Free God, if You're Not Up There . . . by Darrell Hammond

distinctive, high-pitched nasal way of speaking, so he was instantly recognizable when I had him saying the phrase “Hershey Highway,” which, in case you’re not up on your Urban Dictionary definitions, is slang for the, um, back passage. I was ashamed that I was putting that stuff out there, but it’s all I had. Later I considered that kind of shit blackmail material. I would be walking down the hall at SNL , and I’d be afraid someone would come up and say, “I saw you one time in Daleville, Alabama, do a joke about Pat Buttram on Green Acres saying, ‘Mr. Douglas, if I may introduce you to the Hershey Highway.’ Was that you?”
    I imagined responding in a haughty British accent, “I beg your pardon! You are mistaken, desperately mistaken. Good day, sir!”
    I started getting booked in clubs around the Southeast. Sometimes the clubs were really sports bars where the game was on the giant TV, the bar was serving gigantic Long Island Iced Teas for 75 cents, and people were fucked up out of their minds, making out, screaming, and I’d be up on the tiny stage going, “So, any birthdays?”
    People weren’t even looking at me, but I’d have to stand there and pretend that they were. You have to finish your routine. When I needed to, I resorted to horrible shit just to make it through the night. I would do the filthiest, most vile material just to see if I could get a response from the audience. On one occasion, the NBA playoffs were on, and I remember thinking, There’s a reason they don’t have the playoffs on during The Phantom of the Opera . That’s why waitresses don’t come around for last call and give patrons their checks during the big eleven o’clock number.
    So I’d do this joke: “How many people here read Penthouse magazine?”
    No response.
    “How about those letters to Forum? They’re unbelievable, right?”
    I’d start out using a cross between Bugs Bunny and a Joe Pesce kind of voice:
Dear Penthouse,
I never thought it would happen to me, but I was skydiving the other day from 1,500 feet when lo and behold I noticed that my skydiving partner was not a man but a woman. Imagine my surprise when she sidled over to me in midair, unzipped my fly, and engulfed my rock-hard cock. Although small for an adult male, a mere nine inches in length, she nevertheless hungrily lapped up my hot gurgling seed.

    A woman with blond hair teased within an inch of its life caromed off the tables in back on her way to the bathroom.
    I’d switch to a southern drawl:
Dear Penthouse,
I never thought it would happen to me, but I’m a schoolteacher at a local elementary school here. And the other day a student came up and asked if she could use my #2 lead pencil. I said yes. Imagine my surprise when she dropped to her knees, unzipped my fly, and engulfed my rock-hard cock. Although small for an adult male at a mere seventeen inches in length, she nevertheless hungrily lapped up my hot gurgling seed.

    A table full of frat boys stood up and howled at the television when their team’s star forward sank a three-pointer from half-court.
    I brought it home with my best evangelical voice:
Dear Penthouse,
I’m a preacher in the Baptist Church here in Melbourne, Florida. I never thought it would happen to me, but the other day I was giving a sermon, and a parishioner came up to me behind the lectern, unzipped my fly, and engulfed my rock-hard cock. Although small for an adult male, a mere twenty-four inches in length, she nevertheless lapped up my hot gurgling seed.

    Someone put a John Cougar Mellencamp song on the jukebox. And then I’d say to the crowd, “I’m sorry, that was over the line. I didn’t mean to offend any churchgoers out there.”
Let us pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we are gathered here at Giggles Sports Bar along Route 70 in Daleville, Alabama. It’s been quite an evening so far. A lot of drink specials going on. I was onstage a little while ago, and lo and behold I noticed that one of the audience