Ari Shaffir's Skeptic Tank

Kristian Harloff and Mark Ellis met me at the Comedy Store for the 3rd straight year to talk about the Oscars. I love these podcasts. We get to shit on movies for 2 hours, it's great. Kristian and Mark are the team that makes up Schmoes Know. They've got an awesome movie podcast and they always teach me about the movies I didn't get a chance to see. I also come up with a sweet plan for fun so listen before Wednesday and listen all the way through.

Mistress Isabella Sinclaire came over to the apartment I'm unwillingly sharing in LA to tell me about BDSM. She's pretty much a professinal torturer, which is way different than that job would be in Game of Thrones. This is all about domination, usually sexually. It was a great long discussion and if you're wondering if she was going to put electrodes on my balls to shock them, the answer is of course she did. Benji Aflalo joins me for the outro.

Mike Lawrence met me at the Creek and the Cave in Long Island City so we could record a podcast about wrestling. Mike has always been one of the comics who loves wrestling on a non-ironic level and he's always been good at explaining things to me that I don't agree with. So I'm glad he was able to explain to me what I'm missing with wrestling. It always seemed like garbage entertainment for garbage people. But Mike made me see how cool is it to follow the action of the squared circle. And plus I think we did this on, like, Christmas day or Christmas eve. So thank you, Jews. Steve Simeone helps with the intro and outro. 

Ali Siddiq met me at the Comedy Store to talk about prison. I always knew prison life was hard, but damn. I didn't know about all of this. Ali spent 6 years locked away with some of the most violent criminals in Texas. This is a great episode and really fun and interesting. 

Godfrey came over to my apartment in New York and we had a long non-judgemental talk about race. It was really interesting to me and I think talks like this can really help us grow as a society. Not listening to Godfrey and me, but having these kinds of talks with the people in your own life. So listen to the way we're not attacking each other, and then try to do the same in your own discussions.

The story of how I became a paid regular at the Comedy Store. From when I started comedy to when I got passed to when I made the announcement that I'll be filming my special in the Original Room. This was originally the intro to episode 180: Haole 5-0 but I thought I'd upload it on it's own the day my special comes out. It airs tonight (Friday night) at midnight/11pm central on Comedy Central. It's called Paid Regular and it's available at www.AriShaffir.com or at Comedy Central On Demand.

Jeff Danis and Ryan O'Neill came over to my AirBnB in LA while I was in town to film my special, Paid Regular. We talked about the open mic at the Comedy Store known as potluck. It was a parade of lunatics. In its prime, potluck was one part freak show, one part standup show, and two parts club soda. Seriously, you had to see it. And I talked to Danish & O'Neill about what it was like hosting that mother week after week. Always great when these guys are on and this one is no exception. And don't forget to watch my special on Comedy Central Friday night January 16 or get the extended version at www.arishaffir.com

Robert Kelly invited me down to the Riotcast studio to act as my producer for a podcast about our amazing experience eating at Noma. Noma was named the best restaurant in the world by Restaurant Magazine 3 of the last 4 years. Chef Rene Redzepi has created an amazing culinary experience in Copenhagen, Denmark. And Robert and I were there for the Copenhagen Comedy Festival in September and I got on the wait list for Noma. And wouldn't you know it, our name got called. So here's two comedians talking about our 2 1/2 hour lunch at Noma. David Taylor joins me for the intro from the apartment I'm staying in in LA until April.

Kathleen McGee and I got SUPER high and went to see Dumb and Dumber To and then we did a podcast and talked all about it when it was over. Recorded in my hotel room in Vancouver, this was supposed to be the first Spoiler Alert podcast from me but now it's just an extra gift for New Years. Enjoy. And don't worry about it spoiling any jokes for you. If you were gonna see the movie, you would've seen it by now. Be honest with yourself for once.

Dan Naturman stopped by my apartment to talk about what Christmas is like as a Jew. It was a surprisingly upbeat and pro-Christmas talk from two people who would have been used as the star on a Christmas tree only 30 years ago. Is that a thing? Anyway, happy holidays, everyone.

Morgan Black met me in my hotel room in Vancouver to talk about his job at Insite. Insite is the safe injection place on Hastings Street in Vancouver. It's a place in heroin alley where junkies can go to get clean needles and they can use those needls to shoot up in a place that's supervised by people like Morgan. He watches over them to make sure they don't overdose. If they begin to, it's up to him to try and save them. He's seen a lot since he's been there and he shares it here.

Nick DiPaolo met me in the damn soundbooth at The Stand (I've really started doing these just about everywhere, huh?) to talk about life in the sticks of Westchester. Nick is from Boston, lived in New York for probably almost 2 decades, and now he lives up there. He's a guy I always looked up to as a comic so it was nice to get him on.

Liz Miele came over to my apartment to talk about dyslexia. Well, she came over to talk about running marathons but the damn recorder screwed its mother right at the end of a 2 hour podcast so then we did another one about dyslexia. We probably should've done that one first because it's a way more interesting subject. She tells me all about her dyslexia, what it means to her, how she copes with it, and how other people react to it. It's a really interesting episode all brought to you by my stupid recorder not auto saving.

Kathleen McGee came to my hotel room in Vancouver to update me on all the new adventures she's been on. I had her on to talk about some new sexcapades but then we also got into depression and giving up.

Joe Rogan had me over to Freak Party studios to do an album commentary of his 2007 album, Shiny Happy Jihad. This is the first time I'm doing this where it's not the comic's first album. But I was there when Rogan was developing this material and I was there for the recording in San Francisco at Cobbs and I thought that added insight would make it way better to talk about this CD rather than his first CD. This is the longest podcast I've ever done. Hopefully iTunes won't have a problem with it. Emjoy your lives.

Christine Evans made the block and a half trek to my aparment to talk about sex some. And more importantly, about the threesomes here and Big Jay have been having for the last 6 months. You see, Christine is one of those cool girlfriends. She's into doing fun stuff with her boyfriend and what could be more fun than boning a third person. And then another third person. And then another. It's an informative and boner inducing episode that's sure to be a Christmas classic for years to come.

Steve Simeone is my guest for the 4th of these album commentary podcasts. The cool thing about this one is that Steve's album doesn't come out till tomorrow. I begged him to do this with me and he was cool enough to say yes. So everyone go out and buy Remember This by Steve Simeone and tell 8 to 10 friends about it as soon as you can.

Dean Delray came over to my Los Angeles AirBnB to discuss a great love we both share. Candy. It's our muse. Seriously, we're both highly addicted to candy and we can't stop eating it but this is more a celebration of the thing we love. From how we got started on the sugar highway, to how it makes us feel, to our all time favorites. This is all about that sweet sweet. 

Jayson Thibault came to my AirBnB to talk about alcholism. Jayson is a drunk. He's addicted to alcohol. He was sober for almost 3 years and then he relapsed and now he can't stop drinking. So we talked about what it means to be an alcoholic. From how it started, to what it means on a day to day level, to why it continues. It's an educational experience through the eyes of an addict.

Dan Soder met me at my apartment to talk about growing up in a single parent household. Dan's dad was like me, so he was gone pretty early in Dan's life. From then on it was just him and his mother. So we talked about that and some of the usual meanderings and that's how you make a podcast.