53. I'm Hooky!

AlexThis is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast with Merlin Mann, Alex Cox and Max Temkin. This week's challenge, get a flu shot.

MaxI wrote down on my little, I have a little, you know, my little document with all my bits that I come up with to talk about on the show. and I wrote a little bit and I said Chicago and it's written on my list here. It says Chicago God Ownership.

Did I mean to say gun? Chicago gun ownership? I think dog. Dog ownership? Is it an acronym? I don't have any stories about Chicago dog ownership or gun ownership or God ownership. Maybe ownership is the Chicago God something. I even think I remember where I was when I was typing this hastily on my phone and I wonder what I was thinking about

Merlinat that point. Terrible feeling. Hmm. Maybe it's about an eminent domain.

MaxEvery so often I have a dream where I come up with either, like, usually it's comedy related. Like, sometimes I'm, like, I have a dream where I'm, like, either doing a podcast or I'm on stage doing comedy or something. And I say the funniest thing. And I'm, like, oh, my God. I can't believe I just came up with that. And sometimes I'm even aware that it's in the dream. And it's, like, and I even have that thought of, like, this is a dream. But I just thought of the funniest thing of all time in the dream. and then I like wake myself up. I have my little, I either have my phone or I will pad a paper by the bed.

I write it down and then I wake up the next morning and it says like Chicago God ownership. And I'm like, what the fuck? Like, that was the joke? Like.

MerlinI have, I have probably three breakthroughs a week at some point when I'm dreaming. And at least three times a week, something occurs to me in a dream that explains everything. It's some kind of unified field theory that explains. And then when I wake up, I say something like, there were four sticks in a box, and it was real. And I'm like, what? That doesn't really capture, I don't think, the... Maybe in order to be a unified field theory that explains all things, maybe it has to be inscrutable.

MaxWhat am I supposed to say when you talk about your dreams? I've already forgot the catchphrase. Oh, ancient bird, tell it to be ancient bird. No, no. What is it like an Italian word? Permiso, permiso. Oh!

Speaker APermiso.

MerlinYeah, and then you got the Scarlett Johansson branded helmet.

MaxI'm buying a planetarium projector. It's like 10 feet tall. You guys want to see a picture of it? Yes. Hang on.

MerlinIs this for your home? You sound sick, Max. Do you have a little bit of a cold?

MaxI'm very sick. I'm so sick. You probably didn't get your flu shot. That's wrong. Don't say it if you get a flu shot. Here we go. Let me put it in our secret super channel here. Open up the messages. Do by Friday. Here's a picture of it. So my friend Harper saw this on Craigslist yesterday. $750.

Speaker BWhat?

AlexOh, my God.

MaxYeah, it's from an old planet. It looks like a satellite. Yeah, it's huge. So it's like from an old planetarium. So I'm trying to buy it. I'm in contact with the guy. I'm the leading buyer. I'm trying to find the Adler Planetarium or the Chicago Design Museum might be interested in it. Maybe I'll just put it in the office and we'll have a 1940s star projector. Is it functional? Yeah, it works.

AlexOh, okay. This is very cool. Is it updatable?

MaxWhat do you think? We discovered new stars? I think we knew them all.

MerlinYeah, you're probably right. They probably knew them by the 30s. They probably had it all written down. This is a very large, just so our listeners won't be able to see, in this old black and white photograph, there's a man standing next to this thing that looks like, not a centrifuge, it looks like something you test astronauts in, spinning around, and it's like a big barbell that looks to be about eight or nine feet high.

MaxIt's big. It's a Spitz Space Systems Model A4 Planetarium Projector for sale, $750. That's it? It was refurbished in 2011. I don't know what I'm going to do with it.

Alexget high and look at it.

MaxI talked to some of my astronomer friends, and they're all skeptical. They're like, what are you going to do with this? And I was like, I don't know. It's pretty.

MerlinWell, if you appreciate it as a beautiful pseudoscientific device, I think that's plenty. To be able to use it, I think you're going to need a lot of conditions. I don't think you're going to be able to shoot this on a 10-foot ceiling.

MaxMerlin, let me ask you a question. And sometimes in situations like this, you've got to say WWRD, what would Roderick do? Oh, yeah. I think we don't know the answer to that.

MerlinYeah, yeah, he put it in his Superman.

MaxWhat if I listen to 200 hours of Roderick on the line to not buy a Spitz A4 planetarium projector for $750?

MerlinSee, I thought this was going to be a five-figure type situation. That's a doddle. You've got to pick that up.

MaxI think he wants it to go to a good home where it's going to be appreciated. Ultimately, I'd be really happy if this ended up in the Chicago Design Museum and it was just sort of a really cool piece of industrial design that the public could look at.

MerlinYou could put it on loan. Can you get your name on a plaque or something? Wouldn't that be nice? It never works. You're always looking for a legacy, Max. You want to be remembered. Am I wrong? I don't know. I get the sense that you would like to be remembered, and I think this could be the beginning of something for you. Maybe you just start buying large things.

MaxWell, you know, when the last person, the last living person forgets you, you become the Edward James Almost skeleton, and then you fade away. Is that what happens?

MerlinCylon's never really had a plan.

AlexYou guys never saw, you guys didn't see Coco yet? No. Guys, guys,

Maxone time, let me tell you something. One time Paul Saboran, I'm going to say acquaintance of the show, friend is a strong word. One time acquaintance of the show, Paul Saboran said, I don't like anything popular or mainstream.

And I just want to say, It's a normal thing to say. I just want to say Coco is very popular and everyone loves it. And I thought it was fucking brilliant. I thought it was incredible. I think it may be the best Pixar movie.

MerlinI'm so glad to hear that.

MaxIt might be my favorite Pixar movie.

MerlinWe've been seeing that trailer for a long time. And I found it impossible to believe the movie could be even passingly good. Just because it looks so much like a combination of Book of Life and Kubo. But every person to a person is all saying what you're saying. So I'm going to try and keep my expectations muted. But we're going to see it this weekend.

MaxIt's really fucking good. I cried. I cried at the end. And it's a Pixar. It's a feels movie. You get all the feels.

MerlinYou get all the feels. Was there a point when you turned over and whispered to your partner, that's Coco? What did I did say that about?

MaxOh, no. So there's that goddamn 20-minute Frozen short beforehand. I heard it's bad.

MerlinI heard it was bad.

MaxI'm excited for it. It's got a little snowman. Veronica really liked it and didn't like that everyone that we saw it with was making fun of it. but she likes Frozen more than I do. I think I like Veronica. I like the way that she rolls. But I did when we were watching the Frozen short and then the snowman came on, I did lean over and go, that's Frozen.

A little chappy. Chicago God Ownership.

Speaker BThat's Baby Driver. That's the Baby Driver.

AlexYou know what? Are you trying to maybe get it into Veronica's head? I really think that you wrote dog and you're like, hmm, maybe a dog.

MaxWhy do you think I've written that? I don't have a funny bit about dogs.

AlexDo you want a dog?

MaxNo. Are you sure? Are you sure? Yeah, because I don't have the lifestyle where I can give a dog a good life. That's true. Like cats, my cat already gets pretty stressed out for the amount that I travel and I really think it's emotionally harder on it. Dogs are less self-sufficient and they really emotionally suffer when their owner isn't around. I think that's true. I think it's totally true. And to be honest, this is going to be a popular opinion with our listeners. I already think it's a questionable decision to have a dog living in a city. Not saying it's wrong, but I think you should think about whether that's the best quality of life for a dog

and whether that's how dogs are meant to live before you get a big dog in a little city apartment. And so I would have those sort of feelings about it added to the amount that I travel, and I don't see it in the cards.

MerlinYou get so much unconditional positive regard from people already. You don't need a dog.

MaxIs that controversial, insulting people's pet ownership preferences?

MerlinNo, I'm not going to agree with you because it's problematic. But it drives me crazy when you see people with these dogs that are like little horses because that's kind of a cool kind of dog to have. A lot of people are secret cat people. They're secret cat people, and they want to overcompensate by getting a big dog and say, look at me, I'm a big dog boy. I think that's a thing people do. they get a big horse dog and they walk around and they're living someplace like in 500 square feet which is you know not unnormal for a big city flat or apartment

Maxit's like some sort of weird Victorian wealth display it's like look I have so much food I can afford to feed this large beast

Speaker Ait's not even a beast of labor

MerlinI love my curvy dog for many years I love a fat dog I know it's not healthy. I know you're supposed to do all kinds of stuff, but I'd love to see a dog that can barely walk.

MaxDid you ever see the beagle, the morbidly obese beagle named Kale Chips that was turned into the Chicago Adoption Center?

Speaker BHe was adopted, though. But it has a happy ending,

Maxwhich is he did water aerobics, and he lost a lot of weight, and he got down, he became less morbidly obese, and then he was adopted by a family.

Speaker AHe was so fat.

MaxHe couldn't walk.

Speaker AHe was so fat.

MaxHe's just sitting on that cushion, like what? Look up kale chips beagle.

MerlinI'm looking at him now. He's on a pop-a-san. And he's blobby. He's just melting. Look at those toe beans. What a sweetie.

Speaker AThat's a very curvy dog. I mean, he's a cubic.

MaxHe looks like a Minecraft. He looks like a Minecraft dog. It's just like two bricks put together.

AlexThis is like how I would draw a dog. Like just a big oval.

MaxYeah, it's like a six-year-old boy's drawing of a dog turned into a real dog. Look at him in his little floaties doing water aerobics. What a good boy.

Speaker AOh, look at that good boy. Oh, look at him.

MerlinOh, with the strap on. Yeah, like he's going to run away. I think he did. Why have I been bound like this?

MaxI have no desire to move. I will not bolt. I wanted to get kale chips too when he was a social media sensation. I was like, I should go to the pound and look into adopting kale chips. Just add it to my cabinet of curiosities with the planetarium projector. Put him next to Killer Queen in the planetarium. Eventually, I'll capture a superhero and put him behind glass and be like, finally, my collection is complete.

Speaker AEscape from this, Captain America. And over here, we have Sebastian Gorka. You should collect Sebastian Gorka. No, he can't be captured. He has 90 guns in a tourniquet that he can apply with one hand.

Speaker BIt is I.

Speaker AOh, God.

MerlinI think you should do the San Francisco route. In San Francisco, you get pairs, maybe siblings of the same kind of dog. I think you should get some kind of crazy, genetically distorted, high-maintenance dog, maybe with a skin condition. You get two of them, and you give them a funny name.

AlexOh, I mean, that's kind of what we did with our cats. They're kind of like a comedy duo now. because it's like oh you got the straight man with ness and then you got the big dummy which is francis and yeah they're great they are a social media sensation up to 50 likes on instagram

Merlinit's a very big deal merlin does your partner agree with your frame of mind about how you

Alexidentify these animals yes oh absolutely in in fact they more so i would say that that cat's a dummy that francis is a dog oh god he and the worst part is like the other cat like frames him for doing shit, it's, yeah.

MaxMy cat's been doing a thing. Okay, explain this, everyone. My cat's been doing a thing where, so we feed her. So let me explain how I feed my cat because I'm a genius. So one of my big fears of getting a cat was I've heard all these stories about how people's cats wake them up because they want to get fed. Do you know what I'm talking about?

AlexOh, yeah. That didn't happen to me this morning.

MaxIt's fine. Listen, I'm a genius. So here's what I figured out. I decided I'm never going to feed the cat when I wake up. And that way the cat won't associate me waking up with her getting food, and she won't give a shit when I wake up. So the way I make it work is I feed the cat. It's the last thing I do before I walk out the door in the morning. So she doesn't really have an association with me waking up because I wake up, I putter around, I get in the shower, I read a magazine, I go on Twitter, and then finally I'm out the door, I make my coffee, and then finally I'm out the door and I give her a can of mush.

AlexSee, I had that pattern down with the good cat, but now it's a choice between getting up and feeding the cat or being smothered and having an anus rubbed on my mouth.

MaxOh, interesting.

AlexYeah.

MaxInteresting. That's a very aggressive tactic.

AlexSo I just kind of, sometimes I just throw a little crap.

MaxDoes she trim her nails at least?

AlexNo. That was a good joke.

MaxOkay. And then the other thing is I feed the cat really late at night, like right before I go to bed because the idea is like if she eats late at night, she'll be less likely to wake me up for food in the morning. So lately she's been doing a thing where our cat also only eats wet food because she doesn't have any teeth. And lately what she's been doing is she takes a little mouthful of the chicken mush and carries it in her mouth and comes up the stairs up to the bedroom and drops the chicken mush in a little parcel of chicken mush in the

hallway outside of our of our bedroom. It's not like liquid. It's like gelatinous. So it's like a can of cranberry sauce, and you can still see the outline of the can. Like it still has like right angles on it. And she'll drop a little mouthful of the chicken mush outside of our bedroom, and then just sit there and meow, help just helplessly. Like kind of a frantic meowing, like a help me meow, like when she corners a bug. What do you think it means? Well, I don't know. I don't know what to make of it. And she's done it a couple of times.

MerlinIs it a complaint? Is the cat lodging a complaint? Like, I don't like this particular mush. Maybe it's a compliment.

AlexMaybe she wants to share with you. Here, have some.

MerlinI heard the only way to train pets and men is to ignore the bad behavior and reward the good behavior. And then eventually patterns will be created out of that. I don't know if that's true, but that's what I've heard. Supposedly, you're on the right track, Max. It's us capitulating to the animal that makes it develop those habits and saying, Oh, when I do this thing, this happens, especially with cats. How is she coming up with that, though?

MaxBecause I'm a creative person. I'm a maker. I sit there all day. You read a lot of books. Oh, I love to read books. I sit there all day, and I think of funny bits like Chicago God ownership. And it never occurred to me to bring a mouthful of food up to the bedroom and just dump it on the floor and start crying.

Maybe you try that on her and see what happens.

MerlinMaria Abramovic performance art. The Max is present.

AlexMerlin, are we going to talk about the notch in the room?

MerlinThe what?

AlexNo. Okay.

MerlinI'm officially not talking about it.

AlexOkay. All right. No, no.

MerlinYou can ask me in the after show and I'll talk about only a little bit. But I'm officially not having an opinion about this.

AlexGiveUsYourFuckingMoney.com. Minecraft drama? Yes. Yep, that's what it is.

MerlinGiveUsYourFuckingMoney.com. We're up to 1,660 patrons. Thank you, everybody, for giving us your fucking money. What did he say now? What?

AlexNo, no, nothing, nothing. By notch, we mean a telephone.

MerlinThe game guy.

AlexMm-hmm. Oh. We're not talking about the bocce boy.

MaxI'm with you. Okay. Merlin cocked himself

Merlinalso people got posters posters are arriving so sorry those weren't as fast as we'd hoped but you should be having your

Alexno they were exactly as fast as we hoped I apologize for apologizing okay yeah no fuck your expectations

Merlinkeep giving us your money

Alexthank you

MaxOh, I know what Chicago... Oh, God. I know what it is. I know what it is. It's follow-up. It's follow-up. It's follow-up. I know what it is. I know what it is. I know what it is. I know what it is. Chicago God ownership. It's Chicago dog ownership, meaning the Chicago hot dog. It's fucking follow forward. It's fucking follow through from your other abominable podcast where you were complaining about... But I also don't remember why I was, but it was all wrong.

It was so wrong. How could you let John Syracuse get away with talking about Chicago hot dogs in that way? How could you let him get away with that? I'm not mad at him. He doesn't know better.

MerlinIt's your fault. I'm the one that should have said something. I know. I owe you an amends.

MaxI don't remember specifically what I was mad about, but he was talking about how Chicago people are like.

MerlinJohn has that effect on people.

MaxYeah.

MerlinWhy was he?

MaxYou just know you're mad. You're not sure which part you're mad about. about god damn it about the chicago hot dog and fuck why don't you why don't you spend a few

Merlinminutes telling us a little bit about what you think if you choose to what are the important aspects about the chicago okay i remember it's all coming back to me holy shit i feel like i

Maxjust did some sort of like a like a like a like a did you do a clean i just took one of those like alex jones powders like i'm like i'm i have a galaxy brain i remember the whole thing now Oh, no. So John was saying it's just this arbitrary, like, you put the spore peppers and the celery salt on there, and it's just some arbitrary ingredients. Why does Chicago have to own this hot dog? And I was fucking furious. People don't understand the provenance of the Chicago hot dog.

It's like a food ethnography of Chicago. So every major – it's an amazing thing. It's like all of these ingredients that were cultivated and brought to Chicago and became cheap because of the crazy hodgepodge of ethnic groups that were crammed into the city during the Great Depression. That became the Chicago dog. So you have like Mexican ingredients like the pickled peppers and the tomatoes. You have I think the celery salt is like Polish or Hungarian or something like that. German. You have the hot dog itself.

The sausage is German.

Merlinwhere's the nuclear where's the nuclear the nuclear green relish feels like a very chicago

Maxdog why why does it i think i think the relish i mean so now that's a modern affectation that's like a manufactured you know i think that's like a people of nostalgia for this food from the 70s or something like that but originally i think that was either i think the relish is sort of a

Merlinpolish food right like sort of a sour proud i think i told you my anecdote but you got me so excited about chicago i really like chicago dogs i'll even get a crappy one in the airport like i'm just i'm just excited to have them in particular sport peppers we don't get a ton of here in florida we used to get this really great thing which is whenever you go to a barbecue joint there'd be this little shaker bottle on the table with a bunch of little tiny green peppers and vinegar in it and you get this pepper vinegar sauce oh i love that i love that stuff it's hard it's kind of hard to get um but what's really hard is the poppy seed buns and so i went to

You should try this yourself. You go to that Vienna site, and they have a whole package they'll send you where you can get all of the official stuff. And I keep forgetting this, but I've gone on at least, I want to say two, probably three occasions. I go, I click, I add it to the basket, I go to checkout. And if memory serves, the packet itself is $45, and I think the shipping is $44. Ooh. And that's why I don't have poppy seed buns.

MaxMerlin, I'll send you poppy seed buns. They're made in Chicago from the Rosen Bread Company. Rosen? Rosen. That's the official. Rosen. That's the best one that you want. You want a Rosen, poppy seed bun, and 100% beef, all natural, natural casing, Vienna beef.

MerlinOh, you put onion on, too.

MaxNow, what you're describing, I'm going to get those Costco hot dogs the next time I go because they do sound pretty good from your description. Are they all beef? I think so, yeah. Okay. Yeah, you know, again, I... It sounds like what you're describing, that they're a little garlicky, a little better seasoned. It sounds like a Polish sausage. I've talked about Polish... That everyone should be eating Polish sausages.

MerlinI think you've talked about that given the opportunity between in the same brand, you should get the Polish sausage.

MaxThat's more like a real actual, like, old-time hot sauce. If you have access to a... Specifically of Vienna... I mean, Polish sausage can mean a lot of different things. To an older generation, like our parents, a Polish sausage means... What it means is half beef, half pork. And I don't like that. I don't think that's a good-tasting sausage. But if you have the opportunity to get specifically a Vienna beef brand Polish sausage, it's 100% beef. It's the same thing as a Vienna beef hot dog, but just better seasoned and has a natural casing. Upgrade. Get that Polish sausage. It's so fucking good.

MerlinDugga, Dugga, Dugga. Dateline Business Insider, May 29, 2016. I might have found the best hot dog in America, and it's not where you'd expect. Stupid Business Insider. But this person stipulates that they think Costco is the best hot dog in America. The dog is unexpectedly flavorful. What is that noise? What does that noise mean?

AlexI think.

MerlinAlexandra, why'd you make a noise at my hot dog?

AlexYou are talking about. What are you buying this crap at the Costco for?

MaxI can't believe that Costco would have a good hot dog.

AlexNo, I love Costco. But is he talking about the one that you get at the little concession stand? Hell yeah, I've had that hot dog. That's a good hot dog.

MerlinThat's a good hot dog. That's a great hot dog.

AlexThis is a business.

MerlinPizza's not great, but the hot dog's good.

AlexThis is a business insider like, oh, turns out, like, you can get the best. It's a Thomas Friedman type situation.

MaxYou know what? I'm going to be like my, God, I'm turning into my dad. but I would not surprise me if Costco had great hot dogs. That seems like exactly the kind of thing that they would randomly have good ones of.

MerlinThe dog is unexpectedly flavorful. Gone is the bland, hollow taste of the average hot dog. Instead, a delightful smoky taste pervades, similar to a kielbasa sausage, but not as fatty or rich. There's a slight charred taste to it that isn't overpowering. It's juicy, and there's a satisfying snap with every bite. I want this hot dog right now. I might go to Costco for lunch. I want hot dogs so much right now.

MaxYou know what I think my parents, and I think that old Jewish people say is a big compliment when you have something really good, like if I cook something, they'll be like, this is so good, it tastes store-bought. It's so good. That used to mean something different. It's so good, it tastes like it's from the sunset.

Speaker BIt's so good. Oh my God.

Merlinoh man one time i i had a friend who uh my best friend when i was a kid uh i realized in retrospect was a little bit on the spectrum and uh a very very best friend from childhood great great great great great guy he uh he came and stayed over one night and uh mom's like oh yeah what do you want for breakfast and I was like I'll have a pop tart like I always have and he's like I want waffles

this is not a very interesting story but it's a famous family story that my mom was like oh god I haven't made waffles in like 15 years I don't even know where the waffle iron is she spends like an hour making waffles he's like this isn't like the toaster kind because all he wanted was he had to have he had to have an eggo every morning it was really sweet my poor mom Your parents put up with so much.

AlexThis hot dog costs $1.50. It's a loss leader. It's a loss leader. Yeah, I guess so. They get you in there.

MaxYou go to the Costco to get four folding chairs for Thanksgiving, and you walk out with a Dyson humidifier and a seal-a-meal. That's how they get you.

MerlinDid you hear that, I want to say, Planet Money, about the history of Costco? It was really, really good. Yeah, they don't make any money. Well, they deliberately wanted it to be kind of difficult. They wanted it to be something that was sort of an event. And they came up with or adapted an idea that is we don't want you coming in here and spending a little bit of money twice a week. We want you coming in and spending a lot of money once a month. And that is what drives their whole approach of like keeping it deliberately spare. You know, the boxing, they could probably afford bags.

MaxThat's just not part of their money. You guys, I really think – okay, I have a couple of thoughts on this. Number one, I really think we should do a Costco challenge where we record an episode of Dubai Friday covertly in a Costco. So Merlin, you go to your Costco. We go to our Costco. We connect. We fucking go nuts. We record. And I think that would be very interesting. But number two, here's my other question. What are your big purchases? Like what are your like, okay, I'm at Costco. I got to get X. What are your big, you know, got to get this?

MerlinWell, just as a preamble, I don't like to talk about this, but I have leveraged the gig economy in my life. I rarely go to the grocery store anymore because it makes me so sad inside. In the days when I did, we were totally those people. Wait, you don't go to Costco? Our gig economy service will go to Costco.

MaxWow. Which one is that? The Postmates? Couldn't say.

MerlinAnd so, in my early days, it was- Don't they have to have a card? They got a card. I don't have a card. I don't know. What am I going to buy? A casket? What am I going to get? No, I'm good. You ever seen the caskets? Yeah, I want one so bad.

AlexI don't know why.

MerlinI just want the display. Max, that would be so good for your collection. It's a modest little, looks like a primary school science project, and it's the corners of like four caskets. You should get that.

MaxI love walking up and down the aisles of the Costco, and I stop and I look at these items, and I'm like, how would I incorporate that into my life? Like, oh, a box of 300 highlighters for 25 cents. Well, what would I do with that?

AlexGoing to Costco is always like a celebratory childhood event because we'd go like every couple of weeks. And actually my family of seven, eight plus the dog, we spent so much money there that we opened a business account. Wow. And yeah, no, there's a lot of us. You need a lot of hot dogs. But then you go down that aisle that's basically a giant table full of books. And I would just kind of like sneak them in the cart because along with the big box of highlighters, you don't notice a Dan Brown novel in there.

It worked out quite well.

MerlinDan Brown's book strode purposefully into the cart. Its eyes were like eyes. I was like eight years old. Come on. They've got so much good stuff there. I'll tell you some things I like a lot. It's not as good as it used to be, but obviously the champ is the Costco rotisserie chicken, which is a good-ass chicken. That's a good-ass... If you get a hot chicken when it's coming out, that's really good. You know their beef is surprisingly good.

MaxWhat do you mean their beef?

MerlinThey have pretty... Like raw beef? It's six. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like they've got good, pretty good cuts.

MaxIt's not prime. So you go to Costco.

MerlinYou buy, you get a bunch of beef, seal a meal. I do. I seal a meal three steaks last night.

MaxDo you dry age or do you do anything to them?

MerlinAre you curious? Yeah, yeah. I can tell you about my rib roast. Oh, I cooked the shit out of a rib roast.

MaxOkay, go. I have my notes.

MerlinOkay. Rib roast. Rib roast. You get rib roast. You know, you think you need more than two ribs. For a family, our size two ribs is way too much. Like even one rib would be fine. I get that. I very carefully, if they don't do this at the butcher shop Our butcher shop will do this on request Cut the bone away And I will put it on a baker's rack Wait a minute, wait a minute, I go to the butcher shop in the Costco Oh, so Oh, do you want to talk about Costco or you want to talk about rib roast?

MaxI've never bought, well wait a minute Why are we talking about rib roast if I can't get it at Costco?

MerlinWell, you can Okay, here's the deal, you can age other cuts too You could do, let's say you get a Chateaubriand The rule of thumb I think is About one day per pound I wouldn't do it for more than three or four days, but just put it on a rack with a – on a baker's rack, like one of those little wire deals. Yeah. With like a – you can put –

MaxI did that the last time I got steaks, and they were – It's surprisingly good.

MerlinThey were incredible. Especially if you do it to something like a ribeye, and you get a lot of that moisture out of it. Oh, man. It's so good.

MaxI had –

MerlinWhat else do you get?

MaxThere was a little sale on ribeyes at the Whole Foods Butcher, and I got like six ribeyes. And I made one the night that I got them and froze the rest. or no I dry aged them for five days and then froze them and as compared to the one that I had straight from the store versus the dry aged ones they were so much more tender and flavorful and cooked and they got more crispy when you when I when I know you're exactly you know what you

Merlinnailed it that's exactly right like when you sear it it sears really well I used to like to get lots of office supplies because it's a good place for office supplies at the cost can you finish your

Maxyour you're you're putting more things on the stack could you finish your fucking rib roast recipe. I'm ready. I think it's kind of boring. Edit this out. I want to know.

Speaker AMax wants to know. So what do you go to your butcher,

Merlinrib roast, bone out? Well, I like the bone to be on, but what I'll do is, and I would prefer a butcher to do this because I tend to massacre it. I'm not a good cutting man. You'll trim right at the level of the bone on a curve. You trim the bone away from the meat part all the way to when the big joint thing happens. You want to leave the bone on.

MaxSo bone on but trimmed.

MerlinYeah, yeah, because later on when you're going to roast this or sous vide it, you're going to want to put some garlic in that area. That's a good place to put garlic and salt and stuff.

MaxIt's a little crevice.

MerlinIt's a meat pocket that you can jam into which you can jam your garlic pieces and your spices and whatnot. And so I have a pretty straightforward meat recipe that I use in some variation for lots of these. So, yeah, I'll leave it in there three, four, maybe five days. I don't want to get gamey. You sous vide it, and then you— If you're doing sous vide, you've got a really good setup, so you're probably good. But for most people in a home sous vide environment, this is not fun, but you're going to want to cut it into smaller, like, giant super steaks, basically.

Because if you're trying to do it in a pot for a lot of people, that's not going to work. You got me to get one of those big, like, five-gallon things.

MaxYou get the cam bro.

MerlinWhich is what I use for something large. Yeah, okay, I got the cam bro. I got the pasta cam bro. Yeah. And then what I'll do is lots of kosher salt. Oh, and I get these silicone rubber bands. Silicone? Silicone. Silicone rubber bands, right? But you don't put those on yet. Lots and lots of kosher salt. I like, inside the meat pocket, I like to put thyme and rosemary in there. God, this is making me hungry.

MaxOh, my God, this sounds so good.

MerlinNow, me, now, John Siracusa doesn't like this. We get those Whole Foods garlic ice cubes. Oh, Merlin, no.

Speaker AMerlin, no.

MerlinNo, I don't like my hands to smell. I don't like my hands to smell. Anyway, you jam some garlic on there Now, depending on how you want it Now, here's another trick I think you could do something as simple as kosher salt and pepper On the meaty meat part But what I'm going to tell you You could also then put more thyme You could put, if you like Italian parsley and that kind of shit You could put that on there A fun trick to try If you like a little bit of spice Is get you some, like, creamy meat radish

MaxWe need to have an intervention on you buying this processed garlic I can't believe you're buying this Why have it at all? It doesn't taste like garlic Yeah, okay It tastes like wood chips It's not good It's like a It's like a Sulfury wood chip They're really bad

MerlinWood chip Okay Okay Okay And then what you can do is Cover the whole meaty top part I feel like you're saying Okay but you're gonna keep Buying frozen garlic No I know Why would you think that I'm always looking for A new thing to stop doing How was

MaxDo you ever Can I tell you something Do you ever just Do you ever just smash a garlic With like the flat part of your knife I know how Cause your fingers don't smell Like the garlic

MerlinWell, you can also rub it on a spoon. It's not that— If you rub your hands on a spoon after garlic, it won't smell. It makes it better.

MaxIt helps. But I don't understand that. It's like, why? Just not have the garlic then. That's not how I— See, get a show with Syracuse.

Speaker AYou can cover the whole top.

MerlinWe need to have some sort of garlic intervention for you. Oh, my gosh. No intervention. Okay, you know what? You know, you get a clove of it. I don't know if we use enough fast enough. In the ice cube, you pop it out. Room temperature for a second, and you get garlic. It's brilliant. It's brilliant. And you know, you can freeze all your herbs, too.

AlexDig dug. We got to stop. We got to stop with the food because I'm so hungry.

MerlinHow do you make a rib roast, Alex?

AlexHow do you make a rib roast? No comment. No comment. Max, what? Are we still in follow-up and front matter? I don't know. Student emails? What?

MaxOh, do you guys ever get this? This is, I'm really mad about the garlic. I really am upset about the garlic. Oh, my God. You think it really makes that? It really tastes bad.

Speaker AI mean, it's not that it's like a worse version of garlic.

MaxIt's a little bit sulfur-y, kind of a sulfur taste. It's bad. It adds a bad taste to the food. Anyway, whatever. Have you ever tried it? You get it at the Whole Foods. Yes, I grew up with that fucking abomination of that. It's not the size of a full ice cube. I grew up with that little glass jar. My parents would always get that glass jar of minced garlic and formaldehyde. Oh, that's handy. You don't have to cut it up. Oh, my God. These little cubes are about the size smaller than a sugar cube. I thought I didn't like garlic for a long time because of how bad that was.

MerlinYeah. Anyway. What have they done to you, Max?

MaxWhat have they done? Do you guys ever get emails from students who are like, can I interview you for my class project? Yes. They're infuriating because they're like, so I get a lot of these. I'll get like a couple of these a week. And it's like, they're like, would you just help me a little old student and like answer my questions about the thing? And then they always want to ask like, how'd you come up with Cards Against Humanity? And it's like, well. Where do you get your ideas? Yeah. It's like, I don't have any, like, I can't answer that in the timeframe that I'm allowed to do this interview that I can do this interview with you in so I got one this day what what do

Alexpeople ask you Alex they it's the same thing like what's it like they want to know what it's like working in cards against vanity and I always say uh no no I don't have a time no no you say no no

Merlinand Merlin what do you do do you get them it depends on factors but generally I will I don't get them so much anymore I'm not really that famous anymore but first of all a lot of people just want to be a friend and say hi and have reach out and have a little moment and i think that's a nice thing to give especially to a young person i think it's very important to do that uh what broke me much like the cubes of garlic broke you is a time in my pseudo career when i

would get lots of questions from idiots who were on deadline at the last minute and we're looking for a quote and and i know that's not the same thing but that made me a little bit angry and broken inside. I got so sick of people calling me to basically keep me on the phone until I gave them the quote that they needed for something. So if it's somebody who really has an interest and a curiosity about some topic that I can offer assistance on, I love that. But I don't want to just be like another footnote or a talking head. You know what I mean? But on the other hand,

you have to be supportive of young people, unless they're collectors. Be careful of the collectors, because the collectors are out there.

MaxIt might have been a collector, so be careful. Oh, he wants to put me in his little museum? Don't put me behind glass. Well, I told you the story of the first. So when I met Roderick for the first time a couple years ago on the Joko Cruise, I was trying to think of some inn so I could go up and say hi and not be a crazy person. And we wound up, I think we were sitting together at dinner or something, and I was like, oh, John, I'm a big fan and I'm friends with your podcast co-host Merlin. And John takes a long beat and kind of looks me up and down

and sort of sizes me up and he goes, real life friends or internet friends?

Speaker BOuch.

MerlinPlease don't make me apply that.

MaxHe fucking nailed me.

MerlinPlease don't make me apply that.

MaxHe fucking nailed me. Oh, God. And then I just had to sulk away. I think I just crawled under the table.

Anyway, here's my email from Dayton. Dear Mr. Temkin, Hello, I am making a school project and I wanted to ask you one quick question. Do you think teens should play inappropriate games? In this case, Cards Against Humanity. Thanks for your time, Dayton.

AlexThat went in a very different direction than I thought it would. Now, I'm no, you know, press expert.

Speaker ABut do you think he's working at it?

MerlinHe digs his thumbs into his suspenders.

Speaker AI'm just a simple country lawyer. But I'm just a simple country option call.

MaxBut do you think this guy's working at Angle? Yeah. So he goes, do you think teens should play inappropriate games, in this case, Cards Against Humanity? I think this guy might be part of Project Veritas. So I think he might be. Oh, my God. It's a jam up. Well, you probably haven't gotten to this episode yet. I think he's leaning into me and he's got the little flower lapel. And he's like, please answer into my lapel. So I replied back and I said, no, Max.

MerlinOh, geez. Well, you haven't gotten to this episode yet, probably. But a recent Roderick on the line, Roderick got one of his offers to basically be an emcee. Long story short, it was a chance to interview Dan Harmon. And all the questions such as they were. You heard this, Alex?

AlexYep, the paragraph questions.

MerlinThese paragraph-long questions that were obviously written by a sophomore in college, which is the worst kind of person. But wouldn't you agree that it's those kind of like – there's certain kinds of questions that give somebody the opportunity to say something interesting and other kinds of questions that already feel like kind of a trap. Perhaps a better question for Dayton might have been, do you have an idea of when it's appropriate for people to play a game? I'm like, how would you suggest guidance to young people or parents on when it's right to play this game? That gives you an opportunity to go lots of different places.

But when you ask people these yes-no questions or, as Roderick said, I really don't like those questions where you're like, well, you know what? There's five different things about your question that I will not stipulate to, and so I can't really answer that question. When did you stop beating your wife with your other wife?

Maxyou know my actual feeling on this is that it is that of course it depends on the kid because like when i was a teenager i'm thinking of like when i was like you know 12 or 13 or whatever i really should not have been playing card you know i had cards against humanity existed i was sort of too excitable and upsetable and i really shouldn't have been playing it you know i was way too sort of emotionally young to be playing that however i had peers in school who were fucking smoking cigarettes and pouring sugar in the principal's gas tank and you know riding their their motorcycles home and you know going on dates and stuff and like you know picking up girls at bars and they

could have played cards against humanity wouldn't have affected them so it depends on the kid yeah

Merlinbut it's there's there's another part of it and i suffer from this as like a dad who has exercised some influence over my kids taste but one problem is when you try to make two leaps at a time two or more leaps at a time where it's one thing to say like hey you know you're five i think you'd enjoy the star wars movie and it's another thing like the thing with cards or stuff like that is that It requires a great breadth of knowledge about a lot of things to get why that feeling of, not being offended, but that feeling of being provoked and like, oh my, you are a caution, Cards Against Humanity.

Why that feeling comes to you is because you go, oh, they're upending these certain conventions about things that we all know. And I think when you skip too many levels, you rob a person of the chance to get to understand why that's funny. Do you know what I'm saying? Like if you put your kid right into a Rick and Morty or whatever, they're not going to – I mean in addition to being inappropriate, they won't get a lot of it. So now you're going to explain to your kid what felching is or whatever?

MaxYou can't start – it's like kids today, they're not watching like scrambled Showtime softcore pornography. They're watching like straight like hardcore like streaming anal. They're not even getting –

MerlinWhat age do you think is appropriate? What age is appropriate to start with hardcore streaming porn for a kid?

MaxOh, I don't think you get to – oh, boy. I just listened to that John Ronson thing, the butterfly effect. Holy shit, it was good. It was so good. With the guy smashing the stamps. The stamps. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. I'm thinking about porn all the time. It really is. It is this huge upheaval in the social fabric of America that nobody talks about and it is so clearly affecting every aspect of American life and childhood and sexuality

and stuff. Crazy. And it's just like a...

MerlinIn a way where you can't draw... It's difficult to draw a straight line, but down to doing a sexy dance and putting up the video. It's like, well, how did you decide to do that? There's always one kid in my kid's class who's watching way too much YouTube and stuff that that kid shouldn't be watching, and they like to be the one who becomes the Pied Piper or the town crier about the new dirty word.

MaxWhat's with the whole news story? I kind of missed this, but... That was weird. Is this news story about the weird YouTube videos where it's like caillus getting eaten by clowns or something like that? I don't fully understand that.

MerlinWell, there's at least a couple angles to it. One of the angles is that clearly there's always going to be trolls who want to provoke and upset people. The way more interesting story, and I can't put my hand to it right now, but this one very interesting story was why are there these weirdly random things about this certain kind of toy with these certain kinds of characters? And the thrust of that story was that the ideas for plots or videos, these short videos that are being produced in mills, basically, the concepts are algorithmically derived, but they're being acted out by real people.

so if you get something that's like genie rubs a bottle and you know cum shoots out on anna or whatever like that was something in an algorithm produced that so it's this it's being regarded by a lot of people as this tipping point of like holy shit now we really are doing what the algorithm says and the out the actors don't have any thought or any kind of like uh you know the

Maxactors just do what they're told to do right suddenly they're suddenly they're in a frozen vore fetish video.

Speaker Bmany things I don't know in this video. All right, see you again. Okay, see you again.

All right, see you again. All right, see you again.

MaxAll right, see you again. All right, see you again. New York Times, Bangkok. Uh-oh. Panarat Chia Boon was using the toilet in her downstairs bathroom in July when she felt a sharp bite on her thigh. She jumped up to see a scene straight out of a nightmare an eight-foot python emerging from her toilet. She rushed to the hospital, bleeding heavily, and still bears the marks from eight tooth punctures that were around her half an inch deep. The snake was captured, but a week later, Ms. Paranat's 15-year-old daughter

found a second python in the same toilet. The daughter was so shaken, she went to stay with relatives. It could be argued that snakes have always owned this corner of Thailand and that the people of Bangkok are merely borrowing it from them. But it's basically an article about snakes in the toilet. I just thought I would share that with you guys.

AlexDo you guys ever check for a snake in the toilet?

MaxYes.

MerlinWhat do you check for in a toilet, Alex? What are you looking for?

AlexI don't know.

MerlinIt's like driver's ed where you learn to walk around the car before you get in and start the engine. Do you like to go in and just see what the environment's going to be, what you're facing?

AlexWell, I mean, have you ever sat on a toilet before looking directly into it? It's like looking into the eyes of God. You just want to know. I don't know.

MaxI always look in the back of a car before I get in. If my car's parked and I'm getting in the car, I always take a peek. because you don't want there to be a clown with a butcher's knife back there. With a hook for a hand. You don't want to find that out while you're already on the highway. I'm hooky.

Speaker AYeah, hi, can I ask you a few questions for my class? What do you think of Vorpaw? I'm hooky.

You want to see me eat a wolf? for a hand. I bet there's a YouTube video of a clown with a hook for a hand.

MaxSo I always look in the back of a car to make sure that there's not a clown with a hook for a hand. And you always look in a toilet, especially if you're going to sit down on the toilet. Boy, you get your little cell phone flashlight and you look down there for a second. You make sure there's not going to be any sort of snake or lamprey or any sort of creature that could come swimming up.

Alexi'm wondering do you let's say that there is something in a toilet before you use it will you will you flush beforehand what do you mean something uh any anything paper excrement whatever

Merlinlike a clean bowl you like to go in and make sure that you got a clean bowl

Alexwell i'm wondering because i've been shamed for you know flushing but i don't i don't want to piss on someone else's shit it's very weird to me don't yuck their yum i i just don't piss on

Maxyour shit i spit on your we should start saying that don't don't don't piss on you know how yuck you don't yuck my yum we should start saying don't piss on my shit yeah especially when it says like

Alexa low flow toilet like save the i'm like god damn no god ah you flushed the toilet that's an entire amount of drinking water for a day i think you gotta give that to yourself alex if you'd like

Merlinto know that you're you want to feel like you're the first resident i understand why you want to i don't understand why you look down into the bowl while you're okay i don't like stick my head in

Alexthere like you can you can see it at a normal height see what if there's anything in there

Merlinbefore you sit down marilyn you look down in the bowl and you look if it's dark described it as like an ongoing situation where she's like on the border with korea and she's like she's like

Alexlooking down making sure that no vores come up well oh okay well at night it's kind of a different situation because well oh merlin oh okay well google google and search for yep yep yep um

Merlinoh it's a okay okay oh no yes okay maybe i did know this and i decided to forget it yeah okay okay did you hear the yes yes no about uh that that tumblr site max yeah yeah yeah yeah okay Similar thing, right? Like, is it for, is it not for? Do you just put it in your mouth? Are we just tying up the princess? Like, what's happening on this tumbler?

AlexI just want to put her hair in my mouth.

MerlinJust...

AlexRapunzel. That's why she cut off her hair at the end. She was like, no. She just didn't want to be harassed by Flynn Rider, the hair eater anymore.

Speaker Aanymore. Ang, ang, ang, ang, ang, ang.

MaxFollow-up, Washington Post. Donald Trump Jr. had just posted a batch of private messages he exchanged with Wikileaks during last year's campaign, confirming reports that he communicated with the website that published stolen Democratic emails obtained by Russian military intelligence. Quote, more nothing burgers from the media and others desperately trying to create false narratives, the president's oldest son wrote on Instagram. Keep coming at me, guys. Over the course of the week, Trump Jr. went on to tweet or retweet criticism of his father's 2016 Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, actor George Takei, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, and former Vice President Joe Biden, sharing unsubstantiated claims about him from an anonymously sourced blog post.

Trump Jr. referred questions about his activities on Twitter to the family's private company, which did not respond to requests for comment. His brother, Eric Trump, said in a statement that, quote, Dodd and I are totally dedicated to running our family business, the Trump Organization, which has been an incredible experience. Wait, there's more.

AlexHe's sucking on Rapunzel's hair.

MaxWhile our sole focus remains on the business, our father has the most important job in the world, and we could not be more proud of all that he has accomplished in his first year, he said to the Washington Post. Quote, Don and I will always remain his biggest advocates and supporters.

Speaker AMy father is a very smart man.

MerlinHe gets the History Channel but doesn't have time to watch it, but knows it all anyway because he's read all the books.

MaxQuote, Don barely talks to his father and they barely see each other, said one person close to him who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. Quote, it weighs on him. It does. It didn't really hit him until laying the wreath before inauguration that this is so much bigger than us and that they're going to have to make sacrifices. Amid his angry online missives are nostalgic posts about the president whom he dressed up for. He dressed up as for Halloween. Don Jr. dressed up as Donald Trump for Halloween.

On the anniversary of the election win, Trump Jr. posted photos of the two hugging and what he called, quote, his favorite piece of campaign memorabilia. An electoral map signed. Great job. Thanks, Dad.

MerlinOh, my God. Please. Oh, fathers out there, please let your children know they're loved. Please do it while there's still a window for fixing this.

MaxIn one video, Trump Jr. says he, quote, had the privilege of being able to fly with his father to the White House. He can be seen in the helicopter window's reflection as the president walks away. Oh, God.

Also, it's kind of heartbreaking. It's beyond heartbreaking. It's very Fredo.

AlexIt reminds me of the interview. It was a while ago, and I forget what the context was. but it's like what was it like growing uh up with donald trump and he responded with well well he was uh uh like a father that's all he could say and it's like you know about the the dorm room

Maxincident right uh no what was that oh boy this is really good let me find this um a former classmate of donald trump jr's wrote a facebook post on wednesday explaining why he thinks donald trump is unfit to be president um in his post he wrote that trump jr was drunk throughout much of his college career at University of Pennsylvania and that he once witnessed Trump slap Trump Jr. so hard that he fell to the ground while Trump Jr.'s entire freshman dorm watched. Oh, shit. No. Here's what he wrote. I was hanging out in a freshman dorm with some friends next door to Donald Jr.'s room. I walked out of the room to find Donald Trump at his son's door there to pick him up for

a baseball game. There were quite a few students standing around watching, trying to catch a glimpse of the famed real estate magnate. Down Jr. opened the door wearing a Yankee jersey. Without saying a word, his father slapped him across the face, knocking him to the floor in front of all of his classmates. he simply said put on a suit and meet me outside and close the door it's gonna suck when we find out that eric's a smart one donald jr was donald jr was so hard the post goes on donald jr was a drunken college every memory i have of him is stumbling around campus falling over passed out in public with his arm in a sling from injuring himself while

drinking he absolutely despised his father and hated the attention that his last name afforded him his nickname was quote diaper don because of his tendency to fall asleep drunk in other people's beds and urinate. I always felt terrible

Merlinfor him. Oh, is that real news? This is a Facebook quote from the guy

Maxwho went to college with him. It is Facebook. You can't lie on Facebook. It must be true. Come on, Diaper Don. Diaper Don. He'd fall asleep in people's beds and piss himself. Also a classic sign of sociopathy. Wetting the bed. Is that right? Yes, yes. Wetting the bed up until an old age. A classic sign that many sociopaths exhibit.

MerlinMany people have asked me about my diapers they like talking to me you know my favorite thing with him is like hey that's right i'll show you the emails here's the email and it's like oh man we've seen like nine emails from him and they're all terrible like imagine what else is in there i know this is not a new idea but it's so chilling when he's like yeah no big nbd here's my here's those emails you heard it's like it's

Maxfascinating it's a perfect arbitrage on this like moment of political discourse because all of the smoke and heat around that is wondering what's in the emails and the speculation of the idiot media trying to figure out what's in them, what's in them, what's in them. And we sort of know, although the media is, you know, it's good journalism to not be like, wow, we're pretty sure it's this. I mean, we are pretty sure that it's like, you know, for example, that he was coordinating with like WikiLeaks to post their stupid conspiracy theories. So it's like, they're not supposed to come out and say, yeah, we're pretty sure this is what it is. So they're like, well, anything can be

those emails and then it's like you know smoke and heat and smoke and heat and it is a really good like arbitrage on that media climate to just post them because then the media story goes away but of course a lot of what he posts is evidence of illegality so the problem is the reason that that's such a brilliant tactic is we don't have any enforcement mechanism to make him pay for doing something illegal like in theory that's where you have congressional oversight and independent agency oversight and that stuff is all compromised it's really upset it's really upsetting so and and the media is like slightly too like like you know addle-minded to like once the mystery is solved

once we know what's in the emails to like figure out how it's a story you know what i mean it's like mischief managed yeah it's like if it would be like there would be no woodward and bernstein if nixon just like went on the radio and like said what he did right but he had a republican congress who wouldn't prosecute him it's a crazy it's like well that yeah of course well then you wouldn't have that that that you know whatever multi-year investigative detective story

Alexare you listening to the new nixon podcast i didn't even know this existed um it is in our super secret text channel oh listen to the bonus episode um by slate and yeah martha uh just about this woman who is the wife of, not an aide, I forget who it was.

MerlinMartha Mitchell. Sorry, let the old man speak. Martha Mitchell was the wife of John Mitchell, who was kind of one of the heads of the operation, former attorney general, heavily involved. He was kind of the linchpin, like if you go back and watch. He's one of the main players that led to things kind of turning up. And he had this wife named Martha who was talkative and very, very interesting. Sorry, I'm trying to throw it back to you, Alex. tell us about Martha. Well, that's the thing.

AlexDid you know about Martha? Of course I did. I'm 51. Well, I guess that's the thing. I was listening to this podcast and hearing this story about this woman

Merlinwho would call reporters. They were so cute. They were both like, oh my God, there's so much stuff I don't know about Watergate. Dude, oh my God. I was sharing this thing about Watergate and I learned about John Mitchell and it was super interesting.

Speaker AGuys, you're not allowed to do what turns out about this. It's crazy. Well, never mind.

MerlinOh my God, did you know there was presidents after Washington? This is so fucking real. Real AF.

AlexIs your kid going to remember Scaramucci? Is your kid going to remember Steve Bannon?

MerlinI got followed by that bastard again for the second time. I had to soft block him a second time. Jesus fuck, Mooch.

Speaker BWell, I liked it.

MaxThe history podcast is going to be about this era that takes place, you know, that's made in 50 years. It's going to be fucking insane because they're going to be like, Wednesday, November 28th. This was a crazy day in American politics.

Trump appointed a federal judge, allowed his nominee to take over the Consumer Protection Bureau, like subverting the norms and procedures of the department. And Drill was doxed by Homestuck fandom on Tumblr. Like, people are going to be like, wait, what? Like, what the fuck does this mean? Yeah, I don't know.

MerlinSetting aside that you could just take, like, you know, you do that thing where you wake up every morning, and you're like, oh, shit, I guess I better look at Twitter. it's like you could do a whole history a season of a history podcast on 12 hours of what the man said on twitter it's that that part i'm still i'm still not over it i'm still not over the typos i'm still not over the way that like he is clearly we're not even getting into all the articles that came out this week about how badly he's clearly spiraling into dementia but like any 12 hours of what the man said untethered on social media would be an entire like that's a whole season of a tv

show just retweeting the muslim videos oh my god holy shit i mean we're a nerd at this point but like let's not always be too a nerd because this is fucking crazy all right we gotta we gotta we

Maxgotta get this thing moving let's talk about the challenge alex you get a flu shot uh diga diga diga diga is my challenge the challenge was get a flu shot alex did you get a flu shot uh you know

Alexwhat i'm gonna throw to merlin merlin you got a flu shot oh alex you can't have not gotten a flu i got a shot of something um merlin did you get what'd you get no well yeah yeah oh man this is this is gonna be another weird alex health story i'm sorry good lord so um yesterday i did a thing i've had the same protein bar like every day for for two weeks and it's been totally

fine but yesterday i don't know there must have been a tree nut in it there must have been something and this occasionally happens it happened a couple weeks ago after recording um it made i had a severe allergic reaction and uh i had to use my epi pen for the first time yesterday wow what alert what happened what reaction did you have i it was an allergic reaction i assumed to but like what was that but you were couldn't breathe uh like it well my throat started to close up so then i'm like oh I guess this is what my EpiPen is for.

Because normally I just like puke up a whole bunch. And then like the package said no tree nuts. So I don't know what's wrong with me. But so I stabbed. You poor kid.

MerlinMax, look how she cucked us.

AlexShe went up this on us. Yeah, so I stabbed myself in the office bathroom. That was fun. You didn't call me to watch? Yeah, no. I was not going to tell anybody, hey, I got to take off my pants and stab myself in the thigh. I didn't realize the pants had to come off. No, well, my jeans don't go up that far. And then, yeah, Kara's passing me Benadryl under the bathroom door. Oh, no, you poor kid. But no, no. And I was like, no, it was fine. It was fine. Everything. This was in the late afternoon. And I'm like, okay.

MaxDid you get to record it for the podcast?

AlexYou know.

MaxYeah. I recorded mine.

AlexWell, but I was like, oh, this. I woke up around like 8 o'clock. I'm like, ah, I feel much better. I'm glad that I had, I guess, this life-saving device with me. And I went to Walgreens and said, I would like a flu shot, please. And they're like, all right, have you had any allergic reactions in the past two weeks? And I said, yes. And they said they would not give me a flu shot.

And I didn't know why. They couldn't really explain it to me. And I'm like, no, this is bullshit. So I went. And at this point, it's 8 o'clock. but the um we're in Chicago there's 24-hour Walgreens pharmacies so I drove like 15 minutes to another Walgreens and uh they didn't ask me any questions they just said all right um yep let's give you a flu shot but then they asked are you allergic to latex which surprise yeah yes I'm like um I am and they did not have any uh band-aids that were not latex so I didn't get a flu shot

Well, they were out. What a journey. Yeah. And so, but okay. No, no, no. And then this morning, I went back to the regular Walgreens that I go to, hoping it would just be a different person. And they're like, well, are you going to be traveling in the next week or so? And I was like, yeah. So at that point, I'm like, I'm just so with God. You went above and beyond.

MaxYeah. I was going to make fun of you for not doing this challenge, but you actually did.

AlexSo I got A shots.

MaxTell me about the EpiPen. Tell me about the EpiPen. What does it feel like? I'm fascinated by this.

AlexGod, it feels like, you know how there was always that kid in class? I don't know if this was the case for you, Merlin, but there was always that kid in class that was allergic to something. I'm slowly becoming that kid. I have no idea what the fuck is wrong with me. So an EpiPen is just this, it kind of looks like a sonic screwdriver. It's pretty cool. and I was like yeah look I'm this nerd kid who was the cool cool toy but I don't know how to describe it because I've never like plunged anything into a muscle before um and it's all

hazy because I had a lot of Benadryl uh like it hurt a whole lot but then I felt a whole lot better very quickly so I highly recommend EpiPens if you can afford them but I'm kind of mad because I have to spend $500 for another EpiPen,

MerlinI guess. Oh my God. Is that because of that guy? The Wu-Tang guy. Wu-Tang guy, right.

Speaker AJesus, Alex.

MerlinPharma bro. We didn't have allergies when I was a kid. Allergies were invented fairly recently, but there would be the sort of like, who's the kid on The Simpsons? The really pale kid with the lines under his eyes. There would always be

Speaker Aone sickly kid in the class,

Merlinlike special lunch kid. then you feel so bad for them because i i mean i'm not saying that please don't email me it's just that the whole like allergy thing there was allergies to grasses that we all knew about i don't think we knew about all those allergies so kids were probably getting sick and we didn't know why because we didn't have a name or a way to test it we just didn't have that as much when i was a

Alexkid now it's just it's it seems like it's everywhere i used to like roll my eye like i want peanuts on planes why can't i have my peanuts on planes anymore and now now i'm like should i choose between these psych meds that make me function as a human being um or being able to eat a candy bar without dying i so you gotta do a lot of balancing that's no it's uh it sounds really difficult a lot of balance nah it's fine all right uh but no i'm but i plan i scheduled an

appointment for december 12th and i will be getting a flu shot eventually the end all right done alex's stories stories story complete merlin you were a soul you were a fucking soldier you

Merlinwent and got that that that shot i saw a picture of it yeah uh geez this seems like pretty uh piddling stuff uh yeah so my nephew got married yesterday afternoon and we um got my kid out of school a little bit early went downtown and we went to the wedding at city hall with all the family it was really nice and i had on some big boy clothes and khaki pants and stuff and then we had some drinks afterward and then we went to the brand new cvs it was the second day that the cvs has been open literally it was so nice it's so much you guys it's so much nicer than our walgreens

Alexi kept looking at the wall being like wow this is this has it has like a real doctor's office design and I'm like, oh.

MerlinLet me see if I can find some more. Oh, here's me looking handsome in a Ministry of Supply shirt and two devices on my wrist.

AlexI wasn't going to comment on it. I wasn't going to say, oh, I see there's a Fitbit there.

MerlinRolling a Ted Cruz. I like to have two devices on my wrist. Mmm, hair. And so I did it. I went in. I had a couple of fashions and I was like, it's time to get a fucking flu shot. I've never gotten a flu shot before, which my daughter cannot believe because she's had all of the flu shots. I don't think I've ever had a flu shot before. I was very phobic of needles as a kid. I think needles are getting finer. I'm jumping ahead a little bit because I barely felt this thing.

Speaker BYeah, but I went up. I went to the CVS and said, hey, give me a flu shot for my podcast.

MerlinAnd they said, okay, sir, fill this out. And I filled that out. It was like $41. And I had to take off my shirt a little bit. And then they gave me a shot. And I still got the right here. I still got the Band-Aid right here.

Speaker AIt was a breeze.

MerlinDid it hurt? I don't know what they put in my body.

MaxDid you get sick afterwards?

MerlinDid you have any issues? I asked about that. My wife says that's a myth, and I asked this very unpleasant pharmacist if that was true. You know, sometimes people, they want to be a character. This guy likes to be a character. You know, he's a character, and I don't want a character giving me a shot. But anyway, he said, no, you may get a little bit of a fever, but it's not true or isn't true today or this year that people get sick. Because I always heard you get a cold or you get a little flu when you get a flu shot is what I had always heard.

AlexI have gotten that before, but it's always been like a minor reaction to the shot itself. I've never been like, oh, God, I've got the flu.

MerlinHow do you handle shots? And this kind of feeds into what we're talking about here with the whole HappyPen situation. How are you with needles in general?

AlexI'm fine. I get my blood drawn all the time. Yeah. People can poke me. I'm good.

MaxI hate needles. I've always been scared of needles. It's like a very, I think it's my worst irrational phobia. Because there's not really any reason to be afraid of needles. Like, they really don't actually hurt that much.

AlexI mean, the side effects. Like, if you, you know, if there's even a little bit of an air bubble in that flu shot, you're really fucked up.

MaxBut that's probably not going to happen. because like nobody dies from like more people die in airplane accidents than die of a bubble

Merlinin a flu shot needle well let me let me put on my buddhist hat for a minute here i think it's i think it's that it's the fear it's the scared of feeling the feeling that you're feeling about what you're feeling i think it's the fear of the fear that really gets you where you build it up in your head for me like that's right that was probably my greatest fear as a child was the whole idea that i might have to go to the doctor and get a shot and i was completely traumatized i was like you know like when you drive by the vet and your dog starts barking like that was i had no idea that other people had i i thought this was my own weird morbid morbid fear of getting a shot it was

this like i would i would just burst into tears just thinking i had the same thing i thought that

Maxwas my own weird psychosis so also also uh pooping in public bathrooms you know what oh yeah no can't never you know what bothers me about getting the shot it's that i i imagine it's that it's it's not the shot it's that i imagine how upset i it's how how anxious i am while they're unpacking the needles and everything sitting in the little chair you know what i mean and they they like tie you off and then they they do a little swab and it's just i'm just that's the moment that i dread it's like it's the actual shot there's almost a relief of that it happens and it's not as bad as

I imagined and it's the it's the out of control anxiety in that moment that I just can't I can't

Merlinit's a very out of control experience it's but you know it's I mean not to make it about kids and parents but like this is something you face all the time with a kid and I am sympathetic to it because I suffer from it too which is like there's all kinds of things where you just want to be like just fucking do it like I swear to god it's not as bad as you think it's gonna be just do it I know everything will be fine and this is your sisyphean task as a parent is to not find yourself saying that all the time, even though it turns out to be true. But like, I think there's a lot of things like this, you know? I mean, I was talking to my kid about a term I first learned

probably in the early 80s was the first time I heard about agoraphobia. And agoraphobia was something everybody was like, oh God, we have finally gone too far with our understanding of phobias. Because back then, agoraphobia, when they talk about on the news, they would say, oh, there's this crazy new thing crazy people have, which is a fear of everything or a fear that was described as fear of everything fear of open spaces or in time it was like fear of being anywhere outside the house now if you go and actually look up agoraphobia today what it says

is incredibly fucking sensible which is that it's a fear of being in a situation where you might be embarrassed anxious or scared which i totally understand that totally makes sense but there's just all this stuff that like you don't have a clinical explanation for it and so you kind of just gotta fake your way around it i'm not sure where i'm going with this no no that made totally we have developed ways i'm glad we have developed this goes back to the spectrum stuff this goes back to like the allergy stuff all this stuff it's such a relief it's not an answer it's not

the end but it is such a it's so it makes me feel good about science and medicine at its near best when we get better at the ability to detect measure and properly label something because now you have something you can deal with. We're not done. It's not fixed, but like, we're better off than we were before. Like to me, that's the march of medicine that I like to see is like now, no, you're not stupid. Like you have something called dyslexia that we didn't used to have a name for. Like that kind of stuff makes me really happy. I mean, not happy, but like, you know, there's so much shit you hear about these industries that like the actual, the science

that leads us to be able to detect something better is like, it's, I don't know, that just

Alexmakes me happy as a modern person i always like to think that hopefully all of like the new developments and stuff um i wanted to make me more boring like i don't want being gay to be like interesting thing about me like i don't want being bipolar to be an interesting thing like it's just a thing um and any more than your blood yeah i just it's not like it's not like a where you go

Merlinoh i'm a positive yeah i'm special it's just it's just another fact i certainly know people who like

Maxthat who have some facet of their identity some facet of of their of that they you know of a thing about them that they can't really control you know like that they're gay or they're gluten intolerant or whatever and that becomes their whole identity right like the fucking like that that girl i was talking about the twin mom or whatever on instagram and it's like that's just a random thing that happened to you that's not you know that's not actually it's like see that picture of stephen

Merlincolbert colbert with his black friend it's like that's his black yeah that's his friend it's the

Maxblack guy i'm automatically suspicious and and and assume that people are extremely boring if their entire identity is being like the gay friend or the gluten intolerant person or you know it's like really that's the best you think that you think they define it that way yes yes some people there are some people who i'm not this is not in a vacuum right this isn't absent like societal pressure but some people take those things like i had twins or i can't eat bread and then it's like or like i'm like paleo or whatever and then it's like boom that's going to be their whole identity and they're like the paleo guy the gay person and it's like that's so boring like you didn't pick

that that's just a thing about you like don't don't substitute that for personality like i don't want to go all your stories have to relate to you eating paleo like i don't want to hear this or there's also oh there's there's there's also like high functioning alcoholic guy there's like where all their stories are about drinking and it's like don't i don't want to hear your stories about drinking like can't you have some other interesting facet of your personality well there's a joke a

Merlinlong time ago that is still a true thing which is when people would say well like you know why isn't there you know why isn't there a men's liberation movement or why isn't there a men's

Alexclub and all that stuff great point why are you see yeah hashtag international men's day what a fun day why isn't there a white history month

Merlinwe're so lost in all this we will not you'll not replace us and that's what we and that's

MaxSogium that did processed cheese. And a mayonnaise jar that you can store upside down so that it pours out right when you open it.

MerlinI mean, but like one feature of being the dominant culture, like from a hegemonic standpoint, is that everything ends up in some way being defined by its value to you or how it's different to you. Whether that's like, well, the value of women is that it's my property and I take care of them. I think of this person like my daughter. Why do you think about him like a fucking human being before you worry about whether it's somebody's daughter? Like that's useful as a way to emulate the feeling that this is actually a human being. But, you know, you start with the property and you go, I have to take care of the things that belong to me.

And I'll be a benevolent dictator with the things that I own. And then I have to keep an eye on all the things that I can identify as being different from me. And you don't even have to define who you are. You just get to define everybody else as being the absence of what you are or being the corrupted, sometimes impotent version of what you are. Right. to the, oh, that's my crippled friend, Wheels.

MaxThat's my, this is my disabled friend. He's a clown with a hook for a hand.

Speaker ALet's go to your house.

MaxI always hate when you're in some sort of group discussion setting and then someone has to start make this statement where they go, well, as a blank. And it could be, well, as a gay man, or it could be like as an architect. It doesn't matter. It's like, just don't say that part. It's the worst dependent clause ever. Just don't say that part. I realize this is probably my crankiest old man opinion, but it's the least interesting thing about you are your fucking food allergies and your sexual orientation and all these things you can't control.

It's just not interesting. It's like, I would rather you're if you're into model trains.

Speaker BAt least that's something that you picked. As Thomas the Tank Engine enthusiast.

MerlinListen, I'm into clown hooking because of how God made me. Clown hooking is not a choice in my life. It's who I am.

AlexAs someone who really enjoys eating snack foods with utensils. Cama. Cama.

MaxMine is as a podcaster.

MerlinYes. As a woke Twitter ally.

Thank you.

Show notes

Transcript

53. I'm Hooky!

Show notes

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