Mo Amer

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Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert.

I'm Dak Shepherd and I'm joined by Monica Padman.

Hi.

Today we have Mo Amer on.

Yeah.

I'm a big fan of Mo.

Mo is great.

Mo is a stand-up comedian and an award-winning writer.

I first saw him on Rami, which is another show I love.

Friend of the pod.

Where he plays Mo in that, but not our Mo in Mo.

Mo plays Mo in that, but then in his show,

he's a different Mo.

He's a different Moe, but very similar.

Also, Black Adam, and two stand-up specials on Netflix, Mo Amer, the Vagabond, and Mo Amer, Mohammedan Texas.

And he's on tour right now with El Oso Palestino Tour, which is the Palestinian bear.

Yeah.

That's what that translates to.

This was so interesting.

Another incredible story.

Yeah.

We're just coming off of John's story.

And then now we have this.

We're getting some epic tales in this garage.

We are.

Also, very Kihi Kwan.

Yeah, I was thinking a lot about Ki during this episode.

Yeah, we're accumulating some wild.

You can really take some circuitous paths to this town of Hollywood.

That's right.

Please enjoy Mo Amor.

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Do you get get anxiety before you go out on a talk show that you're going to have to pee once you get out there?

Peeing is not the anxiety.

No, it's not.

That's last on a list.

What is it?

I just watched you and Seth.

Actually, I have something in common with Seth.

Edibles fuck me up.

Like, I'm terrified of that.

I don't really get anxiety.

I get anxiety only if something is not settled at home.

You know, if something is off.

You'll carry it off.

I'm a very sensitive person.

I can feel my family's energy.

If something's wrong, I'll know it's wrong.

Right.

Yeah.

I don't know how to describe it.

it's like the antenna spidey that's the only time no compulsive rumination thoughts like I can acknowledge the pee one is insane I'll be in the dressing room at Kimmel and I'm waiting to hear the knock I stand in front of the toilet

and then when I hear the knock I go one second and then I do my last pee because I'm so nervous that 12 minutes.

Do you think you're at risk of ever peeing in your pants?

No, although if ever there was a place to try it, it would be on Kimmel.

Kimmel's the one to do it.

Yeah, for sure.

It's a safe place to peer suit.

It's so easy to talk to.

It feels so calming.

I'm doing Kimmel tomorrow, actually.

I don't know if you knew that.

I'm doing it Thursday.

Oh, that's funny.

That's awesome.

Let's do it on the same stage.

Let's do it.

I'll go to yours.

You come to mine.

Why don't you guys tell me that?

That would be fun.

We'll be in the same story.

We'll plan it.

It's going to be great for him because he's going to be able to do it.

I know, Jesus.

Just see you on the show as an Arab growing up in America.

It'd be so great.

That's kind of what they do on weekend update.

Do you ever watch the stuff with Shay?

Oh, fuck Chey, man.

No, I'm just kidding.

That's my brother.

That's my brother.

It's going to be downhill from here, guys.

But him and Colin.

No, these are my guys.

They're my friends.

Yeah, where they write jokes for each other that they're not allowed to tell.

And they have to read out loud.

On Christmas, I think.

Whatever the last show is, they do that.

That's funny.

It's diabolical.

It is.

I know.

It's scary.

And much higher risk for Colin.

I would say.

Yeah.

Yeah, definitely.

Especially because Che is really trying to get him into trouble.

He's genuinely trying to put him in the worst possible pickle.

But in a weird way, I'm like, they're geniuses.

They've hacked the math of this.

And really, we are dying to see this white guy make a terrible joke because we know the risk is career ending.

And they figured out how to do it.

Yeah, they have.

No, but there's no blame.

Yeah.

The black guy wrote it.

Yeah, exactly.

Exactly.

I didn't come up with that.

I didn't mean to say the N-word.

He told me to say it.

But I have to do it.

It's written.

I read everything that's on my mind.

To not do it.

Yeah, exactly.

I agree.

You know, what gives me, not not anxiety, but the thing that causes me to go down like a thought process, especially since this is specifically about the show and there's so much to discuss within the series itself.

Yeah.

It's like what clip do you show?

What exactly do you talk about?

And I'm a stand-up as well.

It's like, I just want to do jokes.

I just want to be a guy on a couch.

But I'm in this extraordinary position where I'm the only Palestinian on television with his own show created by a Palestinian starring and directed by a Palestinians.

It's like, what are you going to do?

What are you going to say?

Everybody's like, come on, buddy.

Yeah.

We all want to hear this.

Work this out for us.

Exactly.

tell us what to do i really just want to be a comedian that'd be really great to do that but i understand that there's an immense responsibility that comes with my position and you can't just be a clown all the time i have said this a bunch in the past which is for the young black dude who's from a shit situation and makes it out and becomes successful It wasn't bad enough that he had to go through all of that and be extra special to get here.

But now he's also burdened with the responsibility of representing the black community and speaking out on all issues.

And I just have always felt like, if you want to be political, great, but just to have to inherit that on top of everything else, it seems like a weird reward.

No, I agree.

And I would be resentful a bit if I were in a position where it's like, no, no, I want to tell jokes and have fun and I'm entitled to do that as much as anyone else is.

So does it feel like a burden at all?

It definitely doesn't feel like a burden.

It's funny that book says the burden and the glory.

Exactly right.

That says it all.

Wow.

Besides,

I really do feel stand-up itself is an art form since that's how I started out.

Technically, I did theater in high school and I was doing stand-up at the same time.

And once I started educating myself about what stand-up comedy is and the history of stand-up, historically speaking, the greatest stand-up comedians have always made you laugh and made you think.

Of course, there's like the danger field who's just silly and amazing one-liners.

And that's incredible.

One of the funniest guys ever, really.

But if you look at it, everybody's top five is someone who really made you think.

Yeah, who's your top five?

Oh, damn it, man.

Can we agree on the largest number?

Yeah, for sure.

It's close.

I don't like to put them in any particular order

because they each have a fascinating skill set that the other one can't do.

Like Pryor and Carlin.

Carlin has a particular skill set.

He's ahead of the game in the most incredible way, where everything he says today is relevant, but he has a certain structure.

He has to write every single thing down.

And you have Pryor, which is really freewheeling, which is my style.

Really, I write everything on the fly.

I have to do it in front of the audience.

I can't sit down and just write it out.

I'm inspired by the audience.

I need that.

So I appreciate those skill sets.

So I really don't like to put them in a particular order.

But these are the comedians I truly admire and love so much.

A good analogy would kind of be like: you're asking who's your favorite athlete as opposed to who's your favorite basketball player, your favorite hockey player.

Pryor's doing something different than Jerry Seinfeld, than Cosby was sitting down and doing his thing.

How do you like?

Of course.

Yeah, we've done thousands of shows together.

Pryor, Carlin, Bill Hicks, to me is up there.

Unfortunately, he died so young, but he was on that trajectory of being truly ahead of his time and magnificent in his own way.

Chappelle is on my top five.

Just because I've seen him personally, thousands of shows together, it's like seeing inside of how a Rolex works, like how the mechanism all flows.

It's just really fascinating to see that.

And I feel like we're very similar in ways.

A lot of things overlap between us.

And I'm just grateful to have one of the greatest of all time and to be able to see him.

And he's my brother.

He's my mentor, but also like family.

So he's up there, of course.

I don't think there's a debate there.

Then the fifth is really hard.

It's like Eddie Murphy, but he stopped.

He got so famous.

Once you stop doing stand-up and want to come back to it, it's almost impossible.

Yeah, it's very impressive that Seinfeld was able to come back and do a real show.

But he never really stopped doing stand-up.

He always would show up in his show with stand-up.

Murphy became a movie star rock and roll man and a lot of young people wouldn't even know he was a stand-up boy yeah exactly but those are the albums i used to listen to but when i first started stand-up i was only been in the country like five years so i didn't really know anything about the history of stand-up i would be at open mics and be like oh you sound like kennison i'm like who the fuck's kinison they're like who the fuck's kennison

you live in houston people thought i was full of shit because i didn't have an accent To them, they feel like, oh, if you're an immigrant, you should have some kind of accent.

The fact that you don't is baffling.

So we don't really believe it.

Yeah, like I would tell my friends when they first found out, because you don't talk about it, you just walk around like, hey, I don't have a citizenship yet.

You're trying to fit in, not stand out more.

Yeah, but it never really comes up.

You just want to ball in the neighborhood, have a good time.

You're not really thinking about it.

It's not like we're going to go travel to Europe together.

Yeah.

They know the family, but you're too young.

You're too naive.

You're thinking about too many other things to share your immigration status.

It just didn't really come up at that time.

Now, this is linked to the obligation to talk about being Palestinian in this moment, but also, do you get sick of having to tell your story?

Because

your show, which we're going to talk a lot about, is your story.

So you inevitably do have to share it.

Again, back to the, I just want to be funny.

I don't want to have to tell this fucking story again.

There's some fatigue for sure, but it's mostly not coming from sharing the story because I am introducing different eras of it.

And there is...

So many layers that are baked into each experience, whether it's the Gulf War, growing up in America, there's really fun ways and interesting ways to explore that.

As a storyteller, I am really intrigued by that.

And I want to dive into it and capture all the subtleties and bring them out.

That is the best part of writing the TV show and creating a show.

That is really emotional at times.

I can't explain to you how many moments in the series while I was filming, especially season two, where I would have to go off and just weep and then come back and then start over and then direct.

Okay, guys, so what we're going to do is, you know,

process.

Co-star's like, how the fuck are you doing this?

I saw what happened.

I saw it.

You You were in the corner trying to shut your mouth.

You weren't getting anything from craft service.

You were whimpering to yourself in front of it.

That's fun.

I really do enjoy that.

Whether it's super emotional or just straight up comedic scene that we're shooting and you're just feeding lines to Hamid, which is one of my favorite characters in the whole season.

The thing that I have happening to me right now, especially on tour, is all the people sharing their experiences with me.

Sure.

Yeah, you have to hold a lot.

And that's...

A massive thing.

That's the most difficult part.

I may have people coming up to me talking about about they lost 200 family members.

I held a kid yesterday.

He's three years old.

He's from Gaza.

He's getting treatment here.

He's lost his mother.

She was 23.

And I'm like holding him.

And I'm like,

yeah.

You know, just thinking about him.

I just had a son.

He's 17 months.

I can't even imagine that.

Yeah.

That's the stuff that's really, really, really heavy.

And that's where the responsibility comes.

But literally, there's nobody else speaking about it from an actual Palestinian perspective.

Right.

I hear a lot of young white liberal kids telling me about it.

Yeah.

Well, it's good.

People should engage in this conversation.

That's the only way to truly have any kind of progress is engage in these talks.

But no one's coming from my background talking about it.

At least no one has the voice that I do or the platform that I do.

So just to engage in that, and it's also a massive test for me as a comedian because I could always go up and just give me a topic.

dissect this, have a blast with it, make it funny, no problem.

But to toe that line is dangerous.

Well, that's what Chappelle is so masterful at.

And yeah, I need his perspective on block experience.

The insight that he has repeatedly given me is just incredibly valuable and so authentic and from the inside that I always appreciate that.

Can't agree with you more.

To start, you were born in Kuwait.

I was, yep.

I got food poisoning in the Kuwait first-class lounge.

Oh, no.

And then had food poisoning for 28 hours of flight back.

That's not funny.

No, it's really funny.

Can you think of a worse scenario than food poisoning setting on as they close the door for your 14 hours?

That's horrible.

I had a similar situation.

It did not last 28 hours.

That is misery.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I had a similar situation from Sweden to Frankfurt, catching my connection flight in Frankfurt.

Before I boarded the flight, I bought it, I thought it was just a regular sparkling water.

So I take a drink of it.

I was like, oh my God, this tastes god-awful.

It's pear, fucking pear sparkling water.

I'm like, god damn you Swedish people.

Like, who drinks pear sparkling water?

and whatever formula it takes to make the pear taste that flavor that perfume just created the worst possible bubbling

sickness the storm system had to form hurricane was forming

the blood was leaving my head and going right to try to rescue my gut I either needed a pass gas or take a poo I wasn't sure about what was going to happen

I feel fainting yeah you can't sit there on the plane

sweaty brow ridge.

Sweaty brow ridge.

A full-blown waterfall situation from every area possible.

The back of the dome, the front of the dome.

You now look like someone that's smuggling something on an airplane.

I shove cocaine up my ass,

and now it's backfiring.

And that's what it looks like.

I finally hear the ding to get up.

I was like, I got to go to the restroom.

We got to figure this out.

I felt really faint.

And right before I grabbed the door, I just go down.

Perfect, right?

Oh, no.

You collapsed.

I just fainted.

And I wake up to three of the hottest Swedish German

libraries.

They're like, are you okay?

What's happening?

Have you been partying?

What's going on?

Were you all at the beer garden and had so much fun?

You want to have some more fun?

I was like, no, I wasn't.

Leave me alone.

You'll diabetic.

I was like, oh, I'm not diabetic.

Thank God.

I'm not diabetic.

Stop making me panic even more.

Just leave me air.

It was horrible.

I just needed to pass gas.

That's all I needed.

Just pass gas and it was all gone.

Wow.

My first thought upon waking up and seeing the Swedish ski team would be, are my pants full?

Because we don't know what happened.

We don't know what happened while I was out.

Oh, yeah, true.

And these are very beautiful women, and I might have a full cargo.

Yeah, we had an armchairion tell a story about that where he pooped in the lane.

Yeah,

in the aisle.

And all these beautiful flight attendants were there, and there's poop on them now.

Oh, no.

Are you serious?

Yes, you just have to tell yourself in those situations.

Horrible.

Hey, no, I'm not sure.

I might jump off the fucking plane.

Just hear the pilot.

Yeah, he just jumped out of the back of the fucking plane.

He's got three rain slickers tied together.

Hopefully, that'll.

I'm such a shy person.

I don't even like taking off my shirt in front of people.

No, I can't do it.

I do it.

I got the pool and stuff, right?

I can't imagine a scenario where I shit my pants on a plane.

It's everybody, and they're all looking at you.

We'll just say, ideally, if that happens, you want to wake up and see three ugly old men.

Yeah, when when you wake up and you're like yeah guys i shit myself you know it's like hey boys yeah

i'm disgusting like you guys smoking a cigarette with on his fingertips like you don't care yeah i remember this 62 nam was worse i myself an hour ago welcome yeah okay so dad is a telecoms engineer great segue

yeah we're going back to kuwait let's bring up your justice

you lost your mother in 1990

yeah we'll not come wood for that one

straight into that.

Yeah, my father was a telecommunications engineer.

And was Kuwait the first stop when they left Palestine?

When my mom and dad married.

Prior to that, my father got his telecommunications engineer in England.

The first job offer was actually in Doha, I thought, in the 60s.

So he lived there for like a year.

That's the reason why they left.

It was a job.

Just like if you're in Houston and you get a job in Kansas, or if you're in LA, you get a gig, you got to go film in Toronto, same thing.

So he was in Doha, and then he got a job in Kuwait.

And that was where my family settled.

And we were all born there.

He worked for the Kuwaiti Oil Company.

He built one of the first radio stations in Kuwait.

He was instrumental in creating wireless communication at that time between oil rigs.

He was a really brilliant dude, truly ahead of his time.

My mom would always tell me, like, oh, he had a cell phone in the 60s, that big thing that you put on your shoulder and it's a massive box.

Yeah, Mike.

Yeah, he was that guy.

He always had to have the top tech whenever it comes out.

You guys left when you were nine, but how long had they been there?

Oh, since the 60s, 25, maybe 30 years there.

And they would go back and forth to West Bank where my family lives and grandparents are.

And did they come to love it when you guys did leave?

Did mom miss it?

It was more than just loving Kuwait.

It was more the normalcy of the life that we had there.

As a gray life, my uncle and my cousins lived three houses down.

All my aunts, everybody settled in Kuwait.

And we had a lot of family there.

And my grandparents and some of my aunts, of course, a lot of the extended family was still in the West Bank.

But we had this real unification where we would see each other every week.

And there's a barbecue every weekend.

All my uncles will talk and smack and playing all these different games.

And whoever loses has to buy the dessert.

Was your dad gregarious and loud?

Yeah.

Are you more mom or dad, I guess?

I'm a really solid mix of both.

I have the exploratory, like my dad had.

He really wanted to figure out what was going on.

He would really travel a lot and want to see the world.

So curious in that way.

And my mother was...

very funny, poetic.

She still to this day writes poetry and that's her life.

She wakes up in the morning.

She's inspired by something.

She writes it.

Sometimes it's super sad, but thoughtful and sweet.

Sometimes it's funny.

I feel like I have a great mix of both.

But my dad was really outgoing.

He was the first guy on the dance floor, get everybody going.

He was that guy for sure.

I have a ton of memories of 409.

Do you remember living there?

Everything.

But we also come from the Sham region, which is basically Santa Barbara.

It's so gorgeous.

The weather is stunning.

There's not really any desert regions unless you go super south or you hit the Jordan Valley.

That's where it becomes that way.

And there's Bedouins there, of course.

There's tons of sheepherders.

We do come from a farming culture originally.

Santa Barbara seems to be the place.

When my parents first came to visit here, we went to Santa Barbara on a day trip and they were like, this reminds me of India.

I was like, what?

And then we've had a few other people from other places say like, Santa Barbara's kind of like this person.

It's like Caroline, as it turns out.

Turns out.

It's not really suited for that kind of living, to be honest.

You don't go to explore the desert there, but surely in kuwait we did that i mean i used to ride the bikes as kids set up mounds and we just dive off of them you just bounce off of that shit and just keep going yeah yeah just ruthless i would hop on the back of dirt bikes and fall off going 40 miles an hour but you're eight you're just like rubber band doesn't even matter you went to a british-speaking school yeah what kind of classmates did you have?

People from all over the world.

A bunch of expats lived in the neighborhood we resided in.

Since my father worked for the Kuwaiti Oil Company, this is a compound situation.

That neighborhood, north and south, is where we lived in Ahmedi, had so many families, super, super diverse.

You're talking about British, Pakistani, Swiss, everybody lived in that neighborhood.

And most of the people in that neighborhood working for the oil company.

Exactly.

Everybody had a different job within the company itself.

Like a Ramco oil company, you go overseas, that's the biggest oil company in the world, number one, but it's like driving on to a military base.

Oh, right, right.

Our neighborhood at the end of it, there was like the hospitality palace.

So anybody that visited, there would be presidents that would visit.

They would put them up there.

I would ride by on my bike if I was a kid and try to see who was staying in the palace.

All the time.

Would you have to

be so curious?

Like, is Michael Jackson gonna go?

Exactly.

Oh, no.

We're all over it.

We see cars come in.

We

immediately just pedal over there and talk to the security guy in the front.

Try to figure out who this wealthy man is.

He's like, Trust me, you don't want to know.

Michael Jackson?

President of Malaysia or something like that.

Okay, let us know.

Salt LeBron.

Yeah, Michael Jackson.

We used to mimic him.

He was the thing back then for sure.

God, yeah.

yeah.

So Gulf War breaks out in 91.

August of 90.

The reason why I remember exactly the Iraqi invasion was then, and I remember it quite well because I was supposed to have my tonsils removed two days after they came in.

So I was like, damn it.

So now they're stole my tonsils.

Tonsillitis.

Might have been a happy accident.

No, it's not, brother.

They're miserable.

I have enormous tonsils.

I bet they're gorgeous.

They're massive.

They are gorgeous.

They are mountainous.

You can ski all of those fucking things for sure.

You can probably get them out now.

I am so scared.

Adults aren't supposed to do it.

It's like 50-50 bleed or something.

It's crazy, like heavy bleeding.

Was it someone on here?

Six weeks to eight weeks recovery, no talking.

They cauterize it, but you can't feel if it's bleeding down into your stomach.

That's all I needed to hear to make it even worse.

But what about why are the kids more...

Why are they able to?

I don't know if they're tinier or they're easier to congratulate.

I think it's not as mature enough.

It's an in-and-out procedure for kids.

But someone was just telling an adult was really battling whether or not to do it.

They don't like to do it on adults because it's bleeding.

I went to the top specialist of the UCLA and they were like,

50-50, they're going to bleed.

But you'll be fine.

It's just going to take a lot longer to heal.

I was like, you know what?

I'll just take antibiotics.

Take my big ass tonsils out of here.

I do a lot of voices too.

Like, what if it affects how I do all these accents?

What if I just end up talking like he sold his time now?

Yeah.

My life is ruined.

Because they sound terrible.

So the invasions in August.

The U.S.

enters,

as I remember, because my birthday is January 2nd.

And I got my license in 91 on the 2nd.

And it was the only thing that played in the radio.

I feel like it was maybe January 1st of 91.

The U.S.

entered.

Yeah, I had left before that.

It was really, really intense because that was the first time I knew that we were stateless, number one.

I just knew this happy life.

I didn't know anything was wrong.

I was like, why don't we just go back to Palestine?

And they're like, no, we can't necessarily do that either.

That's not the best.

next step.

Let's figure it out.

Your parents, you see them and they're your pillars.

They're always in control.

There's nothing ever wrong.

Seemingly know everything.

And to see them so worried, and I remember this to this day, that call at 6 a.m.

Those days, the phone,

you know, I was like, who the hell is calling?

And I remember getting up and my mom picking up the phone is like, Saddam has invaded Kuwait, hangs up, and now everyone is out to try to get as many resources for the house.

Food, rice, water, whatever you can get to just store it.

That's when everything changed.

And they got to our house at one o'clock in the morning.

I've slept through the whole breaking of the door, ransacking the home.

They were threatening my mom, my dad, who's in this bedroom, who's in this bedroom.

They were pointing at my bedroom and they were threatening they were going to throw a grenade in the bedroom.

Oh my gosh.

Like, tell us, tell us, tell us.

They were trying to figure out who works at the Equator Oil Company since the whole reason of their invasion to begin with is the supposed siphoning of Iraqi oil.

Was that their premise they were diagonally drilling in?

That's what they were saying.

I don't know.

That's the bigger conversation to me now.

As a grown-ass man, I see what's everything going on living in America.

Now I know who's been putting all these people in power.

Yeah, let's talk about that.

But that was the premise is that Kuwait was stealing from them and he's there to take it back.

But then since it's the Kuwaiti oil company, so our neighborhood was a hot one.

And it was all about collecting people who could help manage and turn over the control of it.

Exactly.

Your dad's like, I just do telephones.

Well, that's the biggest fucking thing.

Communication.

Okay.

That was probably on their top five list, transferring all communication to Arak.

So my dad had one choice, either do it or potentially your family is at risk.

Might take them all out.

You're not going to find out if they're bluffing or not.

Exactly.

You're just going to say, yeah, that's me.

What are you going to do?

So he was forced to go in and redirect from what I've heard, some of it at that time.

And he regrets it.

Didn't feel good about any of it.

Well, he had to protect himself and his family.

He loved Kuwait and he loved the people of Kuwait.

He loved everything there.

And he was just saddened to see it all happen that way, but he was also just protecting our family.

Soldiers would show up early in the morning at our house and all throughout the whole street.

It was pretty regular, but I felt like our house was a spot and play soccer with these guys, have me like, hold the machine.

I was like, I don't know, hold the machine gun.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was that weird, different life, just everything changed.

Right.

And trying to evaluate, are these guys mean and evil?

They weren't.

Right.

But when they first show up with the guns.

They have moments, though.

I remember this guy, he had a thick stash, huge, but I was really fast as a kid.

And I played tons of soccer.

So I was killing these older guys.

He just socks me real hard.

And I remember being laid out on the ground and I look up and I see him and this is how he felt like he was laughing.

He goes,

and I was like, like a boss and evil, bro.

It felt evil.

I know he's not.

He was just fucking with me, but I can't forget his face.

If a sketch artist was sitting here, I could draw him.

You never forget that.

But yeah, that was a wild experience that I slept through that first initial invasion.

They took over the whole neighborhood.

My mom and dad are both in a really terrible position.

My dad, particularly, and a bunch of other employees or ex-employees.

Some people were able to get out before they came in really really difficult situation especially with us kids and there's other kids who are studying overseas what about them

and then the money is gone yeah I'm the sixth six okay so all the money is gone overnight Saddam said oh the Kuwaiti dinar is equivalent to the Iraqi dinar well their Kuwaiti dinar was like four times absolutely insane so how did dad get you guys all out?

In the show, I had to tweak it.

But in real life, what happened is my mom got myself and my sister out.

My brother stayed with my dad.

We got on the bus.

My mom strategically hid the money in the suitcase in a really insanely savvy way.

I never saw the side of my mother.

You think your mom's a superhero at this point.

Like, how are you coming up with this?

Like grabbing the razor, cutting back the zipper, putting equal amounts of money on each side.

It's incredible sewing it together.

I just remember it to this day.

And going through Edoch, basically War Zone, through another War Zone.

to Ammon Jordan, to my mom sending my sister and I to Houston by ourselves.

How old was your sister?

She was 18.

So nine and 18.

You're so scared.

I'm assuming.

I'm miserable.

I don't want to leave.

I didn't give a shit about the guns.

Like, it didn't bother me at all.

I was very fearless.

I did not care.

I would go out still on my own, scope it out, what's happening in the neighborhood.

I was just kind of crazy that way, but I love my friends and I wanted to see them.

And I didn't necessarily allow that invasion to like change that for me.

And I knew they weren't going to hurt me.

Like, they're not going to hurt kids.

They were very gentle with children, actually.

But I didn't want to leave my mother and thought I could be really helpful.

Right.

It wasn't like, I don't want want to leave you my friends no it was more like hey i'm a helping hand this sucks i have to go how you're going to do this on your own and that was the thing that really ripped me apart more than anything who did she send you to my brother he was studying in houston is this the brother that became a doctor yes he's a phd in biochemistry super brilliant amazing human and then she by herself goes back to Kuwait and that's where all the real hell started because there was all this posturing between America and Iraq and say Saddam is saying go back no we're not going to go back this is ours ours.

Oh, yeah.

And then the oil fields went on fire.

And now it's a completely different world.

Literally, noon looks like midnight.

Then, of course, the Iraqis started to retreat.

It was a big heist.

They were clearing out Mercedes dealerships.

The Iraqis were overnight.

He released a bunch of prisoners just to create chaos.

That was his strategy of war, I guess.

Then there was a massive situation that happened with my mom and my dad.

My dad in particular, the Kuwaitis started to regain power, as they should.

It's their country.

They started forming these different militias.

They came into our house.

This is my story from my mom.

They knock on the door.

They ask, has a car for sale?

Cause we're liquidating everything.

And she goes, I don't know if it's for sale.

Let me ask my husband.

She asks him.

And as he comes out, they put a hood over him, kidnap him.

He's gone.

She doesn't know where he is.

Nothing.

Then the American soldiers come in.

So you had the Iraqis come in, burst down the door.

You had the Kuwaitis come burst in the door.

And then you had the U.S.

soldiers come bursting the back door.

My brother is neurodivergent, has his own issues.

It's chaos.

She's trying to get medicine for him.

She doesn't know where my dad is, who's diabetic and has his own set of issues.

It's a whole fucking movie.

So my dad was able to call my mom.

They were like holding all these people, trying to see who's the actual traitor, who's not the traitor, who stuck for us, who didn't.

They're trying to regain their power.

I honestly don't hold anything against the Kuwait.

I totally get.

why they're doing it.

Unfortunately, my dad was in an impossible situation.

Somebody has to vouch for you.

You can't just leave.

They got to know it wasn't an inside job for sure.

And I genuinely don't hold anything against them.

I really love them.

The Kwatys are some of the gentle, sweetest people.

But in this situation, it was awful.

She doesn't know where my dad is.

So they had all these makeshift prisons and office buildings and stuff.

They were holding people and torture them to a certain degree to get stuff out of them.

And what did they have issues with at the jail?

Communication.

They couldn't get fucking calls out.

They couldn't get a dial tone.

So my dad goes, I can fix it.

Yeah, yeah.

He fixed it for him.

While he's fixing it, they're not in the room.

He calls my mom.

Uh-huh.

Listen, you got to find the prime minister.

He's a friend of mine.

He loves me.

He's the head guy in Kuwait.

You got to talk to him.

He's the only one that can free me.

Just get to him and let's get the hell out of here.

And my mom's like, what about the money?

We have to get your money.

You're owed this.

This is your money.

You worked 25 years for.

You got to get it back.

And my dad's like, fuck the money.

Just get me out of this hellhole.

And my mom goes, the gangster that she is, I'm going to find this guy and I'm going to get your money.

She's driving.

Soot is in the air.

It's just disgusting.

All these oil rigs on fires caused chaos throughout the roads and the environment and breathing, everything.

So now she's just on a journey trying to find him.

This is three weeks.

Oh, wow.

She says there's one time the militia at this checkpoint.

They told her, How do we know this car is not stolen?

Because people are just stealing so much.

He goes, I need to see the title for this car.

She goes, I don't know where the title is for the car.

Well, you need to find it.

You can't get through here.

She goes back to the house.

She swore to God.

She said, I don't know how it happened, but I couldn't see anything.

It was pitch black.

I just reach into a pile of papers, and it's the title to the car.

The most incredible thing.

She goes in after weeks of weeks trying to trace this guy down.

She finds some jail.

She hears that he's there, this prime minister.

She's talking to the outside security.

She's crying to him, saying, My husband's been wrongly prisoned.

He goes, If you don't stop crying, I'm going to put you in jail with him, like kind of threatening her.

She goes, Listen, I need to talk to the prime minister.

He knows my husband.

He gets scared.

He's like, What?

Oh, yeah, he's here.

So my mom walks into this building.

She can hear guys not having the best time.

Let's Let's just say that.

Yeah.

She's walking down this flickery hallway.

She goes and makes a right into the guy's office.

She looks around the office.

It's pristine.

It's gorgeous.

It's the direct opposite of the building she just walked through.

But then she looks at all the technology in the room.

She recognizes it immediately.

She goes, this is all my husband's stuff.

And he says, who are you?

She tells him who she is, tells him who her husband is.

He freaks out.

He's like, where's Mustafa?

I love him.

Where is he at?

He's not a trade.

He's a great man.

How many letters do you need?

I'll sign them all.

Sign a letter for her.

She went back.

She picked him up at the airport.

They meet at the airport with my brother.

My dad comes in.

He's 50 days now, full beard.

And they go, Where's your two other kids?

And she goes, Oh, they already left.

And they go, How do we know they're not here?

And they're hiding.

We imprisoned his father.

He's innocent.

What if they want revenge or something?

He's like, We don't want revenge.

We forgive you.

Forget it.

He's over there.

He's like, No, now you got to show proof.

Oh, Jesus.

So she has to go by another two days of that.

Then she collects my dad.

They go to Amman.

My mom and my brother come like nine months later.

Wow.

Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert.

If you dare.

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Yeah, I've never told a story.

It's crazy.

In 92, your dad calling about 92.

I got Houston two days before Halloween in 1990.

And then Halloween happened, and I've never seen Halloween before.

Why is everybody dressed like demons?

Where did my mom send me?

Yeah.

This is evil.

You heard we were a godless country.

Did we do it?

It was so funny.

It was so funny.

Everyone in devil costumes.

They were even seeing cleavage.

And like, all the girls were naked.

I'm like, whoa.

It was just

crazy.

And asking for chocolate and candy.

Yeah, exactly.

You know, it was just wow.

And I had a British accent.

I stuck out like a sore thumb.

Nobody really researched the neighborhood we moved into.

It wasn't like the greatest neighborhood right out the gate.

My brother, he doesn't know.

he's a young kid too.

He's a super nerd.

It was next to us, stop and go.

And that's the only thing we had.

I would go there.

And that's what I knew America.

I'm going to go back to war.

What did your mom and dad do in the States?

Once he came to the States, he's an entrepreneur.

So he owned electronic stores actually in Kuwait as well, like a side gig.

He was like the first best buy there.

It was like Radio Shack, basically, before Radio Shack.

So he opened up a place in Ukraine.

He opened up a 99 cent store, but then he started with his knowledge, realizing that it's a poor neighborhood.

He was like, Oh, I can bring telephones that they don't have access to for a really great price.

So he brings them in and he starts showing him the 99 cents plus.

That's how they get you is that plus.

Sure.

So he gets a wide range of goods.

Lot of

$20

pretty quickly.

Pretty quickly.

He wore a suit every day.

He would call people from the living room and tell them he wanted a free cruise.

He figured it off.

You want a free telephone?

It's $200.

Guess what?

Congratulations.

It's so funny, but he would sell these phones, had a whole display of a wide variety of phones that did different things.

Whether it's a football phone, whether it's one that you could push a hold button and it plays music of your choosing, and you're like, What?

Yeah, that was like the tag of that time.

Yeah, so he had all of it, and we would sell like hotcakes.

So I think that eventually he would have probably gotten back in the telecom and the way that cell phones are today.

I mean, I always think about it.

I had a discussion yesterday.

I was was like, I wonder.

Probably been very rich, actually.

Now I think about it.

Certainly.

Yeah.

So he dies in 94.

December 1995.

So you're young.

You're 14.

I'm 14.

Yep.

Why did he die so prematurely?

I think it's the losing everything in your late 50s.

I say it's like.

going from rags to essentially riches and going to rags again after spending your whole life trying to create a future for yourself and your family and your kids and having the ability to provide for them on a level that is going to be really difficult to do at this age.

And he never really diversified his funds.

He was so safe in Kuwait.

Never really thought something was going to go down like this.

And unfortunately, that's what happened.

I think all my dad's friends and my uncles, they all died fairly young.

The massive, massive stress of the war, carrying that burden, carrying that weight around really took its toll and eventually tipped away at him, unfortunately.

How scary does life get at 14 with him now out of the picture?

Oh, it's terrible.

Emotionally, you're gone.

I was already checked out because my mom didn't come for like nine months.

So I was really angry about being there without my mom.

My sister is an absolute saint.

God bless her.

She only knew how to cook one dish.

One of the things that my mom gave my sister was a recipe book that had all these different pieces of paper from different eras from my grandmother, my great-grandmother, from my great-great-great-grandma.

It went back almost 100-plus years.

It's pretty intense.

But these are all the recipes.

These are gold.

But she would only make one dish and I just come home seven days in a row.

I was like, rice and lintel.

Where's my mom?

I want to go home.

And meanwhile, I'll cut to my mom.

She's like driving through oil fields and trying to buy me.

You little ungrateful bitch.

It was really difficult.

And I was always very independent and adventurous.

And I wanted to be out.

Nobody could really control me.

And I didn't know what to do with my emotions.

So I was a 14-year-old kid in high school.

I was just skipping.

I already knew I was going to be a comedian.

Did you make friends easily?

Oh, yeah.

So, you landed on your feet.

You were social.

It was rough at first.

The British English thing did not help.

It was a Mexican situation pretty regularly, but then the British accent were like, You're not Mexican.

But what the hell are you?

Yeah.

Usually, in my class, I was the first Mohammed there.

I spoke British English, and at times I did not know that British English, certain words, were significantly different meaning than American English.

Like, I walked up to my fourth grade teacher.

I was like, Mrs.

Strand, can I have a rubber, please?

I made a mess on my paper, you know, and she's like, what?

You came on your paper.

You were wearing my brain.

My friend Bruce was like, you fucking fourth grade?

What is fucking?

You know, like, I had no idea.

We had a cat.

You don't say cat in British thing, you say pussy.

And I walked up to Bruce at recess, the most embarrassing

possible spot.

I was like, Bruce, que swo.

He was like, what, man?

He was like, I have a pussy now.

Isn't it fantastic?

And he was like, what?

I had learned this quickly about black people.

They can't hold it in.

They have to tell everybody.

I'd be like, come on, everybody.

Get it out.

I'm like, yeah, fresh off the presses.

Exactly.

He got everybody around in front of the entire class at recess.

He was like, watch this.

He's like, Mo, do you have a pussy?

And I was like, yeah, I have a pussy.

Isn't it lovely?

He's small and lovely.

He just kept going with it.

Jose lost his mind.

He was like, what, bro?

You have a Pinocho for real, bro?

That's insane, bro.

And he was like so confused.

This playground sounds like a sitcom.

And he paused and he goes, can I see it, bro?

I don't believe you.

Yeah, I got punched a lot in the beginning, but I learned quickly.

You had the right skill set, it sounds like.

Minimally, you weren't lonely.

That's a blessing.

When I threw a football, everything changed.

It was like, oh, this guy could throw the fuck out of a football.

Oh, no kidding.

You could.

I would play ball.

I'd play basketball.

I was very unassuming.

Nobody knew that I could play that well.

I wasn't always like overweight.

I almost died in sixth grade.

I hit my head on the bottom of a pool, and that's when I gained all the weight because I was in a neck brace like this the whole time.

I was like, almost died.

It was terrifying.

I don't know why I knew exactly what I had to do.

I was spitting blood.

Again, it was almost Halloween.

So everybody thought I had like blood capsules and I was joking around the pool.

And I was like, no, guys, I think I'm about to die.

I walked right past my mom, grabbed a towel, wrapped it around my neck.

I was like, mom, you need to take me to the hospital.

Oh,

you're so lucky you weren't paralyzed.

So lucky wasn't paralyzed or dead.

I just think about it, not even for that.

I think about like my mom.

She didn't have enough on her plate.

Okay, so what's happening financially, though, when dad is out of of the picture?

You just have to fend for yourself.

You have to figure it out.

So, my mom worked at a Mexican restaurant, which turned into Taco Cabana, which is very famous.

Everybody goes to Taco Cabana.

Oh, okay.

It's like the fast food chain of Tex-Mex.

Dinner was lots of Mexican food.

But also, you can negotiate for rides.

Hey, man, I'll throw in a quesadilla if you can just bring me here or take me there.

I had two quesadillas.

All right, now you're asking for a lot.

We did two quesadillas and tacos, but I want four rides.

We just negotiate.

Honestly, it was really dark, but also also some of my greatest years.

And my friends that I've made when I was 11 years old in that particular neighborhood, we're like the sandlock.

We made a pact.

We're going to raise our kids together.

We're going to go to college together.

I always said I'm going to be a comedian.

You guys are going to go to college.

I'll visit you guys.

And everything really panned out exactly how we all set out to be.

And really, truly, that group of friends, that camaraderie, that brotherhood that we created in that beautiful neighborhood got me through everything, that support system.

All the while you guys applied for asylum.

Yeah.

You don't have passports, right?

You don't have a Kuwaiti passport.

No, in the Middle East, it's all about your lineage.

So when you go there, actually, when you enter, they say, Ish Asla, what is your origin?

And you say, Palestinian.

You either get Palestinian ID cards.

It's worthless.

It's actually worse.

My uncle always taught me, don't get the ID card.

If you do, then you're not going to ever be able to fly into Tel Aviv when you get your U.S.

passport.

You're always going to be subjugated to the cages.

You literally have to go through this apartheid system where you go through cages.

He says, just don't do it.

Okay.

And even though you were born in kuwait you don't have any that's not how it works it's all based off of your origin where your parents come from right so my parents are both palestinian so you're palestinian you don't get kuwaiti citizens because in kuwait it's all tribal so if you're an original kuwaiti from that area the government takes care like you should you get a stipend yeah so the resources that your country is producing you actually benefit from those resources they can't do it for everyone so it's like you have to be from that land and your right is your right.

My right is in the West Bank in Palestine or in Haifa.

That was now gone.

as Israel.

So now we go to the West Bank and whatever is there, that's for you.

But that's not for you here.

So that's not how it works.

It's where you're actually from, where your parents are from, particularly.

So I guess we get into some of the complexities of this immigration story you have because you're just waiting forever on the asylum list, however that process works.

In the meantime, you have no passport.

You can't come and go.

You're just in this kind of purgatory.

Yes, exactly.

For how long?

It took me 20 years before I got my citizenship.

But when I turned 18 is when I was able to get a social security card.

I was in the system before, but I couldn't get the social.

And you can't work until you have a social.

You can't work.

I still worked.

My mom would volunteer me down there, business owners, when I had jobs that I didn't want to do, but I did, where I would sell like fake Rolexes or fake watches through my dad because he would go to the wholesale district.

Once he passed away, a layer got rest of soy.

His friend gave me a job, and then I started learning about wholesale business, import, export.

And I started seeing this guy wearing this nice watch.

I'm like, bro, that's crazy.

He goes, ah, it's fake.

I was like, oh, it looks amazing, though.

And so I was like, oh, I think I could hustle these in school and on the street here.

All I have to do is wear it.

And then they're going to ask me where you got it.

And I'm going to tell them it's for sale.

So that was my shtick.

I would just put on a Versace sunglasses and be working at the cashier or whatever.

And people be like, oh, man, those are dope.

I'm like, oh, it's the last pair, bro.

Y'all sell them to you if you want.

It's 125.

They would leave and I'll take out another pair and put it on.

Sure, sure.

Your second to last pair.

And they would be so bad because at the end of the week, they're all wearing the same shit.

And they would come in really mad and aggressive.

Like, bro, you told me it was the last one.

I was like, look, look,

look.

For real, though, this is one of one.

This Movado watch is the only one I have.

There's no other design of this.

I promise you, nobody else is going to have this.

And he'd be like, oh, man, that's cool.

I was like, yeah, I would sell that one.

Oh, my God.

I was really good at it to the point my dad's friend put his own stand-up.

And I was like, why are you doing this?

You're not going to compete with me?

This is crazy.

He goes, bro, you're selling at my location.

And that's where I learned about business, right?

It was like, oh, I'm using your place of business.

I owe you commission.

You got to kick up.

I didn't know this.

And he goes, it's a valuable lesson.

Don't worry.

You still sell.

Just give me the commission.

I was like, okay.

Yeah.

When we meet Mo on season one, he's selling shit out of his truck.

He's got like the full.

It's a very condensed version.

I really wanted to do more with it, but I think there's not enough space and it's so hard to figure out.

And the first season, it was a whole thing with COVID and Civil Unrest and George Floyd.

It It was like a nightmare making season one.

It was really, really tough.

But season two, I had the whole vision for it.

I knew exactly what I wanted to do at the time.

To do the Reader's Digest version, you go to the rodeo and Bill Cosby's performing.

You're young and you see that.

You decide you want to do that.

You're a shit student.

A teacher says to you, I'll let you stand up so long as you're making fun of the course material.

Yep.

That's a lucky, weird thing that happens.

Mrs.

Reed and Ms.

Broderick, my English teachers, specifically Mrs.

Reed, she really was noticing that I was losing it.

Because I was a pretty good student before that.

And I basically threw away my ninth grade year essentially at that point.

And she was trying to salvage whatever she could out of me.

She said, if you go up in front of the class, like at first she said, how would your father feel if you don't graduate?

Which I was like, oh, that's a cold shot.

Hit me in the hardest way.

And then she was like, don't you want to be a comedian?

I was like, yes.

Look, I'll let you do stand-up in class.

If you could throw in some Shakespeare that we're working on now, you'll get extra credit, but you don't always have to do it.

And I was like, great, can I do it now?

i literally went in front of the class read out of the book i don't know this by heart it's monologue from macbeth you know like i don't know this and so i did just a funny version the british voice that i used to have and kids were dying i was like i'm hooked so i was like it's free can i come in tomorrow i'll write a set tonight and she was like okay did it kill it i was like oh my god and then i would just do it every friday and she took me into the theater arts department it was miss chrysner i'm still closer to this day my theater teacher from high school she goes listen this kid's been coming to class he's doing all this original material i've never heard before he's doing all these accents it's hilarious.

She goes, I think he belongs here.

Yeah, yeah.

And I was like, maybe.

The next year, did theater, graduated with honors in theater, honorary thespian, had a partial scholarship for the School of Film and Television in New York.

I passed on that.

I didn't even tell a single soul.

I don't want them to talk me into it.

I didn't want to leave my mother or my brother.

I wanted to be close and just build up my stand-up chops and let that define my career.

And then you enter at 18, the funniest text and he's the most funniest person competition.

They have this around the country in each city, but that was a big one.

If you can get into that, that was my first time on stage at a comedy club.

And I get there and I was so excited.

And my buddy Nick, who drove me to the club, he was my guy.

He still is.

For 2 quesadillas.

He is for 2 quesadillas.

That's right.

He looks at me.

He's trying to be corny.

He's like, You ready, Mo?

This is the first day of the rest of your life.

But he was being serious also.

And then I went up, caught the bug, made this wild car position.

And I realized when I signed up, I was like, oh, shit, my materials for high school students.

These are grown-ass adults.

I need to fix this.

So I rewrote something till three o'clock in the morning.

I go up, I do it, and I get into the system that way.

And I find out what I need to do.

I joined it the following year, I made the finals, didn't win the thing, but then I went off and just started doing stand-up by the time I was 19, 20 years old.

I was already headlining shows and traveling overseas without a passport.

Yeah, how is that?

You got a refugee travel document and it was a really painful process, very expensive, but that was the only way to go overseas.

Because you were doing a lot of stand-up at bases, right?

I did some bases.

The first tour that I did was April of 2001.

It was Italy, Germany, and Sicily.

It was a baby, obviously five months before 9-11.

It was just a totally different experience.

And then I went to Japan, Korea, and Guam, all those military bases.

In February of 2002, it was the polar opposite from the first time.

Now everything is heightened.

But I wanted to do those shows and be myself because I was deathly afraid of being myself.

I said, if I can go in front of the troops and be myself, talk shit, make them laugh, I could be myself in front of anybody.

That's why they love me.

I went on many, many tours.

And my experience was actually that the soldiers themselves had interacted with someone like me many times, and they were excited to see me.

Versus when I was touring in the South early on in my career, it was their first interaction with someone like me.

It was that polar opposite.

They're actually well-traveled human beings and more knowledgeable than you think.

And it's not as unsafe as I thought it was.

I went back to Iraq.

I did shows there, still with a refugee travel document in war zones, the very place that we left.

And I'm doing shows on bases all throughout Iraq in the most desolate of locations where they can fucking kill me and throw me somewhere.

No one's going to care.

I had some of the best sets and one-of-one experiences and estate in Saddam Hussein's palace, which is converted into a hotel.

And I just went there just to see it for myself and collect information and put this thing to rest that's in my heart that was just lingering.

And I wanted to see my aunt that I haven't seen in 19 years.

She was the only one that was still living in Kuwait at the time.

So it was many different things.

I had to sneak into the country, basically.

I'm here for the U.S.

government, kind of just moving him in that direction.

He was like, okay.

And he just let me in.

And then when I was leaving, I stayed three extra days to see my aunt, and I wasn't supposed to.

So the military wanted to walk me back.

to the airplane with the other comedian, Olivia Errington.

And I was like, we're fine.

We're adults, bro.

We're going to go.

And he's like, no, no, military protocol.

I got to escort you all the way to the plane.

I was like, God.

dang it.

How the hell am I going to do this?

And Olivia was like, maybe you go hide in the fucking bathroom.

I was like, okay.

And then he gets a call and he runs to the SUV.

See him talking.

This is what's going on.

He comes back.

He's like, sorry, guys.

Bradley Cooper just landed from Afghanistan.

I got to go get him.

We're like, all right, thank you, Bradley.

You want to hear something crazy?

I was with him.

Yes.

Dude, that's fucking nuts.

It was me.

Bradley.

My body just got chilled.

Yeah, that was wild.

Dude, I remember the fucking flyer.

It's all

right now.

Yeah, and we were in Kuwait and we went on a boat ride in Iraq.

There was like Zodiac boats and they were fucking doing cool maneuvers and shit.

Bro, I want to like laugh and cry at the same time.

Somehow I'm in

the gas simulation.

I didn't see that coming.

Bro, I didn't see it coming either.

Yeah.

That's when I got the fucking food poisoning coming home from bat.

We had been in Afghanistan for eight days and I have been eating at the D-FAC like microwave hamburgers.

We get to the Kuwait first class lounge and I'm looking at all this fresh tabbouleh and delicious vegetables and I'm pounding it and Cooper goes, bro, you're going very hard on the salad bar in Kuwait.

And I'm like, it's good.

It's a first-class salad.

That sounds good, by the way.

It's a damn salad bar.

Yeah, it's always salad.

Mysteria.

You got to be careful.

100%.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm freaking out.

That's fucking hilarious.

I'm freaking out because I did tell you Bradley Cooper.

That's so wild.

Yeah.

There, I remember the fucking poster.

Was there anyone else or just YouTube?

There's another person.

It was Bradley and his cousin, me and Aaron Edwards.

Oh, wow.

That's God, dude.

That's really wild.

You literally crossed paths.

They were literally all there at the same time then.

Because I was about to say, yeah, they didn't let us do shit.

Anytime we tried to wander or stray, or the first time I went, we landed in Qatar.

The GIs took us to a nightclub.

And it was like, I'm going to go on the dance floor.

I had to get that cleared.

There's too much.

They don't want the drama of

you getting kidnapped.

It's not about getting kidnapped.

It's you merely making an ass of yourself and making them look bad because there's literal money at stake that they get every year.

Yes.

Last thing they want is that getting fucked up.

This

guy bozoed out.

You know,

like, thanks a lot, but we're getting half a billion dollars over here, and you want to have a good time.

I thought that I fucked up this contract.

Monica's so sick of this story, but I still think it's very funny that I did this.

I had heard on my first tour that Larry the Cable guy was coming the next week.

And they make you sign all this shit when you're there.

You're signing the Apaches, the Blackhawks, you're just signing everything.

Yeah, yeah.

And everything I signed, which had been signed by all the previous people, I wrote on every single one, get or done, Dak Shepard.

Because I'm like, he's not going to have the catchphrase.

Yeah.

I'm going to steal it.

I love it.

What does he write?

I really like that.

It's kind of like what we were saying at Kimmel.

I love that, actually.

They didn't make us sign shit.

You walk in, be like, come on, get on stage, bitch.

Tell us a joke, whore.

Okay, guys.

Hey, it's really rough out here, eh?

If you were tracking your stand-up career, when are the big level-ups?

Because, of course, I become aware of you watching Rami, which I love.

And I'm like, who's this most hysterical person who needs his own show?

And then immediately had his own show.

Thank you.

That's my experience with you.

So what was happening in the stand-up?

It's different levels that you start to pass.

In 2011, Dave was making his comeback, starting to like really tour.

And then we happened to be in the Bay at the same time.

He was in Oakland.

I was in the Bay doing stand-up.

And it was me and my buddy Uzura Smond, longtime collaborator, worked for years.

He was like, Dave's in town.

Let's just go over and hang out.

So I would go over, hang out with him.

And he's like, hey, you want to to open?

I was like, yeah.

I go up.

And then he was like, you want to come tomorrow?

I was like, yeah, cool.

He's like, you know, I'm going to Atlanta.

You want to come to Atlanta?

I was like, yeah, cool.

Next thing you know, it's eight years of just constant touring with him.

But 2014 was the big turning point for me with Dave.

He just gave me the inspiration.

After a show at the House of Blues in Dallas, he walks up to me after my set.

He's like, Mo, man.

He says, killer, bro.

What if you do a short film in front of your special?

I produce it.

I think if you do it right, you could win an Emmy.

And he like hits me in the shoulder.

I was like, oh, shit.

Short film.

And I couldn't sleep to save my life.

It was like a week or two of me just obsessing on what this short film would be.

Must have listened to 100 tracks, some really visual person.

I need music to help me illustrate the entire picture.

And it just clicked when I listened to Elvis Presley's That's All Right Mama.

That song, That's All Right, Mama.

That's all right now.

That's all right, mama.

You just do as you do.

Oh, that's all right.

You know, when he did that, I saw my mom putting everything together and getting this out of Kuwait.

I just saw the entire thing, which is the same scene that's in episode seven now of the first season.

I wanted it to be the opening, but anyway, I put it together.

I was like, this is it.

I was trying to pitch Dave on it, and Dave was like, oh, God, what if this sucks?

You know, I inspired this guy to fucking do it.

It's a personal story.

I want to tell him it sucks.

It's always a scary thing.

I get that, but I knew it didn't suck.

I knew it was badass.

I was on the bus on tour in Austin.

I grabbed his speaker.

I was like, you listening to this?

I put it in, put it down, and I mapped the whole thing out for him.

He was smoking a cigarette.

He goes,

shit, Mo.

That's genius.

Don't do it in a special.

You need to do a TV show.

I was like,

fuck a TV show.

So that became his whole other obsession.

So I started writing down all these really transformative moments in my life, young kid or teenager or an adult, my experience in war, all these significant scenes, or even like a moment with my grandmother, how she was teaching me how to eat hummus, things that I've never forgotten that I put in season two.

I just put them on index cards scene by scene.

I would work it out.

So I had a hundred scenes accumulated that I just could mine through.

I told Rami about it 2014, early 15 actually.

I was like, yeah, I think I have this idea, but I want to do my stand-up special first.

He goes, no, let's do your TV show.

This is great.

I was like, yeah, but I think I should do my special first, which I did for Netflix at that point.

That explains a lot of the story.

And then I can go into the series and then he was like well if you're not gonna do that i'm gonna make my own show so he goes off and makes his own show he was like come do my show and i was like i don't know because you want to do your own show it's not about the own thing i'm just very protective of ideas and once you put ideas out they're kind of over with yeah i just didn't know if it was right or not i really wasn't sure because you're playing mo who owns a restaurant on rami and you're like well now am i stuck with that character right right people would tell me that that was like an argument initially and i was like i really don't care.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, nor should you, but I could see that being something you were hung up on.

That was something I was totally hung up on.

I was thinking about it.

It was just like, I was just curious.

And then later on, he always jokes.

He's like, remember, I begged you to do this show.

I was like, no, I ain't even fucking begging me.

It was just going through the bullshit, you know, just trying to figure it out and making sure that it's the right thing for you and for me.

Like, it's all love.

Last thing I want to do is do something bad for you either.

It was an awesome thing.

But being on Rami is the first on-screen acting.

I think I did Crashing First, like a guest star.

That was Pete.

Pete, yeah, Pete's show.

This is an impossible question to answer for you, but you're immediately so insanely natural.

Were you shocked by your own ability?

Are we trying to be humble right now?

It's just some humility.

That's what I'm saying.

You can't really answer this question, but I have to imagine there's a big relief at how fucking relaxed and in your body you are.

Oh, my God.

Yeah, for sure.

That's an unknown.

It's not easy.

Most people are easy.

Most people are bad at it.

You get really rigid in front of the camera.

Most people do.

I feel like I was completely born to do it.

It felt so good and comfortable.

Loved it.

I felt like I finally was doing the thing that I was always meant to do.

Maybe more than stand-up?

It's close.

I love stand-up so much.

I love stand-up because of the vulnerability and allowing yourself just to speak your mind and the ability just to do three shows at Chicago theater, man.

It's its own thing.

Bro, we just did 10,000 people.

Like, I'm just backstage, literally thanking God before I'm introduced.

Just remembering sleeping on fucking floors in every spot that you can imagine, every airport, every courtyard, anything, just to try to make it.

So I'm very grateful for that.

But this whole experience, like, oh, this is what I'm built for.

I'm built to tell stories.

I'm built to do television, built to do movies.

Doing Black Adam was huge too.

I felt so natural in all that.

And I just started reflecting about my life.

You know, I didn't create myself.

It's okay to talk about it.

Like, I didn't make me.

You're the product of a lot of context.

But also, there's certain things, bro, that'll blow your fucking mind.

The guttural feeling I had when I saw Stand Up for the first time and the journey that it was supposed to take me on, that wasn't the first time.

I thought it was, but it's not.

When I was seven in Egypt, my dad took us to a play.

And the lead of that play, his name is Adil Imam.

He's an iconic Middle Eastern actor, Egyptian.

He's like the goat of all goats, of all comedic cinema and live performance.

I love this man.

I watched him.

I'm seven.

I don't really even know totally what they're saying, but it's a captivating experience on that trip there is a photo that literally tells the future if you look at that photo i know it sounds crazy to say this but i'll show it to you it literally tells the entire future of what i'm supposed to do it's absolutely baffling and then my mom as much as she was so worried about my future because she's never heard about stand up as a really viable art profession or a career path it's a long one it's an arduous one of course she has every right to be like this

yeah i know engineering results in a roof over your head.

Yeah, exactly.

But she didn't really understand.

And then she told me recently: she goes, When you were 18 months, when you barely could start walking, you're running around, you would turn off the TV and you would start entertaining us on front of the television.

It's already there.

I don't know why it's there, but it's there.

But then this picture, bro, it'll freak you out.

I got to pull it up.

Yeah, we need to see it.

Okay, we have the picture up.

This is in Egypt.

This is the last family vacation in 1988.

I'm in the red short, right?

Yep.

1988.

The guy that has hands on my shoulders,

his name is Yusuf Idris.

He's literally one of the most legendary screenplay and authors of any generation of the Middle East.

Okay.

I'm wearing a shirt that's basically a U.S.

military recruitment shirt that nobody fucking knows I'm wearing.

Clearly, we've run out of stuff because we extended our stay.

It says join the forces.

Forces kill.

It's absurd, right?

My mom clearly run out of shit, right?

So it's there.

It's gone.

She just picked out a bunch of stuff.

We ran out of things.

She didn't even look at it.

I have a camcorder.

It's an over-the-shoulder camcorder.

This is the very camcorder that I found 30 years later that's in the series.

If you watch the ending, that's what I'm holding.

You show footage of your father in Palestine, right?

I do.

When my aunt told me about this camcorder, I was literally asking about it two days prior.

I was on tour in the Middle East.

I look at my manager.

I'm like, look at this picture.

I was reflecting on this photo.

And I was like, wait, what does this fucking shirt say?

And I started zooming into it.

I was like, oh my God.

And I look at the camcorder.

I was like, I have so many memories with this camcorder.

It's insane.

I was like, Mustava, isn't it crazy?

The guy who has hands on my shoulders is one of the greatest writers of our generation of filmmakers, storytellers.

I have a camcorder in my hand.

The two main characters after me in my show is my mom and my brother.

And the U.S.

military invades Kuwait two years after this.

That is wild.

Yeah, that's really

so insane.

and the camcorder itself goes missing i think it's gone and bring this up in kuwait i'm being really reflective it's very painful and also i'm going there they're building a tent for me to do a show it's like oh my god what's happened really in this deep sense of reflection my aunt is going in and out of memory she's having alzheimer's starting to really get worse but she remembers me she's holding my hand don't go don't go don't go i'm just looking at the clock i was like aunt i'm so sorry i have to go up in like an hour i have to go she's like begging me not to go.

It was so gut-wrenching.

I'm sitting there in my hotel room just crying.

Yeah.

Bro, I wonder what happened to this camcorder.

I always remember this.

I'm just reflecting and how everything is happening.

I hear people cheering from outside the room.

It's the 2000 seat or whatever they built for me.

This is just surreal.

Trying to integrate all this.

Trying to just make sense of it all.

Like, how did this all happen?

It's nuts.

I was like, everybody, can you please leave?

I just didn't know how to reconcile it, but I was having, not like anxiety about going on, but I just didn't know how to channel my feelings anymore.

And so I call actually FaceTime Dave.

He was like, oh shit, man, he gonna have one of the best fucking sets you ever had.

I already see it.

And I just wiped my tears.

I was like, you're right.

Went up.

It's literally one of the best.

I did 90 minutes just destroying the place, freestyling, integrating Arabic to English.

It was like a masterclass.

It was like, fuck it.

Two days later, when I'm on Jordan, I'm visiting my other aunt and we're hugging, kissing.

She's loving on me.

She's like another mom to me.

We just ate a really dense meal and I'm just trying not to like pass out.

And I hear her say, or her of a curb quarter.

That's what it it sounded like to me.

I was like, what?

Oh, God, it's so sleepy.

I was like, did she say a camcorder?

No.

And I didn't register it.

Then I see her walk back in.

She has back problems.

She's in her late 70s.

This camcorder, I was like, what the f?

I freaked out.

And then my cousin walks in with a bag full of VHS tapes.

I was like, what is going on, dude?

That night, I'm in the hotel room.

I'm staring at the video camera.

I have my opening act, Adi Khalifa, and my manageable stuff in the room.

I can't stop thinking about it.

And Adi goes, you want to see if it works, don't you?

I was like, Yeah.

I open it up, plug it in,

comes right on.

I was like, Give me a VHS day.

Give me, give me, give me.

I could watch in the little viewfinder.

First tape, Michael Jackson.

I was like, oh, take it out.

The next tape, Michael Jackson.

I was like, God,

swearing high.

Like, next tape, it's a house party.

We don't know where.

We don't know what it is.

I watch him for about five minutes.

I was like, oh, where's my dad?

I really want to see my dad.

I was like, oh, he's probably filming.

Damn it.

Right as I say that, he walks into the frame he's taking pictures everybody he's like dancing i'm losing it i'm like laughing yeah crying laughing crying meanwhile my friend adi my opening i i didn't know he was filming but i was for 17 minutes watching he filmed the entire thing and i caught footage of me as a little kid in our house in kuwait and it was just insane to get footage from my dad that I didn't know existed anymore.

Nobody had.

And I found it almost 30 years later.

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Did it almost help you go, oh, yeah, that was real?

It did.

That's a great way to put it.

It's so far away in so many ways, geographically and time-wise, to see it.

I would imagine you go, all right, I haven't imagined this whole thing.

No, this is absolutely real.

And of course, seeing my mom and young, and she's serving fruits.

There was a tape where we were at our house.

And my dad is very hospitable.

He just loves artists as well.

He'd have people there.

It was guys reciting poetry, freestyling, and they would get your name.

You would go, Dex, Dex, Dex, the Dex.

You know, they would play off of it.

And they would go on a rant about you.

It was so special.

And I'm sitting there wide awake and all the little kids like sleeping, except me.

You can tell I'm loving this.

You went in on it.

It was super cool.

And just having footage of my dad grabbing me like that, it just killed me, man.

I was like so happy.

While I'm recreating this scene in the series, I forget that I, because I cast him as my cousin in the show.

And as we're about to do the scene, he goes, remember I was with you when that happened?

He's like, remember I filmed it.

I was like,

oh my God, ID, that's right.

I sent it to my editor.

I was like, hey, here's the dock footage of me discovering it.

Here's the actual footage that's on there.

If you could just hold it for me and then do a rough cut at the end so people know that there's a real story.

Yeah.

And when I saw it in the cut, I lost my fucking mind weeping.

Like, what did I just do?

It was like one of those things that only the divine can facilitate something like that.

It's impossible.

I think it's hard when people die.

You kind of remember their death.

That's the first thing that is top of mind.

So to click back into their life when they were happy and joyous and living with vitality, that's a gift.

I feel that.

Oh, that's beautiful.

Now, the show is twice 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.

You won, and I'm very jealous.

There's only one award I've ever coveted and I campaign for all the time.

And I don't even know what it gets awarded for, but the Peabody.

Yes.

That to me feels like, oh, you transcended Hollywood somehow.

It was beautiful.

It's kind of a rad group to join of the people

for sure.

Malcolm Gladwell.

I felt that way about the AFI, too.

It was just in a room and they only picked 10 shows and 10 films, and that's it.

That's so cool.

And you're just in that room.

You're like, oh my God, Sigourney Weaver, fucking Steven Spielberg, James Cameron.

I talking about watches.

Like, Better Call Saul is honored.

So you have everyone there, Bob Hordekirk.

I'm like, what's going on, bro?

It's nuts.

And then they bring in Al Pacino to tell a story out of nowhere.

and it's like i hate award shows you know i really hate award shows but because there's a bunch of losers but you guys are all winners that's nice yeah that's nice who are who are he really walked in like that he was like i got a paper i got a speech but i fucking hate papers

i just want to tell you a little story One of the best stories ever.

I don't know, you know, the first role I did with Godfather.

You heard of it.

I can't believe it.

I'm fucking doing a Godfather.

I just got to tell you before this, though, I did a lot of drugs and alcohol, you know?

It got me through a lot of hard times.

It was really worked out well for me.

I'm not advocating for it.

I'm just saying it was really good for me.

Let me tell you something.

Then I get nominated for an Oscar.

I couldn't believe it.

I got nominated for an Oscar.

So what I did was I took so many fucking quavos and I drank so much.

I was fucked up out of my mind.

My manager at the time had to wash my hair.

Couldn't even wash my fucking hair.

Takes me to the Oscars.

You know, we're at the Oscars and I'm sitting in a chair just fucking losing my mind.

High out of my mind, drunk.

And then I realized, oh my God, what if I win?

I got to walk up to the stage.

Oh, no.

Now I'm panicked.

I look over my manager.

I was like, is it almost over?

He goes, it's only been 40 minutes.

We've still got another three hours to go.

He goes, oh, no.

Three hours.

I can't handle it.

And he's so paranoid.

I'm so paranoid about it.

What if I win?

I got to walk on the stage.

I can't walk.

It's impossible.

I can't even stand up.

How am I going to go give a speech?

It's not going to work out.

And it comes up, our category finally comes up.

And I go, the winner is Jack Lemon.

And I fucking celebrated.

I was so fucking happy.

And the next day in the papers, they were like, look how beautiful Al Pacino is.

What a great supporter of

Jack Lemon.

And I was just happy I didn't fucking win and have to walk up on a goddamn stage.

Hysterical.

And then he goes, okay, I'll read from the paper now.

But he was like, right there.

That was a great.

Yeah, that's wrapped.

But it seems like the show's wrapped up.

Yeah.

Yes.

Look, you get as many swings as you can, and you don't know how many you're going to get.

So I feel sincerely this second season is like a masterpiece.

I feel like the eighth episode is something so unique.

Chris Store gave me one of the sweetest compliments and he was just like, you did something really dangerous, but never inflammatory, which is an enormous feat.

And it was tender.

It was thoughtful.

It was sweet.

It was heartfelt.

It was funny.

And kudos to you.

When he said that to me, I was like, thank you.

I felt really seen because it was almost basically an impossible position to be in.

Do you talk about October 7th?

Do you have it?

Do you get into it?

Did season one wrap on October?

No, season one didn't really have a particular date to it, but I decided to date the entire second season.

So when it opens up in the first episode of season two, you can see it's September 2022.

And then it takes us all the way to October of 23, but then the whole season ends on the 6th of October in Tel Aviv Airport before their strip search.

So, I did that very deliberately because every time I started,

first of all, if we talk about it, then that means the family doesn't get to go back.

Obviously, they can't go back and visit if there's a war going on.

Not gonna happen.

Secondly, you're making everything seem like it all started at that point, which is also not fair.

And people need to know contextually what the world looked like before that.

Thirdly, every time I started getting into it, it became a full-blown drama.

And the base of the show is comedy.

And we explored it.

I wanted to see what it looked like.

I do a gut check right away.

I was like, uh, does not feel good.

That's not it.

You only have two seasons.

This is the best foot forward here.

And if there's a scenario where a third comes around or the question comes up, do you want to do it?

Do you want to get into it?

I'd have to really think about it because I genuinely believe.

I'm being objective sincerely.

The first season was really, really hard.

And I'm blessed that we were able to get all the accolades we did for the first season.

But what I was able to pull off with the second season, I feel so blessed that I had such a great support system, wife, my having a son at the same time, being so focused on nothing else and just so zoned in about making sure to tell the best possible story.

And I feel like we did that.

I'm so relieved.

You know what I mean?

Because it is an impossible position.

A lot of opportunity for failure.

Exactly.

Whenever you take on something that has about 90 ways it can go bad and then a couple it could go good.

We're also people who have their own projections on the subject matter, which is everyone.

Exactly, which is immigration, Latinos.

It's not just the Palestinian family.

It represents many different buckets, right?

Did we go into a detention center in episode two?

I've never seen that in any show, much less a comedy, but also telling these detailed stories, showing also how privileged I am as a refugee in comparison to other people's experiences.

Another guy's talking about cartel apprehending them for four days.

And he's like, How'd you get here?

Like, well, I took a bus.

And then I took a bus.

And he tries to make himself feel better.

Like, well, actually, you know, in the 90s, we flipped the Go Four, you know.

But then we took a flight.

I think it was Delta.

So just showing how absurd even I am in my own scenario.

And I just love that misdirection of like, you think it's going to be a hypersexual comedic situation, and then it goes into a political conversation, which things do, especially in that environment.

I would have put the mask on.

Yeah, I wouldn't.

I couldn't do it.

If anybody else in the room have performance anxiety for sure.

Any sexual activity for sure.

The ambassador wants him to fuck his wife with a luchador mask.

A Luchador mask.

Yeah, it's also Palestino to do it.

He doesn't want to do it.

I was like, oh, that would have been easy.

I physically can't do it at all.

And so it was genuinely me.

I know you told the line between the character and myself, but I remember having like a girlfriend and she had this dog and he kept looking at me while we're.

I was like, dude, stop looking.

I was like, I can't.

You got to get this dog out of here, bro.

It's making me feel terrible about myself.

Our old dog, she loved to watch.

I'm so shy, bro.

I'm telling you, I'm super shy.

Even if it's a pet.

A loved one.

Yes.

It's like, bro, what are you doing?

But our dog Lola didn't just want to observe.

She wanted to

walk around and get a little closer.

Sometimes I feel fur on my leg.

No, come on.

And then I was like, Lola's a fucking pervert.

And then I was like, wait, is that what's going on?

Or when Lola looks at me, I feel like a pervert.

I'm aware of how perverted I am with this third person.

I'm really sad we brought this up now.

No, it was fun to play with that.

Okay, so now you're on tour.

Yeah.

And the name of your tour is El Oso Palestino Tour.

The Palestinian Bear Tour.

The Palestinian Bourbon.

Which is the play-only character in the show.

It's just side jobs to make a living in Mexico.

He's a luchador, but he's really just there to get his ass kicked.

He doesn't have any skill set whatsoever.

I did a few of those takes, bro.

That shit is real, man.

It hurt like a motherfucker.

My back went out a few times.

I'm like, dude, what is going on?

They're like, hold on to the rope, squeeze your abs, and then we're going to hold you from your ankles, but you got to hold yourself.

I'm like,

I'm not planking.

It's an extraordinary plank.

I could plank for several minutes.

Shockingly, I can do it.

I'm doing right now.

I knew you were a good planker.

You can't tell on Facebook.

No, we already know about that.

Yeah, let's say something.

Yeah, it's shocking.

Yeah, thank you.

I appreciate it.

For real, it's a female.

She's like kicking my ass.

And I'm like, bro, this is it.

Where's the stunt guy?

Get him in there.

I thought this was going to be fun.

This was a disaster.

Get me out of this suit.

It's hot.

I'm sweating.

I did black atom.

I can do my own stunts.

Let's go.

No, I can't.

I can't do all of them.

That's not your lane.

Driving a car like a lunatic and getting thrown from the ropes are completely different things, buddy.

Completely different things.

So how many dates are you doing?

I think I've done 45 already.

I'm not sure.

You can get tickets on my website, moamer.com, M-O-A-M-E-R.com.

You follow me on Instagram.

I got to film another special.

So I'm just going hard.

I want this to be spectacular.

I want it to be the best special that I've ever done.

And I feel like with getting older, having a son and what's going on in the world, the way you filter things and when you see things, everything is different.

I see things really differently.

As a father, as a man, just coming off of season two itself and how really massive lift that was and the relief of seeing people, the reception that I'm getting on the road now, it's one of the most beautiful things.

Yeah.

How is your Instagram?

Because Instagram is, well, social media is a cesspool.

Yeah, it really is.

It's tough.

It's tough.

Do you face a lot of backlash and weird stuff there?

I try not to look.

Number one, I really, really avoid it.

I have a team that curates, I approve everything because I really don't want to spend my days online and on social.

It was so time consuming and vacuous and everyone's just yelling at each other.

No one's really making sense.

There's no actual progress being made.

It's just people declaring what side of every fight they're on.

Exactly.

And then the worst part of it to me is no one's listening to one another.

So you're talking and I'm just thinking about how I'm going to respond.

You're not there to learn anything.

You're there to broadcast your position.

And a fight.

Exactly.

So I have avoided that.

And sincerely, I haven't had any issue.

Like with season two, I think that the balance was perfect.

And the fact that it was based off of my actual experience in life and that you could see not all of it.

Surely you fictionalize certain things, but a substantial amount of it is copy-paste.

What the divine has given me on a silver platter, you don't want to mess with that.

You can't write anything better than that.

You're holding a camcorder.

Just go with that and build around it and making sure to expand it and make sure it flows into the overall story.

And that's it.

Stay focused and have the right balance of comedy and drama and emotion tapped into it and take people on this ride and let it do the talking.

Well, not to be too corny and make you uncomfortable.

I appreciate it so much.

Rami for me was the first big, like, I really, really enjoyed almost being forced.

to see what the experience is like.

Yeah.

And same with you.

And so I'm grateful we live live in this.

The negative would be like a niche economy of content, but the great part of it is I get to watch Atlanta.

It's a great era.

I hope the pressure doesn't stop these stories from being told.

Yeah.

That's the scary part is that a lot of people at my shows are like, how'd they let you do it?

One guy said, How are you alive?

I was like, bro, pray for me.

What the fuck are you talking about?

I'm alive.

It's a good sweet honesty.

That's how shocked people are because that's how extreme the suppression of free speech has become.

And if we don't like what you're saying, then we can just literally deport you to another country.

Like, what the fuck is going on right now?

I know.

Yeah.

I don't really worry about it, but I just hope that it doesn't happen.

I hope that the artist community, specifically here in LA and Hollywood, they understand like we need more of these stories.

You can't suppress speech.

If you don't like what somebody's saying, you just need more speech, right?

Yeah, exactly.

You don't need less.

Everybody gets to share their stories.

You don't have to love it.

You don't have to hate it.

You can appreciate it.

Yeah.

Well, have fun touring and then also act more because I love watching you act.

You really are just born to do it.

You're so effortlessly comfortable.

Mo, I'm delighted to meet you.

I'm so glad you came and did this.

Yeah, so good to know both.

You really, truly, this is so fun.

Oh, good.

I really, really, what a great experience.

I'm going to do this in my garage.

You should.

You really should.

You got a garage?

Just me just sitting there.

All you need is a garage.

All right, brother.

Thank you so much.

He is an arm care expert, but he makes mistakes all the time.

Thank God, Mike is here.

She's got to let have the facts.

Oh, this is fun.

This is.

So you hit me with an idea.

Yep.

Which is after we chit-chat for a while and we get into the facts, I'm going to cut your hair while you read the facts.

Yes, because you

have boasted many a time about your haircutting capabilities.

Yeah.

And I've never experienced it.

And I need a haircut so badly.

I know, but I told you, this is not the situation.

Like, I need you on a tall chair in the kitchen with a lot of light.

We got to discuss what you want.

But you just, what you're telling me is you just want the ends trimmed.

I mean, you can do some other stuff if you want, but these are big new layers.

Be careful.

You can play with it a little bit.

Okay.

We'll see.

We'll see what we can do.

Okay.

But I do have my tools.

I got my tools.

Yeah, you got your scissors and your brush.

Like, normally I would use this comb, but I was thinking, your hair, I don't know if I can get this comb through your hair.

Can I?

Have you ever?

I brought one of the girls' brushes.

Have you ever cut hair on a

Indian on an Indian woman's head?

Yeah, I only do Indian women's.

Oh, then you'll, then you'll be fine.

You'll be fine with that comb.

Do you think all Indian women have the same hair?

I mean, they seem to, from my point of view, it seems pretty similar.

I don't think they're exactly the same, but yes, I think there's

a thickness.

Yeah.

Although, Matt once told me, Matt, our friend who's a hairstylist, told me that the actual strand itself of mine is not that thick.

It's more like medium.

It's the density.

There's a lot of it.

So density.

Density.

Yeah.

I've never seen a blonde Indian.

Let's start there.

No, they don't.

No.

It's like green eyes.

Cat eyes, as your father would say.

Well, green eyes happens there sometimes, but no blonde hair.

No, right?

No.

I've never heard of it.

There's got to be albino Indian.

Well, exactly.

That would be the, that would be the only albinism.

We learned a cool word today on Armchair Anonymous.

Oh, yeah.

Edenistic?

No, Edenic.

Edenic.

Yeah.

To describe an environment as Eden-like, like the Garden of Eden.

Yeah, I liked it.

Edenic.

I liked that.

God, I'm glad you remembered it because I said out loud, I'm going to commit that to my repertoire.

Repertoire.

People loved your David Chang story.

I just want to add that.

I looked at the comments and people, many people write,

this is all of us.

It's all of us, right?

We just don't know how to operate in the world.

Humans do not know how to operate.

We get so nervous.

As if like people get punched for doing it wrong or something.

I did send it to Callie, of course.

I sent her the text.

She said, what is going on?

And I responded and she said, but where is the bread from?

Oh, we still don't know.

It really impresses.

Rob can

still handle that right now.

Can you find the bread that his children didn't eat that he brought home for his children?

I was going to say, oh, what you got there?

Well, there's a bit of a standoff in our household.

So, Kristen, as you know, you've tried it.

She's in her sourdough phase.

I've never tried her.

You haven't?

Only Amy's.

What about at Molly's birthday party?

She brought over like two fresh loaves.

You didn't get into it.

No.

I had some.

I cheated.

And I also, I was like, you know, I already told you this.

I'm like, oh, sourdough's got the least amount of gluten.

I can eat it.

And I had it.

There's nothing better than sourdough out of an oven.

Forget it.

Yeah.

But anyways, my kids are like, where's the white bread?

They miss the the white bread.

And Kristen's like, I'm making the bread.

You have homemade bread.

Right.

Rightly so.

Right.

And Delta's like, I want

little square white pieces of bread.

Yes.

And I get it.

You definitely get it.

I'm all good.

I get it.

Because I'm a trash monster.

I like crappy stuff.

No, when you have your, you have your five dishes that you make that you used to make.

Those were your special dishes.

And

one of them is a tuna.

A chicken salad sandwich.

Excuse me.

A chicken salad sandwich.

It's been a minute.

It's been a minute.

I haven't had it in a while.

Chicken saladdy.

That one's hard because I don't eat bread anymore and I got to just eat this and watch you guys.

Yeah, well, you can have it on this sourdough, I guess.

How often are you cheating with the sourdough?

I'm not.

When she got into the face, because you can't imagine waking up and the whole house smells like a loaf of sourdough.

Like, it's actually now maddening that I don't.

I had a week of it.

I'm like, yeah, this is where it's not working.

My skin started flaking.

My wrist started hurting.

Yeah.

I also gained like

immediately.

I just mysteriously gained like eight pounds.

Well, we, yeah.

Go ahead.

We, what do we talk about?

That I gain and lose weight really quick.

No, that like I think you're just underweight.

Like your body wants to weigh more.

So of course it's like getting something and it's going to hoard it.

I don't know if you inception me, but I've been eating more.

Oh.

Yeah.

I'm not sure.

Is it that or is it that you're

You got back from New York and you had all this yummy food and now you want yummy food.

Well, then I got back down to 194.

Right.

And then I think vanity, I'm like, I don't like my face at 194.

No, maybe you are having, you know how they call them sympathy pains when a woman is pregnant and then the man

also experiences pains.

You know, I gained a crazy amount of weight when Kristen was pregnant the first time.

And you said that was like sympathy weight or something.

I just don't know what it was, but I find that every man I know has done that when there wasn't.

Is that just because like the woman is eating more.

I think she's like driving it a little more because she's got these weird urges and there's more shit around.

And maybe that's part of it.

And maybe you are like,

you know, like if you, I want people to think about this.

The next time you're at a booth at a restaurant talking with somebody, start paying attention how you inadvertently mirror each other's body language.

If someone puts their hand on their,

rests their face on their fist,

you'll do it.

Just be aware of it.

I mean, we don't.

In here,

I wonder if we were at a booth at a restaurant, we would.

Oh, thanks.

We had an expert on say Zilling Bud's dad, Bod, that like the husband or the father stores fat differently in his body when his wife's pregnant.

Oh, knowing that he's not going to sleep.

And oh, interesting.

But my big thing was we were at one of the checkups, and I just hadn't been on a scale in like four or five months.

When I got on, I was like, oh my God, I've gained 22 pounds.

And I didn't even notice.

Yeah.

I think it's maybe more that, like, she's eating more.

Oh, yeah.

There's more on her plate, literally.

Yeah.

So then you're just matching that.

Yeah, something happens.

It's pretty consistent.

You might be having sympathy,

weight gain from us all being on our periods.

Could be.

That's a good story.

Whiskers.

Oh, okay.

Oh, no.

Don't tell this.

Yes, of course.

This is a good story.

Where are you

for whiskey?

No.

I don't need to say who.

Oh, okay.

I mean.

Why is it embarrassing to have a period?

I'd be embarrassed.

You would.

Yeah, I'd be embarrassed by that story.

Oh, okay.

I don't think she would, but I won't risk it.

Well, there's a woman, but there's only

a lot of women in my house.

Nicole's there non-stop.

My sister's there non-stop.

I got Kristen's there non-stop.

There's a whole bevy of people.

You're in and out of there.

Yeah, it's not me.

I'm not sure.

You pop some tampons in those trash cans for sure.

Maybe years ago, I don't really use tampons anymore.

Oh, you're over it.

I use period underwear.

Okay, that's the rage.

I use period underwear, and there's a lot of rages.

People use the cup.

Yeah, we talk about this.

You don't, you're anti-I'm just afraid of it.

I'm not.

And we have a friend, we won't outer, but we have a friend in the pod that uses the diva cup.

Yeah, and she also told us a story of someone she knows, she was at a wedding, and a girl's popped it, you know, popping locked.

She was dancing.

She's dancing.

And the cup spilled.

It fell out and

the blood flew everywhere.

How does the cup pass your underpants?

She wasn't wearing any.

What a kinky bra.

She's on her period not wearing undies and on the dance floor popping and locking.

Who is this woman?

Do I know her?

No.

If you're able, I mean, it's like suctioned up there.

You should be able to kick.

You should be able to go underwearless to a wedding.

I mean, technically, I'm sure when I'm in the world.

You don't think that if I did something like that, you'd be like, that's that's so arrogant.

You know, you would.

Yeah, I would say that.

But listen, I have, I'm sure,

at some point in life when I was wearing tampons, wore a tampon without an underwear.

Oh, definitely.

Like at a, at a, on, in a bathing suit.

But your bathing suit's the underwear.

You're not not wearing underwear ever.

No, but

then you're on your period and you decide that's when you're going to not wear your underwear.

Let me tell you why.

If you're wearing a certain dress, like let's say you're going to a wedding or something and you're wearing a certain dress and you don't want underwear lines, you'd go to the window.

Even the day of the thong and everything, that's still even still depending.

I mean, there are some good underwears that you can use, but there are certain dresses that like you can just see it.

So there are times that

there are times that I haven't worn underwear.

Yeah.

And then no, commando.

At Commando.

And if I'm on my period, fuck it.

That's a tampon.

And I'm not worried about that.

Can you give a specific time ever?

Like, this sounds so theoretical.

Can you tell me a time you were on your period, put a tampon, and went out of the house with a dress on and no underwear?

I've been on the real period for, I mean,

since I was 11

or 12.

You got it at 11?

Or 12.

I forget.

You live next to a nuclear reactor?

No.

I was an early bloomer.

Okay.

And anyway, I have been on it for a really long time.

And then I like, I know the feeling of what it is to have a tampon in and not have underwear.

In your house.

I'm asking, can you think of a...

Are you telling me right now

you have a memory of going out on a dress?

Yes.

No on these on your period.

Yes, I have a sense memory of it.

I don't have an actual memory of it, but I have a sense memory.

Dax.

We have a commitment to each other here.

Exactly.

To be honest you get to believe each other

feel like you did you'd either you got to say i did or i didn't like that's not fair okay i apologize

listen i remember i wore a dress sort of recently that i didn't wear underwear i do know that and i kind of feel like i was on my period then okay

And I think I wore a tampon specifically because I don't really wear tampons anymore.

And I remember I had to wear it.

Yeah.

Because

it's weird to say wear it.

I know.

Wear a tampon.

I had to put one in.

Yeah.

Plug.

I would never be worried about popping and locking and the tampon falling out.

No, of course.

Yeah.

So I can see why the Diva cup, you wouldn't.

I have no experience with it, but it seems crazy there's a cup in there that's relying on a suction seal.

And that that seal couldn't break.

Anyone who's ever used any suction cups.

Yeah.

They're wild.

Or it's like, I think it's like big so so the fact that the whole thing is up there it does feel like it was a tea cup like kind of i think but rubbery i think but as big as like a coffee cup no not a cup no it's like a golf ball maybe no bigger than that much bigger than a golf ball natalie ragged ball natalie uses them she does yeah your dog ever eaten it no

okay well let me get to the story okay fine tell the story there's a lot of updates on whiskey okay a new update on whiskey is he's a bad to the bone.

That doesn't help me because it needs to be next to a Biclider or something.

Here it is next to a micro penis?

A tampon.

Oh, okay.

So it's the same length as a tampanx.

Okay, so whiskey gives you, you need to know some updates about whiskey.

Okay.

One thing is he's bad to the bone.

Okay.

He's killed over a hundred men.

What are you talking about?

Whiskey's eaten 100 men.

He's bad to the bone.

Okay.

You just really want to say bad to the bone.

What does I wanted to tell you about whiskey?

I know.

Well, you know, first of all, he was trimp and he was president of the hallway.

Right.

And I wanted to tell you about that, and you seem to enjoy that.

No, I want to hear about whiskey, and I know he's bad to the bone.

He's eaten 100 men

and 150 women, but he doesn't talk about that.

He's sounding kind of like Torito.

Okay, so he's bad to the bone.

okay um

and someone in my household put a tampon in the trash can which is advisable for your plumbing correct so i'm on a high five this unnamed person who put a tampon

because whiskey's bad to the bone and he loves blood ew he went and ate the tampon okay

yeah then

And I am getting, she won't mind this.

I just want you to know she won't mind this.

And this is a big, honorable mention because this, I've said this before.

My sister Carly is fucking down.

When shit needs, when the gnarly stuff needs to get done, my sister will do it.

She will.

She is, she's fearless.

So they were taking whiskey bad to the bone on a walk and he pooped out half a tampon.

Yep.

And then a little while longer, he pooped out.

tried to poop out the rest of the tampon and now the cord, the string, the rope.

And now he's got a rope hanging out of his butt.

And he's a bastard, right?

So you can't get close to him.

Yeah, he'll bite you.

He'll bite you.

He'll eat you like the hundred and men he's eaten.

And so Carly's trying to get this fucking thing out of his butt, and he's trying to bite her.

And this whole thing, it's a battle.

Then I guess she had to take him to her house and put him in the sink and get him warm water on him because he calms down when he gets a battle.

Oh my god.

And then she had to pull this thing out of him

these dogs man you are so lucky that your sister did that because he would have died of tss

that's what

that's what

kristen goes i is he gonna get toxic shock syndrome i'm like no your butt is so different than your vagina no yeah maybe hit hit we don't know about you need to get a proctologist on i don't think you can get toxic shock syndrome in your butthole from a tampax you can and it's a tampon

tampax is the brand i prefer kind of like i like huggies tampax radiant they always man these ad campaigns and i i tip my hat to them because what a product to have to sell on tv and you know they have these commercials and someone's like sailing

they like to put you like in a nautical situation yeah because you that's when you need a tampon when you're in a bathing suit.

That's why.

Yeah, this is more, I think, like, oh, it's gonna be a long sailboat ride i don't know it's always like someone's in a field and there's a lot of flowers like they're trying to destigmatize i guess it

keep whiskey away uh-huh um but yeah they got to name it whatever name i just radiant or something

i just i think they have their work cut out for them and i applaud them yeah yeah i get it god bless them or you got to sell depends yeah hard product to sell in some ways it's a hard product in some ways it sells itself because like well you need it you get need them.

Yeah.

You know, no one's on the fence about getting depends.

You either need fucking depends or you don't.

Well, maybe that's why Tampons have had to step up their game because there are competing periods.

I don't like the branding of this.

Why?

Do you like it?

Period underwear?

I mean, that's what I call it.

Grab my period underwear.

Don't you think there's a like I think the Tampax people should take a stab at period underwear because I think they could top it.

Well, it's not all like freedom panties or something.

Yeah, sorry.

I'm so excited to talk about female products i know okay um it's it's there are brands nicks nicks is a brand so you don't you don't have to say period under where you can say like my nixies sure nixies regular nicks yeah it's got it already starts with an x so i'm i love it is an i x and then there's an n i c k x k n i x oh great k n i so like knitting and then there's um

thinks that's a huge brand another x yeah

x is a trusted letter in the vaginal space.

It is.

Maybe they are steal, not stealing.

Maybe they are

inspired by.

Yeah.

They're building upon the

trusted, the trust that these people have tirelessly built with this product that is, you know, look, nothing against the tampon industry, but this is better for you.

If I was

in the ad game,

I would want to get put on Tampax because you want to bite off a lot.

You know, like you want to challenge.

It's like if you're an actor, you want to play someone dying of something or whatever.

You know, you want to challenge.

And I would like, I think to cut my teeth and make a name for myself.

I'd love to just like blow out a Tampax campaign.

Okay.

How are you going to get these people back on tampons?

The people that have left to the cups.

Do you want me to just mat like right off the cuff?

Yeah.

You're in a meeting right now.

Here we are.

Guys, our sales are plummeting.

And why?

Because there's all these competing trends now that look, I hate to say, and this doesn't leave this room, they're better for the women's bodies.

Wait, nothing is better.

What if you're saling?

The cup.

You're supposed to carry.

What you're trying to tell me is that a woman in her cycle is supposed to have a purse full of underwear.

No, they'd use that.

That's not a move for an elegant lady out on the town.

Yeah, see, this is.

The fact that you got to carry extra undies with with you.

What are you talking about?

Well, once you've, once you've soiled your necks,

just like a tampon, you got to change it.

Well, no.

So you got to change these undies.

No, you wash it.

You, you, you technically rinse it out.

Yeah.

See, this is, I got a lot to work with here.

But hold on.

Also, the cup is different.

Are you, forget the cup.

We're talking.

Well, that's a huge thing.

This is Tampex versus underpants.

Okay, fine.

Are you trying to tell me that the day you get your period, you put on a pair of Nicks and you leave them on for the duration?

Okay, great.

But I leave mine on all day.

Even a very heavy, heavy day?

I want to be choosing my words carefully.

Yeah, I

do.

My flow, even at its heaviest, one can sustain it.

What if you go on a sailboat?

Then I'm wearing a tampon.

Bingo.

So we build on that.

For the adventurer, for the person engaged, sure, if you're a couch potato, wear next.

If you want to get out and see the world, if you don't want your period to keep you sidelined on the bench, you still want to go sailing and go to amusement parks,

there's only one brand for you because you can carry extras in your purse discreetly like an elegant lady.

No one wants to have, no one, you know what I would do is I would have, thank you, Monica.

Here we go.

I got my pitch.

Okay.

We start the commercial with a woman in line at an amusement park.

Everyone's having a great time.

Her child asks her for a sucker.

She goes in her purse to get it.

The purse comes dislodged and on the ground tumbles five pairs of underpants.

She's mortified.

And then a girl next to her looks at her purse, and she's got tampax in there.

And then she winks.

Pretty good spot.

No one wants underwear to tumble out of their bag

at the amusement park.

100%.

No one wants tampons to fly everywhere.

Well, they want it because they're not humongous, like

underpants.

Or if they think it's a single camera.

No men, all the men off of this campaign immediately.

This is so embarrassing and bad.

Absolutely not.

Absolutely not.

Every woman has been in a situation where a tampon's fallen out, and it's like the most mortifying.

It is so upsetting when your tampon falls out of your backpack.

I want you to be.

Please be honest.

I am.

You get to choose.

Yes.

You're

on a date with this unnamed guy that was at Saturday Live

and your purse falls over and either a gigantic pair of underwear fall out because they're big, right?

To cover everything.

Hold on.

Am I imagining them correctly?

We're not.

Okay.

I need to take

as we've established.

I am currently on my period.

Yeah.

So.

Fuck, where are you keeping all these other underwear?

Exactly.

Where do you see?

There's no, I'm not carrying any underwear.

There's no underwear in my bag.

You don't.

I think you're reckless.

I think you need a backup pair on you.

I'm not going to say who, I know, I know someone who wears them and they go through a couple of days.

Yeah, sure.

Some people do.

Yeah.

Same as your tan.

So that person has to carry an extra pair of these grundles around.

Okay.

So we just concede the fact that someone might need to be carrying grundles with them.

Now, my question is, your purse falls over at dinner on a date with a boy you like,

and either a very large pair of underwear falls over.

They're very, they're not as big as you think.

You think they're diapers, they're not diapers.

That's another great angle.

I'll start calling them diapers.

No, stop.

Okay,

listen, I never know when the fun's gonna end.

Listen, I put up with a lot here.

Okay, okay.

If this man would rather

me get TSS

slash have to put

cloth up my pussy.

Save cotton.

Please don't use that word in the campaign.

That's all putting one of the consumers.

No, no, that word doesn't work in advertising as much as I wish it did.

Thank you for explaining that to me.

If this man, this hot man who I think is kind and nice

and from another country, this man is.

Oh, that's.

You're giving away a lot of clues.

I think this man from another country

really understands that.

Americans are crazy.

That other country is a lot more buttoned up than this country.

No, but not in this type of area.

Oh, yes.

No.

Yes.

You don't know what it's like to be a woman.

I know I don't, but I do know the difference between, I won't say the name of the country and our country, and we are much more foul.

Not in the female hygienic space guys

there are like oh about everything no but in general i i they

wear more pads there

okay okay so so the the answer your answer is yeah i would lock in the answer you'd rather have a big pair of underwear fall out than a tampon No, that's, I want to get a little more nuanced.

I wouldn't, and stop saying big pair of underwear.

They're bigger than the ones you normally wear, right?

They're not.

Like, there's a pair you'd be happy to fall out right we agree on that listen i'm currently wearing uh-huh a thong

period underwear oh this is what i'm saying you don't understand i haven't seen that product i've seen different versions yes and it looks it has lace oh wow it looks like underwear okay

Okay.

Hot underwear.

Okay, great.

Now, what I wouldn't want to happen, I will say, I will say this, what I would not want to happen is my bag falls out

dirty period underwear falls out

now and be honest you're not going to pitch them in the fucking trash can when you switch no grundles in the turlet so yeah you there's you could be in a situation where you're carrying i'm personally not though so i can't But for the person who does have to change midday, they have to carry that around.

So, okay, they clearly now, they also have to carry a Ziploc bag.

Great product.

I wish I was on that campaign.

I swear by Ziplocs.

Now they have, not only do they have this,

you know.

Go on.

A pair of underwear.

I'll leave it at that.

Thank you.

That are soiled.

Yeah.

In a Ziploc bag.

I mean, now this is a little, this is crazy because the guy who's not as

in a feminist like me, who I already know about all these products.

You do.

But for the untrained guy,

he sees a pair of undies in a Ziploc bag, Monica.

I'll tell you a thousand percent what he thinks happened.

She shit herself.

Okay.

That's a Ziploc bag full of shitty underwear.

Okay.

And is it hot?

Well, now you're, now you're, that's an interesting counter.

See, now listen, this is what I, yes, would I rather

a little tampon

fall out?

It's not delicate.

Yeah, some inspiration.

What was it called?

Radiant.

Radiant.

A radiant tampon falls out.

Falls out.

Yes, I would prefer that to dirty period underwear falling out at a restaurant.

In a Ziploc bag.

Better in a Ziploc bag, at least, than on its own.

But it says

they poop themselves.

If that happened, the underwear, Ziploc bag, slash regular stinky underwear.

When it happens.

You, I would say, ugh, that's embarrassing.

That,

oh no, this is like David Chang all over again.

No, I would address it.

I would address it.

I'd be like, and there's flies too.

Just

there's immediately, there's a fucking swarm.

In fact, before he even sees it, he hears, whoa, is there a swarm?

I heard a swarm of flies.

No.

And then whiskey runs across the restaurant.

Oh, my God.

I would say.

I don't wear tampons anymore because they're not good for you.

Oh, and I'd say, I'm so glad you're taking care of yourself.

Exactly.

And that's the end of that.

Yeah.

Don't you think?

Well, okay, say that again.

Oh, so that's so embarrassing.

I'm so embarrassed.

I just don't wear tampons anymore because they're not great for you for women's bodies.

And because you don't wear tampons anymore, you.

You had an act, you pooped your pants?

Oh, no.

Is that what you think?

Yeah, because it's in Zipple.

Oh, no, no.

Sorry.

Sorry.

It's just, it's just period underwear.

I'm starving.

Let's see the desertment.

I hate men.

All men off the campaign now.

Let's see what kind of appetizers they got.

You're not.

Can we have a can of raid?

Like, you aren't having sex with people on their panel.

Oh, absolutely.

I love it.

I love it.

Police.

Yeah.

One of my, yeah, I'm going to leave that there.

Yeah.

Yes, of course.

I don't give a shit.

I also don't care if you have shitty underwear in your purse, but I do think I'm a rare,

rare customer.

I think you're probably a rare customer.

But

I would be like, oh, I'm so glad you're shit.

Your pants.

Now I got to tell you about 25 stories.

Yeah.

Look, it's tough.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, Mother's Day is right around the corner.

So think about getting mom either of these options, whatever you found out to be a compelling

argument.

We've said three now.

Diva cup.

Yeah.

Underwear.

Yeah.

Choice is yours.

If you're a pop and locker, you wear dresses.

These are all things you got to consider.

Yeah.

They're great.

I'm just having fun.

I'm having a good time.

And you were too.

Okay.

So anyway, she pulled the tampon right out of there.

She's such a gangster, Carl.

And do you think there was now poop?

Let me be honest with you too.

If I ever got in a situation where I had accidentally killed somebody and it was one of these scenarios where it's like, there's no way I can,

my my story's not going to hold up.

Like, literally, the choices are, it was an accident.

Yeah.

And my choices are call the police and go to prison forever because it looks insane.

Yeah.

Or get rid of the body.

Yep.

And I can't do it myself.

I do need one person.

Okay.

And Aaron's in Detroit.

Oh, okay.

I'm calling Carly.

That's the right call, right?

I mean, I'm upset, obviously.

But that's not your lane.

Well, cleaning up bodies.

Cutting up a body.

Oh, it's cutting up.

I thought we were burying it or putting it in the ocean or something.

It's Robert Durst.

Yeah, I'd rather not.

Right.

You know, there's other calls you'd rather.

I would keep it a secret.

Yes, I would trust you to tell you this happened.

Okay.

But I'm talking about the dirty business.

I'm just also not very strong, even though I've been doing my farmer's carries.

Intermittently.

I did them last night.

Oh, you did?

Yeah.

Oh, good.

While you were watching ER?

No, when I was going to and from.

kind of do you ever do them on your way to get another glass of wine

like right there I mean I can't say I haven't done them after a night out sure well of course because you're feeling stronger than you are

you're feeling like overly confident yeah I think I actually am ready so I have been doing two 40s yeah I think I might be ready to move up good yeah yeah but I'm not

going very far how far are you supposed to go longer than to your kitchen probably well I go back and forth until it feels like it's really falling out of my hand.

Okay.

You think that's bad?

I think you can look up.

I want to say they're supposed to last either 30 seconds or a minute.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

I don't do them, so I don't, I don't know.

All right.

I'll look it up.

Okay, you want to do facts and get a haircut?

Yeah, I do.

Okay, great.

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Well, I'm just going to start by saying this will be my first haircut I've ever given sitting down.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Oh, you like to stand.

Well, have you?

No one's ever cut your hair sitting down, right?

That's a crazy.

Huh?

Yeah, but that's okay.

Okay.

All right.

So first I'm going to start by grooming you okay okay don't forget to do the facts though oh i forgot that's also your job for the listener

like if you're watching this will be fun even if you're not giving facts but for the uh listener you're gonna have to give your facts okay i just really like it when people brush my hair yeah i bet you probably never want the haircut to start

i can see why you want to trim there's yeah you have some strays it's really it's gotten really out of control and a lot of them are kind of mid-level so that's a little tricky but those are the layers.

Yeah.

Well, okay, we're going to start.

We're going to start at the bottom.

Do you want me to do anything with my head?

No.

Okay, great.

Yeah.

Okay.

Now, the facts.

Yeah.

Tell me about the facts.

Tell me when you're making your first cut.

I already did.

Wow.

Were you not scared?

What happened?

I just fucking cut myself.

Oh, God.

You know why?

I always cut like this, Monica.

I cut like this.

And because your hair's down here, I have have to cut like this.

And I just cut my finger.

It's okay.

We're going to continue on.

Oh, God.

Get me one ear.

What NYX?

Or wrap a NYX around this.

It's a little how absorbent it is.

Okay.

Are you sure you're okay?

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay.

Now, this is from Mo.

Oh, wonderful.

Mo Ammer.

Mo Ammer.

This was a great episode.

Really interesting life.

Yeah, incredible.

We've had a few people on lately with really interesting lives.

Yeah, John.

John Bernthal, Mo.

That's it.

And that's where it's.

That's pretty much it.

Okay.

Now I have to check myself.

I said that

we had someone on Armchair Anonymous who told a story about how they pooped in the aisle of a plane and it got everywhere and it got on the flight attendant.

Yeah, I didn't remember that story when you told it.

Did that not check out?

No, it happened, but it was the the flight attendant called.

It was flight attendant stories.

Oh, okay.

Okay, that makes more sense.

Or plane stories or something.

And she told it from her perspective.

She's the one that got pooped on.

Yeah.

As if the job's not thankless enough already.

I know.

It's one of your main

stick up force.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I enter the plane a little bit self-fulfilling prophecy.

I'm suspicious someone's going to try to be mean to them.

Yeah, you want it to happen, really.

I don't, but I'm but I'm looking for it, and you find what you're looking for.

That's like the best way to sum it up.

How's it going with the haircut?

Pretty good.

Okay, great.

Bleeding pretty good, but that's okay.

Oh my gosh.

It's okay.

It's okay.

Should we put the cotter or something?

I'll put a band-aid on it for sure.

It's going to get a band-aid.

Okay.

Well, do we want to cauterize it?

Well, the chemical cauterization.

Yeah, that we just learned about.

That we just learned about.

That's an Easter egg farm chair anonymous.

And it's a dick.

It isn't.

Okay.

When do

Michael Che and Colin Joe do their like swappy?

Where they write jokes for one another?

Uh-huh.

That happened at Christmas.

They might do it more, but that was at Christmas.

Seems to be the Christmas present they give us.

Yes.

And then last time they did it, they talked about Scarlett's vagina and it, it

caused some

caused some issues.

Oh my God.

Max.

Hold on.

No, no, no, no.

Keep going.

I just showed Monica the blood, but it's okay.

I just dabbed it and got a bunch of hair inside of it.

Wait.

Do we want to get it?

No, everything's fine.

Continue on.

Nothing's happening.

I'm nervous for you.

Don't be nervous.

Okay.

This is not my first time bleeding.

Yeah, but I caught, I think.

I think that, you know what happened?

This is God smiting me for all the period talk.

Now he's given me a lot of blood.

Well, her.

Now we know God's a woman and she has smited me.

You're right.

It is a ding, ding, ding.

Wait, can we pause for one second?

I am going to get a bandaid because I'm going to have to pull out the layers a little bit.

Yeah.

Okay, great.

I'll just get a quick blend, dude.

I might have one in my bag.

Do you want me to go grab one?

It's Carly inside.

She probably is.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'll go grab one.

Okay.

Be careful not to get any blood on your white shirt.

I'm sorry.

I have to get blood on my white shirt.

Are you so far happy with the cut?

cut?

Yeah, I mean, no, we're just, we're just, no.

Because we just started.

Okay, okay, okay.

Don't be upset.

Don't get upset.

Okay.

Now, why shouldn't adults get their tonsils removed?

They will experience more pain and slower healing compared to children.

And there's a higher chance of complications like bleeding or infections.

Okay.

I am going to have to get your hair.

Your hair is going to look crazy in this interview.

Great.

Or not interview, but fact check because I'm going to have to flop over the

layers over the back of your head.

I don't even know what that means because like that's haircutting lingo.

Okay.

Yes.

So

I still don't really understand it.

Like

must be the size of the tonsils.

Would be my guess.

Right.

The bleeding's the issue.

Yeah, there's like bleeding, but you'd think a kid's tonsils would lead to more bleeding.

So, here's what I'm saying: you're gonna have to deal with that.

Oh, do you want me to hold?

Hold on, no, that's okay.

Let's get a little blood in there.

Oh, okay, great.

Next area.

Okay, now, when

did the U.S.

enter the Gulf War?

January 1st, 1991.

January 16th, 1991.

Oh, okay.

God, I really thought it was like right on my birthday.

I mean, close.

Maybe not.

Maybe they were about to, so they probably talked about it.

Okay, now the Kuwaiti citizenship thing.

I'm going to give your hairstylist credit.

This is a complicated cut you have.

It is?

Oh, yeah.

That's Jenny.

That's why.

Oh, yeah.

That makes sense.

Hi!

Hi.

Paul goes, he comes in and he goes, Dad cut his finger.

Your dad cut his finger.

Can we have a band name?

Yeah, yeah.

Give me a band name.

And I was like, what?

And he was like, cutting Monica's finger.

And I was like, what?

What's happening now in this show?

Yeah.

This is, I think, what we refer to as jumping the shark.

Yeah, yeah.

This may be the last successful episode of this show.

Oh, my God.

I know.

He really did it.

Monica's hair is in it.

Yeah.

That's what I told her.

Do we want to rinse it off?

No, we'll do that afterwards.

I just need to stop it so I can finish this haircut.

Why did you let him do this?

Well, I actually, I asked.

I asked for it.

You should have seen my hair.

It was way too long.

Right?

They're really bad.

Thank you, Lincoln.

I love you.

Hide your face.

Okay.

I'll do my best.

I can't guarantee it.

But I'll try.

Do you know I was telling Monica that whiskey's a very bad man who killed 100 men?

You said he's bad to him.

She doesn't like it.

No, I just don't like.

Well, as you know, I have my struggles with whiskey.

Yeah, everybody does.

Yeah.

Yeah, there's nothing unique about that.

He's a prick, as the whole family will tell you.

He's killed 150 women and he doesn't even care about that.

He doesn't talk about that.

I think he's ashamed that he's killed that many women.

Well, that's a nice way.

Yeah, like men deserve to get killed.

I took it as like, he's so proud of himself that he did that.

That's just like an unspoken.

Like it's tougher to kill the men, yeah.

Minds that he did all of that, ugh, like he doesn't even think it's a brag, exactly.

So, he doesn't mention it.

I'm gonna be honest with you, like, this is gonna be fine, and you're gonna need to see Jenny when you get home.

Okay, I will

be great, yeah,

shout out Jenny Cho, best hairstylist alive.

Well, I'll let you guys continue.

Thanks, Lane.

Thanks, love, thanks for saving the day.

The show will go on.

It must.

Okay.

Bye.

Bye.

Bye, sweetie.

Love you.

Okay, now back to the fat.

How's the blood?

Blood's done.

We're all done with blood.

Great.

It didn't bleed through the band-aid.

Nope.

Great.

It's not like that penis story.

I don't think I'll need a chemical cauterization.

Okay.

Now, I asked AI

about the Kuwaiti passports and stuff.

Okay.

in citizenship.

And it said, in general, no, being born in Kuwait does not automatically grant you Kuwait citizenship or a passport.

Kuwait follows a ju sanguinis, that means right of blood principle, rather than jus soli, right of the soil.

This means that citizenship is typically passed through Kuwaiti parents, not by birthplace.

A child born in Kuwait to non-Kuwaiti parents does not automatically qualify for Kuwaiti citizenship or a passport.

There are very limited exceptions if a child is born to unknown parents or in specific cases where the father is unknown but the mother is Kuwaiti, but those are rare.

Great.

Yeah.

I mean, not great.

If you're born there, I feel like you should be a citizen.

Oh, me too.

Me too.

Not great, but great.

Not great, but great for the information.

Great to find out.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's see.

The Peabody's.

Do you think maybe we'll get a Peabody for this fact chip?

This might be the one.

I mean, I bled for this episode.

Yeah, you're so sad.

That's what I'll say.

And

yeah, and so did I.

Quite a bit of blood.

Oh, yeah, we're both bleeding.

Rob, you got any blood back there?

Not yet.

Okay, the George Foster Peabody Awards, or simply Peabody Awards, or the Peabody's, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor what are described as the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in all of television, radio, and online media.

Because of their academic affiliation and reputation for discernment, the awards are held in high esteem with the media industry.

And as I told you, they are presented by the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Georgia.

Ding, ding, ding.

Bingos.

And we still don't have one, even though that's the case, which is pretty upsetting.

Doubly embarrassing for us.

It really is.

We should have a home court advantage and still no Peabody.

And they, when you're in college there and you're part of the journalism school, which technically I was because my PR degree was with Grady,

you could apply and basically audition slash tryout to be one of the like student judges.

And I did that and I did not get chosen.

You could have been a voice in the Peabody's?

Correct.

Oh, wow.

Anthony got picked.

Oh, God, he is.

I'm impressed you're friends with him.

Yeah, it speaks to my.

Because he kind of blows you away in a lot of these competitive situations and you still love him because he just killed you at Major Dong.

Mahjong, yes, he did.

He did.

He won like three out of three games.

Yeah, I guess that's true friendship.

It is.

It is.

That's how I felt about Aaron.

Like Aaron was just so much physically superior to me in everything boy related as a kid.

His coordination and his athleticism was off the charts.

Like we both tried out for the basketball team in seventh grade and I didn't make it and he didn't even want to do it and he made it and then he just didn't play.

Sure.

Oh, that reminds me of an even worse thing that happened.

With Anthony?

No, with Callie.

So when I lived in

the house now, I think.

What was it?

When I lived in Atlanta after college and I had an agent and was trying to work in Atlanta before I moved to L.A.

You know, the auditions that come through aren't that frequent.

Right.

So it feels like there's a lot of pressure on them.

There was a commercial audition for,

I don't remember.

It was a fast food brand company.

And

they basically said, like, bring a friend to the audition because you needed to like be interacting with someone in it.

Uh-huh.

And she booked it.

And she didn't want to be there.

No, she wasn't there to act.

She was there to just be there with me and do this thing.

And then she booked it.

I'm pretty sure I did cry about that.

You did.

Yeah, I think so.

Oh, but you guys made it.

Oh, yeah.

I didn't blame her.

Even then, I didn't blame her.

But I was like, man, I suck.

Yeah, a non-actor beat me.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

That's rough.

Yeah.

I'm sorry that happened.

Thank you.

You just got to stick with it, you know?

Yeah, war of attrition.

Well, we've cleaned up the back.

Okay.

Yeah.

I mean, again, Jenny is, she's going to need to come in here, but I'm just doing it.

I'm just going to flit around a little bit.

Okay, yeah, because you guys said you like to be playful.

Yeah, yeah.

And I'm going to try to clean up just some of these strays.

Okay.

I'm going to tell you right now, you are free of gray hair, which

that's nice.

Yeah.

Good for you.

Did you pull any out?

No.

You didn't see any.

That's good.

No.

I mean, there's some that are like a slightly different color, right?

But they're not.

They're not gray.

I don't know how to do do this, but let me just take a look at the side here a little bit.

We did not touch the sides, which conventionally you want to cut the whole hair.

Oh, is that normal?

That's what I've been told.

Okay.

Are you regretful right now that you didn't take this opportunity to shave one side of my hair?

Stop!

Stop!

I can't believe you guessed this.

I brought this down in my pocket.

I was like, is she going to see this thing hanging out of my pocket?

This whole thing was leading up.

No, this whole thing was leading up to freaking you out and just going.

It really feels like you're doing it.

Stop, stop, stop.

Did you get some?

No.

Oh, my God.

Oh.

Okay, well, it looks a little healthier back there.

This part I'm holding.

I already did that.

That's why you were holding it.

Oh, phew.

Okay, so it's done.

Yeah.

I mean, I should probably just quickly look over here.

I didn't look anywhere over here.

Let me just quickly

see what we got over here.

What if I fucking shaved a side ear?

And you were so mad.

Yeah.

And then you looked in the mirror and you were like, fuck, I look awesome.

I mean, this was your opportunity.

Well, there'll be others.

You're cheap.

No, you're not even cheap.

You're lazy.

I've been trying to coordinate with Jenny for like a month.

Oh, my gosh.

Okay.

All right.

It's a little better.

It's definitely less straggly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It was a little wispy.

It was a little too wispy.

Yeah.

Nice.

How do I look?

That's an improvement.

Yeah, yeah.

It's better.

Okay.

Again, you need to see Jenny.

What do you think?

Yeah, it looks good.

Okay, great.

Looks great.

That looks good.

But the camera gorgeous.

All right.

Well, that was great.

All right, Rob, sit down.

Now I can actually do a good job.

I think you did a good job.

I did a fair job.

You have way less split ends.

Great.

All right.

That's it.

Love you.

Love you.

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Hi, I'm Monica Klawinski.

Welcome to Reclaiming.

I would define reclaiming as to take back what was yours.

Something you possess is lost or stolen.

And ultimately, you triumph in finding it again.

Miley Cyrus, welcome to Reclaiming.

My 2013 is your 1998.

I lost everything during that time in my personal life because of the choices I was making professionally.

Chelsea Handler, welcome to Reclaiming.

I did have a teacher who instilled in me that I was going to do something special.

And she was like, you're going to have an impact.

Sophia Bush, welcome to Reclaiming.

You went all the way.

you committed, and if it wasn't for you, you had the courage to tell the truth and get out.

And I had to say that to women in my life, and I had to learn how to say it in a mirror to myself.

This last decade for me has really been what I consider my own reclaiming.

My own journey, my own reclaiming story is in the bones of this show.

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