214. Yelling at Plywood

AlexThis is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast. This week's challenge, shock your brain.

Oh, oh, oh, hello. Hello. R2? R2? Is that you? I probably got that reference wrong.

MerlinI got to warn you coming straight out of the box.

AlexOh.

MerlinI've been wearing this all morning, and I'm going to wear it through the entire episode. On top of it all, on top of it all, Alexandra, I'm juicing. I'm juicing because I'm doing double salt. I'm doing double salt in warm water, and I think my IQ might be increasing exponentially. so. I hope you brought your A-game.

AlexWell, would you allow me to do what the YouTuber use would call a story time? Yes.

MerlinThe problem is that I have double strength saline solution. I've moistened my pads so deeply that it's dripping into my eyes, but I don't mind because my IQ is so high right now. Good, good.

AlexJust bulging. My testing is unmetered. Has your brain

Merlinlike smoothed out you think too or like a panda manatee a panda tea see i could not have come up with panda tea last week finally a creature we can both despise oh no let me have a powerpoint are you gonna do a youtube story is that one of those things like a is that like a fleet

Alexoh i love fleets because nobody looks at them but me it's my it's my new favorite

Merlinit's fun to lose a sixth of the screen oh boy to faces oh hey you know that thing you came here for here's something from somewhere else hey sir sir i i ordered the the the eggs with grits this is this is hot with antlers no no i want my grits what's going on alex talk to me about

Alexyour youtube story well you know how on days you wake up and you're like everything is just gone to shit and nothing's going going the way your way it's like the universe has transpired against you today was not one of those days except i woke up at what your text woke me up this morning saying here's the show doc which i still don't have open hello which was my time about 11 13 which is which just two minutes before we record and I was like oh my god I'm sorry can we start at 11 30 as of

right now it's 11 49 because I I hopped in the shower real quick and people might be like wait your your you know little studio corner is literally like five feet from your bed why wouldn't you just rolled over you would have been there in time but I was you know just completely drenched in sweat. I'm like, I won't be able to do this. And I must have had a nightmare, overslept, coming out of a manic episode. I don't know. But it seems like the world isn't on fire. There was nothing. Nothing has gone wrong. I just slept through at least like

six alarms and timers because, you know, I'm one of those time tracking monsters. So I am incredibly sorry has is it does this happen to normal people just like has this ever happened for for this show that i've just totally i don't i'm sincerely asking i don't know i'm just i'm

Merlinreally i'm i'm i'm focusing i have so much attention on you right now because of all the

Alexelectricity course i know it's very upsetting um it's it's you know i it's like i'm staring at the

Merlinceiling and i see the chess pieces um i'm not sure which part i'm gonna choose one part of this because I don't really understand what the fuck you're talking about. I think what's interesting here is the part where you're, you don't need to apologize for these things. You're surprised because you weren't on time and that you appear to have slept deeply. Is this what life is, you're doing your alien robot thing where you're like, oh, I never have normal. And so you're asking like, is that what it's like for normal people? Or what is it you're doing?

AlexI am asking.

MerlinIt's not really a story if you're asking a question. That would be more, it's really more of a story than a question.

AlexThe end of the story was, and I slept until 11.13.

MerlinOh, it's a humble brag. Hey, good for you, Alex.

AlexWait, is this a brag? Being late and sleeping for eight hours? No, sleeping for eight hours is great, but completely sleeping through a long... Technically, I just missed half a day of work. No one... I'm glad I'm loved. No one was like, hey, where's Alex? They're not on Slack.

MerlinIt's like when Miranda chokes on the delivery food or that kind of thing or Liz Lemon. It's always a single woman.

AlexOh, gosh.

MerlinYou choke on the delivery food or like you eat the cake out of the trash, that kind of thing. I get it.

AlexOh, gosh.

MerlinI'm glad you did that. That's good.

AlexThat's really good. This, I don't know. This is just very strange. Like I have slept through alarms, but not for hours and hours.

MerlinIs Matchy out of the house?

AlexYeah.

MerlinWhat about Dougie? He's dug you out of the house?

AlexOh, I hope so. Oh, no. I've just realized that he's definitely seen me asleep. Oh, wow. There's like, there's no way he has not seen me asleep. Oh, wow. What?

Well, because he typically comes here very early on weekends. Like my landlord, this might be his full-time job now, but I wonder if he's ever come into the apartment as he tends to do. I mean, he knocks.

MerlinHe just lets himself in is what you're saying.

AlexWell, he knocks first. But I won. But then, you know, comes in. And we've been here for five years. So, yeah. Oh, I bet he has seen either me or Mattia's sleep.

MerlinI see what you're saying. It's not a large place. It's not a Balmoral or whatnot. I get what you're saying. That's weird. One time in the midst of severe baby brain. um so i had a real good relationship with two of our uh ups drivers and uh this is two this would be early or late 2007 and um you know because when you got a baby you get a lot of stuff the baby was still fresh and anyway long story short i was like sean you gotta see the baby and i was like sean you gotta and it did not occur to me at all that as was happening almost all the time my wife was

breastfeeding the baby so i brought sean into the room and i'm there's there's only two people in the room that were not falling over with surprise, and that would be my infant daughter and me. Both Sean and Madeline were very, very surprised that I had made this particular love connection.

Because I think without them actually saying the words, I think my wife said, hey, I'm breastfeeding and my boob is out. And without saying it, I think Sean was thinking or saying, you know, hey, she's breastfeeding and her boob is out.

Anyway, hey, you've met Sean. He's the guy that brings the diapers. Okay, I have to move now.

I have just the tiniest bit of self-knowledge. And some of my self-knowledge, I mean, you know, I try to take the temperature. You know what I like to say, Alex? Read the room is what I say. Read the room. You know I like to read the room? Did you know that?

AlexI try. I don't think I succeed often, but, you know, practice makes perfect.

MerlinWell, okay. Like this program is kind of a good idea. I have a weird set of improbable mental rules about this program as long as we've done it. One is we start on time. The other one is whatever's in the show is in the show. But what's in the show when it starts is it's a little bit like a Quaker improv meeting. Okay. I think that would be something like this. Quaker improv meeting. You wait for the spirit to move you, but also you got to play in the space. And so like, I don't know, in my head, like all those work together. Now, my worst friend, John Siracusi, is like, meh, meh.

You think you ever start talking, it's the show. Meh, meh. And I'm like, well, that's just how I was raised in podcasting.

AlexTen years of podcasting and here we are.

MerlinAnd so I like to read the room. Yes, and, right? And we're playing in the space. and then you just go, you know, you go kind of straight into it. You know what I mean? That's just one of the rules for me. And that's also, that's kind of a rule for life. But that's too much improv to visit upon other people to have a boob out.

Anyway, I'm glad you're here. I'm glad you slept. But being a part of my self-knowledge is I realize little things, little things when I read in my own room. For example, I know that if the last thing I remember watching when I fell asleep on the couch is teppanyaki videos, if that happens several times, then I start to learn, oh, let's be honest. If I feel like turning on a teppanyaki video, what should that be telling me? I mean, right? I mean, it's not who we think we are. It's who we are. It's what our actions reflect. If I turn on a teppanyaki video, now I have the presence of mind to go,

ooh, this is usually the last thing I watch before I fall asleep on the couch. Another one of those is Disney videos. So I dreamed about Disney last night because like teppanyaki videos, Disney videos were often the last thing I watched. So I fell asleep watching Disney videos. So I was a little bit out of sorts. I dreamed about Disney.

AlexNow, Disney the Antioch Semite or like the human or Disney the magical world that I enjoy? There's so many vectors.

MerlinWhich one would you like it to be for this bit?

AlexOh, oh. I mean, honestly, I'd like it to be Winnie the Pooh.

MerlinMost of the theme park, most of the theme park, I watch this one particularly terrible YouTube channel. I think it's called the Disney food blog. It's just like, oh, beignets. But anyway, it's also like the 47 surprising things they don't want you to discover about hidden Mickeys or whatever. But sometimes I fall into that. I go like, I'll watch something, you know, about the parks. Or I love the defunct land. Defunct land has several good ones, but I really like the one on, I like anything about listen to the land. and I also really like

the one about the, what's it called, the California Adventure Superstar Limo, the worst ride in the history of Disney. I'll watch that several times. A lot went wrong with that.

AlexOh boy. It did indeed.

MerlinAnd there's even a Princess Diana angle.

AlexOh, wait. Okay, I'm trying to be in the space. I'm trying to be in the space, but is that true?

MerlinNo, no, you're good. It was this ill-conceived, I don't know this part oh well it is as they like to say a perfect storm and I'll make it quick but like so first of all California Adventure the reason they made the California park was they had room for it they basically converted a parking lot into I think into the California Adventure because here was their business logic the problem is people come here but they want to go other places in California ergo why don't we create a theme park that has all of California in California in the California Adventure

AlexMm-hmm.

MerlinReally good idea. Super good idea.

AlexMm-hmm.

MerlinSo they want some movie magic. Michael Eisner, whose head is so often very, very far up his ass, is very committed to this idea of this one dark ride. It's going to be you have to get from LAX to Gram's Chinese Theater to accept your award or something. It's kind of like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, except for paparazzi chasing you. They're being chased by paparazzi on this particular dark ride. and it's, I say Mr. Toad because, you know, it's a little bit like, whoa, this ride's crazy and all the paparazzi are chasing you.

It came out around August of 1997.

AlexOh!

MerlinAnd they were already pot committed to this ride with this. Yeah, so can you think? Yeah, I think basically the Princess Diana crash was like just a little before this ride was supposed to go live.

AlexOh, no.

MerlinYeah. So then they had to change a bunch about it. They had, obviously they had almost no money for this. So they basically made some real. So when I say audio animatronics, we're not even talking like Carousel of Progress. We're talking like it's basically a cutout on a stick. whoopi goldberg uh regis regis philbin uh antonio banderas share and uh and so there's uh abc oh drew drew carey abc based celebrities that they were allowed to use for cheaper almost no money

Alexbecause they're they're owned by michael eisner he owns celebrities yeah exactly and he thought it was

Merlinhe still thought it was a stitch he's like oh i love all these jokes oh at one point they had a fake logo of the boy with a fishing pool and said dream jerks because of jeffrey katzenberg that he had a feud with isn't that fun leave that in dream jerks they eventually took it out anyway it is widely oh and then on top of it all so then they have to have all these they don't even do they don't do individual even like it's small world level audio animatronics of like the crowd scenes no they don't do that they don't even do the unanimated regis philbin no they don't do that

They don't even do individual cutouts. They have like, it looks like something from The Simpsons. It's basically like, imagine somebody had an hour, took a big piece of plywood, cut something like the tops of heads to make a shape, and then painted it, and then made it jiggle a little bit from side to side. Super weak offering. And now, I think now it's the, I want to say it's a Pixar ride. I think it's the Monsters, Inc. ride now.

AlexI believe so. Because this is indeed the California one. And they made a similar one in Disney World, which I think had a little bit longer.

MerlinIs that where they had the Nickelodeon studio thing? Was it that area? No.

AlexOh, I'm sorry. So Universal. You mean Universal?

MerlinI'm probably confusing two parks.

AlexI mean, there's so many in Orlando.

MerlinBecause there are these wild videos about the out there nature of what people were coming up with for parks and especially integrated hotel experiences around that time. There's one about, I think you might be right, maybe Universal, where they have theme rooms that are so weird. But anyway, so they made a superstar limo for Disney World.

AlexYes. Well, but it wasn't called that. but it was what replaced actually Mr. It turns out Mr. Toad's wild ride.

MerlinYou're kidding. In Fantasyland.

AlexI could. Yeah, I could be wrong, but then almost immediately afterwards. That totally makes sense. Yeah. But then they replaced it with the Snow White ride, which was terrifying.

MerlinNo, Snow White's Scary Adventure and Mr. Toad were around at the same time. Those were OG rides.

AlexOh, maybe it was Peter Pan.

MerlinWell, no, no shit, no. Oh, my God, no. Peter Pan's flight is like the most popular attraction in Fantasyland. That was the first thing we went to last time we went to Disneyland was getting in line. We even had the Fantasyland on-campus hotel one hour early plan.

AlexOh, my.

MerlinAnd we still went straight for Peter Pan because it was my favorite ride as a kid. And the line is still crazy long.

AlexOh, then this is totally different.

MerlinSo when I was a kid, there was a – so on your way – oh, my God. So you've been to Disney World in Orlando, correct?

AlexMany, many times. I've only been to Disneyland twice.

MerlinOkay, well, let me just take you through with my mind palace. I'm trying to remember where this starts. I think you come in, you walk. I might be conflating this slightly with Disneyland. There's one point where there's like, used to be, there was the carousel. But on your way to the Captain Nemo submarine ride, on your right, you would pass Peter Pan. I forget the order. Snow White Scary Adventure. Mr. Toad. Some dining and gift opportunities. but there was this row of like kind of cheap looking you know it was one of those things where they obviously

it was a one story building and they jazzed it up a little bit with a facade but but those were always like the kid rides but Mr. Toad was totally scary when you're little and Snow White's Scary Adventure was terrifying when you're little

AlexI mean you know

Merlinoh my god the goddamn witch with the apple

AlexI'm like literally are you getting chills thinking of it?

MerlinI don't like jump scares. Well, I don't mind them now because you can smell them coming usually, but I did not like a jump scare as a kid.

AlexYou say that you like them now. Why?

MerlinI don't hate them now in the same way that like, the worst part actually was when I was, there was the period of not being able to anticipate a jump scare, right? Many, many lifetimes ago. And the period now of like, yeah, there's a jump scare coming. You can tell, look at the way this thing, look at the framing on that. Something's going to enter that frame. usually probably that window in the background right in between as i was getting better going

Alexoh no i think it's gonna be a jump scare that was the worst i i i think i'm in in that place right now especially when i'm watching you know an artsy scary movie like uh uh heredity the the midsummer one um when you're like oh god i know it something is gonna happen some uh oh and then when it does, it's 10 times worse than you thought. Yeah, yeah.

MerlinWell, sometimes there's the vibe and that kind of thing. We've started, I can't believe how my kid has come around. Alex, the weird thing with a kid is everything is always exactly the same every day until one day it's not. Right? And there's so many beverages that used to be the center of her life, and then one day it just stopped. It's all crazy stuff like that. Now, she's not as scared. She's watched so much of that goddamn Grey's Anatomy. Like, she can watch the most grisly stuff. She did not mind Murphy's arm and hand getting blown off in Robocop because she's like, oh, I've seen worse.

And I'm like, you have seen worse. Grey's Anatomy is disgusting.

AlexUh-huh. But now she's not even that scared by jump scares. And we're watching Supernatural, of all things.

MerlinOh. Because there's a gay angel. And so we jumped. We go on from one straight to four. It got into season four because that's where the gay, sorry, sorry, bye, angel. Oh. I'm going to hear about this.

What's his name? Balthazar or something like that. And then what's confusing is Dean from Gilmore Girls is on Supernatural, but he has a brother whose name is Dean. So Dean from Gilmore Girls has a different name, probably Chris or Ian or Todd. But I don't know. I don't know. But the one who eventually, spoiler alert, makes it with the angel, you know what I'm saying?

AlexMm-hmm.

MerlinI call him New Dean. Now, New Dean also is going to be in the next season of The Boys.

AlexWow. This is quite the odyssey.

MerlinI know. Oh, and old Dean is the one who used to pack the groceries, if you know what I mean.

AlexYeah, at Doses. Before Jess.

MerlinBefore Jess came along. And now Jess is on the show that makes everybody cry.

AlexDo you think this is like a liberal gay agenda? Because old Dean.

MerlinI hope so, honey. I really, I really, I so hope so.

AlexI mean, because we learn, it was always implied, but we learn in Gilmore Girls that old Dean worked at Doses and the mayor of the town, I don't even know, but he was like flamboyantly gay. Oh, Taylor is

Merlinobviously, yes. Yeah. Well, and what about Gypsy?

AlexOh, yeah. Big energy. She was wonderful.

MerlinNo, no, no. I mean, no shade, no lemonade. I'm not saying that you have to be, you know, a lady liker to be handy.

AlexBut sometimes...

it's just a set of skills that transfers over certain set of skills taylor totally gay gypsy

Merlingay uh luke i think luke wouldn't uh you know throw you out of bed for eating crackers i bet lorelei had a had a lesbian semester at some point oh i mean i think that's i think

Alexlorelei is the kind of lady who's like anything goes but she kind of miss missed out on that because we learned hashtag spoilers from A Year in the Life. Oh, yeah. Never had a one-night stand.

MerlinI like that actor, though. I like her, the father. I like that guy. Also, though, who am I thinking of? Not so...

AlexOh, boy. Oh, it's been 20 minutes. It's been 20 minutes.

MerlinGotta re-moisten my pads. Ow, ow, ow.

AlexOh, God.

MerlinOh, it hurts so much. Okay. All right.

AlexShall we pull back the curtain? Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for interrupting. Okay. Go on.

MerlinOkay. Who else? We got to finish this and then let's get into our device. Kirk. Mostly he's ace, I'm going to say. But he has a cute girlfriend. Oh, right.

AlexWell, you can still have, I mean, that's.

MerlinYou can't have these conversations anymore without getting yelled at.

AlexOh, I'm past that.

MerlinYou can sit around all day and talk about who's gay.

AlexNo. Back in the day.

MerlinLet's see. Who else is going to say nuts? Oh, Paris. Because Paris ends up with Michael York for a while, which is kind of a weird situation. Do you think that's an age play thing?

AlexOh, interesting. Well, were they that?

MerlinHe was in Cabaret, and that was a very gay movie. But he was also in Logan's Run, which is a futuristic movie.

AlexAnd then people from the future are gay. Oh, God, it is. It is.

MerlinIt's starting to all really come together, isn't it?

AlexThe seams are being, oh, wow. it's like in Toy Story when we're looking out and we see Woody being stitched together oh god is that another one because the mom doesn't have the toy repairman in Toy Story when he stows back Woody's arm

Merlinis the specimen ready for cleaning

AlexI think it's called the cleaner

Merlinno I'm thinking of Pulp Fiction I might be thinking of Harvey Keitel he was the cleaner

AlexI still haven't seen Pulp Fiction

MerlinOkay, and John Travolta's the one in the Santa Cruz.

AlexAnd he has a ponytail? Oh my God, it goes so deep.

MerlinSamuel L. Jackson was stacks. Everybody liked stacks. You know, but he wasn't very reliable. You know, the Lufthansa heist, one of the biggest, you gotta remember to stir the sauce. Okay, I think I had my head thing on for too long, and now I have too much wisdom.

AlexI just keep thinking in my head that as I was reading these directions yesterday, it said multiple times.

MerlinDid we cover the gay agenda of the Gilmore Girls to your satisfaction?

AlexI mean, I think so.

MerlinWe'll put in the challenge.

AlexIt's a surprisingly liberal town for something progressive.

MerlinYou know, I don't like Logan. I don't like that guy.

AlexOh. Oh.

MerlinLogan, he's the blonde rich boy.

AlexOh, I apologize. I was thinking of Jesse. Jesse? Jesse?

MerlinOkay. Jesse. Jess is, let me get this right, is Luke's nephew.

AlexI believe so, yes.

MerlinAnd he lives up in that cool apartment where it used to be the hardware store.

AlexYes, yes. And where there's definitely- His dad's office, basically. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Totally normal and not weirdly invading of one another's space.

MerlinOh, oh, oh, oh. What about a drummer friend with the huge suitcase, antique store mother? What's her name? Mrs. Kim?

AlexOh, yes, Mrs. Kim.

MerlinNo, but what's the daughter's name? Oh, Mrs. Kim, totally.

AlexBut what's the daughter's name?

MerlinLynn? Lynn?

AlexLynn?

MerlinNo. No, it's... Oh, my God. How can I know Taylor Dosey but not know her name? She hides Pixie's records in her floor.

AlexThis is... Oh, yeah. I mean, she is a hardcore... Lane! Lane! Lane.

MerlinOh, do you remember the big suitcase?

AlexThe big...

MerlinThere's the one shot where she's like, the show is like the way it is, And then you hear the phone picks up. It's Rory's on the phone. And Lane is talking about how her mother is going to send her to Korea as a punishment. And then so you got the medium shot of Rory on the phone. Cut to medium shot straight on of Lane standing next to a rolling suitcase that's almost as tall as she is. And it was the funniest thing in the world.

AlexI mean, I enjoyed her. Oh, wow. Because she's literally in a closet. She doesn't just have her records, but she has that, you know, when she's on the phone.

MerlinShe has like a whole little, like a little biome.

AlexYeah, yeah. Biome. Biome. You see it? You see it?

MerlinIt's almost like a bat cave, a lane cave.

AlexIt does. Yes, yes. I mean, oh. And then she comes out of the closet. It's all coming together.

MerlinRight, and it doesn't fall on her. What is it up in the air for? Challenge. Challenge, challenge, challenge. This week's challenge comes from Alex. Alex.

AlexOh, boy. This week's challenge was to use a product that I found out about on Shark Tank last week.

MerlinI would lift it. I would not have put this onto my head several times had I seen that before.

AlexNope.

MerlinAfter I did, I said to my family, you know, as part of the challenge, I'm not obligated to watch this episode, I don't think, but we should probably watch this. and I saw it and I went, ooh, I can't believe I just put an electric appliance by these people on my head because they see it.

AlexYou hadn't seen it beforehand? Oh, okay, this explains a lot. Okay, okay.

MerlinWe ordered the straight, first of all, Alexander, you very kindly gifted this to me. I got an Amazon box, I opened it up, and I said, oh, I think I know what this is. This handsome Nogahyde case must hold a mirror and a bottle and...

AlexIt looks like a very fancy drug kit, like something that someone from The Sopranos takes out? Yeah.

MerlinOr one of those things you give, like when Beatles walk off the plane in America and you've been in business class, so they give you that cool pleather bag.

AlexYes.

MerlinWith probably slippers and, I don't know, vibrator or something in it. So Alex saw this on Shark Tank. I had not seen the episode yet. And this is, Lifted is a hell of a thing. It's got a lot of camel case or weird capitalization and science-y things. What is this new trend? I hear it in an answer and I have to read. But there's a whole thing of mentioning N,000 scientific papers that support thus and such thing. And they're very much doing that with the lifted, I think.

AlexIt's a very wellness industry type thing, except really scienced up. Oh, after show, I found out someone helped me with Joe Rogan. All right, putting it there. Oh, good.

MerlinOh, good. We do a whole second episode for us by going to give sure fucking money.com.

AlexBut I as soon as I saw this episode, I put it in order for myself. And then about 20 minutes after the episode, I was like, all right, this I without Merlin's consent, I just need to send one. It may or may not be a challenge. I just need to know.

MerlinYeah. And so you can either I guess you could describe the same. Do you want to just start by talking about what this thing is, or do you want to start by talking about the segment?

AlexOh, I mean, let's – I still don't know what it is. So let's do the segment because I can't believe you're –

MerlinOkay, listen. Here's the lifted. The lifted is a thing that purports to use science. You put these – so basically you charge this thing up, and then it's like a little – it looks a little bit like a cross between a headband and something related to Hellboy. So you get these little nubbins, you know, like you're a dehorned Jew, like on the top of your...

AlexIt's very cyberpunk. It's very...

MerlinYeah, it looks like you're somewhere between... You're transitioning, if you like. You got on the Joker Cruise and you're transitioning from cyberpunk to steampunk.

AlexExactly. Exactly. Yes, yes, yes.

MerlinMy pronoun is brass. Or bray. And so you put this... So you moisten the sticky pads, these pads. You put a salient solution on there. And you're supposed to put it basically where if you did have horns, like right at the top, like personally my hairline. Sorry, weird flex. But you put it like near the top of your head part and you turn it on, it beeps and you start feeling this, what do you call it, itchy feeling?

AlexOh, no. It was definitely a stinging feeling for me. And it's, yeah.

MerlinYeah. I mean, yeah, they kind of warn you by saying, you know, this is going to put a little bit of electric on your face. so it could be you know tingling definitely electricy uh you know sort of like that thing where you're like am i getting if you've ever had that experience of touching something that's just like slightly charged or poorly wired not the kind that make you go but the kind where you go oh this feels weird is my getting am i getting electrocuted like we're you know you're not dying or anything itchy scratchy irritation kind of and it purports to be doing something sciencey

that stimulates your brain. And they make up this, I want to talk more about this if we have time because I think there's an interesting hook into the world of gullibility here. But they're really saying over and over, you see this in the photographs, you see this in their pitch that we'll describe, saying, look, you need to put this thing on while you're doing something that's real thinky, like studying or something that's going to be a mentally taxing, mentally intensive activity is how and when this thing works. Wouldn't you say they kind of keep saying that over and over?

AlexYes, but then they continuously, in both the presentation on Shark Tank and in their literature, include video games in there. I mean, there are many types of video games, but okay.

MerlinSo when you say that, though, and not to spoil my gullibility unified field theory, but what is the implication? Is the implication that this sounds like a distinction without a difference, but I think there is a difference. So is the video game playing generating the stimulation that will like improve the use of this appliance in the long term? Or is it implying that having this appliance on your head while you play video games will make you better at video games? Because I think there's a difference.

AlexOh, yeah, exactly. I think it's very much implying that you will be, you know, you're going to snipe out those what terrorists in Call of Duty or you're going to.

MerlinAre you talking about you're going to no scope some fool?

AlexI know those are words and I feel like I really feel like I should know them.

MerlinI've watched enough Monster Factory to know a lot of things. I watched the Monster Factory last night.

AlexOh, I'm so glad it's back.

MerlinBut my kid turned me on to the there's the game where people guess things and is it truth or a lie? And there's a really good one with my what do I call her? This is gross. I love what's her name? Simone. I think she's amazing. Her laugh might very well be the vaccine. She has the best laugh in the world. And she's so delightful. She's so goddamn funny. It's her, Griffin, Justin, Pat.

It's a really stacked cast. And it's very funny. You know, you draw things and you say truth or lie. You know the game I'm talking about?

AlexIt's a Jackbox game. Jackbox, yeah, that's it. I don't remember the specific name of which game they were playing. but I know exactly what you're talking about.

MerlinAnd there's another one with BDG from when I think he first started there. There's one from like two years ago and he looks so young. His hair is very small. He hasn't invented the sport of the future yet, future sport, which is not the Wesley Snipes movie, I copyrighted. So, but like, this becomes important though because like all of this snake oil stuff, a question comes up, which is like, what is this really supposed to do? And let's just take it seriously for a second. what is this thing supposed to do?

And is there a way for me to know if it's doing anything, let alone what it seems that it's supposed to be doing? Do you know what I mean? It feels like a real common thread from everything from nootropics to like, you know, miracle cures, you know, Steve Jobs, you know, pancreas juice, like all these different kinds of things. You're like, well, how will I know if this is working? If I take penicillin and I'm sick, I feel better after a few days and I can go, wow, I really felt better after I took the penicillin.

AlexI, so are we taking this thing seriously now? Because, yeah, I have no idea.

MerlinNo, no, no, no. I just, I mean, I think that, well, I mean, before you can tear it apart from being stupid, I think it helps to look at what it is that makes it stupid, which means you have to take it somewhat seriously, I think, and put the claims of the people alongside the experience. But anyway, so this is Shark Tank. These people come out. And, boy, there's something real red flaggy about the guy in particular. Don't you think?

AlexMm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

MerlinHe's one of those, like, okay, so here's the thing. Like, you know, like, don't make the risotto on Top Chef. Don't be front of house and restaurant wars, you know?

AlexYou're next to go.

MerlinDon't get stuck with dessert, right? There's all of those things.

AlexNext to go.

MerlinAt the point when at least a couple of the sharks, usually even three of the sharks are out, and someone starts talking about, I'm the hardest working CEO you will ever meet in your life. There's nobody who's ever worked harder than me. You know that's a red flag. When you come out guns blazing like a little too, like even setting aside like the stage fright and nervousness of being on TV and in a studio and stuff, if you're as over the top as this guy was, that doesn't feel science-y.

AlexNo, no, it does not. And I sometimes I really wonder if these people come onto the carpet, as they call it, and actually think that they're going to get a deal or if it's just the producers like, you know, they pick some ding-a-lings and these are clearly the ding-a-lings.

MerlinThey definitely have designated ding-a-lings from very early on. And like, well, there's again more tropes. We could do an entire like TV tropes page on Shark Tank. There probably already is one. But here's one of them. You get some new, like, handsome man who, like, invented insoles or, like, you know, I revolutionized the five-sided pencil. And, like, or, you know, or, like, the GoPro guy or whoever the fuck. The very first segment of the very first episode they're in will be a deal that they get that everybody congratulates them on. Right?

AlexYes.

MerlinAlways. They always have a thing where we have to basically establish who this person who's not Robert is. And, like, and help you be able to figure that. It's real stupid. It's the show that has never seemed stupider to me.

AlexYep.

MerlinMaybe I'm just getting a little bit of a sniff of it. Maybe I don't love Mark Burnett. But like the show is like.

AlexRight.

MerlinAlthough, you know, Mark Cuban looks good. It looks like he's gotten healthy.

AlexOh, the amount of Botox this season. I mean.

MerlinBut it's also he looks slender. He used to. Mark used to look like somebody had just torn the mask off a Scooby-Doo villain.

AlexWell, that's what happens with billionaires, I'm told. But I mean, it's nothing.

MerlinAdrienia Crumb?

AlexNot eating the rich. But the season of Shark Tank, I really love how they're like, we're going to acknowledge what's going on, but not really acknowledge what's going on.

MerlinThat was so weird. Like with the company that makes masks. And I was like, wait a minute. So when was this shot? They make dog masks?

AlexYep. And they're like, oh, gosh. Yeah, I think this was this week, but there was one, like, a couple that made dog masks. And they're like, as you know.

MerlinYeah, dog masks was this episode. Yeah. They make basically masks for dogs. And my whole family's like, wait, when was this shot? It keeps out, like, pollutants from, like, having a city dog. And I was like, wait a minute. This seems really, like, the tone of this seems odd for being a COVID thing. This must have been before COVID and just be a coincidence. But why would they leave that in?

AlexYes, exactly.

MerlinAnd yet, then they go, oh, yeah, something, something, COVID. And you're like, shit, was this maybe like February, March? Like, when do you think they shot this?

AlexI think this was an episode out of time because you notice they are sitting closer together. But also, they still don't hug in this one. So I was like, I truly don't know. Because there's still the like now more than ever segments in the middle where it's like, let's check in with whatever.

MerlinLet's check in with the Lobster Brothers.

AlexYeah, let's see these people who are like, we've sold over five, we've made over $500,000 in the past 10 years. And you're like, oh, okay. Oh, no.

MerlinKevin's recent investment, Jar in a Jar, caters to the wedding industry where people enjoy opening jars with other jars in them.

AlexBefore I met Kevin, we were only putting out 50,000 units a year.

Merlinand now jar in a jar is carried in every bad bath and beyond and beyond.

AlexThis show has never made me feel worse about watching this show, but I still got it.

MerlinIt's when they get to the veterans episode that it always kills me. It's when they get to the like celebrating. It's veterans week or veterans month or whatever and it'll be like mooks with brown backpacks and thank you for your service shit. We met in special forces and now we make diapers.

everyone who works for us is a veteran. We move them all to Nicaragua where they sew labels into backpacks. Thank you for your service.

AlexAnd my favorite part of those episodes is how, you know, like we're made in the USA. And then the next episode is like, we're manufactured here in the USA. And they're like, oh, we can get you way down once we get you over to China. I'll get your repacker in China. And I'm like, hmm.

It's, oh, Mark Burnett. But, ooh, Mark Burnett.

MerlinMark Burnett. So, oh, God, we've got to talk more. I'm ready to take a nap, 38 minutes. So how did you know, as you were watching the Shark Tank, how did you know that this is something you needed to get and that possibly we needed to do? What is it that moved you? Did it just have the stink of a Dubai Friday terrible challenge on it?

AlexIt did. And it was also a very Alex Cox trying another weird thing that they strap on their body type of vibe. And in fact, in the literature, it says like bio, like novice biohacker. Like I, you know, I'm not the guy making his own COVID vaccine, but you know, I like to electrocute myself every once in a while. And so, but it also just seemed like one of these things where either we're going

to take this challenge very seriously, which it kind of seemed like you did based on our super secret text channel. And by seriously, don't want to steal the powder, but you've used this a lot, I take it.

MerlinYeah, I forget when it arrived, but I've been doing it. You're supposed to do it for 20 minutes a day.

AlexOnce. Once a day.

MerlinYeah.

AlexOnce a day.

MerlinI mean, you know, no guts, no glory. but you know so maybe this can we expand this topic a little bit and we'll you can just whatever tell me if you don't want to talk about it but I have a thought on this

Alexgo on so like well no it's just weird because

MerlinI don't have anything particularly brilliant to say I will say this that I have dabbled in some bullshit in the past and it has almost all uniformly turned out to be bullshit or really magical thinking not so different i mean since i was a kid i've done shit the way that john roderick thought he could manifest an orb like almost that level of like you know i can predict the future i know what color the next car i mean have you ever had things like that you're sitting there like i remember like i'd be waiting for my mom to pick me up somewhere and i'd be going like

i'm gonna close my eyes and i'll know when my mom's coming or i'm gonna know that the next car is blue that kind of thing where you you should pretty sure you can read minds or know the future or do telekinesis. I hope it's not just me where you've had a stage of like, I have a power that I've been taught to ignore, but I could probably do something pretty special and mutant-like if I could develop that power.

AlexI mean, every single millennial I have met has seen Matilda and not just seen Matilda, the movie starring Merle Wilson and Danny DeVito, where she has like a telekinetic power and thought, you know, maybe, you know.

MerlinI probably have that. I probably have that a little bit.

AlexYou know, it could. It's, you know, it's a Ronald Dahl. It's based on a Ronald Dahl book, but maybe. So it's, and it's, I don't know. But I think it's always something in the back of your mind. I mean, honestly. That's why I can,

Merlintoday I can only finish if I'm in the crookie.

AlexOh, no. you just triggered a generation oh including oh god the oh oh that should be a challenge matilda

Merlinbut this goes this also goes to things like like for example like okay here's a classic example i don't know if this is still still a classic example but there's a time when i horoscopes have come back i guess oh when i was a kid horoscopes well okay see this is what i'm saying it's probably different. But back then, I think it was a little, it was on the one hand, there were some people who were very into their horoscope and other people were like, but almost everybody knew their sign and thought it was kind of silly fun to read their horoscope. Or somebody like me,

like I would cut the horoscope for the day out of the paper on my birthday, for example. But it wasn't that I believed in the horoscopes, but it also wasn't that like I was, I wasn't like mad about saying horoscopes must be abolished. I was somewhere in between. But I'd also done stuff with like self-hypnosis that was actually, I think, kind of helpful. It's that kind of helpful where like I don't know if I was just making myself feel better. Probably. I was basically probably just happy talking myself at like a slightly deeper level.

Things like that. I mean, I never got into like Satanism or something. But I've definitely fiddled around with, again, nootropics. I've taken stuff like ginseng. I've taken stuff like ginkgo biloba. like there's all this kind of stuff that's like a little bit at the time out of the mainstream that i would dabble in but you know i don't think i've never like joined an mlm as far as i know exactly that you know that you know i'm saying though like i mean what i'm also but also i know that i am

susceptible to a certain kind of magical thinking and also not a certain kind just fucking magical thinking where I will like, I think, try to manifest something that's not rational.

So anyway, what I'm trying to say is when you, I'm really curious about the way this works. And this is, I swear to God, I don't mean this to be about Trump, but like, if you're going to go out there and say, how do you, how do you start a business like electro headband business? Is it something as callow as, well, we have the parts and access to this manufacturer that can make this cheap? or I mean how much do you think this came out of somebody's like scholarship to start up you know what I mean like I think you start this by going here's some bullshit we can solve to

somebody kind of don't you think do you think I mean do you think those folks are like you you put them into the goldfinger machine like do you think they would admit or not admit that they know

Alexthis is some bullshit that's that's what brought me I think now that you bring it up that's probably what intrigued me because I couldn't tell. You can kind of, when some, for example, when someone's trying to get you into an MLM where you take a lot of melatonin or something,

or, well, not, I mean, melatonin, I know works for some folks, but like they're, you know, they're trying to get you to take the ginseng and they clearly don't, they don't.

MerlinWell, there's always, I mean, what you're describing, there's always, it seems like there is always this au courant, I mean probably I guess oat milk is not that but there's always something where it's like um um oh like juicing could be one like there's all those different diets that would come and go the cabbage soup diet there's these kinds of things where I used to this is the whole the general phenomenon of this on the hugest level I would call macrame my the concept that I call this concept macrame and it's when something you've never heard of something mostly then you've heard

of something, then everyone is doing it and it's just somehow suddenly taken its read that everybody needs to be doing this.

AlexYes.

MerlinOwning an SUV in the late 90s. Why did everybody suddenly need to have an SUV? Like, they just did. Why did everybody suddenly buy a Pet Rock? I don't know. They just did. It's a fad. What about macrame? Well, you need that macrame. I make gifts with that or whatever. But then the other part of that, it's this Walmartization of the culture where that thing that was the macrame object then disappears and everybody's like, well, yeah, sure. Like, of course, I had a mustache in the 70s. I wore a green shirt in 1984, whatever it is. And you go from this is the most normal thing in the world

to, oh, that's just a silly thing from my past. So when you look back at something like your juicing diet or your cabbage soup diet or whatever that thing is, you kind of chuckle and go, oh, yeah, that's a thing that we did. But you don't go like, wow, that was really fucking stupid. and I guess it's just I guess what I was trying to think about is I have a thought on this but I don't know if it's in line with how other people think which is like if I were trying to scam people and I were a real smart guy like say a cult leader somebody who understood human motivation

really well and knew the tricks for getting people you know as I say brainwashed right isolation control your diet you know control your access to information and people all the kinds of things that they do in a cult. If I knew that in going forward with a business, obviously I'd start CrossFit.

AlexNo!

MerlinWhat I would do, but what I would do is think like, okay, I gotta find people who find people where I can exploit their vulnerability and have them not just realize I'm exploiting their vulnerabilities, but if I do this right, they're going to think that I'm really helping them with their vulnerability. And you know what? They'll probably give me money for that. If we just take that as like the overarching, whatever kind of scam bullshit you're going to pull, it seems like that must be kind of where it starts.

And then you're able to do stuff like say, here's this $150 headband. Here's the rules. I hope you read all the rules. This is what it's for. And like if it doesn't, if you obviously it does work. But if you're one of those .00001% people who says it doesn't work, well, you're probably doing it wrong or there's something defective about you.

AlexYou didn't use enough saline.

MerlinOr maybe you weren't playing the video game, right? And as we said very clearly in the stock art, you do need to be doing this kind of activity. What I'm trying to get at is if you're a sort of unmoored seeker who is very gullible, you're going to be as gullible as you are to buy this. You're going to be just as gullible to believe this is my failure because I did it wrong and I'll look for the next thing that I do wrong.

AlexHuh.

MerlinI don't think Barack Obama buys stuff like this.

AlexNo, no, no. know well uh but do you think people hmm i'm still kind of going back to the uh what the the presentation on shark tank and the couple that uh supposedly owns this company and i feel like they uh that they they were drinking what they were selling like they truly believed you think his enthusiasm was not feigned i i i don't because uh i i see like i think i can

tell a little bit of neurosis when i see it because it happens to me quite a bit and uh it seemed it maybe not uh the the lady friend i think it was his wife didn't necessarily buy it it was like oh god please let us get a deal my husband has mortgage our house for the third time but I there's like you could there's like an air of desperation like when someone's in an MLM or a cult uh but also sort of like also a desperation of like no no no this does work

please can't you see it like can't you see what this has done for me I want I want I want to help I want to I just want to make people happy like that sort of thing and I I really don't know if I'm that sort of gullible person. Because I do a lot of strange things and try a lot of strange things. And I'm always like, oh, let's see if this powder works. But I mean, I still often take L-theanine with caffeine. And I know that the caffeine works. And who the fuck knows if this L-theanine is doing anything.

MerlinWell, you've got to get the suntheanine.

AlexYou've got to get the good one.

MerlinBut think of another case of this, though. And I don't know if this is like the devil and the angel. But there is a kind of character in life and in TV and movies.

Like the kind of person who like works at like a nursing home or a hospice and like is fully invested in the whole like, you know, here's what I learned from the 36 hour day kind of stuff. Like, here's how here's how I can show up and make my fairly meager money, but also like create a world for the people here that anybody else looking in would look at this and go, wow, that you're really deluding them. But it's like, well, there can a lot of them are going to die soon and they don't remember what's happening anyway. but so like if we stage a wedding today if we stage a wedding every day and like you listen

to Benny Goodman and that makes their day good for a few minutes like that's yeah it's a kind of delusion or a kind of deception but like you know what's the best kind of deception in some ways and you know what I mean just in that sense of like well I know I'm going into this eyes wide open in terms of knowing that what I'm saying to these people is not true but I don't know if you had any people in your family with dementia exactly yep no yeah but there's that wonderful book i think it's called the 36 hour day and you know when the my i've gone through this with

several people now in my and my wife's family but like when i when we first when that first was happening with my grandmother it went from being the kind of funny anecdotes i told you here with driving with grandma to more like um it was rough it was rough for me but it was quadruple rough for my mom because my mom had to deal with her more and my mom also then was having to deal again this is if you ever have anybody in your family parkinson's alzheimer's dementia the 36 hour day is a really good way to like get your head around how to deal with this without losing your

mind but the first time that my grandmother didn't remember who my grandfather was the first time that like out of nowhere seemingly because now you really can't help but notice at a certain point Like didn't know, you know, confusing generations of people. Like thinking that I'm my dad. Or thinking that, just the classic kind of stuff. And of course the irritability that people get with dementia. My mom though, who was doing her best, was fighting that by basically saying, of course you remember Barry.

Barry was your husband. You were married for 50 years. Of course you remember him. That's my father. Basically, you know, you don't remember my father so you don't remember me. And it's like, well, you know, you're kind of yelling at Plywood. grandma's brain is not at this at this moment and again frustration inside of frustration the classic good days and bad days and then suddenly she remembers something from around world war one and you're like what how yeah how do you remember this incredibly and sometimes we could like prove it anyway if you're the kind of person that could help somebody like that by like not being truthful

with them i mean what are you gonna do you're gonna show up and just yell at everybody in the sunroom about how they have unrealistic expectations about the popularity of big band music no you're gonna so you can put those powers to good or you can put those powers to ill but like part of confirmation bias or any of those biases is like you're telling me you're describing my problem in a way that's sensible to me and your cure for it seems to be in a loud landly way like exactly the solution that i need even if i didn't know i had this problem yesterday now i've decided

i need a monorail or an electric headband yeah sorry i'm talking a lot today that's the electrodes I don't know. The last couple of days I've just been thinking about that and how like the very thing that makes you likely to buy something like this credulously could be the very same thing that makes you not return it as total bullshit. If you're an insecure person in search of one big answer, and isn't it always one big answer? Like all you do is buy into this system and everything will make sense. Hold these soup cans. You're going to be fine. But the very thing that makes you a vulnerable seeker could be the thing that makes you a self-doubting consumer.

And pretty soon you're Michael Scott with a bunch of Bowflexes in your garage. Say something.

AlexNo, I mean, you are totally right. I'm thinking of my mom who, like, my great, I think I've probably talked about this on the show. I'm very, very close to my grandma and was really close with my great-grandma. And my grandma and my great-grandma lived basically next to one another. Like my big old clan of weird Catholics.

MerlinAnd just to be clear, that's mother and daughter.

AlexYep. Mother, daughter, and then granddaughter. My mom. So three generations of women in my family. But my mom and my grandma would always check on my great-grandma before we went over to see, like is this uh as they would say a good day for her um and so when i was you know little we're talking like from a baby to uh she passed away and by passed away she died oh have i told you this story it's a good anyway uh but but she would they would always i'm gonna write i'm gonna write

Merlindown the phrase grandma death story yes please do i hope i remember what that means it's great

Alexit's it's very good uh but i never knew that she had alzheimer's um because they were you know she it was and and if she'd forget something uh it's like oh you know she's in her mid-80s of course she's gonna forget something or you know call me my mom's name even though i'm eight years old like

Merlinbut it was i call ted lasso ted leo all the time so

Well, it is kind of fun, though, when both of the people in your family, the humans in your house, are both, like, staring at you in exactly the same blank way. And there's that liminal space between doing something stupid and then realizing you've done something stupid. And the only way you know is by the faces of the people you love. And you go, I did it again, didn't I? That's like the third time today that I've said that Leon's got a dead lasso. And I'm like, at least.

AlexOr silence on a podcast after you said something. Yeah.

MerlinWell, you know, one of the, what do they call it, a malfluence? Like, one of the worst things is, like, I do that thing. I do lots of things. But one of the things I do is instead of saying A, I say not A. And I wonder why people are confused, where I'll say the exact opposite of the thing that I meant to say by adding some kind of, like, a small word that reverses the meaning of it. And that's very confusing to people. And they stare at you like you said to Leo.

Alexgreat-grandmother grandmother oh well and i'm kind of going i i i don't my grandma right now is uh a bit i'm elderly as as they say and she's she's kind of she's not like a q anon person but she watches a whole lot of fox news and as she as you know she she always did but now there's kind of things where you can see that she's sort of going with that whole you know it's not a full

on MAGA and I just and I kind of can hear myself trying to already like defend my my grandma because

Merlinno no no but like there's a lot of reporting on this I mentioned this on another show the other day but there was that I forget this woman's name but she basically did a tour of the country during the COVID times and what she discovered is that there are a ton of people Trump supporters and otherwise that believe QAnon, some QAnon thing, but B, they don't consider, they don't even know what QAnon is. They don't consider it.

AlexExactly.

MerlinIt's us extremely online people that call this entire constellation of bullshit QAnon. But the skepticism or like, you're not going to pull one over on me feeling of like people who an older, like usually more mainstream older person who watches Fox News is like, well, yeah, of course I think like, you know, we're overtaxed and, you know, Soros owns the bank and stuff like that. but you may not go full on adrenochrome. Right. But I think that's an entirely, I mean, like people get more paranoid as they get older, don't you think?

AlexI, that's the thing. I don't know. I don't know if that's, I, I, I agree, but I don't know if that is a product of our culture or.

MerlinWhich parts are QAnon, if you can say, which parts, what QAnon-ish things does she do?

AlexOh, more, it's very, more like a voter suppression, voter suppression is. everybody yeah right and and like um it's like sure there's a live stream but alex you know that live streams can be faked and like that sort of thing where i'm like she she's not at the point where um i she's not like all gone you know like she she's still the this feels like the same human being and you know can uh but but yeah it's it's like that creeping paranoia where i'm like is this

is this like a part of a downward spiral like a health thing or is this kind of um i think brainwashing is a strong word in this case but uh undue influence and i i wonder if i'm going to be really susceptible to that because already i'm like haha let's try this fun hand headband but when does when am i like uh when am i gonna be like yeah everybody let's let's shock our nipples or something like is that am I going to become that person and it's and I don't know because I

am always searching for the the next best thing and I think part of that is you know you call me a curious person and I think I am that way but I wonder like is that because I'm curious or is it because I'm always looking to to be fixed like this morning I was looking for why did I sleep in because that is genuinely a thing that never happens to me. But like I said, the world went on and nothing terrible has happened.

Although I haven't looked at Twitter. Who knows? Is Joe Biden still alive? I don't know.

MerlinJoe Gutterwitz says happiest season is quote unquote great.

AlexOh, good, good.

MerlinAnd it combines at least a couple of your interests that I'm aware of.

AlexOh, boy. Well, we're running. We're at 59.46, according to my call recorder.

MerlinI don't know how we're supposed to know a bunch of things. Because a lot of times there's stuff you won't know until somebody else that you love or admire or trust clues you to it. And at a certain point, it feels like even that has lingering persuasive powers. It's a lot to worry about.

AlexWhat do you mean?

MerlinOh, so like, I mean, I don't want to throw everything on to my grandmother, but I mean, you just think about any of the human conditions. So like I would call you curious. I would call John Roderick curious. I would call a lot of people. I am. I'm intellectually or I'm mentally curious, but I don't want to go anywhere. Like everybody's different. But, you know, what happens to everybody eventually? Like you maybe, I don't want to sound like I'm so far anyway, very not obsessed with death. But I know there are times people get sad and like you start to feel especially lonely.

And I imagine a time you're like this and this under these conditions that would really suck. But to throw to grandma, like she did start to feel lonely and she did start to increasingly find solace in what I will very generously call her faith. although at the time she was basically going to a Pentecostal church that walked right up to the edge of snake handling. They did speak in tongues.

And so is Pentecostal the kind of thing that you get into after you've moved to Philadelphia in the 60s? Probably not, but it's the kind of thing that a simple girl from Kentucky could definitely return to. And increasingly, though, like, so what are we talking about here? We're talking about that ability to clock basic con man shit, to be able to clock somebody's vulnerability and know how to exploit it. That's what we're talking about. So someone knocks on the door.

Well, first of all, everything that looks like it might be a FedEx package gets opened and responded to immediately, like that kind of thing. But two people show up at the door wearing like basically seersucker suits and straw boaters and go, hello, madam. Looks like your house could use a painting. We're Christians. and she's oh please come in for the next six hours and let's talk about the lord and when they walked out my mom did not discover this until she found out that she had because her name was on the mortgage she the christians in seersucker suits had basically offered to paint her house um and

to pay for that follow this pay for that they would refinance her house for her and she would walk away with more money than she has right now and a house painted by christians oh and that's the kind of thing where like my mom works all day she comes home like there's something slid under the door that she's supposed to sign and it's like um you know where do i begin i mean suckiest of all is to once again have the conversation with mom with her mom about like you've got to stop doing things like if this is the stuff that i'm catching i'm terrified to find out what i'm not catching

but like okay in that case i'm not i don't mean to keep throwing grandma under the emotional bus

Alexbut people have needs that need to be filled well let's throw me under the bus i i mean clearly uh pretty much everybody in in my life knew that i was inclined i was romantically inclined to people who weren't really men and uh far far along that is the single best way i've ever heard that not that you're lesbian not that you're attracted to women it's like i think people realized i was not attracted to men yeah well but it's and but i think about um when you said uh

like it was it was a kind of place where uh they spoke in tongues i have been to many an event where people have spoken in tongues and been incurred and these are these are like catholic uh really

Merlinlike charismatic catholic um oh charismatic catholic is kind of like pentecostal it's

Alexit's more like it's more like like church in a tent yes revival yes but it wasn't right but but it wasn't that it was people who were like a part of my church and the part even even into high school who would ask me to come to these these very extreme things um yeah where it would start with uh do you know what adoration of the eucharist is i know the term but i don't think i know what it means it it's where you uh literally just sit in silence and uh you're supposed to pray to to

to the eucharist aka the our communion which catholics have priests have apparently literally eucharist is the what they put pour the wine in right uh yeah yeah the the little wafer or is it

Merlinthat water fountain they prepare all the different uh buffet parts that's uh no i was thinking the

Alexeucharist as the cup it's no it's well it's it's uh it's it's the cup and the wine and the host so the little wafers that are truly delicious but it's a pre it's a pre-fee but you just you just sit there in silence and and pray and i always found a lot of comfort in that when i was younger and now you know i know that it was sort of a practice in in mindfulness really so it was just a you know like it was group mindfulness and but when i think when people saw that they're like ah

Let's go to the next level of that. And luckily I saw like, okay, clearly this is not a thing for me when we go from sitting and praying to a place where it's dark at night and there's a bunch of teenagers speaking in tongues.

MerlinYeah, describe it. What are the emotions though? Is it scary? Is it overwhelming? Is it like sexy? Like what's the feeling of being in that environment?

Alexuh the i mean i i can't really describe it other than hard nope well i gotta say like so my um my

Merlinmain i mean so a girl i went out with in high school for a real long time was catholic and i think the first time i ever probably definitely the first time i was ever in a catholic church but probably the first time i ever went to a ceremony because there was always this sort of like um understood like you don't go to other people's churches you know like that's that's looking at somebody's wife you don't go to another but anyway but like i did go and i found it's all of the bits that people have been doing for years i'm not sure what to do when oh my god this is so long it was a wedding and the wedding had to be like three hours i mean even we don't know

Alexwhat to do like the sit the stand the sit the stand well and they keep changing the rules but

Merlinanyway the um but it was it was real long but uh it was very funny we remember we were talking on the after show last week about the um Mallory Ortberg uh Black Mirror thing yes what if phones but too much that's it was like it was like very strange to me that it was almost like a dream version of non-denominational Christianity where my church was very like it's you know I mean a kid but like it really was the most like mainstream normal not weird midwestern church experience

you could possibly imagine. I mean, it was really just a couple clicks left or a couple clicks right of like being Unitarian practically. I would never say that to them. But going to Catholic church, it was a dreamlike, too intense, the colors are too intense, the ceiling was too high, the singing is weird, why are we standing? Oh my God, that bar's for kneeling? That's weird.

AlexThere's a lot of costumes.

MerlinBut it was like, yeah, but you know, but it's weird though because it would be like thinking you're into some kink, but then going to some meetup where everybody's real into that And you're like, oh, no, I just like lingerie. I'm going to go.

AlexYep, yep, yep, yep, yep.

MerlinBut Catholic Church is intense. So I'm imagining you're doing that with the charismatics must have been intense.

AlexIt was – well, but that's the thing. I don't want to call it a cult. And maybe that is, you know, my own, like, wanting to defend grandma in terms of like wanting to defend my friends who were clearly trying to put me back on the path. Because this is a common thing in, I think, all sort of like Christian youth groups where you go on retreats and you often like share testimonials about things in your life that were challenging and God helped you through it.

And those I found really, I still find them really powerful. And the.

MerlinSome of the most intense feelings I had as a kid were at church camp. I mean, whether that's like an oogly sexual feeling, but also just the intenseness. I think we talked about somewhere on Slack. But the feeling of being around. Oh, no, I made a joke on this about Twitter weeks ago. No, but like being around a campfire singing. Like is like is amazing. Like singing like Protestant Christian songs around a campfire is so fucking fun. Yes. And intense in a way. Because you're not, it's not your parents' sanctuary experience.

It's not the junior church, as we called it, experience. It's not the Sunday school experience. It's just this more basically human version of that. That like if it hits you at the right time, it's really quite a wallop. There's camp kids and there's Christian kids. And boy, there's also Christian camp kids.

AlexYes. and there's and and i was and and and that's kind of like what a youth group like you youth group

Merlinyouth group would it be like a field trip like where would you go uh oh well so so there's sort

Alexof two different parts i i think it's not a mission right not a mission uh well there's there's uh what were called service trips which is where you know a bunch of white kids go to downtown detroit And it's like, hey, we're here to fix up your school. And then there were retreats where you literally go to like this retreat center, which would be a monastery or something. And that's where, you know, you share your stories and you pray a lot. And it's pretty boring. But there's also, you know, it is kind of like camp in which you get to hang out with your friends.

And those were the ones that weren't.

MerlinIs it like a dormitory?

AlexYeah.

MerlinLike a camp dormitory kind of feeling?

AlexAnd those are the ones that didn't feel super weird because we all knew like, okay, this is what this is like the thing. But we all got to, you know, be kids together in this space. And those are things that I've those are the ones that I very much treasure because it was very it was like camp. Like people would, you know, also do the like they would, you know, sneak off and make out. And it was kind of it was it was very sweet. And I think it was wholesome because I don't, you know, it was still kids talking about their disordered eating or in my case, you know, a deep loneliness and sadness.

that I would come to learn later was mental illness. But it was all, I think most people got a lot out of that. But then there was like this, it was, you know, like kind of like NXIVM where, you know, where it's a, it's a, oh, this is a betterment type of thing. But then it's like, you're going to join DOS. And this is an even, you think that felt good? That regular, you know, normal sense of community that everybody craves? How about you go to the one where like, we're all sitting in silence for 10 hours and uh and then people are speaking in tongues you just go you go sit nude in this room yeah

and that and that is happened to a lot of catholic kids obviously a lot of them boys um and with priests and uh and i think luckily i had the sense of my and me and i think all of my friends were like oh no this is a hard hard no uh and that that was usually luckily something that was like one of our friends who was you know like a little too into astrology nowadays would be

like and you know um because i i have a lot of yeah i mean look at the jeffrey i mean not to

Merlinchange subject but like look at the jeffrey epstein stuff like there was he had a recipe a formula for knowing how to talk about a pyramid scheme basically taking a vulnerable abused kid and turning them into the next level of the pyramid for finding more underprivileged, vulnerable kids.

AlexYeah, and there were kids like me and the majority of my friends who saw through this kind of thing, right? This is why human trafficking is so hard and not really a thing in America because it's really hard to convince somebody to get into a van.

MerlinI mean, it's hard to have a puppy.

Alexlike imagine trying to keep girls yeah exactly exactly which is why like you literally need to be a billionaire to successfully have the time and resources finally a reason to succeed

Show notes

Transcript

214. Yelling at Plywood

Show notes

Transcript

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