rant · moment 7 of 13
Summer in America
from #305 - Summer In America | The Tim Dillon Show · #305
13 min
A long rant on record heat waves turning into an extended riff on what a broke American's summer really looks like: block-party street festivals, cocaine in the projects, sending kids to weird camps, and his own memories of doing drugs as a teenager instead of going to camp.
- Temperatures so hot it might be easier to just die than go to a beach or pool.
- Guy's car breaks down in Death Valley, California—he's dead.
- Tim argues against whining about summer; half the country will see 100-degree highs this week.
- After Famous Dave's barbecue, sweating in your car from heat makes indigestion feel like a coronary event.
- Street festivals: kids on bikes potentially robbing you, fireworks, drunk neighbors, and block parties with hot dogs.
- Local parades feature Vietnam veterans who committed atrocities, marching while everyone thanks them for their service.
- Poor-family summer: your white child dressed like a gang banger while you tell neighbors he's doing much better.
- Tim describes a daughter in Tampa with three kids at 24, a gas station job, stealing, cooking meth in the backyard with her brother.
- Send kids to camp—they come back trans from theater camp or talking about skull shapes and Jews from woods camp.
- Tim's greatest summer memories involved doing cocaine before it melted, sitting in project apartments with friends on dirty beds.
- Summer is about figuring out who you want to be; Tim did drugs with local children instead of going to camp.
- At 13 or 14, Tim decided he wanted to be a drug addict for the next 10 years until he was 25.
- Tim's dog memory: sharing an ice cream cone in the backyard, taking turns licking it on a hot summer day.
Death ValleyLong IslandTampaFamous Dave's barbecueNantucket