S01E03: Finding the Wemberlys with Ex-Principal Raymond Coufus (Ronnie Adrian)

#### **Synopsis**

Todd goes to therapy, and tries to track down two students who mysteriously died in his class, while Mr. Weatherman tries to promote his deadly limo company with flyers. Mr. Cravy loses another basketball game, and Mr. Levi’s comes into money, though his campaign is struggling. Then, Ex-Principal Ray Coufus (Ronnie Adrian) stops by to clear his name, and talk to us about his new Karate Dojo.

#### **Notes**

##### **Bill Cravy**

* Mr. Cravy lost his cool before the tip-off at the last men's basketball match and backed his Italian catering truck up to the Cracker Barrel porch on the gym, where he tried to serve the opposition team bad lasagne. Unfortunately, Bill has gained quite a reputation throughout the county for his antics and the team did not take the lasagne. Instead, Bill let a couple of coyotes loose in the team's dressing room; one of the coyotes was actually a rabid Dachshund and the other was a coyotaje, a small, rabid man who barks a lot and foams at the mouth who everyone is certain has rabies. The other team did not make it out for the second half and the game was called. However, Bill's team had already shot some baskets in to the opposition's net and lost the game as a result.
* Bill reveals that some coach scouts from the Arizona Wildcats are coming in to watch his team's next basketball game.
* We discover that, in attempt to motivate his team, Bill once tried to commit suicide by climbing up to the hoop and using the rim to hang himself, shouting "You are making me do this, your lack of winning is making me do this" at his team. He also shot his ear off at practice three weeks ago whilst trying to get his team to run the right zone defence.

##### **Howard Levi's**

* Howard spoke to his mother and father for the first time in fifteen years, leaving them a ransom voicemail asking for $33 million, which he received the next day. He used most of the money to fund his mayoral campaign, buying up all available advertising space around town. He also secured a partnership with the local McDonald's, adding the 'Levi's presents Big Mac' to the menu, which was a regular Big Mac in a denim bag with a slice of denim instead of cheese and ketchup in the shape of Howard's face, with his website and postal address on it (sadly no one could see this as the staff failed to serve the burgers 'open-face', as per Howard's request).
* Howard is trying to oust the incumbent mayor who has gone down in Hamilton as they best mayor they ever had. The city even held a 'Best Mayor' festival in his honour last year, which the entire population of Hamilton attended. The festival also featured John Mayer getting on his knees and conceding to the incumbent that he was not the best Mayor/Mayer.
* Some of Howard's other campaign tactics included:
	+ reenacting the film Rush Hour during rush hour
	+ sneeking into the maternity ward of a local hospital to take selfies while kissing the babies before they'd seen their mothers for the first time.
	+ promising to find all of the Wemberly children (a promise that was paid for by Todd).
* The media have been giving Howard's campaign a lot of attention, sadly all of it negative, and he has been dubbed 'least-likely mayor ever' by the local press.
* Howard has struck a deal with Hamilton High School to have the next basketball half-time show sponsored by Levi's, where he will debate the incumbent mayor. Todd points out that this is like "the Clinton Foundation sponsoring a Clinton/Dole debate in '96 or even a Clinton/Bush debate in '92". Howard denies there's a conflict of interest.
* Howard asks Ray Coufus (see below) if he can promote his mayoral campaign at his karate school and Ray agrees, but only if Howard beats Ray in a fight during halftime at an upcoming high school basketball game, after his debate.

##### **Todd Padre**

* Todd has removed the pull-out couch from the Teacher's Lounge after spending a night on it where he "shit the bed figuratively and [...] pissed the bed literally".
* We discover that when Mr. Padre flies, Mr. Weatherman accompanies him in a mesh carry-on as his 'emotional support animal'. Sam flies for free with his 'owner' but they can only afford to fly with Ghost, a low-budget airline that also runs drugs for a Colombian cartel which travels to the areas where the cartel is distributing their drugs (so far this has just been Colombia to Dallas Fort Worth).
* Todd has been told by the school's administration that he needs to get his students more involved in 'Untitled: A One Man Show', largely as a result of a petition which they started which went viral on Twitter. A lot of the US, and also the rest of the world, took umbrage at the fact that a group of young theatre lovers were having their education usurped by a teacher who was doing the play on his own. The play has retained its original title but 47 new roles have been created, all of them being 'Trees'. Todd's students still have to provide their own costumes, which he believes is a great learning experience, and he has made it clear that they must be as convincing as possible in their new roles, even down to not breathing which they have been practicing a lot in Todd's class of late. Although his students are finding this quite dispiriting, Todd believes it is for their benefit as "You have to break them down to build them back up again [and] you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette". The other teachers are concerned that these exercises will result in several deaths.
* On that subject, twins Jimmy and Joshy Wemberly allegedly died in Todd's theatre class. However, Todd believes that they faked their death and has begun production on a documentary tentatively titled 'Finding the Wemberlys' in which he attempts to find the missing siblings in Columbia, using Ghost Airlines to travel there.
* After his previous therapist got a restraining order against him, Todd started seeing a therapist named Howard Milton (a mannequin from H&M that Todd rented an office space with floor-to-ceiling windows for). Todd wanted to see the best therapist in town and, by his own metric, the best shrink will automatically have the best office space available. Unfortunately, Todd went to see the best therapist in Hamilton but was left unimpressed by his office space so he decided to rent his own and began seeing Milton in it.
* His therapy sessions have become one of the biggest new attractions downtown with people selling t-shirts to the spectators outside the office. It has been suggested that Todd himself has been profiting off these sessions, a rumour given weight by the fact Todd drove in to school in a brand new Corvette and an anonymous man who greatly resembled Todd appeared on the local news to promote his upcoming therapy session.
* When discussing his looks, Mr. Cravy tells Todd "You look many days over a hundred" which Todd takes as a compliment. Todd explains that "A lot of people ask me how, at 72 years old, are you as active as you are when you look like saggy leather?" and I tell them, first of all, "Thank you" and then I say "Come and see my play as the theatre keeps me young".
* Todd reveals that he once fell into the Koala cage at the Hamilton Zoo and was dragged back and forth by a small Koala. In an attempt to stop this, the zookeepers tried to shoot Todd, but accidentally shot the Koala instead. This incident became a popular meme on Reddit.
* Mr. Padre has been receiving Taekwondo lessons from a clothing rack in TJ Maxx, injuring several shoppers in the process.

##### **Sam Weatherman**

* In order to promote his fledgling limousine service, Mr. Weatherman had two thousand multi-coloured business cards printed, at a cost of roughly $2,700, which he stuffed inside a milk carton and threw from the top of the stairwell in the B Building. As Mr. Cravy points out, a milk carton was probably not the best receptacle to release the business cards from, due to its small opening, but, as Mr. Weatherman points out, he did not have an envelope so had to make do.
* Unfortunately, the majority of the business cards ended up in the janitor's mop bucket which has led to a major beef between Sam and the janitor who is annoyed that he is constantly having to follow Mr. Weatherman around to clean up the mess he makes.
* Sam has been on WTOC regularly as he continues to drive around without a licence.
* After eating one of Mr. Levi's branded burgers, Mr. Cravy and Mr. Padre witnessed Sam pull a "full pair of jeans out of his asshole" in the lobby of the bathroom. Mr. Weatherman felt a little clichéd while doing this and wondered "Is someone about to call me Wang Chun or what?".

##### **Ray Coufus**

* Raymond 'Ray' Coufus is very pale and, during his time at Hamilton High School, was a rather slight man, but he has put on a considerable amount of muscle since that time. However, despite being a small man, the students would often call him "fat eyebrows" and "fat body" in a successful attempt to mess with him mentally. Ray is constantly lathering his whole body, including his clothes, in baby oil. He keeps many karate gis in his Ford Avalanche at all times in case the gi he's wearing gets ruined by the baby oil. He will also use the old gis to clean his truck.
* As principal, Mr. Coufus brought several positive changes to the school. It was under Mr. Coufus that Hamilton High School got both its computer labs as he fought for two years to repeal the Hamilton's 'no electronics' policy (culminating in a literal fight with the female superintendent). Additionally, Ray had a boxing ring installed in the school. Ray also made it a rule that all the teachers at Hamilton had to be adults who had gone to school and knew things about the subjects they taught.
* Ray was disgraced and ultimately fired for an incident that took place during the setup for the Under the Sea themed prom (three years before his podcast appearance). The incident in question was a fistfight between Ray and multiple Hamilton High School students, including 31-year-old student Spike Feirstein , that was recorded on video and posted on WorldStarHipHop. At the beginning of the video, Mr. Coufus can be heard saying, "There's my prey." During the fight, Ray dragged Spike from outside to the school's boxing ring and beat Spike within an inch of his life. Some have called this premeditated murder, although Spike did not die. Despite Spike's age, Ray was still tried for beating up a child, although, to be fair, he did also beat up Spike's crew of 16, 17, and 18-year-olds. Despite his humbling public apology, Ray was crucified in the media for these events and imprisoned.
* Ray has had a passion for karate (specifically hitting children) as early as his time as principal, but possibly since childhood as Ray's mother frequently beat Ray's father "to a pulp" in public pay-per-view boxing events.
* During the infamous fistfight, Mr. Coufus realized that the teenagers he was beating up had poor fighting techniques. So, upon being released from prison (where he had become very religious), Ray decided to open a karate school called 'CouRate'. He would like to change it to 'CoufRate', but he's already printed "CouRate" shirts and signs. Additionally, he has a lot of investors in his business who are currently in jail and he wouldn't want to upset them by changing the business' name.
* Ray's Karate classes primarily focus on how to defend against an advancing principal. In his class, Ray pairs adult students with children as sparing partners in order to teach the children how to defend against an adult attacker and to give the adult students confidence. He has recently allowed women to attend his class due to a petition started by Margaret (though she hasn't turned up for a class yet). CouRate's moto is "not necessarily a safe space" and Ray has been known to rob his karate students as a learning exercise where they either lose their personal items or take them back by force. On such student was Bill Cravy, in disguise as Bethany Hart, who was working undercover for the Better Business Bureau, who he is in debt to, and recording an episode of 'Undercover Patron'. Bethany is described as an older women with a five o'clock shadow, wearing a coach's track uniform underneath a Sunday dress. Bethany's wallet was stolen by Ray, who did not realise it was Bill in disguise, after she had been beaten up by an 8-year-old girl.
* During this episode, Ray fought Todd, Bill , and Sam. Each one of these fights ended with Ray tying Todd's body into a pretzel (a move that Ray calls the 'Coutzel').

##### **General**

* Todd and Sam had a pizza party, where they drank some of Mr. Weatherman's "terrible" bathtub Malbec (Sam has been banned from going in to Margaret's wine shop for driving a car through the shop window, crushing every bottle of wine in there, so he now has to make his own wine).
* The teachers had a meeting with the Superintendent where she implied that the four of them are "almost past the line of being fired". In fact, the school is looking for replacements for all of them but, luckily, they have all benefitted from the enforced 'three-strike rule' at Hamilton High School which dictates that you can't fire anyone until they have been reported three times for doing something wrong. However, punishment is still very much on the table and, following the rule that teachers receive the same punishment as students, Mr. Cravy received three paddlings (his slacks were pulled to the floor to check if he was wearing multiple pairs of undwerwear, which he was) and Mr. Weatherman's head was held underwater in the pool for 35 seconds
* Todd is concerned that these punishments may contravene the laws regarding torture laid down in the Geneva Convention and has submitted a formal complaint in the UN's suggestion box, though he does not think it's being dealt with.
* Sam is exasperated by Kofi Annan's failure to intervene in the "debaucherous" punishments of the "tyrant" running the school. As Todd points out "What keeps happening is we keep screaming at Kofi Annan about this and he says "Don't talk to me. Talk to someone called Ban Ki-moon about it. I don't run the UN anymore" and we keep saying "Yeah, that's the oldest trick in the book"." As Sam explains, you don't just stop being Secretary-General of the UN; it's a job for life.
* Howard has vowed to use some of the $33 million he received from his parents to keep The Teacher's Lounge going, even if they are all fired.

#### **Characters Mentioned**

* Bill Cravy's Daughter
* Howard Milton (Todd's Therapist)
* Leslie Padre
* Leslie Padre's Boyfriend
* Margaret
* Milton Levi's
* Miss Holloway
* The Principal
* Sandra Levi's
* The Superintendent
* The Wemberlys

#### **Quotes**

*"In order to help give my team an advantage, I will attempt to poison the other team or hurt them via poisoned lasagnes, spoiled lasagnes...and this game was no different"* - Bill Cravy

*"Those jeans went down rough and cleaned me out. It's like eating brocolli, baby!"* - Sam Weatherman

*"If you can beat up a kid, that makes you feel like a real, strong man"* - Ray Coufus

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