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1 week ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
Los Angeles is a city known for its artists and creativity. People move here because they want to put their mark on the world. But the entertainment industry is notoriously fickle and they aren’t creating new movie stars like they used to. So a lot of LA’s most creative people end up desperately needing other outlets for their creative juices. Enter: the public sidewalk. I’m not talking about buskers playing guitar for spare change.
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2 weeks ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
First of all, thank you so much to everyone who voted for me in the Webby Awards! I’m thrilled to announce that we won for best advice / how to podcast! I genuinely did not think we had a chance and I was so pleasantly shocked to find out we won.
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3 weeks ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
In a perfect summary of how my life/the world are going right now, I genuinely lost track of which day of the week it was and scrambled last minute to put this together. I’m in over my head and the wheels are coming off the wagon, but I still have a few recommendations for you. Next week, I’ll actually have an intro essay for you.
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1 month ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
I’m no spring chicken. I’ve known that for a while now, partly because I started using expressions like, “I’m no spring chicken.” That’s the kind of old timey saying that spring chickens rarely use. They’re too busy inventing new slang and creating cultural movements. But despite the fact that I am solidly a middle-aged dad now, I felt like I was keeping my finger on the pulse of popular culture through comedy.
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1 month ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
It was 9 p.m. on a Thursday in Mobile, Alabama and just about every restaurant in the area had shut down for the night. This was a problem because we had just finished the comedy show we were in town for and none of us had eaten dinner. We had arrived at the bar/restaurant that locals had recommended 5 minutes after their kitchen closed.
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1 month ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
It’s officially Spring and here in Los Angeles the lemon tree in our garden is weighed down with giant, football-sized lemons. These are not the kind of lemons you can buy in the store. They’re big and heavy and when I hand one to a friend, their immediate first reaction is “this lemon is HUGE.”It’s not at all clear to me that huge is a desirable quality in a lemon. A huge, fresh peach? Love that. A huge, crisp apple? Sounds great. A huge lemon?
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2 months ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
I’m in the final stages of writing a book about humor and how to laugh more. It’s coming out early next year (2026). I’m excited! I’m also trying my best to make sure that publishing this book doesn’t ruin my life and reputation. You see, I’ve never been the most reliable narrator. I think I’m a pretty entertaining narrator! But you wouldn’t want me to be in charge of a narrative that required all the details to be exactly accurate.
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2 months ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
It’s hard to get a good haircut. A barber once told me the difference between a terrible haircut and a good haircut is two weeks, but that felt a lot like him making excuses for the fact that I was going to look like a stunt double from Dumb and Dumber for the next fourteen days. I’ve written before about how, for years, I used to only get my haircut by one particular guy but then he left the country and I wandered through a wilderness of careless clippers and untrustworthy razor blades.
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2 months ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
The dream of any entertainer living in LA is to be cast in a role you can count on for the rest of your career. I finally booked one!No, I’m not the star of a sitcom. No, I’m not a Marvel villain. Yes, I am Zero the Hero, an alien/physical embodiment of the base-ten number system who visits my friend Jocelyn’s kindergarten class each year on the 100th day of school. This is my third year recurring in the role, which Jocelyn tells me means that I have officially booked it for good.
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2 months ago | 
chrisduffy.substack.com | Chris Duffy
When I checked into the hotel in Williamsburg, Brooklyn this week, the guy at the front desk looked at me eagerly. “Are you here for the podcast festival?”“I am,” I said. He looked up from the computer, his eyes wide. “Are you… a podcaster?”“I am,” I said. “Wow!” He said, as he handed me my keycard. I stood there for a few awkward seconds as I tried to figure out if he was messing with me or not. He seemed so genuinely excited. And yet, here we were in Williamsburg.