- And so then I'm like, "Nobody I know knows I'm here.
No one I know even knows that I'm friends with this horse."
[laughter]
"So no one's gonna come look for me."
[dark electronic music]
- [indistinct shouting] - Huh? Huh? Huh? Huh?
- Come on. Move. Come on. - What? What's going on?
- Come on. - This is not happening.
[rapid gunfire]
No, no. What...
I'm--I'm your host.
I'm your host, Roy Wood Jr.
- Come on.
- Ahh, ahh.
- Augh!
- [groans]
[glass shattering]
[panting]
♪ ♪
Mm...ahh!
[bones crunching]
[cheers and applause]
You know her from the show "Baskets."
Martha Kelly is her name.
[cheers and applause]
My story is about the ups and downs of friendship,
specifically between me
and a horse that did--
did not belong to me but show pasture
I climbed into,
because I thought it would bring us closer together,
and it came close to tearing us apart, so...
[laughter]
But just--backtrack.
I--the only thing I knew about horses when I met her
is that I thought that they liked carrots and apples.
And so I met her because I'd moved back to Austin
in 2012, and I lived in a part of the city
that was almost out in the country.
And there were a few places that had horses.
And one day when I was walking my dog,
this horse came to her fence,
and she walked the whole length of her fence
along with us, and then when we were on our way back,
she did the same thing in the other direction.
And she started doing that every day,
and I never saw any people in her pasture,
so I thought that she probably wanted me to go pet her,
because I thought...
[laughter]
I thought I had heard that horses are like
really big dogs, but...
[laughter]
I honestly believe that when people say that,
if someone says that, it's 'cause they
were dealing with a big dog that they thought was a horse.
Because they're not anything like dogs.
And I--finally, I went to pet her,
and at first, she would kind of back away.
And then she finally let me pet her,
and there were some early signs that there might be trouble
down the road.
She did a couple times look like
she was gonna try to bite my hand,
and then one time when I turned my back on her,
she grabbed my ponytail and pulled it really hard.
But I thought that that was, like,
maybe how horsed play,
and I didn't know--
and I forgot to say I'd started bringing her
carrots and an apple every day.
I would walk my dog and stop and give her--
and so I thought that we-- I thought
that's--like,
you could easily by my friendship
if you brought me a good snack every day.
So I felt--and she she seemed to like it.
So--so this is where things
kind of go south,
but it started--it seemed at first like they were--
we were entering a new phase,
because I found--
I took my dog in for a checkup, and I found out that
he had a really fast-growing, untreatable type of cancer
and that he probably only had a few weeks to live,
and I know that's not a great topic for a comedy show, but...
[laughter]
But it's relevant to the story.
So that--I was devastated, because I--
he was my first dog.
I totally treated him like a person
and loved him like a person.
And I--it's terrible that someone's laughing
at that part.
[laughter]
That's really--
that's--that's in poor taste.
But--so I'm just saying--
I'm not--but it was devastating,
and so I got the news, and I took him for a walk.
And I stopped to her her her carrots and apple,
and for the first time, she--
after she ate the snacks,
she leaned over the fence and pressed her forehead
against my head and just stood there.
And I thought, like, "Wow, horses are really sensitive.
Like, she could sense that I was really sad."
That's what I thought.
In retrospect, she might have been trying to, like,
psyche me out or something.
I don't know.
I don't--I don't know what...
But...so then my dog passed away,
and then I got another dog, who's great, but...
[laughter]
That's not part of this story.
But so a little bit later,
I kept visiting her and feeding her and petting her,
and then I--just one day...
This--this person.
I can't... [laughter]
So one day I think--
I don't know what was going on with me,
but probably some, like, reckless daredevil,
once-in-a-blue-moon thing came over me,
and I just thought,
"I bet if--like, she's like a dog.
I bet she would like it if I was petting her inside
her fence, and... [laughter]
Because that's what a dog would want want:
you to stand next to him.
And I should also say,
this had been a couple of months or more,
and never once did I even just Google "horses."
[laughter]
It never occurred to me to do that.
So this day I just decided to--
I climbed the fence and got in the pasture with her.
I thought I would have, like, a story tell
my friends later, which I did,
but it wasn't the kind of story that...
I thought it was gonna be like I was really courageous,
but I climbed in with her.
She ran away, and then she came back.
And then I just walked next to her petting her
and in a soft voice talking to her,
and then she kind of moved in front of me
and turned her back legs to me.
And then I went, "Uh-oh."
[laughter]
"This seems--this is what horses maybe do
right before they kick somebody."
So I stepped out of the way,
and then she turned around and reared back on her hind legs
and started flailing her hooves at me and whinnying.
And I still wanted to think she was playing.
[laughter]
But it was kind of terrifying,
so I just started going, "No, uh-huh, no, ma'am, no."
[laughter]
And then--and then I ran,
and so she chased me behind a tree,
and--and she wouldn't leave.
Like, she--I thought maybe she--
once I got behind the tree and she couldn't get me,
she'd give up, you know, following,
and then--so at one point I looked over,
and then her head popped out on the other side.
And so then I'm standing there for maybe, like,
15 or 20 minutes.
I'm like, "Nobody I know knows I'm here.
No one I know even knows that I'm friends with this horse."
[laughter]
"So no one's gonna come look for me.
I've never seen any people come and take care of her."
At one point a car slowed down.
And I--they were looking at me,
and instead of flagging them down for help,
I thought, "I don't want them to know that I'm an idiot
who climbed in here," so I just gave them the wave that's,
"Oh, it's okay. We're okay over here."
And I found--later I found out
those were the owners.
And--and they--I went like that,
and they drove away.
Like, they didn't--I don't know why--
they just saw some weird lady
trapped behind a tree with their horse,
and, "Oh, she waved. I guess it's fine.
We'll drive."
So they drove--so finally I saw
this horse go towards the other part of her pasture.
So I slowly walk out from behind the tree
and start kind of trying not to upset her,
walk toward the fence,
and then she came back and chased me again,
so I ran behind the little structure
that she had her hay in.
And then that lasted for, like, another 15 minutes
of having to wait for her to get bored.
She walked away again.
I ran behind another tree closer to the fence.
And then the last--
that was the last tree that, you know,
was the closest to the fence, and I thought I could make it,
so when she lost interest and walked away,
I ran for the fence, and in my mind,
in movies when people take a run at a fence...
[laughter]
They get--they jump at the last minute,
so they land high on the fence,
and then they just throw a leg over, and they're done,
but I ran at the fence,
and I tried to jump, but I still landed at the bottom.
And then--and then I--
I climbed as fast as I could, and she was running towards me,
and I threw a leg over, and it got caught.
My jeans got caught, so they ripped,
and then I--finally I got to the other side.
And so at first
I really was mad at her,
and I felt like...
I was like, you know, I'm not--
I'm not gonna come visit her anymore.
We're--like, this is why I never see people
in her pastures, 'cause she's not a nice horse,
and then later I realize I have to keep going to visit her,
because she's a terrible horse,
and no one else is ever gonna be friends with her,
so for the rest of the time I lived there,
I kept bringing her food,
and I wish there was an ending to this story,
but thank you for listening.
[dark electronic music]
- Martha Kelly.
[cheers and applause]