Eric Johnston - All Talking, No Writing, Some Dancing

[00:00:01] Hello, this is the Tyrant In Training Podcast, I am Kevin and this is an improv comedy podcast where each week a guest joins me to chat about how they would rule their own country. Today's guest is comedian Eric Johnston as a tyrant of his own country. Eric is known as Eric of Bullwhip Island and here are some out of context quotes from Eric about how he deals with his adoring fans.

[00:00:22] Eric Johnston, The one thing about me as a leader is I always try to make people laugh and sort it out before they start killing each other. So I think on my island if they were to do this like fun the leader of our country secretly is a very good dancer because you really see what someone's made out of after you know five drinks.

[00:00:46] Eric Johnston, The One Thing, The Two Things. We're having some fun and fuck it. I want nothing. They're very cheap people. I don't want to think about this anymore. I just don't want you around. Eric Johnston, The One Thing. You can subscribe to this podcast anywhere online you usually find podcasts. You can also follow the Tyrant Training Podcast on social media on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and Blue Sky at Tyrant Training Podcast or you can just follow me on those sites if you look for at Kev Ryan Person.

[00:01:11] Also, this podcast has its own website which is tyrantintraining.podcast page. Now, here is this crazy tyrant from Canada. All right, let's take over the country, the world, our own place. Let's get into it. Okay, Eric, I'm a little bit worried already. So I insist for people to not take over a country because that's sometimes bad. You're right, you're right. As a Canadian, we've never taken over anything in our lives.

[00:01:37] What do you feel about that? Because I know like I'm from Ireland, right? And I've played, you know, like those Total War games where it's like you have your map and then you can take over. Or risk or whatever, yeah. Risk and stuff like that. And I've started as Ireland and then I remember like I took over Stockholm and I saw an Irish flag over and I thought like County Stockholm doesn't sound right. And I don't think I have it in me to take over. No, Canadians would take over a country and then apologize to everybody inside that country and then eventually give it back to them because I felt guilty. It just wouldn't feel right, I don't think.

[00:02:07] No, it wouldn't. No. But you can get your own country. We're going to set you up. How is your geography? Sorry, yes. Good, actually pretty good. Geography was one of my top, you know, subjects in school. I've always been very interested in geography. There's a TikTok page that I follow and it was like guess the country just based on the outline and I usually get a lot of them. I even got like Burkina Faso or something the other day and I was like, oh my God, I nailed it.

[00:02:36] But yeah, and also I travel a lot for work as a stand-up comic, mostly North America. But you know, places like cities and capital cities and states and state capitals and a lot of Canadian geographies. I've been there. I've seen it with my own eyes all of Canada, you know, four, five, six times. So yeah, geography, long story short, is good. Until you question me on it and I'm probably going to fuck something up and then I'm going to be like, ah, I was talking too much shit.

[00:03:04] I'm going to share a map of the world and I'm kind of dreading that you're going to go, what the hell is that? I'm like, that's Earth. You should know this one. I swear most people who I ask, how's your geography? 90% of the guests have went, ooh, not good. So thankfully I've got someone. I've dialed in here, yeah. Can you see the map? And I appreciate it. I can see it all. I'm ready, yes. All right, there's Canada. Actually, if you move your, you're asking where I am. You're hot. You're hot.

[00:03:34] You're cold. Yeah, cold go down. Oh, down around here. Yeah, keep going. Now go straight down from there. Right there. You're literally over my head right now. That's one of that little elves shoe I was telling you about. Oh my God, it is an elves shoe. That is Ontario. Oh, yeah. So that's the Great Lakes. Yes. If you zoom in. That's why you feel right. I'm pointing on my screen like you can see it. I'm like, right here, right here. But you're hot. You're hot in there.

[00:03:59] So right where those two little lakes meet in the bottom, right about a centimeter below your cursor, that's where I live. Hamilton on tier. Okay. By the way, I will mention to anyone who's listening. I've spent about 40 minutes chatting to Eric. A lot of it has been. I was like, have we started? He's like, no. So this is just entertaining for me and Eric right now, just because I want to know where he lives. That's right.

[00:04:27] So if you're setting up a new island for you to take over, this is really a question about your, what sort of weather you like, but where do you want us to put this island? We can put it anywhere. See, that's, I thought of this. I really have because, because I grew up in Southern Ontario in Canada, Southern Ontario experiences all four seasons and they experienced them very clearly.

[00:04:54] Like sometimes the calendar will change to fall. Like September 21st is the first day of fall or autumn. Yes. The next day it'll be fall weather. Like the temperature will drop. The leaves will start to change. The leaves start to change for about a month and they start to go. And then like first day of winter is clearly winter. And then, but first day of spring, it's like, it'll be like, I don't know, it'd be like five degrees. And then the first day of spring will hit and then it'll go up to like 14 degrees. And you're like, oh my God, it's spring.

[00:05:24] I quite like that. It's real. I'm a very big, I spent some time in Los Angeles and I enjoyed it. I was there obviously to do some comedy shows, but it was so nice. Just all the time. It was just sunny every day. And I go like, don't you guys want to mix it up around here? Like, don't you want their weather? Like other, other, other, I don't know, not only seasons, just like, give me a cloud. Give me a, give me a rainy day. We love a rainy day. We can lay on the couch. We can watch Netflix.

[00:05:53] You know, this is a rainy day. And alternatively, I lived in Vancouver for a year where Vancouver just rains all the time. It is the Pacific Northwest, you know, Seattle is the birth of the grunge movement and Nirvana. And like, no wonder why Kurt Cobain killed himself. Very depressed, very depressing place. It rains all the time in the winter. I love Vancouver. Right off the bat. For weeks at a time. For weeks at a time, it would be rainy.

[00:06:21] And then you go, oh my God, give me some sun. So I feel like I want my island to be close to Canada. I feel like Michelle Shaughnessy where I'm like, oh, it's going to be between Canada and Greenland. Not quite. No. I think my island would be, like if you were to take where I live, Hamilton, Ontario, Southwestern Ontario. If you were to draw that straight line across that parallel there. Oh, like this straight line. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:06:50] So you get into the East Coast of Canada. Halifax. Yeah. There's New Brunswick. There's Newfoundland, which is right above where your cursor is. Which is very Irish, by the way. A lot of Irish settlers. The Newfoundland accent is, you could swear, is an Irish accent. You know, we traveled far enough and we weren't traveling no more. No, you're like, we've landed. We've landed. Where's the pub? We just found land. Yeah. So I think somewhere, I think somewhere south of Halifax, south of Nova Scotia. Yeah. Right.

[00:07:19] I think right above the A for Atlantic Ocean. Is that bad for hurricanes, I wonder? No. You're not, you're not quite in hurricane territory. Hurricane comes in south, you know, Florida, the Gulf of Mexico. And it dissipates, you know? It kind of goes east and dissipates and it's. Yeah. So I think somewhere around that A of the Atlantic Ocean on your map, which is just. Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think you've got, you know, you've got good enough weather, but there still is seasons. It's basically New York.

[00:07:48] It's like basically New York City east heading on in the Atlantic. Okay. I think you'll still get seasons. It'll be nice and sunny in the summer and warm. You'll still get winter, but it won't be crazy minus 40 winter. It will be kind of, you're in the, like today in Hamilton, Ontario, it's minus two. I'm fine with minus two. I went and got the garbage cans in a t-shirt. I'm fine. I'm not cold. I'm not hot. That's somewhere in the middle. Fahrenheit, right? No, it's Celsius. We're not American. My God. Oh, okay. Yeah.

[00:08:18] Yeah. That's. It's only, it's only America who does things like idiots in terms of temperature. Yeah. Temperature and measurement. Uh, now Canadians, we also use Celsius. So I, yeah, it was minus two Celsius today in Hamilton and I'm fine with that. But you know, in the summer it gets up to sometimes 40, which is hot. Yeah. Yeah. And so I'm, so I think it'd be similar is what I'm saying. I think it'd be similar weather to where I am, but you're also in the ocean and you're got nicer, you know, opportunities. Yeah. You can.

[00:08:45] And do you think with your Island, usually I'll tell people they have 10 million people on the Island. I just think of it as a round number to get the economy up and running. And some people insist on not having that many people. No, that is crazy. 10 million people. There's only, there's only 37 million people in Canada. And they're not going to be on top of each other. Like you won't be wedged in what I'm saying. It's just, you know, it'll be big enough for them. No, still no. Okay. That's fine. I think, I think 1 million.

[00:09:15] I think my Island would have 1 million people. Okay. Um, I'm trying to think what Island would, or what country would only have 1 million people? Like what's the equivalent? I'm going to stop sharing that map, by the way. But what's the, like, it probably is like Fairlands. What country has, how many people are in Ireland? Uh, I want to say about 4 million. Okay. So a quarter of Ireland. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you'd have a quarter of Ireland. Quarter of Ireland's people. Probably. It's fine.

[00:09:44] In an area I would think would be about the size of Ireland, my Island. Yeah. Yeah. You'll have the space. Like you're not going to be, as I said, you're not going to be on top of each other. Um, do you have any idea what the name of the country will be? Which is very important. Oh, I never, I didn't think about this. Um, okay. So I, it's so funny because my first thought was new Amsterdam and I'll tell you why. Right.

[00:10:10] I'm a big Counting Crows fan, uh, from the nineties rock alternative band Counting Crows. And New Amsterdam was the, I think was the, the name of New York city when it was originally. Yeah. And it was down in New Amsterdam. And I think that was in the song, he's talking about a bar, to be honest, um, down in New Amsterdam. And I, what's my island called? New Amsterdam. But I don't know. Cause there's going to be absolutely no relation to Amsterdam or Holland or the Dutch, the Netherlands.

[00:10:40] You won't even speak to the Dutch. No. There'll be no wooden shoes on my Island. There'll be no clogs. No embassy. No quarter given to the Dutch. I want nothing. They're very cheap people. Very cheap people. The Dutch. Very blunt. Very blunt and cheap. Needlessly blunt and cheap. The only good thing Dutch people are has tall, beautiful women, weed, crepes, and a good economy. I think. The main floor. The main floor you need.

[00:11:10] Yeah. I love the Dutch. Just not the crazy Dutch bastards. Yeah. Okay. So not New Amsterdam. I, I, I'm a big Hamilton guy. No. Okay. No, I think, I think I grew up in a town called Hamilton. Uh, I'm still here now. Um, I think maybe like New Hamilton or just, uh, yeah. Or you know what? Let's go on brand. Let's go on brand. I think this is nice.

[00:11:38] So a lot of my stuff is bull related. The animal. Yes. And my father's wrestling name was bull whip Johnson. B U L L W H I P. Yeah. I think it would just, I think it would be called, I think maybe just bull whip the Island of bull whip. It sounds tough, but it sounds like, uh, where there was, there was no problems, but there's also a great agricultural society. The Island of bull whip. Yeah.

[00:12:08] Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I'm going to, I'm going to lock it in. Bull whip. Bull whip. Because it's very on brand. It'd be a nice homage to my late father. And I just think it sounds tough, but also sounds cool. It does. It does sound. Yeah. No, I do. It is a strong, I was going to suggest Bolivia, but you're going to bull whip. Well, Bolivia is actually very funny. I, I think they'll, that'll be the capital.

[00:12:31] So it's, yeah, the country of bull whip in the town or city of Bol, Bol, Bolivia, B U L L. Yeah. And then the, and the main dish is spaghetti bolognese. Sorry. I'm going to spend, okay, the next hour is puns. You're better at puns than I am. I think, I think people in the UK and in Europe and stuff in your area are definitely more pun heavy people. I would say. The, the, the true mark of a cheap podcast host rely on puns.

[00:13:01] Okay. So if you are situated in, are you going to be living in the capital or are you going to live outside of, you know, a bit of away from people? I, I like people. I like cities. I like going to make sure that there wasn't 10 million people. You only wanted one. Yeah. No, like the city I live in Hamilton, the city I live in Hamilton is about a million people now. And we call it in an admirable way. The world, the world's largest small town.

[00:13:31] Oh, whereas Hamilton, everybody knows everybody. Everybody kind of has an idea of what everyone's about. Basically neighborhoods have their own feel. Like the East end of Hamilton feels different than the West end of Hamilton, which feels different than the Hamilton mountain, which feels different than downtown, which feels different from kind of the Hamilton proper. So in that everyone kind of already has a feel of what people are like. And I think I like that in a country.

[00:14:00] I like to go, Oh, you're going to, you're going to the West end. That's where people are like this. Yeah. Yeah. And, but then there's always wild cards and all those different areas. Um, but yeah, I think with a million people, I would live just outside the downtown core kind of, which is what I, where I live here in Hamilton. I'm really just, I'm really just building. I like my life here in Hamilton. And I'm just like, my island would be very similar, very similar. In this scenario, you've been forced, forcefully removed and put on this island to lead.

[00:14:29] And I'm like, make it the exact same. We make the exact same. I presume the family is coming along. Yes, of course. I just need to check that. Yeah. Yeah. A wife. I have a young son now and he would be like, um, he would be kind of my second in command. Well, my wife would be my second in command. He's a, that's what, that's the fun. He's a baby. He's a second in command. You saw a bus baby and taught. Yeah. He's like more naps, more bottles. I'm going to, everyone can shit their pants. Right.

[00:15:01] So yeah, no, they, they can definitely come. So in your house, um, is it a mansion? Is it fancy or are we trying to keep it low key? Uh, I definitely think it would be on the fancier side, but I would like, I would like it again, like my house. I would like to have that kind of mid-century modern feel. I like, I like vintage.

[00:15:22] My favorite things are like Frank Sinatra, the rat pack and like, um, like the Sopranos, but less gaudy, you know, good guys. It's the movie, my favorite movie. I think if I were to have like a mansion that would be like, not one of those mansions where people would be like, holy shit, look at this guy. Who does he think? Not old manor house where you're like. No, I don't need an estate. I don't want an estate. But I would like a nice house where people go, that's a nice house. And then inside is like, have you seen the inside?

[00:15:51] That's what I like. But you don't want it ultra sleek and modern. You want it. No, I think like. Classic but not 17th century landlord house. No, I think like 1960s, 70s. Cool. I want, my living room should have a conversation pit and a fireplace. Oh, Jesus. Yeah. A bar room, you know, a cigar lounge. Does it look like the end of Kill Bill? Yes. Similar, yes.

[00:16:17] That kind of old Hollywood, not on fire, not on fire as it occurs. No, you don't die in the end of this. No, no, no. Old Hollywood, mid-century, modern kind of classic but classy feel. That's how my house would be in my country. And also, surprise, a lot of what my house is that I'm currently in that we just bought a year ago. We have a conversation pit and a bar. Do you actually have it? Do you actually have it? Fuck. Not a conversation.

[00:16:46] We have a sunken living room. Our house was built in 1971. So to get into the living room, it's like two steps down and it's very cozy. Oh, that's fantastic. Yeah, yeah. So wait, I know this has nothing to do with the podcast. So it's not... No, no, it's good. It's not L-shaped couch. It's the square. Is it around in the table? No, no, no. That would be awesome. It is an L. It's an L-shape. But I would have no qualms in putting another L against it to make a square.

[00:17:15] Selene is killing for an L-shaped couch. It's just a sitting room we're in. It's not shaped right for it. But my God, stepping down into it would be another level of shape. You've got to move. Yeah. So you're in this lovely house that is nice. People can recognize it's nice. The Bull Whippers, I'm presuming that's what they're called, are like... I like it. The Bull Whippians. The Bull Whippians are impressed.

[00:17:44] What is the official title for the leader, Eric Johnston, of Bull Whip Island? Yeah, I heard that when I listened to your previous episodes when you asked me to do this. And I don't like to be as a Canadian. I don't like positions or titles that make you seem like you're so high above everybody else. Yes.

[00:18:10] Like, even I don't even love the word boss. That's my boss. I don't love it. You know, and then, you know, I don't know what everyone said in your podcast, but like, you know, like the leader or the God or the whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The glorious one. The anointed one. I think I would just like everyone to call me Eric. So it's just first name basis. Just Eric.

[00:18:40] Just Eric. By the way, your baby. Is he going to call you dead? Or father? Yes. He calls me Eric. Right now, he just cries. Yeah, no, I like dad for me. Because I think, I think, you know, a lot of people in the surreal part of the podcast, it might make me emotional. But so many people know me as my name, Eric Johnson. That's Eric Johnson. That's comedian Eric Johnson.

[00:19:06] There's only one person in the world right now who can call me dad. Yes. And I like that. And so in that way, I think, yeah, that'll be dad. Some people, some people float around with papa or pops. I don't, I don't hate it. Papa is weird. Papa is a bit much. Yeah. Yeah. Papa. No. But pops. Dad. Yeah. Celine and me have talked about this. When I was younger, I used to call my mother. I still call her it. Mam. M-A-M. Mam. Mam.

[00:19:36] I call my mom ma. M-A. Mam. Mam is fine. I have no, yeah. But then Celine is thinking, no, mam is awful. Mam is fine. Mam is terrible. Mam is what she wants, which I'm like, no, mam is. Mam. Mam. Especially with an Irish accent. Irish accent. Mam. Mam. So when Celine is listening to this episode, she'll be annoyed that you fully agree to me. Which is. Mam. Mam sounds like mam. Mam.

[00:20:06] Like it sounds like you're a New Yorker or something. A bratty New Yorker kid. Mam. Yeah. Usually that's how we say it, Tor. It was for boys. But okay. I'm also glad that you didn't choose your name as dad. So I don't have to call you it. Soph. Yes, dad. No, no. Yes, dad. It's reserved for one boy. Are you allowing other people in Bullwhip Island to call their children Eric? Like is Eric going to be, no, that's just you. Or. Oh, I never thought about that.

[00:20:36] Because you know, it could turn into an official name. Yeah. I. Growing up, I was the only Eric. Isn't that weird? Like I grew up in a relatively kind of. You know. You grew up in Hamilton, right? White. White. Anglo-Saxon. Waspy. But also very Croatian, Italian, Ukrainian, Polish neighborhood. In my elementary school, I was the only Eric for the entire run of elementary school. And I kind of liked it. I kind of.

[00:21:05] But it worked in good because when you knew you were talking about you, you knew you were talking about me. But also when I was in trouble, they said Eric did it. All roads led back to me. Yes. So when I got into high school, there was other Eric's. There was like the kidney. Eric for Rasso. I remember Eric Cleary. Eric. A couple of them. How did they match up in the Eric scale? Not even close. Nah. Just let down. Breaking your back trying to carry the name. It's a tough one.

[00:21:35] And my sister's name is Holly. And she was the only Holly growing up. Holly. Holly. Yeah. H-O-L-L-Y. H-O-L-L-Y. And I like that. Like my son's name is Jet. I'm pretty sure he's going to be the only Jet for a while. I hope. I like that it's very, you know, unique. You know, in my neighborhood, there's a lot of Michaels, Marks, Peters, Pauls, Matthews,

[00:22:05] you know, Marco, Steve. A lot of like regular names I grew up with. And a lot of them I went to high school with. Like my graduating class probably had 50 Michaels. Yeah. Yeah. And it's not good for. Yeah. Creating an own persona and its own identity. So. I just realized your child's name is Jet Johnston. Yes. See, he gets it. Get that man on this case. I don't know what the murder case is, but Jet Johnston needs to get on it. He can be anything.

[00:22:33] He can be a cowboy Jet Johnston. He can be a wide receiver. He can be a wide receiver. The career path for Jet Johnston is wide open. I was stoked on it. When we came up with it and we said it out loud for the first time, Jet Johnston, we're like, oh my God, this kid is Justin to be whatever he wants. If someone goes, if someone goes, oh, what's your son's name? And you go, Jet. And I go, I'm not sure. You go, Jet Johnston. It's kind of like a James James Bond situation. You're like, oh. The name's Jet. Jet Johnston.

[00:23:05] Okay. So to answer your question, I think I would, it sounds very egotistical. And I've done a lot of work on my ego over the last couple of years, getting married and having a child, being a comedian. You know, egos are fuel. I think I would decide, though, I would be the only Eric. So anyone who comes on or onto the island and they're called Eric, we're booting them off. You can go elsewhere. Well, killing them, killing them. I didn't bring up killing. So you're killing them.

[00:23:35] No, no. They just. They disappear. Yeah. So they disappear. I guess that's where the tyrannicalness comes from is how do I deal with people who break the rules? As a Canadian, I don't know that answer. I would just be like, well, geez, just don't call your son Eric. That's the deal. As you say, as you shove him down. They're like, well, we did it. And I'm like, well, fuck, fine. Don't do it again. Like that's the Canadian version.

[00:24:05] Do you want to ship them off to the Netherlands? Yeah. Send those. Send the Dutch with all those Dutch bastards. There are loads of Eric's over in. Oh, I bet. Yeah. Okay. We'll deal with the Eric's later. Okay. We'll deal with it. We'll deal with them. More of a suggestion. I mean, either way, they're in trouble, right? Okay. On Bullwhip Island. Do you want people to have the right to vote for a Senate with 100 senators?

[00:24:35] They'll just run the everyday duties of the island. You have obviously ultimate say. Or do you just want your own inner circle of people? Of 10 people you choose. There's no voting, basically. Interesting question. Because in my real life, outside of this podcast, I don't like to delegate. I really don't. I find that when I delegate tasks dealing with my career, that most times it gets fucked up.

[00:25:03] Because you learn very quickly that nobody cares about yourself and your career as much as you do. Yes. And I've taken the approach of if there's something that I need done, I do it. And if there's something that I need done that I don't know how to do, I will generally hire out or delegate once. In that time, I will learn how to do it myself and do it continuing forward. Now, I've never run a country.

[00:25:33] I'm sure there's a lot more day-to-day tasks than just creating ticket links for shows and posters and creating and editing promo videos and stuff. I'm sure there's more. Yeah. Yeah, traffic lights and stuff. Those things I can delegate in terms of day-to-day, in terms of infrastructure. The kind of boring admin stuff. Admin. Let's call it... Yes. Excellent. Admin. Admin is a great... Admin can be delegated. Yeah.

[00:26:00] But in terms of decisions that will directly affect the country and that are more major decisions, I think I would like to... You sort them out. Yeah. Yeah. So I guess... Yeah. I guess that's my answer. My answer would be delegate the day-to-day admin stuff. All big decisions come to the top. But you don't want... So... You don't want your citizens, the Bulwipians, to have any say...

[00:26:29] They don't have any vote on who should be doing the boring admin stuff. And by the way... Oh, no. I can... I'll just add... If you decide there's no voting, you'll pick the people you want to delegate to. Your Bulwipians are more than happy with that. Like, they know the story coming onto the island. If there's no voting, there's no voting. They're happy. No. I like a vote. I like when someone's going, should we get pizza or should we get chicken wings? And we go, well, let's put it to a vote. And then you just... You get that...

[00:26:57] As a Canadian-Canadian politics, most of it is voting. There's no... Yeah. You know, it's not one of those societies where there's no voting. It's a democratic society. I think I've grown up in a democratic society, especially North America as a whole. Yeah. So I'm used to the idea of let's vote for this. But... Why don't they vote for someone stupid? Yeah. Yeah. What? Yeah. I think if I found out that they voted for something stupid, I'd go, never mind.

[00:27:26] Are you allowed them to vote again? Or you'll take that decision? You'll take that away. I'll go, listen. I will take all... I will take all of your voting into account, literally. But if you make a stupid choice, it's going to happen. Which is, I think, a lot of... In my real life, I go, okay. You... And then someone says, we should do it. I go, nah, we're not going to do it like that. You all have a voice. Not that voice. It's not good.

[00:27:55] Your voice, as long as it sounds stupid. It's annoying. It's annoying. It's annoying, stupid voice. So we don't need to... You know what? I think the way I would do it is, everyone's allowed to vote. This is going to create complete havoc on my island. Okay. This is funny. Everyone's allowed to vote. Yeah. And then once we come to a decision, we get to do another vote. And that vote is if that decision was stupid. And then I go, who thought this was a good idea? Who thought this was a bad idea? If more people think it's a bad idea, then we just flip to the first one, I guess.

[00:28:25] Yes. And it'll cause absolute pandemonium and they'll assassinate me. But right now, this seems like the clearest choice. Clearly. Yeah. By the way, in your house, do you have guards or armed guards? How comfortable are you amongst your people? I think maybe one or two guys that I'm friends with. I go out there and we chat and bring them a sandwich. They're your guards. Yeah. And they're usually funny. They're retired police officers or retired professional wrestlers.

[00:28:55] Wrestlers. Yeah. Like just guys with a story. I don't like guards that have no personality. Like I like, I like a mafia guard that, you know, the guy was a bookie for 40 years. And then he got into like a night watchman shift. This I like the British guards. Like you see the guys who don't talk. Yes. Boring. Boring. I can't be around someone who doesn't talk. Yeah. I can't be someone like storytelling and being able to riff with someone is the most important part of my real life.

[00:29:25] And I think will be the most important part of my fake country. So I think a couple of guards, they're kind of rough and tumble guys, East Enders, if you will. I know with where they're, where they're from on the Island. Yes. And you know, they'll protect your ass, but they'll also, you know, get your kid a birthday gift. You know, you said one of them might be a like retired wrestler or something. So Mick Foley is going to be one of your guards. Yeah.

[00:29:53] You know, you know, if some shit goes down and he's on the roof and it's happening in the driveway, he has no problem with going off the helm. Elbow. A well-timed elbow stopped a terrorist attack today on Eric. Broke him in half. Okay. Do you have, I know I was going to ask this, but usually I ask this when it's someone who takes the more Royal pass, I was going to say, do you have any sort of throne room? And everyone says, what the hell are you talking about?

[00:30:23] Cause I can't pronounce my TH, but like a throne room. Yeah. Do I have a throne? Yeah. But you probably have the sunken L-shaped. Yeah. Yeah. I think it'd be more of a conversational space or I'm standing behind the bar. This is, this is my country. Yeah. I'm standing behind my bar and someone wants to come speak to me. They have to sit down. We both mix a drink. At the bar. Yes. At the bar. Yeah. We talk about it. Okay.

[00:30:51] And we come to some sort of solution over a drink. I think that's important. And I think a couple of drinks, because you really see what someone's made out of after, you know, five drinks. What if I only drink water? No, they can't come. Uh, that she didn't soda, beer, red wine, whatever it is. Get your silver ass out of here. I like, not that I'm going to encourage drinking as a lot of people.

[00:31:20] But I think it's my favorite thing is when you're having a couple of drinks, especially at a business meeting. I love business in my real life. I love business meetings where you sit down for a drink and then you have the drink. You talk about the business. So in the, in the bartender comes around and the waitress comes around and goes, can I get you guys another one? And you go. Yeah. Yeah. No, no, no, no. And the conversation starts to pick up and three, maybe four, let's not say five, five starting to get a little something. Four drinks. When you've got that really nice glow. Yeah.

[00:31:49] And someone goes, can I say something to you? And you go, yeah. Yeah. Nate, when they go, you know what? Can I just be honest with you for a sec? And it's like, and it's that four drink glow. Yeah. That's the kind of business meetings I want to have on my Island. So I want to go. And I go, tell them what you really think. And they go, I go, listen, there's no cameras. There's no armed guards here. Me and you. Yeah. Let's hash it out. Let's talk about it.

[00:32:16] And then if they do and they speak freely as an, as a real life, in real life, as a comedian, I'm always on the quest for truth. That is what a comedic job is to do is to, to observe and find the truth and everything. And that would be kind of the major rule of my Island. No bullshit Island. It's called bull whip Island, but there's no bullshit. Yeah. It's bull whip, no bullshit. Yeah. Sometimes it takes four drinks to get there. And sometimes people can just speak freely.

[00:32:44] I was saying this to my wife the other day. There was, you know, in my family growing up, like you, if again, if you had a problem, if someone, if something, if someone, if someone was doing something incorrectly, like, or weirdly or just being rude or something, someone would call you over and go, let me talk to you for a sec. Yeah. What the fuck? What the fuck are you doing? You're embarrassing me. You're embarrassing. Whatever you're, you're, you've, you've, you've acted in a way.

[00:33:14] That is upsetting me and other people around smart in the fuck up or get out. Like that's kind of the house I grew up in. Yeah. My wife, my wife didn't grow up in this house. My wife grew up in a very, everything's good and no one's going to get their feelings hurt. And they want to act that way. That's how they're going to act. My Island. None of that. You know, I grew up in a house and again, in real life where like, if you came into the house and if you were, if you, you, you're telling a story about your day or something, you, you better be killing.

[00:33:42] Like you better be telling a good story. Yeah. That's entertaining, funny callbacks. And if you weren't, if you start bombing, someone will interrupt you and go, fuck all that. My day is this. I would like, I would like in my Island kind of like, uh, maybe my top five people, top 10 people they're allowed to sit in and they're allowed to just go, let me tell you about my day and what's going on on the Island. Okay.

[00:34:11] And I want it to be entertaining and fun and funny and whatever. And that's how I'll make decisions. So say like, say I, if I, if my, if my Island was broken up into four zones and four guys came in with four different stories. And at the end of their four stories, they were asking me for something specifically for the Island. And the best story, the person who entertained me the most, that'll be my decision. That's who will get the thing that they're looking for.

[00:34:38] Is that what you think you'll do for, um, like working that you'll allow four people in maybe one from each zone a day? Yeah. Hey guys, this is me working, helping the people tell your four stories. I'm helping you today. Better luck next time, lads. Go back. You better come. You better kind of as, as, as RJ city once said to me, our friend, he said, you always come in loaded and he didn't mean drunk. He meant you always have something. You always have, you're loaded with a story. You're always coming in loaded.

[00:35:09] So you're always coming in with something to say. And generally that will, like if I, if I, I did a breakfast show here in, in Canada called breakfast, breakfast television. And my opening thing that I said was like a local reference that I couldn't even explain to you, but it was an old newscaster I talked about. And I said, I feel like Lucy Zilio, who was an old newscaster, it's going to pop out of nowhere, whatever. I made the, the news, the other guy who was interviewing me laughed so hard that I was

[00:35:38] immediately over with the entire network. Yeah. Yeah. I, and I, when I finished the interview, RJ, my friend, our friend texted me and said, I knew you would come in loaded. I knew you would be prepared like a soldier with something interesting or funny to say. And I texted it back. The funniest part is that was not what I had loaded. I saw an old picture of Lucy Zilio on the wall as I was walking into the set and it reminded me of it.

[00:36:05] I said it and it got a laugh and that was my, that was how I came in loaded. Um, but yeah, so anyway, so we'll circle back. Uh, you cannot, you cannot bomb in my room. You cannot come in and sit down and bomb. If you bomb, you, you're out. Would that be part of the education for kids in the growing up? Lads, you need to, I don't know, improv classes, something to get you, get your mind thinking that you can't bomb. You can't tell a boring story. Yes. Yes. This is a great idea. Yes.

[00:36:34] This is part of the job to throw out ideas. Put it this way. Well, my real life, uh, elementary school, I, um, in written, I got like sixties in like, in like, uh, writing a paper. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and like, if it was a science, uh, not sciences back example, history. Yeah. If I had to write a paper on the history of something, write it down, I would get 60, 65.

[00:37:00] But if we had an oral presentation, I would get 90, 95, 100 because I knew how to kill. Yeah. And I learned that at a very young age that even if I'm bombing the written, I'm going to kill the oral. Yeah. So let's just focus on that. And that's how I basically got through elementary school and high school. So I think I would implore the same methods to my, my Island.

[00:37:27] So your Island has very little interest in writing, but speaking is, is on point. It's very illiterate. Saying these things and then you're just, you're just reiterating them back to me. And they're so funny. They work though. It's a nice, you know, they're not a paper will be written, not a paper, but an oral presentation. These Bullwipians are kind of dumbasses, but my God, they're charismatic. They can talk, baby. They can talk me into any base.

[00:37:55] You just described my Island and my life. Okay. Here's some other questions. So what, oh, what unusual list is the country of Bullwhip Island on top of in the world? So like unusual list, I don't mean, you know, you'll have lists like best healthcare in the world or the most, um, the wealthiest country in the world. What unusual list I'm going for? I mean, I guess probably like best storytellers.

[00:38:21] If you're, if you're, if you're, if you're training them at a young age to kill, uh, I think they would be the people who carry the stories forward. Like you ever hear those old, like, they didn't have anything written down, but their, their storytellers were, their stories remained. Yeah. Their stories remained for hundreds of years. I think like best storytellers are best, like, um, like, um, I guess I was going to say play rates, but that doesn't, that doesn't make sense because they don't write anything down,

[00:38:48] but like best, um, I suppose storytellers is the word, right? Oral, oral people. Their oral history is among the highest of all the nations. Do you know what, and I did a very quick Google search, which means that I'm fully right. Do you know what the best country for storytelling or what they refer to it as story spotting is? Oh, this is in 2017. I'm presuming it's the same thing. I don't know. You have to tell me. Switzerland. Switzerland. Yeah. I have no feelings about that. Me either.

[00:39:19] Good for them. Interesting. I don't know any Swiss people. Swiss people keep to themselves and they can't, they tend to keep to Switzerland. Why would they leave? It's beautiful. Good, good chocolate. It's safe. All the women are beautiful. Why the fuck would they ever go anywhere? The only thing I know about Switzerland, and it's a bit unfair probably because Ireland is rubbish at soccer, is every time I watch the Euros and I see Switzerland in it, I'm bored to tears. So that's it. So maybe storytelling is good. But yeah. You sit on the bench and tell stories.

[00:39:49] Bullwhip Island has taken over though. That's pretty good. What seemingly mundane thing is banned in your country? Any pet peeves you want to get rid of? Nobody's allowed to do them or have them or see them. What's banned? Besides writing. Writing. All thoughts must be spoken, not written now. And bombing on stage. No bombing.

[00:40:18] This is a good, I think the first time you've actually stumped me because I don't, I don't, I don't like to ban people of anything. You banned all Eric's. Except for Eric's bombing, writing things down. Um, shit. I'll say right now. Okay, go on. Maybe ask me a new question. Yeah, we can circle back to that. I was going to say that if there's any poet called Eric, they are getting murdered straight away out in the street. Torned him from him.

[00:40:47] There's nothing else going to happen there. Oh, I do have a bit of a tough, tough question for you. It's, um, it's something you're going to find out. So your approval rating is in the high nineties because you talk all the time and people like the way you talk and you know what I mean? It's, it's high nineties. Unfortunately, some newspaper has come out and people have learned to read about a scandal involving you and it's gone down to the low sixties.

[00:41:14] See how I'm tying it into the scores back when you said you used to get sixties first. Yeah. Um, you nailed it. Yes. I can cut out all that. Let me see. Um, a scandal is going to come out involving Eric and you get to decide what the scandal is. I'm not sure how that works, but you get to decide what scandal would people find out about you that would cause a 30% drop. By the way, this is a light entertainment podcast. So, you know, like he's racist.

[00:41:44] He will kill every Eric woman in the world. The thing about scandals is, is I'm okay with scandal. If you own it. The biggest thing I have a problem with a scandal is people who lie. Like if I'm trying to think of a local, a new scandal, like R Kelly's too much, Harvey Weinstein's too much, all that kind of area.

[00:42:09] But I just think that like, if someone gets busted doing something, when they go on the thing and they go on like Twitter or whatever, and they go, I unequivocally deny all allegations. Minus like murder. And, you know, again, light entertainment podcast, but like rape and things like that. Yeah. I, I don't, I, I much prefer when a scandal comes out and the person just goes, Hey, you're right. I fucked up, but I'm sorry.

[00:42:39] And I won't do it again. It was 30 years ago. I didn't even know I was doing something wrong. And someone found out about it. Now they're trying to use it against me. And, uh, it's not who I am now. And, uh, it happened. And let's just all move on with our lives. I like that. I like when someone just owns up to their shit. I've had to do it many times in my life. Nothing obviously is serious. Yeah. Um, but I just go, yeah, fuck it. Do it. Yeah. What's what happened? Who knows? I'll do it again. No, I'll do it. I could do it.

[00:43:08] And if you don't like it, if you don't like it, name your son, Eric, and then you're all out of here. Uh, I don't know if I pick the scandal, I would just let the scandal come to surface. And if it was true, I would own it. But then the thing is, if it's not true, then you gotta, you gotta fight. And then you look like a liar, no matter what. Cause we've learned in current society that the allegation alone is enough to, to drop the approval rating by 30%. Well, uh, what would you do then?

[00:43:37] If the scandal came out that, uh, the great, no, I was going to say the great Eric, but then you don't want that sort of title. So I'm going to say Eric, um, has completely fecked that up. Um, Eric doesn't actually know how to, I don't want to say this right. Fucking hell. Don't know how to talk right. He actually has an earpiece when he's on stage, when he's giving lectures, when he's giving talks. Someone else is feeding him lines. Ugh.

[00:44:07] I think of the funnier scandal would be if it came out that I actually had no idea what I was doing in terms of running a country. Yeah. That would be something that I would go, you know what? You're right. We're all stuck here. There's no planes leaving. But we're the number one storytellers. We got a great economy. Uh, we're having some fun and fuck it. You know what I mean? The wheels are in motion. Let's see how long we can go. So you're just going to admit, I have no idea how. I don't know what I'm doing.

[00:44:36] I didn't know what I was doing when I started this podcast and we're figuring it out. That's kind of the, my kind phrase in life is go, we'll figure it out. You are embracing amateur gate, which has rocked the country. This fucking amateur hasn't a clue. It's funny. Cause I just become a man of the people with someone would go like, he doesn't know some top, you know, political figure from an, maybe another Island would go, you know, I really don't think he knows what he's doing. And I would just go, you know what? Compared to you, I think you're right. I think you might. I, I'm not, I don't know what I'm doing. The Dutch.

[00:45:07] The Dutch. The Dutch are coming for you. Yeah. But, uh, I go, but we're figuring it out and we're having a good time doing it. So I think that would kind of be my answer. I would just own up to it. And if someone said, he doesn't know what he's doing. I'd go, you know what you're at. I don't know what I'm doing. But I'm willing to figure it out. The Dutch have flooded social media with propaganda saying he's just trying to create Hamilton. He's just sure. He's just looking. What does Hamilton do? He checks the Hamilton Daily or whatever the newspaper is. And just copies it.

[00:45:36] The Hamilton Spectator, which is more of a pamphlet these days. There you go. Legendary meeting or a legacy meeting, a media in Canada is dying. But, um, yeah, I think it would be very funny. I don't know. He just loves where he grew up and he loves what he's got. And he just wants to recreate it in a slightly more subtropical climate. If your 30% drop in the approval ratings happens because of it and you just come out going, yeah, anyway. I'll get you back. I'll get you back.

[00:46:06] And you know what? I've already had my four drinks. So you know I'm telling the truth. I think some of the approval rating will come back. I mean, maybe not all at once, but you're at least getting at least 10% out of 30. Maybe 15. Well, most comedians, especially earlier on in your career, they make the mistake of not owning up to why they're bombing. And they always want to blame everybody else. It's the audience. The audience. The candles were too bright.

[00:46:34] I could hear noise from the ice machine in the backs too loud. That's why I bombed. Whatever it is. The candles? I know. What? Yeah. Little candles on the tables in a comedy club. Oh, okay. Get those candles out of here. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. A lot of comics usually blame everyone but themselves for bombing. I never did that. I was always like, I just wasn't good tonight. And I will come back tomorrow and I will be better tomorrow. And I did that and I did that and I did that.

[00:47:03] And 15 years later, I haven't bombed on stage in a while. Sometimes I bomb in a corporate, like a corporate gig where... That's probably very different though. Is it? Yeah. It's like they can get hired to do a party or something. This happens a lot when a boss of a company or a CEO of a company loves stand-up comedy. And this actually is a true story. I'll break from the show to tell you a funny true story. I got hired last Christmas for a Christmas party for an accounting firm and the show was in Niagara Falls.

[00:47:31] The CEO owner of the company loves stand-up comedy, has seen me online and wanted to have me perform at their Christmas party. And I just threw a number at him, kind of like a fuck you number. Like, kind of like, let's see how much I can get out of this guy. Not in a mean way, but I was also like, Christmas season was coming up. I didn't really want to do it because I knew it was going to be bad. So I said, I don't know, $2,500 or whatever it was. I don't remember. Yeah, yeah. And he went, okay, great. And I went, okay, great.

[00:48:02] So he booked the show and he treated the show like a surprise for his staff. I'm going to surprise my staff with this up and coming kind of Hamilton-based professional stand-up. Then from the time he booked me to the day of the show, he got COVID and he didn't come to the corporate event because he had COVID. Yeah.

[00:48:27] So then he just told his, like, controller or second command, hey, I got some entertainment coming. Just show them where the mic is. And she kind of went like, okay. So I showed up. These people are, like, eating dinner. And I tell the lady who I am. And she's like, oh. And she goes, what do you do? I'm like, oh, I'm a stand-up comic. And she's like, okay. Do I have to introduce you? I was like, I would love that.

[00:48:54] And she went, okay, guys, Brad booked this comedian. Stugasovich. Mary. Yeah. Okay. I guess we'll listen to him. Like, it was like that energy. Yeah. And then she just went, she didn't say, like, please welcome Eric Johnson. She didn't give me any credits. She didn't give me a proper intro. She just went, Eric Johnston. And I went on stage. And I bombed my dick off for 45 minutes. Oh, that's long.

[00:49:23] I was supposed to do an hour. Yeah. Around the 40-minute mark, I literally just said to the audience, hey, Brad. I don't remember his name. It was Brad. Yeah. Brad is not here. Can we, can I just wrap this up? And you can tell Brad that I still did the full hour. I've already been paid. Yeah. I don't want to be here. You guys don't want me here. Let's call it. And they kind of, like, half applauded. Biggest cheer tonight.

[00:49:53] That's all I need. Thank you very much. My name's Eric Johnson. I walked off stage and I, like, I was so excited to get out of there that I just fucking, like, ran out of the door. Yeah. I got to my car, got in the car, and I went, fuck. I realized that I had brought my own backdrop banners. I brought some merchandise to sell. Yeah. Because I don't usually sell merch at a corporate gig, but I knew it was, like, a bunch of accounting people. They had money. Yeah. So I had, like, a bag of merch, banners, a bunch of, like, my jacket. Yeah.

[00:50:21] And I, like, had to walk a shame back into the ballroom. And, like, I was, like, hey, I forgot some stuff. And it was just, like, they were in the middle of doing, like, awards or something. And I'm pretty sure they were talking about how terrible the stand-up comedy was as I walked back in. Anyways, the check's still cleared. That is a situation where I can blame the audience. I can blame the situation. It was not my fault.

[00:50:48] But sometimes early in my career when I was young, like, I just tried a new joke that just wasn't funny or it wasn't fleshed out enough. And that is the reality of it. And the guys who don't do that are delusional and they don't last very long, guys and girls. So to circle all this back to my island, sometimes there's situations where you bomb and it's not your fault. But most of the time it's your fault. And if you can admit that it's your fault and move on and talk about how you're going to get better, that will lead to a better situation.

[00:51:15] So I think on my island, if I bombed or someone bombed and they just came to me and went, listen, I broke up with my girlfriend that day. I said some shit I shouldn't have. I probably shouldn't have even come to our four-person storytelling thing. But I came and I fucked up. Listen, my people really need the thing I'm asking for. Can you just give it to me? I'll go, I'm glad you came to me like a man and admitted to me that you bombed.

[00:51:41] So now here's your horses and whatever thing you need for them. You're just out of the back. I have them right here. Whatever the fuck you need. Here's your horses. Now get the fuck out of here. Now you're banned from the table for four weeks, but I appreciate you coming back. That's how I would run things. Okay. Yeah. You will get the approval rating back up that way. So it is a very pleasantly, not blunt, I keep using blunt, but pleasantly straightforward. Yeah. You fuck up, you fuck up. No bullshit. No bullshit on Bullwhip. Yeah.

[00:52:11] Okay. And the Dutch have failed in trying to, I presume trying to usurp power by spreading shit. Listen, because of the scandal, the news station that's in Bullwhip Island, they just thought, well, they're doing a documentary piece. Honestly, it's a bit of propaganda. I'm not going to lie. They're all in on Eric. What fantastical fact about you can they say? Can they make this documentary about? Well, is it a hit piece documentary or is it like they're just... Oh, Eric.

[00:52:41] This is very pro-Eric. Yeah. It's funny, true in my real life. Yes. And I think would work for the island to boost morale and just general joy. Yeah. Whichever you take would work. Yeah. I, on this island, and I am in real life, am an excellent dancer. Really? So, I, as a child in real life, danced competitively for seven years.

[00:53:11] Tap, jazz, ballet, music theater, hip hop, all kinds of just different types of dance. I competed all across Ontario. Yeah. I won many awards as a small child. At a party, I can cut a rug. If I'm in the mood, a couple drinks, four drinks, back to the four drink policy. Yeah. I can, I really can dance. Yes. And I enjoy dancing. But I don't like people who like to dance. Because most people who like to dance can't dance.

[00:53:41] Oh, okay. Yes. Yeah. So, I like to dance, but I like to keep it as a little ace in my pocket. I like to, I like to, it has to be the perfect setting with the perfect amount of people, with the perfect ambiance, with the perfect music, perfect amount of drinks. Then I will cut a rug and be the best dancer out there. So, and. The people who, you said you don't like people who like dancing because they're shit at it.

[00:54:06] Are they, is that sort of the like classic thing of the guy who thinks like, I'm really funny, therefore I'm a good comedian. You're like, no, but can you. Oh yeah. Being a comedian has a, like, has a skill that you need to like hone and you can be funny. That doesn't therefore make you. Yeah. So is it the same thing where you're like. And in real life, I've gone on to use my dancing skills as a six foot one, 245. Muscular man. Yeah. For good.

[00:54:32] I, last, last year I did a dancing with the stars event here in Hamilton and raised a bunch of money for, for kids in wheelchairs. I've been in, I just posted actually on my Instagram, Eric Johnson, who at Eric Johnson, who on Instagram of me dancing in a commercial, which I actually. Plumber. Plumber dancer guy. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:55:02] is a very good dancer let's do a little i was gonna say expose it's not an expose because it's celebratory but it's let's do a little fun piece and they would go wow i already like this guy he was no bullshit but he has this history with dance he knows how to dance he enjoys dancing so let's all celebrate and have a dance party now people who can't people who can't dance can't come uh

[00:55:28] okay that's me no no but i think what a fun guy yeah the potato masher yeah um what a fun guy you know what he just went up five approval rates because what a fun that'll that'll get it back into the 90s surely yes yeah and we can call the documentary dances with bulls right that'll work let's good night everybody that's great we're done we're done we're out of here

[00:55:54] oh okay that's cool we'll get that documentary going when it's your birthday what celebration should people of the bullwhipians what should they do to national national holiday obviously national holiday everyone gets it off work everyone uh four drink minimum uh you know and by the way i know we're not like promoting like no no we are not the country workspace after four like that's

[00:56:23] definitely a cultural thing i should make a t-shirt i best after four drinks uh that's the sweet best after four drinks uh no but you know if you if you listen to the podcast you don't drink hey i know the i know the fight i got a lot of friends who don't drink and i love you and support you and you're powerful and all that stuff but you're dancing is so sweet more drinks more drinks come on yeah get that uh i don't actually i actually don't get drunk at all anymore in real life

[00:56:48] because there's so much going on with travel and the house and now the baby and stuff that really my max really is four drinks and i think i haven't had more than four drinks in a sitting in god a year almost a year and a half um but anyways even baby jet after four bottles of milk is a delight oh he's sleeping i wish hilarious um yeah um yes but yeah so national holiday i'm a big birthday guy i love my birthday yeah in real life in real life i celebrate my birthday every year i always have

[00:57:17] a birthday party i'm like i had a 34th birthday party last year like who gives a shit but i i like i like when i like i like people july july 11th so yeah you're i'm a cancer good summer nice night time stuff four drinks um but you know i i like people yeah i my job is people but i like col i collect

[00:57:43] people like my wife is always so thrilled and enthralled with how many people that i know like how many people i have relationships with yeah i have a core of like maybe five to ten best friends yeah yeah yeah but i'm also friends with like 5 000 people yeah and on my birthday my favorite thing is i have a party and it's my new house we have a big pool and backyard and everything and i like

[00:58:10] people of different groups like i like i like when my friends from over here meet my actor friends who meet oh yeah yeah meet my whatever musician friends and i like introducing them to each other and seeing how they can become friends and work together like i'll go like oh you're a musician um my buddy over here he has a studio let's let's make that connection happen i like to connect people yeah so i think on my

[00:58:37] island now it'd be hard to i think it'd be hard to you know orchestrate with a million people that's why we could never do 10 million yeah but i think my birthday would be like a party that everyone gets to have their own separate parties but the rule is you gotta invite we have four zones we have four countries divide yeah the north southeast the west where the mandate of the party is you have to invite different people from different neighborhoods and different sections of the country oh okay everyone has

[00:59:03] to cross and see where they're similar see where they're different come over four drinks come together and talk about their differences the number four is ruling this country it's four zones four drinks that's four currencies four languages four languages uh english bad english uh but yeah i think i like my favorite part of my real life birthday is when people from different groups come together so i think on my country

[00:59:29] i would have the same as it's a big party everyone gets a day off you can drink you can smoke you can whatever but make sure if you're having a party you invite different groups of people so the worst thing for me in real life is when i go to a house party it's the same six people or same 16 people same 26 people every single time i go can we shuffle this deck can we get some new blood in here can we get some i want to i want to meet other people are you so i think that'd be the mandate as well as i'm thinking as well when when i was younger when i was more like going out with your friends

[00:59:59] and then you're single going out into nightclubs but i was a wanderer i think my whole family were wanderers we tended like let's say i'm with you and five other friends of ours that's great and we're in the pub whatever if we go into a nightclub i'm wandering around and i'll see you at two o'clock but i'll only be chatting to people it's not like i'm going home with a woman um yeah i quite enjoyed that part or um when you say about meeting or getting one group of friends to meet another

[01:00:25] group of friends is it always a bit nice in in a nice kind of egotistical way to say let's say hey eric here's celine and then celine says hello to you and it's a little bit like me going celine's awesome isn't she i don't pick bad people to hang around with celine eric's really nice i don't pick bad people to hang around with that little bit of like told you i've never thought of that but you're exact you're exactly right but in a nice way not what a great connector i am because i i like

[01:00:51] great people i don't hang around with bad i don't pick bad people i think and then people who's someone who's you know i've had people come to parties or whatever and you know they just don't jive they don't uh they don't work together and most people generally don't come back or they're not invited or they're they're sent to netherlands yeah yeah yeah they said to the netherlands or they find their own other party or whatever it is but you know i like i agree with you i think there's nothing

[01:01:20] better than when you have two separate friends and you introduce them to each other and they hit it off and then the three of you can talk about how great all three of you are is that ego maybe but is that like good fun good ego it's good look at great people in our lives yeah no no shit out there there's so much negativity that good yeah oh sorry no go ahead to your no i was gonna say good people can make good people make good times yeah the i was going to ask earlier i know you have this

[01:01:49] kind of like no it's a fancy fancy living situation you're in in bulwip island is there anything that you're going to indulge in a bit of vanity and say that is mine since i'm the leader of this country i'm gonna splurge on this one thing like i know you don't want a big huge mansion or you don't want you know do you want a uh ridiculously over luxurious limousine or you know military

[01:02:13] i like i like i think my like presidential car would be like a like an old cadillac or something like an old like big like town car would it be a convertible like cadillac yeah again convertibles if i have any naysayers or the dutch people on my island the dutch i'm i'm really hitting my fucking head off maybe not a convertible um but yeah like an old you know what i would love i would

[01:02:43] love on my island and this is something i would love in real life too is i would love on my island if i owned like an old club now let me explain like an old like burlesque style low ceiling with the stage at one end yeah the booths on the outside are like red velvet yeah with like the nice and the gold bars on the top like an old like the coke the copacabana yeah yeah yeah yeah

[01:03:13] yeah would you would you have the velvet rope for the vip area yeah yeah exactly yes yeah but not too much there's not everyone's a vip at my nightclub you know and um and it's like it's a performance space but it's not just comedy yeah i'm a comic and yeah i would probably perform but it could be for music for jazz for magicians yeah or you will for burlesque for whatever and it's just like a

[01:03:39] really cool place that they would go hey leader for lack of a better phrase hey eric this we built this for you and this is your space that you can just have your club and that would be the one thing that i would go like okay this is my space this is my again something i would want in real life but on my island it would be it for sure that'd be my thing that would be that your thing that's you you you look

[01:04:04] after that place that's your it's a little smoky there's green there's like green and gold candles on all the tables exposed wood and brick and velvet and gold and everything's comfortable everyone everything feels like they got good food they got good booze four drinks you know people from all four zones are welcome yes this is my that that would basically be my white house that isn't my house

[01:04:29] it's like that's my office my office is the club if you're not at the house you're at the club the club yes yeah the night club um what do we a bit like have you watched the well no i was gonna say the penguin i was watching the batman dinner night the one yes is it a bit i did watch the penguin though which i thought was excellent fantastic um and you know what just very annoying i'm gonna i'm gonna complain about someone i know um i ran into him and i they they were talking about tv or

[01:04:56] something and i said oh i just finished watching the penguin best show i've watched all year i can't think of the the last thing i watched i was better enough blah blah and then they were like oh the penguin what's that and i was like what's it's um you know that like the batman villain but colin farrell but it's and he he goes wouldn't be interested in that superhero stuff and i was like right it's nothing no think of it more like a fucking mafia show like it's yeah honestly at the very beginning and it's in the spider at the very beginning they go hey we're in gotham batman

[01:05:24] anyway and they move on and it's just yeah yeah and he was like they call him the penguin and i was like no that's that's just a mocking name it's nothing to do and he's like not interested and i was like no i'm telling you watch it like i wanted to grab him and choke him and like force feed him videos of the weekend so now so a month ago before i watched the show i was your friend i will

[01:05:47] completely admit i don't i've never cracked a comic book in my life yeah i've never i've never read an illustrated novel i've never i've never i i think i saw the first spider-man at a sleepover in grade i think i saw the batman that has jim carrey in it in the 90s yeah that may have been the best last superman i think i watched the first deadpool but i have no interest in this i'm not yeah i'm not a

[01:06:14] superhero guy and i don't i i actually um i host a lot of comic cons and stuff niagara falls comic con hamilton comic con and i am almost jealous i when i see these people dressed in costume and in like having the best time of their life i often say i used to say to myself i go i wish i liked anything in my life as much as these people like comic books i wish i was this into something

[01:06:40] so the point is i don't watch or listen to any comic book or anything and when i first heard about the penguin i was kind of like well who cares is i don't i don't watch anything comic book why would i watch that and then you watch the first episode now i will say the first episode i was a little fucked off because i thought oh colin fernal is just doing an impersonation of tony soprano he loves his mother this is just like a sopranos knock on yeah yeah and i was a little like

[01:07:06] but because i'm a huge sopranos guy i've seen sopranos like 15 times i've gone to new jersey to all the places where they film the sopranos i was a contributor to a sopranos meme page uh i was going to host a sopranos con in new jersey uh and then covid i couldn't pass across the border anyways the huge sopranos guy and i was like i do not like this knockoff sopranos by the end of the first episode and into the second episode you realize that colin feral is really creating his own character

[01:07:33] yeah and then i agree with you by the end of it i'm like this might be the best show i've seen probably since the sopranos do you know what i can't remember and i'll go back to the podcast but just now this is a penguin fan podcast how much time are we doing on this thing i know we will we will i do think i have three other questions that but i would say what i noticed at the very uh when we were watching it it's the i can't think of another show where i was do you know when you're

[01:07:59] watching either a tv or a movie and you hit the high of the like third act and something happens or whatever goes wrong or succeeds or whatever and then like the movie has to finish so it has to end where like this is where all the characters end up and it's kind of like a roller coaster where you have the big drop and it takes you a second to get back into the station and you relax right yes you don't immediately drop and you're done do you know what i mean you know whatever yes but the penguin

[01:08:25] seemed to be like up to the last seconds of the thing you were still going like so invested and yeah you're living in it yeah the credits roll and then you went okay i need to come down off this high yeah yeah yeah yeah um i find good tv like that i know the sign of a good show is if i don't pick up my phone this is a good sign of a show my wife drives my wife crazy but in my job in my in my in my line of work i'm always working there's always a show to promote there's always a message

[01:08:54] to answer there's always a video to send out there's always an email to answer so i have a hard time gripping away from my phone and that's how i relax it's sitting on the couch watching a show whatever show we're watching love is blind or one of those stupid netflix shows or whatever but i'm also on my phone but i'm looking up and i'm enjoying it this is how i relax i'm getting stuff done but i'm also sitting and enjoying something where we had the penguin on i you could have thrown my phone into lake ontario and i wouldn't have noticed and that's usually a sign of a good show

[01:09:24] where i go by the end of it i go what time is it where am i where what happened whatever so um yeah i don't even know the question you asked we're so far gone i was gonna say so anyway my last question yes or no and independent what you say like and you you ran away from the country um no i did have three questions left um one of them was they're tough questions um your finance guy paul

[01:09:53] um knocks on the door knock knock knock knock knock knock hello are you oh so he just opens the door and he walks in yeah okay yes yes yes uh hey eric um it's paul the guy who looks after the finances just making sure what's happening um i have some bad news for you i'm not gonna sugarcoat it i've had several drinks to be willing i'm gonna lay it out for you uh the country's broke yeah uh nobody's been looking at these numbers because they were written down

[01:10:23] i've looked at them we're a couple of billion in debt how do we make money yes now paul is fleeing the country he's got okay he is out of there now you're okay with that so yeah sure he's actually gone to uh rotterdam um you how are you going to make money if the country's broke what any any quick fire ways to to generate income easy quick i always find a way to make money in real life and i

[01:10:48] always find a way to make money on my island we're such good storytellers we uh have the club the the national club of of air yeah bulls uh the bull's den if you will um yeah um we will up tourism and we will just just tourism this is not immigration not that there's anything wrong with that no this is yeah tourism is hey we're the best stories in the tellers in the world we have the

[01:11:16] best nightclub for that we have the best musicians actors comedians yes magicians ventriloquists burlesque dancers we need to we need to build hotels and whatever create a downtown core people it's like the vegas of the middle of the atlantic ocean gambling old school it's you can gamble sure i like to gamble i i don't win a lot but um sometimes i win uh but you know it's it's going to be a

[01:11:42] destination and it's going to be in one zone you come you gamble you watch a show you whatever you leave this is our our export this is our money making up and we will hoover the money out of those tourist pockets as much as we can okay send over the cheap dutch and get the much shake grab them by their ankles and shake them upside down i get it we're gonna have some person from hall and be like what the fuck here don't worry i vaguely remember the countries where i have

[01:12:09] listeners and i'm pretty sure so we can really go in on them they won't know they'll never know um yes uh tourism tourism entertainment storytelling uh drinking you don't think ai is gonna ruin the storytelling aspect no no no no no you're okay with that you know you know a good storyteller from a bad storyteller or fake storyteller that's my answer yes um okay yeah no we will get on that

[01:12:34] we'll make sure that enough tourists and what and fuckball for leaving us i just said and fuckball i thought you were inventing a new sport we've seen us we've seen how much money fifa can make we're gonna introduce some sexiness into it okay um that was another another avenue um and that's all going very well but unfortunately oh um something almost catastrophic happened to you um there was a coup

[01:13:03] attempt okay you from that wonderful country you know well and well try to stage it um they've been caught 10 of them they're in custody what you want to do with these 10 dutch bastards kill them uh no uh they've all called eric they are former erics who have been trained by the dutch police yeah i i don't know my big thing is just like i even at a party if someone fucks up i just go just

[01:13:29] leave just go just leave the room today yeah like you don't i don't want to think about this anymore i just don't want you around so i would just send them back to holland and they would start over on their new attempt and learn from their mistakes and be successful the next time but for as we're living right now you think you can good times only yeah after all you don't know what you're doing so yeah you've admitted that you've admitted it's very clear it's very clear yeah okay um luckily though

[01:13:58] do you plan on having a long reign like are you going to live like are you going to rule the country until old age and then out you go are you just gonna no i think i think it would be one of those things where like you know when they say beloved politician they go like they go he doesn't he's not in politics anymore he doesn't run the country but we still love him yeah like i'm trying to think of an example uh in canadian politics there's not really much um but you know it's one of those things

[01:14:26] where he's given up maybe jet takes over my son yeah yeah i maybe there is a successor and it's my son but if he doesn't want to do it doesn't want to do it i'm not gonna force him to do it the famous one in history is cincinnatus in rome who they said hey cincinnatus we need your help i can't remember what but they made him dictator right and then he went off i think it was to fight another group right it was before rome got really big but then he was dictator he had all the power he had

[01:14:54] right and he won this war and then he went back to the senate or whatever and went right i'm done and just went back off to his farm like gave up all the power and then you know so i think like would you do that just be like i'm done now and everyone loved him i think i think the classic saying is like i'm here for a good time not a long time and i think it'd be like that'd be it like what's you know five seven years ten years of this lifestyle and then i get to go live in my mid-synast people

[01:15:21] could still come by for four drinks we can talk about their problems uh and jet is in charge you think jet i mean he could be in charge if he doesn't want to do it we can find a successor but then we go back to the voting thing and then i'll be like that was a stupid vote then i've got to pick somewhere new it's a tough call i think i would relinquish control but almost had it like advisory shares i would have a advisory yes position and i go listen i don't want to do this

[01:15:48] anymore but if you have any questions just ask me because just like it's like it's like giving up a comedy it's like we start an open mic i haven't done this in a long time it's like you start a show then you want to go do your own thing you give the show to another comedian go listen i don't run this anymore but if you need help booking or you want to like yes well you want me to bounce ideas off me i can help you and then generally those that person takes the open mic and runs it into the

[01:16:12] ground uh so i hope that doesn't happen that's hopefully yeah yeah but i think it'd be like you know classic you know beloved uh leader i'm using leader just for lack of a better phrase our beloved eric he still lives here he still advises but he's kind of given up his main day-to-day role to you know live his life and uh he's at the club if you want to go talk to him i'm trying to think

[01:16:37] there was in england you had queen elizabeth and then the queen that it was her mother who was the something queen or the queen not regent queen of scots no i made it up yeah the eric of scots no but so the idea is that for the succession you're going to have jet take over if he wants if he wants to go off and you're going to be an airline pilot yeah and you're going to be a pilot and you're going to allow people to vote for someone sure you're not going to name someone no i don't

[01:17:06] think i i think i'd leave it up to the people but they'd have the advice but this is where we're going to circle this all back yeah it will come down to four candidates they come they come to my house we sit at a table we have four drinks they i let them pitch me the reason why they should be the next leader if they kill they get the job if they bomb they don't so i think i'd let the people

[01:17:32] vote to those four people i'd let my people vote who your top four candidates send them to eric's house let them explain themselves and their story and whatever they kill they get the job it's only going to be what so one person has to kill how long would they have to pitch like they can't just ramble on endlessly do they have a timer oh i think a couple minutes give me a tight set five to seven five to seven i'm going to for the for the sake of um this podcast i'm gonna say i have two minutes

[01:18:01] to convince you that the man called sweeney would like to take over you ready i'm presuming i've had four drinks because honestly i talk like i have four drinks in me loosen up loosen up okay i'm starting now i have two minutes this could be terrible idea um eric let's be honest you haven't a fucking clue what you've been doing okay fair i don't know is that a good start i'm coming in on okay okay i'm coming in loaded okay let's say come in loaded okay i've killed several people

[01:18:30] in my own life it was justified it was justified right do you need to know the reason or do can i just move on i mean if you're willing to talk about it sure okay one of them kicked my cat and then i shot him but then he had a boyfriend so i needed to kill the boyfriend and then the boyfriend had a family and it became a whole thing and it was kind of like john wick but in reverse if that makes sense so um anyway i killed all them and i came to this island and i think i should take over because you didn't

[01:18:57] know what you were doing and i don't know what i'm doing i'm actually i i'm just living day by day so i think hey if you've lived for the last 10 years and run this country and it's going okay i can do the same i come from london which is doing fantastic so i'm just going to copy what london does i have the london times newspaper um so i'm just going to follow the same thing and i'm going to make some changes nobody's allowed to be called sweeney okay just like that i agree

[01:19:23] yeah sweeney's a terrible name so but except me you have to call me the sweetie we'll work on your name swines sweet you call me sweet and i'm going to not allow tourists i don't want anyone with a different viewpoint for me okay there's no more tourists okay and that's it yeah and i'm do not as a good leader i'm going to finish up early so there you go okay get a job yeah so no

[01:19:49] the answer is no uh where did i lose you in that waffle the no tourism thing is up there but i think killing over a cat because cats have nine lives and you know the cat only got kicked once so you really made a brash decision by killing a gay man you kill the guy and his boyfriend i'll say it i'll

[01:20:13] say it as the host this podcast i was proud to kill that gay man and we're both canceled uh no but uh yeah no you're too quick to react to violence the one thing about me as a leader is i always try to make people laugh and sort it out before they start killing each other uh no okay but you're not getting the job no and jess i just just he'll do if he doesn't have a good job at that point i would

[01:20:43] hear your pitch and go oh my god um and then i would say to jet listen you gotta you're the most like me so you just gotta just for a bit just true college just true college five yeah just try it yeah just try it see if you're like you don't like you don't have to do it but i think you should just try it's probably his first job so nobody likes their first job hey he's a dormant at the club yeah you'll be fine okay um eric the great thing is because you mentioned your name as eric on the

[01:21:11] island i don't have to switch back now and be like oh i'm not calling you a glorious wonderful man anymore um eric thank you so much for for showing me bullwhip island um when are you starting the tour uh so i start uh january hold on i've got it what a what a life um january 24th or 25th january 20 january 24th um in st catherine's ontario i know you have some canadian listeners and

[01:21:38] some canadian comics on here and stuff so i start in st catherine's ontario and the tour goes all the way every weekend until god i just booked a show on june 1st or may 31st and june 1st so basically from from january to the summer uh i'll be doing a show somewhere in ontario or i have a show in michigan and then at the end of the tour the middle to the end of the tour in april 25th or 26th i'm doing a show

[01:22:05] in the cayman islands my first international international date i've done shows in america and stuff like that many times but my first outside of uh north america tour date is in the cayman islands at the end of april uh if you're listening now and you thought you know i was funny and you want to hear more from me it's eric johnston who e-r-i-c-j-o-h-n-s-t-o-n-w-h-o uh at dot com and it's at eric johnson who on instagram twitter fucking threads and facebook

[01:22:33] and whatever uh tiktok you can find me anywhere it's all eric johnston who and come on to a show and you can ask me questions about my island or you can come to my house and see that my house is just basically my island if you want to help move in a second lg couch that'd be much appreciated get in the conversation pit and have four drinks baby that's what we're doing sounds a wonderful evening okay uh thanks very much everyone for listening and and yeah we're back all right cheers eric see you buddy

[01:23:03] good luck