(Stuttering) John Melendez - Easy For You To Say

Praise for Stuttering John Melendez

John and I harken back to his grade school years, as he and my sisters, Susan and Judi, shared school days. Furthermore, he grew up only a few blocks from my family. We have another slice of life in common, Pappalardos Pizza Cove. With those credentials, I can, with the utmost of confidence, and no financial bribery, tell you John is a determined, passionate, and talented writer and performer. He looks at the business from both the stage and the balcony, and from those vantage points, his book takes you on a ride that is quite funny. Give it a read, hes our hometown friend and he tells us hes quite famous.

Steve Guttenberg, actor, comedian, author

The word no is not in Johns vocabularyunless you ask him to pay for lunch. All kidding aside, hes is a pitbull who will do anything for a friend, a boss, and for a laugh. John is one of the most fearless people I have ever met. It doesnt matter if its asking O. J. Simpson to autograph a knife or agreeing to fight someone one hundred pounds bigger than him, he will never back down. What I like best about John are the memories that I have of him going out on shoots, the laughs I have shared with him, and when we saw each other after fourteen years the conversation picked up as if we were still working together.

Richie Wilson , senior broadcast producer for
Howard Stern On Demand and E! producer

John has beat the odds and earned a front row seat during some of the most iconic shows in entertainment history! This is a book no one else couldve written!

Ross Mathews, TV personality and comedian

This is a Genuine Vireo Book

A Vireo Book | Rare Bird Books
453 South Spring Street, Suite 302
Los Angeles, CA 90013
rarebirdbooks.com

Copyright 2018 by John Melendez

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever, including but not limited to print, audio, and electronic.
For more information, address:
A Vireo Book | Rare Bird Books Subsidiary Rights Department
453 South Spring Street, Suite 302
Los Angeles, CA 90013.

Set in Dante

epun isbn : 9781644280188

Publishers Cataloging-in-Publication data
Names: Melendez, John, author.
Title: Easy for You to Say / Stuttering John Melendez.
Description: First Hardcover Edition | A Vireo Book |
New York, NY; Los Angeles, CA: Rare Bird Books, 2018.
Identifiers: ISBN 9781947856196
Subjects: LCSH: Melendez, John. | StutterersBiography. | Celebrities
United StatesAnecdotes, facetiae, satire, etc.| BISAC:
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs |
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Rich & Famous.
Classification: LCC PN2285 .M45 2018 | DDC 790.2/092/2dc23

I dedicate this book to my three wonderful kids: Knight, Lily Belle, and Oscar. I have dreamed about having you since I was a little boy, and you have surpassed all of my expectations. There is not a day that goes by that I dont feel proud to be your father. I love you always, Dad.

Contents

This is my amazing story. Its the story of an abused, bullied, stuttering, OCD-ridden kid who ends up becoming a staff writer, as well as the announcer, on The Tonight Show . Among the many things that happened to me, I became a cast regular on The Howard Stern Show , which I had been a fan of since I was a kid. I got the chance to box, something that I always wanted to dobut for me it was in front of a sold-out Taj Mahal! (The one in Atlantic City, not India.) Ive had two record deals and an MTV video. I lived the life of a rock star and rubbed elbows with some of the biggest stars in our lifetime. I wrote a song with Joe Walsh. I opened for Mtley Cre, Ozzy Osbourne, Collective Soul, Ted Nugent, and Cheap Trick all across the country! My album received a good review from Rolling Stone , and I got to guest star on Wings alongside Steven Weber and Crystal Bernard. I got to be in movies and work alongside Ashton Kutcher, Seann William Scott, and Rodney Dangerfield! As a big fan of National Lampoon , I got to write and star alongside Scandal s Bellamy Young in one of their movies! I have been lucky enough to direct stars such as Quentin Tarantino, Jack Black, Hugh Laurie, Charlie Sheen, and Gordon Ramsay. Ive hung out with the Kardashians on a regular basisokay, it all cant be good. Ive toured the country with my comedy tour. I had the opportunity to be the head writer of the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar roast. I got to fly in Donald Trumps helicopter, Howard Sterns chartered private jet, and Jay Lenos private casino jet. Heck, I was writing for Jay when he performed at the White House correspondents dinner, and one of my video jokes even made President Obama laugh!

My prank on his successor didnt exactly get the same reaction.

Still, the most important part was being a father to my three wonderful kids: Knight, Lily Belle, and Oscar. How could this kid from the lower-middle-class Long Island neighborhood of North Massapequa have achieved so much? It is because of the mantra that I have always told myself: Believe in yourself, and never, never accept the word cant . Never let anybody tell you that you are not good enough to do something, and most importantly, overcome your fears. Dont allow the naysayers and the doubting voice in your head to take control of your mind. We can all be anything that we want to. It just takes hard work, belief, perseverance, and a little bit of luck.

And one final note before we get rolling here: Much of what Ive written in this book about The Howard Stern Show is how I experienced things and how I felt at the time I was there. The truth is that I will always love Howard, Robin, Jackie, Fred, Gary, Billy, Ronnie, Scott, KC, and Artie. We had a lot of great times, and unfortunately some bad ones as well.

Anyway, here is my crazy story. Enjoy!

The Howard Stern Show: The Early Years

At the end of my high school years, I started listening to The Howard Stern Show on NBC radio. The dude told it like it was, and I was immediately a fan. I was a seventeen-year-old who still hadnt gotten laid, so I masturbated all the time. I even tried banging a Noxzema jar and nearly burned my penis off. I thought I was crazy. Not for trying to bang a jar of Noxzema, but for masturbating. I would ask my friends if they masturbated and they would say, No, of course not.

I felt like an outcast. Because of my Catholic upbringing, I would mark on my calendar how many days that I would do it each month and try to keep it down to like eight rubs a month, but if I went over, I felt so guilty, like I was sinning so much and giving in to the devil. Anyway, I started listening to Howard Stern and he talked about waxing the carrot all the time. I thought, Wow, Im not the only one. Little did I know that my friends were full of shit. Those motherfuckers were beating off so much they lost feeling in their right hands.

Id listen to Stern while driving for Wholesale Tirethis tire warehouse where I worked off and on since I was thirteen and through collegeor when my mom picked me up from the train that I took to NYU. Id listen to him when I drove to my job selling housewares at Sears or when I was counting electronic parts at Standard Radio. Id listen to him, Jackie, Gary, Robin, and Fred all the time.

See, I was a huge MAD Magazine fan, and this show had the same irreverence. In fact, one of the ways my dad would get me to go to church with him every Sunday was that, after Mass, hed take me to the candy store, where Id get one package of candy and one MAD . I couldnt wait until the latest edition came out. The Stern Show reminded me of just that, MAD Magazine .