Ep. 93: "Between the Monkey Bars"
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: Hi, John.
Merlin: Hi, Merlin.
Merlin: How's it going?
Merlin: So early.
Merlin: Yep.
Merlin: I never know.
Merlin: I wait until I see you somewhere online in the morning before contacting you.
John: Oh, you're one of the only people left who is actually watching what other people are doing online.
Merlin: So when I notice you online, that's when I'll send you a little bloop.
John: Do you have a Google alert set up for when I tweet in the morning?
Merlin: I do.
Merlin: Here on my Android phone.
Merlin: God Rodman is now available for things.
John: Hello.
John: The great thing about our podcast is it's a professional sounding podcast.
John: It's a professionally organized podcast.
Merlin: In every sense except the money part.
Merlin: right and in the organized part we put yes that's true uh with those two notable exceptions this is a very professional thing we have going here yeah it is it's got a website remember when having a website meant you were like officially uh you'd really arrived do i ever i remember when having i remember when getting a website was a forty thousand dollar proposition and you'd have like a flash animated bear holding a holding a bunch of balloons skip intro
John: The long winters.
Merlin: You should do that.
John: That would be sweet.
John: Would the bear look like you?
John: A little bear with the balloons kind of going up and down, animated.
John: Little eyelashes.
Merlin: I love you.
Merlin: Oh, the internet.
Merlin: I can't believe it's still around.
Merlin: You know, it barely is.
Merlin: Oh, God.
Merlin: All right.
Merlin: John, why is the internet barely around?
Merlin: What's going on?
John: I don't even care.
John: I don't even care to talk about the internet.
John: I feel like there are bigger fish to fry.
John: In the world.
John: There are bigger fish to fry.
John: Bears love fish.
John: I was thinking the other day.
John: I was thinking the other day.
John: You know what?
John: I'm changing my tune.
John: I'm changing course.
John: I realized that I now am going to work the rest of my life
John: That in order to pursue the end goal of having the U.S.
John: Congress be composed entirely of women.
John: Huh.
John: I think if we had if we had an all female because there have been there were many, many, many decades where it was all men.
John: Right.
John: And you got Patty Murray.
John: Patty Murray, an amazing senator.
Merlin: Is she the one in tennis shoes?
John: Is that her?
John: She's the mom in tennis shoes.
John: That's right.
John: Maria Cantwell, the other Washington State, the junior Washington State senator, also a great lady.
John: I feel like if the Congress, if the House and Senate were all women, the country would be run better than...
John: And there would be, it would just, in general, I mean, picture it for a second.
John: In general, the quality of life in America would skyrocket.
John: I don't think there's any, you can't make a case against an all-female Congress.
John: Hmm.
John: And, um, I mean, you know, half of them will be Republicans.
John: Let's just say that right off the, right off the top.
John: Half of them are going to be, you know, are going to be Phyllis Shafley style.
John: Um, you know, I think that's what you're looking for cases, right?
John: But, uh, but I think in general, all of the whole Congress, all women, maybe, maybe like a couple of token guys, um,
John: And I think the United States will only benefit.
John: So that's my new project.
Merlin: Would you do this via democratic means or would there be a coup d'etat?
John: No, I think it has to be democratic in order to keep the flavor of America.
John: It has to look democratic, for sure.
John: And the honest to God fact is that I cannot, like, in order to achieve this goal, I actually have to...
John: Like, it's not going to work if there's some guy behind it.
John: Yeah, that's thorny.
John: So what I have to do, what it is basically is I have to voluntarily step aside and not run for Congress.
John: not run for the Senate, in order to make space for a more qualified woman.
Merlin: Ladies first.
John: That's right.
Merlin: You truly are a gentleman.
John: So I'm making this sacrifice, kind of in some ways what would be the ultimate sacrifice.
Merlin: Not running for Congress would be the ultimate sacrifice.
John: Not running for Congress, for me, would be the ultimate sacrifice.
Merlin: All gave some, but some gave all.
Okay.
Merlin: I've decided to not do something.
John: I'd laugh, but I have a mouthful of peanut butter.
John: I ate a cookie this morning.
Merlin: Wow.
John: It's the first cookie I've eaten in a long time, and it's a cookie that I found when I was cleaning out the van.
John: And I was like, I don't want to throw this away.
John: I don't know how old it is, but I don't want to throw it away.
John: It seems like a waste of a good cookie.
John: So I kept it around for a couple of weeks in a jar.
John: And then I was like, this morning, I don't know, I was feeling vulnerable.
John: I ate the cookie.
John: And I don't know what happens when a cookie is like six months old, whether the salt in it kind of condenses.
Merlin: I think it can sit up on its own.
John: Maybe it drew salt from the air.
John: It was a very salty cookie.
Merlin: Was it out in the open, John?
Merlin: Was it just a van cookie just kind of out?
John: No, it's not like it fell between the seat cushions.
John: No, I mean, it was in a cookie bag.
John: But it was a solitary cookie in a cookie bag.
Hmm.
Merlin: Maybe it's just the Christmas talking, but that seems very sad.
Merlin: I'm glad you ate it.
John: Yeah, I ate it and it was good, but boy, salty.
John: And I have to watch my salt intake now.
John: Why's that?
John: Well, you know, I am aging so fast.
John: Right.
John: I went to the doctor the other day.
John: First time in a long time.
John: And the nurse weighs and measures me.
John: And I swear to you, I have no idea if this is even possible, but I have lost an inch in height.
Merlin: Vertically?
John: Yeah.
John: I don't have osteoporosis.
John: My spine is not collapsing.
John: You're in an old house, John.
John: You're just settling in.
John: It was extremely unsettling.
John: I was there to see the doctor about a thing that was bedeviling me.
John: But as soon as this nurse gives me this diagnosis of being one inch shorter than I ever was, now I didn't care about whatever the problem was that got me to the doctor.
John: And all I wanted to talk about was how it's possible...
John: I was sitting in the examination room and the doctor comes in and said, so tell me about what brought you in here today.
John: And I said, I don't want to talk about that anymore.
John: I want to talk about your height scale and how it is broken.
John: And so she measured me again.
John: Actually, it was a nurse practitioner.
Merlin: Oh, they pulled in the big guns.
John: She measured me again, and she was like, sorry, I don't know what to tell you.
Merlin: Oh, my God, John.
Merlin: That must be really disquieting.
Merlin: I don't... There...
Merlin: I have no context for it.
Merlin: Well, cause like, for example, I, there are people in my family that I guess, I don't know if it's osteoporosis, but you know, when you get old, you get smaller.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: I don't claim to understand it.
John: It happened to my dad.
John: Hmm.
John: He was not the, he was not the tower towering man.
John: He was in his, in his later years.
John: He, he lost an inch or two, but I am not, I am not an old man who is shrinking in his shoes.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: You might want to get a second opinion.
Yeah.
John: I got a second opinion from the nurse practitioner.
John: I'm very disquieted.
Merlin: That's very disquieting, John.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: That should be something where let's kick this other thing down the lane a little bit and talk about my height.
John: Yeah, right.
John: High blood pressure can wait.
John: Yeah, for a time.
John: Although it cannot.
John: See, all these things.
Merlin: What can be worse for your blood pressure than knowing you're getting short?
John: Thank you.
John: I was washing my hands at the sink the other day and my back went out.
Merlin: I just need to lay on the floor.
Merlin: I'll be fine.
Merlin: No, no, you go ahead.
Merlin: I'll catch up.
Merlin: It's the worst.
Merlin: I need to use the toilet anyway.
John: You know, it's not...
John: It's not that I need to start working out in order to get lean so that I can look good at the beach or whatever.
John: I now have to start working out just to survive.
John: To not become elephant.
John: I have to start working out just so that I can wash my hands at the sink and not collapse into a pile of nerve endings.
Merlin: You just need compensatory hand-washing muscles.
Merlin: The thing is, maybe you could get a standing desk and...
John: You could get one of those backless chairs where you're kind of kneeling all day.
Merlin: Oh, like a yoga ball.
Merlin: That'd be sweet.
Merlin: Oh, yeah, sit on a yoga ball.
Merlin: Yeah, yeah.
Merlin: I think you should get a lectern or a pulpit.
Merlin: Wouldn't be good if you did whatever your work is, if you did that from a standing position.
Merlin: But instead of one of those hipster standing desks or a treadmill desk, you could do it from an actual pulpit.
John: Sure, a genuine pulpit.
John: And maybe then get a really giant yoga ball, like five-foot-tall yoga ball.
Merlin: That seems like it would be very hard to balance on with your condition.
John: Well, I wouldn't actually sit on top of it.
John: I would just kind of lean back on it.
Merlin: Okay, so the thing is, was it really like a full inch that you lost?
John: It's an inch in height.
John: I was always six foot three and a smidge.
John: Six foot three and an eighth or something.
John: And I'm sitting here, and the guy says, how tall are you?
John: And I go, six foot three.
John: And he says, get up against the wall.
John: And he measures me, and I'm six foot two and an eighth.
John: Well, six foot two is the height of a normal...
John: guy.
John: That's a normal guy's height.
Merlin: No, you're officially not special anymore.
Merlin: Six foot three is someone who's tall.
Merlin: Six foot three is extraordinary.
John: Six foot three puts me into this special category of people that legitimately can walk around like normal rules don't apply.
John: They can sort of just lumber into a room and expect that special compensation will be made.
Merlin: Six foot two is like having 22,000 frequent flyer miles.
John: Yeah, a six foot two guy
John: It's like, hey, welcome.
John: Take a seat.
John: Take a seat anywhere over there.
John: It's like, take a seat?
John: What are you talking about?
John: I'm six foot three.
John: No, I'm sorry, sir.
John: You're six foot two.
John: Take a seat anywhere.
Merlin: And that's the way they'll start talking to you.
Merlin: I feel like it's already happening and I just didn't realize I had lost this inch.
Merlin: Oh, are you having a Shyamalan moment?
Merlin: It's all flashing back by, and you're realizing everything makes sense.
John: Why did I end up riding the bus the other day?
John: Oh, it's because I'm a normal height person.
Merlin: And I have no dignity.
Merlin: I was standing around.
John: I was like, oh, it's a really long way up the hill.
John: Maybe I should take the bus.
Merlin: Maybe I should pay a dollar and a quarter.
Merlin: Boy, this is very upsetting, especially around the holidays, to learn something like that.
Merlin: Did your clothes fit different?
Merlin: Because the thing is, you've been losing weight, so you might not have noticed an inch of loss.
John: Well, and so that's what I'm wondering.
John: I'm kind of wondering, did I, in losing all this weight, did I lose some fat in my spine?
John: You probably had a fat, you had an obese spine.
John: I had like fat in my knees and my joints and it was making me an inch taller, but that doesn't explain what I was.
John: I mean, I reached my normal height, my actual height of six foot three and a smidge in the 80s.
John: And I had no, there was no fat in between my joints then.
Merlin: No, it was all snack wells and carbohydrates back then.
Merlin: I have to ask, the second, when they remeasured, I'm curious, though, because I know if it were me, I would be doing stuff to try and be taller.
John: No, no, I didn't, you know, I didn't want to game the system.
John: I wanted it to be an actual measurement of my height.
John: But now I'm wondering whether I shouldn't have stood up a little taller.
Merlin: You never did that before.
Merlin: Never had to.
John: No, that's the thing.
John: You just stand up there and you slouch a little bit just to like, I don't give a fuck.
John: I can even slouch a little bit and I'm still over 6'3".
John: But not now.
John: Now I'm going to be one of these guys that's straining.
John: You can see his neck muscles straining when he's getting measured at the doctor.
John: That's not what I want.
John: Yeah, because it's the difference between like, hey, take a seat.
Merlin: You better be careful.
Merlin: You might throw out your back.
Merlin: You don't want to stretch too much.
Merlin: Now, was this concerning to the medical staff at this facility?
John: No, they were laughing.
John: They were mocking me.
John: Because they're all really normal people.
John: They're all in their five foot.
Merlin: It's a form of medical schadenfreude.
Merlin: They're glad to see you come down an inch.
John: Yeah, that's right.
John: This is the thing.
John: I don't think there's anybody who doesn't want to see a six foot three guy get told he's six two.
Merlin: Harrison Bergeron.
Merlin: It's all over again.
Merlin: This is sickening.
John: A six foot six guy is going to be happy to see me cut down an inch.
John: Because, ha, fuck me, right?
John: I mean, like, I was, you know, Sean Nelson was never impressed by my six-foot-threeness.
John: being 6'5", and that's not counting the hair.
John: He's fine to see me get knocked down an inch.
John: Every guy that's 5'11 can't wait to see an inch lopped off of me.
John: No one has any sympathy.
Merlin: I can think of two people that I saw you playing a band with in the last few weeks that I bet are really happy that you're an inch shorter.
Merlin: And I bet Sean's one of them.
John: I'm really like...
John: I'm annoyed because I feel like it's probably a calibration problem that what happened was the floor of the hospital rose up an inch relative to the walls and nobody has checked it.
Merlin: No, you should definitely go someplace else.
Merlin: I mean testing twice in that same – what if that's a tainted facility like you say?
Merlin: Maybe they've got some structural issues.
Merlin: Maybe it's some kind of a metric thing.
Merlin: You should definitely get retested somewhere else.
John: I don't want to go get tested at like a drugstore or something like that because then it's – then everybody that's standing around, just people walking around buying peanut brittle.
Merlin: Yeah, but they're always trying to sell you stuff.
Yeah.
John: Yeah, John Corbett is talking to you over the PA.
Merlin: I don't want that.
Merlin: I like that Kelly Clarkson song, by the way.
Merlin: I think I might have to disagree with you on this one.
Merlin: You like which Kelly Clarkson?
Merlin: You don't like that one song about all I want is you underneath the tree?
Merlin: You don't like that song?
John: You know, I'm telling you, sex and Christmas have no business being in the same room.
Merlin: Now, wait a minute, but aren't you one of those people that likes Christmas porn?
Yeah.
Merlin: See, I have a strong feeling on Christmas porn.
Merlin: I'm very much against it.
John: What would you describe as Christmas?
John: You mean any porn that has a Christmas element?
Merlin: I think if you have intercourse with a lady in a Santa hat, that's definitely in, like, but pictures of that.
John: I don't care for it.
John: You don't like pictures of people having sex where the woman is in a Santa hat?
Merlin: That covers so much of what's out there in the world that I wouldn't want to just reject it out of hand.
Merlin: I can't take the backlash, right?
Merlin: Because I know it's very hat normative.
John: What about Asian girl in a Santa hat?
John: Okay.
John: Well, you... Santa hat, but Asian.
Merlin: I'm not going to touch it.
Merlin: I'm not going to go... The problem is you want to have Christmas an hour later.
Merlin: We've got no soup.
Merlin: Not me!
Merlin: Not me!
Merlin: That is really... Now, I could see this happening to you.
Merlin: I don't want to sound derisive.
Merlin: I could see this happening to you when you get to be about another 10 years older.
Merlin: I think that would be...
John: I'm going to be five foot eight here in a little bit.
Merlin: No, no, no, no, no, no.
Merlin: What I'm trying to say is I think, I think they, you have legitimately lost an inch.
Merlin: I think it's just, it's, there's gotta be something wrong.
Merlin: That does not, that does not, I don't know.
Merlin: That's a lot.
Merlin: That's a lot of inch.
Merlin: That's a lot to lose.
Merlin: Yes, I've been the prime of my life.
John: I'm out, you know what I was doing the other day?
John: I was out shopping for four by fours.
John: Look at you.
John: Now a guy doesn't go buy a new four by four just to compensate for the fact that he's an inch short.
Merlin: You sound like someone in an erectile dysfunction commercial.
Merlin: When I'm not racing cars or sipping wine.
Merlin: But the staff, when they got done laughing unprofessionally, they were not worried that you were getting soft bones or something.
John: They gave every impression of not believing that I had ever been 6'3".
John: Oh, that is galling.
John: They were just like, oh, well, hmm.
Merlin: So now you also sound like an old man who lies about his past.
John: Yeah, it's like, okay, well, let's see.
John: It's not likely that you lost an inch in height.
John: So the only explanation is that you are either lying about your height as a grown man or that you have never known your height.
John: Right.
John: And at some point in your teen years developed a fantasy of what your actual height was.
John: And no matter what people told you this whole time, you just ignored it.
John: And now all of a sudden, for whatever reason, your ears are open and you're being told the truth.
John: I don't like... Neither of those things... None of these things are possible.
John: The only possibility is that the floor of the hospital is wrong.
John: That the floor of the hospital is skewed relative to the walls.
John: And I think probably it's either the floor has risen because there is some kind of... The water table is rising under the hospital or the walls of the hospital have sunk and the floor has remained the same.
Merlin: Is it an old facility?
Merlin: It is.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: Well, it's probably breathing.
Merlin: It expands and contracts.
John: An inch give or take.
John: That's right.
John: Let's table this.
Merlin: Asian gal.
Merlin: Santa.
John: We go to great lengths to not talk about porn on this website.
Merlin: I don't know about great lengths, but it sure has come up a lot for somebody who's trying that hard.
John: Because nobody likes to talk about it.
John: No.
John: But it's out there.
John: It fills the tubes that make up the internet.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: It's clogging the tubes.
Merlin: There's a lot of different things out there.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: That's for sure.
Merlin: Well, and I don't want to get into your health otherwise, but are you feeling okay?
Merlin: Were they able to help you with your condition that you had?
John: No, I have a lingering unrightness.
Merlin: Good.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: Thank you for putting that.
Merlin: I don't want to edit the show anymore, by the way.
Merlin: I can't do it again.
John: Did you get angry emails about garbling my daughter's name?
John: It just took me a really long time.
John: Oh, it did?
John: Yeah.
John: You know, one of the great things about Roderick on the Line is that it requires very little work.
Merlin: Well, of course not.
Merlin: If you script it well enough, you don't have to do as much editing.
John: Exactly.
Merlin: With the rehearsals.
Merlin: We're already on page four of this ten-page script.
Merlin: So you still have – let me go back a second here.
Merlin: Let's start at line 48.
John: Line!
John: This is the thing about medicine.
John: You and I have been over this round and round.
John: But did you read the other day that the doctor who popularized the diagnosis of ADHD –
John: is now coming out saying that ADHD is being over-diagnosed by a factor of 10 in the American people.
John: Yep.
John: And he doesn't believe that any of those people have it.
Merlin: Fueled by the pharmaceutical industry.
Merlin: That's right.
John: Pushed by the drug companies.
Merlin: It's been a crazy couple of weeks in turns out medical literature.
Merlin: There was the ADHD thing that was in – was it Atlantic or New York Times somewhere?
Merlin: There was the letter to – the letter basically from the esteemed physicians about how vitamin supplements do nothing but harm you.
Merlin: Oh.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah, I saw – it turns out I saw one this week about a guy who was taking some kind of green tea extract to lose weight and he almost lost his liver.
Merlin: Whoa!
Merlin: Yeah, this is the problem.
Merlin: This is why everybody thinks I'm a nut because I'm not crazy about generic drugs.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: And so if I had to try and in my own ham-fisted –
Merlin: non-expert way say what my problem with all of these things are is just because it has the 0.0001% of this active ingredient in it.
Merlin: I mean, you could have catch it in there besides that.
Merlin: Who knows what else is in that stuff?
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: I mean, you know, you think the idea of somebody making a generic drug, you think they're going to get the like most high quality filler they can find for that.
Merlin: Anyway, there was, so you got ADHD.
Merlin: It's all salt, Peter.
Merlin: That explains a lot.
John: 98% saltpeter and 2% acting.
Merlin: That explains my lost inch.
Merlin: And does saltpeter really do that?
Merlin: I hear there's a lot of mythology around saltpeter.
John: Saltpeter, saltpeter.
John: You know, having never been to Catholic school, I have no idea about the efficacy of saltpeter as an erection reducer.
John: What about prisons in the army?
John: I've never been in the army.
John: I've never been in prison in the army.
John: And I have never been to prison.
John: Let's just say not prison.
Merlin: Prison is not jail.
Merlin: I think a lot of people don't know that.
Merlin: That's right.
Merlin: Okay, and then there's the other one.
Merlin: So you've got ADHD, you've got vitamins, and what was the other one?
Merlin: Oh, about antibacterial, too much antibacterial stuff.
Merlin: These are all ADHD.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: I've got some opinion about that.
Merlin: But the other two I have pretty strong feelings about.
Merlin: I think there's too much antibacterial stuff out there.
John: Oh, my God.
John: I mean, there should be no antibacterial stuff, except in conditions where bacteria is the actual problem.
Merlin: Yeah, like if you have a wound.
John: Yeah, right, a wound.
John: If you are in a field hospital in the Somme in 1918...
John: An antibacterial would really be an advantage.
John: That's true.
John: But if you are a housewife and you are cleaning your kitchen, you do not need any antibacterial anything.
Merlin: Or you're between bars on the jungle gym.
John: Between bars would be an empty space.
John: You are an empty space between... Zeno's antibacterial paradox.
John: Listen, I went to the emergency room in Wairica, California.
John: And I said, I have a problem and I want you to help me.
John: And they gave me, the doctor was a smug Northern California ER doctor.
John: He was a smirking doctor who probably went to medical school in Grenada.
Yeah.
Merlin: This is up in Reagan country, right?
Merlin: This is the actual real actual Northern California, not some hobo middling Northern.
Merlin: This is the actual like almost up where you live.
John: No, this is, yeah, this is where, this is the part of California where when you go to get gas, everything is Duck Dynasty branded.
John: Like it's, you know, Duck Dynasty brand, motor oil, Duck Dynasty brand, coffee, sweetener, Duck Dynasty is everywhere up there.
John: People love it.
John: We went to a black bear diner for dinner and a family of like 10 people.
John: There were three dads, three moms.
John: All the kids had strap-on beards.
John: Ten kids.
John: And they were all of them, I swear to you.
John: And they're all young.
John: There wasn't a person at the table that was older than I was.
John: They were all in their 30s, late 20s, early 30s.
John: Every single person, moms and dads and kids, all in camo.
John: And not matching camo either.
John: Maybe they're self-conscious.
John: Maybe they just don't want to be seen.
John: Well, but it was snowing at the time, and so they're like Vietnam-era jungle camo.
John: Oh, I hate when people wear the wrong camo.
John: And there were mismatched camos.
John: There were some of those camos which were photo print camos as opposed to, like, garment print camos.
Merlin: Oh, you mean like you would use to cover up a gun?
Merlin: The kind that you would have on netting?
Merlin: That kind?
John: Camo technology has really evolved.
Merlin: It's all digital now.
John: It's all computers now, right?
John: It's digital camo, which I can kind of... The square camos I can kind of get into.
John: It makes you look like a Nintendo.
John: Right.
John: But these camos that are actual prints of pictures of leaves and then are like somehow spray affixed onto clothes.
John: I feel like, oh, no.
John: But in any case, so I go into the emergency room and the doctor gives me he's like, oh, well, it's clearly this, although it could be that here's a prescription.
John: And I said, well, if it's clearly this, although it could be that, what is this prescription for?
John: Is it for this or that?
John: Or is it for the space between the bars?
John: Like, what kind of prescription is this?
John: Is this just like...
John: Is this just antibiotic?
Merlin: I bet he gave you an antibiotic.
Merlin: He gave me an antibiotic.
John: Oh, fuck that.
John: And it was, it was, it felt to me like he had put plaster of Paris into a fire extinguisher and was just like, here's what we'll do.
John: Exactly.
John: Might as well tell you to do a novena.
Merlin: It's like, what is this for?
John: Yeah, thank you.
John: What is it for?
John: It is an antibiotic for a thing that he does not know what it is.
John: And so, because this issue was causing me, you know, some psychic discomfort, let's say, I, against my, against every... It's your second cock, isn't it?
John: My second cock is shriveling up.
John: You lost an inch.
John: And it is accounting for a loss in height.
Merlin: But the funny part is when that happens, it not only hurts the credibility of your medical relationship, but it doesn't make you feel any better.
Merlin: To go like, well, I'm not sure what it is, but just in case it's something that I don't understand, you better take some penicillin.
John: So I take this drug for a week.
John: My problem does not improve.
John: So I go to another doctor.
John: Back here in Seattle.
John: And I bring the empty pill bottle and I said, I went to a doctor.
John: He gave me these pills.
John: It did not do anything.
John: I'd really rather talk about how it is I could have lost an inch in height.
John: But while I'm here, can you tell me what this is that he gave me, why it didn't work, and what is actually the problem?
John: And the nurse practitioner was like, oh, I see why he gave you that.
John: He probably thought it was this.
John: But I think it's probably this, and I'm going to give you this pill.
John: At which point...
John: Everything I think about the medical profession and the world is confirmed because right now the car that I drive is producing a kind of high-pitched whine in the transmission.
John: And I know, although I could not do the work myself, I know pretty much every part that goes into a car.
John: And I have a kind of idea about what is making this sound.
John: And if I took it into a guy, he would listen to it and he would probably have a kind of idea about what it is.
John: Maybe it's this, maybe it's that.
John: Put a little STP oil treatment in your gas or whatever.
John: I mean, he's not going to break open the transmission.
John: There's only a couple of things he's going to do to treat the problem.
John: And this is a car made by humans, and there are books that have every part laid out.
John: Now, a human being with all of their many, many parts that we do not understand, I'm just talking about the pumps and valves.
John: These doctors are just throwing pills at it like it's some kind of, like it's a dart game.
John: None of it's working.
John: It's just making me madder.
John: And then I remember a year and a half ago, the doctor who was throwing mind pills at me.
John: He was throwing little blue pills that were going to improve my mood.
John: By blocking my betas.
John: By blocking the serotonin reuptake inhibitors.
John: No, he wasn't blocking them.
John: Double negative, yeah.
John: He was blocking the reuptake of serotonin.
John: And I'm just, oh, I'm so infuriated.
John: None of these people know anything.
John: You know what?
John: I went to school just as long as they did.
John: Now, maybe I wasn't taking the whole time.
John: Maybe I wasn't taking labs.
John: But the reality is I would happily prescribe stuff to people.
Merlin: I don't think it was until my 30s that I ever finished a course of the prescribed antibiotics.
Merlin: You were one of those guys.
Merlin: I'm one of those guys.
John: Halfway through and then dump the rest of them in a river.
Merlin: Well, and they would say, yeah, I put it right into the toilet so you can get into the aquifer.
Merlin: But yeah, but they would say back then, now remember, you got to take all of these.
Merlin: And I always thought that was like, okay, well, yeah, whatever.
Merlin: But if I'm feeling better, if I don't have the earache anymore –
Merlin: And so, I mean, it's like a friend of mine.
Merlin: A friend of mine has – oh, God, I shouldn't even mention the word.
Merlin: It's like with the vaccine stuff.
Merlin: Like I have a friend whose kid doesn't have like phony baloney vaccine things.
Merlin: Like he actually has allergies that will make him very, very sick.
Merlin: with certain kinds that could kill him, basically, if he takes certain vaccines.
Merlin: So it's really important that other people have vaccines because they'd love to give this kid vaccines, but they can't.
Merlin: And now I feel like today it's like that with antibiotics where I'm like, people, let's all work together to make our immune system stronger.
Merlin: Let's not do things to take our little bugs to the gym.
Merlin: Let's all...
Merlin: Really take this a little bit more seriously.
John: See, and this seems like the type of thing that an all-female Congress would address.
John: Which part?
John: The whole thing?
John: The whole concept of working together as a group of people.
Merlin: This isn't some kind of hot porno thing.
Merlin: Are you actually talking about the body politic?
John: That would be a great name for the film.
John: The body politic.
John: No, I feel like, did you ever see the movie where Demi Moore was a Navy SEAL?
Merlin: You love that movie.
Merlin: G.I.
Merlin: Jane.
John: G.I.
John: Jane.
John: And do you remember who played the senator?
John: The southern senator?
John: No.
John: I don't.
John: You don't?
Merlin: I don't remember.
Merlin: I don't know if I ever saw it.
John: A gal who was married to a guy you might have heard of named Mel Brooks.
Merlin: Oh, Mrs. Robinson.
Merlin: Anne?
Merlin: Bancroft.
Merlin: Bancroft.
Merlin: She's terrific.
Merlin: She's terrific.
John: And, you know, when I met Mel Brooks, I said... You met Mel Brooks?
John: I said at one point... You met an EGOT?
John: I did meet Mel Brooks.
John: And I kind of – we talked for a while.
John: And then he was – You and Mel.
Merlin: We talked for a while.
John: Mel and I talked.
John: We talked on several occasions over the course of a couple of days.
John: And at one point he was standing there.
John: He was talking to Richard Lewis.
John: And I was kind of –
Merlin: When did you turn into Dick Cavett?
Merlin: I was kind of hovering.
Merlin: Dick Cavett was there.
Merlin: Oh yeah, he had a couple Groucho jokes.
John: I was standing there and I was like, I really want to say something to Mel Brooks about Anne Bancroft because I'm a huge Anne Bancroft fan and I know he was too because he was married to her for all those years.
Merlin: I always got the feeling that their relationship was a pretty good thing.
John: I thought it was too.
John: I really admired it and I wanted to say that but I didn't know she's only been dead not that long.
Merlin: It's a little creepy.
John: I didn't want to be creepy
John: But at one point, you know, I'm kind of standing there and he's talking and we're just standing around and I was like, you know, I just want to say I really admired your wife and she seemed like a nice lady.
John: And he like turned, he directed his attention toward me and he like accepted the remark and, you know, and said, thank you.
John: But I felt like I had crossed the line.
John: And I was like, I should have just kept that to myself.
Merlin: It's hard to know because on the other hand, like I could very much see that going either way.
Merlin: I could definitely see no matter what, I could definitely see him giving you, as you say, throwing the shape, like basically saying like, OK, well, thank you.
Merlin: Now we're done with this part of the conversation, no matter what his reaction was.
Merlin: But I could also see that being something that it's always nice to hear.
Merlin: You know, when you get famous, there's stuff that's still always nice to hear.
John: Yeah.
John: And, you know, who knows whether he he took that away and was like, oh, that was nice.
John: But, you know, he didn't he didn't want to sit and talk to me about her.
John: Which I understand.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: So you think she should have been in the Congress?
John: Well, oh, so the role she plays in G.L.
John: Jane is, you know, she's like a crusty, real politic, southern, accented, you know, clearly like a Democrat who's playing both sides.
John: And Demi Moore is trapped in the middle.
John: She's between the monkey bars.
John: And
John: And I feel like, yeah, right, that, I mean, that is a character that I would like to see duplicated and made real.
John: The Bella Abzug's of the world.
Merlin: Oh, I understand.
Merlin: You would like to see the Congress filled with Anne Bancroft.
Merlin: You would like to see a lot, or at least a handful of people like that character.
John: Well, yeah, or the actual Anne Bancroft.
Merlin: Oh, that would be nice.
Merlin: Wouldn't she have made a great politician?
Merlin: You know, another good late wife, Joanne Woodward.
Merlin: She's a nice wife.
Merlin: If I had had the chance to meet Paul Newman, I would have been very tempted to say something similar to what you said to Mel Brooks.
Merlin: Right, exactly.
Merlin: You appear to have had the kind of relationship that is very inspiring to me.
John: Yeah, there are not very many people who can say...
John: I was married to an amazing person for 60 plus years or whatever.
John: Yeah.
John: And when you see those events, when you see those instances where it's like, yeah, right, you probably had your hard times, but wow, what a pair.
John: What a coupling.
John: That whole idea that we are halves of a whole, that we are incomplete without our other, was an idea that was not made clear to me
John: But when I see it manifest in the world, it's appealing.
John: It's appealing at a distance.
Merlin: Oh, excuse me.
Merlin: It absolutely is.
Merlin: And the other thing is that I think that can be made more universal and less creepy by saying there are a lot of people who may not realize in retrospect that there was another half to their whole until they meet that person.
Merlin: It isn't like everybody should sit around and feel bad that they haven't found their Joanne Woodward yet.
Merlin: But there are people out there who clearly get a gestalt out of a relationship that other people don't get.
John: But I feel like the idea that you just haven't met your other half is a terrible idea.
Merlin: It's horrible.
Merlin: It's one of those... God, of all the crackpot romantic mythologies, that's one that's really corrosive.
John: That is... It makes me so mad.
John: When I met the lady that wrote the book Eat, Pray, Love...
John: Yeah.
John: I was really mad at her.
John: I like your TED talk.
John: I was really mad at her already because she wrote that book.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: And then when I talked to her a little bit – Your buddies are old-time pals with her, right?
Merlin: They go way back.
John: They're pals.
John: When I realized that she was also a pretty smart lady.
Mm-hmm.
John: It made me madder.
John: Yeah, I know.
John: And then I tried to rake her over the coals about her dumb book.
John: She's probably never gotten that.
John: That sold millions of copies.
John: And she did not flinch at me raking her over the coals.
John: In fact, she just Heismaned me.
John: She blew me off.
Merlin: You got Heisman?
John: Yeah.
John: And now I'm super mad about it.
John: Yeah.
John: Eat, pray, love.
John: You know what it is?
John: It's the antibiotic soap of books.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: I'd like to get back to the body politic.
Merlin: I want to tell you about a comic called Why the Last Man that you should read.
Merlin: But I also want to know how you thought that would turn out well.
Merlin: Which part?
Merlin: Confronting, I'm forgetting her name now.
Merlin: Yeah, I know her name.
Merlin: What's her butt?
Merlin: Yeah, she's a great TED talk.
Merlin: Great TED talk.
John: Yeah, super good TED talker and, you know, very smart lady.
John: She's written several books.
Merlin: You thought she was going to, like, demure?
Merlin: That she was not going to, you know what, you're right.
John: No, you know, I just wanted to have my day in court.
John: Elizabeth Gilbert.
John: Elizabeth Gilbert.
Merlin: She seems very talented.
John: I just wanted to have my day in court.
John: I just wanted to say, for the record, your book has increased the amount of free-ranging biomatter in women's minds.
John: specifically the ones that are around me all the time so glad when this sentence is over lives may hang in the balance but no she uh she didn't she was just like she didn't even she didn't even stop eating the shrimp from the from the ice tray
Merlin: After which she prayed the shrimp and loved the shrimp.
John: I didn't even get to the second page of my thesis.
Merlin: You never got to praying.
John: She was already moving on to other better conversations at this party.
Merlin: Oh, look.
John: It's Jonathan Franzen.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: So Why the Last Man?
Merlin: I'll just mention in passing.
Merlin: It's a comic you should read.
Merlin: It's pretty good.
Merlin: It's about the last man on earth.
Merlin: Why is his name?
Merlin: And he's the last man on earth.
Merlin: And he wakes up one day and there's nobody at women.
Merlin: It's a very good comic.
Merlin: Why?
Merlin: The Last Man.
Merlin: Why?
Merlin: Third base.
Merlin: It's very good.
Merlin: Written by Brian K. Vaughn, who does Saga, which is another comic you don't read.
Merlin: Well, I will happily read it.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: I'll send it to you.
Merlin: I'll send you the first trade.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: You know, I replaced my coffee maker the other day.
Merlin: With a new one?
John: Yeah.
John: Not because my coffee maker was broken, but because I saw a coffee maker that had more features.
John: And my old coffee maker had no features.
John: It was featureless.
John: It was just all it did was make coffee.
John: Poorly.
John: Everybody that came to my house was like, that's your coffee maker?
Merlin: It really, it had the feeling of being something you picked up at a Walgreens on the way home.
John: Yeah, Jonathan Colton's, it was either Jonathan or his wife who said, you have a blade grinder and not a burr grinder?
John: It burns the beans, John.
John: How do you even live?
John: How do you live?
John: It's just, it's a coffee maker that you wouldn't use at an AA meeting.
Merlin: It's got a, was it white?
Merlin: Is it white?
Merlin: No, it was black.
Merlin: But it had a green room vibe.
John: Yeah, it was too shitty even for an AA meeting.
John: And then I saw this coffee maker.
John: I was at some place and this thing had like, it was 15 cup capacity and it had a timer and you could wake yourself up in the morning with freshly brewed coffee.
John: And I was like, wow.
John: It was one of these aspirational moments where I thought, that's going to change my life.
Merlin: This is a bit of convenience that I could actually use.
John: Yeah, I'm going to get one of those lights that comes on on a timer in the morning.
John: And it's a full UV spectrum light.
John: And it's going to wake me up in the morning with the light of the rising...
John: led and then my coffee maker is going to go on and it's going to fill the house with the smell of freshly brewed coffee and i am going to get up in the morning and i'm going to do 200 push-ups and i'm going to write wow and i'm going to write from eight o'clock in the morning until 11 and then i'm going to go to the gym and then i'm going to go to the climbing wall
Merlin: But this would set off, this would be the first domino.
Merlin: That's right.
Merlin: Setting off a series of events.
Merlin: And it isn't simply to say that you would never have done all those push-ups before.
Merlin: But this could be the thing that really gets the dominoes moving.
John: This is it.
John: And pretty soon, I'm going to be standing in a park with an easel, wearing a Panama hat, and doing watercolors.
John: Because I have so much time to pursue all my dreams.
Merlin: Restore it to your full height of six foot three.
John: I'm going to be six foot four because I'll be standing up so tall with pride because I got going.
John: And so I bought this coffee maker and I set it up.
John: Well, first of all, what I did was I left it in the box for like four months and used my old coffee maker.
John: But I set it up, and now I have only used the timer setting once.
John: It was too complicated to scroll through all the menus to figure out how to do it regularly.
John: And this coffee maker, every one of its features comes with a corresponding bug.
John: So it has a gold filter instead of a paper filter.
Merlin: I'll throw that out.
Merlin: That's garbage.
John: But what that means is that every one of my coffee cups has like grounds in the bottom like I'm in Turkey.
Merlin: Oh, and they're awful to clean.
Merlin: Like who wants to be sitting there spraying out a gold filter?
John: That's the thing.
John: I use twice as much water as I used to use because I have to clean this gold filter.
John: And if the water bucket isn't seated in the grommet properly, then it won't turn on.
John: And it beeps 20 times.
Merlin: Who has time to write after all of that?
John: He's scaled.
John: I wake up in the morning and the prospect of making coffee with this thing makes me roll over and go back to sleep.
Merlin: It's just created anxiety, John.
Merlin: I'm not painting watercolors.
John: I'm not wearing a Panama hat.
John: Down to 5'11".
John: It's infuriating, you know, because I bought this thing thinking like, I also have one of those lights that comes on in the morning that is supposed to wake me up with full spectrum light.
Merlin: I've never plugged it.
Merlin: Do you have a color television with a remote?
Merlin: Merlin, I don't have a television.
Merlin: I hear they went and built a skyscraper seven stories high.
Merlin: Everything's up to date in Kansas City.
Merlin: Yeah, I don't own a television.
Merlin: Is that something I need to own a TV to know about?
Merlin: I don't own a television.
Merlin: There's only one name you ever need to give at a takeout place, and that is Bob.
Merlin: And there's only one coffee maker you ever need to own, which is the one that we own, which is this one Cuisinart.
Merlin: You pay a little bit more.
Merlin: You get one of these every year or two.
Merlin: And it's all the coffee maker you need.
Merlin: Wait a minute.
Merlin: You buy a new coffee maker every year?
Merlin: Well, we used to really go through them.
Merlin: No, less so now.
John: How do you go through a coffee maker?
Merlin: Let me restate.
Merlin: I put that poorly.
Merlin: What we used to do was say, fuck it.
Merlin: We'll just get whatever at whatever.
Merlin: You go to Luria's or something.
John: You get whatever at whatever.
Merlin: Yeah, you get whatever at whatever.
Merlin: And finally, we popped for – I don't know.
Merlin: It's like $40, $60, something like that.
Merlin: This one Cuisinart DCC-something-something.
Merlin: It's the one everybody owns.
Merlin: It's kind of slightly retro-looking.
Merlin: It's got like a metal front thing.
Merlin: And it's really – to me, it's like all the features you need in a coffee maker in one place.
Merlin: Now, why am I telling you this?
Merlin: Because I think it's very difficult, especially with – gosh, especially with things like TVs.
Merlin: It could be with computers, with whatever it is.
Merlin: It's so hard to find the right balance of that seeming convenience that will enable you to write and do watercolors versus the complexity.
John: I wish somebody would keep a blog where they would review new gear and tech stuff and tell you which one is the best.
Merlin: There's only one site you need to go to for that.
Merlin: There actually is.
Merlin: Is it Gizmodo?
Merlin: Nope, Wirecutter.
John: Oh, Wirecutter.
John: You told me about them.
Merlin: It's exactly one paragraph.
Merlin: Based on research, this is the one you should buy.
Merlin: Thank you.
Merlin: That's exactly what I want.
Merlin: I just added a $1,500 TV to my Amazon wish list because my friend John Syracuse spent months and months researching it.
Merlin: And so I just added that one.
John: Well, so we just did an ad for Wirecutter on our podcast.
John: Why don't they sponsor us?
John: Let me tell you a little bit.
John: I want to thank Wirecutter.
John: Elizabeth Gilbert.
John: We should retroactively go to them and say, listen, you're already sponsoring our podcast.
John: Give us both $1,500 TVs and we'll call it a wash.
Merlin: I think we'd call it a wash.
Merlin: I think they just wouldn't call it anything.
John: Well, I don't watch TV, so... Yeah, me neither.
John: It would just end up in the corner with my... How are you going to watch Doctor Who?
John: Coffee maker.
John: Anyway, the... I've never seen a Doctor Who.
Merlin: Good, good.
Merlin: Are you saying good or are you saying good?
Merlin: I'm being dismissive in that way you hate when I do.
Merlin: Between the monkey bars, why the last man?
Merlin: Too shitty for an AA meeting.
Merlin: Oh, sorry.
Merlin: Go ahead.
Merlin: Well, have you ever been to an AA meeting?
Merlin: No, I keep meaning to.
Merlin: They're amazing.
Merlin: Well, I've always been curious because it seems like people on TV anyway, people smoke and they drink a lot of coffee at AA meetings.
John: Is that real?
John: Well, no, you can't smoke in them anymore, most of them.
John: Boo.
John: I know, but there is a lot of coffee happening.
John: And the problem with AA meetings, as they are portrayed in film and on TV, is that dramatically the scriptwriters, the screenwriters, who all, I'm sure, belong in AA meetings, but probably none of them have ever been to one.
Merlin: Or N.A.,
John: Yeah, they all want there to be what in AA is called crosstalk, which is that the person is talking, telling their story, and then someone else in the room confronts them about it.
John: Or the quote-unquote leader of the meeting gets up and makes some comment about what they just shared.
John: Yeah.
John: You know, like, they always introduce into the script some back and forth between a person who is, like, in authority in the AA meeting and the protagonist.
John: But the reality is that that never happens in an AA meeting.
John: There is no leader.
John: And so there is never... No one ever comments on... No one ever replies to you.
Merlin: There's not, like, a Robert's Rules of AA...
John: Well, there are rules, but like you get up and you talk and then you sit down and then the next person gets up and talks.
John: There isn't no one ever says like, you know, part of your problem is blah, blah, blah.
John: Like it's not it isn't ever done that way.
Merlin: Is that part of the ethos?
John: Yeah, it's absolutely part of the ethos.
John: It's called crosstalk and they frown on it.
John: They also don't think that you should date people that you meet in AA meetings, but that's really hard.
Merlin: It sounds like a lot of script writers get a lot wrong about AA.
John: They do.
John: They do.
John: And I don't know.
John: For a long time, I thought maybe they were intentionally obscuring it because everyone in Hollywood was in AA and they didn't want the secret ticket out.
John: But then I realized that it was just that for dramatic purposes, they need there to be some authority figure.
John: And I think what's happening is they're setting a lot of those scenes now in rehabs.
John: And rehabs are a lot cultier feeling.
Right.
John: But I don't know.
John: I've never seen... Actually, Fight Club did a pretty good job of representing what some of those meetings are really like.
John: Although I've never been to cancer survivor meetings.
John: Meatloaf was funny.
John: He was funny.
John: But in any case, a lot of those meetings are held in churches.
John: And if you go into the church basements and you start going through the cupboards...
John: you will find sometimes 8 to 15 coffee makers that are just like dead soldiers.
John: It's not that they stop working.
John: It's that a new one is cheap enough to get into that somebody brings the new one.
John: And then you feel like you got to plug the new one in and start using it.
John: And so the old one's not broken.
John: But you're not using it anymore, and so it goes up in the cupboard.
John: And a lot of these kitchens in church basements, they're not used for anything but AA meetings.
John: So they got all these cupboards,
John: And so the coffee makers just go up in the cupboards and pretty soon you'll open these cupboards and it's just like, it's a fucking museum of coffee makers.
Merlin: Is that what you've done?
Merlin: Have you gotten them from AA meetings in the past?
John: You just pick one up?
John: No, you don't take from me.
John: You know, you're not supposed to steal a coffee maker.
John: That's the third rule of Fight Club.
John: Never steal the coffee maker.
John: But, you know, you open it up and it's like, is that an original Mr. Coffee?
John: Like probably some of them, if they weren't also coffee stained, probably they would be like worth a little bit of money.
Merlin: I don't know about that, but I think that's one reason.
Merlin: For me, this is not fun to clean anymore.
Merlin: This is just gross.
Merlin: All the parts on this are plastic, and it's disgusting.
Merlin: Think about this.
John: Think about a pneumatic cannon that shoots coffee makers.
Merlin: It's like a t-shirt gun, but for coffee makers.
John: Yes.
John: So we build a t-shirt cannon, but coffee maker size.
John: I'm listening.
John: And then people from all over come with their old coffee makers.
John: And we, we like shoot them.
John: Like we shoot, we put a couple of old Volkswagens down range and we just shoot coffee makers at them all afternoon.
John: Who wouldn't, who wouldn't pay $15 to shoot a coffee maker at a Volkswagen?
John: This is a money-making scheme if we've ever had one.
John: It would be really fun.
John: The glass would shatter.
John: Yeah, the whole thing.
John: I mean, think about the satisfying impact of the entire coffee maker.
John: And half the time, like, the carafe would come separated from the launch system, the heating system, somewhere in midair, and you would end up with a kind of shrapnel effect, a grape shot effect.
Merlin: I think it's a no-brainer.
Merlin: People would absolutely do that.
Merlin: People would come to that, and the price of admission could be bring an old coffee maker.
John: Bring an old – well, wait a minute.
John: No, we want to make a little money too because we have to pay for the pneumatic.
Merlin: Couldn't you fire your old coffee maker and maybe you buy a new one?
Merlin: Maybe that's part of the process.
Merlin: Maybe if you're – because there's so many crappy – think about like you come in, you're going to buy a TiVo, but you get to fire your old VHS at a VW.
John: Okay, but wait a minute.
John: I'm hoping that people will come with eight coffee makers.
John: We're solving a problem for people.
Merlin: We're solving at least three problems by my reckoning.
John: All around America, there have got to be used coffee makers sitting in people's bottom cupboards.
Merlin: Littering the church basements of America.
John: That's right.
John: And so the thing is, yes, I think we should sell new coffee.
John: You should sell your Cuisinart coffee maker at the, like, there should be a gift shop.
John: And it just sells coffee makers, new coffee makers.
John: But the thing is that if somebody brings eight coffee makers, they're not going to want to buy eight new coffee makers.
John: They're bringing eight coffee makers to shoot.
John: They're going to want to buy one.
John: I feel like there's got to be a per-shot charge.
John: Even if you bring your own coffee maker, you've got to pay.
Merlin: Well, don't they have services where you can come out and get an automatic weapon and get to shoot it at something?
Merlin: Isn't that something you can do?
Merlin: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
John: I mean, they don't come out to you.
John: You go out to them.
John: It's not like a mobile lab.
Merlin: They don't come to your house with an automatic weapon and say... Yeah, but I mean, if it's Friday afternoon, you're mad at your boss, you could just go out and shoot a fucking coffee maker at something.
John: I feel like the area around San Francisco is perfect for this.
John: Like, out in East Bay somewhere.
Merlin: There's a firing range right down the street from here.
Merlin: Really?
Merlin: Yeah, you can hear it on weekends.
Merlin: You can hear them shooting down Lake Merced, yeah.
Merlin: Is it a police thing?
Merlin: Nope, just a regular old bring a gun and shoot stuff range.
John: You know, there's a police shooting range over here by my house.
John: Really?
John: Yeah, and sometimes you can hear them shooting machine guns.
John: Wow.
John: It's pretty great.
John: But you know what?
John: They do a lot of shooting in the summer, not so much shooting in the winter.
John: And it makes me think, are they underprepared for gunfights in inclement weather?
John: Right?
John: I can't decide if you're turning into Ron Popeil or Malcolm Gladwell.
John: If they're not practicing all year round, then they are an ineffective force.
John: Interesting.
Merlin: This could alter the course of history.
Merlin: Oh!
Merlin: This is what happened to Napoleon.
John: This is what happened to Hitler, too.
Merlin: They weren't ready.
Merlin: He was not ready for cold weather combat.
John: That's right.
Merlin: He didn't know what he was getting into if he had some coffee makers.
John: If he'd been out there year-round shooting coffee makers in the dead of winter, both of them would have made it to Moscow.
John: Hitler wouldn't have had to go to Moscow because Napoleon would have already gotten there.
John: They'd have been speaking French in Moscow more than they already were.
John: Can you imagine that?
Merlin: Talk about undignified.
John: What would have happened if Napoleon had conquered Moscow?
Merlin: That is something I've never really thought of.
Merlin: It's kind of a Doctor Who type thing.
John: I don't think they would have survived.
John: I think even if he had conquered Moscow, I don't think they would have survived the winter.
Merlin: I, you know, it's like, let's say like the, what's that line about how like revolutionaries don't make great politicians or whatever.
Merlin: It's probably more clever than that.
Merlin: But I mean, that's a hell of a large landmass to run.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: You know, and even if you, I mean, it just, it seems like you would have to be as crooked as they are there in order to run that well.
John: Hmm.
Merlin: Back then.
Merlin: Sure.
Merlin: I mean, you would need the fear.
Merlin: I don't know.
John: I don't think the majority of Russia has ever really been governed.
Merlin: We're talking USSR, though.
Merlin: We're talking 10 time zones, like the Negative Land song says.
Merlin: Are there really that many?
Merlin: There are a lot of time zones.
Merlin: Are there 10 time zones in Russia?
Merlin: I was not a giant Negative Land fan.
John: I think that's right.
John: You know, my friend Sean Wolf, who did the cover art for Pretend to Fall, also Negative Land cover art.
John: Really?
John: He was the Negative Land graphic artist for a long time.
John: This book is cool.
John: Sean Wolf.
Merlin: We should get him.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: All of these people should have to pay us, including Hitler.
John: We should get to sponsor this podcast with free remover installers.
Merlin: That's the name of the device, right?
Merlin: That's his little device.
John: Yeah, the remover installer.
Merlin: I think your and my shared understanding of how people actually make money from things has become so backward at this point that it just might work.
Merlin: How do you make money from things?
John: How does anybody make money?
John: I see people all the time who have so much money.
John: Yes.
John: How did they make it?
Merlin: VCs?
Merlin: You should get a VC.
Merlin: That's right.
Merlin: In the shit.
John: Oh, venture capitalists.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: How do we get one of those?
Merlin: How do we get a venture capitalist?
Merlin: Why don't we... Is there like a trap that you set?
John: No, I think you can get under the pound or... We should make a proposal.
John: You and I are smart.
John: We should make a proposal that gets a venture cap that attracts the interest.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: Of like a serial entrepreneur.
John: Right.
John: Like that guy that I met at that party in New York City where Arianna Huffington was.
Merlin: Who gave me all his books about... Is that where you saw the slides of poor children on the wall?
Merlin: That's right.
John: Where the guy came up and said, are you an entrepreneur?
John: And I said, yeah, sort of.
Merlin: Can I borrow a book?
John: Did you see our slideshow about poor children?
John: I did.
Merlin: I did see it.
Merlin: You know there won't be snow in Africa this Christmas time.
Yeah.
Merlin: Thank God.
Merlin: Do you remember that back in 1984 when there wasn't snow in Africa?
Merlin: God, that song sounds more condescending to me every year.
John: There's something about 80s culture that was still...
John: so in between, so in between the monkey bars where the, the like rampant ignorance and like casual racism of the sixties and seventies was still like, it was still what, what the culture was soaking in, but there was all this new, uh,
John: flippity gibbity that was only 10 years old that nobody could quite figure out like how do we show that we are compassionate but
John: Because we have no experience with real compassion.
Merlin: Well, yeah, especially if I understand what you're describing, and I probably don't.
Merlin: The mid to late 80s and into the early 90s, it was like the end of the pro period of assholishness and the very tenuous beginnings of this new kind of fancy nice guy softness that we actually hadn't learned to do well yet.
Merlin: And so there was a kind of assholish nice guy-ness to that time.
John: Like, yeah, the presumption that Christmas even applies to fully half of the continent of Africa.
Merlin: I've thought about this a lot.
Merlin: And I think the reason they did that is because the donations were going to come from people who love Christmas and want people to be happy.
Merlin: So I kind of get that.
John: Yeah.
John: But do they know it's Christmas?
John: It's like, it's the whole, just the title of the song implies that Africa is...
John: It's like a cave.
John: Of course they're hungry.
John: They don't know it's Christmas.
John: It's like Plato's cave.
John: Do they know it's Christmas?
John: Is it just shadows on the wall?
Merlin: That would have been a better lyric than half of the lyrics.
Merlin: And the answer is so depressing in the end.
Merlin: We can feed everybody very, very, very easily.
Merlin: We just don't like paying the transportation costs on things.
John: Well, that's true of half the things in my house.
John: I was thinking about it the other day.
John: Half the stuff in here, it's just that I'm paying for the container.
John: I mean, seeds don't cost anything.
John: What are seeds?
John: Seeds just fall from the sky, right?
John: They're like baby plants.
John: Yeah, sky seeds.
John: I had to pay somebody a couple of cents an hour to pick these seeds and put them in a bin.
John: But then the rest of it is just transportation.
John: Are you talking about vegetables or what are you talking about?
John: Well, you know.
Merlin: Just the seeds of items.
John: Yeah, like you don't eat seeds?
John: You don't eat crunchy seeds?
Merlin: Oh, I'm more of a nut man.
Merlin: I'll eat a seed.
Merlin: My wife likes seeds.
Merlin: What about seeds and nuts?
John: Do you ever eat mixed seeds and nuts?
Merlin: I kind of always feel like that's a little bit of a jam up.
Merlin: You got your gorp, you got your trail mix.
Merlin: I always feel like you're not going to get the same quality control as if you've just gotten an ass ton of nuts.
John: The one kind of thing, yeah.
John: Somebody was yelling at me the other day that cashews aren't nuts.
John: What?
John: Somebody was yelling at me.
John: I posted a picture of some cashews, as you do.
John: Yeah.
John: And I was like, yep, just sitting here eating some nuts.
John: And somebody was like, cashews aren't nuts.
John: Cashews are not nuts.
Merlin: Is it a bean?
Merlin: Is it a legume?
Merlin: A legume?
Merlin: No, what about peas?
Merlin: Peas aren't nuts, right?
Yeah.
John: Peas.
John: I don't think peas.
Merlin: John, did they know it's Christmas time at all?
Merlin: Maybe a cashew is a fruit.
Merlin: I'll have to look that up.