Whitmer Thomas: Terminal Crew of Dudes

One, two, three. One, two, three.

I grew up skateboarding.

Yeah, I still skate.

It's weird, though, 'cause I'm in my 30s.

It's weird 'cause I'll just be, like,

at a skate spot under a bridge for hours,

and I'll just look around and realize

that I'm just hanging out

with a bunch of 14-year-old boys.

Just me and a bunch of young boy--

-Usually shirtless young boys. -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

Y'all ready?

These skater boys will always film each other

landing tricks and shit.

Sometimes they'll have me film them doing trick--

To be honest, my camera roll, chock full of 14-year-old boys.

Choppin' broccoli, choppin' brocc--

I noticed that skater boys have this thing

that they do whenever they get hurt,

like, they won't admit to it.

Like, they could have blood pouring down their face,

and their buddy will come up to them and be like...

"Oh, my God, dude, what happened, man?

Are you okay?" And they'll be like,

"I'm totally fine. I just had the sudden urge to go inside."

-(AUDIENCE LAUGHING) (NORMALLY) Like, it's okay, pal.

You could admit you're hurt, man.

Hey, hey. (SCREAMS)

I was lucky as a kid, you know? I wasn't too good at skating.

And at one point, we hit hard times.

And then every time I'd go skate,

my mom would be like...

"Please don't get hurt today.

We don't have insurance."

-(AUDIENCE LAUGHING) -(KID SCREAMS)

But I like that,

'cause my buddies would be like...

"Today, you gotta drop in

from the tallest half-pipe at the skate park."

-(AUDIENCE LAUGHING) -And I'd be like,

"I wish I could, man, but sadly, I don't have insurance."

(NORMALLY) Pretty cool, pretty cool.

Let's do it.

We all grew up in Alabama together.

We've known each other pretty much our whole lives.

That's-- That's my best friend Jeramy right there.

That's my best friend, Clay, right there.

And this is my best friend, Budd, right here.

Actually, Budd did not grow up in Alabama.

We did not grow up with him.

He's from California. He's a coastal elitist.

I've only known this man for 18 years.

He's basically a fucking stranger to me,

and I don't know what he's doing on stage tonight.

I consider you one of my closest friends.

-I-- It hurts-- Fuck you.

It hurt-- Oh.

I hate you. -All right.

And everybody, let him hear it. My big brother, Johnny.

He's huge. He's huge.

Look at him. He's huge. (CHUCKLES)

Man, I really, really want to be cool.

Like I do everything in my power to be cool, man.

I try to buy the right clothes and listen to the right music.

Ah, it'd be so cool to just be like the coolest guy ever.

The coolest type of guy there is is an LOL guy.

I don't know if y'all know this style of guy.

An LOL guy is a guy to where you, like,

text him the funniest thing

you've ever seen in your whole life.

-And then six weeks later... -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

-...he responds, "LOL." -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

Which is sort of the same thing as going,

"Mm, I don't care if you live or die."

-(AUDIENCE LAUGHING) -That's a cool guy.

That's the kind of guy I want to be, man,

but that ain't me, man.

You text me something that's actually funny,

I won't say "LOL," I'll already be on your doorstep

and you'll just hear me outside going...

'Cause some people just wanna watch the world burn.

That's the... That's the second time

I've done an impression of Michael Caine tonight.

I don't know. I don't care if it's hacky.

-It's really funny to do that. -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

Really, I just think it's funny that,

you know, that's a quote from The Dark Knight,

and that's one of the biggest movies ever made,

directed by Christopher Nolan,

who's one of the most powerful directors there is,

and he didn't have it in him to say to Michael Caine, um,

"Hey, Michael Caine, I was wondering

if, uh, maybe, uh, you could redo that line,

'cause, uh, we wanted to use it in the trailer,

and nobody knows what the fuck you're saying."

And then all that Michael Caine could muster was...

-(IMITATES MICHAEL CAINE MUMBLING) -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

All right, I guess I'll just live with that.

I think it's pretty clear

that I'm really good at impressions. (CHUCKLES)

I can basically do an impression of anybody.

All I gotta do is get your first name

and what you do for a living,

and I'll do a perfect impression of you.

So, I'd like to do that tonight, if that's okay.

Um, would it be okay if I did an impression of you? Okay.

All I gotta do is just, uh,

get your first name and what you do for a living.

I'll do a perfect impression.

Okay. I'm Ian, and I'm a writer.

"My name's Ian, I'm a writer."

Sorry, Ian, you sound annoying, man.

I think it's pretty clear that I was raised by addicts.

-(AUDIENCE LAUGHING) -But that's okay, that's okay.

Sadly, my mom drank herself to death.

But, uh, you know,

I figured I'm gonna name my first kid in her honor.

Yeah, I'm gonna name my first kid Al-Anon.

-Can I talk to you over here? -Yeah.

That wasn't good, right?

-Yeah. -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)

We could do better? -Yeah. Yeah, I'll do better.

Let's do that. -All right. Okay.

All right, from here on out, I'm gonna do a better job.

Now, you go one way or the other when you're raised by an addict.

You either become a cool, impenetrable mystery,

or you become a squeaky little dumbass.

And I'll let y'all decide which one of those I am.

This is my impression of a, uh...

of, like, a serious folk musician

whose harmonica is just a little too far away from him.

Actually, I don't gotta do it.

-I just explained it pretty good. (CHUCKLES) -(AUDIENCE LAUGHING)