Something Different

Prom stories and school dances

A host (speaker-1) recounts going to post-prom at age 20 with Pants, who snuck him in, and spending eight hours on a giant inflatable slide until the ride operator made him leave, wearing a hole in his pants. The hosts trade school-dance gripes: dates in tall heels making shorter guys feel short, dancing badly on purpose, fudge rounds in the pocket as a hit, and one host's story of going to his senior prom solo in a brown van with a 20-piece chicken platter from Long John Silver's.

'Buzz Attends A Wedding' YouTube dance promo

Matt (speaker-2) promotes his YouTube video 'Buzz Attends A Wedding' — footage of himself doing the MC Hammer / Vanilla Ice dance at a wedding. The hosts joke about finding a six-foot-five woman who dances the same way for a side-by-side, agree to play it during the break, and rib him that his only motive is more video hits.

Break setup: Facebook page, Pants Skype call, Chutney's tease

The hosts announce their new Facebook page (18 fans; at 25 fans they get a custom username, facebook.com/livefromthepath), plan to Skype Pants in after the break, tease the Chutney's chicken story and a couple of Olsen stories, and sign off as live from the path on desmoineamplified.com.

Post-break return and stray bits

Back from break, the hosts trade stray comedy bits: a fake Vanilla Ice intro, outrage that ketchup bottles are now painted red inside, a 'dirty cat' named Chris, and a group reaction to watching Matt's wedding-dance video — with Ben named on-air as present in the studio ('Judging by Ben's face'), though Ben is not identified with any speaker label.

The failed Pants Skype call

• How did Pants get his name?

The hosts try to Skype Pants in — the show's produced intro voiceover man, talked about often on-air — but the stream delay makes real conversation impossible. They ask how he got his name Pants, a question never answered because they have to let him go, and joke that he is 'pulling the Dan' as he goes silent and non-responsive.

Keith Olsen, the downtown food court, and the homeless man

A host tells the story of Keith Olsen, the realtor for the building they broadcast from, and the sketchy downtown food court they dub 'the dungeon' (also floated: 'the dirty factory'). Over lunch there he watched a homeless man with a half-Rollie-Fingers mustache see Olsen's leasing sign and start chanting 'greedy Keith Olsen... chutneys chicken chicken chicken,' blaming Olsen for the closed Blimpy's and its defunct coin program.

Mustaches, dated Christian fashion, and Tammy Faye

Spinning off the mustache riff, the hosts debate who has a distinct but outdated look: Ron Goldman's handlebar mustache, the claim that the more public a Christian you are the more likely you dress ten or fifteen years behind the times, and the Tammy Faye Bakker / Jim Bakker / Jimmy Swaggart mix-ups (transcript spellings 'Tammy Faye Baker', 'Jim Baker', 'Jimmy Swagger'). After chat notes Tammy Faye died of cancer, it veers into writing one's burial-dress instructions into a will.

Burial clothes, morticians, and the 'happy police'

• Would you work in a mortuary?
• Do you have to be licensed to be a mortician?

The hosts debate what to be buried in — not a suit if you never wore one — and how the dead get dressed: a host whose brother-in-law is a mortician explains they cut the backs off the clothes and blanket them over. They recall the biblical death-squad that wrapped the dead in linens (the Acts 5 land-exchange story), Golden Girls and the Golden Palace, and answer chat's questions about dressing corpses. A host (speaker-1) says he and Mike are brothers and that at funerals they act as the 'happy police,' ignoring the death and telling funny stories, and admits he is bad with mourning people.

Managing the oil-change shop: Stoney gets arrested

A host (speaker-1) tells how, while managing an oil-change shop, he hired a wayward housemate the transcript calls Stoney — real name Matt Stone, with the line 'Ben called him Stoney' — who walked out of the basement pit with a $50 bill, was arrested in uniform in the parking lot, and was fired the same day. He then caught the entire night staff smoking weed on the back doorstep and fired every one of them.

Matt's Dairy Queen rant

Matt (speaker-2) vents at length about the Altoona Dairy Queen: at 9:30 p.m. they told him they were out of chocolate ice cream for his chocolate-ice-cream Reese's Blizzard — 'you don't run out of chocolate ice cream' at a place that specializes in ice cream. The hosts pile on: a gas station out of gas, Burger King running out of Whoppers, Quick Trip's pay-inside button requiring a pump-start card, and Matt defecting to Culver's.

Smoothies, Cold Stone upsells, and the rant spills over

A host describes a peanut-butter-and-jelly smoothie with a free 'energy' additive from a Des Moines juice company; Zach (speaker-0, addressed by name on-air) complains Cold Stone upsold him seven times for a single cup; and the Dairy Queen and Keith Olsen riffs flare back up, including 'I will bust a cap at Keith Olsen.'

Olsen threats, skywalk manners, and old job stories

After more Keith Olsen and Dairy Queen riffing plus a skywalk etiquette gripe (walk on the left) and a lament over the missing Blimpy's, a host (speaker-1) tells how he quit a financial-institution job and got his old job back the same day, and recalls a night gig he shared with Mike delivering Federal Reserve checks by van on the airport tarmac — including getting knocked by a jet blast that moved the van 30 feet.

What the show is about: 'Jesus and food'

• What is the main purpose of the show?

Answering chat's question 'what's the main purpose of the show?', a host answers 'Jesus and food' — describing it as four dudes trying to stay on the path talking about what Jesus might talk about in a given week. They plug Pathway Church in Johnston (Sundays 10 a.m. at Wallace Elementary), thepathonline.org, and livefromthepath.org. Dan is noted as absent this week.

The newborn, the longest Psalm, and patience

A host (speaker-1) shares a 'Jesus moment': up at 2:30 a.m. feeding his week-old daughter, having just read Proverbs and then the longest Psalm (Psalm 119) before bed, he decides to get up and change her dirty diaper rather than leave it — and wonders why his patience is unlimited for his baby but not for other people. He connects it to Jesus' ministry and 'turn the other cheek': 'The Lord wants my cheek here. I'll move it when he tells me to' — an approach he says he discussed with Ben on the way up.

Lazarus, burial in the desert, and Alaska

The hosts riff on the raising of Lazarus — Jesus telling them to open the tomb, 'he's been dead for three days, it stinks' — tie it back to desert burial practices from the earlier segment, and detour into an unverified claim, sourced only to 'something I read on the Internet,' that Alaska has a high death rate from depression and drinking.

Sign-off

Thank-yous, desmoineamplified.com, the Pathway Church in Johnston plug, livefromthepath.org for past shows and commercials, and 'we'll be back next Monday from ten to midnight.'

'Old Man Jonah' rapture song

A studio participant (speaker-4) performs an original song about 'Old man Jonah' — no teeth, no hair, no daughter, no son — waiting for the rapture, holding the old brass horn he has had since the day he was reborn and refusing to blow it until then.

'The Lonely Goatherd' outro

A participant (speaker-3) sings the yodeling 'lonely goatherd' number ('High on the hill was a lonely goatherd... lay on lay on lay hee-hoo') over the close of the show.