123. Food Day

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

Speaker BGood morning. Good morning, Merlin. Good morning.

AlexI mean can you enjoy Michael Jackson anymore? Who's to say? Sorry. He's already dead. I'm sorry.

MaxWe can't punish him any further by boycotting his music. It's given 43 months.

AlexMoving back. Am I wrong about that? No. He died. He did.

MerlinManafort sends. Manafort sends. What happened?

AlexManafort what?

MerlinNothing. Nothing. He's dead.

MaxSo what can you say? He's got gout. But if he was still alive and buying the music was helping him somehow, then I think you've got to, I at least think that there's an interesting debate. Knowing what we know about him, do you give him the money?

AlexIs that a debate you would want to have on an internet? So when Bill Cosby dies, I can like him again? Oh my God. No, backing out of this. I have no comment.

MerlinThe chocolate cake behind you.

AlexIs that a Bill Cosby bit?

MerlinNo, Alex, I just made it up. I don't know. at 9.06 on Wednesday morning. You already pre-canceled him. Your childhood was bereft of him.

MaxI think that...

MerlinI never thought he was funny.

MaxI'm going to go out on a limb and say I think Michael Jackson was a pretty good musician. I like some of his songs. Thank you. That is a bold, brave statement. You know, history may judge me, but I think he made some pretty good music. I don't know.

MerlinBoop.

AlexBoop. Oh, God. Boop.

MerlinBoop. I never got to dance on stage with him. That would have been so cool. We would side moonwalk together.

AlexOh, boy. I liked the Free Willy song.

MerlinWhoa, easy.

MaxAre you guys following the college admissions scandal thing?

AlexNo, because I thought you'd tell us about it.

MaxNow, Merlin, you have a child. and she's going to be applying for college in what, in a couple months? Yeah.

MerlinShe's looking for early entry, yeah, if you know what I mean.

MaxYeah, and, you know, have you ever thought about that you may need to pay an imposter to take the ACT for her? Well,

Merlinthis already exists in so many formats, and it's played real casual, but this already exists. Okay, here's the thing. You want your kid to get into the good camp. Not necessarily the white kid's camp, but like the good camp. You want to go to a camp, right? And there's way more people applying for camp than people who are not. So guess what you can do for every camp? You can pay a little bit extra to get like an early,

like it's basically like you're more likely to get in if you pay this extra $100. That's just camp. I'll never forget when I first heard, oh, Jason Kake's ex, Meg, when Meg first used the phrase feeder preschool. I don't know if that upsets you the way it upsets me. You're familiar with a feeder high school.

MaxNo, what's that? I'm actually not. I actually don't know how that works. I don't know what a feeder school is, although I do hear people talk about it.

MerlinThere are, okay, so most colleges and universities, they don't do this, they don't advertise or market this directly because it sounds so coarse to do. But what you will learn if they're trying to recruit you, if you're a very good student and you fit their profile of what they need, is they will say to you, if you haven't learned it already, that kind of, you know, so do Voce, you know, we are a feeder school for Harvard Med. Like our record, basically our record of having our graduates make it into Harvard Med School is very high,

not least because we have the relationships that can help our students get in there.

MaxAnd do they have like a formal relationship with that school or it's just like they're just specialized in getting their students in there?

MerlinNo, they have a track record. I mean, it's the same way. If you wanted to go like basically learn gymnastics, you would want to go to the school that has a high preponderance of getting kids, you know, onto the team that gets you to the Olympics, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. If you're very aggressive about walking up this ladder, you learn this system. So for years we've lived with that. We've lived with the idea that you go to this college so you can go to this grad school. You go to this college, so you can go to this law school, med school, what have you. And, of course, then in time that became, well, you want to feeder high school. So if you go to Choate or you go to one of these fucking, like, boy schools, or whatever.

I don't know the names of all of them. But you go to a prep school that will get you into the good college. This is not a new thing. And I know it's not. God, I fucking hate Twitter right now. It's just insufferable. Yeah, I went to college. but I remember Megnut saying yeah yeah now there's feeder preschools because you want to go to the preschool that gets you into a good elementary school that gets you into the good middle school etc etc etc it's so depressing we didn't get into any of the preschools that we wanted I like the one that we did get into but that's

fucking I can curse on you that's fucking preschool that's a three year old kid

Maxbasically if you don't if you don't so now she's going to grow up to be a garbage man

Merlinif she's lucky that's a good job it's a union job no so anyways i'm not i'm not saying anything new here uh what happened i mean when i first heard this i was like oh god is this what's going to distract political twitter today is just all of this like outrage machine about this but then when you do actually dig into the details it gets pretty pretty gross about the photoshopping there was one that was really egregious it was about that girl that was there were two that were that seemed really egregious I'm sorry I'm stealing your story Matt

Maxno no I'm just thinking you know this is a phenomenon I see sometimes where the actual story of what happened is very interesting I think there's a lot to get into there but then almost as a separate side show the public reaction to it is also kind of interesting and funny although they're not even reacting to the right thing

Merlinwell I mean I feel like there's at least two important things to distinguish because it's always two things with me the second thing that we can get into and join the chorus about which is really true, is that, okay, when that kid got in on that scholarship for that obscure sport, that means a kid who actually had put in the years getting good at that sport didn't get to go to that school. But the part that we can mock and make fun of and have a little fun with is the first part, which is like how bananas some of this was. It went from stuff like having somebody take your ACT for you,

having your ACT scores basically adjusted, to there was two that were really bananas. One was, I guess, Melissa Fuffman's daughter who, or no, no, it was Lori Loughlin's daughter who got into this school, but she was an influencer. So the first week of school, she was going to Fiji anyway, stuff like that. There's that. And then there's the one that was so crazy, which was like they got some stock photos and Photoshopped this young lady into this photo. I guess she had never played a kick of soccer in her life. And they basically got her and then wangled this coach and got her a soccer scholarship having absolutely no ability in soccer.

And that's how she got into USC. My wife was like, USC? You worked that hard? I won't say what she said specifically. But she was like, you worked that hard to get into USC? Home of the juice? That's where O'Shea went.

AlexAs you're talking about this, I absolutely went to a feeder grade school, high school.

MerlinTell us about it.

AlexUh, it was, it.

MerlinTalk more about that.

AlexDo you, I don't know if you, do you, is that serious? Do you?

MerlinYeah, I want to, I want to hear about that. I'm being, I'm being dead serious because I feel like, I feel like there's a couple parts to this. The part that's easy to trigger the libs on is the absolute inequity of people being able to spend five to six figures to get their kid into the school that they want. And that's absolutely outrageous. But what we should also talk about is like the dumb shit that anybody with a little extra dough has to do to get their kid even the minimal stuff. And that includes stuff like you're just going to spend $300 on school supplies at the beginning of the year. If you want to have music

programs at your school, guess what? You've got to pay for that. There's all of this stuff that requires parents pay money for stuff. And I think that I'm not trying to minimize what this means, but I think there's a lot of, God bless them, single people who don't know what a fucking minefield this is already. And I'm not complaining about the money part. I'm complaining about the opportunity part like if you're just not at a good school and can't afford music you don't have music because we can't pay that teacher this is this is something that you get from the time pretty much

Alexthat your kid is born yep yep so so so theater oh yeah i mean that's the thing you uh your parents pay for you to go to a private catholic uh grade school and middle school and then you go to a I had to take multiple, well, just one admission test to get into high school, my private high school. And then you had to take a bunch of different aptitude tests to make sure you could get into the AP classes.

And you had to pay extra for the AP classes because it required different textbooks. And then you could, I had people in my AP classes who couldn't afford to take the tests. and it was like 300 bucks per test. And then you just happen to be accepted to Notre Dame and Marquette and Duke and all of these schools that they advertise stats to the parents.

MerlinMost of those are nominally Catholic. Two of those are nominally Catholic schools.

AlexYeah, and all private schools and U of I, which is harder to get into every year, I guess.

MerlinIs that the fight in Illini?

AlexYes, that's a problematic one.

MaxOh, and I... No, the fight in Illini is fine. It's Chief Illini Wick that was problematic.

AlexAnd I think he's gone. Chief Illini Witz?

MerlinDid that happen at Ellis Island? It says Vito Andolini from Corleone. I'm imagining... Godfather 2, I'm just imagining a little boy in full, like, 1970s laugh-in style chief head.

MaxI have a good Chief Illini with story. So when my family was growing up, the turkey, the brand of turkey that we always got for Thanksgiving was a Hoka turkey. And I always, I don't know, it has, the Hoka sort of has that, it sounds like some sort of American Indian. Maybe he gave the pilgrims the turkey for the original Thanksgiving or something. And you're like, oh, a Hoka, that's a good turkey. And I went a couple years ago to go get a Hoka turkey at like a grocery store. And I was like, I want to find a Hoka turkey. Where do you go get one of those? And I went to find it, and I realized it's Howard Kaufman turkeys.

AlexHuh.

MaxChief Illiniwitz.

MerlinMy chicken is not your costume.

AlexIt wasn't that funny. Why?

MerlinHave you ever even seen a chicken?

AlexCock, cock, cock.

Speaker BCock, cock, cock.

AlexOh, boy. So there's my privilege for the week.

MerlinWell, this is... Now, when you get butter, do you get Challenge Butter, or do you get Land O'Lakes, or do you get a different brand? Because, you know, that's problematic, the Land O'Lakes. Well, you know, with the Land O'Lakes lady. Go on, go on. Land O'Lakes lady, she's a recursive logo because she's holding a box of butter with herself on it. Well, that's true, but also you can fold it up so she looks topless. Make boobies. Take her knees, knees to boobies. Is that a form of trans... Never mind. So... Wait, that's how I identify.

AlexMichael Jackson. What?

MerlinSo joint... I'm taking my joints. These are my bones.

AlexOh, not joints.

MerlinYeah, Alex and I both got excited for a minute.

AlexI was like, oh, what? What? No.

MerlinI'm going to go on the JoCo cruise and come out as an Indian maiden. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying that these are my joints. These are my boobs now.

MaxYou know what else is crazy? Some of these rich ladies who paid someone to take the ACT for their kids, they also set up a fake ACT test for their kids and then told the kids that the score they got was the score that the fake test taker got because they wanted the kids to-

AlexOh my God, that's so sad.

MaxWhat's the highest you can get? Is it 30? 30 is the highest?

AlexNo, 36 is. I only got a 30.

MaxOoh. There's been inflation on the scores. I had a 26.

AlexYou had a 26? You're so much smarter than that. See, I'm such a fucking asshole.

MaxAm I wrong? Didn't it used to be 32 when I took it?

AlexMaybe. Yeah, we're like five years apart. I beg and beg. Oh, because they added like a creative writing portion, which totally makes sense for a standardized test. Good God.

MerlinOh, yeah, that should be perfect. Tell more, Max, because I mean, there were so many different. So I guess the nut of this is, at least according to people like Popat, is that they were coming down hard on this, was named Singer, the guy who was the conduit for all of this, and then basically they just made a bunch of phone calls and recorded it.

MaxHey, remember that crime we did? He flipped and wore a wire. But I mean, you know, basically like I think the way – the best explanation I heard yesterday is like, you know, I think everyone kind of understands that there's a front door for getting into college, which is you apply and you get in on your own merits, and there's a back door where you sort of – your parents like buy a building with your name on it, and then they pretty much have to let you in. And I knew a few dipshits in college who had the same last name as a building on campus. Yeah, right. Like, what are they going to say? No? Right. And they, like, once they got there, like, their contribution to the collegiate community

was, like, inventing new ways to smoke salvia out of an apple. But they, but. I'm so into your hands right now. But then there's, like, these people, they didn't do the front door. They didn't do the back door. They kind of created a side door where you would do various scams to get in at, like, a tenth of the price of the back door.

MerlinOh, okay. It's a bargain inside door.

MaxAnd the way that I think that they got caught was they were paying for doctoring test scores and paying fake test takers and all of this sort of outright fraud. Right. And then they were deducting it from their taxes as a charitable contribution. Yeah. I think that's how they got busted. Oh, that's how they – I see. Okay. I heard they did that. I didn't realize that's how they discovered it. I hope I'm not wrong about this, but I think that's what caused it to all come crashing down was they realized.

MerlinI think the fact of what you're describing is true. I just didn't realize that was how they got it. That's interesting.

MaxThe other thing that's interesting to me is I suspect that this kind of fraud in getting your kids into college is pretty endemic among the elite. and unfortunately I think a lot of the reason that that this particular operation got brought down is they had a lot of these like sort of nouveau riche people like celebrities and like Instagram influencers and people like that and I think they had like enough money to sort of get into trouble but not enough money or old enough money to sort of know how to legitimize their fraud so if you're if you're uh if you're uh if you're like actually a wealthy family you probably have

like intergenerational knowledge of how to like cultivate these relationships with schools and do the the bribery and the fraud and the financial crimes in a way where they're not actually even crimes they're just one hair onto the side of of propriety you know you're like allowed to do it right and these people i think they got i mean it was all like that's why it was in the news because it was like celebs and stuff right and i think that they probably well there's yeah that's

MerlinSomething they talked about on ATC yesterday was the lack of transparency to the way college admissions works. I mean, I certainly felt this way. The entire thing is like a game show. It's like a big black box. And you put in all of your best doctored stuff that you can. And yes, I was in Key Club and Drama Club. And here's my essay. And then you just close your eyes and think of England and hope that it worked out. And it's not, there's not any kind of, it certainly doesn't require any kind of reporting on how the criteria, what's that word you like to use?

What is the rubric that we are applying to letting people in for this particular class this particular year? I don't think that kind of data is exposed very often or it would be extremely ugly. Also, the fact that just a coach can take a walk over to admissions and say, this kid's going to be our shortstop. Can you make that happen?

AlexGood morning, everybody.

MaxLike, don't you think that if they were like, you know, I can't even, what's like a rich family, like an old money family? If they were like Rockefellers or something like that, like they would understand that you have to like, first you have to like launder the money through like a shell corporation in Panama. And then you could somehow get it into the hands of the college so that your failed son could become a communications major.

MerlinWell, yeah, you use that phrase nouveau riche and it's kind of an ugly phrase, but I know exactly what you mean. I mean, here's how I think it would, I suspect, at least in like movies where people sit around and, you know, have Brandy Snifters in a paneled room. I think you make some phone calls, mostly. If you're in the old boys club, unless your kid is a 100% fail son, you should be able to make a call and say Tyler III is 17. And, you know, it's about time for him to be in Skull and Bones. And somebody will say, of course, he's a legacy.

MaxYeah, I mean, do you think these people who are actually rich and powerful, do you think that suddenly their kid is 16 years old and they start scrambling to like... Panicking? No, no, no.

MerlinIt's people like Massimo the Shoe Guy who's worried about where's Antonio going to go to school.

MaxRight. No, they've been working on this for 20 years.

MerlinYes.

MaxThere's a lot of hustle to it.

MerlinThere's for sure a lot of hustle to it.

MaxYep. the other thing that I think is interesting is like there was that great article I wish I remember who wrote it but it was like maybe a year ago or something but it was like being a scammer now is like being an oil painter in the 1700s like every cultural wind is at your back like this is the time this is the time of the grifters and the scammers and the fraudsters this is your moment right now because like it's something about we have all the powerful technology but we haven't figured out how to sort of regulate it and make it safe.

Like you can get a huge audience. You know what I mean? I do. I do. And I keep thinking of that.

MerlinIt feels like you're leaving money on the table if you're not leveraging some aspect of scam culture.

MaxYeah, and it's amazing how it keeps popping up in our culture, whether it's, you know, we love talking about Trump, our big white president, and his various sort of frauds and scams and all of the sort of grifters in his orbit who sort of feed off of the crumbs and the leavings that he leaves behind. And then you remember that Anna Delvey story that kind of captured everyone's imaginations? Oh, yeah. It feels everywhere in our culture. I mean, and also, we're just going through this in city council in Chicago. It's been a... I mean, even by the standards of corruption and craziness in city politics in Chicago,

it's been a very tumultuous couple of months. And there's been all these sort of long-time aldermen who are under FBI investigation or they're going to jail. There's these crazy votes getting rammed through city council that are clearly corrupt. It's just everywhere I turn, I feel like it's just like grift, just everywhere. Everyone's on the take, and they've got some angle or some scam, or it's all the multi-level marketing stuff that we're obsessed with.

MerlinThat's funny you should say that. I just sent you the link to Don LaPrey. Do you guys remember the TV ads with Don LaPrey in the 90s? I know you were awfully young at the time, but this guy's infomercials were everywhere, And it featured basically- Oh my God, making money secrets. Well, here's the thing. You're going to learn about buying and selling. He would say over and over. To these weird like Dutch angle shots of him on a beach talking with his weird fake hair. And he would go on and on about, and he'd say buying and selling. Well, here's what the buying and selling was. It's the oldest trick in the book. If you've ever seen an ad, well, now I'm going to date myself, in the back of Rolling Stone,

it says make money stuffing envelopes, send $2 to find out how. And of course, you write back to the person with a little strip of paper and it says, do what I just did, right? So the buying and selling that he's talking about, you're buying small ads in local newspapers. Dutch angle, Dutch angle, Dutch angle. But what it is is basically you go and put it, it's basically envelope stuffing on a broad scale. You buy inexpensive ads in lots of papers to tell people to do essentially what you just did. And he did this with, he had, so what does it say in this article?

He had a credit repair business called Unknown Concepts, which is an awesome name. Then a 36-page booklet he would sell on how to recover a federal housing administration insurance refund after paying off a mortgage. Then he got into the 900 lines and so forth. The money-making show with Don LaPrey, one of the most widely seen infomercials in the 90s. So at that point, he's just your kind of like standard garden variety grifter. Then we get to – I just read this Wikipedia entry yesterday. It's so sad and bad. He later began broadcasting infomercials for, quote, the greatest vitamin in the world.

In 2005, the FDA warned LaPrey about his claims that his vitamin was intended for diseases such as diabetes, stroke, heart disease, insomnia, cancer, and arthritis. FDA stated that. So eventually now you go down to charges. And he was charged with bilking 220,000 victims out of nearly $52 million. Wow. And then you can see the way it ended, and it's not very pretty.

MaxBoy, I'm having like a, like, I feel like I just ate the, like a, like a Madeline and I'm flashing back to these, these, these crazy infomercials in the nineties. Yeah.

MerlinIt was parodied on Saturday Night Live. But if you, if you just see it for a second, you're going to instantly recognize it. It's the, it's a classic get rich quick infomercial.

MaxI think he's on boats. Alex, can you play this? I want to see the making money secrets infomercial. I mean, the nineties were so weird because you, you, I had to, I watched. It seems like a fever dream. I accidentally watched some TV commercials the other day Because I was watching the The Bachelor live finale Two hour live finale Part one of the So I was watching the first two hours of the live Four hour Bachelor finale Are you kidding? Series It's that long? Well the finale And Oh my gosh And I was watching it on like Hulu live

But like time shifted And you know Hulu live you still see the commercials Yeah And I realized Boy I haven't seen a commercial in years And they were so weird. It was very, very strange.

MerlinIt's never been clearer, the demo, of who they're shooting for, especially like on MSNBC. There's just so much stuff for like pharmaceuticals and reverse mortgages. And like this is for depressed. No offense. This is for depressed 60-year-old people who used to be first responders. Like how to like sell your life insurance. But if you have a life insurance policy of over $100,000, you may be able to. Oh, my God.

Maxit's just crazy to me that just recently we all watched like hours of commercials every month all the time we just were watching commercials it was like part of your life and it's gotten i mean

Merlinlike it's it's gotten where it used to be i feel like when i was a kid shows were like 24 25 minutes and i think now they're like 22 or shorter there's like you know more commercials than ever

Alexoh my god i'm finding 28 minute long thing this is horrible that's that's that that's his infomercial Oh, that's what an infomercial is? Okay, let's go.

MerlinOh my God, it's in my thesis, Alex. Semiotics.

Speaker BYou are here, USA. The show you are watching is a paid program or advertisement. USA Network is not responsible for the claims and representations made by the sponsor. Our characters are welcome. The program you're watching is a paid advertisement for making money secrets.

Speaker AThink about this. If millions and millions of people just like you have already started up their own small business and they made a fortune, then why can't you?

Speaker BConservatively, I'm making over $350 a month. Wow. We're literally living on $200 a month for groceries, entertainment, clothing, medical. We had a child at the time and one on the way. This year we're on track to make close to a million dollars in sales.

AlexThis is the easiest money I've ever made, ever. I can't believe it. It's actually happening. and it's actually real.

Speaker BI've now hired employees to help me answer the phones. And once they realize that all I'm doing is running classified ads and they see how easy it is, it's very hard to keep them working for me. They want to go.

AlexJust quick comment. It's a straight on shot that's turning into a Dutch angle as this guy is talking.

Speaker BAnd do it on their own. Can you blame them? No.

Speaker AYou've made $15,000 in sales in a day. $15,000 in a day.

AlexOkay, that man looks like the kingpin from Dare and Fireball.

Speaker AYeah! A lot of people all over the country will watch my TV show over and over again. Epic pimp. They'll never get started because when they hear me talk about how much money you can make placing tiny classified ads in newspapers, it just sounds too easy. It just sounds too good to be true. After you hear my story and you see just how real and just how incredible this is, you're going to want to start doing this. Here I was painting houses for a living, working 12 hours a day, And then one day, just for the fun of it, I decided to place an ad in the newspaper.

I created this 36-page booklet that I wrote about refunds that are due back to people after they pay off their mortgage. I placed the ad in the newspaper just to see what would happen. And I generated so much money, I thought I died and I went to heaven. But that's not even the real exciting part.

MaxThat's a classic thing that the Bible says happens when you go to heaven.

Speaker AYeah, it's from numbers. Every week, I just had this one ad in the newspaper. Well, one day, I was going through the USA Today newspaper, and I'm looking through the weather section, and I noticed all these different cities that were being listed. Oh, no. And that's when it hit me. I thought, oh, what an idiot. What am I doing? I'm such an idiot. I could have put that same ad in every single newspaper in the country. I thought to myself, I could have been making 100 times what I was making. So to make up for my own stupidity of just having one ad in the newspaper, I decided to take placing ads all the way

and I compiled a list of almost every single newspaper in the country and listen to this I ended up generating over $50,000 a week week after week after week right out of my one bedroom apartment Wait, what? Is there a number I can call? I'm placing tiny classrooms in newspapers That's pretty good actually I know we're making fun of it but it sounds easy You should do this Challenge Challenge Challenge Challenge

MerlinHold on Challenge

MaxWell I have a discussion question related to this Have you guys ever fallen for a scam in your life?

AlexYes

MaxYes I have

AlexYeah Yeah I think it Wait No I almost did What did you fall for?

MaxWhat was the one that you almost fell for?

AlexIt was actually like, get a discount on these protein balls.

MerlinWow. Okay. These particular protein balls. What if I told you there was a way to get discounts on protein balls by placing ads? You'll get so many protein balls, you'll think you died and went to heaven. I lived in a studio apartment that was filled with rats, but I was making $50,000 a week on these particular protein balls.

MaxWhat was the scam? Just please describe it.

AlexIt was just... God. Okay. All right. I'm sending you the link to the actual product on Amazon.

MaxWhere did you encounter this?

AlexJust done like researching stuff about like weird keto stuff. And then.

MerlinOh, this is recently.

AlexOh, yeah. This is very recently. Because normally I'm like, because I'm obsessed with this stuff, I can like, I'd like to think that I can normally smell it like, oh, no, no, no. You can smell the balls. I smell the balls from a mile away.

MerlinDeez balls.

AlexAnd it was just like it had the price on Amazon. It's like get them wholesale here. And then it like took you to a I don't know if it was like a scam scam. It like took you to like buy these classes and have your gym at home. And I just wanted my protein balls.

MaxSo I'm confused. So the scam is that you order these on Amazon, but then they.

AlexNo, no, no. They say, oh, look at how expensive these are on Amazon, which I previously almost bought. But it's like $15 for a bag of chips, basically.

MaxOh, you're paying almost a dollar a ball.

AlexYeah, exactly. 14 grams. A dollar a gram.

MaxOh, it's a dollar per gram ball.

MerlinWhat you want to be looking at is your CPV. Okay? Okay, and that's based on clicks? Yeah.

AlexOh, God.

MerlinOkay.

AlexAll right. I shared my shame. What was yours, Max?

MaxBalls per meal.

AlexOh, my God. PPM. Max, what did you fall for?

Maxuh well the one that will always sort of stick in my memory is damn i must have been in middle school when the game diablo 2 came out um this was uh diablo 2 merlin was a game where um you have a character it's kind of like dnd it's a it's a it's a role-playing game and you have but it's on the computer and you have a you have a computer and well merlin doesn't play video games he doesn't know any of this stuff and he has or maybe our listeners don't know so uh it's a game where you play a role. Yeah, yeah.

You're like a barbarian or a rogue or you pick something and then you run around and you can play this game for like...

MerlinYou don't do that in real life though. That's all on the computer set. Yeah, you're using the mouse and keyboard. A literal

Maxmouse. You run around and kill monsters and pick up loot and your guy gets more powerful. He gets more powerful on the computer set. Yeah. Alright, should I not explain it to the listeners? No, tell the story! Hey, where's the scam? Show me the lie. I have to explain how the game works for you to understand the scam.

MerlinOkay. Does it have game mechanics where you're using your controller?

MaxAll right. How did you get scammed, Marlon? No, no. All right. How did you get scammed? No, keep going. Talk more. All right. So the way Diablo 2 works is it's a role-playing game. You have a character, and you can put hundreds or thousands of hours into running around in this world and getting swords and loot and little items and gems. and there's this incredible economy of like probably hundreds of thousands of different special items that you can get. And what was interesting about Diablo 2 was they had ways,

it was one of the very early games where there were ways for you to interact with other players online. Not like World of Warcraft because I think you could only have like four people in the game at the same time, but you could basically use chat rooms to meet people and play the game with each other. So Ben, one of the Cards Against Humanity partners, was very, very good at Diablo, had put an ungodly amount of hours into this game, and he was helping me build up a character, and we were running dungeons together, and I was gaining loot and stuff, and Ben very generously gave me some really special items.

He gave me this crazy, unique, enchanted battle axe that he had probably put hundreds of hours into just getting that item, and Ben specifically said, I'm not giving this to you. I'm just loaning it to you so you can use it for your character to get your own loot. To level up. To level up, yeah, but he said, this is my axe, And when you're done with it, we're going to meet back up in the game and you'll give it back to me. So then Ben goes away. I'm playing the game. And I go into one of these chat rooms where you try and get a group of four people together to go do dungeon raids together.

And this guy is like, you know, also Diablo 2, there were lots of like cheats and hacks. And this was back in the day when that was a much bigger part of gaming. And also I was young enough to think that that was really interesting. And someone is in the chat room and they're like, hey, I know how to duplicate items. There's a glitch in the game and you can duplicate items. Oh, man. And, you know, and I'm like, holy shit, I could get this axe for myself and then I don't have to give it back to Ben. And so he takes me. So he's like, yeah, jump in the game and I'll show you how to do it. So he takes me into the game and he goes and, you know, there's areas of the map where you can fight each other.

And there's areas of the map where you're not allowed to fight each other. And it was he had found some sort of exploit where he could stand in an area where you're not allowed to fight each other and have me stand on the axe and kill me and take my axe. And that's exactly what happened. Oh, my God. And he disappeared off the server and took my axe. And I'll never forget that feeling of that. And then I had to go tell Ben I lost his axe.

MerlinIt's such a stunning feeling. You're still processing what happened, and you feel the stupidity creeping up on you. I can't believe I did that.

AlexHow did Ben react when you told him?

MaxI honestly don't remember.

AlexI would be very curious.

MaxBut another time, we all really liked SNES games, and this was well into the era of the Wii or whatever, and I was the only person that had original SNES controllers that were still in good condition, and I lent them to Ben to play SNES games, and his dog chewed the cables up. And I said, Ben, are you going to replace the controllers for me? And he said, no, you knew that it was a risk that my dog might chew them up when you lent them to me, and you accepted that.

You knew I was like this when you met me. You know what you're getting into. I can't help it.

MerlinIt's my nature.

AlexPeople don't change.

MerlinThe scorpion and the frog. What is it? It's the scorpion and the NES controller?

Speaker BYeah.

MaxWhat's your scam, Merlin? How'd you get scammed?

MerlinI'm just sitting here trying to think about it. I mean, like there's just been I feel like I do have my brain is not fully functioning for this recall right now. But what I do know is that I all almost all grifts grifts depend on the other person thinking they're too smart for the grift. And almost nobody is too smart for the grift. I mean, I've watched enough Ricky Jay to know there's somebody who's better at something than me. and I won't even realize in that instance that my wallet was stolen

or he planted a card on me or whatever it is. I won't even realize it's happened until that person wants me to know it, right? But I guess what I'm thinking about, there's been lots of stuff where I feel like I don't, first of all, I should say in passing, my family, it's not like The Dream or something, which I put in show notes. You should listen to the podcast The Dream about MLM. My mom was a Mary Kay person. Like she could scarcely afford to buy the kit to get started, but she did because she saw it as a chance for extra money and opportunity. And she legit genuinely loved the products and she really believed it.

But like, you know, two years later, she wasn't doing it. She had a bunch of dusty like concealer sitting around. Did she have like pink, pink clothing? No, she never got that far. But they did have these pink cases that were basically like a Barbie dream house full of cream. and like you would take that and do demos at people's houses and it's pretty much like what happens in the dream a podcast i highly recommend but i do know i've been pulled in as an agent of some of things that while they didn't have the recursive recruitment part of mlm i did very

much feel myself as a cog in somebody else's scams a lot of the times and that could be stuff like I mean for band for chorus for drama club having to sell candy like Travis McElroy I ended up owing like $50 because I ate all the Snickers the Snickers went in my mouth hole and I ended up being the person who was funding band with my mouth hole there's that kind of stuff I was a telemarketer for a while God it just occurred to me

Maxthat that's a deliberate thing that they know the kids are going to eat the candy

Merlinthey know the kids are going to eat the M&M's they know that yeah yeah yeah yeah and I had a friend I've talked about my friend Phil, who at the same time had a rogue operation with employees. He had a dedicated locker at school where he was selling candy, the same sorts of candy that all the liberal arts were selling at a discount. And he called it the Marshall Fund because he was able to buy a Marshall amp by underselling the band kids. So he was smart. He had hustle. I also, though, think about, I mean, stuff like, you see this everywhere right now. I mean, I guess the nearly legit version of

This is affiliate links. Wait a minute. I have a question, Alex. Yeah.

MaxWas there people selling candy at your school?

AlexNo.

MerlinDid you sell like sausage and cheese or candles or anything? No, no, no. Did you sell any of that? Yes.

AlexWell, okay. So we sold magazine subscriptions and wrapping paper.

MerlinYeah, I remember that. That was the lamest.

AlexIt was so lame.

MaxWe had to do the magazine subscriptions.

MerlinOr like the turtle candies where the whole conceit is your parents go to work, put it down in the break room, and everybody is obligated to sign up because you're supposed to support each other's kids with that stuff.

AlexOh, and the – I mean this – I feel bad calling this like a grift, but the whole run for charity situation. Oh, that's such a grift. Oh, my God. Just donate. I just want to give you money.

MerlinKeep me out of your system. Just take my $50 standard donation to anybody who ever – if anybody asks me for – don't abuse this. If anybody asks for money, I will give $50 or $100 just because that's a thing that I do. Don't eat whatever. It's fine. But no, I don't want to support your fun run.

It's like the Oscars or any of this shit. It's just all it does is keep more like the Webby's or whatever the fuck. Any of those dumb awards where it's really all about who's giving the award. And you sound like a bad sport when you say it. But all of that shit that really kind of picked up in the 2000s was all about this kind of virality of spreading the message of this bullshit organization that's giving out these awards to broken people. And it's like I hate participating in that. I was going to say the other one is affiliate stuff. Or like I see there are products that I know to be not that great that I see people on Twitter tuning out links to like over and over and over to where it drowns out the negative response to stuff.

that becomes a kind of not mlm but a way of like spamming is probably too strong a word but not by much of like diluting the market for people's actual responses to stuff because if you go and search for certain products you're only going to find people's links to this is a great thing

Maxi i was thinking about the the magazine sales and the candy sales and how and how smart it was for your friend to like undercut them because he could just wholesale the candy for he would just go he

Merlinwould go to Sam's, which was like Costco for Florida people, and just go and just buy fucking crates of M&Ms and Snickers.

MaxI don't think, so in my school, the candy sales were ubiquitous, and pizza sales after school, and just sort of that kind of thing. And in fact, the candy sales were such a big deal that when someone was selling candy for orchestra or band or whatever, the teacher would usually allow them to stand up at the top of class and say, I'm selling candy for band. Backpacks outside. Kids with money only And the candy bars are $5 a candy bar and you can get one Just come see me after class if you want one Usually they would sort of finagle like an announcement

And I was just thinking like It definitely wouldn't have been allowed For me to sell candy on my own

AlexOh no

MaxOh absolutely not Was this illegal that your friend was doing illegal candy sales

MerlinOr was it a different time No he got clocked he eventually got clocked by the principal and had to stop But he did make hundreds of dollars

MaxBut why are you allowed to sell? Why is it? Why? What? I don't understand that. Why?

AlexBecause it's for charity and to benefit. But it's not for charity.

MaxIt's for band.

AlexWell, it's for benefits. You ever try and buy a saxophone? Yeah. It's hard. It's hard.

MerlinWell, mostly, I mean, like, with the stuff like band, it was there to, or like, for that matter, like, not Key Club. What's the one? Like, not Model UN. But you know the one? Oh, you know, Boys State, Girls State. It was to be able to afford to go to the Capitol. Yeah, weren't the kids a little young for a key club?

AlexOh, no. No.

MerlinIt was the Kiwanis. Oh, my God. You're right. I was in the Kiwanis, the youth Kiwanis thing called Key Club. What is that? I've never heard of this in my life. Well, you get a brandy snifter and you put all your keys in there and then you just have heavy petting for seven minutes. You have heavy petting and then you just sit around for three minutes. I've never heard of Key Club.

Did you ever do that, Alex? Did you ever have heavy petting in school?

AlexNo, just free willy.

MerlinNo, for charity. For charity.

AlexOh, we did have buttons that had the phrase, pet your dog, not your date, that were sold.

MerlinArf, arf. Are you supposed to jack off your dog?

AlexI'm right.

MerlinI mean, what is that, a second date thing?

AlexOh, no, no.

MerlinYou're a good boy. You're such a good boy. You like rubs. It's a rub and tug dog spot. No. What?

Speaker BI don't have stress? Oh, God.

AlexIn the super secret text channel, I put market day. Was this a thing that you ever had, Max, where like someone would come to your, you'd get a catalog. It was kind of like Scholastic Club. similar to the book fair and you would order food and like once a month your parents would pick it up. It was just like groceries and like the school got a cut of the groceries.

MerlinWe're doing that right now. Yeah, okay. Right now at our school.

MaxI don't, I'm not aware of that ever happening. We did have, you know, a weird one that we had was food days and this was in middle school and so I think I would say it was probably about once a month you'd have a food day and what that was was if your parents wanted, they could pay extra for you to get, for you to have, for like basically a fast food, a local fast food restaurant to give you like an individual meal of fast food. Oh, yeah. It was not like a lunch line. It was like folding tables and you'd come pick up a pizza, a personal pizza.

MerlinOh, wow. And they get a cut of that.

MaxI don't know. I assume someone must have been making money because they were allowed to operate in the school. And I remember about once a month you get a little personal deep dish pizza and it was a food day. Food day.

AlexWe called it hot lunch day where it would be. It would be like Connie's pizza or like even there was I think there was like McDonald's at one point. And it was like a fucking holiday.

MerlinI think we had Burger King sometimes. This is so wild. Well, you know, I mean, there was there was little avenues even when I was in high school. When I was in high school, they still had a Coke or Pepsi machine at school.

MaxOh, well, they had those when I was – did they have that when you were in school?

AlexNo.

MerlinWe were lousy with, like, vending machines.

AlexGod, I wish there was Diet Coke. Right.

MerlinSo, I mean, that becomes a revenue stream. But, like, it's sort of like when I said cheese and sausage, you laugh. But that was when the band in particular, the orchestra band would – Orchston Marching. I think that was an orchestra thing. Yeah, but basically it was Hillshide – not Hillshide Farms. What's the place where you buy stuff for family you don't like? Like Hickory Farms? Oh, yeah, yeah. It was that kind of thing. You'd get a crock of spreadable cheese and like a summer sausage. And it's like, who came up with this to sell to people? But like with the Key Club or whatever it was called, I think that's what it was called.

I'll find a photo of me in the yearbook. Oh, yes, please. Our government teacher's wife's recipe for the most excreable cookie I've ever had to mouth in my life. And when Mr. Sherwood presented it to us, these are really great. You wouldn't believe the shelf life on these. That was the primary feature of the cookies we were making is that they wouldn't go bad until we were in college. You got to lead with the F's and B's. Yeah.

Slide. They were so bad. It tasted like baking soda in pain. They were so nasty. But the point is nobody fucking cared. You put some of that bullshit in a plastic thing and sell it outside the Publix, you know, somebody's going to buy it for the children.

Speaker BAnyway, I...

MerlinWrong Whitney Houston.

Speaker BI believe in the future, so the cookies let them find the way.

AlexOh, wait. Girl Scout cookies are okay, right? They're not.

MerlinProblematic?

AlexI buy a lot of.

Merlin58% of the women in Congress used to be a Girl Scout.

AlexI mean, that checks out. But are they bad? I buy some. Like, at our office, we get, there's a list.

MerlinDon't we like the Girl Scouts now? It's the Boy Scouts we don't like, right?

AlexI hope so. Oh, the Boy Scouts are the worst. But, like, buying Girl Scout cookies, that actually benefits them, right? Right? Someone just tell me I'm right. Please.

MerlinI think according to, you know what? I don't know. I just bought some from my daughter's friend.

AlexYeah, I love them.

MerlinPulled up in my van. Pulled up in my van in my clown costume.

MaxI have a question about being a Girl Scout, about the Girl Scout to Congresswoman corridor, the sort of career path. Buy their way into Girl Scouts. There used to be this statistic that Kickstarter would say sometimes because I used to do all these events and talks with Kickstarter, and I remember that the big thing used to be, because people would always go, how do you make a successful project? And one of their big statistics were, well, we've analyzed all the projects on Kickstarter. And this was an earlier time when not every project had a video, when only some projects went to the trouble

of making a video. And they said, if you make a video for your project, you're like 80% likely to get funded. And if you don't make a video, you're like-

MerlinOf the videos that make, of the projects that make a video, X% get funded more than people who don't.

MaxCorrect, right. And that was like one of their big top line advice on how to make a successful Kickstarter. And I always thought that was funny because to me it's like, I don't think it's, it's not the video that's making the project successful. It's that the same people who have a good project and put a lot of work into it and market it and care about it, they're also going to make the video. Yeah, it's like it's a result, not a cause. Right. And to me it's like, if you come from money and a stable family who cares a lot about your development

and your accolades and sort of like invests a lot of time and energy into your education and your whatever, like assembling a good child or whatever, like you're – of course you're statistically more likely to become a congresswoman. Oh, there's so many examples of that. It's not – is it that you learn anything from the – I mean I honestly don't know this. I don't know that much about what the Girl Scouts does, but like it does sort of like put my antennas up if people are saying like, oh, if you become a Girl Scout, you're more likely to go to Congress.

MerlinThat's a really, God, that's such a good point, Max. It's a super good point. And I think about your wonderful interview with the Kickstarter advice lady. And so much of the cargo culting that she was doing kind of falls under that aegis. All the stuff of like, well, if you don't get X percent in your first 24 hours, your project will fail and all that kind of stuff. And it's like, well, if you're doing like a small time grift, that's probably true. Like you're going to fall between the cracks. But if you're Max and team or Max and associates, you've taken the time to craft something over time that's entirely ready to launch right now and will have longevity beyond the 23 hours that you need.

MaxWell, I don't think it's I don't even think it's a that's fine for maxing. I think it's true for everyone. Yeah.

MerlinNo, no, no, no, no. I know. I'm saying I'm saying no, no, I'm sorry. That's that came out wrong. And what I was trying to say was that, like, there's so many things like this in life where, like, there's all these – you ever seen those crazy charts people can do? The kind of the correlation causation charts where you can say the number of terrorist attacks went up with the amount of popularity of Internet Explorer. And it's like you can prove anything with correlation. Right. And so – but you end up looking at all these results. And this is white privilege, like, on a platter. Right. In some ways is to go like, well, look how they turned out because of this one magic trick.

Now, if you just learn to have some hustle, you're going to be rich dad instead of poor dad.

MaxI honestly think wealth and selection bias and coincidence is probably more of an – I actually think that it's a much bigger problem than we're even discussing because I actually question whether even going to Harvard gives you any advantage in life over not going to college or going to like a completely average state college. I understand that people who go to Harvard are more likely to become a CEO, but is it because they went to Harvard?

AlexNo.

MaxOh, absolutely. Or is it that they're more likely to become a CEO for the same reason that they got into Harvard?

AlexYeah, I disagree, Merlin. I think it's because you got into Harvard. It's how you got into Harvard.

MerlinOh, no, no, I'm sorry. I phrased that poorly. I was just trying to say like when you get – there's a phrase, my sponsor used to use that really stuck with me. And he would talk about the need to get your ticket punched. Like there's just so much stuff in life where you've got to just show up and do the thing. And then that becomes, especially if you're a white guy, like that just becomes your entree into the next thing. And you get the next ticket punch and you get the next ticket punch. And because somebody said this on Twitter today so brilliantly in talking about the college scam stuff, is that like the thing about white privilege is that it isn't, it's partly that

your white, I'm going to misphrase this, but that your white privilege got you to where you are, But it's more that what your race is has never been an issue to impede you in what you do. Right. Right. And so for me, like that, that's, that's what you're talking about. That's a big fucking ticket punch to go to Harvard because that's, that's the first thing people are going to notice on your resume is like you. And the thing, it was so dispiriting to me when I was thinking about grad school and applying to grad school. And that same sponsor said to me, my academic sponsor, said, you know, there's basically all any school cares about is that you can complete projects on time.

Like you got out of college in fewer than four years. It basically shows you can finish a project and put up with administrative bullshit. That's what that proved. Beyond like the SATs and then that, you know what I'm saying? Like, yeah, sure, you're not your LSAT, but your GRE will matter. like what you did your thesis on might matter but mostly they want to know that they can punch your ticket because the last person who punched your ticket said that you're good at putting up with

Alexbullshit and finishing projects on time sorry i derailed that go ahead no it you're right i i agree sentence is thought thought complete no no what what were you gonna say what did i cut you off no i i agree like so much even going to art school so much of it was just okay go to this building get this thing it's approved all right you're good to go and you know like that i max has never asked to see my grades they're really good but i don't even know that i didn't even know that

you had a college degree until we started doing this podcast wait what okay letting that go you also said you didn't know that i was gay when you hired me which like what i have known i watch your

Maxvideos on vimeo and i thought you were a good filmmaker and i hired and we hired max doesn't

Alexorientation there weren't many dutch angles um if you know what i mean i do know what you mean

Merlinyou just go to a cafe and smoke dutch it's a different country uh yeah yeah getting your ticket punched it was so depressing to me though because i really thought because of the the theory of the great man and exceptionalism and whiteness i really thought that people were really going to be clamoring for me at grad school because of the things these creating my own major and doing this thesis that was really groundbreaking and he's like well no no you need to like you need to like fit there uh again to quote the brady bunch you got to fit the suit basically that's if you fit

in the suit you can be johnny bravo and like that's how it works

MaxAlex you watching The Bachelor?

AlexNo no Dig Dug Challenge? Challenge?

MaxLet's fold some stuff Challenge Challenge

AlexWhose challenge was it this week?

MaxIt was Alex's challenge

AlexNo it wasn't It wasn't It was Merlin's Oh it was Merlin's?

MerlinYeah Gosh darn it My dang toe I had the challenge this week which was to make something cool out of paper the notion was just go find some kind of project where you can make something out of paper it could be practical, it could be cool, it could be whatever make something cool out of paper, did you guys do the challenge? oh fuck yeah I did the challenge

Alexoh no

Merlinthis is one where I smelled it, I just knew you were going to do something really fucking cool

Maxit's more cool for Alex well no actually I know how I'm going to do this what did you do, you guys go first what did you do? I'll send you mine Uh-oh. Do you guys like arts and crafts stuff at home, Merlin?

MerlinUm, I don't love it. My daughter, it's like one of her favorite things in the world to do. It's okay. Yeah. No, I liked it more. I liked it more like vacation Bible school, like making stuff out of popsicle sticks was fun, but I'm not as into it.

MaxI love arts and crafts stuff. I love cutting and folding paper. I love glues and tapes, and I love all that shit.

MerlinI love having all that stuff. It's just using it. It's kind of tedious sometimes.

MaxOh, dude, I have a rolling tool chest, you know, like in a shop, just filled with different kinds of tapes and glue sticks and rulers and exactos and things. And I use that for design. I mean, I wish – I mean, I have probably more tools than I have used for for design, if I'm being honest. But, man, getting into magic, if you like, like, arts and crafts and you're like, I love, like, the finesse and the care of, like, that. But like I don't you know, I don't want like when you're like a grown ass man. Like what are you going to build out of?

Like you said, like a popsicle stick thing. But it's really centering. There's something very centering about doing those little things with your hands. It is very satisfying to to like make something yourself and be like, I fucking made that and it works. Yeah, totally. I really like that. So I'm doing a lot of arts and crafts lately with with magic stuff. I'm spending hours and hours and hours just like cutting stuff out with, you know, cutting things out with an exacto blade. and gluing them just so and trying to do it over and over again.

MerlinDid you make models when you were a kid? I don't know if models were even a thing when you were a kid, but did you ever make like cars or planes or anything like that from model sets?

MaxIt was never on my radar. It was all Legos for me. Oh, wow. It was all Legos for me. But I did enjoy – like my thing was like I would get the Legos, I'd build the set once and then take it apart and make my own stuff. And I did really enjoy making my own stuff. That's so cool.

AlexYeah, I hated the, I think I was just at the tail end of where you could buy some Lego that was just like blank bricks. But no, then it became like, I really liked building the Star Wars thing, but sometimes you just want a little house.

MerlinYeah, I was gonna say on popular opinion, I love the kits. I find them incredibly satisfying to make.

AlexAll right. So I didn't quite peanut butter.

MerlinDid you try?

AlexOh, absolutely. In fact, okay. So I think I talked.

MerlinThat's okay. Trying counts.

AlexRight. Thank you. I would like a trophy, please. Oh, look at you. This is what I did this a ton as a kid. I would just.

MerlinOh, my God. This is so sad. Oh, this is so cute.

AlexIt's so sad.

MerlinThis is so Japanese.

AlexOh, it's very, very Japanese. I'm trying to find the Newton one.

MerlinTell people what we're looking at here.

AlexWhat I'm showing Max and Merlin are, there's these papercraft PDFs of old Apple products. And when I was younger, I would just print them out.

MerlinThat's so cute.

AlexCut them, get my little, my mom would have to watch me with the X-Acto knife. But then I'd get that out and I'd tape them together. And yeah, so I did do this, but I forgot it at home. So I'm waiting for Machi to give me a picture. But it looks like a disaster because I didn't want to cheat because...

MerlinThis is a tough one. That's a lot of tabs.

AlexYeah, yeah. And I was also just using gaff tape. I should have done this in the office. We have all the tools to make a beautiful... We have the technology here. But no, I just ended up cutting out little stencils of stuff at home. And it was very satisfying. I don't like glue, though. Really hate glue.

MaxThere's a... What is it? I made one of these in college that was one of the coolest things I've ever seen, and it was a paper craft dragon optical illusion. And I think it's by Richard Kaufman, maybe? The guy with the fold-out books? No. Oh. Oh. What the fuck? That's wild. It's even cooler. It's from Gathering for Gardener. Okay, hang on. Oh, the convention? Yeah.

Oh, cool. What a weird way that life makes its little spirals like that. Right? I made this thing 10 years ago in my dorm room because I probably Cory Doctorow posted it. And I thought it looked neat. Oh, wow. And I thought it looked neat. And I loved it. And I showed it to everyone. Put it in the robot, Max. Oh, sorry. I sent that to Zach Gage, not to you guys. So I put this thing. So I made it. Oh, and that's my private key for something. Okay. That's okay. I'll delete it. and

MerlinI put some special characters in what the fuck is going on this is really bad

Alexsearch for

MerlinI am not known as I slowly turn into a corn cob

Maxsearch for that on google papercraft dragon optical illusion I'm sorry I'm trying to put it in and it's not

Alexgoing oh wait I actually have this in slack we were looking at this yesterday with

MaxJordan oh it's so cute so I'm telling you I built this thing Cory Doctorow posted this and I thought that's neat and I printed it out and I made it and I put it in my dorm room and everybody who came to my dorm for three years was like that's the coolest shit I've ever seen. And now I know all these people who go to Gathering for Gardner and I own all of Martin Gardner's books and I think he's the coolest thing in the world. That is very strange to me. What is that? Martin Gardner.

AlexThe. Oh, fuck. Where is it?

MaxOh, cool. So he does like logic and puzzle things. Gathering for Gardner is a convention for puzzle designers, magicians and mathematicians. And they all and they all get together and they say what's the weirdest shit that's going on in your little circle right now? And everyone sort of feeds off of each other so the magician that's exciting So the magicians go and they hear some mathematician give a talk about like a new weird math principle And then they go I can use this to trick people and the math people see new some new optical illusion And they're like oh, maybe I can discover a new math principle based on this weird optical illusion

It's very cool. It's a very cool sort of cultural exchange and it's named after this guy Martin Gardner who is both, I think, a pretty prominent mathematician, but a very prominent sort of magic writer. He's a puzzle boy, too.

MerlinNow, Max, if yours is going to be really good, can I just do mine and get it out of the way? Please. Okay. I had ambitions for this. So my ambition was that I would do some kind of bespoke, homemade, amazing thing that would be funny to you guys. And so I tried to make an index card holder out of index cards. And basically I ended up with a pile of thin cardboard and staples. And that was not good. So... It's the hipster PDA holder. A recursive hipster PDA.

Yes. Sort of. But instead, I was a little bit... So I made this last night using... So I made this. Wow!

AlexOh, no. Oh, no. What is this? Oh, no. It's a little Alex.

MaxLook at your little arms.

Speaker BMy arms are...

MaxBut why isn't there a little max?

Speaker BI'm so proud of her. I love it so much.

MaxI mean, I'm looking on your desk.

MerlinIt must be just out of frame. Just out of frame. You're Domino. That's Domino in the background. Wow.

AlexWhere'd you get these arms?

MerlinThis comes in the app. So you go to Foldify. You go to Foldify. And Foldify lets you say, which one of these hedrons do you want to begin with? And they have some templates. They have a best of where you can make a SpongeBob and stuff. But then you can go and make your own. You can put like a Groucho glasses on it. You can do whatever you want. And as you can see, it took me about 30 seconds to make the design and then about half an hour to cut it up and put it together.

But that's a little Alex. Look at those arms. It comes right out of the side of your head with you.

AlexYeah, just like how I look in real life. It's uncanny.

MerlinI didn't even have time to put a watch on there. It's the worst.

AlexAll right, Max, how about you?

MaxSo I'm going to make mine right now.

AlexOkay.

MaxCould you FaceTime Merlin on video so he can see it? Oh, shit.

AlexOh, no. Really? Fuck.

MaxThis is going to turn into a magic trick.

MerlinFuck you. No, I don't think it's a magic trick. It's definitely going to be a magic trick.

AlexIs this a Mobius strip? Do you have a dollar? No, I don't carry cash.

MerlinI hate this. I can't get through to you enough how much I don't want to see magic. I don't want to participate in magic. Okay. All right. So I'm doing this on my phone, right?

AlexOkay, I'm getting...

MerlinI hate this so much and I have to pee.

AlexOh, I hear it. I hear it. Oh, boy. Oh, my. Hello. Hi, Merlin. Hi, Merlin. Hey, guys.

MaxSo I've got the crisp $20 bill. I'm going to make a little... I'm beginning my origami here.

MerlinYou can't turn the sound all the way off. That's interesting. Boy, I do look like Nick Nolte.

MaxYou got a little bit of Nick Nolte. A light Nolte going on.

MerlinI'm losing weight, but I'm afraid I'm losing my meat beard.

Speaker BOkay.

MaxSo here's the deal. So I'm going to give this a little fold. I'm going to give this a little fold like this.

MerlinI hate this so much.

AlexOh, I know this one.

MaxIf you fold it just right, like this. So I've kind of got the dollar in my hand.

MerlinHe gave money an erection. This is really good, Max. Looks like a magic trick. I feel like we've talked about this a lot. Oh, look. It's floating. He didn't eat it so much. That's crazy. Wow, look at his hands.

Does he know he looks like that? Does he walk around the office doing it with his hands?

AlexYou okay, Cameron? You doing all right out there? watch Alex watch oh boy you watching you watching I'm I'm not watching you am I oh okay Merlin's doing great Max impression right now I am I Max just handed me $20 I'm gonna keep that

MerlinThat's a normal 20. Wait, you got to watch it. I'm not done.

AlexYeah.

MaxMerlin is pantomiming that he's jerking himself off. No, I was petting a dog. And pulling streamers out of his mouth like a clown. I was petting a dog.

Thank you.

Show notes

Transcript

123. Food Day

Show notes

Transcript

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