Muse

Chase, what's your favorite thing to snack on when you're jamming out to music? Um, I don't know. Everything's good. Okay, well, we're streaming live on Bagel Bites TV, so can you say Bagel Bites? Oh, yeah. Bagel Bites. Okay, great, but can you say it in a sentence? Like, I'm Chase Dreams, and when I'm jamming out to music, I love to eat Bagel Bites. I'm Chase Dreams, and when I'm jamming out to music, I love to eat Bagel Bites. Okay, great. Congrats on whatever it is you do. Thanks. TV-TL. TV-TL coming across the airwaves full of love through the sky.

There is one more thing. The network has received quite a few angry phone calls from older viewers about our theme song. Really? I think our theme song's sassy. Laughter, a sure sign of a good time.

A year ago, this is exactly what Greg Kinnear was doing, but now he has an Oscar for Sliding Doors 3, colon, jingle all the door.

Things are going to start happening to me now.

Well, all right, hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Tuesday edition of TBTL, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. The word that comes to mind is ludicrous. My name is Luke Burbank. I am your host. L-O-L-R-U. Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio, perched high above the mighty Columbia, where we are looking at a kind of a rainy, wet, mossy day here. Didn't know you like to get wet, though. Had some real nice weather during the weekend, and it did that thing where it tricked me. I was coming up with this elaborate explanation to Becca about how basically it's already spring. I was like, it's sunny. We're going to spring ahead in a couple of weeks. I couldn't remember what the groundhog saw or didn't see. And I was like, you know, just nothing but sunshine and blue skies ahead of us. And I knew I was lying. She knew I was lying. But I just wanted it so badly. I'm not going to get bogged down in that. What I'm going to focus on is that we have made it to episode 4,665 in a collector series. Let the fun begin. And we have a ton to talk about, including the Winter Olympics, which are going on right now. I actually watched some curling last night. Curling, that's a... I don't have that on the show sheet, but there's a whole situation in curling as well that we can talk about. And also the fact that a number of the figure skaters were like in the weeks and the days and even the hours before their performance wondering if they were going to be able to use the music they had been rehearsing to and carefully choreographing their entire routine to. You've got to be kidding me. It does involve minions, as so many things do. in these troubled times so we'll get into that also i've got a new favorite local radio station that i've been jamming out to on bagel bites tv i heard about that thing on the am radio and we've got this guy the longest running cobro of the show may be best known for his depictions of the tall ships something else you may or may not know about him this guy

is a four and a half foot tall pile of awesomeness i knew he's andrew walsh i knew you were gonna do that joining me right now good morning my friend good morning a little background on why that was

just a better drop anyway though honestly like it was to slightly mess with you but also because it was a better suggestion so best idea wins around here andrew i'll let i'll let the audience

should i let the audience in on this yeah why not they like a lot of people say what do you mean

behind the curtain you mean there's anything that is behind the curtain we're like yes there is and

we're gonna let you behind it right now that's right uh you and i were doing our little sound test we run through all of your drops this is not a joke it sounds like a joke but we do a real sound test where we play all of your drops and you read into them and i get a good level and sometimes we have to adjust the level of a drop and you played a drop for me today during the sound check that was a little bit low or something or for some reason it just didn't the audio was low and also

kind of echo echoey like the person i had forgotten that the person who's saying the um whatever little drop is she's kind of off mic too which i don't really love So, yeah. So I was playing that. We were testing things.

So then she was like across the room or something. So anyway, you're like, I don't like that one. So you're like, I'm going to pull a different drop for you. And then, you know, while you're going through your library, we're chatting about some things. And then before you played for me the new drop that we wanted to sound test, I said, I want to guess what it is. And I guessed that, or maybe it was right after you had played the new drop. I said, oh, I thought for some reason you were going to play the four and a half pounds of awesomeness. This guy is a four and a half foot tall pile of awesomeness. I keep saying pounds when it's foot tall. I'm not good with measurements. So I kind of knew once I introduced that idea into your head, when we did the regular show, you would bamboozle me by slipping that one actually in there. Andrew, much like your BDSM life. That's about going to the post office, by the way. Much like your boxes. mail, stamps, and delivery life. I like to keep it spicy so that we still have fun all these years later, you and I. Do you know what

I'm doing right now, Luke? I wanted to tell you about this yesterday, but I felt like there were so many things over the weekend that maybe starting with this was not the best idea. But you know what I'm doing right now? And I don't know if this makes you uncomfortable, and it maybe should. I'm rolling my foot on a frozen water bottle. You ever do this move? Is this part of that?

I haven't done the move. I've heard about it. Is this because of the ankle thing you were dealing with?

I think it's not so much an ankle thing. I think it is plantar fasciitis. I've been doing more reading about it, and this weekend was pretty rough, to be honest with you. There were times where it was kind of fine, and then I told you we had gone on a little walk around Ballard. Maybe I didn't. I don't know. You did. I meant to tell you. But by the end of that walk, it was like rough, rough stuff. I was limping through those mean streets. And so one of the things people say to do is, like, you can freeze a water bottle and roll it under your foot. I've already got one of those spiky balls that I, you know, those things that you roll your foot on? No. They're like the size of a baseball, but they have little spikes on them, little rubber spikes, and they're plastic or whatever. And it just sort of, like, kind of breaks up the tissue in your foot a little bit. It's like a massage ball is what you would call it, I think. And anyway, so I've been using one of those for a long time. Now I'm trying this ice thing. I thought it was my So your arch is bothering you? Well that's the weird thing about it It really felt like my ankle And I know plantar fasciitis is not an ankle related thing But I was reading about it and people were like Well it can feel like your ankle because you start walking funny Because it's actually the pain might be the bottom of the foot

It sort of displaces the pain Or the discomfort to somewhere else But the ultimate issue is probably the plantar fasciitis

I was dubious about that I really was And I was like, I don't know, it feels like the ankle. But then when I started icing it, I realized the place that felt the best when I was icing it was actually the bottom of the foot. And I was like, ah, this is all starting to track a little bit. But today is a lot better. The last few days were really bad. I know this is something, you know how you look it up on WebMD? You're like, well, how long will I be dealing with this? And for these types of things, it's usually like do some stretches. Between one day and a lifetime. It basically, it was like, yes, what is the community that's for a day or for a lifetime?

Bothell. Welcome to the Bothell of health. Yes, the Bothell of health. And also this may be terminal.

It said something like, oh, it'll usually, you know, take care of yourself, do the stretches, do the water bottle stuff, you know, keep it iced. And it'll usually resolve itself between six and 18 months. And I'm like, well, I don't have that much time. Six and 18 months? Yes, and I kept, I was going to other sites, I'm like, you mean weeks, you mean days, you mean hours, but no, apparently it's six to eight, don't worry about it, it'll take care of itself in six to 18 months. I don't even know who I'm going to be in 18 months.

I've had that before. I've had plantar fasciitis, and it did, I don't know if it took 6 to 18 months. It did go away. I don't have it any longer. If it gets, and it sounds like you're already on the mend, but one thing, sometimes you can sleep with a special boot on. Did this come up in your research? Yeah. It has something to do with keeping your foot straight at night and maybe keeping the tendons and muscles and things basically extended because that's what happens overnight. They sort of curl up and tighten up, and that's part of the pain.

Yeah, sorry to cut you off, but yeah, the boot, or I even saw a sock version of it where it looked kind of weird. You put on this sock that has a strap attached to it that goes up to your knee or something like that. So basically you're bending the front of your foot upward at night to keep it stretched. But I'm hoping that it doesn't come to that. I got to say, I think, oh, the day was Sunday, honestly, that it was like really, really bad. But the past two days, or I guess today's Tuesday, it's getting better and better. So I'm feeling better about this. I knew that you had had it, but it makes sense for you to have it. Like for you, it's a running injury, right? It's like an athletic injury. For me, it's just because it's like I weigh too much and I don't get enough exercise, which bums me.

Well, you know, of course, I love that narrative because it makes me the athletic hero of the story. But I do think it can just kind of randomly come on because one thing is it went away and I didn't I wasn't diminishing my jogging. You know what I mean? It was just kind of it just I think it comes and goes for folks. So, um, yeah, I'm actually, I'm pretty relieved. Remember I was having that weird, like, like kind of upper leg pain that, uh, I was, I was Googling and I think it was a, um, it's like a tendinitis kind of a thing, but it basically is where it kind of like my leg and hip join each other. And I was, there is this billboard when I go into town, there's a billboard for like, um, a physical therapy place. And I've never been to physical therapy. and every time I would drive by it I would think

I'm going to have to call that place because it was like this leg was really bugging me and then it just miraculously it did exactly what I was hoping it would do but what I thought there was no chance it would do which is it just kind of stopped hurting the dream you know right right that's that's the that's the dream of it because because yeah I was definitely thinking and that's what happens when you go on the web md or things like that is it's like oh this is a lifetime condition and here's what you do here's here's the treatments and you're going to definitely need to see a doctor about it and stuff and i was like or maybe i'll just ignore it and it'll fix itself and that worked amazingly yeah then i've been doing this other thing um where i've been uh i've been having some sciatica pain and then i started doing nerve flossing are you familiar with this this is when you floss your teeth with the nerves of your enemies yes

yes yes yeah i've read a little bit about that in some comic books it was kind of in one of the

later game of thrones books when it really starts to fall off um you lie on your back and you um raise the leg on the side of your body where the sciatica pain is and you kind of do this weird kind of bend your leg and then you you pump your foot up and down five times and it's supposed to be like somehow loosening up and moving around your sciatica nerve and it kind of worked actually

Really? The only reason I don't believe you is because nobody knows how to spell sciatica, and I don't think that you would have actually been able to look this up.

I believe I put in, it was like, it was P-S-I hyphen Attica, or whatever, and you just found it.

One of my favorite Atlanta area rappers, actually. That's right, exactly.

Yeah. Hey, do you know that I've got a new favorite radio station that I've been jamming out to called KMUN out of Astoria, Oregon?

I know you were texting me about this the other day. I was hoping that they might carry Speaking of Faith, but I did not see it on the broadcast schedule.

Well, I don't think Speaking of Faith is the name of the show anymore, Andrew. It's called On Being. Oh, right. I know. But still. um but they've got just about every other classic from your your and my day of um of like working in public radio and stuff like that i was reading an article in the astoria oregon the the local newspaper this is advertising like working andrew i'm scrolling through a story it's actually a very sad story it was an obituary for a young woman who who died in a car accident um recently on the part of the road in Oregon that I can see from my house and I had seen a bunch of like emergency vehicles and I was kind of you know in the following days I was like I wonder if that was in the news and I looked it up and unfortunately it was and somebody passed away and the article about about this woman who was a like a vet tech in Astoria a young person sounded like a great a great person it was in the Astoria newspaper which I didn't even know they had a newspaper over there and I was reading it and then there was this ad for this thing KMUN 90.9 Astoria and I clicked on it and I have been listening to this station practically non-stop since I uh since I was telling you about it on Friday it's really great it's just like again they've got Les Show with Harry Shearer they've got uh I believe I'm pretty sure that they do um well they do left right and center with our friend david green or an ai program posing as david green nobody can ever tell we'll never know they do on the media freakonomics the ezra klein show which i didn't realize it's called speaking of media now i didn't realize the ezra klein show was a thing you could play on your radio station you know what i mean like which is so small-minded of me i listen to the ezra klein show every week but i listen to it as a podcast and that's how i think of it And then, but of course, what is a podcast, Andrew, but a thing you could also broadcast on your radio station?

Yeah, because wouldn't that be kind of a similar story with The Daily? Totally. Is a Klein show a New York Times podcast? It's a New York Times show. Yeah, so that would sort of be kind of a similar.

Yeah, it's exactly like that. And by the way, I was shocked when I heard The Daily being played on the radio. Yeah. Because of just how I categorize these things in my mind. They've got, they also feature, of course, Democracy Now. Oh, okay. They've got Alternative Radio, which I'm going to click on this now and see. Is it still hosted by David Barsamian? Yes, it is. Alternative Radio, established in 1986 as an award-winning weekly one-hour public affairs program. I used to run the board at KUOW during Alternative Radio. That's why it was near and dear to my heart. I love to see that they're still making it. Then they've got a bunch of different music shows. I was listening to this show last Friday. that comes on after. They do play Science Friday, by the way. The show is called The Sounds of Japan.

And it's just Japanese music, but it's hosted by this guy who clearly is here from Japan. And it was so informative and interesting. He was saying, okay, this song is from a movie soundtrack. It's from this particular Japanese movie. Think of this as kind of like our John Wayne kind of a movie. It was like this little kind of cool cultural experience of getting the context for this music. The music also just absolutely slaps. Like I've not been listening to enough. I have this one double vinyl album. I think it's called City Pop. It's like Japanese pop music from the, I think, 80s or something that Addie had at her house. And when she was in the other room, I took a picture of it so I could remember what it was called. So I could order it and have it at my house. But I didn't want her to know that I was just nakedly stealing her music. By the way, speaking of, my darling daughter, today is her 32nd birthday.

Oh. Happy Blurs. I would wish her a happy birthday. It's not quite the right time in the program schedule for that, so I'm going to hang on to this for a couple of days. Membership has its privileges. Absolutely.

She did. I was wishing her a happy birthday this morning. She sent me a picture. She is having neck pain. No. And she has this, like, I didn't even know they made this. Speaking of, today's whole show is about basically maladies. Yeah. She was basically like, yeah, this is being 32. I reach you from bed wearing a neck brace, Dad, at the age of 32. but it's a thing that you can put on your neck and then you can inflate it so it has like a hand pump so it's kind of a neck brace thing but you can you can pump it up and then like extend your neck which is kind of a great idea right

so extend your neck it sort of inflates in a way that it kind of pushes your neck further away from your shoulders I should say your head further away from your shoulders

yeah your head further away from your shoulders she said it slowly inflates so you can

decompress your spine a bit oh interesting that is interesting but anyway i have this one japanese

record that i really like but i was just loving this music it was so good and anyway so now i've just been like checking in with this radio station and what i like about it is and you know this too from your kicksy times and things it's it's very relaxing to have some to let jesus take the wheel i think that was the name of the japanese guy um who was hosting that show no it's really nice I've forgotten how much I like not having to pick either the playlist, the album in question, the next song I just haven't listened to that kind of radio in the longest time where it's just like, okay, now they're going to play this song and now they're going to play this song and now I'm going to hear this underwriting ad about some business in Astoria I'm really, really digging it

I'm on their website now I bet you they hold a pretty awesome fundraiser, I see that you can donate at any time but I'm wondering what their schedule might be because i'm i'm kind of fascinated now i have not listened to the station i'm just sort of googling around right now as we speak but this is an interesting kind of local station that i don't know if casual listeners would pick up the difference of this this is clearly a public station but it doesn't follow the usual npr style like member station style so it doesn't have like they're not playing morning edition not morning edition in atc which means they're probably not paying they're probably not on the same kind of model because i think radio stations sort of you know if you are going to be like on that kind of npr station model you're buying probably various packages where you also get the midday shows and if you're in a small market you get a whole bunch of stuff from npr it looks like they're really piecing this together themselves with a pastiche of local programming and some local news programming which by the way is not cheap as you well know no this is what i'm so impressed yeah they have they're they're

creating some local news content which is really hard to do exactly especially when you're sort of

like doing it on your own in in this particular way so i'm pretty the reason i kind of as soon as you said that they had some pacifica programming i'm like oh okay yeah this is this is one of those scrappy stations and it's all this was impressive in 2002 uh in 2026 it's all the more so it seems

to be a tremendously well-run operation i was looking at their staff they have you know some full-time staff i think that they're my guess is they're very beloved in the community they have some really good names for some of their shows i told you this the other day but they have a french music show that's called french air oh yeah that's a great name yeah and then they have a show that's on at 2 a.m on sundays called what's the frequency kenneth oh really it's a musical series from award-winning writer producer paul fisher who spent 24 years writing for dan rather on cbs evening news and has now returned to his roots in public radio each episode is hand mixed for maximum flavor um but uh but yeah i'm i'm really digging i'm really digging this um this station there's one more thing i was going to say about it that now is eluding me in the moment oh they also seem to have this uh this like newsletter they put out that is weirdly called the current which is like,

I guess they hadn't heard about the one in Minnesota. I think that's because Astoria, you know, it's a coastal town, and so it's a reference to that.

Oh, I was also thinking of the public radio newspaper called Current as well. That's what I mean. Yeah.

Oh, sorry. What I'm saying is I don't think they'd heard. I don't think that they – my joke was that they were ripping off the Current, the one that we know about's name. But I think –

Are you talking about the radio – you're talking about the radio station? I was talking about the publication Current, the newspaper.

I meant the publication, which also, I think, comes out of Minnesota, right?

Oh, it does?

Adding to the confusion.

Oh, I did not know that the newspaper... I thought you were talking about the radio station, The Current, that comes out of Minnesota. I did not know that the newspaper came out of Minnesota. Oh, okay.

I believe... I feel like... Hold on, I'm double-checking this. This is so uninteresting to listeners, I apologize.

Have you looked at their merch shop, by the way? You're going to buy all this stuff.

Yes, the KMUN merch shop? Yeah. Yes, absolutely. It's amazing, this whole thing. And this newsletter, The Current that they put out, the illustrations on it are phenomenal. When Becca and I were in Cannon Beach this week, there was a copy of this little paper, The Current, in this bookstore I went into. And it's like a beautiful little, I don't know if it's a monthly or a weekly, but I mean it's like the art on it, it's just amazing.

Yeah, this is pretty sweet. I love that you got into this. I don't know that I will be, you know, moving on over here as well and living in the space with you.

Well, you're a Kixie man, like your father and his father before him.

The sad thing is I'm not even really a Kixie person. I mean, I still fly the flag. Like, I was cleaning my window yesterday, and I saw my little Kixie window cling, which I will cling to forever, of course. But I kind of don't know what's going on over at Kixie anymore. I mean, when I got into Kixie, they were, like, exclusively 50s and 60s music, and it was, like, very, very charming.

Is the music as cool today as it was back then?

As cool now as it was then, which it's kind of good to level set like that, because TV would be like, well, I don't know how cool it was in the first place. But anyway, you know, the Dick Clark rock roll and remember, like they were totally bought in on that. And now I don't want to disrespect what they're doing. I think that they are.

Considering one of our friends is the sales manager for the station.

Right, exactly. But like they started integrating in, like talking about podcasts on the radio, Like, they have this strip of programming in the middays now that is talk programming. But you can tell that it's like—

They're playing the Ezra Klein show now.

They're not playing the Ezra Klein show. How great would that be?

You're just scrolling the AM dial, and you just get Ezra talking about abundance.

They're playing Ezzie and Bill talking about how to manage the cash and cookies on your computer type of stuff, which I don't mind that, but it's not what I was tuning in for. And then it was like they handed it all over to Bloomberg News for a while, like big chunks. It's just kind of like they're floundering around because, I mean, listen, I was the only person who was listening to the old format. I realize that. But it was really special to me, and I loved it. You should have listened harder. And I think they've backed away. I don't think I could have. And I think they've backed away from a lot of the old. This really bums me out. A lot of the, I think, I don't want to speak out of turn here, but the old-time radio stuff. That really got me into old-timey radio because, same with you, I would just get in the car on a Saturday night. Usually, after dropping Genevieve off at the Eagles, this is about, let's say, a year and a half ago. Would you pin a note to her and drop her off?

If found, wandering the streets, return to.

I would tie her mittens to her jacket sleeves. An average Saturday would have been, Genevieve says, you know, it's bingo night at the Eagles. I'm like, oh, yeah, I might do that with you. and then the Saturday moves forward and then as it gets closer and closer to bingo time I start thinking like of course I could stay home and just like play darts

It's also bingo time for you but a different

version of that. Yes, bingo the cat time and then by the time it's bingo time I say you know I don't think I'm going to go but I'll give you a ride if you want and that's always nice. You don't have to figure out public transportation or take a car or whatever so then I'll drive Genevieve, drop her off at bingo night. Hope I don't see any of our friends as I drop her off because I feel bad that I'm not coming in. And then I pin her note to her, push her out the door, and then as she leaves, then I turn on the radio, and it was just in time to start hearing things like The Whistler or Johnny Dollar. And it was just like such, it was like, oh, I'm going home. I have the whole night. I probably have some sort of awful frozen pizza in the freezer waiting for me. Freezer feast. Freezer feast. So anyway, that was sort of how I got into it.

All is well in your world.

Now I listen to those shows on podcasts, like those old-time radio shows, which is just not quite the same. Or I listen on satellite radio, which is sort of in between.

I have a theory about this station, by the way, KMUN, and how it appears to be certainly, if not surviving, maybe even thriving. I think it's because the city of Astoria, Oregon, is a magical place. And I think it's only a matter of time before I end up living there This is my theory It's one of those kind of small towns That just punches above its weight for culture And just kind of cool stuff Addie and I were there for her birthday It might have even been last year or two years ago We went out and stayed out in Seaview, Washington This cool little kind of community there Of little buildings and trailers and stuff And we stopped in Astoria on the way back and like it's just as charming as all hell and i think it's the kind of place that like you can still buy a semi-affordable house there so people you know move there and kind of just figure out their life you know for their maybe their families and their job stuff and whatever but it just seems like it's a it's kind of a magical little place i think i'm going to told you about this when i came back from there the last time it was the first ever cable television operation was in astoria oregon and it was basically this woman at a store told me and addy the whole story but it was like basically this guy wanted to watch tv oh right right i knew i was vaguely remembering it was like a guy wanted to watch tv and there was a giant transmitter but for some reason uh for some reason he basically just wired and he wired a cable from the transmitter down into his like apartment or hotel room or something and it was like the first ever i guess example of or maybe it wasn't maybe it was the first broadcast television or something I forget it was cable

I'm gonna look this up because I know you were talking about the show I don't know I'm gonna have to look it up while I talk here but I remember it was something about they were in a dead zone for broadcast or something so he basically ran and I'm almost wondering was it related to him

wanting to watch a sporting event too yeah it was it was something I'm just getting bits and pieces of the story back into my brain but one of the things was that like there was a like it was like a hotel that had like a television in the lobby or something and then people would come in and watch that somehow but then like this guy wanted to have his own television or something are you have you gotten eyes on yeah and this is what i was looking up last time too this is

early television.org by the way and the article is cable television in astoria oregon though not the first cable system in the u.s earlier systems were built in arkansas and pennsylvania it is one of the earliest beginning at the end of 1948 stanley daniels and ellie parsons began experimenting with receiving tv signals from seattle in portland 125 miles away between the two cities is a mountain range about 4 000 feet high and they have clippings here of the actual newspaper articles about astoria to get video show two sets ready for wednesday so i'm now i'm reading original source material, but it says, first public television showing in Oregon is scheduled for Wednesday night, according to Stanley Daniels. So I think, yeah, these two guys basically ran a cable,

I think. Yeah, it's amazing. Anyway, I just think Astoria seems like a kind of a magical place, and a place where they're like, we're going to support this local public radio station and make it happen, so go Astoria, I guess, is the point of that.

We was hoping for some razzle-dazzle. Razzle-dazzle. That's right, man, razzle-dazzle. On your mark. On your mark. Get set. Net set. Now ready. Ready. Go. Everybody rattle, dattle.

Hey, let's thank some dazzling donors. These fine folks are donating a dazzling amount of dough. And we are grateful for it. We don't have, we're not in the glitz and glamour of Astoria, Oregon. Home of, the original home of cable television, Andrew. We don't have that kind of money backing us. This is just, we're out here, I'm in Southern.

I'm sorry, I don't know why I interrupted you. Go ahead. I was just going to say, we do have a merch store as well. That's all. I was just trying to compare ourselves to the story. But we don't make any money off of that. That's very important to say.

We have a merch store, but we would rather if you didn't take advantage of it.

I think that's the messaging. We don't lose money in the merch store, but we don't make money in the merch store. Literally, the only way we make money is through donations.

And I guess there's a small amount of PR. Maybe somebody's wearing a TBTL t-shirt and somebody asks them, Hey, what's that? And then you say, it's my favorite podcast. And then maybe that person becomes a listener.

Maybe. If you're out there, I'd love to hear from you. Did you start listening to TBTL on the reg because you saw a sticker or a T-shirt or a mug somewhere in the world? A water bottle or a mug. A water bottle.

Yeah, did you find your way into this by way of merch?

That would be amazing.

That would be a really interesting data point for us. uh what we have here andrew is incredible generous long-standing supporters who send in money every month and uh that's how this is a job for you and me and our guy john sklaroff and today we want to thank a longtime friend of the show dave bledsoe in new york city dave as in dave's not here bledsoe

as in Drew Bledsoe, to whom I am not related. Drew Bledsoe had, to me, a very interesting... He's kind of the Wally Pip. He's sort of the Wally Pip of football, in a way.

Yeah, because he was the one who preceded Tom Brady, right? I think I was watching that game in a pool hall in Boston.

That's so random. Not a pool hall. I was playing pool in a bar with friends. But that is just so random, because, of course, at the time, Nobody would have sort of predicted that this kid coming into the game out of Michigan, Tom Brady, was going to become arguably the greatest quarterback of all time. Here's what Dave Bledsoe has to say for his dazzling donor message. For me, TBTL is like a line from Rush's Spirit of Radio. Begin the day with a friendly voice, a companion, unobtrusive. I like that. I listen in the mornings while I'm kick-starting my brain with coffee. Back in 2014, while listening to Peska's Gist, he had a guy on talking about podcasting. This fellow once had a radio show that ended, so he made the switch to podcasting. And that guy's name was Tom Likas.

Nice, Dave. Nice. It's Flash Friday. I honestly, I was no longer looking at the screen when you were reading that. So I thought that was you making that joke. That's good, Dave.

That was all Dave. Dave is not only listening to the show and then funding the show. He's now writing for the show. He is writing successfully. I'm kidding. It was Luke. So I pulled up TBTL. I listened, and I thought, what the hell is this show about? 11 years later, I'm still trying to answer that question. And the second I have, I am out. So keep what you're doing. Good news, Dave. None of us will ever understand this. So you're stuck with us for the foreseeable future.

You're welcome for the frozen water bottle talk at the beginning of the show.

So keep doing what you guys are doing. Never change. Finally, thanks to Luke and Andrew, I was inspired to try my hand at podcarding. And now, almost 11 years later, my podcast, What the Hell Were You Thinking, is still going. Oh, yeah. I have checked out Dave's podcast. It's incredible. He has been doing this podcast for, as he says, 11 years. And that is such a feat We do this five days a week because as I just mentioned It's our job, we literally get paid to do this It's how we support ourselves But when people Do a podcast that is Mostly a labor of love And they do it for over a decade That is so incredible to me And I doff my cap To thee, David He says, it's no TBTL But I feel less shame about it So thank you TBTL, I feel actual pride my donation helps tbtl exist so everybody go check out dave's podcast what the hell were you thinking what the hell were you thinking what the hell were you thinking what the hell were you thinking i don't know i'm sorry i um mistakes were made anyway dave thank you so much uh for uh for supporting the show and congrats on your long-running program as well thanks man maestro

On your mark. On your mark. Get set. Get set. Now ready. Ready. Go. Everybody rattle, dattle.

Look who it is. It's Robert Pape, the fourth. It's our pal Bobby Pape, an eerie PA. Esquire. I'll give him an Esquire. It's Robert Pape III. It's Dr. Robert Pape III. Esquire. DDS. slash what's the what's the most formal title we can give for somebody who's running a symphony because i believe that's what bobby is oh that's right yeah is bobby i should know this but bobby's

kind of on the fundraising side of things right that's well i have a feeling that in his job

uh you know you're always he is the uh he's the executive director of the eerie phil harmonia And my sense is, because a friend of mine is the president of the Oregon Symphony, my buddy Paul, and his job is largely fundraising. You know, I mean, you just have to be if you're kind of a large arts organization. So I'm sure that comes with the territory.

I'm reading the press release now. Are you as well? Erie Philharmonica appoints Bobby Pape as next executive director. The thing that doesn't make sense to me is... We didn't get a press release about this show, did we? No, I thought you were going to say we didn't get a press release from Bobby on this. But Bobby has signed me up for plenty of subscriptions in the past. We don't need to add to it. But for a second, I was just sort of thinking, but like, because Bobby's kind of of our generation. I'm assuming that he's a little bit younger than us. But like, I'm just like, well, Bobby can't be the executive director of a nonprofit. We're still kids. I know. We're not old enough to be doing this kind of important stuff.

Well, let me lay this on you. Oftentimes, people that have important jobs are younger than us now.

which is not okay at all, in my opinion, Robert. Bobby says, spin the wheel of classic topics, TM.

What are our classic topics? I did have something on that. Well, that's the thing. I was Googling.

First of all, I wanted to find, should I drag that tote board wheel out, Andrew? Oh, yeah, do you have it?

Do you still have it over there? I was trying to build a replica over here, which I could find mine, maybe.

I'm getting it out of the back of the Madrona Hill studio. Okay, I've got it right here. Yeah, so here we go. Let's just do this at home. 9-11.

It landed on 9-11.

Go, Luke. And, you know, that was such a fun topic pre-2001.

Well, actually, can I honestly jump in here and say the reason I said that was Drew Bledsoe, I wanted to look up when his injury was. I think Bobby would be into this from his part of the contract. Oh, yeah, this is classic paper contract, TM. But I was like, well, because I told you boldly and with confidence that I knew where I was when that injury happened.

Yeah, you clarified it wasn't even a pool hall. No, it wasn't a pool hall. It was a bar that featured pool.

And I definitely have a memory of being with Genevieve and a couple of other of our friends. We weren't even big football people, but we were playing pool in this bar, and the game was on and there happened to be a little TV near our area. This is probably pre-flat screen TVs in bars, to be totally honest with you. And I was like, I could be, I know that I was in that bar watching some sort of Patriots game playing pool at one point. Am I kind of conflating the idea that that was the game? And so I looked up when the game was that he got injured. It was September 23rd, 2001. And that did sort of shock me because I was kind of like, Of course we were back and playing football. I don't even know that football took a break after 9-11. But that was such, I mean, obviously such a world-rattling event that it's kind of funny to think that, oh, and then just a couple of weeks later Tom Brady took the helm and would become like the best quarterback ever in the world. And that just happened a couple of weeks after that other world-rattling event. I don't know what I'm doing there, Luke. It just seemed weird in my head.

Well, I'm glad you were able to clarify that. I would not have known that that was all happening around the same time. I don't know what I would have thought. I would have maybe thought Tom Brady started playing professional football in 2010 or something. I didn't realize he went back that far.

I would have guessed maybe 2002 or 2003 or something like that. But yeah, for some reason, the 2001 thing did really shock me. What did the wheel actually land on, Luke? I'm sorry to totally steal you. Plantar fasciitis. Oh, good. But we've already talked about that today, so we're kind of screwed. Oh no, oh jeez.

We've already kind of, you know, burned that Roman candle of content.

Yeah, from both ends, as it were.

Yeah, unfortunately. So Bobby, there you go. That's the wheel of content. I hope you enjoyed it, and thank you so much for the support. Hello, and welcome to Top Story. This is a top story that you actually sent to me, Andrew, which I found very interesting. It's from the New York Times, written by Tariq Panya. Figure skaters try to master a new routine. Copyright compliance. I guess it never occurred to me that they had to get clearance on the songs that they're using, that they're figure skating to. And it turns out it's actually very, that can be really challenging from a sort of paperwork perspective. and whoever it is that they're trying to get the permission from, sounds like there's a lot of foot dragging. And so you have a lot of these skaters who are like weeks out from the Olympics or maybe even at the Olympics still waiting to find out if they're legally allowed to skate to the music that they've been practicing to.

Because there's been a bit more of an emphasis on cracking down on this. I think in the past they were only, first of all, the Olympic rules, I think, or maybe even just figure skating rules for whatever national or global body it is, it was you could only use instrumental music, right, for a long time?

Yeah, no lyrics. And then they would let them have lyrics in ice dancing, apparently. And now they're letting them have lyrics in figure skating, I think because they think it will make the sport more popular.

And so, you know...

If somebody's figure skating to Pitbull.

Yeah. Fireball. Can't play that old Melty Ice. the uh yeah and so of course having popular music is a bit more of a draw and so they just started using it now i knew like i'd never really thought about it but it's not surprising to me that you would need to get this music cleared it's more surprising to me that they weren't doing this especially because i would figure it would be more of a

You

broadcast rights thing i would just figure oh interesting yeah they'd have to clear it for nbc that's what i thought like and i know nbc doesn't own the olympics but obviously as the huge broadcast partner you would just sort of think that like oh yeah they would kind of check those boxes but i guess this is an issue that doesn't just apply to broadcast this applies to their performances outside of the olympics as well because there's somebody who at the very very last minute got their song cleared just so they could do their olympic routine like literally the next day but the the you know licensing organization said you can use it for the olympics this one time but after the olympics you can't use it anymore so you got to get a new routine i don't understand and i as much as i found the topic of this article interesting i don't think it does a great job of explaining some of the details of of how this works like how they got so far what was the mindset of some of these skaters where they're like okay i'm just going to use this song by tony tony tony uh-huh what was tony tony tony's biggest hit it feels good yeah okay yeah okay so we're like we're just gonna use this because this is what slaps in 2026 and then they're like but we'll just we'll just build the whole routine around this now we'll spend months and months and months and months building this routine and practicing it and in the meantime i'm sure the paperwork will all work out like i would get that shit cleared right away but maybe it's because the landscape is changing and so maybe by next Olympics this won't be as

much of a shock to them that they got to get this stuff cleared yeah like this one um one of the skaters uh let's see uh Olivia Smart and her ice dancing partner Tim Deke they competed for Spain they traveled to Italy unsure that the clearance for their song of choice from the soundtrack of the recent Dune movie would come through in time even though they had requested it months earlier Tim was like, maybe I'll message Hans Zimmer myself, Smart said, referring to the film's composer of the soundtrack. The permission came through just before the competition. There was another guy who kind of went viral because he wanted to use a Minions song, and he couldn't get clearance, so he made a video begging the Minions to, I don't know, begging whomever.

This is a direct appeal.

It's that one minion who has like the, he's like the steampunk minion. He wears the one, I don't know, I know so little. I bet you I would actually kind of like Minions if I ever watched it. Like, legit, I bet you it's pretty funny. But it's because I don't have kids that age, I never got into it. So it's like, it's a complete black box to me, what goes on with Minions.

It's funny, as you were describing that, I'm like, yeah, I know what you're talking about. He has a light on his head. But no, they all wear goggles, but one of them only has one eye for some reason. That's the guy I was thinking of. By the way, I've never seen the Minions or, I always have to remind myself this, the Minions. Despicable Me. Despicable Me was the original product. And I was at the gym one time, just like on the elliptical, and it happened to be on. And I don't even hear the audio. It just had like, you know, subtitles. And I remember being kind of sucked into it, Luke. And I didn't even get to hear the voice acting, which is like, you know, those are where the stars are. So, like, I'll bet you I could get into it. You know, if I were, it's just the chance of me sitting down to turn on the Minions is going to be pretty rare. You know what they need to do next year?

They need to do a Minions halftime show so people can complain that it's not in English. Oh my God, yes. Like, I couldn't understand a word they were saying. Yeah, yeah. The Minions. Yeah. There was another thing about this music that I thought was kind of an interesting angle to this is basically the question of fairness, because I don't know if you got this far into the story, But somebody was saying, okay, a lot of figure skaters and people that participate in, I call it ice skating, but that's not really the name for it. Some of them are actually making some pretty good money, depending on what country they're from and what their endorsement deal is. And, you know, they have the money to basically pay to get the rights to whatever music they want. But then a lot of the other ones are amateurs. They're really living hand to mouth. They don't have the money to just pay whatever they want. And so there's an unfairness there Because if you're rich You get to pick any music you want And thereby maybe have a better routine Like it shouldn't be the case That only the rich ice skaters And figure skaters can have the music Of their choice and everybody else has to just use Some rights free ass shit

Yeah when I was reading this

Some like buffalo gals won't you come out tonight Or whatever

Camp town race And once again Skating to camp town races

is our fourth competitor of the evening skating to camp town racers i you know my takeaway from

now you got to take this with the largest grain of minion possible because i don't watch the olympics and when i do watch the i assume that's what the minions say basically you know you want Look at me.

watching olympics do a hamburglar themed performance on the ice you're getting i like

the idea that that whatever the hamburglar said or grimace actually i guess is it who said robble

rob i thought that was the hamburglar no that's probably the hamburglar i don't i like the idea

that the hamburglar that's the romance language and then you have all these languages that split off from it and minions is a romance language it's like like hamburglar is the latin uh-huh

to the english that is minions robble robble is a dead tongue is that what you're saying yeah that's insulting to so many scholars and hamburger thieves but i was reading this article just thinking like i would just go back to not using popular music you know like you just have everybody because well i mean i don't want people just using ai to create music because that really sucks for musicians fire at all the planet and all kinds of things and the price of hard drives apparently do you see the price of hard drives are going up because of the price of ram is going up and all has to know all of this ai shit yes anyway i should have bought that uh i should have bought that hard drive that i left on the counter and as i stormed out of office depot a couple of weeks ago because it's probably a thousand dollars now but i don't know you watch more of this stuff than than i do do you think it would just be a level playing field if everybody just had to get some you know like some sort of like not rights free but like you pay a nominal amount of money for there's so much of that kind of content available online you know you want to make your little video for whatever you can go to various services and pay a licensing fee for something that is not tony tony tony or whatever is you know top of the pops in 2026 i just i

I didn't come in today expecting two.

Tony, Tony, Tony. Well, it's the same conversation.

One maybe, but two. That exceeded my expectations. Well, that was the other thing, too. I mean, you're right. They should figure it out. Like, the IOC should just pay for it or something. You know what I mean? I don't know if they have any money, Luke. That's the problem. That you know of. Yeah, right. It's all buried at the bottom of the sea, probably. It's all in Sepp Blatter. It's all in Juan Samarau's back pocket. Did I just name two IOC presidents off the top of the dome? Samurau or Samurau?

I think SEP is the FIFA guy, though, no? Am I wrong about that?

No, you're right, you're right. The thing that they mentioned in the article, too, was they said the rights— I don't have it right in front of me, but they basically— I was kind of surprised at how not expensive this is. They said the rights, you know, basically to get this music can cost hundreds to thousands of dollars. I might have even said like $3,000 which again $3,000 is $3,000 yeah here we go the cost associated with using a piece of music can range from a few dollars to as much as several thousand dollars per year and I also don't know

I guess you're licensing it but yeah

but I'm figuring like that's actually not as expensive as I thought it would be like if you really really really are you know want to do your routine to a particular song and you've got to go out and like go fund to be you got to fundraise three thousand dollars to get the song you want like i mean i don't know that i was that was not as expensive as i was expecting it to be i'm with you on that and again

not to not to just dismiss a few thousand dollars especially if you're doing this as an amateur you're putting so much time like just i'm sure your life is just like absolutely a hundred percent revolves around you just like waking up super early you're spending like 15 hour days on the You don't want to come back and try to run a GoFundMe so that you can afford, I don't know, a song by, I don't know, is there like a kind of a hip-hop trio that you think of that would be a good example? But they all have different names? Well, they would have similar sounding names, but maybe spelled differently. Oh, okay, but spelled differently? I don't know. I can't think of anything off the top of my head, but if you just had to raise the money to license that song, I could understand that being a bummer. But again, this sort of feels like, well, it would be a bummer if your entire career, you didn't have to do this, and now suddenly this is a new expense. But I do sort of feel like when it gets normalized, it's like, oh, $3,000, how much do you think a pair of skates costs, like professional skates like that? For real, as I say that, maybe I'm an idiot, but I just assume that if you're at the level of ice skating that you're going to the Olympics, are you just spending Boku bucks on ice skates? Are those, like, super special ice skates? I assume they are. I assume they cost way more than just average skates.

I would assume that you're sponsored by an ice skate company.

Good point. But if you were to buy those skates, though, like thousands of dollars for a pair of skates, do you think? Or am I just a fool?

I don't know. I'm way out over my skates on this. And I'm also, if I'm being honest with you, Andrew, I'm reeling from some information that I've just learned, which is that nobody in Tony, Tony, Tony is named Tony.

The original, like, their real names are not. Their real names are not – there's not a Tony amongst them. They are Dwayne Wiggins, his brother, Raphael Sadiq, born Charles Ray Wiggins. By the way, I didn't know Raphael Sadiq was a Tony, Tony, Tony guy. Tony, Tony, Tony guy.

You know him from outside the group?

Yeah, I know him as Raphael Sadiq. He has a whole career outside of Tony, Tony, Tony. Oh, okay. And I did not put that together that he was, yeah, I mean, I don't know if I've seen him live, but I've certainly seen him coming through town. I've heard him promote it on the radio. I've heard his music on the radio. I had no idea he was one of the Tony, Tony, Tony guys. So it's Dwayne Wiggins, Raphael Sadiq. Have we cleared this, Andrew?

Well, as long as you're talking over it, I think we're okay.

And then Timothy Christian Riley. By the way, Timothy is the only one that even has a T in his first name. So I'm going to give him a little bit of credit on this. Does it say how they got their name? Originally, they went by Tony, Tony, Tony as a joke until they realized it, quote, had a nice ring to it.

Really? But what's the joke?

Well, the joke was on me, Andrew, going around all these years thinking it was a band that had three guys named Tony in it who just happened to spell their names differently.

I mean, the joke's on me because I thought they had at least, like, three to five hits. Oh, wow.

If the rhythm feels good to you, baby, let me hear you say, uh, uh, baby.

I kind of forgot about the sexiness there.

If the rhythm feels good to you, baby, let it take you away, or whatever they say.

Then their second most popular hit is something called Let's Get Down, and I don't think I know this at all. So did they only have one song that I knew?

You didn't think we could flip it on your ass, huh?

No, I didn't. Remember, I specifically said, I'm like, I don't think Tony, Tony, Tony can flip it on my ass, Luke. We were having that conversation before the show, I think.

Uh-huh, yeah. But that was an off-air conversation. Yeah, it was. It was a private conversation that we were having. Of course I like this. They got DJ Quick in them. DJ Quick is in the mother effing house. Check it out.

So anyway, I guess 2020 only has that one song. I thought they had a whole bunch of songs that I would have.

Well, they have a lot of songs, but you mean songs that you knew about?

Yeah, I mean, I'm sorry, songs that I knew about. Because I have a very specific memory, and this gets into Drew Bledsoe territory with me again. But I remember, for some reason, I associate Tony, Tony, Tony with my friend, Tim Casada, who had a very fun basement area. And he had Luke. He was the only person I've ever known in my life who had the USS Flag, which was the ultimate in G.I. Joe toys. It was this huge aircraft carrier. Oh, it was the aircraft carrier. Yeah, and it spread out like across a whole floor. It was a huge, huge toy that the other toys would land on. If you can picture even like a full-size G.I. Joe airplane, it was like all to scale. So you can imagine this aircraft carrier was huge. And Tim had it, and we would spend, and he also had laser tag. He had literally everything. Sounds like a child of divorce. He was an only child, I believe. Oh, okay, or only child. Yeah, I don't think divorce, but only child and lived with his parents and grandparents. And so I think that really kind of helped grease the wheels on things. And so he had everything a boy could desire. And so I remember like playing G.I. Joe, playing with the USS Flag down there and listening to like whatever the pop radio station was. And I remember it was like the era of, I think, Tony, Tony, Tony. And I want to say, oh, geez, I want to say Red, Red Wine. Oh, sure. UB40. By UB40. Would that have been around? Written by Neil Diamond. Oh, yes, of course. Originally a Neil Diamond song, but it was the UB40 version of that. And I think there was also, this is where I'm really stretching here. And I have to enter this conversation backwards by associating, and then you're going to get me there. Okay. I believe there was an 80s cover song of an Elvis song.

Yes. It's Fool's Rush In. And that's a UB40 song also.

Maybe I'm confusing those, but that wasn't what I was thinking of. I was thinking of the one that...

Was it Cheap Trick's cover of Teddy Bear?

That's maybe exactly what it was. Because I was about to say, they used a version of it for Teddy Grahams. Your Teddy Grahams. But it was Cheap Trick.

Cheap Trick covered Elvis' Teddy Bear. And I remember this because I did a lip sync. First of all, I did not know that was an Elvis song. I thought it was a Cheap Trick song. I would have been in like 7th or 8th grade. And there was a talent show. and I did a lip sync to the Cheap Trick version of the Elvis song, Teddy Bear. So that would have probably been around the same time. I'm looking for this.

Is it definitely Cheap Trick that did Teddy Bear? Or is it definitely called Teddy Bear? Because for some reason, I'm not getting hit on it.

I could be wrong about that.

Teddy Bear by Elvis. Do you remember the commercial, though? Oh, yeah, the Teddy Grahams one. It makes me want to eat a Teddy Grahams to this day. And a Teddy Grahams really was, let's be honest, it was a graham cracker, but just in the shape of a teddy bear.

But then they started coming out with different flavors. Remember they had a chocolate one, I think, or something like that? Oh, yes, chocolate Teddy Grahams. It's a four-and-a-half-foot-tall pile of awesomeness.

By the way, Andrew, just quickly, what do you think an unopened, still-in-the-box, 1985 USS Flagg aircraft carrier is going for on eBay?

It's going to be expensive, because I told you that I had a couple of just, and I still do have a couple of leftover figurines, like action figures, and Genevieve bought me a bunch of little rubber bands so I could replace them because they were kind of breaking at the waist. And then I was like, oh, this is fun. I'll buy a bunch of other little pieces of G.I. Joe's and put them together. Buying broken G.I. Joe figures was out of my budget, Luke. Like, they were selling broken G.I. Joe figures for like $30 a piece, depending on who they are. So in the box, USS Flagg.

Storm Shadow with one leg. Yes.

I mean, it must be expensive. I'm going to say $1. No, wait. I'm going to say $8. And come on down. No, no, wait. I'm going to say $1,239.

I'm going to say, Andrew, because I'm reading it off of the screen here, $29,999.

What? Well, that's what they're selling it for.

That's what they're asking for. $30,000 or best offer.

$30,000?

$30,000 or, Andrew, as low as $1,440 on Klarna per month.

Oh, great. Klarna. I assume that you have not messed around with Klarna, right?

I have not messed around with Klarna. I have enough, you know, access to consumer credit as is. I don't need to. I'm just finally digging out from under this Michael's card situation. Yeah, right. I don't need to have Klarna on my ass.

So I am, and I'm not doing this to prove you wrong, but I'm doing it because my head is reeling now. I can't find any popular cover of Let Me Be Your Teddy Bear, let alone Cheap Trick, and I'm trying to figure out what each of us are thinking of. So did Cheap Trick possibly do a different... No, no, no, no, no.

It wasn't Teddy Bear. It was Don't Be Cruel. It was Don't Be Cruel.

Don't Be Cruel. That's what's happening.

Somebody has thrown their phone and is just now turning around to go retreat it off the side of the road. They're just getting it now. It wasn't Teddy Bear. It was Don't Be Cruel. That's what it was.

And I was confusing it with the Teddy Bear because the commercial was probably running at that time. I was thinking of Teddy Grahams and Cheap Trick doing Don't Be Cruel. And all of those things remind me of hanging out in Tim's basement for some reason, and I'm being absolutely serious.

Speaking of Neil Diamond, Andrew, I have a—I wouldn't say a beef. I feel like it was a real—I feel like they did not do a great job around the marketing of the movie Song Sung Blue. Have you seen, like, I don't know, billboards—they don't do that anymore, unless you're in L.A. or, I don't know, any kind of advertisements or mention of this, it's a Hugh Jackman and Kate Hudson movie, Song Sung Blue.

I saw the trailer for it twice in the theater, so I don't know what movies I was seeing, but I saw the trailer twice, I know that.

So you saw the trailer, which means you then actually had the relevant information about the movie, which is that they're a Neil Diamond cover act, right?

Yes, although I'm not even sure that I clocked that for a big chunk of the first time I saw the trailer or something. Are you saying that they're kind of burying the story? Everybody thinks it's actually a biopic of Neil Diamond? Because I think I thought that even maybe after seeing the trailer ones.

Having seen the billboard for it, again, being in LA, and seeing some digital ads for it somewhere, not the trailer, but just a picture of them. And you can tell that he's supposed to look like Neil Diamond, Hugh Jackman, but it's so you can tell what it looks like is they it looks like a biopic where they couldn't find someone who looked a lot like neil diamond or they didn't have a lot of money for hair and makeup like it looks like a biopic where they didn't do a very good job of making the guy look like neil diamond but that's because he's not neil diamond he's a neil diamond impersonator yes which and they didn't put that that that's i feel like that's not they did not make that public enough so i saw i remember seeing a poster for it or whatever for it and thinking like god that looks like absolute shit then when i find out that it's about a neil diamond cover act i'm still not going to see it but i'm a little more interested and i understand why he doesn't look exactly like neil diamond he's not playing

neil diamond in the movie yeah i don't think that i saw the whole first i don't think i saw the trailer and got to the end of it and didn't realize that that was the bit but i do think it took me maybe a while because i don't think i was paying that much attention to it my brain shuts down when i think i'm seeing a biopic advertisement i just hate biopics so much are so self-serious and corny.

And so when I was like, oh, they're impersonators and kind of, you know, like, you know, it's kind of a hard luck story. It definitely adds to the intrigue.

Yeah, I mean, it's a more interesting idea of a film to me.

Yeah, absolutely. No, no, no. Absolutely. I'm with you. I was listening. I can't remember who it was, but I'm going to say it was somebody like Aukerman or Bill Simmons, like somebody who actually like has podcasts about movies and consider themselves a movie person. And somebody that I was listening to said they walked into the theater not knowing that it was about impersonators. They thought it was a biopic going into it. So I think you have a lot of a lot of evidence on your side. Do you think that they were kind of being sneaky on purpose?

I'm just wondering that, too, because to be honest with you, now I'm looking up the real story of this this Neil Diamond cover band from Milwaukee. They were called Lightning and Thunder. they were mike and claire sardina aka lightning and thunder and i'm looking at pictures of them and i would absolutely watch a movie about these two people so much more so than about the real neil diamond peace and love yeah but you but that's me that's what i like and yeah you might be right that they were just kind of like the in the promotion of the movie they kind of wanted people to misunderstand what the movie because most people like why would i want to see a movie about a Neil Diamond coverman. I want to see a movie about Neil Diamond himself. So maybe they were being coy about it, but it worked too well because it made me not want to see the movie. Now that I'm reading in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about lightning and thunder and looking at pictures of them doing their performance, they seem fascinating. What I would watch is a documentary about them.

I was literally going to say that. I was going to say, I'd rather, because I still think that this movie is pretty mid. I don't know if I heard that from somebody who saw it or just based on the trailer. I still think the movie isn't quite as good. It's more interesting than a straight-up biopic for sure, but I would watch a documentary about the real ones, sure.

Yeah, anyway, that's my tight five on SongSongBlue.

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

All right, emails, v-mails.

Yeah, Luke, I have a voicemail for you here. This came in a long, long time ago, and it's been sitting in a folder on my desk. I've been meaning to play it, but the problem is I'm trying to reach way back in my memory to remind you what prompted this voicemail. What I think it was was I had purchased for almost $0, like for literally $1.99 or something like that, I had bought a cat toy at the pet store that I brought home, and then it was broken. And I just wanted to go back. It was just like a stick that you would put a toy on the end of for your cat, but the end of it came off, rendering it totally useless. So I just wanted to go back to the store and swap it out with another one. And I was totally ready for them to say, no, we can't even accept this anymore. I'd be like, okay, well, then I got to spend another $2. It is what it is. But instead, they let me swap it out, but they still had to run it through their system. And then when they ran it through the system, they said at the end of the exchange that I owed 17 cents or something like that. Do you remember all of that? Yes, I do remember that. Instead of just letting me take a broken stick and replace it with a working stick that I had bought the day before, they're like, okay, run it through. And they're like, well, now for some reason you owe us 17 cents. And I had to like, I don't remember how I paid that 17 cents, but I found it to be pretty annoying. I think that that is the story that prompted this call from Annie.

Wow, first of all, that new voicemail threw me off. So sorry, I was like chewing chocolate. I wasn't ready for that. Oh, my God.

The new voicemail, that must have been when we changed it for the billboard, right?

Oh, right. Yeah, I've forgotten that we did.

We just punched it up a little bit, I think.

Yeah, Zazzle. We gave it a little Zazzle. I think it's, what did she say in that drop?

I love that. I think it's Zazzy. I love that phrase so much. Anyway, go ahead, Annie.

Okay. i am listening to i don't know monday's episode about andrew owing 17 cents hey and i am ta rigard i went to ulta and i had a shampoo bottle and it had like a pump on it and so i go in there and i'm like hey i bought this i have the receipt but like the pump is broken so i just want to exchange it and they're like okay and i'm thinking they're gonna do it andrew is saying like you just get the same thing and you walk out the door there's no boopity boop on the cash register so she's like okay i'm gonna like you know do it on the computer i'm like okay whatever so she does the thing on it and she's like oh well it was on sale when you bought it so you owe like four dollars and i'm like no no no i just want to exchange it like the item that i just purchased like a few days ago like the pump is broken on it and she said yeah but it was on sale then and because you're bringing it back now you owe four dollars and I'm like

are you fucking kidding me? Like, of course, I don't say that to her. But in my head, I'm like, what? No. I don't owe $4. That's crazy. You sold me like a faulty product. So I say to them, I'm like, wait, the product I bought was like defective. And now I have to like owe more money because I discovered it after the sale. Can't you just like change the price maybe to match what the price was that I bought it? And she was like, no, I have to get a manager to do something like that. And I'm like, okay. um could you call your manager over like i'm full peak i guess middle age now or something yes so the manager comes over and like the situation is explained and she's like okay i'll make the exception what this is an exception now what i can't i'm triggered

anyway well i'm glad it worked out i thought you were going to say that the uh manager wouldn't

help you either but at least you got yeah i'm i'm you i'm texting becca to try to get clarification on this she had a situation like that at like i don't know if it was h&m it was one of those she basically bought something that was in a package like it was i think it was some jewelry or something and then when she opened the package it was actually broken so she took it back and they said we can't take this return because you've opened the package and she was like yeah but it was broken and i couldn't know that until i opened the package they were like yeah sorry with the packages open we can't return it and it was the same thing it was like well can you get a manager okay and they get the manager and the manager basically says like I'll allow it this time it's like you'll allow it this time yeah exactly like and it was you know it was one of those moments where it was very would you describe that as Kafka-esque

I could see that yeah like because you just can't kind of you can't fight the system it just sort of seems like it's almost or yeah well in this case it's almost heller-esque right it's catch-22 exactly well i can't return it turn into a bug right yeah um but like it's it's like well i can't i can't fly because i um what what is the what is literally the catch-22 is like he doesn't want to fly his last mission right he's like i can't fly it because i'm not fit to do it and they say well the policy says if you say you're not fit to do it you are fit to do it like it's just like this impossible scenario where the snake eats its tale of of of nonsense right and that's sort of like what's going on like well we you open it up you find that it's broken you can't return it because it's open yeah it's more like yossarian's

wow i'm just gonna i was gonna try to make a schrodinger's cat but then throw in a catch-22 name then it was just what about yossarian's ulta i don't know sure that's a show title Why not?

I mean, the only problem is, do you think we've already named a show? You know, I never got through Catch-22.

I didn't like this is when I knew that I was not a smart person because at least two or three people in college were like, oh, man, my favorite book is Catch-22. It's just so it's so kind of, I don't know, arch. And like, it's, you know, it's just a scathing satire and, you know, whatever. And I read it, and I was like, I didn't get it.

Wait, you did read it, or you didn't finish it? I read like half of it.

That's how I knew there was someone named Yossarian in it, or Yossarian or whatever.

I read it in college, and I remember liking it okay. I don't know, I just remember reading it being like, well, this is a book that you read. I don't even remember how I felt about it. Now, it's been a really long time, so I don't know if this holds up, But I loved the movie because it's Alan Arkin who plays Yossarian, and also it's Mike Nichols who directed it from The Graduate. So I just remember when I say I love that movie, what I think I love is like the opening scene. I'm sure I've said this on the show before. It's been a long, long time, but I'm pretty sure like the opening shot is just like a still camera shot maybe on a tarmac. And it just is like a lot of planes taking off and landing in World War II. And, like, there was something so still about it and from that era of filmmaking that I'm guessing, like, kind of mid-70s era. I could be wrong about that. But there was just something about that. It's, like, literally one of the movies I watched because I liked the quality of the film. You know that feeling? Totally.

Yeah, like the film stock or whatever you want to. And you know what? I bet you if I read the book now, I would really enjoy it. I don't think I knew it was a satire.

You know what I mean?

Like, I think I was just reading kind of like, why are these people being weird?

They all act very weird. Yes, you're right.

Instead of being like, this is a satirical commentary on how militaries operate and how wars are fought, etc. I think if I had that in my mind, because I wasn't reading it for a class, that was the other thing. The only books I've ever really gotten through are because they were assigned reading in college. But this was a voluntary exercise for me, and I remember just not getting it. I bet you if I reread it now, or certainly if I saw them... movie i bet you i would appreciate the absurdity of it the other thing is i'll bet you i read this around the time that i was reading a lot of vonnegut and i would maybe not you know there's a lot of differences i think but i could also sort of seeing it being in that like kind of satire world can i tell you a story about so you know that i love me some alan arkin right like i really really like alan arkin we talk about him a lot on the show because i'm obsessed with people who have the same letters starting their first and last name and alan arkin is one of those people but i

You know his granddaughter was a regular listener to this show for many years. No, I didn't. Molly Arkin, big fan of the show at one time. Molly, if you hear this.

Molly, are you still listening? Shoot me a note. Well, then trigger warning to Molly and everybody. But I will say.

Molly, stop listening.

No, no, no. I mean, I have nothing but love for Alan Arkin. But he's one of those actors who I like so much that, and I don't like admitting this, but sometimes I think like, oh, yeah, he's of that generation where we'll be saying goodbye soon. You know, like one of these days I'm going to wake up and that's going to be the news.

By the way, throw Alan Alda on the list. Alan Alda. Of double A's. Because he's also alive and I just saw a photo. He looked great. But he's getting up there and I was like, I don't want to live in a world that doesn't have Alan Alda in it.

Well, here's what I realized is Alan Arkin has passed away. He died a couple of years ago in June of 2023. and I can't remember if I knew that and mourned or if I'm just learning this for the first time. This clearly doesn't ring a bell to you either because I think you were entering that conversation assuming that he was still with us as well, right? I was following your lead on that. But you don't remember, we didn't do a tribute to Alan. We didn't do TBTL's tributes to Alan Arkham. In memoriam. In memoriam, you know. I sort of feel like he might have been of the level that we would have maybe dedicated a conversation to?

Yeah, he definitely deserved it. He passed away in 2023 at the age of 89 years old. I mean, my big Alan Arkin kind of like the thing that he did that first really put him on my radar and will always be his main thing for me was probably Glengarry Glen Ross. Oh, yeah. He was phenomenal in that.

Wait, yeah. Wait, who is he in Glengarry Glen Ross? Wait, hold on. I'm having trouble picturing him.

He's one of the guys. He's just one of the salesmen? Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

But he's great in that. And then, of course, Little Miss Sunshine. He was really good. Of course, yeah.

That's where he won his Oscar, I think, pretty late in life, right? Argo. Argo, yes.

Edward Scissorhands.

Oh, I've only seen that once. I didn't remember that one.

I would think you'd be a real Edward Scissorhands guy. I love that movie so much. Just the sort of set design of it, really. yeah I uh the costumes the way it's shot you know I just I love that movie it's so it's so

stylish I don't know oh and of course gross point blank um yeah I don't know why I didn't get more into that during my um who directed that during my phase of uh that's Tim Burton I believe Tim Burton yeah because I really did love Tim Burton he might have been the first director whose name I knew because I loved Batman so much and then you kind of get into that world it's like oh this guy has a whole vision right it was like when you're at that age you're learning about like the vision of filmmakers. Yet, for some reason, Edward Scissorhands, I saw it once and liked it okay, and then just never returned to it.

He was also in Burt Wonderstone. He was, really? I'm just looking at his IMDb now.

Do you know that I actually got confused there for a second because I thought you were talking about the Ping Pong movie, and I was like, no, no, no, that kid. This is what happens when a joke gets into the water supply industry.

You can't separate facts from fertilizer because you joked too hard with Genevieve about something that you can't remember what the actual source material is.

We need to get Facts from Fertilizer as a drop before that goes away. That'll be my after show.

And you know what else he was in? And this really brings the show full circle, Andrew. He was in Minions, The Rise of Gru. He was? He was in Minions, The Rise of Gru. Which minion did he play? The bald one.

Oh, okay, gotcha.

The kind of irascible bald one. The one that's kind of a little stooped over, a little bit crusty, but in a lovable way. He is that minion. Well, there you go, Andrew. We did it three years late, but we finally memorialized Alan Lincoln here on the show in the manner that he deserved.

I don't want you to list them because it's such a bummer way to end the show, but do you have certain celebrities that are in the back of your head? It's like, oh, one of these days we're going to wake up and we're going to have to really be sad about someone.

Keeping a running list, but I really did have that thought about Alan Alda because his grandson took a couple pictures. It was like his 90th or 90-somethingth birthday, and they went out for dinner. By the way, he looked great. And he was, you know, everything seems to be going great for Alan Alda. I was like, honestly, I was like, oh, my gosh, Alan Alda is very old. And, man, I'm going to be really bummed when we don't have Alan Alda anymore.

And you're also going to have a lot of angry listeners if anything happens to him in the next couple of weeks, by the way.

Yeah, I just realized that's a pretty powerful jinx. So, Alan, you got to hang in there, buddy. I can't take that smoke from the listeners.

Keep the heat off of Luke's back.

Yeah. All right, that's going to do it for today's show. But we will be right back here tomorrow with more of this imaginary radio. uh tbtl2 rise of andrew that'll be tomorrow on the show so tune in for that in the meantime have a great tuesday take care of yourselves and please remember no mountain too tall and good luck

to all this is what happens when an inside joke gets into the water supply power out