Bruno’s You Don’t Have To

Hello boys, and mostly boys. Welcome to another episode of "Bruno's You Don't Have To," the short-form podcast where I try to make you chuckle once or twice in less than four minutes. I don't. I usually fail, but it's what I like to try to do. It's the challenge. When did birthday parties for eight-year-olds become a huge fucking production? When did a hamburger, birthday cake, and some Pin the Tail on the Donkey become, like, not acceptable for an eight-year-old's birthday party? We used to eat it up back in the day. We'd go to McDonald's. We'd try to drop the straw wrapper into the cup. That was like the height of the adventure. That was the height of the excitement for an eight-year-old birthday party. I dropped my little guy off at a party the other day. I'm pretty sure they tried to do Lord of the Rings in their backyard. Beyond the bouncy castle, which was medieval, there was archery. Boys were dressed as knights and the girls were dressed as wenches. It was really just over the top. And I thought to myself, "This is fucking crazy. What are we doing here?" Even more insane was the goodie bag that he got. It was ridiculous. It was really nice shit in there, don't get me wrong. And I'm pretty stoked he got it, but he didn't deserve it. No kid deserves a goodie bag. If I'm putting a party on for my kid, and then my kid invites your kid to come to the party, and I take your kid off your hands for two hours, I feed them, I let them jump around for a while, and they can even pee whenever they want, there should be no expectation for additional shit. And normally it's crap that you get in a goodie bag. If you're having a party for your child, and your child is not cognizant of their place in reality, then really the party's for you and your buddies. And that's fine. Once the kid becomes cognizant, you're having a party for them. I don't want the parents there unless we're friends. I don't want you at my house. The worst. I don't want to be responsible for two hours of small talk with you. I don't even know you that well. Our kids are friends; we're not friends. I'm not saying you're a bad person, I'm just saying I don't want to put any effort into this today. But the absolute worst is expecting to drop your kid off and then the expectation is that you stay there. What do you mean? No, I wasn't planning on doing anything for these two hours. I was totally planning on hanging out with you guys who I barely know. If I'm having a party, you're not staying, because I'm gifting you two hours. Now, gentlemen, if you're tasked with dropping a kid off and your wife, your missus, thinks you have to stay there and supervise... at my house, you don't have to. Just drop the kid off and go enjoy those two hours. That's your two hours too. Enjoy them. I think it's the internet that's made everything so freaking hyper-competitive and like one-upmanship on all the things that used to be nothing. Kindergarten graduation? What do you have to do to graduate from kindergarten? You just show up. There were kids who peed on the floor in my kindergarten; they went on to first grade. Eighth-grade graduation? Nah, seriously, you're still not doing all that much. Middle school graduation? Maybe. High school? I understand. My little niece, she looked cute as hell in her cap and gown, but it was for fucking kindergarten. Goes the same with parties. Everything's like a one-upmanship. There was a period when baby reveals went from, "Oh, here's a cute pink onesie," to these animatronic, pyrotechnic shows with pink and blue powder exploding in the air. Literally, people got hurt because the powder that they put into some balloons caught on fire. It was flammable. They got hurt. I didn't laugh at all. I just thought, "That's what I'm talking about."

Hello boys and mostly boys again. Welcome to another episode of Bruno's You Don't Have To, short form podcast. Lost a sock, kept the dress. Where we talk about modern fatherhood, digital dating, parenting fails, and saying, the script, they tuned. Weird, it's real, got rainbow sprinkles. Just pressure and pride. The first time I had sex, I lost my sock. I was 17 and I had to drive home. I remember my left foot feeling so uncomfortable inside my sneaker compared to my right foot. So I lost my left sock. I also didn't cum. There was a lot of pressure sophomore year of high school to have sex. And it wasn't overt pressure, it was just you knew that other people were having sex and you wanted to have sex too because it was supposed to be awesome. And for nine years, you've been wondering, the chick that you're having sex with, is she gonna pee like the girl did in the Hustler magazine that I took from his dad's nightstand and we had in our fort and we used to look at all the time. Till his little brother got nervous and brought it back to his dad, covered in... She didn't, she didn't pee, I didn't cum. Now I was waiting for his parents to call my parents to tell them what had happened. And I was shitless. That was not a conversation I wanna have at nine years old. His dad, his mom never said shit to my parents about it. And I was thankful. And looking back, I can understand why. I wouldn't have wanted to have told my mother that I had ruined her innocent little baby's mind with a magazine that had urinating women in it, among other things, that he was exposed to because his Hustler magazine was not locked up in the gun safe. There would have been a lot of shame going on. That's what I'm trying to say, a lot of shame. I don't know anyone who had a romantic first time with sex. I remember I was 16, a buddy was 17 and he had a line on a girl a couple towns over who was going to have sex with him. So we drove him out there and we sat. 15 minutes later, he came out of the house. He was very happy. He was dancing, running around the living room, arms pumping the air in celebration, singing, I got laid, I got laid, I got laid. It seemed so immature at the time. I was so fucking jealous and happy for him, but mostly jealous. The woman I lost my virginity to was four years older than me. And that imprints something in you as a younger man. My senior year, we had a substitute in class. Her name was Maria. She must've been 24, 25. She gave me her number. I called her. She said it wouldn't be appropriate for us to hang out. I get it. I don't know how I would feel about it now though. The first time I lost my virginity was to a 24-year-old Spanish-speaking Maria who covered the absent Ms. Gotez that one great day my senior year. I am not advocating for inappropriate relationships between students and teachers. Not at all. I like conducting the thought experiment in my head. If Maria had been my first, would I have lost my sock? And would I have been successful? The first time you do anything, you're supposed to be bad at it, but you're not supposed to lose your sock. Or cum on a Hustler magazine with your best friend who eventually becomes a Lesbian.

I'm an idiot. You should not listen. You should not think that I know what I'm about. Hello boys and Welcome to Bruno's You Don't Have To, the short form podcast for all of us awesome people. This is episode 21. If you like what you're hearing, hit the like button, leave a comment, I'll write you back. Tell your friends. These three minutes occupy six hours of my day, twice a week. I was born in one of the whitest towns in one of the most Republican counties in New Jersey. I believe there was one African-American student in high school. They had him in a separate room. The school called it pull out. They just isolated the kid from the rest of us. And that eventually led to him setting cars on fire. And not just a few cars, 14 cars. To a crisp. They should've just let the kid hang out with us. Although he did stab Robbie in the thigh with a pen. I went to a college that was very white. The ghetto night party was not a good idea, but the apology that we wrote to the school was very sincere. After college, I took a job working in DC. I had a ride-along that first week I was in DC so you learn the accounts and we're driving through Southeast DC. What he liked to do if he saw a group of black teenagers was to make them think that we were the police. That didn't seem like a good idea to me. We were driving a white minivan full of cases of Heineken beer. We had to leave that beer in the white minivan while we went into the accounts. And those kids obviously lived in the neighborhood. And I thought this is not a good idea. I was going to say something to him, but I was the new guy. He had literally just called me the FNG about an hour before. So I didn't say shit. When we came out of the account, the white minivan was gone. I don't blame the kids. If I was 17 and sitting on a street corner and some douche bag came around acting like he was the police just for shits and giggles. And he parked that white minivan outside the strip club he went into. And I looked in the back of that minivan and it was full of Heineken beer. I'd fucking take it too. I remember driving around DC and noticing sharply dressed black men in suits on street corners, holding pamphlets and what appeared to be pies. The first time I was out walking around and I saw a well-dressed black man on a street corner holding pies and pamphlets in his hands, I walked up to him. I said, excuse me, sir. He turned his head away from me, and walked away because I was white. I was bummed. I wanted to hear his spiel. I really wanted to know what was in the pies, how much they were, how I could get myself some. That was my only interaction with the Nation of Islam. Until last week when I needed a haircut and I walked into a barbershop. Inside the barbershop was a black man cutting another black man's hair and numerous posters of Malcolm X on the wall. And I was hesitant for a second because of my past experiences. But here's your opportunity to find out about the pies.

Hello boys and girls welcome to bruno's you don't have to the short form podcast for all of us awesome midlife people. If this podcast was a private entity and ownership was divided by listenership, we would have 45% of our board members being women. Nice job ladies. This is the 20th episode of bruno's you don't have to. Thanks for listening. Tell your friends. I have never been one for pomp and ceremony. Graduations, I won't even get started on kindergarten graduations, weddings, church. I was raised Catholic, but I always found it really silly praying to these statues, going into that little room telling all your dirty deeds through a screen to an old man who back in the day touched a lot of boys in Ireland. All the pictures and the symbolism. I can appreciate it. It just wasn't my thing. That's not to say I'm not spiritual, not to mention that one summer it was August. It was really hot outside the air-conditioning wasn't working. We had to go to church. Father Joe was leading service. Father Joe was 350 pounds and he was sweating profusely. He got done with that mass in 12 minutes. I remember thinking what the fuck? I got a beer for 45 minutes. We can be done with this in 12 minutes? What the fuck? I respect it, it is just not for me. I don't put a lot of value in celebrity. Jeremy Piven doesn't tip by the way, and I don't really care for rituals and ceremonies. I think award ceremonies in particular are rather ridiculous. The Oscars, the Grammys, a bunch of your buddies just giving you an award. Nice job Joe. Thanks, Tim. So I was thinking I need to make a podcast award. So I did. I've been on reddit in the podcasting subreddit and I was speaking with another podcaster, but it wasn't a dude. It's a woman and she's rather easy on the eyes. So I gave her the award and then I sent in press releases to some different organizations and I had to fake it. I had to fake being a marketing executive at a consulting group that supports podcasts. Is there any money in that? I didn't feel bad about it. Why do only certain people get to promote their products for free? I can't because I have a gmail account. So I skirted the rule. I like rules. Rules are important when they're not stupid. I digress. So the messy minded podcast won the first you don't have to award for independent audio excellence. We are going to promote indie podcasts without a lot of production, something maybe a little edgy, a little raw. Okay, that's not the messy minded podcast now. She's pretty, pretty well put together. You should check out the website. I made for it. It's gonna happen once a month. We're doing awards once a month boys and girls. I'll put the link to the website in the description. My tiktok as of 10 minutes ago, 849 views. Go check me out. I'm trending, baby. She's just you and the pod is legit.

Hello boys and girls, mostly boys. Welcome to another episode of Bruno's You Don't Have To, the short form podcast. I've gotten roomed up with another weirdo, the punk rock straight edge kid from Long We got along really well. We attracted quite a crew of misfits. Part of that was we were badass, right? We all wanted tattoos. We wanted to be cool. So we looked in the yellow book, flipped to T, T- A, T- A- T-T, you get the idea. And we settled on a tattoo shop, gave them a call, come on in. That was our introduction to the Hammerskin. That's slightly hyperbolic. We didn't know that they were Hammerskin at the time. They were just tattoo guys. We recognized that maybe they had a different value system than we did, but they didn't talk about it and we didn't talk about it.

Fast forward three years, I found myself aligned with a motley crew of misfits. We had a house off campus. We heard through the grapevine that a fraternity in town was very upset with us because they had parties on Wednesday nights and they wanted to come kick our ass. We were scared. So we did what any logical, scared group of kids would do. We called up the tattoo shop. Bill answered. I said, Bill, we have this situation. Frat boys want to come over and kick our ass. Would you and some of your buddies want to come over and just kind of hang out? He said yes.

Before the party, Bill and two other guys that we knew from the shop showed up, along with three other guys who we'd never met before. We sent them downstairs to the basement, where the keg is. Bill's friend pulls me aside and he said, hey Bri, just in case, and he reaches into his pocket and he pulls out this pistol that's like the size of the palm of his hand. I'm like, dude, no guns, man. I also remember about 30 seconds later, 25 frat boys walked down the steps of our basement with looks of aggression on their faces. The five skinheads turned around, looked at them, and the frat boys walked over the keg and filled it up and hung out for 20 minutes, said thank you, and left.

I always found people who lived outside the bounds of normal society to be interesting. I didn't agree with Bill's thoughts or his buddies. It was also never a conversation. Bill never asked us our beliefs. We never asked him his. This all came to a dramatic conclusion. I worked for the local beer distributor. I remember Bill at one point had spoken to me about a buddy of his who died from an illness and they were going to hold a benefit for him and he asked me if I could get a deal on some kegs for this party. I said yeah, sure. The next day my boss gave me the local paper. On the front page was a picture of one of our beer trucks delivering kegs of beer to what the headline described as the hammer skin meeting. I didn't go over so well.