WEBVTT

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One of the weirdest
things about reading

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is you start wanting to--

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I start want to changing it.

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I'm like, well, maybe I
could ad lib a little bit.

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And sometimes you can ad
lib and you do all right,

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and then sometimes
it just falls apart.

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And tonight, I don't feel
like I'm as sharp as I am.

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I'm never that
sharp, but I'm not

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feeling extra sharp tonight.

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And so I refrained, but any
pause or mess-up you saw

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was because I was wanting
to just make shit up.

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[LAUGHTER]

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But that's just
what I do, I guess.

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So this section is--

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I was really interested in
the idea of brain injuries,

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because I think
they're so horrific.

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Everything I've read
about brain injuries

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is your mind kind
of lives in a--

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unable to contain its thoughts.

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Your mood swings get
worse, and you never

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end up in happier places.

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It always seems darker places.

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There's a really
interesting book

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about it called Thank You for
Your Service-- the David Finkel

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book that I think is really
interesting-- about soldiers

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coming home with brain injuries.

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So I thought, if your life
was so rattled by that

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and you were stuck with that,
but maybe one night you woke up

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and you saw how rattled you
were, that's the big dream,

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right?

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Like if you're
really falling apart,

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maybe you'd have
one night of clarity

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where you could see where
you really were and maybe get

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yourself out of it somehow.

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So this guy wakes
up and realizes

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that his life has been
10 years in a group home

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in a suburb of Spokane.

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And he realizes like,
"Well, Jesus, I just

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want to get out of here."

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And so the guy tries
to kill himself,

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but he doesn't do a good
job at it, and he survives.

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And so he wakes up and he goes,
"Well, what I'll do now, then,

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is just disappear into a story.

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I'll disappear into a dream."

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Personally, that's the
way I always live my life.

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When I was a kid
and things got bad,

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I just made up something
that wasn't bad.

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And it's a bad--

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it's kind of a lazy way
to live, and maybe not

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the most beneficial to
a person's well-being,

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to live inside a fake world.

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But that's what
I did, and that's

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what Leroy does in this story.

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He wants to go and disappear
on a boat with his girlfriend

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up the Pacific coast,
up through Canada,

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because that's what his
girlfriend always wanted to do.

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And by the time we meet him
now, reality and his story

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are kind of coming together.

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And his girlfriend's
come back because he's

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dying in the hospital bed.

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And so this is just a
little section from it.

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So this is kind of like that
idea of-- it's a dream world.

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But it's like when
you're having a dream,

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but it's also
things are happening

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outside that change your dream.

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So if that makes any
sense, I did good.

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And if not, then that's OK,
because I don't know if it made

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sense.

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"In the middle of the night,
she woke to Leroy's arm

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over her, pulling her into him.

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'Well, how are you
feeling?' she whispered.

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'I'm better,' he said, 'but
I keep seeing things that are

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so horrible.'

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'Well, the things
you've been seeing,

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I've seen them
too,' Jeanette said,

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'and they're the worst
things I've ever seen.

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So are you sure you're OK?'

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'I think so.'

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'You know, I was just having
a dream,' Jeanette said,

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'that I graduated from college,
and you and I were living

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in a one bedroom house
we bought together.

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You should have seen this place.

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The plumbing didn't
work, the wood floors

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were splattered with
paint, and everything

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was covered in grease.

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I don't know why there was
so much grease on everything,

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but there was.

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Anyway, we fixed it up until
it was a really nice house,

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and the yard that had once
been all weeds and trash

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became a real yard.

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You poured a concrete
pad and built an awning,

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so we could sit in the shade
during the summer and barbecue.

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And we planted trees.

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In my dream you had
just come home from work

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and you were bleeding.

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You'd cut yourself
from a job site.

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The cut was on your forearm.

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I tried to wash it
out in the sink,

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but it wouldn't stop bleeding.

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We decided to go to
the emergency room.

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In the dream, we didn't drive.

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It was like all of a sudden,
I was in a waiting room,

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and you were gone.

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But you weren't gone
in the doctor's office,

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you'd vanished.

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You were in the National Guard;
you were deployed in Iraq.

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In the dream, I panicked.

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And when I panic,
everything changed.

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All the walls turned
gray, and suddenly, I

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was in an empty building
that I couldn't get out of.

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I was alone and I
couldn't find you.

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And I knew, then, I'd be
stuck in there forever.'

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'But that's not real,' he said
gently and kissed her neck.

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'Maybe it is.' 'I
don't think so.'

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'In our house, there were
pictures of us all over.

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One photo had your uncle in it.

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He has long, black hair, and
he's wearing a corduroy coat.

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Your mother was short, she
had brown hair and freckles,

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and she's hugging your uncle
and they look very happy.

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They're surrounded by snow and
there's someone behind them

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that I can't quite make out.

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The image is blurry.'

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'Well, I have that picture
framed,' Leroy said.

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'When I was 13, my mom rented
a cabin in the mountains,

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and we spent the weekend
there for my birthday.

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I'm the person behind her
that you can't really see.

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My uncle took the
picture on a timer,

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but I moved in the last moment.

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That's why it's so blurry.'

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'Well, how would I
know that picture?'

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'I don't know,' he said.

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'You're going to join the army
and get killed,' she whispered.

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'That's what the dream says.'

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'It doesn't.' She moved her
hands up and down his arms

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and stopped over a long scar.

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She turned on the bedside
light and looked at it.

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'See!' she exclaimed,
'You have a scar,

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and before you
didn't have a scar.'

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'No, I've had this
scar for years.'

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'You haven't.

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I know, I feel your
arms every night.'

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'Well, I swear,' he said.

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'Well, how did you get it?'

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'I cut it on a job,' he
said, 'like your dream said.'

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'I just don't understand
any of this,' she said,

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'I don't understand what's
real and what isn't real.'

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He kissed her neck again.

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'In my dream, I
could see the couch

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we bought at Salvation
Army, and the table

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and chairs we bought
from a garage sale.

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I can remember us
painting the walls,

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and you wiring the
basement so we could

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put in a washer and dryer.

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I remember buying
towels and sheets,

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and inviting your
mom over for dinner.

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We had movie posters on our
bedroom walls and a framed

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picture of Amália
Rodrigues on our dresser.

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We had a bathtub
and a fireplace,

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and we used to make
love in every room

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because you convinced me
it was good luck to do so.

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We had everything
you could ever want.

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Why would I know all these
things that aren't real?

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Why would I be dreaming about
things like this if they

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weren't true?'

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It was early in the
morning, and the woman

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who sat holding Leroy's
arm couldn't stop weeping.

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Her name was Jeanette,
and her thin fingers

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moved over a long scar on
his arm while she spoke.

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'A couple of weeks ago,
I was going to the store.

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And in the parking lot, I
saw an old red Ford Fiesta,

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like the one I had, like the
one you always had to work on.

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I just stood there and looked at
it, and I couldn't stop crying.

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I kept thinking about all the
places we went in that car,

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of all the times
you tried to fix it

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when we went camping
in it, when we went

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to the beach, or the movies.

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I just stood there
staring at the car,

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and I couldn't leave.'" So
that's just three little

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sections of The Free to give
you a taste of what it's like.

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I'm not going to read any more,
because when I go to readings,

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I hate listening to a
guy read from a book.

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I always like to see what
weird shit he's going to say,

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if he's got anything
to say at all.

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So if you have
any questions, I'm

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more than happy to answer
them, because maybe I'll

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say something so idiotic
that it'll make you laugh.

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Yeah.

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[LAUGHTER]

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Or not.

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[APPLAUSE]

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Thanks.

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Thanks for clapping.

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[LAUGHTER]