Muse

Before we say goodnight, I just want to take a moment to address any perceptions out there regarding bias in my reporting. In divided times such as these, I'm reminded of one of my great heroes, Walter Cronkite. Because of him, I have the integrity to stay firmly impartial. He gave me a gift I can never repay, a $25 gift card to coconuts. If only I had used it before all their locations closed.

TBTL!

I've seen it coming for years. I've worried about it. I hoped with all my heart I wouldn't experience it. I wouldn't see it. But it's now here.

What's even the point in this freaking podcast? It doesn't even make sense. Why would anybody listen to it?

I yell at you because I love you. You listen to me because you love me. Is this a weird dynamic? Yeah, sure, from the outside.

You know what, dude? We can make a lot of money on this. If you're making these out of thin air, I mean, there's no overhead. We're going to be rich.

Oh, my God. One hundo a day, both of us. Five hundo a week. That's rich. That's it.

Boomba! Boomba! Boomba! Boomba!

Well, all right. Hello and welcome to another special edition of TBTL. It's an audiophile's nightmare. The show that just might be too beautiful to live. My name is Luke Burbank. I'm your host. here with another TBTL Night Cheese

Do you know what time it is? I was sound asleep

I heard you singing Night Cheese

Oh ma, pa It's just beautiful

That's right, another late night edition of the program This is when things are going to get special

This is special

This is special Things are going to get weird Things are going to get tired If by things you mean me Talking about how tired I am I believe that was actually exhausting for the listeners Last night during Night Cheese To hear me talk about how tired I am Based on a gig that I volunteered for So I'm going to keep it peppy I'm going to keep it fun I'm going to try to really honor the spirit Of this notably upbeat song by Wham Careless Whisper As we all arrive at episode 3570 in a collector's series together. Let the fun begin. I'm wondering if part of my exhaustion yesterday was that I was talking over this soulful nighttime saxophone. I mean, forget your melatonin. Forget your MyPillow. This thing will just absolutely put you right down and give you the best sleep of your life. Actually, that is something TV Teal is known for. It is a nighttime companion. Even when we record the show in the morning and we're all hepped up on coffee, people like to listen to the show at night as a way of falling asleep so maybe this is really the kind of the the completion of the circle of life for this here program we do have a lot to talk about on the program tonight including uh people named alexa who would like their name back please

from the device everyone else is being called by their name or nickname and i'm over here being

called she who shall not be named uh this is a person who actually named changed her name to valdemort which is a bold choice but that's what you do when you're desperate it's very interesting the statistics on the popularity of the name alexa and actually what happened in the 1980s to cause a surge in people naming their kids alexa and then of course what the impact of the amazon device has been so we'll talk about that and also uh speaking of internet things talk about the ceo of a i believe it's some kind of mortgage getting or loan getting company called better the ceo laid off hundreds of the employees of the company over zoom you're fired unfortunately at least in terms of his public appearance or his image i should say this was around the same time that this startup it was valued at seven billion dollars so he is getting Some pretty rough treatment online We'll talk about it I have a take on the story That I feel like will be interesting But also will probably put me on the wrong side of history So we will get into that Plus emails and vmails And we'll talk to this young man The longest running Cobra of the show Maybe best known for his depictions Of the tall ships He's got a song in his heart And it sounds like this

He is Andrew Walsh

And he's joining me right now From the Roosevelt neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, where I'm also sitting here with him tonight. Hello, my friend. How are you? Hello, Luke. Yeah, right? Welcome to the studio. Yeah, things are... That's about as sexy as I get. I promised things were going to get sexy last night, and they didn't get that sexy. How was that, though? That was uncomfortable.

no it was good well you know what made me uncomfortable how sexy it was yeah no that is true if you use that other weird voice that you like what other weird voice see i don't feel uncomfortable with that is i don't even know what that is there's no danger of me falling for that

second voice the first voice that's how i met genevieve by the way that's how i won her over by using that high-pitched voice your owen meanie voice yeah exactly give her the old owen meanie Oh, man. You know what? That is funny. You should say that because Owen Meany actually did play a kind of a I mean, I don't know if it played a part in our relationship, but I read that book because Genevieve recommended it to me very early on in our relationship because I am sure I just moved to New Hampshire and I had never read any John Irving before. But Genevieve had written a she had written her big thesis for her school on Irving and whatever. It was about certain themes in his books. And she can explain it some other time. Have her back in here. We can we can listen. Talking about talking.

I say one thing very quickly. And I want to. Yeah, I want to talk about. I think I'm done with the one and only time that I've talked to John Irving. Oh, I like that. You've given me a chance to brag about myself. But I love how popular Genevieve's appearances on the show are. She's so good. And she is. But it also hurts how popular Genevieve's appearances on the show are. The Internet lights up with delight. I know. She's delightful, though. Because she is delightful. But, you know, I guess it's just the reality of the world. She is much more dynamic on the imaginary radio than we are. Now, John Irving and a prayer for Owen Meany. I read that book in college because it was recommended by a then college girlfriend of mine, Francesca Severini, who I believe helped the Mario brothers almost find the princess.

I thought they rescued her.

She was in another castle. But I wasn't a reader of those kinds of books in college, but she recommended it. I was trying to impress her, so I read it, and I quite enjoyed it. I remember it being about a boy with a broken voice.

A stand-in for Jesus.

But I didn't pick that part up because, as I mentioned.

Just like, you know how when he speaks, it's all caps in certain Bibles. Isn't Jesus' text in all red?

This is the first that I'm realizing that.

I think that's a thing. I believe it. Genevieve's thesis was actually on, I believe, maybe religious or spiritual. All caps in literature. Exactly. In Vonnegut and Irving, it was how they kind of, whatever. It was about, I think, either religion or spirituality in their books. Not that Genevieve is a huge religious person. It was just like a theme that she was pulling out of their stuff. Yeah.

I did not get that. I just thought he was yelling the whole time. Yeah, he did have a broken voice. I'm not kidding. And you don't do the broken voice. You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off. But I remember we were doing Livewire, and it was part of the book festival some years ago, and John Irving was in town. And I think I've told this story before on the show, and I may have even mentioned the wrong writer. I think I mixed John Irving up with a different writer of his time. Wait. Could it have been Updike? Sometimes I get those names confused. Yes, I do. I mix those two up a lot in my mind, and I think there may have been a chance that I thought John Irving was John Updike. I mean, I read the book. He wrote a book. It was part of the festival. But if I remember right, part of the deal was he was going to be at a different event and it was going to be a game time decision if he was going to get to the theater we were in in time to do this interview because these book festivals, there's lots of different events. He was obviously kind of pretty high on the food chain there being John Irving. And so I think it was a thing where the plan was for me to read the book, have questions ready to go, but also be ready for the possibility that John Irving might have gotten stuck talking to somebody at one of these events and just never came. So, like, I don't know. I don't think we promoted it at the beginning. I think it was a surprise for the audience. Lynn may have been there. And, Lynn, can you hit me, remind me as to if it was a surprise or not? It felt like a surprise to me. I remember there being a point where I was on stage and someone waving on the side was like giving me some kind of semaphore that said John Irving in the house. Oh, and then I said, what flags are those? I mean, I know the John Irving flags. I don't know. Oh, it is weird. The house flag. Definitely not the Confederate flag. But so I remember saying, ladies and gentlemen, we have a special surprise. And I may have almost said from the rabbit run series. I shit you not I read the book that he wrote But in my mind a lot of the time I was thinking I was reading John Updike Well it's funny because I was about to make a port noise Complaint joke there but that's not him

That's

Thomas Benchon? No, is that Roth? That's Roth. Roth, yes. That's Roth right for less? Genevieve. And again, I don't know why I'm just telling her stories, but I think it's interesting. Because we've got to keep her off the air. Exactly.

She's rapidly, rapidly supplanting us as the host of this show.

But I told you she wrote her thesis or graduate thesis or whatever it was. She was an undergrad. That's why I'm confusing exactly what it was. But it was for her English program. She wrote this big thesis on him and Vonnegut's work and then somehow parlayed that into an interview with him to be his assistant. So she went to his house in New Hampshire. She was going to school in Massachusetts, and I believe he was living in New Hampshire. And so she went to his house to be interviewed to be his personal assistant. And she did not end up getting the job. And we talked about that a lot when we were kind of dating like a year or two in about how that was a disappointment for her. But we wouldn't have been together because our paths wouldn't have crossed had she gotten that job. Right. But she said, here's a little dazzling detail from the story. She says at one point, like she's talking with him and then the phone rings. He has to go get the phone. And he's like, oh, yeah. Hey, Maggie. And they're talking for a little bit. And then he gets off. And she's like, was that Margaret Atwood? And he's like, yes, the famous turf. No, he didn't say that. But I don't know Is Margaret Atwood a TERF I saw some rumblings online the other day What does a TERF mean You know what is it Trans exclusive radical feminist You know it's like what they call

A radical feminist who isn't intersectional enough As it relates to trans women

Yeah it's like who's the Harry Potter woman JK Rowling She's the TERF right So anyway I thought How did Harry Potter get down the hill Iran JK Rowling I said that as a joke I don't really I mean this shit is complicated and nuanced and I don't know like I think Margaret Atwood tweeted something that would hit some people the wrong way I don't know what it was I'm not taking a stand here I was just trying to make a joke and I regret it you know what I've found over the years is that the facts are your friends

what I was going to say is this is TBTL night cheese this is when we let our hair down when we get sexy and when we may or may not be slandering people that's what we do here but That's a genuinely good John Irving story Mine is less good in that I thought he was John Updike Oh I'm sorry you weren't done

I interrupted your story

He came out on stage And I was pretty nervous about the interview And I wanted to try to ask questions That sort of Indicated to him that I was Maybe not at his intellectual level But at least worthy of interviewing him And he sat down And he looked at me And then he rotated on his stool And then he just launched into A monologue slash Q&A with the audience Really? He just like He kind of just freelanced it himself I feel my memory I don't know if it ever made it on the radio But my memory is I asked a couple of questions And then he just Because he's a famous writer And he does millions of literary events And because when he goes to those He's the star of the show He just I don't know if anyone told him It was a radio show Oh, interesting I think he might have just thought it's a well attended Q&A where there's a guy who's overly obsessed with the PA system because he just he just I remember him opening up to the audience asking about rabbit run and just talk. Yeah, he's like, this is a very eager young man who continues to ask me questions about Updike's work. Does it smell like Updike in here?

Is that a joke? I'm not supposed to say. Yeah. You know, the Updog joke. What's Updog? Yeah.

Does it smell like Updog? And then you say what's up dog And then I go I high five you The more literary version is does it smell like updike in here You say what's updike And I say I don't know I just interviewed John Irving

I'm thinking of another version that's a dirty joke That I actually just told this weekend But I don't need to bring that up

So that's my big story on that topic Now the only other books that I read in college Outside of the ones that were assigned And I guess these were assigned as well Were of course the books of Gabriel Garcia Marquez Oh, yeah. Which which which, you know, uses a lot of magical realism. Very different. Something that I never really vibed with because I was kind of like, oh, well, that's fake. That couldn't have happened. Yeah, that's magical. I go for realism. But Andrew, I saw something today on my drive over to your house that felt almost like something out of Marquez. OK, maybe that's overstating it, but something weird did happen. And it's so specific and weird that it kind of blew my mind. And I know that I'm going to tell you this story.

Is this going to end with you telling me and you don't believe in a god?

Well, we'll see how it goes. The thought crossed my mind. I've told you stories like this recently, how I'm not a person who believes in psychic knowledge or magic.

or magical realism, or any of those things. I don't care what my sign is. Having dinner with some extremely nice folks over the weekend and was talking about travel, and I was actually telling the story about you and I going to Australia, and one of the folks said to their partner, oh, we got to go, Brisbane's on your line. I was like, on their line? And they said, oh, you know, it's based on your birth chart, you're like we're going down levels of astrology here we're not just talking about oh i'm such a capricorn yeah this is like five levels deeper where somehow your sign also affects like latitudes and or it is aligned along latitudes and longitudes and you have your lines that go around the earth

that indicate cities that you should visit mine was brunswick ohio yes yours was um mine was

Bothell Washington for a day

or a lifetime I actually think we have a listener who lives in Brunswick no offense to Brunswick Ohio

by the way well you've been to Brunswick Ohio

just outside the valley city that was yours was actually your line went right through Burgundy Bay yes that's right yeah so

anyway this is not I don't believe in any of that you know sort of woo woo stuff but I do see odd coincidences at time and I guess what I wonder to myself is is this a one in a billion chance and i want to ask you if you think this is a one in a billion chance i am driving across the 520 floating bridge today after my gig i was doing which again i'll not d that a i'll not disclose that agreement that i signed why do you always make it dirty i'm talking about i'm talking about things that i have agreed to not talk about i've agreed to not d that a and that's what i'm gonna not do no that's on me but i'm coming over from the east side i don't know fill in the blanks yes i was at um i was at uh john howie steakhouse right yes bellevue square um anyway i'm driving on 520 and i'm listening to all things considered and i'm listening to an exit interview with someone i believe named francis collins francis collins i think is the outgoing director of the nih okay and the um a health policy reporter at npr is doing sort of an exit interview because francis collins is leaving the nih after being the director for some number of years he's 70 he says he's you know wants to spend some time with his family etc and this health care reporter health policy reporter asks if uh if francis collins feels like the NIH has succeeded during his time at the helm and one of the metrics and yes that's why you tune into the night version of TV show US longevity metrics when he took over the NIH the average life expectancy in the US was 78 years plus a little change and over his time at the NIH it's remained basically 78 plus a few years even though other countries that are similarly wealthy have seen life expectancy go up Oh, interesting. So he's held the line. That's not a victory. It hasn't gone down. It went down a few years ago, but I think maybe it's gone back up to where it's basically he's leaving it sort of as he found when you look at other places. And there's a lot that goes into that. There's what they call deaths of deaths of despair. There's all kinds of stuff. but he was talking about things that they could have done better at the NIH under his time or things that the NIH needs to do better. And I am driving on five 20 and he is saying the words we need to get to a point where your zip code no longer predicts your life expectancy. And next to me is the back of a U dub bus, a shuttle. It's going across five 20 that says U dub making it. So your zip code no longer predicts your life. He's saying the words, and I'm looking at the words. Now, it's not like he says, you'll pay less in Burien. Cars cost less in Sumner. That is such a specific phrase.

But here's the deal. It is so clearly, I mean, the U-Dub. And you don't believe in a God. I think it actually makes a lot of sense. I mean, don't get me wrong. That's a hell of a coincidence, but I don't think it's like one in a million because, you know.

Not even one in a million?

The UW is huge on public health right now. That's one of their biggest initiatives. And so when you have these types of initiatives, they're national things, and people are using the same buzzwords and the same campaigns, and this is what everybody is trying to get out there. I'm sure the NIH is on the same page with population health, which is what the UW's program is called.

I agree that it's definitely something that is national and is being sort of used as a quick way to describe a problem we have, which is that we people in this country, of course, do not receive.

equal health care so your zip code should not predict your life expectancy I definitely agree that it's something that's said a lot and put in a lot of different publications but the chances that I would be and I'm not talking about four minutes later I passed a bus that said I am talking about I am driving at the rear of the bus where those words and as he's saying I'm looking at the words like follow the bouncing ball your zip code shouldn't predict your life expectancy And I just thought, I guess really what it comes down to is me and that I'm a very cerebral person because I'm listening to All Things Considered. In other words, if I'm not listening to All Things Considered, it goes up to one in, like, let's say it's one in 100,000, even with me listening to All Things Considered and me being near the UW campus. But it goes way up if I'm listening to KISW. Yeah, I was going to say, like, move in 92. Yeah, exactly. If I'm listening to Jubal in the Morning.

Yeah, and there's some PSA. I mean, there's even a chance that a PSA could potentially run during low traffic hours.

You have to keep taking this away from me.

No, no, I'm agreeing with you that the chances of that happening are much, much less, but also probably potentially not impossible, although probably impossible.

It was just such, and again, I don't think that the, I mean, what I think is that I'm going to retire from the podcast and dedicating my life to the work of someone's zip code not predicting their life expectancy.

I thought you were going to say, I mean, with these chances you have, I thought you were just going to beeline it to Goldie's. Well, I do have to pick up my credit card that's been there for a month. Yes, yes, yes.

You pointed out something very disturbing about that, which is kind of a long time ago, I was up there with a friend. We were having fun. I had a bar tab and took a lift away from the casino and forgot that I had a credit card there as my bar tab. And only realized it a few days later that my card was missing, and I kind of backtracked into my mind and realized it was there. And I said to you, well, the positive of that has been that I haven't had access to my credit card for like now, like going on maybe two months. Yeah. And I said, well, so I haven't been running up my card. And you said, well, you haven't been. And you're right. I mean, hopefully nobody else is. Right.

Isn't that one of the most secure things, though? Like if you leave a credit card because they take money and security so seriously at any kind of a gambling organization like that. Like, you know what I mean? They have something called the cage. It's in the cage. Isn't it actually one of the safest places to have your card in the cage?

It probably is, but it had never even occurred to me that it could be, you know, the number could be out in the wind. It also shows you how I'm extremely lazy in certain specific ways, and by that I mean I was in Portland when I realized this. My card was up in Seattle. Probably the easiest thing to do would be to cancel the card and have my bank issue me a new card. But then what I would have to do is go into various internet accounts that that card is auto-paying. Oh, God. And change those out. And I found that to be a more onerous project than just waiting until the next time I was in Seattle to drive up there, go to the cage, and ask them if I could please have my card.

And you're in Seattle quite a bit, too. So, yeah. Anyway, so. Oh, go ahead.

Were you wrapping up? That was wrapping up other than to say I thought it was quite coincidental that I heard those words out of Francis Collins' mouth as I was looking at them on a basis.

I think it is greatly coincidental. I didn't mean to take that away from you. It would be like if you were driving in 2017 and you're listening to Fox News Radio and they were saying Nothing Burger right as you were passing a restaurant called Nothing Burgers. What was the Nothing Burger thing? Remember Chris Hayes on his show actually put together a montage? I think I'm wrong about 2017. I don't know. I can't remember what that was related to a very specific story. I'm trying to think, though.

The quizzical look on my face is I'm trying to think if that's the same level of. . . I don't think it is. And the only reason I would say it's not is because I want you to be wrong.

And I was just saying that as a joke. I don't think that. . .

Although, Nothing Burger does sound like the kind of place I can still eat at.

It really does. Have you heard about Nothing Burger? Oh, my God. It's so good. It's a whiff of air. Hey, this is apropos of absolutely nothing, and I just got the idea to play this for you right now. That's how TBTL night cheese works. Exactly. I'm leaning into the night cheese here.

I don't even like cheese.

Would you like us to give it a different name?

I don't. No, no. Night Sweat? TBTL Night Sweat? Cheese Sweat. I was putting together, doing a little work on the newsletter just right before you got here today. And I guess, I mean, I try not to spoil things, but, you know, of course, we always feature a 10 of the week, right? One of our listeners who's kind of in the spotlight and they answer questions. By the way, you can sign up at tbtl.net. You can also take the little survey yourself and become a 10 of the week at tbtl.net. But all of that is to say, spoiler alert, this week's 10 of the week.

the week and i won't say their name um said that their favorite drop one of the questions is what

is your favorite audio drop i find that endlessly fascinating because what people yes yeah because it's it's i don't know how you predict these things but it's it's just always a surprise to me for some reason i don't know what i expect people to say and i don't know what my quote unquote favorite drop is but it's always a shock to me and it's actually good because it reminds me that like there are drops that i just don't give any mind to it's like oh i'll use this one and It's someone's favorite drop.

Well, I think this one this week is actually you're going to find it very surprising, in fact. And in looking for the looking for the audio so I could link to it, it took me on a little adventure. And that's what I play for you. Essentially, let me just tell you what I want to play for you is a moment of TBTL that I have not heard in years that just listening to. And it's you and it's just you and me. But being so removed from this moment, I just found it so charming. And I just want to play it for you so that you and I can take a moment and say sometimes we have funny moments.

I like to hear that because I feel like I was in such a weird state of mind last night. I was so tired and kind of, I don't know, just feeling weird. And then I feel like I got into talking about anxiety, which we talk about a lot on the show. I probably wasn't breaking any new ground. I actually found that really interesting. Okay, good. Well, I am glad to hear that tonight we're going to hear some good old-fashioned fun TBTL tape.

Because I'll be honest with you. I don't have an excuse. I didn't get up at 6 a.m. and work on a non-disclosed project all day. But for some reason, just like the time of day. You were allowed to D the A of what you did? I just feel so low-gy right now. So I feel like my brain isn't working that well. I mean, you could tell that nothing burger joke there. It just wasn't good. So let's go back to the old days when I was more sharp. Actually, the funny thing about this is. Do we have a harp sound effect or do you need me to look one up? You can try to play one. But the funny thing is you actually can tell that I'm a little burned out. This was probably the most burned out period when I was doing TBTL. This is down in L.A., right? Oh, boy. And you were getting up at 5 in the morning in those days. Yeah, maybe not quite that. But I was kind of doing TBTL after long, kind of tough days in the radio mines. And they made us work in a mine. Actually, Casey, it was not unlike a mine.

The signal was very weak. It really was.

It had to travel from about two miles under the earth. So that's the era. And so I was really tired. And maybe that's what I like about this. It really is a real moment. So let me back up. The drop that the listener says is their favorite drop is none other than it's actually your least favorite drop, Luke. And it is the turkey gobble.

Oh, God.

Yes. And I got that. If you'll recall, for a while, like you play drops all the time, right? And I just had one drop that I used to play and it was like an instant symbol or I can't remember exactly what it was, but it was some like big red button. And I'd go to a website, I'd type in like instant slide whistle or something, and it would sit there and I would play it from time to time. It was the only thing I would play. But they had a few other options in there, and one of them was this turkey gobble, right? And so I started playing it. But what I did not remember was the very, very, very first time I played it. Here, I think I've said too much already. This is just like a very real moment that I found very charming. It starts with you just kind of, you know, you're talking about something. You're very much just midstream to like, okay, we're doing this.

And I don't, you know, anything that's like, okay, we're doing this.

I'm really sorry about that. Honestly, I was not trying to interrupt you. I'm sorry.

Andrew?

I am dead serious that that was next, and I had something in queue, and then it went through the speakers. I'm sorry. Was that a dog? It kind of goes on from there that I explained what I explained to you. And by the way, thanks again. And you mentioned it before. Thank you to Lynn for putting this up.

How about some meat? Do you like turkey?

Who are you calling turkey? Marsupialgurgle.com. Oh, my gosh. Visit it. Support it. But anyway, I don't know. It was just like I was looking for it. And I had forgotten that no wonder you have such a bad connection. Well, you also just hate that sound. But the very first time I played that, it was in the background. Can you play that again? You just stopping.

And then me earnestly just trying to be like, no, no, I wasn't doing that on purpose. To like, okay, we're doing this. And I don't, you know, anything that's like, okay, we're doing this.

I'm really sorry about that. Honestly, I was not trying to interrupt you. I'm sorry.

Andrew?

I am dead serious that that was next. And I had something in queue and then it went through the speakers. I'm sorry.

Was that a dog? Anyway. Sorry, that was me. It's a hot one. That is. The pause. The best moments on this show is when we just stop for a second. Well, because we kind of try not to, and I think we generally, you know, we try to sort of tap dance. You and I are both not fans of long sort of pregnant pauses. We try to keep it friendly and also try to have something to say next.

Yeah.

And I think that. must have just caught me so off guard i have a bunch of other thoughts though one is there's so much echo on my voice because i used to put the show into garage band and garage band there was no setting on garage band with zero echo that's that's absurd maybe i didn't know about it huh there they and actually i do think that because when you know when we got fired from being a radio show and started doing it from my house in mount baker every day the tradition was i would record it however i forget how i recorded it but then i would load it into garage band and that's how i would you know bounce the show into some other kind of thing and put it on the internet and i don't know if you can hear how much echo there is on my voice there but that's pick it up this is the lowest echo you could have on garage band if i remember right yeah i mean i'm just going to kind of pick up where we left off you being mercilessly whipped in order to buy candy

from someone's kid i don't know what i have i don't know what mario has you doing i sound weird too i sound like and that should be a good studio mic but i sound so tinny it's probably garage band it was probably my yeah but you do sound like you're right you have some it's not even necessarily bad but it sounds very voice of god yeah because it's not like the echo that sometimes we'll get in here, especially if it's you and me and Genevieve and all the mics are open. It sounds like you're in a big room. It's process. I have this sound effect website open, and I'm looking. They have something called The Price is Wrong, which is the thing that you use all the time with the sad horns. And then I saw that they have something called Instant Gobble, and I knew that you're going to be doing probably a Chateau Saint-Michel. Instant Gobble's going to get you? Mention a little bit.

This would be something worth playing. You know, what you forget, Andrew, is that if we need a turkey gobble we got a turkey gobble nothing has changed too much meta too much meta dangerous amounts of meta alert meta alert what did you just say as a show title i've already

forgotten my brain is mush um uh you just did gobbles gonna get you okay yeah was that the

name of the file was like instant gobble or something yes that's good um yeah i have i must have so i would have been in port townsend probably at the post office yes and were you at

the post office yeah a little bit before we got hired by apm were you there for a little bit

i must have been and i had an isdn line in there so you were you were sneaking this is where this gets very technical and very not interesting um but we had isdn that was why you had to sneak into one of those rooms at kcrw because you had to be somewhere where this very um both antiquated and fancy audio connection existed. And I wonder if we had you, can I take it to a more esoteric place? Yes, I can, Andrew. We might have had you on G.722 to cut down on latency, which is maybe why you sound compressed.

I think that's exactly... There are four radio people

enjoying this conversation, and two of them are in this room, baby.

That's the thing that you use all the time with the sad horns. This sounds like G. SG.722. You thought we were doing L2-120. What was it? L2-Mano 128. No way. We couldn't afford it back then.

Yeah, 20, L2-64, whatever that was. God. Old radio producers don't die. They just get podcasts. They just get fuzzy. All right. On that note, why don't we go to our break and then thank some donors of the day and then talk about the top stories, Which we have a couple of actually quite interesting ones Which we will get to in a moment Here on TBTL Night Sweats I was starting to Kind of bop my head and play along To that song And I started playing a guitar Which I do not think is part of the build up Can we start that over? Can we hear if there's any guitar in there It's definitely some drum And an organ I don't think there's a guitar I think I was playing the wrong instrument For what that sounds like That's definitely organ Drum I'm playing the silent guitar on this song I want everyone to just imagine You play some of the best silent guitar I've ever heard One of the best donors we've ever had is Dana Blazkowicz in Corvallis, Oregon.

There are two Corvallises? No, there are at least two listeners in Corvallis.

Now there are two of them. We also can't rule Dana out as a suspect as to what happened to our signs in Corvallis. We know where Cheryl...

How did Dana not reach out to us?

We know where Cheryl was because we were in her driveway. That's right. We don't know where Dana was and Dana may be donating to the show because of a guilty conscience overboosting our signs. signs don't you think while we're whatever you're gonna say yes thinking and accusing Dana here for a second thank you sing if you were in Corvallis Washington and you listen to this show yeah and you heard about those signs possibly being stolen don't you think you would voluntarily write in and say by the way I live in Corvallis I just want you to take my name off the suspect list Like I think Dana That's what a not guilty person does It says everything

Thank you Dana Your silence is deafening Dana We appreciate you

Give us our signs there

Mike Barney is in Sacramento, California Another place we went On that trip We'd already lost the signs But we can't rule Mike out As maybe a co-conspirator with Dana

That's right, especially if he's a time cop

He called, he might have made the call and said, Dana, they're going to be at the, was it a holiday inn? I kept booking us in the holiday inns and then not booking you a room. That was kind of my move on this trip. That was once too many. Thank you, Mike, despite your possible implications in the great sign heist of 2021. Sarah Gordon is in Cincinnati, Ohio, the Queen City. A historic place, a lovely place, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Getting to celebrate a pretty damn good football team for the first time in a long time.

I like Joe Burrow.

I do, too.

Because, I mean, when he was at Ohio State. Is that where he came from? Didn't he win the Heisman? No, at LSU. But he's from Ohio. Oh, okay. I believe he's from Ohio. He won the Heisman. And his Heisman speech was just genuinely touching. And I believe he was talking. He came I want to say he came from a very working class town in Ohio and his his sometimes these you know speeches by athletes or movie stars or famous people will feel a little contrived but it felt very to me genuine that he was saying hey I've had this experience in life that's quite unexpected and I just want to tell other people who are in the version of life that I was in you know however many years ago that this is a thing maybe not the Heisman but your life can be what you want to make it. I just remember it being really touching, and he dedicated it to Sarah Gordon. That is so sweet. I didn't even know that last part. Yeah, that's a dazzling deet that I just made up. Susan Long is in Silver Spring, Maryland. Thank you, Susan, for supporting the show. I am so tempted to say Silver Springs. Oh, yeah, I get that. And I need to remember, Silver Spring is the Nordstrom of cities in Maryland. Yes, yes. There's no S. Or the Pike Place Market. Thank you. Yes. Jennifer Oak thanks you as well. Jennifer's in Woodinville, Washington. Fitting last name for being in Woodinville. I wonder if they changed it. We would also accept a Jennifer Elm. Jennifer Poplar. Will you quit naming trees, Jennifer Maple?

When you emigrate to Woodinville, they often will change your name at the border. Did you know that? I do know that.

My Aunt Alice and Uncle Tom lived there. Tom and Alice. A cottonwood Barrelhead

Barrelhead? Is that a snake? I don't know Barrels I was just thinking About barrels

What about Christine Woodward in Renton Washington? What about her?

That's a That's a Interestingly a very Woodinville name Yeah the good news

Christine is Easy transition To Woodinville For you When you move there You are more or less Prepped for it So we'll see you there In Woodinville Hey thanks to all of Our donors of the day Thank you for making This episode of TBTL Night Sweats Possible We appreciate you Hello and welcome to Top Story. All right, let's start out with this very well-reported and well-told story in the Washington Post by the writer Alexa Juliana Ard. uh this uh a piece is titled amazon can we have our name back so you notice that and look i want to apologize in advance i don't think there's any way to talk about this without saying the name of your particular amazon device that might be uh might even be how you're playing this program right now uh or it might be in the room where you're hearing this uh sorry but it's going to get activated i don't know i mean is there another way and we could give it a different

name like we give another a name like we could just call it alicia for the i just worry though

it's so specific to the name that i will yeah you'll forget i'll lose the thread at some point it's just so i'm we're just gonna do it everybody just throw a blanket oh also there was that huge

WS slash Amazon outage today that actually was affecting those devices. Just listen to this podcast quickly before the service gets up. Or give

your device a new name, which is something that many people who are named Alexa have had to do in this article. Can it be anything? You just train at the sound of your voice? Yep. Yeah, that's great. You can change the name. This happens all the time. Now again, I mentioned the name of the writer of this piece. Her name is in fact Alexa. She comes to this quite honestly it's been her own experience she writes about uh this is one of the things that i was fascinated with in the piece popularity of the name alexa has plummeted in the years since amazon released its device so in 1980 andrew now you don't have this article in front of you no In 1980, how many people a year were named new babies? How many new newborn girls? I think we were very much, you know, gendering things back in those days. So I think it's pretty safe to assume. Also, it says so on the graph. Number of American newborn girls given the name Alexa in, let's say, 1988. What would you say?

What would you guess? I'm going to say here. So I just, I did look up one thing and the thing I didn't, I just looked up. This is according to the social security administration, by the way, this data and all just, just so you know what I was just Googling there. I wasn't cheating. I was just Googling how many babies were named Alexa in 1988. Okay. How many babies can you fit in, you know, the tire? It's one of those Zen things. It's a good question. No. So I looked up how many babies on average are kind of born in the U S each year.

That's actually a very good baseline because I just needed to know. These numbers were very these numbers were surprising to me, but maybe because I misunderstand how many babies are born in America and how many girls. So let's say slightly more than 50 percent of that number if we're going with the average.

So it looks like in modern times, we're at about like three point seven five million births in the U.S. Wow. So that was that was twenty nineteen numbers. and that's down from 2016. But anyway, so you cut that, and if you're, but it must be such a small percentage. I'm going to say there were 75,000 babies named Alexa in 1988. That's the question, right?

Yeah, it looks like baby girls named Alexa in 1988. It looks like it was on the order of about 600. I was slightly off I was shocked I didn't know what to do It wasn't a very popular name back then It was not and then something changed A little before 1990 Billy Joel and Christy Brinkley Had a baby and named her Alexa Oh uptown girls And the name took off

Like a rocket ship What did it peak at Given these numbers though I realize how far I overshot I'll bet you it never even came close to that

There was, I mean, I, unless you're talking about Mildred, I can't, which I think we just collectively retired at some point, it'll come back. We said, you know what, Edith and Mildred, we're not doing that anymore. Although all of those, you know, names that seem to fall out of fashion come back into fashion. I feel Genevieve. I feel, oh, I love that name. I just think it's a beautiful name. One of my very favorites, actually. But I am shocked that there was any name in America that's getting only 600 occasions. Yeah. So when it peaked, though, did you get that number? It peaked at about – and again, I'm kind of – this is rough estimation because what I've got is a line graph and the dates aren't exact. It goes 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010, 2020. So I'm kind of trying to do this I'm eyeballing this a little bit But it looks to me like in about 2008 It peaked at a little over 6,000 I was so far off I was shocked at 6,000 That seemed low Like I would have thought just random There's so many babies being born That you pick almost any Throw a dart at almost any Any baby You throw a dart at any baby You throw a dart at any baby And they will beg you to stop That's what I've learned They're like fine call me Alexa Just please stop throwing darts at me Please stop hurting me 6000 is about the peak That's in 2000 and about 8 And then what's interesting is It starts Dropping and then It starts This is the weirdest effect of this whole thing As you can tell I'm quite the statistician Move over Steve Kornacki Move over Who's like is who is there somebody that does kind of breaks down stats for NPR that I can't call?

their name to mind right now or used to was there anybody whose job it was to come in and make sense

of the polling data andy cohut they used to call it oh now i would have never got i would have never gotten there but you're absolutely right yeah andrew andy you are so right so this is

what's really strange it's you're looking at about 2008 the name peaks at 6 000 then it starts dropping it's less popular it's less popular it's now down in the range of let's say 4 000 in about 2015 and then it starts growing again for reasons that are unexplained it starts growing it goes back up to 6,000 at 2019 it's back at its peak of 6,000 and that is exactly when Alexa is released nationwide and then it goes off a freaking cliff drops over the course of like two maybe one year it drops from 6,000 to 1,200 a year. A huge reduction in the number of people naming their newborn girls Alexa. I am a little surprised because when something is just out in the culture and being said, you would think that just people overhearing it will cause them to choose it. No. Especially in those early days where you don't have the device yourself.

Yeah, you don't have the device yourself. It might just be subconscious. You didn't even realize that you were kind of hearing that. I don't know exactly when the device was released, but you know this drop off i mean it must have it looks i mean it goes from it's literally like

6 000 and then an arrow alexa released nationwide and then almost a straight line down yeah i'm

surprised that because you would think it would be several years into the devices yeah because

life as we most of us are not futurists sure yeah so most of us don't actually like have a sense of

like how is this going to really permeate our lives um do you think this gets us off topic and I know that we need to get back on topic after this, but I'll bet you I would love to know if the name Luke got much more popular after 1976 or 78 or whenever the first Star Wars.

I would guess that it did. I will mention, I don't know why I need to clarify this, but my mom named me Luke because she believes to this day that an angel came to her bed at the religious commune where she was, the Lighthouse Ranch, sat at the foot of her bed and woke her from a sleep and told her, name your child Luke. Oh, wow. That is.

We've told each other a lot of stories. I didn't know that one.

That is the story of how my mom got my name. It was not a Star Wars thing. Well, I kind of figured that. Well, I mean, I'm born close enough to that time that it also wouldn't be completely out of, you know, the range of possibility. I bet you that that name got, I would guess that name got a lot more popular after that. Yeah, I'm going to try to Google it. Because he's kind of the hero as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's like he's, you know, likable. Also, Chewbacca went way up from zero people to four people.

Exactly. Until Google released its device where you say, hey, Chewbacca, what's a gorgle? You know, that was.

Now, that's a short title. Hey Chewbacca what's a gorgle Here is more of this piece That the writer Alexa Juliana Ard Did and what I love about this piece By the way it's very hard for me to talk about On the imaginary radio and play you the audio Because I'm trying to do this all off The computer but as a read It's very multimedia because My sense is that Alexa Juliana Ard is a video editor And does multimedia stuff So there's a lot of actual interviews with Alexas in this that's cool And it's great. You get to hear them in their own words. I actually have some tape I'll play in a minute here. But this is what she did for the piece. I interviewed more than 25 women and girls named Alexa and several parents of Alexas to see how the voice assistant's rapid takeover of workplaces and homes has altered their feelings about their name and identity. The Alexas I interviewed ranged in age from 5 to 55 and lived throughout the U.S., Mexico, Canada, and Europe. A few were indifferent to the connection or amused by it, but the majority were tired of interruptions from the bot and by jokes at their expense. In virtual classes, business meetings, and at auditions, Alexas said they have been instructed to avoid saying their name or arbitrarily assigned new names. One Alexa said the teasing and jokes Escalated to sexual harassment For me This is the writer It was highly personal My mother named me Alexa After falling in love with the name Long before I was born in 1994 I've also experienced uncomfortable encounters After Amazon made the name a wake word Including being given commands As if I were the bot Almost two years ago I started introducing myself Outside of work and family By my middle name Juliana And this is something that goes on Throughout with these various Alexas That she talks to, like I said A number of them just punting on the name Because they got so tired Of having people make jokes about it Or it being She talks to one person Whose name was Who was named Alexa at birth

who now goes by – I'm scrolling down here – who now goes by a totally different name because this person is an actor. Chewbacca. Yep. And that gets no comments, which is actually surprising.

You think you give the occasional Chewbacca I am your father joke.

Yes, like in the movie. Right. Harlow Brooks is now how this person, who was previously known as Alexa, identifies herself because she was – and she is an actor. And she said she would show up for auditions, and it would become the whole topic of conversation. And I believe she said something. Let me just see if I can play this. This is her audio directly from the website. I think it starts with an auto-loaded ad, if I remember. So I'm going to hit play, and then I'm going to mute the computer. Yes, here it is. You're not hearing an ad right now for Tiffany and Company.

Okay. But I will just take a moment to say Tiffany and Company provide some of the best jewelry and perfume that the money that money actually is a pretty Beyonce is playing piano. She's singing to Jay-Z. I'm glad we're muting this. Just use the promo code TBTL. TBTL is not brought to you by Tiffany and Company.

They will kick you out. Yeah, exactly. It's almost over. And then I'm going to turn the audio back up. We're going to hear.

I was doing some acting stuff and it was just like going into an audition is like nerve wracking enough. But then to be told by the casting director or somebody like, oh, just don't say your name. It's kind of, it feels like you're more of like a problem than like you're going to be their solution. I don't want to be remembered in these auditions, not for like what I'm doing, but as like, oh, the girl with the Amazon name. So I was just really frustrated that I felt like I just couldn't be myself.

I feel that. This is her mom talking now.

She and I talked about this. Because your name has impressions with it, it puts you in a servant role. That's what Alexa does. Right. there to give you what you need it's upsetting to see that imposed on her i think there's something really misogynistic and dehumanizing about it all but yeah i would have kept my name if it wasn't

for this that really right you know me like i like my boundaries and i like my um the things that are mine to be mine and like to have to change your name because something changes around you really sucks especially because i have pretty negative feelings about this behemoth of a company Anyway, I wonder if the company should have been more responsible and just said, like, you need the first thing out of the box is you need to program whatever trigger word you want to choose or give it a non name. I mean, I understand why they want to give it a name because they were trying to give this idea of this is a your new digital personal assistant. It sort of makes a lot. It doesn't sort of it makes a lot of sense from a marketing perspective why they wanted to give this a name and to make it sticky and that it worked for them. But, man, did they screw a lot of people over.

Well, one of the women who's interviewed in this, her name is Alexa Jade Morales. She is named after her slain father, Alexis, who never got to see her born. He died when she was in utero. She has now had to, you know, sometimes go by a different name or feel a lot of kind of hassle associated with her name, which, again, is very, very personal because it's also related to her father. This is what she said. I was like, you guys have so much money. And so many people working for you and not one person thought to be like, hey, listen, Alexa is a name that people are already using. Yeah, right. That's again, it's like it's all kind of funny and we call it the hockey puck and we joke around. But, you know, there are so many made up. Why didn't they call it Quibi?

Yeah. Right.

Why didn't they call it some sure made up thing instead of a name that now has been like these people have been more or less evicted from their own names. This is another person named Alexis LaBruyere. She is a Florida college student, and this is what she said about it.

I would go over to my friend's house, and when they first got their Amazon in their house, I was over, and they would keep calling my name, and the thing would go off. They just kind of said, oh, we need to say, like, she who shall not be named. Some people even give me nicknames when I'm at their house. They just kind of yell or make a noise to get my attention instead of saying my name. It makes me feel dehumanized and just kind of like I'm lesser than everyone because everyone else is being called by their name or nickname and I'm over here being called she who shall not be named.

So there you go. I mean, I don't have a great power out or, you know, sort of way to wrap this up other than to say I had really not contemplated how much it would suck. if all of a sudden your name just became this whole other thing that was out of your control and that you were powerless to get back. They're not going to change the name of the thing, but I really do wonder why they didn't just pick a made-up thing. And like you said, they wanted to be... There are cutesy words, though, that sound like a name that would cause you to have the same attention.

Attachment to it that they wanted you to have that are just, I mean, how about just name it Nermal. Pay the estate of Jim Davis.

You said Quibi before, which got me thinking about Q-Bert. Q-Bert would have been great, of course. Q-Bert. You know, probably some rights issues there.

Well, I'm sure that, you know, Activision, whoever owns Q-Bert, would happily have licensed it to them. Yeah, there are things that are cutesy and endearing that you, Indira, name it Indira. Yeah, yep. This is completely off topic, but today when I was out at my daytime occupation that I was doing today, somebody was involved in it, and they had said that they thought that when the initial email went out that said, hey, do you want to be a part of this project? They thought that the email was soliciting volunteers, but in fact, they were just sort of being instructed that they were going to come be a part of it. And they said, oh, it was a total voluntold. and I was like that's a good portmanteau voluntold like I'm being voluntold to start putting my vacation time down even though we record all these winter games voluntold is great yes that is a that is a good

turn of phrase you know I want to go back to this story really quickly just to say maybe a good power out is I'm you know at the end of the day I'm glad I'm not glad that I said at the end of the day I don't like that I don't like that cliche just Word garbage there but anyway I'm glad that We didn't change the name after hearing these People's stories I'm glad that we didn't Choose a different name to tell this story Let's empower the name Alexa again

Right because if we call them by some Made-up name it further Kind of you know I'll use the word of some of the people interview Kind of dehumanize people or kind of erases Them as it were so I don't know how we fix This but I will hope that other technology Companies as we continue I mean look i will give gorgle some credit gorgle home is you know that's there are far fewer people who are being displaced or you know being evicted from their name by that by home maybe there's

someone oh i don't think you say that word you said because with my phone you say okay i'm gonna say okay google you just say google so the one problem is every now and then i will say i will say something that sounds like okay google and then my phone kind of beeps for a second But it's not a big deal. But, yeah, that's how you say it. There aren't a lot of people named Google. And if there are, they were probably named after the company. So, you know what they didn't?

You know what they didn't name the device? Jeff. Yeah. Yes, exactly. Jeff gets to keep his name. Yes, he does. He gets to keep everything. But he doesn't. Does he pay taxes on his name? And I know Elon Musk apparently doesn't. And it was not to just go down this road. But Elon Musk was apparently recently raging against what he considered to be a government subsidies and and a sort of handout culture. Yeah. Even as Starlink, his Internet company received. And I forget the number, but it's a shocking, shockingly huge amount of money from, I think, the FCC for building Internet service.

And doesn't Tesla get tons of money for being a green car company? And he's also, I think, I think I read a headline or something that says he's also now trying to affect legislation that would kind of pull the ladder up after him so that other companies can't enjoy the same breaks. These are just great guys. Would not be shocked at all.

Speaking of speaking of great guys, the head of a startup called Better.com, which is described as a digital mortgage lender based in Oakland, California, laid off 900 employees weeks before Christmas on a mass Zoom call. Only those being laid off were invited. This was a stark title shift for the company. By the way, this is Joshua Botee writing in the San Francisco Chronicle. I'm reading from his piece. It's a stark shift for the company, which announced it was going public earlier this year. This is the CEO. His name is Vishal Garg. And I actually have the audio of the video. Now, I want to mention that this person, it would appear that the person who's watching the Zoom call is also finding out that they're being fired. so they use a little bit of colorful language that you might use this is we're going to earn

that explicit rating finally right now okay so but actually though i am a little bit confused so this is a person who is on this zoom call in which they are getting fired and there's a recording of it and they're going to start because i heard i overheard a little bit of this tape is it them just recording themselves on their phone they're like recording their own reaction to this or are they saying these words to the people on the other end of the zoom call so that they can hear it in

other words the hr manager or the boss or whatever their laptop is open the zoom is happening on the laptop they're filming the computer with their phone okay they're talking i believe to themselves They're talking to themselves, okay. Or they're kind of talking to the guy, but they're not on the meeting. Yeah. My guess is— Because this is a—how many people are on this call? Like hundreds of people. Well, 900 people got fired, so that many. And I'm assuming that somebody at Better.com had the sort of good sense to mute participants. Sure. Okay, right. For this very reason possible. Oh, explicit. Yes. Okay, here we go. Earmuffs, everybody. Yeah, there's going to be two incidents of a swear word. This is Vishal Garg telling people at his company by way of Zoom that they're being fired. Only the people on the Zoom.

Hi, everyone.

That's, oh, you know what? It was confusing. You and I both had the same. For a second, I thought it was coming out of your computer. Like we weren't plugged in. I think it's just because of how this person was recording. Yeah, you're right. But it's, well, in a way, it's very good fidelity because it sounded like it was coming out of the computer in the room. Maybe they use GarageBand. There is an echo on it.

Hi, everyone. Thank you for joining.

I come to you with not great news. The market has changed, as you know, and we have to move with it in order to survive so that hopefully we can continue to thrive and deliver on a mission. this isn't news that you're going to want to hear but ultimately it was my decision and I wanted you to hear from me it's been a really really challenging decision to make this is the second time in my career I'm doing this and I do not want to do this, the last time I did it I cried this time I hope to be stronger

a lot of people online did not like that oh he's really you know what he's making such a sacrifice he's going to be stronger well yeah people him saying the last time he did he cried

did not go over well with the internet we are laying off about 15 of the company for a number of reasons the market efficiency and performances and productivity if you're on this call you are part of the unlucky group fuck you dude that is being laid off your employment here is terminated

effective immediately

are you fucking kidding me

what does this mean for what's next you're gonna get an email from HR

askhr at better.com to your personal email address regarding the details of your severance and your benefits. For all U.S. employees, we're providing four weeks of severance,

one month of full benefits, and two months of COBRA for which we will pay the premium. So three months total benefits if you elect for COBRA.

If you don't get a communication from AskHR and Better.com Before the end of the day, you can email AskHRBetter.com. Thank you for each and every one of yours individual contributions to better.

I wish the news was different. I wish we were thriving enthusiastically as we were at the beginning of this year. But that's not the case.

and I am sure you will leave us

and be more successful, more fortunate,

and luckier in your next endeavor. I wish you all the best of luck. Thank you for everything you've done for better.

Thank you.

Do you think that's what it's going to sound like when they fire us? I was having similar thoughts. I was like, it'll be a smaller call. If you're on this call, you work for a former APM property called TBTL. Okay, Andrew, do you remember a time when the listeners liked me? You know, like in the olden days when I was a general... You were likable. People held a generally positive opinion of me. Sometimes I forget about that, yeah. Well, I'm going to obliterate whatever's left of that goodwill and say, i actually kind of think that it was at least worth noting that this guy who was firing these people got on zoom and faced them and said it was my decision i wanted to tell you myself didn't have hr do it sure yeah you know uh like the the first that i saw of this was you know see lays people off over zoom and i was like well that sounds like a pretty shitty way to do it but then you realize that the people that work for the company are spread out all over the country and possibly world so there's it's not there's not a way for him to do it in person it's not like when we got fired when i got fired from the tbtl radio show and rod arquette and um whoever was the general manager at the time brought me up to their office and said famously we're making some lineup adjustments and i said how so and they said well we're taking tbtl off the air and i said well what else is getting moved and they said nothing an adjustment yeah oh you you had an s

on there it's not it's like the nordstrom of firing right there's no s we don't have to get in that but in you in their defense when you have a frank shires in your hand like you have to you

have to let that bird sing shires in the hand is worth two burbs in the bush easily and we had bad rating so like i yeah i wasn't i guess this is the thing i am not trying to side with the person who is presumably fabulously wealthy from this startup and and people will email in and say yeah but did you see the part of the article where they valued the company at seven billion dollars and said that the firm will soon have one billion dollars of cash on hand because of an infusion from its It's financiers or it's investors I guess you would say Those are all real things Is there a way that this guy if it's his decision to make Could have kept these people employed and just burned through that cash Yes he decided maybe ruthlessly and maybe so he could You know have one more Lamborghini or have the company Look good in some financial model which then allows him to sell it for more It's very possible that he is doing this for Purely selfish reasons But I guess If I can contradict the words Of Drill Our friend on Twitter In this case I do feel slightly compelled to give it To him that at least he had The Whatever you call it to get on The Zoom call and say I'm the one who made this Decision and I wanted to tell you myself Because it is not a fun thing and I can see A lot of other CEOs just sending An email to HR saying these are the people that you need to let know are not going to work here anymore and he didn't do

that yeah so here are the things that i want to say god i'm so tired i'm so sorry i don't know why my brain is so not working but um yeah what you're describing is two different things right now was it and i'm kind of agreeing with you to a degree on both things thank you i'm agreeing that you used to be likable um whether or not it was the right thing to do for this man or this company to make this decision, that's one part of the equation, right? And you can debate that, and I don't know enough about it. Generally speaking, my heart comes from a place of we keep on hearing about how tough it is in this economy, but it really does not seem like everybody is suffering. We see some companies and some heads of these companies making just record, like astoundingly record-breaking profits, yet we, and so there's a huge divide, And that's a huge problem. And that probably plays into this story. That's one thing. The way the message was delivered is a completely separate thing. And that's what you're talking about. You're saying, OK, listen, whatever led to this, the guy who made the decision at least, you know, put himself out there. I can agree with you on that to a degree. I mean, I'll just agree with you on that, given the context of the first thing I said. The third thing I'm going to say maybe even maybe even leans into a little bit more of what you're saying is I saw this headline. I saw that it was trending on Twitter before the show today, but I didn't really dig into it. And then you just gave me all the story behind it. And I'm kind of curious. It sounds like this is only the story that it is because somebody opened up their cell phone and impotently said F you to a computer screen five times in a row. I count it five. You count the first one, the M effort. But I keep track of these things. That's why that's why my future secured APM. You see what I'm saying?

If they have you deliver the news to me, I'm fired. That's like when your dad makes your brother go pull a switch to come in and spank you with. That's some next level stuff. No, no, no, no, no. I'm going to let you choose your own switch, obviously.

Luke, the good news is TBTL will be continuing. We've made some adjustments. We've made some adjustments to the TBTL staffing. APM is keeping TBTL. The bad news is neither one of us are going to be on it anymore. The good news is Molly Bloom is also a very personable person. I would listen to that show.

I really would, too. I would love to hear this show in someone else's hands Because I very much think it would get better Oh it would Wait let's give it to Jeff we're just saying that before like you know um thank god they can't match her salary yeah i know the public employee uh in the house okay so enough of the cattiness but you know what i mean like i saw and i'm still not exactly sure i mean i'm sure this would maybe you know it would be written up in some publications but we've never i've never heard of better.com before this i don't think this would be getting the the treatment except it went viral and it didn't really go viral because of anything that happened publicly it's like right it was one guy filming himself and it was on tiktok fired and then he put on tiktok which i'm not saying that he's wrong to do that i'm just saying that the it's just as i don't know it's just something worth kind of noting that people are getting fired probably for um potentially worse reasons all the time but this story uh kind of got the traction it did because somebody opened up their cell phone and did it Which is exactly what I'm going to do when I'm fired.

I think that you're exactly right. That's actually a very astute observation, which I hadn't thought of, which is things like this happen, but pre-pandemic would probably not happen on Zoom. And then there wasn't a thing called TikTok that somebody could put the video on to elevate it. And then the headline becomes – I mean, actually, the headline I'm looking at starts with bleep you, dude. It's a great headline. I mean, I don't think it's a great headline. What they're reporting, as you point out, they're reporting the reaction from someone who was getting laid off.

Who just got fired. You think this is the first person who said F you when they got fired?

And can I mention, though, laid off and fired are different. Yeah. I was fired.

Yeah, this is a layoff.

Layoff is no one did anything wrong. They decided that the bottom line for the company financially was they needed to have fewer employees. Fired is what happened to us, which is you're bad at your job. Because the ratings weren't good. You're not getting the ratings that we want you to get, so you're fired. I guess I this is this is the part where I have a perfect chance, Andrew, to transition to the emails and emails and still have one or two listeners who like me before I go all libertarian on it. But I guess there are a couple of things that are true at the same time. Something you point out, which is that and actually as we're talking, I'm just scrolling, you know, various newspapers. Here's in The Seattle Times report billionaires wealth surged to record level during the pandemic. rich people got richer during the pandemic it's yeah it's it's a fact and the companies maximize profits and they continue to maximize profits often on the backs of their employees yes those are all true things and it's effed up and maybe we're in late stage capitalism i feel though it's also kind of true that companies should retain the right to look at the revenue forecast and the expenses and figure out how do we give this company the best chance of

surviving in the long run but they have retained the right nobody's taking that right away right

but there seems to be a general of the people that i was looking at commenting on this there was this idea that this there was something immoral about this guy firing or laying people off just as an idea forget the fact that he did it on zoom forget the guy saying a few a lot of the comments a lot there are a lot of people who just think if a company says we cannot keep these employees working for us anymore it that by itself is a sign of sort of the moral collapse for the company and i'm just saying i don't know if it's always that necessarily i mean yeah maybe it's not

always that um in this case it sort of seems like that to me i guess the framing of that and i kind of got a little bit itchy there and my apologies but it's almost kind of like to say that companies should maintain that right i i just i mean aside from people who are actually really pushing for for socialism um i think that they do have the right they exercise that right other people have a right of free speech and other people are saying i don't like that and i think you should be a more moral company like it's almost like when people say you can't say anything anymore when the truth is you can literally say anything it's just that there will be consequences for it and usually those consequences are people standing up and saying i don't like you you know that's what's

happening here right i guess i saw for all the i don't like you's i saw i just thought to myself Yeah I don't think that there's someone trying to pass a law that says companies can never lay anyone off But I guess I kind of want to say y'all it happens It's happened to me I didn't like I didn't say F you to Rod Arquette when I got fired From Cairo I didn't go in there thinking I have some kind of birthright to have this Maybe a radio show is different than other kinds of jobs But I just I don't know the idea again I don't I can't hop into the experience of the person who was saying FU to the zoom screen but I don't know I guess my personal response and this is less of a this is less of a larger statement and more just my personal thing because I've also been laid off I was fired from Cairo I was laid off from KUOW when they laid me off from KUOW I was like well hey it was cool working here you made a decision you laid me off I just don't personally have the fuck you gene I just like to spend the next 10 years talking about it on podcasts. That's my version of it. slowly letting the air out of the balloon but this idea that it's like someone saying if you're on this call you're being laid off we're giving you three months of cobra and we're giving you a month of pay and you're going to go on oh that was the other thing too that the internet reacted very poorly to is that the ceo at the end said i i hope that you all go on to do bigger and better things than this and i think i understand what he was trying to say which was you are all good at your jobs and you will be successful people took it as cold comfort as him being kind of insulting in a way but i don't know just my personal feeling is it's like if i were to be if sitting on the other side of that now again i don't know that ceo maybe that ceo lives in a billion dollar house and this person who was saying f you to their zoom screen has seen the house like you know knows about the house and feels that there's a real hypocrisy there i could see that making you be mad about

it but i don't know that's why it's the story i think i mean that that i think you just nailed it and you even caveated before you said this like everything you said about the huge imbalance in the country right now and what we're seeing in our culture i mean i do think i mean it's one of those things like on the micro level i agree with you nobody has a god-given right to a job in certain industries that you and i have in certain industries that you and i have worked in what could i be talking about here you and i have had plumbing we did both used to have to sort pipe fittings yes uh in different parts of the country at different times but um uh i you and i have both um talked about people that uh were colleagues i'm saying i'm saying this carefully because i want to say this isn't literally this isn't something that we talked about with apm i'm talking about like kind of um people that we you and i happen to know in the industry yeah that we would see what their output was on certain things and it seemed astounding to me that they were able to maintain jobs when there were maybe younger, hungrier people in the pipeline who would have taken those jobs and just ran with them, but there was stasis in the system that kept people with these jobs that they should have had to prove themselves more. Like, yeah, I'm a little bit of a Gen Xer when it comes to that as well, and that idea of kind of, well, do prove yourself with your work ethic, but that is also different given the industries that you and I worked in working for small independent stations or public radio stations or whatever that is versus working in in this industry where you do have this grand inequality that is just so mind-blowing and not only are the rich getting richer and richer and richer but also the way employees are being treated and now I'm thinking specifically about Amazon and some of these stories I was reading over the past couple of years about just the the maddening almost sci-fi nature of employment under this robo god jeff bezos you know what i mean and so this story while i think from a journalistic standpoint like leading with this headline like if you dude and like your headline is starting with somebody who's just talking to himself and recording it on his phone and it becomes the national headline i think that's bunk journalism as we say so i will criticize that but i won't criticize the people who were saying this is an effed up situation you know i think i think that's a very good assessment of

things now i'm awake just in time here i go once again with the email every week i hope that it's from a female no man it's not from a female all right uh one email or female yeah let's go with

this one voicemail here. Yeah, this is really good. And I think this might be the last chance we have this week to play some voicemail. So let me play this one. I think it's self-explanatory. It comes from a listener who did not leave their name. But it's in reaction to this idea of doctors potentially at times saying things at the wrong moments. Now, we were talking about your doctor coming up to you in public. I'm still getting voicemails about that, by the way, from people in the medical community saying how inappropriate that is for a doctor to come up to a patient in public and identify themselves as the doctor but also you were uncomfortable with conversations you were having with your doctor the first time you met him in the doctor's office and him recognizing you from from the um the radio show that you do so uh live wire i'm not trying to avoid the plug for live wire you have a big show coming up this thursday do you not december 16th

We will be at Revolution Hall with Paul F. Tompkins, Demi Adige Ebay, also music from Deep Sea Diver, Sarah Marshall from the You're Wrong About podcast. Couldn't get any guests, huh? It's going to be a cavalcade of stars.

I know, right? Come on out. Okay, so anyway, so that was the conversation about you being in the doctor's office and the doctor saying, hey, I know you from the radio.

Hi, Luke and Andrew. I was just calling to share a story about an experience that I had at a doctor a few years ago.

And this may apply to what Luke was talking about with his doctor running up and saying that he knew him. So just a fair warning, it will most likely make you feel uncomfortable. So when I was in my 20s, I needed to see a specialized gynecologist. And it was a male, which normally I don't like seeing male doctors. But anyway, when I first met him, he was saying, I recognize you from somewhere. I don't know from where. But then we were getting on with the appointment, and he was examining me. And he all of a sudden says, oh, I know where I know you from. You groom my cocker spaniel. And at this point, I had owned a grooming shop. And so I knew a lot of people through their dog.

That doctor. Yes, that's right. Yeah, I almost meant to give a little bit of a warning if people are driving right now. These sirens that you're hearing, they are coming from your pod cart.

So I knew a lot of people through their dog, but wasn't quite sure what to say as he is down there and suddenly remembers that I groom his Cocker Samuel. and it was a very uncomfortable and awkward situation like what was going through my head was like what was it that you saw or experienced in that moment that reminded you of your cocker spaniel it makes me uncomfortable thinking about it so anyways I love listening to your stories and I hope you have a great day.

That is not unlike, I mentioned this before, the lebitard has a story about him going in for some sort of testicular procedure and the doctor, like right before he goes under, I believe, or something, the doctor just saying,

oh, I love your radio show. Unbelievable for that listener. You would think that somebody who was, you know, a gynecologist would be especially, Yes, especially. Yes. Discreet. And would I mean, it would be like before they even if you are in medical school and that's going to be your specialty before they even circled apart on the anatomy where you're going to be working. That's day two. Day one is you never talk about anything out that exists outside of this exam room.

Mm hmm. Yeah. I mean, yeah, especially or like I understand that you might want to when you're getting to know the doctor, the very first, very first words you have might be, you know, people say, what do you do? You know, usually your occupation is on it. So when I say I work in radio, when I work for Cairo, some people might say, oh, yeah, I enjoy Cairo or something. You know what I mean? Like, it's OK to maybe liberal for me. That's some people make those those connections. That's fine. There's a certain amount of small talk, but you've got to know where those lines are. And then certainly once the exam begins, you know, we've all been examined in the delicate parts of our body, and we all might feel like different parts of our body are. You don't know. Somebody might feel like an ear exam.

You know what I mean? Oh, I'm going to go out there and say that exam, I think, is objectively more personal than, say, a finger exam. Ear exam. No offense. No offense to what you're doing. You're right.

But I'm just saying that, like, generally speaking, once the exams begin, maybe shut up about the small talk. You know, talk about health stuff. Maybe just say if you feel the need to sort of like keep things light or sometimes, you know, talking through kind of talking during an uncomfortable moment can maybe be a way of distracting somebody. But you can talk about things that are health related that aren't necessarily specific. You know what I mean? You could just say, hey, one thing I often tell my patients is to do these practices and you know what I mean? It'll help with whatever. But I wonder how old this is. I guess my point in all this is I wonder what generation this doctor was. I wonder if that's an my gut is. I could be totally wrong. I wonder if this is an older doctor who had a different bedside manner than maybe how they train doctors today.

Also, what I would wonder is, I mean, the caller said that they wondered what it was that kind of finally sparked the memory for the doctor. What I would take from that was he was not concentrating on the task at hand. Also that. You know, he's like doing his doctorly thing, but also kind of like when you and I can't remember something on the show and then we wait for the other person to talk so we can Google the thing we couldn't remember.

I feel like this doctor's mind was drifting or sometimes, although if you let I'm not defending the doctor, sometimes for me, the opposite does happen is when I stop trying. So maybe like one, you know what I mean? You're trying to think of somebody's name or some connection and you just can't. You can't. You can't. So you're like, ah, screw it. I'll never think of it. And then you stop thinking about it Then ten minutes later It just comes to you Because your brain unlocked These worlds though Should never collide

Of the civilian life of the caller

yes and the civilian life of the doctor yes and the the the life of the doctor as the doctor is providing medical care to that very particular part of the caller's body yeah it's like i mean even my doctor you know coming up to me and at the show i know the listeners thought that that was maybe not the greatest it didn't bug me in the moment and also there's one moment where he was holding a kind of a you know a personal part of my body that was pretty quick though he was hitting my knee with that reflex thing and looking in my ears, doing all the normal doctorly stuff, which didn't feel overly personal. It felt like doctor stuff. Yeah, sure. And people talk about their doctors and who their doctor might be, etc. Maybe they're even playing golf with them. Who knows? But this, gynecology. Yeah. And I would say gynecology and proctology are probably in a special category where you have to pretend as the provider, like you live in that room, you sleep in that room, you have no life outside of that room that's like oh hey didn't i see you at the gym didn't i see you um you know uh playing volleyball at the gym the other night like you cannot know those worlds cannot ever collide i was at that movie and i think you were coming uh you were coming out of dune and i was going in i was about to see come on come on you cannot yeah i mean he's a cool

gynecologist he was saying come on come on and you can keep it general like i just remember like The current doctor I have now, who I haven't seen in way too long, I need to make a check-in appointment. But, you know, I remember when I had my very first, like, you know, meeting with him or my first appointment with him. And often when people, the first thing they do is they come in, they look at the chart, and they say, oh, I see you're a blank or whatever. And, you know, I think that he said, oh. Capricorn. He said, yes. Where are your lines? You have to go to Tanino. He said, I see you're a Wookiee. And I said, argh. No, but he said, oh, you're a podcast. Or, you know, he said, oh, my my my daughter and my wife love podcasts, you know, and I said how to meet a murderer. No, I said, what is the murder? No, no, no.

The Georgia Hardstark and Karen Kilgariff one. I love that you can name them.

Yeah. My favorite murder. Wow. That was bad for a lot of people.

But anyway, what we kill is entertainment.

Anyway, I said, yeah, probably my favorite. Murray's like, yeah, exactly like that. But it was still, it was like related to my chart, but it was general. I was fine with it. Anyway, I don't know why I'm belaboring this shit. Let's get out of here, man. Good Lord. I think it was a good show. It was a good show. I'm tanking it.

Don't be mean to my friend Andrew, please.

I have no reason to suggest this, but I was listening to Sweet Judy Blue Eyes by Crosby, Stills, and Nash the other day. I love that song. I don't know if we'll get to that part. That's pretty far into the song. It's a seven-minute song, but we could start with it. I liked it. I mean, I was just going to I was going to suggest a night related song.

Oh, no, that's good. That's better. What do you got? What do you got? Well, we could do Last Night by The Strokes. That's a little upbeat. Maybe that's too. No, I want something.

I want something.

It doesn't have to say night, but I want something that evokes the night. OK, how about this? The District Sleeps Alone Tonight by the Postal Service. I like that. Yeah, I like that. Let's do that. Yeah, that was if you ever try to do a Bob's Burgers. Who's the mom in Bob's Burgers? Tina? No, I can't think of her name right now. Next up kid. But there was a, oh, I could do that. Then I just went into Edith Bunker. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So we'll do that then. We'll go out with. My brain is dead. We'll go out with The District Sleeps Alone Tonight by the Postal Service. Sounds good.

Okay. Love this song. It's been a minute. I do too. This is my attempt at us. I didn't want to deploy this until the end of the show because it's too dangerous. Too distracting.

Thanks for listening, everyone. Hey, special TVTL After These Message crossover episode tomorrow. Yes, for you Vives heads. They'll get your fill of Genevieve and Andrew and me talking about commercials on tomorrow's episode. So please do join us for that. It'll be released at the normal time. And then we'll see you on Thursday. I'll be in Chicago. So, again, see you then. All right, thanks for listening. Until then, have a great Tuesday. Stay safe, take care of yourselves, and please remember, in a mountain too tall.

And good luck to all.

How's your cat? Oh, how dark is it? Too dark?

I am a visitor here, I am not permanent

And the only thing keeping me dry is You seem so out of context In this gaudy apartment complex A stranger with her door key Explaining that I'm just visiting

And my grandpa likes to say, hot diggity dog, as I like to say, hot damn!

Power out.