This Week In a lively interview on LeMent Tonight, Eric Sizemore, a librarian and comedian from Champaign, Illinois, shares his eccentric observations on modern life, ranging from the quirks of parenting to his "twin passions" for wealth and librarianship. The conversation weaves through a variety of colorful topics, including a "service lizard" encounter at his library, a satirical take on the lack of real-life Batmans among today’s billionaires, and the "industrial charm" of nearby Decatur’s soybean-scented, Blade Runner-esque landscape. Eric Sizemore https://youtube.com/live/V3uYMcR3qLA Bad AI Transcript Hey, everybody, and welcome to LeMent Tonight. my guest tonight is eric sizemore all the way from Champaign, Illinois. Uh, thanks everybody for being here. Hey, uh, Gary, how are everybody doing there? I know gary quit being somebody to me so erica hailed now, are you originally from uh champaign uh yeah coincidentally born here and then yeah. Oh, okay. Well, there you go all the way. From Champaign, Illinois. If people don't know who Champaign is, Champaign is. Don't tell them, Bob. We don't want people here. Well, I was going to say it's famous for several things. Okay. All right. It is the flagship of the University of Illinois schools. Yep. And Hal 9000 was born there. So there you go. Yep. Yep. If people know those references. But everybody, Eric Seismar. Eric, take it away. Oh, thank you so much.
Hey, who else is making poor choices tonight? Me and Bob. Amazing poor choices. I am a parent. A lot of people, I can feel sort of some non-parental vibes through the screen here out there. I'm going to give a little preview of the future. As soon as you become a parent, it's very annoying. As soon as people find out, they get in your face. They're just like, how many kids do you have? How many kids do you have? could know that hey you got you guys know star wars good so i don't have to explain that abomination of a 300 billion dollar defense program? I'll tell you, man. A lot of people don't know, since president ronald Reagan, we have been trying to shoot things in the sky. Pew, pew, pew! Haven't hit a single thing.
Seriously. Yeah. I'm saying Imperial Stormtroopers hit more. You see what I'm saying? Anyway. A little about me. My twin passions are comedy and librarianship. As you can tell, I am drawn to wealth and power. Ah, it's fun, man. I was working in the library the other day and just had a patron just like threw down her hands, just complete body. You could just read the body language of frustration. She just went, you ever just been done? I mean, you don't care what people think. You don't care what grade you get. You're just done. I looked around. I was like, are you, are you a comedian too? We are thick around here. Not the most interesting thing, though, that happened in the library. I got called into the computer lab the other day because somebody had brought their iguana. I had to explain to them that we have a very strict no animals policy. To which she replied, it's a service lizard. Which is complete nonsense. But it is my new favorite euphemism. At your service. All right.
uh this is uh bob this is my uh 395th set doing comedy yeah that's fantastic yeah i know none of the other comedians you've interviewed keep track, and to them i say, you don't count uh i do think it's funny i like i like to count things uh i don't know if you know this, but 100 years ago uh planet earth got its very first billionaire, jd Rockefeller. Now, a little over 100 years later we got now a little over 100 years later we got now a little over 100 years later we got just north of 3 just north of 3 just north of 3 000 billionaires oh my gosh 000 billionaires oh my gosh 000 billionaires oh my gosh not one batman you know we gotta you know we gotta do you know we gotta do you know we gotta do here we just gotta keep cutting their here we just gotta keep cutting their here we just gotta keep cutting their taxes until those batmen trickle down. do you think it's funny though i mean do you think it's funny though i mean do you think it's funny though i mean your whole life, you're raised thinking your whole life you're raised thinking your whole life you're raised thinking you know, there could be a batman nobody you know there could be a batman nobody you know there could be a batman nobody ever once said to elon elon ever once said to elon elon ever once said to elon elon we gotta save the city we gotta save the city
just like i could send some mean tweets to billy Irish. eilish Worthless. No toys. Somebody's feeling me. Where are these thumbs up coming from? Whoever you are. I like you. Thumbs up back uh i uh i got into i got into comedy uh i guess because i have no filter pretty much just say whatever crosses my mind. I figured that out. Uh, I stumbled into a gay bar. I didn't know it was a gay bar, but there was about four women's softball teams there, and I figured it out. It's a pretty small town, as you know, so one of my old girlfriends from literally middle school, she ran up to me, and she was just like, oh, Eric, I just want to let you know that now I'm a lesbian. I don't know why. I just said, oh, that's fine. Some of my favorite movie stars are lesbians. She's like, oh, really? Like who? I was like…
i don't know their names. Yeah, whatever crosses my mind uh yeah whatever crosses my mind uh yeah whatever crosses my mind uh had a friend of mine told me say i had a friend of mine told me say i had a friend of mine told me say i said i was born in decatur said i was born in decatur said i was born in decatur and i said i've had sex there turns turns out that is not the turns turns out that is not the turns turns out that is not the politically correct thing to say politically correct thing to say politically correct thing to say somebody somebody tells you there from somebody somebody tells you there from somebody somebody tells you there from decatur you are supposed to say i'm decatur you are supposed to say i'm decatur you are supposed to say i'm sorry sorry
Oh, something laughed. Good. Yeah, let's see here. I was thinking, you guys, I am a librarian, so do you guys read books? Folks out there reading books? Sure. Excellent. You know that book, How to Win Friends and Influence People? It used to be the second most popular book in the whole world. It's a great book. A lot of people read that book. Unfortunately, though, if people see you in public reading that book, they will know. You have no friends. How about 1984? There's a title that's been flying off the shelves lately. You know 1984? Yeah. Absolutely love that book. Love one of the concepts in there. He's working for the Ministry of Information, and he's destroying the dictionary. They're deleting words. They're destroying words. That's his whole job.
And I thought that was just the coolest thing. So I started gathering words that I thought had been destroyed. And I said to my parents, I was like, hey, do you guys know any words that have been destroyed? I swear to God, they turned to me in unison and they went, gay. I'm not sure. The way I picture it happening, they had just donned their gay apparel. And we're getting ready to go out and have a gay old time. Some queer just shot in there and ruined it. I told that joke one time and this voice in the back of the bar just went, sorry. Anyway, I love words that have been destroyed. You ever come up with one, please let me know. Oh, I got one. Presidential. I feel like that used to mean something. I don't know what it is anymore. Oh, probably my favorite. This will be my last.
Uh, Amazon mirror back amazon used to be like a beautiful rainforest, right? That, that we needed to preserve by using a lot less cardboard boxes. That's my time. Thank you so much i gotta go drain the service lizard. Eric Sizemore. Thank you very much, Eric. Hey, that was great. I'm glad I threw in Decatur. You're from Decatur. I'm from Decatur. I'm like, hey, guess what? I had sex in Decatur, too. I don't remember seeing you there. It seems like a smaller town than it is. You'd think. You would think, right? I told that in Carterville, which is almost to Cairo. Right. That's south. Way south. I told that joke, and 200 people laughed at Decatur. Did everybody in Carterville show up for this thing, or what? Was it a family reunion? What was it? When we got done, the booker said, you saved the town. It wasn't just a show. You saved the town, boys. That's right. We were in dire straits, and then that Decatur joke pulled everybody out of the fire. I was…
I was not sure how geographically aware Americans were, but they laughed real hard. And I was just like, can you smell it from down here? That's right. Yeah, soybeans. That's money, son. Fresh air. You know, yeah. Just drive a few miles, you'll be out of it. Don't worry about it. Yeah, Decatur stinks pretty bad, especially… Yeah, near… Well, now it's all Archer Daniels, but it used to be called Staley, A.U. Staley Company, but yeah, terrible. I love it. I tell sci-fi fans, you got to drive there at night, man, especially in the wintertime because they got that one bridge that you go over through the plant and there's all the lights and the smoke and everything. It's like a scene from Blade Runner. It's like the opening of Blade Runner. It's very cool. And it smells horrible. Yeah, yeah. You feel like you're in a toxic wasteland dystopia.
Exactly. I was thinking Brazil. It reminds me of the movie Brazil, uh, because all the, uh, piping and there's even piping. So if you go out to, um, there's a little community college indicator called richland community college. And there's literally pipes that run from archer daniels all the way to the college because they heat the college. Wow. And that was part of a bargain that was struck. uh, wh