Muse

Anytime you can do something that's fun and you like to do it and make money doing it, hey, it's a win-win-win. And anytime you can win-win-win, you're win-win-winning, you know? If you're just winning or win-win-win, that's just winning or win-win-win. But when you're win-win-win, you're win-win-win-win.

TBTL! Am I cool, kids? No. Good, I'm glad. And that's what makes me cool. Not caring, right? No. Come on, Johnny. You're talking to a grill master. Do you know that I've been given three different aprons because of my barbecue skills? Let's see. I've got license to grill. I've got working grill. Oh, and I have grills just want to have fun.

Brother, who are you? What are you doing? I'm with the news, dude. A lot of times what we like to tell people is that you have to let life bounce off of you. Yep. Right. And so we are going to do just that literally in the literal sense.

Well, all right, hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to day two of the TVTL Winter Games. My name is Luke Furbank. I am your host. It's episode 4,105 in a collector's series. Right over there is my friend and fact-checking cuz, Mr. Andrew Walsh. Hello.

Hey, Luke. There's one thing that just occurred to me I should clear up. In fact, I wish I could go back years and clear this up in case there's any confusion. We are not in any way associated. We call this the Winter Games, but we are in no way associated with the International Olympics Committee.

No, those are a bunch of scoundrels, honestly.

Right, exactly. There are no kickbacks involved. We aren't getting, you know, just truckloads of anonymous money dropped off in the middle of the night.

No, even though we're using this music.

Which we have all the rights to.

we are in no way associated with either the summer or winter games of the international olympics the ioc i believe the international olympics committee i'm glad that uh we cleared

that up though because i do feel that that might have been impacting people's listening habits

speaking of the winter games i almost i almost went for i did my classic uh move which is try to flex with a weird name or weird piece of information but then be loud wrong i almost said we're no sep blatter oh that's fifa huh that's the fifa guy but like i was proud that i knew sep blatter yeah but then not even the rights a different corrupt guy yeah and i don't know if

that is a name that i would know the ioc guy i am just assuming it's a guy it used to be a guy name one samurai by the okay that i don't know why i know that yeah that's thank you brain for

remembering the one-time head of the ioc but not things that are important like birthdays of family

members but sep bladder there's a reason why you remember that right yeah exactly i mean that's kind of like you realize you're definitely seems like an ailment your farts are getting a little too stinky you go to the doctor it's like oh yeah we think you might have a sep bladder you're like oh no they're like it's okay there's a procedure but you're gonna need to take a week off of work

yeah exactly um we are not part of the ioc we are part of tbtl and we're doing the winter games uh this week and next week although tomorrow andrew i will be checking in from germany from frankfurt germany where as this is being released to the world as today's episode episode whatever it is 4105 4105 um i've i've i've touched down in germany but i'm dazed and confused and so we're not trying to do a live show or a new show with me but tomorrow's episode I will be in in Germany and I yesterday said I'm gonna give myself a little a little pass on something I'm going to I'm going to give myself a little license to chill on a particular topic while I'm in Germany and that is I'm in I'm gonna be in Frankfurt home of the Frank furter I don't need a lot of meat but I am going to have a Frank furter in Frankfurt

Germany. I got it, right? Yes, absolutely.

I'm actually jealous. Can you get it in a pretzel bun? And then I'm just going to eat it. I'm going to eat it very sensually on the air on tomorrow's show

and you'll get to hear it. Just driving me crazy. No, don't do that. I'll be so hungry. You're making me hungry just thinking about that. I haven't had a hot dog in a pretzel. I'm not somebody who gets into fancified ways of serving hot dogs. A pretty traditional hot dog is good for me on a hot dog bun but there is something special about a hot dog wrapped in a pretzel i haven't had that in years if not decades but i can the texture of that oh if it's done right it can that's great man

i'm typing in frankfurt germany hot dog just seeing what don't call it a hot dog there they'll

know you're

been there for years that was an ll cool j reference don't call it don't call it don't call it a hot dog but it actually kind of worked though because you said don't call it a comeback and i said it's been there for years which it sort of has been sure is that by the way do we know yeah look at this um the term hot dog can refer to the sausage itself the sausage used is a wiener or a frankfurter uh also called a frank is it let's see uh place of origin germany early version united states modern version well do you i'm just i'm just on the hot dog wikipedia page

what's really what's going on right now i have a piece of tape you know i when i'm making little intros for the show i you know just kind of click randomly through years and years of like you know drops that i've collected and all kinds of um audio and i'm looking because there's one piece of audio that we've only used once and it was in the i think the intro to the hot dog show that we did and it's me saying like i can't get into the difference between hot dogs and sausages and it was like me off mic like saying that to you does this ring a bell to you at all and i was kind of like i we just we just can't get into that we just i'm in this very serious producer way like i can't get into the difference between hot dogs and sausages today well maybe we can get into it a little bit or something and it's driving me bananas that i cannot find that tape now and you type hot dog into my uh into my audio collection unfortunately you get a lot of results

Yeah, I want to say that me being in Frankfurt and eating a Frankfurter or a hot dog is going to really re-up the energy around us and hot dogs, in particular you and hot dogs, Andrew. I love hot dogs. Now, I want to be careful about this because it's a miracle we have any listeners, and it's a miracle we have listeners who want to take the time to send us content or send us keychains or whatever. But I would say there was, there has been, there have been a period, what is the, I'm trying to think of how I, how to phrase this. There, there has been a, there have been a number of years during which one of the number one things we receive is hot dog related stuff, links, stories, like, and that is just starting to die down. And now I'm going to reanimate that by doing a hot dog episode where I'm meeting a Frankfurter from Frankfurt.

Well, let me, here, I have a piece of tape here called Hot Dog Show Outtake One. I don't even think this is what I was looking for, but let's hope. It's going to be good. Let's hope that it's not you and I like screaming at each other over hot dogs like in the background. I don't want to get into the hot dog versus sausage thing. Well, I might have to. We'll figure it out. I might have to. You guide me, hot dog story. You guide me. I don't try to define where this hot dog is. I can't tell what is you and what is you on tape. Have you been talking on this or is this all the tape, Luke?

That was all tape, but I would just like to say that was exactly what you were hoping to find.

That was exactly the tape I was looking for, yeah.

It's a day after Christmas miracle.

Yeah, I'll play the whole thing at the end of the show, but we do have a quiz for today. Oh, but wait, wait, we have to get into the plan for tomorrow's TBTL from Germany, or you being in Germany. How is this going to work? Do you want to be like a guest on the show, like I'm kind of hosting the show and then I bring you on from Germany? Are you going to be prepared enough there? Like, are you going to have some sort of a setup where you can actually, like, do the show the way we usually do it? Have you thought about this? Is it too early to tell?

I have thought about it. I think I'll just bring my gear, my normal gear, because it's not that much stuff. And, like, initially I was like, no, I'll just be on the phone with Andrew. But, like, I mean, why not? Like, first of all, I have a friend who lives in Germany, and I was texting her. I was like, Hey, what, like, what's the scoop in Frankfurt, uh, this week that they, you know, these days that I'll be there. And she was like, Oh yeah, it's all closed down. Oh, she's like, she's like, we take it, we take Christmas hella serious. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, maybe not the whole week, but definitely like it's not, it's not a highly active time, um, for, for stores and for things, because again, Christmas is very much associated with Germany goes pretty ham on the Christmas stuff i'm i'm led to believe um so anyway all that is to say i don't have a lot going on i'm gonna fly i can and i can bring my little microphone and my newly revived mix pre machinery uh and i should be able to do the show from there and then check in with you i mean it'll be like i don't know it'll be like 10 o'clock at night for me or something but it should be it should be um i'm pretty doable i think that'd be kind of fun i i feel like it would be fun for listeners to hear me originating from a whole entire other continent that's great yeah and

it's also easier on me if we're going to stick with our regular roles of you because like i like hosting tbtl but like there's a there's a rhythm that you get into when you host a show every day you know even my old night show on cairo radio like i never claimed to be good at it but obviously day 100 of doing it was a lot easier than like day one because you just kind of get Thank you.

into a rhythm and a pattern with your intros or whatever whereas so when you're out i kind of got to get myself into that mindset again and probably do a little bit more prep so if you're ready to just like you know be do the main hosting responsibilities from there i can just sleep into the last minute like i always do and just drag my ass in here and ruin the show um actually

wouldn't you're the one that should be in germany think about how i think how awake you would be

at 10 o'clock at night that's prime andy time it'll be seven o'clock i think your time by the

away 10 a.m. night time but even so yeah seven o'clock you're ripped roaring like that's that's when you we need to set this up so that you know we dial up at like you know 8 a.m. local time for me but somehow it's like 5 p.m. where you are or whatever your most like energetic hour of the day

is and then and then we're good to go I think my most energetic hour of the day is probably one one o'clock or two o'clock depending on how much soup I've had for lunch and nobody knows how my

body processes soup that's i think by the way this is what always happens with these winter and summer games is someone has worked hard to put together some kind of game yeah and then we end up just going on some kind of tangent or flight of fancy i think it's a very interesting question what your most active and least active hour of the waking day is because obviously our least active for most of us would be like 3 a.m but as far as the times when we're mostly awake as you know normal nine to five schedule people I would say that my most awake hour is probably 9 a.m. because I've been up for a while but I've still got energy I've got a lot of coffee in me like 9 a.m. I'm feeling like yes uh 3 p.m. 4 p.m. I am low gee it does not matter how much sleep I got between three and five I could go to sleep if I were to close my eyes at any time that's just my low point and then if i power through that because sometimes it'll be like five and i'm literally thinking to myself i'm going to bed at like seven tonight this is forget it like i'm my my lids are getting heavy it's it's five in the afternoon and then i'll have a little dinner i'll watch some chris hayes i'll kind of i'll get my second wind and then i'm up till you know 11 12 at night but i am so so sleepy between three and five yeah i can see that and then you think i'm gonna go to

bit early but then somehow you power through like for me a lot of it's tick tock related and i'm just like i just am a night owl like like we're in the winter games now which means i don't have to you know with the exception of like the the show i'm recording with you tomorrow which will be you know a specific set time like i don't have to wake up for any particular reason as long as i get all my work done and like you know i've been working later into the evening and also just like working on tbtl not related projects until late at night and i know during the winter games my habits are going to get so bad that i'm going to be going to bed like at three o'clock 3 30 in the morning um that's just what i naturally do um but i know why by the way why this is we probably

talked about this like maybe during the pandemic or some other time there's a lot of people who really like being awake late at night report that part of what the appeal is is that no one has any expectation of you during those hours there's you're not going to get a work email now obviously our jobs are kind of sort of unique to us but like generally speaking there are a lot of people who really enjoy the wee hours of the morning or late night because it's sort of your time it's like you're not going to be getting an email from your boss saying like um can you quickly send me over this thing even your friends might not have any expectations of you it just feels like your special time where there's nobody bothering you and that's a really good feeling for folks yeah and for me

it's like it's not even about emails or whatever like that that kind of and i know you're just using that as an example but like that kind of communication it's just sort of like i don't know we're receiving messages everybody these days is receiving messages kind of around the clock and you get to it when you get to it and you just get your job done but i do think what you described reminds me of a sensation that I had a couple of weeks ago and I I'm only really kind of considering it like outwardly right now for the very first time but I believe Genevieve was out for the evening and I had the house to myself and I want to stress again when Genevieve is home there is nothing put upon me like I do the same exact thing if Genevieve is home she's probably upstairs working on a sewing project and binge watching some tv show and I am probably downstairs in the basement listening to the dan levitard show throwing darts like i mean we we communicate i'm not trying to make it sound like we're living in some chilly upstairs downstairs situation that might sound that might sound depressing to some people because they you know a lot of people love watching tv together and everything like that's just not i'm not a big tv person and so like you know i don't get upset if genevieve watches a show that i want to watch or whatever because I'm never going to to sit down to watch it anyway i like to play my darts listen to my show she's got her projects we're we're doing our own things if genevieve's not home i'm still playing darts and listening to the levitard show there's no difference at all but a couple of weeks ago um we're doing that genevieve's out for the evening and then she comes home and i think i'm thinking about maybe going to bed and then she goes to bed and then again this is the way i'm describing this probably makes it sound so depressing but i almost got like a second wind i was like oh genevieve's asleep now and i kind of realized that there was a little part of me that was like while Genevieve was out thinking well eventually Genevieve is going to get home and we're going to talk a bit about our nights or whatever but then once she went to bed it was kind of like and I didn't have to wake up the next day it must have been a weekend night I was like I have no restrictions I can stay up and I think I was pretty deep into like some sort of project that I was I was obsessing over on the computer and I was like when I get in that mode I'm just like oh man this is really my time now it's like 1 32 o'clock at night i don't have to wake up tomorrow you've pushed through there's absolutely unless there's an emergency that happens like i'm easily here until three or four in the morning just working on a dumb project or throwing darts or what have you yeah no i mean you i i've said

this many times on the show i based on our personality styles and also our work styles like i feel like you're very organized you're very on it it's shocking to me that i'm the morning person in our friendship and not you because everything about us make it would seem to point towards you'd be the morning person and i wouldn't be but that's not the case yeah that is

true like kind of like kind of get everything done like i'm a man you're just you're just so

much more organized than me and you like i mean you you you just are you're detail oriented you you follow through you don't let things drop you're like you're very on it like it would seem that you'd be like okay i'm i'm up i'm doing all my stuff i'm sending it over and i'm the one who's usually just like wait what day is it like it's it's that's a surprising sort of uh what we call

divergence in how we sort of tend to operate no that is true and um let's see so so um today is tuesday i will not stay up all night tonight because uh we'll do a tbtl at regular time pacific time and then that'll be like an evening for you in frankfurt we'll do a regular show tomorrow i'm really looking forward to hearing what's going on over there me too i'm also really

looking forward andrew to hearing about today's winter game yes this comes from our friend bill

in kingston oh bill of former toronto and now exactly and bill uh traditionally submits games for us during our winter and summer games again not affiliated with the ioc no but i can play that music again if you want sure yeah i don't i always like to hear music whatever the music is i'm into

it this is the music of the thing we're not doing i want to be very clear isn't this called like bugler's dream or something i don't know i'm not kidding i think that the technical name for this is like fanfare of the olympics bugler's dream the important

thing though is when listeners hear that music they should not think about the olympics because we're playing that to remind you that we're not associated with the olympics it's all very clear um but bill has submitted a quiz for us he says here's a selection of quotes from either jack handy or stephen wright stephen wright of course the very droll dry comedian jack handy not a real person right just a character like no a real person oh jack handy is a real person it's not

a nom de plume of somebody who wrote for SNL no he I think he was real because he then wrote a book um and uh and and was promoting it and I was like I that might have been when I learned that that was not just a made-up you know obviously when I was a kid Jack Handy's deep thoughts on SNL was like everything to me it was probably like the first kind of would you call it surreal humor

it's so funny you said that because I just looked it up on Wikipedia Jack Handy and um he's best known for his deep thoughts by jack handy a large body of surrealistic oh no one-liner jokes

i i mean it was that was a real kind of revelation for me as a kid to to to he you know and of course i can't i i can only think of one jack handy deep thought which is like which is like oh i'm not even remembering it right but it was it was like you know something like if you ever fall off of a building try to act like you're a mannequin because then somebody might try to catch you because like hey free mannequin like that's a terrible that's a terrible like 35 year old memory of how that joke went but like i just remember being a kid and just being like this you can do this on snl like you can just like say these like completely loony words that are great and funny um so yeah i was a big jack candy fan but i assumed that that was just like a made-up person, but yeah. Yeah, I always did, too. And I bet you we've had that conversation on the show before, too. But I feel like in my head, I still categorize Jack Handy as a made up name. And people were contributing to this idea of deep thoughts by Jack Handy. But he's a real humorous. But the point of this quiz from listener Bill is we're going to get a quote and then we have to guess if it's Jack Handy or Stephen Wright. And I basically you and I can both make guesses here and then I'll click a button to find out if we were right or wrong. Now, the problem here is, Luke, I don't know if it's a problem or a blessing, but there are 25 of these. I don't think we're going to be getting to all 25, but maybe I'll skip around a little bit here. Are you laughing because you've started this?

I'm laughing because while we're doing this, I also want to favor you with some top Jack Handy deep thoughts.

Well, you can't, though, because that's the quiz. Don't be Googling Jack Handy deep thoughts because we're about to read a bunch, and you have to guess whether it's a Stephen Wright or Jack Handy.

That was one flaw in my plan.

Yeah, exactly. I have a feeling you're going to do really well. Okay, who said this? Whenever I think of the past, it brings back so many memories. Was that Jack Handy or Stephen Wright? By the way, I don't know. I will make a guess with you. I'm going to guess Stephen Wright.

That sounds like a Stephen Wright to me.

Okay, Stephen Wright. I'm going to click on a little doohickey. Hey, look at us. We are both perfect in every way. That's the sound we make when we get one right. Lori got offended that I used the word puke, but to me, that's what her dinner tasted like. Who? Lori? Yeah, this is a strange one. Lori got offended that I used the word puke, but to me, that's what her dinner tasted like. Huh. I'm going to go Jack Handy.

It seems a little, yeah, it doesn't, I can't. I can't imagine Stephen Wright saying that because for all of his low keyness, I feel like his jokes were never like him saying someone's dinner tasted like puke.

It's too aggressive.

It doesn't seem like a Stephen Wright thing. So I think I'm going to go with Jack Handy as well.

Yeah, and frankly, it doesn't seem like either one of them. But I think Jack Handy is closest. Let's click on Jack Handy. And we got the green checkmark. Nice. I'm just going to do that every time we win. Here's another one here. I'm going to skip around a little bit here. How about this one?

Okay.

Eagles may soar. Wait, no, that's putting my finger on the scale. Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines. Eagles may soar. Now, do you want me to do it in both of the voices? Yeah, could you please? Eagles may soar. Which one is that? That's really terrible. I don't do a good Stephen Wright. Never mind, I'm bailing on that bit

Eagles, this is also bad but like Let me get into the zone with Stephen Wright By doing one of the jokes that I ripped off From Stephen Wright for the Snow King Kiwanis Club Stars of Tomorrow talent show I used to have a pony That was involved in an electrical accident All its hair was removed Except for its tail Now I just rent it out to Hari Krishna birthday parties Wow Okay, now I'm in the zone Don't take me out of the zone What's the line? Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines

It'd be funny if this was a Jack Handy We don't even know if that's Stephen Wright or Jack Handy yet

Also, I feel like the And now, Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy I'm trying to remember who did that The VO for that on SNL Was someone who's not Jack Handy I feel like it was either Phil Hartman Or it might have been like Kevin Nealon or something And then I think Jack Handy Would actually read the You know, if you're ever falling off a building Go limp and pretend like you're a mannequin And now Phil Hartman, baby!

Yep, that's Phil Hartman Nailed it It's also very it's giving 2001 sort of as well with that

okay so let's see

weasels

that's again some of these ones don't sound like I can't quite hear either one

of them yeah me too I'm going handy myself

I'm going Stephen Wright let's make it

interesting I'm going handy myself yeah you are oh you are correct I am incorrect

so it was Stephen Wright

that was Stephen Wright you were right I clicked on Jack Handy and I got the big red X how about this one yeah sorry I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met oh that's Stephen Wright that's gotta be Stephen Wright come on let's see here I'm gonna start this early Just a quick reminder, we are in no way associated with the Olympics.

No, that's to demonstrate the thing we're not associated with.

If we were associated with the Olympics, do you think we'd use that music? It's so on the nose.

Obviously. No, that's reminding you of the thing we have zero connection to. Okay. We're doing pretty well here. What's the next one?

We're doing pretty well. I'm moving around here. I'm trying to pick ones that I like. So I'm reading this dry here. I have no idea what's coming. Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine. Did you just see it on your Jack Handy sheet?

No, I just know this from my youth. How does it finish? Dad always said laughter is the best medicine. I forget how it ends.

Which is why several of us died of tuberculosis. This is one that I can see either one doing, but I was going to go with right, maybe? Oh, I was going to go with Jack Handy, but let's find out together. Do you agree, though, that this is the one is like this is the perfect question because you could really see it's really good but i have a

vague i again my memory is is faulty as hell but part of me seems to remember this as a jack handy thing but i could be wrong i could be wrong i'm ready to be wrong so i'm going to click on

jack handy and if you get a green check mark here it means you're right and i'm wrong huh it's an orange circle nope you're right it's a green check mark correct congratulations You don't have to come over And put an L on your forehead So that's a Jack Handy That was a Jack Handy, exactly Let's see here

That's his real name, right? That is his real name Because as I'm saying it now I just heard it Andrew, I'm 47 years old And I love, love, love The Deep Thoughts with Jack Handy Bit on SNL And I just heard it That way for the first time

Yeah, it's suggestive

It is suggestive I guess unintentionally so Because this is a real person Their name happens to be Jack Handy

How long have we been recording? I'm trying to figure out how many more of these we have to do Maybe one more

I'm guessing we're at around 25 minutes into the show

28 minutes it looks like

I also love Shallow Thoughts with Slab Jackie Can you write that down?

Can you email me that? As a possible show title Because I'm struggling on a lot of things here Alright So here's what I'm gonna click back over here. How about this one? If people from Poland are called Poles Why aren't people from Holland called holes?

I think there's a good answer for that, but yeah, there's it seems like I'm actually that I think that's beneath both of them Like because Holland they would be called Halls if anything. Yeah, all in POL

That's I'm going Stephen Wright, but I don't know man. I'm going Stephen Wright. I'm not on his best day Okay, Stephen Wright, when he's just woken up, but he still hasn't, you know, it's not nine o'clock Luke here.

Right, no, this is not prime Stephen Wright, this is Stephen Wright, a low-gee, even more low-gee than normal Stephen Wright.

Oh my God, could you imagine, an even low-gier Stephen Wright. The good news is, we are both correct, that is a Stephen Wright spoof.

Okay, excellent.

Okay, I'm going to read you one more, one last one, and this is it.

Please, here's what my investment in this segment now is, Andrew, and even this winter game writ large. I hope to God the next one you read isn't the Jack Handy one I want to tell you when we're all said and done that I already did see because it's so flippin' funny.

Okay, well, I'm going to choose one here that I'm going to tell you right away I'm pretty sure is Jack Handy. It just sounds like him, but we have to make a final determination. I'm also curious to know if this is the one that you want to share. Probably is. If trees could scream. Is that it, really?

That's the one, dang it. Is it really?

It really is. Say it how you were going to say it off the top of your head.

If trees could scream, would we really be so cavalier about cutting them down? Maybe if they screamed all the time for no reason. How close was I? That is exact.

The actual quote is, if trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might if they screamed all the time for no good reason. That is such a good joke. That's just a spectacularly good joke.

Very, very good. Let's see. I'm just trying to find some other one. I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate, and I can picture us attacking that world because they'd never expect it. Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. that way when you criticize them you're a mile away from them and you have their shoes

it helps when I step on the punchline I remember that one wow

One last one here.

Bill's like, why did I make a quiz? I could have just sent you a bunch of quotes to read straight. I know.

I'm just reading these without any pre-reading either. I don't even know how this one ends, but I'm going to take a chance. I hope if dogs ever take over the world and they choose a king, they don't just go by size because I bet there are some chihuahuas with some good ideas. There you go. All right. That's amazing. Bill, thank you for connecting us up to some degree with the work of Stephen Wright, but maybe to a larger degree with the work of Jack Handy. We've got to thank some donors of the day. These are the generous folks keeping TBTL chugging along. Their financial donations are how this show exists. No donors, no Rachel Potestas of Kalamazoo, Michigan. No TBTL, Andrew. It's that simple.

Thank you, Rachel, for allowing us to read old jokes from the 90s.

You don't have to be a deep thinker to understand that that's how this entire operation works. Wonderful, generous folks like Rachel donate to the program. and then we use that money to pay ourselves to do the job and also John Sklaroff and then we do the show five days a week and we do winter games and summer games. This thing never stops. This content machine never stops. It never stops rolling. No, it doesn't. Nothing can stop it, even though people have tried. People have tried, yes. Certain jurisdictions. Certain radio stations, actually. People who appreciate good content have tried. Nobody's been able to defeat TBTL yet. Yep, even the Rodfather. Thank you, Rachel. Also, thanks to Alexa, Raider of Everett, Washington. Thank you, Alexa. Appreciate you. Thanks also to Annette Sakab Tan of Livonia, Michigan. Oh, my. Livonia. I've got Livonia stories.

Wait, is it definitely? It's definitely Livonia, right? Oh, yes. And it's spelled with a lowercase L there to trick us?

I don't think the lowercase L is accurate, but everything else I can. Boy, I've got. This has come up on the show before. But I stayed in Livonia when I was covering the Super Bowl. Oh, that's where you stayed.

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I was there a solid week. And nobody at NPR was looking for lead-up to the Super Bowl stories. So I basically had a kind of unsupervised week in Livonia, Michigan. And I got up to some hijinks.

Yeah. Were any of the refs staying in Livonia?

Boy, I wish I would have known. I would have gone and, with the benefit of hindsight, found them and given them a stern talking to. I don't know if Annette was there back in those days, but that's where Annette is now. And Annette is supporting TBTL. Thank you so much. Thank you also to Cecilia Hanley of Atlanta, GA.

There's a familiar name, Atlanta. That's right. No, Cecilia. Thank you, Cecilia, for donating all these years.

Thank you also to Robert Rowe, who's out there in Issaquah, Washington. Oh, nice. one of my favorite places to go to taco time oh really yeah that's what i've got a lot of favorites but it's it's culturally issaquah there's different places where like the like so basically you go through issaquah as you're if you're coming from seattle and maybe going on a long road trip you're going east on i-90 and you're heading out over the snoqualmie pass and and and all along that kind of highway and byway and uh sometimes you like to just refuel you like to get yourself uh some taco time there in issaquah before you head on the rest of your long journey like it it you know it does a body good it fuels you for a long drive sure absolutely that's that's what it says on the sign i believe it does welcome to issaquah last taco time for 150 miles then you get over in eastern washington you catch a few as robert knows but thank you Robert you know if you if you took I-90 Andrew and you took it I think to its extreme terminus you might hit Joseph Shin in Boston Massachusetts you go Joseph why are you standing on I-90 right

now yeah what are you doing just hit you yeah oh my gosh that reminds me that reminds me of what

I think might be the greatest New Yorker cartoon I've ever seen Andrew and that's really saying something is it i tell you about this your dog on the internet did i tell you about this on i had this honestly like a note to myself to bring this up with you so apologies if if a few weeks ago i mentioned this but it's um it's a man and woman and they're in the car they're in a car the man is driving and the man's kind of distracted and unfortunately it turns out that he's kind of hit he's sort of bumping Thank you. An older woman We can tell because of the way her hair is drawn And she's maybe tossing a walker up in the air And the woman says to the man You're turning into your mother

I'm having trouble following this

He's turning the car Into his mother accidentally

It's wordplay

Maybe that's one of those Things you gotta see To understand it but it really got me Because I was like wait a minute what's happening He's like, you know, he's kind of crashing, crashing his car into this older person. But no, he's literally, I think that also the way they drew it, you knew it was a low speed event. So it's not like he's not like the mother is more annoyed than than maybe injured. Yeah. But it's like you need to be you need to be. You got to make sure that this is maybe where the drawing is also important. You need to know the stakes aren't that high. But the idea that he was literally turning into his mother and his wife presumably is saying you're turning into your mother.

Ah, well, that raises something that's been on my mind a lot lately that I was going to give up on. but I actually want to raise with you some production-related thing. But let's just make sure. So in the clear, we did thank Joseph Shin of Boston, Massachusetts. We did. After possibly crashing into him in our vehicle

and then reading or reciting a New Yorker joke that didn't work as a purely audio product.

Exactly. So thank you to all of our donors today. Now here's the production meeting I want to have on the air before we get out of here. I suggested something to you months ago now That This is kind of rare for us too I could tell you were straight up Not into this idea as TVTL content Do you remember what this was? Why are we doing this at the end of the show and at the beginning? I know I think this is actually interesting But I don't think But we'll have plenty to talk about with you in Germany tomorrow But maybe we can continue this I gotta get to the airport So back in November I visited my folks And they gave me a rebooted Farside 2024 off the

Wall calendar I didn't think this was a bad idea it's a

Page a day calendar and I said is there any Chance that we kick off the show maybe The problem is kicking off the show with it but Like instead of doing a weigh in at the Beginning of the show or like whatever you guys Used to do in the radio days what if My original idea was what if I read To you one far Like I describe it to you and I read to you The caption of one Farside joke a day Based on this page a day calendar It would that be funny and it's potentially excruciating delivery right um and i got the impression that you were very not into that idea um maybe i'm wrong about that but then i but i have this calendar and i'm so excited for january 1st to get here so i can start peeling it away like genevieve ask genevieve how excited every time i pass this calendar that i have propped up in the hallway i say i can't wait to break into my new far side calendar and so i every time i see it i've been brainstorming how can I make this idea better do you think it would be fun or funnier if we found a person a listener or somebody from our lives or something somebody else to try to read and describe the far side cartoon every day and I play it for you in the show at some point if they're on the telephone on the telephone somebody that's what I like on the telephone I like and try to describe it produce a bunch of these right i would like we couldn't i was thinking we could do like this actually we could do like a month of one person a month of another person or we could just like choose somebody and have them do it and they and i send them like i could take photos of the page a day calendar and just like i need you to call in and just like leave a voicemail for each and

don't even try to like i i think that would make this by the way i didn't think it was a terrible idea when you proposed it probably what you heard was a certain like a pause where you know my where you're processing it where i'm and where i'm thinking through like what do i think is the most entertaining way to to present this and dispense this like i think it's a good idea you know me i love regularity on the show you love to be regular i know that the listeners would be shocked to hear that i like also am sometimes actually thinking what is the most entertaining way to do this and then i usually do the opposite but i'm thinking about what the most entertaining way to do it is that was my thought i think this is a good idea but i think like i don't think we Want this to be something where a person is taking five minutes to try to sell us on anything? I honestly think a kind of a dispassionate Description like today

It's a so we see two cavemen today

It's two lions and one is looking at the other one and one is saying this right exactly and of message right and so yeah

We don't want it to be super long. I have one idea and we rate them

I see here's what I like to about this. We are getting the well You're kind of not because you're taking the photograph I mean really what you need to do is mail this calendar To someone and never look at it again

Nobody's touching my god damn calendar It's the only one that's going to bring me joy in 2020

What I like is The idea that we're Basically experiencing These Farside cartoons The way the listener is

right like we're hearing someone describe it over the phone to us and then we have to kind of try to make sense of it or enjoy it say that's a good one or that one doesn't make sense we're kind of riding along with the listeners because none of us have the visual information but you will in fact

have the visual information and I was also thinking like it might be funnier if the person is not particularly good at it um but anyway I have at least one idea of who this person could be but I'm not going to say that my mom because they might hear maybe that'd be pretty funny that would be funny could this is no this is no disrespect to your mom but like could we count on that being like a regular thing that i get in time and that i'm not hounding her to get it no you'd have

to really do well you know no my mom's pretty reliable with this stuff but what you'd have to do is like we'd probably need her to knock out like 20 of them at a time yeah it turns into a

production session yeah exactly no i mean you'd have to be like it so okay we'll figure out who

we should have do it but i'm i'm pro this idea like i really wasn't i didn't i mean there's a lot of other a lot of other things i thought you were going to bring up that i am very down on that you've suggested but that was not the thing that i thought you were going to i just think it would

be so weird if a podcast in the year of 2024 spends even if it's just like 90 seconds or less a show but every single day just describes a far side joke from the 90s that is so weird I think we can maybe find a way to make it work But anyway Then my parents can write off the calendar On their taxes for work related Spending

And that's really what this is Is a tax dodge For the Walshes of Burgundy Bay, Ohio

Alright We should get out of here

We really should

We're making some good plans for the future I'm excited about this

I'm excited about tomorrow when I'm in Germany Eating a hot dog

And you're hosting the show I don't even have to do an intro I know.

Things just keep getting better for you. I know. I might take tomorrow off, actually. Okay. I'm solo hosting the Moxie in downtown Frankfurt. All right. Thanks, everyone, for listening. We will be back here tomorrow with more Imaginary Radio for you, so please do join us for that. In the meantime, have a great Tuesday. Take care of yourselves, and please remember, no mountain too tall. Good luck to all.

Power out.