THE WEEK BEFORE SATURDAY
Chapter One: Doniphan, Missouri
I showed up nine days early. That was my first mistake.
By Friday night, I had been in Doniphan, Missouri, long enough to have acquired an accidental mullet, a Doniphan tattoo, an ostrich egg, and a reputation with the Chamber of Commerce as “The Hugger.” I had not applied for any of these positions.
Briar Sjurset, better known as Doniphan Deadpool, had my signature permanently tattooed on his leg. His wife Jessie had tattooed DONIPHAN on me while two baby kangaroos waited outside in a stroller beside a toothless monkey with a history of drinking Wild Turkey and sexually harassing women.
I remember thinking we must be kin.
Teresa had taught me that the survival instructions for the Current River were hidden somewhere inside the gossip. Our inflatable unicorn had been kidnapped, held for ransom on Facebook, and returned. People were leaving gifts at our RV. Half the town thought I was running for mayor.
I had been there eight fucking days.
The comedy show wasn’t until Saturday.
Everybody Kept Saying Doniphan
This whole thing started with a Facebook post.
I asked people where the REAL small towns were.
I wanted three Dollar Generals, one Mexican restaurant, and a stop sign everybody is still pissed about.
Every town thinks it’s small.
“Come to my town, Dustin. Ain’t SHIT here.”
Then I look it up and y’all have a Target.
Motherfucker.
Y’all have amenities.
But one name kept showing up.
Doniphan.
Doniphan.
Doniphan.
Finally I said fuck it. Let’s go see what the hell is wrong with these people.
I was talking to several places about bringing a show to town when Beth Rigdon reached out from Rocky River Resort.
Everybody else was selling me on their venue.
Beth said, “We aren’t the fanciest place, but you can stay here and float the river.”
Sold.
Quit talking before you fuck it up.
Then somewhere in all the back-and-forth, Beth came up with a name for the show
Redneck Rendezvous.
Well fuck me to tears.
Now we had a name.
We still didn't really know what the hell we were doing, but it had a name, which makes anything feel about 40% more legitimate.
Most of the time, I get to a town, check into a hotel or campground, do the show, meet everybody, and leave.
You learn the stage, the green room, and which gas station stays open late.
That’s about it.
I didn’t want to do that this time.
I wanted to actually live in this one for a minute.
So Dana and I showed up nine days early.
Beth later told me some people didn’t believe I was really coming.
Oh yeah?
I fucking live here now.
When we first pulled into Rocky River, I remember telling Dale
“This is it... Whatever IT is, this is it.”
I couldn’t explain what I meant.
I told Dana, “I feel like I know these people.”
I did not know a single motherfucker.
But I knew them.
Nine days later, unfortunately, I was fucking right.
The Mother of Redneck Rendezvous
Beth took a chance on me and this weird little idea before there was a crowd to prove any of it would work.
I brought the RV and the dick jokes.
Beth gave the thing a name and somewhere to happen.
That makes her the Mother of Redneck Rendezvous.
Which I guess makes me the father.
I don’t know.
We weren’t careful.
Now there’s 350 people in lawn chairs and we have to raise it together.
Whatever this thing turns into, Beth gets to say she was there when it was born.
Because she fucking was.
I Live Here Now
Dale Neece handles the outside work and operations at Rocky River.
He made sure we had everything we needed, checked on us, talked shit, and laughed all week.
Just a cool motherfucker.
That’s my dawg.
His son is Konnor.
With a K.
Every single time that kid saw me..
“DUSTIN SIMS IS HERE! MOM! DUSTIN SIMS!”
Buddy.
I have been parked 200 yards from your house for six days.
At some point this is no longer an appearance.
I live here.
But every time I came around the corner, Konnor reacted like fucking Travis Tritt had just landed a helicopter in the campground.
Konnor brought me rocks.
Quartz, specifically.
That’s his favorite.
A man with taste.
He had an awesome collection.
Tells the best jokes, too.
He actually got up at the show Saturday and told two of them in front of 350 people.
Kid wants to be a YouTuber.
Great kid.
Even reads better than I do.
He thought it was incredible that I was a YouTuber.
I thought it was incredible that somebody could see me six days in a row and still be that excited on the seventh.
And after watching him grab a microphone in front of 350 people like it was nothing, I believe him.
He’s gonna be a YouTuber.
Mayor of Doniphan.
President of the United States.
Whatever the fuck he wants.
Just remember I knew him back when he was paying me in quartz.
Konnor told me his dream is to be a YouTuber. He’s too young to run it himself, so I made him a channel for when he’s old enough and his dad says it’s time. And I just wanted him to be able to say he’s officially a YouTuber.
Go subscribe to Konnor Rocks. There’s nothing on it yet. Y’all are just getting in early.
Kid paid me in quartz. Least I can do is find him some subscribers.
People started stopping me for pictures while I was riding my bicycle around town.
One woman was shaking so bad she couldn’t speak.
I genuinely thought her blood sugar was low.
Her friend said me coming to Doniphan was the best thing to happen there.
Which is obviously not true.
But don’t correct her in front of me.
People at the hotels and gas stations were talking about the show.
And THAT started making me nervous.
These people had built me up.
I knew I could do the show.
It was being Dustin Sims the rest of the fucking week that had me nervous.
People knew the loud, wild version of me from the videos.
That IS me.
It just ain’t all of me.
Sometimes I’m quiet. Sometimes it takes me a minute to warm up.
I didn’t know if I could live up to the lore.
What if they met regular me and wanted the other motherfucker?
I didn’t want to let them down.
Dana said, “The pressure is off. They’re happy you’re here.”
She was right.
She usually is.
By then Doniphan was already scheduling my appointments and leaving tribute offerings at the RV.
Apparently I’d gotten the job.
I just didn’t know what the fuck the job was.
Bingo
Beth took us to bingo at Doniphan’s VFW Post 3485.
On the way she casually mentioned she hadn’t been in about thirty years.
Hang on.
You LIVE HERE.
You’re taking ME somewhere YOU haven’t been in thirty fucking years?
Then I figured it out.
Beth was making a return.
She was about to walk through those doors like
“Yeah, BITCHES. Guess who I brought.”
Julie Braschler was calling the numbers.
Julie is sweet, naturally funny, originally from Boston, and does not approve of how much I say “fuck.”
Naturally, we had her introduce me at the show.
I thought bingo was going to be relaxing.
Fuck THAT.
These people were athletes.
Julie was calling the numbers too fast.
One woman threatened not to come back the next week.
And what scared me was nobody laughed.
Everybody basically looked around like
“Yeah, she IS going a little fucking fast.”
Oh.
So there are standards.
Apparently Julie was one B-12 away from a work stoppage.
Better slow them balls down, Julie.
Tuesday night’s about to look a little different.
Barbie helped Dana and me play.
And by “helped,” I mean this woman essentially adopted two grown adults for the evening.
Barb had eight arms and could hear into the future.
She marked her cards.
Dana’s cards.
My cards.
Probably cards at another VFW.
I was thirty-five years old in a room full of senior citizens and somehow I was the one requiring adult supervision.
Between rounds, a man walked around with a dry-erase sign advertising a one-dollar chance to win a 9lb Boston butt.
Carried it like a boxing ring girl.
Just walking laps.
B-14.
G-52.
WIN THIS ASS.
I immediately wanted him at the comedy show.
Then a woman asked why I hadn’t answered her Facebook comment about performing at the VFW.
She started explaining why it would be a better venue.
Beth was sitting RIGHT THERE.
Ma’am.
I have known Beth approximately four days and somehow I am already offended on her behalf.
We hadn’t even finished bingo and somebody was trying to get me in the transfer portal.
The woman told me to come back afterward for a picture and to talk business.
When she walked away, I leaned over to Beth.
“I don’t want to fucking talk business.”
“I’ll go tell her.”
Oh.
Fuck yeah.
I got shooters.
Eventually the woman asked Beth, “What are you, his handler?”
YOU DAMN RIGHT SHE IS.
I had been in town less than a week and already required local representation.
I posted about bingo and tagged Julie and Barb.
Somebody commented
“Holy shit, I think this motherfucker might actually run for office.”
And when I looked at my week...
Fair.
I rode my bicycle around town.
Went to the VFW.
Met the Chamber of Commerce.
Supported local businesses.
Julie took us through the Current River Heritage Museum, where they had actual taxidermied bullfrogs holding banjos and other instruments.
Somebody had taken Joe Diffie’s “Prop Me Up Beside the Jukebox” and done it to frogs.
Now THAT is Art.
So bingo was senior outreach.
The museum was historical preservation.
Floating the Current River was an environmental study.
I’m not saying I was qualified to be mayor.
I’m just saying I didn’t know what the other motherfucker had accomplished that week.
I’d asked people to tell me something about Doniphan nobody else would know.
One woman told me she had two history books that had belonged to her granddaddy. The last things she had from him.
Oh, fuck.
I told her she could hold them open and I’d take pictures. I did NOT want to be responsible for those books.
She brought them anyway.
I thanked her, got on my bicycle, and took them straight back to the RV.
Dana watched me walk in carrying them and just shook her head.
I was looking for gossip. Now I’m responsible for somebody’s fucking inheritance.
And somewhere between the dead frog band and local history,
I found out Julie has a dream. The Big Gig.
She wants to break the WORLD RECORD for the largest gig and turn it into an annual event in Doniphan.
Which feels appropriately Julie.
Tuesday night she’s fighting for her life over the speed of B-12.
Wednesday she’s trying to get Guinness World Records involved.
I hope she fucking does it.
At the museum Julie introduced me to a woman from the Chamber.
She looked at me and said
“Oh, you are the hugger.”
The fuck did you call me?
She explained that I hug people.
I KNOW THAT.
I wanted to know who the fuck I had hugged long enough, hard enough, or frequently enough that local government had begun documenting it.
I’d been there less than a week.
Already had a municipal nickname.
People kept warning me about Doniphan, too.
I asked everybody to bring random junk from home to decorate the stage.
“You don’t understand. People are going to bring trash.”
I know.
That’s what I fucking asked for.
Then I told people they could put their chairs out Friday and leave them overnight for Saturday.
“Those chairs are going to get stolen.”
BY WHO?
Y’ALL ARE THE ONES COMING.
Everybody kept warning me about Doniphan like another, worse Doniphan was on the way.
Y’all keep warning me about y’all.
Doniphan Started Scheduling Me
Tucker Koenig is the other manager at Rocky River.
His unofficial position is Shit Show Coordinator.
He warned me our sound guy, Cody Harris from Grateful Headz, could get distracted.
Oh, man. There can’t be two of us.
While Dana and I were at the museum, Tucker texted that the sound guy had arrived.
I told Julie we had to go.
Then we talked for another twenty minutes.
Made it to the door.
Talked another ten.
In Doniphan, “we gotta go” is how you START leaving.
By the time I got back, the sound guy had already left to pick up his kids.
Later, Dana and I were in a thrift store when she asked if I’d texted him.
“Shit. I forgot. I saw something shiny.”
Tucker had warned me about the wrong motherfucker.
This is why “directly” isn’t a time. It means I have acknowledged the thing.
Could be twenty minutes. Could be next Thursday.
I felt very understood in Doniphan.
I was the technical difficulty.
A woman drove past the campground several times before finally stopping to talk.
First question:
“You drink?”
No.
“Smoke weed?”
No.
She looked genuinely frustrated.
“What the fuck am I going to give you then?”
Her disappointment made me feel like I had failed HER.
I suggested heroin.
Her name was Jacqueline.
She was a hairdresser.
I asked if she’d cut my hair, but when I tried to go, she was closed.
I BRIEFLY mentioned this within hearing distance of Tucker.
I didn’t realize how seriously he took the job until he walked up out of nowhere
“I made you a haircut appointment for two.”
Excuse me?
I didn’t ask him.
Apparently Doniphan had taken custody of me.
Thanks, Dad.
I went to Jacqueline and asked for a scissor cut with shorter sides.
Simple.
At no point did I request a mullet.
At some point I looked up...
I was getting a fucking mullet.
She said she could cut a good mullet.
I bet you fucking can.
That’s muscle memory.
At that point I didn’t even stop her.
Fuck it.
Apparently Doniphan was customizing me.
Of Course There Were Kangaroos
Thursday night Dana and I rode our bicycles to Black Veil for my tattoo appointment.
Outside were two baby kangaroos in a stroller, a monkey, and a snake.
Okay.
Sure.
Why the fuck not.
They’d come from SEMO Exotic Sanctuary.
People were trying to talk to me while I stood there figuring out which animal I was supposed to acknowledge first.
Do I pet the kangaroo?
Ask about the snake?
Why is the monkey looking at Dana like that?
I had been in Doniphan a week and was losing the ability to identify what required a follow-up question.
Of course there were kangaroos at my tattoo appointment.
Then somebody told me the monkey had no teeth because a previous owner had let it drink Wild Turkey.
Okay.
THERE’S the follow-up question.
Then they warned me that he liked women and would pull down shirts or lift dresses.
So let me make sure I understand this animal.
No teeth.
Drinks Wild Turkey.
Harasses women.
Are we sure this motherfucker ain’t from Muscadine?
Inside, Jessie tattooed Missouri onto my arm with a dot where Doniphan is.
Dana and I had been together two and a half years.
I love that woman.
I don’t have one tattoo for her.
I’d known Doniphan about a week.
We haven’t argued about that at all.
“Baby, don’t make this weird. Me and Doniphan have just been through a lot together.”
While Jessie worked, her husband, Briar Sjurset, asked me to sign him so he could get my signature tattooed.
I tried to talk him out of it.
He insisted.
Said I could sign anywhere.
“Your taint.”
He basically agreed.
Oh.
No.
That was supposed to make YOU quit.
Motherfucker called my bluff.
We settled on his calf, inside a big Alabama tattoo.
Then I asked if he was coming to the show.
He shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
The fuck you mean you don’t know?
“Motherfucker, YES you are. You have my name tattooed on your fucking calf. We’re together now.”
Briar told stories the way I was starting to recognize as very Doniphan.
He’d skip over ENORMOUS events to get to some shit that apparently mattered more.
I knew he’d survived two heart attacks.
Then, in the middle of a completely different story
“When I got hit by that car”
Hang on.
What fucking car?
He said it like we’d covered the car.
WE HAD NOT COVERED THE CAR.
Two heart attacks. Hit by a car.
Still standing there getting a comedian’s signature tattooed on his leg.
Nothing could kill this motherfucker.
Doniphan Deadpool.
I left with his town on my arm.
And somehow Dana and I left with two new friends.
A few weeks later, Briar and Jessie drove all the way to Nashville just to come hang out with us.
Apparently we really were together now.
Teresa Knows That River
Friday morning, I overslept my own float.
I’d publicly told everybody we were leaving at ten.
Dana woke me up at ten.
Five or six people were already waiting.
I ran down and told them I needed to get my life together.
They waited.
Then there was Teresa Brower.
I fucking love Teresa.
She kept appearing on the Current River in a kayak with her wiener dog like she’d been assigned to us by the river.
She reminded me of my Aunt Sheila.
Teresa knew everything out there.
Every house. Every family. What used to be where. Who owned what. Who married who. Who didn’t anymore.
She even knew how long some random tire had been sitting in the river.
How the FUCK did Teresa know the tire’s birthday?
But you had to pay attention to Teresa because buried somewhere in all that information would be something that could save your life.
“That used to belong to so-and-so. His wife left him, somebody’s cousin bought it, that tire’s been there eleven years, and stay over here because that current will pull you under that tree.”
Hang on.
One of those things was WAY more important than the others.
Teresa gave divorce gossip and drowning instructions with the exact same urgency.
Finally I said, “Teresa, you fucking live on this river, don’t you?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Love that answer.
And she basically did.
When our friend Deborah Lee floated away from the group, nobody called Teresa.
Teresa just appeared.
Went and got her.
Came back.
Like the river had dispatched roadside assistance.
I was convinced this woman knew everything until Dana spotted a house for sale.
“Teresa, how much is that house?”
“I don’t know. I’m not a fucking real estate agent.”
Oh.
There it is.
Found the edge of Teresa’s jurisdiction.
Current that’ll kill you? Teresa knows.
Missing friend? Teresa will go get her.
Eleven-year-old underwater tire? Full history.
Three-bedroom house?
Call a professional.
Then Friday night Teresa explained that the previous night’s moon was for taking away the bad things you didn’t want, and that night’s moon was for bringing in the good things you did.
Of course she knew the fucking moon too.
Never mind.
I had not found the edge of Teresa’s jurisdiction.
During the float, we lost the inflatable unicorn tied behind our kayak.
Her name was Dolly.
A little while later, a car pulled over beside us.
“You Dustin?”
“Yes sir.”
“I just dropped her off.”
I had no idea which woman he meant.
Apparently I’d been in Doniphan long enough that a stranger telling me he’d just dropped off one of my women required clarification.
He meant my baby.
Dolly had been found, held for ransom on Facebook, recovered, and returned safely to Rocky River.
I don’t know what happened between her disappearance and recovery.
She won’t talk about it.
Around the same time, we met some people on a boat who owned an ostrich farm.
Before we left, they gave us a hollow ostrich egg.
A week earlier, I probably would’ve had questions.
By Friday?
“Thank y’all.”
Of course I have a giraffe chicken egg now.
I’d stopped asking why things were happening.
I was just figuring out where the fuck to put them in the RV.
Rendezvous Eve
More than a hundred people came to Rocky River Friday night for Rendezvous Eve.
The bonfire plan involved approximately ten gallons of gasoline and a flaming crossbow bolt.
Reasonable.
Somebody asked if I was good with a crossbow.
“I’ve never shot one.”
A woman looked WILDLY disappointed.
“I thought you was a redneck.”
Ma’am.
“I didn’t say I was a redneck. I said I came to party with them.”
I hit the target.
Only problem was the arrow wouldn’t stay lit.
So now everybody’s standing around trying to troubleshoot fire.
More gasoline. Different arrows. Different ideas.
We had somehow made setting shit on fire complicated.
Finally, an older man watched enough of this foolishness, picked up a burning stick, walked over, and threw it on the pile.
Bonfire.
Oh.
Apparently we could just carry the fucking fire over there.
Ten gallons of gasoline. Crossbow. Flaming arrows.
This old motherfucker solved the whole thing with technology available to Jesus.
Cheyenne, I Am Still Sorry About Your Car
Somewhere in all this, Cheyenne left me her car to paint.
I had warned this woman.
Several times.
Don’t leave me with your car.
I don’t even have a license.
I don’t WANT to paint your car.
Those are not the words of a man hiding an incredible artistic gift.
Those are warnings.
She said she had paint in the car.
We looked.
Couldn’t find it.
But I had spray paint.
Unfortunately.
Somewhere in this process, I decided I could do graffiti.
I could not.
And every time I messed something up, I tried to fix it.
Which made it bigger.
Apparently my approach to correcting a mistake is to give it more of the fucking car.
By the end, me and Andy had just vandalized this poor girl’s vehicle.
So then we thought we should take some pictures with it.
Maybe that would help.
It did not.
Now we were just standing awkwardly beside a car we had vandalized.
That’s evidence.
We needed to make it funny.
So we put skeletons on top of it.
Banging.
That was our solution.
We had exhausted our abilities as painters and moved into sculpture.
Cheyenne came to get it the next day.
Sweet as she could be.
She looked at that car the way a mother looks at a painting her four-year-old made while wearing a blindfold.
That kind of encouraging face.
Like, oh, this is GREAT.
Thank you.
You did your best.
The problem was I fucking had.
That was my best.
And somehow her being that nice made me feel worse.
I still feel bad about that car.
I told y’all I needed a handler.
Saturday
Saturday night, more than 350 people came to Rocky River for the first Redneck Rendezvous.
Andy Gunnin featured on the show and absolutely fucking crushed.
Julie introduced me.
The woman who’d nearly caused a bingo strike, shown us a museum full of dead frogs, and spent the week disapproving of my vocabulary was now handing me a microphone.
“Give it up for Julie, y’all. I fucking love Julie.”
I told them having her introduce me felt very brave.
But standing there looking out at everybody, something was different.
These weren’t just people who bought tickets anymore.
I knew these motherfuckers.
Beth had become my handler.
Barb had kept me alive at bingo.
Dale had looked after us all week.
Konnor had paid me in quartz and gotten onstage that night to tell two jokes of his own.
Tucker had started scheduling my appointments without my consent.
Jacqueline gave me the mullet.
Teresa kept me from drowning and apparently had jurisdiction over the moon.
Jessie put Doniphan on my arm.
And Briar is legally my husband now, I think.
I’d spent the whole week worried about whether I could get these people to come see me.
I had it backwards.
They’d spent the whole week coming to see me.
They brought me rocks.
Cut my hair.
Gave us things.
Took us places.
Waited when I overslept my own float trip.
Let us into their lives.
Dana had been right.
The pressure was already off.
They were happy we were there.
And somewhere during those nine days, I stopped feeling like I was there to sell them a ticket. I just fucking liked these people.
Beth got emotional that night and told me the event had been life-changing for her.
It changed something for me, too.
I do a lot of shows.
I’ve been to a lot of towns.
But this was the most fun I’d ever had coming into one.
I felt recharged.
I felt at home.
Because we’d stayed long enough that these people weren’t just the audience anymore.
We had stories together.
When I first pulled into Rocky River, I told Dale, “This is it.”
I didn’t know what the fuck “it” was.
Now I did.
This was it.
Move in for the week.
Eat at the local places.
Go to bingo.
Float the river.
Meet the people everybody else already knows.
Stay long enough that they quit trying to make a good impression and start warning you about each other.
Stay long enough to have stories together.
Then Saturday night, get onstage and tell those stories back to them.
I thought arriving early would help me promote a comedy show.
Turns out I had it backwards.
The show had been happening all week.
THE SHOW WAS SATURDAY.
THE STORY STARTED NINE DAYS EARLIER.
We’re Doing This Again
So we’re doing it again.
Redneck Rendezvous is going on the road in 2027.
Eight small towns.
The RV.
Move in early.
Stay long enough to find out who everybody is and what the fuck is going on around there. Then Saturday night, we have a show.
I want to meet the people y’all tell me about. Follow the invitations. Find the strange, local, meaningful shit that never makes it onto a tourism website.
And I’ll tell those stories here in The Week Before Saturday.
But Doniphan will always be the first.
Rocky River will always be where Beth took a chance on this thing before either one of us really knew what it was.
And on August 28, 2027, after seven more small towns, we’re bringing the finale back to where the whole thing started.
Doniphan.
That’s home now.
Besides, I’ve already got the fucking tattoo.
Nine Days in Doniphan
The people, the place, and the photographic evidence.
Swipe or use the arrows to see all 23 photos. Tap a photo to enlarge it.
Couldn’t Have Done This Without Y’all
They put their name and money behind this weird little idea before any of us knew if anybody was actually going to show up.
That matters to me.
It’s easy to believe in something after 350 people are sitting in lawn chairs.
Poplar Bluff RV believed in it before there were lawn chairs.
Thank y’all for taking the chance.
And thank you to Rocky River Resort, Doniphan Smoke Shop, Black Veil, the Current River Heritage Museum, SEMO Exotic Sanctuary, Doniphan’s VFW Post 3485, and everybody else who fed us, showed us around, gave us things, invited us places, waited on us, tolerated us, and let us into their lives for nine days.
And for the record, Cody Harris did a hell of a job on sound for us. He didn’t ask for a damn thing.
He even invited me to help host their Grateful Bluegrass Festival. I can’t make it, but y’all can.
It’s October 22–24, 2026, at Rocky River Resort in Doniphan. Go give Cody and the Headz Entertainment crew some love.
Grateful Bluegrass Festival — details and tickets
And special thanks to Andy Gunnin for featuring on the show, helping me turn Cheyenne’s car into a crime scene, and somehow agreeing to come back for more.
He’ll be joining us for Redneck Rendezvous in 2027. Go follow him.
Follow Andy Gunnin Comedy on Facebook
On our way out of the campground, somebody gave Andy some moonshine. Andy called it “Felon Juice.”
Of course Doniphan sent us home with a beverage that sounds like a probation violation.
Watch Andy tell the “Felon Juice” story
I showed up thinking Redneck Rendezvous needed a campground, a stage, and a comedian.
Turns out it needed something else.
It needed Doniphan.
WANT US TO COME TO YOUR TOWN?
Who do we need to meet? Where do we need to go? Tell me about the local characters, the places everybody knows, and the weird little shit I’d miss if I only stayed long enough to do a show.