Muse

Hey there, this is listener Catherine from Portland, and my lovely Eleven just had a really great question. Well, I had a great question, and then he said, that's one for the TVTL hotline, and I said, who am I to deny you this? So here's the question. We're watching Chimp Empire on Netflix, and I would like to know why chimps' buttholes are the way that they are because they look like a pocket full of hemorrhoids, and it looks incredibly uncomfortable. Anyways, power out. Love the show.

it's your lucky day you just found a usb flash drive in the parking lot let the fun begin oh ma oh pa it's just beautiful didn't know you like to get wet though no mountain too tall and good luck to all a cat is an angel that poops in a box no definitely yeah

literally no yeah yeah no for sure no yeah i feel so full of what's the opposite of shame pride no not that far from shame less shame yeah don't worry about it the audience will be

completely drunk and if we're not perfect they'll take it out on us but that's why you're gonna be perfect you have to be perfect okay all right let the filibustering begin

well all right hello good morning and welcome to a wednesday edition of tbtl the show that just might be too beautiful to live hi everybody my name is luke burbank i am your host do you have a story or a question for me my name is wait i just said that luke burbank right yes okay hosting Yes, okay. Here at the South Waterfront in beautiful Portland, Oregon. If I sound a little distracted, it's because I'm dealing with a wild animal known as Bubbles Burbank.

A cat is an angel that poops in a box.

Who is prowling about me and has already jumped up on this desk a couple of times. is just, yesterday, if you tuned in, you heard her shatter a priceless family heirloom of Becca's. The shards of that flower pot are in a bag, right? Right here. You can hear that. And the bag is on the ground because I'm hoping to maybe figure out some way to glue it all back together. And then Bubbles has just been coming over and has been just trying to pull the shards out of the bag and re-break them. If you want to know what her level of mischief is, that's where it's at. Meanwhile, Holly Golightly, the tuxedo cat, the beautiful angel of the South Waterfront is just being cute and sitting over on the couch like a cute one.

I am a cute one.

Anyway, it's episode 4031 in a collector's series. Let the fun begin. And we have a whole bunch to talk about with you, including the fact that many of you may have recently received uh an email from american public media social engineering what is it exactly and how does it work you may have been asking yourself didn't didn't the guys stop working there a while ago but i'm still getting emails from them where they're starting it with hey friendos um so we'll we'll we'll try to figure out what's going on with all of that and then speaking of things they're trying to i guess still figure out all these years later um there is a new telling of the story of the assassination of jfk and it raises some questions about how many people might have been involved uh we'll get into that also um a bunch of uh people in milwaukee wisconsin thought they were gonna drink for free the other night but it turns out they didn't and they all had to pay their tax i've made a huge mistake uh so we will discuss that as well i also saw something truly horrifying at the coffee shop down here in the ground floor of this apartment building that I'm in, in the South Waterfront. You're a gross person. It was just absolutely terrible behavior. I want to get the opinion of my good friend Andrew Walsh on this matter. He, of course, is the longest-running co-bro of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships,

their grace, their splendor, and all that intricate rigging. I'll say, what's up, dog?

He's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend. Good morning. My advice for you, And I don't know the story that you're referring to, but my advice will likely be to just extend grace and, you know, just don't let it don't let it get to you, because when it comes. to infractions of others, Luke, I'm notoriously chill.

This one also involves garbage anxiety, Andrew, so it's really tailor-made for you. Now, I know I just lit a fuse on you. Before you shoot up into the sky like a cartoon firework, let's also welcome to the program today, joining us, our dear friend, trusted colleague, and TBTL employee numero uno, it's John Sklaroff, everybody. Hey, John. Hey, good morning, guys. Good morning, John. So here's what I saw just a moment ago. Oh, by the way, side note. The reason I was having trouble at the top of the show, Andrew, is because there was not like one, but like three drops that I had ready to go that were in the intro drop package. So I was scrambling.

Well, I was going to ask you about that because I heard the cat that poops in the butt. But you heard me sound check the drops.

You didn't think it's your lucky day.

I made that intro last night, but I also, I meant to ask you about it. I meant to ask you about it, but I also sort of figured that, like, it could be an echo. Because, I mean, obviously Andy Rooney rattling them off, I thought could... I do love that tape. If we heard them again later, it would maybe explain to people what you just heard with Andy Rooney. I didn't think it was an issue, but we probably should have discussed it.

I just forgot, like... No, but that's also... I probably should have done that. That would have been a better way to handle it. John, were you tuned into the particular program where... Andrew, was that a listener who sent in AI voice of Andy Rooney saying things that are TBTL drops? Yeah, I think a listener

Steve, maybe? Yeah, I think I've

definitely heard that before, but I'm still reeling from the intro tape about Chimp's Derriere, so I was a little distracted when the Andy Rooney tape

was played. Now that one's on me, because Andrew sent me that tape the other day and said, could this be outro tape? Could this be something we play way at the end of the show? And I listened to it and i laughed so hard i said this sounds like intro tape to me so that one's that's

on me i'll raise my hand that was my call i love that intro tape from long time friend of the show catherine but the thing is it is a little you know it's a little course at the end there and i have this thing where i'm always imagining somebody listening to the show for the very first time you know and then i'm just like what will they think of us if they're dropping the needle on the show for the very first time and they hear and they hear that so if we do lose any potential new listeners for this we will reach out to katherine and hope that she will make it right

it doesn't pass the new york times crossword breakfast test or are you guys familiar with this no no please say more i just learned about this i was reading um a uh an essay from um from a woman who is one of the has written many new york times crossword puzzles actually she's like you know a puzzle maker and that's a whole kind of subculture uh and people who are very into words obviously i don't know where i thought those came from but i don't know just it didn't occur to me that someone sits around trying to like figure out all right i got three letters and the first one is a y but it needs to end in a g what am i doing here like that's a person has to do all that and um there's this thing uh that the new york times has for their crossword puzzle which is if someone is trying to solve this puzzle on a Sunday over breakfast there cannot be any answers that would make them stop enjoying their breakfast and they were talking to puzzle designers and one of them said tell you what the word urine could have gotten me out of a lot of jams over the years

right I was thinking the same thing I was wondering how many emails will we get of people saying I was eating lunch when I listened to the intro to your show I'm sure it'll all be

fine it is delightful tape though yeah I encourage more of it yes um okay so speaking of things that may turn, I'm probably overstating this, things that may turn people's stomach. I was hustling over here this morning, ready to dial you two gents up, and I wanted to grab a quick cup of coffee. Of course, I should have known that because Becca is an extremely thoughtful person, she had the coffee maker all kind of ready to go. I'm in her apartment right now. She's at her job. I didn't know that to be the case, so I went into this coffee shop down on the ground floor. And as I was getting towards the coffee shop, I noticed that there was a woman and she was walking her dog, some kind of, um, one of those like real designery dogs that they have down in these nice neighborhoods that it's like a combination of every expensive dog. They put them all in a blender and, uh, and then, uh, and then they end up with, uh, you know, some kind of hypoallergenic dog that, that doesn't bark and also, uh, you know, separates your recycling or something. Anyway, this dog decides to go to the bathroom on the sidewalk and I see the lady picking it up which i think is a good thing uh then i get into the coffee shop i order my coffee i get my coffee i go back to the little stand where they have the half and half and the splenda and i'm putting that stuff into my coffee and less than seven inches away from me this woman now comes into the coffee shop and drops the dog poop bag right into the garbage can come on man and it's It's an. open it's not like a garbage can that has a kind of some lid that flaps open and close it's it's this stainless steel circular open pit it's like sarlacc and she drops it right in there next to where everyone will be fixing their coffee up for presumably the rest of the day in this very busy

coffee shop that is poor form right okay okay okay so i mentioned extending grace i'm gonna try to puzzle this out a little bit by the way and see if there's a great sitcom in the 90s i think

it was right after um it was rett butler right wasn't it rett butler no what was the one where she was a cartoonist i think it was caroline in the city it was yeah extending grace i think was

what came right out of uh caroline in the city what was the rett butler show that had grace in that was called grace under fire grace under fire yes man what a golden age it feels like the what do they call the isn't there a generation that is sort of between gen x and the greatest generation and i'm sorry the um the baby boomers and they call them like the hidden generation or the invisible generation or something i feel like there's an invisible generation of tv shows like that as well um but i was gonna say so let's say let's let's kind of piece out the various scenarios here that that could have played out this person who's walking her dog you could have seen her first of all not pick up the poop right that'd be the worst case scenario leaving on the sidewalk she didn't do that good so bell ding um you could have seen her pick it up wrap it up into the little plastic garbage bag and then leave it on the sidewalk and you see people do that sometimes i think you said you used to do this sometimes luke and you'd say i am going to come back to pick this up later but you do have to sort of face the scrutiny of everybody around you who do not believe that you will be coming around to pick it up later she could have come into the coffee shop to get her coffee and held it in her hand the whole time how do you feel about that

scenario uh i i like it i like it more than her putting it in the garbage can because it is in the bounds of the coffee shop for less amount of time in other words it is in as the other patrons it's in our life for five minutes which we don't like but by her dumping it into the garbage can it's in everyone who comes in that coffee shop's life including the people that then have to take the garbage out later for the rest of the day yeah so what do you think is the

best scenario sorry i'll just say and i'll throw this to both you what do you let's say there was not a garbage can on the sidewalk outside you know what i mean no public garbage can let's just give them that's the benefit of the doubt there what do you think there is a war on garbage andrew and

this is something i've complained about a lot there are not very many garbage cans outside anymore because somebody has to maintain that so i that does frustrate me but you were saying anyway yeah

So what do you think is the best case scenario then, assuming that there is not a public garbage can outside? What would have been the best thing for this person to do?

Well, I know this, like, this hardscape pretty well because I'm over here all the time. So there's actually a – this is like a real modern apartment building. And so there's all kinds of concrete planters and things that are built out that have, you know, various bushes and plants in them. There are a lot of places where she could have placed the bag while she was in the store or in the coffee shop, and that would have been not in anyone's way, and then she could have come out and picked it up and then dealt with it. In fact, there might have even been a garbage can outside that I didn't see. So to me, the best case scenario would be leave the poop outside, come in, get your coffee, and then pick the poop bag back up and deal with it somewhere else. Second If not that I would take Have the poop bag with you But come in get your coffee and get out of there And then the lowest on the list is Leave dog excrement Separated from the rest of us By the thinnest of membranes A.K.A. a dog poop bag In the garbage can that's not just In a random part of the coffee shop But literally where everyone's coffee has the lid off And they are putting things in it Like it's possible that trace amounts of dog fecal matter are but this is gonna make everyone really long for that intro tape trace amounts of dog fecal matter just kind of sort of diffusing into your coffee as

you're making your coffee john you have like 14 dogs and they're big ones too as somebody who

tries to be a responsible dog owner i hate everything about this and really don't like this person uh i think luke's like find a place to stash it is the only answer if you know like even if you're having grace under fire you can still like understand that that person like had opportunities to like not bring it inside the shop period um you know like if they're on a sidewalk you know you have some space between like maybe the sidewalk and the street just like put it on the ground you're gonna be inside for five minutes like it's not gonna get run over you know i mean like there's there's just so many things you can do that people like this make responsible dog owners look bad i think this is on par if not worse than just not picking up the poop and this is deeply upsetting but the thing is

I have no grace. I bet you that the funny part is I would imagine that this woman in other contexts is probably a fairly thoughtful person. She did pick up the dog poop. I just think it's one of those things where it literally never crossed her mind. I think so, too. I don't know how she could have demonstrated this to me in the eight seconds I knew she existed. But she did not give me the – she wasn't giving the energy of someone who was trying to be a bad person in the world. I think she just thought, it's dog poop. It's in a bag. It's garbage. here's a garbage can and i just don't think she did the math on what she was really really doing to the citizens of the south waterfront of portland oregon i'll say this and

and i i'm often a very black and white thinker which is something i'm trying to work on i'm trying to be better about so this is maybe a good example of that thank you uh but i that's a moment as somebody who is always picking up dog poop like literally 12 times a day um it's it's conscious Like you pick it up, it's in your hand I mean in the bag of course But like that's not, like you don't just like Forget you're holding a bag of poop And so, I mean I You guys are a lot nicer than I am I would have probably said something to her You know, as nicely as I could have But that is That's interesting because I'm

Generally, I would say I'm sort of Fairly confrontational And it didn't even occur to me to say anything But I did think, I'll tell you what I did i texted myself so i wouldn't forget to bring this up with you guys and i texted myself dog poop horror well content first content that's right content is king around here if you haven't heard speaking of content andrew uh before i hijacked the show with my uh dog poop story there was something else you wanted to mention here at the top yeah i had a funny run in but i

just want to say one more thing about this dog poop thing and this is maybe not extending grace to you luke i'm not sure but you're um this is a small dog you describe this dog as a designer

dog but i'm assuming medium not it's not a chihuahua it's so think about it's smaller than like a yellow lab okay well let's use let's use the the lingua dogma i don't know i was trying to make a lingua franqua lingua franca making a dog reference about john's dog smaller than a golden retriever but larger than a french bulldog okay um so maybe this dog is a little bit bigger

than i was picturing i was picturing it being one of the smaller dogs available on the dog market um because here's the deal i feel like and this is going to be controversial but i'm just trying to be honest here as i scan my emotions over this um i feel like most the only damage done here to the to the yous and me's of the coffee shop is psychological i don't think that if you had seen her if you had not seen her throw the bag in there and somebody had done it say 10 minutes prior my guess is that bag is tied up pretty well it's in the bottom of the garbage can you the coffee maker have no idea are you going to dismiss that out of hand I'm not going to dismiss it out

of hand but this is where I'm going to bring my colleague John Sklaroff in dog owner that he is and this is I think maybe the difference between having been to a lot of dog parks dog parks rather like i have and presumably john has and i don't know have you done that a ton andrew no but i do

i have been around garbage cans that have that whose primary um focus is to collect dogway so i understand that if you get enough of that stuff i know that that's an issue and so therefore if every coffee shop person does that that's a problem i'm going on the supposition here that this is one person doing this and we're not slippery sloping i think no i think you're right

I think if I wouldn't have known it was in there, clearly it would have never even occurred to me it was happening. But yeah, being at the dog park, there's almost nothing that I find more upsetting than when I would be at the dog park with Rudy after she would go to the bathroom and I would pick it up. It would be like, I don't know, when Cersei Lannister is just being led through, I don't know, King's Landing or something. like uh like i was just like walking to this giant garbage can full of other people's dog waste and within your five steps out and you start to really smell it and it's so i think i haven't i'm especially sensitive to that because i've dealt with it a lot in my life and if it has a

lid and you open it it wafts out like like it punches you but i think uh is that psychological

point like you are mentally preparing yourself for that walk so at least you know it's coming if i'm just going to pour my half and half or whatever it is into my coffee and i get a whiff of that that's gross i'm also more concerned about like the employees but i yeah i guess like one bag of as long as it's tight like it might not be the worst thing especially in a coffee shop where there's a lot of other strong aromas i'm just hoping that they decided to also throw

coffee grounds on it that feels like a cure-all yeah right look can i ask one more follow-up

question I'm not going to do that. and then turn over to Andrew because now I'm stepping on him too. Did you say, was the dog, the person clearly came in, they didn't have another human with them or else hopefully that human withheld the poop outside. Yeah. Was there the dog, did the dog come inside and is that allowed in the shop and like did the employees.

It's Portland baby, anything goes. Okay. I mean, it wasn't even, like no one even batted an eye. And by the way, no offense to this person, the dog was wildly out of control like you ever see somebody strike two walking a dog where it's like it's almost less a dog and more like they're doing a yo-yo trick where at the end of the leash is something that's just like it's sort of like it's like a yo-yo that's flying around at the end of the leash but instead it's a dog like the dog was wanting to jump on people like the dog was wildly out of control but leashed in the store right after she had dumped the poop as i'm describing this person i am starting to think maybe they are not the most thoughtful person

as they move through the world yes yes come to the dark side yes okay so sorry to try to uh wedge

this in here at the top of the show but i did get an email or i read an email yesterday that delighted me and i thought you both would be interested in this so i mentioned to you um a couple of weeks ago on the show luke that i met a neighbor here in my neighborhood who is also a listener to tbtl i ran into kim about a year ago thought we'd run into each other more we hadn't and then coincidentally when i brought it up on the show we ran into each other again recently we're in contact all is good the other day i'm walking to the train and i see her murdering

somebody no uh the other day dropping some dog poop into a garbage can at a starbucks which is

honestly worse than murder no i don't know why i said that other than i just wanted to like kind of say it kind of delights me to know that I have like legit neighbors like in my small little neighborhood here who are listeners of the show and I was walking to the train the other day maybe a couple of weeks ago and it's that time of year or it was that time of year where the apple trees in the neighborhood are full of apples I think you know that that's one of the things in in life that delights me the most when you can just walk down the street and pluck fruit from neighbor you know assuming that you're not going in their yard or whatever pluck an apple from an apple tree that's hanging over the sidewalk and just eat it on the way to the train. Just one of my favorite things in life. And I know where the apple trees are on the way to the train station. And there's one really big one on the corner of a couple of streets. And I was standing under that tree. They must have gone out and picked all the apples off it, like whoever owns it, because there were a few apples on the ground, but the tree was bare of apples. And I was standing under it. I must have looked like such an idiot. I was just like standing with my headphones on looking up at this apple tree that had no apples in it, kind of wondering, just thinking like, were you posing for the cover of a Shell Silverstein? Yeah, right. They call it the giving tree. So anyway, I was just sort of wondering, like, wait, I haven't walked this way in a while. Did I miss apple season or maybe they they plucked them all? And then I see somebody and I'm not wearing my big headphones. I'm just wearing little headphones. And so I was able to hear somebody yell across the street, a man say, hey, hey, I'm listening to you right now. And like, I'm totally caught. I'm totally caught in my own moment staring up at the tree. I look across the street and before I even introduce myself, I just say, where are all the apples or something along those lines? He's like, oh, yeah. Hey, hey. And he's like, I'm Trevor. You know, I live in this neighborhood, too. And we chat for a little bit. We chat about the neighborhood. and I said, hey, Trevor, send me an email so we have each other's contact info. Well, he did do that, and I was checking my email last night, and I found this email from Trevor. This is where it's all going. This isn't related to apples. The apple thing was just me being caught in a weird moment.

By the way, that is about the only way that I will eat an apple.

Oh, yeah?

If I'm out in the world this time of year and there's an apple that's growing on a tree and it seems appropriate to pick it, that's just so enjoyable for me. What I am not great at is purchasing apples, bringing them into my home, and then consuming them. I saw somebody had a picture online somewhere of an insulated kind of lunch bag now that people will take to work. And it's got an apple in it. They're coming back. They go, just done taking my apple out for the day and bringing it back home.

I've had that apple. I've taken apples out for a while.

That's my general relationship. Unless they're growing somewhere and then I feel like, free fruit, what?

I do like apples, but if I'm buying apples and bringing them home and then snacking on them here, I think I'm more likely to eat them if I cut them up. I'll sort of stand at the counter and cut them into little pieces and eat and cut and eat and cut. And that's how I eat apples. The idea of just sort of chomping into an apple unless it's one of those street apples.

I'm also getting to the age where I feel I could lose a tooth.

Yeah, right. Yeah. No more caramel apples. That's for danger.

do you like do take a look a sharp knife and you're like you're whittling the apple do you do that move because i feel like that's a real menacing oh yeah no i think that's like good older guy not saying you're old but you know i'm saying like yeah that's something you see in the movies when you're a kid like i'm

gonna do that especially if it's a knife from your pocket and you're doing that thing where you're kind of carving it towards your thumb and it looks sort of dangerous but you don't yeah but

that's i feel like that's from a guy richie film it's pretty tough that's like a guy who's like some kind of british gangster is like eating an apple like that while talking to the person you

know who they're about to do some harm to i prefer to be an older grandfather type fellow who's like imparting wisdom like i'm like this was my pappy's knife and now it's gonna be your knife kind of

thing yeah exactly like maybe also somehow eating an apple but also has a straw like a piece of hay

coming out of their mouth by the way i promise you somewhere there's a very overpriced bourbon called pappy's knife yes and there's a guy who wants to tell you about it at the bar like oh this is the pappy's knife 12 year well it's i it's really it's really good not as good as the 24 but

it's good you're the one in portland luke report back because that's where you're gonna find that i think but anyway everything that i just said as lead up to this email is pretty irrelevant i just wanted to set up the scene but anyway i get this email from trevor who's like good look uh you know good meeting you and talking about the neighborhood and then saying, by the way, I've been listening to the show since we stumbled into the 2000th episode show at the Neptune. What? So this person's first experience with TBTL was stumbling into the live show, what, five years ago for the 2000th show at the Neptune? I saw an ad for it and I had no idea what it was and I thought it would be a fun night out. I assumed it would be more of a Prairie Home companion kind of thing because of the quote make make believe radio show tagline but obviously it was not i have to say we were a little bit confused and disoriented during the show but i did go back and listen to the arby's show because i have a history with the meats at that particular arby's location and i've been sometimes annoyingly hooked on the show ever since i just i i've wondered you know about the people whose first exposure to tbtl is a live show but i've always assumed those are people who are going to a show exactly dragged there by somebody who at least knows what's going on yeah this person trevor and i assume his partner we're just like oh i like kind of public radio things let's go see what this is and then i mean i would i want to go back and listen to that show now through trevor's ears i am and wonder glad you did not

know trevor was in the audience that night andrew you would have you would have turned into a pillar of salt like lots family looking back on sodom and gomorrah like and maybe me too because there's nothing that would have gotten in our heads more than thinking about people who like you said if somebody is dragged to one of our lab events by a loved one or a friend you they've presumably gotten somewhat of a heads up but a couple of people coming in completely fresh to the experience that would have forget what your response would have been injured that would have paralyzed

thinking thinking that it's like a prairie home companion as well yeah and feeling like i needed

to contextualize everything like there would have been i don't know how many people were there for that night but let's say four or five hundred people there would have been about 498 people going we know japan yes japan's number one yeah so go we get it and i'd be like explaining it to trevor and the other noob because that's for some reason where my brain goes yeah can i just flip

that for a second from your guys neuroses to know a positive i aspire to be trevor like that is a listener to the show yeah we aspire for you to be that as well no i mean i mean like hey here's a thing i know nothing about i'm gonna give it a try that spontaneity that that boldness and braveness trevor that's that's not who i am and that is that's a really really good point john

Like, just the kind of being that open to the universe to, like, go. I mean, I won't go to things that I know I'm going to like.

Right.

You know what I mean? Like, a band that I like is coming through town, and I go, like, I don't know, man. It's a Wednesday. It's going to be kind of a late night. It's like Trevor is just like, all right, I'll take a flyer on that. You're absolutely right, John. That's a really cool way to go through life.

And it worked. And I don't know if this is a setup for something we want to talk about after we thank some donors. But, like, we had somebody at American Public Media whose grand advice for us. APM? Never heard of it. A manager-level person who came in after we had been there for a while and became our manager and said one of the best ways for us to grow our audience is to do more live shows. Seemingly unaware that we do live shows, and that's something that had already been part of our repertoire. I think the 10. terrible way to grow the audience for a show that doesn't make sense on first listening i mean that does not seem like i mean i i use that as an example of like kind of bad advice for a while like really you think the best way to grow our audience is by throwing something on a marquee and just hoping people walk in and now trevor's out here being like yep exactly what i did and i'm still listening five years later all right alex doing 52 road shows next year yes exactly

What we're going to do is we're going to broadcast from inside of a dirt pit that we've dug. And we're going to put leaves over the top of it. And then if you fall into the pit, you have to listen to the podcast. Because that's the only way we're going to get more Trevors in on it is we literally trap them.

Exactly. Thank you, baby.

Hey, let's thank some of our daily donors. These incredibly kind, generous, thoughtful people are keeping TBTL going by making a donation. Folks like Amanda Wilhelm in Linwood, Washington. Yeah! Named for the Walsh Helm Scream. That's right. Thank you, Amanda. Also, Matt Estrada is in Tacoma, Washington. Thank you, Matt. Um, condolences on the aroma of Tacoma going away. I feel like it's a big part of the identity, but the good news is it's moving to Longview, Washington. So if you ever want to come visit it, you'll know where to find it just down the street from me.

What was it? The strong pew of Longview? Is that what we've decided?

I believe, I want to tell you the bald and the beautiful. That's a, you named the show, the bald and the beautiful the other day. That was, I thought pretty inspired. Thank you. Uh, thank you, Matt. Thanks also to Arlen Horst. in seattle washington and then look who it is out there in chardon ohio it's in the samoski pizza district i believe it's keith baruster am i is any part of that right is there is that in

geauga county um let's see here chardon is it in geauga county i would have guessed cuyahoga county but oh you might be right um ohio county now the one thing that i'm sort of thinking about here is I think both Keith and Arlen have been somewhat recent tens of the week. It is in Geauga County. It's in Geauga County, Luke. Look at you.

I know that was a weird response. Sorry, I was busy waxing my mustache. You caught me off guard. Yes. Oh, tut tut. Yes. Very well. Thank you, Keith. Thanks also to Rob Peacock right here in Portland, Oregon. Rob. I think I may have read a thank you message. Well, what What you just heard in my voice, Andrew, was a sort of a flash of awareness that I believe I may have read a thank you to Rob on a different program that I also work on that is also in the public radio space. And if that's the case, Rob, that's incredibly kind of you. But let's just talk about TBTL. Let's focus on TBTL and just say thank you so much, Rob, for supporting this program.

In fact, I would encourage you to divert some of those funds, but we can talk about that. I'll reach out privately

I would tilt it this way I get a lot more of this money Than I do at the other joint They don't let you

Touch the money at the other place

Oh no they don't tell me anything About it Thank you Rob and then Sarah Nerper is in New York New York New York City that's where I'll be next week Sarah I'll probably bump Into you somewhere out there In the Big Apple thank you Sarah I'm probably just forgetting Because my memory is shot these days But I don't know if I remember I recognize Sarah's name But I don't know if I remember Sarah being in New York City

I'm not sure

That could be misremembering Or that could mean Sarah has decided Mary Tyler Moore style To take on the big city Although I believe that was set in Minneapolis John? Milwaukee Milwaukee was The Laverna Shirley Oh, yeah.

It makes sense because in Minneapolis there are, I think, Mary Tyler Moore's house. She throws the hat in the intro.

But what I think is interesting about that, and, you know, probably outside of Seattle, I would say our hottest zip. Well, our hottest zip is actually Andrew's neighborhood we've learned.

Yeah, right? We've got Trevor.

It's crawling with tents. But then outside of Andrew Zip, I would say probably the Twin Cities might be one of our most sort of like a place where we have maybe the most listeners outside of Seattle. So I love the Twin Cities. I do think it's interesting when you think about the Mary Tyler Moore show open and it's kind of this this idea. of somebody going to the big city and like making it in whatever that particular, is it advertising? I've never watched the show.

Mary Tyler Moore, she was a news person.

Okay, so going and doing this thing in the big city and it was Minneapolis. Like it feels like a New York thing to me, but it was Minneapolis.

Yeah, that's right. Ted Knight was the anchor, I believe, and her boss was Lou Grant.

And he was a creep when we had him on Livewire. That's what I hear.

I remember you telling me that.

R.I.C. Rest in Creepiness. Yeah. I mean, that was, I don't know. He was a very, very, very, very advanced in age when we had him on. And I don't want to make an excuse for him. But I don't feel like, I think when you meet someone at like 94, it's unclear if you're meeting the same person that you would have met at 44. I don't know the answer to that. But it has to be at least added in as a factor.

Does the veil just kind of fall away at that point? Is that, sorry, Andrew. No, go ahead. Jump on you. No, go ahead. Like, I mean, like, is it like that's who they actually are? Maybe like, cause they're not, I don't, I don't, listen, I don't know Ed Dazner, but like, is that as you get older, it's kind of like the, a drunk mouth speaks a sober mind kind of thing, you know, to say what you really want to say at that point.

You know, I mean, I think honestly it was, what happened was, I think he sort of said something. He basically was sort of talking to our staff on the show, our staff, these staff members happen to be women and just kind of being a lecce in that way that i think a lot of men from a certain generation they think they're being kind of fun and flirtatious but it's not how you should be talking to people uh without their interest and or consent and uh and but it what what happened was somebody somebody like mentions this in my ear as he's walking on stage and i'm kind of like well are we doing this interview or not then you add to that the fact that he was difficult for him to hear it was you know he was not he was not alive on planet earth a whole lot longer after we did this interview but anyway the mary tyler moore show yeah in minnesota show i was going to

ask you when when when john and i said milwaukee you said no that was blank show what did you say laverne and shirley yeah okay yeah that was milo meal schlamazel yes yes and patriot i think took place also yes in the was that also a happy day spinoff same universe john was uh friends with uh

squiggy hello and welcome to top story i was talking to andrew um when uh probably on monday

when we were coming back after the summer games. And I was saying how it is still, to me, a very unique feeling to realize that we are the bosses of TBTL and that the three of us are the sort of triumvirate of what we decide to do and not do on this program. Because it's always felt like that to some degree, but we always technically did have bosses after we merged with APM. And so this is probably the kind of thing that if we had bosses still and we worked somewhere else, they would be like, maybe don't get into this. But we're the bosses here. And I think we should at least mention that an email went out from American Public Media to a bunch of people who are still listeners to our show because when we, and both of you know so much more about this than I do. So I'll just kind of set it up and then I'll let you both explain more of the details. But my sense of it is, we had this big email list when we were at APM, that was folks that were subscribing to the newsletter and other things through fundraising. And Andrew, you had done great work at creating good newsletter content that had people subscribing. And then again, I'm assuming there was a few different ways that people were put on this email list, but there was like a TBTL email list. Now we don't work at APM anymore, but it came to our attention recently that APM used that TBTL email list to send out a notice about an event involving Tig Notaro. Now, I am personally a huge fan of both the person Tig Notaro and the comedy of Tig Notaro. And I don't think it was something terrible that our listeners were being alerted as to something that would probably be in their interest. What was surprising to me was, A, they started the email by calling everyone friendos. I don't know why that felt like a little dirty to me. And then also it was, in effect, kind of a fundraising email that was kind of going out to our current listeners from the entity that we used to work for. So I guess I was thinking it might be good to clarify it to anyone who got that email, what exactly is going on with that? So I'll ask you both, what exactly is going on with that?

Yeah, this is the email list that we established by creating a TBTL newsletter way back in 2015. I will be honest, when our boss at the time, Steve Nelson, said, you guys should really start a weekly newsletter, I was like, are you kidding me? There's Twitter, there's Facebook.

There's Instagram. I think there was Instagram then. I was like, nobody uses email these days. Why would we start a newsletter? But it ended up being a great idea. And of course, a good way to stay in touch with our listeners, send out the send out the the weekly email, have some fun spoofs in there, but also reach out when we have an event coming up or a fundraising situation we want to let people know about. And so it was valuable in that way. We talked a lot about when we were leaving American public media that we were not allowed to take that list with us. We were not you know, they did not allow us. I believe we tried to get the list and I believe we were told no. Exactly. And they said, no, you have to create your own list. We own this list. There are legal reasons for that. Like, whatever. Like, I I don't know if really the legal scrutiny stands up there. But either way, it's like, OK, that that's the one sticking point. Fine. And so we worked hard to recreate an email list as people who are listening a few months ago. No, we were hammering home, like, please sign up for our new list. I assumed that that would just mean that the list that American public media still had that was directly to our listeners would sunset. It never even occurred to me that they would continue to use that to fundraise for American public media our audience.

Yeah, I thought they weren't letting us have it because they were trying to protect people who had signed up for one thing like they were trying to protect our own listeners from us in a bizarre sort of way that I kind of understood. In other words, if you subscribe to the newsletter when it existed under APM, you would sign up for that thing. You hadn't signed up for whatever Too Beautiful to Biz is. And so I saw that they could try to make the argument that letting us take that information with us was taking a bunch of information that people had submitted under a different system and with a different expectation. So that was like kind of like, well, that's a bummer. But it never even occurred to me that they wanted to hold on to it so they could try to talk to our listeners and call them friendos.

And now here's the deal. And I'm going to really spill the beans on something here. We're not live. So I suppose I could cut this out if either one of you are uncomfortable with me talking about this. But something came to our attention or to my attention a few months ago regarding APM's position on promoting TBTL. And, you know, during our eight years there, it was something that would constantly come up in meetings that I would raise, whether it was my performance review or just check in meetings with all the various bosses we had throughout the years. And our new bosses would always come in and say, yeah, we're going to we're going to help you grow the show. We're going to help you grow the show. And then any time I would talk about like, well, let's start by promoting the show. They'd say, well, promotions don't really work. I'd be like, well, you're promoting all your other podcasts. yeah but that's not how people really learn about new shows i'm like okay all right fine like i thought that our lack of promotion of american public digging a pit yeah exactly just dropping people and so i whoa god was that the cat again yes bingo bingo bubbles bubbles sorry sorry bubble

keep that name out of your mouth i mean apologies they are pretty close together

they're by syllabic they start with a b i'm kind of with john on this one thank you but bingo what a good boy yeah bingo's a good boy what's going on with bubbles jeez louise re-break the shards come on bubbles by the way that's not not fleetwood max greatest work re-break the shards no um anyway so what came to so i was saying that my assumption during our time at american public media was we were not being promoted mostly because i don't know they it was just sort of like neglect like they just didn't think about us after a while they all had new new shows new projects to promote and we would just kind of get ignored i didn't realize until we had already left the company that there was sort of a directive not to spend any money or resources on promoting tbtl because somebody had determined that there was quote no growth potential there and um and so without like giving up any sources on this this is something that we learned that there was you know the people who kind of crunch the numbers and do the polling and and always would talk about how great our audience was, basically said, yeah, there's no growth potential here, so don't promote the show. There was some conversation about, hey, why aren't we promoting the show? There's some good stuff here. And people saying, well, we've been told not to do that. And so that is something that has obviously lived in my brain. The fact that for all this time, and again, our time at 8 p.m. was good. My time at 8 p.m. was good. I liked mostly the people that we worked with. I liked getting a paycheck. I like the fact that they gave us a pretty long leash that we were able to do things like fly, you know, to Australia without them stopping us. Not that, you know, you set that up, Luke, but, you know, nobody said no when we decided to hitchhike to Mississippi. So I don't want to, like, kind of retroactively paint my experience at APM as a bad one. It was not. It was a good one. But it has been very galling for me in these past several months to sort of realize that there was.

actually a a stated goal of not promoting i don't know if a goal is the right word but a stated policy of not promoting our show and then to find out that they are now trying to fundraise specifically to tbtl listeners who are no longer with them and by starting an email with our language hey friendos sort of blurring the lines there i'm it's hard for me not to be insulted by

that i want to mention too that we are not promoting tbtl now but that's our choice

But we're going to start. Too beautiful to biz.

I mean, very little has changed about growing the audience, but we get to make that call for ourselves. What if I had secretly sent John a directive, Andrew, saying that we were not going to try to promote TBTL? For your entire life working on this show, there's always some shadowy cabal putting the kibosh on promoting TBTL.

Well, I didn't want to put anybody on blast, but that's one of the most galling things is the directive came from you. that's what i found out is that luke was telling all of our bosses do not promote tvtl it will go

to andrew's head yes um anyway but actually luke yeah i will i will i will push back we have been promoting the show we did do a live show so maybe we got more trevors that yeah you never know

no i mean and and you're by the way you're right andrew i was i was attempting to make a joke there But the reality is, actually, we're really intent on trying to grow the audience so that we can have more people know about the show and so that we can spread the financial responsibility across as wide a group of folks as possible. And it's exciting to know that we're, I mean, you know, if you've seen the coin, we're in a little boat. We're the captains of that little boat and can really, I think, affect some change and some growth on the show, which is actually very exciting. now john i don't want to you have a different relationship with the company and also with the people at the company than i did i was pretty kind of hands-off with a lot of it i will echo what andrew said which was my time at apm was was great because i nobody ever made me other than the you know my uh the uh like hr training and the occasional like performance review nobody ever made me do anything i didn't want to do so i don't have much bad to say about it um but i thought it was interesting when you and i were talking over email and i said i can't believe that this happened i think your response was oh yeah i totally believe this happened this was kind of like you you did you kind of see this coming um well so i yeah i have a lot of feelings on this

as both somebody who's a 10 so like from the experience of listening to the show and like knowing what you guys went through with apm as somebody who worked apm and now somebody who's an employee of tv to biz um so i yeah i have a lot of mixed feelings emotions and somebody worked in like public radio for or public media for you know about a decade before jumping ship with you guys and specifically in fundraising and development i'm like of course they did this like this is you have contacts and um you know it's like glengarry glenn ross you have the leads these are the glengarry leads right and which is why we were so you guys were so great and being so diligent like telling everyone before the switch over hey sign up for our new newsletter sign up for a new newsletter because it is important for what for i mean to be frank for fundraising you know that's from my perspective at least that's you know it's the non-content lead it's that's the most important way to reach people um but i do think genuinely speaking not sucking up to my boss here i think one of my bosses andrew does a great job every week writing those and they're a lot of fun so it's like if you like tbtl it is more fun good content and the hey dummies videos are great so the power of the newsletter list is so significant for for content for fundraising for everything steve nelson nailed it um but yeah somebody worked in that industry and like having a lot of people i'm still connected to on the inside uh i understand like their jobs are tied to making money for apm and this is a list of names and going back to the legality of it i'm no danny but i understand i believe it's based in like privacy stuff they like they can't give us people's emails because of privacy rights issues and stuff and you know again i'm not a lawyer but i i understand that rationale and one of the things i think i said to you luke over email was in my time there there have been shows that have been sunset from apm and we did the same thing it's like oh hey you like such and such maybe you'll like this now in my time i don't if memory serves correct i could be wrong um i don't think i ever led any of these projects necessarily but it was not give us better not like the way the way this the tig event was but it was hey you liked this show try listening to this show so it was still still and take my i mean now i'm thinking about take might be one of the shows i could be wrong about this but could be one of the shows that got that boost of like hey We'll be right back. like such and such try listening to don't ask kid kind of thing um which don't ask don't tig was a

very very terrible time in our military's history it was uh thank you show title one of those

i'm just saying maybe um yeah so i don't know so i think from the public media from the fundraiser

like the fundraiser in you understands hey look all's fair in love and fundraising and if you are if you have if you have a a source of potential uh donation and you know it's all voluntary i will say they're not trying to auto charge people you know who were donating to apm as far as i know

anyway they're not trying to like you know fun fact about that don't please please tell me that that's a joke we i recently came aware that there were a few people that were still getting charged and i think i've been in contact with them and like this is the email you send it to they will give you a refund i'm really sorry this happened because of like system you know this is one of those challenges like apm being such a big and onerous thing that some people end up on the wrong lists and i know personally the people that process donations and stuff and they really are are like good people just try and do their best and but but errors happen and that sounds so crappy to be like oh errors happen once people's money like i so yeah so but this is a good this is a

good chance for us to do a little quick tbtl psa which is just like two things one is we don't have any control i guess at this point over emails you might be getting from apm um and you obviously i'm just talking to listeners now have the you know you get to decide what you want to do about that like if something seems appealing to you i'm you know i'm not trying to tell you not to go watch a virtual tig notaro event um but just know that there's a good chance that you might get an email that kind of feels like it's from us but if you notice that the the the actual sender even if they're calling you friendos or even if they're kind of like using a lot of sort tbtl type of vibrations just be be aware that there you may be getting emails uh that seem like they're coming from us or they kind of feel like they might be coming from us that aren't coming from us so so just want to give people's heads up on that and also i'm just going to say if you have had any kind of missed billing or your money's still going back there and you'd rather it go to us it sounds like they can email you john yeah they can definitely get me on slack

on email wherever dm me on instagram i don't care i'll give you the apm email address and tell you who to contact there and like i said i think it was just maybe a couple people at this point again not to excuse it and make light of it um but i don't think it's like a huge concern i hope at this point yeah it's all all wrapped up as far as emails not coming from us it is okay though if it's coming from splatnet.net though right yes exactly those are from us actually

Split one is my dad John what is your email address If people want to reach you

Yeah real simple TBTL John So TBTL J-O-N no H TBTL John with no H At gmail.com So feel free to email me And I'll happily I'll put you in touch with folks I want to mention to the listeners

We did offer John An at TBTL email account But he was already using Gmail That's what I don't want people to think That we're othering John Because you've got Luke at TBTL.net andrew at tbtl and then john at splatnet that's yeah that was your choice as the guy who's like

dealing with the money on the show right it's an extra like 80 bucks a year or something we can save a little money so let's just save the money i'll just say two last things just because i don't want to dominate this too much here but uh just because i have a lot so many thoughts in regards to the concern andrew you brought up totally valid about the actively like we're not going to promote tbtl i you know that i know came from some really good people who who wanted to help tbtl

it was like the higher the information came from them not the yeah not the edict not the directive

yeah and so there were definitely that's i think that to me is the most frustrating part is that there are people who like could and wanted to do stuff to help the show and were just kind of directed not to um and then also i can say with the i think the more i've thought about luke the the hey friendo thing of the tig email i think really got that was really what kind of stuck

in my craw it's not that they're trying to yeah you raise money it was the it like that's a real well i mean that's like what was it um it was was it jacob or esau that we're gonna get deep into the bible now one of them was trying to steal the other one's not the first biblical

no at least this one isn't sodom and gomorrah though so you remember this building i remember

the story that one of them was going in to, I think it was Abraham, to try to get his blessing or the birthright, and the one who was going in, I can't remember if it was Jacob or Esau, had smooth arms like I do, but then put some kind of like hairy, like...

animal skin so that Abraham who didn't have great vision anymore would feel the arms and would feel the hairy arms of I think it was like Esau and then give the birthright to the wrong kid and that was basically exactly what APM just tried to do by using friendos they were putting animal skins on their arms to

fool Abraham yes literally actually how the tubes and wires of the APM email system works it's just hairs from lambs and stuff no but I was gonna say the thing i say about that is you know we got a friend in the on the inside i won't name names who was i know they were the one that allured me to this before the email went out uh and was like i told them this is not a good idea overall but especially the friendo thing like because that did really that was flagged internally yeah like hey that's that seems kind of icky uh so like you know so

there was a conversation about that and, and somebody that at the highest echelon of whatever that fundraising department is, the decision was made. We're going with friendo.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, shout out to the person who spoke up on our behalf. Who's still there. Thank you.

Great, great individual. I will personally thank them and say, Andrew owes you a great debt.

And I owe a great debt to the listeners. Cause I was wrong about one thing. It's Isaac, not Abraham. I was, I was going to say something, but I didn't want to. We both knew it, and you just let me hang myself out to dry like that.

Well, you know, you're going to get the Old Testament wrong. You're going to look like a fool. Is that my Testament?

It's way Old Testament. It's like, it's about as old as the Testament gets. I think it's in Genesis, y'all.

I do think that John, being the more proud, John, you're probably the most hirsute of the three of us. Luke, you'd be probably balancing out the other end of that spectrum. There is a chance that someday, Luke, you will have to put animal skins on your arms to convince a banker somewhere that you're John. I've already tried it. It didn't go well.

Try putting it on your chest. It'll go better.

OK, there you go. Hey, this is a story that we meant to talk about yesterday. I didn't get to. I was I will say, Andrew, I was a little bit surprised that you you sort of brought it up as a topic. Although now I've read read the articles and I do think it's it's sort of interesting for a variety of reasons. But there was a big story that came out recently about a guy named Paul Landis, who is one of the Secret Service agents who was very close to John F. Kennedy when he was shot in Dallas in 1963. and uh this guy paul landis is now saying that basically he found a bullet in the car that jfk had been in like a bullet that had apparently by his sort of reckoning had struck jfk but not actually penetrated his body and it kind of got stuck in the seat of the car and that this guy Paul Landis had for some reason picked up the bullet taken it to the hospital and then put it on a stretcher I believe next to somebody else and this had led to much confusion what's called the magic bullet theory which I'm no Kevin Costner in the movie JFK directed by Oliver Stone pretty much everything I know about this I just read in Peter Baker's piece in the New York Times so please jump in, Andrew, if I'm starting to get things wildly wrong, but the idea about Lee Harvey Oswald being the only person who shot at President Kennedy was that basically the bullets, they said, all matched his rifle, and there was a bullet that hit somebody else in the motorcade, somebody else in the car.

The governor of Texas at the time, who was also shot.

John B. Connolly of Texas, and he was hit in sort of multiple ways in such that this shot that supposedly hit him was described as the magic bullet. I think somewhat sarcastically, like how could it have hit JFK and then hit this guy and done all of this stuff? But they found this bullet, they thought, near on the stretcher next to John B. Connolly of Texas. So they found a bullet near his body that was fired from the gun, that was fired from Lee Harvey Oswald's gun. And so this told them that the only person shooting was Lee Harvey Oswald. Now this guy who was there, Paul Landis, says, no actually i found that bullet for some reason i didn't tell anybody about it i brought it to the hospital in all of my stress i must have dropped it on the stretcher next to the governor of texas leading to all this confusion about the whereabouts of that bullet it's more i think he

says that he put it on the stretcher next to jfk and he doesn't know exactly how it got onto the governor's stretcher but then possibly through just like the the wrangling it jostled its way over there potentially is the best explanation he has so it's like a really confusing thing that

happened many years ago that now doesn't feel less confusing based on this

telling i did think peter baker's um writing in the times was really interesting because he he basically i think kind of starts out by saying that this guy paul landis is not somebody who is looking for a bunch of attention he kind of he sort of describes mr landis's like personality his physical size his sort of vibe and all i think to kind of make the the point that this is not like some swashbuckling sweat this is not a guy who's written 11 books about the jfk assassination it's just who's just kind of like trying to continue to be in the spotlight this is a guy who's really not tried to make it about himself or his experience for all these years but now is talking about it which i think is meant to lend some amount of veracity veracity to what he's

saying that he's not doing that is not in it for anything yeah although he does have a new book out

I mean, this is this. Well, there is. So there's that. I mean, there is. And he'd like to tell you about the new Tig Notaro live event. If you can. But other than that, he has no agenda. Hey, friendos, I found a bullet in the motorcade.

If you get any emails from Paul Landis with an APMG email return address, unsubscribe. Ahoy, hoy.

I'd like to talk to you about my new book. So like I said, Andrew, I am woefully under-informed on kind of the ins and outs of this. But I'm just curious, what about this, other than just like it's the JFK assassination. It's a big part of our nation's history. What about this story kind of jumped out at you or had you wanting to talk about it?

Well, I think it started with me kind of just asking you. I think it was the end of Monday's show. You were forward promoting a couple of things. And for some reason, I think I had just read it that morning or the Sunday night.

Remind me that I didn't deliver on one of those four retros.

So I wasn't I wasn't I wasn't like hopping to talk about this. I was just sort of asking. I don't know. It just came up. It sort of was on my mind, I guess. I was sort of curious if you had read it or if you I think it was one of those stories that I was reading before you sent out a show sheet. And I was wondering whether or not it was going to be on it. It's not like there are probably people in our audience who are. I know that there are people in our audience who are well more way more informed about this. And maybe even, you know, there are people who dig deep into all of the different theories. And I saw the JFK movie in the 90s. Did you see it, Luke?

I did not. You know, what's really I don't know if weird is the right way to describe it. But I'm a person who has not spent a ton of time thinking about the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I mean, other than it was a huge thing. But like for some reason, this or, you know, Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby, all of that kind of stuff. It's just it hasn't fascinated me as much as well, I'll put it this way. If it were to happen in modern times, like if something were to happen now to a U.S. president, I think I'd be obsessed with it. I think it was just so much before my time that I just kind of never really was that interested.

I think you might have accidentally said JFK Jr. there, Luke. I think you just misspoke. We're talking about JFK, of course. Just saying, not saying that to pile on just in case somebody was about to send an angry email.

Jay, you're telling me, because I told you I'm not up on this case. It wasn't JFK Jr. in Dallas?

No, but he has some interesting opinions on vaccinations, I believe. I think I'm sure. Let's further cloud things. Wait, do I have that wrong? No, I think it's Robert Kennedy Jr.

Oh, shit.

How dare you correct me, Luke? can i ask an important question about this whole thing because obviously i don't i'm one of the people that don't remember the assassination and i never saw that movie um how does this impact the magic loogie episode from seinfeld that's what i back and to the right i was gonna back into the

right or whatever back into the left yeah see that was a parody of that oliver stone movie jfk of course and so like you know obviously i'm not a conspiracy theorist when it comes to this i don't even know that i don't even know that the regular facts of the case that aren't that aren't being debated um but you know that was kind of the whole point i think of the jfk movie it really zoned in on this magic bullet theory because the other theory is there must have been more than one shooter more than just lee harvey oswald and i think even oswald before he died had said something along the lines of like it it i i couldn't have been the only shooter or something i'm probably getting that wrong just scratch all of that listener you got it go back and edit it um but So I'm not super in I'm not super into this world, but I think the thing that drew me to this story is what you started by talking about and how Peter Baker apparently wrote it. I didn't read his write up on this, but what would be the motivation? Because I also from whatever recap of the Vanity Fair article I read, it also sort of said that like this guy doesn't have a he doesn't really have a big stake here. I mean, maybe some more book sales, maybe. Maybe if he is an older person, he's thinking about his estate and his family, and maybe he just wants to make sure that he can, you know, maybe cash in as much as he can because he was so close to this historic event. I mean, that's the only argument for it. But also, his whole story just seems weird to me, too. Like, literally, why would you wait 60 years? The answer to that question, according to the write-up I read, was he just didn't know about all the hullabaloo around this magic bullet theory.

And he was worried he would get in trouble.

Oh, and was that part? Oh, that's right.

Yeah, from moving the bullet or something?

Yes, and also, like, he had filled out paperwork that goes, you know, back in the day, in, you know, whatever, the weeks after this.

Yeah, he had been, like, you know, of course, debriefed or, you know, interviewed right after, and he had said certain things which don't line up with what he's now saying.

Exactly, and he's sort of saying, like, well, you know, there's shock and there isn't the moment, but, well, we should trust your memory 60 years later? Like it just and also like his new revelations, if we're going to call it that, are still really complicated. Now this bullet, you know, after the fact is being jostled between different stretchers like that. Just it doesn't line up well, although, like you say, he doesn't seem like a type of guy who's trying to make headlines or could have been doing this for the past 50, 60 years anyway. So that's the thing that I find the most curious about this is his story doesn't seem super convincing to me, but also why?

Well, what I have read from many people who were there at the time and who have made their whole career sort of after that event talking about theories of what happened or, again, writing books and consulting on movies, like people that are sort of like professional, I was a secret service agent when JFK got shot people, right? Which it turns out is it's an it's a shrinking industry because they're getting older. But there's a lot of people who are in that. And they were interviewed in the Times piece. And to a person, they basically said, we totally think that this guy, Paul Landis, very much believes what he's saying. No one is accusing him of intentionally misleading anyone. But then they also all said to a person, we would be surprised if this was these series of events had actually happened. it's sort of like everyone believes that he believes this is now what happened but nobody believes it's actually what happened if that makes any sense like nobody wants to impugn his character he's not some you know some charlatan who's who's i think i think he really and you know what believe me on this show we do something an hour ago i don't remember it so you're talking about a long long time i mean what somebody said in the piece that i thought was pretty on the money was how would your memory get better after 50 or 60 years like that's just not how human memory works and we know that so he was you know interviewed right after the event and said certain things and it just doesn't really totally seem logical that he would be remembering things better and more clearly at age 88 than he was at that time and it just could be sort of some mandela effect stuff um that's just slowly kind of crept in over time um and and so it was it was weird because yeah he seems both like a really genuine and like a a good person who is is telling his truth and what he very much believes to be the truth but then a lot of other people who've looked at it are like it would be hard to imagine that this is the actual truth of what happened

yeah and i don't want to impugn his character either but like to john's point you know there is a whole seinfeld and it's funny john mentions the magic loogie episode that is a direct parody of the magic bullet um theory as it's presented in that and do we have to rethink that now it was such a cultural moment like i think of that first like i it was such a cultural moment that this guy who was it you know at one point in the car with jfk after he was being shot somehow missed the cultural moment that was jfk the movie and the back into the left i there there was probably a there was probably an oreos commercial in the 90s that had a back into the left reference i mean

right it was a dark dark time for our nation i could see chester cheeto exactly he was chester

back into the left man extreme hey man i'll see you at the book depository

is this so because all the attention this guy's getting now because of this whether it's true or not is this our marketing strategy for tbtl just make claims about like a very hot huge historic moments in this country like actually it was luke that put the first you know took out the first brick of the berlin wall or something like that you know just like i did do that oh there you go it's on a podcast it's true so we can just like 1983 though luke you were well ahead of your time

Think about what a crazy-ass time in this country that was, too, because you have, of course, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated. You have J.I. JFK uh you have Bobby Kennedy and then also the guy who shot JFK gets shot like you know Lee Harvey Oswald is killed by Jack Ruby however many days later like I don't know what the timeline was between when do does anybody know what between like I my sense is it was like a weekend it was

like two days I'm probably compressing that in my brain and I don't know the history really well unless is that like they were literally dragging they were taking they were moving him between like like jail locations right it wasn't just out of the book the depository itself like it was like later it wasn't even like immediately immediately afterwards it was i think he had been in jail i

think he i mean the allegation was he did the shooting from the texas book depository right and then he they caught him or whatever he was in jail and then when they were trans they were moving him between facilities or something he was in jack ruby steps up and shoots him yeah but like that must have just been such a crazy moment and then for our generation it's just like a Like, how funny was Kramer's hair when he was responding to the magic loogie? Like, that's our that's our generation's take on it from from very, very important things in U.S. history to even more important things. The demise of Aaron Rodgers. There is a bar in Milwaukee that decided I think it was like Jack's American Cafe or something. jack's american bar uh that because there was a lot of folks that were in you know pretty bummed in wisconsin about aaron rogers leaving the packers and going to play for the jets that um this bar now you want to talk about i don't know if this is more or less convoluted than paul landis's story about this bullet andrew because basically what it was was any game that aaron Rodgers starts at quarterback for the New York Jets, wherein the Jets lose, but not on the same day when the Green Bay Packers are playing at the same time, we will pay for your drinks.

I know. I had to reread that sentence like a bunch to figure it out.

So the idea was on Monday night, obviously, there's a huge marquee game. Aaron Rodgers and the Jets are taking on the Buffalo Bills. And the idea was supposed to be that it's going to be hard if you're a Green Bay Packers fan to watch Aaron Rodgers prospering with the New York Jets. Therefore, we are going to give you free alcohol or we're going to pay your tab. Also, by the way, not legal in a lot of places. I wonder how they were even able to kind of put this on the books, right?

Everything's legal in Wisconsin when it comes to alcohol.

It does lead the nation in alcohol consumption per capita perennially. That's a true story. so like the idea was if you were like a uh you know if you were a diehard Packers fan and you were sad to see Aaron Rodgers winning with a different team at least you wouldn't have to pay for your beers at the end of the night so you know Monday night comes they pack out the bar Aaron Rodgers starts the game he gets of course as most people know even if you're maybe not a football obsessed person he sustained an injury that has ended his season and maybe his career Most likely his career. He's 39, so yeah. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I have thoughts on that one, too, which will take us too far into football town. But just imagine you're in the bar, you're drinking, and Aaron Rodgers is out for the game. Now, he is so much better than the guy who is his backup, Zach, what's his name? Wilson. Zach Wilson. And so apparently, according to various news outlets, people just start pounding drinks in this bar because a it's wisconsin and b it looks for all the world like you're getting free drinks because the jets have now lost aaron rogers he started the game so that that um sort of criteria has been satisfied but then what happens through some odd series of events the jets actually win the game so you had all these people who were according to reports drinking heavily even for folks in wisconsin all ready to get their free drinks at the end of the night and then in overtime there is a punt return for a touchdown a very unlikely thing that wins the game for the jets meaning everybody there actually owes their bar tab after all to which i say or what did you say john in the text chain if it isn't the

consequences of my actions yeah well well well the consequences of my own actions yeah i don't know

i don't know who to side with on this because i i do love me a good free drink yeah but it's also

you don't go to a bar or watch a football game and expect to drink for free right like i mean you're consuming a product not to be you know super pro capitalism i guess but it is it is like the expectation and the standard and to get something for free is like a nice bonus but You shouldn't expect it. So you just got to be cautious, I guess.

Yeah, I'm with John. I mean, oh, huge surprise that I'm thinking this way. But, like, yeah, I mean, even if you're like, oh, man, this is my lucky day. Rogers is out of this.

this it's we're probably going to win this game you still must be thinking in the back of your head this is a bit of a gamble especially as you go into extra quarters there's a period of time during the end of the baseball season in the beginning of the football season that i cannot remember what overtime is called in either sport i think i referred to overtime in baseball the other day and i almost said extra innings in football but i mean there i mean what person doesn't have somewhere in the back of their head oh shit i may have to pay for this totally i mean

i here's the thing y'all know me and what this would become is basically sports gambling right i mean yes you're not you're not using you're not using i mean you are sort of using money but i mean this is this is what happens uh when you take something of that has monetary value in some way and you apply it to a you know a sort of an outcome like even though these people were not just lining up at the bar and just placing hundred dollar bills on the bar about the outcome of the game they were effectively doing that which is why i think even in wisconsin this might not have been i bet i wouldn't be surprised if we if we don't end up hearing that this was technically not allowed because i mean which you know me i love sports betting i have no problem with them doing this but i can't imagine this was legal because you just create a situation where all of this money is riding on what happens in this in this sporting event but i will say this luke

the difference because i was thinking about it being like a gambling thing too which is why i thought it was an interesting story for tptl but i it's not like those people didn't get anything they were still drinking all night they were consuming a product right so it's like not gambling in the sense that they just gave like to your point like they're giving away money they were getting hammered or whatever they're right you're right like if i put a sports bet down on

the mariners through the little app that i use oh i can use that today i'm in oregon again y'all if i put down a bet on the mariners and it doesn't come through i got nothing in i got nothing in exchange for that but these people were getting a tangible thing which would be their you know their beer or their food or whatever by the way how how big do you think the bullets that the owner of this bar was sweating yeah when aaron rogers went down that is a worst case scenario because you notice they put in the fine print any game Aaron Rodgers starts so it wasn't any Jets game it was any game Aaron Rodgers starts where the Jets lose as long as Green Bay is not playing at the same time your tab can get whatever like they you know so for Aaron Rodgers to start but then immediately be knocked out for the whole game it could not have been a worst case scenario for

the owner of that bar purely from a sports betting standpoint yeah um but even it was a gamble yeah it was a gamble either way though right because i guess they hadn't seen seen the jets with aaron rogers in anything but practice at that point did aaron rogers i mean now i'm getting too in the weeds it doesn't matter i did he play any of the uh preseason games why do i have a feeling like he didn't even play in any of the I don't think he played much yeah he's old and because

they know that he's good so I think it was mostly uh Zach Wilson in the preseason I will um uh I

will say this that I think so far like all the jokes about Aaron Rodgers getting injured however you feel about this like there's some delicious karma there obviously I hate Aaron Rodgers like I really really dislike that guy he uses his I know that he sort of had a um a reputation renovation what's the word i'm looking for a restoration yes through the um through his appearances on uh the hbo show hard knocks um but i still really dislike him i think he uses his platform to spread a lot of kind of misinformation and um generally speaking i find him to be a pretty deplorable character um and when he got injured i was kind of like well i do think it's kind of i was kind of happy to hear that he will not be playing football the rest of the year and and there's some like real irony here but it's also you know when you're talking about physical injuries like there is generally a rule you don't root for injuries right with the exception of deshaun watson who i want his wiener to fall off during a football game and never play again with the exception of that like i don't um you knew i think i've made my stance on that pretty clear um aside from that you don't really root for injuries so So do they wheel you off the field when that happens? Because you're still mobile. Yeah, I mean, do you get the cart for that? It really depends. But here, I'll let you, I'll give you, I'll cede some ground here in a second, John, but just to get this out. So there's all kinds of jokes about him and, you know, his like vaccine denying status and people are saying he's taking his broken ankle or his Achilles under advisement or what have you. There's a million jokes like that. To me, the best joke, of course, came from the Dan Labotard show. So the one. One of the main guys, Stu Gatz, or the second in command on that show, Stu Gatz, is a huge Jets fan and also just, you know, a beleaguered Jets fan, as they all are. And he was finally happy that they had a quarterback who was good. But for months leading up to this, he's been saying, like, how is this going to break? Right. In the same way, when I was a Browns fan, you're waiting for the bottom to fall out of everything. I don't know that I've ever been more excited and anticipating my moment of turning on a podcast than I was yesterday. looking forward to hearing the reaction from Stu Gotts and the whole gang about the irony of his quarterback going down after four plays and one pass with an incomplete pass at that.

In fairness, he did outgain Geno Smith.

I get one football joke. I'm allowed one football joke a day, and that was it. That is true. And my one football joke is just repeating what Stu Gotts said, which I thought was the funniest joke of this whole thing, which was he said, hey, we still have Randall Cobb. Which I thought was hilarious because, of course, they signed him just because Rodgers dragged him there with them.

And you're less – do I have this right, John? You're kind of like mildly interested in football but much more of a baseball, much more of a Yankees guy. Like you're kind of – what's your level of football caring?

Baseball and basketball are my two primaries. I loved football. I loved the NFL. I grew up a huge Jets fan. and i just got turned off by the stink of the league last few years wow all the reasons like

we don't you know we can get into or not but um you stayed turned off see this is interesting i don't think i realized you were jets guy so you stayed turned off even as they were adding aaron rogers and they were on hard knocks and they were becoming this whole fascinating thing because he's

a despicable human that just actually you know he's one of the people that like oh you know face of the league that was such a like as andrew called him deplorable that like he's the reason

that kept me off of the jets and off i am so glad that it was both of your football teams that had very problematic quarterbacks join them because i don't know if i would i'm being totally serious i don't know just wait your turn well no but i just well we'll find out just chance chances are

not saying gino i'm just saying in general i'm just saying i don't know if i would have had the

i would have had the the kind of self-discipline to just go okay this ends now for me like i think I'm it's such a big part of my of my Sunday and my life and the things I tend to think about and I can't defend that at all like I'm I respect both of you for being like nope sorry not gonna not gonna do this because of the sort of moral implications of all this now but if we can just very quickly because it's late in the show we've given the listeners plenty to chew on would it be the greatest thing ever or the worst thing ever if they signed Tom Brady to the Jets If they bring him out of retirement, would we are we rooting for this as an outcome or are we hoping it doesn't happen?

Well, my response is going to be no fun, but he's got an ownership stake in a team, so I don't think he even can. He'd have to give up. Is it the Raiders? He'd have to give up his ownership stake. And I just don't think that that would happen. Right. You don't think so.

I feel like he would happily, well, I don't know his brain, but I'll tell you what, it sure would be a hell of a plot line. I feel like he could divest himself. He could divest himself of whatever that is for a season and come ride in on a white horse and probably have a terrible quarterback rating. I mean, honestly, he was not very good his last couple of seasons. but I mean golly the narrative would be fascinating to watch I don't want more good

things for Tom Brady either so I would oh I think it'd be a bad thing for him though that's why I'm

so interested turn out well like me trying to quarterback the Jets like I think it would just be it's it's the kind of thing that's so there these are kind of headlines that they're writing on sports blogs right now that I saw this morning when I was like glancing at my phone nobody even knows I'm guessing the Jets are not going to try and do this it doesn't really make any sense but this is what people are writing jets have allegedly decided their course of action on if they are going to ask tom brady to the team now does anyone know what the course of action is no but there's so it's there's such a fervor such a froth around this idea it's all clickbait i'm

looking at a tweet from diana russini right here saying that um i'm told the team will not be inquiring about brady i thought that that i thought that that was what we knew that the team decided

not to reach out the headline that i saw like early this morning and andrew i don't know if i've mentioned this but i get up at 5 a.m so way before you around the time i go to bed so there you go it was so we're both up at five though yeah no there is one sweet minute but like the one that i read was and maybe this was just a lousy reporter that didn't have access but they were writing that the Jets had made a decision but this particular and it wasn't like Rappaport or anybody like you know who gets the dirt early like they were just somebody was yelling at them to write something about what the Jets were going to do and they're like I don't know anything so they just wrote the Jets have decided what they're going to do or something anyway

what if you got an email from like theathletic.com that said hey friendo the Jets are choosing not to sign something here I go once again

with the email every week I hope that it's from a female. Oh, man, it's not from a female.

All right, emails of emails.

Yes, I have a voicemail that I wanted to play for you. I'm looking for it here. We were talking about bullying on the show the other day. For once, it wasn't about me being bullied by you or John. It was a listener had called in with a story that was kind of about found money, but also about these kids that were harassing her for a big chunk of school. She was in grade school, I think, and these were older kids who were, like, menacing her and her friends and even, like, kind of chasing them down in cars and, again, just being very menacing. And that led to this voicemail that we got from our friend. Hey, Lloyd!

Hey, it's listener Lloyd, one of your pizza correspondents from Pizza Expo. It's inspired by listener Rebecca's story of being bullied to tell mine When I was a little kid, I was very small and very scrawny. And so as a fifth grader, I was tormented by a third grader who would take my lunch money, throw my books off the second floor balcony of the school, and threaten to throw me off of the balcony. So like listener Rebecca, I did not tell my parents. And when I went to a wedding with my parents for a distant relative, was shocked to see my tormentor mark there and was afraid it would turn ugly in front of my parents but instead my parents uh told me that mark was a second cousin which was pretty awkward but also resulted in the next two years of school being that mark was my protector so i just power out

love you guys take care how about that to quote the stu gods again um that you have a bully at school you go to a wedding turns out he's in your damn family you go back to school you now have a more than an ally but actually a bodyguard wow hey lloyd that's that's a yeah that's a twist

I didn't expect at all I was hoping I would like Well I would like people to be honest with us But I would like anyone who calls in with a bullying story I want to hear the story of how they got back At the bully at some point I want some good old fashioned Revenge I guess maybe technically the term is revenge I would call it justice I feel like when growing up All the movies The bullies always got their due But the problem with real life is It's not a movie And it seems like a lot of times the bully didn't get their due

I can confirm As somebody who was also bullied as a kid That doesn't happen Justice has never served

Well I mean is your bully still out there John You want to talk through this Maybe we can cook up a plan here

I don't know Larry Musso are you listening Oh wow Love it

There is something in the DNA of TBTL That does seem to attract people Both on a staffing level and a listener level Who were bullied it's a very i'm i'm like the only outlier and i was somewhat bullied but to much less a degree than the reports i've heard from other people but as but um i may be the only person associated with tbtl on any level who was not um the target of that and all i can say is i that's something that i didn't realize how fortunate i was in that having that be how my childhood was until i heard other people's stories even just like lloyd's story like that just must have sucked to just feel that kind of physically unsafe going to school every day and like someone trying to throw you off a balcony. Like, that's just absolutely awful. And if you didn't grow up with that kind of experience or that kind of fear, I wouldn't even... It's a good lesson for me to just understand what people are going through and sort of how fortunate I am in certain ways with that kind of stuff.

Yeah, I mean, you're just playing video games with your friend and then your friend knocks your tooth out with the controller.

like these are the types of things yeah that bullies do I heard a story from somebody else about playing video games oh you know what it was there's a comedian who I really like his name is Dan Soder and he sorry about this it's gonna go back to football but for people that care about football it'll be interesting so John take the rest of the day off so there's a comedian Dan Soder and he is from I

I forget where he's from, but it turns out that he was childhood friends with the current head coach of the Miami Dolphins. That guy, I think his name is Mike McDaniel. Yeah. McDaniels. And he is that McDaniels kid. I think they lived in Colorado. And the McDaniels guy is interesting because he's very young. He's like 30-something. And he never played organized football, which is a rarity usually. Even, you know, most coaches played some amount of football and and, you know, then became a graduate assistant and then a coach and worked their way up. This guy, McDaniel, seems to be someone who just loved football so much. I think he might have been a ball boy for the Denver Broncos or something. And through just sheer football geniusness has worked his way into being a head coach and a pretty successful one so far with Miami. So Dan Soder was coming from kind of a broken home and was kind of not into his scene at home. So he would spend every weekend at this other kid from his middle school's house, Mike, who now is the head coach of the Dolphins. And he said that this guy, Mike, would just fucking destroy him at Madden. Like, just absolutely. Like, basically, Mike McDaniel's football brain was already, like, on another level for scheming. And that Dan Soder would want to beat the living S out of him when they were playing Madden. because he would just be doing these things that were technically legal within the game, but that were just like giving him such an advantage. And I thought, well, that's why I was so mad at Peter Williams. When we were playing MLB baseball, he was also doing things that were technically legal, but that were total BS. So that made me feel less bad about shattering his tooth with a Nintendo controller.

Yes. And of course, Peter Williams played that famous cello playing video game, right? Is Peter Williams a cellist? He is a cellist. Okay, gotcha.

He teaches at the Suzuki School in Seattle, and I believe some of our listeners have had their children actually taught by Peter.

Sorry, John. I talked over you for a terrible joke.

No, that's quite all right. I was going to say, Luke, I once got kicked out of my friend's house for dropping 55 points on him in a game with Kyle Korver. If you're a basketball fan, that would mean that. He's not a guy that scores 55 points in a game. But I'll just kind of round back to I feel like I was very bleak on the bully thing. i will say by the time i was coming out of high school i think there was like a paradigm shift in society of like bullies like people treat it actually they believe it you know so i think it's probably better for kids today i hope than it was for when i was a kid or andrew was a kid like i think that adults started to take that kind of thing more seriously yeah in more recent years

i'm hoping that's the case i mean i my guess would be it's totally based on where you live what your family is like but I'm hoping that the days that Andrew you kind of again I don't want to speak for you but when I was growing up I think there was definitely a sense of like if you got in trouble at school you were definitely getting in trouble at home if somebody was bullying you it was on you to kind of like pull your pants up and figure it out and punch them in the nose or something hopefully that's not how the parents of America are trying to solve these issues for their kids which is just man up or whatever well it's funny because now how the worm has turned

let's talk about my cats for a second we have our older cat professor bananas who's like i don't know 13 or something now when we brought in little bingo now bingo is like a full-size cat now a year since we brought him home or almost um but he was a tiny little kitten when we brought him home but he immediately started harassing bananas and bananas is a very skittish cat now when bananas was a kitten she would harass our old man theo but then theo would give it back to her and they would wrassle around and then they they'd end up snuggling now we have bingo come in and he just starts bullying the hell out of bananas and it would not be uncommon to hear me and genevieve say things to bananas like well just stand up for yourself give them one good give them one good thwack and like that is the role of the older cat to set boundaries for the little cat and here i am i'm saying like well there's a reason he's bullying you bananas like how about you stand up for

yourself that's i was wondering about that because i know you you love bingo so much but bingo definitely it sounds like is the bully in the relationship yeah he i mean we actually have

ongoing issues where bananas sometimes will not use the litter box because if he hears her in the litter box she he runs and harasses her and like any anybody here anybody listening want to be harassed while you're taking a dump like what a terribly vulnerable position and now like she started going around the house we keep on having to retrain her to be safe that she feels safe in

the litter box speaking of litter boxes can we wrap the show up because you all can't even know what i've been dealing with silently and stoically and honestly heroically here for the last probably 40 minutes. So here in this room that I'm in is also across the room is the litter box. And bubbles because she's a feral jungle cat when she uses it it can be a pretty pungent situation for that becca kindly draped like a towel and some other things over the entry so that she can get in and out but it kind of contains things of course bubbles pulled the towel into the litter box and then just like went to town in there and i'm too far away for me to get over and like try to put the towel back up i can't open the door to the to the deck because then bubbles will jump off of the 15th story of this building so i've just been my eyes have just been watering in here for the last four so if my performance suffered i want listeners to know what i've been dealing with and i can't take in the words of popeye i can't take no more oh god let's go ahead and wrap her up here on this wednesday why don't just why don't we uh thank you everyone for listening hey john thanks for being here it's always fun to talk to you great time and and uh We will be back here tomorrow with more Imaginary Radio, so please do join us for that. In the meantime, have a great Wednesday. Take care of yourselves, and please remember, no mountain too tall. And good luck to all.

June 14th, 1987. Mets, Phillies, we're enjoying a beautiful afternoon in the right field stands when a crucial Hernandez error opens the door to a five-run Phillies' ninth cost the Mets the game.

Our day was ruined. There was a lot of people, you know, they're waiting by the players' parking lot. Now, we're coming down the ramp. Newman was in front of me. Hernandez was coming toward us. As he passes us, Newman turns and says, Nice game, pretty boy. Hernandez continued past us up the ramp.

Then, a second later, something happened that changed us in a very deep and profound way from that day forward. Who was it?

He spit on us. And I screamed out, I'm it!

Then I turned, and the spit ricocheted off him, and it hit me. Wow. What a story.

Unfortunately, the immutable laws of physics contradict the whole premise of your account. Allow me to reconstruct this, if I may, for Miss Fennis, as I've heard this story a number of times. Newman, Kramer, if you'll indulge me. According to your story, Hernandez passes you and starts walking up the ramp. Then you say you were struck on the right temple. The spit then proceeds to ricochet off the temple, striking Newman between the third and the fourth rib. The spit then came off the rib, made a right turn, hitting Newman in the right wrist, causing him to drop his baseball cap. The spit then splashed off the wrist, pauses in midair, mind you, makes a left turn and lands on Newman's left thigh. That is one magic loogie. Power out.