Muse

The thing about this economy right now, treats might not be market drivers as much as we thought. Also a little bit later on, cats, love them or hate them. Yep, that old chestnut. From American Canine Media, this is Bark It Plays. From Dogs Angeles, I'm Kai Ruffstall. It's Blur's Day, the 33rd of May-vember. Good as always to have y'all along.

T-B-T-L okay no sounds no sounds just words no yeah i need words not silence just give me words

i need words that's how i communicate i know everything there's no about computers okay

all the twitters i know well there's there's that fine line between you know have showing

emotion and being a hot dog hey i want to dance with somebody oh boy who keeps putting twizzlers in the fridge i told is it sarah crystal crystal she likes okay well crystal you and i are gonna

have another twizzler talk ww dot this and ww dot that let's ww dot explain it all right good

morning and welcome to a tuesday edition of tbtl the show that just might be too beautiful to live

sorry billy joe we did start the fire my name is luke burbank i am your host you paint your bald

One ball spot. Coming to you from the Nest Broadcast Center, high in the sky above, Portland, Oregon, where it's looking like it's going to be a dry day with some blue sky.

Oh, ma, pa, it's just beautiful.

It's going to be getting colder later this week. Not, you know, upper Midwest, East Coast cold, where apparently there are all the conditions for an ice storm, And I don't mean the Ang Lee directed intense film about families falling apart. I mean, y'all out there are going to be dealing with some real weather here in Portland, though. We may even see a little bit of snow later on in the week, which could be kind of exciting. Happy Tuesday. Happy National Pizza Day. Sometimes you got to stop and smell the pizza to all of you. Is National Pizza Day a real thing? Only barely. Will it probably lead me to eating pizza tonight for dinner? Very probably. Welcome to episode 3355 in A Collector's Series. Let the fun begin. We have a lot to talk about, including the international row between China and Canada over a t-shirt. a t-shirt that involves the wu-tang clan and the city of wuhan i'm the president of rap music

and i need to work with you right away most importantly discussing this topic gives me

the excuse to use the word row it's one of my very favorite ways to describe a disagreement me um also in sweden a film festival realized we're not gonna be able to do the typical thing because of the pandemic so instead they went with a very different model a film festival for one person in a lighthouse by themselves on an island okay we'll tell you how that went coming up here in just a few plus emails and v-mails and this guy the longest running cobro of the show he may be best known for his drawings of the tall ships uh he has really been gassing me up getting me hyped before the show with all kinds of like positive statements and compliments are you familiar with the term backhanded compliment uh he is andrew walsh and he is joining me right now from the roosevelt neighborhood of seattle washington good morning

my friend good morning luke um the person or entity that sends us an email every day letting us know what show number it is also mentioned in the body of their email today that today is also national toothache day i have uh googled that i tried to like just you know secondary sources i just typed in what is national toothache day the internet does say that it is february 9th so is it a coincidence that national pizza day and national toothache day happen on the same day and do you think that the toothache stuff kind of harshest pizzas buzz well what i really want to talk about

is that audio tape at the beginning of the show that I have never heard before. I'm told by you that it's from listener Max in Brooklyn, and it is, in this world, in this world that we live in, one of the best pieces of audio tape I've ever heard in my life. But, so let's get to that in a minute. On the subject of what day it is, Andrew, what I'm particularly fascinated by is this dazzling detail about National Pizza Day. Do you know that up until last year, today was also National Bagel Day, Hmm.

but whoever the bagel, I don't know, consortium is, but whoever big bagel is, it's not the water, Andrew, they agreed to move National Bagel Day because they could not compete with National Pizza Day, which tells me pizza is the supreme food in this country because it went head-to-head with bagels. I'm trying very hard not to say bagel in the weird way that we from the Northwest say that word. Basically, pizza won. You know, the war's over. This is pizza's country.

Now, I'm wondering if that is how Bagel Bites happened. You had pizza and bagels on the same day. They were fighting. They were tussling. But then they started kissing while they were fighting. Bagel, bagel, bagel, bagel. First thing you know, you have – because bagel bites, those are primarily pizza topped, right? They're little – can you get bagels? That's how I think of them. Yeah, I don't know if they have other kinds. I don't know if I've ever had one. But when I think of a bagel bite, I think of a small, I guess kind of like bagel thing with pizza toppings on top. So I don't know. Maybe that's how those things came about. Sure.

It was the – whoever – I mean, whoever was – now, the question is, can you still eat a bagel bite on National Pizza Day? Or do you wait until National Bagel Day?

Yeah, or is there a special Bagel, bagel, bagel, bagel, boogle Maybe they should have both abandoned this day Found their own days, but kept today Bagel Bite Day, since that was the day That everybody came together

Sure, sort of like Peace Arch Park Up in Blaine, Washington Which is right on the border And it just stands as a testament that Canada and the U.S. will never go to war again Just a monument to the detente Yes Between bagels and pizza. Bagel, bagel, bagel, bagel, bagel. The Toronto Accords.

Weren't they the Toronto Accords? Yes, they were. They absolutely were. Yeah, so let's talk about that tape, though. That came from, yeah, I mean, that's all I know is I opened up my email.

This is what happens when an inside joke gets into the water supply.

Yes, of course. You had your fire tweet about Barker. You made that up on the air, or at least you tweeted it while we were doing the show, I think.

I do that far more frequently than I should, considering this is our job and I should be trying to be as professional as I can. Like sometimes we'll be talking about something and you may hear me say something, Andrew, that indicates that I wasn't listening as closely as I should have been to the previous statements you were making. That's usually because I'm composing a tweet or something. I'm doing some important Internet business. But a lot of times if I say something on the show that feels Tweety to me, I will then jump on Twitter and put it out there even while we're doing the show. And I believe something about Barket Place, our pet business show, was exactly a situation like that.

Yes. And so Max took it to the limit one more time. One more time. And, of course, we all know Max. We've talked about Max on the show before. We met him after our Brooklyn show in a meet and greet. Remember meet and greets, Luke? That was when you would do, like, a live performance in front of a group full of people, and then you would talk with people. You'd shake hands. You'd even hug sometimes, and it was nice. That happened a long time ago. Anyway, we met Max there in Brooklyn, and we've learned that he's an actor who acted in a show with another 10 who was also at the other end. Exactly, FBI.

Female Body Inspectors. It was on Cinemax. Right. In the late 90s.

It was late at night, and I used to watch it through the squiggle vision.

You would leave it on between channel two and three and bang the back of the TV. You get two minutes of clear picture.

Do you know the rumor for for real? The rumor growing up for me was that if you left it on the channel long enough, it would start to de-scramble. Never. Interesting. Never saw that happen. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't know if if I was ever successful in my, you know, my my sort of. how would I describe this?

Attempts to watch blocked cable that might be a little titillating.

On the adult side, all of those attempts that me and my various friends, now we never had in the Burbank household, we only had TV intermittently and we never had cable. So this wasn't happening at my place. Also, I would have been like really afraid my parents would find out. But sometimes it'd be at my friend's houses and they would have a cable box. And yeah, you'd do that thing where you'd turn to one of the adult type channels. You could hear, which is genius by the way, You could hear what was going on, but you couldn't see it. And then everyone's older brother had a theory about how you could about how you could hack that thing. I don't think I ever saw it successfully hacked. Yeah, it was the dream. I think there were how to do that.

There might have been times we thought it was hacked, but it turns out that they're probably giving away like a free week of HBO or Cinemax that week.

Yes, which is when I used to watch female body inspectors. The other thing that would happen would, you know, through the squiggle, you would see what you were really hoping was an exposed breast and you'd be like very excited. And then you would realize that's a kneecap. That's an elbow, man.

It was a nice elbow, but it was an elbow.

Yeah. Max, thank you so much for taking the time to create that very complicated and hilarious Marketplace intro. The question is, will Kai Rizdahl ever hear that? The reason that my original silly Marketplace joke tweet got some kind of attention is because Kai Rizdahl sort of jokingly responded to it saying, Luke, don't do that or whatever. Like, that's a terrible joke, which makes essentially Kyra's doll pizza and meat bagels. I have had the only way that I get any kind of fame online is somebody more famous than me. Oh, I see.

I lost you there. I am. You're big to his pizza.

Yes. Right. He is the alpha. I'm the beta when it comes to Internet fame.

And what is Max?

Max is the bagel bite. He brought them two together Previously warring factions Because Kai and I have Famously had a very strained relationship Bringing these two warring factions together By doing a Kai Rizdal impression In an imaginary show called Marketplace One of the things I noticed When I put that tweet out And it started to get some attention Was a lot of people saying I would listen to that show Oh yeah, pet shows Which it's not the worst idea I don't know if it would so much be the business of pets.

There is actually a lot. There's probably a lot there. There really is.

I mean, if you – my thought is if you took a kind of – if you took a sort of generous interpretation of the business of pets. So maybe each week you got to start with a story that is about like pet insurance or the fees associated with some part of owning a pet. Maybe the price of tropical fish is going up or something. but then maybe you're allowed to work in some more sort of pet interest stories that are a little more general.

Like, yeah, I was also thinking like the kibble. I feel like the price of kibble, like let's check the numbers, would probably be where the kibble market's right now. And then, yeah, definitely.

Does kibble just mean, can I ask you something really quick? Because does this kibble, does it just mean all pet food that's dry? Because I see kibble used sometimes, But, like, I sort of have a vague understanding of what it is, but I'm not fully aware of the specifics of kibble.

You're asking me what kibble means. According to the internet, a ground meal shaped into pellets, especially for pet food. So it does look like it tends to be dry pet food.

So, like, dry cat food, dry dog food, dry food for any other animal you might have in your home. That's all just kind of under the umbrella of kibble.

I mean, I was taking a flyer there when I threw it out there. I think kibble is kind of a funny word. But, yeah, it seems like that's where we are. Yeah. Okay. So I'm no expert, but I do have a computer.

Yeah. Do you have a company, Andrew, that you simp for that you kind of don't even really necessarily like the place, but you find yourself using their services over and over again?

Interesting question. interesting question um and if i do have one does it fly in the face of a sponsor that we already have oh no because at first i thought you meant like a company that you just love because i mean truly if i can be a bit of a um i i don't know what i'm being here gross i guess but uh you know grove like i really do love grove i'm talking about grove all the time when i'm not on the air But you're talking about a company that, like, I don't like their service. I use them, and I hate myself for using them.

Or how about a store even, like, because where I'm going with this is I have a very complicated relationship with a store here in Portland called Canoe. And I've talked about this on the show a few times. It is a place that is very designy. They sell just a kind of very random assortment of things. I guess you might call it loosely home goods, stuff that you would have in your house, like a small little dish that you might throw your car keys in. But they have one that they sourced from some very cool Japanese company that, you know, makes the best of this kind of thing. Or, you know, if you want to get a pencil, it'll be more than you've ever paid for a pencil, but it'll be the best pencil or a pencil that's very everything in this store is just like the highest design of that thing. And I find myself going to them when I. want to buy something but i don't want to just buy a kind of throwaway version of it and what happened was i was buying addy a present that from there on christmas and uh or around christmas and this is you know i don't need to say this but it's during the pandemic so i had called them and they said i called the store the the history of my relationship with this place is that every time i'm in there i feel like they're annoyed that anyone's in the store trying to buy things because they're very designy people that own this very designy store and they don't have that kind of customer service approach that is sort of like hey thank you so much for coming in and looking at our very very expensive items that you could be buying a cheaper version of at target which is four blocks from here they sort of have that they sort of emanate this or radiate this sense of like we've let you into this cool club called this store and you're probably devaluing a lot of

their items just by being in there next to them sure exactly some of my unsophisticated ways are

shedding onto, say, a folding camp rocking chair that's $900, and it was designed in the 1960s in Iceland, which is a real thing that I have actually, a couple of times after having some wine, been very close to buying, and have not, but have been on the website almost buying it.

I mean, it sounds like something that every apartment dweller needs, though.

Mm-hmm. Sure.

Actually, you know, I said that joking, but you said a camp chair. Is that a camp-style chair that you actually would put in your apartment, or do you mean actually an outdoor?

Well, no, this was long before I lived here. This would have been years ago, and so it would have been more for, like, in Bellingham, maybe on the front porch. And it's actually a really cool-looking thing. It's this – yeah, it's like a folding – it's like a rocking chair that – imagine one of those folding camp chairs, but the legs of it are like a rocking chair. And it's pretty simple, which is also the overall aesthetic of this place is just really refined, really simple everything. And I'm actually right now forgetting the details of the first time that I had a run-in with them. But something happened like years ago, long before I lived here, when I was at the store where I just – I remember going on Livewire and actually talking about them and just being kind of like, I don't know why. I love this store even though this store doesn't seem to love me back. So it's getting near Christmas time, and I see that they have this little item that I want to buy for Addie, which is like – because she doesn't have any tools in her apartment. And so this was a little – it was like a golden hammer that also unscrewed, and the handle of the hammer becomes screwdrivers of a couple of different sizes, kind of a nice all-in-one tool that's also just kind of a cool object. So I wanted to get her that for her place as like a stocking stuffer. So I call them, and I ask if they have the thing, and they say yes, and they say, you know, if you want to go ahead and just order it online, we'll call you when it's ready to go. And I said, okay, so nowhere on their website at that time did it say our store is physically closed. Because I was on their website, that's how I found out they had this particular item. So I just thought, why don't I just go down to the store and then I'll buy the item. Instead of like putting an online order in and waiting 36 hours, I'll just go down and buy the item with a mask on being safe. And I show up and the store is locked. The person who works there comes over to the door very harried and almost doesn't want to open it. They open the locked door and I said, oh, hi, I called earlier about this item. They said, you have to do it online. And I was like, oh, no, I can come back tomorrow. And I was like, actually, I'm leaving. And is there any way?

So you're supposed to buy it online, then just treat them like a pickup service.

Yes.

Come back tomorrow to pick it up. So you couldn't like go to your car and like buy it online and come back five minutes later.

Well, I could do that, but I would have to wait 24 to 36 hours for them to bring it for them to walk seven feet over to where these hammers are. and then process it and then walk it back to the door and hand it to me. Well, I will say, they actually, with a certain amount of, I would say, frustration and kind of just being a little bit like, we're not supposed to be doing this, but okay, fine, they basically sold me the hammer. So, I mean, it worked out. I want to be honest that they were nice to me, ultimately, by selling me the thing.

Not important, clearly, but how did that transaction go down? Did they still make you take out your phone and buy it online? Because I assume they have systems in place. They can't just be handing things out and taking cash.

What they actually...

did was took down my information on some sort of invoice and then charged me later. So it was not like the normal transaction, but I didn't actually go online and punch in all the numbers. It was something sort of modified. So, I mean, again, I want to be clear. They were ultimately nice to me and bent the rules to give me this thing that I needed. But I realized I don't have any coasters here at my place. And that's one of those things that you just don't realize how much you need coasters until you live in an apartment where you don't really have a I don't really have a dining room table because my living room is it's like a living room kitchen is one thing and it's very small so what I end up doing a lot of the time is eating on sitting kind of like watching tv or whatever and using the coffee table that I bought as the dining surface the problem is it's a pretty nice coffee table it's wood it's mid-century and I'm super worried about making like you know cup like ring marks on the coffee table or just somehow damaging it so what i've taken to doing is spreading out two dish towels on the coffee table pretty much at all times so which feels i don't know a little day class a for a 44 year old person like that this is my system in life makes me feel like i'm not you know totally heading in the right direction as a mature adult So I was like, I got to get some coasters. And I funnily enough, I have some coasters from this place canoe that were a gift from my sister, Sarah and her husband, Josh, that I love. They're felt they're very designy. They're like everything from this place. so i decided to go on and buy some more coasters from them and it's just the usual thing which is like i just want to buy some coasters and of course the email that i get back from them is explaining that they're closed uh that if they're gonna if i want them to ship the order please allow 36 hours for them to process it which to me is just like i cannot imagine you need 36 hours i do i don't i i do not believe that there is that many people ordering stuff from this store they need 36 hours to process these coasters and then also if i want to pick up the order i have to wait 24 hours at which point they will send me an email letting me know it's time for me to come down and get the coasters also they are open from wednesday to friday 11 a.m to 5 p.m now i want to say this is their business and their prerogative but every time i every time i interact with them i tell myself this is the last time and then i just you know it's a toxic relationship i i realize i want something i realize they have the coolest version of the something and then i'm just back at it simping for the store canoe i have a story that's so

similar i'll have to kind of skip over the details because it's so similar to your experience there is a um chinese buffet in concord new hampshire next to the market basket uh i'm gonna clear my throat way better way better coming in stronger now yeah um and it was in this uh in this you know i guess like shopping mall not shopping mall but just like what do you call like an outdoor shopping mall just a strip mall just like a it was basically just a shitty parking lot with a, I think, Burlington Coat Factory. Burlington Coat Factory was around back. That's where all those chefs hung out. Yeah, they closed that down in the late 90s. A market basket and this Chinese buffet, which I think might have been called China Buffet. And I was in my very early 20s. They went with the creative name. And I don't know how they came up with it. I think they had an eight-sided die, and they rolled it, and that's what they came up with. And then I would go there for lunch. And again, this is like my first year of being like post college full time employee, public radio professional. And I would drive and eat these shame lunches over there. And I'd always leave feeling terrible. And of course, this is Concord, New Hampshire 2001 era. There's not a lot of places to go. So there are times when I would run into other coworkers there or see them there, and I would have to – I'd sort of hide my face or try to hide from them because I felt so much shame. But then I'm like, they're here too. But I'm like, yeah, but look at Connie. Like, Connie is not going back to this buffet like seven times at lunchtime, right?

I have real questions. I think your feelings are real. Your feelings of shame are real. But I'm wondering if you really went back to the buffet as many times as you remember.

No, I'm sure I didn't because I'm filled with shame as soon as I walked through the door. Like these were these lunches that I would look forward to, but also would be filled with shame during. And one time I went in there and I had already probably gone through the line twice. And then I'm like, OK, I'll just get a few more chicken wings and then, you know, get my money's worth and then sign out and then go back to work and be really productive. Right. And I got a few more chicken wings and I. Bid into one of them, and it still had a feather. It had a feather on the other side sticking out of the breading. That means six years of good luck. Oh, my God. It means six years of salmonella. No, that's not how it works. And I, of course, did not eat it, and I put it down, and I just felt immediately sickened. Like I was so full already. I was so full of shame already. And then just seeing a chicken feather sticking out of my food, like really just upset me, and I was like, I'm not coming here. anymore three weeks that lasted maybe three weeks before i was right back there showing down at china buffet ordering extra feathers yeah exactly eating around it like yeah and so um that was a that was a place that i did not i never wanted you know as i said to my dad a long time ago like nobody ever leaves a chinese buffet saying like that i feel great let's tackle the world like you just i'm not saying i'll never go to one again but that's not the feeling that one has when leaving that place you know that the knock the sort of joke

on chinese food that i've never understood is the whole you eat a bunch of it and you feel hungry later i know i don't i never that is not my experience with eating like very heavy chinese food i mean you can there's a few things you might say about the experience but being hungry you know soon thereafter is maybe maybe I just you know consume a tremendous amount of the stuff and so I'm satiated but yeah I've never gotten that joke yeah me too I have no idea what that's

about I almost I always thought for some reason I always thought that was uh mildly racist but I don't know if that's true or not it's just like one of those things that never made sense to me so I probably just like and I heard it it's like one of those things that I heard early enough in my life that I puzzled over it and then it lodged itself in my brain and now it just always makes me uncomfortable in some way i'm like something's wrong with that i don't know what it is maybe it's

racism you know what what what does appear to have a hint of racism to it or maybe more than a hint is the whole msg story oh we must have talked about this before a little bit and i know that

this is something that i i have um heard a lot from from camaro kev he has some strong feelings on this are you familiar with that i am not actually yeah like he's a huge msg fan and was actually getting like he's the only person i didn't realize you can just buy msg for your house but he like had some line on msg that he and anita were getting and and absolutely loved and and that there is this whole i mean i can't you you tell it but there's like more of a mythology about how bad msg was for you compared to like salt but it might have just been wrapped up in kind of

xenophobia or something well what what happened i'm doing this from memory so i may get a few of details wrong but i i believe i heard a a long maybe i can't remember if i read a long story on it or listened to a long story on it on public radio but essentially the the story of msg being somehow bad for you can be traced back to one letter that somebody wrote oh to i think it was the journal of the american medical association or one of those sort of you know uh industry or scholarly journals somebody wrote like one letter a long time ago based on no science just sort of describing their personal experience with how they thought they felt after they ate at i believe it was a chinese restaurant that they thought was using msg and from that one little thing this entire kind of assumption has grown up around msg and there's really no science To support it whatsoever And it's just been kind of It's something that has dogged Chinese restaurants Even though lots and lots Of different restaurants use MSG It's just become this thing That people will say derisively About Chinese food And Chinese restaurants And there's just no science to it Luke Burbank

That's my name This American Life Episode number 668 The Long Fuse That's I had heard that as well I heard it I remember where I was I don't know if Does everybody have this? I often remember where I was when I heard something. In this case, I happened to be on an elliptical at 24 Hour Fitness listening to that story. So if somebody wants to hear it, it was a long story you heard on This American Life.

And I like to know, because I was wondering, just how non-racist Camaro Kev and Anita are. Because they not only don't have a problem with MSG, they're buying their own.

Yes, exactly. That's next level. They're allies. Yes. And I never knew. Like, growing up, I always heard MSG, bad for you, but I didn't even know what it was, you know? Like, I didn't know that it was just something, you know?

It's just a seasoning that adds sort of umami to stuff. I mean, it is by all accounts, if you really read into it, a pretty – it's not some, you know, terrible chemical that's, you know, going to do you harm. It's just a way of kind of –

amping the flavor of things which is why it makes things taste really good right right right right there you go when is national msg day do you suppose it used to be today but then they moved

it to a month from now but then that was the new national bagel day and so they've had to move it

once again and it's tbd wow there actually is not this is the first time i've ever looked up whenever a day is and there is no national msg day so well i think i mean i think it's because

Probably there is still some, you know, some PR rehabilitation that should happen for MSG. I think the number of people, at least the number of like white people who now know that MSG is not what it's been described as all these years is probably mostly confined to the people who listen to that This American Life episode or have seen a few of the other articles floating around about it. But I bet you if you went out on the street and you asked 100 people, at least maybe 100 white people, what's the story on MSG? I bet you a shockingly high number of them would say, oh, yeah, that's bad for you.

Which is exactly why they need a day. So much more. Like we all know. Exactly.

No one has a bad opinion of bagels or pizza. Exactly. Or toothaches. We love toothaches. If anything needs a day, it's MSG. Maybe that can be how we extend the brand. Maybe we become the podcast that starts the national movement for MSG. Now I'm probably going to eat Chinese food tonight, honestly. I was thinking it was going to be pizza, but now I'm really craving some delicious, delicious Chinese food. There are some really good places here in Portland, actually. Speaking of my sister Sarah and her husband Josh, because they work in the restaurant industry, they've got a restaurant here, Pollo Bravo. They really know all of the spots and not the like famous place that everybody goes, but the like, you know, sort of like out of the way hole in the wall place on Powell Boulevard. That's like got the best of whatever, you know, this particular dish is. So I may have to text them and get the get the low down after the breaks.

I know we need to take a break here after the break. Do we want to talk about how and why I received a text message on my personal phone, my New Hampshire phone number when you were trying to order a pizza this weekend? I wasn't ordering a pizza

I was ordering very middle of the road Italian food which I loved But yeah We can talk about that on the other side of the break So we'll do that Right after this on TBTL

Let's thank some donors of the day

These folks are basically the MSG in the fried rice that is TBTL. They add the flavor. They just help sort of kick everything up a notch.

And we got them on the dark web.

We're talking about Vicki Hintz of Helena, Montana, as well as Richard Oakerson of Woodinville, Washington. Matt Phillips is in Chicago, Illinois. I was thinking, you know, you and I both follow a buddy of mine from Chicago, Ramon. So good.

So inappropriate sometimes. But like, yeah, sometimes he is just on fire. I have to yell up to Genevieve upstairs. Are you seeing this?

The king of the memes. But he also works at Rossi's kind of notorious dive bar there that I, you know, have been known to attend on occasion when in Chicago. and he was just sending out, I guess they're letting people go inside in Chicago right now because he was Instagramming out that he was working the other night and there was just a photo of the place. And boy, it just made me miss Chicago. Like, you know, I would visit there probably four times a year for weight-weight-related matters, and I can't wait to get back there. Maybe I'll bump into Matt Phillips when I'm in the Windy City. Jeffrey Burke is in New York, New York. Thank you for supporting the show, Jeffrey. Laura Farrell-Wortman is in Tucson, Arizona. And then Amelia Patterson is in Libertyville, Illinois.

That was a trumpet for Liberty. I don't know.

I think I've actually stayed in Libertyville, Illinois. Or was it Libertyville? Remember when I did that impromptu road trip across the country? from Buffalo to Seattle because I had lost my last real piece of ID, which is my passport, at Chautauqua in New York, and then found out midway into the drive that I could have actually gotten on a plane. I just had to convince them that I'm me, which is a pretty easy thing to research. But anyway, I stayed in a Libertyville, although I can't remember if it was Libertyville, Indiana or Libertyville in Illinois, But I Airbnb'd in Libertyville And

Walked around the town and ended up at an old school pizza hut, Andrew, which I hadn't seen in years. One of those just like perfectly preserved with the red roof thing, just pizza huts from our childhood. And of course, I had to go there.

We saw some of those in like on our road trip. There was something like you get to these small towns and like a Wendover, there was one, but we couldn't go because it was pandemic time.

Oh, what a bummer. You have to get back to Wendover. Yeah, I guess Wendover, Utah, right?

That is Nevada, but it's right on the Utah border

Oh, okay, yeah, that's the casino town?

Yeah, exactly, and West Wendover is the town right across the street That's Utah, yeah

Well, thank you so much to our donors of the day We absolutely would not be here doing this without you Hello and welcome to Top Story Speaking of pizza orders or things like that What happened this weekend, Andrew, was I developed a powerful, powerful hunger for a certain kind of Italian food, and that was not like high-end, rustic, good Italian food where they give you a sort of a reasonable serving of pasta and then come and put a little bit of hand, freshly grated pasta. parmesan over it i wanted like you know like eggplant parmesan kind of red vinyl booth italian food and um and so there is a place here in portland you probably know the name of it more than i do it's like d novellas or something and uh it's exactly that kind of italian food De Nicola's. De Nicola's. Like just the sign alone. If you Google it, Andrew, you'll see the sign. You'll know exactly what – they have the classic sign for being this kind of Italian restaurant. And I wanted to order that food from them and so I did. But because of something around how their ordering system works, like it was like order online and then I did. I was somehow thrown into a world of Google that I was not expecting where instead of my credit card information being processed like through the website of this Italian restaurant, I was somehow in Google buying it and then I hit buy and I was shocked that it actually worked, that they got – that I had a card saved in there and that it made it to them, that they made the food that I had asked them to make. And that it was there for me to pick up all of those things were surprising to me because of how I don't ever remember putting my card into Google. I've never ordered anything through whatever this part of that Borg was, but it did start to get a Gmail situation going. And that, I think, is when you got an email from this restaurant saying, like, your Italian food is ready or whatever.

No, I mean, this is what's weird about this is what I want to make very clear. It wasn't an email that I got And it wasn't to the It was not to the TBTL Address, it was to my cell phone To my 603 New Hampshire Cell phone, I got a text message

You realize that now people will be able to guess The rest of the digits You've knocked the combinatorics down to just 4 billion possibilities

When I mentioned that we can get text Messages at the TBTL Line this weekend, I was actually getting a lot of Text messages from listeners, it's good to hear from everybody sending me pictures of their cats and updates on the Windsors. And updates on my favorite, like, middle-brow documentary series, The Windsors, which, thanks to listener Carrie, I know has re-emerged on HBO Max. I was dipping my toes back into that world last night. Started over from the beginning. And no, but on my personal cell phone, I got a DeNicolas confirmed that your pickup order will be ready between 6.25 p.m. and 6.35 p.m. we cannot believe you ordered so much food what is wrong with you or are you ordering for a huge gathering of people no i made up that other part are you shading me now it doesn't my order because

i don't have your whatever your problem is with that i don't got it i don't have i was like i have maybe occasionally ordered maybe in the like long ago days maybe gotten two drinks at mcdonald's just to kind of throw them off my scent that may have happened but in this day and age because I don't usually eat in the day. I'll just, I'll go hog wild at night and I make no apology.

Yeah, no, Veeves and I, I mean, we still, I know it's now cliche, but like we'll order food and they put like six fortune cookies in there and like enough utensils for like a family of 10. And we're just like, well, keep them up. Not that that's where we need to go

with this conversation and not that there was. anything implied in in your joke but i have noticed that i if you're particularly if you're doing like a delivery type of thing like a fine sponsor door dash who i did use to get a little chipotle last night um and it was very very yummy um i've noticed that if i'm ordering food and having delivered there is this kind of impulse to just kind of get more stuff part of it is because if there's a delivery fee associated with it it's like well i'm already paying you know i'm already paying to have this food brought i mean depending on the restaurant and what they have agreed to with these various services but sometimes i just feel like i i sort of order more food now when i'm having it delivered maybe than i used to just because it's like ah it's three more bucks and i might need more guacamole you know and then also uh at this point it's i can't afford not to because they're gonna be i'm getting charged three bucks i felt kind of bad yesterday because uh i was you know again we love fine sponsored door dash but this thing happened where i was ordering this food from chipotle i'm sorry andrew i've completely derailed this conversation oh i think i think

yeah it does i my guess is my my guess is when i took over the tbtl listener line it probably asked me for a phone number to in case there's ever any issue with the with the gmail account now you're using the gmail account because that's your access to google and it must have just somehow gotten my phone number from gmail it was funny though because i had no idea at first i'm just like well they sent this to the wrong person and i responded wrong number and they were like we don't know what that means uh because it was just like a system and then i suddenly saw on my phone that there was like somebody logged into your into your tbtl account somebody like and i was like oh this is luke trying to order a pizza in some way anyway back to last night though well

So last night I'm ordering from Chipotle and they – I mean I'm ordering a large burrito, like a huge burrito, and I'm getting some chips on the side. I'm not making a super-duper calorie-driven decision here as in I'm going to eat a very, very large amount of calories and food. I'm not – this is not diet food for me. And yet the only beverage that they will deliver, the only soda, is the so-called Mexican Coke. Oh, yeah.

High sugar.

And I'm like, no, I don't. Yeah, but it's like sugar. It's probably 100 calories or something, 150 calories, which is funny because I'm going to eat 1,300 calories minimum with this burrito and the chips. But this is where my brain locks up. I'm like, no Diet Coke. So I order, and then I'm just like, well, whatever. I'll just have a soda water or something. And then DoorDash says, hey, you can bundle. Right now, for no extra charge, you can bundle your order with 7-Eleven. That's some kind of complicated business B2B relationship they've got with DoorDash, right?

Yeah, that's interesting.

So I'm like, okay, cool. Actually, I like this idea because I know what I can get from 7-Eleven, which is some Coke Zero. And so I guess I just thought that it was going to just have the person who was bringing the Chipotle stuff just swing by the 7-Eleven on their way there. Which kind of made sense. I got literally two, not two liters, but just like, you know, that plastic bottle of soda that you get.

Yeah, like 20 ounces maybe.

Maybe, yeah. It's more, I mean, maybe it's basically a single serving. It's the thing you would have with lunch maybe.

It's not a large. Maybe it's just 12. I don't know. A can is 12. I can picture these bottles, though. They got a little bit bigger over time.

Right. But I guess my point is it's not an amount. I got two of these. They probably are like $1.70 each. This is not an amount of product that I would normally have somebody drive and get and bring to me. But what I didn't realize was it was not the person that came from Chipotle. It was a different person. Now, they get paid either way. They get their tip. I guess, you know, they've signed up for it. But there was something that felt so decadent and like Louis the whatever of me that I had someone bringing me two fairly small plastic bottles of Coke Zero, which I just wouldn't have done if I would have known it was a different person. Somehow it being the same person seemed fine to me, but it being a different person felt like I was being a little decadent.

I am with you. I did not know about that partnership. And it's the type of thing where when you first said it, I assumed the same thing. Yeah, just person just picks it up, swings by the 7-Eleven. But of course, it makes sense that that's not how it works. Like I could see maybe having that work. But when you think about the systems in place, yeah, they're having two different people pick up and deliver it. I can sort of see that it's not as counterintuitive as it might have seemed at first. For me that would come in really handy With like Subway, because I like a good foot-long Subway sandwich, Italian BMT, but I like chips at 7-Eleven. I like getting some weird-flavored chips. I just don't want the plain sun chips that you can get or the Lay's chips that you can get at the Subway. But, yeah, I think I would have to really – yeah, did it change the service fee or the charge? These are our sponsors too, right? We should have this information straight. But do you know that you – did you pay more for the second delivery?

no it was bundled so this is this is why i was under the impression it was going to be the same person yeah because they said you have and it's like a ticking clock they go you have five minutes to bundle this with something else at no extra charge this is what i'm saying it's a complex b2b relationship they've got some layers and layers of algorithms and apps and relationships with 7-eleven that somehow it knew that i like still wanted some soda yes and so it presented it as an option at no cost to me so yeah i understand why that seems so decadent though

i don't know if i would if i could bring myself to go in for that which is funny because if

somebody is working for a service like doordash they don't care yeah they're just doing their they've agreed to the terms they're getting paid to do this thing in fact it's probably easier if it's just a couple of bottles of coke zero instead of like going through the grocery store and pulling 40 items or something like this is probably a good gig but still it just felt like you know i i don't know i felt like uh francis from uh from peewee's my dad says you can fix

anything with coke zero now um i guess tipping proportionally or proportionately you're just not going to get as much of a tip for a couple of bottles of coke although i'm sure you tipped a way higher percentage for those bottles of coke than for the main meal i think i just i think i

just let it do the default setting for me which is not which is not the the lowest tip it's like somewhere in the middle but anyway enough about that sorry i feel like i'm really taking enough enough of this dribble drabble let's talk about the issues going on between china and canada over this wu-tang t-shirt uh that had been kind of refashioned to say wuhan uh so it turns out that there have been issues between China and Canada for a while, partly because a very important person at the Chinese tech giant Huawei was arrested in Canada. And so China was bummed about that. And so then they started, they arrested a couple of Canadian sort of high profile Canadian CEO types that happened to be in China. And so there's been this like standoff where both countries want to get back their folks um and so i guess that was sort of exacerbated lately uh by the fact that some canadians that were a part of like the state department or whatever the canadian version is people that are working in china but they are canadian citizens had ordered some t-shirts that instead of the wu-tang logo which what is the is it like the original that's a w right like if you think about the wu tang clan logo that that sort of thing that's just a w stylized w that's what i just kind of assumed that but yeah i don't know um so some uh one of these uh folks that was a canadian citizen in china but like again working for the government of canada had ordered some t-shirts made that instead of saying Wu Tang said Wuhan. And according to the Chinese officials, and then maybe this was the part that made it worse in their minds, had modified that stylized W into being a bat. And so that seemed they're very sensitive in China about this question of if the COVID virus started in Wuhan or not. It's actually really amazing because I was listening to a story on I can't remember which public radio show the other day but they were in wuhan which is totally open and completely normal again by the way andrew and they were interviewing people there and they couldn't find one local resident who believed the virus started in wuhan really the narrative has very much become this was something that the west has lied about and is blaming on wuhan but is not our fault it is a

very sensitive subject in china apparently yes and so just to be clear here because this is where i was confused on the story is the t-shirts that you just mentioned online right now there are some t-shirts which i do not approve of that is a modified wu-tang symbol that says wuhan but it's also modified because like the middle part of the w somebody has added two little bat ears to it so that is 100 a reference to uh and and i guess a joke playing upon the idea that uh wuhan was the the epicenter of the coronavirus and it began because of, you know, somebody in general, arresting a bat in some way, right? And so those are t-shirts that are out there right now. But I think we're learning these are not the t-shirts that are at the heart of this particular story.

Right. The Canadian delegation has been saying, by the way, the guy's named Chad Hensler. It doesn't help that his name is Chad. And I say that with absolute peace and love to all the Chads in our audience, many of whom I've met personally. But this guy, Chad Hensler, is a canadian embassy staff member um and what the canadian delegation is saying is no no no this was just uh it was it was intended it was not intended to represent a bat it was created for the team of embassy staff working on repatriation of canadians from wuhan in early 2020 like this was just supposed to be like a bonding exercise amongst these canadians that

were working to repatriate people from wuhan yes and i mean there are there are idiots all over the place but when i was reading this story i was like it just does not seem very canadian that this you know this very specific group of people who work for the government especially especially a repatriating program right that they're going to be making like literal wuhan bat jokes i mean the joke is wuhan kind of sounds like wu-tang and it's one of the most famous you know icons in Western culture is the Wu-Tang symbol.

Right. And, I mean, the Chinese authorities who reached for this article, by the way, in the South China Morning Post, which I just want to tell you something, Andrew, they really, really put some effort into making these stories hard to print out. I know that's not the crux of this story or this event. How did you not lead with that? It was like half of my morning was trying to figure out how to print this story out so that I could just have it easily at the ready. The Chinese officials that were reached for this article said, it is beyond our belief that senior diplomats who have been working and living in China for years could make such a stupid mistake inadvertently. And they're demanding a more clear explanation from Canada. I don't know. This could be my bias being from the West, not being someone who's spent any time in China. But the story that's being told by the Canadians seems plausible to me. And like you said, Andrew, there are people who would be racist and glib. In fact, one of them was president of this country for a while. The United States? Yes, the United States of America had a very racist president up until a few weeks ago. There are people who would make up a racist T-shirt thinking it's funny. I don't know if it would be the people that are living and working in China and interacting with Chinese citizens and trying to presumably work to better the lives of some of those folks through repatriation. I could very much see them being like, hey, Wuhan sounds like Wu-Tang, and this is a cool shirt. And as you've pointed out to me before, Andrew, a cool shirt primarily worn by white dudes.

Yeah, these are the type of thoughts I try not to tweet too much because, like, what's the point in getting into race relations vis-a-vis the Wu-Tang symbol? But I was watching I was watching MSNBC several, maybe a couple of months ago or something, somewhat recently. And, you know, it's everybody's at home doing the Zoom thing. I can't remember who was hosting, but you had three guests and they were all Zooming in from their homes. And of course, the people who are showing up on the cable talk shows a lot, they've got their whole setup, right? They've probably got ring lights and they definitely are thinking a lot about like what is in the background. Room Raiders. Oh, Room Raiders, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They said Room Raiders. Like people are going in and stealing all this stuff and then using it for their own Zoom backgrounds. But in this panel of people, there was one guy. He's like a white guy, probably my age, actually maybe slightly younger, but like a middle-aged white guy. And he had hardly – he looked like he had a nice place, but it was very sparse, but tasteful. But then in the background, literally the only little piece of flair he had was some sort of a Wu-Tang box. Like I don't know if it was a box set or if it was like some sort of a – it didn't look like a lunch box. But it was something along those lines that was sitting like on a mantle behind him, maybe even a fireplace mantle. And I was just kind of like, of course you have that. And also – and this is irrelevant.

Was it the Wu-Tang record that no one – was it Martin Shrelly?

It was Martin Shrelly. He seemed like a good guy. No, he was just a guy. And this is where this is where I don't I don't know if me saying this actually somehow makes me racist. I'm not sure. But there was a young black woman on the panel as well. And somehow I was like embarrassed for him because I. I'm a white guy. And like somehow I was embarrassed that that this white guy has the Wu Tang symbol behind him. And I don't know exactly why it is. And I texted my friend. I was like, is it true? I mean, it's got to it's got to bear out that way more white guys who fit like kind of for whatever reason, my demographics have Wu Tang symbol T-shirts than black people in this country. Right.

Right. Well, you know, it's funny because I just the other day on TikTok saw a couple that the husband is black and the wife is white and they were making some sort of like a TikTok joke video. And he was actually wearing a Wu-Tang T-shirt. But I think that was probably and I only noticed it because we had been having this conversation off air. I only noticed it because that was one of the first times I can remember in a long time seeing a black person wearing Wu-Tang gear. I wouldn't imagine that it's the case that the Wu-Tang Clan is not popular with black Americans, but it does seem like a certain affectation that a certain kind of white guy does really go for. I say this as the white guy who, when I was going to be in a New York Times article and they were sending a photographer, did not miss the chance to wear a Biggie Smalls t-shirt, which I will sort of never live down because it was the exact same impulse that you're describing.

When you say never live down, you mean in your own head, though. Has anybody ever given you grief about that?

No, but it's just in my own head because I think I wanted to try to transmit the notion or broadcast the notion that I'm not your average public radio host guy, that I like Biggie, which I do actually like Biggie. But I don't know. I mean, this gets into a much more complicated question, which is just sort of like I would, you know, my guess would be if you were to sit down with the surviving members of the Wu-Tang Clan, which I guess is all of them except for Old Dirty Bastard, they would and you would say, would you like to sell more T-shirts or less T-shirts? They would say, we'll go with more T-shirts. Yeah. Would you like – it's not even that the artists are not into white people consuming the product. I'm sure if you would talk to the ghost of Biggie and they would have been like, hey, would you like to have a T-shirt with your image featured in the New York Times? You'd be like, yeah, that sounds good to me. But there's just something very try-hard about it that it feels to me, at least in what I was doing in that moment.

Yeah. And for me, I'm even trying to figure out if it's try hard because I don't. And again, yeah, I'm saying all of this without trying to cast too many aspersions because I don't know how I really feel about it other than I think it's a fact. You know, like I don't think that anybody should stop buying Wu-Tang T-shirts if they like them. I personally like I didn't even I didn't like hip hop really at all until like my 20s. I had a friend who was like, oh, yeah, you should probably get to know the Wu-Tang Clan. I can't remember exactly how. And so I went through a period where I was like, holy shit, this stuff was big right at the time when I was a teenager. And I probably should have been exploring new music, but instead of listening to Donovan. And so I got really sucked into the world and they create, you know, the Wu-Tang as a collective has created this very textured world that is very appealing. I also got to a point where I got to some records Where just like the kind of like some of the Violence specifically I'm thinking of one record that Some tracks that were just unlistenable Because of the violence directed towards women in them And it's just like made me so uncomfortable That I think I kind of hit a wall with that And just kind of slowly backed into the bushes Like Homer a little bit but I understand Like I mean and the production I mean not now I'm going to nerd out on it but I mean There's just no denying the amazing Production and what RZA created So I mean I get and you know and again Like, I'm not into, like, kung fu movies at all or that world, but they just created this textured universe. And I think that appeals to a certain kind of person. And, of course, their place in pop culture, it goes well beyond, like, just hip-hop circles. Like, they're in, I think, a lot of those Jim Jarmusch films. Do you say Jarmusch or Jarmusch?

I say Jarmusch. Yeah, okay. But I've heard it both ways. Yeah, like cigarettes and coffee, right? there's like bill murray doing a scene yeah with uh with a couple of the guys from wu-tang yeah i

think riz and jiz and and some others as well and so anyway so that's all good like you know and again i i want them to be um successful and and to sell t-shirts and everything so i'm not really like trying to say this is bad or or or make like an appropriation argument here all i can say is As a person who sort of fits the demographic of that kind of guy myself, I think I just kind of got embarrassed when I started to think about it a lot.

Yeah. Speaking of of hip hop folks from that era, when we're done with this, I'm going to I'm going to actually interview Talib Kweli for Livewire. And this is he wrote this book.

Which is really good by the way It's called Vibrate Higher It's kind of a memoir I didn't really know what to expect going in And it's like It's just really good Like I actually If you want to have a copy of it After I'm done Andrew I would give it to you Because I bet you would find it really interesting as well It's just well written He's a really good writer It's a biography or Well it's a memoir It was a memoir His life in sort of hip hop And but I mean, he's just a really, really good writer. I wasn't sure because, you know, obviously, if you're a rapper, you have to be a writer. But that doesn't necessarily translate into this kind of prose. But in this case, it really does. But here is all I this is I'm like trying to stifle the urge to get into this with him because it's not relevant and I don't think it's going to go anywhere good. But when I moved to New York to do that morning show, The Bryant Park Project, which was the thing that had them writing a New York Times story about me and Allison Stewart, when I moved there, I got an apartment in Park Slope in Brooklyn. And I think it either used to be Talib Kweli's apartment or he had also been looking at it because the leasing agent specifically mentioned him when they showed me the apartment. um and i feel like i want to bring this up with him to sort of like bond and to be like you and i have an overlap in our life but i do not think it's going to mean anything why would it this is 15 years ago an apartment in brooklyn he may have looked at probably not even for his real house because like i'm sure he had some big place somewhere in brooklyn this was probably going to be where he set up his like business office or something um because i don't think uh at that time Anyway, me and Talib Kweli were like looking at the same kind of residential rentals, but he was wearing a T-shirt with your face on it when he was looking at the apartment. There's a certain kind of hip hop guy who wants to prove cred by having a T-shirt with my face on it. And it's like, huh, thirst much. But anyway, it's like I already know that if I bring it up, it is just going to be like it's going to go nowhere. It's not relevant. But in that way that I had to bring up with Ethan Hawke the time I saw him in a puppet show, this is my one even very, very, very tangential, very, very tenuous overlap with the hip hop artist Talib Kweli. And I know that I'm going to bring it up. I already know it's a slow speed crash.

Well, it doesn't have to be a crash. Well, what if you know that you're about to crash? So you wear your your conversational seatbelt. I'm going here with this title. Conversational seatbelt. Not Louis the whatever. um but like you i think the the risky thing is going in and just thinking like this is it's gonna like this is gonna land this is my yeah and whether it's on air or off like right you know feeling like this is a real conversational nugget you know that this might be a glancing blow so don't lean into it too much just say you know i was looking at an apartment in new york like or in brooklyn like 15 years ago and i think the the realtor said that you had some connection to it you know or you live there like or something and you can just like and you know he might just be like yeah I don't know man that was a long time ago I've looked at a lot of places or maybe be like oh what the place down on Main Street and 3rd that's how that's how things is where's Main Street in Brooklyn

oh it's 1-2-3-4 Mockingbird Lane

yeah right I just like the idea of Main Street anyway um yeah so you know just go into it knowing that it may be a non-starter but also don't you know hang everything on it that should be fine And not everything has to be a starter. I think I've proved that with this show.

Here I go once again with the email. Every week, I hope that it's from a female. No, man, it's not from a female.

All right. Any emails or V-mails that are jumping out at you? Or just texts from the listeners?

Or just texts from the listeners. Let's see here. I have several emails here. And what happens is sometimes you open up an article in the China Morning Post and it all goes away. Yeah, South China. Yeah, here it is. This is from listener Allie. Has a garbage story for us. Actually, for y'all. Because this is listener Allie. I have a little garbage story for y'all. You love it. There's an old folks home one street over from me. And it has been very interesting living so close to them during the pandemic, Allie says. last night I was taking my fives for a walk and as we rounded the corner getting closer to the home there was an ambulance and a fire truck outside it's a scary world these days but my fives don't really know that they don't have a clue they were just excited about the fire truck as we got closer two firemen were walking back towards their truck with a relaxed energy so I'm hopeful that everything was okay inside my fives obviously wanted to talk to the firemen so they came towards us but a safe distance and waved and chatted with the kids truly just so sweet before they walked away One of them popped something into a trash can that was on the curb. I watched him do it and waved goodbye, and then it hit me. Trash was collected this morning. That fireman just put some trash into an empty trash can. Four exclamation points. Then I immediately thought, he can do whatever he wants. That sweet, sweet fireman is just a first responder in a global pandemic. Perhaps there are other outliers to the laws of garbage. I couldn't agree more, Allie. I think that fire I think that firefighter had every single right to use that garbage can on the curb.

The good news is you've really put your evil inside the list. You've got them out walking their kids, judging fire. I mean, flexibly judging firefighters because of this kind of behavior. Yeah, I do. I am guessing this would have never even occurred to listener. I don't think as of five years ago.

I really don't think so. I mean, also, like, you know, not to be too high on my own supply, but, like, the brand is strong. I'm getting text messages and text lessons from listeners telling me, hey, your six-part British documentary about the royal family is on HBO now. Have a good Sunday. Like, I mean, you know.

Yeah, we've outsourced so many parts of our life to the listeners. By the way, listener Matt is doing just that by telling me, this is an email that just came in, good news, you don't need to feel bad about Jimmy's Johns, they were purchased a couple of years ago by the same company that owns Arby's, Jimmy's John has been flung to the top of the John pile, along with Papa John

Yeah, I saw that, I saw that, yeah That's great I haven't double checked that, but, you know, I mean, I don't know if this is another Taco Time situation I have every reason to believe listener Matt You're going to call me a noob or something I don't know, it's just the listeners

I knew that was going to rile you up

No, I didn't even think about it until this very moment

Okay, good Well, I guess we should go ahead and wrap things up here Because I do need to read the last 30 pages of this Talib Kweli book I feel like that's And then I have to write a question that's based on the last 30 pages So that the person I'm interviewing knows that I got to the last 30 pages Although you know And this should come as no surprise to you and me, Andrew Because we have no memory of what we've done on this show But I'm often I'm struck by how often I reference something in a book To the person who wrote the book And they have no memory of it being in the book Which at first, when I was doing these kinds of interviews I was surprised, and I was like, well, of course If a book is 400 pages long What are you going to remember, every page?

Right, exactly It must feel like, and then you go through the editing process I mean, I have no idea what the editing process is like But it feels like it might be insurmountable I mean, you must just forget what order things are in And by the way, speaking of here, I'm going to put you on the spot. Although we can, again, with a glancing blow, you can blow this off. But do you have a Talib Kweli song that you want to play? Because I don't really know his stuff. Or should we just not mess with it?

Yeah, let me see here. I'm trying to decide between going with a Talib song or with a Blackstar song. Yeah, that's true.

Yeah, that's something I've always meant to get into. Blackstar was him and Him and Yasin Bey

Which is another question that I have Andrew when I talk about that band Because Yasin Bey used to go by Most Def And I want to like say Most Def Because he was Most Def when he was in that group And you know the listeners Will probably be more familiar with Somebody named Most Def But his name is now Yasin Bey So out of respect I feel like I should What would you do if you were in this situation?

Probably say Yasin Bey but on first reference you know mention that when when you collaborated with him he went by most deaf because i mean that is a real thing like i mean sure i'm sure as far as writing credits are concerned and and what have you like that those are most deaf projects right like uh right oh while you look for a song by the way can i just say one other thing that i just meant to throw in because i got a bunch of like kind of just saw some chatter and emails and what have you we were talking about a australian death metal band called Scythian Fate, I believe we were pronouncing that. A lot of people said that is probably not a reference to Scythes the tool, but to the Scythian people, which was like a middle European ancient people. Really? Yes, but I meant to look up more details and I didn't, but at least I'm throwing that much out there to let everybody know. I think

I still stand by Scythes Matters as being one of the greatest show titles you've ever had on this program full credit to you my friend how about we go out with get by all right by talib quality this was produced by kanye by the way oh great uh so you know that you know that it's and it's off an album called quality so you know it's quality oh good that's how you know so we'll uh yeah we'll do that and quality yeah or good it's not over promise good oh that's a good point yeah okay all right thanks for listening everyone we're gonna be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for you Until then, enjoy your Tuesday, stay safe, take care of each other, it's not the water, go Brungles, and please remember, no mountain too tall. And good luck to all.

We'll be right back. Melt in my mouth, they hot like the jail cell in the south Before my nigga core bailed me out But to give out, just to give out Just to give out, just to give out Do we die like best stars, see the red skies The window of the red island, the lead flies G-Rap shit, live in the lead Now this morning, I woke up feeling brand new I jumped up feeling my high And my low, and my soul And my goals just to stop smoking And stop drinking But I've been thinking about my reasons just to get by, just to get by, just to get by, just to get by Power out