Ep. 26: "Go Practice the Car"
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: Hey John, how are you?
Merlin: Hi Merlin.
Merlin: How's it going?
Merlin: Merlin, man.
John: john roderick no that's not a good song no you don't like that it's a march you don't like marches you know what i did i i cribbed a little bit from janet jackson and i think that's what you should do you should go back to the great stars of our youth and find a song okay make some notes but i mean you know what i i didn't have to find it it's like a kind of synesthesia
John: When I hear your name, when I hear your voice.
Merlin: Huh.
Merlin: Who had that?
Merlin: Was it Baudrillard?
Merlin: Baudelaire?
Merlin: Baudrillard?
Merlin: Who had it?
Merlin: Somebody had that.
Merlin: Bruce.
John: Baudry.
John: Baudry.
Merlin: Who's the guy that says... It was a TV guy.
Merlin: That's not the guy.
Merlin: That's what I'm thinking of.
Merlin: You know, I tell my daughter this.
Merlin: You know the thing about Bruce Lee?
Merlin: I don't know if this is true.
Merlin: Bruce Lee's success.
John: Because he's a great actor.
Merlin: He's a terrific actor.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: You know, the thing is, he's a very moving story.
Merlin: Very moving story.
Merlin: But you know what I heard Bruce Lee says?
Merlin: Bruce Lee says if you want to break a board, and again, I'm not really sure how effective that is from day to day, but if you want to break a board, you know what?
Merlin: You don't aim for the board.
Merlin: Uh-oh.
Merlin: You aim two inches behind the board.
Merlin: Wow.
Merlin: That affects me in day to day life.
John: You keep aiming two inches behind the board.
Merlin: I've never hit a board, but I know when it happens, I have a pretty good idea where to aim.
Merlin: I'm surprised he... It seems like he might have done that in Metrix.
Merlin: Isn't he from Hong Kong?
John: Yeah, but that was before Metrix were invented.
John: That's how Uma Thurman got out of that coffin that was buried six feet underground.
Merlin: Oh, in that movie with the guy who likes feet?
Merlin: That's right.
John: I think about that all the time because...
John: I'm a claustrophobic and I have a fear of being buried alive.
John: That's not funny.
Merlin: But you've probably researched this in your mini sleepless nights.
Merlin: You know that's a thing, right?
Merlin: You're not alone in that by a long shot.
John: Oh, about being buried.
John: I haven't researched it because it's not a thing that I... That is not a topic that I want to socially network around.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: So you're not on Quora, like asking questions about... Or ask Metafilter, like the best way to deal with...
John: No.
John: It's something that I just want to put out of my mind.
John: When it comes into my mind, I ask myself, how did this get in my mind?
John: And then I just want to get it out.
Merlin: Can I be honest?
Merlin: I don't buy that.
Merlin: Is that right?
Merlin: Oh, are you kidding me?
Merlin: You keep cigarettes around your house just to make yourself stronger.
Merlin: It seems to me like you're the kind of person who might actually, I don't know if you want to get Ken Stringfellow's coffin, but you would get some kind of a coffin that you could practice with.
John: It's really – even talking about it now is giving me the creepy crawlies.
Merlin: I think it was Poe.
Merlin: I think it was – I'll have to look this up.
Merlin: I think it was Edgar Allan Poe had the same – he did the thing where they put the guy in the – brick the guy into the – The cask of the Amontillado.
Merlin: A cask of Amontillado.
Merlin: I think he had some kind of a special coffin that had like hinges and a phone.
Merlin: He had a plan.
Merlin: I'm sorry.
Merlin: I don't want to upset you.
Merlin: But it just seems to me that you're a man who arguably thrives, if you like, lives by confronting your fears.
John: I don't think Edgar Allan Poe had a phone in his coffin.
John: I don't have a way to prove that.
John: Just going back on the timeline.
Merlin: You don't think so?
Merlin: Not at all.
Merlin: He couldn't have, like, I don't know.
Merlin: I think he might have had a bell.
Merlin: Give me a quick one.
Merlin: Hit it.
Merlin: He's alive!
Merlin: You'd need a pretty big fucking bell to be heard six feet under.
John: Well, I think what it is is after they bury you, it's too late for the bell.
John: But during the period where you could actually just knock on it and get people's attention... Oh, so maybe more like a mausoleum.
John: Yeah, right.
John: Okay, maybe, yeah, if he expected to be buried above ground.
Merlin: What about when you call your butler?
Merlin: Don't you pull, like, a large silk rope, and then that rings in the butler's pantry?
Merlin: What do I do?
Merlin: Well, you had a butler's pantry on Supertrain, right?
John: On Supertrain, I have a butler's pantry, but here around the house, I just use one of those vuvuvulas.
Merlin: Did you know that those spread disease?
Merlin: Vuvuvulas?
Merlin: Turns out that that is a huge... Vuvuvulas?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Think about that.
Merlin: Think about a Vuvuzula.
Merlin: I don't know how to pronounce that.
Merlin: I don't really care.
Merlin: But this is a thing when you had the soccer thing a few years ago.
Merlin: People in the southern countries, they get this thing.
Merlin: And I think it's a little bit like those horns that you would buy at a shitty carnival.
Merlin: Like a chauffeur?
Merlin: You mean like that drives your car around?
Merlin: No, like a chauffeur.
Merlin: Oh, like the Jewish conch, right?
John: Yeah, the conch, right.
John: Okay.
John: Yeah.
John: They get to talk when they have the chauffeur.
Merlin: Is that like the talking stick at a camp?
John: Yeah, exactly.
John: Except they've been carrying it with them through the desert.
John: That doesn't involve puppets at all.
John: What, the Jewish religion?
John: You know what?
Merlin: Let's move on.
John: There's a little puppetry in it.
John: That's true.
John: So you're saying the vivuvula is a disease spreader because as people go into it, it broadcasts their germs?
Merlin: Well, I just want to establish for our listeners who are not familiar with soccer disease that when I was a kid, there was lots of really stupid shit that you would buy at a carnival that would either break and or become useless, like the second Neupot, like the fake dog, fake dog on a leash.
Merlin: Right.
John: Or remember the Coke bottle that had been stretched so it was really tall?
John: Oh, that's mysterious.
John: I just kept thinking about how easy that would be to break.
John: Or the dog leash, but there was no dog.
John: Invisible dog, precisely.
Merlin: Coke mirrors, lots of cocaine mirrors.
Merlin: Leonard Skinner, 38 Special.
Merlin: Who do you associate with Coke mirrors?
John: I think 38 Special is a pretty good grab.
John: I'm going to say also...
John: Van Halen is a big Coke mirror thing.
Merlin: You think they saw any money from that?
John: No, that was before you could track all that stuff down.
John: I bet you there were people screen printing Coke mirrors all across America.
Merlin: Did they have phones at the time of Van Halen?
John: They did have phones, but not in traveling carnivals.
John: Traveling carnivals did all their business at a phone booth out by the highway.
John: Okay.
John: All right.
John: Got it.
John: You know what I mean?
Merlin: I do.
Merlin: I'm just thinking I could see Mike Anthony getting on whatever version of a carnival person uses for a phone and saying, what the fuck?
John: What the fuck?
John: Where's our two cent royalty on all these Coke mirrors?
Merlin: We want our cocaine cut.
Merlin: We want our bump.
Merlin: Is that what you call it?
Merlin: A bump?
John: Yeah, we want a bump.
John: We want a little bump.
John: Yeah.
John: Well, the thing that used to mystify me was those feathered roach clips.
John: Feathered roach clips, right?
John: You'd get those at the carnival.
John: I didn't understand what they were for.
Merlin: I think there's so many things at a carnival that involve make-believe drug use.
Merlin: See, it seems to me that if you were really serious about it, and I don't know, I did cocaine once and it didn't do a lot for me, but I'm just thinking... Is that right?
Merlin: Why is that funny?
John: It's a real busman's holiday for you, right?
John: Oh, I'm writing that down.
John: Okay, all right, we'll come back to that.
John: Oh, what is this drug?
John: Oh, it makes you...
John: It makes you feel real good, real strong.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: I'm just thinking that if you were someone who was really serious about cocaine, A, you probably aren't hanging out at a carnival.
Merlin: You're probably hanging out with hookers and people who pretend to like you so they can get a free bump off you.
John: Oh, that's where you're wrong, my friend.
Merlin: Okay, well, okay, this is where I need more of your wisdom.
Merlin: I'm thinking you're going to buy a glass coffee table or possibly a Peter Frampton live record.
Merlin: And you're going to use that.
Merlin: Now, I don't know, do razors, I've rolled weed on those, but now, you've had cocaine before.
John: I've had cocaine.
John: I think that the cocaine mirror was more of a decorative thing.
John: element then and then truly like i mean if you're when it's time to cut up some cocaine i think you're right you're going to use a peter frampton album you're not going to you're not going to take your van halen mirror down off the wall does that harm the resale value of the frampton album yeah
John: Well... Depends who's buying, right?
John: What resale value?
John: God, I was listening to that Peter Frampton the other day on the radio.
John: Boy, I can't account for it.
John: I really can't.
Merlin: Okay, I'm glad you said it and not me.
Merlin: I never told you my story about the records that accidentally got delivered to my house.
Merlin: you got accidental records did you sign up for one of those record programs and then accidentally order a bunch and not pay for them later i one copy of sports by huey lewis harmed my credit forever oh because you didn't uh because they got you they got what was the triumph the the well all the triumph records are bad was it alliance or something was one of their like mid-80s ones did you just say all the triumph records were bad
Merlin: It was like a Brownies version of Rush.
Merlin: Don't you think they were kind of fake Rush?
Merlin: Yeah, they were fake Rush.
Merlin: He even tried to sing high and stuff.
Merlin: But 38 Special was fake Skinnerd.
Merlin: Oh, no.
Merlin: They had a huge pop sensibility.
Merlin: Well, so did Triumph.
Merlin: I disagree.
Merlin: You don't think... Triumph was the pop rush.
Merlin: That's exactly what it was.
Merlin: During the age of Paola, Triumph got their shit jammed into heavy rotation on MTV, and that's why people know who Triumph is.
Merlin: MTV?
Merlin: Oh, you bet.
Merlin: The Fight the Good Fight video?
Merlin: Constantly that was on.
John: I'm talking about album-oriented radio.
Merlin: They call it AOR in Canada.
John: That's right.
John: AOR.
Merlin: They put a U in it.
Merlin: It's A-O-U-R.
John: poutine i didn't even know that triumph was on mtv because i was too busy driving around i know oh wait is this your locomotive or is this your plane i was too busy riding around in the passenger seat of a piper cub of my friend of my friend's audi fox listening to triumph and mowing lawns all summer uh god damn it john i
Merlin: Can I point out one thing just in passing and fucking A, I never got back to the Vuvuzulas.
Merlin: Fuck.
Merlin: Here's the thing, John.
Merlin: I mentioned this before in a previous visit, but you did actually once in what I think was what you thought seemed like a jokey way but was obviously serious.
Merlin: When I wanted to drive one time, you offered to put a broomstick up my ass.
Merlin: You've never not driven –
Merlin: And so my question to you is, we know from Pump Chili, we know from this, you're constantly mentioning these people driving around, that you have a suspended license, and how did you handle it?
Merlin: Why are people always driving you around, John?
Merlin: Were you that bad?
John: In this particular instance, in the Audi Fox... Were you wrecked on Frampton powder?
Merlin: No, I was 14.
Merlin: And you weren't driving at that point?
John: No, I hadn't.
John: Well... You're precocious, John.
John: Technically, here's how I learned to drive.
John: My dad had an Audi 5000, but it was a diesel.
Yeah.
John: and it had a manual transmission.
John: And he took me out in the town of Girdwood, Alaska, which was at the time a town that had no paved roads.
John: It was just a little dirt town, ski village.
John: And he showed me how the manual transmission worked, and we worked on it until I could get the car going.
John: I guess I was 15.
John: I had just turned 15.
John: And then periodically on his whim...
John: It would never happen when I asked, but on his whim, he would throw me the keys and say, go practice the car.
John: You quit doing the voice.
John: He'd say, go practice the car.
John: Go drive around.
John: But here's the rule.
John: Don't go over 30 miles an hour.
Merlin: Without warning, he would just spring it on you.
Merlin: Don't go over 30.
Merlin: Pop quiz, hotshot.
John: And so, oh, okay.
John: So I would get the, you know, I'm 15, right?
John: And I would go out, I'd get in the car, I'd start it up, I'd stall it a couple times, I'd get it going.
John: And then I would drive all over Girdwood and pick up every kid I knew.
John: And we would go out to the airport, the Girdwood Airport, which was a dirt runway, about a mile long.
John: And we'd start at one end of the runway and...
John: We'd drive out on the wrong way and we'd floor it.
John: And you know, it's a diesel, right?
John: So it takes forever.
Merlin: Is this an operating airport where planes went, landed and took off?
John: Well, yeah, but it's one of those Alaska airports where if you're a little airplane and you're flying into the airport, you look down and you see if there's anybody around.
Merlin: It's really more like an off-ramp.
John: There's a frequency that you get on the radio and you say, Girdwood traffic, this is Cessna 634 Mike Alpha or whatever.
John: Is there anyone around?
John: And then you take your hand off the microphone.
John: If nobody says anything, then you're like, okay, it's all me.
John: You don't expect to have an Audi 5000.
John: We didn't have a radio, obviously.
John: Cessna bikes are for clearance.
John: Could we please get John Roderick off of the runway, please?
Over.
John: We'd start at one end of the runway and we'd floor it.
John: But, you know, it's a runway, right?
John: So you have all the time in the world.
John: And the Audi, we'd get up to 115 miles an hour, however fast this thing could go.
John: And then I would pull up the emergency brake.
John: And we would spin and spin and spin.
John: Because you won't hit anything.
John: No, you won't hit anything.
John: You're out in the middle of this runway.
John: I mentioned it was covered with snow and ice, right?
John: In the middle of winter.
Yeah.
John: So we would pull up the emergency brake.
John: But you didn't go over 30.
John: And this thing would just spin like a top, you know?
John: Oh, my God.
John: It was so great.
John: I mean, obviously, at any second, we could have hit a divot or whatever and rolled it 30 times.
John: But it never happened.
John: And then I would drive back and hand my dad the keys and be like, I learned a lot.
John: But I'm really getting it.
John: I'm really getting it down.
Merlin: And he never caught on.
Merlin: Did he know what you were up to?
Merlin: I mean, he knew you were trouble.
John: Yeah, he knew I was doing something, but I don't think anybody expects a 15-year-old to go drive his dad's car down a runway.
John: I mean, I don't think that was... That's the thing.
John: That's the great thing about being a teenager.
John: They never, ever think that you're doing what you're doing.
John: They couldn't even conceive of it.
John: My dad...
John: learned to drive in a Model A, you know?
John: It never occurred to him that I would be doing speed trials, emergency brake speed trials.
Merlin: Even before you did, I guess you were deep in autodidacticism even before you realized it because you were doing, you ever seen like on cable TV, they'll do their shows where they show how you can become like a secret agent chauffeur.
Merlin: Like you get one of those heavily armored cars that's just super, super heavy because you need a special kind of chauffeur if you're going to have an armored,
Merlin: you know, a sedan, you have to know how to get out.
Merlin: Like if drug dealers have surrounded you, how you get out.
John: Well, that's why Diana Prince of Wales, the princess of Wales died because her chauffeur was a hack.
Merlin: Oh, and he was, wasn't he working for the other side?
Merlin: He was like a double agents chauffeur.
John: Well, I don't know.
John: That's what they say.
John: He was definitely working for a fight or, or whatever her boyfriend's name was, but you know, he was drunk and he obviously didn't know how to drive his car because he crashed.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: It's like in project management, you know, pick one.
Merlin: Like you can be drunk or a double agent, you know, or one of those things, but you shouldn't do all this.
Merlin: And those cars, am I right though?
Merlin: They're extremely heavy because of the armoring.
Merlin: And I don't know if the glass makes it heavier, the special glass.
John: Yeah, they're very heavy, very, very heavy.
John: So they don't get good mileage.
John: They don't get good mileage.
John: But I did learn to recover my car.
John: I learned to recover from almost any kind of spin.
John: I mean, I've spun out a lot of cars.
John: But, you know, I learned to recover because I had done all this like heavy,
John: heavy, crazy, out of control car work when I was young.
John: But my dad did catch on to it later because that wasn't all I did to that car.
John: He caught on to it when the car's expected lifespan of 350,000 miles or whatever was dramatically truncated.
John: He was like, why is this car falling apart?
John: It's only got 60,000 miles on it.
Merlin: Also, he had to go to the Goodyear place every couple weeks to replace the extremely odd pattern on the tires.
Merlin: The front left and back right show a lot of wear on the outside edges, Mr. Roderick.
John: Your anti-sway bars are bent beyond recognition.
John: Can't account for it.
Merlin: Audi makes pretty good cars, right?
Merlin: That's a German car.
John: Audi does make good cars, and we drove Audis.
John: My dad picked Audis for many years.
John: We had a succession of them, and they ran like tanks.
John: But, of course, maintenance costs.
Merlin: No, let's see.
Merlin: I had a 1970 VW bus.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: I had one, too.
Merlin: What, the in-between ones, between the two models, before the Porsche engines?
Yeah.
John: Yeah, it didn't have a Porsche.
Merlin: No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Merlin: Not from like a 911, but like, no, but I had one that was between the pop-up.
Merlin: It was one, mine hinged.
Merlin: Like, did yours hinge at an angle?
John: Or did you have a pop-up?
John: Oh, you're talking about a camper.
Merlin: Yeah, a camper.
Merlin: Oh, sorry.
Merlin: You had like a van.
Merlin: I had a camper that was totally sweet.
John: Oh, wow.
Merlin: Yeah, yeah, it was awesome.
Merlin: Sounds like a real love camper.
Yeah.
Merlin: Well, I mean, the back seat turned into an extremely awkward bed, if that's what you're asking.
Merlin: Yeah, and I learned from my friend Chris, who had an even older, he had like a 1965 or 1966 bus.
Merlin: And he said, you should always keep a, you know, there's like a little closet.
Merlin: You open little doors, like a tiny little closet in there.
Merlin: Super cool.
Merlin: He said, you always keep a pressed white shirt, preferably in the dry cleaning bag, in there.
Merlin: Because you will eventually have an appearance in court if you own a van.
John: And so as a real, he's a real smooth.
Merlin: Oh God.
Merlin: Chris is one of the, I learned so much from Chris.
Merlin: And, um, and so I learned to always keep an appearance in court shirt with me wherever I go.
John: That's very smart.
Merlin: Yeah, because if you show up and you're wearing like a Kind Bud shirt, it's all like red and green.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Mustache ride, 50 cents.
John: My bus actually caught on fire in Sprague, Washington.
Merlin: Is that right?
Merlin: Were you not changing the oil?
Merlin: No, they're air-cooled.
Merlin: That's my problem.
Merlin: I seized mine up because I wasn't changing the oil enough.
John: No, I changed oil, but I think what it was, it actually had a cracked block, and I drove it for a long time, just short distances.
John: But I took it on a long road trip, and it caught on fire.
Merlin: That same Chris, guy, he's just the best.
Merlin: We had a, what is it, a gasket, a header gasket?
John: Yeah, one of those header gaskets.
Merlin: He came over to my house one day, and he said this was going to happen.
Merlin: He said what we were going to do, and I honestly thought it might as well have...
Merlin: have been like a brother's grim thing.
Merlin: I had no fucking idea how this was going to happen.
Merlin: He came over to my house with like two scissor jacks and a small toolbox.
Merlin: And a few hours later we had taken out my engine and replaced the gasket.
Merlin: And it was the most magical.
Merlin: We just moved, you put the scissor jacks up and then you just roll it a little bit and you've taken the engine out of your car and you're repairing your own.
Merlin: We had that book, that little cartoony book that everybody had to be that awesome VW.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You know, for not for dummies, but you know what I mean?
Merlin: That awesome, you know, cartoon book about how to fix your VW.
Merlin: I remember it well.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: And it worked.
Merlin: We did it.
Merlin: You have to understand, for me, I don't know how to make chocolate milk.
Merlin: This blew my mind.
John: Guys like that, I have always loved and admired so much.
John: The ones that are like, oh, you have a blown head gasket?
John: Here, let me come over and help you fix it.
John: God, I wish I had that.
John: I had a Fiat Spider for a long time, and a friend of mine came over and changed all the struts on it for me one afternoon.
John: Didn't even put it on a jack.
John: Set it up on a milk crate.
John: Great guy.
John: And he ended up being... He's like a physicist working for the Manhattan Project.
John: I mean, I guess the Manhattan Project's kind of been... It's the Manhattan Project 2.
John: It's kind of been... It's a little slower over there at Manhattan Project Central.
John: No, he's working for the government making nuclear bombs.
John: He's an engineer.
Merlin: He's a physicist.
Merlin: You shouldn't say.
Merlin: Don't say.
Merlin: Don't say.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You've got to get clearances for that kind of stuff.
Merlin: Here's the thing, though.
Merlin: Well, not anymore.
John: Now that the Russians aren't a big threat, all the nuclear stuff's right out in the open.
John: Here comes the Cold War.
John: They have a website now where they're like, here's what we're doing.
John: Here's how we make the bombs.
John: No worries.
John: You can just get a PDF.
John: Yeah, get a PDF.
Merlin: But that experience had a big effect on me.
Merlin: First of all, it made me feel extremely like a penisless incompetent man.
Merlin: But also, it was so cool.
Merlin: I really get like car guys now.
Merlin: Because back then, before you get all the stuff, like our VW now, we have an ancient 1996 VW.
Merlin: But still, it's got the thing where you plug in the thing and it tells you what's wrong with the car.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You know what I mean?
Merlin: But back then, I think it's kind of cool that especially with VWs, again, you know, there's some things you've got to give the Germans credit for.
Merlin: And in that case, like having a kind of engine, a true people's car, if you like, where you could actually do that yourself was really inspiring to me.
John: Yeah, they're about as complicated as a sewing machine or even less complicated than a sewing machine.
John: You ever sew?
John: I have sewed.
John: I did learn to sew.
John: And I still don't understand how sewing machines work.
Merlin: I hope somebody's going to start a wiki about how full of shit you are.
Merlin: No, no, no.
Merlin: I learned to sew and here's why.
Merlin: Are you talking about darning or are you talking about making a suit?
John: Well, I can't make a suit.
John: But I learned to sew because I don't like to throw clothes away.
John: when they have a minor imperfection.
John: And so I used to bring my clothes to my mom when I was in high school and say, can you fix this ripped jacket?
John: Can you fix this pair of trashed jeans or whatever?
John: And my mom comes from that sort of depression era way of thinking where it's like,
John: Uh, you can keep a, you can keep a piece of clothing going only so long, but I believe she actually has a, she carries a white pressed shirt everywhere she goes.
John: And at a certain point she felt like these clothes were, were reflecting poorly on the family.
John: that i was out there wearing these patched i looked you know like a hobo which is what i was shooting for but she was like no it's time to retire this garment a learned hobo yeah right i looked like a man who had once held a high station in life who had who was only 16 but had already fallen and then complaints had been lodged and he was he was he had moved from oklahoma to the central valley of california and he was just looking for work
Merlin: Because you saw an ad that there were grape farms.
John: Yeah, I saw a guy came through our town on the back of a flatbed truck, and he said, out of work, come to California, land of prosperity.
John: So my mom said, I'm not sewing your clothes anymore.
John: Your clothes look ridiculous.
John: You look ridiculous.
John: You should get rid of them.
John: You have plenty of, I mean, you have new clothes.
John: You have all these other clothes.
John: And I said, I was offended by this.
John: that she wouldn't patch my my coats and she said you know what smart guy learn to sew and she she sat me down in front of her sewing machine and she taught me how it worked and for a long time so of course i went to the fabric store immediately and i bought um reams and reams of fake fur and
John: Pink leopard stripe taffeta and like yellow corduroy.
Merlin: Those are hard.
Merlin: I mean, it's hard enough to just take a piece of like cotton fabric off a bolt and get it to run a straight line.
Merlin: You were working with some very challenging textiles.
John: I really was.
John: And my idea was... You wanted to look like a retarded bath mat.
John: What I ended up looking like was a freaking juggalo, but it was before they'd even been invented.
John: I would take the seams out of the sides of my jeans and I would insert like two inches of fake fur on either side.
Merlin: You sound like a developmentally disabled pimp.
Merlin: I was so stupid.
John: 100 for the night.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: And you were sober when you would sew?
John: Oh, yeah.
John: I mean, I was still a teenager.
John: Drunk sewing hadn't really taken off.
Merlin: That's big in Brooklyn now, you know.
John: Drunk sewing.
John: Drunk sewing, yeah.
John: But no, I had created all these what I thought were like outrageously cool outfits.
John: that were just stupid.
John: It kept me off the streets, though.
Merlin: Was it like a jacket you could put on?
Merlin: Were you limited to tunics?
Merlin: Don't you start with a tunic?
John: I couldn't fabricate an entire garment from scratch, but I would take old garments and modify them
John: To be fancy.
Merlin: Oh, I see.
Merlin: It's more like a craft project.
John: Yeah, I would fancy them up.
Merlin: You weren't buying old Butterick patterns or anything.
John: No, no, no, no.
John: I would go to the thrift stores and I would buy stuff and then I would add fake fur or leopard spots or pink tiger stripes or...
John: You know, like, for a while there, I was really into the whole Graham Parsons, like, fringe jacket thing.
Merlin: Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes.
John: But I didn't want a fringe leather jacket.
John: What I wanted was a suit, but that had fringe.
John: And not like a cowboy suit, not like a nudie suit.
John: Like if Roger Daltrey were a district attorney.
John: Yeah, like a proper three-button Brooks Brothers suit, except with fringe.
John: Like on the arms?
John: On the arms and on the pants and on the, yeah, everywhere you could put it.
Merlin: Do you have any sketches of that?
John: I don't.
John: There are some pictures floating around, I think.
John: My junior prom tuxedo had pink tiger stripe lapels.
Merlin: Oh, come on.
Merlin: Did you wear Converse?
Merlin: No, I had... I had nice clown shoes like Oxford's.
Merlin: No, I had...
Merlin: i had wingtips i'm not i'm not a jerk you're not an animal i'm not a fucking animal i don't i don't want to speak for her but i have a friend who i believe listens to the program whose name is uh bridget and she is uh i don't know if you've seen she does amazing like like needlework and all kinds of different crafty stuff i'm just saying as someone who listens to the show i'm saying you might be able to cross her palm and walk away with some pretty fucking amazing i'm saying like some bespoke fucked up outfits
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: Lots of people, I have lots of friends who sew, and I'm just saying, John, if you want to crowdsource this, you might be able to get some extremely disturbing clothes that actually fit you.
John: Well, I have always said, if I came into...
Merlin: A truly awesome amount of money.
Merlin: If Super Train works out the way you hope.
John: If Super Train works out and I have cash to burn, the first thing I would do is have my clothes tailored.
John: Oh, God.
John: Before I did anything else, before I bought a fancy car, before I went on a trip, I would go somewhere and I would have my measurements taken and I would have people start making me clothes.
John: Because clothes, real clothes that come from the rack...
John: Just do not fit.
Merlin: You shouldn't even call those real clothes.
Merlin: They're not even clothes.
Merlin: My friend Buzz did this.
Merlin: Buzz was in London and went to, like, I don't even know how to say it, Seville Road or whatever?
Merlin: Savile Row.
Merlin: Sorry.
Merlin: Oh, God.
Merlin: I got every aspect of that wrong.
Merlin: He went to Tom Sawyer Island.
Merlin: Anyway, so much for me trying to sound smart.
Merlin: Anyway, he went to the Cuddy Up Closy District.
Merlin: Yeah, right.
Merlin: And he went in there.
Merlin: And Buzz, who I don't think would mind me saying, is like myself, is a not tall man.
Merlin: So like in my case, like for example, I mean just in terms of, you know, being simpatico here.
Merlin: Like I don't know.
Merlin: Right now I'm like a 34, 32 in jeans.
Merlin: Mm-hmm.
Merlin: Which is like sometimes weirdly hard to find.
Merlin: I feel like it must have a very odd body shape.
Merlin: So even when I find clothes, they still fit weird.
Merlin: And that's hard for Buzz.
Merlin: I have another friend.
Merlin: I have another friend.
Merlin: She actually used to be a reporter at NPR who's like under five feet tall.
Merlin: And like the only clothes she could find is like children's clothes.
Merlin: It's ridiculous.
Merlin: So in this case, Buzz.
John: Although I like the sound of that.
Merlin: Yeah, she did work on Science Friday.
Merlin: So in Buzz's case, so he's in London.
Merlin: He goes to Sevilla Road today.
Merlin: Sevilla Rodeo.
Merlin: Sevilla Rodeo Drive.
Merlin: And he went in there and he got what is called a bespoke suit.
Merlin: He fucking went in there and like a guy made him a suit and it was impeccable.
John: Like Charlie Watts does.
John: Does he do that?
John: Charlie Watts wears these amazing suits.
Merlin: I love to meet that guy.
John: He has made on Sevilla Rodeo Drive.
Merlin: I think he dislikes the Rolling Stones as much as me.
Merlin: He does.
Merlin: I don't know as much about jazz and I don't swing, but you know how hard he can swing?
Merlin: Yeah.
John: The door is closed on jazz, but he does hate the Rolling Stones.
Merlin: You're saying he doesn't like jazz anymore?
John: No, I think he likes jazz.
John: I'm saying the door is closed on jazz.
John: New jazz or old jazz?
John: Jazz has become like rockabilly.
Merlin: If you're making rockabilly... I don't think Charlie Watt is sitting around in a suit listening to fucking rockabilly.
Merlin: I don't think he's sitting around listening to Pat Metheny.
John: If you make rockabilly, you're not going to make a rockabilly song about... How did this go from suits to rockabilly via Charlie Watt so quickly?
John: Am I right?
John: Am I right?
John: You're not going to make a rockabilly song about dragons, right?
John: The door is closed on rockabilly.
Merlin: Because you're saying it's like a D&D Turing test.
Merlin: If you can't write a song about dragons, the genre is dead.
Merlin: No, no, not dead.
Merlin: I'm saying it's closed.
John: For instance, heavy metal, the door is also closed because you have to write songs about dragons.
John: I'm so lost at this.
John: There are no new vistas.
John: There are no new vistas.
Merlin: How do dragons become the metric?
John: You go back, well, can you write a song about dragons and rockabilly?
John: No.
Merlin: Are you challenging me literally right now to write a rockabilly song about dragons?
Ha, ha, ha, ha.
Merlin: I will literally do it right now.
John: This is my internet challenge.
John: Don't do it right this second.
John: Hang on.
Merlin: Go ahead.
John: Keep talking.
John: My internet challenge is Rockabilly's song about dragons.
John: Go.
John: It can't be done.
John: Are you sure?
John: I am pretty sure it's not going to be Rockabilly.
John: Do it.
Merlin: Well, you thought that it had faced its death, but now you're going to feel that dragon's breath.
Merlin: That's pretty close, right?
Merlin: That's pretty hot, actually.
Merlin: Well.
Merlin: Well.
Merlin: Eddie Cochran does not get the credit he deserves.
Merlin: Fucking Eddie Cochran.
Merlin: You know what that is that you just wrote?
John: That is a parody song.
John: That would not be accepted in the Rockabilly canon.
All right.
Merlin: Okay, Umberto Eco, moving on.
Merlin: They measured every fucking part of his body.
Merlin: Cock and balls, arms and eyes.
Merlin: Every part of Buzz got measured by an English man.
Merlin: It took a while, okay?
Merlin: This is not FedEx.
Merlin: This is not FedEx.
Merlin: This is fucking English people, like Charlie Watts, who does not listen to music about dragons, to our knowledge.
Merlin: And anyway, he got a nice suit.
Merlin: You should do it.
Merlin: It's expensive.
Merlin: Let me say this.
Merlin: As you know, John, I like to distinguish...
Merlin: I'm going to say this for the record because I think people wonder when I speak to my kids.
Merlin: I distinguish between costly and expensive.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: I'm a word guy.
Merlin: And I distinguish between cheap and inexpensive.
Merlin: Aha.
Merlin: I think the suit that you buy at Marshall's, blankets and pillows notwithstanding, I think the suit you buy at Marshall's is inexpensive and cheap.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Right?
Merlin: I think...
Merlin: There's a chance the suit you buy on Sevilla Road, it could be very – it's certainly going to be costly, but it doesn't have to be expensive.
Merlin: And can I tell you why?
Merlin: Because unless you gain a large, large, large amount of weight, that's going to last you.
Merlin: It's like the suit – it's like the Polish invasion suit you got, right?
Merlin: The English guy?
Merlin: Yeah, the Polish invasion suit.
Merlin: You know, a lot of that music is pretty amazing.
Merlin: Do you remember that?
Merlin: Do you remember the Polish invasion?
John: Sure, I love the Polish invasion.
Merlin: Oh, God.
Merlin: That sparked that whole Polish sound.
Merlin: Remember that chick sent me how I did Invade Me Do?
Merlin: It was amazing.
John: There's a company in Oregon that makes lumberjack boots for lumberjacks.
John: Okay.
John: And you can find them online by Googling the Big Black Boot Company.
John: That's not the name of the company, though.
John: It's called... What the hell is it called?
John: We Need a Gayer Name?
John: No, no.
John: It's a proper company, and they have a proper name.
John: But they make these boots, these lumberjack boots, for lumberjacks.
John: And these are guys who, like, you know, their boot...
John: And their chainsaw, that's basically their whole kit, right?
John: I mean, you wear a denim jacket, but it's your boots and your chainsaw that really, that's all you need to spend money on.
John: Oh, is it?
John: It's Westco.
John: It's called Westco.
John: Oh, because I just found boot.com.
John: Well, yeah.
John: Westco existed before Boot.com.
John: Okay.
John: If you go Big Black Boots and then look for Westco, W-E-S-C-O.
John: Anyway, so they make these lumberjack boots, and the lumberjack boots are more than $500.
John: Right.
John: Right.
John: But I really, really, really want a pair.
John: Oh, these look nice.
John: They got really nice sewing machines too.
John: And they make them to your foot.
John: You go down and you show them your foot and they make the boot to you.
John: And so I've done an unscientific poll of everybody I know for the last couple of years because this is a large investment to buy these boots.
John: And I've gone to everybody and I've said, what's the most you've ever paid for shoes?
John: Yeah.
John: And my female respondents have said, you know, anywhere between $200 and sometimes $400 or $500.
John: But I have never met a guy who's paid more than about $150 for his shoes.
Merlin: For the most expensive.
John: His shoes is straight.
John: Who's straight, right?
John: That's true.
John: I have not asked that many fancy men how much they've paid for their shoes.
John: I see expensive men's shoes online, but I don't live in that world so much.
John: The $1,200 shoes.
John: I know there are some men in Texas who pay $2,500 for their cowboy boots.
John: But anyway, I have been teetering on the fence of buying these Westco boots for like five years.
John: But I haven't been able to pull the trigger because it's just... I know what you're talking about.
John: They are expensive, but what was the other word?
John: Costly.
John: They're costly, but they are also...
John: Value added?
John: I'm not sure.
Merlin: Well, I mean, assuming again, and I just think this is something, there's a big asterisk here.
Merlin: Well, two asterisks.
Merlin: Well, yeah.
Merlin: Well, like number two, you don't want to lose them because if you lose them, you'd be bummed, right?
Merlin: If you accidentally leave them in a hotel room.
Merlin: But number one, what if you, God forbid, become heavy and start retaining water?
Merlin: Because then you can... I think it's that.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: But no, but I think that'd be great.
Merlin: And that's the thing, though.
John: Let me ask you, when was the last time you left a pair of boots in a hotel room?
John: Oh, what time is it?
John: I mean, do you like go running out of hotels in your socks a lot and like, oh, what did I forget?
Merlin: This is how I can tell you don't really have a child because I forget everything everywhere now because I'm trying to gather up.
Merlin: I'm not a mathematician, as you know, John, but I think there's a mess.
Merlin: to clean up ratio of two to one, at least when you have a child, by the time you've cleaned up one mess, two more have been created.
Merlin: And that works in restaurants, that works in hotels, that works anywhere.
Merlin: You're always behind and behind her.
Merlin: And so I'm like, I'm scurrying to make sure I've got my wallet, like let alone, you know, a stuffy toy and some lumberjack boots.
Merlin: So that, no, that's just my thinking is I would think about that, but no, you're mindful.
Merlin: You answered your own question.
Merlin: You're not a man who leaves lumberjack boots in a hotel room.
Merlin: So I don't think that's a concern.
John: Well, the thing is, if I wear a pair of lumberjack boots into a hotel room, I'm going to be wearing them out of that hotel room.
John: You know what I mean?
John: You might keep them on the whole time and not lay on the bed.
John: I don't bring them along.
John: Are you somebody who unpacks his suitcase and puts all the stuff in the drawers?
John: How many days?
John: In a hotel room?
John: How many days?
John: Four days.
John: You bet.
John: You're going to unpack.
Merlin: Otherwise, I'm going to be like an animal living out of a suitcase.
Merlin: That's not right.
Merlin: For four days.
Merlin: Well, John, it's not complicated.
Merlin: You're implying that I carry a lot of clothes, which I do.
Merlin: But what I do is I'll use the top drawer.
Merlin: The bottom drawer is for all the marketing materials.
Merlin: Everything in the room that has a logo on it goes in the bottom drawer.
Merlin: And then the top drawer is for underpants and socks.
John: So when you roll into a hotel room, you really like, you do a full white glove.
Merlin: I spread out, yes.
Merlin: I come on everything and I unwrap the soap and I really get in there.
Merlin: I get very comfortable.
Merlin: I roll around on all the towels.
John: See, sometimes I find it, I find that I am staying in very expensive hotels because various times people fly me places to do things and they think that I am a fancy person.
John: And so they're like, oh, we better put it in.
Merlin: They could give you half a tent and you'd be fine.
John: Yeah, they're like, oh shit, we'd better put him up in this really fancy hotel.
John: So I go into this hotel and everybody else in the hotel is clearly conscious of themselves as being fancy people.
John: And they don't like me even being in the lobby.
John: Like they can see me walk in and they're like, I see.
John: He's acting like he belongs here.
John: And that makes it even worse.
John: But I go upstairs and I'm staying in this fancy hotel and I'm living out of my suitcase.
John: I don't unpack.
John: I just dig in my little bag to get my shirt that I'm going to wear that day, which is all wrinkly.
John: And every once in a while I look around and I go, hmm, maybe I should have unpacked.
Merlin: I can already tell why you don't.
Merlin: You don't even know.
Merlin: Maybe you're not saying.
Merlin: And we'll cut this out if this is too much, but here's the thing.
Merlin: I'm just going to say, I could see being a man who's very suspicious of drawers for any number of reasons.
Merlin: I think one of the things is you need to be ready to run.
Merlin: You don't know what's going on.
Merlin: I'm not talking about fucking fires.
Merlin: I'm not talking – I'm talking about like when shit goes down, you do not want to have to be opening –
Merlin: let's be honest, probably a pretty filthy drawer to gather your clothes and put them in a bag.
Merlin: You got your shoes on, right?
Merlin: Because you sleep in your shoes.
Merlin: I could see you walk.
Merlin: I could see you sleeping in your shoes.
Merlin: I could see you walking in, looking at the back of the door for where the map is for how to get out and going and making sure that it's accurate, correct and up to date.
Merlin: All the doors open out.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: I could see you having literally a suitcase by the door ready to run or maybe, you know what, maybe by the balcony in case you have to jump five stories.
John: See, you don't want your doors opening out.
Merlin: That's the law, John.
Merlin: You ever heard about the Who concert?
Merlin: Who concert?
Merlin: You've got doors that have to open out now.
Merlin: Well, okay, you're exiting.
Merlin: No, you know what?
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: Hinges on the outside, right?
Merlin: Is that why?
John: The doors have to open in because if they open out, you can block it from the outside.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: I take it all back.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: In public places, doors have to open out.
Merlin: Hotel room, for obvious reasons, you don't want the hinges on the outside.
Merlin: Is that what you're thinking?
John: Well, neither the hinges on the outside, nor do you want it to open out.
John: This is a thing you learn in Alaska, because when it snows six feet in the middle of the night, if your door opened out, you'd be really in trouble.
John: If it opens in, you can open it in, and then you'd dig a tunnel.
John: Also, a gumshoe could stick a chair under the doorknob.
Merlin: Exactly, and then you'd be... You're stuck.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Now you're a fucking damsel in distress in $500 boots.
Merlin: That's not fun.
John: You're held in prison in your room by a gumshoe.
Oh.
John: Usually what I do, if I need to get out of a hotel room fast, I throw the bag out the window and then I take the stairs.
John: And then the bag is like, I go out the exit door, the bag's right there.
Merlin: Because you know what?
Merlin: In the ensuing mayhem is all those people who are running around in their underwear with nothing.
Merlin: I'm confused they're carrying hotel ice.
John: In their night shirts.
Merlin: Last thing they're going to do is grab a musician's bag.
Merlin: You know exactly where to go.
Merlin: You've worked it out in your mind.
Merlin: I could see you practicing the night before.
John: Well, you're always practicing.
John: Every time you go in and out of the room, you're looking, you know.
John: Yes.
John: Do you stick a matchstick in your hotel door to see if anybody's been in there?
Merlin: I've done it.
Merlin: I don't know why you wouldn't.
Merlin: Oh, you know what?
Merlin: Oh, I got an even bigger system than that.
Merlin: I got a dense system.
Merlin: Which system?
Merlin: I got a system.
Merlin: Tell me the system.
Merlin: You want to know the system?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: This is an old trick.
Merlin: What's the trick?
Merlin: It's a trick and a meta trick.
Merlin: You could take a little piece of, you know, whatever.
Merlin: In the old days, it would be a matchbook.
Merlin: It could be, let's say, an index card.
Merlin: Right.
John: Whatever you have in hand.
Merlin: An index card.
Merlin: And you stick that in the door as you're walking out.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Right?
Merlin: But you can also do variations on that.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Was it visible from outside?
Merlin: No, but here's the thing.
Merlin: I should not reveal this.
Merlin: Okay, here's the thing.
Merlin: How about you do this?
Merlin: How about instead of actually putting it in the door, you put it on the floor, and then you know what happens?
John: What?
Merlin: The guy thinks it was in the door.
Merlin: And moves it and tries to put it back.
Merlin: Oh.
Merlin: You know what I'm saying?
Merlin: And then when it's fallen, when you walk in, you see that it's in a different, more plausible place.
Merlin: And you can see if somebody's been in your room.
John: Wow.
John: I shouldn't have said anything.
John: That's super spy.
John: Now I'm not going to know what to do.
John: When I'm at your house, I'm going to be like, is that just a piece of lint on the floor?
John: They ask the guy why he robs banks.
Merlin: They ask the guy why he robs banks.
Merlin: He says that's where the money is.
Merlin: You want to do good in sales, excuse me, do well in sales.
Merlin: You don't think like a salesman.
Merlin: You think like somebody who buys your shit.
Merlin: And in this case, people think too much like somebody scared in a hotel room and not like the kind of person who wants to get in a fucking hotel room.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: So this is where you take it and turn it.
Merlin: And again, I'm saying too much.
Merlin: I know, you know, all of this, you, you've probably written books about this that you won't release, but I'm just telling you, there are things that you can do.
Merlin: There are things you could do.
Merlin: You know what I, well, I don't want to say what I do.
Merlin: I do.
Merlin: I do lots of things like this.
Merlin: I'll do things like, I'll do things like leave, uh, leave a hundred dollars, uh, just inside of a door.
Merlin: So if somebody comes in, you're crackhead.
Merlin: What do you do?
Merlin: You break in.
Merlin: What do you do?
Merlin: You don't have to make a 20.
Merlin: Doesn't matter.
Merlin: You put bills just out of sight of the door where you couldn't look in and see it.
Merlin: They come in to rob you.
Merlin: What do they see?
Merlin: They see the bill.
Merlin: You know what they do?
Merlin: What?
Merlin: They grab it and run.
Merlin: You're a crackhead.
Merlin: You just got 20 bucks.
Merlin: You're going to run.
Merlin: Right?
John: Prisoner's dilemma.
John: Speaking not as a former crackhead, but as someone who associated with many crackheads.
John: Pretty close.
John: You know, a lot of them are going to see that and they're going to say, if there's 120...
Merlin: If you got that much ambition, you got no business being a crackhead.
Merlin: So here's what you do.
Merlin: You put one 20 there.
Merlin: You put another 20 a little further away.
Merlin: And the third 20 is armed.
Merlin: The third 20 is in a rat trap.
Merlin: It's attached to a dynamite cap and you blow the fucking crackhead's hand off.
Merlin: How do you like that, Smokey?
Merlin: I like that.
Merlin: There's glass everywhere because, you know, they like their glass they smoke in.
Merlin: Or for that matter, their Coke mirror.
Merlin: They might be carrying a Coke mirror.
Merlin: I bet they are.
Merlin: Can you get a portable?
John: It's not a portable one.
John: It's a full-size one.
John: He's got it strapped to his back.
John: It folds out.
John: It says Nazareth on it.
Merlin: Now you're messing with it.
Merlin: A Vuvuzzavela is a large horn.
Merlin: And if you've been to a carnival, you'll know what this is.
Merlin: It's a piece of shitty plastic that's like really long, right?
Merlin: It's a long, horny thing.
Merlin: And then there's what I believe they call it a bell.
Merlin: Is that right?
Merlin: You call the flared part at the end a bell.
Merlin: And so if you're a little kid and you're a dumbass, you try and win that milk bottle game you can't win, whatever.
Merlin: You get the thing and then you put it up to your mouth and you go like this.
Merlin: That's exactly the sound, yes.
Merlin: That was accomplished using a paper towel roll.
Merlin: So what are you doing?
Merlin: What are you doing when you do that?
Merlin: I know you're ahead of me on this, but this is the problem with these South American people.
Merlin: Do you hear what I just did?
Merlin: Yeah, yeah.
Merlin: I'm making a noise with my mouth that is causing my lips to vibrate inside of the tube and make a sound.
Merlin: But can you guess what's coming out of my fucking lips?
Merlin: Spit them.
Merlin: Tons and tons of spit.
Merlin: You get...
Merlin: Spot them.
Merlin: Spot them.
Merlin: You get literally thousands.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Particles of bacteria.
Merlin: You get thousands of South Americans vuvuzeling at the same time.
Merlin: You could not create.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: Fucking Hitler could not come up with a better way to spread disease quicker.
John: It's like a spit fountain.
John: It's like a it's like a crowd source.
Merlin: It's like it's like it's like a hundred thousand spit fountains all pointed at each other.
Merlin: You know what I'm saying?
John: You take it all together and it's a tremendous installation.
John: You have a whole stadium that's making this mist, this spit mist.
Merlin: It's an aerated salivary goulash.
Merlin: It's everywhere.
John: It's fantastic.
John: Maybe that's what sports is really about.
John: Maybe it's just some kind of like...
John: Aeration, spin aeration.
John: It sounds like a test.
Merlin: But then what do you do?
Merlin: You're blowing your vuvuzel, you're drinking whatever South American people drink for beer.
Merlin: You inhale between blows.
Merlin: And then you're breathing in all the other people's vuvuzel.
Merlin: Oh, right.
Merlin: That's it.
Merlin: That's it.
Merlin: And then you put the index cards somewhere they didn't expect.
John: Here's the thing about soccer playing countries.
John: Yeah.
John: Countries that like to play soccer, and I'm including all of Europe and South America and Asia and basically everywhere.
John: What about Romania?
John: They play it there?
John: Oh, they love it there.
John: The Balkans, they play soccer?
John: Oh, they play the shit out of soccer there.
John: And here's the thing that goes hand in hand with soccer, and that is fairs.
Oh.
Merlin: Oh.
Merlin: Am I right?
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: Traveling fares.
Merlin: You just blew my mind.
Merlin: They love fares.
Merlin: Simple people love fares.
John: Love fares.
Merlin: You never see Stephen Hawking at a fair.
Merlin: It's like a lot of mud.
Merlin: In this case, you're saying you could go and get a Vuvuzela or a Nazareth Coke mirror at all of these places.
Merlin: It's just a question of what you bring to the game.
John: You get dream catchers.
John: You get magic tricks made out of match boxes.
John: Feathered roach clip.
John: Get feathered roach clip.
John: Did I say dream catchers already?
John: You can get dream catchers.
John: Dream catchers.
Merlin: I think dream catchers don't work.
John: Is that right?
Merlin: Have you ever tried one?
Merlin: Well, I think it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Merlin: I think if you get a dream catcher, things already aren't working out.
John: But wait a minute, if it's self-fulfilling, if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, that doesn't mean it doesn't work.
Merlin: I've done a little scholarship on this.
Merlin: It's technically considered the Native American version of a lottery.
Merlin: You get a dream catcher and then you wait.
Merlin: You might as well just hang a tennis racket from your mirror.
Merlin: You get a dream catcher and you wait and maybe it catches a dream?
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: What are the odds?
Merlin: What's the payout this Tuesday?
John: I'm just saying.
John: You know, I have a baby rattle that's made out of a gila monster spleen.
Yeah.
John: Of course you do.
John: Do you let your daughter use it?
John: I do.
John: She uses it all the time, but I keep worrying that maybe she's going to get the right combination of rattles and gibberish, and she's going to conjure a great spirit of some kind.
Merlin: Oh, you should have that thing demagicized.
Merlin: What would you call it?
Merlin: If you wanted to remove the magic from something, what would you call it?
Merlin: Marriage?
Merlin: How do you do that?
Merlin: How do you get the magic out of something?
Merlin: Have you verified that it's a spleen?
John: I'm pretty sure.
John: Well, maybe it's a black.
Merlin: It's an organ.
Merlin: It's definitely some kind of organ from Gila Monster.
John: Some kind of Gila Monster organ, bladder or spleen.
Merlin: Did you get that at a roadside attraction or is that something you get from like a scientific American kind of place?
Merlin: Like where do you find a Gila Monster organ?
John: Well, you have to go on a vision quest.
John: You have to go on a spirit journey.
John: Walk with the wolves.
John: Yeah, and then when you're there, it's part of that.
John: They award it to you when you become a brave.
Merlin: Oh, like when they give you that aluminum foil blanket after a marathon.
Merlin: Do you have a sense of what's causing the rattling to happen?
Merlin: Would you be able to take that apart with a manual?
John: No, because it's stitched together with Gila Munster leather strap.
John: Does that worry you at all?
John: It might be eyeballs.
John: It might be peyote buttons for that matter.
John: I don't know.
John: Maybe I should open it up.
John: In case of emergency, right?
John: My little girl seems to...
John: My mom told me the other day, she was like, you know, when you were a little kid, you saw things.
John: And I'm like, what do you mean?
John: She said, you were always coming into my room and telling me there was somebody in your room.
John: there was a man in your house.
John: Like Alexander Hamilton?
John: I was like, like Alexander Hamilton?
John: That's exactly the question I asked.
John: And she was like, no, no, but you were always scared.
John: And you would come into my room late at night and say that you saw somebody in the house or you saw somebody in the yard or
John: You know, you're seeing people all the time.
John: And I was like, hmm, interesting that you never told me this before.
John: But I have not yet noticed that my little girl has this power.
John: But I do feel like her working of this Kila monster rattle, it doesn't bode well.
John: I'm afraid that one of these days I'm going to open my door and there's going to be a guy in a feathered headdress with a loincloth standing there, bone through his nose.
Merlin: Holding cigars.
Merlin: You know, John, I got to tell you, you know, they say this, this is true for breast cancer and basketball and all of those things.
Merlin: It's genetics, right?
Merlin: You, you, you can't, you can't, you got to be tall and have that gene, right?
Merlin: Not for breast cancer, but you know, I'm just saying in this case, you know, can I just say your mom, she's a very, she's a very sober, even person.
Merlin: Is she still listening to the show?
Merlin: I have no idea.
Merlin: Okay, probably not.
Merlin: We never fixed her bug.
Merlin: The thing is, though, that's in the genes.
Merlin: Now, I don't know if that comes from your dad's side or your mom's side, but there's something in you.
Merlin: I don't think you just start seeing shit in your room for no reason.
John: You want to know the scariest thing that ever happened to me with my mom?
John: I was out in the yard.
John: I was probably seven, eight years old.
John: You know, I was born on Friday the 13th.
John: I did not know that.
John: Born on Friday the 13th.
John: So when I was a little kid, I thought that that gave me some warlock powers.
John: Yeah.
John: And so I was out playing with some kids and I was like, all right, you know, sure, you guys have Tommy guns or whatever, but I'm going to cast a spell of holding on you or I'm going to, you know, this is before Dungeons and Dragons was even invented, but I was, you know, I was casting some warlock spells or whatever.
John: And my mom was walking through the yard and she kind of,
John: you know, perked up her ears and caught a glimpse of me like doing some incantation over my friends because I was born on Friday the 13th.
John: And she marched over, grabbed me by the shirt front, lifted me off the ground, pulled me very close to her face and said, do not mess with things you don't understand.
Merlin: Your mom?
John: Yeah.
John: And put me back down on the ground and walked away.
Merlin: She's the most rational person I've ever met.
John: And it chilled me to the bone.
John: It still chills me when I think about it because I have spent my whole life waiting for her possibly to...
Merlin: reveal to me something we're cutting we're cutting all of this out because given that she is the most rational person that either of us have ever met she had a fucking reason to put you in her face i have no idea she knew that you were sticking a fork into into satan's uh light light light light plug she obviously she knew something was up she maybe it's like a bewitch type situation where she knew you know like there's a dr dr bombay in the family or something
Merlin: I've been wondering my whole life.
John: I keep waiting for her to initiate me into the inner circle.
Merlin: How do you think, and it sounds like, if I could say it, and if you can say, have you stopped having those visions?
Merlin: I mean, apart from the aliens in your French doors, have you stopped seeing men in your room?
John: I mean, all my pillows turned to owls fairly recently.
Merlin: Hmm.
Merlin: Is that from Ross?
Merlin: They're from Ross.
John: That happens to everybody.
John: They're an assortment of pillows from various places.
John: While you're using them?
John: Well, yeah.
John: I woke up in the middle of the night and I looked around and all my pillows were owls.
John: I'm sure I told you about this.
John: Can I tell you about this?
John: You absolutely did not.
John: I looked around and all my pillows were owls.
John: Like big owls?
John: Well, pillow sized.
John: But not like snow owls.
John: Like pretty big.
John: Well, yeah.
John: Like snow owls that were even bigger than snow owls.
John: They were the size of pillows.
John: Hornet owls.
Merlin: Oh, yes.
Merlin: White owls.
Merlin: Horned owls.
Merlin: Oh, God.
Merlin: Like the cigars?
Merlin: Like those little cheap cigars?
Merlin: Like a white face?
John: They were pillows, but they were owls.
John: They had beaks?
John: Yes, they were my pillows.
John: I have a lot of pillows.
John: I have eight pillows in my room or whatever.
John: And they were all owls.
John: And they were all watching me.
John: They were watching over me.
John: And so I shook off the sleep until I was awake.
John: I was sure I was awake.
John: I was very conscious, like, okay...
John: wake up, and I was awake, and they were still owls.
Merlin: Oh, come on.
Merlin: And they were just on their side?
Merlin: Well, they were all arrayed in various ways.
John: Some of them were sitting up on their little owl butts and some of them were on the floor.
John: That's chilling, John.
Merlin: That is fucking chilling.
John: So I did not feel good about it, but they weren't hostile.
John: They were just sentries.
John: And so I resigned that this was going to be fine, and I grabbed the nearest owl and nestled up with it and went back to sleep.
Merlin: Could they... You say they're sentries, they're looking over you.
Merlin: Do you...
Merlin: they didn't speak to you per se.
John: I don't know.
John: Owls can't talk, dummy.
Merlin: Sorry.
Merlin: But you had the sense that they weren't, they were, they were there for a reason.
John: Yes.
John: Oh, absolutely.
Merlin: Is it a harbinger?
John: That many owls aren't just going to like turn up someplace without a reason.
John: Right.
John: Not without like a Facebook thing.
Merlin: And they can see so well in the dark.
Merlin: Do you sleep in a very dark room?
Merlin: Do you leave a light on?
Merlin: It's dark.
Merlin: I like a dark room too.
Merlin: And so with those giant owl eyes, they could see you just fine.
Merlin: Like if you were a grub or something, they could see you.
John: Oh, yeah, yeah.
John: I mean, they had... There was a project.
John: They had a project.
John: Some kind of owl project.
John: I'm not sure what it was.
John: I wasn't privy to it.
John: I did not feel that they were there to harm me, but I also did not... They didn't give me a warm, fuzzy feeling either.
John: They didn't tell you to do anything?
John: No, they just were there, and they were... When I woke up, they all, of course, were looking at me, and they kept looking at me until I grabbed the nearest one and went back to sleep.
John: So I don't know what to make of that.
Merlin: It certainly seems like the kind of thing that in the fullness of time you would want to make something of.
Merlin: Or now if it happens again, if you can say... If it happens again, I'm definitely... Are you going to say something?
Merlin: I'm definitely going to ask some serious questions.
Merlin: Were they silent?
Merlin: I mean, was there like a rough... Yeah, of course they were silent.
Merlin: Okay, well, I don't know.
Merlin: They have fucking wings and talons.
Merlin: It might have been a clacky talon noise.
Merlin: And it sounds to me like they were rubbing up against each other a little bit.
Merlin: Were they very still?
Merlin: There was some shuffling from side to side.
John: Did they blink?
John: No.
John: I find owl blinking so creepy.
John: Yeah.
John: No, I didn't get a lot of blinking out of it.
John: I mean, it was, admittedly, it was a short-lived, you know, it was only a minute or two.
John: And, you know, just long enough to, you know how that is when you wake up in the middle of the night.
Merlin: Oh, I totally know.
Merlin: Okay, I'm awake now.
Merlin: I'm awake.
Merlin: I saw Abraham Lincoln in my room when I was a kid.
Merlin: Really?
Merlin: I see Abraham Lincoln everywhere.
Merlin: He's our 16th president.
John: Yeah, yeah.
Merlin: Did you talk to your mom about this at all?
Merlin: He's on the penny.
John: No, no, no, no.
John: After that one time, the warlock time, I don't cover supernatural topics with my mom.
John: Right.
Merlin: It would be like walking in and seeing your dad dressed as Ethel Merman.
Merlin: It would have an effect, but then it's not the kind of thing you'd be bringing up a lot.
John: Yeah, and maybe it's my mistake.
John: Maybe I've never gone to her and said, will you initiate me into our family coven?
Merlin: I've been waiting for you to ask.
Merlin: This might be an Alistair Crowley thing.
Merlin: I think you'll know if and when it's time, just as with your daughter.
Merlin: You know what I'm saying?
Merlin: If that rattle starts making things happen, you know what I mean?
Yeah.
John: you're going to know you're going to know you're going to feel it in the sense if you have this in your midichlorians as much as i think you might you are going to know when it's time you're going to know yeah yeah well i dated a girl once uh who one time was trying to really she was really mad and she was really trying to put me in my place and she got up in my face and she said you know what you think you're a white wizard but you're not one you're a gray wizard
John: And, you know, I have to say I was flattered that she thought I was a gray wizard.
John: But she was obviously, I think, seeing something, some white wizard potential in me that I hadn't realized.
Merlin: Is that gray as in wizened or gray as in chaotic neutral?
Yeah.
John: Well, I think gray as in, yeah, like you have not yet been purified by fighting a Balrog down to the center of the earth.
Merlin: You're going to need lumberjack boots for that.
Merlin: You know what I mean?
Merlin: I do.
John: I totally do.
John: I need to do some more training in anticipation of ever encountering a Balrog in dwarf mines.
Merlin: But I think that's what she was getting at.
Merlin: John, are you a man who's not, you're not afraid of a Vision Quest, right?
Merlin: You'll do a Vision Quest.
Merlin: No, I've been on a few.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Well, you know, you mentioned in an earlier visit that, well, one plan you had to, I think you were going to go to, was it Tierra del Fuego with your daughter?
Merlin: Is that right?
John: Yeah, yeah.
John: We're going to buy whatever Jeep, the best Jeep we could buy for $2,000 and just start going crazy.
John: Fix it as needed.
John: Start going south to Tierra del Fuego.
John: Meet an heiress.
John: And meet an heiress somewhere down on the Pampas.
John: I'm sorry, go ahead.
John: But, you know, I figure that's as good as junior high for a girl.
John: Am I right?
John: There's a couple years there when you send your kids to junior high.
Merlin: That's absolutely worthless.
Merlin: Nothing happens.
Merlin: If you bring along a 38th special cassette and just make her feel bad a couple times a week, I think you get three years credit.
Merlin: But here's my question.
Merlin: Here's my question to you, John.
Merlin: If the carnival... I was at a dance in eighth grade.
Merlin: And by dance, I mean the guys stand on one side, the girls stand on the other.
Merlin: And everyone's nervous.
Merlin: And they were playing Whip It by Devo and Another One Bites the Dust.
Merlin: No.
Merlin: But you know what your timing is precisely.
Merlin: You know the era.
Merlin: Because we're both part of the, you know, super trained generation.
Merlin: But here's the thing.
Merlin: There was a cover band there.
Merlin: I know I told you this.
Merlin: What?
Merlin: It was a cover band.
Merlin: They brought a cover band in the local band.
Whistle.
Merlin: And no, they did not play Steve Miller.
Merlin: But they, you know what they did?
Merlin: Toward the beginning and toward the end, they played Hold On loosely twice.
Merlin: Oh, because it's a hit.
Merlin: It's very fun to play.
Merlin: Here's the question.
Merlin: If a carnival comes to town, right, and you continue having this sense in your gray wizard heart, you know that there's something going on with that kid of yours, do you think you would go to a carnival with her?
Merlin: Because it seems to me you go to a carnival, there are many opportunities to tease some of this out.
Merlin: You go into a dark fun house and see if there's owls.
Merlin: Maybe you finally win the fucking milk bottle game and get a Vuvuzidlala.
John: Well, maybe we put a quarter in an unplugged tell your fortune machine, which comes to life
John: And grants her one wish.
John: Grants me one wish.
John: If it grants her a wish, I'm taking it.
John: Oh, you're going to claim her wish?
John: Well, if I can.
John: I don't know.
John: Some supernatural stuff works.
Merlin: You might have to fight each other with force lightning like in a Roger Corman movie.
Merlin: There should be only one!
Merlin: I remember a movie, I barely remember it, but I think it was either The Raven or The Pit and the Pendulum.
Merlin: And it had, like, nothing to do with the books.
Merlin: But I do remember one scene where I know it was Peter Lorre and I think, maybe not Christopher Lee, but it was, oh, it was Vincent Price, I think, and Peter Lorre, like, having a magic showdown on, like, a $5,000 budget.
John: Darkness falls across the land.
Merlin: Midnight hour is close at hand.
Merlin: Dump, dump.
Merlin: Dump, dump.
Merlin: He sounds like a really cool guy.
Merlin: He sounds like a Mr. Rogers-level guy.
Merlin: I think he was an art collector.
Merlin: He was married for a long time.
Merlin: Oh, are you talking about Vincent Price?
Merlin: Yeah, I think so.
Merlin: Vincent Canby?
Merlin: Which is the one that the movie reviews?
Merlin: Of Vincent Price.
Merlin: And he seems like a very cool guy.
Merlin: I'm sorry I never got to meet that guy.
Merlin: But you know what?
Merlin: He had career longevity.
Merlin: He's one of those guys like my hero Ray Milan.
Merlin: He's one of those guys who found a way to work.
Merlin: He was getting work, right?
Merlin: You go, you check your book.
Merlin: Are you available?
Merlin: Yes.
John: He was doing a film over here and his eyebrows were doing a separate engagement over here.
John: He was making money two times.
Merlin: That's how you can tell somebody's a pro.
Merlin: His eyebrows might have been going and getting a bespoke suit or perhaps in lumberjack boots.
Merlin: I have so much respect.
Merlin: They said that Joan Rivers documentary, very hard to watch.
Merlin: But I have a lot of respect for people who go out and they try to keep their book full.
Merlin: I don't do that.
Merlin: You don't do that.
Merlin: I know you don't do that.
Merlin: But I would love to have more opportunities to be interviewed in a documentary and say, I had room in my book and I did it.
Merlin: Do you have a book?
Merlin: I don't even have a book.
John: No, I don't.
Merlin: Do you ever hear people talk about their books?
John: No, I don't.
John: But I know people who go from one thing to the other.
John: And there's a certain point, there's a certain line in the sand where I feel like some of that is just that you're trying to keep the demon dogs off your heels.
John: You're just doing one thing after another so you never stop, you never hear the screaming in your head.
John: But then again, the other way of looking at it is that that's really as good as you can get in life.
John: You know what I mean?
John: Like we all have screaming in our head.
John: We all just need to keep moving from thing to thing.
John: There is no value.
John: I'm beginning to feel like there is no value in sitting and thinking about stuff anymore.
John: Oh, John, John, John, John, John.
Merlin: It's so, so true.
Merlin: No, I mean, I don't want to get serious here, but you're right.
Merlin: Thinking has never fucking done anything for me.
Merlin: I should be filling my book.
Merlin: I should be like Joan Rivers.
Merlin: Well, I don't want to spend as much as Joan Rivers.
John: I should be like Vincent Price's eyebrows.
John: I should be out getting gigs at Magic Castle.
John: That's exactly right.
John: And making things happen and filling up my book.
Mm-hmm.
Merlin: Vincent Price, Thurl Ravenscroft, Paul Lynn, people who say, what time and what do I wear?
Merlin: They show up and they fill their fucking book and they don't have to think.
Merlin: I don't even know if they even unpack.
Merlin: You know what I mean?
Merlin: They're probably moving so fast.
John: Right.
John: That's how you get the center square on Hollywood Squares.
John: That's right.
John: You don't get there by sitting at home waiting for somebody to call.
John: No, you write jokes for the Oscars.
John: You go fill up your book.
Merlin: I've got to get that book.
Merlin: First of all, A, I'm going to write this down.
Merlin: A, I've got to get a book, and then I've got to fill it.
Merlin: I've got to pee.
Merlin: I've got to pee, but I've got to... Sorry, go ahead.
Merlin: Well, you're three by five cards.
Merlin: Well, I'm out of cards, and I have to pee.
Yeah.
Merlin: Maybe we should take a break and come back.
John: That's unceremonious end.
John: I have to pee.
John: Click.
Merlin: Okay, we'll take a break.
Merlin: Outstanding.
Merlin: Feel better?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: You use that phrase a lot, category error.
Merlin: I don't know what that means.
Merlin: Don't tell me.
Merlin: But I'm going to say I made the category error of before our show having a large bowl of soup, a ginger ale, and a Snapple.
Merlin: Oh, those are all liquids.
Merlin: You went to the U-Dub.
Merlin: I did.
Merlin: I don't even know.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: We've never done anything like this, John.
Merlin: Do you think this is going to work okay?
Merlin: What, with the interlude?
Merlin: I think it'll be fine.
Merlin: We could drop in some Goldberg variations or something.
Merlin: We don't have the rights for the Hendrix estate.
John: Oh, right, right, right.
John: You gotta have the rights.
John: I should have improvised something.
John: Although that version of Purple Haze I think qualifies as jazz.
John: I think it's...
Merlin: Wait a minute.
Merlin: You know what I'm actually playing?
Merlin: You know what song I'm playing.
Merlin: Holy shit.
Merlin: Well, sometimes sit back, leave something to keep you warm.
Merlin: I'm playing Ice Cream Man.
Merlin: Holy shit.
John: You've been doing it for 35 years.
Merlin: Ah!
Merlin: That's my other impersonation.
John: You keep saying, oh, we should edit that out.
John: Oh, we should edit that out.
John: But we never edited anything on this podcast.
Merlin: I've edited two things, I think.
Merlin: Excepting, you know, the end.
Merlin: One of us said boobies.
Merlin: Yeah, I had to cut that out.
Merlin: No, no, no.
Merlin: I don't realize until later how much I sniff.
Merlin: On the show, I sniff a lot.
Merlin: Post nasal drip.
Merlin: Well, I have allergies, and I take ADD medicine, so I'm sure there's something in between, or I eat a lot of soup.
Merlin: So one time, there was one show where it was unlistenable how much I sniffed, and I went through and I reglassed out all of the sniffs.
Merlin: Wow.
John: I never realized you put any work into this thing.
Merlin: I don't.
Merlin: No, no, no.
Merlin: That was once, once, once.
Merlin: And there was another time where we had a really good episode, and I cut out seven hours of arguing about religion.
Wow.
Merlin: But I'm not going to mention that.
Merlin: I'm not going to mention that.
Merlin: We're going to cut all that out.
Merlin: That's the beauty part.
Merlin: I mean, that's what makes this show.
Merlin: The last episode of our program, because people will listen to this, you know, hopefully chronologically, people should be listening.
Merlin: John, you know me.
Merlin: I don't like to pimp my stuff.
Merlin: I don't like to tell people what to do.
Merlin: You should fucking listen to every episode of this show.
Merlin: And while you're waiting for John to put out the next episode of this show, you should keep listening to it and listen to them in order.
Merlin: Because it's cumulative.
Merlin: It's like fucking organic chemistry, like from John's brain.
Merlin: That's what I'm saying.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah, we're building a pyramid, and when we reach the top, we are going to touch the hem of God's garment.
Merlin: Super Train, which, like all of our episodes, is even better than the one before, because your wisdom continues to grow each week with what you learn.
Merlin: We went from, I don't know if you noticed this, but we went from hang-up to Mike Mills' penis cocaine in like 30 minutes.
John: I don't understand the construction.
Merlin: Oh, you don't listen to the program like I do.
Merlin: The last program ended with you talking about how your drinking buddy, Mike Mills, shoots.
Merlin: Do you shoot cocaine in your penis?
Merlin: Do you do bumps?
Merlin: How do you do that?
Merlin: Do you need a penis coke mirror?
John: You know, I think it's one of those things where you squeeze all the air out of your penis and then you stick it in the cocaine and then you let go of it and it just sucks the cocaine.
Merlin: They call it milking.
Merlin: It's reverse milking.
Merlin: Reverse milking.
Merlin: And it keeps you from getting an embolism.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: You know about embolisms?
John: Yeah.
Merlin: I don't know much about embolisms.
Merlin: I know it's pulmonary.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: You never blow into a lady's vagina.
Merlin: Did you know that?
Merlin: I didn't know that.
Merlin: She can get an embolism.
Merlin: I'm going to have to completely adjust my technique.
Merlin: You're going to have to consult with the owls.
Merlin: I'm going to need to change up a little bit.
John: I'm going to have to put this voovula in the dishwasher.
Merlin: I don't even know what that word is.
Merlin: I got to say also, if I could, I want to let you continue.
Merlin: But the feathered roach clip seems like a terrible idea on so many levels.
Merlin: Of all the things that I would want in a roach clip, having inflammable bird parts is about the last thing I would want on a roach clip.
John: Well, but you remember that the extension of the feathered roach clip was that girls started wearing earrings.
Merlin: Well, John, that's supposed to be what it's for.
Merlin: It's like how some people use Coke cans to drink Coke instead of smoke weed.
Merlin: Uh-huh.
Merlin: I guess.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: No, I know exactly who drinks Coke anymore.
Merlin: You get a Coke mirror, you drink your Coke right off the mirror.
Merlin: Now, I think the idea was the whole reason you could have that was that you go tee-hee-hee.
John: Oh, you clip it on your earring.
Merlin: Well, it's for your hair.
Merlin: Well, you don't put a fucking alligator clip on your ear.
Merlin: I mean, I think it's, you know, unless you're German.
Merlin: But I think you put it in your hair.
Merlin: You put it in your hair.
John: Oh, it's like a little bit of flair.
Merlin: It's a hair flotchy.
Merlin: It's a little bit of flair.
Merlin: By the way, where the fuck is my moe?
Merlin: How do I get my moe from you?
Merlin: Well, are you talking about your binky?
Merlin: No, no, no, no, no.
Merlin: The German fan who sent me a moe.
John: Oh, oh, your Mo.
John: Oh, well, I have it here in the box.
Merlin: Can you put it in the cello?
John: We put it in the box with your cello, yeah.
John: I'm just making a Merlin care package.
John: I got your Mo.
John: I got your cello.
John: I'm just throwing stuff in it as I see it.
Merlin: Wait until you got five things and send them.
John: I've got a copy of Live from New York, the oral history of Saturday Night Live.
Merlin: I have that book.
Merlin: That's a terrific book.
Merlin: All right, I'll take it out then.
Merlin: Okay, so now we've got to wait for more.
Merlin: Okay.
John: I'm glad there's no way for people to contact us.
John: Well, you know, it's interesting.
John: You have steadfastly refused to have a comment page on anything you do.
Merlin: That requires very little steadfastness on my part.
Merlin: It's never going to happen.
Merlin: It's very good.
Merlin: What would they say?
Merlin: What would they say?
Merlin: Thank you for helping me.
Merlin: Okay, we know.
John: Yeah.
John: No, they would say blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
John: Some kids sent me an email the other day.
John: One of these emails that only... You could only write a thing like this if you were 22 years old.
John: If you're 23, you're too wise.
John: Otherwise, the computer won't even accept it.
John: Yeah, if you're 21, I have to assume you're doing something else.
John: But this guy wrote me a letter in response to one of my Seattle Weekly articles.
John: where he said, the article, the letter itself, like, refuted and negated itself 13 times, you know, like.
Merlin: Oh, you hate that.
John: You're one of the, you know what, you're, John Roderick, you are a guy who just, you're one of the music business people who stands in between, you're one of the music business hipsters that stands in between good new music and the world, and yet, your band sucks and nothing you do matters, and yet,
John: you are part you know and he just he goes he's just reading me the riot act all these things and and and throughout the course of the letter you can tell by the references he's making that he is a super fan he's listened to every he's listened to every album he's seen us 15 times you know he's like he's just having a tourette's moment or something where he is he or he's one of those people that hates something so much that he goes and
John: It obsesses over it and absorbs it all.
John: I feel like if we had a comments page...
John: Well, no.
John: I mean, we do have a comments page.
John: It's on iTunes.
Merlin: It's called the internet.
Merlin: Get a fucking blog.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: And John, I'm glad nobody listens to this show because I'll be honest with you.
Merlin: Praise Jesus.
Merlin: Uh-huh.
Merlin: What you're describing there is, you know, whatever.
Merlin: I get stuff like that.
Merlin: I know you do.
Merlin: And it's so fucking creepy.
Merlin: It's so creepy because every time I get something like that, which is,
Merlin: if I hadn't read everything you've ever done and loved you so much, I wouldn't want to kill you kind of stuff, you know, which isn't the case.
Merlin: Please don't write that.
Merlin: That's super weird.
Merlin: But like, it's, it's almost like every time I hear something like what you're describing, I imagine like, like a frat boy who's just beat up his friend and is like crying while he's fucking him.
Merlin: Like there's just something about it.
Merlin: That's like, so I fucking love you, but I hate you, man.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Now, watch out.
Merlin: That guy might come in and try to steal one of your owls.
Merlin: You might need your daughter to use force lightning against that guy.
Merlin: You never know.
Merlin: You sure it's a guy?
Merlin: I'm not sure.
Merlin: You should run it through one of those computer programs and find out what you can learn.
Merlin: It might be your editor at the weekly.
John: Good point.
John: But I do.
John: I relish someone trying to breach my perimeter.
Merlin: You mean literally come into your house.
Merlin: This is your opportunity.
John: Oh, I'm waiting for it.
Merlin: I get that sense.
Merlin: Just to close one quick loop, you definitely did not write that guy back at all, especially by interleaving responses to everything he said.
John: You definitely didn't write back.
John: I learned that many, many years.
Merlin: You really didn't write back?
John: Oh, don't reply.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: You've turned a corner, John.
John: I have.
John: I have.
John: I turned a corner.
John: I learned it in part from you, in part from Dave Eggers.
John: You both have lectured me many times.
John: Don't reply.
John: You know Dave Eggers.
John: Yeah, and he has said many times, things that people write about you on the internet are none of your business.
John: Don't read them.
John: Wow.
John: Don't read those things.
John: Don't read reviews of your writing.
John: Don't read reviews.
John: It is none of your business.
John: It's not for you.
John: And I'm like, that's very hard for me to do.
John: And he said, I know, it's hard for all of us, but don't ever read what people write about you on the internet.
John: And then you have said a similar thing, different, but similar many times.
John: Do not reply to trolls.
John: But there is only one reply, which is, if you hate it so much, why are you listening to it?
John: That's not a response.
Merlin: My response is a very old joke, the punchline from a very old joke, as quoted by Morrissey in the leadoff track, the titular track from The Queen is Dead.
Merlin: And once a month, I do this almost exactly once a month, I should put it on my calendar, I will yell back at a civilian once a month who yells at me, on Twitter in particular, and I will say, that's nothing, you should hear me play piano.
Merlin: Remember that joke?
Merlin: You ever heard that joke?
Merlin: I'm not sure.
Merlin: Oh, you don't know how the Queen is dead?
Merlin: Well, let me tell you my Smiths.
Merlin: Now you can tell me in a minute.
Merlin: You got two more things to tell me.
Merlin: I know you and you cannot sing.
Merlin: I said, that's nothing.
Merlin: You should hear me play piano.
Merlin: La la la.
John: god i bet you sean sings that a lot i'm sure he does okay sorry i cut you off you are your perimeter oh sorry go ahead my sister worked in a record store when she was a young teenager she was a very hip girl when she was a teenager and she worked in a record store during that era and she has every smith's 12 inch there are a lot there are a lot oh i know because they are in my house now they fill up an entire shelf and
Merlin: Oh, great.
Merlin: You need more collections, John Roderick.
Merlin: I have all the colored vinyl Smiths.
Merlin: Do you have the 12-inch of This Charming Man with four different versions on it?
Merlin: The London mix.
John: Absolutely do.
John: I have it.
John: And the thing about the Smiths is that they are an incredibly polarizing band, even within my own heart, because some of their songs are some of the great songs, and most of their material is unlistenable dreadful.
Merlin: Sorry.
Merlin: Get that out of my system real quick while you were potentially making fun of the Smiths.
Merlin: Now, you got good at that with Sean, right?
Merlin: You got really good at this with Sean because you knew that could get it.
Merlin: Isn't with Sean Nelson your frenemy?
John: And Colin Malloy and every other person who sings in a fake British accent, they all love the Smiths.
John: The Smiths never said that.
Merlin: What's Colin Malloy's voice?
Merlin: What is it again?
John: I'm not going to imitate Colin Malloy on this podcast.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: I told you I introduced myself to him the other day.
John: I did, and I think that's a good policy.
John: I think everyone who sees Colin should introduce themselves to him and say, I'm a friend of John Rotter.
Merlin: I don't want to derail your story about the Smiths and your perimeter, but it was pretty funny.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah, yeah.
Merlin: Well...
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Well, no, this is literally like less than a month ago.
Merlin: We've been doing our program for a while.
Merlin: I know you guys are a frenemy.
Merlin: Is there a better a frenesis?
Merlin: No, I would say we're friends.
Merlin: I know, I know, but we still haven't told the toilet papering story.
Merlin: But I've tried to explain to my daughter, like the difference between expensive and costly, I want her to understand what I believe.
Merlin: I don't care if it's true.
Merlin: What I believe is a huge difference between an enemy and a nemesis.
Merlin: oh right and obviously you've you've done that wonderful song with with jonathan colton but what i'm saying is an enemy to me is somebody that you want to destroy and potentially have very little respect for right and a nemesis is like you almost need that person it's a symbiotic there's a certain kind of uh respect that could be grudging or not uh-huh now what about the roadrunner in wile coyote
Merlin: I think the road... Well, you know what?
Merlin: It's not even an match.
Merlin: I think the coyote sees the roadrunner as an enemy.
John: The coyote needs the roadrunner.
John: I don't think the roadrunner needs the coyote.
John: And that makes him so mad.
John: It does.
Merlin: He's like the grudge fuck frat boy.
John: The roadrunner is someone who is living in the moment.
John: The roadrunner has no future, no past.
John: Right.
Merlin: For a while, though, he was your nemesis, right?
Merlin: Wasn't calling your nemesis for a while?
John: The roadrunner?
John: I feel like my relationship with Kamaloy, like a lot of other musicians... Like a lot of gay men, it's complicated.
John: A lot of musicians that I respect and admire, my first impulse is to hate them.
John: for their success.
John: That's the Alaska talking.
John: And also for their talent and also, you know, for their methods, their manners.
John: So Colin and I have spent a long time together and a lot of that time has been in kind of a
John: facing each other in a wrestling pose across maybe a rickety bridge made out of bamboo across a chasm.
John: But like a lot of my feuds with rock musicians, at a certain point,
John: what happened with Colin was that he got too rich and famous to care anymore about the feud that we were having.
Merlin: That's how you lose the good ones.
John: Yeah.
John: And so then he was like, oh, are you still having that feud?
John: I'm not even here anymore.
John: And then I was like, oh, this isn't fun anymore.
John: I'm not going to have a feud with somebody who's not feuding back.
John: So that's happened a few times as the people that I was feuding with became so rich and famous that they didn't...
John: I think that Colin, if he listened to this podcast, I would be getting his goat right now.
John: And so that means the feud is still on.
Merlin: Good.
Merlin: Well, I really doubt.
Merlin: I think he probably has someone who has someone to listen to this, if he does, which he doesn't, probably.
Merlin: But the thing is, let me ask you this.
Merlin: Let me just give you a quick idea here.
Merlin: You have toured with the Decembrists.
John: Yes, a few times.
Merlin: Are you not on at least one recording by the Decembers?
Merlin: Yes.
John: I play the backwards piano on our Decembris album.
Merlin: And you could, if challenged, sing along with or perhaps even cover like at least the Barrow Boy song or the Tin Smithy March or any of his material.
Merlin: I'm familiar with their recording.
Merlin: You know the Pirates of Yale by heart?
John: And many nights, many, many nights, Colin has introduced the Chimbley Sweep.
Yeah.
John: by saying that it is a song about me and my life story.
John: Not only that.
John: But you're featured in that book.
John: In his new Wildwood book, I Am a Character.
Merlin: But my point is, you are familiar enough with a lot of his stuff.
Merlin: You could probably, if you wanted to, backstage just loud enough for him to hear with his craft services that you're not allowed to touch, you could sing just loud enough a parody of the Chimbley Sweep, like inserting the word poop a lot.
Merlin: Like if you wanted to, you could probably know the chords to be able to do that.
John: The main way that I get... It's not really an answer.
John: The main way that I get their goat is to drop constant references to how their songs are all about pirates.
John: And for a while they took it with a kind of like a forced smile.
John: And then there was a period where every time I would do it, Colin would say, we have no songs about pirates.
John: None.
John: Not a single one.
John: And I would say, oh, right, except for that.
John: And then I would list all their songs that are about pirates.
John: And he would say, none of those are about pirates.
John: And then we went through a phase where he stopped.
John: He just would ignore me.
John: He would just keep his face completely blank.
John: It's called the patrician shrug.
John: When I would talk about pirates.
John: Now I'm not sure.
John: If I said all your songs are about pirates, maybe he would laugh.
John: Maybe it's a meme now.
John: We've been doing it for so long.
John: But I don't think he would laugh.
Merlin: The reason I bring it up is it seems to me that you are now, especially given your owls, you are uniquely qualified to write him a super creepy letter.
Merlin: In which, in which you display how familiar you are with him, how close you are, how much you know about him and how many fucking things are wrong with him.
Merlin: It's the perfect time.
Merlin: He loves to read.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: No, I think, in fact, I think he might even have a story.
John: He might even have a story like that himself where he wrote a letter like that to someone.
John: Hmm.
John: Uh, I think, uh, George Bernard Shaw.
John: Yeah.
Yeah.