An elderly Kinston man missing since January 9th has been found safe and sound at Neuseway Nature Park in Kinston.
The man in question – Bryan Hanks, 64, of Kinston – went missing shortly after completing a live broadcast of his highly rated radio show from the Neuseway Nature Center.
“It was my first day on the job and Bryan has always been very supportive of me,” said Bryan Hanks Show co-host and Neuseway Nature Center Director Jonathan Massey. “He did the show live from the Nature Center that day but disappeared just after signing off at 9 a.m.”
“Mentally speaking he’s as a mosquito on amphetamines,” said Dr. Julius Erving of Quickie Care Gastroenterology and Lube on U.S. 70 in La Grange. “He routinely watches three televisions at once, yells at microwaves for being too slow, and has more jobs than a board room full of Jamaicans.”
Erving said it was only a matter of time before Hanks went off the rails.
“The man is busier than a one-armed pickpocket at a kangaroo convention,” said Hanks’ publicist Danny Rice. “Between his radio show, his Golden Girls reenactment commitments, and being the public address announcer for every high school between Raleigh and the Outer Banks, the man doesn’t have time to think. Or bathe.”
Jonathan Massey realized something was wrong when the animals at the Nature Center in Kinston stopped eating.
“After Hanks did his show from our lobby he disappeared,” Massey said. “We assumed he’d stepped to the restroom to remove his make-up. Yes, he puts on make-up to do a radio show. He claims it’s a union thing. I don’t ask questions.”
With his animals essentially going on a hunger strike, Massey decided to set up 24-hour surveillance to find out why none of the animals were eating.
To listen to live and archived broadcasts of The Bryan Hanks Show with Jon Dawson and Jonathan Massey, visit http://www.BryanHanks.com.
“About 12 hours into the investigation I started to notice an unusual odor,” Massey said. “It was as if a herd of wildebeests were giving birth in the middle of a tire fire. All of the animals were huddled together in one corner of the Nature Center. It’s quite the site to see a snake, a vulture, a bat, and an opossum huddled together out of fear. Fear of an odor, no less.”
Around hour 20, Massey began to hear scratching noises and what sounded like an odd howl coming from the basement of the Nature Center.
“Initially it sounded like ‘ooo’, but as I got closer I could clearly hear someone – or something – was crying out “dude….duuuuude”.
Thinking Bryan Hanks might be the source of the ominous cries of “dude” and the otherworldly smell, Massey contacted Darrell Hanks – brother of Bryan – for help.
“Bryan works so hard that he sometimes gets a little loopy,” Darrell said. “I knew how to draw him out into the open.”
Upon Darrell’s instruction, Massey gathered together a pile of Bryan Hanks’ favorite things and placed them in a pile in the lobby of the Nature Center.
“The pile of bait included a Golden Girls VHS tape box set, a pair of Nike socks, Barry Manilow’s Greatest Hits, Nike shirts, Paul Lynde’s autobiography, Nike dental floss, Cheerwine, Nike ice cube trays, Swisher Sweets, Nike pocket protectors, The Collected Works of Oran Juice Jones, and a roll of Nike toilet paper.”
Within minutes of placing the aforementioned items out in the open, a disheveled, hairy, dyspeptic, University of Virginia-shirt wearing creature emerged from the basement.
“I wasn’t sure it was Hanks until I saw the UVA shirt – no one else in the entire state would wear one of those,” Massey said. “I’ve seen homeless people throw brand new UVA shirts in the trash.”
See Jon Dawson with Third of Never in their new video for Grab The Ground, now available for purchase at Bandcamp.
Massey said Hanks approached the pile tentatively, sniffing and pawing at the items for several minutes.
“I didn’t have all day, so as soon as I had a clear shot I took him down with a tranquilizer dart,” Massey said. “He dozed off and we dragged him out into the parking lot and spent the next few hours hosing him down. It took three tankers of water from the fire department and several pallets of Tide, but after several hours of scrubbing and rinsing and scrubbing and rinsing, Bryan Hanks was defunkified.”
Advised by his doctor to stop working so much, Hanks took the advice with a smile. Mere seconds later, he agreed to host a pillow-fighting championship in Ocracoke, a cup-stacking match in Greenville, and a wedgie tournament in Goldsboro.
The Bucklesberry Gazette 