Muse

If you've got a problem that you can't solve, if you're known for your drawings of ships that are tall, if you've got grites, if you've got dreams, if you've got something to say, then call the TBTO voicemail line today. Just dial 206-414-8285. That's 206-414-8285. The voicemail's ready to record you, and it's so easy to call Burbank and Waltz. In the Bay City.

TBTL.

He's the handsome devil that came down from heaven to make some great songs and a dance forever. You don't say much for him, but when you do, it's to the point and I salute you for it.

Listen, I'm not one of those college types that's going to talk your ear off. I bought a balloon and it doesn't mean I think I'm better than everybody else. This is the real thing. This is the necessary art of our time. This needs respect. So let's keep the drinks full, let's keep the appetizers circulating, but let's not get in anybody's face.

All right, hello, good morning, and welcome everyone to a Wednesday edition of TBTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. And boom goes the dynamite. My name is Luke Burbank, I am your host.

In case you're wondering what's going on here, I'm having an absolutely fabulous time.

Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio perched high above the mighty Columbia, where we are bracing for some very rainy weather. Didn't know you like to get wet, though. Trying to get the last bit of cedar shingles up on the house before the deluge moves in. And when I say we're trying, I mean my dad, Walt, is trying. I'm in here talking to all of you in the warm, dry confines of the Broadcast Center, presenting you with episode 4131 in a collector's series. Let the fun begin. Yesterday was, well, it was a fairly typical episode of TBTL in that I promoted some stories that I wanted to talk about and then spent 45 minutes discussing the fine points of trying to move a refrigerator out of your house and unload it via Craigslist. Did I get to any of the stories that we promoted? The answer, sadly, is not yes. Will we get to them today? I'm standing here before you telling you that we're going to talk about bunk journalism in the New York Times and New York Post, but I said that yesterday, and we didn't get to it. Maybe the only person who knows the answer to this question is this guy, the longest-running co-bro of the show. I'm an activist and house party enthusiast. Maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. He's Andrew Wills. She's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

It's a bittersweet day, Luke. I'm not sure if you realize that. Do you realize that this is sort of the, today marks the end of a short-lived but special era in the annals of TBTL?

No, but I'm intrigued.

You haven't been following this? So, a little recap here. On Monday, you and I woke up, and we recorded an episode of TBTL together. That episode number was 4,129. We posted that show on Monday, January 29th. Yesterday.

Oh, fun. I see what's happening.

Yesterday, episode 4,130, we posted that, Luke, on January 30th. Today, episode 4131, being posted on January 31. It's exciting. Tomorrow it all goes to pot

How fun You don't believe in a God

All you have to do All you have to do is record 4,130 episodes To achieve this miracle

I wonder how frequently That has happened over the many Many years of doing this Where the show numbers kind of line up Because we do have the added Kind of you know I don't know wild card element of the fact that I regularly misnumber the shows well I mean we've tightened down on that I would say I've gotten better about that can I get a little please can I get a little respect from mostly the listeners on this point I mean you still get it wrong but

I correct it so you know maybe I should be getting that credit you know another thing that we sort of slept on while we're talking numerology here are we talking numerology we are my friend and

Next week, we're talking phrenology, studying the bumps on your head.

Oh, great. But we started off the year with a Monday as January 1st. I think that's pretty special, too. That first week of January was really something. You had Monday the 1st, Wednesday the 3rd, Friday the 5th, things in between there as well.

Like, that is just a clean week. That is beautiful. I love that. Do you find yourself seeing that kind of synchronicity in the world? Do your eyes go towards that?

It's calendar stuff specifically. Like, that really literally was very satisfying for me when I was dating show sheets or whatever. Like, having any month that has the Monday begin with the one, I like. Now you're going to have people come at me, Luke. Obviously, a lot of people are coming at me right now. The haters. Yeah, just block them out. Technically, Sunday's the first day of the week. Yeah. I know, Einstein. Like, settle down. We got that. But there's still something very clean.

Hey, I'm sorry. I didn't see you there. I was too busy blocking out the haters. Is that, I mean, have we decided that Sunday is the first day of the week?

Yeah. I mean, it's been established, sure. All right.

I don't think of it. I did just actually look at a calendar that very much shows Sunday is the first day. I guess it is how we lay it out. Yeah, but, I mean, okay. we've decided with the calendars when we're displaying this we're going to put Sunday out there as the first thing. But do we culturally emotionally think of Sunday as the first day of the week? Absolutely not. We think of Monday as the first day of the week. You know, I mean

culturally, yeah, we think of Monday oh, you know, Sunday ends the weekend and then Monday you get going. But I mean, I I'm looking it up now. I mean, I thought officially we learned it in school. I didn't think it was just a calendar thing. I thought it was like i thought that was something we all learned in school and we all think is stupid the first time we hear it but then this is the first time i'm hearing this really so this is not amazing i got

47 years into this life before i your life is beautiful but you're also getting in my head

about this like what if i'm just wrong or what if times have changed since i was taught this in 1983 like uh okay i do see some people saying why is sunday considered the first day of the week instead of monday but i am wondering like are we not teaching is this new math like is monday no key

is gen z uh no cap is gen z being taught this important lesson which is that sunday is the the first day of the week i mean again it's what's written on the calendars but i defy you to find a person who wakes up on a sunday and goes okay time to face the new week time yeah exactly nobody

talks about the Saturday scaries rise and grind yeah no I'm slay all day I'm with you but I mean also that's always been one of those frustrating facts the same way there's an extra R in February

but we all try to abide by it well you've got you've got to deal with that for 28 days here or is this one of those Februaries where we do we go it is a sleep here I just learned that yesterday

I just learned that yesterday we're gonna have to pull out our uh leap leap day William tape

from pretty rocky proud tradition absolutely i i wonder if that idea of establishing sunday as the first day if it predates the weekend what is this weekend you're speaking of like if if that you know start are we which are we on the gregorian are we on the augustine calendar we're on some kind of a calendar that goes that's more the months i guess but like i just wonder if if sunday being the first day that we see when we look at a calendar if that's because when they did that it wasn't a special day it wasn't a weekend it's farmers i almost get it always comes

back to the farmers i don't have any evidence on this but it's got to be the farmers you think

just something with the crops some kind of like with the um you know it's like with all of the daylight saving yeah time etc speaking of which i recorded a commentary for a cbs television back when i was in new york and the look i'm just between you me and the tbtl listeners i don't i'm not going to win any daytime emmys for these commentaries that i do it's it's kind of fun maybe i get one reasonably interesting joke uh into one of them or maybe a slightly wry observation but but but look i'm not i'm not i'm not going to tell you that i'm overly proud of the work and what i'm especially not overly proud of andrew is i did one um which again may or may not air about it's supposed to air on the on the sunday that we um spring ahead and i'm just kind of making the case that like it's a it's a it's a great day and we should all be very excited for it in fact maybe we should spring ahead three hours next year which is an obviously ludicrous proposition but when i tell you that i was walking into the studio to record this for national television with it completely backward as to if we were going on to daylight saving time or going on to standard time and it's like in the teleprompter i'm like about to start talking and then amy wall our our fact checker goes i you might have this backwards she hands she hands me a printout and i was like i don't think so i looked at becca and i go can you google this for me please i did not believe that the fact checker at cbs uh sunday morning was right she was right by the way i was about to record a commentary with the exact opposite thing of what i was trying to

say which is yeah like so when you when this thing drops we will be entering daylight saving time right because we're saving daylight and you

have i thought but i much like starting the week with sunday which none of us do in our head i think calling what we're going to enter in march daylight saving time is very misleading because it sounds like we're saving daylight like we that means to me it's like if you're if you're i'm gonna save some money i got my paycheck and i'm gonna save some money you're putting it away you're saving it you sort of you don't have less of it but you're not showing it around how you see you

you see it as like a lock but you see it as a vault that i see daylight saving as like we have

it's okay everyone it's gonna get dark at 4 30 but but it's because we're saving that daylight we're hiding it away somewhere and we're gonna get it later that's how my mind thinks of daylight saving it should be called daylight extending we're gonna have more daylight guess what we're doing here we're extending it it should i didn't put that in the commentary that would have been

a good line andrew can they punch this in in three two one um that's interesting why don't

they make the plane out of the daylight extending i don't know but you know what i mean don't you think daylight saving time meaning you're going to get more daylight is kind of slightly misleading

now that you put it that way i hear it and also i will say this it's always been confusing to me I feel like because this topic has come up, not just on our show, but like nationally and and in the halls of Congress, Luke, in the past five or 10 years, I have had to protection act championed by Marco Rubio. That's why I got the tattoo. That's why I got the Rubio tattoo. But, you know, we've been talking about it so much that I think I've, you know, put more energy and effort into thinking about it. And so now it doesn't seem, well, certainly, but it doesn't seem counterintuitive to me. It sort of seems like, yes, we're like, I don't think of the saving as a vault the way you did. I think it's reasonable to, I just sort of think of, okay, we're entering the summer months now. And so we want to enjoy and appreciate every last speck of daylight. So it's kind of like, that's, that's what I think.

That feels like to me, you're spending the daylight. You're not saving it. Like it's, it's like what I do with my paycheck.

we're saving it for the daytime though we're not letting it bleed over into into nighttime or morning time i don't know i don't know why it makes sense but it's just sort of it's in there

now it's just it's time somebody call it out and i'm gonna do that next year on march 11th for my other commentary although that uh will it be march 11th next year when we spring ahead i mean the other thing is i'm i'm i am not just trying to gin it up for television or for this podcast i do really really get an emotional boost from when we when we spring ahead and when you know when we gain that hour even just uh coming back from las vegas this weekend uh saturday night i was waiting for the lift outside of the hotel and it wasn't even balmy it was probably like 65 degrees but it just felt like it didn't feel bone chilling it didn't feel like it's it wasn't raining and it wasn't like oh my god i can't even be outside which was what i had sort of been dealing with between the weather we had in the northwest and then the weather in new york and there was something about sitting on this little bench waiting for this lift to come get me and just feeling the not being freezing being outside i was like okay this is a preview of what i'm going to be able to enjoy in a matter of a couple of months and i'm telling you it actually was emotionally good for me it was it was exactly what i needed i get it's a big deal to me a bigger deal than it should be i i'm like a you know how like amphibians they can't um they're they're cold blooded they have to lay out on a rock in the sun they can't thermoregulate themselves the way we mammals can that's me emotionally around the topic of daylight and warm weather most people can just generate it for themselves internally in fact you don't even mind it the you know it being a little gray or maybe it getting dark earlier because you're you're you're creating your own enjoyment in life mine is completely dependent on what's going on around me well i think it's really

I mean, it's funny that you had that experience because I try not to be too snide about this. I know this is important to you, and I don't want to just be bickery, but it's so funny how we had opposite reactions because when the warm weather hit here, I think it was like two days ago. I think it was like, so let's say, oh, well, I'm into numerology, so let's say it was the 29th or the 30th, and I'm going outside without a coat on, and it's nearly 60 degrees, and then the next day it was 60 degrees. And I'm literally I stood outside for a couple of hours on Sunday without a jacket on and not suffering, like feeling great. And I'm like, this is January on the West Coast. Dan, you are then Jen, Jen, you are. I'm like, this is the winter that people complain about. It's January. Like the idea of standing outside without a coat in January. I just don't think I'll ever get over how mild it is here. And yes, I mean, and then I told that to Genevieve and she's like, are you shitting me? She's like, we just lived through.

two atmospheric rivers and a pandemic i said the pandemic has nothing to do with this i'm lying i'm

just making that up i'm gonna roll you sounded like you were channeling gene from bob's burgers for a minute the pandemic has that's a terrible eugene merman impression was doing there but

anyway yeah i genevieve was like we just it's it's been so dark and rainy and all this stuff i'm just like yeah and again you just can't convince people who grew up on the west coast or in georgia what it's like in January in Cleveland but it's just relative like it just to me like I remember moving to Seattle and like and like okay gearing up for winter and like your brain my brain was not you know like kind of accustomed to this yet and so this idea for the first couple of years that I lived here where you start to get spring days in late January and even you know in throughout

February it's just like it feels like magic to me yeah I am uh I I'm generally speaking I think I'd rather it was it was clear and cold rather than just whatever we get here. And I've said this on the show many times. I don't have to get back into it, but I feel like my tolerance for the weather in the northwest. It goes down every year, which is the opposite of how it's supposed to work. You're supposed to become, you know, more used to something and then you don't even notice it anymore. But but it's I notice it and talk about it incessantly. Maybe maybe I can stop talking about it now and we can we can thank some donors. We can actually get to those. i mean not only do we have the bunk journalism stories there's a whole sub set of topics andrew that i didn't get to last week including one that if i say it then i guess we're obligated to talk about at some point the i don't usually get into these kind of like movies are you know someone's part of the same cinematic universe even though the movies are actually different you know they're not like sequels there's one that i think is pretty interesting out there involving um the actor steve i'm gonna say it buscemi because that's how terry gross says it

is that how terry gross says it i say yeah i've been saying buscemi for years but again i don't know as have i but i trust terry you think you think terry has fact checkers looking into that

kind of stuff before i think she does and she probably also knows when it's daylight saving

time and when it's standard time we need to do we need to call steve buscemi and see how he answers

the phone. So maybe we'll talk about all of that after we thank some donors. Let's thank some of those donors that I was referencing moments ago. These are the financial lifeblood of the program we would not be able to do the show without all of the people who have decided out of the goodness of their heart and I guess to some degree their enjoyment of TBTL to sponsor the program and we love to thank them and we love that this is our job and we have Anne Keating of Keene, New Hampshire to thank today first off. Thank you, Anne. Yeah, Anne's a long

time listener and a pen pal of the show. I hear from Ann quite a bit. Hi, Ann.

Did you ever visit Keene, New Hampshire when you lived there?

Yeah, I can't. You know, the longer I'm away from New Hampshire, the less I remember about the locations and how they relate to each other. So I don't need to make a fool of myself here, but Keene is definitely a notable place around New Hampshire, for sure.

Thank you, Ann. Thanks also to Kemi Suzuki, who's in Pasadena,

California. I've been there, too. So I went to the 24-hour fitness there one time. It was very nice.

I went to, I think, the first location of Din Tai Fung, which is outside of Pasadena. It's out in kind of like the Altadena area.

Is that in a big, because I was one somewhere out there, but it was kind of in a big fan. It was almost like the Grove 2, like a big fancy mall area, or is that a different one?

This one, which I went to with an ex who was a real knower of things Los Angeles. she said to me we got to go to this place and get these soup dumplings and I lived in like LA LA at the time and I we drove all the way out there it was in a kind of a small like strip mall at the time and there was a line to get in and I was like this is absolutely ridiculous what are we doing here on a Sunday morning this is the start of my week okay I need to be I need to be rising and grinding and then of course uh we went in and got the soup dumplings and to to this day if I ever decide that I'm going to kind of cheat on my generally non-meat lifestyle, if I were to go to Din Tai Fung, I would order exactly the same thing that I was, that I ordered that day or that was ordered for me, which is the soup, the pork soup dumplings, the green beans, and then the pork chopped fried rice. It's a really a bad day for the pigs of the world when I go to Din Tai, but

But what has happened is over the years, and you've been to Din Tai Fung with me and you've observed how sort of caustic I am with the people that work there. Whenever they ask you, have you been in before? I want to say to them, not only have I been here before, I went to the one outside of Pasadena, near where Kami Suzuki lives. And put some respect on my name, please. Like, I feel like I found out about Din Tai Fung before most of the people that work there. And that's a me problem. That's something I really need to relax about.

I will say, generally speaking, the question, have you dined here before, is unnecessary in 95% of American restaurants. This might be the 5%, right? Now, I will say, Din Tai Fung, like, you do have to kind of know, okay, you're kind of ordering for a table. Like, if you've never been there before, you could use a little explanation up front. Yes, fair. But 99%, but did I just go up from 95 to 99? You did. Okay. 99.8% of American restaurants. You're springing ahead. Like, where were, Avivs and I, for our anniversary, like, maybe a month ago or something, Genevieve found a nice restaurant, I think, sort of in the Ballard area. It was a nice time. Small, little, like, Indian-influenced restaurant, but, like, very, very nice. You would have loved, Luke, the interiors of this place. I couldn't, I mean, I just, I mean, from the land, like, one of those places where, like, every little detail has been considered, right? That sounds fun. Yeah, it was great. But the server came up and the first thing she asked was, have you dined with us before? And we're like, no. But it didn't go anywhere from there. It was like, OK, now you order food. Like, you know what I mean? She might have said, OK, I mean, usually there's some sort of spiel. And I feel like it's usually forced. It's a way of the restaurant sort of feeling like it's more of a and we do things differently here. Yeah, like that they're a little bit more special than they are. And again, like I'm not trying to diss on this restaurant or any other. And of course, I can't even think of the name of it. I'll try to send it.

I was intentionally not asking you because I didn't want to lock you up, but I'm curious. I'd like to go to this place.

Yeah, I could look at my calendar from our anniversary date. I'll actually bring you that later in the show because actually I do recommend it. This is a nice place. And so I'm not really complaining about it. They weren't like, you know, high on their own supply in any other way. But I just do think it's a thing now that restaurants feel like they're not fancy enough unless they ask you, have you eaten here before? We're like, no. How does it work? It's like, well, you choose the food you want off of the menu and then you communicate that to me. And we bring it to you in the order in which you request it. Also, we serve beverages. Like, we've done it. We've got it, folks.

My problem, and I don't know if this happens in Painesville, Ohio or not, but that's where Mia Carr is checking in from. Thank you, Mia. Thank you, Mia. My problem is that I can eat, and you've witnessed this, ridiculous amounts of food when I'm hungry. and so when the server is saying if someone asks you know the server well you know if we order like we're ordering three small plates that enough for two people the server will give their opinion but i'm always thinking yeah but you don't know how much i'm about to eat like you're you're describing the amount of food that let's say a typical person who comes in this restaurant might need like i feel like the servers servers generally speaking i think i don't want this to become an anti-server screed because i love servers and i love restaurant people my sister sarah and her husband own a restaurant in Portland, Pollo Bravo, please go there. But like, but like, I feel like the server, when you ask the server, is that gonna be enough? They always say yes, because I think what they don't wanna do is cause you to order more food than you want. And then you're kind of a little bit annoyed with them. Like, I feel like usually when it goes, is that gonna be enough? They go, yeah, that's good for two people. And then in my experience, it's usually not enough because I eat so much and poor Becca is like, she eats at the pace of a more normal person. And I am like horfing down the food and assuming she doesn't even like she didn't even like it because she hasn't inhaled it the way that I do. So when I when someone has a server, is that enough for two people? And they say, yes, I always go. Yeah, but let's just get a little more just to be safe.

And when you do get a little bit more, are you still at the end of the meal feeling like I could have used a little bit more here?

No, usually it's too much food.

It is too much. It's funny.

Like Veeves and I, I think we usually regret the decision.

We walk maybe a different path because I think Veeves and I like Veeves loves ordering a whole and like trying a whole bunch of things. So almost every time it's her and I or her and I and maybe another couple or something. But often just the two of us will be like, you know, Genevieve will pick a bunch of things or we'll pick together. And Genevieve is always team captain on this, though. So she then kind of makes the order for us. And you, though. Yeah. Yeah.

I like that you go with that flow because, you know, you do. I mean, I guess at this point, this many years in Vives knows that, like, the, you know, artisanal cottage cheese is probably off the menu for both.

Oh, sure. Yeah. I mean, we'll talk about in advance. But she's just, first of all, she's less shy than me, I guess, is kind of part of it. Not that I'm not, like, super bashful in restaurants. I can navigate. But, like, I'm not. Genevieve's a natural-born leader, I think, when it comes to this stuff, basically. And also just, like, she is more excited. about food than I am and so she'll want to try this and try that and try that and so like speaking of we went to a dumpling place somewhat recently or oh this place by the way that I referenced earlier is called a rupee bar have you ever been there before no uh check it out check out the photos online I think um again just like a really beautiful little space um but anyway uh uh we always end up getting too much but and it's kind of but the server always seems to I don't know the servers just always are supportive with whatever we want i feel like maybe they maybe they just basically stay out of it yeah i was gonna say if anything like nudging you towards a little bit of extra food um works you know in their favor but yeah i sort of feel like vives and i are our eyes are always bigger than our stomachs when we walk in there we order a bunch of stuff and then the shame starts to settle in like when they start bringing like plate number seven and they're like there's no more room on the table like where can we drag that other table over here like and then and then we're just kind of like and i gotta say and again loved the dinner at rupee bar but one other thing maybe maybe i should have listened to the instructions at the top more the one thing is the very last dish they brought was the um was like the heaviest and richest it was like a lamb shank you know with like with with like kind of heavy spices on it which was delicious but by the time it got to that part of the meal like it was a little bit we took most of that thing home because it was a little bit it was such a heavy way to like sort of end to be the last course you know what i mean are you laughing at something you're seeing

well i'm now i'm just i'm i'm hiking around here uh virtually on 24th avenue where this place rupee bar is and i'm laughing because it is a directly across the street from the apartment building where my first ex-wife lived oh really oh way back in the day and then did it used to be the viking is it in that little is it in that little complex that used to have the the maybe the viking is still there i think it's wait no olaf's oh sorry olaf's there's a bar there called olaf's that i feel like it used to be called back in the day i'm talking like andrew i'm talking like 25 years ago i think it was called viking bar or the viking bar now it's called olaf's but anyway the other thing that's happening to me i'm sorry that i'm being such a weirdo today i don't know why i have weather on the brain but you know how sometimes you talk about how you'll go street view like a location maybe a restaurant you haven't been to before or you have done this occasionally and just kind of get a sense for like what's the vibe the parking like what am i getting into here big fan i have had this happen a couple of times recently and it's it's happening right now as i'm looking at the day that the google car went past rupee bar and olaf's they're on 24th in ballard um it was a beautiful day in seattle it was a blue sky the trees are just in full it was a beautiful spring day and i swear to god looking at this photo andrew i can smell what it smelled like that day and this happened to me recently i was looking up something in portland somewhere i think maybe becca and i were trying to go or whatever and it was and i told her about this i was like the day that the google car took the pictures of that neighborhood it was a beautiful day in portland and it's like i'm like i i'm like kind of mentally transported there because i just i can just feel it you know like anyway i won't i won't belabor this um hillary turner specifically asked i not belabor these things so thank you hillary i was excited to see my own car outside

my house on google maps recently oh hell yeah because for the longest time we moved in here um you know i would see the the former tenants or owners cars or whatever and then at some point And to like, I started to notice, I don't know why I'm looking at my own house on Google Maps so much, maybe sending people links if they're coming over or something. But yeah, I saw, oh, that's our car. It's outside of our house. It's like, welcome to the new era, Google Maps.

That's like, that's like you're a real boy. Yeah. You really live there. You've really put your stank on that place. You're now, you're now in the digital record. Exactly.

By the way, thank you, Hillary Turner.

Yeah, Hillary requested that I, that I not say, put your stank on things. Yeah, yeah. so hillary's in suquamish by the way thank you hillary appreciate you that was uh i believe uh roughly the area where we were doing last year's tv telethon oh yeah right sure kind of that area uh well north of los angeles california which is where elena flores is elena hey elena friend of the show love los angeles we're getting a good southern california representation today we're getting los angeles we're getting past the donuts i promised myself when i saw pasadena on the list i wasn't gonna say pass the donuts but then i but then i did then i uh sold myself out um which is not a surprise to tim little who's in normandy park washington is that a little bit

no is that north of seattle technically i don't know normandy park it's south it's kind of down

i believe it's sort of it's south and towards like maybe the greater burien area it's it's actually normandy park is a really cool little spot like it was it's got some great old kind of

classic neighborhoods uh down there in normandy park oh okay yeah so a little a little bit south of the airport i'm looking at it yeah yeah there's some cool spots down there um des moines you know that kills me to say normandy park a lot of areas that got populated when the airport was getting built up and so you got a lot of cool mid-century stuff going on you got that real you know pan am go go go go 60s when you had all those you know pilots and their families were building these mid-century homes near the airport, and there's some, yeah, some really cool spots down there. So thank you, Tim Little, for checking in from Normandy Park. Thank you to all of our donors for making today's episode of TBTL possible. Couldn't do this without you. Hello, and welcome to Top Story. Speaking of housing, Andrew, I saw a headline in the New york times the other day uh which was the best part of tiny living question mark the freedom we've created for ourselves that's a quote from the people in the article and there's no end of writing about tiny living and and you know tiny homes and also just decluttering you know i feel like we're we've i wouldn't say moved past the marie kondo thing but it's i feel like we're on the we're sort of on the backside of the of the Marie Kondo decluttering craze I feel it was all

anybody was talking about for a while yeah I think I actually saw a direct like opposite response just recently like a trend I mean anybody we're recluttering now honestly yeah like enjoy the things you love oh you know what an argument for maximalism sort of I think I saw that article yeah it was only a matter of time right sure yeah there's so much though that's written about you

know living with less stuff and tiny homes and everything and you know I'm I'm I feel like I've kind of seen that story plenty and so I generally don't click on it but I don't know I was having a weak moment and I thought all right this is there's a photo of this couple and they're in some kind of tiny home and I what I really do now because I'm in the midst of of kind of remodeling this house and and kind of decorating I guess because um you know basically every time I get divorced I lose a lot of furniture and and so I'm kind of starting from scratch and so I'm always on the lookout for like oh a cool bookshelf or oh that was interesting how they did that with that credenza or whatever so I thought I'll see what they're doing in this tiny home and then one of the things also that people love about tiny homes is that of course they can be more affordable and you could be less attached to you know a big mortgage or whatever so I'm gonna read about this tiny home living and as I read the article which is about a couple named Robert Lasansky and Edith Wassenaar who lived in the The Hague I don't think I knew The Hague was a place other than a world court yeah right you just picture all you pictures columns I thought it like The Hague was a world court that was in a different town like in the Netherlands somewhere is that even more

yeah like if you tell somebody that you're from The Hague like oh say hi to slobodan melosa for me how many times are you sick of explaining it like i mean really like

they they should have named it something else that's like calling it the portland that's where we're dealing with the war criminals where the portland that's where you also live okay confusing anyway if i ever meet anybody from the hague i'm gonna say oh is that the birthplace of grunge just to give them something new so what unfolds in this article and i'll just say it i don't know if this is tim mccuse fault or not the author of this piece because i don't know if tim wrote the headline but what i went into this piece thinking was i was going to read about some folks that had kind of decluttered their life and moved into some kind of a smallish place to live and they were loving it jerry and what unfolds in the article really is the story of two people who appear to have done very well for themselves one of them uh mr lasonski is 54 ms wassonar is 49 Uh, Mr. Lissonsky worked for Microsoft. In fact, I just realized he's probably had to do cyber training starring me.

Oh yeah, he's probably a fan.

Which would be, he's, I mean, honestly, I'm, he's probably a Luke head. But what we basically find out is that this couple, they sound perfectly nice, by the way. This is not, my rant is not about them. What we find out is that they were living in some kind of nice, sounds like a nice apartment in an upscale neighborhood in The Hague, the piece says, back in 2017. but because they were avid kite surfers they decided to look for somewhere to live on the North Sea and they found a little small 600 square foot fisherman's house that was steps from the beach. So they bought it. Now they didn't sell their apartment as far as I can tell in the piece. I don't think they divested themselves of their apartment in the Hague. Oh I thought they did. Does it say that somewhere?

Because that would kind of change my take on the story.

You know, I'm sorry. I read this a few days ago. It's been on the show sheet forever, Luke. So, you know, I'm probably wrong. They definitely rented it out for a while. So that's right. They specifically say that they rent out that apartment. So maybe you're right. Maybe they didn't close the loop and sell that thing.

Yeah, I don't think, and I'm often wrong about these things. I don't think that they ever had to, like, sell their first place. I mean, they're obviously not living there. but they found this little fisherman's cottage kind of on the north sea and they buy it uh for 158 000 euros um and then they remodel it and let me just tell you it's unbelievably idyllic this little fisherman's cottage i mean it's just it's beautiful they did a really cool job with it so then so now they've got if we're if my if my reasoning is correct here they've got their place in the Hague they've now got their fisherman's cottage that they've that they've remodeled with a with a design firm and an architecture firm to just be absolutely splendid and then they arrive at tiny home number two this if I'm counting right is home number three tiny home number two inspired by the surfers who traveled around Europe chasing waves and camper vans and buses they soon decided they also needed wheels because mr. Lissonsky no longer needed to be in an office and Mrs. Wassenaar could work from anywhere. We felt this freedom. He said, Europe is so small, but so dense with culture and opportunities. We wanted to explore it more. Oh, by the way, uh, I, we, I buried the lead with the rent coming in from their place in the Hague.

Mr. Lissonsky is able to retire at age 50. Yes. And also by the way, um, the, the apartment that he owned outright because he bought it before they got married, before they met and

has the mortgage totally paid off right so he's got his apartment in the haig paid off in an upscale

nice apartment in an upscale neighborhood in the haig i assume that the low-scale neighborhoods in

the haig are still pretty nice i promise you their health care is better than ours so he's got this apartment uh he's paid it off this also is a deeply scandinavian story to me you get this couple uh who uh appear to have made very good decisions in their life and they seem like nice hard-working people who've who've really set their life up pretty well they've got their uh he's got his free and clear apartment in the hague which are now renting out the income from that means he doesn't need to work he's retiring at age 50 and um and and now they're they've got their fisherman's uh cottage and then they also decide to um buy a fiat ducato van uh for 26 000 uh bucks us and then they they take it to a custom camp outfitter they spend under thirty seven thousand dollars so that the cool camper van now has a loft bed wood cover walls it's just basically one of those like really really cool you know van life vans that would be amazing to have to take around uh so now i guess if you're going to call that a home it is it's a home on wheels so we've got the apartment in the hag we've got the fisherman's the fisherman's abode that's been fixed up we've got the dope ass van that you're driving around in and then we find ourselves a tiny home number three an island fixer-upper while staying in their van for longer they anticipated they spotted a rundown 650 square foot house for sale in mandriola on the western side of this island we looked at each other and we said it's a project but we already did this once so we can do it again so they then buy this i guess fourth home if we're counting for 127 000 euros they hire an engineer who comes out and does all the structural assessment uh and then they eventually uh fix this place up and spend another 127 000 u.s renovating their uh fourth home and again my my i do not take issue with these very nice people who are just living their life i do think the headline was misleading and it made me think i was just going to read about some people that were downshifting or downscaling their life what i read about was people who have four homes yeah and get to just move around

effortlessly in europe between their four homes yeah and are incredibly wealthy and live this just absolute like beautiful lifestyle that anybody would uh admire you know but here's here's the deal like i've said this on the show many times like the new york times i feel like sometimes does stuff like this specifically because they know it's going to piss people off like this this this this sort of class warfare shit like those are like oh we're going to write this little story like you know I mentioned the the story about how people are house poor now and they focus on a woman in Seattle who can't just leap over to Italy for an Italian meatball lunch god that on a whim remember like and they do that all the time and I feel like they know that these stories are going to cause like class outrage Tim McHugh is in on this well here's what I would like to point out at the end of this article it says this article is part of the new york times

living small project articles exploring what it takes to lead a simpler more sustainable or compact life and so you think okay so let's say that this article is one version of that like this is a you know beautiful people doing their beautiful thing right but maybe you're going to have some people of other you know where you are in the socioeconomic scale um but no when you click on like this entire like new york times segment on living small and living more sustainable it's just all dwell magazine shit listen to these headlines these are the other headlines about living small what's better than a tiny island cabin two side by side a tiny la bungalow with the soul of a cotswolds cottage their pronunciation of their cape cod home isn't small but its carbon

footprint is there aren't enough actual tiny homes to write about but four articles in and We're not even writing about a tiny home anymore. It's a big home, but it doesn't burn as much fuel as other homes.

On fucking Cape Cod and L.A. and two tiny. What's better? What's better than a tiny island cabin, two side by side? I mean, listen, it's design porn. It's beautiful to look at these things. I enjoy these photos, too.

Like real porn.

But honestly, like the New York Times, like this idea that, oh, this is a this is a this is a section dedicated to living a small, smaller, more sustainable life is bullshit. This is all just like rich people doing like rich people shit.

It's funny because when the New York Times does it, it makes me mad. And when Dwell Magazine does it, I say, yes, Condé Nast, I will re-up my subscription. But I think it's about my expectation that I go in with.

I don't think that Dwell tries to pretend they're doing anything but doing what Dwell does, right? Or am I wrong about that?

No, no, you're generally right. I think you know what you're signing up for. But they did have one that back in the days of me being on Twitter, I probably tweeted about. Or maybe I Instagrammed about it. But, like, I remember it was, like, the cover of the Dwell magazine was something to the effect of, like, you know, doing more with less. Or it was, like, budget breakdown or, like, doing more with less. It was basically about, like, working with what you had. and i was like well that's interesting because i'm remodeling a house and i am out of money and i would like to see how some other people solve these problems and then mostly i was interested in this home in la that a couple had bought and again i don't have a problem with any of the people in any of these articles they're just living their lives it's the way the stuff is framed so what ended up basically being the story in la was like this couple again i this would be much more interesting if i had the specifics because it was just egregious you went in thinking this This was a budget breakdown of how did they do this? And they encountered all these problems and they solved them creatively because they didn't have unlimited options. And all they did was build an incredibly beautiful home in Los Angeles or remodel a home with a swimming pool that was indoor, outdoor. Like the one thing was like, there was a wall that they had a hard time moving. It was one of the most grand homes I've ever seen in my life. And I was like, I think what I wrote on whatever social media platform was like, why do I keep going back to something hurts me so much the way dwell magazine does like this was the it was it was on the level

that you've just been citing from these new york times articles the new york has has two stories about la bungalows the bohemian bungalow in la was tiny luke but it had soul oh good how nice

um the other piece of bunk journalism actually it's not i don't i'm not even going to say it's bunk journalism i'm going to say it's not up to the usual standards of the new york post

headline writing oh the headline i guess if we got to give any credit to the new york

post it is their creative headline writing they have great creative headline writing uh again it's a terrible newspaper generally speaking they give pierce morgan way too much of a microphone but um but they do have funny headlines and i don't know if you remember andrew a couple of weeks ago there was a new york post article that had a hilarious headline yeah but then because of the way that the internet news cycle churns by the time i went back to to find the article it no longer was it was no longer associated with the headline that made me very crazy so I sent you this article about these protesters in Paris who basically threw a bunch of soup on the Mona Lisa at the Mona Lisa at the Mona Lisa good point because the Mona Lisa is protected behind some kind of you know glass so you can't actually throw soup on it but I will tell you this from a visual standpoint they accomplished kind of a Like because if you don't know the glasses well first of all this picture is all over the world of this soup I believe it was at pumpkin soup

That sounds right. Yeah, I remember it pumpkin soup. Yeah

and It's I will say that it's a kind of a pretty it was a I think was an effective protest because even though it's not actually on the Mona Lisa

just look at the photo it looks like someone threw soup all over the Mona Lisa like you're you're forced to confront the possibility and then I guess maybe if you read further into the article you sort of find out what these folks were there protesting and basically they are protesting I think the destruction of the environment and they want to draw attention to their cause I kind of feel like this is sort of a win-win the Mona Lisa doesn't get destroyed these people who are looking to draw attention to the way that we're destroying the planet they get their moment in the sun now it's important to me that it was pumpkin soup andrew because did you see the article i sent you did it include the headline that that

that i'm on the fence about i don't think by the way these weren't climate um sorry did i did i these were food um this is about oh food insecurity maybe security globally yeah this is an environmental okay thank you but you know i i'm now i think i realize what happened here because

you well that's weird the post says a pair of climate change activists hurled pumpkin soup at

the Mona Lisa Sunday oh you're right maybe it's it's combining it says the two the two nuts well that's where that's our members feels a little opinionated right activist group that is called food response um and so I oh I see the need to protect the environment I'm sorry I thought it was about food insecurity it might be the combination of the two sorry for correcting

you there but no no they're it's all integrated or all connected more to your point though I am

very curious about this because when you included this in the show sheet a couple of days ago I kept reading the headline over and over and over again trying to figure out what you're getting at here But I think the headline has maybe already changed for me. Yes, it has but I wrote down with the air because I learned my lesson

Okay, I wrote down the original headline. I saw which caused me to click on the article which is no longer easily found What do you think the New York Post? Decided to call the sea isn't this a fun game? Yeah, it is. Okay, so now okay

Give me the now. I'm back in the headspace So this is a story New York Post. They've changed it for some reason though So they must not have been super proud of their punnery.

I just think that's what happens. I think it's, again, the churn of the digital news cycle. I think it just kind of goes away. I don't think, I don't, or maybe they did realize that they kind of didn't quite hit the mark with this one.

Is it, I know we're a little bit tight on time, so I can't spend as much time lingering on this as I would like. But what about like, is it a Smashing Pumpkins reference?

No, but that would be great. Okay. It's what they the headline of the story about people throwing soup on the Mona Lisa just said chowder keg.

Oh, wait, wait.

It wasn't chowder, though. That's why it was bunk journalism.

Pumpkin. It's close. I mean, I will say pumpkin soup is kind of close to chowder, though. Right. A creamy. Yeah.

And chowder keg is a great line. It really is. But it doesn't, I feel like they really needed to, somebody needed to step in and say, it wasn't chowder that was thrown at the Mona Lisa, therefore we can't call this a chowder cake. We have to wait until there's some kind of a conflagration that happens in the Northeast between, you know, like fishermen out of Gloucester or something. Then we can say chowder cake.

When there's a fight at legal seafood. Thank you. You know, like, yeah, sure. Exactly. Or wait. Nice legal seafood poll, love it. I feel like there's a lot of soup throwing in museums these days to raise this awareness. So I sort of feel like somebody should have been like, that's an amazing headline. Save it. It's chowder saving time. You save that for when it comes up soon. Exactly.

Exactly. Because it will happen again. And it will be chowder just because that'll be the easiest can of soup to grab. But let's not waste that. Don't waste it on this because it was pumpkin soup. It was not chowder. But I do think chowder keg is a pretty great headline.

Well, then it raises the question for me. Can we name our show chowder keg today? We absolutely can.

I support that. Yes, we do. Well, because we were covering it, I think, in a journalistically accurate way. So, yes, we absolutely can.

Here I go once again with the email. Every week, I hope that it's from a female. No, man, it's not from a female.

emails or emails or you played that um intro tape today which put the voicemail line out there and it had me thinking we should remind folks that we do love to give voicemails and it's 206-414-TBTL

like the song exactly and I know we're a little tight on time here I've had this voicemail sitting on my desktop for quite uh some time now okay I will uh play it for you I think it was just Eric calling in with a little just to celebrate a little bit some personal victories hey dummies

This is listener Eric in Tacoma, and the context doesn't matter, but my old trash can disappeared, and I was just delivered a brand-new, sparkling clean trash can. It is the cleanest trash can I've ever seen, and it was just a magical feeling I got inside, and you were the first people I thought of, specifically Andrew. Luke, you'd probably like it too, though.

the show thanks guys there is that thing i remember getting our brand new trash can here at the new house about a year and a half ago and just like looking in there and just thinking like how can i throw garbage in there like well that's what i was wondering about like if it's so pristine

are you i mean are you uh disrespecting it by putting by by using it for its intended use

i i spent the night in the garage with the brand new garbage can i told it what I told it what its life is focused on and how it plays a critical role, and we all have our jobs to do, and some are more grandiose than others, and I think it understood, and then I threw a bunch of cat shit in there.

But wait, so where do you come down on garbage can washing? Is that an annual event for you?

I don't have it on the calendar, which, as I say that, I'm actually shocked I don't. But I have, yeah, I've cleaned out my bins. I've lived here for, what, a year and a half. And there was definitely some point last summer where I had to get the hose. I believe I might have even, for my smaller garbage can, maybe used a toilet brush and soap to clean it out. But, yeah, you should clean those things out from time to time.

I feel like I would hit mine with a hose and, like, the spray, you know, that kind of, like, pistol grip thing. That's about as involved as I'm going to get in cleaning it. Like, I don't think I would break out the toilet brush, but I would probably hose her down.

You know, the time I think that I had to break out brushes was, I don't want to make people sick, but I think it was our yardaway situation, and there was some, there was some, um, what? Well, it was like a, it was, it involved old shrimp and maggots, and it was a rough, yeah, I was hesitating.

Was it your old shrimp?

Yeah, I'd made a stir fry or something, and then I'd thrown the remnants of the shrimp, and maybe I think we had some extra stuff that ended up kind of starting to turn a little bit, so I threw it in there. I mean, you're supposed to throw your food waste in that thing. It's fine, but then it sat in the hot sun for a week or whatever, and then when I went to open it again, it was alive. And so I had to go through all kinds of – there was a pretty epic spotless about this. I literally had never almost vomited from, like, smell. Like, I don't have that kind of reaction to things usually. Right. Gang reflex or whatever. Yeah. But, I mean, I opened this thing up, and I almost had, like, a Goodfellas, like, retching scene in my driveway. Wow. Okay.

Well, everyone go listen to that Spartacus episode. Yeah. Right? Okay. Thanks for listening, everybody. We are going to be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for you. So please do join us for that. In the meantime, have a great Wednesday. Go Mariners. I'm trying to use the power of positive thinking, Andrew, to get myself into a Mariner's state of mind. And please remember, no mountain too tall. And good luck to all.

It's garbage. All I've been thinking about all week is garbage. I mean, I just can't stop thinking about it. Power out.