- Hey.

I am, he's right, I'm Brad McMurran.

And I know the theme of the night is home and I don't have one.

Well, I did, we'll start with this way.

So, I'm gonna rewind to October 30.

Can anybody hear me all right?

Am I too close?

Okay.

October 31st, Halloween night in 2021, we have a show here that's called "The 666 Project," which is where we get these directors.

And it's kind of a Halloween kind of feel to it.

And when the show was over, I had some weird things going on and I had to leave and I went home.

And that night when I went home, I had had a drink or two and thank you.

And I went home.

And when I got home, I had left the TV on and I thought to myself, you know what, I'm gonna watch "Columbo" 'cause he's fun.

And so, I had the TV on and I sat down in this, on my sofa.

And it was about two o'clock in the morning, I'd say.

And I'd heard a party going on downstairs, no big deal.

And the next thing I know, it was five in the morning and at five in the morning.

And I've been thinking out like just a few minutes ago, I was thinking about how to describe this.

I hope I don't get in trouble, but when I woke up, I couldn't breathe.

And that isn't always awkward, 'cause sometimes I smoke marijuana, but, but this time it was a little too much where this whistle was coming outta my body where I was like, (groaning) and I was like, "Now what the hell's going on?"

And I looked down my hallway and I thought I saw like a child or a little person kind of running down my hallway.

And I lived by myself, so I was like, they're not welcome.

And, but when I looked over, I started to realize it was actually, it was a fire.

There was a flame going down my carpet.

And I said, "Oh man, am I dreaming?"

I think I actually really said, it was like, "What the hell is going on?"

You know?

And I went to go move my legs and they weren't moving, right?

And it was not because of the alcohol.

So when they bring this up in the court that I'm suing them about that is not about the alcohol.

It was about carbon monoxide.

And I couldn't get my legs to move right, and I started to realize and looked over my sofa, and this was on fire, too.

So I'm like, I may be in some trouble.

And I kind of flipped off the sofa and I landed flat on the ground, but I don't mean to sound like a scientist, but fire rises.

And I caught a breath for the first time.

And I was like looking around, I'm like, "Okay, I am in a fire, right?"

And that's what's going on, right?

And so I said, okay, I know that there's a window there that doesn't open, you'll hear about that in the court case, that doesn't open.

And then down the hallway, I went and looked, and that was completely engulfed in flames.

So I have a door that is like the front door, but I have been having problems, the doorknob on it because the door swells.

I won't get into it all, but it would never work.

And so, I went to this door and I had to jump over a little bit of a fire, and I grabbed the doorknob and I pulled it to get out of the house and the doorknob came off in my hand.

And if y'all know me, I'm real cocky.

I'm the kind of guy that thinks I can do anything.

But this was that first moment I'm like, "Oh man, this may be Brad's bad day."

And I know I tell this all the time, but that song, Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down" played in my head.

And I'm like, "You got this."

And I made an announcement.

I didn't have a choice.

So I just made this announcement, which I'll get to in a minute, where I can corroborate this.

I said, in a very deep, very awful like breathing smoke voice.

I said, "I'm gonna do a Greg Louganis out the window."

And I had made this plan up where I was gonna take this chair and just run with it and jump out of the window of the second floor 'cause I didn't, I really didn't have a choice.

And I heard this man say, "Is there somebody in there?"

And I'm like, "Fuck yeah."

Not supposed to cuss, but I just did.

And he said, "I'm breaking the door down."

And right as he did, I dropped and he broke the door down.

And the part they don't tell you about like fires is people like to watch 'em.

And this man, this fireman, is carrying me out over his shoulder.

And I'm a little tubby and he's got me over his shoulder and I'm wearing these boxer shorts that are extremely tight, right?

And all of my neighbors that were out there said that, I'm real pale, they said I was purple, right?

And they threw me on this gurney, and I know Lindsay's in the crowd who was living across the street.

And I saw her face, and I'm getting taken to this ambulance.

And they get you in the ambulance.

I'm looking up this burning flame fire in West Gantt, the one that was down there on Redgate sort of, Greenway Court.

And when I get into this ambulance, I said, "Is that my apartment on fire?"

And he goes, "Yes."

And I said, "Is everybody all right?"

He goes, "We don't know yet."

I said, "Okay."

I said, "Well, I guess I'm happy that I'm gonna live."

And he goes, "Oh no brother, we don't know whether your esophagus has melted into your stomach."

(audience chuckling) And I remember, I held and I'm like, "Okay, what would you suggest I do here?"

(audience laughing) And he goes, "If I were you, I'd just breathe."

And I'm like.

So they stick you with everything you can think of.

They put me on anti-cyanide pills, right?

Which is because, and again, don't think of me as a scientist 'cause I'm not, but apparently carbon monoxide sticks to red blood cells like 10,000 times quicker than oxygen does.

So, I was very carbon monoxide, right?

And they get me to this hospital, and they take me to the burn unit, right?

Immediately, right?

And what people don't realize about burn units, and it really has changed the way I look at this on a serious note is they have blinds in there, which I didn't quite understand, 'cause if you think about it, people are burned, right, you know?

And so, there's these blinds in there, and I'm breathing, and this doctor comes in and says, "Okay, here's where we are.

You're about almost 38%, 37% carbon monoxide at this point in time.

We have a four hour window.

If you don't recover in that four hours, they're gonna put you in one of those compression chambers.

Like you would be in the, I don't know, the bends or something, right?

So, I said, "All right, I know what I'm gonna do.

I'm just gonna breathe here."

And so, I'm breathing with this oxygen mask on, and every few minutes, this blind would come down and this nurse would keep looking in.

She's like this, and she would wave, and I would be like, hey, you know?

And finally she came in and she was like, "Hey, I just wanna let you know, I've seen you do comedy before."

(audience laughing) And I was like, "That means the world, yeah."

And yeah, I put it back on and she would leave, and I was like, "I'll get you free tickets if I live, you know?"

And so, anyway, again, I had thought about, there's a bunch of stories that go to this, but this is the one I wanted to go with 'cause of home.

Is that, what you forget?

So, four hours later they come in and I know I've got my basketball buddy out there, Mark is, they came to me and the guy goes, "What sport do you play?"

And I said, "Basketball."

And he goes, "Well, I think it saved you today.

You've gotten into the numbers where you're gonna live."

You know, and I'm like, "Man, that's cool news."

And he's like, "We want to keep you overnight."

And I'm a comedian, my insurance.

Well anyway.

(audience laughing) So, I was like, "Nah, I'm good."

(audience laughing) And I said, "Doc, am I gonna die?"

And he goes, "No, you'll be all right."

I'm like, "I'm outta here."

And but here's the thing that you also don't think about when you're in fires is I didn't have anything.

So, I was in underwear when I got there.

So when I get out, they give you a pair of pants that don't fit.

And I had the yellow socks still on.

And this, I was still wearing the nightie thing out of this hospital.

So, my brother, I didn't have a cell phone, it had burned in the fire.

And I called my brother and I said, "Rob, can you bring me some clothes?"

And he was like, "Yeah, man."

He's like, "Are you all right?"

I'm like, "No, my house burned down."

And he's like, "All right, I'm gonna bring you some clothes."

So, I go back to this house and I see my brother and he gives me these clothes.

And my nephew is there, his name is Trey, but I call him Octopus.

And we are like, he like loves his uncle.

And I don't blame him.

And I love him dearly too, but he kinda looks up to me and he's about 11, I guess, at the time.

And they're trying to be sweet.

And they've given me these clothes.

And I saw people over there.

My family was there just trying to be supportive as I'm looking at this wreckage of my house that's gone.

You know, I was the one that lost the most in that, right?

My apartment cooked.

So, some people got some stuff back.

I had 97% gone, right?

And the one thing that was there was this book bag.

And if you know me, I carry a book bag everywhere.

It's kinda like a man purse or whatever.

And I carry it everywhere with me.

And it has everything in my life in it.

And this fireman had pulled it out, or it was there or whatever it was on the ground.

I saw it and it was all burned.

And I had this, I have a temper, and I grabbed this book bag and I threw it across whatever street that is, Westover or whatever.

And I threw it out in the street.

And my nephew being really sweet goes to run after it, right?

But like I said, everything in my life is in there.

So, all my marijuana flew out all over, all over the ground.

So I'm like, God dang it.

I'm like, now I'm gonna have to like tell my nephew that I do drugs, right?

And his mother's like more pious than I am.

She's a great mother.

And she's like, "Oh, Trey, don't touch that."

And he said something really cute.

He goes, "Oh Mom, if you don't, my uncle's a comedian.

I know he does drugs."

And so, I'm having this embarrassing, real embarrassing moment kind of in this moment.

And again, I'm hearing all these giggles going on and I've got this temper going on and I look down and my brother had, and I know Lindsay's in the crowd out there.

She saw it this day.

My brother had brought me a shirt, you know, that was really kind.

But on the shirt, and I have a picture of it.

I meant to bring it.

It says, I hear you laughing already.

It says, "Home is where the heart is."

(audience laughing) So, you know, I'm starting to stare at him.

I'm like, "You think you could have picked a better shirt than this, man.

I mean, it seems kind of insensitive."

He's like, "Oh my bad," you know?

And so anyway, sort of fast forward on this, and I know I'm at time, so I'll be done here in a second.

But I had, one of the things I wanted to tell is that how, you know, I heard Rick say earlier, which was so lovely about what a home is, right?

And I'd like to know what that is.

But what I would say to you is the community was wonderful to me.

I mean, it really, really, they raised money.

I spent it all, but they raised money and they raised money for me, which was really nice.

But one of the things that happened is is I meant to wear it, but during the summertime I had, I like hats 'cause I'm pale and I bought a hat down in North Carolina that was like a, it had apples on it and bananas.

And it was like one of my funny hats I'd wear.

And I guess there were pictures on social media about me having this one particular fruit hat.

And any who, the way the community decided to help me is everybody started buying these fruit hats for me.

So, I didn't have any clothes, but I had 95 fruit hats.

I'm talking about, I have every avocado.

I'm not kidding.

You'll see in the summertime, I have every one of these kinda hats that everybody, I guess was trying to be nice.

I have duplicates if you need any.

And but anyway, they were buying all these hats for me, which was really lovely.

But where I'm sort of going with this is that I sort of had this moment where when all this madness happened, and yes, there was comedy all involved.

I felt like I needed to give back.

And I'll wrap it up on this, is I decided to throw a comedy show here for all of the EMTs that saved my life.

The entire Hampton Roads area.

And I threw it here and I made it for free and let them drink for free.

And I wish I had that money back.

But I did all of that.

And I did this show up here and I told that story I told you about the bravery of me getting out, my getting outta the house, right?

And I had this surreal moment where, here I am in kinda the same place I am with y'all, where, you know, if you're up here, I can only see this front row right now, I can't see anybody.

And I said, you know, "There's my story and now I wanna let y'all, all the firemen to say thank you, but I also get a big moment for me.

I get to meet firemen that saved my life."

And this man came up named Mike Rydberg, who ended up winning Firemen of the Year for this.

And he comes up and I gave him the biggest hug I've ever given a human being in my life.

And was like, "Thank you for saving my life."

And he goes, "Absolutely."

And I was like, "Now that story I told you about, like, how it went that night.

Is that the way you remember it?"

And he goes, "No.

(audience laughing) When I came in there you were on the ground going, "Everything hurts.""

And he was like, "Get up, bitch."

(audience laughing) That's what home makes me think of.

(audience laughing)