Muse

Tell me one fact that you know about me. Do you not remember one single thing about me?

Dude, things have been nuts around here. I bet you don't know anything about me.

You were born in Phoenix. You went to school in Tempe. You're an only child. Your favorite show is something called The Real Housewives of Atlanta. And your favorite book is Kendall Jenner's Instagram feed.

How did you know all that?

Because you are constantly talking about yourself. You are the most self-obsessed person I have ever met.

You should see Kendall Jenner's Instagram feed.

TBTL! Hey, TBT. TBTL.

You want, you can do so, you can.

I used to be with it, but then they changed what it was. Now what I'm with isn't it.

And what's it seems weird and scary to me.

It may be an ugly world, but at least I have a beautiful face. I see you exhaling, sir. We're going to be with you in just a moment. You've got to be patient, okay? We're very, very sorry. Our apologies. We apologize to you. You will not have to wait that much longer at all.

All right. Hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Thursday edition of TBTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. My name is Luke Burbank. I'm your host. If you want to talk, I've got two ears and they're tuned to the listening station. Coming to you once again from the Madrona Hill studio. I'm back, baby. Perched high above the mighty Columbia where we have got a fun show in store for you. It's episode 4591 in a collector series.

Let the fun begin.

We're going to do some top fives today. This is really the content sensation that's sweeping the nation. By that, I mean sweeping TBTL. It's where we go through the top five experiences of various things.

This is special. This is special.

And decide where the people who are submitting these were wrong or omitted things. That's the fun part of it. We're going to do that today with the help of this young man, longest running Cobra of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. He wants to be very clear about what this show is, in fact.

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

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

Good morning, Luke. How are you doing, buddy?

I'm great. Good. I am feeling good. I'm feeling excited. I like this top five thing that we've started doing. And by the way, huge turnout from the fans. People also really like this, what would you call it, framing technique? Yeah. A lot of people submitting a lot of things for these shows.

Yeah, and shout-out to listener Bobby, who sort of kicked this off. It was sort of a— No, come on. Let's not, honestly— It started as a bit of a parody, sort of, or his own take on what they do on the Dan Lebitard Show, which is the top five list where they list—they call honorable mentions OLIs, which means outside looking in, and he did that about beers, experiences of drinking beers, and it just got—I mean, we got so many voicemails and emails from people who wanted to add to his list or take exception with his list or our list or whatever. I'm just worried about it going to Bobby's head

He's a pretty big wheel down at the Cracker Factory And by Cracker Factory I mean the eerie Philharmonic He's doing local public radio appearances He also is in charge of the music at the Cracker Factory Yes, he chooses the playlists every night Regional celebrity out there in the part of the world that he lives And then he's also doing things on TBTL that are starting entire movements And I worry that he's going to become insufferable

You know, speaking of choosing music at workplaces This was a list that I, well, this was an idea for a list that I was tossing around via text with my buddy Nick Jarn a while back, which is top five songs that you hear in a grocery store. I feel like Phil Collins is definitely on that list.

So songs you mean, but or artists?

Well, now I want to back away from Phil Collins a little bit because I have some personal memories of Phil Collins songs coming on in a grocery store, and they've been little moments for me. But honestly, I don't even know if that's a good pick for that list. Maybe that's an OLI because there are some songs that are just like you hear them in grocery stores, and you're like, of course. If you are wandering around your day, it's the afternoon or early evening, and you have a song stuck in your head, and you're like, How the hell did this song get stuck in my head? I want you to stop for a minute and examine your day. Did you go to a grocery store? Because if you did, I'll bet you a million bucks that's how that random song got stuck in your head. The original version of Pave Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot, that's a great grocery store song.

You don't mean the Counting Crows? I would argue maybe the Counting Crows version.

is actually maybe replaced the Joni Mitchell version as far as a thing you would hear on the music at the grocery store.

In a grocery store, interesting. Maybe it depends on the neighborhood.

If you're in a Crow's district or if you're in a Joni Mitchell district. Exactly. I can only think of one song from a grocery store now, and it's because it's in an intro package that we play. Do you remember the song?

Oh, yes. I know the intro package. It's like they keep on going over the speaker announcements, and they say, please check out our special on Daddy's Home 2, the only store, the only VHS that you'll find in a grocery store.

This is the story of a girl.

Yeah, right. And who does that song? See, that's an era that I don't really know that. That's like that early 2000s punk pop music, right?

I guess, yeah. I don't I don't know the name of that artist either, but that song definitely was pretty ubiquitous at the time. And now because it's used in that in that tape, that's the song I think of. I think what you're saying, it's not even the specifics of the songs. It's more just the fact that you're absolutely right. I think that probably the also you're a heavy user of the grocery store. I was going to say the grocery store is one of the last public spaces where they're still probably playing music. And so that's when we go into it I mean, first of all, we're going into fewer and fewer public spaces Probably because more and more stuff is being purchased online I mean, for commerce, right? And then I feel like the grocery store, they still do bump the tunes You know what makes me really happy is when I'm in the produce section And they're bumping the tunes And one of the produce folks is singing along

Oh, I don't know if I've experienced that

I like it when the people that work at a place Are actually enjoying the music that's being played On the overhead It makes me feel like, okay, they like being here they like music this is making their day better like when i worked at dick's drive-in and i used to look forward all day until i would hear ironically i guess let it be by the beatles because that told me that i was i think about 45 minutes from my shift being over because the music was on such a tight schedule that i knew i knew like the second or third spin of let it be meant

oh we're almost done here oh my god see that's interesting like i i rarely hear an employee singing along to the music because I think that they've heard the songs too many times. And while I try to maintain a personality as somebody who does not force grocery store employees to engage with me, like I just, I'm like, they don't want to chat with this old man. Every now and then I will ask when a song is playing kind of loudly and I'm checking it, I'm like, do you, do you hear the same songs all the time? And it's always the same answer, which is just like a huge eye roll. And just like this, this moment where they feel very seen and they're like, yes, I've

heard this five times today see maybe i don't again i haven't had that many jobs where where there was like muzak or whatever you call that you know muzak is based in seattle oh no the original company muzak the original company muzak which is that still a going concern i don't know is that like you know are they are they are they still building their their base of customers is muzak out there in the world i mean we we did a story by the way we need to get to these top fives But we did a story some time ago about what we decided was probably a scam operation of people just like sending. And we talked about how this happened to your dad, actually, at Walsh Manufacturing at some point.

Yeah, I don't know if it was actually a scam, but he did. I'm willing to say it was a scam. Some hold music. So they had to change their hold music.

I'm willing to say on the record it was absolutely a scam. I asked him about that.

He has very little, very little recall at all of that whole thing. I'm like, do you remember you were using classical music as your hold music? You were using, this is the story of a girl. And somebody sent you like a cease and desist or something, and you had to change your music. And he's like, oh, I just, he just, he barely had a recollection of that, which is why I'm a little bit uncomfortable with you suddenly saying my dad was scammed in the 90s.

Your dad was scammed into near bankruptcy.

My dad was scammed into the 90s.

Yes, he was scammed. It was cross. What is the, what's the word I'm looking for? It was actually dragged him into a whole other decade. It was cross-decade, the scamming that went on for Bob. No, but, like, I do wonder if Muzak is still able to get people. I mean, on one hand, I mean, it's certainly not, like, more illegal to just play a Spotify or Pandora playlist at your grocery store over the PA, right? Like, I'm sure you're still not technically allowed to do that.

You'd need some sort of clearance. You'd probably have to buy a license. Right.

And that was part of, I think, where Muzak came in was that it was, you know, if you paid them, then you weren't going to get in trouble with anyone for basically improving the experience in your establishment by using music that somebody else wrote and was entitled to money for. I think, let's see, I'm on a Muzak web. Muzak is still a company, but I think they're now maybe officially branded as Mood Media, and then Muzak Background Music is underneath that. It also looks like I was loud wrong on Muzak's history, I think. Oh, not Pacific Northwest-based?

I don't know. I'm on their Wikipedia page, and I feel like I'm seeing a bunch of stuff. Why did I think that, by the way? I don't know.

You're not thinking of stock photography, are you? No, no, no. Because they're certainly based here. What's their name? Oh, my goodness gracious. Getty Images, of course, is Seattle-based.

How is Getty based in Seattle? It's not named for the— Is it not? Unrelated to the Getty family, like the Getty Corporation of L.A., the Getty Oil? Yeah, it's true.

They're associated with L.A., but I don't know. That's a good point. I do consider Getty to be associated with L.A., of course. But I thought that Getty Images was based in Seattle. I could be wrong about this.

Top five things that Luke has gotten wrong. Top five favorite things that Luke gets wrong. I'm going to do, you know, before tomorrow, Andrew, after today's show and before tomorrow, I'm going to do a little deep diving because it's not that I'm trying to die on this hill about Muzak, but I'm trying to figure out where it is that that got into my head, that there's a strong Seattle association.

Well, wait, hold on. Well, I mean, I know you want to come back tomorrow, but if I just type in Muzak Seattle, Well, I get the Wikipedia page, and the preview on Google says Muzak was based in various Seattle, Washington locations from 86 to 99, after which it moved its headquarters to outside Charlotte in 2000.

Well, cancel tomorrow's show. We have nothing to talk about.

Sorry, I burned your content. No, I also didn't want you to lose sleep over this.

You can burn any content that involves me being less raw.

Right, exactly. So, yeah, you were totally right, and that would be the era that you would have known of it and been proud of it, probably.

And their HQ used to be up kind of in the Maple Leaf neighborhood, if I remember right, kind of like as you would be driving along, you know, you're going past. Well, anyway, it was sort of between like the Roosevelt neighborhood. But then before you got to like where Nathan Hale was over by the what was the Wedgwood Broiler, not too far from the Wedgwood Broiler, there was a building and it said Muzak. And the reason that jumped out at me as a kid was because, as a kid, what I knew of Muzak was, like, oh, that's boring music. Because Muzak had wormed its way into the pop culture as, like, a quick throwaway line for music that you didn't want to be hearing. Like, oh, God, the Muzak. Like, that's what I knew about Muzak. They called it elevator music, too, right? Elevator music.

Elevator music or Muzak. I feel like those were very boomery references that we absorbed as the children of boomers, right? That's right.

Like, elevator music was the worst possible thing you could say about music.

Yeah, absolutely. And by the way, I mean, for whatever it's worth, Getty Images was founded by somebody who was part of Mark Getty back, let's see, this says 95, although that seems so much later than I would have thought. Wouldn't you have thought Getty Images would be older than that? But he is part of the Getty family, for whatever that is.

But probably in Seattle, right?

It is. I do think you're right. It's based in Seattle. Yeah, I've confirmed that.

Okay, now, what about the voice of Getty Lee?

How did it get so high? I wonder if he talks like an ordinary guy. Luke, should we do, we have so many, okay, I want to say some things about these lists. We asked listeners if they could send in some of their ideas for top five lists and then sort of fill them out themselves, right? Anything. It could be anything. And we have some good examples of them coming up. Now, we have, as often is the case with this show, we have had a tremendous response from the listeners. And so we're not even going to be able to get to probably, I don't even know if we'll be able to get to a quarter of the lists that were sent in. So I'm wondering if maybe we can hang on to some of these because they're all good. You know, it's like I got 10 fingers, but I wouldn't give up any of them.

No, I mean, again, I don't want to like already start looking forward to special programming. But I did have the thought, oh, these lists actually seem like they're really good content. And if we have too many of them, we don't want them to go to waste. Maybe we preserve them, we vacuum seal them in a mason jar, and we put them up on the shelf, and we bring them back down at some point. We bring them out of the root cellar, and we enjoy them during the cold, dark winter months when they'll still be delicious.

Now, that sounds good. I had one idea, too. Let me know if you're okay with this. I got one of those giant bags that you can then hook a vacuum cleaner up to to then suck all of the air out of it to really make it easily storable. So I was going to put them all, all the ones we don't use, maybe into one of those things, vacuum it, and then put under the bed.

See, this is the difference in our approach to this. I'm planning on eating these topics. You're describing them in a non-perishable kind of a way.

I plan on rolling all over them and burying myself.

You're talking about them like summer clothes that you put away, you vacuum seal and put under the bed. I'm talking about them like peaches. Although I guess those aren't refrigerated either if you can them properly.

No, they're not usually refrigerated, right? Canning means you don't have to do that. Have you ever done any real canning?

Isn't that a surprise? Kind of seems like something you'd like. It does.

I got to get into it. I got to get into it. I think the thing is I'm not associated with any kind of garden or growing or even CSA situation that lends itself to having a whole bunch of extra produce that I don't know what to do with. One thing that I would like to get into is pickling. I've said this on the show many, many times, because I love pickles, and I love also these kinds of projects where the majority of time is spent waiting. You feel like you're doing something, but all you have to do is look at the jars sitting there, and you're like, I'm doing something right now. I'm pickling those things.

You know what my entry into pickling is going to be? Quick pickling.

Oh, yeah.

You think I'm joking.

No, I know what you're talking about.

I mean, that's the like the easiest and and like the kind of requires the least amount of waiting. And, you know, again, it's in the name quick pickling. Yeah, I see all these. My brother in law, Josh, is a boy's a food phenom all around, but they'll quick pickle some red onion. You probably do the same thing. A lot of people do this. I love having a quick pickled red onion. I don't think I've ever done it on my own. I want to start doing that. And then once I master that, then I'll move into medium pickling and then eventually long pick.

Well, be careful, cowboy. All right, so all of that is... How about this? Let's thank some donors. First of all, I like it when you call me cowboy.

It feels cool. I feel like, you know, I don't know, real mask, real macho. Let's thank some donors, and then let's finally dive into some of these top fives, if you will. Sounds good. Thank you, baby. Hey, let's thank those donors who are making this program, this thing called TVTL, possible five days a week. This is 100% listener-supported. The way that this is our job and is a job for John Sklaroff is because of folks like Joshua Johnson in Missoula, Montana.

Hey, Joshua. Thank you, as always. What up, Joshua?

I wonder, probably not the one-time host of the public radio show 1A.

But you don't know for sure.

We can't say it's not that, Joshua. You wouldn't say that to Tom Petty, would you? No, you wouldn't. You wouldn't open a can of whoop-up on Tom Petty, would you?

I'm so sorry. I don't even know why I said that. I was confusing 1A with what was the Canadian show that Billy Bob appeared on that. Q? Yes, yes, yes.

Was it called something else before that, or was it always called Q?

I think it was always called Q, and it was Meshi? Well, it was Gian Gomeshi. Gomeshi. I mean, Gomeshi was the last name of that host, right? Yeah, no longer. But there's no connection there. 1A is W-A-M-U.

1A used to be the Diane Rehm show.

Yeah, exactly.

So when Diane Rehm stopped doing that show, they said, well, we can't call it the Diane Rehm show anymore because we're down to Diane Rehm. Yeah, exactly. Did I tell you about the—I know we've got donors to thank. We've got top fives to five. Did I tell you about a very kind of an embarrassing moment that was Diane Rehm related that it got me so excited, and then Becca had to bring me back down to earth.

So this is a Becca-era story, which means it's somewhat recent, yet it's a Diane Rehm-related story.

So I was listening to, I really like the band Big Thief, and there's a song on the Big Thief, not this most recent, there's a new album out, which is really good, but the previous one, there's a song that's sort of towards the end of the record, and it's Adrian Lenker, who's the lead singer of Big Thief, is just kind of it's kind of a rollicking number and she says uh something like sitting on the porch hanging out with diane ream that's my grandma and i was like are you kidding me right now adrian lanker of big thief is diane ream's granddaughter like this is crazy this is and i told the one person who would care about this as much as i do which was becca because she of course knows who diane ream is and she also loves big thief and so i was like i was like i was like you got to sit down right now like this is like i broke up the middle of her day to blow her mind with the news that adrian linker's grandmother is radio's diane ream and she goes i thought she was always saying diane lee and i was like no no it's definitely diane ream and then later i looked up the lyrics on whatever and it's diane lee it's nothing to do with that i just misheard it okay And I got so excited by this connection

And so in the song slash story, she's actually hanging out on the porch with her real grandma Yeah, whose name is just Diane Lee Oh, okay, yeah

That's my grandma And like, I just got so These two people whose work I had admired over the years And also just who I kind of was very aware of The idea that there was a connection between the two of them And that it was buried somewhere in this song that Adrian Lenker is Diane Reen's granddaughter I just was so psyched about it that I didn't let the actual thing she was saying get in the way of my excitement it yeah and then I looked up, and then the rest of my day was kind of a letdown, honestly. Yeah. You're still recovering. I am. Tiffany Peterson's made it through just fine, actually, in South Orange, New Jersey. Tiffany Peterson was never even under the impression that Diane Rehm was the grandmother of Adrian Langdon. Ah, ignorance is bliss. It sure is. This is one of the many reasons I'm jealous of Tiffany. And also Anne Piquineau of Everett, Washington. Hey, thank you, Anne. Anne's been supporting the show for Evs, and I've been, let's just say 50-50 on saying Ann's last name for Evs.

Well, we haven't received any corrections that I know of or recall, and everybody knows I have a really good memory.

But is there also... The other day off-air you were telling me, oh, there's the pronunciation part that you don't see. You were talking to me, and I thought, why don't I see? Wouldn't that be... Is there another cell on the Excel that I don't know about?

Well, there's a whole bunch of cells, including email addresses and everything, and the thing is there's one column that is the F column. So you want to do this? The A column is first name, the B column is last name, the C column is city, the D column is state, and that's all the information we usually need. The E column is where I put notes about what day we thanked people, because sometimes at the end of the year, people will say, hey, you never thanked me, and I can look it up and make sure that I did or not. That's what you slam them down. And then I just say, listen, you gave us money and we thanked you. You got E column. No, and then there's the F column, which it's like one out of every 30 or 40 people have a pronunciation. It's so rare that it would blow up the whole email I'm sending you to try to include that. So when I see a pronouncer, I try to integrate it into something that would be more easily read. So that's the process.

I appreciate you doing the advance work on that. And we're saying that Ann is confident in our ability to say her last name, and so we don't have a pronouncer on Ann's last name.

Or you could email John if you want a pronouncer to be added to your name. Email John, J-O-N, at tbtail.net, and he'll add it to the information for future readings.

I do not need that help for Casey Anderson of Boise, Idaho, because Casey is, of course, a long time. Long time. How many millions of years ago were we actually staying in Boise in that RV parked in that yard with Marge the Bulldog?

It's been a minute, but Casey still stays in touch and still supports the show. Thank you, Casey.

Thank you, Casey. Thanks to Sam Charner of Chicago, Illinois. Thank you. You're a real charner. Oh, God. Sam, I apologize for that. That was 100% Andrew, and to some degree, John. I stand by it. We had a meeting yesterday. There's a Z column where they do their little jokes. I don't see that one either. I'm not privy to that.

We had a meeting yesterday, and I said, what do you guys feel about me making a charmer slash charner joke? And you said, and I quote, you said, that's the best idea I've ever heard in my life.

Honestly, that's what I said. That is what you said. I'm keeping it 100. And finally, thank you to Leah Farzin, who's in Juneau, Alaska. Hey, I feel so far away. it it and yet in washington state you know i feel like we're growing up in washington state you feel very connected to alaska because it's we're the closest state sure yeah yeah the closest other state and also i had a lot of friends whose dads were fishermen and they would go and fish out of alaska like they lived in seattle but they'd spend significant portions of the year up in like dutch harbor and places like that so i've always felt connected to alaska even though it is a fur piece from even Washington State. And yet, the good news is the internet makes it all the way up to where Leah is. And then Leah uses the internet, presumably, to send money all the way down to where we are. And this whole thing just keeps going. I'm looking at

directions now. First of all, I cannot take the E-line there. That is so much shocking to me. There's no... It looks like there's

literally no... They don't have an E-line on the Can-Am?

They're not even showing any public transportation options for me getting to Juneau. Well, because when you go through Canada, it's the A-line. See, in the meeting yesterday, you floated that joke.

If you remember, you were using the restroom during that part of the meeting. So you actually didn't vote on that. But anyway, thank you to all of our donors for making TVTL possible. We couldn't do this thing without you. Hello, and welcome to Top Story. All right, where are we going to start with these top five?

Well, it's interesting. You just inadvertently changed the plan, Luke.

Or vertently. Maybe it's all part of my system.

Well, no, because you don't know what's in these lists, and I do. That's fair. So we have a bunch of voicemails from folks, and we have some emails from folks. And usually I like to emphasize voicemails because we're an audio medium, right? And so I was going to start with the voicemail and then lead into the email.

but we have an email here from Dave in New York City who says, I have a list of the top five most satisfying tinkles. And since you made that joke about me leaving the meeting to use the restroom yesterday, I figured that is fate saying that we must start with Dave's top five most satisfying tinkles. Did you get drunk and urinate on people?

I can't comment on that.

It occurred to me, if we're doing Dave's List, should we have some music behind it? That's one thing I did not consider for this.

Like maybe the song Yellow by Coldplay? Whatever you want. I'm trying to make it thematic.

What are we allowed to play these days is a whole other thing. Should we just play the El Robo theme song underneath it? That's one of the last things that we're allowed to do. Let me see here. That's music from a yellow-billed loon. Oh, well, are we allowed to play that here? How about this? I believe so. I'll just play this for now. If you have anything more funny or fun, we can punch it in in post. We can't, by the way. It's impossible. It's the most impossible thing. This is the music we use for A.W. Okay, I like this list. I like this list. So Dave, in New York City, top five most satisfying tinkles. Number five, the work meeting that could have been an email, be it on Zoom or in person. We've all been there, a meeting that no one needed to be in, scheduled inconveniently early in the day, just as the morning coffee has had a chance to settle in. When you rush out of that meeting and into the bathroom, the sheer sense of relief reminds you that you should decline every meeting invite ever. Seems like there's a lot going on there that's not just about peeing.

Feels like Dave might work at the chair company. Yeah, he might work at the place that builds the malls in the chair company TV show. I feel like Tim Robinson would be running out of a meeting and then taking a whiz that he was dying to take.

Although I will say, so far in that show, in some ways, he's not the worst project manager. He's a pretty go-along, get-along guy when it comes to the actual project. He's insufferable when it comes to anything else, like his ego or, let's just say, side projects. Side quests. Side quests

Jeep tours And the like Yeah Okay so work So in other words This is number five And we're going

You're stuck in a meeting You're stuck in a meeting And this is number five And you go out And you finally get to use The restroom after the meeting And it's The number five Most satisfying tinkle On Dave's list The number four is The middle of the night Sit down Now that's something you do Don't you

Is there any other kind Do you sit down I don't trust myself In the dark

Oh that's right You leave the lights off Because you don't want wake yourself up too much and you're walking around with your eyes closed i call it an i call it a reverse bow deading we'll we'll keep the lights off for you we'll leave we'll leave the lights off for you he also tends to walk around with his eyes open and you do this with your eyes closed don't you do something where you're trying to keep your eyes closed yeah sometimes if it's

the middle of the night and i'm using the bathroom i will try to stay as asleep as i can during the process which means don't turn the light on in the bathroom don't open my eyes fully maybe have them just kind of mostly closed still and definitely sit down but i'll be honest with you if i'm at home and i'm peeing i'm sitting down really yeah so i'm not i don't do that i i'm always looking for an excuse andrew to have a good i mean that's like that sounds like i'm trying to be funny i will never miss an opportunity to sit down when it is presented unless if i was at a public restroom i will always use the urinal obviously but if i'm at my house yeah but you

You sit down in the urinal, right?

Yeah.

You don't? It really depends on the situation, honestly. Sports bars, I definitely do. Yeah. Here's Dave's context for this. He says, you've woken up at 3 a.m. You're not exactly awake, but not asleep either. You know that you don't actually need to pee, but if you just do it and get it over with, you will fall asleep much faster. That's another thing. That's not my experience. If I'm on the edge, or if I don't really think I need to pee, I'm not getting up out of bed. The problem for me is I cannot trust myself to go back to sleep. So then I get up and I use the restroom. Right.

Well, for me, generally speaking, if I wake up needing to pee, it's because I really actually need to pee. Yeah, me too. Every once in a blue moon, this is what it'll be. It'll be second time. So first time I wake up needing to pee, it's like, you got to do this. But let's say that's at 3 in the morning. Sometimes there might be at like 4, 4.30, a little, like a 30 percenter. It's kind of wake up and go like, I could go. And this is what I do. I don't. I go back to sleep because now my body has set a new alarm that will definitely get me out of bed at 6, 6.30. Like I literally harness that discomfort to be something that will propel me out of bed. Because I know like, oh, in an hour and a half, this is going to be not great. And that's fine. I'm good with that.

I used to have that. but now my wake-ups happen too early to push if that makes sense you know what i mean like i know what you're talking about it doesn't apply to me right now number three on dave's listen this is the first one that i start to associate with more is uh number three the one hour before landing p you know that the flight is almost over and that if you don't go now you run the risk of not being able to go until the concourse so you slip out of your seat and you make your run and you come out of the door to find five people lined up lined up outside the lavatory i there is something about that for me because i don't often have i don't usually have to pee in the first part of any kind

of an airplane trip but that because you've been you've you've made sure to go in the airport itself like are you trying to get on that airplane completely evacuated as it were i think so also

i'm probably drinking water which obviously makes you pee but for some reason i always think of coffee as being more of a trigger and usually on a flight i'm not drinking coffee before or during Because if I could be decaffeinated and maybe accidentally get a little bit of shut eye, I'd prefer that than being wired on coffee in an airplane seat. But there is something about, especially let's say it's a five-hour flight, and you're like, boy, I haven't used the restroom at all. But maybe you've watched a movie, you've read half a book, and then you're like, well, we've got about an hour left. You can start counting down safely because you're like, well, we have an hour left. And that means in about 20 to 30 minutes, they're going to start, you know, the descent, which means, like, it would just time out well for me to use the restroom. And also, I could do something to break up this monotony a little bit. And so the one hour before landing, Pete, speaks to me.

But this is where your strict adherence to the aisle really helps you. Yes, absolutely. Because you're not doing any calculating. And this is the whole reason you do it. You're not doing any calculating of, like, how many times have I made these folks get up in this aisle? You don't even want to have that be something you're worried about or considering. For me, a lot of it has to do with, did I get upgraded or not? Because I'm a window guy, but if you get upgraded, if you happen to be up near the front of the plane, a lot of times you can get out of your window seat and go past your seatmate with consent, and they don't have to actually get up. There's that much room up there. And so that's also very nice because, again, I'm getting both the window seat and I'm not stressing about bugging the person next to me. but um but yeah i know particularly oh man back in my boozier days because that'll really kick it into on the flight right there would be let's just put it this way i don't agree with anything about this guy's behavior but there were times where i sort of vaguely understood how it was that gerard depardue was being in the aisle of a flight yeah i've never done that i would never do that super drunk right he was wasted drunk but what happened was again i'm i i promise you i'm not trying to defend his actions but i think what happened in that flight was it was one of those things where the plane has pushed back it's out on the you know the runway the tarmac but for some reason it's like it's in an active runway which is like you can't get out of your seat but it's not just like taking off it's like kind of in purgatory which can sometimes be a really long time and the thing about drunk peeing or drunk needing to pee is i feel like that just goes from zero to 60 like probably because it's a diuretic probably because you know all the chemical elements of it that's the that's the like you just don't have any you just don't have any discretion anymore about about if you need to pee or not it's like you have to pee and you have to pee so bad that you're now almost about to have an accident which is again not defending Gerard Depardieu but just making it making it known that I'm grateful that at this phase of my life that's less common for me where I'm sitting in the seat and looking around and we're like beginning our initial descent and i'm thinking can i actually hold this until we're at the gate yeah and more on

because i more on the peeing that is influenced by alcohol yeah in in a moment because i want to return to that but let's get on with with dave's list here uh number two is the rest stop whiz you've been on the road for four hours and you start to feel that press at the bottom of your pelvis and just as you feel it a sign appears rest stop ahead you pull in you do your business and you get back in the car and on the road like a champ. That is a good one. Because usually you're pushing it. You never stop at the first rest stop that you need or that you want. You stop at one, two or three down, where it's kind of like, I can't deal with this anymore. We're stopping. And by that point, God, that is a good feeling.

You know what they should do? Honestly, they should put gas pumps at the rest stop that are operated by the state, and the revenue should go to the state.

Interesting.

I mean, I guess then you just have a gas station. But what I mean is like, because I feel like I haven't been to a rest stop in the longest time because when I'm in charge of the vehicle, I'm with you. Like, I'm always like going, well, a few more miles, a few more miles. And then it's like, well, I'm going to go to the gas station because I need gas. So while the car is getting filled with gas, I am getting emptied of urine at the gas station. Like, the fact that both of those things can happen at once means I'm spending less and less time in your finer rest stops. Whereas when I was a kid, we were a rest stop family. We would stop at the rest. I mean, it was a lot of kids, too. But sometimes there would be, like, a sweet lady from the, like, Elks Club that would have, like, coffee and cookies for a donation. Did you ever see that when you were a kid?

I don't know if I saw that. And I'm going a little bit bananas here, Luke. And I'm sorry. My brain sort of wandered here. But I need your help with something.

How dare you? during my entertaining story from my childhood.

I am struggling with a very, very common word that I can't think of, which is the highway, the toll highway that you travel on when you're going on a very long road trip, but the kind that doesn't just have your regular mobile gas stations or whatever, but they have true truck stops and rest stops, and then they'll have the little stops that have a Roy Rogers and something called The Wrap and whatever those other fast food restaurants are that are only in these. What is the word for that kind of highway? Well, I would call that a freeway. Turnpike. A turnpike, yes. The turnpike. That's different than a highway, right? The turnpike is a specific toll road that has like, a turnpike rest stop is different than just pulling off the highway and using the restroom.

Right, but I don't know if that's called a rest stop. Do you think Dave means, when I hear rest stop, I think of that very specific, and again, it's very Northwest coded for me, okay? When I hear rest stop, I think a thing that you pull off, and what it has is a bathroom, maybe a vending machine, somebody's walking their dog, there's some grassy area, there's a couple of big trucks parked. That's what I think of with rest stop.

That's what I mean. And aren't those usually on turnpikes? I think of that as a turnpike phenomenon.

Well, I only know about, well, first thing, the only turnpike that I ever knew about was New Jersey Turnpike. Did they have turnpikes in Ohio that were like that?

Yeah, I feel like we went on a lot of road trips as a kid, and it was often turnpike-focused, which is why I went into all that detail. You have the rest stops like that that are almost publicly maintained. But then another thing that you'll have in a turnpike is a place where you're turning off, and there's places that are restaurants and stuff, but you're still not in a community. It's still something that is very turnpike locked, right? And that's why I said Roy Rogers. It's like these very specific restaurants that are usually there than maybe like a mall area with like a cheap gift store or whatever where you get a key chain with your name on it.

I know exactly what you're talking about. And you're right. Those are very turnpike associated. You're absolutely right. Sometimes when I've been doing stories in like the greater New York area but outside of New York, so maybe in Jersey or Connecticut or something, where I have to like rent a car, maybe in Manhattan and drive out. Then I'm on the turnpike. And then I'm seeing exactly that thing you're talking about where you, you get off, you get into this kind of environment. That's like, yeah, these kinds of chain restaurants that barely, that almost only exist as a turnpike, uh, whatever you'd call it again, rest area to me usually means that more park like environment, but yeah, you can pee there. You can buy some, you could probably buy some weird CDs that they're still selling for some reason, uh, and some other crap. and then you could use the bathroom, and I think in those cases you could maybe gas up, you think, probably?

There are some—well, then usually—I don't know about the gassing up there, and again, I'm thinking of the 80s and 90s when I grew up, and I'm also thinking specifically, I guess, here of the Ohio Turnpike. But yeah, then the third one would be like the truck stop. I feel like then you have a truck stop, and that's where you gas up, and usually it's this huge gas station area where the trucks go to one part, and your cars go to the other part, and if you accidentally are in a car and you end up in the truck part, you feel like a lilliputian you feel so tiny amongst these giants and you're so embarrassed you just want to get out of there so quickly i'm looking up the ohio turnpike yeah me too

where is this where does it go it looks like it run well the one that i'm seeing looks like it

kind of runs east west a little bit that would make sense because i just feel like growing up the turnpike was like a big deal it wasn't like we're not on the highway we're on the turnpike

Right. And there are no turnpikes in Washington. So I always heard about the turnpike, but it was again, it was always the Jersey turnpike that I had heard of. But yes, it's a you're right. It's its own very specific overland driving ecosystem is the turnpike. And it also, by the way, always stresses me out because you're right, it's a toll road. So like driving and being like, how much is this racking up right now? Or do I have the proper change at this thing to like, you know, like there's a lot that goes into being on the turnpike that you don't get on like I-5.

Yes, exactly. But also you're kind of at the turnpike's whims as far as like what you can get access to. And again, I think it's the only reason places like Roy Rogers exist, although I could be wrong about that.

I have been to a Roy Rogers in, speaking of New York, where I just was, I've been to a Roy Rogers in Times Square.

So they do exist, but I think they probably are few and far between outside of the Turnpike experience now.

Okay, so I want to finish this list. I have some input, some things that I think were omitted from this list that we needed to discuss.

Okay, so we've got Dave's list now.

We have one more here, and then I have another list that I don't have any input on, so I think we can zip through kind of quickly. But the number one most satisfying tinkle, according to Dave, is the perfectly timed bar pee. Oh, yes. It says you're at the bar, about three to four beers in, depending on your bladder. You might be watching the game or having a song queued up for karaoke that you're dying to sing. You want to wait until either the commercial break or a new singer takes the mic, but you cannot wait. So you run in, you relieve yourself, and walk out to either a huge play on the screen that you just missed or the KJ calling your name to come up and sing your song. You're fresh, you're relieved, and ready to take on the world. All you need is another drink to own the night. It sounds like you are familiar with this.

Yes. Being tipsy and peeing in the appropriate place is one of the great joys in life. Not like you're sloshed, like you don't know which end is up, but just like being kind of a little blissful because you're a little, a little, a little drunk and you're in a, and it's like, you know, again, it's not like, it's interesting. Peeing in a bar bathroom when you're a little drunk is one of the most fun experiences you can have. Having to go number two in a bar bathroom when you're a little drunk is one of the worst experiences you can have. It's like, they're very different, but yeah, I know that feeling. And now I don't want to be gross, but let's say you get that bar bathroom and you're by yourself and maybe there's just the little flatulence going on too. So your body is being relieved of all the pressure that exists in your world, both physical and mental, Andrew, is being relieved at the same time. Alcohol is doing its job. You're urinating. You're maybe letting out a little pressure in the other direction, and everything in the world is right. I know that feeling, and that's a good feeling.

I definitely can associate with a good pee when you've had a few drinks. This very specific, like, you're sort of holding it for various reasons that are, I find that a little bit harder to relate to. And I don't know why. I watch a lot of sports. I will say I remember in game five of the ALDS, I know I was in the restroom or just coming out of the restroom when Kel Raleigh, I think, reached base or did something that started to change the dynamic of that game a bit. Because then I remember people were like, you've got to stay in the restroom. I was like, I wasn't technically in the restroom. I just remember that whole thing. But the specifics of, like, sort of – when I'm at a bar, it's very rare that I'm holding it in. Like, I just got to go when I – I just go when I got to go.

And sometimes you even go to the bathroom for it.

Sometimes. It really depends on the bar and who I'm with.

If you're in this place with peanuts on the floor, you let it fly.

But I will say – I'm going to add a couple to this list that I'm kind of surprised were not mentioned. Like, first of all, generally speaking, the outdoor pee is huge. like especially if you if you own the place or you feel comfortable like going in your backyard you're like you know what i don't want to go inside and i have a yard and i can go pee in the corner you don't want to do it too much because it will it will build up after a while but like you know every now and then the outdoor pee is good or maybe put that in camping or something but also i would add to that and this is where it gets a little bit on the edge is the surreptitious do i say that word the surreptitious the surreptitious outdoor pee usually involving alcohol and for me you mentioned earlier that when you're drinking that has a very specific effect on your bladder and things aren't just like working the way they are when you're drinking water because i know this happened to me at least twice if not three times there was a little watering hole that i used to like to go to on like kind of an early friday night take the bus there or whatever have some pizza have a few beers and then i would always go to the bathroom around the time i was leaving the bar to head home but i'm waiting for the bus and then suddenly it hits again and you're like how do i have to go to the bathroom so badly when i was just in that bar but it's already dark out and i can go behind this dumpster and quickly relieve myself and hope nobody sees me before my bus comes it is really unnerving and in some ways terrible during it because you think somebody's going to catch you some cop's going to come up you know like kind of spinning a billy club or something but when you're done and you get away with it my god it's

like oh it's like a second life because you have two different waves of relief you have the physical relief of you just urinated and you have the mental relief of i didn't get caught by the cops yes so exactly compounding interest on that investment in your future um the other one that i would add and it's sort of like a personal definitely outdoor p it's the main reason that

I own this house. Yes. And it's funny

because like there are

I have neighbors, but also my neighbors can't really see onto my property, and also they're not even home half the time. I have a lot of privacy here, and even to this day, I feel a little bit edgy if I'm peeing in my yard. Let's say I'm mowing the lawn and whatever, or it's nighttime, and maybe I've had a beer of either the N.A. or the A variety. It's so fun, but I also still feel like I'm kind of doing something a little bit illicit.

Yeah, and you're also marking your territory a little bit.

The one that I would lastly throw in here, which is kind of a cousin of what Dave was talking about, which was the like the work P, I guess, after you've been in a meeting or something. Mine would just be the work P that you didn't know you were holding in. And this would be in the office environment. This used to happen to me so much when I worked at radio stations, particularly when I was a producer. So this would have been more in my KUOW era, my early days at NPR era. like I sometimes would just feel super duper stressed out and I wouldn't be able to figure out why I was feeling so stressed out and it would take me the longest time to realize oh you have to pee and you've been holding it in literally all day and then I would finally go use the restroom and I would pee and I'd be like oh my god I feel my anxiety has dropped precipitously I feel so much better I was I wasn't nervous I was holding in pee and not realizing I was doing it that

That reminds me actually of the most unsatisfying P, which is when you think you have to go to the bathroom, but you actually don't have to go as bad as you thought. And I think of that usually like in a situation where you – this is a later in life thing for me. And I don't even think it's about – I don't think it's physical. I think it's mental. You're talking about having the airline seat that is closest to the window. If I end up in that seat, which I never choose for myself anymore, the moment I sit down, I start thinking, do I have to go to the bathroom? oh, shoot, I think I'm going to have to go to the bathroom a little bit. Or if I'm on a bus and it's like, ooh, this is an hour-long bus ride. Am I fine? Am I fine? And then you start thinking about it, and in the back of your head, you're like, oh, shoot, I think I've just talked myself into having to go to the bathroom. Then eventually you use the restroom, and you're like, I didn't even barely have to go. This was all in my head.

Yeah. I definitely think as we get older, I mean, I'm not saying anything here, but it's like fewer and fewer of our systems work the way they used to, And so it's this amazing combination of both having to pee more than you used to and also somehow sometimes not having to pee when you thought you did. None of it's none of it's great.

No, none of it is great. All right. The list was great, though. The list was great. Thank you, Dave. Now, I want to play one voicemail for you here, Luke, and then we'll get out of here. But I want to mention that I don't have any input on this one. So luckily, this isn't going to be something that I drag out more. And it's a voicemail from Listener Summer.

So if it gets dragged out, this is my fault.

Yes, exactly. No, I don't want you to worry about me kind of extending this too long, but we do have so much good stuff, and this is a really interesting list. I love the uniqueness of this list, and it's from listener Summer, and I will let Summer explain it.

Hi, this is Summer in Seattle.

Which, by the way, Summer in Seattle, just absolutely beautiful time to be in Seattle. I would like to point that out.

Hi, this is Summer in Seattle. I live in the beautiful little suburb of Kirkland. The top five sad Starbucks experiences. So I'll start with number five. When you show up to a Starbucks at an odd time of day, so it's like maybe late morning, maybe it's 2 p.m., who knows, and you're met with only two workers who are probably at the tail end of their shift and you're greeted with just dead eyes and they don't care if you live or die. Number four, a full garbage with napkins on the floor and a dirty service counter. You know that countertop where the garbage generally lives underneath and you can get your napkins and you can add cinnamon to your coffee or you can put a little half and half and it's just dirty. It's just littered with people's leavings. So gross. And let's see, let's number three. Number three, saddest Starbucks experiences. When your navigation takes you to a Starbucks in a safe way. Oh, my God. Just a general grocery store Starbucks. Oh, that makes me so mad. Number two, and this one really sends my spouse. When the nitro cold brew machine is broken, and I will tell you, one out of, I don't know, maybe six times. And you just get a hankering for a nitro-cold brew, and their machine is broken, and literally nothing compares. Number one saddest Starbucks experience is going to have to be bugs in the food case. I have seen ants, which send me, and I have seen...

Oh, that's where it ends.

The voicemail ran out. First of all, I would listen to Summer's Starbucks podcast 100%.

I was on the edge of my seat.

If Summer just did a weekly podcast about her experiences at Starbucks, I would listen. That was a truly elite voicemail and list. I totally agree. I'm more of a Starbucks power user than you are, Andrew, but I am nowhere near Summer's level of fidelity or fealty to the brand. but i can identify with almost all maybe not the um when you go in in the wrong time of the day one but everything else and not the nitro have you seen bugs oh sure yeah i mean well because you know it's it's food that's in a you know it's in a kind of semi-refrigerated case but it's like when it's bug season you could i haven't seen ants but certainly i've seen flies um for me the overflowing garbage can is the big one like just that's just a general thing like there's nothing there's nothing worse than when you have garbage to throw away and the garbage can is over full and you're balancing your garbage on top of other garbage I feel like I know I'm making the problem worse but also you know I do want to throw this away and so like there's just like nothing as opposed to showing up there's a mostly empty garbage can you toss your garbage in there you feel like I'm putting my stuff where it's supposed to go and I'm getting it out of my life but I'm not making someone else's life worse but when you're Just like balancing it on top of a bunch of undealt with garbage. Very unsatisfying.

You know, I don't want to throw Genevieve under the bus, but that is one thing that I find. Like I, as you know, I take out the garbage here. I take it to the curb. I tend to take garbage out of the house. But one thing sometimes feels insulting to me, which is when like we have a recycling bag that we keep underneath the sink. And I'll go to like throw something in it. And it's more of an art structure at this point because the bag is well beyond filled up. But there's, like, an uncrumpled half-gallon milk carton that is sort of balanced on top, and then maybe some sort of a strawberry thing that's, you know, discarded on top. And it's kind of like, well, I don't mind taking this stuff out. But at a certain point, you know you're no longer using a bag. You're just creating a pile. And how do you expect me to carry this? Yeah, you're just placing it in the general area. And just saying it will go away. It will disappear. And I don't mind disappearing it. Of all the things, that's not a very big complaint, though. I think I got the good end of this relationship.

I'm remembering, Andrew. Actually, we can't even talk about it. I'm sorry.

Did I start the music too soon?

No, no, no. No, you didn't. This is the perfect time for the music because it tells my brain that I need to stop talking.

I don't know if we can get into this. I have to pee, by the way. I'm not even joking.

I don't even know if it was that list. If we want to get into this tomorrow because I want to do more top fives. I did something a week or two ago while out with Becca that as I was doing it, I was basically it involved me explaining a lot of your garbage anxiety to her as we were out for a walk. And I don't know. Maybe it'll come up tomorrow. Maybe it won't. You'll have to tune in to find out, my friend.

Is it gum related?

Not gum related. Maybe we'll talk about it tomorrow. In the meantime, we are at the end of today's program. So that's going to do it for the Thursday episode. But we will be back here tomorrow with more of this imaginary radio. We hope you can join us for it. So please do that if you can. Have a great Thursday, everyone. And please remember, no mountain too tall.

And good luck to all.

Power out.