Top Shelf Stories
In a world that often shuns the uncomfortable, we embrace it with open arms—and open laughs. Our candid narratives around our stories assure you that awkwardness is a shared human experience. Tune in, enjoy the ride, and maybe learn a thing or two.
Top Shelf Stories
Teenage Joyrides
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We trade stories about underage driving, “borrowing” cars, and the dumb logic that makes bad ideas feel smart at 3 AM. The laughs land, but the real thread is how fast luck can run out when you mix friends, speed, and zero consequences.
• Gift-giving jokes and friend group rivalry
• Where the line is between joyriding and stealing a car
• Mailbox smashing story and instant karma
• Sneaking a mom’s Subaru Outback for late-night cruising
• Knocking down construction barrels until hitting a concrete-filled one
• Ditching the wreck, running home, and the blame game
• Driving underage by swapping seats at a stop sign
• Field sobriety tests, close calls, and getting someone to retrieve the car
• Sanibel Island traffic stop strategy and why it worked
• DUI consequences, breathalyzer refusal talk, and how the rules bite back
Every Tuesday, top shelf stories. Listen to us on any podcast platform you listen to. And guess what? Tony wants to see us give give us a review and rave.
Cold Open With Gifts And Jabs
SPEAKER_02Top Shelf Stories with Jay, Chris, and Tony.
SPEAKER_00What is going on? What's up, brother? What's up, man? How you doing?
SPEAKER_02What's up, people at home?
SPEAKER_00I'm here with some of my best friends, and there's something I don't know. I don't there's something I don't know. Dude, best friends bring each other expensive bottles of liquor as a gift to give to them in front of their not as good a friend.
SPEAKER_01You know, I'm kind of angry too that uh we had or wait, you sent a message in our little group chat and you asked, hey Tony, do you smoke these fucking vapes? Because I'll buy you some. Where's Jay's present? Where is Jay's present?
SPEAKER_02I'll have to think of a present.
SPEAKER_00I don't know what you like, Jay. Boops! A pizza cutter that says I love Alaska.
Did Anyone Ever Steal A Car
SPEAKER_00Uh so anyway, I I was kinda thinking about something the other day, and I want to know before you had the legal right to drive an automobile, did you ever steal somebody else's car? Fuck out of here, no. I think I am.
SPEAKER_02I never stole anyone else's car. I did drive a lot before I was legal.
SPEAKER_01Tony's asking this question because he obviously stole a fucking car.
SPEAKER_00Has there ever been a time when you were like 15 and you were with your buddies and it was the middle of the night and you decided to jump in your mom's car and go uh joyride it, so to say.
SPEAKER_01I did worse shit. I did I broke into people's cars and stole shit out of it. Or uh drove with friends that had license and then just took bats and smashed uh mailboxes.
Mailbox Smashing And Instant Karma
SPEAKER_01I didn't steal a car ever. I know I'm an asshole. I know I'm an asshole. That's asshole stuff. Did you do that now? No. No, I'm curious. Well, I had to think about it for a second. Would you like hey guys? There was this one, there was this one of Bombay.
SPEAKER_02There was this one from my dad. You guys want to go smash the mailbox? There was this one max.
SPEAKER_01There was this one mailbox that pissed me off all the time in my neighborhood. I always wanted to smash it. It looked like a uh it was a pig, this the shape of a pig. I always wanted to smash it. So that was our fucking like strategy that night was to destroy this one. So we drove past that thing going 45. I hit it as hard as I could, didn't know, was made of metal. Fucking bat, went back into the car, smashed it, broke the window. Dude, that hurt so bad. I thought I was gonna fucking I thought my arms karma instant, instant. That thing's still standing today. That's fucking hilarious.
SPEAKER_02But I also never stole a car.
Sneaking A Mom’s Subaru For Joyrides
SPEAKER_00So I I used to have this friend, and at one time I would consider him one of my best friends. Uh, we spent most of our childhood together. It was me and uh these two friends, and we were pretty much inseparable from the time we were you actually have another friend? I didn't know you I thought you just had brothers. Like seven years old till the time we were probably 17-ish. We were inseparable. Ironically, Jason. Oh, that guy that gets drunk all the time? No, I've literally never talked about Jason.
SPEAKER_01Okay, different Jason?
SPEAKER_00But anyway, um, your only friend that's not named or was named Jason. So when we were when we were about 15 or so, and it might have been as early as 14, I I remember this, dude. His mom had a Zubaro outback. Lesbian car? Yeah, for sure. No, the Foresters, the lesbian friends. Lesbian friends. So this would have been in like ninety four or five-ish. And uh she parked it in a garage, and we used to go break into the garage and take her key and take it out and just go cruising. And we did it all the time. Who would drive? Him. Nobody else is allowed to drive his mom's car. Did you still hang out with him? No. How old was he? I haven't seen him since I was about 20 years old.
SPEAKER_02Was he like through the driver's class driving age or never?
SPEAKER_00No. I and you know, he's I'm 45, so he's 46 now. I he probably still hasn't gone through driver's ed. Okay. Um but we used to steal that car fucking in summertime when we were all staying at each other's houses every single night. It was the three of us. You couldn't break us up. I would say it's more like borrowing. It's dude, that's blatantly stealing. Okay. We returned it. Yeah, that's returning something you stole. I mean, that's not that's definitely stealing. It's using. Well, that's one way to bend it.
SPEAKER_01You never return something You never return something used? So uh not answering the question. Yeah, but I put it back.
SPEAKER_02Did you take it? Yeah, but I put it back.
SPEAKER_00We uh so we used to take this, we used to just go all over the place, and it'd be at like one o'clock in the morning. Um nothing but apparently drunks and 14 and a half year olds on the road at that time. And how old are you? Like 14 and a half. Okay. Well then you know what you cruised the highway? So we we never once got pulled over. And he drove like a 14-year-old with no driving experience. Yeah. It wasn't like Did he look old? No.
SPEAKER_01So he looked like a young kid driving a car, yeah. Never got pulled over.
SPEAKER_00That summer that we would steal his mom's car on a regular basis, the main street that we always avoided, like the first 20 times this car got stolen, um, we would always avoid this main street because it was relatively busy and you never know. You know, everybody drove fast on it. You never know. And we just we just avoided it. We went the other way, we kind of snaked through neighborhoods and stuff like that. Well, it was under construction, and instead of two lanes, it was one lane going each way. And what do they divide those lanes with? Those little orange cones. The orange 55 gallon drum barrels. Yeah. With reflectors on the top, and they basically had them for miles and they were making a wall. He ran someone over. Well,
Knocking Over Barrels Until Concrete
SPEAKER_00so he thought it would be hilarious because now it's like three o'clock in the morning and nobody's on the road anymore. I've done that before. We're just gonna we're just gonna clip them with the front end of the car and knock them all down and cause chaos in the streets. So he's trying to like hit them at a perfect angle. Yep. So we're just shoveling them into oncoming traffic, which at this time of the night there's no traffic. And I thought it was a great idea. Super smart. Yeah, like I'm like, this totally makes sense. Let's fuck this up for the city workers and everybody trying to drive down the street from here on.
SPEAKER_01Were you hyping him up? Like, yeah, dude, yeah, hit him to the fucking street, dude.
SPEAKER_00There wasn't like let's have a conversation about it. He just hit the first one and we're like, fuck yeah. And then he hit the second one and we're like, damn, dude, you're doing this. And he hit the third one, and we're like, You're gonna fuck up this whole road. And he's like, Yeah, dude, I'm gonna hit all of them. How many were there? Uh for miles. Two or three thousand of them. Oh, they're for miles? Yeah. Holy shit, that would have been a nightmare for the I'll give you the coordinates. They were from sixth in Oklahoma all the way up to 51st in Oklahoma. Oh my god. And we started our journey on our road, which was ninth. And we were heading toward 51st, and we were gonna push him until there was a fucking car, right? Holy shit. And now he's driving because they're he's realizing that these things are relatively light and they're just kind of bouncing off the car, they're not breaking or anything.
SPEAKER_01So aren't the the bottom is really heavy and and and structured, but it's weighted, but once you hit it, yeah, it separates from that. Yeah, and then it just will fly. And and the barrel just goes, dude.
SPEAKER_00It just goes. So, you know, he was kind of nudging them with the corner, and after he got through like five or driver. When he got through about five or six of them, yeah, swerving into it. It's fucking hilarious in a fucking lesbian car. And he's going up, he gets through like five or six of them. He gets through like five or six of them, and he's like, Well, now I'm just gonna drive in the center lane and just fucking blow them in front of me. Oh my god, I know what happens. And we got to one that the city of Milwaukee anticipated this happening. No, so they filled one with concrete. Oh my god. What?
SPEAKER_02And at this time we were going like 20, 25, 30 minutes. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00It was it was at 9th Street we started this, and this happened at about 13th Street.
SPEAKER_01So he got so unlucky that all these ones he hit nice and you know, sideswiped, he finally got straight on with the concrete. He got to the concrete.
SPEAKER_00Oh my and at this point, now it's the driver's side from center to end. Head on. Jesus, that would destroy that truck car, lesbian. Well, it act it actually formed itself around the cone. Oh my god! And it was embedded in it. And of course, you know, now now that I know like what things are a little bit more, he obviously blew his radiator because it's blowing smoke everywhere. Oh my god. We thought the car was gonna start on fire because we're 14 and a half.
SPEAKER_01Is that like that typically destroyed excuse me, destroyed the car?
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. I mean, the car was, for lack of better terms, totaled. I mean, back in the 90s, I'm sure they just threw new fender hood, fucking painted it up, and it was fine. But but in today's standards, if you did that with any kind of fucking car, it would be total. There'd be frame damage.
SPEAKER_01Maybe maybe he practiced this on a practice run when you weren't around him, did it for like weeks to show how good he was at it. So that's why it was filled with concrete after whatever time he had to
Running Home, Cops, And Blaming Family
SPEAKER_01practice.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so me, him, and our other buddy uh, instead of dealing with the consequence, we got out of the car, left it there in the middle of the road. Fuck yeah, do that too. And we ran home cutting through cutting through yards. We wanted to stay off the streets being chased because dogs because it would look a lot less suspicious, us popping out of people's yards, right, running across the the middle of the street, and then jumping into somebody else's yards.
SPEAKER_02Plus, you're disturbing 20, 30, 40 people as well.
SPEAKER_01Back in that day, at that age, you get pulled over, uh, or a cop would stop you for uh curfew, right?
SPEAKER_00Or my own, for sure.
SPEAKER_01Do they do that now still?
SPEAKER_00I don't know. I don't know if that's a thing. I don't think kids are allowed to go out on their own anymore. I don't think they I don't think they care anymore. But uh so we make it back home and we sneak back into the house and we go upstairs and we we like pretend we're going to sleep, but we're so fucking amped up. We were literally just in a head-on collision in the car. So the guy like where the airbag went off, my friends all like fucked up.
SPEAKER_01So Jason, the guy that's his his grand who is the car of his mom's his mom's car, he ran with you too. Yeah, and he wasn't a like like terrified, like freaking out.
SPEAKER_00I don't know. He laughed the whole run. So I'm assuming I'm assuming he was trying to hide it, and an aircraft. How do you hide this? And an airbag blew up in his face. So Oh, he thought that maybe he would be like, oh, someone really stole. Yeah. Yeah. So we get home and we go up in his room, which was in a converted attic at the time. So we sneak up this little back south side duplex staircase to get up to this converted attic, and we sneak into his room and we're being all fucking noisy because we're all amped up and just got in a car accident. And no drugs at all. No, dude, we didn't we didn't know about drugs for at least three or four weeks after that. After our first major car.
SPEAKER_01Everyone just started sucking each other's dicks, right?
SPEAKER_00And the cops did show up with the car. To the house? Yeah. They towed it over there. Yeah, it got towed back to the house, and really they woke her up. We didn't even know the cops showed up. And it was like uh, you know, stolen car, blah blah blah, all this shit. And uh yeah, dude. Uh he got asked about it in the morning and he fucking blamed it on his sister.
SPEAKER_02On his sister?
SPEAKER_00Why didn't he just face all fucked up from the airbag? She was like a year older. I don't know what happened to it. He's like, sh you know, I'm not gonna say her name, but Wow. Darren probably stole it. That's crazy. And that worked, that was it. Yeah, like more or less. Because you don't talk to him anymore.
SPEAKER_02Did you hang out with the were those parents like let you over to the house after that, too?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that was actually the dad that hit me in the face. With his dick before or after
A Wild Childhood Slap Story
SPEAKER_00this? Uh this it would have been before this. Damn it. Answer those questions. I would have been like 12 at that point where he where he hit me in my face. With his dick. And I told that story on this podcast. I just want him to answer it. We were we were kind of doing like a snapping back and forth and talking shit to each other, and I called him a piece of white trash. And because he was, he got really offended by it. That'll work. And he just stood up and fucking hit me as hard as he could across the face. I thought you'd never been in a fight or got punched. I got slapped. It's different. You said punched. Hit, I said. Oh, I mean, to me that's how hit me across the face. I mean that's not hitting. Yeah, tell that to CPS. Child protective services? Yeah. Tell him I didn't hit my kid, I just slapped him.
Driving Underage With A Girlfriend’s Help
SPEAKER_02I never I never stole a car, but I did drive when I was like 14. Because I was dating this girl, and it was when I was older, almost 15, and then 15 also. Also driving then. But I had gone, I think, to the classes, but maybe not. But I learned how to drive when I worked at a golf range on a Kubota tractor. Yeah. And once I knew how to drive a Kubota tractor, of course, you know all the rules of the road. And what man, as I was 14, 15 years old man, let's a woman drive the car for them. No. My bicycle. So we would drive. I would go to my girlfriend's house, we would get in the car, and she would drive away from her house and get out at the stop sign, and I would get in and drive. I mean, totally chucks out. But I was very afraid that I was gonna get in an accident or something was gonna rear-end me, and then I would be the driver, and it would be my fault. And then you'd have to both duck your heads and then like switch places. Yeah, we'd have to switch places somehow. But that never happened. I was very lucky. I must have been a very good driver. Yeah, definitely.
SPEAKER_01So I I never stole or brand new car, too.
SPEAKER_02Brand new car. Stole an escort? No, it's Chrysler Cyrus. Cyrus Cyrus. Fucking it was six disc changer in that bitch. Dude. Stereo six. Her fucking family was wealthy.
SPEAKER_01I never stole a car and never drove a car before I was a certain age. But I did uh
Field Sobriety Tests And Lucky Breaks
SPEAKER_01and I don't know if you guys ever gotten a sobriety test on the street with a cop. I have not, yes.
SPEAKER_02I not a machine, but a test.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no, no. You can't you can't pass the machine. Uh the blow test? What you is that what you're you said? Yeah, never had a blow.
SPEAKER_00That's actually how I get out-of-field sobriety tests. Just do the actual test. You just drive so much.
SPEAKER_01So you drive so shitty they think you're drunk, and they're like, okay, he's not drunk, give him the fucking yeah. No, I've gone through probably like five or six of them, and I beat them all, and I was wasted in most of them.
SPEAKER_02Um I failed it. The guy was like, Oh, you failed it? Yeah, he was like, You're how far from home? I was like, I'm right there. You can see the house over there. Like that light that's kind of on the horizon, that's it.
SPEAKER_01That's the worst part when you tell them how close you are to home.
SPEAKER_02Is there anyone who can come get the car? And he I said, Yeah, my downstairs neighbors don't drink. They're high as fuck on pills, though. And they didn't like me. But I showed up to their house. I was like, hey, can you go with this cop in his car and go get my car?
SPEAKER_01What happened to you?
SPEAKER_02I got fucking let off. That's why I don't wow. Yeah. I was fucking blessed, so thankful. And he's like, Yeah, you're fucked up, bro. You got you can't be driving your car. I've got if I can't, if I leave it here, he's gonna give me a ticket. He goes, If I have to leave it here, we're giving you a ticket. But if you can come get it, get someone to get it, eh? It would be good.
SPEAKER_01Well, I was always the idiot that drove to the bar or parties, and a lot of times, I don't know why, but I got I I get pulled over and then I do the sobriety test and I fucking pass it because uh I don't know why. I just great I was good at it.
SPEAKER_00You're just the one who tells them that you passed.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I'm like, I passed this before, I can do it again. I know exactly wait, I know the next test. Everyone does the same thing.
SPEAKER_00I know what you're gonna do. I know what you're gonna do. Like sober me, finally prepared for this.
SPEAKER_01So the the uh one of the times where I
The Sanibel Island Traffic Stop Trick
SPEAKER_01really was absolutely wasted, I was with my brother and we were in Sanibel Island, Florida. We were at a bar.
SPEAKER_02Oh, you could pass strict. Oh, yeah. You pass drink driving tests. You probably weren't even Florida drunk.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I was fucking I was I was waste, I was wasted. So what I did when we got pulled over because I was speeding across the fucking this bridge to get down to Sanibel. Excuse me, I uh I told my brother because when when well when they pulled me over, bees, I told my bees, there's bees everywhere. I wonder if it actually is. I wonder if that actually would actually ever work. But I told my brother, he what he was still he was wasted as shit too. But I told my brother, and this is on video because we had our camera going the whole time. I told my brother, you have to act wasted because I'm gonna tell him I'm taking you home from the bar. I picked you up at the bar, I gotta take him home because it's all fucked up, like insane.
SPEAKER_02You're only groggy because or weird looking and whatever, because you're sleepy. Because you had to come get him.
SPEAKER_01Well, what happened was when he came to my window, my brother right away jumped out of the fucking vehicle and then started acting. You said act really fucked up. Yeah, no, he was he he played it fucking beautifully. Uh he could have got shot. You don't get out of the car when you get pulled up.
SPEAKER_02No, you just sit there like a statue.
SPEAKER_01So he jumped out of the car right when the cop got there. He pulled out his fucking gun. The cop he's like, get on the floor, get on the floor, don't get on, don't move, don't move. Dad's like, just it uh making no sound, like he's making sounds, trying to say fucking words, and I didn't have to like script it or you know, tell him what to do. He was already wasted, so he was fucking idiot. And uh he irritated the cops so fucking much that they didn't look at me at all and told me to take him home. Take him up. We were actually just like you said, we were a fucking two blocks from the from our our site. Get him on our site, and I'm like, We'll do police officer. Yes, sir. I will do.
SPEAKER_02They were probably freaked out because they had to withdraw their weapons.
SPEAKER_01I was so fucked up that I didn't even know. And then we we went home, we went back to our place and Santa Bell and I was just the whole time saying, You're how lucky we got you know how lucky we are, and Dan Dan Dan fuck fucks with me every time.
SPEAKER_02Fell asleep, pass out.
SPEAKER_01But well yeah, but I'm just saying, like you can get out of it. You just gotta find you know idea. Be you know, be exciting. It's like in the movie, be in the car, be something different, do something different. It fucking works. I was so fucking wasted. There's no way I could have walked any line. Even if I got out of the car, I probably would have tripped. So how do you pass the tests? How did me before on the other ones? Yeah, uh, I wasn't as drunk. I wasn't as drunk, and you know, when you get to a point where you're at an age where you drink like almost every fucking day at parties and shit, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02You get like this uh what's the word for it? You're more drunk when you're sober because you don't have the alcohol, but you have like a baseline, a baseline of drunk. You got the shakes. That's high school or after, or I guess after
DUI Lessons And Breathalyzer Consequences
SPEAKER_02high school.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think it's like 18 to like 20 something. But uh that that was like one of the easiest ones, the best ones, but I did get a DUI one time, and I was speeding down the street that I now live on, and I passed all their tests fine, and they're like, We're gonna let you go, but we still have one more test to do. And then I was like, fuck. I didn't know you could, you know, say I I don't want to take it, or I I I refuse to take the breathalyzer.
SPEAKER_02I don't think you can refuse it. You can they've taken that right away from us.
SPEAKER_01You can, but you get if if if if you do blow over the or they'll take you to the hospital and take your blood, and if you are over the legal limit, they will take your license away for a year. So you have extra disciplinary discipline
Subaru Pronunciation And Closing Plug
SPEAKER_01give me that word. I don't know. Discipline. Disciplinary actions.
SPEAKER_02So what did they do about the car, by the way, Tony? Let's let's round that one in.
SPEAKER_00Nothing, man.
SPEAKER_02Nothing. She's got insurance claims. Another lesbian car. Is she a lesbian?
SPEAKER_00Uh later on in life. Of course. Is it a force?
SPEAKER_02This time she's serious, or you fucking You turned her, you and you're her kid. Turned her into lesbian because she had a Zuru.
SPEAKER_00Without our influence or help. Oh. Then now. Yeah, I don't know, man. I haven't seen her in 25 years. Hmm. Interesting. I'm sure she still has the same haircut.
SPEAKER_01What was it? What was the haircut?
SPEAKER_00Super Butch.
SPEAKER_01You lying, son.
SPEAKER_00Subaru special. Give me the Subaru special. You're lying. You lying. You lying. Her barber actually recommended a Zubaru to her.
SPEAKER_01Why? Isn't it a Subaru? I don't know. Why are you saying Zubaroo? It's not the fucking zoo. I always say Subaru. It's Subaru, isn't it? Or am I wrong? Am I wrong?
SPEAKER_02It is Su. He's wrong. Subaru. Who's wrong? He is. Me. I mean he's wrong.
SPEAKER_01Now you just fuck with me now. A little bit. Fuck you. All right. Every Tuesday, top shelf stories. Listen to us on any podcast platform you listen to. And guess what? Tony wants to see us give give us a review and rave. Fuck you. Bye. I can't even talk. We know.