22. U-Haul Lesbian Moment

MaxThis is Do By Friday, the weekly challenge podcast with Merlin Mann, Alex Cox, and me, Max Semkin.

This week's challenge, cry. Hello.

Speaker BHello. Hello.

MaxI'm doing one of my main hobbies, which is configuring a new iOS device. deleting all the apps and putting all my apps on there. You got to log in to everything. You get your 1Password set up. Got to download all my podcasts on Overcast.

Speaker AGot your two-factor going? Oh, big time.

MaxThat's fun to set up. I had some sort of weird... Okay, I had a new iOS experience. Really? I had a three-factor where after I two-factored in, it said, we also need you to put the password for your MacBook Pro in.

That's totally legit. Have you seen that? It was like official Apple branded. So I was like, I guess I trust this. Yeah, you'll be fine. Is that weird?

MerlinNo, it's totally normal.

Speaker AIt's fine.

MerlinAlso, click any email attachment that ends in .pif. That's totally safe. It's called .pif.

MaxOkay, before I can, I have, guys, I have literally so much to talk about because we haven't done this show and the world is ending. I have huge, big balls full of content. but all my notes are in bear and I can't log into bear until I authenticate one password and I can't do that until I set it up on my iPhone and scan the QR code. There's a way to do this. You got to

Merlindo this properly. It's in the right order. And we sit with you. We sit with you, Max, like Shiva. We sit with you through this entire thing. I thought that I'd have time to do this before

Speaker Athe show, but I only had one hour. He slept a summer by my side. Uh, okay. Get, show me, display the QR code. Alex, is that you typing this?

AlexMaybe.

Speaker AAre you speaking in my voice or yours?

AlexNo, me. We'll get to follow up, but I should.

Speaker ATuesday was a scene, man. Are you guys gossiping? Is this going to be part of the show? What is this? We're gossiping about my ass.

MerlinCheck the Google Doc, Max.

MaxI don't do that. I don't even have that app installed. I can't log into it. I don't even know my Google password. It's all chaos over here.

MerlinSend me your Google password, and I'll use Google Authenticator to get you in. Also, send me your MacBook password. Dot piff.

MaxWhere do we start this? I honestly don't even know what the fuck to talk about this week. How's it going?

Speaker AWe're still sitting shiva. How are we doing with your logins? Are you feeling good? No, no, no. I'm in. I'm in the Matrix. I'm jacked in.

MaxOkay.

MerlinYeah. Did you have anything you wanted to update us on? There's so many things. Now, here's how my week. My week goes that I read the political list, and I make a mental note of all the things I'm pretty sure you're going to end up reading to us. And I've come to really, really look forward to it.

MaxOh, I've got some good shit this week. It's been a big week. It's been a big week. I do have some follow-up copyright John Syracuse 2010. Me. All me.

Speaker AI'm never going to get over that. I recorded it like two and a half weeks ago. My brain is still bent. Well, apologies to John Syracuse. Follow-up.

Speaker BPew, pew, pew, pew. Are we leaving this in?

MaxListen, guys, here's the thing. Nobody listens to this podcast. We can say whatever the fuck we want. I have one. This is the beauty part. I can say whatever crazy shit I want on this podcast and no one gets mad at me. Okay, here's my first one. I have a rant that's been brewing all morning, which is this is not even anything. This is, listen, this is something I can't say on Twitter, but I don't care. Nobody listens to this shit. Okay, listen to this. CBS Chicago. Under a new plan to prepare them for life after high school, Chicago public school students would have to come up with a plan for after graduation before they can get a diploma.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel said the new graduation requirements are something he's been considering since he was elected in 2011. Starting with next year's freshman class, in order to receive their high school diploma, all CPS students would have to show an acceptance letter to a four-year university, a community college, a trade school, an apprenticeship, an internship, or a branch of the armed services. This is such fucking horseshit. It's such – you know, I just finished this capitalist realism book and one of the things that it talked about is that the old model of the way that society oppresses people that like all of the like post-war fascists were writing about is like the prison society where the model of the citizen in the prison society is a prisoner.

And we've moved on to something new which is like a capitalist society where the model of the citizen in a capitalist society is the debtor. And it's insane to me that we're taking these kids that already do not have enough opportunities and we're saying you now in order to even graduate high school you need to agree to incur tens of thousands of dollars of debt. Welcome to life. You know, here you go. Now you can't even graduate high school until you're civilized by society by being oppressed by debt that you can never crawl out from under for the rest of your life. And you constantly have to work and be owned just to fucking steal a loaf of bread for your family.

MerlinYeah, and then 15 more for escaping. The model for the last generation has slowly emerged to be about consumer debt in a lot of ways. And then I feel like that then sort of transformed into the whole like, well, I mean, now, what did I see yesterday? I saw the thing where there was the menu of what it costs in this one community. like if you want a jury trial, you have to pay $30 per juror per day, stuff like that.

But so tell me more about this model, though, because I think that's a very interesting model, which is that there's something fundamental obviously happening in a model like that, which is that we're switching what we could call the default mode. The default mode is not a sort of classic American idea of, you know, innocent until proven guilty. It's more like, well, just wait until we catch you on whatever we're going to catch you on. And then like you're going to become Soylent Green for this community. That's right. Whether that's through onerous fees and parking tickets and then late fees for the parking tickets.

Like there's all these little ways. And it sounds like what you're saying is that in that model, we eventually get to where we're not even trying to make it sound like a convenience fee. It's turning into like this is just how we make poor people stay poor.

MaxIt's not poor people. It's that the model – it's that we don't live and we haven't for some time lived in like a democratic republic. We live in some new kind of social organization where capitalism is more important than direct democratic representation. And the mechanism that you use, the way that people are controlled is through economic means.

Speaker AIt's like, well, you're tired. You have to work all the time because you're in debt. And you got to get a car loan to get a car because you need the car to get the work.

MerlinAnd then if you lose your license and you drive without the license, you get charged for that. And it just accumulates.

MaxThat's right. And the thing is, also, if you look at all of the stuff that rich people trade around to make money on, it's poor people's debt, right? We have a whole debt economy where Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan and whatever, they're trading. I mean, the big short was a great—the scene where there's the people gambling in the casino, and then there's all the people placing side bets on the people betting in the casino. They're all gambling. I mean, that's happening again right now because there's been no real substantial regulation since the 2008 collapse that prevents these new financial technologies from having the banks over leverage on financial technologies that no one could possibly model or understand.

So it's all happening again. And all it is is it's people betting on bets on bets on bets on bets on whether poor people will pay off their home loans. And it's like we already know that we've structured society in a way where people will never pay off their loans. like I even see this in my own office where it's like people have to people get into a panic about like keeping their job here or whatever because it's like well if they don't have this job they could never pay off their student loans and they have to have the work and it's like what kind of like I think it's great to work here but like what kind of who could ever be happy anywhere if you

can't ever leave because you're owned by the debt it's a crazy life and the notion that we're going to take every public school student and hold their diploma hostage until they fucking join the army or incur $100,000 worth of debt. It's the perfect illustration of the fact that everyone is to be part of this debt society. You can't be trusted unless you're owned by the debt and the sort of like economic mechanism of society has some sort of leverage over you. Like for shit, I had to get a credit card because I couldn't do things in my life because

I had no credit because I'd never owned a credit card. Like, we've talked about this before. But that's fucking crazy. It's good to not have a credit card. I never bought anything I couldn't afford. And that meant there were times when I wanted something and I didn't get it. That's healthy. That's responsible. It's okay not to have things if you can't afford them. But then I had no credit and I couldn't do things. Because I wasn't a trustworthy person because I didn't owe anything to the capitalist debtor society. So now I have a credit card.

MerlinYeah. I realize this is turning into a little bit of a John Oliver bit, but there's a whole thing with civil forfeiture. Have you been seeing more and more of those stories coming up? Absolutely. There was that guy. I have no way to vet this story, but it was an interesting anecdote that this guy was basically, he was traveling somewhere to buy parts for, I think he has a company that repairs boats or something like that. And he had a bunch of cash with him. And the cops basically just, they seized everything. They seized his phone. He wouldn't give him the password.

This is a new thing I'm really thrilled about. They took all of his stuff, took the $8,000 that he had in his backpack. And so basically now he has to go. Now there's fees to even apply to get your stuff back, which of course you never will because now that's going to be spent on cigarette boats to pursue drug dealers and stuff like that.

MaxI'm sort of amazed that people are still mad about Apple things. I sort of haven't seen a lot of Apple grousing in my world. Part of it is that I'm listening to more politics podcasts and less tech podcasts, so I don't hear as much of the grousing. And I just on Twitter, my Twitter feed is more about stuff that actually matters than people complaining about the travel distance of the keys of a new Apple keyboard. and it's kind of amazing.

It's kind of amazing. Careful. It's kind of amazing to me.

MerlinThat pedestal's a little rickety-butty. Be careful. I would really prefer to watch people who have strong reckons about politics than people with strong reckons about technology. It's a much more sound worldview.

MaxYeah, it is. Everyone should be reading a lot of hot takes about Pepsi commercials. Oh, my God. All right. Listen, what are we talking about?

Speaker AAll right, we've got to start this thing.

MaxLet's talk about something important.

Speaker AWhat are we going to... All right. Give me some more follow-up. It's been a huge week. There's so many things I need explained to me. I have three pieces of follow-up. Follow-up. Copyright 2010 John Siracusa.

Alex2011.

Max2011. He just wants so little. That's real-time follow-up. He wants a legacy.

Speaker AAll right. He's done so little apart from him.

MaxOkay.

Speaker AOkay.

MaxAll right. Listen. Do you guys know about this character, Sebastian Gorka? Yes. So I have a handful.

MerlinI described him at one point as being the last face you see before you die in a clown's basement.

MaxHe looks like, okay, he looks like Pendulet before Pendulet got skinny, but if his face stayed fat.

Speaker AHe looks, he's like a crazy, or he looks like. Oh, he's like, he's like, he's like the picture of Pendulet. Like the Oscar Wilde book. There's a picture up in the attic of him that continues to age. Yeah. Have you seen Fat Steven Seagal?

MaxWhere he always bursts into a scene and he's out of breath and he's like, hey guys.

Speaker AHe kind of looks like Fat Steven Seagal, but he's this like- That was the best take we got. He's got kind of a British accent, but I don't know if that's- He looks like the guy from The Americans in some kind of a really poor 80s disguise.

MerlinHe looks like there's probably somebody even more horrific underneath. But he's done something. He bought something like at the Disneyland magic shop and he's put on some kind of a disguise kit.

MaxOkay, so what's the deal with this guy? He is a national security sort of consultant. He latched onto Trump very early. He's one of these guys who thinks the main problem with U.S. foreign policy is that we don't say the phrase radical Islamic terrorism. That was like his big sort of cause. As far as I know, among people who sort of like are involved in the world of national security policy and commentary, he's nobody. Like he's not even a fringe figure in that no one's in order to be a fringe figure. People have to have heard of you. And no one's ever heard of this guy.

He just sort of rose up with Trump and came out of he's one of these like a chud monsters that came out of the sewer when Trump started running. And, of course, Trump won. And now all of this like sort of like island of misfit toys are in charge of our government. And this is one of the crazy people who now is very important. And I don't exactly know what his position is, but he's some sort of big, big deal advisor to Trump. So this is a great – there's been a couple of great stories about him recently. This is one from The Telegraph. So this is about how they should – how we should be fighting ISIS.

So Gorka and Trump say we should launch a Cold War-style campaign to, quote-unquote, delegitimize the enemy. But it is a propaganda war that has human rights groups hyperventilating. Trump has called for surveillance of Muslim communities and mosques in the U.S., tests to weed out those who believe in Sharia law, and even the creation of a Muslim registry. And he is still seeking to prohibit immigrants and refugees from six Muslim-majority countries. One other, more unconventional tactic Gorka suggests is to translate into Arabic the Federalist Papers, historic articles promoting the ratification of the U.S. Constitution.

Quote, for the cost of one missile, we could probably translate the papers and put it in a leather-bound book and give every Muslim in the world a copy, he says. Oh, boy.

AlexI'm on his Twitter feed right now And he's one of those guys who has a picture His avatar His profile picture is him with Trump And then the banner is just a picture of Trump Being surrounded by his family and Pence And there's a lot of Oh, there's some 9-11 pictures He was on Bill Mitchell's show Got some more 9-11 stuff

MaxIt's just, you know, one of the things about this whole issue, you guys have heard of this issue. It came up during the debates of like that. It's kind of a big fringe right wing thing of like Obama and Hillary wouldn't say the phrase radical Islamic terrorism.

MerlinIt became a talking point for the Republican candidate.

MaxThat's right. And it was like the implication is like they're afraid to say it or something. But the thing is, there's I don't want to litigate this whole thing, but there's very good reasons that Obama and Hillary don't say it. One of the reasons is most Muslims in country, even in countries where ISIS is there and has power, they don't support ISIS. So most Muslims are actually our natural allies in that they don't like ISIS or what they stand for just because ISIS has like military power, controls their town or whatever. And if the U.S. starts lumping all the Muslims in with ISIS and uses phrases like radical Islamic terrorism as though it's like Islam that's against us and not just some crazy Islamic analog to the KKK or something like that, it turns off our natural allies who would otherwise sort of help us in this battle.

Right. Like it's not it doesn't it doesn't get anything for us to like insult the people who are already on our side. And it's this whole it's this crazy logic that these right wing people have that it's like like some sort of Harry Potter spell. If you say the right word, you'll like stop them. It's like, ah, if we learn their true name, we'll gain their powers. You know, it's like that's not how it works. But it's the same thing that they get this idea, I think, from pickup culture, where it's these spells that you can do to get a woman to have sex with you.

Where it's like, oh, if you just say this incantation or have the right pickup line or wear a crazy hat. And then if you wear a red hat while you say that.

MerlinYou just weave the dragon's breath and the milkshake comes to the yard.

MaxBut it's just this it's this crazy logic. And it's and it's like, of course, the natural extension is that if we if we publish the Federalist papers in Arabic, it's like, ah, we'll like we'll like cast our spell. It's like, you know, if we defeat the leader of ISIS and gain control of his wand and then we'll have the most powerful wand or something like that. Like, it's just what a crazy worldview.

So here's the next story about Sebastian Gorka. These sort of escalate.

MerlinSo up till now, he has gone out of his way to say that despite his background and some kind of casual associations that he has had, he is absolutely not a crypto fascist. He is, to quote Gore Vidal, he's not, you know, basically you guys, you guys don't understand. You don't understand the subtleties of what Hungarian, you know, thug life.

MaxYou may know where I'm going with this story. I think I do. Yeah. So what you're saying is Gork is saying, well, I'm more of a Ronald Reagan guy. I'm not a full I'm not I'm not in here yelling restore the dictator to health. And then a little suitcase of powders and needles.

But here's a here's a fun story from this week. So this is the story I have is from forward. So as a Hungarian political leader in 2007, Sebastian Gorka, President Trump's chief counterterrorism advisor, publicly supported a violent racist and anti-Semitic paramilitary militia that was later banned as a threat to minorities by multiple court rulings.

AlexSounds about right.

MaxAsked directly on the TV interview program if he supports the move by Jobbik, a far-right anti-Semitic party, to establish the militia, Gorka, appearing as a leader of his own newly formed party, replies immediately, that is so. The guard, Gorka explains, is a response to, quote, a big societal need.

Not good. Not good. That is not good.

Alexso alright hold on I gotta go back to Twitter again why is it Sebastian Gorka and then Dr. G G

Merlinhe's one of those guys who it's very important you know he's a doctor

Alexso he's a real doctor he's a scholar

Maxhe's a healer he's a midnight toker does he have some sort of Bob Odenkirk mail-in degree you know better call Saul

Speaker Bis he even on Wikipedia what is Oh, Alex.

MaxAlex, I'm so glad that you asked me about Sebastian Gorka's Wikipedia article because this brings me to my third piece of follow-up. Copyright 2010, John Syracuse. 2011. This is from CNN. A Wikipedia user who goes by sk-gorka has extensively edited the Wikipedia page of White House aide Sebastian Gorka, including a section on criminal charges he faced for bringing a firearm into a Washington, D.C. airport. Your words. It is unclear if the user is connected to Gorka. but Gorka did not respond to a request for comment.

The user, however, has only made edits to the pages of Gorka and his wife, Catherine Gorka. Those edits include adding photos and information about Gorka's policy speeches and books. The user created the page for Catherine Gorka.

AlexAlso, the word doctor does not appear on his Wikipedia page.

MerlinHe has a PhD in political science.

AlexOh, God. I'm sorry. Anyway.

MaxYeah.

AlexPlease go on, Max.

MaxYeah. I mean, so in his spare time, when he's not advising the president of the United States on how to beat terrorists by learning their true name and casting a spell on them, he edits the Wikipedia page for his wife to promote his books. Oh, God.

Anyway, so new Mac pros.

Let's take a break and hear from our first sponsor, Blue Apron. You guys love to cook, right?

MerlinYeah, I had the frazzled raindrops with farm egg. We're trying a new thing tonight. My wife is having paleo delivery. I think a caveman's going to go.

MaxHave you learned nothing from having your blood bag delivered?

Speaker AThis is fresh food. Fresh ingredients. What was the blood bag? Was that not fresh? What? Well, it's fresh-ish. You know?

AlexIs this Kitch Fix? What service are you... Oh, God. Is that a sexy thing? I don't know. That sounds like a sexy thing. Clean, craveable, fully prepared meals.

MerlinWe are getting Meal Made. Oh, God. We're getting the Mustang Bar. We're getting the Salmon in Parchment with Provencal vegetables. We're getting the coconut shrimp, chicken tenders and broccoli for a little shaver, and the carnitas bowl.

We're trying a variety. We're getting more than we normally would because we're going to try it out. Our kid's a monster. She won't eat anything. She'll probably barely touch the chicken.

Speaker ABut we're going to try this.

MaxMake sure you use the offer code DUDEWIPES on checkout for 20% off your first made delivery.

AlexSo are DUDEWIPES one of the best all-purpose wipes I've ever used?

MaxWait, why do you own them?

AlexBecause I, for one of our challenges, if you remember, I gifted you a box of dude wipes. However, I accidentally ordered a subscription.

MerlinOh, you got one for daddy.

Speaker AYou got a subscription. Oh, did you subscribe and save?

MaxI surprisingly have a lot of dude wipes follow up to cover. Number one, I used the dude wipes when I had some sort of stomach virus and I was vomiting and shitting my pants all the time. And the dude wipes were good. Are they hardy, Max?

Speaker ADo they really hold up? Is that part of it? Is there very solid? There's a good build quality? There is a good build quality.

MaxI like that they're not scented, really. I prefer that to a scented baby wipe or something that has a scent to it. But I also heard an amazing wipe story from a friend of mine, from our friend Jana. So this is not specifically about dude wipes, but it is about wipes, which is you are not supposed to flush these things down the toilet. No way.

MerlinYou talk to your plumber, never let your landlord know that there have ever been wipes in the house.

MaxIt specifically says on the package that you can flush them down as long as you do it one at a time. No, no, no, no. But Jana told me a story that she used to live in a building, or she knew someone who owned a building. I don't know. This was a secondhand story, but I'm going to assume that it's true. And basically, someone in the building had been flushing wipes, and it clogged the toilet, the whole vertical for the whole building. and the property owner had to go there and he had to open up the pipe to remove this like basketball size wad of like diarrhea wipes

that were covered in people's splatter and when he opened up the pipe it released a bunch of pressure and like diarrhea and wipes came spraying out of the pipe into his face and he got dysentery. Ticka ticka ticka follow up.

MerlinDateline. London. August 5th 2013. A 15 ton fatberg caked with grease and fortified with wet wipes was extracted from London's sewers in the nick of time by an expert team of sewage fluffers from the Thames Water Company. Had the Titanic mask on undiscovered, a company press officer told NBC,

Speaker Awe could have had sewage popping out of manholes all over London. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Did you get the photo? Hang on now.

MaxWait a minute. Did you get the photo of the fat bird? This is moving more quickly than I can process. Developing story, developing story. We're going on the next tangent. Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa. Okay. Is this number one? Is this real? NBC News.

Speaker APlease back up. Please read the first sentence one more time. Digga digga digga. Dateline, London, August 5th, 2013.

MerlinHeadline, Fatberg, dead ahead. 15 tons of slime and wet naps clog London sewer. We go to press. A 15 ton Fatberg, caked Fatberg, F-A-T-B-E-R-G. Pause right there.

MaxPlease pause. A 15 ton what? Fatberg. What is that? Is that an iceberg of fat?

MerlinIt's like an iceberg made of fat. Oh my. A fatberg caked with grease and fortified with wet wipes was extracted from London sewers in the nick of time by an expert team of sewage flushers from the Thames Water Company. Please pause again.

Speaker AA team of what now? A team of sewage flushers. Hello. Hello, governor. Flush your sewage then. A team of sewage. There is a castle.

Wow. Wow, wow, wow. So that's a career?

MerlinAn eight-member team used shovels and jets of water to dislodge the pulpy aggregation of cooking fat and flushed wet wipes, uncovered after residents in Kingston, Surrey complained about unflushable toilets. Together, the wipes and grease form, quote, a congealed wet mash, the size of a bus that smelled like, quote, the worst wet dog you can ever think of.

AlexNotice, no one's talking about tampons here. They're like, if.

MaxNot all tampons. Okay, Alex, when we had the sewer, when we had the toilets back up in the theater bathrooms and the shit king bubbled out of the toilets and claimed. What a time. What a time. Tell me about the shit king.

Speaker BGo, go, go, go.

MaxHe claimed half of our office as his own, and we had to learn his true name and battle him back. Cast spells at him.

Speaker AHe gave one of your assistants a silver hand. It was a really dark time in our office history.

MaxSo we eventually had a bunch of sewer flushers. A sealed team six of London sewer flushers came out. and they excavated the pipes and they pulled out a fucking rat king of used tampons that had obstructed...

Speaker BDo people know about this? They pulled out a Sally Ride of tampons? A Sally Ride's worth of tampons. I don't want to shame people, Alex. No.

Speaker AThey're only dirty like a quarter of the time. So I asked...

AlexOh, no.

Speaker ASo let me ask you this. I've asked a bunch of women this. Do people flush tampons? Is that a thing? Not smart people. You wrap it in a Kleenex and you put it in the toilet. You put it in the waist basket like a gentleman. What I've heard is this.

MaxWhat I've heard is everybody knows you're not supposed to do it, but everybody does it if it's not your bathroom.

AlexThen they're monsters. They're bad people.

MaxListen, I'll flush a wet wipe. and if I'm at a, if I, listen, if I have to go, listen, if I have to go to my bank and meet with a banker downtown, I see. I'll flush a fucking Chicago Tribune down there totally. I don't care.

AlexAll right. Okay, okay. So then, in a public place, I'm going to say it's acceptable to flush a tampon or a newspaper.

MaxOh, man, every theater. But not in someone's office. Listen, the bank, the bank, they're trading a bunch of student debt back and forth. They're not contributing to society. Fucking get some flushers in there, create some jobs, and get my newspaper out of the toilet, you know?

Speaker BAlright, I'm going to say that's successful.

MerlinWe found your paper. He's a little bit wet. It has some fatty grease on it. He's a fatterberg.

Speaker A15 tons of slime and wet naps. I mean, listen, this is really the circle of life. This is a very Lion King moment

Maxbecause this is the circle of life of capitalism is you go to Chicago Public Schools. We've gutted the funding so you don't really learn much.

MerlinBy the time you're a sophomore, you start preparing your exit papers. You get a job somewhere. You take out some loans. By the time you're a junior, maybe you're qualified to start applying for leaving.

MaxRight. And that's the thing. So you're in school. Now, we've negotiated down the school year into eight days of school per year. And you have a mediocre teacher who doesn't make any money.

Teachers got to take a standardized test. Then in order to graduate and get your paperwork to participate in society, you've either got to join the military or go to college. So now you sign up for college. You're $200,000 in debt and you have a four year degree in gender. And you you wind up being a sewer flusher for a bank in downtown Chicago. And you can never fucking quit because then you go to some sort of debtor prison, I assume.

MerlinYeah. Just also dig a dig a breaking news follow up. I just want to clarify, if you have not been getting the numerous photos of giant wads of poop and wipes, it's because I've accidentally sent four of them to John Syracuse.

Speaker BOh, good. Sure.

MaxListen, my giant iPad keeps going to sleep every two seconds if I don't tap the screen like a bird. How do I make it stop doing that? General. I'm clicking. I go to settings. Now what do I do?

AlexScreen, I think It might be actually under security

MaxSettings Display and brightness Probably Oh, auto lock, is that what I want?

Speaker AGuys, just while you're working on that, make sure you check back in Because I'm finding tons of good photos I've turned all my notifications off

AlexSo I'm not getting these You probably have it at the one minute You want to put a three minute on there

MaxI turned it off I'm a big, listen, I'm a grown ass man. I'll turn my iPad off and I'm done with it.

MerlinGood for you. You can see some wet wipes on the walls of London there. You can see some on the floor. You can see some on the beach. We will fight them in the sewers. We will fight them on the Thames. Look at the one holding it like a big chunk of ambergris. Look at the first one with that Vernon Dursley looking motherfucker holding the big ambergris of wipes. Isn't that a hell of a thing? Okay, hang on. I'm opening this up.

AlexThis is actually, it's almost majestic.

MaxIt really is.

AlexIt's really impressive.

MaxIt looks like an old lady in rags, like an old crone.

AlexNo, no, no, no. It looks like you're going to find a baby dinosaur in there. Like there's some dinosaur.

MerlinThe one on the beach looks kind of like a Dementor, but the Vernon Dursley guy. Let me just say what he's holding is very much in contrast to what the kombucha made me do.

Speaker BOh, God.

MerlinYou would not be holding that up if it was being photographed. This is unbelievable. I think we may need, I'm not saying my daughter uses wipes because she doesn't, but if she did, I think we really need to curtail that.

MaxThis is very, very upsetting. Can I ask you the obvious question here, which is, let's say that you want to be a good, upstanding member of society and not flush your wipes. Now, they sell the wipes, and so you wipe your splatter off, right? And now you've got a wipe, and it's full of splatter and kombucha. I've got splatter. What is the – what's the sort of – you know what I mean?

Speaker AWhat's the official procedure here? I think you should probably get a bespoke plastic wipe case that you put it in.

MerlinLike you use one plastic case per wipe. You close it up. You seal that. And then you leave that in some kind of a bank container.

MaxDo you understand what I'm talking about?

MerlinI do.

Speaker AYou're saying what if we treated it like a responsible tampon? What are you supposed to do with it?

Speaker BIt says flushable. That's what it says in a pen.

MaxNo, no, no. This is like how when you buy Q-tips, it says on the box of Q-tips, do not put these in your ears. And now I understand-

Speaker AAnd what is the single reason that everybody buys Q-tips? Listen, I understand that everyone puts them in their ears.

MaxI put them in my ears and it feels amazing. Every day. It feels amazing. It feels great every day. It feels better than eating a bag of Doritos.

MerlinI do two at a time. I do two major sewer flushers and then I have one for cleanup.

Maxit's probably the next best physical sensation to sex is putting a Q-tip in your ear after you shower. What about pooping? It's above pooping. It's a more visceral pleasure for me than pooping. Now, listen, I know that you're not supposed to do it and it makes your ears itchy and it's bad. I know all that. Listen, don't do this. But here's my question is, why is the Q-tip corporation selling these things? Because they, you know, what's the, do you understand what I'm saying?

MerlinI do. You're saying like you're saying it's yes. I mean, it would be like selling bullets and saying like, oh, yeah, like we don't have any culpability in their use. Like the whole fucking reason that I assume Johnson and Johnson, the big Q-tip, I call them. The whole reason they make them is they know people are going to stick it into their ears like animals. But like what's the on label use for a Q-tip? If people used to say back in the day, it's so amazing how many people used to smoke, including me. But they would say, you know, cigarettes are the only thing on the market that, if used correctly, will kill you.

Right. So that I mean, that's kind of the canonical example of if you do this, if you buy this legal product and use it the way it's intended, you will absolutely die earlier than you need to. It's kind of similar to that. Right. Like if you use this for the on label purpose, even though it's not really technically on label. So you think now you think maybe that could be a new job for Steve Bannon? he goes in he covers all these industries maybe he could be the watchdog for all the industries that are selling off-label uh things that shouldn't be used oh i see well i think this

Maxshould be part of the jared kushner portfolio because this guy he's solving all of he's running america more like a business he's bringing peace to the middle east he's negotiating our trade

Speaker Adeals he's in charge of the wall max isn't he also running the it department i believe so yeah so if you have a problem you need to cycle your router you're called jared kushner jared Kushner, come over here and set my iPad up, bitch.

MaxIt's turning off. I have to tap it like a bird. Do the settings. Come over here. You don't want to be fucked? I'm a customer of the U.S. government, and Jared Kushner's running it more like a business. Well, I have a customer service complaint. Come over here and make my screen. I'm tired of tapping the screen.

AlexI know this is Max's bit, but I found this great NPR story that starts out now a disclaimer. NPR is not responsible for damage done to the listener or his or her own body after hearing the following segment and then a soundbite of music. The reporter. I'm in the studio now with Dr. Dennis Fitzgerald. He's an ontologist. That's an ear doctor here in Washington. Why does it feel so good to clean your ears? Well, there's probably two answers to the question.

The first answer, and probably the most common reason, is that people like to get a Q-tip into their ear, and it's that they've already cleaned out the wax out of their ear. And wax is a protective component of our ear canals, so that once you clean out all the wax, then the ear starts to itch. It's the Carmex problem. But, but, but. That's right. So that tells me why people do it in the first place. Right. Why does it feel so good? Well, it feels like there's some tentative pausing here. Well, there are a lot of nerve endings in the ear, and a lot of those nerves are hooked up to the other parts of your body, especially internal organs.

Certain nerves that are in the skin of the ear canal connect to the intestinal organs. So basically, you're kind of doing a little ASMR massage to your ear, and you're getting the tingles from poking your ear every morning.

MerlinAre you implying a prostate-type situation?

AlexYeah, yeah. Okay. So Max is not off.

Speaker AWe should defund NPR, no question.

AlexMaybe people should put other things in their ears. I don't know.

Speaker AI'm questioning so much of my sexuality right now because...

AlexNo disclaimer. Dubai Friday hosts are not responsible for damage done to the listener.

MerlinHow about your family goes away for the weekend and you just spend the whole weekend on the toilet using the Toto while you clean your ears? Can you imagine that? Where they have kombucha right there. Oh man, I'd be jamming some powders pretty hard. Oh my God, my ear is so itchy.

MaxI'm very conflicted about this. You're saying when I get a Q-tip in there and I blast my ear with that Q-tip.

MerlinYes.

Speaker AAnd I'm getting like a chilled on my spine. It feels so good. It's a kind of reflexology. It's like when they rub your feet and then you can feel your colon.

MerlinSame deal. It's reflexology. Wow. Acupressure, they call it.

MaxIs this a fetish where people put a Q-tip in their ear while they're having sex? Oh, that's a really good idea.

AlexIs an ear fetish normal? Is it normal.com?

Speaker AAccording to who? What normal doctor of normalcy do they have on here? I don't know. I know there's definitely nose things. That's a Japanese thing.

MaxOkay, listen. Can we return to my... I'm really troubled by this because what are you supposed to do with one of these fucking wipes once you wipe your ass with it?

Speaker AWhat are you supposed to do if you're not supposed to flush it? I don't fully understand wipes. Is this a Talmudic question, Max? What's the proper thing to do? That's what I'm asking is like if I go to the – what is it called?

MaxThe shit chimney sweep? What's that? You're talking about in London? Yeah.

Speaker AWhat are their jobs? Oh, sorry. Fatberg, dead ahead. You're talking about the sewage flushers from the Thames Water Company? Sewer flushers. Thank you.

MaxIf I go to the sewer flusher and I say, listen, I have a delicate butthole and I need to use a dude wipe to control my splatter. what do I what is the what does the US government recommend I would have changed your mind to know that I also shit on my balls you remember what you said

Merlinjust to get the sewage flusher sympathy vote you say by the way I do shit on my balls

Maxhere's the thing you have to know is that I'm drinking an enormous amount of kombucha it's explosive there's splash back everywhere I need the dude wipe it's a living beverage rejoice I have splatter and it's going everywhere. It's in every crevice and you need to wipe it. You need to wipe with the dude wipe and I'm, okay, but you can get this and you're going to say, listen, I want to be a good upstanding member of society. I've incurred hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. I'm a good boy and I just want to dispose

of my wipe in the way that the U.S. government says is correct and now he would say to me,

Alexall right, first of all is it I am not a wipe user I'm like if I'm in that situation I feel like a shower I've never been put in that situation but I feel like a shower. Didn't you just say you use the wipes? Yeah but they are all purpose you use them on your face or like yeah they're mostly face wipes for me dude wipes are all encompassing yeah

MerlinI have a follow up question I'm going to call this the mini challenge of the week do you take off any articles of clothing before you take a shit what time of day where am I

Alexno

Merlinlet's say you go to the bank let's say you go to the bank you go to the bank because you've incurred student debt and you brought your paper you're going to be in the bathroom you've got a fox, a chicken and a bag of grain do you take off your shirt

Maxno I don't take anything off you never take your shirt off

Merlinwhat about pants

MaxYou took your pants off all the way. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. This is, you're not asking the question in a well-formed way. Because here's the thing. If I'm at the bank, it's all going to stay on because I assume that at any moment a security guard could bust in and go, why are you flushing a newspaper down the toilet? And I don't want to be. What if you're given a hanger? That's interesting. Okay, how about a friend's house? If I'm wearing outerwear, the outerwear will come off. If I'm at a friend's house, same situation. I don't want them to come in and ask why I'm flushing a newspaper down the toilet. But if I'm at home, I mean, a man's house is his castle.

I will take off whatever I want.

MerlinOkay, so how about this? Okay, let's start with an easy one. You got to take a shit. You're wearing a heavy winter coat like one would wear when it's cold in Chicago. Do you take off your winter coat before you take a shit?

AlexOh, well, that's different.

MerlinIs it really that different?

AlexWell, see, I'm trying to think of—

MerlinLet me tell you why I'm asking this. This is not just the George Costanza bit. I have learned this is this is kind of one of those things people don't talk about. I have learned that there are people who if they have to go sit down, they take off articles of clothing. I've heard of a lot of men who it's like a whole event because, you know, they probably don't drink enough water. And so if they're if they're going to go and do that, they will take off their pants and fold them up before they might take off their shirt. It's like it's like an entire morning. This is a thing. This is totally a thing.

MaxWhy? Listen, I can do a business shit or I can do a sort of leisure shit. And the business shit is if I'm doing something else or I'm working or I'm in the middle of a video game or something. But listen, a couple times a week, I just want a leisure shit. And listen, I'm going to get my Instapaper going. I might have a podcast playing. I'm going to take off any sort of clothing that's sort of restrictive of movement. I'm going to settle in for a good 15 minutes of shit.

MerlinOkay, so any article of clothing, restricting, or let's even say distracting. Now, I know you don't like to eat in the bathtub. Do you bring any food with you when you have a nice leisure shit? No.

MaxNo, that's too much. Not at all. That defeats the purpose. It's a little too human centipede for me.

AlexOh, God. I'm enjoying a BuzzFeed article, 24 surprisingly divisive pooping habits.

MaxOkay, here's another one. Do you know that a lot of people stand up to wipe? stand up to wipe.

AlexI feel like that's a situation.

MaxOkay, let me tell you how I discovered this. We went on a cards retreat. We were out in the middle of nowhere and we went to some sort of we were renting a house in like a lake in the middle of nowhere in like Michigan. We went to like whatever family style you know, Ruby Tuesdays or Shoney's or whatever was there and we went and got dinner and we're out back steakhouse or whatever and Ben went to a cards, a co-creator Ben went to the bathroom and he came back and he said man they have the worst bathrooms here whenever you stand up to wipe the auto thing on the toilet flushes and i and it keeps flushing

continuously and we all our jaws dropped we were like we were like what and he was like a fatberg and we were like say that again more slowly he dropped a fatberg on us we were like excuse me we you stand up to wipe and he was like yeah uh as you do as everyone does And we were like, this is fucking insane. This is like you just told us that you're like John Wayne Gacy. It was like the biggest thing in the world. And then we discovered like later when we were talking about it that one of the other cards guys, David Pinzoff, also stands up to wipe.

And he and Ben and Pinzoff got very emotional and defensive about it. And they're like, it's perfectly normal. Lots of people stand up to wipe. And Pinzoff, in a peak of defensive rage, he goes, my entire family stands up to wipe. Oh, my gosh. It's like the Yankees. And we all went quiet again. And you're like, David, how do you know that? And he's like, well, he's like, there's a bathroom in our house where the lock doesn't work. And we've all walked in on each other, standing the wipe repeatedly.

MerlinI had the pony. Oh, my goodness. Okay. Well, oh, my gosh. Okay. Well, I think maybe we should, you know, I don't want to, I know Max does not want to be contacted by our listeners. If anybody out there takes the clothes off when they ship, please let us know about it. All right.

AlexHold on. follow up. Do you pee in the shower?

Speaker ANo. Sure. Wait, wait, wait. I will pee in some showers. While you're taking a shower, I'll pee anytime. I'll pee in a sink. I call it the guest bath.

AlexWell, you have your jug. That's right.

MerlinI'll pee in a hotel shower. It's right here. You want to hear it? Peeing in the shower. Come on. It's fine.

Alex48% say yes frequently. 31% only rarely. 20% no.

MerlinI want to ask a question for Alex, please. I have a question for Alex, please. Do you have you known women? So I'm going to say that women I have known in my life tend to greatly. Not really. Everybody always prefers to use a residential bathroom over a public restroom. Right. Let's let we can stipulate that for most people. There's nobody who's like, oh, yeah, I get to go to the gas station. Like, that's not a thing. But have you ever known women who, when they use any given bathroom, run the water while they're urinating?

AlexYes.

MerlinI'll do that. Because you do know that this is a thing, right? Yes. I do this. No, hang on, Max. When you go number one, you run the water? Sometimes.

Speaker AIs it for inspiration or coverage?

MaxNo, I don't want anyone to hear me peeing.

Speaker AYou're afraid you're peeing wrong? Well, that's my business.

MaxI don't know. Listen, when I go to the grocery store and I buy my groceries, and then I always have a little moment of panic when there's no sort of self-checkout thing. because then I have to fucking Oh, because they're going to talk to you about your limes. What are you going to do?

Speaker BAre you going to make a pie? Yeah.

Speaker AYou sure got a lot. Oh, boy, you sure like tequila. Yes, I really do. Exactly.

MaxThen I'm checking out and they're like Having a party? Yes, every day. Wow, that sure is a lot of turkey pastrami. And I'm just like, I'm ashamed. I don't know. What do you want? I don't want you to know the brand of turkey pastrami

Speaker Athat I'm eating and comment on it. You know they tell them to do that. You know, make sure you compliment their decisions. I know.

MaxI know. I know. And it's like, or the other one they say that drives me nuts is, well, did you find everything you need? And here's the thing is, no, I've never found everything I need. I always need something that I can't find 100% of the time. But also when they ask that, I'm never going to tell them because I don't want to hold up the line because there's 50 people behind me. And I'm not going to be like, oh, I need an anchovy paste. And it doesn't make any logical sense where it is. But I need you to go get my little tube while we gum up the works of this whole grocery store. I'm not going to do that because I'm a civilized member of society

so don't fucking ask me don't fucking ask me

Speaker AI just want to get my paper and go

Maxyou know what I mean but anyway listen it's my fucking business how much turkey pastrami I eat and it's my fucking business what it sounds like when I pee and how much I pee and how long it goes on for and how long it takes me to start and I don't want anyone to know that I don't want anyone to know that so I'll run the water and it's my fucking business it's my pee

AlexWe frequently did that at our old office. I feel like the majority of people did that because that wall was paper thin and everyone knew what was going on. Oh, I went home to pee. Well, you lived down the street. I lived like two hours away. I don't think I pooped in that office one time.

MaxBut you got to show up to work because you got that student loan debt. Yeah, exactly.

MerlinCan I ask a follow-up question? Yes, please. Would you agree that it is not a good trend that people talk on the phone while taking a shit?

AlexNo, never. Can we agree that that's not a good idea? Never, never. I did it one time.

MaxWait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Extenuating circumstance. Okay. You're on a conference call and you know that you're not really going to need to talk. So you mute? Yeah, you mute.

AlexOkay.

MaxI've done that.

Alexyeah i there was one time where there was an emergency situation but never no it sucks because

Merlinit's echoey it's echoey it really gives you a way if you have to unmute and go sounds good

Maxlisten if you're on a conference call with me and i'm not the one presenting something

Alexi guarantee you i'm taking a shit jazz break i couldn't even text mp until this year like it It was very much like a cleanliness thing. Like when you, especially in a public bathroom, when you flush. You know how many germs are on your iPhone right now, Alex? Yeah, I know. It's really upsetting.

MaxI had a friend in college who did a project where for almost an entire school year, he texted us, our friend group, a photo on our phones of every shit that he took. Until towards the end of the year, he dropped his phone in the toilet. Oh, no.

Speaker AOh.

MerlinOh, this is the saddest O. Henry story.

MaxAll right. Digga, digga, digga, digga, digga. Follow up. Copyright 2011. John Cucuse. This is from the Washington Post. I'm sure you guys heard this story, but we got to talk about it. During the first of Vice President Mike Pence's two unsuccessful races for Congress, He rode a single-speed bicycle more than 250 miles around his district, much of it accompanied by his wife, Karen, who was along for the journey during their time in the Indiana governor's mansion. the Pence's installed twin treadmills upstairs in their residence.

And during his years as a White House, or excuse me, as a House member in Washington, after he had finally won on his third attempt, Mike Pence proudly displayed an antique red phone on his desk, a Christmas gift from his wife for which only she had the number, a hotline straight from her to him. More than a decade later, even his cell phones were the norm, Mike Pence had that same red phone installed in his statehouse office as a reminder, both physical and symbolic of the direct and enduring connection between Mike and Karen Pence. Now, a second lady, Karen Pence, 60, remains an important influence on one of President

Trump's most important political allies. She sat in on at least one interview as the vice president assembled his staff, accompanied her husband on his first foreign policy trip, and joins him for off-the-record briefings with reporters acting as his gut check and shield. Friends and aides, meanwhile, say she is the Pence family, quote, prayer warrior, a woman so inextricably bound to her husband that even then candidate Trump understood her importance and consulted her in critical campaign moments. When Trump called to offer Mike Pence the number two slot, the businessman knew Karen Pence was by his side and asked, I hear Karen is there, too.

Can I talk to her? and after three months later and nearly three months later when an access hollywood tape revealed trump talking crudely about women trump called his running mate to apologize and then asked him to hand the phone to his wife so he could apologize personally to her too though aids say karen pence is among those most upset by the tape they stressed that she also emerged privately as one of trump's staunchest defenders overall in 2002 uh now skip to down the article In 2002, Mike Pence told The Hill that he never eats alone with a woman other than his wife and that he won't attend events featuring alcohol without her by his side either.

I know. Now, listen, first of all, here's my first. I have a number of different reactions based on how woke I've become. So the first thing is you're you're you're really a Twitter ally. Thank you. I do consider myself a woke Twitter ally. So my first reaction when I read that is that's fucking weird and crazy. and these people aren't really normal human beings and none of this is normal behavior and it freaks me out that this is a powerful public servant who like can't be alone with a woman. But then I realized that it's actually, that's very disrespectful and discriminatory towards Christians and that the more woke thing to do

is to not judge them.

AlexI've never made that laugh before.

MaxWow. Yeah, so I'm actually more woke than you because I respect their personal choices and their marriage.

Speaker ABut anyway, what are your guys' reactions? Wait, wait, you're meta-woke. You're meta woke. You're woke on two levels. I'm woke about being woke.

AlexOh, look. This was another thing. Like, this is honestly, for me, on par with the acid bath. Like, this is just so fucking weird.

MaxAlex, are you allowed to say that without your wife here?

AlexHold on. I'm going to text her.

MerlinDo you dine with other women in her absence?

AlexYou know, she doesn't know. I'm not a cuck.

MerlinDo you dine alone with other women in her absence?

AlexYeah.

Speaker BI can't even make jokes because it's so bad.

MaxAnd then a bunch of Twitter, and then a bunch of these conservative, evangelical men on Twitter, they all started tweeting like, yeah, the only time it's appropriate to be with a woman who's not your wife is if you're planning her surprise party or funeral. And it was like, what the fuck is wrong with these people? These are people who don't, they're not friends with any women, and they don't have professional relationships with any women.

MerlinWell, I couldn't, the thing was, you know, this has been discussed a lot in the last few days, of course, But like the almost universal reaction seems to be mostly like, huh? You know, it isn't it isn't even just as it's not even it's not just funny, like the calling her mother thing and who has prepared the meal. Like, it's not that funny. It's more like, wait a minute. So I just I really want to I guess I understand. Here's what I here's what I can understand. I do know, first of all, that this is a thing, as we like to say on the program. This is a thing that they're in certain, especially evangelical communities. This is a an understood compact inside of a lot of families.

and I guess on the one hand you say like I maybe you're trying to be respectful and say I never want to give my wife who let's say in this case and you're more woke than me so you tell me if I'm I'm off base here who's probably back at home while you're out doing whatever you never want to give her a cause for concern just cause for concern right we're back to Bill Clinton and the appearance of impropriety you don't want to do anything that could even be conceived as something that even looked inappropriate. So that almost passes the sniff test. But there was one tweet I saw from somebody,

I don't remember who, and they said basically, so imagine this in quotes, I really, I'm not allowed to be alone with any children who aren't my kids. And when you put it that way, suddenly you go, okay, yeah, that is really weird. That's a very weird thing to say. Anybody who said that, you would go like, wow, tell me more about that.

Because it does seem like he's basically saying, I will fuck the shit out of whatever is there regardless of what course we're on, is what it feels like. And they're drawn to him. He looks like an old G.I. Joe.

AlexI feel like she has to have some motive. No. So, like, what does she do all day? And you're right, Merlin. I understand it is a thing. She polishes the phone.

MerlinShe sings I Wish songs.

Speaker AAnd someday the phone. Listen, what does she do all day?

MaxShe, like, cleans things and takes pills and prays. No, she has enough money to pay. What do I do? What do I do?

Speaker AI watch Star Trek reruns and configure my iOS devices. So it's no different. Do you think she takes off her clothes to poop?

AlexOh, I'm sure, actually. Like, you got to take off your pearls, at least.

MaxRight. You don't want to splatter on the pearls.

Speaker APoo-poo-poo-doo. Dugga-dugga-dugga-dugga. Challenge. Challenge.

MaxGuys, you know what? I just want to say I'm sorry that the first part of this podcast was such a bummer. I think we all feel, we could all agree that we need a little pick-me-up. Let's get to the funny part. What was the challenge this week?

AlexEssentially, I just wanted you guys to find something that not necessarily made you sad, that just made your eyes a little dusty, or I don't know. I thought it was a really good challenge, and then I was like, no, this is terrible. I love this challenge. Why are you guys doing it?

Speaker BThis is a fantastic challenge.

AlexOh, God. It was, oh, what a week. All right, Merlin. So, so bring it on. What, what did you find? What would you like to present to the group?

MerlinWell, I feel like there's several ways that we could address this. I don't want to mention one thing. I want to mention several things. I have many, many things that I would like to mention. And I would like to, with, with, with your permission, perhaps, I would like to talk about like maybe why things, which things, right? Like, why is this thing and not that thing? And why that thing now and not this thing then? You know what I mean? Like, I think it doesn't just, I've got a lot. I've got a lot because I cry a lot. I'm a crier. Well, that was my question. I've added all of these with my family and they agree, oh, yeah, you totally cried during that.

AlexHow often would you say that you cry, Merlin?

MerlinOnly when I watch TV.

AlexWait, really? Really?

MerlinWhen's the last time you cried? I'm not a cuck. the last time that I cried, it was probably when I was consuming one of these media properties.

AlexAll right.

MerlinI do a legitimate I give up on life cry. I mean, like about my life. Sure. I mean, you know, I don't want to open that door. It's like a tampon rat king. I would open that door, I'm going to say twice a year. Where I'll do a really good you guys style cry. But no, it's media. Media is what makes me cry. What about you?

AlexUh, there's probably, um, I don't know, like once a year, like everything's bad. But no, I bottle my feelings, and then occasionally, um, uh, I, I will cry on a, and this is a thing. I really rarely, rarely cry, but on planes, sometimes it just happens, and I have like silent, you've got, you know, like the silent tears, and they just like come down your face.

MerlinYou know this is a thing, right?

AlexYeah, it's a thing, and I can't explain it, and it's real weird. And usually it's during a song of some sort, but that has like, no, normally would give me no feelings whatsoever, none of the feels, and it just happens.

But yeah, I guess that's a thing, and people, like, even within the company, it's a fairly normal thing. But yeah, I'm trying to remember the last time I, But I sort of curbed that. I think the last time I cried was when a family member was in the hospital. But yeah, I'm a little dead inside, which is why I thought this challenge would be interesting.

MerlinWell, this is I totally agree because I don't know. I mean, it's there's something I mean, this is kind of part of the whole idea of the dramatic arts is that it's a way of, you know, comedy and tragedy and seeing these things played out from a certain safe distance gives you not just a reason, but then permission to cry. Like you've got a reason to cry. Like there's there's a reason that, you know, it's cathartic, I guess is the word I'm looking.

AlexOh, I cried in Star Wars. like that was a big not not rogue one uh force awakens and it felt socially like it i was it was like about the about the death in the third act uh no no i don't give a fuck um when when she the lightsaber goes goes to ray that just man wow mine started right right at the beginning because

Merlinuh see now it's gonna be impossible for me to get through the show without actually crying is the funny part oh yeah my daughter and i have watched star wars movies together since she was about two and there's this thing we have always done which is as soon as any 20th century fox movie comes on and you hear the bump bump bump bump bump bump we turn and we look at each other and we make big eyes and then we pause and we're staring at each other we're staring in anticipation and then you hear bum and we both stick our tongue out like this and we still do that to this to this day every time we watch a star wars movie so who cares but so we're in the theater the three of us a

little after Christmas, I guess. And it comes on. And then the crawl starts. And I realized it's the first time I'm seeing a Star Wars movie in the theater with my kid. And it hits me, I don't have to read the crawl to her. And it was such a complicated feeling. I was like, I'm so you know, my daughter's a really good reader. Anyway, that's the kind of thing that you when you become broken in middle age, that's, you don't know when it's gonna come up, it catches you in weird places. Because I think a lot of crying comes out of juxtaposition and unexpectedness. The same way the humor comes out of surprise in so many ways and juxtaposition. I'm not going to get too

theoretical here, but like, I think that when something hits us when we're not expecting it, or it pulls on some kind of a nostalgic string, a nostalgic string that you're just, the dough has risen in some emotion just to the point it hits you at the right time. It's so difficult to know. Something that's mawkish a thousand times will hit you one time in the

Alexweirdest way see also dr who i got a lot of dr who on here you guys i made a uh playlist about 20 songs that um and and a lot of them are from uh they're clearly clearly from when i was a teenager that just like wrecked me and even now listening to them i was like oh oh boy and i i came across this weird thing where uh we you know we were talking about uh i'm gonna call them true emo

bands from the early 90s that uh i'm sorry the late 90s real emo bands yeah the real none of that good charlotte shit not those fake fake emo girl bands but like so many uh so many songs where they were like about girls and at the time i didn't realize that I wanted them to be about girls. And then I was like, oh my God, holy shit. That was clearly repressed. And then a lot of just the typical sad teenage girl songs

that I would listen to after I'd come out of the hospital or whatever. And man, I've got like, and also I have Iris on here by the Goo Goo Dolls. That's a terrible song. But for some reason it just, man, I don't know. All right, Max is on his phone again. so why is he on his phone Max

Speaker Aare you invested in this are you going to read us some David Foster Wallace what's going to happen well I have my answers

MaxI have a little video I could send you guys to start us out you let me know I'm following your lead here

Alexhow often do you cry

Maxit's hard to say it's hard to describe something that you don't have or you're missing but I don't really cry with like tears involved where I'm like sobbing like I honestly it maybe I don't really have a lot of memories of crying in that way But I do get that feeling of being emotionally overwhelmed or overtaken by something and that lump in my chest or like a heaviness, like I can't breathe.

That's that feeling of like I sort of want that catharsis or that release, but I very rarely cry where there's actual tears coming down my face and I'm sobbing. That kind of an emotional release.

MerlinThe reasons and context, the situations in which we cry probably change over our life as we change, as people. So, like, if your ice cream falls off the cone, like, you cry. You're a little kid because you don't have ice cream anymore. But, like, I think about something like just one anecdote that I can think of is I've mentioned before my mother-in-law, who died not very long ago, is one of my favorite people in the world. Like, genuinely, she's one of the best people, coolest, funniest, sharpest people I've ever known. And she's had a lot of health scares, you know, before she passed away.

Over the years, she's been in not great health. And there was one where she'd broken her hip and then she got like an infection. And my wife, you know, flew off to the East Coast to go be with her. And I was with my daughter. And I felt like, and I was, you know, I was sad because I like grandma. But it was only when we got to the point where I felt like I vetted this with my wife. And I said, I think we need to talk to Ellie a little bit about this and kind of prepare her for enjoying the days that we have with grandma because that does go away for everybody.

And in talking to her, I started talking about my father and when he died. And so, I mean, yeah, this is selfish. Yeah, probably selfish. But it was the vulnerability of that situation with my mother-in-law that opened the gates for this, you know, then 40-however-year-old, you know, memory that I still feel very sad about. So I think that's part of it. It's like it's when you're tired. It's when you're vulnerable. And it's a lot of times when, as you say, Alex, when you're overwhelmed, like when you're ready to give up. Crying is your body's way of giving up.

It's your body's way of saying, I can't even anymore. But I think it's also something when something unexpected, something makes you unexpectedly vulnerable or it reminds you a lot of something else. I think this is very key. Almost everything in my media list here is stuff that often reminds me of something else. And that could be another thing that happened. It could remind me of another event, another time. You know, something like, again, like I dreamed a dream. I was just talking to Syracuse about this. That song is so moving because it's about that delta between like being so down right now, but still clearly remembering when the future was bright.

That's a very good reason to cry. So anyway, not to go on. But I think that tiredness, vulnerability, unexpectedness, when those things hit you all at the right time, it's kind of impossible not to. It's just that not everybody has those same situations or they have different tolerances to that. Also, you're a little upset all the time anyway, Max. So I think, you know.

AlexThat's I mean, that's that's what I'm thinking. like I mean not to get I mean it's no secret for people who follow me on Twitter that like my my family has quite a history of mental illness and it's like so many bad things happen that it's at some point you that surprise isn't there and that just like numbness kind of kind of takes over and then I hear a Steven Universe song and it's like oh Jesus Christ um and it's also oh now see now I'm thinking like oh maybe I am a crier like I remember at one point uh it was like bad stuff

had happened and then I came home and my cat flopped over a funny way and it wasn't like I'm not I'm not a sober but I just like sat and cried like cried with the crap with my cat for a good like 20 minutes uh and yeah it's it and all the songs I have on my uh dumb playlists are just like clearly connected to like one event or like I remember a specific time uh that like a bad thing

happened uh or or a good thing happened um I guess yeah I actually should ask Merlin because I feel like uh some things on your lists are some things on your list are going to be what triggers I guess can we call a happy cry is that that I guess so but you're really making me

MerlinI think another way to look at this, at least for me, the times that I've had real breakdowns where you think of it almost like an emotional dam breaking. I'll be mostly fine through something extremely bad that happens. I might even be mostly fine afterward when it's a pain in the ass and it's difficult. I'm thinking of things like a death. I'm thinking of things like a major breakup. For me, it'll sometimes be a little bit after that. So I had a major, major breakup in the late 90s and I had a very eventful 1999.

And so one of the things that happens is I broke up with the person that I had been with. She broke up with me and I had not expected that. And so I was very, very sad, like very, very, very sad. I was desperately sad. And I suppose I cried a little bit. But, you know, when I cried the most in some ways was when I had to tell my mom about it because I felt like I had been a complete failure, which I was. But also it was when I got a really good job and was going to move to California and get to have a whole new life. And I had to tell my ex about it.

And I was not doing it in a braggy way. But like I found myself and this is probably not particularly woke, but I just remember saying like it just kills me that I can't share this with you. In the same way that it killed me that I couldn't share how much the breakup was killing me with the person who broke up with me. You know that feeling. Like the person who you feel closest to in the world is the last person in the world that you can talk to about it. And I think there's a moment where like the reality and the weight of those kinds of paradoxes, not paradoxes, but contradictions just becomes too much.

And your brain just goes, fuck it. And you just melt down. And sometimes it takes some distance. Maybe it's the distance of media. Maybe it's the distance of time. But you have to have some kind of a permission to go, OK, you're safe. The lion's not going to attack you. Now it's OK for you to just completely fall apart.

AlexDid you cry at your wedding?

MerlinYes. I also had a cold sore that day.

AlexOh, I'm very sorry.

MerlinI get cold sores for all my important occasions.

AlexDid you cry when your kid was born?

MerlinYeah, mostly laugh crying.

AlexOh, interesting. Interesting.

MerlinWell, because it took a long time. There's no way. One of the funny things in modern medicine, there's so much you can learn about the health and things about your child. Not obviously gender. You can learn gender, obviously. But you also learn things like the likelihood that they're going to have lots of really, really serious problems. And you get past that and you're like, oh, that's great. You know, the spinal thing is less than a centimeter. That's really good news. You get the flip chart with the doctor and everything looks like it's this percent okay. But then the thing that's still a question mark is how big the child will actually be. Unless there's a very

good reason to do something fairly invasive, it's difficult to know exactly how. And basically my kid got stuck. And when she came out, there was a moment where I thought she was dead because I'd never seen a baby being born in real life before and she looked like a gray chalky pile of death and i i couldn't breathe and then she started crying and i started laughing and they put her on the scale and she weighed almost 10 pounds when they thought she'd be about six pounds and i there's a photo of me on flicker of me laughing so hard because it all just seemed like a hilarious joke at that point well of course the baby's fine and of course the baby weighs

like a 12th of my wife's pre-birth weight like of course the tragedy goes on this is hilarious Sorry, I'm monopolizing this.

AlexNo, this is so good, Marlon.

MerlinThis is great. It does, yeah, it does. But then so many of my media things increasingly are about those. I have so many of these. Alex, I bet at least half of these we have overlap.

AlexI'm sure. Well, Max, did you complete this challenge?

MaxI did.

AlexDo you have a number of things? Just one thing?

MaxI have a couple. All right. Should I just run through my list? What's the best way to do that? I'll just go through my list. Migo, you stay. No following.

AlexWait, what?

MaxMigo, you stay.

Speaker ANo following. Oh, wait a minute. Give me a second. Migo, you stay.

MerlinHow dare you? Is that Iron Giant? How dare you? No, wait, I know this.

Speaker ANo, no, I know this. And then it's repeated.

MaxThen the other character says it. It's... The ending of Toy Story 3 where they all go to the concentration camp. The last shot of Next Generation. the episode of Next Generation Measure of a Man where Data tells Riker that he is a good friend because he helped him the episode of Deep Space Nine The Visitor when Snoop dies in the wire the finale of Parks and Recreation the episode of Parks and Recreation where Leslie has Ron read the poem at the whiskey place the whole movie Interstellar the Futurama episode Jurassic Bark

Adriana's death and The Sopranos the double click song Impostor but specifically the acoustic version where Angela sings it with the ukulele. Oh, that's on my list. In general, when a veteran comes home from the war and their dog recognizes them, the ending of Good Will Hunting, when Mrs. Landing says that she misses her boys who died in Vietnam, the finale of Battlestar Galactica,

let's see, when children have their hearing implants turned on for the first time and hear their parents' voice. The best. Snape's death in Harry Potter, when Bartlett gives Leo the Bartlett for America napkin, Stringle Bell's death in The Wire, when I had a bite of sea urchin for the first time at a fancy sushi place in Tokyo. I got very emotional. Wallace's death in The Wire, seeing Obama in the Disney Hall of Presidents. The first few notes of Everything in the Right Place, the first song on the Radiohead album Kid A. Bodhi's death in The Wire, the final montage when McNulty is on the bridge

in the finale of The Wire. Dumber of Dollar's death in Harry Potter, the scene in Mass Effect 3 with Morden in the elevator, when Harry makes Dobby's grave and it says here lies Dabi a free elf the season one episode of Lost with Terry O'Quinn called Deus Ex Machina when Harry sacrifices himself in the woods at the end of book seven of Harry Potter the ending of Dead Poets Society the West Wing episode two cathedrals when the Dire Straits song plays Mary Oliver's poem about telling her dog that she loves him which is on YouTube why are you laughing at me?

Speaker Byou're not much of a

Maxokay and then i'm sending you another okay okay all right all right can i get through this oh my

Speaker Bgod well max has indeed succeeded in making me

Speaker Aokay okay okay can i've sent everyone to al alex is crying now all right can remember we hold up

Maxthe wand to snake and the tear okay can i can i i've sent everyone a video can we just play this and everyone would just watch it. Where did you send it? I texted it to our text. Oh, oops.

Speaker BEverything's fine. You probably sent it to Syracuse. I did.

Speaker AI sent it to Syracuse. Hang on.

Speaker BOh, God. We have not much of a question.

MaxOkay. All right. Hang on. Sending you a YouTube movie. I was so embarrassed.

MerlinDid I have like eight items? Okay.

MaxSo please prepare this video, Alex. I'll just watch on your... If you can tilt your computer, I'll just watch on your computer.

Speaker BDid you send it?

MaxThis is good.

Speaker BWhere did you send it? It's in our text. Oh, here we go. Okay.

Speaker AAll right. Merlin, cue this video up and we'll watch it together. Say when.

Speaker BOkay, ready?

Speaker AGo, go, go, go.

Speaker BThis is Vera Dierment. Now, Vera Gissing. We did find her name on his list. Vera Gissing is with us here tonight. Hello, Vera. And I should tell you that you are actually sitting next to Nicholas Winton. and it was just so wonderful so terribly terribly touching can i ask is there anyone in our audience tonight who owes their life to nicholas

If so, could you stand up please?

MerlinOh my god.

Speaker BShit, his face.

AlexAll right.

MaxThat was good. And then also videos of Aaron Schwartz speaking or David Foster Wallace speaking. Fuck. Yeah. Yeah.

AlexYeah.

MaxYeah. Yeah.

AlexWe'll put in this video in notes. It's fantastic.

MaxOh, and also the video of Mr. Rogers talking to Congress.

AlexOh, man. Where he's defending public broadcasting. Oh, wow. So how did you come across that? Was it just like something with your family?

MaxWhat, this Nicholas Wynne video? Oh, I don't know. I look at sad YouTube videos. It's one of my hobbies. I'm not much of a crowd. Yeah, Karen Pence is a prayer warrior, and she prays and calls Mike Pence on the red phone, and I look at sad YouTube. I look at sad YouTube videos and configure my iOS devices. Everyone needs a hobby.

Speaker BOh, God.

MaxThe third factor was love.

MerlinAll right. Oh, my goodness. Well, I think we're done. I think that'll do it for this week. Holy shit. I want to see that whole list. I couldn't even catch most of that.

AlexOh, boy. We'll try to put some.

MerlinI'm going to get some wipes and I'm going to get a sandwich. I'm going to go sit down. I'm going to do a leisure shit. I'm going to watch every single one. I'm going to read all that stuff. I'm going to do it all at one time. No wipes.

AlexOh, man. That's the problem. So as I was making a list, I'm like, okay, all of this requires so much context. And not only just what I was feeling. Like the end of Vincent and the Doctor. Holy shit.

MerlinThat's fine. That's my number two of three.

AlexAll right, Merlin. So I just have a dumb emo music list. Please share your list.

Merlinoh well it really seems kind of slight now well i vetted this with my family the number one thing that in the last few years i will definitely always cry while watching several times is the doctor who episode day of the doctor three particular scenes uh when clara says be a doctor when uh the doctor says you'll have hope and when number four says who knows and taps his nose it always makes me cry oh that episode is so good so good and then number two yeah vincent and the

doctor and you know i've i i've said to people who've never seen a frame of doctor who you know what i kind of want you to show that to max right now because i think you could watch that scene and basically say here's the situation the doctor and his companion have been with uh vincent van

Maxvan gogh i've seen it i've seen it i've seen it you've seen it's not a very good episode i've seen the little part where he takes him to the museum and the camera spins around he talks to bill He puts on his scarf and he says, we're all made of stars. We're made of stars.

Speaker BWait, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

MaxI've seen it where they're in the gallery. I get it. I get it. I get it. All right.

Speaker BWhat?

MaxWell, oh, hold on.

Speaker BWait.

MaxThere's two galleries. There's two galleries. Listen to me. It's much, Toy Story 3 is about the same thing and it's much better. Toy Story 3 is about the Holocaust. It is actually. It is actually about the Holocaust. It is. But it's also about, it's about the emotional, this is, okay, you were talking about emotional through lines that connect the things that make you cry. I have a number of them for me, but one of the big ones is the feeling of being appreciated, of people understanding that they're appreciated. I don't know why that gets me, but it does. Oh, yeah. And one of the big themes of Toy Story 3, emotionally, is that nobody feels appreciated

for all the things that they do for other people. And the toys get this moment of being appreciated. They face the fact that they're not appreciated, and then they get it. That's a much better piece of media than the stupid Vincent Fango thing.

Merlinnot true but i will jump down to and then also my other one is a good man goes to war um which i think is a really fun episode uh but the scene when they translate the writing and it

Speaker Bsays river you know that scene yeah yeah yeah yeah oh my god are all of yours doctor who that was i'm done with doctor who now okay okay shut your cry hole all right all right

Merlinbecause the scene my toy story 3 scene there's several scenes but obviously the one where it all comes together uh the end when they're on the lawn at her house and he he brings out each toy and then he says my and when she says my cowboy that's it i'm done i mean we probably don't have to go into i've discussed this particular scene in many places including during a talk at pixar where it was a major part of a presentation i did was explaining uh the concept of uh how the importance of sacrifice in your productivity system and i used

a bunch of screenshots from that to explain like based showing with Toy Story 3 that you know he could have gone to college and he didn't. What a great misdirection. God I love that fucking movie.

Do you want to do something or should I keep going?

AlexKeep going. Keep going.

MerlinTwo songs from Hamilton. It's Quiet Uptown and Who Lives Who Dies Who Tells Your Story. As we talked about the orphanage part always gets me. Don't at me. The end of

Speaker Alame is when he goes to heaven. not all right I'm I'll concede that the part with the orphanage kind of got me in Hamilton

Alexoh yeah I didn't know that yeah that was like all right so it that was a huge huge deal because like as as fucked up as the foster care system is now like it used to be pretty it was basically

Merlinlike what Max Max described earlier in this episode except that was how every kid started

AlexMm-hmm. Ugh.

MerlinYeah, those two. And the lame is when he goes to heaven, sorry. The Futurama episode, meanwhile, the last episode. Which last episode? Describe it a little bit. The one where the time is frozen and he and Lila. Oh, yes.

Speaker AOh, my God. That's a beautiful episode. The moment in Iron Giant when he says Superman.

MerlinUgh. Almost all of the movies, Synecdoche, New York. the first movement of Mozart's 40th symphony especially the second theme bum bum ba dum bum bum is the greatest piece of music ever written 10,000 people singing Ode to Joy in Japan have you guys seen that? I think I sent it to you in text that's mostly it Toy Story 3, Snape's Death, added it to my list oof

AlexI mean, don't at me, but honestly all of Rent Like all of Rent. It makes no sense. It's not. It's.

MerlinOh, God. And I need a name for this. I was talking to Dan about this. I need a name for this thing where like there's a certain kind of media or franchise or property or band or whatever. Don't you kind of wish there's a name for like, look, I get a freebie on this. I have no desire to defend. I feel like that way about the movie Les Miserables. You know what? Give me that one as a freebie. You know, it's like the middle space in Bingo. Let me just have this. Rent okay now for Rent I have the soundtrack I've seen

the movie it didn't really stick to my ribs should I watch the movie again or is it something you really need to see on stage

Alexwell the first thing that I saw I mean first I listened to the album and then I was you know just so excited for the movie that was that was actually the first movie I saw with Kara Max's assistant when we were freshmen in high school and it was I don't know it hits the gay buttons honestly the gay button thing is

Merlinreal you know you and I were talking about this because I was mentioning I didn't include this on my list but for some reason the album Personal Best by Team Dresh always makes me almost a little misty and I'm not sure exactly why and I think there's something about what gay people in America have gone through that has has like a special impact on me. I talked to you, I told you about the first time I saw that movie, The Boys in the Band when I was in high school, that terrible movie. But there's just something about the like people

almost eventually getting to lead the life they want to lead and then it doesn't go the way we would like. And it's young people and it's people in arts a lot of the time. And there's something about that that is so poignant that even for a cis person, like you watch that and you go like, oh God, that fucking sucks.

AlexThere's one thing I will, there's one scene in the movie that I think almost holds up to the scene on the stage. And it's the life support group where there's a bunch of folks who have AIDS and, or, or some of them are just positive and they, there's the song will someone care? And it's like all about, will I lose my dignity? Will someone care? Will I wake tomorrow from this nightmare? And it just, it really kills me. And I think that's the one scene in the movie that captures the mood of what happens on stage.

MaxThere's this great speech when Murakami was accepting this thing called the Jerusalem Prize. He had this talk and one of the things he said was, Between a high solid wall and an egg that breaks against it, I will always stand on the side of the egg. Yes, no matter how right the wall may be and how wrong the egg, I will stand with the egg. Someone else will have to decide what is right and what is wrong. Perhaps time or history will decide. But if there was a novelist who, for whatever reason, wrote works standing with the wall, of what value would such works be?

And for me, that's like I also get the gay feelings. And for me, it's just my natural proclivity to side with the egg in whatever situation is transpiring. They're just always going to be the protagonist in my mind. And when it's a group that's, you know, in society is actually persecuted, you know, that emotional button is there to be pressed for me.

MerlinYeah. Another thing you're describing, and I think I keep anticipating that you're about to say is like we were just talking earlier about, we cry because we're vulnerable. But you also seem, and it sounds like we all are, somewhat – it is – would it involve someone who is a vulnerable person? There's something about like obviously stuff with kids, right? The Syrian kid sitting on the chair because you're just like this should never should that should never have happened. Right. And this but the way the kid comports himself in that situation, you know, it's like it's one thing to see, you know, the girl, the same Kim Phuc, the girl who cries and running down the street naked, you know, after the napalm attack.

And that's that is in its own way. That was still such an important image for helping us realize what was being conducted on our behalf. But the kid, the Syrian, right, the Syrian boy sitting in the chair, like with the dirt on his face and just that look on his face. And you're like, no kid should ever have that thousand yard stare. And there's something about that that's just, it's not, it's undigestible by your soul.

Alexdo you think that i mean i mean that you know hits hits me too but do you think it would uh like hit you as hard if you didn't have a kid i think probably yeah yeah i mean the other one

Merlinthe other one the other day or i just i i there is a certain i don't mean to sound skeptical cynical cynical i guess but there is there's a certain kind of um tragedy porn that I think people can be very attracted to because it makes them feel things very strongly. Just the other night for the first time in my life, I learned about this from April, I think, on Parks and Rec. I finally started watching Russian dash cam videos of car crashes. First time I've ever done that. And the funny part is the more of them that I watched,

the more violent I wanted them to be. And I think a similar thing happens, even with a really good-hearted feeling. Like, boy, the picture of the Syrian boy, well, what's going to move me more next time. And I think you have to be careful about, in the same way that John Syracuse won't listen to the same song too many times that he loves because he doesn't want to burn out on it, I think you have to be careful about not overstimulating yourself with those kinds of images. Something that I think was probably in some ways very useful in this last election. Some of the memes that went around were just incredibly rough images that really stimulated

people to want to vote a certain way. I think that was why they were so effective, but I don't want to become emotionally that inflammable. To answer your question, though, yeah, I think it was still, even if I didn't have a kid, yeah, yeah.

AlexMan, this is such a funny show. I'm definitely. This is a great show. What are you talking about?

MaxGreat show, guys. What show?

AlexIt's part of life.

MaxEverything that's in the life is in the life.

AlexGreat show.

MaxYou know, I definitely have that issue where, like, I started off watching weird YouTube videos. It was, like, smoking a little weed here and there, and it was like, oh, you got a little something from that. But now I have to fucking like tie off in the living room to like, you know, feel anything. Like I need harder drugs.

Speaker AYeah, I got to tie a belt around your neck just to feel.

MaxYeah, it's like I need to watch a video of a guy trying to insert. Put a dry cleaning bag over your head.

Speaker AYeah.

MaxNo, I'm really crying. Now it's like in order to feel anything, I need to watch a guy like insert a mason jar into his anus. Don't Google that because it does shatter.

Oh. So don't Google that. But anyway, you know, it's like that I'll see and I'll be like, oh, now that's something.

Speaker AOh, OK.

MerlinWell, yeah, there was one. I'd watch so many of these dash cams. It's mostly just like, oh, it's kind of funny. Somebody has to run out of the crossing lane fast. And you go, OK, that's all right. There's other ones where you're like, whoa, a truck flipped over and went into flames. That was really cool. And there's one that was like, please don't know this morning. The video is not appropriate. And like seriously, the first one is like a guy clearly gets hit on a motorcycle and dies. And I was like, well, okay. I think I just found my mason jar.

MaxYeah, that is a genre. There is a genre of just like snuff films on YouTube. And you can like, they escalate. There's like a community on Reddit where people-

MerlinBut not snuff films in the sense of killing a woman during intercourse,

Speaker Abut just films of people getting killed. No, no, no, no.

MaxNo, no, no, no. That's not it. It's just that you're giving yourself that Q-tip in the ear feeling while you watch someone die. But it's like there's this community on Reddit that collects these things. and I don't actually watch too many of these because they start to freak me out. But it's really funny when they find a good one because they're like, guys, this one's great. His arm flies off and hits the camera. It's not a Quentin Tarantino movie. That guy died.

MerlinOh, God. I want to also just make a quick note. This is a very old point of mine, but I also want to talk about things that specifically do not fucking make me cry. And I'm going to mention here the public radio program StoryCorps, which makes me so goddamn angry It's so, it's just, it's the show, the notion of the show. And it's actually the guy, Jay Allison, the guy who started it is a Mandarin of public radio. He's done a lot of great stuff, continues to do great stuff. I think that is a disgusting pornographic shit show of a program.

Basically, you got a little van. You bring two people in, they record. Two people who have some kind of connection from the past and maybe haven't seen each other in a while or they have something to work out. And inevitably, they cry and then we're supposed to cry. Have you ever heard this, Alex? Have you ever heard StoryCorps?

AlexOnly because you made a parody of it, and I felt I needed to listen to it.

Speaker BSo cold. So cold. Little pool dog. Pool dog. Tulip.

MerlinTulip for a New York Mets. It's the worst. And see, here's the thing. It's like, I hate being. So I will walk right up to the line of a Steven Spielberg. I like me a Steven Spielberg movie. But I really resent being manipulated. And so why would I like Doctor Who? I don't know. Sometimes it doesn't work. A lot of times it does. That show is about the feels. Let's be honest.

Speaker AOh, shit.

MaxBridge of Spies made me cry.

Speaker ABridge of Spies. I don't even know what that is.

MaxIt was a Spielberg movie. Oh, wait. I know that. It was a recent Spielberg movie that won some Academy Awards. And I don't think Latter-day Spielberg is very good. I think he makes sort of like treacly garbage for the simple-minded. But I'll watch this. And if something wins a bunch of awards, I'll watch it. Raves Max Tempkins. And I watched, now who's the guy, Mark Raylance, I think, plays the spy. I love that guy. And like, it wasn't, I mean, listen, Spielberg did a fine, he actually did, it's a good movie. He did a good job directing.

He was a fine director. But it was Mark Raylance just like, God damn, like right into the, right into my brainstem at the end of this movie. Ugh. That movie made me cry.

Speaker AWhat about the end of Saving Private Ryan? Oh yeah, big time. that's a man feelings movie

Alexit really is I was going to say I don't even remember

Speaker AI've seen that movie so many times and I still can barely make it through the beginning

MerlinI get so upset by the beginning of that movie

MaxI actually won't watch that movie and it's not the I mean it's intense but no more intense to me than any modern action movie I don't know that's not what does it for me it's the emotional I don't want to go on that emotional rollercoaster and feel like that at the end of the movie like it's too much

Speaker Ashit dog the cone brothers wrote that screenplay for bridge of spies oh it's a good matt charman

Maxethan listen me it's a good film all right you gotta the beginning is a little confusing and weird and you just have to sort of roll past it until until you sort of clearly understand the a plot of the movie so give it you gotta give it your 20 minutes to like have the plot introduced but it's a 20 minute test it's a good film all right well i think we've done a lot of good work here wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute you there wait a minute there's someone else on

this podcast who didn't say all the things that makes her cry i i did okay well i i'm sorry i i

Alexhonestly i glossed over it i i will share my playlist and but it uh is it all music it's well that's the thing like so so much requires context like your long list like it's it's a lot of it does require context and um like Doctor Who yes it is made for the feels but and and as I'm thinking about uh I think our lists overlap a whole lot um but a lot of it it really I'm thinking like pretty much all of it correlates with something that's happened with like me and my girlfriend

wife Jesus Christ I really need to stop doing that um and just like stuff with her like the song this year which I've listened to that's the first song I listened to. Mountain Goat song? Yeah the Mountain Goat song. And that's the first song I listened to every year for the past over oh Jesus Christ over 10 years now.

MaxWait a minute you listen to that at the beginning of the year not when it's already got you ground down into a paste? Yeah.

AlexWell I mean yeah. Like it's gonna be like oh alright we did that. Alright it's gonna happen again. And that was the song and now it's like oh God that's. I just realize that you two and and another one of my high school friends are the only people who have seen me blackout drunk which and uh it has happened four times two two of which were uh cards against humanity parties one was wwdc you were you were surprisingly dignified thank you

Maxthank you um the last time i saw alex a drunk well typically our routine is that we go through the McDonald's drive-thru and get a French rice together. But I believe the last time I saw you drunk, you tried to arm wrestle me. Yeah. I think you won, actually. As a matter of fact, I think you won. I think I won all those arm wrestles at New Year's Eve.

AlexBut another time was I apparently called my girlfriend, girlfriend now wife, at a Mountain Goats concert and told her I love her, which is nothing I had ever said, nothing I had said to a person meaning it and never said to a person before. I had never initiated that conversation before. It was way too early. Such a bad idea. Such a U-Haul lesbian moment,

which I have no memory of whatsoever. I remember John Darneal. Title. That night, in fact, John Darneal, as he was leaving to go to the merch table, knocked me over. Remember that part and helped me up. It was delightful. Thank you, John Darnielle. But yeah, no memory of that. Don't remember apparently puking all over my condo at the time. No.

But yeah, so that song is like, oh, okay. That was a weird, weird place and time in my life. And also, it's always been there. It's an old friend. Yeah.

MerlinDid you hear the election profit makers mixtape?

AlexThat's the thing. I'm waiting for the plane ride, for my plane ride coming up.

Speaker Abut did you hear the one from Rip Quintelation? The original one sampled that song, and it was really good. It features fabulously in that. Yeah, it's so good in that.

AlexAnd that's the thing. That first remix was just so good.

MerlinWhen he says there'll be feasting and dancing in Jerusalem next year, that line always kills me.

MaxDo you have any albums that became breakup albums where it kind of ruined the album for you? Opposite. Oh, an album is enhanced?

MerlinOne of my all-time favorite albums was discovered in 1999 by no coincidence at all. Either or by Elliot Smith That's a good breakup It salved me It saved me It salved me I would just listen to that every single night And it ends with Say Yes Because sometimes you need to listen to sad music when you're sad You don't listen to happy music when you're sad Like you're a fucking monster You listen to downbeat music

MaxNothing is better than when you're feeling sorry for yourself And you do sad things To like wallow in it It's like when a Navajo is like shot with an arrow and it's like, well, you can't pull the arrow back out because it's got barbs. You got to go all the way through.

MerlinOnly way out is through.

MaxSecond arrow. For me, it's the one that really stands out is Sunset Rubdown album, Shut Up, I Am Dreaming, which is a fine album, but it's just like-

MerlinI know those are nouns. Now say that in a way that I'll understand what it means.

MaxSunset Rubdown is a band, I'm guessing? Yeah, it's one of those Vancouver post-rocky bands. band. They're in the family with Wolf Parade. I don't know. They're good. They're fine. But that album, they have an album called Shut Up, I'm Dreaming. It's a good, fine post-rock album. It's just so weirdly charged with emotional meaning for me because it's like a breakup album. It's hard for me to listen. So it's a rubdown.

AlexI'm just emotionally stunted. And after every breakup I've had, it's like, oh god,

Speaker Afinally. You don't know Wolf Parade?

AlexNo.

MerlinOh, wait. Wolf Parade. Yes, I just got them on the iTunes. They do a song that I like, and I just learned about them.

MaxThis is like one of those band families, like the Neutral Milk Hotel, Hawk and the Hands Up. Yeah, Elephant Six. Yeah, Elephant Six. It's like a bunch of musicians, and they all play in each other's bands.

AlexGot it.

MaxIt's a good scene. I like the music they make.

Speaker AOh, what about Holland 1945?

AlexAnybody? Oh, God.

MerlinHoly shit.

Speaker BI love that whole album. I don't, that album, I have.

Speaker AReally? All when I want to keep white roses in her eyes? I don't know. I mean, it's certainly one of the best albums ever made

Maxand one of my personal favorites. It doesn't make me cry. Comma. It's a good, I mean, I don't know. I don't have that emotion. I don't have, it doesn't make me cry. I'm more like, it's more like looking at like a, like a beautiful, like how do I describe it? It's like looking at a beautiful landscape or something where you're like overtaken, but you're like, I'm like overwhelmed by how good it is.

MerlinYeah, yeah, yeah.

AlexHas a piece of art, like visual art, fine art, made you cry?

MerlinYeah, that's a good question.

AlexI have never met with me.

MaxI think this is related to the same thing of what we were talking about with like watching more and more, you know, whatever shocking or sad. YouTube videos to like, you know, it's like you like you can't get hard to like soft core porn anymore. So now you need to like, you know, you need to watch you need someone to like German you need someone to like swab your ears while you while you watch German dungeon porn. Really get in there. Make a niche. It's related to that problem of like, I think in like the the 18th century, you know, one of the most high fidelity, technically complicated ways of of making displaying

seeing an image was a painting. So paintings became imbued with all of this cultural meaning because the best painters were able to like render things in interesting ways. And it was so lively and it just doesn't do it for us in the same way anymore. It has it. It's not to say paintings are bad or not interesting, but they have a different cultural meaning than they did at one point because it's not really the best way to see an image anymore. It's a it's a it's the best way to see that artist's work or that artist's image. But it doesn't it's not the only way to see a part of the world you'll never go to you know it's like there's videos and photos and you can fucking go

there so it's like it has a different relation people have a different relationship to it it's not as emotionally charged i mean i would say the closest analog we have in today's society to like you know like paint visual art or like paintings and like the 1700s would be video games these video games are like the cutting edge technology where people there's a moral panic there's a moral panic and they're corrupting the children and if you have a gay character it's going to turn people gay and if there's a gun people are going to become violent and we're sort of it's going to

Merlinturn people gun yeah take for example you take the work of like say vincent van go van go is obviously the finest painter of them all certainly the most popular great painter of all time the most beloved he's a man of color the most magnificent he transformed the pain of his tormented life into ecstatic beauty pain is easy to portray but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy and joy and magnificence of our world no one had ever done it before perhaps No one ever will again. To my mind, the strange wild man who roamed the lands of Provence was not only the world's greatest artist, but also the greatest man who ever lived.

But honestly, like, I mean, in all seriousness, seeing Van Gogh's paintings in person is really, really something. Because what you don't get about Van Gogh that you can't really get is the y-axis, the impasto. There's like a quarter of an inch of paint on there. And when you see it in person, you're like, holy shit, this looks fucking crazy. You guys ever seen a Van Gogh in person? No. Oh, it's nuts. You know what I mean? The impasto, like all the pointy, the pointy paint coming out.

It's like he has, there's so much paint on that canvas. And it really, you take something like, you know, like the field with the three birds over it, you know, seeing that in person, like, oh, man, it's really something else. And I actually, in some ways, I kind of feel that way about some Picassos. I'm not, I think it's difficult to get, you know, too much of a hard on about cubism as any more than a mental exercise. But I had a very strong emotional feeling about the Demazelles of Avignon. And the first time that I saw it at MoMA, maybe in New York, it's like actually seeing it in person was very emotionally overwhelming.

MaxI think people love hearing about our stories about seeing a painting. I know. Here's one other thing.

AlexWhat a good program.

MaxHere's one other thing to think about. Here's something I think about all the time about paintings. Back when a lot of these paintings, when painting and oil painting was like a huge part of the culture, color and palettes were a very lively technology. And for some people, it was one of—

MerlinA very scientific thing, like a very scientific thing.

MaxYes, and it was trade secrets. So artists had access to colors and powders and palettes and things that nobody else— it was basically a trade secret of how they got access to it or found it or made it. and for some artists the first time people were the public or or other artists were seeing those colors and that color palette and all those colors together was in that painting because those colors don't necessarily occur in nature they're not you know things that you would see that's a really

Merlininteresting now yeah you're really you're really bringing it with this painting talk i've got to say like this is very thought-provoking thank you so uh i'm serious i know i'm being serious like

Speaker ABecause you didn't have movies.

MaxYou didn't have, I mean, even books were not widely available. The number of colors available for you to see on the screen of your MacBook Pro Retina display are more colors than most humans have ever had access to see.

MerlinThere's more news in the Chicago Tribune that you flush down your bank's toilet than most people in the 14th century would encounter.

Speaker AI read more on Twitter in 10 minutes than a caveman would have in his entire life. There's more men with powders and neckties on Twitter.

Merlinif they were laid end to end it wouldn't surprise anyone at all

Alexevery day someone listens to a podcast and they don't know what follow up is

22. U-Haul Lesbian Moment

Show notes

Transcript

22. U-Haul Lesbian Moment

Show notes

Transcript

0:00

0:12

0:21

0:24

0:39

0:42

0:57

1:07

1:08

1:11

1:18

1:37

1:44

1:57

1:58

2:00

2:04

2:12

2:13

2:21

2:43

2:46

2:51

2:52

3:11

3:26

3:39

3:45

4:18

4:59

5:35

6:05

6:38

6:51

7:13

7:19

7:24

8:05

8:36

9:11

9:40

10:11

10:39

11:10

11:14

11:25

11:34

11:36

11:37

11:49

11:50

12:00

12:04

12:05

12:06

12:12

12:17

12:24

12:42

12:53

13:08

13:20

13:51

14:26

15:02

15:11

15:41

15:53

15:56

16:42

17:16

17:31

17:36

18:00

18:04

18:25

18:42