

War. Just be happy.

[Eli Double Tap]

All right.

[Christina Mariani]

We have some good T shirts to make.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm thinking of all these in, like, the Cracker Barrel. Like, I blew my left nut sack off in the Cracker Barrel parking lot and all that. Like, the shitty T shirt format. Have you never seen those?

[Donut Operator]

No, I've seen some where it's like, what's the police one? It's like I get on my knees for this.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, God.

[Donut Operator]

You know what I'm talking about?

[Eli Double Tap]

I think so.

[Christina Mariani]

It's like the thin blue line and. Yeah, yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Put it right here and blur out some of it, because I don't think YouTube will like that.

[Christina Mariani]

Or I'm not allowed in Cracker Barrel because I blew my nuts off with my concealed carrier or something.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like my 1911.

[Christina Mariani]

With my 1911.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, my.

[Christina Mariani]

But it's like the skull and, you know, just the cheesy. You get the.

[Eli Double Tap]

You see the boomers wear, and I hate it.

[Donut Operator]

Sells a whole bunch because you see them out in the wild and you're like, oh, people wear this.

[Eli Double Tap]

I want to do an ironic one at Bunker. Just some just really cringey boomer just to see how it sells.

[Donut Operator]

It's gonna be your number one make. It brand is number one. That's.

[Eli Double Tap]

Everybody buy it for their dad at Christmas.

[Donut Operator]

Dude, Jack would be so happy wearing that. So in three months, you get your. Your set. You're doing that before that. What was your lead up to Comedy. Because you had to have something where, like, I'm doing. What was your job at that time?

[Brandon Herrera]

I was working in insurance. I was an insurance underwriter.

[Donut Operator]

I'm so sorry.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, it's okay. That was really boring. And then I was like, this can't be it. This can't be my life. Nine to five like this for. And then I was just, like, kind of feeling lost. And then I just started doing things that scared me. So I moved away and I drove from California to Texas.

[Donut Operator]

Terrifying.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, it is scary.

[Christina Mariani]

That makes sense why you live in fucking Austin.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, I gotta get away from California. Austin is great.

[Eli Double Tap]

Austin's like California light.

[Donut Operator]

I know.

[Eli Double Tap]

That is the safe space of California.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, I heard it was like a young, fun city. And it was during COVID too. So California was really shut down during COVID and I heard that Texas wasn't.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's when we moved.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. Yeah. So then I moved here and I was planning on, like, making my rounds. I was gonna go to New York and then Denver, and then maybe I was gonna go back to California, just like, do a loop. But then I started doing comedy and I was like, oh, I'm just gonna. This is because after three months, like, I started, like, getting opportunities, so.

[Donut Operator]

Which is crazy.

[Eli Double Tap]

How long ago was that? Like, our. Well, how long? Three years since you started doing comedy.

[Brandon Herrera]

Three years. Okay.

[Donut Operator]

And now that's your. Is that your main source?

[Brandon Herrera]

Hey, this is what I. Yeah, finally. I'm not working in insurance anymore. I'm just doing comedy. So.

[Donut Operator]

It was scary, though. Like, even that. That jump, because you still made the jump. We have a lot of discussions about it's getting rid of that net. So one day you're just like, hey, I'm going to do this. It. I got a little nest.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Like, now I'm just going to make the. The leap. I'm going to move here with no family. I'm assuming you have anyone here?

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I had no idea here. I lived in a hostel when I first moved here.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, God.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I'm very trusting, I think.

[Christina Mariani]

Do you have any crazy, hostile stories?

[Brandon Herrera]

I did acid, like, the first night I was there.

[Donut Operator]

You are very trusting.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, no, I just.

[Donut Operator]

This guy, he seems super nice. He offered to put this on your.

[Eli Double Tap]

Tongue and I did it.

[Brandon Herrera]

I just have always wanted to try doing acid. That was my first time doing acid too. Yeah, it was really fun. I had a really good trip. And that's it. It was pretty much. It wasn't. There wasn't a crazy story to it. I guess I Guess there was.

[Donut Operator]

There is a crazy story. I met a random dude.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no, no, it was a group of people. No, it was a group of people in the hostel. It was like all the people in the hostel and they were like, do you want to try it? And I was in my like, oh, do scary things.

[Donut Operator]

This is turning into a really dark episode. Episode.

[Christina Mariani]

We're here for it, dude.

[Donut Operator]

Dude. So good. What's your, like, so first time on or what was your most nerve wracking moment where you're like, oh, fuck, this is not going according to plan.

[Brandon Herrera]

I think right now.

[Eli Double Tap]

Really?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. Oh, no, I should have said that. Shouldn't have said that.

[Christina Mariani]

But this is worse than acid with the strangers, dude.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, acid was cool. I kept looking at it.

[Donut Operator]

We're not.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

This sucks.

[Donut Operator]

This sucks.

[Christina Mariani]

I told you we should have drugged her, man. Come on.

[Donut Operator]

Oh my God.

[Brandon Herrera]

It's okay. I microdose Rufus.

[Donut Operator]

Really high.

[Eli Double Tap]

Should have.

[Donut Operator]

Really high tolerance.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, acid was cool. I was looking at paintings and they were moving.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's a nice hostel.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, it was, it was really nice, but it just lasts too long.

[Eli Double Tap]

How long does it last?

[Brandon Herrera]

Like 12 hours.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, you.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, no, after like six hours I was like, okay, I think I'm good now. I don't have to that roller coaster.

[Donut Operator]

Like, man, I went off.

[Brandon Herrera]

I know. This is enough.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, we got six more hours on this trip. Oh, no, I'm good.

[Eli Double Tap]

I would have, I. It would be the six hour mark. I have a panic attack thinking I have six more hours. Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Bad dude. Fuck. Hell no. Hell no.

[Eli Double Tap]

I am really curious though how you decided to get into comedy and what you did to prep for that. Because two shows were two shows before Kill Tony.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

That is insane to me.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. But I did open mics too, so I was like going to.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, okay. Well, okay, so you did a bunch of open mics before that?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, I did a bunch of open mics.

[Eli Double Tap]

All right, So I would consider that, like I. I was thinking you got up in front of people twice and you're just like.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, just like shows where there was like. Cuz open mics, like, don't really have that many, many people. Shows are the ones that like, you can get the most feedback.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

But still, like, I feel like you.

[Eli Double Tap]

Got 10, 20 people or.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, sometimes there's like three or four people that open mics.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, wow.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

So when you bomb those, that hurts.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Here. Yeah. You can't make three people. Yeah. I'd be like, I want to be a statistician childhood yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Can't make three people laugh yourself.

[Donut Operator]

So going into it, as Brandon's saying, it's like, okay, you did the show. You had three or two, three shows. And then open mics, which are for whoever doesn't know. That's just. You stand up. It's a cycle of how many minutes for an open mic. You.

[Brandon Herrera]

It depends. It's like two to sometimes 10 minutes, depending on the mic. So on average, it's like four to five minute mics.

[Donut Operator]

You know, growing up, were you like, hey, did people say it's like, hey, you're funny or leading up into thing? Or are you like, I'm scared, so I want to do comedy because that is such a, like, specific thing to make people laugh. It is not the easiest of things.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, ever since I was little, I always liked making people laugh. Like, I just wanted to make people happy. And then in college, someone I dated thought I was really funny. He's actually in the Navy, so that makes sense. Sense of humor. And. But I never thought about doing it seriously because I feel like my parents wanted me to be a lawyer. They wanted me to like you too.

[Eli Double Tap]

Law school?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I. I just studied for the lsat, then got into insurance, and I was like, I'm just gonna make some money. And then maybe. But I didn't want to go to law school. It was like, this boring.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, I was. I had my whole life set out for me, like, law school, everything. And I'm like, you know what? I think I'm gonna eat a bullet before I do that. So I'm gonna try the gun thing I enjoy before I try the gun thing that I hate.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Really? Really? Yeah. No, no. So then it was like, okay, lawyer didn't work out for you doing this? Really want this to work. I'm going to then write up. Where did you start learning how to write your material?

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, I majored in English in college, but I was always writing. I always loved to read and write, even growing up. But then, I don't know, I always just like writing for fun. And then I started writing just, like, at work sometimes I would just, like, try to write funny things, just. But I never really thought about doing it seriously, still. And then when Covid hit and we all worked remote, a lot more time on our hands. Yeah. And also I could travel because I could work remote. So then I was like, I'm just gonna move around. But at this point, I wasn't thinking, I'm gonna go to Austin to start comedy. I just went there, and then I Was like, one of my goals while I'm here is to get up and just try it, just because it's scary to me, and I've always wanted to, and people have told me to try it out and. And then I did, and I really liked it, and I felt really good doing it, and I've just been doing it ever since.

[Christina Mariani]

You chose a great place to start.

[Brandon Herrera]

I didn't even realize that that was like a. Everybody was talking about Rogan's club opening up, too, and I didn't know even that that was a thing.

[Eli Double Tap]

Did you move before Rogan?

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I think he was there and he was.

[Eli Double Tap]

Had he launched Alien or Comedy Mothership?

[Donut Operator]

A comedy.

[Brandon Herrera]

He hadn't yet. He just. Last year, that's when he launched it.

[Christina Mariani]

Damn. You went at the right. Right time.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

And now you open there.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. So it's insane. Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, damn.

[Donut Operator]

You get some, like, crazy. Your photos and everything that you do. I'm like, holy shit. Okay. Homegirl's killing it.

[Eli Double Tap]

Out of curiosity, have you met Shane Gillis?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yes.

[Eli Double Tap]

How is he?

[Brandon Herrera]

He's great. He's. He's funny, obviously.

[Donut Operator]

He's.

[Brandon Herrera]

He's awesome.

[Donut Operator]

That's fun.

[Eli Double Tap]

One of these days, we'll get him.

[Donut Operator]

Dude, I know. This will get Shane. We get, like. We're expanding that we get with the most random people on the podcast now. Like, the most random. We have potential, like, high potentials on future guests, where we're like, the mix.

[Eli Double Tap]

Of people we get on this podcast. It's honestly fucking crazy.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Christina Mariani]

She was telling me before you guys got here. It's like, I know you guys do a lot of military stuff. It's like. No, we had, like, Che on. Yeah, yeah. We had, like, two. The magicians. We had the magicians on Chris and Wes.

[Donut Operator]

My boy Chris.

[Christina Mariani]

And Yes. Like, it's more than just, like, military stuff.

[Eli Double Tap]

So Jody Blichet, like, just. We have, like, random people that, like, throughout American history, almost War II, World.

[Donut Operator]

War II vets that drank those beers. That's why we did that.

[Christina Mariani]

We have just two random, cheap beers.

[Donut Operator]

It's not like we like coolers and shiner boxes.

[Brandon Herrera]

I didn't even notice that.

[Christina Mariani]

98, 99 years old, they're just sitting here slamming beers with us. It was awesome.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

We're like. We're framing at least one apiece. And then they were, like, taking a nap. That's how we had to wind it up because he's like. One was getting sleepy, which. Understandable, bro. I got you. And then the other one, Don has So much energy for 99.

[Eli Double Tap]

I don't have that energy now.

[Donut Operator]

Home was just living the life. Like, he is the epitome of also lucky. Like, did not get even a purple heart. He was the only one to survive out of the flamethrower unit that was there. So 1500 people. Because it was two battalions worth of flamethrower people. He's the only one that lived.

[Eli Double Tap]

So 15 minutes or something like that. It was. It was something stupid like that.

[Donut Operator]

It's.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's wild.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. His story. And you're like, oh, yeah, he was there during the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima. That was. He was there there.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, wow.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. So that's why that beer's there. You're like, yeah, yeah, we're just gonna.

[Christina Mariani]

Keep their DNA forever.

[Donut Operator]

When you say it like that.

[Eli Double Tap]

So when we have to invade mainland China, we have.

[Donut Operator]

We'll make a bunch of them. Yeah.

[Christina Mariani]

An army of dons.

[Donut Operator]

It's gonna be awesome, man. He's pre programmed to hate Asian people.

[Eli Double Tap]

We knew that. Swing back around.

[Donut Operator]

Like, what's going on?

[Christina Mariani]

Stop.

[Eli Double Tap]

Asian hate.

[Donut Operator]

Hold on now. Don't get me. What's your.

[Christina Mariani]

What's your next big show coming up? Like, what you're excited about?

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm excited. I'm headlining Big Laugh Comedy in Fort Worth. 604 Main Street.

[Christina Mariani]

Noise.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. So I'm excited about that because I haven't headlined much, like once or twice before. So. Yeah. And it was like. So I'm trying to get a set together. Like a 35 minute set.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, 35 minutes is a lot.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, I know it. Yeah. I'm really. But I need to. I feel like I've been stagnating a little bit. Like I've been getting into a routine, so I'm starting to feel antsy about. So I need to do something challenging.

[Donut Operator]

35 minutes will do it.

[Christina Mariani]

That's the.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's.

[Donut Operator]

By yourself, Cody.

[Christina Mariani]

I know. Standing in front of hundreds of people by yourself, doing a 35 minute set. Just. My anxiety is already rising. I need more alcohol.

[Brandon Herrera]

Mine too. I avoided like responding because I was like, oh, God, I don't know. But, you know, I just kind of have to just do it or else I'm just going to stay at the level I'm at.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. And that is awesome.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's a very healthy approach.

[Donut Operator]

It's always that growth. You're like, I'm uncomfortable or I'm feeling stagnant. I need to push myself to get to that next level. And that's what I mean, literally, so far, how you've lived your life was like, I don't like what I'm doing. I'm going to take a risk. I made risk.

[Brandon Herrera]

I feel like I always have to challenge myself though, or else I just start feeling sad. And when I feel like I'm not doing enough, I go and I climb a mountain. Like we were talking about that earlier in a joking way. But like I will just take off and go and. Yeah, climb a mountain.

[Christina Mariani]

You have legs though.

[Donut Operator]

I like those damn veterans.

[Brandon Herrera]

I know. I'm sorry. I feel really bad for making those kinds of jokes.

[Donut Operator]

Just smile.

[Christina Mariani]

You don't have to. But can you share like one joke from your set that you have coming up?

[Brandon Herrera]

Um, I mean, I kind of told you guys the one I'm working on right now. Trying to make funny the.

[Donut Operator]

Trying to make funny.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

And the whistle one.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, that's.

[Donut Operator]

I'm trying to make funny of the.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. Just trying to like.

[Eli Double Tap]

Chase is gonna be working overtime on this one.

[Donut Operator]

Chase, bleep out that word. Put a grape up really big and we're good.

[Eli Double Tap]

Just put the grape is from whitest kids, you know.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

You shit look like you can delicious fruity beverage.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, I don't know, it's a. That's a hard one because it's like you don't want to say in your set because people get real uncomfortable for some reason. Weird.

[Eli Double Tap]

Wow.

[Donut Operator]

Gay.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. In conclusion, I love the gays. My little brother's gay and but we grew up Catholic, so he got lucky.

[Eli Double Tap]

Nice.

[Brandon Herrera]

He got lucky in a sense, cuz I mean he's still going to hell. Can you guys say something?

[Eli Double Tap]

Cuz I'm going to keep like you're.

[Donut Operator]

Doing great, doing good. When Cody started his this crazy business of podcasting, you know what? He didn't think about merchandise. But now he's selling what merch.

[Eli Double Tap]

And it couldn't be easier.

[Donut Operator]

All because of Shopify.

[Eli Double Tap]

If you've shopped on Bunker Branding.com, you've used Shopify.

[Christina Mariani]

Shopify is a global commerce platform that helps you sell at every stage of your business.

[Donut Operator]

From the launch your online shop stage to the first real life store stage, all the way to the. Did we just hit a million orders exclamation point. Shopify is there to help you grow.

[Eli Double Tap]

From their all in one e commerce platform to their in person pos. That means point of sale, wherever and whatever you're selling. Shopify's got you covered.

[Donut Operator]

Once you start selling, Shopify makes getting paid simple by instantly accepting every type of payment.

[Christina Mariani]

Shopify helps you turn browsers into buyers using the Internet's best converting checkout up to 36% better compared to other leading commerce platforms.

[Donut Operator]

And sell more with less effort thanks to Shopify Magic, your AI powered all star.

[Eli Double Tap]

Shopify powers 10% of all E commerce in the United States. And Shopify is the global force behind Find Allbirds, Rothy's and Brooklinen.

[Donut Operator]

My favorite companies.

[Christina Mariani]

What is that?

[Eli Double Tap]

No clue. But they also power millions of other entrepreneurs across 175 countries because businesses that grow grow.

[Christina Mariani]

The Shopify.

[Donut Operator]

Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com unsub pod all.

[Eli Double Tap]

Lowercase go to shopify.com unsub pod now to grow your business, no matter what.

[Christina Mariani]

Stage you're in, go to shopify.com unsub.

[Brandon Herrera]

Pod I feel like that shot just hit me because I feel more comfor comfortable now.

[Eli Double Tap]

I can tell because your leg finally relaxed.

[Donut Operator]

Your sense of holy. So what is the worst performance where you like these jokes? Do you. Do you modify your jokes for different locations?

[Brandon Herrera]

No.

[Donut Operator]

Oh. How does that work?

[Brandon Herrera]

Sometimes I don't think so. I kind of read the vibe of the room, though. I have a. I can see if they're more sensitive. So then I have cleaner jokes. How? I can just sense the tension in the audience. Like, if I say a joke, like, that's darker and then they kind of pull back on it. I know that they're not gonna like me. And so then I just like, try to like, self deprecate in the beginning because I feel like if you self deprecate, then they're like, all right, she's not a. Like, they open up a little bit and then I like, I can kind of sometimes like, ease them in to me being up. Like, they learn more about me up front. That's. And then they're like, okay, she got beat when she was younger. There's this. There's that. Like, I get why her brain is the way it is, but if just right off the bat, I. I'm up. They're like, what the. You know, like, I have to babysit. That's what Brian Holtzman says.

[Eli Double Tap]

Question mark?

[Donut Operator]

No, no, I have to what?

[Brandon Herrera]

Brian Holtzman, he's a comedian too. He says you gotta baby them. Kind of like, just like easy baby.

[Eli Double Tap]

Steps, but objectively worse.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I mean.

[Eli Double Tap]

No, it's your whole.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, this is your conversation.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I don't know. I didn't have anything. I guess I just.

[Eli Double Tap]

Baby, just.

[Brandon Herrera]

Just like, Like, I. I don't know. Just Like, a little bit. Like, just lube them up a little, you know, just like a baby.

[Eli Double Tap]

So on that exact note, what kind of jokes do you usually feel like the audience is starting to pull back from? Like, what? Where do you go that you're just like, oh, wrong crowd.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know. It really depends on the crowd. Sometimes they don't tense up on me until I.

[Eli Double Tap]

You make the Catholic jokes in the Vatican, for example.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, that's okay. I mean, most of the time, applause is.

[Donut Operator]

That's actually a really good question. It's like, what is. The line is like, hey, I can make these jokes, but these like. Like, jokes, like in. Depending on where you're at, it's like, oh, that hits home. Or like gay jokes or whatever.

[Eli Double Tap]

There's certain jokes, like, in LA that you could make and other jokes you really can't, versus, like, rural south, like, very different.

[Brandon Herrera]

What I noticed is you can't spill.

[Eli Double Tap]

By the way, I was not gonna let that.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, I didn't realize that that was. I felt the splash. I don't know what it wasn't gonna let.

[Eli Double Tap]

You just have that one.

[Brandon Herrera]

Just the baby splash. People, no matter what, don't like it when you say you want to kill a dog, is what I notice.

[Eli Double Tap]

It definitely ruins your chance of being the vice president.

[Donut Operator]

How many times have you tried that joke? And you're like, damn it.

[Brandon Herrera]

It's only because my Texas, you just.

[Donut Operator]

Scratch it out like you're going state by state. It's like, it doesn't work sometimes.

[Brandon Herrera]

A train to be candid and talk about things, you know, like real stuff, you know, like, not that I want to kill a dog, but kind of because. No, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

What kind of dog?

[Brandon Herrera]

It's a really small, yappy dog that lives right next door to me, and it won't shut up. And it just. I stay up all night listening to the dog just yapping, yap and yap and yap.

[Eli Double Tap]

They love antifreeze.

[Brandon Herrera]

Huh?

[Eli Double Tap]

They love antifreeze.

[Christina Mariani]

It tastes sweet.

[Brandon Herrera]

Look, I don't know how to break into the apartment. I already thought about it. I even looked up because it's gotten to that point. I don't want to kill a dog. I don't. But it's one of those things where it's like, when it's your. You get to the point where you just realize that you're not that good of a person, you know? Would I do something bad? Yes. And I guess what I'm saying is I don't want to kill animals, but this Specific one just keeps me up all night. It's affecting my health. I feel like I'm getting sick, and I just hear it and hear it and hear it all day, all night. I don't want to kill this dog. I just do. I just. I don't want to kill it, but I do.

[Eli Double Tap]

This is like the argument I hear in court about people killing their spouse.

[Donut Operator]

No one else. With no one else but her. Dear God.

[Brandon Herrera]

Bitches, man. I get it now. I get it.

[Eli Double Tap]

I don't know if that was a.

[Christina Mariani]

Pun or not, but that was a great.

[Brandon Herrera]

It was. It was husband murders woman.

[Donut Operator]

I get it.

[Brandon Herrera]

I looked it up. Is it illegal to kill an animal? Yes, but only since 2019. Trump. What made it illegal in 2019? You can't torture and kill animals. So I guess I'm not gonna vote for Trump.

[Donut Operator]

That was your problem.

[Brandon Herrera]

God damn it.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's the, I guess, very fucked up version of thanks, Obama.

[Brandon Herrera]

Thanks Trump.

[Donut Operator]

A dog would have been mine.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I mean, it's a dog, you know, But I really should focus on is the owner.

[Eli Double Tap]

I just.

[Brandon Herrera]

The dog doesn't know. It's like a little kid. Like, you need to discipline it.

[Eli Double Tap]

That just broke.

[Brandon Herrera]

Beat it.

[Eli Double Tap]

Otherwise it won't be funny.

[Brandon Herrera]

Otherwise the dog won't be funny. And that dog is not funny.

[Eli Double Tap]

Just brought me back around. In the old shop, we had. If we had a big plastic trash can that we cut a hole out of and we made, like, a mousetrap out of it. Like, put the antifreeze at the bottom and, like, the. The bait at the end of, like, a stick as we had a ramp through the thing.

[Donut Operator]

For what?

[Eli Double Tap]

To kill. To kill mice? Like, kill rats.

[Donut Operator]

In our old shop, you were talking about dogs. And now I'm like, brandon, we need to remove the segment altogether.

[Eli Double Tap]

And we wrote above the thing, like, in the nice font, we put mouse. I think we put the lit. Albrecht. Mock fried. Like.

[Donut Operator]

Welcome to Mauschwitz. You will not escape. Holy fuck.

[Eli Double Tap]

I love you.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, dude, I defer.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, it's antifreezer. After, like, a week, you just shake it a little bit and disintegrate.

[Brandon Herrera]

So, like, that's not too bad. Oh, no.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, my. My God.

[Eli Double Tap]

So my girl asked, like, cuz, you know, all three of the dogs that we have at our house now are. Are hers. And she's like, oh, well. So if something happened to me, you would. You would adopt all three of these dogs, right? And I said, absolutely. Except that one. I'm taking him to the local tie.

[Christina Mariani]

Joint, just like Eli you know, you can make some dog tacos out of him.

[Donut Operator]

I know just the best because he's Asian. And the picture he's handing as you walk by your Asian neighbor's like, man, that's a really succulent dog. A 224.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, you know what? One time in high school, I found a lost dog, and I went door to door after school, trying to find its owner or somebody to adopt this dog because I felt bad.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, no.

[Brandon Herrera]

And this old Asian man opens the door, and I go, do you want this dog? I found this dog. And he was like, oh, no, I already ate. And he goes to dog.

[Eli Double Tap]

I swear to God, that is an actual.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, that is an actual story that happened. And it was just so funny. I was just like.

[Donut Operator]

What was your reaction?

[Brandon Herrera]

At first I was like, okay, because you don't expect that, you know, you don't expect somebody to do.

[Eli Double Tap]

You didn't process it later. Yeah, yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

And then I was like, wait a minute.

[Donut Operator]

Also terrible Asian accent.

[Brandon Herrera]

I. I didn't know if that was too far. I could have done better.

[Donut Operator]

No, you can. I make it all the time.

[Brandon Herrera]

You guys have to do it first.

[Donut Operator]

No, done and done. I do it all the time.

[Brandon Herrera]

But your age.

[Donut Operator]

Excuse me, sir, Would you like this dog? No, I just ate. Very full right now.

[Christina Mariani]

Thank you.

[Donut Operator]

White girl. And then they walk off. Go on now, your turn.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay. But, like, yours was so much better.

[Eli Double Tap]

So every time, like, from then on, you're looking for the owner of the dog. I'm assuming this is before next door. You. You open up. You. You have the neighbor open the door, and as soon as you see an Asian, you're like, oh, sorry, wrong. Wrong house.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm like, no.

[Donut Operator]

You act like, how dare you? You knock on my door. I got to remember, you come to my house. You come to my house. Oh, no, I don't know. Some. A. Some white girl knocked today, ran off with a dog. Very confused.

[Brandon Herrera]

I just picture. Do you know in cartoons, when they see, like, the. You know, like a fox sees a rabbit, and then it just turns into, like, a cooked chicken or like a dog, and they just start salivating. And it.

[Eli Double Tap]

Should do a study. They should do a legitimate study.

[Donut Operator]

The salivation glands of Asia. Person opens the door.

[Brandon Herrera]

Pavlo's dogs. Is that you're talking about?

[Donut Operator]

Jesus Christ.

[Brandon Herrera]

They don't even need, like, the. The bells. They just salivate.

[Donut Operator]

I just picture you chicken gets back to the Asian dudes like, oh, my.

[Brandon Herrera]

God, it turns into chicken. They're like, never mind. Like, Never mind. We like the dog.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, I don't like chicken.

[Brandon Herrera]

Like, oh, no.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like, chicken tastes like dogs.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, my God.

[Donut Operator]

Bro.

[Christina Mariani]

I told you guys the coyote story with my buddy's Vietnamese neighbor.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, God, yeah.

[Christina Mariani]

Remember that?

[Donut Operator]

No.

[Christina Mariani]

My buddy living in Charlotte, he was a Blackwater guy, and, like, there's a coyote out in his front yard, and it's, like, clearly rabid. He goes out with his three in a blackout and he shoots it. Kills it. The Asian neighbor comes over and it's like, can I have that? This is a dude that fought in Vietnam for the Americans and he won his citizenship, like, fighting for our side. So he's like, yeah, you can have it. Like a rabbit coyote. So he comes back a couple weeks later, and he's got this. This jar full of, like, gray, chunky inside of it. He's like, I made this for you. He's like, well, what is it? He's like, I pickled the coyote and just gives it to him. He's like, thank you.

[Donut Operator]

It's like horses.

[Eli Double Tap]

He opened it and smelled it, though.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah. Yeah, I think he did. You know I'm talking about.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, I. You told me the story, like, a couple years after it happened.

[Donut Operator]

But, yeah, dude, those ones. Because, like, different. Different cultures. You have different, like, bugs eating bugs. Not for me. Never will be into it. But then I was thinking about.

[Eli Double Tap]

I was like, have you never done that? Like, eaten the.

[Donut Operator]

No.

[Eli Double Tap]

Certain touristy place, like, they do that, like the bugs and shit.

[Donut Operator]

That's on a very low.

[Eli Double Tap]

I feel like I'm now more Asian than you are. 100.

[Donut Operator]

You're just Mexican.

[Eli Double Tap]

We got that in common.

[Donut Operator]

We.

[Eli Double Tap]

We can cut out of your brown people.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. No, I was like. Every time. I'm like, ah, it's probably not for you. I'm just bugs. Horse meat. Never tried.

[Eli Double Tap]

You've eaten Taco Bell, though.

[Donut Operator]

That is true. Never mind. I don't know what I've had in that.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

All alone. Time to trim the old pubes.

[Eli Double Tap]

Hey there, beach babe.

[E]

Are you ready to soak up those summer vibes and get the perfect beach bod?

[Donut Operator]

I don't have pants on.

[E]

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[Eli Double Tap]

Season. Season.

[E]

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[Donut Operator]

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[E]

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[Donut Operator]

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[E]

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[Donut Operator]

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[Christina Mariani]

Did you read goat near deployed?

[Donut Operator]

Yes, we had goat. My bud Casey. Our boy Casey, he just had. He's in Japan right now. He just had horse sashimi. He sent me videos of it because they do. Do they sashimi, too, which is dangerous. Yeah, like, it will. Not with pork sashimi.

[Brandon Herrera]

Wait, just raw pork?

[Donut Operator]

Japan.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, that's why they get coveted. Like, that's why it's like. It's because they're eating pork sashimi and bats. I know, I know. It wasn't Japan. They're the fancy ones.

[Eli Double Tap]

Ask Activision or Ubisoft what kind of Asians they are.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I. I dated a guy who's Chinese, and he told me that it's a compliment to be mistaken as Japanese, but it's offensive to be mistaken as Chinese. That's what he said, Understandably. And I think all Asians are really racist about other.

[Eli Double Tap]

Everybody knows. Yeah, the Asian tier list.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, what is it?

[Donut Operator]

Japanese, South Korea, Chinese. And then you have, like, Vietnam, Filipino, almost verbatim.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Filipinos are like the Mexicans of the Asian culture. You. It is a tier list of.

[Eli Double Tap]

Stop looking at me for confirmation.

[Donut Operator]

How do you feel about Asians?

[Eli Double Tap]

Would the whitest man in the room please confirm?

[Donut Operator]

Let me measure your skull.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, I've got my phrenology kit in the car.

[Christina Mariani]

Don't get to me. Let me tell you about them black folk real quick.

[Donut Operator]

We're talking about Asians. Cody.

[Eli Double Tap]

You guys were talking about races. He just wanted to talk about it, like.

[Donut Operator]

No, no, no. Actually, a good segue, too. Oh, first, before we go to the offender. Brandon.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes.

[Donut Operator]

Traffic stop. You got. Just pulled over.

[Eli Double Tap]

So I got pulled over earlier this morning. I was on my way out to middle of nowhere Texas. I was driving a couple hours out this morning, so I was a little late. I was driving kind of quick. I had the funniest traffic Stop. Of my entire life. So I.

[Christina Mariani]

Funnier than the female cop that pulled us over.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes.

[Christina Mariani]

Okay.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes. So I was driving kind of quick. I won't say where I was, but I will say I got pulled over, and I did get a citation. I was going 90, and they clocked me at 90. And I will say that the speed limit was lower than 90. I'll say that. I think that's pretty fair. Got pulled over by, you know, two state troopers. They were very nice. Had a great interaction with them because I didn't, you know, move my hands really fast and try to bail out of the vehicle. So weirdly enough, if you're polite to police, you have a very good time.

[Donut Operator]

Even us, just for reference, I. I know how I look. I put my hands on the steering wheel. I turn on the dome light. I am like, you know what? I'm not even gonna. I want to be as respectful. If I was in their position, walking up on a car, you know what? This dude with tattoos, if he's like, this dome light on. I'm like, okay, oh, let's at ease this thing. So.

[Eli Double Tap]

And I was. I was in the cybertruck, the cyber hog or whatever people are calling it now. I rolled down all the windows because I know they're tinted. So I'm like, all right, just put these guys at ease. Roll down the windows. Whatever brands, steering wheel. Yeah, exactly. But they were just two good old boys. They were really, really cool about it. And they're like, hey, you know, your registrations out. I'm like, yeah, I know. Tesla hasn't sent me the plates yet. I'm still waiting on it. So it's technically a couple days out. And we're going through it like, the guy goes back to the car to write me a ticket. And I'm bullshitting with the guy. He's like, what do you do for a living? I'm like, I'm in the firearms space. So I'm talking to him. He's like, oh, dude, we got an MP MP5 in the truck. Full auto MP5. Them new recruits don't have that. We're rolling around with it. They wish they did. We're just bull about machine guns. And we're just me and him for five minutes. We're just bullshitting back and forth. I tell them kind of a little bit about what I do. I don't mention, obviously. But his friend comes back, I get a ticket for the. Obviously speeding pretty heavily and a citation or a warning for the plate or the registration, and we Keep talking. They're asking about all the features of the cybertruck. I'm just showing them because we're just bull. At this point. I know I'm getting a ticket. And I roll back the COVID over the trunk, and then they see all the.50 cal shells and everything. I've got a pintle mount for a.50 cal in the back.

[Donut Operator]

I don't have the.

[Eli Double Tap]

But there's casings, links, everything for the.50 in the back. And the guy's like, I don't mean to be weird, but can I have one of those? And so he takes. I'm like, yeah, dude, of course. Like, whatever. I don't care. It's like, basically trash. So he takes one of the.50 cal casings. The guy's like, I'll be right back. Goes to his car. So you did get a ticket, but I'm changing it to a warning. And I'm like, oh, that was. Those guys were really cool. So it's one of those things like, just be. Be nice to police. Not because you might get out of a ticket, but, you know, human.

[Donut Operator]

Just as a nice. Like, being human goes a long ways. Cody will always say, what is it police are there to? I figure you're saying, yeah, protect and serve. But it's also judgmental. Like, it's on judgment.

[Christina Mariani]

If you're an. You're gonna get a bunch of tickets.

[Eli Double Tap]

What is it? It's officer. Officer discretion, I think, right?

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah, officer discretion. They don't have to give you a ticket, but if you're nice to them, you know, a lot of times they'll just give you a warning.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's the same thing with. It's not only cops, but it's like everybody in life just don't be a. Don't be an asshole for no reason. It's like, I fully expected to have to pay that ticket, but just because I was not an.

[Brandon Herrera]

Did you show them the picture of you as a Marine? AI? Is that really what it was like? I served.

[Donut Operator]

Can I speed your id? Brandon's first thing. He's like, I don't know if, you know.

[Eli Double Tap]

I pull out Eli's Purple Heart. My favorite part is, like, I could tell the story because they have a. I'm not saying where it happened to be. They have no idea who I am. They had no clue. It wasn't that like, oh, you're blood. No clue. Just random guy that just happened to.

[Donut Operator]

Have 50 calcifications back up his. Also two medals of honor and two medals.

[Christina Mariani]

You showed him that picture yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Brandon's just like, let me find my id. Oh, sorry. That's not my idea, man. It's two medal of honors.

[Eli Double Tap]

And I accidentally let. Oh, I didn't even say this. I accidentally let slip with one of the cops who stayed behind that my front windshield was tinted. I didn't know that's illegal in Texas. I was just saying, like, I was not impressed with it. I was gonna get ripped off because it's getting scratched and whatnot. Not. But he's like. Because he was saying, oh, you scratched the. The windshield already. I'm like, oh, no, it's just the. The shitty tent. Whatever. He's like, you know, you ain't supposed to have that. Like me, totally forgot. You're 100, right?

[Donut Operator]

There's a lot of weird laws. Even fire. I think I said with a. I put the. No. I had my pistol in the front seat. Just open. This is years back. Cop pulls me over. We just did a range shooting thing. So I had a bunch of guns.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's probably changed after the new constitutional carry.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. Because it wasn't. I had my pistol in the front seat. That is considered concealed. Like, oh, I had a blanket or something over it.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

He was like, that's a felony. Just so you know. Like, that is a felony. Felony. If I was a dick or if you got a dick head cop, they could arrest you for that. And I was like, oh, well, thank you for not doing that. He's like, of course. Nice guns in the back. I was like, yep. He's like, I was kind of nervous the second I walked around the corner. Flashlight. It's nighttime, and you're just like, AKs and M4 or AR. She's like, yeah, okay. With gun.

[Eli Double Tap]

Most cops, like, if you're like a normal dude, they don't care. They don't really want to you over. They just make that tack on charges in case somebody's an. You're like, oh, really? You want us to throw the book at you? Sure. That sound about right?

[Christina Mariani]

Yep, sounds about right.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Police stories anywhere. You're like, I got pulled over.

[Brandon Herrera]

I honestly feel like being a military guy is kind of like being a hot girl when you get pulled up. It's what it sounds like. No one's getting tickets.

[Eli Double Tap]

Not military.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. You had the marine thing, and you did. You did. And they backed away because they didn't want to get aids. They were like, don't touch me.

[Donut Operator]

He's a marine.

[Eli Double Tap]

Cut. You said. You said, he's a marine. And the only thing I thought of was a cringy tick tock. He's a marine. That whole thing.

[Donut Operator]

Oh. Oh, my God. Yeah, that poor.

[Eli Double Tap]

You remember that? Oh, yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Who was that?

[Christina Mariani]

I don't remember her name, but she.

[Brandon Herrera]

Got like him in so much trouble with his command.

[Donut Operator]

Like, I'd be so mad at my wife.

[Eli Double Tap]

That was the military equivalent of the I'm snacking video, babe.

[Donut Operator]

What is it? He's a marine, loyal, strong. Da da da. And he's just standing there like this.

[Eli Double Tap]

He's in the background. Like the shit I do for.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah. And then it went viral. Oh, yeah. Like that probably has how many? 20 million views easy.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

And no military guy like that, like that poor husband went through hell and that trouble.

[Christina Mariani]

He's roasting him in the comments.

[Eli Double Tap]

He was the 22nd.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, he's a statistic now. He is. I would be if that happened to me.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm like, we should get him on the podcast. Oh, I would love to hear that. I would love to hear the story.

[Donut Operator]

No, so you get. You do comedy. You're what else? Also, by the way, if you want a really good YouTube series, you just doing shit you're afraid of and recording that is actually.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Phenomenal. I'll let you know that. That, hey, if you recorded. I don't like, I'm terrified of getting on a stage. This is what I'm scared of. And then you show your comedy beats and then you show that progression. Might have got one or two.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know. I feel like I'm not very good at being on social media. Like I have an Instagram, but that's pretty much it. And I guess I just want people to come see me in person for my content.

[Eli Double Tap]

I mean, social media is just kind of like the way to amplify that, I guess where like you get. You get it out. Like, hey, you got a couple clips. Like, I've seen your Instagram. You got a. A couple like, yes, right. Immediately recognize, oh, I've seen this person before.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. But even the clips I do have, usually it's somebody else that posts them and then make me a collaborator, you know, so then I don't have to do anything.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

That's why you get somebody like our amazing show. She runs all the socials for us and then we don't have to do the thing we don't like because we're awful at it. Yeah. We are straight garbage. If guys, if you want to know where the content comes from, that is amazing show over there.

[Eli Double Tap]

People think like, oh, you're influencers.

[Christina Mariani]

You blah, blah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like, you always have a camera pointed at you. Like, we hate it when we're out in public. Like, we hate having a camera at ourselves. We just. We like to hang out and have fun, and we need people, like, show to reign us in. Like, hey, guys, you know you need to take a picture of this.

[Donut Operator]

Like, oh, right, today she'll take a photo of this. And that's because she took a photo of this, not because we were like, hey, everyone, selfie. And we do that. That is one of the rarest things in this friend group.

[Eli Double Tap]

I think if you are that kind of influencer, by the way, out there, and you love selfieing yourself and taking videos, that's fine. You're just going to hell. No, I was staring at the camera. That was like, I love sad. She knows that.

[Donut Operator]

Damn.

[Eli Double Tap]

Fight, fight. That was camera, eye contact, whatever. I. I don't think I've ever seen Sav take a selfie.

[Donut Operator]

God, no. She's really good at that. She takes after me. Even me. I'm like, just do content this. And she's like, a content in general is the hardest thing to do. And I get where you're coming from, where it is. Like, I want it.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't like being on camera either. Like, this is, like, making me so self conscious.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah, but let's do kill Tony. Two months in our career.

[Brandon Herrera]

That's because I was going through something in that time. I was like, I'm going to do things that are scary to me. But now it's like, I've done, like.

[Eli Double Tap]

And you're like, I'm healthy and I hate it Again.

[Donut Operator]

Well, this is my life now.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, but I forgot what I was saying. I have such bad ADHD, too.

[Donut Operator]

This.

[Eli Double Tap]

You don't say.

[Brandon Herrera]

Can you tell?

[Eli Double Tap]

I recognize the tics.

[Donut Operator]

Really?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

I try to contain it.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, we're all.

[Eli Double Tap]

I've popped my thumb so many times. You know where I learned?

[Brandon Herrera]

Underneath the table, though.

[Eli Double Tap]

I Learned that from A.J. wilkerson.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, dude.

[Eli Double Tap]

He's like. He's like, dude, he's like, I'm watching you tick over here. And.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, yeah, A.J. called you out on those. Like, you're probably autistic.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's like, oh, you don't think you're autistic. Second clip.

[Christina Mariani]

So what he's doing right now is also stimming.

[Donut Operator]

Are you talking about me? Yeah, no, he's got the J. Have you met aj? Dude, AJ is. I think we named that episode the autism test. And then during Autism Awareness Month. We use that as the ref. Or I should say the three nonprofits that we donated. One of the big ones was. Was a massive one. They're like, oh, my God. We watched the autism test. We say retard like 80 times. I was like, that's the one you watched. And like, thank you for what you're doing. We actually laughed at this.

[Brandon Herrera]

I tried to take an autism test online because I was curious about it, but then when I took it at the end, it was like, oh, you got to pay $40 to see your results. And I didn't. So maybe I'm autistic, but like. But I'm not, so. Cuz I feel like it was more of a test. Like, are you going to pay for this? Are you. Are you autistic? And.

[Donut Operator]

Got me on that second part.

[Brandon Herrera]

You didn't get me.

[Eli Double Tap]

That sounds like a two for one test, dude.

[Brandon Herrera]

Like, it's okay if I'm autistic.

[Donut Operator]

I can live with that one.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know what I'm saying anymore. I've lost the plot.

[Donut Operator]

You're killing it. You're killing this. So good.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm so sorry.

[Donut Operator]

No, don't. Do not apologize. This has been amazing.

[Brandon Herrera]

My parents don't see this.

[Eli Double Tap]

Welcome to every episode of Unsubscribe.

[Brandon Herrera]

So far, I don't know how this happened. It's like one shot and half a white claw. I guess that's my limit. Holy.

[Donut Operator]

You should definitely come down and just hang out with the group. You get along really well. Like, everyone's going to love this. And it's like pushing for whatever content you do in the future.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

You're crushing it right now.

[Brandon Herrera]

I don't know. I feel very nervous about this all.

[Donut Operator]

Being out there, but this is not. We've had way hard. Dude, Jody's episode, the guy, that one for the book. So Jody's dad is the one that killed the guy on live camera, etc, and then did six months community. It was a few years of community service.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

No community. Like, no jail time. This dude killed the. The guy that kidnapped his son on live tv. If you've never seen that was like, this is like 90s or 80s.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah. Late 80s. Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Or.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Christina Mariani]

And then. But the. So the son that got by, the person that he killed was on the podcast and he went hard making like, like child jokes.

[Donut Operator]

He's the only one that caught everyone off guard. Out the gate. We're like, we can do this too. And then the only time we've ever in the history of the podcast had a disclaimer at the beginning. We're like, hey, like, this episode goes.

[Christina Mariani]

Oh.

[Donut Operator]

And the comments were like a disclaimer. What the. Oh. Holy. They. Yeah. Thank you for the disclaimer. It went so hard. So this is still PG13 on how hard we've witness an episode. So you're good.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay, that's cool.

[Donut Operator]

So open it up. Open that. Once Brandon gets back, we get to do the offenders.

[Christina Mariani]

Our sponsor for this video is PDS Depth, because everything is really expensive right now.

[E]

I spent 400 at the grocery store. I don't even know what I got.

[Donut Operator]

Milk. He got milk.

[Christina Mariani]

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[Donut Operator]

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[Christina Mariani]

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[Donut Operator]

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[Christina Mariani]

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[E]

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[Donut Operator]

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[Christina Mariani]

PDS Debt is a top rated company on Google and has an A rating with the Better Business Bureau.

[E]

They're personable. Go check out all their reviews and see how many specifically mentioned PDS employees by name.

[Donut Operator]

It's incredible.

[Christina Mariani]

You can get a free analysis right now by going to pds.com unsub it takes 30 seconds. Go to pds step.com unsub go.

[Donut Operator]

Now I'm going.

[Brandon Herrera]

Hey.

[Donut Operator]

And then we get to do the offenders bit, which I cannot wait.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm excited for that.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, tequila.

[Eli Double Tap]

All right. So have you ever wondered if you were part of a superhero group like the Avengers, what would your power be?

[Brandon Herrera]

I've never wondered that.

[Eli Double Tap]

That makes you a normal person, but.

[Donut Operator]

I think that's a dude. Qu. Like, dudes are the ones that wonder. It's like, bro.

[Brandon Herrera]

Guys would just be like to have a really big dick.

[Donut Operator]

Everyone's superpower.

[Eli Double Tap]

Just wait till you.

[Donut Operator]

So we all have superpowers. Like, we've created this massive universe. Kind of like the Avengers, but the Avengers. You get to pick your superpower. We get to pick the offset. So my favorite is always Cody's. I will just. We. We just have to go off of Cody's because I think that sets the standard of how this works. Cody what's your superpower?

[Christina Mariani]

All right, so I and fly. Pretty cool power. But in order to fly, I have to be shouting racial slurs the entire time.

[Brandon Herrera]

That's great.

[Christina Mariani]

It makes it hard rescuing certain communities.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's like a flappy bird thing. You have to constantly press space just to stay in the air.

[Brandon Herrera]

So you have Tourette's.

[Donut Operator]

That's what we'll call.

[Brandon Herrera]

So that's what you have is Tourette's.

[Eli Double Tap]

Your offset is Tourette's about that shit.

[Donut Operator]

Going into a Section 8 house. It's on fire.

[Eli Double Tap]

This is the shitty part. Like, I never thought unsub would get here. And so, like, I chose my offset years ago when I was going through something very difficult.

[Donut Operator]

You can change it.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'd have to think about that. We'll see what the Reddit has to say about it. But my thing is that I can never permanently die, but I am constantly myself.

[Donut Operator]

And so, like, you die, but you don't remember how.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, yeah, no, no, I can never permanently die. Yeah, yeah. But I'll just wake up the next morning and see two of me swinging from the ceiling fan like, oh, man, Thursday was rough.

[Brandon Herrera]

So you're like Groundhog's Day.

[Donut Operator]

But his body sticks around the next day.

[Eli Double Tap]

But, yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, so you see yourself.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, yeah. Body will never. That's what I like the most, is the body always stays. And Brandon doesn't remember how he died. But it's my thing is, like, man, we had.

[Eli Double Tap]

I took a pill and Ibiza on repeat. I'm not doing great.

[Donut Operator]

I still like you wake up, you're like, what a good night's sleep. Oh, two bodies, like, on the fan. Aw, man.

[Eli Double Tap]

The other me. Dad cut the other one down.

[Donut Operator]

I was sad about.

[Brandon Herrera]

So do you have to kill yourself or do you just do it for fun?

[Eli Double Tap]

I think I'm asking the real questions.

[Brandon Herrera]

You wake up in the morning, you're like, I'm done.

[Donut Operator]

It was a long day. It's 9:15.

[Eli Double Tap]

Stub my toe getting out of bed.

[Brandon Herrera]

Like, all right, you remember, you're a Marine. You look at the picture.

[Donut Operator]

Every day. Brandon looked at that.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, I guess I gotta myself.

[Eli Double Tap]

So. Eli, your power.

[Donut Operator]

I travel at this. I'm like the flash. But then I cannot interact for five minutes of when I get to a situation. So what your job joke plays into. I can't do anything like, stop, ma'am. Fight back harder. Blow the whistle louder because I cannot do anything other than talk.

[Brandon Herrera]

You just accidentally did the answer really fast.

[Donut Operator]

Did I? The wizard man, bro to Rachel Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

I get there like so you get there really fast. But then she's disappointed. I bet that's real life too.

[Donut Operator]

Sad.

[Eli Double Tap]

That is sad. That's not that funny. Why are you laughing that hard?

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm sorry.

[Donut Operator]

Make that thumbnail later.

[Eli Double Tap]

So it's her and Sab with a black eye.

[Donut Operator]

What Sab is? I don't know.

[Eli Double Tap]

One hour, 38 minutes and 30 seconds. You'll understand.

[Donut Operator]

What power have you always wanted? We picked the offset. You get to pick the power part.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, I always wanted to fly. But you already took that one.

[Donut Operator]

If you want to fly, we can also.

[Eli Double Tap]

You forgot your name. Oh, he's the crime cuck.

[Brandon Herrera]

Crime cuck?

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, he's a dope ass name.

[Eli Double Tap]

Can write a really awesome police report in 10 minutes.

[Donut Operator]

I'm the worst. Just showing up and be like, I am sorry I can't help with what's going on right now. But in 4 minutes and 30 seconds, breathe, this all is all over.

[Brandon Herrera]

That's so funny. That's kind of like a Family Guy I saw on Family Guy. It was like, they're making fun of Aquaman. The girls getting r on the beach, and Aquaman's like, hey, stop it. Yeah, yeah, you're lucky you're not in the water because just wait till high tide. She's like, oh, God, please help. And then Aquaman's like, well, you shouldn't have been a. Because he can't do anything about it. So.

[Eli Double Tap]

God. See the. That Seth MacFarlane gets away from. Gets away with. Oh, my God.

[Donut Operator]

Also, you're just adding a new standard for future guests and episodes, so thank you for that.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm saying what Family Guy did. I didn't come up with that.

[Donut Operator]

This isn't my joke.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, I just thought it was. It reminded me of like, kind of your power, except you're on land and.

[Donut Operator]

You'Re just there just watching.

[Eli Double Tap]

Except you have no excuse with a clock.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

So you can't fly? Fly.

[Brandon Herrera]

I can't fly.

[Eli Double Tap]

What power would you like?

[Donut Operator]

If she wants to fly, though? Okay, maybe being invisible because we have like, everything we.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, so who is it, Rich? That's invisible?

[Donut Operator]

Yep. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. If she wants to fly, we just got to pick an offset.

[Eli Double Tap]

For now, one of the. One of the folks on. On our unsubredit should probably do a complete, you know, Excel spreadsheet. All the powers. Did they?

[Donut Operator]

Yeah.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, I.

[Donut Operator]

A month ago. They like every gag best and what their power and offset is. And even them in the. The thread, they're like, yo, they can start doing. There's.

[Eli Double Tap]

I lost track.

[Christina Mariani]

I.

[Eli Double Tap]

We have so many.

[Donut Operator]

Every power has been taken almost at this point, so it's really difficult. Flying is one where if she's the second flyer, we just have to pick an offset, which I think.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, now I want a different power, though.

[Donut Operator]

Okay, well, you get a. Pick it.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay.

[Donut Operator]

It's not locked in. That was your choice. Don't. Wow.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm trying to think of what it is now.

[Donut Operator]

I want something else.

[Eli Double Tap]

Cool.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay. How about.

[Eli Double Tap]

Where do you want to eat, Eli?

[Donut Operator]

She's like, I always know where to eat.

[Brandon Herrera]

No offset.

[Eli Double Tap]

You're a man.

[Brandon Herrera]

Don't.

[Donut Operator]

Beer Gus.

[Brandon Herrera]

It's kind of like the whole Hulk, except I turn into a dinosaur. Ducky.

[Donut Operator]

So your superpower's changing into a baby dinosaur.

[Eli Double Tap]

You get killed by your father.

[Brandon Herrera]

Is that the offset? Am I just swinging on the fan with you? It's fly. No. I don't know.

[Donut Operator]

I want to turn into a velociraptor. What? Dinosaur. You turn a baby dinosaur. Dude, the idea of turning into a dinosaur, really gangster superpower, but.

[Brandon Herrera]

Or something cool, like a. I was.

[Eli Double Tap]

Literally just thinking, nobody's done the Hulk thing yet.

[Donut Operator]

Dude. The Hawk thing's great.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, but it could be, like, anything. Like, maybe I'm a shape shifter, like, depending on the situation.

[Christina Mariani]

Like Beast Boy.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, Depending on. So I can, like, change into whatever. Depending on what it calls for.

[Christina Mariani]

What? Oh, that's yours.

[Donut Operator]

That's mine. The offset is that every other time.

[Eli Double Tap]

I'm a sex toy.

[Donut Operator]

I got this guy's dildo. No, no, I can't. I miscal it.

[Christina Mariani]

I want a T. Rex.

[Eli Double Tap]

Male or female?

[Brandon Herrera]

It was. It's.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's random. Fleshlight.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, dude. Or I give me a fucking butt.

[E]

Plug, and I just hope they don't get horny.

[Donut Operator]

That day, sitting in the top drawer, I forgot that was it.

[Brandon Herrera]

If they have a butt plug, they're gonna use it. Well, who has a butt plug? Goodness.

[Eli Double Tap]

Where was Conor during Infinity War? Top drawer.

[Donut Operator]

He was in every scene. I assure you that.

[Eli Double Tap]

There'S a reason Hulk smashed. Hulk angry.

[Brandon Herrera]

Infinity.

[Donut Operator]

Shapeshifter. Okay, what is a good offset for shapeshifter?

[Brandon Herrera]

Well, she has that one, too now.

[Eli Double Tap]

One out of three times your Jeff Goldblum for 24 hours.

[Brandon Herrera]

I feel embarrassed. I don't know who that is.

[Donut Operator]

What?

[Eli Double Tap]

It's my son, Wendigoon.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm sorry. I actually. I don't know who a lot of comedians are either. I feel like I don't watch that Much. Stand up. Oh, Jurassic Park.

[Eli Double Tap]

The really creepy guy, you know, Jeff Golden, Water over the Hand. That whole. You've seen Jurassic Park.

[Brandon Herrera]

I've seen Jurassic Park. I just don't know who you're talking about.

[Eli Double Tap]

The guy in the all black that had his shirt ripped open for no reason.

[Donut Operator]

He was in the Fly.

[Brandon Herrera]

Did he have glasses?

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes, I think.

[Brandon Herrera]

Okay, that's who it is.

[Donut Operator]

Have you seen the Fly?

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I haven't seen the Fly.

[Donut Operator]

What's another big movie that Jeff Goldblum did?

[Eli Double Tap]

He's Thor Ragnarok.

[Christina Mariani]

Independence Day.

[Donut Operator]

Independence Day.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yes.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, he was the scientist at Independence.

[Brandon Herrera]

Day, so he never plays the main character, is what it. Okay, I know who that is. Yeah, I'm just bad with names.

[Eli Double Tap]

I feel like I could do the Jeff Goldblum impression that Wendigo does, and.

[Donut Operator]

Hunter always cuts it out.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's so bad. I'm so sorry. It's.

[Donut Operator]

No.

[Eli Double Tap]

Isaiah, I love you. That is one of the worst Jeff Goldblum impressions I've ever heard in my life.

[Donut Operator]

You should play Hunter's version of Windigo.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, God. You have it.

[Donut Operator]

Cody has it. Dude. Dude, you should play that, because that's hilarious. That is, like, segment that will get clipped. Hunter, this is for the both of you.

[Christina Mariani]

We could ask them if we could do this.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, we'll ask. We'll shoot him a text. Be like, hey, is that okay for an episode?

[Eli Double Tap]

Because it's on your. Your text, dude.

[Donut Operator]

Okay, Jeff Goldblum turn into that. What else is another offset? That is a possibility.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's on a Hunter Hunter shapeshifter.

[Donut Operator]

Whenever she shape shifted, she has to be a woman.

[Eli Double Tap]

What a What an offset. I don't think I can punish anyone.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

That does suck. That is harsh.

[Eli Double Tap]

Whenever you're not shape shifted, you can't vote.

[Donut Operator]

Jeff go boom. That. I'm trying to think of another offset. Always like to do any other offset. Jeff Gold. Boom. Kamala Sex toys.

[Eli Double Tap]

The sex toy one is pretty good. Not gonna lie.

[Donut Operator]

That is why we got that. That's why Connor's offset's really gangster. Is it like a. Like a luck chance of the intelligent level?

[Eli Double Tap]

Did. Did Hunter send you that?

[Donut Operator]

He did.

[Christina Mariani]

No. I found that when I was listening to their latest podcast.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, you. Oh, I thought that was a clip. Right?

[Eli Double Tap]

It was a text. One of you guys. The revised Wendigoon impression.

[Donut Operator]

Dude, I said no. He sent that for your birthday, Cody. He did. That was. Yeah, that was a birthday message.

[Christina Mariani]

Was it one of those that.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, yeah, it was a birthday message. I got It. Do you know who Nick Canyon Meat Canyon is?

[Brandon Herrera]

No.

[Donut Operator]

You don't do any YouTube, do you?

[Brandon Herrera]

No, not at all, though. I feel bad because I don't.

[Donut Operator]

No, don't feel bad.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, yeah. But even comedians, like, like I said, like, sometimes big comedians will come in the club and I have no idea who they are.

[Donut Operator]

Like, so what do you do on your. Do you stare at a wall?

[Brandon Herrera]

I write. I write and I read a lot.

[Eli Double Tap]

She does kill Tony. Like, none of us have done.

[Donut Operator]

It's very true. That's terrifying to all of us.

[Eli Double Tap]

Us, We've all wanted to do like stand up at one point.

[Donut Operator]

No.

[Eli Double Tap]

Except for Eli.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, I'm good.

[Christina Mariani]

What if we do. We do like a two minute a piece. Just like a short one.

[Donut Operator]

That's what we're going to do on this next tour.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, I hate you.

[Christina Mariani]

I don't like that.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, you want to do that giant. These are like 1100 seat studio, like theaters. Yeah. Terrifying for all of us.

[Eli Double Tap]

That expression just said cool.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no, I, I, I've done theaters that have been like 8,000 people. So.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like 8,000. Jesus Christ.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yes.

[Donut Operator]

How was that?

[Brandon Herrera]

Insane. But it's almost like certainly you can't see anybody, so there's that. But then you can like hear it and it's just.

[Eli Double Tap]

So you're preferring for the first 300 people, really?

[Brandon Herrera]

Not even like, I mean, you can only see like the first two rows, but, like, you see how vast it is.

[Eli Double Tap]

That's crazy.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, it's really cool. It's cool. It's, it's just electric. You can feel the energy in the room.

[Donut Operator]

Thousand is.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Insanity, that is because our first, we did like 500. Now we're moving to a thousand seat venues, which we're super thankful, all y'all. Thank you so much for that level.

[Eli Double Tap]

Turns out a lot of y'all is.

[Donut Operator]

Autistic and you like showing up to these shows like, yes, we'll be there. I'm like, what the. Oh my God, this is terrifying. But 8,000 is that next level where you like walk up there and you're.

[Brandon Herrera]

Like, yeah, no, it was just like. But it was only one time I did 8,000 people. It's not like I constantly do that.

[Donut Operator]

Who are you?

[Christina Mariani]

Open up for?

[Brandon Herrera]

Theo. Theo.

[Eli Double Tap]

Oh, God.

[Donut Operator]

Okay.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, no, that was. Yeah, it's crazy.

[Donut Operator]

So writing, reading, what kind of books are you into? Like, reading. Are you into like, hey, I love to read comedy. Or are you, you like, more into sci fi, fantasy, fiction?

[Brandon Herrera]

It depends. I really like nonfiction, like self help books. Sometimes when I'm going through it, like, just self development.

[Donut Operator]

That's your life.

[Brandon Herrera]

So every, every, every once in a while when I feel like I'm not doing good, I'll be like, oh, this is something I need to work on. Then I'll look for books on that to try to learn about it. But then when I'm just like. Just for fun, I'll read like murder mystery, kind of like thriller type of books.

[Christina Mariani]

You like your murder porn?

[Brandon Herrera]

No, just, you know, regular.

[Eli Double Tap]

Regular murder.

[Brandon Herrera]

Regular. Just good old.

[Eli Double Tap]

Good old fashioned.

[Brandon Herrera]

Killer. No, I'm trying to think of the last book that I read that was what it's called.

[Donut Operator]

Who's it About?

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm blanking out now.

[Donut Operator]

No pressure.

[Brandon Herrera]

I'm sorry. Now I can't think of. I know.

[Donut Operator]

Camera's slowly panning in. Music's getting more intense.

[Christina Mariani]

Do you listen to, like, the murder. The murder podcast?

[Brandon Herrera]

I used to listen to the murder podcast.

[Eli Double Tap]

Now she just does it. She just kills people. Yeah, Specifically her neighbor's dog.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, I can't do that.

[Christina Mariani]

It's her offset. She can change it to a dinosaur, but she only kills innocent people.

[Eli Double Tap]

She's got the Matt character.

[Donut Operator]

She has to kill a dog. Change. She's like, how do I blend in? Cool guy. We're just like, jesus. She's so weird.

[Eli Double Tap]

She has to continually convince her like neighbor to, like, keep getting more shelter puppies. Yeah. Don't let it get you down. It's only the eighth one this week.

[Brandon Herrera]

But it's not the dog's fault. I know that. I feel bad for saying I want to kill it. I just haven't slept, you know?

[Christina Mariani]

Like, all I'm saying is flank steak can fit underneath the door frame soaked in anti crease.

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, you're right.

[Donut Operator]

Chase. I don't know with that clip you do you. We're giving tips on like, Cody sliding a fucking steak under the fallout.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like, negative 50 dogs after putting that clip on the Internet.

[Donut Operator]

Animals. What? But like, what other books. Okay, you have when you're. Or, sorry, minus the book you're reading now that you don't remember. What are some series where you're like, hey, I really enjoy this one. I'm big into self help. We talk about this all the time. Like self help motivational. Or when you're going through shit like, hey, how do I get through this? Add to my tool belt so I come stronger and learn.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, yeah.

[Donut Operator]

Crazy concept.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I don't know why I'm blanking out on all the names I've read. Read so many of them. Not Nice. That's a book that I really liked that really helped me. The Subtle Art of Not Giving. A good book. That was a good one. That was a good one.

[Donut Operator]

I've never read Not Nice.

[Brandon Herrera]

Not Nice is good. And especially, like, I was raised in a really Catholic household, so I was raised to be super polite and just feeling really guilty about everything. And that book really addresses a lot of, like, lucky brother. Yeah, a lot of that stuff. So.

[Donut Operator]

So. And that's. Wait, not nice. Stop.

[Brandon Herrera]

People.

[Donut Operator]

Oh, people pleasing. Staying silent or feeling guilty. And start.

[Brandon Herrera]

And I'm still working on that. But that one really helped me. Like, a lot of the things he was talking about, I resonated with. And just like that, guilt pretty much is something that you don't have to feel guilty most of the time. Like. Like saying no. Like, say, go back to your previous joke line. That's where it comes from, actually.

[Donut Operator]

Like, what a good book.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no. He talks about doing things, like just saying no to people, even for things that it would be really easy to say yes. Like, some. One of his co workers was like, hey, can you help me me do this? And he was like, no. And he's just like. He seems like a dick, but it's okay. Like, it's just about overcoming the judgments that you're worried about people having about you and just setting boundaries. And I'm really bad at that because I get really anxious if I feel like someone doesn't like me, which is why I've been so nervous this whole podcast, because I'm saying up stuff, and I'm like, oh, God, people are gonna hate me.

[Donut Operator]

You're like, man, she was a really good PG13 episode. That's gonna be the comments. Like, she should come back. That was hilarious. We work on that, Sav. That's one thing we've worked on a. It is being okay to be like, hey, like, I am autistic when it comes to. I just need communication, and I just want directness because it makes life so much easier. So it is like, hey, just say why you don't want to do that, or you want to do that, and then we can move forward. Because if it's that weird, like, yeah, I'm just, do you want to move? Do you want to help me move? And you're like, okay. And then you show up.

[Brandon Herrera]

When people ask me to hang out, I always want to say no. But then I have. I'm like, yeah, maybe. But then I don't want to chase 100.

[Eli Double Tap]

What we're talking about right now.

[Donut Operator]

That's the only reason you're here right now. We just pressured you enough.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's working. Let's get Ice Cube.

[Donut Operator]

We just kept pressuring her and then she caved.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, but that's something I'm working on. I'm working on setting better boundaries. I'm not very good with that.

[Donut Operator]

I think that goes to a lot of people on is something difficult saying no setting boundaries. Especially when you're doing. It's where you are in your career. You have that point where you can be like, ah, no, I don't want to do that. I don't want to open up for them. I want. Here's my pay rate. It affects every aspect of your life. If you don't communicate that because it's hard sometimes your average person hates saying no. Period.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

But relationships, whatever it is, business partners, a lot of the times it's like, okay, okay, we'll figure. Yeah, whatever.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I feel like I've gotten a lot better at it, but I still am working on it. I mean it's always like, like you're always a work in progress. And, and for my fun books, I just remember like the Housemaid. That's one of the books that I really enjoyed. It's just. It's a murder kind of like it's like a murder mystery one like kind of like it's like a thriller.

[Eli Double Tap]

Okay.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. I'm trying to think of other ones but that kind of genre. Freedom McFadden. I like all of her books too.

[Donut Operator]

Do six bucks paperback.

[Brandon Herrera]

Mm.

[Eli Double Tap]

I back I've always like, you just had me looking through my Amazon cart or my Amazon and I've seen like some of these like thank you for my service by Matt Best. Like I'm looking through like previous fucking.

[Donut Operator]

Download purchases or audible. Like I've read a lot of this stuff.

[Eli Double Tap]

Like never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. The Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday. Like a lot of these, like I really like self help stuff. Like I almost exclusively read nonfiction because I just enjoy it.

[Donut Operator]

Dude. Those, those books though are how I truly believe. If you want to be a better person, it's that therapy. Those are your two key like your aspects in life. It's like, hey, how do I get ahead? Or hey, how do I get this motivation? Because leading up to your big jump from I am doing insurance and now I'm going to do this giant step. Any help be. Did you read a book?

[Brandon Herrera]

And I read all self help books. Like a year worth of self help books. Where I was like, finally like, yeah, I just got. It was like basically pep talks that I got from reading these self help books.

[Donut Operator]

And it helped though, right?

[Brandon Herrera]

It did help.

[Donut Operator]

And would you change anything from that? Like, it was probably terrifying doing that jump.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. But it's so rewarding to do to just go past that anxiety and then you're like, oh, I feel brave. Like that's how you get confidence. I feel like is you do stuff that you're anxious about and then you realize, oh, I can do it. And then you get a little more confident, then you do the next hard thing and then you get more confident and that's. And then when you stop doing that, that's when you start losing confidence. Because I don't know that for me anyway, I'm also kind of a.

[Eli Double Tap]

No, I think it's really true.

[Donut Operator]

I'm a head case. Yeah, the stare at surrounding people.

[Eli Double Tap]

Well, I think it's really interesting too because like back before I was successful in any. Right. Like I was broke as shit. I was driving around a $3,000 flood car with no AC, no electronics, whatever. Like I, I was constantly listening to audio books in my $29 gas station. Like Bluetooth headset. I was listening to self help stuff and just like people who I wanted to be like or people that I was learning from, who had experience that I thought was valuable and I learned from that. And I spent, spent years doing that. Broke as hell. And I feel like that's not to put too fine a point on it. I feel like that is a lot of what led me into the mindset that allowed me to succeed.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah, David Goggins too. That's another one that I read his book and basically after reading his book I was like, I can go read. I can go run for three miles. It's all mental. Like it's just in my head, it's just being lazy. And it was just so inspiring. I mean, he's kind of insane, but yeah, good.

[Donut Operator]

You know all that. Literally all I do every time I'm at the gym, that is every day, five days a week. It is motivational speeches on YouTube where, well, I lift weight.

[Eli Double Tap]

So it's like, do you listen to music in the gym?

[Donut Operator]

No, I'm the same way. I, I have my mo. Like motivational speech. When I click on like a laugh, motivational is going to be like, yep, like, what do you want to listen to, bro? Don't. You cannot give up. I'll click that and then listen to that. When I work out the entire Time. Because then I'm like, I'm. I suck.

[Eli Double Tap]

I either listen to like that so much harder when I'm going, like, super hard gym time. I either do like that or I listen to Sabaton. There is no in between. Two choices.

[Donut Operator]

Like, this is it.

[Eli Double Tap]

It's either that or, like, I'm benching to the Bismarck.

[Donut Operator]

Well, I do. I. I truly believe that's what gets. It's what separates everyone. Especially, like the people sitting at this table. It is. Okay, I'm gonna be uncomfortable for you. How long did you live in a hostel for?

[Brandon Herrera]

A year.

[Donut Operator]

A year?

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. That's how I wanted to meet people. I was like, a hostel. That's how I can meet people. And they're not gonna be like stuck up people that live in hostels. They're gonna be like, cool people that are like, like kind of doing the same thing. Maybe a few, like, crazy. Yeah. People that give you acid on the first night. And I was about that. Yeah. It was like the first or the second night, it was like, very soon. And I was like, well, I'm in a good state of mind. I've read all these self help books. I feel good. Like, you're not supposed to do psychedelics if you're in a bad place because it makes you have a bad trip. But I was pretty confident I was going to have a good trip on it just because of how good I was feeling about myself, like, doing this stuff. And I was right. It was a good trip.

[Donut Operator]

They put on host, like, no, no.

[Brandon Herrera]

No, no, no, no. It was a good movie host.

[Donut Operator]

Yeah, the movie.

[Christina Mariani]

You're tripping balls.

[Eli Double Tap]

Damn.

[Christina Mariani]

They cut that eyeball off.

[E]

Holy.

[Donut Operator]

But that's where you got to your next step. You're like, you did that for a year. Which is insanity to me.

[Brandon Herrera]

I had a lot of fun, though. I made, like, a lot of really good friends that I'm still friends with. And I even live with one of the people I met in the hostel. And he's great. I'm very trusting, though, because we live together, like, after not knowing each other for that long, honestly, and. But he's great and worked out, so.

[Donut Operator]

Pays the bills.

[Eli Double Tap]

Yeah.

[Brandon Herrera]

I mean, we both do.

[Donut Operator]

I. I hope.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah.

[Donut Operator]

I'm freeloading. I let him know that next month's gonna be the big break.

[Christina Mariani]

But he gives me acid.

[Donut Operator]

Still giving me acid. That was on top of it.

[Eli Double Tap]

Reminds me of the DiGiorno thing. I think it was. It was the. The why I stayed. The hash, why I stayed. It's like domestic abuse. Survivors, like, talking about their experience, and then DiGiorno hops on Twitter, like, hashtag, why I stayed. He gave me pizza. Wait, dude, dead serious.

[Donut Operator]

This was actual Twitter.

[Eli Double Tap]

Actual Twitter. Their intern thought that that was a good idea.

[Donut Operator]

I'm more amazed that somebody they hired somebody gave him the social media. And that social media person was like.

[Brandon Herrera]

Maybe he wanted to get fired.

[Eli Double Tap]

Maybe he was like, that's a rad way of quiet quitting.

[Brandon Herrera]

Yeah. Like, but everybody knew about the Journal after that. So true.

[Christina Mariani]

Yeah, I saw that and bought a pizza, dude. It was awesome.

[Brandon Herrera]

It's like, now I want to try the pizza.

[Eli Double Tap]

Hell yeah, brother. Pepperoni, extra cheese.

[Christina Mariani]

I'm going to eat pizza.

[Brandon Herrera]

What makes you want to try this pizza? Beats me.

[Eli Double Tap]

And after show.

[Donut Operator]

I know. Holy. We can. We can just go right to the after show after that. That beat. That after that beat. Yeah, Sorry. Hey, Cody, send us to the after show.

[Eli Double Tap]

Hey, guys.

[Christina Mariani]

Thank you for joining the Unsubscribe podcast today. With a girl.

[Eli Double Tap]

There's a girl. Girl. I'm joined today by Eli Double Tap.

[Christina Mariani]

Christina Mariani, Brandon Herrera, myself, donut operator. Thank you so much. Check out the after show on Patreon.

[Donut Operator]

And where do we find your stuff?

[Brandon Herrera]

Oh, Instagram. C R I I M A R I I. Creamery. It sounds gross. I didn't realize it would sound.

[Donut Operator]

I am creamery.

[Christina Mariani]

I make jokes.

[Eli Double Tap]

See you guys in the afternoon.