I grew up in the suburbs of Toronto, where everything was in a strip mall.

There's something about strip malls that just reeks of my childhood.

In the 1954 Internal Revenue Code, a Republican Congress changed forty-year, straight-line depreciation for buildings to permit 'accelerated depreciation' of greenfield income-producing property in seven years. By enabling owners to depreciate or write off the value of a building in such a short time, the law created a gigantic hidden subsidy for the developers of cheap new commercial buildings located on strips. Accelerated depreciation not only encouraged poor construction, it also discouraged maintenance...After time, the result was abandonment.

I grew up in the Seattle suburbs - the suburbs of suburbs. Where I'm from, it's super quiet, just woods and nothing.

The thing that really surprised me about strip malls in California, specifically Los Angeles, is that they have some really fantastic restaurants.

Stand-up comedy and poverty. Those were my two main endeavors.