JK LOL Storytime

Jon spent months planning a proposal that Keisha would never see coming.

She doesn't like surprises. If she had even an inkling she would have figured it out. So he told her his fried rice elbow was flaring up and he couldn't swing a golf club. Then he suggested a walk instead. He had pink flagging tape in the trees two weeks in advance. A trellis pounded into the ground. Polaroids of every significant moment in their relationship pinned across it. Rose petals. A dozen roses. A speech he still has. A photographer named Ashley hiding up...

It's June 1st. We're leaving today.

We probably should have scripted this one. We did not script this one, just like all episodes. 

What you're hearing is two people standing in their basement on a Monday morning with totes full of wedding dresses, four veils, boutonnieres, bouquets, and holy guacamole, about to drive 7,588 miles across two countries to get married nine times.

Either we are completely batshit crazy or we are onto something amazing. We genuinely do not know which one yet. There is no middle ground and that feels very on brand.

She wanted to quit this morning.

Not the tour. Not the relationship. The whole thing. The podcast, the brand outreach, the content, all of it. Too stressful. Savings getting tight. Can't do everything at once.

She said it out loud in the middle of an ordinary Sunday morning sitting across from a man whose arms were sore from shaking 19 gallons of cocktails for a charity event the night before, who ate cottage cheese for breakfast and drank a V8, and who listened without immediately trying to fix it.

And then she found her...

Alex and Keisha met at a continuing education course in New York City. The instructor from Ireland thought Keisha was the Canadian. By the end of the week they were roommates, they had walked through the middle of the Pride parade in business attire with no plan, bought flower headbands to blend in, received a free bag of Oreos that tasted exactly the same, gone to Grand Central Station at midnight looking for gluten-free donuts that were obviously closed, and picked up a Manhattan manhole cover on Fifth Avenue at midnight because nobody else was doing anything about it.<...

Adam has been around since he was eight years old. He grew up around Jon's house as his younger brothers best friend, graduated to full-time bartender at the Tap Room, became the Dwight Schrute of the operation, and is now the reason Jon and Keisha are driving through Scranton on the way to Philadelphia.

In this episode Jon and Keisha introduce the Philadelphia stop and the friends who make it worth the drive. Adam's New Year's Eve wedding — where the groom's drink was a Maker's Mark old fashioned served in a pint glass for seven dollars, where ev...

Ken and Janet are responsible for all of this.

Not the wedding. Not the podcast. Not the six-hour FaceTime that started everything. 

Well, actually all three of those things. 

Ken was a part-time bartender at a restaurant Jon was consulting for, a man who also happened to be the vice president of a construction company, who just did it for love of cocktails. Soup of the day means Miller Lite. That is not negotiable.

In this episode Jon and Keisha tell the Kentucky chapter. How Ken and Janet became family. How a...

Some people get serious about dating and keep it quiet around the kids. Jon wrote Reagan a letter.

Nearly a year before the engagement, when Jon and Keisha decided this was real and they were building something together, Jon sat down and wrote Reagan a letter. He didn't tell Keisha he was writing it. He didn't ask permission. He just decided he didn't want to withhold affection for Keisha in front of her daughter anymore — and that Reagan deserved to hear why directly from him.

In this episode Jon and Keisha introduce the Wisconsin stop an...

New mics. Queso Thursday. And a completely random Randy sighting at a gas station on the way home: red mirrored sunglasses indoors, white lumberjack beard, and yelling for Grandpa Randy from across the parking lot.

In this episode Jon and Keisha introduce the Utah stop and the woman who was influential in Keisha's younger years. Beth. Apartment Building C, Unit Nine. The friend who was just there: no conditions, no explanation required. They also get into the stolen yellow Volkswagen bug, the first kiss that landed on a cheek instead of where it was supposed to go...

Before Jon was Keisha's fiance he was her best friend. Before he was her best friend he was the guy who stayed on the phone all night while someone tried to get into her hotel room in Las Vegas — and then quietly booked a 5am flight to be there by morning.

In this episode Jon and Keisha tell the Las Vegas chapter of their story. How a Glacier hike led to a Golden Knights dentist. How a consulting gig turned into a hotel nightmare. How Jon showed up before he was supposed to. And how he called ev...

It is St. Patrick's Day, Jon knows how to make a proper Irish coffee, and Keisha is there for it, always. That is where this episode starts.

From there it goes to Arizona — Gail, Keisha's best friend who was supposed to be a bridesmaid at the original wedding that never happened. The chosen family that showed up when things fell apart. The apartment that did not have internet so they watched Vampire Diaries at mom's house instead. The people who made Keisha who she is before she ever made it to North Dakota.

Also: a la...

Jon and Keisha pull back the curtain on Wedding on Tour for the first time — not just what it is, but how it's actually going to work. Three segments, nine stops, one father on a Harley. 

In this episode they walk through the first leg of the tour: a roots trip back to Keisha's mountain origins, a grandmother named Minga who crochets one-of-a-kind hats and has never once called Keisha by her actual name, and a reception that involves natural hot springs, a cheeseburger, and one very expensive lesson about what sulfur water does to an Apple Wat...

When Keisha was five years old her brother was three and they were hungry. She found a can of peaches and didn't know how to open it. So she got down on her knees, pulled her brother down next to her, and prayed. What happened next is the story that explains everything about who she is.

In this episode Keisha traces her origin story from a single mom household where hardship built faith, through pizza places and dental offices, a career-defining offer letter handed to her while she was scrubbing floors, building a dental practice from the...

Jon's resume reads like a list of dares. In this episode he walks through the career that built him — from digging holes in the backyard and counseling Boy Scouts in Minnesota, to answering 911 calls for five years including one involving a severed thumb in a gallon of strawberry milk, to running the only craft-only beer bar in North Dakota, launching a hot dog cart called Fun on a Bun, and building Saul's — a scratch cocktail speakeasy that COVID ultimately took down.

Keisha keeps him on track. Mostly.

By the end you'll understand exactly how someone goes...

Jon and Keisha introduce their new podcast, JK LOL Story Time, aiming for a casual, bar-like conversation that shares life experiences, humor, and encouragement. They explain they’re both unexpectedly “funemployed” after Jon was let go by his employer and Keisha left a toxic workplace where she lacked leadership support. Inspired by a six-hour FaceTime with friends who suggested they start a podcast, they begin recording from their basement studio. 

The couple, engaged and originally planning a $45,000 destination wedding, decide instead on a Wedding on Tour: nine ceremonies across nine locations in eight states and Canada over about t...