Muse

Uh, would you like to enter our raffle? Win dinner with a real astronaut? Okay, I like space. Ever since I was a child, I was always fascinated by Major Tony Nelson's failed space flight, his capsule crash landing on a desert island, knocking over a genie ball to releasing Barbara Eden. Thank you, NASA. She was his slave. TBTL!

I can't hear you. That's not true, of course. But cheer louder. Yeah. Look, I get it. I'm not always fun to be around. I can be loud and abrasive. My breath. The doctors say I have incurable stink tongue.

So tired of you getting angry and yelling all the time. It's exhausting. I feel like I'm partners with the Hulk.

Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good. Oh my god, man, we are seeing some s**t we ain't never seen before.

All right, hello, good morning, and welcome everyone to a Thursday edition of TVTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. Hey, where's the freaking gabagoo? My name is Luke Burbank, I'm your host.

There's an explosion in my mouth, it's like, holy Toledo.

Coming to you from the Nest Broadcast Center, perched high in the sky above Portland, Oregon, where we are just absolutely working day and night, burning the candle at both ends to get ready for the upcoming TBT-Elethon 12 content list delivery.

TBT-O!

wherein we will be climbing into a 1993 Mitsubishi Delica camper van driving to various listeners homes and hand delivering the show working on getting some signs made for the van all kinds of things going on I think it's going to be well it's going to be an adventure next week like these things usually play out it remains to be seen if any of it will work but we've got big plans and so hoping you can join us next week for that Glad you're joining us today for this, episode 3,427 in a collector's series. Let the fun begin. I spent a good portion of my morning screen capping angry tweets from one William Shatner. Hi, everyone. Welcome to my Twitter. Because I saw a story in The Guardian, a puff piece, an interview with Bill Shatner, where the headline is, Take it easy, nothing matters in the end, according to William Shatner.

From my point of view, it's a beautiful story. I love your story.

As I later wrote on Twitter, notorious, easy-goer, William Shatner is logging on. We'll read some of this just absolute wet kiss to William Shatner and become angry about it together. Coming up in a few... Speaking of Twitter, there is something called Twitter Blue that's on the way. That's not Twitter with more swearing. It's a subscription service. They say it's going to be $2.99 a month, and it will let you do a variety of things, including unsend tweets. I just call that deleting a tweet, but I'm old-fashioned that way, like my father and his father before him. Old tweet-deleter Farnam Burbank, as he was known. Back in the day. Anyway, we'll tell you what's going on with Twitter Blue. Also, speaking of the Internet, there's another case of mistaken Andrew Walsh's by way of Internet connectivity. Brother, who are you? What are you doing? If you remember, a while ago on the show, somebody was wondering if Andrew Walsh had been their teacher in school on the East Coast. We had that listener check in, or we caught up with the young man who thought this might be the case. And then, I don't think he was a listener at the time, but we had found the real Andrew Walsh eventually, this teacher from the East. Well, now there's a new Andrew Walsh, and they may or may not have some IKEA furniture that belongs to someone else. So we'll figure out what's going on with that. Plus, Thursday, a.k.a. Blur's Day, do the Blur's Day messages. And of course we'll do all that with the help of this guy The longest running co-bro of the show Known best for his depictions of the tall ships You know, his two broken fingers Are honestly the least of his sort of medical issues right now They basically do not have a butt He's the real Andrew Walsh And he's joining me around

right now from the roosevelt neighborhood of seattle washington good morning my friend

good morning luke i told you before the show that i'm going to be even a little more annoying than usual on the show today okay i'm just gonna make a high-pitched wailing sound every time you try to talk now i have my cell phone here you know my cell phone also there's a camera and a calendar it's a whole bunch of stuff on here whoa it's like a you should check a computer that fits in your pocket you gotta get one of these they're called smartra phones i mean they're just so amazing dude i don't have time to get into it now but anyway i have to have my notifications turned on audibly whoa that was not me everybody that was luke that sounded like was that an actual like tuning rod okay that was me now we have the irritating oh wait did you get a text coming in Has it actually happened? It's not the text that I need. What's going on? When we were about to dial up, you said, I'm really anxious today. I'm very anxious. I'm peak anxiety and has everything to do with the TBTL-a-thon. Here's the deal. I don't have a lot of responsibilities in this TBTL-a-thon. I keep telling you this off air. I feel like every time I have a task to do, I literally don't know if these are your notifications or mine I'm hearing now. every time I have a task to do I say okay I'll work on that and then a few days later I say hey Luke how about you take care of this task and that's the way it's been the one thing that is my purview that is my responsibility is to make sure that we can stream these shows when you and I get in that van and start doing shows in listeners driveways heading down the coast my one responsibility is to make sure that we are able to stream that live as video from my phone onto a YouTube page that will be at tbtl.net. 10 a.m. every day next week. You can watch the show live, or you should be able to watch and listen to the show live via, you know, like my phone. But there's technical complications. I can't just put my phone on a tripod in a listener's driveway. I mean, people wouldn't hear all of the audio coming through the board. Like, there's stuff that has to happen for this to get encoded and then be routed through Minnesota so that it can then get onto the official YouTube page, and then our listeners can sit back, eat popcorn like Michael Jackson, and enjoy the show, right? In order for this to happen, our buddy, pal, confidant, and in some cases hero, technical hero, Eric the Viking Stromstead at American Public Media had to send me. That was you, right? That's the tuning fork? Had to send me some equipment that will turn my phone into a little studio that can handle all this stuff. We have a meeting, me, Eric, and Christina. our producer, have a meeting at 2 p.m. today to go over this equipment and learn how this is all going to work. The stuff he shipped me was supposed to show up yesterday here at my house, and it did, sort of, except instead of opening my door

and seeing a box on my porch, there was a sticky note that said, you were not here when we tried to drop this off, which is not true. I was here when they tried to drop it off. We have a door that is as heavy as a, I don't know, a moat door on a castle. So they probably knocked and I didn't hear it.

But you had that installed after I learned your address, which kind of, I have to say, hurt my feelings.

Yeah, yeah, and the moat itself, which, by the way, crocodiles, more expensive than you'd think. Yeah, just the raw chicken costs. I think I got alligators. I think that's the problem. I think I paid alligator prices for a crocodile. Anyway, so now I'm really anxious. Just like literally like this box of stuff is key to getting TBTL live on the Internet next week. And this meeting I'm supposed to have to learn how to use it is supposed to happen at 2 p.m. today. The stuff is not in my hands. Every other delivery is just left on our porch. I don't know if maybe Eric put a special note to say he must sign for it. I don't know what it is. That would be my guess. If I don't catch this. So I signed up for every goddamn alert. Like, I got an alert this morning that the truck is on the road. It should be here sometime before 4.30, which isn't great because my meeting is at 2 and Eric is not at work tomorrow. So if we don't do this today, we're in some trouble. Must be nice taking Friday's off, Eric. The clock is ticking. And I'm just so furious. I'm so furious at FedEx. I'm furious at the whole universe. There is, like, supposedly there's an option to say don't put it back out on the road. Right, just go pick it up at the place. But have you ever done that before? I've heard that it is like a nightmare. I heard it's like going to like a impound lot in hell trying to get your packages. I just don't trust them enough to be able to like take care of that. Have you done that? Can you calm me down?

I've done it, but it was in Bellingham, and it was because everything is just a little more mellow there.

Because it's a smaller town It was just like literally a What would you call it Sort of a not a mobile home But you know what is the name

Like a temporary building kind of

Yeah but it's a permanent building But it was just kind of like one of those You know I don't know why This is what I'm getting hung up on But I've never known what to call those things It's like a manufactured home of sorts That's just adjacent to the airport In Bellingham And you go there and they disappear back into some area And they come back and they have your thing So it was pretty easy, but I – it's often near the airport, by the way. So if you have to go to SeaTac for this, that adds a whole other layer of hassle to it.

This one isn't SeaTac, but it is down on like Alaska Way. It's Alaskan Way? No, Alaskan Way. Alaskan. Yeah, Alaskan Way. And Genevieve says she's been there before, and it was a nightmare. And I don't know if it worked out for her, whatever she was trying to pick up. And it's just like I just feel like this package is out there somewhere, and if I try to stop it and intercept it, I feel like that will cause more problems. Sure. You know, I'd need it today for the meeting if possible. But even if it doesn't come today, I definitely need it by tomorrow because I'm hitting the road to head down to your place on Saturday. So I'm just kind of at peak anxiety to get this equipment in my possession.

Let me ask you a question. What is that? So you're tracking it online, right? So I'm tracking it.

I'm now. And that's that's the out for delivery. Yeah, I got here. I'll tell you the latest text that I got. Latest text I got was from Ron Upshaw, who wants to know if I want to go to a Mariners game if I'm vaccinated. That's not helpful. Okay, the latest text I got from FedEx is 844 this morning. Hi, your package is now out for delivery today by 4.30 p.m. Reply help for help.

One thing you could do, I mean, maybe not right now because we're trying to record the show, but if you wanted to alleviate your anxiety a bit, well, actually two things. Camp outside all day because that's kind of where I am. Why don't you put a note on your door that says FedEx, we are here Please knock loudly A note, Luke

My sweet child I have more notes taped to the outside of this building It is like a fucking art project out there If anybody wants my phone number Figure out where I live and walk by my apartment right now

Or actually just get within four blocks of your house And they'll start seeing the notes just follow the trail of of laminated notes they're nailed up to various buildings with arrows

oh man yeah no i taped them up last night immediately after this happened or after i realized it happened i the gate is open i have a note on the door itself this is my phone number leave it on the porch if i'm not here but you know like you know i love that it didn't i love

that i thought that that hadn't occurred to you like i love i love how simple how naive i really Like, I thought I was telling you something that had just not occurred to you. But of course, of course, you've left a hundred notes about this.

They're just like, you can see they're increasingly panicky. I have my phone number on this. The handwriting is getting shakier. Yeah, exactly. One of them, for some reason, even I can't figure out, I just cut out a bunch of letters from magazines and taped it into the note. I don't even know why I did that. It says Teriyaki Madness.

One of them is tear stained.

one of them i wrote in blood another i kissed with lipstick i don't know i just want anything

to catch there's two cootie catchers that are just laid out in case they want to find out their fortune which is to please deliver the box the other thing okay so uh my suggestion number one was not particularly helpful but suggestion number two is you can always call that helpline which i've done before and you could say if you just to reduce your anxiety by five percent they can send a note to the driver and and the note could say you know we're home we like if you just wanted to triple check if you just want to have it in the system i've done that before because at burbank springs there was always so much confusion about how because we had this big wall kind of not like a huge one but basically to keep rudy in the yard there was this wall that was constructed but it kind of confused delivery folks as to where the front of the house was and so stuff was always getting delivered at in random parts of the yard and then i think it hadn't been delivered so i got pretty used to checking in with the helpline so they could put a note in the file of the delivery person with the details so that's another thing you could do um at which i think you're going to be okay i think the notes will be sufficient but if you just wanted to do one more thing you might try that yeah and i'm also like just really going to

keep an ear out because yesterday i knew the package was supposed to be here at some point but I it did not occur to me that this would be something that I'd have to be there to sign for because I just haven't dealt with that in forever like we just get packages here all the time we leave the gate open they drop them on the but also it might be one of those things where there was a special note in there from Eric or possibly all the services we use our U.S. Postal Service and UPS and maybe that's because I mean we know like there's a

This one fellow who comes by and he's always whistling really loudly and he's a delivery person, a delivery person. And he said Omar from The Wire. You know, it's interesting because you need to really be careful. You know, everything comes back to race for me. He is a black guy and he often will be dropping stuff off at night. And he's a really, really loud whistler. Not night, but like kind of evening. Right. And Genevieve kind of mentioned like sometimes it's kind of creepy. She's watching TV and also she hears the whistling man coming. right like this and when he's whistling like yeah right exactly and i said i wonder if it is a way of him kind of announcing his presence for people in case you know we do live in a in a in a racist world where if there's a you know you know like i mean how many times you have to go into nextdoor.com and people are freaking out because they saw somebody who makes one day you'll defeat nextdoor.com 75 000 a year in their neighborhood so everybody We better be on the lookout or we saw a person of color in Wallingford. Sorry, Wallingford. But anyway, so I do almost wonder if that's it. Or he just likes to whistle and I'm way in my head about that.

Both. But that's I think that if that is the case, that it's a tactic that this delivery person has developed to just kind of try to head off any kind of weird racist suspicion or just bad outcome from people that are racist, to put it bluntly. That is fascinating. And that would be yet another little kind of thing that I, as a white dude, never have to think about. Yeah, you don't really think about it. It's like, oh, I want to make sure that everybody knows that I know that they know that I'm here, so they know that I'm not trying anything, you know. That's an interesting theory.

I don't know if you heard the – a little alarm just went off on my phone, but it is not related to the package, just so you know.

If the package shows up during – well, I guess what will happen is if the person is there to deliver the package during the show, you're just gonna have to drop the mic and run out there and grab yeah that's secure the bag i think it'll be good yeah absolutely um and that'll be good too because that will reduce your anxiety level i don't even want to get into this is one of the least interesting things to the listeners about this upcoming project that we're doing what's interesting to them is that we're going to be driving around and broadcasting from people's yards and streaming the show that's what they're interested in what i'm interested in is how it is that we can't just go tick tock live But I know there are good reasons for that. And the thing that I keep saying to you is this applies to our friend Eric the Viking Stromstad and previously to our friend Corey Schreppel, RIP. By that I mean I hope he's resting peacefully at the New York Times where everyone we used to work with now works. Wow. But all of the tech folks that we deal with at 8 p.m. are amazing. And usually we'll come to them with a project. and my first thought will be yeah i don't know we'll just can't we just like just put it on the internet with the phone some simple simplistic idea and they will explain why that actually isn't how it works and then whatever they develop it's always a thousand times better than if we would have just tried to do with the phone i think of like last year's talent show which our buddy eric actually like what sort of directed if you will from minnesota and there were cool like dissolves and the way that the stuff this is all happening live on youtube the three cameras set up that he was switching back and forth and he was straight on td was so good so anyway i trust that this box of stuff and whatever this somewhat involved process is is going to make the listener experience uh next week as far as folks who are going to be just like watching and listening to the show live on the stream as you already mentioned andrew 10 a.m west coast uh monday through friday i'm hoping it will make their experience great and i bet it will now yeah on to If you feel like we've sufficiently Discussed that topic I have a couple of other things I want to ask you about here At the top One What is going on with our new listener Who's trying to find Our newly minted listener I believe Who's trying to find an Andrew Walsh Who may or may not have some of that guy's Ikea stuff

Oh I'm sorry are you talking about Funkasaurus

I saw them open for Jurassic 5 At Bumbershoot one year

And they were good Somebody named Derek Who goes by the name Funkasaurus On Instagram And he may be listening to this right now It depends on if he started by listening to yesterday's show He may be listening To today's show I guess it depends on how Did we do a good show yesterday? I don't remember It was as good as any of the shows are That we do Anyway I will often get notes from listeners on Instagram Just about whatever It's a way of reaching me via the chat function And so I saw that I got a note from somebody I didn't recognize. I thought it was maybe a listener weighing in on something that we had talked about on the show or sending me a funny. spoof about hot dogs or something. But when I finally got around to opening it, I saw that this person doesn't know what a TBTL is. Derek just writes to me out of the blue and says, Hi, Andrew. Weird thing, but did you get a shipment of Ikea stuff today? I'm looking for an Andrew Walsh from Seattle. My Ikea shipment had some extras in it from other people, and I'm just trying to track it down, seeing if they have any of my stuff. Andrew Walsh can't be that common of

a name a i wonder if he's canadian um he's good looking i'll tell you that much can i ask can i ask you this do you think he is saying that andrew walsh can't be that common of a name he's saying that i kind of um ironically i don't know it seems like a kind of a common name i mean it doesn't seem like a it seems extremely common in as evidenced by the fact that we had a whole other plot line on this show about a different andrew walsh who i'm convinced by the way looks exactly like you but let's not let's let's not pick at that scab again um i i was wondering when i read because you sent me this last night this chain of conversation and i thought oh i wonder if he's joking about that because i think of andrew walsh as being a very typical american name and i don't you know you're a very atypical person no i'm basic and no i'm basic with my

splendor by the way what is it am i chuggy over here huggy i don't know even what i am Chugi. Chugi. Chugi. Anyway, we get our pet meds. Listen, so I wrote back. I'm like, I just wasn't sure if I had this straight. I said, oh, wow. I don't know of any other Andrew Walsh's in Seattle. But no, I didn't receive anything from Ikea. To be clear, your package had some missing items in it, as well as extra items with my name on it. This is weird. This is what I'm writing back to Funkasaurus, who says basically, yeah, confirms all of that, says that he's missing some stuff, but also has like a sink, says. And I assume Ikea will figure it all out. Either way, I'm sure their bathroom is going to come out just fine after they get their sink. So I take it that Funkasaurus has somebody else's sink. Then, though, closes that message by saying, but in contacting you, I found your TBTL and already got it downloaded for tomorrow's drive. And then an emoji that is like a smiley face with teeth. And I said, well, that is how we build audience. He said, thanks, Ikea, and gave me a heart. Well, welcome, new listener Funkasaurus. I hope you made it to today's show because you already got a shout out, like brand new listener shout out.

Wow. Yeah. Next year, the TBTL-a-thon, we will drive to Funkasaurus's house and do the show from his bathroom and standing next to his new sink. Hey, have we gotten as Dusty Buttons listening to the show yet?

Oh, my God, that's right. We have so much to talk about before we even talk about the show. So I why did it come up? Oh, we were talking about our our audio boards and how you and I have kind of we both have sort of a similarly malfunctioning mute button on our boards. And I said, yeah, I think it's Dusty Buttons. And then we started spoofing about how Dusty Buttons sounds like an adult dancer's name, possibly. And we imagined what Dusty Buttons might be like on the dance floor. Well, it turns out there's actually somebody named, no S, but there is somebody named Dusty Button. Several people reached out to me about this. I will read this from Jay in Cincinnati. What? Who says, I thought you might be interested to know that Dusty Button, without the S, is a real person. And she's pretty well known, but not for work in the adult industry. She was my favorite principal dancer with the Boston Ballet back when I lived there. And she's since gone on to be known for doing kind of edgy and commercial slash entrepreneurial things with her dance career. I'm not exactly clear on what. And there's a Wikipedia page for Dusty Button. Luke, if you Google Dusty Button, you will see a lot of stuff. Let's see. And then it doesn't look like there's a looking forward to the Thon, says Jay in Cincinnati, formerly of Boston. What are the chances that there would be a Dusty Button and they would be a dancer? I know, and a dancer of some sort. I know. I thought that was too interesting to pass up. That's very coincidental. Uh-oh. Is it happening?

Is it happening right now, you guys? Everybody just calm down.

No, but Publicola has released a new article about police accountability. About police accountability. That is an email. I like it when Publicola comes right into my—I like it just straight into my email, Luke.

When Publicola slides into your DMs, you need to watch out because they've already done four FOIA requests.

Yeah, that's right.

They only slide into your DMs after they've already got all their facts straight and they're about to publish. Yes. That's what I'm saying. I also like, by the way, that Listener Jay had a favorite principal dancer at the Boston Ballet. It was like, oh, are you a Jenny Summers fan or do you like Tom Terry? I'm good at making up fake names I'm more of a Dusty Buttons oh god wait is that is Publicola writing a piece about me now

let's see here Google News Alert out for Andrew Walsh nothing good wrong Andrew Walsh yeah sorry man I'm signed up for a lot of stuff CNN Breaking News Andrew Walsh – actually, that doesn't even make sense. I was going to say Andrew Walsh receives Ikea sync, but it would be Funkasaurus receives Ikea sync parts after interacting with Andrew Walsh. All right. I have a feeling that you get a lot of notifications on your phone.

Yeah, no, this is going to be fun. You're going to learn a lot about me. For example, do you think it's embarrassing that I have a Gmail notification out for Andrew Walsh because I'm waiting to see if I'm ever famous? I don't think that that's embarrassing.

I mean, particularly in the world that we work in and live in, if, let's say, you know, somebody were to write about our show or tweet about you or either this show or the other shows that you do like after these messages and spotless, I think there's a there's a very real need for that for you. So I don't think that's embarrassing.

Well, in this case, this is actually an obit from the Rockdale Reporter. Somebody has died, and the pallbearers are Dimitri Lara, Andrew Walsh, and Daniel Thompson.

It's not not supporting my theory that Andrew Walsh is a fairly common American name.

Exactly.

Speaking of which, yeah, if I had a Google alert for Luke Burbank, it would just be something maybe about me if I got mentioned on the internet and then about the other Luke Burbank. I think there's two of them out there that I know of One of them used to be, maybe still is The head of the Missouri Cattle Association Oh right, who's kind of rebuffed your advances That's right, back in the radio days A story came out about Google gangers at the time And these were, of course, a person who has your same exact name And it was a story about how people had become kind of friends At least virtual friends with somebody who had the same name And we thought that was a funny bit on the show And so we reached out to the other Luke Burbank, and he declined, which I find hilarious. I wonder now. I don't – listen. I don't want to cast aspersions. Uh-oh. I'll let you know. Who's that?

Sorry. Is this going to – The other Luke Burbank? That is some folks trying to reach me on Instagram. It's all fine.

I thought it might be the other Luke Burbank. Maybe it would be hilarious if you hosted a different podcast with the other Luke Burbank about Cattlemen's Association issues.

What if the other Andrew Walsh, who's now Andrew Wolfe, because I think he changed his name Oh, right But don't you really think that says something about the Andrew Walshes of the world and the Luke Burbanks of the world When we asked another Andrew Walsh to join us on the show, yeah, of course, yeah, I'll join you on the show You asked another Luke Burbank, nope, uh-uh, too busy for you

I don't know anything about the other Luke Burbanks politics, but Guy lives in Missouri and is the head of a Cattlemen's Association So if I wondered – this is amazing because we are now 12 years removed, 11 years removed from when we tried to get the other Luke Burbank on and he said no. And I'm only now realizing this. I wonder if he was vaguely aware of my existence because by that time I had done a lot of like wait, wait, don't tell me and things like that to where maybe his Google alert for Luke Burbank started populating with this guy that's doing public radio. And if that isn't necessarily his kind of cultural and political persuasion, maybe he was not feeling it for myself, the original Luke Burbank. The other thing that's funny is every time you call yourself the original. Yeah. Often imitated, never duplicated the original Luke Burbank. There are certain hotel chains also Because I mean if this guy has a job Where he travels a lot for his Cattleman's work He also has a lot of like hotel points And things and whenever I check into a certain Hotel chain they try to figure out which Luke Burbank I am and I say Not the one from Missouri and then they go Oh okay the other one The other person named Luke Burbank Who's reached out to me was a guy in Idaho Who is like And he actually, his Twitter handle might be something like real Luke Burbank, which is hilarious to me. He was mad that I made a joke about Donald Trump. There was a picture of Donald Trump, I think, allegedly writing his State of the Union address or going over some paperwork. But he had a look on his face that looked, I said, like he had when you're in a room by yourself and you fart and then somebody walks into that room. It's a very specific, very embarrassing moment that many of us can identify with. And I thought that was the look on Donald Trump's face. And the the the quote unquote real Luke Burbank in Idaho was mad at me on Twitter or said something to the effect of like, just let it go or leave him alone or whatever. So I'm pretty much over to with interactions with other Luke Burbanks in the world.

You know, do you remember we talked about our Wikipedia presences maybe a year ago? And you know You of course have an entry On Wikipedia as does Too Beautiful to Live Which is the podcast you're listening to right now Or hosting depending on who I'm talking to And I said Yeah I don't have my own page and then somebody Somebody created – I think it might have been Sherilyn Corvallis – created a Wikipedia entry for me, and then it got rejected by the Wikipedia editors. I don't know why, but they just basically said this guy – there weren't enough citations or something. They're just like – but basically it's like I was rejected like a blue checkmark on Twitter, right? Like this guy, he's nothing. He's nobody. He'll never be anybody. Get him off of the website. Well, when you go to Luke Burbank's Wikipedia page right now, it does mention Too Beautiful to Live with Andrew Walsh, the longest-serving co-host Andrew Walsh. But now when you click on that Andrew Walsh, I'm like, oh, am I back? Because it is a clickable link. Nope. According to Wikipedia, you are hosting the show with an Andrew Walsh who is an Australian festival director who's directed numerous ceremonies and public events. So there you go. Wait a minute.

There's got to be a way to fix this.

No, I did not bring that up to go down.

Anybody got Jimmy Wales' email address?

Let's not do that again. We've gone down that road. That wasn't why I brought it up. I just thought it was kind of funny because we were talking about this. Because I think that if you had a Google News alert out for Luke Burbank, at least 90% of the stuff would be you. I mean, whether it's just like LiveWire press releases about upcoming guests, like you have a lot of stuff. If you do a Google News search on Luke Burbank, I'm sure it's, again, almost all your stuff. So you might get the occasional thing, but I am on the other Luke Burbank's, I guess we call him the non-original Luke Burbank's LinkedIn page right now. He's now North America Business Strategy Enablement Lead at Bayer Crop Science. And full-time hater. Let's see, does I say that? Can you edit somebody's LinkedIn page?

I'm doing it right now. What do we have here? That's what I made. Speaking of Twitter jokes, I made that joke a long time. What was I watching? um some show that i got really into for a minute a while ago where there's that classic oh you know what it was it was wandavision and it was when kat dennings character is doing that kind of like great tropey like like hacking into the mainframe which people pointed out on twitter isn't even how any of that works anymore but you know what i mean yeah like kat dennings had one of those top yeah it was funny had one of those great moments where she's like and what do we have here as she's like chewing gum and like logging in on like a some kind of dos screen you know of getting into the guts of the system uh and i wrote on twitter something like i just once in my life i want to mutter what do we have here under my breath as i hack into the mainframe i think that's what i just did as i just changed the as i just changed the imposter luke burbank's linkedin page what do we have here by the way in his toast the uh the the other andrew walsh or one of the others the one that's being mysteriously linked to that must just be something that wikipedia the the software of wikipedia it must just it must go and grab if someone has a wikipedia page and then the same name is mentioned somewhere else it must and i'm i'm going to use the word hyperlink and i don't know if that's even the terminology anymore but it must automatically hyperlink because there's no way somebody went and and activated the your name to a link or connected your name to a link that they knew was going to the wrong place but what's interesting about the andrew walsh the other andrew walsh the australian festival director is um usually what they'll have is after you know there's some sort of statements about a person or facts or whatever then at the bottom of their wikipedia page it has the links where that information is derived from and uh the a lot of the andrew walsh stuff comes from an article written by someone named michael gordon in 2006 One Man's Duck Is Another's Inscrutable Mystery Is that a TVTL show title? Maybe That's apparently the article that was written In The Age that has generated Most of the information about the Australian Andrew Walsh One Man's Duck is Another's Inscrutable Mystery So there you go There you go Okay well I think we're all on tenterhooks About this delivery Andrew and the very fate Of next week's streaming hangs on it so if you need to leave just do what you got to do but fingers are crossed let's take a quick break and then when we come back we'll get into these top stories we'll do some Dazzling Donors and some Blur's Days here on a Thursday edition of TBTL

on your mark on your mark, get set, get set now ready, ready, go everybody rattle

dazzle, everybody rattle, dazzle

alright let's thank some Dazzling Donors We're going heavy on the TBTL-a-thon talk this week Because of course next week will be That one time It's the most wonderful time Of the year Where we go out and Solicit donations from the tens of listeners But we're still in the process of thanking Some dazzling donors These are folks who Signed up to donate during last year's TBTL-a-thon And they've been dazzling us with those donations And we really appreciate it Talking about Give it all you Good old Mickshell McNelly in Edina, Minnesota. Michelle says lies. I need more lies. Or at least a hot dog story. We must have. Did we go on an extended imagined Mickshell McNelly universe last year?

You know, I'd be lying if I told you I remembered or if I knew you're already lying. Well, we know you're good at lying. I feel like I started the show with a few hot dog stories, but I don't know if that counts if I don't have this music underneath me. I mean, do you want a literal hot dog story? Last hot dog I ate was actually a reheated hot dog, which, God, nobody wants that in their life. That was a couple of weeks ago. Why? Well, because I'd made some hot dogs the night before, and I have this weird condition where I always have to make one extra hot dog because I don't trust that two hot dogs will be enough for me. It also depends how much beer I've had before I'm making those hot dogs.

That's only one of your weird medical conditions. I basically do not have a butt.

Yeah, no. They're both passed down through the generations. They're in my jeans. Hey-oh. Anyway, so I made a hot dog dinner a couple of weeks ago. Wait a sec. Ate two of the hot dogs. The third one, which was still a good hot dog, is a big fat Mariner dog. I buy Mariner dogs at the grocery store. You don't like this. Please don't say big fat Mariner dog. That was a big, thick, fat Mariner dog. And it was waiting for me in the refrigerator the next morning. And I was like, it's not going to be as good reheated, obvs. But I'm hungry. And it was like 1030 in the morning. I think we were getting off to a late start that day. It was actually that day where we got off to a really late start, Luke. And I was like, this is going to push lunch back so far. I'm going to have me a morning hot dog. And, you know, it wasn't the best hot dog I've ever had, but it served the purpose in the moment.

This is what I don't understand. Hot dogs are pre-cooked. So the quote-unquote cooking of a hot dog is really just applying heat to it, raising its internal temperature to a point that is just more pleasant to eat.

Well, we keep hot dogs in the freezer here because we always like to have hot dogs on hand, but I can't guarantee. I don't eat hot dogs as often as you might think, or I go through phases. So our process is we keep a pack of Mariner dogs in the freezer along with some hot dog buns in the freezer. On hot dog nights, I pull out the hot dogs, and I have to make a decision. How many of these do I want to defrost? Usually I cook them by boiling them, so I defrost them just by putting them in the water, not in the microwave. And then slowly when they're defrosted, I turn up the heat more and I boil them up and they're good and they got the snap and everything's good. But I like to, you know, I, you know, I defrost that third one and cook that third one because I don't know. I see what you're saying. Like, why don't just defrost the third one, defrost it and keep it in the fridge?

No, what I'm wondering is, so this one had had it been cooked at one point and that was getting recooked, right? It was boiled the night before. My question is, does boiling a hot dog the second time, is it any different than boiling it the first time? It just seems to me like it should be – every time you boil it, it should just bring it back to whatever state it would be. So there's actually a noticeable difference.

There's a noticeable difference. After you boil it – and first of all, to reheat it the second time, I don't re-boil it. I just put it in the microwave that time. But, yeah, if you boil a hot dog and then you don't eat it and it cools down and then it eventually is refrigerated, the next morning when you pull it out, you can see it's kind of wrinkled. It doesn't look like a fresh hot dog. It doesn't have the snap to it anymore. You know what I'm getting you for Christmas Unfrozen hot dogs

Unfrozen hot dog lawyers I'm just an unfrozen hot dog I was in Andrew's freezer this whole month And then one day No, it's just a hot dog roller Like they have at your local 7-Elevens Or at the ballpark So what you do is You just put your dogs on there My sense is that can just go on indefinitely

Just constantly, constantly have the hot dog And the house would smell so good

I know it does smell so good I do love that smell

It smells like a 7-Eleven

I had a I took a picture of my Refrigerator yesterday Because I was reaching in there for something And I realized this is Pretty intensely bachelor fridge Because there's just like It's like the classic kind of almost stereotype of it Like there's basically like Two different jars of pickles Some sauerkraut Like four Modelo beers And two Topo Chicos And that's essentially it And then condiments And it just struck me as funny Because it was like It couldn't have been more stereotypical And then But what that What that generated Was just A shocking amount of engagement From people Just taking pictures Of their own refrigerators Something

You know I did not

see your original tweet on this yet somebody well this answers sort of a question for me somebody replied to a tweet that had nothing to do with refrigerators that said something else about like they were corresponding with you but then copied me on twitter and made some reference to this i had no idea until this moment what the hell they were talking about yeah it was a big

again i was it was much more a hashtag engagement than i expected and it was very participatory like people were really into sending in pictures of their fridge so that's good to know i guess but um somebody had said somewhere in that whole chain like you just need the hot dogs and i was like oh i should have actually taken i should have pulled out the crisper drawer because all that's in the crisper drawer are light life hot dogs oh really really yeah not no freezer for you the light life hot dogs i'll tell you i don't know if boiling them and then reboiling them i mean let's be honest they're never going to be great uh-oh let's see what we got here what are we working

with here what do we work it is a text message it is a text message it looks like it is from um the stew bot uh on the fun living criminals it's something about the twins

can't get into that right now maestro on your mark on your mark get set get set now ready ready All right.

Now that we've honored our commitment to Michelle McNelly to tell a hot dog story, we need to, of course, also recognize our other Dazzling Donor today, Diane Marshall.

Diane.

Diane says, I would like to use my Dazzling Donor message to remember my sweet dog, Fred. That's a great name for a dog. It really is. I've never met a dog named Fred that wasn't awesome. I had a cat named Fred. Fred and Ethel.

Not a great cat. I had two cats, Fred and Ethel. They were good names then.

Did you come up with those names?

I was a kid. I think the family, I think we as a family liked it. We were watching a lot of WIO UHF reruns back then. And we liked the Lucy show or whatever it was called. And so we called them Fred and Ethel. But then Ethel died, got hit by a car, I believe. Very sad for me. First kind of taste of a pet's death in my life. And then we just had a cat named Fred

Which was a different vibe Right, because it makes sense when it's part of a kind of running bit We had a cat named Lucy And then we had another cat named Got Some Splainin' A Do Really? That sounds Yeah, and then Lucy ran away So that was really a lot of confusion for people Diane says I want to remember my sweet dog Fred From the earliest days of the podcast I would listen to TBTL during our walks. Longer episodes just meant longer walks, which was fine with him. I will tell you, of the many things I miss about having a dog in my life on the daily, it's the podcasting and the walks. Nothing gave me more joy than downloading two or three podcasts I was excited to hear and then hitting the road with the rude dog. So, Diane, I totally understand the vibe you're talking about. Fred had many character traits that you would associate with the 10s. He had his anxieties and petty jealousies, but he also had a big heart and a good sense of humor.

Sorry, that was me imitating Fred.

Fred was forever waiting for a FedEx delivery. He had left so many notes. But they all just said food with the F spelled backwards. He had anxieties and petty jealousness, but he also had a big heart and a good sense of humor. He always knew when it was garbage day. Wow. This guy. Is it possible you're the biological father?

No comment.

And he never missed a sausage fest. We adopted Fred from Seattle Humane almost 15 years ago, and he filled our lives with love and goofiness. We said goodbye to him in March, but we will always remember him with love. I don't have a song to suggest But I've attached a picture of Fred For the show pic if you want to use it I am looking at this picture Of Fred Andrew with a towel Covering him He looks like Fred Kenobi He looks like What my mom used to do with my sisters This is a very weird specific reference That about five of the listeners will even get But But when my mom used to give my sisters baths and then pull them out, she would wrap the towel around them kind of like this and be drying them off. And she would say, you look like Judah Ben-Hur's sister. Oh, right. Because in the movie Ben-Hur, there is a point where Charlton Heston playing Ben-Hur, his sisters, they contract leprosy. And this is why it's a weird reference. And they are going around in the shadows and they're wrapped up in robes and things because they're – They're considered unclean and they have leprosy.

I was going to say you just mentioned this on the show recently, but you didn't mention it on the show recently. That is also something that is discussed in the very first appearance of Susie Burbank, your mom, on TBTL way back on the Mother's Day special in 2008 or 2009. And, yeah, but, you know, when I was taking clips, I didn't take that part. I took the other part that we used. And, of course, Chris Hayes knocked your mom out of the contest anyway. So it's all moot now. Anyway, I hope Chris is sleeping well these days. But anyway, yeah, so I just heard that story recently. It was very, very cute. I love that you're revisiting TBTL, that you're reacquainting yourself with the history of this program. Yeah, there's actually – it is true. There's a lot I didn't know or misunderstood, like the just-a-minute-round story. I was so wrong about what that story was about. I thought that was about somebody knocking on the door when Jen was trying to use the restroom or something.

That's what I thought it was too, honestly. Yeah. Well, Diane, we're so sorry that you guys had to say goodbye to Fred, but he looks like he was a pretty good dude. And this picture will absolutely be the show pic today because it's just absolutely adorable. And thanks also for supporting TBTL. We really do appreciate you. Hello and welcome to Top Story. I woke up this morning, Andrew, with a pretty long to-do list of just a lot of it Thawne related. And related to our trip next week We're gonna, I don't know I don't want to give too much away We're also doing a special recording project On Saturday We can explain it tomorrow, yeah I'm just gonna say this We have a special recording project on Saturday Involving DFTB That's part of this whole thing And so anyway, there's just a lot going on You and Genevieve are coming down to Portland It's gonna be exciting But anyway, I got up this morning And I've gotta do a CBS interview from this room i gotta i just have a lot going on so why did i spend an hour on our friend andrea seabrook's twitter feed trying to find the points at which william shatner was being unnecessarily rude to her on twitter because she had the audacity to ask him for an interview via well because today when i got up one of the first news stories that hit my little feed was this headline Take it easy, nothing matters in the end William Shatner at 90 On love, loss, and Leonard Nimoy Isn't it Nimoy, by the way? Is that true? Yeah, I think we've all said Nimoy, but I think it's wrong I think his family says Nimoy How does Ayn Rand pronounce it? It's, I'm sure it's It's not the kind of thing that any Star Trek enthusiast Would have specific thoughts on The pronunciation of Spock's last name

It is weird, though, but that's the truth That I've never heard that before

oh i i it's somewhere it's somewhere buried i think it was called a nimoy person special i think it was what they used to call it in the 90s

sorry it took me a second to figure out that was a really weirdly deep cut joke that also didn't

really make sense anyway uh this is a an interview in the guardian with william shatner and it's by a writer i don't know if she's a columnist or a reporter there named hadley freeman and i guess why it struck me was because it is the most glowing like just absolute love letter to william shatner ever which is funny to me because i feel like at this point if you know anything about william shatner you know that he spends most of his time fighting with people on twitter like he he has not i don't think he has blossomed into a likable person in his dotage i think he is whatever goodwill he engendered from tj hooker and the practice and boston legal or whatever else he was doing outside of star trek it feels and maybe it's just because you and i have been on kind of a personal thing with this with him but like it's just funny to read an interview with someone who has nothing but good things to say about william shatner about how he was early for the zoom interview about how he looks amazing about how i'll just read to you um uh he doesn't uh the man in front of me doesn't look more than 60 years old by the way shatner was turning 90 as he bounces about in his seat twisting to show me the view around him with the agility of a man two decades younger is this actually shatner or a celebrity lookalike you look amazing for 90 bill I say cautiously so okay she's sucking up to William Shatner fine I get it if I you know if he was going to be on live wire none of the Andrea stuff would have unfolded I'm sure I would have probably acted exactly the same way but this is the thing and I won't like read this whole article because it will just take forever but one of the things that I find trying about William Shatner's persona at this point is. he is constitutionally unable to ever answer any question in the affirmative. And we noticed this when he was on Wait, Wait, when I was on that show at that time, which is so she says, you look amazing for 90. His response, 90? A lie. Who told you that? CNN? And then she says, well, yeah, and every other news outlet. The press has spread this ridiculous rumor. I'm 55, he says, and he really does look like he could be. But you first appeared on Star Trek 55 years ago, I say, beginning to doubt myself. Okay, then. I'll admit to being 90, he grins, enjoying my discombobulation. Throughout this interview, and that's not even the best example of it, any time that this interviewer asks him something or tries to present some kind of objective fact, his answer is always to say, that's wrong, or where did you hear that, or whatever. It's like he is just And the idea that this is just playfulness Or he's enjoying the discombobulation You know who else enjoys the discombobulation Van Morrison These two should start a club called We are older

We are wearing hair pieces And we're not pleasant to be around Also by the way that will be TBTL in 20 years Famous anti-masker Van Morrison Exactly And anyway the interview It just is incredibly Frustrating to read If you're somebody who recently had your friend dragged by William Shatner on Twitter for no reason. But I also just found it so funny that he thinks that his life advice and how he ends the interview is to say, take it easy. Nothing matters in the end. Because, again, my cursory search this morning of his tweets turned up so much evidence that he does not take it easy. No. Ever. He is constantly fighting with people about Star Trek. There's two things going on. One is weird ancillary Star Trek projects or shows that are maybe like I don't know if they're podcasts or vlogs or whatever that are like about Star Trek. But at some point they've gotten sideways with William Shatner. And so then he is just like in the weeds tweeting emojis of violins about these these sites, these podcasts or these projects that other people do that he's mad about where they're recording video messages or cameos where they're making money. And William Shatner wants to make sure that their fans know That these people who he doesn't like Are making good money And he's like posting like internet things About like what's the net worth of these people Like it's madness Inside the mind under the toop Of William Shatner So for him to think That it's just like hey man Just take it easy bro It's like we only get one shot at this It's like it couldn't be less How this guy actually moves through the world

Yeah, there is something that I find so irritating and almost – I don't know if toxic is too strong of a word, but there's a toxicity. What is this? What is this? Uh-oh. Let's see here. Andrew, could you just take it easy with the text? I know. That is a newsletter that I received called Next Draft, which is a roundup of news. It's good for ideas for the show. I could read it to you, but I can just finish my thought to you if you prefer. You want to do this every day? You want to leave this out every day?

You know what it is? It's basically like I'm getting the experience from my end of what it's like for you every day to work with me because I don't have I don't have like a phone that's pinging all day. But my brain is just constantly derailing what we're trying to do.

I have by the way, I have a notification set up on this for all three podcast emails. No, I don't think TBTL email will give me a notification because GoDaddy is so ridiculously hard to use. But like if I get an email for after these messages or for Spotless, we'll be hearing about that. If you order any food online, I will get an email at the TVTL. Don't I know. Voicemail. Anyway, what I was going to say was there's this like this particular generation of these famous guys who just who they still they they think they're charming, you know, and I hate to go here. I think I've alluded to this on the show before, but not long ago, there was an interview with Don. Donovan also just celebrated his 90th, 80th, and he just released a new song with David Lynch that David Lynch co-produced and made a video for. It was weird. Yeah. But there was an interview with him that was released about a year ago. A listener sent it to me, and he was just awful. Like, he's just awful. And again, it's that like he's talking to a I believe the reporter is a much younger woman and her whole piece is I don't know if I sent it to you or if you know what I'm talking about. But her whole piece is just like it was terrible trying to interview this guy because he like good. He talks down to you and he's he's still he's on this, you know, hippie dippy shit, which, you know, I guess the transcendental meditation stuff is why he and Lynch have found some some common ground. So that's why. And I like.

lynch so it's weird i'm not trying to dismiss all of his philosophies but like he's this guy who was like you know kind of looked down upon by the bob dillans of the world and kind of a beatles hanger honor and i know donovan had a career of his own like you don't have to tell me that i have i know okay i i know and i was a big fan for a while but like here he is in the 2000s and just like talking down to this reporter and and like kind of actuallying her all the time and just sounding like he knows he he has all the answers to the universe figured out but it's all just a bunch of bullshit and like he just it's terrible i get kind of similar vibes from paul mccartney like the cheeky bullshit i've i've hated that for 30 years now like i don't know man paul mccartney i guess i can't maybe i shouldn't lump him in here because i don't know of him ever like being he seems like a very gracious guy who will be there and give fans the time so i very briefly

met him and i think i've talked about this on the show what i thought was paul mccartney in my five minutes of chatting with him was incredibly uh polite and and seemingly present but i also think it's because of a lifetime of training himself to seem that way i've also met ringo star opposite like ringo star was trying to get ringo was trying to get this thing that we were doing ended early it was a tribute to joe walsh his brother-in-law but and so he was there for it But he was trying to get it ended early so that he could catch his flight. And I remember saying to the person who had intermediated this, I said, what is he flying Southwest? And they said, no, he has a private plane. I was like, well, maybe just have the private plane take off 10 minutes later. Right, right, right. But anyway, McCartney, again, I'm not trying to act like I know anything, but he seems, I'm sure he's got his own BS going on. But to me, the ones that are the worst about it are like Ringo being, you know, all Mr. peace and love but then also forcing a statue although i want to clarify something i i think i've always called that ringo statue that's in beverly hills a statue of ringo star it's a statue of the peace sign yeah i guess shiny right isn't it presumably his hands also it's a complete jeff coons ripoff so come on like but i i drove by that when i was in la a while ago and i think i took a picture of it and sent it to you but like um i just i don't know why i want to clarify that But it's not a statue of Ringo Starr It's a statue of Ringo Starr's hand flashing a peace sign That he managed to get installed in Beverly Hills Because he's so zen And he's released so much desire That he wants to have a statue of his hand Prominently displayed so people will take pictures with it But all of which is to say You are not wrong, Andrew, about the vibe In this Shatner thing Okay, what are we hearing? What are we looking at here?

It is a text message Oh, it's from my friend Tracy from Ohio Who says disappointed. She's apparently still listening to TBTL and is disappointed in our Wham! George Michael conversation. She's a big George Michael fan. She says this Wham! George Michael conversation has put me over the edge. Almost 40 years of devotion and multiple trips to England yet I have taught you nothing. Frowny face. What I like about the frowny face is though it's not an actual cartoon emoji. It's actually the colon and then the parentheses which I like. I like an old school frowny face. You know why that happened? She's voice to texting you um maybe i but i actually type that in myself i think that's a much funnier

way to send the um i agree with you but i bet you anything that she i could be wrong but i bet you if you asked her are you voice to texting she would say yes because when i do voice to text and i say smiley face that's how it does it here's why also maybe she's just here's why i think you

might be wrong is because she just sent a follow-up george michael was the first white guy to have a number one pop song and number one r&b album on the u.s charts with faith but the number

is the number sign. Thank God a white guy finally got some

recognition. But it's a hashtag sign and usually voice to text if you say number one it'll spell it out. Yeah. I'm not going to ask her if she's doing voice to text. You'll be very surprised to hear me reading these private text messages on the air. Hi Tracy. I miss you.

The vibe that Shatner is putting out in this interview is precisely what you're talking about with that Donovan interview too. For instance you know this writer Hadley Freeman continues to be very, very deferential and complimentary about William Shatner's appearance. She says his youthful appearance goes much further than impressive hair. Well, it's a toupee, which she recognizes. She says there's a website dedicated to his toupee. But then she goes, but his appearance goes much further than impressive hair. And I question the premise of if having a toupee counts as impressive hair. And I'm not shaming anyone who's wearing a toupee. I will probably avail myself of it someday. But I'll be like the George Burns of podcasting. But it's like saying an impressive girdle, right?

I mean, that's weird. Right, exactly. It's like there's no shame in doing that. But is it impressive that you're doing something that's going to like kind of fake your.

is fake your appearance the wrong thing is putting on a shirt

putting two cantaloupes in your bra and saying you're impressive bosom

which I plan on doing next week by the way yeah get ready

everyone whose house we're coming to Andrew's got a new look so she says has he had some serious work done which again is a compliment veiled in a question because you're saying like you look so good and here's no have you he shoots back no because I'm just a journalist and I can't afford it I say ha well i don't have any secret potions he says it must be genetic uh then he goes on to ask her uh she's asking about his marriage because he's like living with his ex-wife and of course he's super unhelpful with that answer about why he's living with his ex-wife and then he says um are you married he asked not very subtly changing the subject well i say i've lived with someone for a decade and how's it going he asked well we have three kids uh so there's not much time to think about that and you bore them all i what you bore them all i'm not sure if he means did i give birth to them or do they all find me incredibly tedious but either way the answer is yes um so it's like basically the idea that he's like asking do you have kids and then did you give birth to your kids

yeah that's how that's that's i think that's rude straight up rude i think it's very personal to a

person who's i mean and as we know from bill shatner's own twitter feed he only does these interviews with the outlets that he deems worthy of his pearls of wisdom he only gives them a certain amount of time and he volunteers to be a part of this and he is promoting something always so i don't think it's reasonable for him to ask the person interviewing him if they gave birth to

the kids they consider their children luke i hate him i just hate him and the funny thing is you said before that like you know anybody at this point would know that his reputation is being Kind of impossible in some ways Or just you know kind of a prick for lack of a better word The funny thing is I didn't know that Like we gotta know It was one of those things where I think it was like From listener Morgan Like on some social media was just like I find it both infuriating and charming That Andrew I don't know if it was Luke and Andrew or just Andrew Didn't realize that this is his whole Raison d'etre like this is his personality This is what he's known for I didn't know that until he went off on Andrea a few months ago

Yeah, he is, even in this interview, where it's, he's clearly enjoying it because the person who's talking to him is just absolutely, completely enthralled with him, or at least pretending to be. But even in this interview, he gets touchy at a certain point, or tetchy, as you might say, because the specter of Star Trek is even casually raised. Oh, you wouldn't ask that to Tom Petty, would you? Exactly. It's exactly that again. You know, it's very frustrating when – to me, when somebody – here's what I think William Shatner is very much allowed to do. He is allowed to continue cashing the checks from whatever ancillary Star Trek projects he's involved in and whatever cons he attends where there's – he gets paid lots of money. All of that is – and he's also allowed to just not do interviews. But if he wants to do interviews to promote other things Then I think he should I think he has to be realistic about the fact that The reason people are talking to him is because of Star Trek And for him to become angry anytime Star Trek comes up I remember poor Peter on Wait Wait Having to be extremely careful about how he got into that part of the conversation Because it's like an interview ender For that guy whose whole career is because of Star Trek

yeah no more questions about tj hooker oh wait what is this what is this exciting time it's an actual text oh it's tracy she says um i'm texting you from my car right now she says boy this text to speech technology has sure come a long way you're my number one friend no smile she's just saying that uh no everything's good but this is just a topic close to her heart okay so i guess

we got there with the whatever the george michael conversation was no i think no she's just saying

that, like, sorry that I have to hit you up with these complaints, but yeah, this one I couldn't let alone, is what I think she's saying there.

Okay, got it. That's just absolutely stupid.

I love that I, like, petered out there so wimpily without energy. I'm just, like, muttering my final words, and then you come in with that high energy. I love it. I'm back in this, baby. Yeah, that's right. But I do have to open up the right tab here, so let me just Let's take a moment, not get too ahead of ourselves on the energy thing. We're doing Drops of Stupider here, right? Okay. Here we go, ladies and gentlemen. Here, can you pump me up again, Luke? Just get me. Absolutely. I need that. I need that. Yeah.

It's just absolute stupidity.

Round three, Drops of Stupider. Only a few matchups remain. You must vote. Go to tbtl.net and click on.

today's show page to cast your vote for all of the round three against luke burbank the second recurring segments is the bracket uh category and what we have for today's matchup i don't even know are you ready for this and maybe a better question is am i ready for this from a production standpoint the answer is of course i am we have cat rolling this is pepper schwartz i fucking hate you i hate you so much a lot of language on today's show um cat rolling is going

up against cooking with sean the recipe that jen selected was uh was cheese it's cover mackerel covered in cheese it's right the cheese it's is like the breading okay i don't even want to open this can of mackerel in here you guys yes you can open the mackerel well everyone hooray for you

there you go that is a cooking with sean or maybe not a cooking with sean but it's definitely sean cooking uh going up against cat rolling which of these recurring segments do you like better we should mention that i just got a text message my new favorite is andrew's phone notifications oh dude it is from ups oh no this is uh from ups this is about the other delivery luke that we're

waiting on so that actually is exciting that's positive um okay um ups fedex yeah tbtl.net yes vote on drops of stupor you know what's funny is uh that jen just said hooray for you on that tape uh because of course we were obsessed with this i think it was a cd series that you could buy that was somebody just being encouraging saying hooray for you and you can do it all like positive affirmation i don't know if this was conscious or subconscious but i was watching our friend chris hayes's television show two nights ago and he was i forget what the topic was but it was something that was like you know cold comfort where you know a certain politician was finally admitting something or whatever and chris just goes hooray for you and i was like is that is that is that just like a thing he's saying or is that some kind of buried subconscious tbtl

memory yeah because you know we tend to speak in drops I have actually I have a question for you and I want to tell you who got eliminated too if you don't mind but first this hooray for you thing I'm pretty sure in that segment like if that tape went on a little bit longer there I'm pretty sure you or Jen say oh can we still say that and you say it's okay if you say but we can't play the audio because like whatever you pull that from it got litigious or something I think it's the

opposite i think we might have like had the person on who made it and they were super nice and we just felt bad i don't know i maybe that was my my memory is that it was more like a thing where we started to feel bad that we were kind of punching down or at least punching towards a person who would just really only had very good intentions right right right that's kind of my distant memory of why that was retired a little bit i think it was more that than the opposite because lord knows if the hooray for you people would have come at us yeah i would have never stopped playing i would have like i would have made it particularly at that point in my life i would have made it absolutely my personal mission in life to to to confront them over it so my guess is it was more the opposite it was more just like people who were actually pretty nice okay but now

i have some questions for you though before we tell you who got eliminated because now i don't know if you can call this up quickly enough but do you have a hooray for you drop still that is the original or is that actually listener nick um nick the delivery i think the medication delivery guy who's been a like listener since day one i always hear him when you play the hooray for you drop i always picture no i think this is yeah i'll play it for you hooray for you okay we have another one where somebody says that on a phone and i don't know if that's my collection or yours but I think that might be listener Nick who left it on the voicemail line. Uh-oh. Another text. Oh, this is a text coming into the TBTL listener line. I don't know who. It's somebody from the 520 sending me a music for your weekend suggestion on Instagram. I mean, this is, by the way.

Feeling that no one really gets you or you're just wanting to hear some encouraging words. Well, there's a solution. You can have what you want. You can do it. The finish line is closer than you think. The Cheers to UCD is eight tracks filled with encouragement and cheering applause. It's even been featured on the Ellen DeGeneres Show. We're on your side. We're here for you. We believe in you. We guarantee you'll be feeling better about yourself and your life, or we'll give you your money back. Call 1-877-545-6715 now to order the Cheers to UCD. and you'll also receive three puzzle-shaped affirmative tokens.

One says, I am courageous. Another, I am unstoppable. And the third, without me, the puzzle is incomplete. Together, all these items normally sell for $35. But right now, you can get them for only $24.95. Call now, and don't forget.

Hooray for you!

What really, really sells the ad is the video of the folks that are listening on it, like headphones to the affirmations are really quite something.

Do you, you don't have the phone tape one, do you buddy?

Is your mind blown by the way, just that you're like, I am courageous. That you're getting the full context for that kind of stuff.

Yes, yes. I think you've played this for me before, but I just totally forgotten about all of that. Yeah. It's literally applause to make you feel better.

Yeah. Which, you know, again, some listener will check in with the full details of why we had retired that. But let's just say if we play it today, it's in the spirit of love and appreciation as opposed to making fun of it because it's – I don't know what the downside is of people feeling better about themselves. I should try it sometime.

So do you want to know what is eliminated from the contest? Garbage anxiety. You're out of there, garbage anxiety. Wow.

Does that feel somehow cathartic for you?

Luke, I'm helping you actually purge your actual garbage anxiety. Can I be honest with you? This is a terrible – I'm going back to the low energy level thing again because I'm going to say I think I'm kind of emotionally dead to this round. Like – or not to this round but, like, to this bracket. Like, because the other one is Trucktober's out of there. I just don't – I didn't have really strong feelings about any of these, you know. Cat rolling. I'm just being really negative here. I'm being real shitty. Go to TVTL.net and vote. But, yeah, none of these – If you're not emotionally dead. Yeah. If you're not –

Show that by going to tbch.net and voting on this contest.

Feeling empty inside? Voting will fill the void. Yeah, I don't have a strong attachment to any of these. I am courageous. Things, and I don't want to give away anything here, things that I have much stronger feelings about are things like Splooch the Turtle, the Blue Angels. Maybe this is because I was there for them. I don't know. Of course, garbage anxiety, I'm there for that every damn week. Oh, shit. Things are hard. Your boat crash story, I feel pretty invested in that whole deal If it made it to this round We don't know yet But anyway Yeah but this one I'm not I'm not super You know Whatever happens is fine I don't care what you do Wow Wow Okay

Well This seems like a good time To get into the Blurs days Yeah I'll cut it all out

There's a right way to rock And a wrong way to roll You can't just listen to your soul Just remember that life Is number one You can be having so much fun Just remember that life is much fun You can be nothing but one

Did I send you the Blur's Days, Luke? I like to think I did. Yeah, all right.

Great. Do you want to kick us off here? Sure, absolutely. We're starting things today with Zachary, who says, My fiancée absolutely loves your podcast. I think she's listened to all of your episodes, which is crazy. Since you have over 300 podcasts. 3,000. It is true. It is 3,000, excuse me. But that's also over 300, Andrew, so just let me do my process. Actually, Luke. Let me, please, yeah, could you not mansplain to me about this? You're absolutely right, Zachary. In fact, we're at 3,427 today. Her blurs day was yesterday. Could you please give her a shout out If you could I'd highly appreciate it And I'd become an even better 11

Well absolutely Is there no name in here

Not in the version I'm getting I don't know if Zachary neglected to send The name of his fiance Or if in the editorial process It was edited out But if you're Zachary's fiance Just know he's wishing you a happy Blur's Day

That's interesting I well you know what i want to do here right i want to blame zachary um but it could have been my fault

sorry i think it's more fun this way in fact maybe we have multiple people who are engaged to zachary's and they all get to have a fun little moment that's a good point

i'm going to broadcasting andrew look into it i'm going back to the emails because i want to be right so bad no not not only that because i also want if the name is in there i want to find what it is but i will uh well i'll read the next one i'm gonna buy you some time all right okay

The next Blursday comes from Jamie I would like to wish a very happy Blursday To my colleague Bettina She came to work in our tiny office Without me knowing that she too was a 10 I told her If she had just mentioned

it during the interview i would have hired her on the spot we're not above a little little mutual tbtl back scratching a little tbtl 10 back scratchery uh bettina is kind and funny and a total whiz with data visualizations oh la la jamie writes i am so grateful she applied for the job and that we can nerd out together i was watching this great key and peel sketch yesterday which is like So Jordan Peele is – it's kind of set in like the 70s or maybe 80s. Jordan Peele is like in the waiting room about to go in for a job interview. And Keegan-Michael Key is the person hiring. And he comes out and he's letting the previous candidate who did the interview out, which played by actually Adam – I think it's pronounced Paley.

Okay, yeah.

That guy that we think is very funny. And it's just basically the whole premise is what would be the most defeating thing ever to see in terms of the person doing the hiring. I remember this. With the potential candidate who's in front of you. And it goes on for like four minutes of them just back slapping. And Keegan-Michael Key eventually gives this precious family heirloom to Adam Pally's character. I mean, it's just wonderful. But Tina could have been in that sketch had she just mentioned TBTL.

That's right. With listener Jamie. I know you've been digging in the emails. You probably weren't tracking what I was saying. No, no, I got it. I was mostly following you there because I did find this thing almost immediately. Here's what happened. I blame Zachary 100%. No. He put his fiancée's name in the subject line, and it was that weird form, Luke. You know how we get those emails in the web form? And so I had just copied and pasted the message, not the subject line. The subject line was Blur's Day for Kelly. So happy Blur's Day, Kelly, from Zachary. I really apologize that Zachary messed that up so badly. He only had one job to do. And also, if you're

not Kelly and you're engaged to a Zachary, that wasn't for you. Sorry to burst your bubble. Sorry, Kel. Sorry, Kel-Kel. Do you want to pick things up?

I'll do this next one. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Mariah says, happy birthday to my sister Leah. No, well, she said it's pronounced like the Star Wars character, so Leia. Sorry about that. Oh, right. Happy birthday to my sister Leia. Over the last ten years, we've had three kids, not together, gotten married, not to each other, moved, and so much more. These were all good things. Yes. We have enjoyed many TVTL laughs over the years. Happy 28th birthday, Leia. Everything is more fun with you this year. I hope you achieve your goal of becoming famous.

I love that. You know, as somebody who's a micro-celebrity, I will tell you, Mariah and Leia, it's overrated. I did, I think I started following Mariah on Twitter recently because she tweeted at me, I'm part of weird Twitter, you should follow me. So I gave her the follow. I love it. I smashed the follow button on that. A lot of pressure, though. You better be able to keep up with old friend Josh Letterman and Wint.

Yes, Wint. Speaking of being famous, your goal of being famous, I think that's really funny and maybe sincere. And I don't want to give anything away, but I was having – this is going back a couple of years now. I was having dinner with a couple of podcasting friends of mine. One is a close friend of mine. The other is his podcasting partner. I don't want to give anything away. These are pretty well-known fellas, and it was kind of at a time when their podcast was really starting to reach some fame that maybe even they didn't expect. I don't know. But the one, the podcaster who I did not know as well, straight up admitted that his goal was to be famous. Wow. Like, not to – like, I think about this all the time. Like, I've always wanted to be successful in whatever my job is. I've always wanted to be good at my job, and I'm passionate about radio and audio stuff, so there's that. But that is the complete opposite of my personality, the idea of, well, I just want to be famous. One way or another, I want to be famous. I don't have that. How do you relate to that sentiment?

I think when I was young, I think I wanted to be famous. Yeah. I just wanted people to pay attention to me. And now that I'm old, I don't have any desire to be famous. But you kind of are famous.

You're more famous than this person I'm talking about.

I'm only the most famous Luke Burbank, and that's only by a little bit. But, you know, no, I mean, like, really famous. Like, I think if you would have asked me at age 20, would it be cool to be, you know, Tom Cruise or something or whoever was a megastar at that time? I would have said, yeah, of course. It's amazing. And in getting older, I, of course, realized, like any logical person, that that does not seem like a fun life at all. and uh i and in fact i was just thinking about this the other day i love doing this job and i will i will co-host this podcast as long as you'll do it with me andrew and as long as the listeners keep donating i'm not even kidding but if the time of my life comes where i'm not doing this i'm not doing live wire and i know i said this recently and i think you

You kind of think I'm overestimating how over I am, how over it I am about talking into microphones. But I do genuinely feel in my core like I have reached the point in life where I've had enough attention paid to me. And if that wasn't happening on the regular, I don't think it would bum me out. That being said, I haven't tested the theory. So maybe if all this were to go away and I were to just, you know, have a much more typical job, maybe after two weeks I'd feel like, is anyone thinking about me right now? You'd probably really go ham on Twitter. You'd probably really see some shit on my last microphone that I have access to. Yeah.

Because, I mean, I think about that, you know, I was actually thinking about this the other day because I was having some intrusive thoughts about stuff I had said on the show earlier. You know, I mean, that's one thing. I mean, listen, I have the best job in the world. I'm not complaining here, but one aspect of the job is, for me, once the show is over and posted, then the real work begins, which is trying to drink away the memories of all the dumb shit I said on the show that day. No, it's not quite that bad, but I was just having one day where I was like, oh, God. And I thought, oh, there might be a time when I won't have these intrusive thoughts because my job won't be to just talk for an hour or two every day, and therefore I won't be regretting that. But then I thought, you know what, like if that day comes, I will miss this because like I remember I always say that, like, you know, when this when this phase of my life passes, I'll be fine with that. I don't need to I don't need people to know who I am. I'm very humble in that way. But then I remember like the one time I took a day off like four years ago to move from L.A. back to Seattle and I had to pick something up at a mall. And I was the very, very first person at the mall, and I was the very, very first person to take a shit on a pristine toilet that was so clean. It still had soap bubbles in it. And all I wanted to do was dial you up and tell you and the listeners about this wonderful experience I had taking a dump in a mall.

Well, we can still be friends. By the way, happy birthday, Leia. We can still be friends even after this. You can still call me with that kind of information.

Yeah, I know. We're a long way from that The good news for us and the listeners

Is there's no As long as we get to keep doing this for our job I don't have any interest in ending it But yeah It's also at this point I think We also tend to run in circles where people know They know that you're not supposed to say I want to be famous You're supposed to say I want to do good work I want to do meaningful work I want to tell stories Everyone's a storyteller now That's the stuff you say You don't just say I legit want to just be famous Right, that's why I was very surprised when this person said that.

Having said that, I really want Leia to become famous this year, so can we all get behind that?

Oh, yeah, no, I'm into that. I'll do whatever I can to help with that. Kate in Seattle says, tomorrow is the Blur's Day of Traverse City, Misha 10. Traverse City. Gene and my husband grew up together in Michigan, and somehow, several years ago, Gene and I discovered we were both 10s. And we were both married to tolerant 11s. Happy Blur's Day, Gene. hope sometime post-pandemic we can see each other in person and annoy our families by talking. Why did I say talking that way? By talking only in drops. I'm trying a new thing where I say the L in talking. Yeah, no, I like it.

I like it. A little Moira Rosie there. Oh, I just got an alert, Luke. No, it's from Durs. Oh, it is. It's from Funless Grimler. Is Durs, I didn't open it, but is Durs excited about the state of the Mariners right now?

No, they delivered the package. You're packaged to his house for some reason.

Yeah, they delivered a big, big bag of sadness to all of us.

That's what they're doing. How many times have the Mariners been no-hit today? It's a doubleheader, right?

So two no-hitters today? Right, right, right. Oh, and by the way, cheers to the listener who came at me real hot and fast a couple of weeks ago when I retweeted something funny about how bad the Mariners were playing and said that I am not allowed to be sad about the Mariners because nobody knows the true pain of a Tigers fan who then, last night, after they sweep us embarrassingly and no-hit us, then sends me an image of a dancing tiger. You can't be both guys, dude.

Also, the Tigers have won a World Series. Yeah. I believe, or been to a World Series. Well, I know that they won it in 19... Was it 84? Because I remember that was in the, like, Alan Trammell days, and I remember they came into the kingdom and the Mariners were putrid, as they've almost always been, and the Mariners swept the Tigers that year. And as a 12-year-old kid or whatever I was, that just gave me life. But I do know that that year, for instance, I believe they beat the Padres. The Tigers have won a World Series in my lifetime, which the Mariners have not even been to. But we're not allowed to ever be sad about any Mariners losses, Luke, because Tiger fans are out there and they love baseball more. All right. Hey, speaking of talking and drops, which Kate in Seattle just mentioned, Sherry, if it's spelled C-H-E-R-I, I always ask you this. It's actually Sherry, right? I believe that's Sherry. Yeah, Sherry says, ahoy, hoy, and happy Blur's Day to my husband and TBTL progenitor, Peter. Hooray for you, honey. You are hilarious, dog. Sometimes I just want you to be normal, and clearly you're not. Truly, though, sweetie. I'm ready for you. What you do is so important, and I appreciate you. I love it. And you can be my number one. Jalapeno. I'm happy of myself being your wife, but sometimes I wonder, am I a problem or a blessing?

Boy, that is well constructed. Very good. Some of those seem familiar to me, but I can't place it. I don't know. Veronica, the vegan tan in Ojai, California, says, It's my birthday today, drop voice.

It's my birthday today.

Who is that kid? I don't know who you always play this.

Was that a listener? I thought that was from you. I don't think I even have one.

I mean, it is from me, but I've forgotten what the source material was on that. Anyway, it's my birthday today, drop voice. Just joking. It's not today. It's Friday.

Wow, what a journey.

God, that reminds me of, I follow, like, this thing called WeRateDogs on Twitter, which is just cute dog photos. And then there was a picture of a very cute dog on April 1st, and it says, today wasn't a good day. April Fools, it was the best day.

Oh.

It made me so happy. Veronica just dropped a similar joke. Yeah. Just joking. It's not today. It's Friday. I'm turning 35 this year, and I don't have any 10 friendos. so I decided to send one in for myself just so I can fangirl out on hearing Luke and Andrew wish me a happy birthday my 11 are two fives and I will be camping out in Joshua Tree this week to celebrate my guess Veronica is you're not going to hear this if you're out in the wilds of Joshua Tree but have fun out there and also if I can suggest jump on the old Stens page or the Slack you can make some TBTL10 friends and then I'm sure somebody will remember to remind, to wish you a happy birthday. Yeah, that's what I was going to say.

Like, if you don't have any 10 friends, I mean, you can make 10 friends. What you do is you find your non-10 friends, you turn them into 10s, right? Sure, that's a way to do it.

Or just hope that the Ikea mails the wrong furniture to your house, and then you meet somebody, and then you get them to start listening, and then they become your friend, and then they wish, I mean, that's the traditional way that Andrew does it. This is how we get to the top of the pops.

Ann says listeners, April and James have another five with a May Blurs Day. Hey, Truman, guess what? TBTL knows about your birthday, too. All of the 10s hope you have a really fun time turning 8. Happy Blur's Day, Truman. Great name.

Yeah. Look at this. If I was raising Truman, he would have Jim Carrey's exact name from the Truman Show. What is the exact name? Truman Burbank.

Oh, really? I didn't know what you were going for there.

Yeah. Katie

Our Katie

Our Katie Our Katie I'd like to wish my friend Liz a happy birthday We go way back to third grade And I'm so appreciative of her in adulthood Aww She helps She works to help the underserved And the Seattle unhoused in her professional life But obviously that bleeds into real life She was so supportive When Jason That is Jason Newman R.I.P. R.I.P.'d on us That's an interesting way to put it, Katie I guess that kind of did happen In that way When Newman RIP'd on us And I just hope for her birthday She receives all the love and support That she continuously gives out As a sister, daughter, and friend Wow, that is a ringing endorsement From a truly awesome person Our friend Katie For another truly awesome person Her friend Liz Happy Blur's Day, Liz Yeah RIP Newman Amen Virginia says

Happy Blur's Day to my favorite Coho from another zip code Hollywood Franz Okay That's all I got man I like it Unless I missed something that was in the subject line

Jared is going to wrap things up By saying happy Blur's Week To my handsome Intelligent And caring Eleven jimmy jam james who is quickly on his way to becoming a full-blown 10 these are congrats on buying days these are yeah man top show congrats on buying that car and happy 25 years does that mean you're middle-aged wow we have i don't know if what does that mean if james if jimmy jam is now listening that means we have at least one 25 year old listener that's good but the fact that

He's middle-aged doesn't bode well.

Well, for age 50, I guess.

This is from me, our hog-bodied dog daughter. Excuse me? Our hog-bodied dog daughter and our rapidly growing collection of lovely tarantula ladies. What a crazy life we've built together. Love you. Smiley face sent from voice to text.

Nice. Hey, happy Blursley, everybody. You guys really brought it this week. That was great. Yeah. Thank you. Delightful.

Did we have a song? I don't think there was a song requested this week. I was going to ask you this. Dazzling Donors.

Yeah, I was going to ask you that, too. Is there anything that you would like to – what is the music you'd like to see in the world? I'm trying to be the music I want to hear. Hey, can I mention one thing while you are clicking around looking for music? While I ruminate on that show? Yeah, I want to talk about something that you and I talked about before the show. So yesterday's Dazzling Donor asked us to play a Hall & Oates cover by this band, The Bird and the Bee. I can't remember. Was it Rich Girl? It was Rich Girl, yeah. And I really liked it. I'm not a big Hall & Oates person, I was telling you. And I know Hall & Oates and that kind of era of music is cherished by a lot of our listeners. I'm not against it by any means. It's just not something that really has spoken to me in my life as much as some other people. But it turns out, and oh, you know what? That was Morgan and Amy, right? Do I have? No. Yes. Yes. Morgan and Amy, I believe, were the Dazzling Donors who asked for that music. No, Brett. Sorry, Brett. Brett and Amy. This is good. This is good content. Please, somebody text me or email me fast. Anyway, no. So they asked to go out with that song. And when I went to play it, I realized it's on a whole album of the Bird and the Bee covering Hall and Oates songs. And I am into it. Because, you know, these songs are good. But I like the Bird and the Bee twist on them.

so yeah check it out i know yeah that was a good that was a jam how about this this is apropos of essentially nothing okay but how about we go out with a little kurt vile and courtney barnett oh god every day over everything yes over everything yes i just love that song i was obsessed with it a couple years ago and was constantly talking about it and i don't just feels like uh this

might be a day to revisit that luke this whole record i was i remember you were obsessed with this song and then later like a long time later i got obsessed with courtney barnett and then this whole album that they did together and i think you said that you loved this song but we're not

quite as familiar with the full album a lot of sea lice is the album maybe i just need to give it another listen because because i loved this song was released initially and i loved it and then i thought it's just going to be like eight more tracks of that and it isn't it's it gets it's it's different uh tonally i think hey luke are we going on any road trips soon where we can

listen to this album over and over again and it can be the album of the road trip maybe it's great

road music just throwing it out there all right i'm uh i'll i'll put it under consideration i've got a little bit more galaxy 500 to oh god yes all right so that's how we'll wrap things up today with a little kurt vile and courtney barnett thanks everyone for hanging out with us today we're going to be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for you and that will be the last show before we hit the road for tbt elephant 12 uh so please do join us then until then have a great thursday stay safe take care of yourselves and each other and please remember no mountain too tall. And good luck to all. I didn't murder your dirter. I didn't murder your dirter.

When I step outside to a beautiful morning Where the trees are all wagging My head flag waving The scenery raging My life love cascading And the small pains Over everything When I'm outside in a real good mood, you could almost forget about all the others. Power out.