Ever have this one happen?
Ever have your toddler hand you part
of a prescription pill?
Uh oh.
(audience laughing)
Think about that scenario.
It doesn't matter which part.
It's equally horrifying.
So this is a couple years ago,
and my son was a toddler.
And we go to see my mom,
and you guys wouldn't know this,
but my mom is quite a bit older
than me.
(audience laughing)
And you know how it is
at elderly people's houses.
Their houses are mostly medication.
They're mostly medication.
My mom had a load-bearing pill
bottles in her kitchen.
I'm talking Hunter S. Thompson
suitcase level pharmaceutical here,
right?
So we're sitting there, and my boy--
he brings me
a gnawed-on prescription pill.
Uh oh!
(audience laughing)
So the first thing is, we got
to figure out what the pill is,
right?
So I think, what I'll do
is I'll taste it.
And then I'll be able to identify
exactly what it is we're dealing
with here.
Yeah, finally my drug use will help
my parenting, and everyone can shut
up about it because who is the hero
now?
(audience laughing)
We find out later the pill
was her morphine.
He's fine, he's fine!
He's fine.
(audience laughing)
For a while, he was really fine.
(audience laughing)
But he's fine.
Now, in the United States
of America, when your toddler eats
your mother's morphine,
the next expected action
is to dial a number called poison
control.
Here's the thing, everybody.
Maybe you know this.
Maybe you don't.
Poison control is a scam.
OK?
Just dial any number in your contact
list.
You're going to get very similar
advice.
So the first thing is, she doesn't
understand me.
And she says-- she says,
"Wait a minute.
"You say your boy is in morphine?"
Yeah, that's right.
I'm calling you from an opium den
in late 19th-century San Francisco.
And the toddler that has accompanied
me to said opium den has fallen
into a barrel of morphine
and I thought I should call you guys
to figure out whether I should pull
him out or not.
Because sometimes they say,
when a man is stabbed, you best not
take the knife out right away
and I thought maybe that same logic
held for boy in barrel of morphine.
(audience laughing)
And then she asked me the oddest
question I've ever been asked.
She says-- she says,
"is he acting strangely?"
(audience laughing)
He's two years old.
Exactly what is the strange behavior
I should be on the lookout
here for because, as it is now,
he eats mud.
OK?
He eats crayons.
And when I say crayons,
I mean crayons.
He'll eat a crayon.
Then he'll eat another crayon.
Is that the normal behavior,
or is that the morphine kicking in?
You know what, now that you bring it
up, he hasn't been making
full and complete sentences
all day long.
It's as though he doesn't understand
the rules that govern
the English language.
Is that the morphine?
You know what?
Now that you bring it up,
he's been incredibly temperamental
as of late, almost
to an irrational manner,
you might say,
where if he doesn't get exactly what
he wants, he throws himself
on the ground like an animal.
Not like a human at all,
but like an animal, and he hits,
and he kicks until he gets exactly
what he-- is that the morphine
going on there?
You know what?
Now that you bring it up, sometimes
he feels like a heavy yoke
around my neck,
weighing me down, causing me
actual, physical pain, as he is
a daily reminder of all the art
that I'll never create just
because he is alive,
all of the jokes that I won't do
and the shows that I won't attend
just because I made
the selfish decision to be a father.
Is that the morphine going on there?
You know what?
Now that you bring it up, sometimes
he feels like a vampire that's
attached himself to my vertebrae
and is sucking the youth directly
out of my life force.
Is that the morphine?
Oh my gosh.
He's crapped his pants.
The morphine's kicking in!
Send somebody!
(audience applauding)
Thanks, guys.
(audience applauding)