94. The Flat One

AlexThis is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast with Merlin Mann, Alex Cox and Max Temkin. This week's challenge, make a YouTube playlist.

Is Merlin here?

MaxI hear some sort of tribal music in the background.

MerlinYes, introducing... Oh, I'm on fire this morning. En fuego. Sorry I'm late. Alex was actually late. I'm coming up with ideas for challenges, and I got ideas. Oh, do you? That's good, because I feel like we're one week away from doing the keychain challenge. Yay. You know, I've got it here on the list. It's line 98.

I wonder if I should tag that one. Whose idea was that? Was that the Reddit?

AlexSure, yes. I have no idea what you're talking about.

MerlinYou okay? You okay, Alex? I well I was just there's a running joke on the Dubai Friday show that when we do the keychain challenge

AlexIt'll officially be the end of the show. Yes, but you're making a reference to the spreadsheet and I don't have the spreadsheet open

MerlinI'll send it to you. It's also put a link in the doc

AlexI've just been told there's a dream daddy Uh graphic novel great very exciting

MerlinDoes it continue the story of dream daddy? Oh, yeah, you had an idea Alex. This isn't this is not the show you guys

Maxalright you sound low energy what's going on I'm sorry I'm organizing my I'm just

Merlintaking a second to organize my notes okay I have big let me organize my notes too mm-hmm okay set to Alexa organized notes Alexa organized notes Alexa why don't you know that organize my notes

Speaker Abut here's something fun would you like to know this week's hey this is Merlin

MerlinAlexa, stop. Hey, everybody, it's your old pal Merlin, and he's singing the song today. Follow up. Dig it.

MaxIs this a show? Business Insider. President Donald Trump uses an iPad to read. He calls it, quote, the flat one, according to a tweet from ABC News' Tara Palmieri. Trump's computer use was in focus this week as he attacked Google on Tuesday, claiming it used its powers over search to suppress conservative news about himself. Google denies the accusation. While Trump may love to tweet, he's not really a big computer user. Quote, he doesn't use a computer, New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said on Twitter. It is true, by the way. This is an aside from breakout character Max from the hit podcast Dubai Friday.

It is true that Trump has never been photographed using a computer. He's been photographed reading computers, but it's not clear that he knows how to click and type. Making that serious face that he makes. Quote, someone is doing the Googling, but not him.

Speaker AIt's me, the Googler.

MaxI live in your search history.

Speaker AWhat even are bondage pants?

MaxHello. So you guys, how are you guys liking your new flat ones? You think Apple's coming out with new flat ones this year? Oh, man. I want a maxi flat boy. I want all the original gear. All the kit and tackle. I think I heard that they're going to do a small bezel flat one. Oh, God. It's a small boy. It's a flat one. Oh.

I've never been more tempted to start a tech podcast and just call it like the flat ones and just talk about iPads. And that does two things for me, which is one, I get to use that incredible pun. And then two, I probably would get into the Relay FM Slack.

MerlinOh, that would be it. You'd be invited. One of the classic semi-classic self-owns of the last five years, especially on the ding-a-lings on the alt-right, is when they go and do a Google search and share their results. And even if it doesn't have hentai porn in it, It shows very clearly how the algorithm has been tuned for their own ding-a-ling point of view.

MaxYes. Yeah. Like their name always shows up because they're constantly, you know, ego-surfing their own name or something like that. Yeah.

MerlinSo if you've spent a week on a project trying to find things that show that you are, you know, being fake news, there's a pretty good chance you're going to eventually bubble up some stuff. I don't know. I mean, the algorithm is tuned per person, right?

MaxIt evolves over time. Obvious other breaking news with that was that last week, Alex, your friends of the show, Alex Jones, was he was like doing a screen share on the air of his computer and he had or his phone maybe or something. And he had open a couple of tabs of trans porn on his phone. and it's funny because you know to each his own but it's funny only because he recently as you may have heard in the news got banned from you know Twitter and YouTube and all these different platforms because he was making anti-trans comments

can we do a yes yes no because I learned a new term please

Alexplease enlighten us go on

MerlinAlex do you know the meaning of trap porn no please go on Max do you know the meaning of trap porn? Like bees in the trap? Yeah, yeah, chicken in the bread pan picking out dough. I know. Apparently, turns out there is a genre of men's well, it's entertainment. It's not men's entertainment. It's not going to be normative. There's a genre of entertainment peculiarly enjoyed by straight men called trap porn. Yes. It involves getting something like a beach from

a hot chick and then finding out she has a dong. It's called trap porn and it's a genre. I looked it up on the internet and now my results changed. Alex, had you ever heard of trap porn? Is there another name for that in your community?

AlexShitty transphobic stereotypes. That's about it. No.

MerlinWell, I didn't spend time viewing the trap porn. And I don't even know if that could be a terrible word. I don't know. But that when you go and look.

MaxWell, I was having a fight with my kids and they said the trap porn didn't exist. And I was only Googling it to prove that it did exist.

MerlinThat's why I had seven tabs of dongs. the question I don't know because I have not gone and looked at it I will do that as part of my Pete Townsend research I'm willing to go in and do that for you on behalf of the listener my question is when they find out that it's not what they expected in the downstairs basement tackle area are they happy? are they relieved? are they mad?

Alexwell is it trap porn like they are watching somebody else be trapped or is it like is there a tab on Pornhub that's like, this is trap porn. I'm very confused, I guess.

MerlinThere's one way to find out. I don't want to. I'm sending you the link to Urban Dictionary. Oh, no.

MaxI have an overarching theory. We talked about this a little bit in our super secret channel. Command shift N, highly recommended.

Speaker AOh, no.

MaxCommand shift N. I think there's a couple of interesting overarching theories that will explain all of this, which this is the most. I mean I have to admit that I find it I find it I just find it so compelling that Alex Jones watches trans porn And also like he's made a career of hating trans people in this I don't know why why is I don't couldn't like it's just it just it's like poetic justice or It's something it's but you know I number one I think in general that people always hate most in others what they fear in themselves

Merlinthemselves. You actually, you laid this out nicely in our super secret text channel, Max. You have some persuasive theory behind this. Well, I know that, so a friend of the show,

MaxCard's co-creator David, recently got his PhD in research psychology at UCLA. And one of the things he's interested in is like politics and sexual habits. And what's cool about studying that right now is historically for, you know, whatever, for however long people have been interested in this since like Kinsey or whatever, we've used surveys. You ask people like, what are you into? And even if a lot of people are into like, you know, whatever incest porn or trans porn or something really taboo, they would never necessarily confess that on a survey.

But now we have to it.

MerlinIt's one thing to admit that you like boobies. And it's another thing to say you watch boobies. Another thing you say you like boobies that are on a transition person.

MaxRight. Right. And you would expect people to sort of under report the more they would they view their own fetish as niche. And obviously the Internet has changed that considerably. And now we actually have data sets from like, you know, Pornhub and things like that. And they release like data, not not of individual viewers, but of trends. And you can see like what are people actually consuming? So like I know David, David has showed me some research that shows like in like so like in southern states, the top porn categories are interracial porn. and one of the theories that people have is that basically people you know arousal in psychology

arousal means something different than like a sexual context it just means like your excitement like you could be a heightened state of awareness yeah it's like uh you could go to a horror movie and be aroused by it aroused just means like you're you're you're i don't know what you have like energy and um arousal like the greater the taboo and the more it's forbidden the more the arousal because the more it has that that naughtiness so it does kind of check out to me in a way that that if alex jones made a whole career out of demonizing trans people and being afraid of them

and and reporting on their nefarious political agenda and you know whatever that the greatest taboo in the world for him would be to to be sexually aroused by them and that and that and and it just makes it better and better and better like it's so forbidden um in the in the same way that in the same way that like in the South you have interracial porn or I don't know what what I actually don't know what people in blue states watch well and you I mean this is this is kind of

Merlinlike at least psychology 202 stuff which is that you know we tend to seek out the thing that we're not I mean at the very basic level of hetero attraction you are attracted to the gender that's not yours I'm obviously not a psychologist but I bet that goes for lots of stuff I bet there are big powerful strong men probably attorneys in New York that want want a lady to step on their stamp

Maxcollection well that's part of the fun there's a whole documentary about this with the elliot spitzer thing that alex that i think was by alex gibney and alex says doesn't exist remember that fight i never was able to find it but there was a whole thing where there was there was interviews on that and the elliot spitzer documentary or some documentary about elliot spitzer that i thought was by alex gibney but they interviewed like escorts who work on wall street and they talked about how all these powerful men need someone to smash their balls yeah yeah yeah

MerlinYeah, maybe it was Alex Garland. It could be a different Alex. We'll never know. You also, by the way, had the most on-brand Max Temkin response, in addition to your usual, you know, just being a karma suck and not letting anything be fun. You dive-bombed in with my favorite Max response. So we were going in and went, oh, boy, look at this. Alex Jones. Alex Jones. Alex Jones. And quick in passing. It was noted by some people, not simply that it was in his visual history, but was it actually in his favorites? Could that be possible? Oh. That it was like bookmarked?

Because there's a difference there.

AlexYeah. I was thinking like I wonder how much of this is like how close can I get to the dog before it starts barking at me type of thing. Or the cat hisses. I don't. Whatever that metaphor is. Or if he's like actually into it. And it's like when preachers are gay. Like very much of what Max said.

MaxRepublican congressmen are working up with pages in the cloakroom or whatever. Mail pages.

AlexRight. And that's what I think is curious if it's that or if he's genuinely like I I go down. Thank God we had this challenge. But usually my YouTube is just filled with conspiracy theory videos because that's what I will watch for two hours. Not. Oh, wow.

MerlinYeah. We were having a lively conversation about this and having having some laughs. And somehow we pivoted to, oh, you know what we did? You pivoted to these facts you just dropped about how, oh, it's interracial porn or it's incest porn. And you said, actually, I have a materialist explanation for that. And I said, if memory serves, of course you do. What is your materialist explanation for the rise of incest porn? Because it's pretty good.

MaxI just think that a lot of this I'm getting from that podcast, John Ronson's, Ron Johnson's podcast about the porn industry. They're a basement for the Mets. Yep. The porn industry has changed a lot over the last couple of years where the margins are down Yeah, basically like because you know long tail because you can't make porn without it going on like free streaming sites Like immediately it's very very hard. There's like very you know somebody like fucking a lioness like you're gonna have to figure out a way to

Merlinmonetize that that's a lot of

MaxBoogie nights yeah, it's it's so anyway the business models has been very disrupted So now like all porn is like low budget and amateur. There's not the same productions that there was in like the 80s or whatever. And I think the rise of incest porn is largely explained because it's cheap to make. Like it's the cheapest plot to throw on a porn is just to say, yeah, they're a brother and sister.

MerlinI love what makes it cheap. It's what makes it cheap. The beauty part is what makes it cheap is you go, what's our budget for this? we have $90 plus some Starbucks. So basically, we've got somebody who's tweaked out and we've got a very nice MILF. And you go, okay, well, now the MILF is the mom. Oh, okay, well, all you have to do is change the credits a little bit, change the casting, and suddenly you've made something very perverse.

MaxYeah, the other thing that Ron Johnson talks about is that... Ron Johnson is right. is the hashtag economy of porn. So like you kind of in order to like do well in the new environment with your porn, it has to have lots of hashtags. And so what you're, so like you can, so basically what you're doing is you shoot a scene and then you're trying to come up with this brainstorm as many hashtags as possible to put on it so that it comes up in as many searches as possible.

MerlinOh, so that it's somebody who's looking for discoverability for their special thing.

MaxRight, right. So you can add incest. Like missing pounce line missing a toe incest is incest is like bingo where it's like it's like a free space in the middle of The bingo card like I'm gonna add incest you can put the incest hashtag on almost any scene right okay Cuz like if that's what you're into you can be like yeah sure let's have this show up in that you know Whatever but you couldn't say it you couldn't say lion pegging because you don't have an authentic lion Right people are gonna take one look at it and they're gonna go where's the lion But there you know if you're if if you need incest porn and you're like and there's just like

like whatever, a man and a woman with the same hair color having sex, and you're like, yeah, they're brother and sister. You'd be like, oh, yeah, yeah.

AlexFor eternal twins, yep. Yep.

MaxI'm into it. Ooh, twins are creepy.

AlexWhat a normal opinion. That's probably not going to come up, though. Nope. Oh, boy.

MerlinWhat was that thing, Ted Cruz? No, no, Ted Cruz actually Somebody on Ted Cruz's team Or Ted Cruz Somebody with access to Ted Cruz's account Tooted out a link To like mom watching people Or like her daughter have sex Was that the video? Do you remember this? I remember Remember she was around the corner And she started jerking her gherkin Remember that? I remember that he tweeted

MaxBut I never I never watched the video that he tweeted So I don't know what that was Oh, it's so good Let me find it

MerlinTed Cruz mom corner porn masturbation. The time Ted Cruz argued is this a I should take up masturbation. I get too many false thoughts. Oh, I'm very sorry. This is my worst

Maxfear is that I'll just be watching some good old incest porn on my flat one and then I'll think of a funny political tweet and I'll go like I'll be like I should reply to the president and say you sir should lower that flag to half mast and I'll post and I'll go to paste my link of the picture of John McCain I was

Merlinjust stirring my beans on me mobile oh no Ted Cruz just liked a very not safe for work tweet and it's all over followers timeline

Maxhe faved it or

Merlinhe faved it or posted it I think it was who can keep it straight anymore That guy's such a fucking freak.

MaxI know.

MerlinI know. Now he's trying to go after Beto O'Rourke because he's cool.

MaxHe was probably trying to drink a cold Campbell soup like a soda in one hand and cranking his hog in the other hand. I was having some soup just like a normal person enjoys soup.

Speaker AThat's such a good thing.

MerlinYou know that's all done by one guy. That's the amazing part about BLR. is it's all one guy. One guy.

MaxSo you know the funny... That'll find you soon. So Beto is closing in. So my man Beto is closing in on Ted Cruz. He is one point behind, which is a statistical tie. And that is not accounting in these polls for what I would say is the likely turnout model, which is Republicans stay home and Democrats vote. So I'm very, very excited for Beto. I do think Ted Cruz is going down. And Ted Cruz is getting a little whiff. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Max Temkin, you think Beto has a chance of winning? Let's come back. We'll come back to this, but I'm getting excited about it. And I do. And if we hold every other Senate seat and get Beto, we might be in good shape, but we're probably not going to. We're probably going to lose two or three seats in the Senate is my guess. But even if we get Beto. But anyway, Cruz is getting a little whiff of the desperation there. And he's challenged Beto to like seven debates because, you know, Ted Cruz fancies himself like a debate boy.

like he thinks he's like a real clever like high school debate like he's good you know you know

Merlinthat personality of like he's very very confident oh no 100% like if I can just get you well yeah I mean it would be sort of like oh if I could just get you into a game of cribbage I would show you because I'm so good at cribbage he really he thinks that he is very good with words and persuasive

Maxyes he thinks he's very very clever and like very likable when he's in that situation so he's challenge beta to like seven debates which is just ludicrous and uh like that's gonna like cinch it up for him but i thought i would just play this is not part of the challenge this week but i do have this little video of it's your senator i don't know what the context of this but last year someone asked senator ted cruz to talk about queso and he just sort of held forth on the topic of queso for a minute i thought i would play this just keep in mind this is him thinking that he's real cool and he's gonna like and get everyone on his side listeners who are who uh queso is a kind

Merlinof delicious cheese sauce that's a Mexican-American treat.

MaxIt's so great.

Speaker AIt just tastes good. It speaks to the soul. Good queso relaxes you. Look, if cheese dip can be served on a Ritz cracker or with one of those tiny Vienna sausages.

AlexOh, my God.

Speaker AQueso is made to be scooped up with tortilla chips dribbling down your chin and onto your shoulder. One is a visceral, emotional, powerful family bond. Oh, my God. When kids pour in the nachos covered in queso. What? at an afternoon tea.

MerlinWhat? I hate him.

AlexI have seen this video 38 times and it never becomes normal.

MerlinI loathe him. I loathe him. I hate him. Somebody needs to flash his P-Ram.

Speaker ALike, he's something as fuck up in that dude's head.

Maxoh jesus what did i post this week i had like an i message thing that was driving me it was it was driving me within an inch of my sanity where like on what was it on mac i was sending messages and everyone had an air but it was sending and then i didn't know what was going and what wasn't and i finally like broke down and i did that post that i hate when other people do on twitter which is i just i trust me i googled it and i tried all the things that google said and then i couldn't fix it and so i just posted and i was like please someone help me like i message on Mac is like extremely broken in this one way and I don't know what to

do to fix it and God it was the worst I don't know when the last time you guys asked for you can't do it was it was so fucking useless I got like five switch to Linux's and I got a bunch of flash the p Rams and what I eventually did if anyone is actually having this problem was I like logged out of iMessage on all my devices and log back in and I think that that made it work me sound tired i'm so tired why why are you did you check your messages max um i'm not sure they're working yet let's see oh here we go okay what is this why did i well everyone was posting this on twitter

yesterday what what am i looking at here uh here's the original tweet what is this well first of all calista gingrich the wife of uh okay is that the one that he divorced while she was no no that's

Merlinthe different one the cancer one no that's a different one um no he can't cancel it's not with us anymore. RIP. In this one, so Calista Gingrich has recently discovered...

MaxAh, but this is the first wife, though. This isn't the cancer one. This is the one before that.

MerlinOh, no, this is the current one. The current one. Model 3. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's like the Model X or whatever. Okay. So this, Calista Gingrich has apparently discovered filters for things that she posts, which makes this, even without the filters, this would be so good. Calista Gingrich, 22 hours ago, dinner in Roma with at Newt Gingrich. I hate this. Italy flag. Oh, really get in there. Really get in there. Really get in and look.

MaxIt's making my skin crawl.

MerlinSo this guy has what looks like he cut open a cheese and made it into a bowl and filled it with fat pasta and a man with latex gloves is holding a giant forkful of disgusting barfy pasta in front of Callista Gingrich as she doesn't look at it. She stares at the camera. He's gazing. It's really upsetting.

MaxHe's gazing lovingly at her like, yeah.

Speaker AHe's going to consume me.

MaxNow, let me stand up for this. Let me stand up for this just for one second. Have you guys never seen hot pasta like tossed in a cheese thing?

AlexNo.

MaxYou've never seen that? It's good with the antisausages. It is a thing in Italian food. Okay, so is that a cheese bowl? Yeah, so it's a wheel of cheese. And what happens is you put the hot pasta in it and you toss it in there. Now, what I have not seen, what makes this a little disgusting is that there should not be pasta sauce in with the cheese wheel. Well, it's got grated Parmesan on it as well.

MerlinI'm sorry. I'm zooming in a little bit. No. It's got grated. It looks like a Bolognese. It looks like a Bolognese. It's got chunks of meat. And it's got grated Parmesan.

MaxThey're at a fucking macaroni grill. Like, this is not. This is not.

MerlinThis is not like a. Is this the first time you dine with us, Mrs. King? This is not like a beautiful.

Speaker ASo we do things a little bit different here. Giuseppe feeds you.

MaxIt's called tapas, or as you might know it, small plates. Small plates. I fucking hate when restaurants do that. We're like, oh, we are. Let me tell you how we do it here. What you're going to do here, you're going to get a couple of plates and share them all. Isn't that wild? I've been to a restaurant before. I know how it works.

AlexLook at that car in the background, though. The sticker is... Do we know that this is actually in Rome?

MaxThis is very... I think that they might be in Westworld. Oh, do you see what I'm saying? No, Westworld. She's a host. Joseph is a host. But I think the plot twist here is that she's also a host. These are two hosts having a bowl of pasta together.

MerlinLook at that next one. Look at that next one. Don't they look pretty? Look at those filters.

AlexOh, wow. Jesus. Okay. that is so upsetting my god it's super upsetting all right uh wait i have more business for us

Maxevery night can you fucking imagine how insufferable that would be yeah he you know he came to i met new kingrich once he came to speak at my my college when i was there they had like a string of like republican speakers i think under the guise of like false you know both sides ism and i was sort of the the i was sort of a good boy at the college i did like student government and stuff. Yeah, you like weasel your way into some special status or something, right? Typically you'd get so they would have like a talk, right? Newt Gingrich would come to the school and he would do

a talk in a big, you know, theater, but then before that there would be like a dinner with the college president and they'd serve good ass food at that dinner and so I'd always try to get myself into the thing because, you know, like I'll take a nice free dinner as a college student, so I went to this dinner with Newt Gingrich and the man was just like, he was just like, I didn't even know how to describe i mean what was it he wasn't he wasn't charming i could see him being charming no he was he was he was such an he was just so aloof like he just he was so out of it

like didn't give a shit about anything going on didn't participate in conversation like they had no and he he probably hated having to do these like paid college gigs i guess but like i would contrast it with we also had carl rove who at that time i considered to be my sort of nemesis and intellectual equal we had carl rove come to dinner and i was very excited to meet carl rove because I wanted to sort of figure out what his deal was. And with Karl Rove, it was funny because all these students, the sort of social justice-y students who came to this dinner, they wanted to entrap him in their web of logic.

They wanted to engage him in a Socratic dialogue. And it was a game to him. He would just swat them down like flies, right? They'd be like, ah, Mr. Rove, well, if you agree with that, then you must agree with this. And he would just be like, nope. He would just sap all the joy out of it. And you could tell he was having fun, just like running circles around these idiot kids. But boy, did Newt Gingrich was just a real dud. And then I remember when he went to speak, one of his big points in his talk, and this was in 2010 or something like that.

So it was way long before the Trump era. One of his points was he was like, I don't understand. Why is it that we can track a package and I can know where my FedEx package is using my phone at any moment, But we have no idea where all these illegal immigrants are when they cross And I remember he had a whole riff about this for like five minutes and I remember thinking to myself That's the dumbest fucking thing I've ever heard like yeah They're like FedEx packages have like a barcode on them and we scan them all the time and

Immigrants when there's a chain of custody that is has taken years of evolution right and also I would say the success rate for the tracking system working for my FedEx packages is probably about 75% Despite all of that and that's why we need to get the US Postal Service. I remember thinking I remember thinking that's the dumbest thing in the world and thinking the The no I was thinking this is probably the end of the Republican Party Because if this is supposed to be like the big idea guy in the Republican Party and this is what they're saying It probably they're gonna be go kind of go extinct and have to like

Rebrand or something within the next two or three years and now contract was he contract with America guy? Yeah, yeah, yeah sure in the Republican Revolution 1994 sure enough Trump's in there now. And I would say Trump's ideas are substantially stupider than having the FedEx tracking system for illegal immigrants. Like I yearn for the days when people suggested the FedEx tracking system for illegal immigrants.

AlexWho do you think is the most charming Republican senator in person?

MerlinSo it's a guess on if you got to hang with this person If you got to meet them

MaxOr just to the press or what I would say McCain I would say McCain was for sure the most Skillful manipulator of the press Well he's not a contender anymore Easy text I bet you Chuck Grassley's kind of fun McCain had the whole press like believing this whole mythology about him Oh boy Wasn't true I knew this was coming

MerlinI embraced myself you guys need me for the phone? Well, sorry.

MaxNo, I... Go ahead.

MerlinGo ahead.

MaxI had to turn off El Chapo. It was making me very uncomfortable. I'm sorry. I thought I stuck the landing there.

MerlinI guess I didn't bring it in for a landing like I thought. Let's see. Bill Clinton, people say he's nice in person. He's not a senator.

AlexOh, oh.

MaxOh, Bill Clinton has crazy energy. If you ever have a chance to see him speak or something, I...

MerlinThey say he makes everybody feel like the most important person in the room.

MaxYeah, he does. I mean, lots of politicians do that. I would say that's like a good indicator of apologizing. If you walk away from him going, man, I really had something special with that guy. I really connected with that guy. That means he's good at what he does. But Clinton has another thing, which is I met him at the Democratic Convention a couple years ago. And when he came into the room, it felt like the electricity got turned on or something. I don't know how to describe it. Like the crowd, like you just felt it in your skin.

It was like, it was energy. I bet Patrick Stewart has that. Oh, it would not surprise me. That guy has some sort of fucking energy. Like a balloon would have stuck to the back of my hand or something. Like it was crazy.

MerlinIt sounds crazy, but like it's true. Like one night I didn't go to a party I really should have gone to. And back in Tallahassee, this woman's mom came to the party. And everybody knew she had this mom. and the one party I didn't go to Jane Fonda was there and everybody was like oh my god she was like the barometric pressure in the room changed you didn't even know she was in the room yet but she exudes such a charisma in the room you know I'm talking about that that's the feeling

Maxwe're talking about I once was in a bar in Boston for PAX and we were waiting to get into this fancy bar in the little vestibule and all of a sudden the door blows open and this tall blonde woman comes in wearing like a black like feather coat and I felt it felt like time was dilating like time was slowing down and everyone like turned to look and it was just like there was like a like suction in the room or something it was just like everything went quiet by a few decibels and it was uh Charlize Theron who I did not I didn't I didn't recognize I well I didn't so

believe I did not go like oh that's Charlize Theron it was just it was just like boom just like everything went quiet and like and and it was crazy like she just had some energy about her and she just blows into this bar and uh she's carrying her two adopted oh you told me she goes and gets a drink yes and just sat and she was i think she was in boston filming and she had her two adopted black babies with her and sat them on the bar and they were kind of eating breadsticks and she was having a drink and um like maybe he's on a bar eating bread everyone everyone just sort

of went on life is normal and she was and she did take her um flat one and she had it sort of propped up on the bar and she was showing her babies videos of like african children and like grass skirts like like playing this is just sort of a weird it was just sort of a weird scene

Merlinoh let's do a lightning round um i'm gonna do one i'll bet meryl streep is like that i'll bet meryl streep comes in a room and i i bet she is charming she has a great laugh i bet i bet she would light up a room when she comes in.

MaxI bet Lin-Manuel Miranda has that crazy stage presence. Yes.

AlexYes. What about you, Alex? I kept thinking there's nobody. I'm absolutely broken. I've never felt any of this energy around another human being. And then I remembered that I have met Matt Smith and it was at one of those stupid like, it was the worst time. Oh, you waited in line, right? Yeah, and I was like, this is so stupid. I don't want to do this, but someone like my friends had put money together for me to have a picture with Matt Smith and I'm like, this is so fucking stupid, but thanks guys. And then like you go behind this curtain and then he's like, hello. And it was like the best 50 seconds of my entire life.

Well, describe it. I don't know. He smelled really, really, really good.

MaxSo he was wearing a scarf and you walk up to him.

AlexNo, he was wearing, I have a photograph of it. Was he wearing his floppy hat? No, no. He was actually wearing a shirt that was unbuttoned quite a bit in a way that was appealing. and we took a picture and he gave a hug and he smelled better than any other human being in the world. And that's about it. And then I walked away. Also, the Mickey Mouse character.

Okay, how do I?

MerlinOh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Am I going to get a new hashtag out of this one?

Speaker ANo, no, no, no. Have you?

MerlinBounce sign, big head character.

Speaker AHello! Welcome to the happiest place on earth.

AlexWell, I was Googling for it. No, we'll save that story for another day.

MaxAnytime a fursuit character talks to Alex, she immediately vomits in excitement. There's a leak in the basement.

Speaker AHey, Alex, welcome to Disney World. You like fun rides? Okay. Oh, what's your name?

All right.

MerlinYou go to the character breakfast and just repeatedly vomit.

Speaker AI'm wishing.

MaxChip and Dale start walking over and a pancake starts sliding back out of Alex's mouth. Just a fully intact Mickey waffle starts sliding out of her mouth. Did you want to get a picture?

Speaker BNo.

Speaker AI just need to go

MaxWhen I was at the last time I was at Disney World I did feel I did get some celebrity energy From you know Mickey and Goofy and all of them And then there's sort of the newfangled characters Like the you know I don't know Like the Tangled or Stitch Or whatever and I was like

and I was like I don't and I was like I'm tangled I was like I'm not I'm not impressed to me. I don't care about you get out of my face Mahara means family

Yeah, I I was there was a plenty of characters at Disney where I was old enough that I was like I'm not nostalgic for you

Speaker AGet out of my way. Well, okay

MerlinI don't make this about sex But I have to tell you that at some, so I'm looking for a picture of me at Disney World when I was 10.

AlexOh, boy.

MerlinMeeting Mickey Mouse. But at some point I learned or was told that the genders of the actors inside the big head did not conform to the gender necessarily. That in fact they were almost all slight women.

MaxWasn't Kara a Disney character?

AlexShe was a Disney cast member. What's that? All of the employees are cast members.

MaxOh, I see. Okay, I thought she played one of those characters.

AlexNo, she just sold Pirates of the Caribbean merch. He's a noob, Merlin, don't judge. Classic character tangles.

MaxYou probably do have to practice signing your signature with one of those three-fingered gloves.

AlexYou do indeed. I bet that's pretty hard. You need to study the, there is a signature, a like a signature way that each character will sign their name. Oh, that's so cool. Yeah. And you need to study it and practice it. And only then can you become a costumed cast member.

MaxI'll be damned. Yeah. They ask you every street in London. You have to be ready to name them all.

MerlinThey call it the knowledge. But that's the thing though. Then I found out. So then I found out and then I started, you know, the way the mind works, you start interpolating and I was like, oh, there's actually a very slender dancer inside all of those outfits. And it started to make me a little uncomfortable in a good way.

AlexWell, it's it's weird, too, because when you say slender dancer, you mean like a ballet dancer, because I've I told you about my underground Disney adventure. Right. Tell me again. It's it's just I. Well, that's pretty much it. I got a friend who. Good story, Alex. I did a thing once. next topic okay just uh if you if you go have a chance to go into the disney tunnels and you see because there's this we've talked about this before everywhere in disney world there's a

special entrance and exit so you'll never see a character like without their head like you can't see tigger like smoking a cigarette in a back well you don't see a pirate in tomorrowland exactly so there's tunnels and but usually they so they kind of strip as soon as they get underneath the tunnel and they're just all totally jacked and like sinewy because you have to be skinny enough to fit into all the various costumes it's really strange you think it's like an olympic village

Merlinsituation yeah but oh sure i mean all that pressure you want a medal yeah yeah oh man but

Maxboy they're game for it aren't they um all right they like that suit let's see the money zone and then I have one more topic before that I have a quick one before the challenge so let's see so we are nearing the end of the month here oh well yeah we're nearing our first anniversary well

Merlinthe one year mark however you want to define it we're also nearing the one year mark of our

Maxlittle money zone oh are we did you realize that I did not September wow well it's going pretty well for us I guess all right well do my Friday as you know is a free podcast no ads or nothing on here and we make our money for doing this podcast we are a listener supported on our Patreon, so if you like Dubai Friday, please go to giveusyourfuckingmoney.com. You become a subscriber for $5, and every week, you will get a whole second private episode of Dubai Friday. That is our after show. We record it every week, and we pick the next week's challenge. But in addition to the $5 level, there is also the $10 level that you can move up to,

the official Cox's Cucks level. And if you move up to be a Cox's Cuck today, the day that this podcast comes out, which is August 31st, if you move up today to the $10 level, we have some treats that we are going to send you in the mail. And we are locking it at 11.59 p.m. on August 31st. So what you're going to want- What happens if people email you about it a few days later, Max?

MerlinWhat if people just hit you up over the weekend? They're like, hey, can I have treats? What are

Maxyou going to say? No treats. No treats. You can't have anything. You get nothing. You're gonna ban them you're banned from listening to the show you're banned from the podcast so uh what are the treats we have these uh very we're kind of launching these collectible little character drawings by uh Dubai Friday's official artist Kevin Budnick they're extremely cute you can see a picture of them in the show notes um for this episode and I will I don't know if we want to say what it is maybe we'll save this for a future announcement but we have a listener of the show hooked us up with some amazingly cool Dubai Friday swag.

It's going to be a little treat. It's a little lanyap. You know what a lanyap is, Merlin? A lanyap means a little something extra. It's a little extra. It's like the baker's dozen. So we're going to give you a little lanyap, and it's a little Dubai Friday treat. And we actually bought these from a small business that we connected with because they listen to Dubai Friday. So you're going to get a little extra surprise treat. And I actually love these things, and I personally use it. It is in my pocket at this very moment. So it's something I use every day, and I think you're going to be pretty delighted by it. And you can get all that stuff if you become a subscriber on the Dubai Friday Patreon at giveusyourfuckingmoney.com.

I have two other items. Item number two, I have a weekly Twitch stream Thursday nights at 7 o'clock central every week. I have usually a friend of the Joe of the Dubai Friday program on. We play some video games together, and we raise money for a congressional campaign this week. so this will have already happened when you listen to this it will be yesterday yesterday we raised money for lindsey fagan in uh she's a justice democrat who supports medicare for all running for congress in texas she's going to flip a red to blue district in texas uh she's going to call

in and tell us about the race give us an update and i will be joined by friend of the show mikey who's going to premiere a brand new episode of movies with mikey his review of his review of Infinity War and that will be shown for the first time live on the stream. And again, we'll talk to Lindsay Fagan in Texas. So check out, you can see the VOD for that on my Twitch, but please join us in the Dubai Friday Discord and subscribe to me on Twitch because I am trying to get those listener numbers up and raise some good money for these congressional campaigns. And that's again, that's every Thursday at seven o'clock central. And what's the final one?

Oh yeah, I made a shirt. You can find it on my Twitter.

AlexWhat you got Merlin?

MaxDon't email me.

MerlinHow about you, Alex? You got like four podcasts. That's right. Alex launched like six podcasts. No, stop talking.

AlexOkay.

MerlinBut right now you got your, what you got? You got Computer World. Yep. You got Robot Lady. What is Computer World?

AlexI don't even know what that is. Computerworld.com. It's a good.

MerlinWhat is, no, the one you do with your friend with your faces on the show.

AlexOh, my friend Matthew Cassinelli, who used to work at Workflow. It's an application for iOS that has since been acquired by Apple. You might know it this September as Shortcuts for iOS 12. And we just talk, we just do one of those classic, boring, nerdy podcasts. Way to sell it. Yep, yep. You probably won't like it. Yeah, I'm intrigued. Yeah. So the other one is with my good friend, Mrs. Soup, also known as Kathy Campbell. And she does all of the work for that show. And it's called, what's happening?

MerlinThat's called the...

AlexThe Robot and the Unicorn. And I made her cry last week. It was... Wow. Yeah. And we're going to talk about backpacks this week.

MerlinAre you a bully, Alex?

AlexOh, probably. the end you also do uh roboism oh that's right no yeah relay fm membership month please go give more money to me is there an amount that you can give to get under the slack or not really yes five hundred dollars a month to roboism.fm also listen to friend shipping um so is that

Merlinyes that's legally binding yes that's an english law it's called the king's law I call it Kristallnacht. You're able to sleep with a glass for the first night. Alex, why are you so tired? What's happening? Oh. Can you talk about it? What the fuck is wrong with you? Oh, no.

AlexI'm just very sick. Yeah. No. I got some more nose polyps. Yeah. But I don't sound that bad because I blasted. I got all the mucinex in there. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I will say, though, the secret trick has not been working with me. The easy blow first and then the hard one.

MerlinWhen the seasons change, it stops working as well.

AlexLike it switches. It's like central no light time.

MaxI mean, like some of the water's going the other way down the toilet. I think like a lot of kind of dubious medical advice, I think that it has a certain Tinkerbell aspect to it where it only works if you believe in it.

AlexBut I do. I want to believe.

MaxYou want to believe, but do you believe? Diggit, diggit, diggit. Challenge. Challenge this week was mine, and I had heard Merlin on one of your other programs, I think on, was it the program Roderick on the Line? talking about that you have a YouTube playlist called Watch Often?

MerlinYeah, yeah. The big picture is I make playlists for myself a lot. I used to do it in Apple Music. Now I do it in Spotify. I like to do it on YouTube. I don't do it a lot, but I realized that I had more of these than I realized, and I realized that people seemed to like them, people with my same dumb taste in things. And so I started making more of these. I had one for a long time called Watch Often, which was the videos that are so important to me that I feel like I need to watch them. at least like once a month or so. And then I, when everybody, there was a particularly bad time this summer where everyone was feeling very sad.

And so I started instead, like I updated that list with stuff that makes me happy. I called that my, I think I called it my happy place. But yeah, the idea is, the original idea is like, if there's stuff that you think is really great in your opinion and you want people to be able to see it, share it. So yeah, Max's challenge, make a watch off end place.

MaxSo how do we want to do this? I think it would be fun. Do you guys have some ones that are short enough that we could like all listen to them together or short enough or audio related?

AlexHmm. Yeah.

MaxI have a few. I have a few that I picked that we could do on the show.

AlexAll right. I'm going to go through my.

MaxSo you know what was interesting? So I'll tell you. So when I went to make my watch off and playlist, one thing that was interesting is. So there's I watch a lot of like music on YouTube. And I don't ever put those music videos in my other playlists. Like my favorite one called favorites are like short comedy things that we use for the cards live show. And I would never put like a song in there because that wouldn't be appropriate to like show at the cards live show. It's like a humorous video. But when I go on YouTube and I'm just like killing some time, like I will watch this sort of yay say or takeaway show video.

I'll watch it like once a week. And I have since I was in college. What? Yeah. It's just one of my favorite musical performances. Yours is good, Alex.

AlexVery weird. But yeah.

Maxyeah. Alex's Happy Place.

AlexMm-hmm. Oh, this is good.

MerlinWell, just real quick, can I tell you what I did? Yes. There was no sense in me creating a watch-off list because I already had one. And I struggled and struggled and struggled on what I should do instead. So on the one hand, I did not peanut butter. On the one hand, I will stand by my list called My Happy Place because I think it's a good list. Max tells me it's not as good as his. But I liked My Happy Place. So what I did last night instead is I went through all of my subscriptions and I created a list called Introducing and I created a list of what I think is a good or fun or appropriate or one of the good ones of a

bunch of my favorite subscription channels so if you're curious about what I watch on YouTube you can go to that list and see the stuff that I think is a good place for you to start what a good idea is that okay is that permissible it's not a total peanut butter right it's kind of chunky peanut butter but well I already had the other one I was the OG it didn't make sense for me to go add more

Alexto that. I just wanted to make a bad peanut butter joke. I'm very impressed and excited. This is great. Oh my god.

MaxI'm going to go on such a fucking rabbit hole. This is going to ruin these two playlists that you guys made are going to ruin days of my life. They're really good.

MerlinHave you seen Eye of the Sparrow, Max? No. You haven't seen Bad Lip Reading, Eye of the Sparrow? You know, I... I really, really

Maxthink you need to see this. I don't have any objection to Bad Lip Reading. I think it's a good comedy thing that lots of people enjoy and it just doesn't get me. Some comedy just doesn't Sometimes it's fun.

MerlinSometimes it's merely very funny. And other times he goes next level with it. That's like, I think Ted Cruz might be the best one. But check out either sparrow real quick.

Speaker AYou know, the hot tub is cool now. But they poisoned it. I know, right? I know. Sing me some harmonies. It's a small picture in a shop somewhere. And I know who it is. It's Mormon, Judy, and cow people. A little pitchy, but good stuff. Governor Romney's black. I mean, I think black can be judged. How do I do this? Dude, I don't have a jet ski. Not the kind you're talking about. Plus, everyone can see that I'm not black.

I mean, this isn't scientific stuff. I heard there's not going to be a test. But, I mean, I do want you to support me and be my man. That's beautiful. I know he's black. Ahmed how did you know about whodunit in the lounge I didn't know oh well they started clapping for the mad cow until someone sold him and then when he died they had him stuffed like that water buffalo

Merlinokay that's enough you get the gist but the ending of it the ending of it is tremendous

Maxalright I'll watch what he does with Jim Lehrer's voice is so perfect I do like the Jim Lehrer voice I just it just doesn't tickle me the bad lip reading I don't know why

Alexthat's okay all right um I'm the same way with the uh Google Translate videos yeah I don't like those either what pisses me off though is Jimmy Fallon who obviously is very very original and funny yeah he just well he like genuinely ripped off this one person who I'm not like super into it but there's this woman who's amazing at it on YouTube like she's a very genuinely funny singer songwriter and was probably the first person to do this and like it could have and some of them are funny but it's just been like pounded into the ground as this terrible bit so you use google

translate and then like make it a song is that the idea oh so you put in a popular song into google translate into whatever language and then uh you then you take it and you turn it you like put it into google translate back in it's like translate this back into english and then it's suddenly like apple becomes pineapple isn't that funny did i did i explain no no no i i get i get i get it and it's it's very much a thing with like top 40 songs and stuff where should we go here let's

look at i definitely have one that is audibly i calm down calm down i want to get the best I don't want to use loop back. Play it. Where's the plug? What do you mean where's the plug? The plug. The plug? Oh, I don't know. I've got it. Oh, wait. Ha ha. I couldn't. I have an iPad. A flat one. I have a flat one. I didn't have a dongle.

MaxYeah.

AlexThat's not fully worked. I will say the very first video on my playlist is something that I send to people, including our super secret thread text chain about once a week and no one has ever found it funny and I think it's the funniest thing that has ever existed. Wait, I'm very excited about

Maxthis Let It Go song. I've never seen this before.

AlexOh, Max, you play that and then put it next. Can I ask a question about Celine Dion?

MerlinYes. Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

MaxWell, this video is called Let It Go Frozen but every go makes the pitch lower by two semitones and the screen gets fatter.

MerlinI love these

Speaker AOh no Oh no The snow glows white on the mountain tonight Not a footprint to be seen A kingdom of isolation And it looks like I'm the queen The wind is howling like this swirling storm inside

Couldn't keep it and heaven knows I'll try Don't let them in, don't let them see Be the good girl you always have to be Conceal, don't feel, don't let them know

Speaker BOh no.

MaxOh, it's getting fat. The screen's getting fat.

Speaker AWait for it.

MaxOh no, no, no. Oh no.

Speaker AWhy don't you jump forward a little bit?

MaxGo to the end, go to the end. I love this. It sounds like Adam in the air.

MerlinOh, wait till you get to the end. It's very upsetting.

Speaker AYes! Absolutely! It's really empowering. It's really empowering for young girls. Oh, it's so fat! The screen is so fat! She's really good. Now she looks like a monster-factor character.

MaxOh, I love this! Alex, are you holding out on me? Do you have more videos like this?

AlexThis is an entire genre that I just watch all the time.

MaxI'm saying, do you have more videos of that level of comedy?

AlexOh, no. Well, that's the thing, though. The Celine Dion, it's all coming back to me. That was the funniest thing ever made on the planet. Is it the straight video? Yes, it's just the whole video.

MerlinThe question I wanted to ask, is this by the meatloaf guy? Because it's got a meatloaf quality to it.

AlexNo, no, no, no. it's clear because you think all right it's a celine dion video like her old her all of her videos are a little bit like just bombastic it's just weird but this one makes no sense at all and it gets weirder and weirder and it has that like it's like the weird twitter of youtube like you're not you're never quite sure did you do you remember the meatloaf videos that look like this the oh i thought you were talking about no no no no i'm talking i'm thinking about like a rocky horror thing. I don't know. What do you mean?

MerlinLet's find perhaps... All music videos used to be pretty funny. This may twist your melon a little bit, but...

AlexI don't know what that means.

MerlinI mean, all... This is a later one,

Maxbut... All 70s and 80s music videos, I think, are extremely embarrassing, except for Peter Gabriel. Oh, yeah. He's probably the only guy who I think has a pretty consistent catalog of music videos that hold up as being cool. Like, they make the music cool.

MerlinDo you do yours, Max?

MaxYes. I would like to pick one of mine, but we're going to have to all kind of watch it at the same time here. Okay. All right. Can I have the – well, Alex is plugged in, so you do yours, Alex.

AlexAll right. This is a –

MaxOh, the first one is so funny. Oh, my God. Which one? On my list?

MerlinNorm MacDonald.

MaxYes. Oh, that's – it's one of the funniest things that I've ever – I mean, I didn't see it on TV, but it's surely one of the funniest things that's ever been on television. Tell me when to start. Which one of these? Okay. So, well, Alex is going to play something on her flat one first because she's plugged in. Oh, good.

AlexSo, Max, are you familiar with the opening scene of Beauty and the Beast, the cartoon version? Not the shitty Emma Watson creepy version.

MerlinSure, why not?

AlexOh, God.

MerlinThere's a girl walking around town saying good morning to everybody and everybody likes Belle.

Speaker AMm-hmm. I'm in this home, boys, waking up to say, Hey, girl! Hey, girl! Hey, girl! Hey, girl! Hey, girl! There goes the baker with his tray and light on it.

Speaker BIt is the same old red or bold as we tell, girl. Every morning's just the same. It's the morning that we hate girls. It's my province town. Good morning, girl. Good morning, Miss here. Are you on the bookshop? I just finished the most amazing story.

Speaker AIt's really good.

AlexWell, you get the idea. It's very funny. It just goes on and on. And then I'm pretty sure there's some homophobic shit that happens during the rest. So I'm not going to play it all. You can enjoy it at your leisure.

Merlinsounds funny can't see it here but it sounds funny

Alexwell no but that's the thing there's no visuals it's just it's just the opening

Maxthey're singing over the cartoons

Merlinthat's funny

Maxwell I'll do a quick tour through my list here so I've got Norm Macdonald on Conan in 1997 with Courtney Thorne Smith and it's a little bit of a slow burn what is it he says that he keeps interrupting I honestly just go watch it again because however funny you remember it it's 10 times funnier and it's about seven minutes long and I do recommend watching the whole thing because

Merlinit starts off as kind of I remember her reaction like she was a gamer but it was funny it's

Maxone of the funniest moments surely that's ever been on television and I I love showing people this video because it's kind of it's you kind of can't believe it's happening that you couldn't write something like they couldn't have written this on the the um uh uh uh like on a TV on a what's the I'm having an aneurysm anyway you couldn't have written this uh all right uh I do have a bunch of music stuff probably my favorite one is this yaysayer song this is I also recommend watching this but you guys know the band yaysayer yes no I'm checking it out now

uh they're you'd like them I think Merlin they're they're you know indie jangly kind of indie rocky band and they just um go on the subway in Paris and like sing some songs they kind of do it acapella and they like bang a spoon against the pole and it's cool the whole train car like start singing with them and it's just a wonderful video oh that is good um have you guys um ever heard this one is another one of my all-time favorite videos that i it's got to be again one of the funniest things that's ever been recorded it's a love line call from like i don't know 1994 oh no and i see the title so this the premise i again please listen to this on your own

time and report back but i i i guarantee it will blow your mind how funny it is uh but basically the premise is a phone sex operator calls into the show and says my clients are coming too quickly how do I get them to last longer so I can make more money and they workshop some ideas with her and then again I it probably helped that I heard this when I was you know 12 years old but I think it's I honestly think it's one of the funniest pieces of comedy ever and then I've got a bunch of cloud cult songs I hope you guys have both seen this video before of Kevin Smith telling

the story of how he almost made the Superman movie? Nope. Oh my God.

MerlinI'm adding all of these to my watch later list.

MaxMerlin and Alex, you are going to watch this two-part video of Kevin Smith telling the Superman story. You're going to, number one, at the end of it, you're going to say, this must be one of the world's greatest living storytellers. I am not a huge Kevin Smith fan, but the fucking yarn that he weaves is just unbelievable. But this story probably has the... Now I do think you have to listen to the whole again. You have to listen to the whole 20 minutes of it. Probably one of the best punchlines of any comedy. Okay. Okay.

MerlinStop. Stop. Stop. Stop.

MaxI'm selling past the clothes here.

MerlinYou're way overselling it. But yes, I would love to. Okay. Uh, you just subscribe to my list. Did you subscribe to me on YouTube? Absolutely. That's holy shit. I wish I could turn this off. I really don't want to know.

AlexI didn't know that was even.

MerlinUm, uh, well, that's why that's why your URLs keep getting fucked up with a one or a two or a three in parentheses because it keeps putting the number of notifications in the goddamn URL.

MaxAll right. You've got, and then the two I want to play on the podcast. Can I have the flat one? Give me the flat one. Plug it into your mobile.

AlexJust throw it over here, Alex. Well, I coiled it nicely.

MaxBut just give me the rest of it.

AlexI know. There we go.

MaxStill not throwing it to me.

AlexI am very bad at throwing. Look at where I work. Why would you expect that I'd be good at that with my left hand?

MaxWhat a mess. What a mess. All right, so first we're going to watch Reggie Watts doing his Radiohead cover, and this is live at like a music festival or something. Boy, I can't hear this for shit.

Speaker AOh, no, no, no.

That's pretty much the whole bit.

MaxThat's good. It's very funny. It's fun to watch him perform too because he does it all, you know, looping in real time and all that. And then the other one I thought you guys would enjoy is, So this is a famous magic trick from my favorite magician who passed away last year. This guy's name is Eugene Berger. He was from Chicago. He's an interesting guy because he was I think he had like a Ph.D. in religion and philosophy or something like that. But he also did magic. And this is kind of his I would say it's up there among his most famous like signature tricks. It's a trick called the gypsy thread.

But he kind of did a different interpretation of it. I think we should try to all synchronize and watch this together, but maybe just listen to my audio. What do you think about that plan? Okay, so let's click on it. You guys see the one I'm talking about? It's number three. I'm all the way at the beginning. Tell me when to hit play.

AlexNope, nope.

MaxOkay, so, oh, let's do that. So hang on. Let me just, okay, so scroll. You're going to go to zero, zero, zero, zero, and I'm going to count it down. Three, two, one.

AlexOkay.

Speaker AA single length which will represent the entire universe. In the stories of India, it is the god Brahma who creates the universe and all that there is. Brahma then retires and the god Vishnu takes over. and Vishnu sustains and preserves the universe in every moment of its existence.

And then, at the end of time, the god Shiva appears and dances the Tandava dance, a weird and terrible dance of fire, in which the entire material universe is destroyed in blinding light,

brighter than ten thousand suns. And the universe is no more. There is only silence, vast cosmic sleep.

And out of this cosmic sleep, Brahma wakens himself again. He looks about and seeing nothing, he decides to create the universe again. and creating it, he retires, pleased with his eternal play. Isn't that cool?

AlexThat was very, just hearing it was... I know, he's... What a voice. I know.

MaxYep.

AlexI've been freaked out by... Okay, let's listen to something nice.

Speaker AYou will never see me coming.

AlexNo. Oh, my God.

MaxNo. Well, all right. So we're going to put the links to all these playlists in the show notes. I would be curious. Some of us already have. Some of us already have. I would be very curious if any of our listeners have their own sort of watch-off-in playlist. And, you know, let me put some parameters on this. It probably shouldn't have more than, like, 25 or 30 videos. What? What are you talking about? Like if you have your like, your like best of videos. Oh yeah.

MerlinI guess it depends on what you're trying to accomplish. I think, I think you should, it's kind of, you need. It depends on what you're trying to do. There are people who, as with podcasts, there are people with podcasts, they love a three hour podcast. Right. There are other people that want to like watch this all the way through. They want, you know, all killer, no filler.

MaxI want.

MerlinI did not have that. I did not feel that need to do that with mine. Mine was mainly, mine was like mainly, I just wanted to find it. These are ones that I thought were very catchy. And it's my ultimate criteria for when I try to say this is maybe something you'll like. Right. You guys know this about me. It's like, OK, if you really hate this, stop watching. Right. If you don't like counterpoints on incels, I got nothing for you. Because that's really fucking upsetting. Really fucking good video.

MaxSo I want. Trash can cookie.

MerlinAlex, have you seen trash can cookie?

MaxWell, I want our listeners to make their own watch-off and playlist and share it with us. Do you? I do. I love these. You're going to watch those? You sound like Nick Denton. Are you sure you really want to do that? I'm going to comb through them. I'm going to comb through them because I always want people's like, I want your, but listen, I am. I'm going to quiz you. I'm going to quiz you and prove you do not look at any of them. I am. This is a strict Nick Denton move you're doing here. I want you to, I want our listeners to make your own watch-off and playlist and please share it with us. You can send it to me on the Discord or Twitter

or whatever. But listen, I want to... Discord would be good. I want some criteria. I want some criteria.

MerlinMake sure you put it in the Discord so that's season.

MaxPlease give me just your best of videos. I don't want every video you've ever seen on YouTube. I don't want every popular meme on YouTube. I want your favorites. So they should not be videos... I wish you could hear yourself

Merlinright now. I want to push this stone

Maxup the hill. Now, I want to be very clear.

MerlinAfter I push the stone up the hill, I do not want it to roll back down.

MaxThey should be... There shouldn't be more than like 20 or 30 videos on the list and do not give me all memes that I've already seen. Do not put Keyboard Cat on there. I know we all love...

MerlinIt's so fun to watch you guys create problems first.

MaxIt's a problem for you. It's not a problem for me. I love people sending...

MerlinOh, I know. You're going to watch them all. You've got tons of time to watch videos from people you don't know.

MaxIt is part of... First of all, I don't know why you... Do or don't meet your criteria. I don't know what you care, but Alex and I are always... Alex and I need a constant IV of new videos to show at our live shows. Can I suggest maybe something?

MerlinYou can cut this out. Can I suggest instead, send me your best video.

MaxNo, I want people to make a list. You want them to make a list? Because their best one is going to be something I've already seen. I need their fourth best one. Oh, all right. Do you see what I'm saying? The number one video is going to be Keyboard Cat. And I've seen that, and it doesn't work for me. So I need something lower down the list. So make your best of video. and I'll comb through it. I'm genuinely interested in what people's favorites are.

MerlinAlex, I want to know. I want you. We're probably getting close to done. Alex, this is mostly. Max is probably seeing some of mine. I'm curious about how you feel. I want you to compliment my good taste by telling me that you like some of these videos I put up.

AlexOh, okay. Let me go back to. I definitely didn't get rid of it. Boom, boom, boom.

MerlinIt's in the channel.

AlexIt's in the channel. What?

MerlinIt's in the super secret text channel where we all pasted our links. God, how do you people make it to work in the morning? Sometimes you don't.

AlexI've, this is, I've. They're all good. Yeah, there was one that surprised me, I remember.

MerlinTed Ed is a favorite of my daughter. That used to be when she had long hair, that's what she would watch when I brushed her hair in the morning. Really? I've seen a ton of Ted Ed videos. I thought that one was, it looks good.

MaxWhich one am I looking at here?

MerlinWhat's Ted Ed? Number eight, the wars that inspired Game of Thrones. And it's basically about the War of the Roses. And as they're explaining the War of the Roses with cartoon characters, there'll be a ding. You'll see a little character from Game of Thrones up in the corner that's kind of based on this historical character. I just wanted some compliments. I think I did a really good job.

MaxYou did a great job. I added about eight of these to my watch later list. What's this Ted Leo?

Oh god I love this Man Ted Leo is so fucking cool Oh my god He's the coolest guy He kills this song He's so good

Speaker AHis drummer rules There's no turning back Even while we

MaxOh, this sounds so good.

Oh my god, this is good. This is so, so good.

Speaker AIt's my own desire It's my own remarks. Help me to decide.

MerlinI think the song is better. She'll play it. Well, this is the thing. When you're covering a song, there are various ways to cover a song. I mean, one is it is fun when people are like, oh, Alex, that's so good.

AlexI know.

MerlinBut you interpret the song your way. But even like he's learned the parts. Everybody in the band is playing the right part, but it's still completely a Ted Leo song.

Speaker AThis is also cool. I love him so much.

MaxWhy is Ted Leo so cool? Oh, he's so cool.

Speaker AYou're dedicated, you took the time It wasn't long for a cold This is so good. And all you ever hear me say is how I picture me with you. Yeah, all you ever hear me say is since you've been gone.

I can't breathe for the first time. I'm so moving on. Yeah, yeah. Thanks to you.

MaxI think all music should be performed by Ted Leo. You should just do all the music. Like, you know, whatever new Kanye album, it's by Ted Leo. As performed by Ted Leo.

MerlinI don't love you like I love you, Wade. That's so good. So I just wanted to highlight a few of mine because I know people aren't going to watch all of these. Some of my all-time favorite YouTube videos I recommend for everybody. I really miss Every Frame of Painting. That was such a good channel. Oh, my God. I stopped doing it.

MaxYeah, there's – Don't you feel like there's a host of Every Frame of Painting sort of imitators out there, and they're a little shallow? Like, they're not – They're all bad. They do not truly have – They're sort of engaging. like they're fun to watch but I don't ever come away from them feeling like I heard something smart or new. Yeah.

MerlinI've got a couple nerd writers in here. I didn't realize I had two. But so for every frame of painting, the Edgar Wright How to Do Visual Comedy is very, very good at editorial. I feel like number two- You had to fall backwards into a fence. Well, but he contrasts it. The beauty of it is he contrasts it with, he does a real good job of showing like, okay, the example he gives in this video is how to show a transition where somebody moves from one town to another town. And he shows, for example, how Edgar Wright does that in Hot Fuzz versus how you do it in a Sandra Bullock movie

where you show a lot of stock footage of the loop and play a Ramones song. You know what I mean? Just showing how you can tell so much more. Showing him with his peace lily sitting on the train and the difference in the taxi cabs in this town versus that town. Anyway, I know you're not a fan, but that's really good. And this David Fincher one is un-fucking-missable. David Fincher, Invisible Details, is such a mind curler because everybody out there saying how CGI ruins movies, this guy goes and lays out how there's so much amazing CGI David Fincher does in his movies that you have no idea that it's CGI.

It's so good. Anyway, so many of these are good. Oh, and Monster Factory. Now, okay, last one. Monster Factory. I went with the final Pam because I feel like that is a very good intro. It is. I love, oh, Vicky. You know, the one with the Wii. with Vicky and Dick Cheney where he's water skiing.

AlexOh.

MerlinThat's very good. I love Todd Coolbody. I love the whole thing with Sweep Sweep and the sitcom characters and Sims. Those are all good. Where would you start people on Monster Factory, Alex?

AlexThis is where I started, actually. So I am biased.

MerlinBecause Merlin told you to.

AlexNo, no. She told me.

MerlinShe told me about it.

AlexAnd I was like, I think maybe it's because I had been enjoying some substances and just hearing robot boyfriend and over him.

Speaker ATrash Hulk. Hello, little husband.

MerlinIt's kind of peak Justin where he's like, meet the baby. And then whatever Griffin is doing with cheat codes or developer codes where he makes the sky rain coffee cans, it's like the fucking funniest thing in the world.

AlexIt's so good.

MaxThe one I recommend to people the most is Monster Factory Dragon Age Inquisition where they make the greasy grandma. I don't know that one. The slime DJ.

AlexOh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

MerlinI love this whole Sims thing that starts with the Darth Vader guy. Oh. Granny slime. That's daddy. Anyways, these will all be in show notes. You can go to DubaiFriday.com and it'll all be in there.

AlexI have a request. Just anybody listening, watch the Celine Dion video and tell me how funny I am. Tell me how smart I am for finding this video that is the funniest thing that's ever been produced. And it's-

MerlinYou don't want to tell us what you think is funny about it. No. It's just weird. It's mainly just weird.

AlexShe ends up in like a, with like the hall of portraits in Hogwarts and then there's a ghost man and there's so many mirrors. There's a candle. I don't know. That's the thing. If you explain why it's funny, it's not funny.

MerlinYou're right. You're right. You're right. If it bends, if it bends, it's funny.

AlexIf it doesn't bend, it's not funny. There's a motorcycle. There's lightning everywhere. One final one that I wanted to play. Merlin, do you know how Pokemon characters speak? Do you know what Pokemon are at this point? Pika Pika. Okay. Yes. Correct. Correct. Oh, my God. You just subscribed to me, Alex. I got two new subscribers. Yeah. Yeah, I did.

MerlinCheck it out. I'm going to screenshot that.

AlexA couple of years ago, there was.

MerlinThis will serve me well at sea.

AlexA couple years ago, there was this feature-length film of the first original episode of the anime of the Pokemon series. And for some reason, Pikachu sounded different. And this is an audience reaction. Come on, master.

Mess with me and you're gonna lose.

AlexSo he is saying Pika Pika there.

Speaker AJeez Pikachu Why won't you get Okay It's because What the fuck What

MerlinIt's not supposed to be able to talk

AlexIt's a Pew issue I still haven't investigated I think this one This has like 20,000 views So I'm sure everybody Let me yes yes no here

MerlinThe joke that Pika Pika is all Pikachu says, right?

AlexYes. That should be.

MaxIf the Pokemon are too intelligent, it has a real... Uncanny Valley? Well, there's some real ethical issues raised by making them live in these little balls and battle each other.

MerlinI want to be with you. And you got to catch them all and you put them in balls and you can go to a gym. Is that right? Yep. It's kind of a death march of training for evolution. And then you stand outside a furniture store for two hours with your phone. Pika pika Pika pika Does she have homework? Todd Todd Don't you have homework? Pika pika

Speaker BThank you.

Bloodline. Got a little Kit Kat in my mouth. Tom Arnold is our guest tonight. Phone number 1-800-LOVE-191. Oh, forget about that phone number. You get a lot of calls. Yeah, we get plenty of calls. Yeah, we get enough.

Is that Lorene?

Speaker AYes, it is.

Speaker BHi, Lorene. You're 20. What's up?

Speaker AHey, well, I'm a phone actress. My problem is my callers are coming way too fast. And in order for me to make any kind of dough, I need to keep a seven minute minimum with each caller. So I need some advice, guys. What do guys like to hear on the phone? How can I keep these guys...

Speaker BLet me get this straight. Are you hot, Daddy? Oh, I thought you were doing like Man of La Mancha and stuff over the phone for like people that were bedridden or something like that who couldn't get to the theater. But you're just doing the sex talk, huh?

Speaker ARight.

Speaker BHow do you describe yourself? Because I think they do a little too good a job sometimes. and then it's like, I'm 5'9", I'm a 38, double D, I have...

Speaker AOh, no, I keep it real. I see I'm about 5'7", long dark hair, green eyes, 36 feet, 24-inch waist.

Speaker BHave you ever had a bachelor party and... Hold on.

Speaker AHave you?

Speaker BOh, hold on, we've got to go. Have you had a bachelor party and then someone described themselves like... I mean, honestly, over the phone they said, this woman is this way and they get to the door and you feel so bad for them right because they do weigh 220 pounds listen i was thinking about this the other day when i had a bunch of people waiting at an airport for me for a chartered plane that was like leaving but not without me and they said they called me on my cell phone and they're like where are you and i'm like i'm just getting off on sherman way i'm on the 405 as i'm basically going down my driveway and i'm

thinking to myself it's nice that you lie but the fact that it takes you 25 minutes to get uh a block and a half from where you said you were like eventually like the stripper who says how hot she is isn't isn't there gonna come a time when the truth is revealed yeah yes and and i i that's why you have to sort of it's good to build it up a little bit but don't when you're still in your driveway say you're down the street don't say you're you're coming up so lorraine you uh You describe yourself as, is that what you are?

Speaker AYes, I am.

Speaker BOkay. And what do you do? Like, is the talk, you're saying the talk is like extra naughty, extra good? Like, talk to Tom. See if you can know. Yeah, hi, hi.

Speaker AWhat do you mean? I'm sorry.

Speaker BHi, Tom here. Talk to me. Visa or MasterCard?

Speaker AI just want to keep these guys satisfied.

Speaker BLorraine, Tom's your client. I'm your client.

Speaker AOkay, cool, cool.

Speaker BGo ahead.

Speaker AHi.

Speaker BHi.

Speaker AWho's this?

Speaker BIt's Tom.

Speaker AHey, Tom. I'm Sugar. How you doing?

Speaker BGood, good, Sugar. What's going on?

Speaker AOh, nothing much. Just relaxing a bit on my bed.

Speaker BYeah?

Speaker AYeah.

Speaker BOh, boy.

Speaker AWhat are you doing?

Speaker BDo you have the 500 count sheets, the thread count? Yeah. I bet. Silky. What are you wearing? This is Tom's friend, Anna. Yeah, exactly. What are you wearing?

Speaker AOh, well, I'm wearing a tight little gray T-shirt.

Speaker BI got to go.

Speaker AOh, God. And my nipples are a bit hard.

Speaker BHey, Tom, can you move your car? It's blocking mine in the driveway.

Speaker AOh, man. Well, I say my nipples are a bit hard, and I'm wearing a black thong, and I'm touching myself.

Speaker BYeah, man. That's sweet. Yeah. Well, listen, why don't you sort of work? Like, you know what you ought to do? What? Here's what you ought to do. Because you don't want to be too mundane, and you want to be sexual. But maybe if she did it in a sort of subliminal way, she could add a little time. Like, you go, like. So the guy goes, like, what are you wearing? No, no, she'll go, like, I'm wearing a lacy, black, teddy, Holocaust, with a long camisole.

Cancer. And just see, like, see if you could slide in, like, cancer, Holocaust, grandparents. And see what you could do. That's good. And I bet it would add some time. The mind works. The mind is very interesting that way, Drew.

Speaker AIt would be a subliminal phone sex operator.

Speaker BRight, right. SNL ought to do this. Right, yeah. I think they did. They did do it, actually. But I think that would work for her. Yeah. Let's try that. Let's see. Laureen? Yes? Why don't you try that? So here's what you do. I ask you what you're wearing, and somewhere you work in Vietnam very quickly. Very quickly. All right?

Speaker AOkay.

Speaker BAll right, here we go. And what are you wearing, sugar?

Speaker AI'm wearing a nice lace garter with a nice black lace bra. Yeah, yeah. How's that?

Speaker BYeah, I'm at Vietnam. It was almost perfect. Where's the Vietnam part? Vietnam. Okay, see. It's my fault for attempting to communicate with the people that call this job. I was amazed that I thought that you had pulled that off with her. She was, like, right on it. Yeah. But it was too good to be true. I know. Well, maybe she actually worked anyway, just didn't notice it. Yeah, I did notice my penis take a little dip in the middle of her description.

Interesting. True. I'm telling you. All right, I've got to try one more time. Laureen?

Speaker AYeah.

Speaker BOkay, let me explain. I have this subliminal suggestion idea. Don't use that word.

Speaker AIt's too, too.

Speaker BI have this quick word thing that's going to hurt the guy's penises, okay? Okay. Now, when you describe what you're wearing, I want you to very quickly work in the word holocaust.

MaxHolocaust?

Speaker BHolocaust. Holocaust.

Speaker AOkay.

Speaker BThe community's wearing cancer. Do you know what the holocaust is?

Speaker ANo, I don't.

Speaker BOh, boy. Oh, boy. All right. Oh, boy. All right. That's all right. Hey, by the way, LA Unified Schools District, everybody. I'm a product. God bless you guys. You guys are really doing a job over there. I do. Subliminal holocaust. Okay, okay, work in cancer. Work in cancer. You know what cancer is? Oh, great.

Speaker AOkay, great.

Speaker BAll right, work in the word cancer when you're describing what you're wearing, all right?

Speaker AOh, most definitely.

Speaker BAll right, you ready? Bring. Bring.

Speaker AHi, how you doing?

Speaker BHi. What's your name?

Speaker AI'm Sugar. Sugar.

Speaker BI'm Ace.

Speaker AHey, Ace.

Speaker BYeah. What are you wearing?

Speaker AOoh, well, I'm wearing a nice black garter. Mm-hmm. Ooh, just thinking about the Holocaust right now. Yeah, burn those shoes.

Speaker BCast them in the shower, baby. Yeah, yeah. I'm sending you my bill. Yeah, yeah. Send them on the train to Krakow. Yeah. No. Lorene, we may need to tweak this just a little bit more. This is a... That was good. Right, right. No, you take direction as good as any actress I've worked with in this town. She really is good. All right, Laureen, that's your new angle. Yeah. There it is. She should actually try that tonight.

I'm thinking about the whole thing.

Speaker AI mean, I think we've got to take a break.

Show notes

Transcript

94. The Flat One

Show notes

Transcript

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