Not Bad Dan Not Bad Stories

Dan Donohue
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My little stories dandonohue.substack.com

  1. Aug 26

    The Two Types of Trouble

    Hello reader, please like, comment, and share if you enjoy this, it really helps me out! There are two kinds of trouble you can get into as a child, they are very different, but the outcomes and consequences are the same. The first type of trouble is ‘crime adjacent trouble’. These are the ‘kids meal’ equivalent of adult crimes. Sort of cute, miniature versions of murder, arson, human trafficking, ect. Found huffing magic markers behind the school? Simple possession. Stealing Pokemon Cards? Grand larceny. Farting really loud on purpose? Usage of weapons of mass destruction. Laughing at said fart? Aiding and abetting a known terrorist. These sorts of infractions are dealt with harshly. Authority figures have the framework of their severity because of their adult crime equivalents and know what will happen if the behavior persists. They dole out detentions and suspensions to the children who commit them, and either the little criminals buckle under the weight of their sentences, or take them with the steely eyed indifference of a hardened criminal. “1 week no recess? How about you make it two? I’ve got to work on my drawing of what I assume boobs look like.” The second type of trouble is ‘Please, for the love of god, stop doing that’ trouble. This is where we trek into a new frontier of punishments which do not have adult equivalents, and are at the discretion of the authority figure in charge. Type 2 trouble arises when you do something which does not technically break any rules, but regardless makes teachers uncomfortable. This was the sort of trouble I got into, which was really tough because, although I was 9 years old, I could litigate and argue at the level of a conservative podcaster. One time, I was thrown out of class when the teacher was trying to describe whether words had a positive or negative connotation. “The word ‘hurt’ has a negative connotation.” She would say, bracing herself for my inevitable interjections.” “Oh really, what if you ‘hurt’ Osama Bin Laden? Would that be bad Ms. Prock? Last I checked he destroyed the empire state building and the pentagon, a shape which I have yet to learn.” I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, no one wanted endless war in the middle east more than 3rd graders. So I would do strange, abrasive things, get in trouble, and then argue about what specific rule I was breaking. I was often met with the phrase “because I said so” to which I would respond “But why, what thought process led you to have such a negative view on me speaking in a southern accent when I answer questions? I swear I’m not doing this just because I heard one on TV for the first time yesterday, this is who I am, and nobody talks to Texas Donny like this!” In elementary school I had a far worse relationship with my teachers than my type 1 compatriots. They were problem children, sure, but they had understandable problems. Their actions followed a line of logic. If you want to do well on a test, but you don’t want to study, you cheat. It makes perfect sense. It’s the kind of critical thinking a teacher can appreciate. It’s also the sort of thing an authority figure feels good about correcting. When you are given the power to punish, you often fantasize of wielding the flaming sword of justice with noble discernment. You do not often fantasize about telling a young boy to stop chirping before answering questions. Leading into middle school, that dynamic began to shift slightly. The type 1 kids, who stayed on the path of crime adjacent activity, became less benign. Scuffles became fights with blood and broken teeth, stealing markers turned into smoking weed, and being late to class morphed into competitive knife fighting. Meanwhile, while my strange behavior was still punished, I think I had broken the spirits of my teachers, who had bigger fish to fry now that my type 1 compatriots had a thirst for blood. Nevertheless, type 1s and type 2s are always lumped together. I got sent to detention, they got sent to special ed, which I always thought was interesting. Special education was supposed to be a place where students with learning disabilities and emotional problems got sorted out, but it was populated by a bunch of kids who just discovered weed too early. I knew a kid named Kyle White in middle school, who played football and went to special ed, a combo that was shockingly common. Kyle did not have a learning disability, at least not one you could ever accurately diagnose through the haze of marajuana that was pumping through his bloodstream at all times. It is certainly plausible that he was using weed to medicate an underlying learning disability, and if that was the case, Kyle was one of the most afflicted children who has ever lived. The amount of medication he had to take surpassed an entire terminal cancer ward combined. He took medication before school, after school, during school, during class. Kyle famously made a contraption fashioned out of a paper towel roll stuffed with different scented materials. He would take a hit from a pipe in class, then exhale it through the contraption. That way, instead of a teacher smelling pungent weed smoke and immediately sending him to the principal, a teacher would smell pungent weed smoke mixed with dryer sheets, and then send him to the principal. He would smile, laugh, say “you got me” and simply half walk half float to the principals office. There has never been a movie, tv show, or rap song that made me want to smoke weed as a teenager more than Kyle. I didn’t care that weed made food better, I was already eating enough of it at the time according to my pants size that called me “husky” and my classmates who called me “fat ass”. I didn’t care that it made sex better. That’s like if you told me now “you need to try this wild berry, It makes yacht racing so much more enjoyable!” You can’t enhance an experience you’re not having. But watching Kyle, carefree, sauntering to the principals office racked me with jealousy. I was always so nervous when I got sent to the principals, from elementary to middle school. But, much like a high paid athlete, the pressure elicited performances out of me that I never could have hoped to achieve without the heightened anxiety. You see, I was a master of getting out of trouble once I was already in it. I had a preternatural ability to tell an authority figure exactly what they wanted to hear once cornered. The trick was to give them everything they wanted, then give them more. Make them think their authority had such power that you were in literal physical anguish at the prospect of disappointing them. Sometimes I would even accent my self-admonishment by hitting my head with a flat palm over and over again until the principal would be forced to say “no no, stop that, don’t feel that bad.” That’s when I knew I had him. My pupils would dilate looking down the long stretching mile I was going to take once they had given me my precious inch. I’d leave the principal’s office, not only not being given a slap on the wrist, but with phone calls to my parents telling them ‘ease off him, he’s a good kid.’ Kyle was not as good at this little trick. He was charming, but he lacked the ability to self flagellate. He had “confidence” and “a sense of identity” and probably a myriad of other traits that were holding him back. We still found ourselves in trouble together fairly often, and we would chat quietly in detention when Officer Gammel (he used to be a police officer but he kept the title) wasn’t paying attention. “I tried blowing up a bunch of soda bottles with M80s on school property, what did you do?” Kyle would ask, like I was a cell mate on my first day in prison. “I tried blowing up my homework assignment with my mind.” I would reply sheepishly, feeling as though my crime wasn’t as cool or exciting as Kyle’s. He never made me feel judged though. There were certain “bad” kids who had a sense of inclusion far beyond their “good” counterparts. I remember Jack Bowdich, a kid who lived in a motel on route 6, was the first person to introduce himself to me in special ed. I personally think they had a mature way of looking at the world. They knew how bad their circumstances were, whether it be because of poor impulse control or their fathers gambling debts, so they were in no position to look down on others. Kyle and I chatted, and eventually the conversation got on the topic of sentencing. He was shocked at how little time I had to spend in detention when I was such a repeat offender. I told him about my little trick of prostrating myself at the feet of the disciplinarian, and Kyle listened with all the attention and focus he should have been putting into class. By the time Officer Gammel looked up from his phone to tell us to shut up, I had already imparted a truckload of strategies onto Kyle, and when we left detention I was assured Kyle would make progress in his ability to get out of trouble. When I found out he was permanently suspended two weeks later, I have to admit I was a little less confident in my council. “What happened?” I asked his cousin Eli. “The idiot got caught smoking weed, and started confessing that he also sold it. The principal booted him that day. He’s going to boarding school in Alaska now.” Up until that point I always had the idea that the truth would set you free, I had no idea that, depending on the truth, it could also get you sent to some adolescent Guantanamo Bay in Alaska. The whole ordeal made me paranoid. I contained my impulses to make weird noises or try to balance books on my eyeball, lest I slip up in the interrogation room and end up getting waterboarded while Alaskan king krabs pinch my toes. Kyle is now a successful fisherman, which is great! It turns out all that stuff teachers told him about studying and not doing drugs was a complete w

  2. Aug 15

    Crying In My Casket

    Before we start, my new book The Aardvark Protocol is available if you are a paid subscriber. It is a humor/thriller and I think you will love it. Now, please enjoy this story: My mom was an amateur motivational speaker. They exist, they are valid, they are loud. Professional motivational speakers are people who made fortunes or accomplished achievements that were so astonishing that other people want to pay them to hear them speak. Amateur motivational speakers tend to be people who think that they are so motivational, if they speak enough, their fortunes will come to them. For as long as I could remember my mother would do speaking engagements. She would put on her pants suits, make her hair as big as possible, and lift the spirits of kids who went to vocational high schools or employees at companies who probably picked her because the magician got too handsy last retreat. My mom was a bricklayer, and went on to start her own construction supply sales business. It was deeply impressive and I am very proud of my mom, but it doesn’t really blow anyone’s hair back unless you own a yacht. People don’t want to hear about your realistic achievements, they want you to own an island that various wealthy politicians and businessmen go and party on. Sorry if my mom wasn’t successful enough for you, but I can say for certain she never sacrificed a child to Moloc. I always wanted my mom to bring me to one of these events. I was interested in them. I was a strange child. My dad was one of those AA guys who replaced the unhealthy habit of drinking with the extremely healthy habit of working out for hours a day with no recovery. Some people get sober and go “I need to do a tough mudder every hour on the hour or I will go back to drinking.” Say what you will, but his legs were always too sore to get to the bar. So he was an intense guy, and my mom, with her blow out and nail extensions and hard hat, was an intense woman. I loved my parents, and got the notion at a young age that to be successful I had to work extremely hard. This is a great mindset when you turn 16, but at 8 it results in practicing four square while other children are building connections with each other. Whatever, I’ll see them out on the foursquare courts. We’ll see how far their social connections take them when they’re beating me 11-3 instead of 11-0. So when my mom first told me I would be going to a motivational speaking event in the library of a local community college, I was ecstatic. I would get to see people like Tony Robbins who I knew because my mom would play his cassettes while she was driving to distract me. Tony sort of became my Barney. They are very similar. They are both huge, scary, and have several pending sexual assault allegations against them. I don’t think their cases will have the same verdict though, you need to be willing to bribe witnesses or kill a judge when it comes to these sorts of things, so I think Barney will be the only one found innocent. When I heard there would be six speakers including my mom I was over the moon. Five Tony Robins plus my mom!? Such a group could take over a small island nation, my mom riding on the back of one of the Tonyranasauras rex’s and directing him to smash guard posts or denationalize pineapple farming. However, when I got to the event, I was somewhat disappointed. There was no motivational music, no giant stage, and worst of all no headset microphones to allow the speakers to get out into the audience, grab a woman by the head, and tell her “do not let your Huntington’s Disease stop you from opening your Etsy shop.” It was just a podium on the floor with a microphone. The dozen or so people in the crowd were old women and a few really intense 30 year old men who looked like they got their motivation by lighting the end of a glass pipe. This was not where business owners decided to take their first step. This was where future McDonald’s employees decided to become managers. I huffed, grabbed my gameboy, and went to the back of the room to hone my skills at Super Mario. Like everything else in my life at the time I approached Super Mario with an intensity far beyond the realm of pleasurable experience. I wonder what would have come of my mind if I had dedicated the same mental effort towards reading. Maybe I wouldn’t have been in special ed, maybe I could spell the word chocklet on a whim like some fancy professor. So my mom prepared her speech as her son soldered his synapses and developed a taste for blond women who were a foot taller than him. She was speaking last, we are a family of headliners, so I had to sit and half listen to the five separate fifteen minute speeches before hers, and boy did they stink. One guy spent the whole time talking about other motivational speakers. “When you’re feeling down, when you get really low, I know it can feel like things are never going to change. But it’s like Tony Robbins always says, “You have to believe it before you achieve it.” It was like we were transported back to a time before cassette players where town criers needed to relay messages from the guys in charge. “Hear ye hear ye, Lord Robins decrees you need to covet before you love it” The audience seemed to like him alot. They had heard all the stuff Tony said, but never from a guy with a microphone on stage, so this was all new to them. The old woman nodded their heads, making their white hair bob above their seats like the foamy caps of waves. The three speakers after this man were even worse. They read off papers, not once looking at the audience. A very thin woman, in a pencil skirt and skin that was so loose it looked like tree bark, would accentuate her points by periodically looking up from her paper, but it was never the right moments. She would say “It took me years to figure out how to lose the weight.” Then she would look at the audience, shaking her fist above her head and crying “It wasn’t diet or exercise!” and then look back at her page and mumbled, “It was my mindset.” The speaker before my mom was the only one that made me look up from my game in rapture. He was a Jamaican man with a thick accent. He had wide fiery eyes and leaned over the podium as though it were the only object in the path of him leaping into the audience and shouting in everyone’s faces. He was great! The thing that stuck out to me about the content of his speech was its completely directionless and non-motivational nature. Most motivational speeches start by the speaker explaining something awful that happened to them, and then conclude with how they overcame it. This guy had the first part down, but seemed to have no concept of the conclusion. “Back in Jamaica, my father would beat me without mercy. One time I was walking down the road, and I stepped on a rusty nail. When I limped home, my father beat me for ruining my shoe.” We all leaned forward, waiting for him to tell us that one day he stood up to his father, or how that experience taught him to look out for himself, but instead he just paused and said “...now that was awful. Why would he do that? It was an accident, I was not trying to step on the nail!” As his speech continued, I saw other audience members shift uncomfortably. This was not what they wanted, they wanted predictable narrative, they wanted conclusions to be hammered home. This man was offering a sort of avantguard abstract version of a motivational speech. You never had any idea where he was going. “Me and my wife have been together for thirty years, when people ask me ‘how do you stay together for so long’ I always say ‘I don ‘t know, I don’t want to be together anymore, but I don’ t know how to leave her.” This man completely broke the monotony of the evening. I realized what was wrong with all the other speakers. You knew where their speeches were going. If you can predict that someone wants you to work harder or turn your life around, the part of your brain that detects spontaneity shuts off. This man seemed like he could care less about what I did with my life, he had his own problems thank you very much. The only thing he said that was even remotely “motivational” was at the end of his speech, when he said, “Not a lot has worked out for me, but at the end of the day, I don’t think I will be crying in my casket. When he got off stage there was a smattering of applause. He did not stick around after to sell a book or hawk a course. He just walked out the front door, probably keeping an eye out so he didn’t step on any rusty nails or run into his wife. My mom got on stage after, talking about being the first woman to join the masons union on the east coast and how much she overcame and blah blah blah, but I couldn’t stop thinking about that strange man. Looking back on my life I think his speech feels as though it resonates more with me than any of the others from that night. Hard work will get you somewhere, but in my experience hard work is like unfurling a sail on a very small boat in the middle of the ocean, all it guarantees is forward motion. The direction is up to the wind and current. I’ve known people who work very hard and get nowhere close to where they want, and I know people who don’t put a sail out at all and end up doing pretty well for themselves. But somewhere on that vast endless ocean of experience and want, there is a man with no boat, no sail. He is on an island wondering why his dad beat him, and hoping his wife does not have his coordinates. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dandonohue.substack.com/subscribe

  3. Mar 12

    Standup In A Haunted Room

    I did a show last night at a wonderful establishment. The booker is friendly and the crowds are stand up savvy and generous, however, I performed in its haunted room. The room is not haunted by ghosts who poke their heads out of closets or appear suddenly in a mirror, what haunts this room is much worse. I believe that years ago, in the far away land of 1998, a comedian had such a bad set in this room it ripped the space time continuum within it forever. Ever since that fateful day, the room has been a black hole of comedy, a vortex that sucks up laughter and leaves audiences, mostly composed of tourists, looking like rows of mannequins sporting the “just got in from Eastern Europe summer line”. Rows of flip flops and shirts that say “Armani” 1000 times. They stare at you, not only stone faced, but looking like they have never laughed before, like they’ve never heard a laugh, like someone came to their town with a rumor that someone had laughed 3 countries over and they beat him to death for his salacious lie. There is nothing wrong with the room itself. You walk in, there is a stage and a bar and in front of the stage there are tables and chairs. In standard comedy club fashion the room itself is lacquered with a thick black paint and everything serves to focus attention to the comedian on stage, it seems normal, and that’s what tricks you. I imagine audience members settling down expecting a good show, but when the first comedian takes the stage, a dark energy envelops the entirety of the crowd. Their faces go blank, their ability to laugh is taken away from them, and as if bound to their tables by invisible tether, their hands cease to be able to clap. This is where I performed last night, this is where I perform almost every week. I’m reading IT by Steven King at the moment, and there is a great plot device where the main characters leave their home town and their memories of the haunting they suffered there are instantly erased until they return years later to face down their monster once more. That’s exactly how I feel before I step back into this room. There is a nauseous sort of hope that sweeps over me before a show there. It’s not the hope of a traveler setting foot on new land, more like the hope a prospector feels panning the same river bed he’s panned thousands of times before, holding on to the false and insidious idea that maybe this time there will be gold at the end of his effort. Once I step into the room even that warped sense of optimism leaves me, and I settle into the darkness and silence. Last night after my bomb, I got off stage and slunk back to the green room. The green room is nice and there is a TV where they have a live camera set up and you can watch other comedians bomb as bad as you do, but last night was different. I watched my friend, Kelly Ryan, crush. It was like watching the devil get beat in a fiddle contest, it was incredible. I couldn’t hear exactly what she was saying, there was no audio feed, but I could hear the laughter bang against the door like a horde of zombies hungry for my self esteem rather than my brain. I had associated that room with bombing for so long that I had built this comfortable space in my mind where I said ‘it’s impossible to make them laugh, so it’s ok’. You could tell Kelly was killing by looking at her performance without audio. She was relaxed, smiling, and generally having a good time. There is a saying in comedy that goes something like this: “If you’re having fun on stage, the audience will have fun with you.” I think it’s a good little saying, but I prefer one of my own: “If you’re not having a good time on stage, the audience should have a good time anyway because you’re soooooo smart and special, and also someone in the audience should give you a TV show.” Anyway, Kelly finished her set to a kind of raucous applause that I didn’t know was possible in that room, and when she came into the green room I told her “wow, that sounded great.” To which she replied “You know, they just wanted me to talk about what was going on in the world. They were all kind of sitting around waiting for it to be addressed.” She said it so simply, so absolutely, like a plumber telling you “ya thats gotta be a blockage in the S-pipe, you’re gonna wanna put a spigot valve in the sprocket joint.” I mulled over what she said for a while, and it struck a few nerves for me. First off, I was thinking about current events a lot that day, and I am now as well. Military action in the middle east, multiple deaths caused in the name of the country I poorly file my taxes to every year, and a creeping sense of inevitability. My parents were born less than ten years after the conclusion of world war two. Those must have been hopeful times, living in the country which was the flaming sword of justice that vanquished evil. They then stood up bravely to the war in Vietnam, because what was going on there was not what the United States military stands for. I was born in a time where the marketing behind the United States military had been on auto pilot for a full generation before me. “Bringing democracy” and “securing freedom” were chanted like the drones of a bagpipe. They would spout talking points about imminent danger with no real conviction, using buzz words like they were entering the password to an ancient evil laptop. Now, we’re at a point where we don’t even really use those pretenses. Now we are at war because we are at war. We can come up with flimsy reasons afterwards, but those explanations are as varied and mystical as oracles looking into tea leaves. Going to war is an inevitability, because the country needs war almost as if we are offering it in homage. Our soldiers sign up to potentially be given as blood sacrifice in exchange for an article on Fox news with their face in front of a big American flag smiling brightly. The wanton disregard that this country seems to have for its soldiers does not hold a candle to the apathy it has for the lives of Iranians. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a way to turn all that into standup, but I think I should figure out a way to speak about things as they happen in real time. My issue is, I think slow, I write slow. My jokes are well thought out and pretty tight, but they take a long time to get that way. The thing that I am struggling with now is how to bridge the gap between what I am feeling and what I am doing on stage. Recently I’ve been going to open mics and letting loose on stage a little bit more. I don’t know if anything will come of it, but it does feel good. I’m a firm believer that an entertainer’s job is to entertain, and a comedian’s job is to be funny. This video that I saw of Stephen Graham recently sums it up pretty well. Go to 3:35 While I certainly believe this to be true, I also think a comedian has a better chance of being funny when they are talking about something they believe to be interesting. I think my problem is. I put a lot of pressure on myself, and pressure is just that, a containing, restrictive force. Sometimes I resent certain audiences, I think they are scared or stupid or annoying, and I let that get to me. My preconceived notion of what they want clouds my judgement and makes me act inauthentically. I think I learned a lot that night from Kelly, even though she doesn’t know it. If you put distance between yourself and others, consider yourself to be different, better, more thoughtful, or worse, dumber, you offer yourself a cushion. I think what I learned is if you look down on people, you make it harder to connect, and connecting with people is probably the only thing that could make me feel better right now. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dandonohue.substack.com/subscribe

    Standup In A Haunted Room

  4. Feb 18

    A Case for Snobs

    When I was 12 years old, there were a few truths I clung to in order to make my socially unsuccessful life bearable. I did not have many friends due to my erratic and frankly off-putting nature--which I am now grateful for--but back then, it served only to keep me on the outskirts of social life, and therefore, on the outskirts of reality itself. When you lack friendship, you learn that it’s not just comradery you are missing out on, but a fundamental tether and attachment to sanity. Friends, romantic partners, and close emotional connections of all sorts serve to mirror your experience back to you, giving you the building blocks with which you construct the world and make a barrier between “normal” and “abnormal” thoughts and behavior. When you lack those connections, you need to fashion your own anchor to society by less conventional means, unless you want to be set adrift in total isolation. Before I get into what I made my anchor out of, I want to reiterate that I was 12 years old, and unconfined by even the most basic social pressures that are put upon us by friends and colleagues. The thing I loved, cherished, and gleaned my world view from was the comedy stylings of Dane Cook. I want to say this in no uncertain terms (and frankly, I want credit for being brave enough to state this publicly)--Dane Cook was the most important thing in my life at this time. I had almost nothing in common with my classmates, I spoke with a lateral lisp that not only made me sound different, but would cause flecks of spit to rocket out of my mouth, especially when I was excited about something I was talking about. My spitting issue persists into adulthood, and even now, after years of speech therapy, when I’m performing standup and I’m on a roll, sometimes I will see a fleck of spit travel from my mouth in slow motion, and arc through a pure, translucent beam of light to settle, as perfectly as if my saliva had a laser-guided tracking system, on the face of someone in the front row. My speech, coupled with my inability to remain silent, left me out of many fundamental conversations which could lead me to have conventional taste. I didn’t like any of the popular movies, didn’t listen to popular music, and opted to dress like my dad rather than my classmates, which left me looking like a 12-year-old metrosexual, my faux hawk jutting upward like a radio tower sending off signals to ward off friendship. But my classmates liked Dane Cook, and I liked Dane Cook, and that meant the world to me. Dane Cook is a comedian who gained prominence in the late 90s and early 2000s. His mixture of storytelling with absurd, act-out heavy material, garnered him an enormous following back in the early days of the internet where going “viral” was not even a coined term yet. His material was incredibly quotable, and he had an enormous fan base of young people. I remember distinctly quoting his material to other kids who were fans of his, and the immediate recognition and connection were a rare glimmer of light in the starless night of my preteens. My admiration for Dane Cook was not based on a deep knowledge and understanding of standup comedy--rather, it was a purely visceral experience that had an added context of providing a social function which was, in those days, extremely valuable to me. Later that year, I made a friend: Evan. He was strange like me, and we shared a love of Adult Swim. There were wonderful years of childhood where a friendship could be built on pretenses that were totally insubstantial. As adults, we choose the people in our lives with the discernment of a jeweler trying to find flaws in a diamond. Back then, all we needed to establish was that we had the same favorite color as someone else before diving into a life-altering social connection with them. Evan had an older brother, Noah, who was the first snob I ever encountered. He was a strange kind of snob--a type that can be hard to identify at first glance. He loved punk rock, played the bass when everyone else his age was learning the guitar, and had long hair that he made sure was covering his eyes at all times. He would have his friends over, and they would listen to bands like Leftover Crack and Fugazi. I would often catch Noah in the hallway to ask him about music he liked, and I would try and remember as many names as I could so I could look them up on LimeWire later and listen to them after clicking several links that ended up leading to snuff films. I miss the early internet. One day, when I was hanging out with Evan, he told me Noah had started doing improv. I didn’t know what improv was, but it sounded like what all my favorite comedians did--go on stage and say funny things off the top of their heads. (I, like a surprising amount of comedy fans, didn’t know then that stand up is pre-written.) After learning this, I rushed into Noah’s room before Evan could stop me. Bursting through the door, I saw he was on a swivel chair while his friend Alex was in the bed. They both had guitars in their hands and looked so, so cool. I was nervous, especially considering the unwelcoming way they were both looking at me, but I wanted to connect with them. And now that I’d learned Noah was involved with comedy, I blurted out, “Do you like Dane Cook?” Noah’s friend, Alex, 17 with muscle development so advanced for his age it seemed that he was destined to either play pro sports or go to prison, burst out laughing at my question. But Noah’s reaction was much more grave and unsettling. He lowered his head so his hair hung like tattered curtains over his eyes, and he said in a low and ominous half-whisper, “Dane Cook sucks.” Alex released another torrent of laughter while I stood, awestruck, unable to comprehend the words that had just been spoken. How could Dane Cook suck? He’d made me laugh like a billion times. Had Noah even seen the bit where he pretends to be a snake? Had he heard him impersonate the voice of a Burger King drive-through employee where he gets the distortion perfect? It simply couldn’t be. “Dane Cook is so funny,” I said, a tremble building in my voice. “He f*****g blows, man,” Alex said, finally getting ahold of himself. I felt a rage boil inside me. I left and slammed the door behind me, and I stewed about the interaction for months afterward. What I didn’t realize then is that I had just had my first experience with a snob, and years later I would not only forgive Noah, but thank him. Because even though I don’t completely agree with his assessments on comedy, I did learn a lot from him and his people about developing taste--and in turn, identity. I want to be clear about my definition of snob here. I’m not referring to someone who prefers the most expensive version of things and disregards affordable alternatives. This is the cartoon image of a snob, monocle in hand, saying a Patek Philippe Nautilus should be in rose gold rather than steel. The kind of snobs I’m referring to would tell you that a $30 Casio is a much better choice than a $12,000 Hublot. These kinds of snobs are people who are dedicated to doing research and deep dives into a specific topic, and through their devotion, they develop strong opinions that someone who is not well-versed in the topic would never have. Indulge me while I continue to use the wristwatch comparison for a moment (something I am a snob about.) You see, Hublot is a widely-known watch brand, and with its luxury price tag it would be easy for an average person to think it’s a brand that rivals Rolex in design and function. But when you start learning about the luxury segment of wristwatches, one of the first things you learn is that Hublot is a vacuum of design, has poor resale quality, and benefits much more from successful marketing than from the quality of its product. Long story short, it wouldn’t be a bad watch if it wasn’t five figures and looked like something...well, looked like something Dane Cook would wear, honestly. With that brief summary, you can understand where I’m coming from when it comes to critiquing Hublot. Now imagine we’re at a store. You see a Hublot, point at it, and say, “that watch looks cool,” only to be greeted with my squinty, incredulous stare, before I ear-beat you about how that’s actually a bad watch, an awful watch. If you wore that watch around watch nerds, we would laugh at you before reaching for our inhalers and pushing up our glasses with tape around the frame. Those kinds of reactions from snobs have given them a bad reputation. They are thought of as existing in a world so esoteric that they’re disconnected from society as a whole. The battle cries of “let people enjoy things,” and “ease up a little,” and “stop foaming at the mouth and barking every time you see a MVMT watch” are used to discredit and undermine snob opinions. Well, let me say this: as offputting as snobs can be, there is something much more insidious and harmful sitting in wait behind them. And if you remove snobs from society, there will be nothing stopping it--SLOP. Here is my theory: I propose that anti-snob propaganda is fueled by the increasing desire to get us all to consume slop products, slop food, and slop entertainment. If studios had it their way, we would all be watching When Harry Met Sally 12, an entirely AI remake where Sally fakes an orgasm, then looks directly into camera and says, “that’s how betting with DraftKings makes me feel.” Slop content, whether it be on TikTok or television, is always the most readily-available, highly-marketed choice out there. Marvel movies, remakes, and general AI and CGI garbage gets pushed on us incessantly--not because it’s the highest-quality material, but because it is the most profitable for the corporations producing it. No compelling actors, no original content, and no concise storyline are all money-saving features, and there is only one thing stopping us

    A Case for Snobs

  5. Jan 9

    Blood Meridian...Dude Book?

    This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dandonohue.substack.com/subscribe

  6. Jan 7

    Before you Resolve

    Hello SubStack! Just a few things up top. I will be doing standup in Seattle 1/9-10, LA 1/25 and DC 1/30-31. If I’m not coming to your city, please join my email list. You can find all that at this link. Important link Also, if you join the paid tier, it’s just 5 a month or 50 for the year and I’m going to put a lot of fun stuff on there! Ok sorry here we go How are we feeling? It’s been a little since I’ve posted a proper piece of writing on Substack. I took some deliberate time off where I decided to store up my creative juices and do what I enjoy most: drinking heavily and watching sensory overload videos designed to give babies dopamine issues. I came out of this fugue state about two days ago, my nails long, my eyeballs on fire, and my brain completely depleted of any chemical that might cause a reaction that could be subjectively categorized as “joy.” After several IV drips and a journey to a faith healer who deemed me a “lost cause,” I thought it was time to pick myself up by the velcro straps of my light-up shoes and make a New Years resolution! Now, from what I’ve seen from friends and family, New Year’s resolutions can generally be put into two categories: 1. Get jacked, and 2. Work more. These categories I’ve constructed are more broad than they seem. Reading more is a form of getting jacked--mentally jacked. Journaling is a form of working more--emotionally working more. If you’ve decided to make a resolution along those lines, that’s great! Enjoy two months of journaling until you realise there is only so much you can write about your ex and only so much you can read about your ex’s narcissism before you’re writing detailed breakdowns of their attachment styles and showing up to their work trying to give them a surrealist painting that encapsulates their negative mental patterns. When the security guard is throwing you out, you can yell, with total certainty, “No! You don’t understand! They’re crazy!” Once the restraining order is filed, you will need to find a more attainable goal like losing weight. But you’ll soon remember that big asses are in, and then you’ll change your goal to gaining weight, until you realize the importance of hip-to-waist ratio, at which point you will enter the quantum mechanics of modern exercise where you are simultaneously trying to gain and lose weight in a Schrodinger’s ass dilemma. Then you’ll give up on all that and decide “maybe I’m perfect just the way I am,” until next year, when you’ll wonder, “If I’m perfect, why do I spend so much time in the Hooters bathroom screaming?” at which point you’ll decide that what you need is another New Year’s resolution! People will try everything from modern, scientifically-studied nootropics, to old-school, classic, tried-and-true nootropics (cocaine) to muster more willpower to follow through with their resolution. To get this Substack finished I took about two grams of pure Bolivian nootrophic straight to the dome. Here’s the issue: let’s say you stick to your goals. You lose weight, read more, and finally start using separate razors for your face and body--what then? While many people could benefit from eating healthier or learning more, I have found these resolutions are a roundabout means to get to a similar end: “I want to change the way the world relates to me.” If you’re thinner, the world will greet you as a thin person. If you’re smarter, doors will open for you because you will be perceived as smarter. This makes a ton of sense, but as a person who willed myself into losing weight and gaining muscle in my early 20s, let me tell you--it doesn’t work as well as you think it will. Don’t get me wrong, it’s part of the puzzle, but people continue to have a huge blindspot in terms of resolutions that I’d like to discuss here. Instead of making resolutions that change you, how about making a resolution that changes your relationship with the world? Personally, I never hear New Year’s resolutions along the lines of “I’d like to do more favors for my friends.” What the hell happened to favors, anyway? Try asking a friend to take you to the airport, and they go, “Ubers are cheap.” Yeah, you want to know why Ubers are cheap? Because they’re piloted by Bulgarian indentured servants. Now take me to LAX before I hire a robot to deliver an IED to your apartment. The economic environment is plunging us all into becoming self-centered automatons, ordering DoorDash while we complain that Netflix slop isn’t as good as the slop they used to make. I think the key to happiness is to break this cycle as much as possible, but there’s a problem--people have armored themselves in ‘self care’ to uphold their complicity in their own atomisation. That’s right, some people are afraid to go against the term “self care” in its misused, mutated form we see today, but I will stare down that evil, demented teddy bear and hug it into submission. It would be insulting to your intelligence as a reader to go on about how I “don’t think taking care of yourself is a bad thing.” Obviously I don’t--you’re not a baby, let’s stop wasting time. Many deeply selfish people hide behind the idea of self care as an excuse for not being a member of society, and I’m over it. Helping other people, whether it’s by helping friends with a project or participating in outreach organizations, can be just as energizing as sitting in a bathtub filled with rose petals while you stare longingly at a picture of Paul Walker. Do both, find a balance. Do not go gently into that good night of solipsism and streaming services. What people fail to realize is that building community is hard work, and therefore, in my opinion, should be prioritized in your resolution. Personally, I will be resolving to do more food sorting for an organization known as “Community Fridge,” as well as trying to get shredded. Community Fridge is awesome because you meet other people who sort food, while also doing something good for a cause bigger than yourself. Imagine how cool it will be when I’m doing all that while also being 10% body fat. Who can stop me then? No one, that’s who. Your resolution doesn’t have to be as powerful or noble as mine. Make your resolution to go to the bar with friends once a week. At this point in society, that is a far more impressive task than journaling 200 pages a day. People get stuck in a self contained loop of self improvement, then feel hollow if and when their goals are completed. What I’m saying is: having abs is cool, but it’s even more cool to have friends around to tell you, “hey, put your shirt back on.” Thank you for reading! Join the paid tier to read more, see me live, join my email list, and as always, have a good one! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dandonohue.substack.com/subscribe

    Before you Resolve

  7. 12/16/2025

    What We Lost in Lifting

    There are a few things I do every day. I write, I drink a full bottle of Bombay Sapphire and I go to the park. The park is about 80 yards by 80 yards, with a large modern jungle gym that takes up about a third of it. It’s one of those sleek multi-colored metal and plastic behemoths that replace the old wooden ones after too many children end up at the emergency room because they’ve gotten so many splinters they’re essentially more tree then child. There’s an area of the park that is supposed to be grassy, but due to harsh dog paws has given way to large spots of dirt that look like craters on an irrigated moon. There are a dozen huge trees that give shade to much of the park. I go there so often I know which spots will be covered and which will be in the sun at any time of day. If I don’t want direct sun I can’t go to the workout area between the hours of 9 am and 11 am, but outside of those hours, the pull up bar, even bars, Plyometric platform, weird platform on a spring that no one uses, and weird manual elliptical that people try to use and stop because it’s stupid, are covered by beautiful, natural shade. This is where I spend much of my time at the park. Gripping metal and hoisting my chin over a bar, doing leg lifts, or watching as men of all walks of life do the same. You never see women at the pull up bar at the park. I always hear men complain that women are wearing outfits that are too revealing at the gym, and to that I say, come with me to the park. You will be free from temptation unless you are attracted to a 60-year-old man with the body of a Marvel hero doing dips and listening to Louis Farrakhan on a JBL speaker. I love working out at the park for many reasons. Taking advantage of this country’s dwindling public utilities brings me a lot of joy, being outside is wonderful, and I love the characters that come around. You might think there would be a lot of crazy people working out at the park, and you’d be right--but what might surprise you is the level of decorum. You see, lifting etiquette is a relic of gym culture that is being obliterated by modern gyms, but at the park it’s a different story. Here, everyone is a little afraid of everyone else, because if you’re working out at the park, chances are you’re a little out of your mind. If someone is spending too much time at the pullup bar and you ask if you can work in (lifting jargon for using a piece of equipment someone else is using for a prolonged period of time so you don’t have to wait,) they almost always happily accommodate--out of respect for the art and tradition of physique development, or fear that you have a homemade knife on you. I went to a commercial gym with a friend recently where we had a much different experience. EOS Fitness is hell on earth for lifting etiquette. You could shoot a video of how not to act at a gym there, especially during peak hours, which seem to last from 6 am to 10 pm. People left weights out of the rack, people stayed on machines for thirty minutes at a time, people ran open air c**k fighting rings--the place was a mess. My friend Anna wanted me to help her learn how to use certain pieces of equipment there, and I happily obliged. I love going to the gym with my friends--it makes me feel like a tour guide in a scary underground cave. I get to say things like, “I know this seems scary, but if you stay on the path, this will be safe and enjoyable. Also, don’t touch that. Don’t touch anything, for the love of god.” We finished warming up in the upstairs area before making our way down to the much scarier weightlifting section. This gym is packed with people, but it feels more claustrophobic because there is zero consideration for other people there. Dudes are camping out at bench presses, and eating full meals in between sets. Women are having phone calls at the abductor machine. Everything was going fine until we had to go to do hip thrusts. There is an entire section for legs that is even scarier than the normal gym--a full room of barbell platforms that are always in use, and a smell that would make a plumber call for backup. There was a hip thrust machine open, but it was loaded with weight, so I started to unload it. I got the second plate off when I heard something that made me jump. “Hey!” barked a man who quickly walked from the other end of the gym. I think he wanted to run, but his body was hypertrophied to the point of near immobility. He was a gym rat. I’ve known gym rats, been friends with them, loved them, but there was something different about this man. He walked up to me and my friend. “No, I’m still using this.” He said it so matter-of-factly, as if he weren’t talking to us, but rather barking orders at subordinates. “Oh, that’s okay,” I said, “Can we work in?” I was definitely too friendly for what he was giving us, but I had just never experienced this level of glassy-eyed rudeness before. To me, the gym is a fun place where everyone has the same goal: to move our bodies, which have become sedentary from watching 500 45-second videos a day. The man just looked up at me as he put the 45 back on the machine. No. I was floored. I literally didn’t know you could say no to a request to work in. I was about to say something I most likely would have regretted when Anna said, “let’s just do something else.” I walked away, but that interaction has haunted me since. Let me explain something: there are different tiers of gyms. If you are at a serious powerlifting gym, there are different rules than at a cheap commercial gym. At a serious gym, you might be on a specific timing regimen for each set, so someone working in wouldn’t make any sense. But what this man did was the equivalent of going to a public basketball court and doing shooting practice, then when other people show up and ask if it’s cool to play, you answer, “no.” This interaction was this man’s fault, without a doubt, but his actions are heavily influenced and encouraged by his environment. I would like to take you on a little journey into the mind of a meathead. There is a conflict with the modern meathead, and one that is very difficult to rectify. They are hyper dedicated to lifting, but not in a lifting community. Back in the day, to learn about how to lift, you would need to find other people who lifted. There were books on the subject, but pictures could only do so much. You had to talk to more experienced lifters, and through talking to them, you would also pick up habits of decorum that are extremely valuable when it comes to community building. If you’re taking four sets of dumbbells and hogging them, everyone in the gym is going to think you’re an a*****e, but I’m sure a lot of people no longer know they’re doing something wrong. It wouldn’t even be worth explaining to that guy that what he’s doing is wrong, because there is no community to keep him accountable. For etiquette to be followed, there needs to be a culture in place so that when you correct someone’s behavior, there is a precedent to back you up. At modern commercial gyms, that culture has deteriorated. What EOS and many other gyms do is sell as many memberships as possible regardless of capacity. Because the memberships are cheap and people are broke, they don’t have any other option but to brave the disgusting landscape created by a cultureless workout space. The gym can’t kick anyone out or reprimand them out of fear of losing clients and getting bad reviews, so the gym sucks and will keep sucking, because people follow what is happening around them. If one person is hogging an area and you can’t do the exercise you want, and later you have the chance to hog an area, you’re of course going to do it. Many would say, “so go to a more expensive gym,” and yes, more expensive gyms are cleaner and people are generally neater. But if it’s always the case that more expensive means more organized, why is the pullup bar at the park so respectful? I have a theory that because the park is a public utility, there is a level of gratitude from people who workout there for the exercise space. Obviously this isn’t across the board, but barring people who are going through mental health episodes, I’ve found people at the park to be much more conscientious than almost everyone at commercial gyms. At EOS you pay your $30 and think, “well, if I’m paying for this place, I’m not going to clean up after myself--that’s the gym’s job.” At the park we understand the pullup bar is all we have, and we get to use it for free, so we better take care of it. This isn’t the case for other free things, but that’s because the pullup bar has a second aspect that makes the whole system work: culture. There needs to be a community for public utilities to work. When something is free, the thing that keeps people in line is other people making sure no one abuses it. That’s something we need more of in society. Many people take a passive role in their lives to avoid confrontation, and I think we have gone too far in that direction. You should pick your battles, but you need to fight a few battles. When someone hogs the pullup bar and doesn’t let me work in, I better tell them, “hey, that’s not how this space works.” Otherwise, the space won’t exist anymore, and it’ll just become a bar in the middle of the park. EOS Fitness is not my battleground--I think it’s lost due to the soulless, corporate ethos that pervades the space, but the pullup bar at the park is where I plant my flag. Where do you plant yours? It can be a library or a basketball court or a bagel shop, but it better be somewhere. Thank you for reading See me live in Portland, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Washington DC. Find tickets here Live tickets Join my email list to get updates when I come to your city email list Join the paid version of my substack for many more posts! This is a publi

    What We Lost in Lifting

  8. 11/26/2025

    Look Who's Coming to Thanksgiving

    On a brisk November day in upstate Maine, the Harrington family worked in quiet happy synchronicity to prepare their Thanksgiving day meal. Tammy and Susan worked over the stove, putting the final touches on plating a perfect golden brown turkey. Tammy’s husband, Patrick, worked on a bowl of spiked apple cider like a mad scientist. Even Grandma Joan, who had been slipping mentally in her later years, was helping to set the table. Each place setting got two spoons and no knives, but if that was the price for old Joan to be included, so be it. Susan’s kitchen was spacious and immaculate--high tech gas burning stove, tasteful blue backsplash against white tiles, and several hidden compartments in which guns of various calibers were stored, in case the war broke out. On top of the general pleasantness of family bonding, there was another reason everyone was so cheerful, and moving with a bouncing glee like elves in a workshop. Robert had not shown up. It was tense for a moment when everyone arrived, but Tammy sat everyone down and told them all not to engage with Robert if he started spouting his wacky ideas, especially Abby, who was on winter break from university. “Listen, I love you all, and I love our Robert, but I just do not want a repeat of last Thanksgiving. I can’t take it. If Robert starts sharing his...opinions, just don’t engage. There is no need to make this holiday ugly.” “Why do we do this?” Abby protested. “Why do we let him hold us hostage like this? What, just because he’s brainwashed we have to walk on eggshells?” There was a heavy silence that emanated throughout the living room. It was shared even by Tammy’s three young children, who didn’t fully understand what the grownups were talking about, but knew it was no good. Tammy had a feeling Abby would dissent--university was good for a young woman, but in a circumstance like this, she knew Abby’s opinionated nature may be a problem. “Listen, I understand what you mean. I’ve lived with him longer than you, but we’re family. Family is important. It’s the fundamental building block of society, and we will need family with what’s going to come in the next few years.” The family nodded in agreement. Even Abby was compelled by her plea. Now, dinner was set, and the chances of Robert showing up were dwindling by the moment. Maybe he was deterred by last Thanksgiving. Maybe arguing with the whole lot of the Harringtons made him weary of family gatherings. As they all sat and began to bow their heads, the front door opened, and a familiar voice pierced their tranquility like an arrow through chainmail. “Hey! Sorry I’m late!” The grace was postponed--everyone got up and immediately performed their duty of small talk and pleasantry with Robert. “How’ve you been?” and “how’s the city?” were greeted with “Great!” and “Hectic, but you know.” Everything seemed to be ok. Robert was pleasant, amicable, even extending an olive branch to Abby by asking her how university was treating her, to which she responded a terse, “Fine.” Robert grabbed a cup of the spiked cider and sat down. Now the real test was upon him, and Tammy cautiously resumed her call to grace. “Okay everyone, bow your heads...if you want to, that is. If you don’t, it’s ok. Just keep looking forward...quietly.” Abby rolled her eyes in disgust at the accommodations to Robert, but to everyone’s surprise, Robert was the first to close his eyes and bow his head. Tammy was startled at the gesture, and it took her a moment to gather herself and begin. “Um, okay. We are gathered here today to share a meal, as a family. May this meal nourish our bodies, like the stream nourishes the land. May we use the powerful energy to do good on this earth--this flat, flat earth. May the Jewish overlords who control the weather allow us to play outside today, and may the robots pretending to be human beings, like Bernie Sanders and Pedro Pascal, be sent into the fiery pits of the scrap yard. This is a day for family.” She looked up to see if Robert would mount a protest, but his head was still bowed and his face was serene. She smiled and went on. “Not the fake families of crisis actors who pretend to be victims of staged mass shootings perpetrated by the government to try and take away our rights as American citizens. I mean real families, like ours…amen.” “Amen,” the family chorused, none louder than Robert. Tammy was almost crying tears of joy as she said, “Okay, let’s eat.” The meal carried on wonderfully. Patrick talked about his new truck, Susan announced they she was trying for another kid--”we’re naming this one Adolf, let’s see what the government has to say about that”--and the kids finished eating quickly to play their favorite game, Ruby Ridge. “Come out with your hands up!” One of them shouted from behind a sofa in the living room. “No! My sovereignty is more important than your arbitrary misinterpretation of the Constitution,” another shouted in the living room. Through all of this, Robert sat quietly, nodding and smiling. But something was off. Tammy noticed he had stolen away six times for more cider, staggering back to the table after the last trip. She braced herself as Patrick continued his story. “So, I told the principal, so what if he brought a gun to school? We teach our kids about guns, they know how to handle them. Maybe a properly-armed student body is the best deterrent for a mass shooting,” he said, taking a bite of turkey so the rest of the table could nod in agreement. Tammy noticed that only Robert sat still. “I mean, we convinced them our boys didn’t need the stupid measles vaccine, so this should be no problem,” Patrick continued. “Vaccines,” Grandma Joan said, rolling her eyes. “I never got them, and neither did my second husband, or first husband. When they told me they both died of polio, I knew instantly it was a simple government operation to make sure I didn’t breed. Well, look who got the last laugh,” she said, winking at Patrick. “Well,” Robert started, and the table fell silent. “I think some vaccines work.” Robert’s tone, soaked in alcohol, still had the tinges of apprehension, as if he didn’t even really want to say what he said, but he had to. “Yeah, they work when it comes to putting nanobots in our bloodstream and tracking our location,” Patrick retorted. His tone was playful, but had an undertone of malice. “I don’t think they put nanobots in us,” Robert declared. “And I don’t think we should be talking about this right now!” Tammy pleaded. Abby leaned forward. “Uncle Robert, what do you think about public roads?” “Abby!” Tammy shouted. “There is no need to instigate at the dinner table.” “Come on--we’re all grownups, we can have a civil conversation,” Abby said. Robert looked at her, his vision clearly blurring and refocusing, before he said, “I think they’re good.” “You son of a bitch!” Patrick yelled. He needed to be restrained by Susan to stop him from lunging at Robert. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Patrick said, settling back in his seat. The children were looking now. Tammy shot a glance at Abby. “Why did you do that?” she hissed. “At university, they teach us it’s important to have uncomfortable conversations with our small minded family members,” Abby replied. “Small minded? That’s not even a real university, it’s a militia in the woods,” Robert said haughtily. Now it was Abby’s turn to stand up. “College accreditation is communism!” “You don’t even know what communism is! Last year you said public tap water was communist,” Robert said. “And I bet you love that fluoride, don’t you, Commie?” “Stop it! Stop it!” All eyes turned to look at the speaker. This time, it wasn’t Tammy trying to keep the peace--it was Susan’s six-year-old son, Stevebannon. “I don’t want you to fight, it makes me sad. I don’t want to be sad, I want to be happy. We should be happy, and together, for when the wolves come.” Everyone sat down. There were tears in Tammy’s eyes, and Robert’s too. They went over to the boy. His father picked him up, and Robert tussled his hair. “Youre right” Abby said. “I’m sorry, we should be getting along. Thanksgiving is about togetherness.” “Thanksgiving is about family,” Robert added. “Exactly, Thanksgiving is about acknowledging that the United States government planned and executed 9/11,” Stevebannon added. “Yeah,” Robert said. “And we can all agree on that.” The End This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dandonohue.substack.com/subscribe

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