#14 - 1994-1995 - Junior Year at Illinois Tech!!

It is 1994. A guy on the floor says he could take Jeremy in a straight fight. So everyone goes downstairs. The dorm basement had activity rooms nobody used. They pushed the couches back, somebody agreed to referee, and the two of them went at each other bare knuckles, three rounds, no gloves. One rule: no takedowns. Which is the whole problem. Jeremy is a wrestler. Take a man to the ground and put him in a choke and it's over — "100% of the time. I never had a problem with that." Standing up, punching, with his one advantage ruled out, he figures it out fast. They bloodied each other's faces and stopped when they'd had enough. Nobody won. "I'm never going to sign up for a bare-knuckle match again, because you're just going to get punched in the face." They called it founding the UFC. It had, in fact, already been founded. That's the junior year at Illinois Tech. Also in it: two guys down the hall who ran an actual bar out of their dorm room — posted hours, monthly membership dues, custom glassware with a ship's wheel on it, and beds engineered to fold flat against the ceiling so you walked in and there were none. "The bar is open." Scott and Phil's Bar and Grill. Nobody ever worked out where the grill was. Turning 21 at 11:50 at night and getting carded in downtown Chicago: "Look at your watch." An electric car built from a bag of parts and a pegboard, second place by a fraction of a second. Captaining the Ranger Challenge B team as a first-year competitor, taking events off his own school's A team, and finishing one and two in the whole state of Illinois. A summer at Mansfield Plumbing, where the whole town said they "worked at the pottery" — and he still has the metal shavings in his hands. And a best friend who spent that year as an extra in The Shawshank Redemption, shot up the road at the Mansfield Reformatory, for minimum wage and a hot lunch. Terry's 1994: the fourth baby arrives on October 24th, one day before their eighth anniversary. Three in diapers at once. A three-year-old who sat her parents down and formally requested a baby sister. A father-in-law who opened a conversation with "I think my daughter is done having children." And a life-size cardboard Omar Vizquel that his wife put up in their bedroom — which ended up in the closet for fifteen years, and came down the day Terry found lipstick on it. Two things we asked on air and actually want answers to. If you're a guitar player: tell us what that fanned-fretboard, slap-and-harmonics style is called. The kid at O'Nellie's was unbelievable and we don't know what to call what he was doing. And if you ever got served at Scott and Phil's Bar and Grill, we know you're out there — find us and say so. Comment on YouTube or message us on Instagram. We read them on the show. Watch the full video episode: https://youtube.com/@amostunpredictablelife Website: https://amostunpredictablelife.com Follow @amostunpredictablelife on Instagram, TikTok and Facebook A Most Unpredictable Life — Jeremy Lewis and Terry Lewis. We're not brothers. We might be related.