Might As Well Get Started

Pre-show audio snippet

An unattributed spoken snippet, possibly a song or station voice, plays before the show begins: lyrics about something going on and a 3 AM phone call. It sits minutes before the actual show open.

Show open and first introductions

Ben Foust, naming himself on air, opens the show live from the REMAX Studios in Downtown Des Moines at 6 AM on a Saturday. He introduces the crew by name: his brother Mike Foust, pastor Dan Hudson, and Zach Hao.

Hotel pool talk

Arrival banter about sneaking through the Marriott and the skywalk at 6 AM. A host tells the story of offering eight hotels $10 to let him swim with his two-year-old daughter the previous spring and being rejected by every one.

Full host introductions and loose banter

The four introduce themselves properly. Ben works downtown at an insurance company; Mike, his brother, is an electrician with a wife, a two-year-old daughter, and another baby due in about two weeks; Zach works at an insurance company, DJs weddings part-time, and has a two-year-old son and a five-month-old daughter; Dan is the pastor of Pathway Church in Johnston, married 25 years, with a 20-year-old daughter at Kentucky Christian University in Grayson, Kentucky and a 13-year-old daughter. Loose banter follows about Wendy's and Subway breakfasts and the cost of eating out with a family.

Ben's Clint Howard comparison

Ben recounts how, at the station training the night before, 'grandpa Doug' said he looks like actor Clint Howard. He pulls up side-by-side photos and the hosts roast the comparison, riffing on Howard's tooth gap as a career asset and the economics of being cast as 'underbelly society types.'

Swim trunks and mesh underwear

A long comic debate about swim-trunk mesh linings: nobody understands their purpose, older board shorts had nothing in them, and teenagers are 'perverted by society' into needing the mesh. Includes a running gag about Dan in a Speedo and a joke about needing an FCC photo regulation.

Paper swimsuits

Dan recalls that motels used to sell cheap paper swimsuits at the front desk for guests who forgot theirs, which the hosts greet with disbelief. The riff spins into origami-underwear manufacturing: a man named Steve whose whole resume is folding underwear without staples.

Kids' TV and the PCP tangent

A host describes modern kids' shows like Yo Gabba Gabba on Nickelodeon as psychedelic cartoons you could watch instead of drugs. That sets off an extended comic tangent in which none of the hosts can figure out how PCP is actually ingested.

Paper swimsuits for the baptistry

Dan jokes that the church should stock paper swimsuits for the baptistry. The hosts discuss how the church keeps a closet of spare shorts and shirts for unprepared baptism candidates, then riff on hiding condemned clothing from their wives (the car trunk, the oven).

Lucky poker boxers

Zach describes his favorite pair of poker-themed boxers, calling them his literal 'lucky boxers,' and admits his wife wants them gone. The hosts riff on the idea of putting one's favorite things on underwear and the multi-level meaning of poker-chip boxers.

The gambling question

• Is gambling okay in moderation, or is it entirely frowned upon?

A host asks whether gambling is okay in moderation or entirely frowned upon, and Dan, addressed as Daniel, answers: it is fine as an entertainment-budget expense once the tithe is out, bills are paid, and the family is not hindered — like buying a movie ticket or a vacation. The hosts trade gambling stories: cheap Vegas nickel poker, getting no free soda, and a grandma's trip where her friend Aunt Verline hit a ~$100 jackpot off a dollar.

Ad break and network promos

The show takes a break for station IDs (desmoineslocallive.com, Hub Tower) and network spots: a FAST SIGNS ad naming Steve Smith in Clive, plus promos for fellow shows — Sean McClanahan's 'Firearms Weekly' (Mondays 9-10 PM, Second Amendment), Mike Sanzoni's 'I don't know. Let's find out' (weekdays 6-7 AM), Jeff Brotzen's 'Your Money, Your Future' (Tuesdays 5-6 PM) — and a J. Michael McCoy real-estate ad for Coldwell Banker Mid America Group.

Recap and the Ben Vereen joke

Back from break, the hosts recap the first twenty minutes (underwear, paper undies, gambling with old people) and argue over the grandma's friend's name — Anne Verline, 'Aunt Verline' — before joking that she is really Ben Vereen from the TV show Benson.

Celebrity comparisons, part 1

The hosts trade celebrity-lookalike stories. Ben says a gas-station customer once told him he looked like Matthew Broderick at 18. Dan recalls being told in college that he looked like Rambo while watching Rambo. The hosts also mix up the bands Slipknot and Striper and wonder who auditions to be an ugly extra in a music video.

Celebrity comparisons, part 2

The lookalike game continues with a live side-by-side of Dan and NSYNC's Joey Fatone ('better from far away'). Zach says multiple people have compared him to Ryan Reynolds from his spiky-haired, dyed-tips days, and adds that his wife has been compared to Scarlett Johansson — the celebrity who married Ryan Reynolds.

Mike's missing lookalike and the saint head-tilt

Mike says no one has ever told him he resembles a celebrity, so the hosts audition comparisons for him: Scott Hamilton, Florence Nightingale, and Mother Teresa, complete with a too-small side-by-side photo. A riff follows on the tilted-head pose in Catholic saint portraits, and Dan rules that Mike would make a terrible church greeter.

The daylight-savings church mishap

Zach tells how the spring-forward time change wrecked his family's Sunday: his phone auto-adjusted, he misread 9:30 as 8:30, and they walked into church just in time to hear 'let's close in prayer,' with the whole congregation smiling at them.

Megachurches and hologram pastors

Dan describes visiting Southeast Christian Church in Louisville: roughly 30,000 attendees, an $800,000 weekly offering, a 9,000-seat auditorium, and six Easter services. The hosts riff on the logistics of communion for 30,000, then debate multi-campus video and hologram pastors — with a host pushing back that video and holograms lose the person-to-person fellowship of church.

Sign-off

The hosts close the first show: pastor Dan Hudson of Pathway Church in Johnston, services Sundays at 10:00, back next Saturday with the livestream chat. A station promo from 'Mac' at desmoineslocallive.com follows.