Muse

Well, I see you got them snakes and sparklers, but where's good stuff, man? Good stuff? This is the good stuff. Snakes and sparklers. Are you nuts, dude? You need stuff to explode. Go boom! Why is that good? So you're gonna tell me that you don't have no black cats, no roaming candles, or screaming memes? No. Oh, come on, man. You don't got no ladyfingers, buzzbuttles, snickerbombs, church burners, gutbusters, zippity-doo-daws, or crap flappers? No, I don't. you're gonna stand there owning a firework stand and tell me you don't have no whistling bungholes no spleen splitters whisker biscuits honky lighters who's could do's who's could don'ts cherry bombs nips and daisers with or without the scooter stick or one single whistling kitty chaser no snakes and sparklers are the only ones i like tbtl

how many hot dogs you have for lunch three well there's your problem you're starving your body's literally eating itself you have to be it so we don't see it you have to live it or we won't forgive it you have to inhabit it or leave it in the cabin it's a b-a-r-t-y because i said so

Hey, everybody stand by. Here we go again.

Well, all right, hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Thursday edition of TBTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live.

I just love our cheetahs!

My name is Luke Burbank. I am your host.

It's just two men celebrating each other's strength.

Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio perched high above the mighty Columbia on July the 4th. And boom goes the dynamite. that's right it's a holiday but here we are podcasting for you working over a hot laptop i'm not even supposed to be here today to bring you that content because that's what we do fourth of july podcasters we exist and we've arrived at episode 4242 in a collector series let the fun begin. That's right, 4242. How fun, how auspicious here on the 4th of July, where as of right now, as of this recording, it's still pretty tolerable in the temperature department, but it is going to get very warm later today and then the next few days, like extremely warm, like upper 90s. It's going to be very hot, going to be very uncomfortable for everybody. And if you've heard the long-running commentary on the Madrona Hill Studio remodel and updates to this little cottage that I bought here, you'll know that at no time has that commentary involved the installation of any kind of proper HVAC system, i.e. climate control, air conditioning, my friends. We don't have it. And I'm worried about next week's TBTelathon 15. Thank you for being a 10. And Andrew and John Sklaroff and I being in this converted garage without any real intervention from, you know, a mini split or a swamp cooler or anything like that. So we're trying to fix that. I pivoted at Home Depot this morning and bought a large ceiling-mounted fan, which I've now got Walt on the case. We're going to try to install it. We're going to try to do what we can to make sure that the equipment does not melt next week for the thon. But anyway, we'll get into that more in a moment. It's a Thursday, and that means it's still a Blur's Day. It's my birthday today. We will do the Blur's Day messages. The Blur's Day messages don't take the 4th of July off, my friends. Nor does this guy. The longest-running co-bro of the show may be best known for his depictions of the tall ships. I've never seen him like this before. He is wearing a full-on red, white, and blue Uncle Sam top hat. He has that sort of Colonel Sanders goatee going on. He keeps, in the sound check, he kept saying, I want you. He's very into this 4th of July party scene.

I want it to party. Do you like to party?

He's Andrew Walsh. He's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

This has happened before. You're seeing a photo of Daniel Vogelbach. This is not the first time that people have confused us.

Can we trade for Vogel? Can we give him back? Is there a possibility? Oh, by the way, I want to apologize to you, Andrew, and anyone who might see this video for my attire. I am looking very, very made under, as they say. This is what it looks like after my jog when I have not taken a shower or brushed my hair or made myself look a little more presentable for the video cast. Deal with it, Cate Blanchett! You're going to have to deal with it, Cate Blanchett, because it's a holiday, and I have a lot of work to do around the yard after this, and I just didn't want to take a full-on shower and then go do a bunch of work and get really dirty. and then shower again you know i'm not a two shower a day kind of man i'm a one shower a day and i also think it's a holiday we're here working in as much as this has ever worked and i needed to do something that made me feel like i was phoning it in a little bit and this outfit and this general demeanor and look for me is me phoning it in a little bit it makes me feel like i'm getting to kind of enjoy the holiday like a normal person i had a similar notion today

You'll be shocked to... Actually, you know what? This is for you, Luke. Again, this is a holiday. We're not even supposed to be here today. That's right. I'm going to lean in.

I played the official audio that indicates this show is going to be mostly for me and Andrew. So, if you don't like it, turn on the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest, people.

So, I'm going to lean into something that I do even on the days when I'm supposed to not be phoning it in. So, I don't know. I just always have excuses for myself. But regarding our attire today, you know how this system we use to record every day called Riverside that the listeners are getting to know very well as well as a video is it has a video component to it. You can see me right now. You can see what I'm dressed like, but you can also see a little thumbnail of what I look like when I first dialed up this morning. Can you see that?

I don't believe I get that visual information. Actually, let me check.

Oh, I think maybe you need to expand the people tab in order to see it. It stays open on mine. But anyway, we don't need – boy, I really don't need to get in there. Oh, yeah.

Okay, I've got you. I've got you. I'm getting eyes on it.

Do you see what I'm wearing there? It's a T-shirt. I was ready to come in here today and wear a T-shirt to record the podcast, which is a very – that is nothing that I would ever do. Just because I'm not comfortable doing that. I'm not somebody who wears T-shirts out and about very often. and I always like to cover this torso of mine. Cover what God didn't give you. Yeah, exactly. Cover what kielbasa gave me.

Cover what cool joke the universe played on both of us.

I think I've got to take some responsibility there. But anyway, yeah, so you can see that I rolled in today trying to think, hey, you know what, it's a holiday, I'm going to wear a T-shirt. And then I sat down and I looked at myself in the camera and I was like, nah, it's not that much of a holiday. let's cover this baby up taste doesn't take a holiday no you do need to um i was going to apologize to you about something though because i'm i'm listening um this is also related to what we're both wearing like you said you're even you're a little bit more casual than usual you're wearing a t-shirt you're wearing a ball cap now i know that you are a strict one ball cap per crew kind of guy but my hair is out of control lately i need a haircut i mean out of control you're looking i mean it's not out of control it's just i don't like it it's unkempt when you're balding a certain way and then your hair gets kind of long around those balding areas it's not flattering people don't swipe for that kind of thing and i'm looking for the swipes i don't know yeah you are i don't know looking for people to crush that like button exactly um so i have a hat right here that i brought in the studio that i was ready to deploy at any moment oh i love that hat that might be my

favorite hat of yours that car my dad got this for me it looks really nice and i you know because it is a holiday because it's the fourth of july and you and i both have complicated feelings I was thinking this morning when I woke up How like last year when we were doing the thon For my parents house I said we could hang a flag behind us You've never hard passed You've never hard passed on an idea Harder and faster than that idea Which I don't by the way Upon reflection I don't disagree with you on that But on this day Where we celebrate the independence of this nation A very flawed nation A nation that raises more questions than answers Right now I do believe we can appropriately celebrate by both wearing ball caps.

I think so.

That feels like the 4th of July celebration we deserve.

And they're both relatively subtle in their presentation. These hats. Mine just has a little leather Carhartt logo on it. Yours just has the classic Nike swoop, white on a black background.

Yeah, I like to celebrate with child labor on this Independence Day.

And for some reason, you have the Chinese flag behind you. I'm not exactly sure why. I don't know.

It was a limited release LeBron drop that they did. I actually didn't even realize how on point that joke is. Yeah, no, I thought that's what you were.

Yeah.

I wish that I could say that was all consciously about LeBron's embrace of the NBA and its terrible policy vis-a-vis China. I just meant there's so much weird shit that Nike releases that's like limited release, whatever, you know. like it'll be like oh hey a basketball shoe you're used to but now it's you know got some because what they want to do is it's like it's like any sport how they're always releasing these color rush jerseys or what have you city city connect jerseys now it's like what it is is an excuse to sell more stuff and so i wouldn't be surprised to know that there was some Thank you.

chinese flag lebron drop that was the nature of that joke but in fact it's actually very that was

very biting social commentary i wish you hadn't told on yourself on that because i did not think of that as anything but a lebron's connection to nike and his refusal to sort of distance himself

or make any changes in in the way he as a business he's refocused his monopolistic tendencies towards getting his son drafted to the Lakers. I know, Bronny. LOL, LOL. I don't know how I, I mean, look, we've established it's a holiday. This is just us time. I know next to nothing about the NBA. But based on LeBron James, Bronny James, his son's college statistics, I think it's very unlikely that if his last name wasn't James, he would have been drafted in the second round. He did not have, he's 6'2", and he did not have particularly remarkable stats in college. and here the Lakers are using a valuable draft pick to get him could it be because they'd like to retain his father's services uh that would certainly that would certainly seem to be the case I mean who cares it's grown men throwing an inflated pig bladder at a metal rim like it doesn't really matter in the case in the grand course of things the grand scheme of things but it is pretty funny to see that happen like that just even as a non-basketball fan I mean that's

that stinks to high heaven right yeah definitely and it seems like everybody just sort of I mean i i don't follow the nba but i listen to various sports radio things and this has been a conversation an ongoing conversation i feel like for quite some time now where will brawny end up and it's all about like well who wants who wants lebron on their team can we like we it's going to be sort of a i don't know package deal is too strong of a way of putting it but oh no i think that's a very accurate way of putting it but for me and i think this this goes to this goes to how i'm very extreme about something but then i think this is the opposite extreme something that it's hard for me to wrap my head around is you you have lebron james obviously he and i have zero in common except for the fact that we both went to catholic schools in the general akron area around the same time that's a stronger connection than i have we almost both went to st vincent st mary but i think i ended up choosing walsh jesuit instead um anyway putting all of that aside Putting all of those similarities aside for a moment, if you can. If the audience can separate Andrew Walsh from LeBron James in their minds for just one moment. Hold on.

Give him a minute. Everybody put down the potato salad and focus here, okay? I want you to create a mnemonic device.

Okay. So, yes. Okay. Okay.

That helps you remember that Andrew is not LeBron James.

So obviously there are very few human beings who are like LeBron James as far as talent and legacy and just persona, right, and celebrity and everything. And so you have to have a certain mindset, as we've talked about, to be so great at anything, to be super disciplined and all of those things. And you have to have a certain idea of yourself. And this is where, again, the separations between me and somebody like LeBron James come in is whereas I have a pretty low opinion of myself and somebody like that has to truly believe in themselves at all times. And I have zero desire to leave a legacy. I've talked about that on the show before. Like, I don't want to leave the world a worse place and I don't want to die and have people be like, that guy was a jerk. But aside from that, like, I'm fine, whatever. We live, we die. We try to be pleasant while we're here. It's my general attitude. I wonder if Nike would be interested in that slogan. Um, but for me, it's hard for me to wrap my mind around this idea of you're LeBron James and the moment your child is born, you're saying this is my legacy. I'm naming him the same thing as me, right? Like, is Bronny his full name or is Bronny short for LeBron?

You know, actually, that's a great question.

But either way, it's, uh, yeah, either way, it's like, I'm named, and immediately out of the womb, you're like, I am naming this person Bronny basically after myself.

Yeah, LeBron Ramon Bronny James Jr.

And by the way, this is not me making it just like a broad attack at anybody who names their kid or, you know, kind of has a junior. I always wanted to be a junior, frankly.

My first choice for Addie's name was LeBron. And I was outvoted by her mother.

And she doesn't want to be called Bronny anymore, Luke. She's an adult now. So anyway, I actually like juniors. I'm not trying if anybody's out there like, hey, I'm a junior or I have a junior. But there's something about LeBron saying, like, we're going to name him LeBron and he's going to be a basketball player. And, you know, and then now to be an adult, a young adult who's achieved, you know, as Bronny has achieved more success in basketball, obviously, than than most people as well. But in the in the world that he plays in, he's not that special like his dad is. But it kind of doesn't matter. Like it just I can't imagine the pressure one must feel. And I know nothing about the dynamics of these two men. I don't know anything about Bronny. So this is me just taking one little nugget of of my perception of. legacy and just thinking about all the pressure that would be on a young person when your dad is LeBron James but then also when you're in his namesake and he is looking at you to sort of extend his personal brand in a way it's a pretty rough way for me to put it but that's kind of how

I see it that yeah it's a tremendous amount of pressure on on this young person and and again I don't I really don't have negative feelings about him or LeBron James other than to I guess really what it is is a statement about how valuable lebron james still is to the nba which is incredible because lebron james himself is not a young person anymore to be playing basketball like i'm surprised he still has this kind of sway i've i thought we would be starting to have these conversations about how like what's the sort of farewell tour for lebron james going to look like but that is not apparently what's happening and also this this definitely feels like lebron james is a person who has had a unique physical talent and a unique mental tenacity, which is what makes somebody as great. It's Kobe Bryant had the same thing. There are, you kind of already said this, but there are the people who are naturally physically really talented, but then they also have some crazy mindset that just takes that physical ability and then just takes it to this stratospheric level that is rarely achieved. Michael Jordan would be another one of them. And Michael Jordan had enormous hands is something that was not talked about. Michael Jordan could catch the basketball out of the air with one hand I mean that's a big that's a game changer like he wasn't a huge guy I think he was like 6'6 but his hands were unusually large which was again just a quirk of of luck for him but like LeBron James is the kind of person who you know won it he wants to win the most NBA championships of any player he wants to score the most points which I believe he's now done I think he has the most points in the history of the nba and now he wants to be the only you kind of feel like okay he realizes that his ability to dominate a game is probably ebbing his ability to be the best player on the court at all times that's starting to go away because he's just older but what he can do now it's like he's now focusing his energy on the new thing which is be the only dude who's ever played an nba game with his actual son so that's like the new thing and then so that's never happened before i don't think

i realized that that would be a all-time first the only sport where it's ever happened is baseball

because that's how unathletic baseball players are allowed to be. And famously, I think it started with Ken Griffey Jr. and Ken Griffey Sr. for the Mariners, and in fact they did have a game where they homered back-to-back, first time that ever happened. So, you know, a sport like basketball is so athletic. It's very rare that somebody would still be good enough to play when they had a kid who was good enough to play. Like, football, it will never happen. It can never happen. It should never happen. It could never happen. it could never happen. Like it is like, you know, basketball, I mean, in basketball, it is, you're pushing the absolute frontier of what can happen. And again, that's just because that's a testament to LeBron James's incredible longevity and ability. Um, and, but I guess my point is this feels like a burnishing of LeBron James's legacy more than, uh, a commentary or a statement about if Bronny James is going to be a great player in the NBA. Uh, I started this by saying, I know nothing about the NBA. I haven't learned anything in the intervening 10 minutes. Really?

Because I said a lot. I gave you a lot of information. I didn't mean that. That wasn't a slam on you. No, no, I know.

I clearly haven't. I'm still the same person of 10 minutes ago who didn't know what they were talking about. But I will just say this. The idea of LeBron James being a great NBA player or even a highly productive NBA player seems very unlikely to me just based on the – I mean, I'm looking at his career, his college career stats like he he like his best game he had was 15 points um he also uh against oregon state he played a season high 30 minutes and uh collected 11 points in a loss to arizona these are not the college statistics of somebody who is going to get picked In the NBA draft It turns out the internet says 6.15 centimeters There is a chance that at one time I was almost as tall as Brawny James Before my bones started turning into root beer And I started getting smaller Again You made it clear earlier You're not LeBron James Let me make it clear I'm not Brawny James Brawny James is a better basketball player than anyone I've probably ever met Well I did meet Michael Jordan So let's just put that to the side Brawny James is a phenomenal basketball player but like the idea that he would get picked in the second round it's an interesting thing it'll be fun to watch but i'm with you like it will also be so much pressure on this young person next year if he's just riding the bench which can very much happen when you're a rookie it's like is the crowd at uh at whatever it's called now crypto.com arena is is are they going to be chanting brawny all game and is he just gonna be sitting on the bench and is um you know who's the new coach of the Lakers at somebody.

oh, it's J.J. Reddick. Is J.J. Reddick going to just be like under all this pressure to play Bronny James and then is Bronny James going to look? I don't know. The whole thing just feels like it's a thing that makes LeBron James have yet another weird historical footnote that puts his son in a spot where he has very little chance of succeeding.

Yes, and I have no idea what Bronny's life is like or what Bronny's attitude towards all this is like. Maybe he loves the pressure. Maybe he loves that LeBron is his dad and opens certain doors for him. Maybe there's part of him that feels a lot of pressure. I don't even, you know, I can't even pretend to know.

He eats pressure and shits out ice water.

You know, I had that for a while.

And by the way, he's yet to pass the physical. So TBD out if you'll be able to join.

Sounds like that might just take care of itself.

The team doctors are particularly concerned about this development.

Okay, you know how I'm just really leaning into this whole I'm not even supposed to be here today thing?

My outfit says it all, Andrew.

But I do things that I do on the show anyway. Again, listeners, consider this just a private conversation between Luke and I that you're eavesdropping on even more so today. I am curious if you watched the Mariners game with the sound on yesterday or listened on the radio. But I'm asking because I saw most of the game. I was at the Eagles with Veeves, kind of a rare midweek visit to the Eagles after my doctor's appointment. I wanted to pep myself up a little bit and there's no better place to do that than a big windowless room and I anyway so I was sort of watching the game it was terrible like the Mariners are you know peeing away now I'm editing myself after you said shit they're pissing away like this huge lead that they had in the division like they're still in first place if you're from the if you're looking at the outside you wouldn't understand why Mariners fans are so upset but we have really good reason to be they're just in a really bad slump right now all of that is to say the The day before, I did hear some boos raining down on Polanco, our second baseman, a couple of times during the game. But then I saw in the paper today that boos rained down on the entire team yesterday. I didn't read the details of that. So what was your experience? Did you hear this? And how do you feel about that?

Here's what I did yesterday. I had the game on television muted as I played Neil Young Harvest 2009 remastered through the house.

Oh, okay.

Like, that was, I don't know what that says about my kind of emotional state vis-a-vis the Mariners yesterday, but it was like, I knew bad things were going to happen. I almost texted the group chain. I forget the name of the pitcher for the Orioles, but he was someone who has not pitched since May. He's been, I guess, injured. Yeah, I saw that. And let's just say his last name.

Dieter or something? I can't remember.

It started with a K. Let's just say it was Kaplan. It's not, but just, I saw a stat that was like, you know, so-and-so has not has not pitched since may 20th and i almost texted the group chain um well it'll be interesting to see kaplan have the outing of a lifetime because you just know that's just what happens against the mariners it does not matter if somebody is 20 years old and literally just fell off the turnip truck doesn't matter if they're uh like if it's bartolo cologne and they're 64 years old it doesn't matter if it's brawny james and he's decided to expand into baseball whoever is on the mound will have the greatest night of their life because the Mariners are just that abjectly terrible at hitting. So that is to say, I knew this was going to be a tough game to watch. I didn't want to fully emotionally engage with it because I knew it would give me bad feelings. So I had it on because I was, you know, hope springs eternal, but I didn't want to commit to the audio feed. So I did not hear the boos, but I have, the previous game, I heard the boos for Polanco and many of them were coming from me, Andrew. People could hear it at T-Mobile Park because what the hell i mean every day it's a new mariner who i'm the most frustrated with that's not true it's always julio um but polanco is a close second polanco looks like a mongoose who's caught in some headlights he is he he really looks like an animated character who actually looks i know i make this joke too much he looks like the character rango portrayed the voice by a johnny depp i believe he looks like rango and hits like rango he hits like a pixar character that was injected into a major league baseball game it's just remarkable um i actually like the way he looks

for whatever it's worth it drives me crazy that he's not you should see the movie rango i would love it he looks like rango if if he were really good if he like were like because a player like him should be on should get on base a lot right like he was an all-star at one point like our whole thing was he'll be good this year if he can stay healthy well he he's male he'd miss some time but he's both bad and unhealthy but like if he were really good i would love seeing that face come up to the plate i love how his eyes are darting around or whatever i think it's actually i think he's a really i think he's a really cool looking guy it's just like but when you see that combined with his performance you obviously can layer some things on there you'd be like okay

okay, well, I associate this look with just terrible baseball play now.

It makes me happy if this team is getting booed. And that just tells you how dark and corroded my soul is. But I feel like there should be some consequences. There are so many – unfortunately, the wider world and the important world of, let's say, U.S. politics feel like a consequence-free environment. As our friend Chris Hayes will sometimes say, it feels like gravity does not apply anymore. like there are very bad people who seem to have absolutely no culpability or at least they're not ever made to account for their bad behavior at least in baseball we should be able to say it's okay to boo jorge polanco and it's very okay to boo julio who dropped a ball in the first inning off the end of his mitt i mean it was a hard play but it listen if you're if your whole thing is the no-fly zone and if when you make a catch you like to stand up and throw up the x and if you can't hit for shit if you can't hit your way out of a wet paper bag you better at least make harder than average but still makeable plays as the announcer said you saw him slowing down because he sensed the wall was nearby bro it is your home field figure it out walk the yard as they say in the before the game figure out where the warning track is and run fast enough to catch that ball like if That guy cannot play exemplary center field. He has no use on the Mariners right now.

Did you hear that story about Willie? I think it was because of all the Willie Mays coverage. Did you hear the story about Willie Mays knocking himself out in the outfield? They had gravel warning tracks back then and cement walls. Geez, no. And I think he lost consciousness but made the catch. Let me fact check myself on that.

I mean, that would be a bad outcome. um and you know in that uh in the same way that i am not the basketball player that brawny james is i'm also not the baseball player julio rodriguez is um that being said it's just the i'm they're playing today and i am not going to watch the game andrew i mean i'm i have to for my own people can hear inside me that there is an anger that's unchecked and also i don't have i don't really have control of how i feel about this baseball team in a way that makes me um unhappy with myself and just feel like a little out of control emotionally. And what I usually have to do when that happens is just turn it off for a while, step back, hope that I get some good news. Hope a raven brings good news. Like, you know, that like, hey, the Mariners seem to have turned it around. The Mariners' bats have woken up and they've actually put together a few good games. And then I can re-engage. Like, I'm doing the exact definition of fairweather fandom. I can't handle how gutting it is to watch them do this right now. And so I have to just go do something else

like mow my lawn today well in your defense you've seen polanco and the damage done and um

polanco and the damage done um i wanted to uh polanco and the damage done are we allowed to name because it's a holiday can we name can we name the show that i don't think we've i don't think we will ever put up a less accessible less seo optimized show title and i completely

support it on this fourth of july and you might be wrong about that being knocked unconscious

catching a uh a fly ball i mean certainly it's happened i i know that it has happened people have run through the outfield wall i mean i i guess i want to be clear there is a legitimate danger to an outfielder of running headlong into that wall and uh you know i i sort of i get that But I just – to me, it's like – I mean, the Orioles start the game off with a diving catch that stops us from getting off to a good start in the first inning from a, I assume, moderately talented left fielder. I've never heard of this left fielder. Oh, now I can picture that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know him for his defense.

Their left fielder makes a diving catch to keep our first – I guess it would have been JP probably – off the bases or somebody in the first inning for the Mariners. and then you turn around and in the bottom of that inning when you need julio rodriguez whose whole thing is this no fly zone you need him to just it wasn't even a diving catch it was a running catch off the end of his mitt you need him to figure out how to make that play and he can't and it's just like it typifies kind of where things are at right now so i did not hear the

booing but i support it wholeheartedly yeah i want to read more details about that because i didn't hear it either and you know i'm somebody who came to sports dumb um pretty late in life and only here on the west coast but you do hear about you know other cities hard you know new yorkers are going and i think bostonians are going to be pretty quick to boo their teams when things go sideways maybe not boston so much i think you think of philly new york i don't know the story

on boston that's a really good question because yes certainly new york certainly philly yeah but

i don't know where boston comes down on that but i feel like there's there's some there's got to be yeah i mean if there's some accountability i mean again Thank you.

I don't think you I'm not going to be quick to boo my own team. In fact, I think I mentioned on the show before I was with a friend who like in the you know, I don't know, like maybe the sixth inning or something sort of booing our own team. I'm like, come on, man, we're still in this like we don't need to. That made me uncomfortable. But like when the team is doing what it's doing right now, which is just like really, really frustrating fans who've been through a lot, especially with this ownership group and everything. I think there's just like a lot of pent up frustration and for the fans to like let the team know that like we're not just going to like be fine like with like taking pictures with the moose and it's all going to be fine.

The hydro races are not going to be enough to distract us. The bread and circuses. I thought I had a pretty good line in the text chain, by the way, the other day, which is the Mariners are basically a dog park where occasionally baseball occurs.

I started to respond to that a million times and didn't know exactly what to say. It was bark at the park night. But honestly, what you described sounds so nice.

Like, I just kept thinking, like, what do we need to reframe how we think about this?

At the end of the game, I almost texted you guys just say, like, now I just want to go to a dog park where no baseball happens. Like, that just sounds, why are we not just doing that? Why am I not just turning on the TV and watching a bunch of dogs at a dog park? That sounds so great. It would be emotionally a lot more nourishing.

because what's happening for the mariners is as the on the field product sours the the like hey it's another bark at the park night it's just like cutting to a bunch of shots of real cute doggos at the park which again i fully support and love because we're now we have to focus more on that than the on-field product because the on-field product is awful right now like that's the thing it's like those are the little kind of nuanced things that make me mad is the more the more that we're talking about like the fact that you can get you know garlic fries at the game or i don't know i mean i don't want to drag piper shaw into this but the more stuff that's not about the baseball that we have to focus on because the baseball itself is it's bad that's that starts to really get under my skin but speaking of things that are under the skin andrew uh how was your doctor's appointment yesterday when they uh hooked you up to various and when he said that that shocked me how did that go when they strapped me into the electric

chairners that was for you that was for you this show's for this this show's wednesdays for the

boys that's a stellar that is a stellar joke andrew i want to honor that right now for those who don't know and that would be everyone outside of like our five friends who are on this text chain I have started this very unfunny thing this season related to the Seattle Mariners. They have an ad campaign that's hyping the team, but it's like, you know, it's talking about how good they are. And then like, it's not even Fariners. And it's all these things that are, you know, like that, you know, kind of is a derivation of the word Mariners.

But then I'm always really like pumped up when they say it's not even Fariners. It's like it starts off with them being like the Mariners are going to hit a home run, a home run there. These are the, it's not even Fariners, like, just like, they're hitting it out of the park. Like, these just, like, boastful, from day one, I've hated the tone of these types of ads. They're so bad, even when the team isn't starting to circle around the drain.

Right, it's like, and fireworks night, Rockets, Red, Glariners. Yeah, yeah. And so I always make up these really dumb versions of that. And I think the other day we were saying something You said something about how the Seattle Mariners fan base Tends to do something And I said, don't victim blame That's not even Fariners So that's what Andrew was referencing But that's a very, very good That was a solid joke

Yeah, but it was So how was it, by the way? So I went into my doctor's appointment yesterday I mentioned this on yesterday's show I almost said briefly I don't mention anything briefly But they were doing some tests And I kind of didn't realize I never fully understand what I'm going in for. I knew exactly what the test was supposed to be like. They were going to be both sending some electricity through my nerves and also they were going to be putting some needles into my muscles to see how the muscles and the nerves act together. That was basically what I knew. I knew it was going to be it had been described to me as potentially uncomfortable, but not necessarily painful. My dad had something similar apparently years ago and he described it the same way. He's like, it wasn't painful, but it wasn't comfortable. And I was like, OK. um and that's basically what i knew but i wasn't sure like are they going to be i thought they were going to be like mapping my entire nerve system like because i told you i've been having like other weird kind of feeling kind of feeling some nerves in my feet sometimes when i move my neck a certain way and again i'm not a doctor but it doesn't seem like that should happen um but it turns out i was going in very very specifically to do this specific test that checks for carpal tunnel and first they you you lay down and um on one arm the doctor attached these electrodes to me and i told her right away i'm like listen i'm really um i'm really squeamish uh almost passed out in the in the blood lab the other day um so you know you don't have to go into tons of detail when you're telling me like what you're doing or whatever just let me know what i need to know she was so cool i really really like this doctor this is a sports medicine doctor over on the on the east side um oh i saw my first um elon musk stupid truck uh over there

i'm surprised it's taken that long i've seen kind of a lot of them and i live in hillbilly country

oh interesting i mean a lot i've maybe seen three or four thing i thought it was like a tech bro thing but no i i haven't seen them on maybe it's just a coincidence but yeah i saw my first one in

bellevue which seems you're not seeing a lot of them from the e-line that is the e-line what if the e-line was a huge bus just a daisy chain just a just a elon centipede of just of uh of cyber

trucks or just get into that or just still a big bus but it's all made of like that metallic material and it's sort of like shaped like it. God, that would be... Now you're getting towards... What is the famous movie by the Korean director about the train that never stops?

Polar Express is a very different train movie. Bullet Train? No.

There is a movie called Bullet Train, which I think they came up with the title first. Yes, Snowpiercer, which I want to go back and watch. Everybody talked about how great that was. Then when I finally watched it, I was like, wow, that was really hyped. and i don't think it's as good as everybody said it was but then and i'm blanking on the director's name but then i saw his you know his follow-up um which won the academy award for best picture yeah uh which was probably my favorite movie that you're a rare a rare time when me and the academy

are in line with each other parasite parasite yes okay uh bong june ho is bong june ho in the movie

was parasite so anyway now that i know that oh i love parasite i'm starting to think maybe i didn't get something about snow piercer and i should go back and re-watch it that's not what you asked me though um so i told the the doctor that you know i'm kind of squeamish and she was like she was just really cool she made you know where we had some interesting conversations i i brought garbage anxiety into her life this was something like she was asking me you know i think making small talk while she was starting to put electrodes to me and stuff said like so what do you do for a living and i said well i work in radio but uh i can do a podcast with my buddy now and i do sort of the short try to just description of we talk about our lives whatever minor dramas in our lives and then pop culture stuff is usually my tagline but then i started adopting what you do i said you know like for example one thing that's going on right now is i'm trying to figure out if my garbage collector is mad at me uh and so i give her a brief rundown of like how i deal with various garbage issues and she's like oh yeah i live in um i live in green lake and uh we're having like we're being they skipped our garbage several days in a row and now we're trying to figure out relatable content baby and i'm like oh yeah and i'm like also you should definitely check your bill um to make sure that if they do finally come and pick it up that they're not then charging you for an extra pickup fee like they used to do to me in my old place you're like oh man i don't even know it's like i haven't even been looking at it it's on automatic i gotta start looking at my bill now and then we sort of just like you know she goes about her work we're kind of like you know in silence for a moment or two a beat or two and then she just kind of like lets out this sort frustrated sigh and i'm like oh my god i'm so sorry i brought i'm like i brought my anxiety into this office you're such a cool customer i could hear the garbage anxiety like i brought it into the office and it was building on her throughout the appointment so anyway don't

i love that you're patient zero for garbage anxiety as this as this virus now rips through the population they'll be able to go back and figure out that you escaped from a wuhan lab

of garbage anxiety I heard this sigh come out of her that I just knew it was her thinking oh now I gotta log in and look at my bill like I just heard it so anyway we uh I found her to be an interesting person um and she was really good at like sort of like you know checking in on me and she you know the what they do is they connect electrodes to you so they can measure what's going on with the electricity but then she put something cold I couldn't look at it uh to my arm in various places and then like kind of shocks it three times and i gotta say i think i'll bet you a lot of people in our audience i don't think carpal tunnel is a very rare thing so i'm sure a lot of people have been through this before so i don't want to make it i don't want to over exaggerate it but for me it was worse than i thought it was going to be i was nervous going in there yesterday just general going into the doctor's office not knowing what to expect knowing electricity and needles were involved that was basically all i knew but thinking i can get through this but i am anxious i'll just try to breathe my way through it but i expected the electricity to be more like really i expect it to be more like more like constant but very low level like just for some reason that's exactly how i imagined it no but it was more like three like so on your arm somewhere or in your hand somewhere you should be like okay it's gonna happen now

and then and it was like um it was like a little defibrillator or something but then but you really feel like when she does it on your arm your entire whatever entire your entire tendon go it feels like somebody took an electric guitar pick and strummed your tendons in your arm for a second and she has to do it like in a three times to each one and i think maybe did it to

like four or five different i promise you what you just described is part of a laser grateful dead show somewhere even as we speak i'm like a skeleton playing its tendons and being like

shake sugary that or fury road i mean somewhere somewhere between the two of those uh so it was like a weird thing and then like kind of knowing that it was going to happen three times in a row on the same nerve thing like i started really tensing up um before each one i didn't like it you know but she did say she said you know some people can't even i don't know if she was just saying this to make me feel like a brave boy i said i better get a sticker out of this and she said we don't have any stickers um but she said you know some people can't even go through with this some people i kind of stop midway through so you're you're doing great and then um the needle part i wasn't sure well what's the needle part going to be where they measure like sort of the nerves relationship with the muscle and that was just like one time in each hand but it was weird you ever go on a um whale watching tour luke you ever go on one of those i haven't boats we do that I would like to, but I haven't. Vives and I do that a lot on our vacations. That is something Genevieve loves doing. She always plans it, and I love going along. And on some of them, what they'll do is they will, this is really cool from a technological and sound standpoint, they'll put like some sort of a microphone overboard and kind of drop it down into the depths of the sea. And then they have a little speaker up top, and you can sort of hear the crackling, and you try to listen to the whale songs down below. But you also hear just a lot of like kind of crackling of the sea and various sort of interference with this special technology. And that's basically what the needle part was. She puts the needle part like right in the kind of the fatty part of your hand right below the thumb. I feel like that should have a name. It doesn't.

I think, yeah. What is that called? We all know what to talk about.

And the needle goes in there and the needle's connected to something. But then she puts it in. And that doesn't feel that much different than just like getting a little shot in your hand or whatever. But the needle stays in there. and it's sending some sort of signals to a device that's making sounds and like she kept saying like you really have to relax your thumb and I kind of got the impression if I'm right about this that if it started making too much noise it meant I wasn't relaxing my thumb enough so I was sort of I had to relax my thumb until there was silence sort of it was a very very strange again kind of uncomfortable but honestly I think the needle part was less bad than the shocks I did not I did not like the shocks they were more strong and more um intense than I thought they were going to be there so I probably got shocked like a total of what maybe it was 15 times on each arm maybe a little bit less than that but it was just like

and just like okay here it comes and then yeah once you know that it's not a great feeling then the fact that you it's like before the first time it's it could be anything but then once you know what it's going to actually feel like then it's like shit now i gotta do this a bunch more times

and you don't know exactly like okay they'll do three in a row in one place so by the second and third on that you know oh shit this is what i'm going to be feeling from my wrist to my inner elbow or something like that but then when they're going to a new spot you're like i don't know which one i don't know which nerves this is going to activate so there's also kind of like i don't i don't know how this is going to feel i just know it's going to be unpleasant but again i don't want to overplay this people have gone through much worse medical procedures but I will say it wasn't the electricity thing wasn't quite what I was expecting and a bit worse so if you need to get it done I'm sure you know if one needs to get it done and you're listening to this don't freak out too much you will you will get through it I got through it but if you're thinking about doing it recreationally I would say it's probably less fun than you're thinking okay gotcha so if you need it

Mathematically, yes. If you're going to go do like a medical tourism kind of spa thing, if you're going to go to Turkey or something for various procedures, don't throw this one on just for funsies.

I would go see a movie or something instead, like if possible, like maybe Inside Out 2 I heard is good. She did say something. We're chatting. I like to – I actually like asking people more about their situation, whether it's job or whatever, than talking about my own bullshit. But I also want to kind of keep people's boundaries in mind. You know, I don't want to pepper a professional, whether it's a whether it's a barber or a or a doctor. Or in my I like to my doctors are my barbers. I kind of go back to the old school of health care. But anyway, I don't I don't want to be asking this.

They also do. They bleed your blood humors, too.

She hung me upside.

down for a long time and put leeches on my forehead so that that was actually kind of cool um but anyway i didn't want to like kind of be peppering her with too many questions but i am interested in her line of work and it was kind of interesting to hear like she's done some side like she's in sports medicine and she's done some sideline stuff like being on the sidelines for basketball games and what have you but i didn't realize i'm like oh so is that the ideal that you end up getting a job where you're hired by the team and it turns out that like if i understand this correctly and i probably don't fully but it's like no the medical like I think whether it's Swedish or whatever clinic she belongs to, actually pays the teams for the opportunity to be the health care provider on the sidelines. And those positions are so sought after by, you know, doctors in the field of sports medicine to actually be on the sidelines with the teams, whether it's soccer or basketball, which were the examples she gave, that you have to do that for free. That's volunteer work. That sounds like such bullshit to me.

Yeah. I remember talking to somebody whose dad was a physician but his true love was being the physician for a hockey team my memory is almost to the detriment of the medical practice because being the medical guy for the hockey team was fun, interesting and you're sort of part of the team and then there's just going back to your normal medical practice of like you know somebody coming in with you know my carpal tunnel some kind of bullshit made up thing like what you have no but um but but yeah that's it i'm i guess i didn't realize that like swedish has to pay to be there but and i'm not sure i do know that the doctors yeah kind of love

that yeah it is interesting at all it kind of made me sad in a certain way i just don't feel like doctors should have to be doing that for free um but uh the other interesting thing was that uh she said at one point while she was you know doing the electricity through me she's like yeah i know this is like i had to go through it for uh medical school so like there are various routines where if you're trained to do something like that and if it's not something that is going to cause you any kind of harm you have to like be the patient and so even though she didn't have carpal tunnel or anything during her training she had to undergo this electricity and i think wow that i mean it's probably good from you know from a practice standpoint but man that would be galling if i had to go through this and i didn't even have carpal tunnel i'd be pretty pissed off

i love that that's part of the training though i think that's really i mean that yeah it makes a ton of sense so i'm i'm you know i'm glad to hear that uh maybe it gives well it sounds like in this case it definitely gave this doctor some perspective as to what your oh yeah your experience was did i i'm guessing it's too soon to know if they figured anything out from the

from the procedure it's actually not i mean so i asked her you know as i was starting to maybe distrust my um general practitioner physician i can what's the official name of your family doctor whatever doctor feel good um as i started to feel bad yeah i was starting to doubt him a little bit when i went in for my last appointment like isn't there any occupational therapy or physical therapy i can do for this and he just looked at me and shook his head he's like not for carpal tunnel there's nothing i was like that just doesn't seem right but i so i asked this doctor as well and she said some people find it helpful she said i doubt um you know she basically didn't she said i'll make a referral to you to that place where i had to go for some occupational therapy when i broke my hand like four years ago whatever that was so i'm like maybe i could go back there she's like yeah they might make you like kind of a custom splint or something for night that might be a little bit better or they might give you some exercises but honestly it looks like i am steering directly towards getting a surgery in both my hands she was able to say and this was actually somewhat satisfying she was like surprisingly your left hand is actually worse than your right hand and this is what she could tell like i guess the electricity uh proves that it actually is carpal tunnel that the the nerves are acting in whatever way they're acting but then the needle thing the the whale song thing um shows the severity the severity of it yeah and so apparently my left hand is actually worse and she said i would categorize your left hand as being severe um and your right hand is being closer maybe to moderate but you base you do have this and it sounds like i'm gonna have to like get surgery on both of my on both of my wrists which i know my dad has had and a lot of people have had before too and um you know now i'm i'm worried that i'm wasting both time and money by trying to go to physical therapy first but i just sort of feel like i know the people there i've been there before i i have again now i don't have to get all the details of my health stuff i feel like i have some overarching things that might be causing this anyway so i was very concerned about like am i going to get this surgery but we're not actually addressing what the overall issue is that caused this because i'm getting swelling in various places now and she said no either way you're you're going to need this like You might have to deal with it. with some other stuff as well but you have carpal tunnel and you're gonna have to you're gonna have to get this surgery which you know I I assume that it's like you know it's an outpatient surgery but it's a real surgery so I'm sure they'll knock me out and everything so that worries me less I actually worry more about anything that I have to stay awake for um so for the first time last night I was in a very weird mood Genevieve and I I picked Genevieve up after work and after my appointment we got some dinner and I was kind of just decompressing and trying to process everything And I don't look forward to having the surgery or the three weeks of recovery time or whatever. But like for the first time, I was kind of like, oh, but maybe I will play darts again. Like, I think there's something that I know that sounds like such a weird thing to focus on. But as you know, it's something I've really enjoyed doing the past couple of years. And it's a hobby that brings other hobbies along with it.

And I think I recently have just been like thinking that that's just over. We went to the Eagles last night and there was a group of young people there, which is very rare for the Eagles. Like a group of about, I don't know, eight young people. yeah they were like 42 no they're actually i think they were actually in their 20s it looked like two of them were maybe new members and they brought a bunch of friends and they i we didn't interact with them at all i wanted to yell at them at one point evan white because one of them was in a conversation with his friends about about the former mariner yes they were talking about relationships or whatever and how he's in some flirty thing with some i think some woman that he's seeing right now and and he said something like somebody in the conversation mentioned um uh uh justin uh who was who was in smoke smoke yeah and he's like that's it smoke him if you got him right he she's like and i hear him saying smoke that's the one that she was trying to think of the the the mariner first baseman that came after vogelbach and i'm like that wasn't smoke my dude smoke came so much earlier than that he's like it's i'm gonna text her right now i think it's justin smoke and i just want to be like dude if if you want some action evan white is the is what You want to be Texan, this lady.

I specialize in a very specific set of skills, and they are very forgettable mariners.

I'm like, I swear this dude is thinking of Evan White, not Smoke. Your timeline is wrong, my man bun dude. But anyway, I did not yell at him. But then they went upstairs and they played darts, this group of young people. And it really gave me a bad feeling, Luke. I felt very old and decrepit and and like I don't like I just I think I've really taken advantage of having even though you know I've been you know it's not like I take great care of myself but I've been very fortunate in the health department my entire life you know my entire life I've never had any kind of like really dogging illness or aches and pains or anything like that part of this is just got to do with age of course but now that I'm sort of dealing with all of this I think it's it's been affecting it's been affecting my mood a lot and just kind of thinking like, hey, maybe I go in, I get the surgery done, and a certain part of my life opens back up. That's something that I'm sort of focusing on.

Well, right, because when you get to our age, and this unfortunately will only be more the case as our lives go on, you start to get this feeling that your life is in certain ways getting smaller. You're probably not going to, at this point, learn the violin or get it together to write the great American novel or whatever the thing is that lives in the back of our minds about how our life could get kind of bigger. It starts to feel like, well, what are the things that I can no longer do? What's off the list now? And I also think for you, the darts is, it's about more than darts. It's about the time of the day that the darts is happening, I think, and how you feel when that's happening. Like, I think it's come to represent andy times and like you're you're relaxed you're not you're not feeling uh maybe the level of anxiety that you might feel during the regular work day and when people need things from you and when you know just a bunch of things so feeling like a really key part of your relaxing in the world and probably the few hours of the day where you feel really really unencumbered by the world to think that that's gonna never happen again that's a really sad feeling i would imagine

And it's not like, oh, well, just do, you know, like I still have my, I'm not overworked. I still have the times of day that I can spend by myself doing what I want. But like, I like doing things that are sort of, that are sort of repetitive. Ironically, that's probably why I have something that is often caused by repetitive motion. But like, I like doing things that are a little bit more active than just sitting down and watching TV. You know what I mean? I could spend that, I could have Andy times watching, you know, binge watching the shows that everybody's talking about. or watching movies or whatever, but it just doesn't satisfy me in the same way. I've been playing a little bit of video games, trying not to do too much of that, too, because of the same reason. But that just is not as fulfilling to me as this great period I had for a year or so where, you know, Genevieve got me this nice record player, so I'm coming home, we're going to record stores, we're buying records, we're coming home, we're playing darts, we're listening to it. It's just like everything sort of around and having people over.

uh and playing darts or having that during parties i again it just sort of sounds like it sounds weird that i'm just keep on talking about darts as if that's the biggest part of this but you're right it's more than just that it's the things that are sort of connected to that and uh and and it brings and hey it's a hobby that brings me joy absolutely and i'm glad to hear

that you're you're seeing maybe some light at the end of the tunnel some light at the end of the

carpal tunnel oh that's if we didn't already have the polanco title uh two very very dark

show titles on this fourth of july but um did the doctor say anything about how the condition responds to intense heat because my friend i am a bit concerned about uh the working conditions here in the madrona hill studio next week i hope i'm overstating this um but it is going to be Like when you and John show up on Sunday to kind of set everything up, it is promised to be 94 degrees here. Now, 94 degrees is survivable. And in a lot of places, that would be a low temperature. You know, it's going to be in certain parts of Oregon, 110 this weekend. So but the thing is, 94 degrees when there's no proper air conditioning set up is a little rough or just when you're trying to do more than just lie there, you know, with a fan blowing directly on you. So I am, today I was in Home Depot this morning buying other things, and I happened to walk by the ceiling fan department and called Walt and said, could we, because we actually, when we remodeled this garage, put in the electrical for a ceiling fan. It was always kind of part of the plan, but it's not a simple process here because the fan needs to come down like six feet from the peak of the roof. This is not just like you're putting one of those little Hampton Bay ceiling fans with a light built in and like a little pole chain on it in your kitchen.

I was going to say, too, you have a very specific design sensibility that you've been maintaining with this as well. And like, though we have, you know, we have some of those kind of cheapo fans that just came with the house, which someday we will replace. But, like, a real basic ceiling fan can look pretty unattractive. I feel like we have some pretty unattractive ceiling fan light fixtures in our house.

It's some of the worst design work that really happens in the world is, like, you know, ceiling fan technology. They don't age particularly well. And I'll be honest with you, the one that I bought was just the one in Home Depot that I thought looked kind of the best, but that was in the right size parameter.

So you did buy one. Okay.

Oh, yeah, I bought one. And then but then you need something called the down rod. Yeah, which is is something that Flanders yells at his kid when he's climbing on the treehouse. But also an important you can hear Walter is boring into the side of the studio now because we're putting some sconces up, too. But I needed this part. And this is part why you and I dial up late today, because Home Depot didn't have the proper down rod, which is just like this metal, you know, conduit that you put in the electrical box that's in the ceiling and then it goes down to where the fan is. But it has to be very rigid because this fan is spinning.

Yeah, so this is really cool. This will be neat because you have a peaked ceiling. So this is going to be like a fan that actually extends down from the ceiling quite a bit. That'll be, okay, see, that'll be a really cool.

Yeah, six feet, 72 inches.

Nice. That'll be a really, wow. That'll be a really cool look, actually. And also, I sort of feel like, is it even more effective when you have more air above the blades as well as blades?

I am hoping that, I mean, I'm not just doing this for like the show or for content because we've done more than enough content for a holiday show. I legitimately am worried about the working conditions here next week because if this is just a giant sweat box and we're trying to like do these important shows and make these bracelets and hang out here and work, you know, typically the way it goes is we get done with the show and then like you and John really go to work you start posting the show, John's working with all of the donation stuff I just don't want this to be a really uncomfortable place for the three of us to operate so I do think my hope is that this ceiling fan which is pretty substantial, it's like 52 inches it will move the air around effectively it will get the warm air that's accumulating up in the peak of the roof in the ceiling, it'll get that moved out of there so that the, you know just the general temperature in here will be tolerable i don't know but it was not on the punch list of things we were trying to do this week but it has now been added to the list because i also bought now uh i'm soon to be the owner of three of these room fans that am uh the new york wire cutter new york times wire cutter says are the best fans for the job that gets their highest reviews so we're going to have those in here although i'm a bit worried about the audio implications of that. So I don't know exactly what it's going to uh be like in here sunday is going to be i think the hottest day so i guess i want to tell you person to person andrew uh that um it's like when you get here on sunday it's going to be warm but that i don't think is what it's going to be like every day next week okay yeah and sunday

we'll be setting up and then i'll be going off to my little i'm sure that i have a probably an air conditioning uh window unit in the hotel i'm staying at um so i'll go back there to cool off

I know, but I thought about this. I was like, Andrew and John are going to decamp to their hotel. I want us to hang out. I want us to be three bros bro-ing it up. That's the fun part. But you guys are going to be like, this sucks. We've got to go down the mountain and get to our air-conditioned hotel room.

I mean, again, there's really no reason why I can't say where we're staying, but I just would maybe want to avoid that since we are staying there for an entire week. But I just want to say the name of the place. But here's one thing that I've actually been thinking about. And not even I haven't been thinking about this as a heat mitigation, although it could sort of play that role a little bit for me personally. But I've been a little anxious about asking you about something, which is I have I have two wrist braces that I keep in the freezer that when my hands get a little bit, you know, sore or whatever, especially near the end of the day, I'll put these babies on and I kind of cool down my wrists and maybe sort of mitigate some of the swelling. But I was going to ask you, if I bring those, can I put them in your freezer? Are you weird about it? Do you want me to put them in, like, Ziploc bags so that you don't have this idea of medical equipment being in the...

No, I want you to lay them on the salmon patties I bought at Costco. Wait, can I...

Hold on.

I'll just wrap the salmon patties around my... There you go. Around my wrists. You can absolutely put them in the freezer. That doesn't bother me even in the slightest. And I am proud to say we have a freezer here in the Madrone Hill studio. That's great. Yeah, that's good. Because there's now an operating refrigerator. And there's a coffee maker out here. So I want it to be, you know, a nice place for you and John and I to work from for an entire week. And I want us to, you know, have refreshments. And I just I want it to be comfortable. And I'm I'm pretty worried that it's going to be uncomfortable. I'm trying to do everything I can to mitigate it. So we like for one thing, I bought a screen door, which we just installed so that and then I'm fixing there's a screen that goes on this this sliding door that's next to me out to a non-existent deck. But the screen for that slider, if that makes sense, is like someone punched through it much like a hat after a horse either wins or loses a race.

Somebody punched through it after somebody got the golden sombrero.

Yeah, after somebody came up with two men on and in a two-run game and, of course, struck the hell out two games ago. So I had to buy this whole repair kit, so I bought new screen. Have you ever done that, by the way, that process? That's on my list for today.

Like reinstall, not just replace the door, but you're going to actually re-screen the existing door?

Yeah, you keep the door, you keep the frame, and you pull out. There's this little rubber cordage that goes into this little gap. So you cut the new screen to size, and then you have a special tool that basically pushes this little rubber cord down, which seals it in, and then you trim off the excess screen.

That's how it's done?

You can do that for all—and one of the things about this house is that when I bought it, there were so many things that were in such poor shape, but the window screens might have been at the top of the list. I mean, they just look like Bill the cat from Bloom County just did an especially rigorous line of meth and then just went to town on them. So like that's one of the things I'm doing today. But the idea is I want to try to create an airflow through here so we can have the door open, but there'll be a screen door so it won't be bugs and stuff coming in. And then we're going to have airflow through here. I'm putting this ceiling fan in. I just want you to know I'm doing everything that I can. Yeah, I want you to know Walt's doing everything that he can to be as loud as possible. And I have some good news. Mission accomplished.

Oh, that wasn't that loud. It was just a little flick in the back. Andrew said that wasn't that loud, Dad. Yeah, I think it was louder to you guys. Honestly, get yourself.

He said, well, it's your screen door.

Get yourself.

You know, he's not wrong.

Get some ice blocks. Can you carve ice chairs for us out of ice blocks?

And then we can ice race down the hill. We'll sit on those blocks of ice. Yes. and then I've got a couple pigs here. We can grease them up and then have a pig catching contest. Oh, I like that.

It's going to be a week. It really is. I'm in physical condition for all of that stuff, too.

Sounds like you absolutely should. So, anyway, I guess I just want to let you know, Andrew, that I am doing everything I can to make this a tolerable work environment for next week, but when I saw 94, because yesterday it was probably 80 around here, maybe at a high point, and it was toasty. Like, it was warm in the afternoon. I'm seeing 94, and I'm like, Thank you.

I have this nightmare scenario of you and John rolling up in the rental car, getting out, walking into the studio, and going, this is not going to work, and then just leaving. And then I just have to do the thon by myself and post the show, and I don't know how to do any of that stuff.

Okay, well, we'll see. We can be having so much fun. Just remember that life is much fun. You can be nothing but fun.

All right. Time to do some Blur's Days here. If you want to submit a Blur's Day message for yourself or a loved one or someone you know but don't necessarily love because the L word is kind of scary. Email me, andrew at tbtl.net, and put Blur's Day in the subject line. Mike did that. Mike says, I'd like to wish Puddle a happy seventh birthday. I heard it's Puddles. It's Puddle, Luke. Put respect on that Puddle. Seven, seven years old. We've watched Puddle grow up in front of our very own ears, Luke. Let's see here. Mike says, I'd like to wish Puddle a very happy seventh birthday. Mommy, Langley, and I are so proud of the smart, kind, and happy kid. you're growing into, I'm looking forward to spending the night with you in the tent. Oh, how fun is that? Love you, kid. Oh, dude. Love, Dad. That's so fun. Wow. A little summer camping. I was just thinking the

other day that, like, okay, one of the greatest tricks that parents play on their kids is breakfast for dinner. Like, when you're a kid and you're like, are you kidding? We're having breakfast for dinner. That is, my mind is blown, and it's really like, well, we didn't have any food, but we did have eggs, and there was some bacon in the back of the meat drawer. but it just plays so well when you're a kid. And also, we're going to camp in the backyard. I mean, what a dream. What an absolute dream, even though it's really like, let's throw this tent up in the backyard and make this into an event. Those are two great, affordable moves you can pull as a parent that will live forever in the minds of a kid.

Mayor wants to wish Steve in Michigan a happy 57th Blur's Day. Happy birthday, Dad. Thank you for continuing to be my hero And always finding a way to make us all smile Love and appreciate you always Love and appreciate you always Your favorite daughter, Mare And the rest of the family Yeah, but obviously Favorite daughter, Mare

If you send in a message to the Blurs On July 4th You've established That you're the favorite child It's not even a question

Now this is Outside the Ordinary We got a message here. It says, happy 15th anniversary, Jenny, from Tremendidums. And I just wanted to mention here, that was just a quick little request to throw that in there. I have pretty strict rules around these Blur's Days segments so that they don't get too long or out of hand. We don't do pet birthdays. We don't do anything but birthdays. We don't do anniversaries. However, Luke. You can be bought. I can be bought. This came along with a donation last week, and it said, hey, I'm throwing some money your way. Can you throw in an anniversary? And guess what? I can be bribed. Hard yes. Hard yes.

Absolute hard yes. You know who else bribed me? Huh. My actual niece, Violet, whose birthday is today. Oh, this is the perfect segment. Violet, a.k.a. Missy. Happy Blur's Day to Sam and Ashley, my brother and sister-in-law. How old now? Well, happy Blur's Day to Violet. Now you've asked me a question I could never know the answer to.

Oh, okay.

Somewhere between 2 and 40.

I just remember seeing photos of her beautiful baby when she was a newborn. Such a little cutie. So beautiful, yeah.

She did, when we were at my dad's birthday, my dad's 70th, she gave me a little kiss on the cheek goodbye. And I did the cool uncle thing where I just pretended like it was the most incredible kiss I'd ever received on my cheek. And honestly, it was in the top five.

I should be up there too, I would hope.

Her response, no, you're in the top three of the kisses you've given me on the cheek. Nice. The besos. that you've bestowed upon me. But it was great because I just did the ultimate uncle move, like, oh, my gosh, thank you. And then the joy that it generated for Vi, I was like, this is why you play the game. This is why you make lame uncle jokes is because every once in a while they just really hit.

I didn't even know. You know, I'm pretty unfamiliar with this uncle reaction, you know, like a kiss on the cheek from a kid. It's like it always just sort of seemed par for the course when I was a kid saying hello to aunts and uncles or goodbye or whatever, but I don't think I ever received that sort of like, what a great, well maybe, yeah, I don't know, I can't quite picture what you're talking about. Maybe you weren't a very good

kiss her as a child. I realize that. Did you hear me try to stop? Did you hear me just say, you know what?

Why don't you kiss a potato like everybody else, Andrew?

I can't hear you over the music, Luke.

All right. Happy Blur's Day to everybody.

Are you kidding me? We're nowhere even near the end.

I thought that the special payola message meant we were at the end of it. That's why I was honoring Violet. I thought we had moved past the paying customers and into the actual blood relations of mine.

But happy birthday, Violet. And also, Denise says, I'd like to wish a very happy birthday to my five, Mike, who became a card-carrying ten during last year's TBTL-a-thon. Heck yeah. Thank you, Mike. See, Luke, I knew you'd like this one. There were many hours of listening to TBTL during long road trips, but if there's that one moment I felt the die was cast, it was when we listened to Luke's boat story. You know, that one. And we laughed and we laughed. Happy birthday, Mike. Love you, Mom.

That was the best. I don't know how much money I ended up losing on just the ownership of that boat through mortgage fees and just how much I lost in dignity. But boy, has that ever paid.

That was a good story.

That has paid some real dividends in terms of getting people to listen to this show. My goodness.

That was a long time ago now, too. Yeah, it was. Annie in Seattle says, I just want to wish you Billy and Ben a happy Blur's Day. I'm a bit late, but I hope your day was fabulous and filled with a long run and beer. The next time you're in Seattle, beers are on me at Flying Lion. Maybe I should say that. Is this supposed to be like Flying Lion? There's a G on there, Flying Lion.

If I'm lying, I'm dying.

If I'm lying, I'm a lion. Happy day, my friend. Happy Blur's Day, Billy. And, of course, Pam in Tacoma says, My son Nathan turns 42 today on the 4th of July. He's our oldest son, but still my little firecracker. He loves board games and video games. He once had a podcast, too. Happy birthday, Nathan. We love you.

Thank God Nathan got out of the podcasting game. We don't need him competing for donation dollars with Pam. That's how I feel. As far as us, we need those donation dollars. We don't need Nathan getting them. I mean, even on your birthday, buddy.

Thank you in advance, Pam, for donating.

Appreciate you.

Owen, yeah.

Oh, my God.

You'll know.

What was going on nine months ago? Was there a Barry White concert?

This one was very important. Usually I say, so-and-so says happy birthday to so-and-so, but this time I had very specific instructions to say the recipient's name first to catch his attention. So, Owen, Owen, I'm talking to you. Owen, happy birthday from Catherine. It's our favorite guy's golden birthday. How are you turning six already? We're grateful for your love and knowledge of all sports that you have learned to tell hilarious jokes and are mastering the art of sarcasm and for your kind and generous heart. So explain that. Happy birthday weekday, number five. Bugaboo, love mama, dada, and tiny Anne.

Wait a minute, but that's not the kid. We talked to a baseball fan last year during the fawn, right? A young person who knew a lot about baseball, but that couldn't have been Owen. I don't think that person wasn't. Yeah, I don't think Owen was. That person wasn't the age of five or the age of four.

I think this must be a different.

Maybe we'll get a call from Owen. Yeah. I want to mention that we will be taking calls next week. Lord willing and the internet cooperating. We will be taking your calls. My brain cooperating. Yeah. One of the many fun little kind of things that we like to do during the TBTL-a-thon week. So please do give us a call.

Yeah, I mean, that's the plan. I got to get over there. I got to get over there on Sunday. And I have a lot of anxiety, Luke. You probably don't know that about me. But we've got to get this shit set up. And the plan is to have, as we have done in years past, have a live YouTube feed of each show starting at 10 a.m. next week, right? 10 for 1030. And we should be able to be streaming it live at tbtl.net via video where you can kind of chat with the other 10s in the comment section on YouTube. And hopefully, because you'll be watching it live, you can call in and say hello to us. if everything works out well.

I think it should. I mean, I've done it before. You've made this work in years past, and we have connectivity here. I think we should be all right.

I need an engineer. This is a belated Blursday to Brett in the U District. We really enjoyed celebrating you with out-of-town family, mini-golf, and shakes. We are looking forward to spending your 48th year with you. You make it all work. Love, Amy, Rockwell, Mac, Blossom, and Reluctantly, Shadow. Yeah, these ones. Everybody, Brett in the U District. Got it. I was surprised.

We didn't hear from Brett. Brett was a self-appointed Neti Pot correspondent years ago. He was sending in a lot of information about Neti Pots. And you were kind of getting in the Neti Pot game just a couple weeks ago.

Oh, yes, I have been. And even though when we were at my parents' house on Sunday, my dad said, you know, your mom has that Neti Pot. I was going to give it to you. And I was like, I want no part.

No, not a secondhand Neti Pot.

I want no part of a Neti Pot that my mother has because I can promise you where she didn't buy it the new neti pot store yeah that was not where this was purchased oh was

at least the idea that she had not used it oh i doubt she'd used it i mean it's a weird experience

my mom accumulates things all the time um you know like uh you know uh sort of whether or not she's actually she'll think oh maybe i'll use that or maybe she saw something on tv about it but then she'll be at a fill the bag sale or something and she'll just grab it then it will just typically she won't ever get around to using it but what i know is that it was definitely somebody has used that neti pot who's not me and that's why i don't want any part of that no no use neti pots no no no no of course not no more wire hangers and no used neti pots also like i the one that i bought off of amazon.com which i've been very happy with is it's it's like a squeeze bottle so you can actually up the sort of psi which you're not supposed to do you're You're supposed to let gravity do the work. You're supposed to just let the water is flowing down, and then it wants to go through your nasal cavity. But I like to give it a little squeeze. I like to really just power wash the inside of my sinuses that way.

You clean your brain a little bit, too.

Yep, and it feels good.

It feels good. Okay, I only got about 14 more of these to go. Are you kidding me? No, this is the final one. Rachel says, happy birthday to my beautiful niece Jojo, who celebrates a whole handful this year, turning five years old. A whole handful of years. Sorry we won't be able to celebrate with you in person this year, but know that I will always think of you on your birthday because it's mine, too. Oh, a little backdoor self-blurzing going on for Rachel. Happy birthday to you, too, Rachel. Let's see here. It says, love, Auntie Rachel. P.S. Kate, can you play this for your daughter? And, yes, maybe I'm being a little thirsty. Thank you. Wow. Oh, my gosh. it's a blurs day miracle i didn't fade that music that music ended there we had the perfect amount of blurs days for that music and blurs and you know what and i was being just because it's a

holiday and i'm ready to get on with my other things i was being all kind of short with you and the blurs day celebrate uh celebrants celebrants um and uh and yet it was the you're right it was the exact right amount of blurs day messages to bring us to um to the end of the show Oh, by the way, Andrew, the word you were trying to think of was thanar eminence. Thanar eminence.

When was I trying to think of that word? That is the fleshy area of your hand below your thumb. Oh, sure. That's fun.

Thanar eminence. Have you ever heard those words put together? I feel like this should have a catchier name.

Yeah, thanar. It sounds like a bad guy in the Marvel movies, right?

Uh-huh. Oh, yeah. I am inevitable. So that's what it's called in case you need that today for any of your 4th of July barbecuing or other things you might be doing. All right, thanks for listening, everyone. Thanks, Andrew, and thank you, Luke, for making the show on the 4th of July.

So I gave all.

Yep, we sure did. Was it good? Unclear. Was it all? Very much. Yes. All right, we'll see you tomorrow with more Imaginary Radio. In the meantime, have a great Thursday. Hope you have fun out there, and please remember, a new mountain too tall. And good luck to all.

look daddy i like you like i like you that's the thing i like you too daddy there's a lot of things about me you don't know anything about daddy things you wouldn't understand things you couldn't understand things you shouldn't understand i don't understand power out