Muse

you know johnny i just don't know how you do it do what a four-hour show every morning just uh talk into the mic and your voice goes out through the wires and once a week whether you need it or not somebody comes in here and uh gives you a check for 38 dollars tbtl

the enormity of of their flat brain the enormity of their stupidity is just overwhelming it's not all bad i would say that but it is more bad than good hey luke and andrew it's jeremy from pullman

um i was listening to this is ridiculous i'm sorry i'm not going to leave this message i'll just realize how dumb of the idea this is love the show bye what if my heart stops beating

What if I'm looking for a bathroom? I can't find it. And my bladder explodes.

Ladies and gentlemen, congratulations. This plan is off to a great start.

All right. Hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Thursday edition of TBTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. Ziggle zag it. Let's get back at it. My name is Luke Burbank. I am your host.

Apparently, I've never been on live television before.

Coming to you from beautiful Scottsdale, Arizona.

I feel warm and I'm levitating.

I think it's going to get up to like 87 or something today. It is already pretty toasty outside. Had an amazing early morning. I went to something called Pinnacle Peak and did a little jogging and got to watch the sunrise from Pinnacle Peak, and it was magnificent. there was a lot of people on the trail it's a very popular path I think but there was this moment where the sun was rising there was no one on the trail where I was I closed my eyes I just sort of cleared my mind as a gentle breeze blew across me and I think I felt present for maybe the first time in 45 years it lasted for about 15 seconds until some older guys walked by talking a little bit too loudly, but those 15 seconds, my friend, those were just a magical, magical little experience in my life. We're about to make some magic here on episode 3547 in a collector's series. Let the fun begin. Fluffernutter is now officially a word in the dictionary.

You keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.

It's some kind of a sandwich from the Northeast involving marshmallow and peanut butter. There are some dazzling deets in the story of how Fluffernutter made its way into the actual dictionary. So we'll talk about that. Also, you might have heard about this Squid Games crypto that increased in value by 23 million percent. That cash could really get me out of a couple of jams. I hope you're all sitting down because it turns out that the Squid Game crypto, that all of the press releases and other sort of online messaging around were riddled with typos and grammatical errors. Turns out it was a scam and somebody absconded with like three million bucks or something of people's money they put in.

And when he said that, that shocked me.

So we will update you on the latest with that. And, of course, because it's a Thursday, a.k.a. Blur's Day, we'll do the Blur's Day messages. All of that with the help of this young man, the longest-running co-bro of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. He's a soulful rocker from New Hampshire. Oh, he's hilarious, dog. Who is? Andrew Walsh. He's joining us right now from the Roosevelt neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. Good morning, my friend.

Good morning, Luke. I spent a chunk of yesterday's show confusing emoji with, wait for it, emoticons.

Do you remember that conversation? Well, I was not helping by confusing both of those things with something called, what is it, ASCII? ASCII art? Yes.

ASCII art and ye shall receive thee. Where's my bell? ASCII and ye shall receive thee. Okay, show title. Wow, we are cooking with fire.

Ascii for people to correct you on Twitter. I mean, I didn't even think the show was released yet to the public. It was like boarding the airplane, and I just started to see many people clarifying just how wrong we were in that conversation. But, I mean, can we be honest? We knew in the moment that we were messing that up. At least I did, because I'm just not good on the details of that kind of stuff.

I don't know if I did know in the moment. I was just confused. I was just old man fumbling.

my way through that conversation as i do i also have this update from holly woo mike regarding the movie major league whether or not um whether she was the closer or a starting pitcher wild thing exactly and uh let's see here hollywood mike says charlie sheen's character in major league rick vaughn would you have known that would you have remembered his name is rick vaughn

i was struggling for it yesterday and that's why i didn't use it i mean now that you say it yeah Yeah, bad boy Ricky Vaughn.

He was a starter, except in the final game. In the final game, it was a tiebreaker against the Yankees who had hit Vaughn hard, so he was demoted to the bullpen slash gas station, and he came in in relief to redeem himself. The film generally holds up, Hollywood Mike says, except for the storyline where Tom Berenger's aggressive pursuit of an ex-wife would be rightly considered stalking.

But I do support Tom Berenger calling his shot at the end of the game, Babe Ruth style, but then bunting and then having to run down the first baseline on his old knees. You know, it's sort of his last gasp in the majors. That was a kind of a cool, by the way, sorry if you were taping that. Yeah, that's how the movie Major League ends.

There's also does the stuff hold up? That doesn't seem like is it voodoo or whatever, like the whatever the native practices or whatever is going on.

And I don't remember that movie that well, but like I remember incense and charms in the locker that one of the one of one of the Cleveland players has set up a shrine to some sort of deity. He calls Joe Boo and and he cannot hit the curveball and he's very mad and he's been praying to Joe Boo. And then towards the end of the film, he decides he says, F. view, Jobu, and then I think that he had some alcohol out as part of the shrine, and then him and another guy on the team do, like, the shots of the alcohol that was for Jobu, and then this is the part I didn't see coming. Then he is able to hit the curveball when he has finally turned his back on

Jobu. And he just goes for the alcohol, and of course, that is played by Dennis Haysbert. We've gotten emails about this before. Oh, I didn't

know that. He plays a character named Pedro Serrano. Yes! No, you're totally right. I forgot who Dennis Haysbert is.

He's the insurance guy. He's He's America's first black president on 24.

And he's the all-state guy, more critically. Yes, exactly. Okay, I forgot that guy was named Dennis Haysbert. Yes, a very young Dennis Haysbert is playing the guy who can't hit the curveball and is praying to Joe Biden.

I had to look that up, by the way. I've said his name a million times because he is in those commercials. And actually, I was into 24. I think I watched the first three seasons of 24.

Does not seem like you're – speaking of things that probably don't hold up, I'm not trying to put you on blast here, but, you know. The war on terror? Yeah, there was a really. Did we win that? It was a tie.

Oh, okay.

But unfortunately, tie goes to the terrorists. Certainly, tie goes to the runner. Yeah, it's a bummer. We tried. No, I was listening to Chris's podcast, Chris Hayes' podcast, Why Is This Happening? And he was talking to somebody about the so-called war on terror. And, of course, all of the terrible things that it has wrought for people in other parts of the world and even here in this country. And I believe they were citing 24 as like a perfect example of how we were thinking about the quote-unquote bad guys and also the use of extrajudicial means by Kiefer Sutherland's character and how basically the bad guys were both the quote-unquote terrorists. And then the liberal judges and legal framework that was trying to make it so that Kiefer Sutherland's character couldn't torture people. Right. Those were the other bad guys.

Those were the bad guys. Like in the way in Ghostbusters, the EPA is the bad guys. I don't remember if you remember that. Genevieve always points that out. Yeah. Like, you know, the officious government EPA guy is trying to shut down the Ghostbusters and then does make them flip the switch that lets all the ghosts out in the city. But yeah, no, that's interesting So 24, let's talk about 24 a little bit I know that yesterday was a real nostalgia fest for us As we talked about the early days of the internet And the early days of WUAB TV In Channel 43 in Cleveland, Ohio

We are currently the go-to podcast For content related to the early days of WUAB television

So let's go back to early November of 2001 We actually, Luke, today on November 4th, 2021 we are we are two days away from the 20th anniversary of the first episode of 24 do i need to chart that out for you so in two days this saturday will be the 20th anniversary of the show's 24 of the show 24's premiere i should say so it's interesting that we're having this conversation right now which is interesting i just look

that up but um because i was like yeah i i remember 24 of course coming after september 11th but it also seemed like it was right after september 11th which it was so the show must have already been in production before september 11th but it goes on for several you know many seasons after that and of course now we're we're in the height of the war on terror um but the interesting thing about this for me is not about the geopolitics but the fact that this was one of the first shows that I kind of binged with Genevieve you know pre-streaming like 24 one of the appeals of 24 for us was we needed something we needed the methadone to replace the six feet under addiction that we had um right that we had developed we loved six feet under I feel like six feet under might have been the first like real bingy show for us and we would still like get the cds I'm sorry the dvds via Netflix and we loved that and if I recall we were either done with that or between seasons or something and then um we got into 24 because again it was the the way it was created was a very kind of fast-paced like very bingeable show in these early days of binging so i remember like getting uh indian food in new hampshire from uh the place around the corner we'd get our indian food and then we would come home and set it all out and we would uh you know just uh chug back i don't know five or six episodes of 24 were you getting those also on the dvd yeah this is still way pre-streaming for us i know that feeling that you're describing

though of like the first time i think for me was probably the sopranos where i i started getting those dvds in the mail from netflix and i was just like lost an entire saturday was just like was in the basement this was like the first house i ever owned this was in seattle on beacon hill and i just remember being down in this very dark basement that we had and like putting in the first and being like, let me see what this Sopranos thing is all about that everyone's been talking about and hitting play on the first DVD and then just kind of coming back to consciousness nine hours later. Yeah, nine years later. Right, that was a lost decade for me. But just that feeling of like, oh my gosh, I can just keep watching these and of course as each one ends, you're just absolutely on the edge of your seat about what's going to happen next so you're very, very incentivized, I guess you could say, to just start the next one. But that wasn't how most television worked up to that point. And that was – so then when The Sopranos were done, I think – I feel like I might have gone to Six Feet Under or something else. I know that Van and I were on a whole Homeland thing, speaking of these shows. I wonder if Homeland was a little more nuanced. I'm not totally sure. I think it was.

Yeah, I think it was supposed to be. Probably not as nuanced as we'd want. But not to – listen, I don't care about this. If you haven't seen The Sopranos by this point, then you haven't seen The Sopranos. But I can't remember, Luke. Do we ever find out where the gabagool is? Still T.B. D. The last episode, he's sitting in the diner, remember? And then somebody comes in and then I think they finally – I can't remember. They fade to black right before they say where the gabagool is?

i there's i've spent many hours just like frame by frame uh-huh reviewing that final scene and what no one's really talking about is right after the guy comes in who seems suspicious that we think maybe that's like the the killer that's somebody there to do harm to tony right behind him is a guy in like a white kind of butcher shirt and he's got wax paper under his arm and my theory is that's where the gabagool is i see he's been he's been he's been grabbing the gabagool

There's a better joke there

I liked our listeners joke the other day About Yo Gabagool

Yeah right yeah we started the show with that

Some good comedy there Yeah that was Patrick good job Andrew I know we've been We've been wallowing in nostalgia For the last couple of days and I want to try to wallow In the future I want to ask you what your personal Policy is on transhumanism Like Something that I've been spending a lot of time thinking about today as i get ready to go do this tv interview at the place where ted williams head

is cryogenically oh i was gonna say are you like talking because that's kind of life extension

stuff right like anti-aging yeah stuff yes so i'm down here in in arizonia there's a for cbs sunday morning occasionally they'll do what we call a primetime special which i think is slightly misleading because we're the show is in primetime but i think it has probably far fewer viewers than when we're just on sunday morning like the first couple times i did this i was like oh my gosh my name in lights 7 p.m on a friday night this is everything's coming up burbank and then i realized oh no there's way more people watching when we do the show when we normally do the show but anyway uh the the i think that the theme of the primetime special is Um, it's about life in some way, shape or form living. I'm not sure. But anyway, one very quick element of it is this idea of life extension. And so the kind of main place in the US that's known for this is called Alcor and it's down here in Scottsdale. And I, I've been kind of reading up on it and watching some videos and kind of studying the website of this place and the members, um, of it. The members would be people who have put down a substantial deposit so that when they pass away, their body will be cryogenically preserved. So in case at some point there is a cure for death, they can be brought back. And it sounds a little nutty, but I actually have a lot of respect for their – this is their motto at this place. Cryogenics is the second worst thing that can happen to you, which is kind of genius because what they're saying, I think, is we're not saying – You're not saying we know how any of this will be fixed or if it can be fixed, but this is slightly better than the alternative, at least for people that would like to continue living in some form or fashion. This is the second – but the fact that they call it the second worst thing that can happen to you, I kind of appreciate that amount of honesty. Yes, it's a funny – The first worst being death.

But do they get into – sorry, this is probably not where you want to take it, but like just the whole concept is just baffling to me. First of all, the idea of wanting to live forever is kind of baffling to me, or maybe not even live forever, but I don't know, get a second life or whatever. But beyond that, do they talk about what the cultural repercussions are if nobody dies anymore? Wouldn't that kind of be a problem?

I mean, it seems like this is their this is kind of their big, like, philosophical thing is when we think about immortality or living in 5000 years or living for 5000 years, we think of it as being like it's right now and like everything is the way that it is right now, except you're just somehow doing it for 5000 years. And what they're banking on is this idea that multiple things will change. I mean, like, you know, having to do with maybe we live inside a computer. Maybe we've populated other planets. Maybe we figured out how to, like, build an extension onto Earth. Like, they don't have the answers, but what they're saying is the logical flaw that a lot of people – I'm telling you, I just watched this video of the CEO of this place, and at the end I was like, he makes some pretty good points. I don't think that I am going to opt for this because the arc for me has been being very afraid of death when I was younger to just wishing for it as I get to middle age, just waiting for its sweet embrace.

Just standing in the middle of the road.

No, but just being less scared of it and also feeling like that's kind of – this is the natural order of things. For all things, right? If someone should write a song or a proverb about this, but I'll just do it right now.

Yeah, so you can come up with it on the fly. Working a gabagool.

Life is like a box of gabagool, Andrew. Where is it? But no, it's like, you know, what I've come to sort of embrace in my own head as I've gotten older is that it's a great thing to get to be alive. It's a real miracle that any of us are here, the ones of us who get to be here right now. And it's so cool. And I'm very grateful that I have gotten to be a part of this. But when it's time for it to be done, then it's time for it to be done. That's just kind of how I view it now. But, you know, I mean, like I said, these people that are really into this like cryonics thing there. I mean, I will say this. They appear to be a quirky bunch. They appear to be an incredibly intelligent bunch. Some might say almost too intelligent. Like I was scrolling through their membership because every person who's like scheduled to be cryogenically preserved. there's like a bio of them on the website also then when people have passed away they are then classified as patients and if they are a patient it means they are in there uh and and also ted williams is in there um which we'll see how that goes today they're not super keen on talking about it so we're saving the ted williams questions until the end warm them up soften them up yeah you know i'm throw a little high heat inside try to back them off the plate i'm just trying to extend the baseball metaphor here and then and then you know kind of basically throw it kind of outside at the knees but on the edge of the strike zone and see if i can get them to to talk about

that side of it because what happened to me actually don't don't warm them up it just occurred to me that you shouldn't be do not i didn't even say that on purpose but on further reflection do not go in there trying to warm them up that's not a good thing for what is it i can never say that word cryo chiro i can never say it the type of cryo radio hey honestly i'm not even joking

why now what are they doing oh cryogenic or cryonics yeah say it again say the first one

again i cannot get cryogenic cryogenics okay don't cry

Cryogenics over spilled milk. There's no cryogenics in baseball.

But there is. That's the irony. You're trying to get to Ted Williams' head.

I'll ask John, our friend John, who's producing this piece, if I'm allowed to say that to the CEO of the place. Is there, in fact, cryogenics in baseball, sir?

That's how you segue into the Ted Williams' head.

I just detach the lavalier mic and just drop it and walk away, which will be weird because it will just drag behind me. It's on a battery pack.

It'll just make this, like, kind of this rumbling sound as it drags across the carpeting.

Just worst mic drop of all time. But, yeah, like, I mean, again, I don't think this would be something I would opt for in my own life. But having looked into it and having, you know, read a lot and watched a lot in the last 24 hours about it, it's less kooky to me than I thought it was before I started researching it a little bit, at least the theory behind it. And the other thing that they're sort of into is like, look, we are modifying ourselves, you know, like when we got first, when open heart surgery was first a thing, people were very freaked out because they said, what are you going to do? We're going to open your body up. We're going to go in there. We're going to, you know, potentially take your heart out. We're going to do some stuff to it. We're going to certainly modify it. And that was a pretty big deal. And I'm sure there were people that were like, no, thanks. And I mean, now that's a fairly standard thing. So, I mean, this is the way that science progresses and the way that our relationships with our bodies and kind of expanding the possibilities for our bodies and our brains. I mean, this is the progression of things. I don't have $200,000 is the other problem. Oh, yeah. Which is, I think, what it costs. The other thing, not to be gruesome, but the other thing that's kind of interesting is so if they only preserve your head, Andrew, you're called a neuro. and they actually think that's i mean in as much as they can guess at what might be the best scenario uh 500 years from now and again the other thing i kind of respect about these folks is that they are not making any claims or promises they are very very like look we don't know we're not even going to be around we're going to be in one of those tanks ourselves but we're just thinking maybe there's a chance right but like um it's technically they think it's probably better if it's just your head for some kind of reasons having to do with like ice crystals or something but there are people who do not like the idea of their head being separated from their body and so then they are and i think they may not even take people this way anymore but there's a certain number of people that are over there their full body and then there are other people that it's just their head and then there's this richard nixon's head in a jar kind of like out of futurama yeah right which is just at room temperature which doesn't seem great cracking wise yeah so are you am i putting you down as a um a hard maybe on this no i'm a hard no on that

but i am what i'm a hard maybe on is what are we going to maybe call the show i mean i've i don't think i've ever been like before the first break struggling to choose between two of the most perfect show titles ever, Ask E and You Shall Receive E, and There's No Cryogenics in Baseball. I think I said it wrong again. Cryogenics. I think I'm throwing in an extra R. Why can't I say this? I mean, listen, I know that I'm not the sharpest pencil in the book.

You're not the brightest pencil in the drawer? I know I'm not the brightest pencil in the drawer, but what is it about this particular word that I can't get my

head around you know what that word is for me apothecary apothecary apothecary i think apothecary that's like a kind of an old-timey name for a pharmacy right yeah and i always want to call it a copa theory i can't i i was staring they have for some reason they love to call those they love to call drug stores in new york apothecaries and i was just sitting in a lift staring at the word apothecary and trying to practice it so that i could actually say it right and you can hear the mixed results there but that's one that i'm just hopeless on i always

thought and i guess i'm wrong because i'm looking it up here i always thought an apothecary was specifically more of a place where you go in and the medicine is kind of sold like in jars sort of but i guess that's just because i associate it with that kind of time you know because i used to go to a medical marijuana shop Luke clutch your pearls if you must in Los Angeles this is why you can't say

cryogenic fried your brain on weed hopped up by goofballs by the way cryogenic is 100% the name of a weed strain that is available in one of those stores

but and I remember like describing it or maybe they described themselves as an apothecary because you'd go in and there'd be like big jars around and you would go in and you would talk to them. And again, this was a medical place. I think this was before most places. had um recreational marijuana legalized so you would go in and you would say like you know this is kind of what i'm looking for you know do i need something to help me sleep do i need something that'll enhance the mood like whatever or my mood i should say um but anyway so you'd go in and you talk to them and they'd say okay then this is what you want and then they would take you know they would take it out of the jars and put it into i can't remember bags or other jars and give it to you or whatever well you bought it um but anyway point is i always thought of that particular processes specifically apothecary i don't think i'm right about that by the way no i think you're

probably on the right track there because my guess would be in the early days like an apothecary and by the way by the time this episode's over today i'll actually know how to say the word so this is maybe boring for the listeners but very helpful to me um my guess is that in the early days of the sort of drugstore pharmacy or if they called it apothecary then it was someone mixing compounds so yeah it wasn't there wasn't you didn't have Pfizer sending you a bunch of like pre-made whatevers it was probably you had a whole bunch of stuff and if you were the pharmacist or the person who you know was kind of behind the counter you were mixing things for people and that's probably more true to the idea and then it's kind of evolved over time to being what it

is now and of course you have the whole the the the reference uh to Jesus where it's like when There was only one set of footprints in the sand. That's when I apothecary to you. Sorry, man. Sort of having a bad brain today, but I'm trying to fake it. No, a lot of really, really bad jokes. Just like one.

It's awful. We should go to a break. No, I'm very into it. We should go to a break. Yes. You know what? Let's do that. I was going to explain to you how I got my comeuppance at this hotel, but I think the listeners are tired of my stories of traveling and always being disappointed in the room they

send me to. Can I take a guess? Is this where your apartment manager sent the screen? Did you go to check in in a hotel room? And I have to give Taylor some real credit. I mean, she got me on

this one. And, you know, tip of the cap, T. I don't know how you figured out that I was at the Hotel Adeline in Scottsdale, but you did and you got me. You woke up this morning and there was

half of a screen in your bed godfather like a horse's head yes um well just quickly i don't

know just i gotta get out of my system i guess so this this hotel that i'm staying at it is a andrew as you might imagine a bonvoy property because i'm all about getting those points but it when you go to the website it has this really beautiful swimming pool and it's got these palm trees and it just looks like the kind of classic arizonia just beautiful hotel and i thought well that'll be a nice place to stay for a few hours. I mean, I'm, I flew in last night. I'm going to check out right when we're done with the show and then go interview these folks and then fly up to Seattle tonight. So it's not a long stay, but I just thought, well, that'll be a pleasant place to be. Well, I get here. And the other thing was when I, when I signed me up for the room, it was like, well, it's two single beds or it's like, you know what I mean? It's like two small beds, but I thought, well, that'll be okay. Or when I show up, I'll just ask for a king size bed. I don't know why I feel like I need a king-size bed because I don't – when I am sleeping in a king-size bed in a hotel by myself, I don't use the whole bed. It's not like I go to sleep on one side of it and I wake up and I've migrated across it. A typical whatever, you know, full-size bed, whatever the size is when they have two of them in a room, that's fine for me. But there's something about it that I don't like. I just like having the king bed. It feels more fancy to me or something. So I just figured when I get here, I'll just switch it. you know i'll ask him can i just get a room with a queen bed or a king size bed or something else and i get in last night and it's not like that late it's like seven and i ask and the person at the front desk says we don't have we're totally sold out tonight and i can't put you in any other kind of room that's the only room i have for you and i was like okay so she it starts to show me on the map where my room is and i start to get a sinking feeling because not only am i not in the cool like melrose place kind of courtyard area that looks out on the beautiful swimming pool that i had seen on the website i'm on the other side of the hotel which is much more um like a a travel lodge motor in a howard johnson's like i'm looking out on a sad parking lot where people are pulling up and parking their cars so you have you have a real like the rooms on the side of the hotel i'm on should be roughly half the cost of the ones that are on the interior you go from the most just like again kind of idyllic arizona little beautiful scene that you i mean it's lovely over there andrew it's just lovely and on this side it's like things have gone very wrong in your life um so i get to the room and the first thing i open the door the light switch doesn't work and i'm just like you gotta be kidding me and then i'm kind of going around the room trying to like it's totally dark in the room because the light doesn't turn on so i'm fumbling around

and turn on the flashlight on my cell phone and I kind of finally locate a different lamp and I turn it on. I have just enough light to figure out where I'm at. And it's just like the room just gives me a little bit of a not great vibe.

That's not a good feeling walking into a hotel room in the dark and not having electricity. And then you can't turn the light on.

And it turns out, excuse me, oh, look, I have my cough button. It turns out I realized it's one of those kinds of light switches where it turns a lamp on and off. But someone had turned the lamp off manually. And so it wasn't actually the switch. But that, for whatever reason, was just enough. It was the long walk going past this beautiful swimming pool and then going outside and then going around to where, like, literally the room looked out on a dumpster, like a few dumpsters. And you know me, Andrew. Even though I'm only here for, like, probably less than 12 hours, I was like, this aggression will not stand. So I get on the phone with the person at the front desk, and I just said, hey, you know, the light switch doesn't work in this room, which I legitimately thought it didn't work when I called. And I was like, and it's just kind of a bummer of a room. It's just looking out on a dumpster in the parking lot. I'm like, there has to be another room in the hotel. She's like, there's not. And I was trying to be nice about it. I said, well, here's the thing. I go, even if the hotel is sold out, not everyone has checked into the hotel. And so there are other rooms I would imagine that are less depressing that I could be in Is there any way you can look into that She pauses for a long time And then she's like Okay, I may have to get it cleaned or whatever But I'll find something I was like, thank you so much, I really appreciate it So I walk back And the front desk person, she was very professional

When you say you walk back, so just to be clear This story is like, I can't even imagine having this conversation with a human being So I'm fascinated by it Were you having this conversation with her over the phone And then you gathered your stuff And walked back to the lobby to wait for the next move Or were you having this conversation in the lobby Face to face

Over the phone, I'm using the phone that's in the room So I've picked it up and I've just hit zero In the dark In the dark Well with the light of like one bedside lamp That's not really illuminating the room enough I'll also mention That if you are if any of you are to be traveling soon just really pack your patience people pack your patience because it is rough out there and i know this is no reflection on the hard working people who are trying to you know work in the travel industry be it the folks at the airlines or the folks at the rental car but it was a full-on like borderline riot at the phoenix airport at the avis counter andrew um i got uh i got off the airplane and my telephone told me where the rental car was that i had and the spot that it was in and i went and i got in the rental car i started it up i drove it to the gate and the person at the gate said i don't see the reservation in the phone in in my system and i said look it's right here on my phone and as i showed her the reservation it evaporated out of freaking back to the future it was a real marty gimmick fly hand situation while he's trying to play earth angel like i was like what is going on and the again this very nice person who was like checking me out wasn't her fault she just said yeah i can't it says there's no reservation i can't let you leave with the car if there's i said i understand so i had to like go out go back around park go into the little center there where there were now 20 people who had all gotten off the plane and they were all, by the way, what's the old saying? Nature has no fury like a woman scorned. Let me replace that with nature has no fury like an Avis preferred plus member who doesn't see their name on the digital board. These people were hot. And I kind of understand it because if you're used to a certain level of ease.

A room full of angry wizards.

just are they still calling themselves wizards i i might be the only person who self-identified they were all calling themselves preferred plus members and i was like okay well get back to me when you're a wizard but um oh man that room was so mad and the the two people that were working you know for the avis again everything is short-staffed and they were doing an awesome job and they were just like getting through people and some weird computer glitch had happened that sort of erased everything but it's just at at about every single level of of travel now you will be encountering short staff you know technical challenges not enough people to fix it angry wizards so just a heads up on that everyone but so i was trying to bear that in mind uh when i was talking to the front desk person at this hotel because i understand that she's just doing her job but i also understand that i'm more important than some of the other customers at this hotel and I should be allowed to not have the worst

room in the hotel i do not want to have i'll have the second worst okay but can i please not have the considering if i got here at midnight and this was the last room in the hotel literally i'd be like it is what it is but i was like there there can't be anything worse than this room so i was very careful i didn't touch anything in the room i didn't want to create a situation where they need to come in and re-clean it or anything so i schlepped my stuff all the way back to the front desk which is a not insignificant walk and uh and the the front desk person she she says okay here's your new room she kind of like rescans my key and then writes a number on it and then i look at it and i start i start to think that sounds like it's even further away based on the numbers and so i go i start walking back to the room and i when i get here to the new room i realize that i am now arguably in a worst room because i was on the second floor before now i'm on the first floor now i'm actually looking at the dumpster i was looking down on the dumpster before but now i'm actually at dumpster level she i think in a very clever bit of brinksmanship

yes she's like she's like you want to say it she's the hero of this story though

she's like you want to dance let's dance i will actually put you at you don't like looking at it You don't like looking down on a dumpster? How about you're looking at a dumpster, dude?

One more change. One more requested change. You're going to be in that dumpster. I'm in the dumpster.

How many Bonvoy points do I get if I stay in the dumpster overnight? So there you go. Every once in a while, my obsessive maximizing catches up with me. And I guess this was one of those days. Is the room basically the same?

Like, is it basically the same except you're a little bit closer to the dumpster?

It's the same except I'm on the first floor. I'm literally looking at the dumpster. The pool is nowhere in sight But you know what I slept like a baby last night I went to bed at like 9 I had the room really cold Like I had the AC pumping Went to sleep at 9 Got up early this morning Did that little run over at the Pinnacle Peak And you know I'm having a great day So it's also a good life lesson for me That everything doesn't have to be exactly how I want it And that can also be fine

And you're only spending one night in this hotel I think so yeah i'm checking out probably working the night shift so you're not gonna run into her

again so that's no and i mean i have to say i think it was fairly cordial like i i didn't pull rank with her i didn't say something like you know as a bon voy whatever silver like i didn't and i at no point did i act aggressive or you know i was i was really working the trying to be pleasant about it angle just saying like is there anything at all that you can do to where i could just be in a different room um and and so anyway that's this is i did end up in a different room i was successful in moving rooms but i i i couldn't have imagined there was a worse room than

the one i was in but now you're like why is there a mop and a mop bucket and some brooms and some some pink solutions and gallon jugs what oh this is smells like chemicals yeah interesting

all right all right okay uh we should take that break and then we'll be back with some top stories and some Blur's Days here on TBTL.

Thank you, baby.

All right, let's thank some donors of the day.

Thank you, baby.

If there was a, if TBTL worked in a sort of a bonvoy fashion and there we had silver elite members who we never put in the worst room in the hotel, these people would be on the list. because they're supporting the program with their generous financial support every month. Talking about Jordan Anderson in University Place, Washington. University Place will always enjoy a little footnote in TBTL history, Andrew. Sorry, my mic was muted. Why? Why? Why? Because in the early days of the program, I knew you were still there because I was still hearing the music. So my brain was trying to figure out if there was a way that the line had gone dead, but I was still hearing the thank you music, and I couldn't think of that. So then I just assumed you were probably there with the mic muted.

Yeah, what happened was, let me just let listeners in on this. So when we go to a quick break, and then we come back, I mute Luke's mic, and I mute my mic, and then I start the music. Then when the music's playing, I unmute Luke, and then eventually I'm supposed to unmute myself as well. Sometimes, though, there is a kink in the system.

So, OK, so University Place. University Place High School was one of the high schools that entered our marching band competition, which was basically this is we're on the radio. We put out the call for various high school bands to record the Catch My Disease, the Ben Lee song that we have started the show with. single episode since day one i mean i guess there have been some exceptions but it's been the theme song of the show um you know since um since we started and so different high school bands the band teachers actually got the music and actually taught their bands how to play catch my disease and then i think the winning band and it might have been university place blue thunder showed up which was like the seahawks drum corps came out and like hung out with the high school band And we had actually a lot of bands enter and it was amazing. That was like the first moment where I felt like this is kind of working as a concept because like we actually had these a lot of bands entering and they were good. And just like hearing our theme song, but kind of as it was retooled and tweaked and then back through these like student musicians, it was extremely gratifying.

Is this when Ben Lee got involved? Because Ben Lee was on the show one time, right? And he was talking about her.

I wonder if we had him judge. I wonder if maybe he was a guest judge on it or something. That'd be cool. Mostly we wanted to get him on the show so that then he can sue us later for using the song. We wanted to have laid down some precedent where he was aware of what was going on. And it worked. So thanks, Jordan. Danny, did that work?

Get back at us. What kind of legal ground are we on there? Any Danny will do.

Ken Fulton is in Seattle, Washington and is supporting the program. Thanks, Ken. Heather Kenyon out there in Chicago, Illinois. Dave Austin checking in from Snohomish, Washington, one of our Snohomies. Are we allowed to say Snohomies since, I don't know, do Ron and Don, speaking of intellectual property, do they own that still?

You know, it almost seems weirder using it now. Well, I guess they still exist as a show, as a podcast. So what am I saying? When they were on Cairo, it didn't feel like we were stealing. Now it feels more like we're stealing for some reason. I don't know why.

But isn't it in the public domain now? It should be. However many years they've been using it, I feel like at some point their trademark on it has to expire.

I will say this, though. If we're on the wrong side of this legally, we will end up in the Graybar Hotel. That's one thing I don't want.

I've been there. It's not fun, my friend.

Isn't that another Don O'Neillism? Does anybody else say that? Is that a real thing that he just latched on to, or did he make that up?

I don't know the origin on that, but he's the only person I've ever heard say it.

It's pretty good, actually. I actually think it is too

Sandy Gilliam is in Burton, Washington Thank you so much Sandy, it's nice to see your name on this list Once again And then Catherine Getting Is in Merced, California What was that response?

I've never heard of Merced I don't think It seems like it seems Frenchy Almost like you're supposed to say Merced or something, but it's a D, not a T, so I think you're right.

Yeah, where is that in California? It feels Bay Area to me. I'm not sure. But I don't know. I don't know if I've ever been to Merced. Well, thanks, Catherine, for the donation. Thanks to all of our donors for making the show possible. We absolutely would not be here without you. So thank you, babies.

Thank you, baby.

Hello and welcome to Top Story.

A headline in the New York Times, attention New Englanders, fluffernutter is now a word. Carla Correa writing this piece the other day about the fact that fluffernutter has officially been included in the Merriam-Webster dictionary. It's a sandwich very popular in New England using something called marshmallow fluff. It was created like a century ago. According to this article, in order for it to be a real fluffernutter, you've got to use marshmallow fluff and then also peanut butter to have the official sandwich of New England. It was invented back in 1917 when a man named Archibald Query, which is possibly the most New England name I've ever heard, was selling marshmallow fluff door-to-door. Soon after, two friends named H. Allen Durkee and Fred Mauer bought this formula for marshmallow fluff for $500 and marketed it as Toot Sweet Marshmallow Fluff. In the following decades Fluff's popularity has spread It's now made by something called The Durkee Mower Company of Lynn, Massachusetts And this is like Just a huge thing There's a Massachusetts legislature A former one named Catherine Reinstein Who said, I grew up eating these She was trying to make it the official sandwich of massachusetts and was unsuccessful what is i find amazing well that was a thing doesn't i don't think it says in the article but to be i mean to think that you would actually put in the time to try to get the fluffernutter establishes the official sandwich of a state and that there would be someone who would say no we can't have that as our official sandwich is shocking to me you feel like whoever shows up first with that request just gets to do

Well, I'll tell you this. All I typed into Google is official sandwich of Massachusetts, and all that comes up is Fluffernutter. The Fluffernutter entry for Wikipedia comes up. Fluffernutter is a favorite New England sandwich in Yankee magazine. Let's see here. Yeah, so I don't know. It's unofficial. Maybe it's just not officially the sandwich of Massachusetts, the unofficial sandwich.

uh the the folks from miriam webster are very um they take the process very seriously would appear there's a guy named peter sokolowski he's the editor at large of the thing um and he said local enthusiasm for fluff did not influence the dictionary's decision making quote we are not the dictionary of new england english he said there is no advocacy we watch to see is this words use growing or is it falling if the word is growing even incrementally even slowly like fluffernutter apparently was then it belongs in the dictionary so I guess because I get the sense that Miriam Webster is also based in the Northeast suspicion that this was like fluffernutter was getting a pass because of its kind of the region that it's from in the region where Miriam Webster is based and this guy is being very clear that this was not like a hometown call this is because apparently people are using the word fluff or nutter enough that it should be in the dictionary there were some other words that made it in as well vaccine passport and dad bod which are two things i know about yeah very very intimately um all right well

let's just do this what do you think is the and all of this is a little bit um a little bit in a gray area but what do you think is the official or i don't think there are any official sandwiches let me just start with that i've been googling around here what do you think though are people are saying are the most like iconic sandwiches of washington state i have one here from orbits.com because orbits will release something like this so that people will gum yeah i guess so you know

like or wait the weird drink that had the little things floating in it that was like boba tea before we knew about Boba. Do you remember Orbitz?

I don't think so, unless maybe you've brought it up on the show before. It was like a soda with junk floating in it. Ugh, gross. Sounds like Lake Erie. But, you know, I'm sure Orbitz released a list so that talk radio people could share the list in their region and then get upset about it and argue about it, which I guess I'm doing here. But we got one list from Orbitz, And then we have one list from delish.com, which I would trust them a little bit more. The answers of Washington State's sandwich vary greatly between these two publications.

OK, can I can I just mention it seems to me that it should be something that has seafood because I think, Well, at least the western part of the state is very much associated with fishing and seafood and things. That would be something that would maybe differentiate it from some other states in the west would be like, I mean, a fish sandwich of some kind. That seems to me or like one of them.

One of them is a fish sandwich of some kind, although a fish sandwich, which I don't believe I've ever seen on a menu.

But I was going to say or an oyster po' boy. But that's much more of a Louisiana thing. We're kind of stealing Louisiana's thunder. Okay, so what are they claiming are the sandwiches of Washington?

So according to Orbitz, it's a smoked salmon sandwich, which I know smoked salmon is big around here, and Genevieve eats a lot of smoked salmon, but I think of that more as something you put on a bagel or something. Have you in your lifetime, can you recall eating a smoked salmon sandwich?

I don't think so, but I bet you they sell that at Ivers.

Yeah, maybe.

I bet you there's a version of that at Ivers, and I bet you that this person writing for Orbitz just was Googling around and ended up on – because it's a big tourist destination in Seattle, and they're big for their smoked salmon and their salmon in general. I think actually you would have been better off – they would have been better off just saying a salmon – a salmon sandwich.

I don't know, salmonella. Actually, you know, if we can trust Orbitz, which I don't know that I'm ready to take that leap, it says that it's actually official the smoked salmon sandwich on wheat became the state's official sandwich in 1987.

Strange. That's weird. But I like this answer. Because I grew up there, and I don't remember ever seeing anyone eating that sandwich. You know what you have eaten a lot of in Washington State? And I like this. Delish gives it to the banh mi. I like that. Sure. The Vietnamese sandwich. I usually get it with pork. Genevieve gets it with chicken. Anyway, I do love a mi a banh mi sandwich. Yeah, those are delicious. Okay.

And I guess I could see that, you know. There's a lot of sort of Vietnamese and Vietnamese-American influence in the cuisine of Seattle. I bet you they've got some real bomb banh mis in Houston as well because Houston has an extremely large Vietnamese-American community as well. I didn't know that. Yeah. I think there was a period of time where Houston was actually, or maybe it still is, the most diverse city in America, or maybe it's the most sort of balanced in that there are – I don't know how these things are exactly measured. But I just know – I mean Houston has a really great, really thriving variety of cultures of people who have immigrated to the U.S., who are the children of people who have immigrated to the U.S. Just about anything you want to get in Houston, you can from just about anywhere in the world, which is kind of cool.

They're given Ohio the Polish boy, which I've never heard of this particular thing before.

Well, that was your nickname in middle school, though, right?

It was. Well, it was everybody's nickname in Ohio middle schools. Cleveland, Ohio, is home to this odd concoction, a kielbasa. Okay, that I can get behind. On a bun covered with French fries and barbecue sauce or hot sauce and a layer of coleslaw. I've never seen any. I mean, I've been around kielbasa, Luke. I've done my time on this topic I've never seen anybody eat a kielbasa sandwich With french fries on top But good for them

Yeah that seems almost like what they're doing At Primanti's out there in Pittsburgh Where they you get that sandwich It's like I've actually had it And I've already forgotten what was on it But it's like I think it's like roast beef Of some kind and then they just put a bunch of fries On it and smash it all down And I remember eating it because I was like Well you gotta do it It's like watching them throw the salmon at Pike Place Market You just have to. But I remember thinking, I like all these elements, but I don't need them all together. It's too much. I would like to eat this delicious sandwich and then I'll grab a French fry or two. The interesting thing about this Fluffernutter story is that apparently in Massachusetts back in 2006, there was a bit of a, as they say in this article, a bit of a kerfuffle, which I guess would be a Fluffernutter kerfuffle. because a state senator in Massachusetts was upset that his son came home from school where they had been serving fluffernutters like in the lunchroom like that was one of the lunch options which was basically peanut butter and like we said this marshmallow fluff this specific kind of marshmallow of spreadable marshmallow that's very big in the northeast yeah the kid came home from school and wanted to have more marshmallow fluff and the state senator was upset because the kid had already had a fluffernutter at school and so was trying to limit how many times schools could serve fluffernutters in a week as part of a move to try to improve nutrition I guess the people from the fluff company were quick to point out that fluff actually has fewer sugars per serving than many jellies

I was going to ask you about your take on this. Yeah, because I'm not a big marshmallow person. These sandwiches don't sound good to me. This vaguely rings a bell from my time in New England. I've never had one, but it does seem like it's like peanut butter and jelly is such a kind of a standard quick sandwich to make a kid. Obviously, we don't want to give our kids a peanut butter and jelly sandwich every single day, but it's a classic, you know, lunchroom thing. Whereas this other thing sounds so much more like dessert. And I don't know that that really makes sense. You know what I mean? This is like a I don't think this is a real Distinction

Well I have to admit that I Was kind of Again I don't like I don't have a Lot of I don't really like eating marshmallow Like me neither one once a Year if I were to be At a campfire and we were Making a s'more Or making s'mores It's kind of fun to try to Roast the marshmallow just so And like You know get it just the exact right amount of brown etc and then have like a bite of it but i just don't need marshmallow in really anything that i'm eating um and so because of that this is not an appealing idea this sandwich i also love a peanut butter and jelly sandwich like that's delicious to me so i was looking at this going like they're spreading marshmallow on the i'm about to do a sebastian maniscalco over here they're spreading marshmallow have you seen this on the sandwiches that's a terrible Maniscalco but anyway like I was looking at it kind of suspiciously until I realized

I grew up eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which is just a different sweet thing that you put on there in addition to the peanut butter.

I mean, I guess the fact that it has some sort of connection to fruit maybe helps a little bit. You know what I mean? Whereas marshmallow just seems totally just created in a lab, right? Or a factory or whatever.

I guess, although I want probably a lot of jelly. Yeah. The fruit at that point is just a flavoring. I mean, there's probably you're not getting any of the fiber. Right, of course. A ton of added sugar, so it's probably – it's sort of fruit in name only, if you will.

Yeah, of course, but I'm just trying to figure out, like, why I feel so strongly. Oh, why I categorize it the way I do. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, we all can agree that the best bite of the peanut butter sandwich is the middle bite, right? Like, when you – unless you've cut it in half or something, if you're eating, like, you know, a full peanut butter and jelly sandwich, you've taken maybe three bites. You've taken off a bite of the corner, then you've taken off a bite of the other corner, then you have one more crust bite. Now you've kind of reached the middle of the sandwich, right? And you could almost, if you've done it right, you can almost have a little peninsula of crustless bread that has the most peanut butter and most jelly. And then you go in for that bite, Luke. That's heaven.

Yes. It's a flavor explosion. Well, that's, I mean, this is the whole premise of Uncrustables, which is not just a new action movie starring Sylvester Stallone.

in i'm thinking of red retired john malcolm delicious which is i get those two franchises

confused all the time no but i mean you know about uncrustables right um it rings a bell like fluffernutter but i don't i don't think i've it's a it's a it's a sandwich product i think probably i don't know craft makes it or something and what it is it's a little disc and it's peanut butter and jelly there's no crust on the bread it's just it's trying to basically be mostly that bite yeah so that sounds great which is delicious although again if old man can if permit old man to yell at cloud for a moment when i was a kid andrew you had to work with the crust yeah i mean that's what they didn't uncrust it for us and also we have this right this kind of dint why do you think we have this this flinty can do personality that that i so famously have you can change hotel

rooms right at the drop of a hat yeah it's because i had to deal with the crust also frankly i mean there's two problems with this number one the reason that bite is so good is because there's only one of that bite but then also um this is the glutton in me speaking but like i also don't trust a pre-packaged food to have the right amount of peanut butter and jelly on that bite when i'm making that sandwich luke that is that one bite is probably about an eighth of a jar of jelly maybe not quite but you know what i mean like i'm loading my peanut butter and jellies up i don't

think craft is i remember when i was a kid and i don't know if it was my mom made the sandwiches or maybe i was at the age where i could kind of make one but sometimes i would have so much jelly on the sandwich that when you get it out of you know what i mean you it's like lunchtime either or or possibly the lunch bag got smashed in my locker but you'd see that thing where the bread would on the jelly side the jelly would have soaked through the bread yeah yeah i hated that Oh, you hated that.

I hated it. I mean, I hate – I can almost have the – my – we're going to get into some detail here. My mom did not wrap my sandwiches in a baggie. She wrapped them in, like, saran wrap. We were not a glad wrap family for whatever that's worth. We were a saran wrap family. But you're familiar, right? And so I'd have to peel it open, right? And I will say that smashed sandwich, if your sandwich gets smashed, that process of, like, I can almost right now, like, imagine, like, picking up the sandwich and, like, the peanut butter is sticking to the saran. bran wrap because unfortunately it fell under the orange in the bag and the orange smashed it like that does kind of suck but seeing a sandwich that is so rich with jelly that is seeping through

there's also some pleasure in that as well well the thing is if I would have connected the dots and realized I really like jelly this is just an indicator of how much jelly is in the sandwich I think I would have enjoyed it but it felt to me like the bread had gotten soggy it just felt like Oh, this sandwich is ruined. And then what I would probably do is drop the whole thing in the garbage and then potentially steal hot lunch from Daniel Bagley Elementary School. How did you steal it? Well, so you could buy milk without doing that. So there was a line that would go up to a little kind of register and 90 percent of the kids in the line would have a free lunch card. We very much qualified for free lunch when I was a kid. But my dad thought that it was unnecessary or that, you know, hey, we can make you a – Luke, we can make you an inedible peanut butter and jelly sandwich just fine. You don't need to do the free lunch thing. OK. I mean the free lunch in those days was like pizza, hot dogs, macho nachos. It was great. So what I realized one day was you could get in the line and you could – when you got to the cash register, you could just say I'm buying a milk, which would be in a big refrigerator. And that was on the other side.

side of the thing it was five cents so you give them the five cents and then you go and you grab your milk and then you just stay in line and then you just grab a tray and you get hot lunch right um and then one day i realized i didn't even need to buy the milk i like i didn't go i didn't need to go through that charade anymore because what i could do is just kind of like stand near the line and then just slip in kind of behind the the cash there wasn't like it wasn't like there was turn styles or anything because it turns out Andrew that most of the kids who went to this school were economically marginalized and no one was trying to deprive us from getting some hot lunch right so I thought I was like the world's greatest criminal

yeah who's going to be the adult who's going to be like hey Burbank like how dare you try to get hot a hot meal at this school I mean I guess if somebody observed this behavior over and over and they were concerned about you and potentially concerned about whether or not you're getting enough food at home I mean maybe somebody could you know maybe try to intervene or talk to your family or something which would be maybe embarrassing for you and your family um but uh i could maybe see that like people want to step in and help kids but it would also be like hey you how dare you try to take hot food you

poor little kid you skinny skinny something very dickensian about that yeah like all of a sudden all of a sudden the daniel baggy elementary school lunchroom is like just black with soot And it's like, you know, it's right out of it's right out of like Oliver Twist or something. Someone's chasing you with a broom for some reason. Right. So once I figured out that I could just pretty much like snag a hot lunch whenever I wanted to, then I would I would just most days probably deposit my packed lunch because there was also never anything good in there. I didn't get like, you know, pudding or like there was never a treat in there would be basically like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and like maybe an apple or something. So I would just kind of chuck that thing and go get me some macho nachos.

I know we got to do Blur's Days, but like talking about the school food and, you know, we've talked a lot about the exact kind of school pizza. You and I used to get square pieces with little pinholes on the bottom of the crust and like even the Sloppy Joe's and whatever the other kind of iconic school food was of our generation. How has some hipster of our generation not – corn dogs wasn't big on our menus. That's a very West Coast thing, I think. But actually, you know what? I mean, hot dogs are so big in Ohio, but I don't even remember having those on the school menu. But anyway, my point is how is some hipster not kind of recreated the kind of lunch line experience with these foods, only maybe improve them a tiny bit but still capture the essence of what they are? Doesn't that – doesn't like – you open up a place called the cafeteria, right? Yeah. But it's like – Or the cafetorium. Or the cafetorium. And I know that there are actual cafeterias. In fact, there was even a big one that kind of reopened in downtown L.A. when I was there that was kind of a big celebration for everybody. And I ate there a couple of times. But anyway, look into it, folks.

Yeah, I feel like I would go there. I mean, probably a lot of that stuff I wouldn't really eat anymore for the meat implications. But, like, you're exactly right. Get that tray. Yeah, the tray is the whole fun of it. And then maybe you even have kind of shared tables. Yeah. It's kind of lunchroomy. And then you, you know, you, but just as like, it's like, so we did, corn dogs were a big thing, at least the elementary school I went to. So it's like a high-end corn dog or a really good slice of pizza or a good whatever. But, you know, yeah, you know, like through that kind of, through that kind of lunchroom, I don't know, lens, if you will. I would do that for nostalgia's sake sometime. Yeah, absolutely.

There's a right way to rock and a wrong way to roll. You can 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 number one

Ah, this one's on me! when I was doing the Blurs days last week. I don't know how I missed this, but Max had an email that he had sent in with plenty of time and somehow I didn't transfer it to my Blurs day sheet. My apologies, Max, so let me say to you a happy belated Blurs day. Max wrote in, here I find myself writing in on this, the eve of the week of my Blurs to wish myself a happy 35th. Last year I asked for the universe to deliver unto me a Blur's Day miracle, the election of Joseph Robinette Biden as our next president, and the Blur's Day God saw fit to grant my wish. Now about those campaign promises. Happy belated Blurs, Max. Yeah, sorry about that, Max. Max also wrote in yesterday to say that he was running around Green Lake this last... Sunday and was tempted to see if anything was hopping at the Browns bar in my neighborhood and poked his head in and saw that it was very busy and then poked his head back out and then heard on the show earlier this week that I was indeed at the bar. I did not see Max. Max, here's a little pro tip. Since I missed your blurs day last week, I'm just going to extend this a little bit in your honor. But when you walk into the Westie to watch a Browns game, you'll see a bunch of people decked out in Browns gear sitting at tables all over. But if you keep walking All the way to the back There's a little room that is dedicated just to the Browns fans And that's where the action is That's where the Browns cookies are That's where the people who run the Browns club are And there's usually some room back there And if you walk past that room

Into the men's bathroom You'll hear someone sobbing quietly In one of the stalls That's Andrew It's a Browns bar It's everybody Jesse says Could you please wish Laura in Toledo A happy Blurs Day Laura is an amazing advocate for equality, and she hosts a great podcast called Toledo Talks about news, events, and politics in Toledo. Wow.

This is probably a good week to listen to that, too, if you're interested in the politics. I'm guessing that there were some elections in Toledo this week.

Probably. Turn to Toledo Talks for all your Toledo news, everyone, and happy Blurs Day, Laura.

Annette in Livonia, Michigan I've been to Livonia Have you been? So am I saying that right? Livonia? Yeah, I've stayed in Livonia That's a great name, so let me write a song about Livonia I'd like to wish my five Dahlia a happy 11th Blurs Day She's a smart and kind kid A great big sister to her brother Pete And we love her bunches We listen to the podcast on our way to pick up Pete from school But I wouldn't call her a 10 just yet Maybe a 10 and a half Or a reluctant 10 I don't know if I like reluctant

Happy Blur's Day We'll get there We'll get there Dahlia It's a beautiful name too Matthew says I wanted to wish a happy Blur's Day to my five Lila Ruth Who turns one on November 1st Hey hey Her golden Blur's Day

Wow your golden Blur's Day is your first Blur's Day You won't even remember it

Man coming in hot Yeah TBTL has been a large part of your short life through spitting up at your first mention in last year's Blur's Day I had a feeling that's how Lila Ruth was going to respond when she heard her name was to spit up although let's be honest at that age you're spitting up most of the time so it's the chances are decent I think it was Matthew

who was spitting up while listening to TBTL

well that's actually more unlikely or listening while eating different food purees and doing diaper changes with your Uncle Andy doll. Lots of love on your Blur's Day. Love, Dad. Aw, come on. Aw. Cute.

Hey, look. This is another one for Laura in Toledo from Molly. You know of Toledo Talks? Yeah. The go-to podcast for Toledo politics? Molly says, please wish Laura from Toledo a very happy Blur's Day from Molly, a fellow 10 and real-life friend. It's been a big year for Laura, and I know the best is yet to come. Keep being a badass. I don't usually swear, but I have to when it's in a Blur's Day.

Marshall says, I wanted to send a Blur's Day message to Katie H. for her birthday on the 9th. Happy birthday. We love you and think you're the greatest thing since Gabagool. Love your 11s.

Hey, look. It's fellow college broadcaster Marissa in Maryland saying, Happy 9th Blur's Day to my 5 Leo, he of the Fwidey Fwidey drop, and who may or may not have spent much of 2020 tied to a tree. Mom loves you to Pluto, snickerdoodle.

Cute. And finally, Ann says, I hope I'm not too late to wish my nephew Sebastian in San Diego a very happy 14th Blur's Day. Seb is super smart, sweet, talented, and in your best Wilford Brimley voice, a real good kid. I don't know if I have a Wilford Brimley voice.

How would you try to say that? A real good kid. Nope. I can hear it in my head, but I can't get it to transcend.

I'm Wilford Brimley. My favorite Wilford Brimley really is, I think, John Goodman playing Wilford Brimley in one of those ads where he's on a horse. And he says, like, I'm Wilford Brimley. And then it's like doing it for a diabetes medicine. But then he says, well, I'm going to get on to I'm going to get off of this horse onto a slightly smaller horse and then onto a donkey and then just down close enough to the ground where I can just roll off or some. to that effect which i thought was hilarious the idea of wilford brimley who what we really know about wilford brimley now and by the way we're not totally done with seb's message so just hold your horses seb wilford brimley famously was not that old in cocoon you now see a thing on twitter all the time when someone reaches the wilford brimley age and it's shockingly young like wilford brimley was for some reason the definition of being kind of an old codger when I was growing up, and I think Wilford Brimley, wasn't he like 45 or something?

I know that that's a thing, but I don't remember the actual age.

I could look it up. Anne says, I always enjoy spending time with Seb and can't believe how quickly he's growing up, wishing him all the best for the coming year. X, O, comma, Auntie Anne. That's sweet.

Aww. She was 50 years old at the time of the film's production. Oh, I got five more years then. Yeah, you got five more years. I found this SNL skit, but I'll play it after we close out here. Oh, a little Easter egg action. Do you have any thoughts on a song to go out with today? Wow, I haven't been thinking ahead on this. My apologies. Let's see here.

Let me just go through things I've recently Shazammed Yeah what have you been playing lately because we don't need to extend this Well for some reason okay so these are things that I Here's a song by Broken Bells which is I think it's Danger Mouse and James Mercer from The Shins And I Shazammed some song called The High Road by Broken Bells because I was enjoying it How about that? I know that's kind of a bit random, but I actually think it's kind of a good song.

I would still like to. We had this idea way back in 2015. I just remember like this is an idea back when we were brand new with American public media because I remember thinking like we got to add new segments to the show. And one of my ideas for a segment was to just go through things we've Shazammed recently and just like play them on the show. We have never done that. We've never actually done that. We've never done that. We've been talking about that for seven. We just kind of did it. seven years so we're gonna do this now but uh that still would be a good segment at some point like let's just go through it of course probably half of it's filthy i would know you what it is

for me is partially songs that i want to i mean mostly it's songs i just want to be able to look up later and listen to them sometimes it's because i i want to make sure i never hear the song again and i want to know what's making me so angry that's what happened in that quilt shop with that billy joel song when i was in kansas although i will tell you this and i really do have to get out of here yeah i got an i got an appointment with a frozen head which isn't a euphemism for going number two um but uh you know i have i feel like i've said things on the show that sound critical of billy joel billy joel just did an interview on the howard stern show andrew i could not love that dude more he is so self-deprecating all they're doing is playing his hit songs and all he's doing is going this song sucks he's like why did i write that line i hate that he was like so he goes i don't know why i thought that was a good line this sounds schmaltzy like and it wasn't fake it was like this is a guy who is incredibly down to earth and also incredibly self-critical like anything i could think about billy joel that would be and there are a bunch of billy joel songs that i legitimately kind of jam out to when i hear them but um i think billy joel is kind of maybe sort of easy to make fun of sometimes i had read that tom sharpling book which is pretty mean to billy joel actually and then i heard him do this interview on stern and i was just like i just want to give this dude a hug he at every single possible turn gave the most self-effacing and genuine answers that i could have ever met i think part of why i thought i kind of he annoyed me is because i assumed that he had some kind of personality that i don't think he actually has if that makes any sense like he's the guy has had a tremendous resume and some really incredible professional accomplishments and and and yet he doesn't seem to take any of it seriously or buy into any of his own hype which i guess i just assumed he was doing and he is not so i just want the record to reflect billy joel seems like a truly wonderful

human being to me do you know that he was only 36 years old when cocoon came out when he was in That doesn't seem right, but he was born in 1949 and Cocoon came out in 85. Anyway, I feel like I've messed something up there, but yeah.

Okay, I just wanted the record to reflect. I'm now pro-Billy Joel. All right, well, listen, thank you, everyone, for hanging out with us today. We're going to be back here tomorrow. Oh, just a programming note. Tomorrow's show is going to get to you a little bit later than normal because I'm not going to get to Andrew's house until about mid-afternoon, but we are going to take calls. Yes. So watch our social media. We'll tell you when we're actually recording, and we'll put the phone number out there and give us a ring and we'll chat.

Yeah, we're guessing maybe.

Maybe around 3-ish Pacific time. But that's very loose right now. But just to give you kind of a ballpark. Yep. So that's what we'll do. We'll see you then. Until then, have a great Thursday. And please remember, no mountain too tall. And good luck to all.

You best did nothing at any house. Two inches on. The garden is sorting out. She curls her lips on her bow. I don't know if you're dead or not. If you and you want.

Come on and get them in and run Before you open up the rush There's all been used up in the hands To analyze Come on and get you on the nose Collected at the borderline They want to get up in the head Cause they know it's a divine Oh, a highlander is hard to find

A detour of your mind

And I'm gonna go get off my horse by getting onto a smaller horse and then onto a large dog until i'm near enough to the ground to roll off power out