Ep. 171: "A Weiner-Shaped Hole"
Merlin: This episode of Roderick on the
Merlin: hello hi john hi merlin how's it going good how are you going i'm going i just had a lot of ramen really fast are you doing some podcasting today i have three podcasts today
Merlin: Wow.
Merlin: Back to back to back to back.
Merlin: Do you think that we have reached peak podcast?
Merlin: Oh, we reached peak podcast when the first podcast came out.
Merlin: That's all you really need.
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: You're on so many programs now.
John: Yeah, I'm hoping to presage the peak post podcast.
Merlin: Maybe you'll be the last great podcaster.
Okay.
Merlin: Wouldn't that be nice?
Merlin: Mm-hmm.
Merlin: You should edit one of these and put it together sometime.
Merlin: That'd be fun for you.
Merlin: It'd be nice to be remembered for something.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
John: He was the last great podcaster.
Merlin: Everyone said so.
Merlin: The last starfighter.
John: I don't want to edit a podcast, I don't think.
Merlin: Neither do I. It's not nearly as sexy as it sounds.
Yeah.
John: It does sound pretty sexy.
John: I've always imagined Lonely Sandwich sitting in his lonely garret surrounded by screens and putting together You Look Nice Today's back in the golden era.
Merlin: He would spend hours and hours and hours.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: It got faster over time, but yeah, he spent an improbably large amount of time on this.
John: A lot of romance in it.
John: Well, so do you feel like you still have podcasting in you?
John: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: No, do it.
Merlin: I don't care.
John: How's your podcast reservoir right now?
John: Is it full of great stories and great memories?
John: Oh, we had some times, didn't we?
Merlin: Well, it's easy with you because you've always got a new angle.
Merlin: You've always got a new thing.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: Always a thing.
John: You know, the king of China is in Seattle today.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: Things are crazy right now.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: China has a king?
Merlin: I didn't know that.
Merlin: Is it not a king?
Merlin: It might be maybe a premier.
Merlin: Premier.
Merlin: Premier.
Merlin: Premier.
Merlin: Premier.
Merlin: Or a prime minister.
Merlin: Chief Poobah.
Merlin: Things are crazy.
Merlin: And you got the pontiff coming to the East Coast.
Merlin: Everybody's iPhones are going to be arriving late.
John: Yeah.
John: I mean, the traffic in Seattle is already backing up from the Pope visiting.
John: All the way.
John: Yeah, well, because, yeah, it's causing a major traffic jam back east, and that just has a ripple effect.
Merlin: That's what they call an additive quality.
Merlin: It's the butterfly in China.
Merlin: Geometric butterflies.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah, if you give one thing, another thing.
Merlin: Now, that's exciting.
Merlin: And so why is he there?
Yeah.
John: Well, there's a little thing you may have heard of.
John: I don't know if it gets all the way down to San Francisco, but we call it the Pacific Rim, which is the rim around the Pacific where you would basically where you would snap the lid on the Pacific if it came with a lid.
Merlin: Oh, okay.
Merlin: Okay.
John: So it's a rim, and we also call it it's like the ring of fire.
John: That's another word for it because it's a rim of volcanoes.
Merlin: Is there a rim conference happening?
No.
John: So it's some kind of RIM conference.
John: This isn't the big RIM conference.
John: They haven't had one of those in a while, but this is some kind of trade deal where Seattle, a city of 700,000 people, gets to pretend for a minute that...
John: anyone in china has ever heard of it or that it that it even ranks in the top 80 cities in china i mean by the time you get down to chinese cities that have 700 000 people you're basically like at the level i mean like the 700 000 person cities in china are the ones that make straws
Merlin: That's a Chinese hamlet.
John: It's like drinking straw city, drinking straw town.
Merlin: They do that a lot, John.
Merlin: They have specializations by different areas, right?
John: Is that true?
John: Yeah, I believe it is.
Merlin: You could be from the straw district.
John: You're from straw district or you're from paperclip town or you're from something like that, you know, like Turtle Wax Villa.
John: And if you live in Turtle Wax Villa, that's a city of a million and a half people.
John: And everyone there works making turtle wax.
John: But just as we like to think that we won World War Two, even though by the time the first American arrived in Europe, something like 80 million Russians had already died.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
John: We also like to think that we are Seattle is some kind of economic powerhouse of the Pacific Rim.
John: where it's just like, you know, there are 300 million Americans and that is a rounding error in the population of Asia.
Merlin: Did I send you that video?
Merlin: I think I did.
Merlin: The video about deaths in World War II was all like visualized.
John: Oh, yeah, that was interesting.
John: I liked the guy, you know, that kind of like take some data, turn it into a video podcast, hope it goes viral.
John: I like that business model.
Merlin: I thought it was very well made, and it really makes the point that you're describing, which is, first of all, you know, we were not in the war super early.
Merlin: No, that's right.
Merlin: A lot of war happened before we got involved.
John: Yeah, we were on the sidelines kind of, not really, I mean, we were cheering, certainly, but it wasn't clear, like, we didn't want to cheer too loud.
John: We didn't want the other kids to feel bad.
Merlin: Yeah, but was it, what is it, how many was it, 20 million Russians?
John: Well, it's hard to say because you really can't... Depends how you count it, right?
John: Yeah, and this is the thing about Mao, too.
John: It's like...
John: The famine deaths?
John: Like, how do you count the famine deaths?
John: Or the people in gulags.
John: Yeah, you lose $10 million to famine.
John: It's happening concurrently with the war.
John: It's happening because of decisions made by the same people.
John: But do you really lump it in?
John: It's a lot harder to count those, too, because everybody starves and they wander off in a field and die.
John: The census guys aren't really like...
Merlin: Well, this is a depressing page.
Merlin: It's called World War Two Casualties on the Wikipedia.
John: Oh, yeah.
John: That's a that's a that is a fun one, isn't it?
John: Because they break it down.
John: I mean, you know, the number of people that died in the Ukraine alone or or Belarus.
John: We just don't really think about the sacrifices that were made there.
John: And they weren't really making those sacrifices on behalf of liberty.
John: They were just being sacrificed.
John: Let's just call it what it is.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: This is one of the columns is deaths as a percentage of the 1939 population.
Merlin: Hmm.
Merlin: And it ain't pretty.
Merlin: Poland, around 17% of the population.
Merlin: Isn't that amazing?
Merlin: Like one in six people.
John: That's a lot of people.
Merlin: It's caressing.
John: Yeah, go ahead.
John: So, I mean, Seattle, in the grand scheme of things...
John: Really doesn't matter to anybody.
Merlin: Oh, don't talk crazy.
John: Except for people who live in Portland.
Merlin: Oh, you got coffee.
Merlin: You got grunge.
John: You got the EMP.
John: Boeing.
John: Oh, God, you got Boeing.
John: See, Boeing matters.
John: People pay attention to Boeing.
John: You got 13 coins.
John: Not for much longer.
John: No.
John: What?
John: Tell me.
John: Well, apparently the building that the 13 Coins is in... So the 13 Coins is kind of... It's strange.
John: Part of it is in the building that is currently occupied by the Seattle Times.
John: And that building is staying.
John: But on either side of the Seattle Times building, there's a plan to tear the other buildings down, including...
John: most of the 13 coins and put in a residential tower of some kind.
John: Whoa.
John: Are they going to move?
John: Well, there is a 13 coins.
John: There's a second 13 coins out by the airport.
John: The 14th to 26th coin.
John: If they tear the one that we're used to going to down, we can always go... I've started going out to the airport one anyway because it just...
John: taking somebody to dinner in the middle of the night out by the airport just has an extra layer of kind of greasy seedy.
John: Um, it just feels, I mean, going to 13 coins was always meant to feel a little bit pornographic and then you, you, you, you dislocate that to see tack and,
John: And it just starts to, oh, I mean, yeah, everybody's crossing and uncrossing their legs.
Merlin: It's literally open 24 hours.
John: Yeah.
John: Look at this menu.
John: You can get a steak Oscar at like 4 in the morning.
Merlin: You can get veal parmesan, 4 in the morning.
Merlin: You want liver and onions?
Merlin: No problem.
Merlin: Steak Sinatra.
John: Served on a trash can lid?
John: You want a little white sauce with that?
Merlin: I've seen you put away some food in that place.
Merlin: Oh, hell yes.
Merlin: I don't know if this has ever really come up in the mythology of John, and I don't say this as a ha-ha.
Merlin: You finish everyone else's food.
John: I try.
John: I try.
John: The thing about me is I like a smorgasbord.
Merlin: A smorgasbord?
John: I like a smorgasbord.
John: In the sense that if there is a plate... On any menu, if there's a sampler plate that isn't like the fried cheese sampler... You go into a place and it's like, oh, appetizer sampler.
John: It's just like, ugh, gross.
Merlin: It's just undifferentiated golden brown fried things.
John: Yeah, but I like to try a little bit of everything.
John: So if there's ever like a...
John: you know, one of each kind of oyster or one of each kind of, of a stuffed pepper.
John: So, you know, I'll always get the, I always get the, the sampler and, and the best sampler of all is the little bit of food that everybody leaves on their plate at the end of a meal.
John: Cause you go around and you're like, Oh, you had the lemon, the lemon pasta and you had the, you know, you had a little bit of this and a little bit of that.
John: And so, but I, but I, but I've learned over time, you know,
John: You have to ask.
John: You can't just put your fork on somebody else's plate.
John: And also you wait until they're clearly done.
Merlin: You're telling me there's sort of like an ethics of food finishing.
John: Yeah, because a lot of people, you know, they want to eat at their own pace.
John: They object to somebody kind of, you know...
John: And understandably, they object to somebody vulturing over their plate.
John: A fellow diner looking like a bird of prey.
John: But you do want to secure your rights to their leftovers before they, A, throw their napkin down on their plate.
John: Because then you're like, oh, I was going to see if you wanted that.
John: Or conversely, the people that, you know, and again, it's their right to do it.
John: It's their meal.
John: But if they want to take it home, you can't really lay claim to their leftovers if they have a plan for them already.
Merlin: You have to sort of politely call shotgun.
John: Yeah, you have to sort of wait until an appropriate amount of time has passed.
John: Thankfully, nobody smokes in restaurants anymore, so you don't have to... I mean, the number of wonderful half-eaten veal Parmesans that were ruined by somebody putting their cigarette out in it.
John: People used to do that.
John: They totally did that.
John: Put their cigarette out right in the center of their plate.
John: And I would be like, oh, God, I was...
John: I was trying to gracefully eye your food without, you know, going right up to it without going over.
John: So it is a technique.
John: But, for instance, this weekend I went camping with some friends.
John: And one of the guys that was going with us owns a restaurant.
John: So it was sort of presumed by everybody that he was going to, you know, be the chef.
Yeah.
John: And he brought some, he brought a pork loin.
John: He brought some Cajun shrimps.
John: He had some food prepared, but I was a little bit like, so, I mean, we're going camping though.
John: Like where are the wieners?
John: Where's the, yeah, right.
John: We're going to want some wieners too.
John: And he was like, well, I got this pork loin.
John: I was like, well, yeah, sure.
John: We're going to eat the pork loin and the Cajun shrimp.
John: But it's a camping trip.
John: We ought to have a package of wieners.
John: And I started to feel like, oh, I see.
John: I mean, I'm the only one that really feels like
John: we're going into this half-cocked.
John: Oh, really?
John: We're going out into the woods, and everybody else is like, oh, I'm sure the pork loin will be fine.
John: I'm like, I'm sure it's fine, too, but there's, I mean, there's a wiener-shaped hole that only a wiener can fill, and
John: Do I have to pull this car over?
John: Do we have to turn around and go back?
Merlin: And at that point, there's probably not like a 7-Eleven you could go to to pick up some wieners.
John: That's the problem.
John: Then you're talking about like, let's go back down the mountain, over the river, through the gate.
Merlin: That's interesting.
Merlin: You're a different kind of fancy because there's already going to be the – there's the fanciness of the pork roast, but you're being meta-fancy.
Merlin: You're being fancy about the idea that there's not – obviously there's a wiener-shaped hole here we've got to fill.
John: Right, right.
John: And the problem – the thing about a wiener is you're standing around the campfire and everybody's drinking their single malt bourbon and half the people are smoking their Nat Sherman Chirrut's.
John: And you can go over, pull a wiener out of a package without asking permission, without doing any kind of song and dance.
John: You can stick it on the end of a sharpened stick and you can have a wiener.
John: But with a pork loin or some Cajun shrimp, you've got to sign off on the whole dinner.
John: Everybody's involved.
John: It's a big production.
John: Part of camping is...
John: Every once in a while, you look around and you're like, well, I'm not going to have any single malt whiskey.
John: Maybe I'll have a little pull-off of a cheroot.
John: But what I want right now is a burned hot dog.
John: But...
John: It wasn't my camping trip.
John: I was part of the Praetorian Guard.
Merlin: That's part of the thing with camping also is a big part of camping is the go-along, get-along part.
Merlin: You want to be helpful.
Merlin: You want to be not a distraction.
Merlin: There's a whole element of helping out and not being a problem when you go camping.
John: That's exactly right.
John: You do not want to be the guy that they're like...
John: Yeah, when are we going camping again?
John: I don't know.
John: Let's not invite the one guy that didn't help do anything.
John: That just sat around complaining about there not being any hot dogs.
John: Where's the wieners?
John: You don't want to be that guy.
John: I mean, and the thing is that in a situation like that, you all revert to basic types, right?
John: And there's the...
John: Oh, yeah, right.
John: There's the cook who's making the pot of beans, and there's the guy that's whittling the toothpicks for everybody.
John: I like to think of myself in that situation as being kind of a justice of the peace character.
John: It's like, you know, I'm here in case anybody wants to get married or anybody wants to resolve a dispute.
John: You're there to adjudicate.
John: Yeah, right, and decide what the law of this region is.
John: I think most people appreciate me in that capacity.
John: Oh, absolutely.
John: Yeah, Roderick's along.
John: He's not here to do a lot of scrubbing of pots.
John: But just in case a tree falls in the forest and somebody wants to know whether we heard it or not, John's there.
John: Think about the big ideas.
Merlin: I had an experience in Portland that...
Merlin: For reasons it'll be apparent, I'm reluctant to bring up, but I feel like I should share it with you.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: That's what I'm here for.
Merlin: There's a group of people that whenever we're in the same town, we go out to dinner, the four of us.
Merlin: And it's just one of those, like, you know how it is.
Merlin: It's one of those, like, you know, we're not going to be in a crowd, just four people.
Merlin: Secret dinner.
John: Do you have a name for yourselves?
John: Yeah.
John: Are you the group or the...
Merlin: No, no, it's just two guys and two girls and we're called Nuts and Cherries is the name.
Merlin: Nuts with a Z. And they're the nuts and we're the cherries.
Merlin: I don't know why.
Merlin: We're just called Nuts and Cherries.
Merlin: And so Nuts and Cherries, we decided we're going to go out and get a nice dinner.
Merlin: We're going to blow the budget a little bit.
Merlin: So we're going to go to El Gaucho.
Okay.
Merlin: So we got a reservation for, I think it was like, it was early because we wanted to go to a party, you know, big fest is going on.
Merlin: I can't believe I'm telling you this.
John: You don't have El Gaucho's down in California.
John: This is the Northwest.
Merlin: No, and this one is not as nice as the one in Seattle that you and I have been to.
John: Right.
Merlin: That one's much more, I mean, no, I mean, just in terms of the interior, it's more space.
Merlin: The one in Seattle is more spacious, but it was, you know, we won't go there.
Merlin: It's 515.
Merlin: We go, we have some drinks.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: We get appetizers.
Merlin: We get steaks.
Merlin: It was amazing.
Merlin: And the service was incredible.
Merlin: It was so fun.
Merlin: And, you know, big dinner, right?
Merlin: This is the big event.
Merlin: But we had so much fun.
John: Nuts and cherries.
John: I mean, when was the last time nuts and cherries had convened?
Merlin: Nuts and cherries two to maybe four times a year, usually if we're lucky, twice a year.
John: Oh, yeah.
John: Okay.
Merlin: So it's a big deal.
Merlin: So two boys, two girls, just platonic eating.
Merlin: And it was great.
Merlin: And we went and then we go to this party.
Merlin: And the party's really fun.
Merlin: Lots of nice people.
Merlin: And we're like, what should we do next?
Merlin: And one of the nuts says, she says, let's go back.
John: What?
Merlin: I said, are you saying what I think you're thinking?
Merlin: What I think you're saying?
Merlin: She goes, yeah, let's go back.
Whoa.
Merlin: So we reconvened.
Merlin: The other cherry was not available, so we had to have a proxy cherry.
Merlin: But Nuts and Cherries went back and had a second steak dinner.
Merlin: You're kidding me.
Merlin: I'm not.
Merlin: It was the greatest night of my life.
John: One of the nuts...
John: Oh, yeah.
John: Said, let's go back.
John: Let's go back.
John: It's almost 11.
John: It was 1030.
John: Without even specifying what she meant, everybody understood.
John: Oh, everybody knew.
John: Let's go back.
Merlin: Let's go back.
John: Wow.
Merlin: I don't know how many more times in my life I'll do that, but I do not regret that.
Merlin: You bookended a party with two trips to El Cacho.
John: That's really good.
Merlin: Is that maybe the greatest thing ever?
John: That's deeply innovative.
Merlin: I want to be clear.
Merlin: It's not the kind of thing I do a lot.
John: No, but I mean, it's kind of revolutionary.
Merlin: Well, the whole idea, you know, it's like the Hobbits, right?
Merlin: You can have second breakfast.
Merlin: But how many times have you heard about somebody having second dinner?
John: Well, I mean, I have second dinner all the time.
John: But not in the same restaurant.
John: You don't go back and drop another $250.
Merlin: It's not something I do all the time.
Merlin: But, you know, as at least a once-in-a-lifetime thing, I can highly – and I also like the idea of going with the same group of people if you can.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: Everything about it is perfect.
Merlin: And maybe even try and get the same – we couldn't get the same waiter.
Merlin: Our waiter was leaving.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: But the waiter saw you come in.
Merlin: The waiter knew what you were doing.
Merlin: He greeted us.
Merlin: I think he was cashed out.
Merlin: He was getting ready.
Merlin: He introduced us to our new server, showed us a place.
Merlin: We had a little bit of shucky jivey, and then we had another dinner.
John: And your second dinner, did you order – you must have ordered different things.
Merlin: I did.
Merlin: I had different drinks.
Merlin: Actually, I had maybe the same drink.
Merlin: I think I had an old-fashioned.
Merlin: But, yeah, I had a different dinner.
Merlin: I tried something a little more ambitious the second time.
John: See, that's exactly what you would do, right?
John: You'd reach a little bit.
Merlin: And I don't think – the thing is, I have to tell you, I had such a wonderful time.
Merlin: I can't tell you that I would do anything differently.
Merlin: But if I were advising somebody who was considering – we need a name for this.
Merlin: If you were going to do a tactical two-dinner night, I think there are ways –
John: to to think about doing it i think the idea of like is it gonna be the same place twice is it gonna be different places is it a different approach i think it might be novel to go and have exactly the same dinner twice i think that's an interesting idea too i mean i feel like hanging out with a group of people going to dinner early going to a party and then after after the party going out to like a late dinner that's something different we're talking about returning to the scene of the crime
Merlin: Yeah, yeah.
Merlin: Let's lay out some of the bullets on this.
Merlin: I think it doesn't have to be a fancy restaurant, although I think that's kind of cool.
Merlin: But it should be the same restaurant.
Merlin: It should be, to the extent possible, mostly the same group of people.
Merlin: Although, again, not necessary.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: This is America.
John: You can tag one or two people in or out, depending on how big the group is.
Merlin: But now I kind of want to do it again.
John: So you go to an early dinner, which makes perfect sense, before the theater, before the show, or before the, like, let's go, let's, you know, 545, we're having early dinner, and then you have a fantastic night out.
John: You don't want the evening to end.
John: Let's go back.
John: Let's go back.
John: Let's have a second dinner.
John: Oh.
John: You know, so...
John: The equivalent innovation for me was several years ago, I realized that when I was going out to Italian food with friends, with any group of friends, four or more, we would walk in the restaurant and before we were even seated, I would order a large pepperoni pizza.
Yeah.
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John: For the table.
John: For the table.
John: So you walk in the way, you know, the hostess.
Merlin: Is this your first time dining at John Carlos?
Merlin: Tell me a little bit about how we work here.
John: Listen here.
Merlin: Let me stop you there.
John: Let me stop you there.
Merlin: Bring us a large pepperoni pizza.
John: Bring us a large pepperoni pizza and four menus and take our drink order or whatever.
Merlin: Please and thank you.
John: Get that pepperoni pizza cooking because then you're sitting there, you're looking at the menu, you're like, oh, what do I get?
John: Do I get the antipasta?
John: Do I want this?
John: Do I want that?
John: Maybe I'll get a Joe's special.
John: And then just as the waiter comes back to take your order, oh, a large pepperoni pizza shows up.
Merlin: it's perfect yeah see god damn it this is the kind of innovation we need in dining yeah it's becomes it's so normative john you go into the place and there's a certain size your first time dining with us why is there anything i need to know about yeah right what what about your fucking restaurant is special what about this experience is special i don't need i don't need to be walked through the fact that you have a menu
Merlin: Let me tell you a little bit of how this works.
Merlin: Everything here is locally sourced, farm to table, and one out of six plates is filled with poison.
John: Let me tell you a little bit how this works.
John: You shut up and go get our drinks.
John: Bring us a large pepperoni pizza.
Merlin: Is this your first time waiting on us?
John: So because the thing is, nobody wants to go through the whole, like, we can all agree on cheese bullshit.
John: Everybody there, though, except if you're dining with Ted Leo, who's a fucking vegan, but everybody else wants at least one slice of pizza.
John: Right?
John: You just want a slice of pizza.
Merlin: Well, I mean, you're there.
John: Yeah.
John: So the large pepperoni comes.
John: Everybody gets a slice of pizza.
John: A few of us have a couple of slices.
John: And then what do you have?
John: You have a slice left over.
John: And then here comes your main course.
John: Here comes your veal.
John: Here comes your spaghetti.
Merlin: If you time that right, it would be perfect.
John: It's bananas.
John: You just walk in.
John: You don't even have to make a show of it.
John: You just lean over.
John: You lean over to the guy and you say, bring us a large pepperoni pizza.
Merlin: I feel like there's so much room for innovation in these kinds of things.
Merlin: We all know about things like, you know, let's have breakfast for dinner, right?
Merlin: Like tonight we're going to have pancakes for dinner.
John: Right.
John: Dim sum in the afternoon.
Merlin: Exactly.
Merlin: My daughter's case at her school today.
Merlin: Today is breakfast for lunch day.
Merlin: So she's getting pancakes and sausage for lunch.
Merlin: Everybody's favorite meal.
Merlin: But then there's also other ways you can go.
Merlin: You can go into things like let's, you know, like, for example, I'm frequently of a mind, especially with certain kinds of restaurants where I would just like four appetizers.
Merlin: Oh, sure.
Merlin: Rather than a plate.
Merlin: Now, is that a thing?
Merlin: Can you do that?
Merlin: Let's have appetizers for dinner?
John: We do it all the time because the thing is here in Seattle now, and I'm sure this is true in certain parts of San Francisco, you walk in and whatever the main courses are, they...
John: are just scaled-up appetizers, and the appetizers are just scaled-down main courses.
Merlin: Instead of tapas, you consider it a large plates restaurant.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: It's supersized the tapas.
John: The appetizer list is like Toronados of beef and seven kinds of croutons and one pickled pickle on top of something else pickled.
John: And you go, none of that sounds great, but then you look at the main courses and it's like octopus tongue pickled.
John: And you go, I don't want that either.
John: You know what I want?
John: Bring us the meatballs.
John: Bring us the blanched spinach.
John: I'll try one pickled thing just to make you guys happy.
John: Yeah.
John: Just to make you feel like this is still a thing that we're all experimenting with, pickling.
Merlin: Pickling, yeah.
John: So, yeah, I went out to dinner the other night.
John: A guy was in town from out of town, Peter Sagal of NPR.
Mm-hmm.
John: I was here in town and a couple of nerds took him out to dinner, Seattle-based nerds.
John: And we went to one of those restaurants that's called like the Whale and the Porpoise and the Captain and the Blacksmith.
Yeah.
John: And we sat down, and it was the server.
John: That's one of the great Cormac McCarthy novels, I think.
John: The server came over and said, Hi, have you dined with us before?
John: Let me tell you a little bit how this happens.
John: Everything has been pickled today.
John: On the premises.
John: On the premises.
John: We picked it all out of the cracks of the pavement in our own parking lot and then threw it in some brine.
John: The chicken takes an hour and a half because it's not actually a chicken.
Merlin: Can I ask a question about the sides?
Merlin: Are they served family style and meant to be shared?
John: And then so we just ordered a bunch of food.
John: We were there.
John: Ken Jennings was one of the nerds, and Ken took the reins and was just like, okay, we'll have the pickled beets on top of cabbage.
John: We'll have the pickled onions with pickled clams.
John: And he ordered like 15 things from the appetizer menu, and it was great.
John: I mean, it tasted like...
John: It basically tasted like you were eating a jar of mustard.
Merlin: Oh, boy.
John: And it cost $1,000.
John: But that's what dining is now.
Merlin: You think it's cheap to pickle stuff?
Merlin: You know what the vinegar costs?
John: Do you know how long it took us to tell you about this?
John: Have you locally sourced dill recently?
John: Listen, $15 an hour is the law in Seattle.
John: And it's very expensive to employ our waiters to sit and explain how food works to you.
John: None of this is cheap.
Merlin: Is this your first time in Seattle?
John: Look, we had to take this formerly, like, this former garage where actual cars were once worked on by people with skills, and we had to take everything useful out of it and then turn it into a pickling parlor.
John: And none of this is cheap.
Merlin: I feel like I'm just abuzz with ideas.
Merlin: I feel like I could be a consultant today.
Merlin: I have so many ideas in my head.
Merlin: For example, think about when you do dim sum.
Merlin: And if you go to a dim sum place, especially where they've got a cart, you're never really done ordering until you just make them go away.
Merlin: Like they're just coming, they're offering you new foods, they're stacking plates.
Merlin: I think the closest thing after that that we get is sushi.
Merlin: Well, of course, obviously you've got a buffet.
Merlin: That's a different kind of animal.
Merlin: But with sushi, even today, like I remember when I first started eating sushi with people, it was very normal to say like, let's start out with this.
John: Sure.
John: Well, they bring you the edamame because so many people ordered edamame to start.
John: that now most sushi restaurants just bring you some edamame just to like, yeah, we know you're going to order this.
John: Now we just consider it part of the deal.
Merlin: They seem like mind readers.
Merlin: But I like the idea of starting out with a pepperoni pizza and just building.
Merlin: Pepperoni pizza becomes just like a foundation.
Merlin: We don't know where this building is going.
John: That's right.
John: It's the basic level.
John: It's the ground floor.
John: And then, you know, anymore when I go to get dim sum, I feel like what's really happening is like I'm climbing up
John: I'm climbing up on the side of like a moving truck and Immortan Joe is spraying instead of chrome directly in my mouth.
John: He's spraying MSG just directly in my mouth.
John: He's like... I call it secret salt.
John: You know, I don't need to eat the mystery pork.
John: I don't need to put the buns in my mouth.
John: I could just jump up there and say, you know, like, I am Chrome.
John: Witness me.
John: And they could just...
John: You're going to Valhalla.
Merlin: Here's the MSG.
Merlin: A theme restaurant with spray MSG.
Merlin: That's pretty good.
John: But if I was standing on a foundation of pepperoni pizza when that happened, first of all, I'd be grounded from electric shock.
John: And, you know, and I would have I'd have some I'd have some base layer of bread and cheese that MSG could kind of soak into.
John: And I would I would I wouldn't have that like hallucinatory hour and a half after after the best dim sum meal where you're just, you know, where you're like you're hearing colors and stuff.
Merlin: Oh, you can like just smell truth.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Because of the MSG and what it's doing with your synesthesia.
Merlin: You get that pretty hard, don't you?
John: You know, I've done a fair enough amount of research to know that the only people that will really stand up and say that MSG has an effect on them, it's like Jenny McCarthy level craziness because all of the science people and all of the food people say, no, that's not true.
John: You do not feel MSG.
John: But they're wrong.
John: I am a member of the cult of MSG feelers.
John: And when I eat it, I can fucking feel the future.
John: I can control.
John: I have spooky action at a distance.
John: I can make like...
John: Atoms line up with each other.
Merlin: It gives you access to, obviously, senses, but potentially, I don't want to put it too strongly, there might be nascent powers that you're not even aware of from day to day.
John: That's exactly right.
Merlin: You get a window of possibility.
Merlin: When you feel the MSG, things start to happen.
Merlin: You're noticing things you never noticed before.
John: I can feel my hair.
Merlin: You can feel your hair.
Merlin: It's just like you really are like, oh, my God, I have this all the time.
John: Yeah, yeah, right.
John: Well, except that it also hurts a little bit.
John: Like there's, there's, it's, it's like with all great powers comes, comes some kind of discomfort.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Right.
John: So, so all of a sudden, like I feel too much, I hear too much.
John: I kind of want to go to sleep, but I also, uh, you know, kind of want to drive a truck into a dust storm.
John: Like it's a, it's a very peculiar state and it's, and it's especially destabilizing when other people try to tell you that it's not happening.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Right.
John: You know, yeah,
Merlin: Hmm.
Merlin: How do you feel about beverages?
Merlin: I think, as you know, I'm a multi-beverage person.
Merlin: I like multiple beverages, sometimes at the same time.
John: You're talking about like a table where you have a sparkling water, an old-fashioned, an orangina.
Merlin: A coffee.
John: A coffee and a cup of green tea all sort of arrayed around.
Merlin: It could be.
Merlin: Surprise me.
Merlin: But, you know, obviously bring the water.
Merlin: I'm going to want the water.
Merlin: I'm a big water drinker.
John: Absolutely.
John: You don't want to have to order that.
Merlin: No, my standard go-to for a time in the 90s was I would have a regular glass of water, a coffee, a scotch, and a Coke.
John: Oh, hey.
John: Woo!
John: Mine is a water, a cup of coffee always, and then a milkshake.
John: If you can go into a place and have a cup of coffee and a milkshake with a water back...
John: And then a pepperoni pizza on the way.
John: Then fucking order a French dip.
John: And you've got it covered.
Merlin: Right?
John: You order a French chip with a side salad, and you're going to walk out of there, and there's not going to be that thing of like, oh, I wish I'd had the mushrooms.
John: Right.
John: Oh, I always get the mushrooms.
John: Well, I used to get the mushrooms until I bit into a mushroom one time, and it squirted hot oil on me.
Merlin: Oh, that's a triggering thing for you now.
Merlin: Do you like to get warnings if mushrooms are going to be discussed?
No.
Merlin: No, no.
John: What about squirting?
John: What about hot squirting?
John: If mushrooms show up on the table, listen, if hot squirting is going to be discussed, I do want some kind of warning.
John: Or at least, you know, I want to be like aware.
Merlin: Should they say it in pig Latin?
John: I want to be aware it's a possible conversation.
John: Mushroom may erding squay.
John: But look, if a ramekin or a gravy boat of mushrooms shows up and they're sizzling in butter...
John: I know what I'm getting into.
John: What I don't want is deep fried mushrooms.
Merlin: No, they have lots of secrets and surprises.
John: Yeah, they appear to be like dry, hot and dry.
John: And then you crunch into it and you realize like, oh, the fungus.
John: Oh, that's a miserable feeling.
John: Like when it hits the inside of your gums.
John: Yeah.
Merlin: Oh, that hurts.
John: The fungus is just soaked up boiling hot oil and then it won't cool down because it's inside this crust.
John: That's a dangerous, that's a fucking grenade.
Merlin: Slam that fucking milkshake.
John: Yeah, but once the hot oil hits you, you're fucked.
John: I mean, no milkshake in the world can take that pain away.
Merlin: I forget.
Merlin: Do you get a vanilla?
John: I rotate milkshakes.
John: I will not get...
John: There are a lot of problems right now in the Northwest, and one of them is that I was also just recently in Portland, and the popular ice cream shop down there now is called something like the Salt and Straw.
Merlin: Yeah, it's pretty fancy.
John: It's pretty fancy, and they hand you a menu of like 14 different kinds of ice cream,
John: Oh, you got to wait like an hour.
Merlin: It's nuts.
John: You got to wait an hour.
John: And the ice cream flavors are salted licorice, shoe leather,
John: Bananas flambe with anchovies.
John: Wooden comb.
John: And you're like, eat shit, you guys.
John: Like, come on.
John: One, just one flavor.
John: Too clever, too clever by half.
John: Yeah, one flavor, one, one flavor that is not for, where it's not an experience.
Merlin: It's not meant to be caught on somebody's twirly mustache.
John: I just want some fucking ice cream, bros.
John: I'll eat a scoop of vanilla right now, except that your vanilla is laced with lavender.
Yeah.
Merlin: I don't want lavender.
Merlin: You know, I have to tell you, I don't want to sound touchy, but I think I have a bone to pick with people who are anti-vanilla.
Merlin: I think vanilla can be very, very good.
Merlin: Vanilla is not vanilla.
Merlin: Vanilla is not boring.
Merlin: No.
Merlin: Like, you get a really good, like, you know, with the real vanilla bean taste to it.
Merlin: God, that can be so good.
Merlin: Even you go get some, you get the Haagen-Dazs.
Merlin: The Haagen-Dazs, what's it called?
Merlin: Vanilla bean.
Merlin: It's really good.
Merlin: That's a good-ass ice cream.
John: You know, up here in the Northwest, we have Tillamook.
John: Oh, right.
John: That's the creamery.
John: That's a creamery.
John: And that Tillamook makes ice cream.
John: And it's not like premium ice cream.
John: But it's ice cream that I support.
John: I support them mostly because it has a Northwestern pedigree.
John: And they have like five different kinds of vanilla.
John: But there's one called Old Fashioned Vanilla.
John: And I just get it reflexively because if you put Old Fashioned in front of something, I just immediately feel like I'm at Farrell's ice cream shop and somebody with an arm garter and a bowler hat is coming over on roller skates.
John: It's your birthday!
John: And so I get that Old Fashioned Vanilla and...
John: The thing about vanilla ice cream for me, the first two bites are ambrosia.
John: And then, like everything, it just sort of dulls your senses and it turns into, and then you're just like cramming lard in your mouth as fast as you can to try and make the screaming stop.
Merlin: So the problem in Seattle has to do with shakes.
Merlin: You get too many fancy ice creams, you can't get like a normal shake?
Merlin: Are they already sandals on?
John: Oh, no.
John: I think 99% of the time when you go to get a milkshake in Seattle, you have chocolate, vanilla, strawberry.
John: But then you have other, you know, you can get raspberry, which I sometimes will do.
John: I like a raspberry shake.
John: I like a blackberry shake.
John: I'll even get a peanut butter chocolate shake.
Merlin: Oh, that sounds good.
John: Coffee shake, very good.
John: mint chocolate chip shake.
John: All of these are the classic flavors.
John: I don't want to sound like Scott Simpson here, but they're the classic flavors.
Merlin: But you come in and you've got your water, you've got your milkshake, obviously you've got your coffee, there's a pepperoni pizza on the way.
Merlin: What would you like to see in dining technologies that either to encourage a certain way of eating or to open up the idea that this can be what you want it to be?
Merlin: What would you like to see when you go to a restaurant?
Merlin: I want to see a big table
John: Where people have carved their names.
John: And probably large.
John: Like too large.
John: The table's too large.
John: But that's good because it's a picnic table style thing.
John: I'd like there to be a pipe organ.
John: Oh, wow.
John: And I'd like them to be playing old Harold Lloyd movies up on the brick wall.
John: And then the guy with the pipe organ is like scoring the movie.
John: I'd like there to be milkshakes that kind of come out with the pizza.
Merlin: Should there be, as long as you're going along on a wackadoodle seventies themes, should there be a phone on the table that you can pick up?
Merlin: Oh, hello.
Merlin: Oh, hello.
Merlin: Sure.
Merlin: There should be a phone on the table.
Merlin: And you could, you could call and you could, I mean, you know, here's another one.
Merlin: I agree with you.
Merlin: I like so far we're getting into shakies.
Merlin: You got ferals.
Merlin: You got that trend of like the, of the, the like prototypical bed against TGI Fridays, lots of antiques and shit on the walls.
Merlin: And you talk on the phone.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Antiques and shit.
Merlin: That's what it should be called.
Merlin: It's called antiques and shit.
Merlin: You get a giant table.
Merlin: I also like the idea, first of all, that everything's okay.
Merlin: Like whatever you want, if you want it a weird way, we'll make it that way.
Merlin: If you want a weird portion size, to the extent we can, we will try to make that work and price it accordingly.
Merlin: No restrictions.
Merlin: There should be a minimal number of restrictions, and it's not because the chef is fucking high strong and doesn't like turmeric.
Merlin: If I want turmeric, I want some turmeric.
Merlin: That's another one.
Merlin: Here's the other one.
Merlin: I know this is going to be difficult.
Merlin: I looked at the 13 Coins menu just now for like an hour.
Merlin: Fantastic menu.
Merlin: It seems like you go to someplace, you go to a Denny's, and everything's priced like a Denny's.
Merlin: You go to a 13 Coins or an El Gaucho, everything's priced that way.
Merlin: I look to see some more variation where I could get an $80 tomahawk steak.
Merlin: But I could also get a pretty good $3 grilled cheese to top it with.
John: Interesting.
John: Now, I wonder how that would work.
John: I wonder if that would actually be a problem if your menu ran the gamut.
John: Well, I just – I wonder if – you know, it's the thing where people always buy the thing in the middle.
John: Right.
John: I don't know if you'd ever – sure, every once in a while some guy in a pressed –
John: shirt with a gaudy watch is going to order the $80 steak just to lord it over everybody.
John: Right.
John: But how long are you going to have that sitting in the fridge before that guy comes in?
Merlin: Oh, you got to be so careful with that.
Merlin: I have to tell you, if it's a certain price, and I don't want to be normative here, but if it's a certain price restaurant and they have lobster on the menu or they've got too many different kinds of seafood, I will steer away from that.
Merlin: You'll avoid the lobster.
Merlin: What if you love kebabs but you're avoiding lamb?
Merlin: What if you want a grilled cheese kebab?
Merlin: Whatever it is you want, I would love a place that would do to the extent possible, try to make it interesting.
Merlin: How about this?
Merlin: What if you want the $80 tomahawk steak as an appetizer for the table?
Merlin: Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: Diners without borders.
John: See, I remember back in the 80s, before the world became standardized, traveling back east through small towns.
John: And by back east, I mean the Midwest, which at the time seemed like back east to me.
John: Uh, you'd go into these little towns and there'd be kind of like the, there'd be a restaurant and the sign outside would say restaurant.
John: You know what I mean?
Merlin: And I do, I do.
John: You'd go inside.
Merlin: It was totally acceptable to have a restaurant called restaurant.
Merlin: Yeah, it was called restaurant.
Merlin: It might be known informally by the former dead owner's name.
Merlin: Sure.
Merlin: It was called jeans.
John: No one cares if it's jeans.
John: They care that it's a restaurant.
John: And jeans been dead for a long time.
John: It's run by like jeans, jeans wife's second husband or something.
John: He loved his cigarettes.
John: But so you'd go in and behind the bar, there'd be a bar, obviously, where people with white paper hats were bustling.
John: It was fairly bustling.
John: The place was full of farmers.
John: And there would be a ham.
John: There would be a ham and there would be a turkey and there would be a roast beef.
John: And you could make any kind of food with those combination of those things.
John: There would be eggs, right?
John: There would be some soup.
John: And when they ran out of that ham, there's no more ham.
John: No more ham until they had another ham.
John: And it just feels like from that combination of ingredients...
John: They had the milkshake ingredients.
John: They had the ham, the roast beef, and the turkey.
John: They had the bread.
John: They had cheese and eggs.
John: You could make like 7,000 kinds of food.
John: You could make a ham sandwich, but you could also make a ham steak.
John: I feel like that has been lost.
Merlin: Oh, God, a ham steak.
John: So much has been lost.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: And now you walk into a place and you're like, well, tonight we have... Tonight, chef has prepared...
John: Ham steak for $29.95.
John: Okay.
Merlin: First of all, it's called Filet of Ham.
Merlin: And it just says $29.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: It's been pickled.
Merlin: There's no dollar signs.
Merlin: No, no, no.
Merlin: No dollar signs on the menu.
Merlin: Filet of Ham.
Merlin: Tonight's chef has Filet of Ham for $29.
John: Price available on request.
John: Thank you.
John: And, you know, it's just like, what the fuck?
John: Ham.
John: Come on.
John: It's one of the basic foods.
John: There ought to be ham.
John: I mean, there ought to be ham everywhere.
Merlin: Oh, I totally agree.
John: And I don't want to sound like somebody that's like, ham everywhere, ham everywhere, ham everywhere.
John: And I've got like dancers on either side twerking.
John: Ham everywhere, ham everywhere.
John: Ladies and gentlemen, the ham twerkers.
John: I don't want that to be my legacy.
Merlin: Ham everywhere.
Merlin: But you could get a scoop, but here's the thing.
Merlin: You have ham, you got turkey, you got roast beef, and you get a scoop of macaroni and cheese on the side, or maybe a monkey dish.
Merlin: That's right.
Merlin: Also, yeah, I want paper hats.
Merlin: I also want lots of monkey dishes and ramekins.
Merlin: Abso-fucking-luthing.
Merlin: Oh, you know what we're missing?
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: Sauce.
Merlin: What about sauces?
Merlin: Now, sauces, it seems to me, like the ham and the turkey, maybe you don't have a ton of it, but you could have a sauce pan of like six sauces that could be deployed tactically on any meal that anyone ordered.
Merlin: You and I have talked a lot about sauce in our lives.
Merlin: Still not enough, though.
Merlin: I still feel like I've got a sauce hole.
John: Well, yeah, you do have a sauce hole.
John: I do, too.
John: But I don't think other people care about sauce like we do.
Merlin: I don't think they've thought about it enough.
Merlin: I think it's an education issue.
John: It's an education issue, and the thing is you can't think about sauce.
John: You have to do about sauce.
Merlin: Oh, God.
John: Say it, sister.
John: You know what I'm saying?
John: Yes.
John: The sauce, you have to live the sauce, and that's how you know that you want the sauce.
John: Okay.
John: The sauce has to come.
John: You have to go, oh, there are capers in this sauce.
Merlin: But the education part is important, John.
Merlin: You have to be aware of the sauce and open to the sauce.
Merlin: Because here's what you're thinking.
Merlin: If you're one of these people, it's not that people are dumb or that people are unaware.
Merlin: Oh.
Merlin: But they're not educated.
Merlin: They're kind of dumb and sort of unaware about sauces.
Merlin: So they're thinking, if you've already gone through this, you know this is the thing.
Merlin: People will go, oh, sauces.
Merlin: There's already plenty of sauces.
Merlin: No, there's not plenty of sauces.
Merlin: Go to the grocery store and try to get yourself some store-made sauces or gravies.
Merlin: How's that work out?
Oh.
John: Have you ever bought a jar of gravy at the store?
John: I've bought all of the gravies.
John: It's a literal abortion.
Merlin: It's so bad.
Merlin: How fucking hard is it?
Merlin: One day I went and I tried about four envelopes from McCormick's and I tried some of those Chicken Tonight type abortions and brought it home.
Merlin: They were all awful.
Merlin: I could have shat better sauce.
John: Yep.
John: Yep.
John: And for me, I have felt like the day that they can put gravy in a can...
John: or in a jar and have it even remotely resemble gravy is the day that I would go on a manned mission to Mars.
John: Oh, sure.
John: This is the thing.
John: The number one thing that is inhibiting me from going to Mars, aside from not having been invited...
John: Is the idea that I'm going to get up there and there's going to be a, you know, it's going to be Thanksgiving and we're going to open up our bags of like... You're going to get a tube of turkey.
John: Yeah, a tube of turkey dinner.
John: And I'm going to be like, yay, I'm on the way to Mars.
John: I'm a historic pioneer.
John: And then you're going to take that first taste of gravy and it's going to taste like somebody burned a plastic bag.
Yeah.
John: And you're going to say, what the fuck?
John: Get me back to Earth.
John: You're going to make that noise.
John: I can't do this.
John: I can't do this.
John: Like, no amount of salt in the world can mask this terrible gravy.
Merlin: there's got to be paper hats there's got to be flexibility there should be and i don't even to me you don't need a ton of sauces we've covered sauces and gravies a little bit in the past i don't think we've talked about it too much but but i think a sausage gravy a nice brown gravy but now i'm told by our listeners that i'm overthinking the sausage gravy thing that sausage gravy is actually trivially easy to make have you heard have you heard this
Merlin: Well, I would like to see it made.
Merlin: Well, you go and look at a recipe.
Merlin: It looks complicated, but apparently it's pretty much as simple as crumble up some sausage, put in some butter and cream, and then, you know, add salt and pepper and you've got sausage gravy.
Merlin: What?
Merlin: I don't see.
Merlin: I feel like I want to fact check it a little bit.
Merlin: But look, it seems like there should be a way to have a restaurant.
Merlin: The thing is, and it could be a big restaurant.
Merlin: Like 13 Coins is a pretty good size, right?
Merlin: Yep.
Merlin: You know?
Merlin: Oh, boy, I'm going to put this in show notes.
Merlin: The booths.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: John, I can't believe this is going away.
Merlin: I'm so sad.
John: Well, it hasn't happened yet.
John: I mean, there are a lot of things that they say are going away and then they don't go away.
John: And a lot of things that they don't tell you are going away.
John: Just go away in the middle of the night.
John: They tore down two blocks of businesses and apartment buildings on Broadway to build the new...
John: subway stop Seattle is very excited about our big subway that is opening finally after decades after 50 years of talking about it or longer we finally now have our subway which goes from the university to downtown and it has three stops university one stop on Capitol Hill and then downtown so it's a three stop train
John: It cost $80 billion to build.
John: Oh, come on.
John: Well, maybe not $80.
John: But it was up there.
John: It cost a billion dollars to build.
John: Yeah.
John: 400 people lost their lives.
John: What?
John: No.
John: Nobody lost their lives.
Merlin: I just can't tell anymore.
Merlin: I'm so glad you're finally out of that race and you can tell the truth.
Merlin: You can speak the truth to subways.
John: But what they did was they tore down two blocks of kind of... They weren't the greatest businesses, but it was...
John: It was one of those stretches of businesses where there was the Indian food restaurant.
John: There was the bong store, yes.
John: But there was also the kitty cat bookstore.
John: There was the state-owned liquor store.
John: There were four or five storefronts where you could, for a while, open a store that sold nothing but butane lighters and swords.
Wait.
John: You could open a store that sold like African imports that was perpetually going out of business.
John: I would call it the eternal flame.
John: Right?
John: That's the store that opened with a going out of business sale and was always going out of business.
John: Okay.
John: Like all those places where if you wanted to sell Magic the Gathering cards and have a folding table where people could play cards in the middle of the day, like you could open a store in one of these places.
John: They tore them all down.
John: including like an old apartment building.
John: And then they tore the great coffee shop down, the Godfather's pizza where I used to sleep during the day when I didn't have a place to live, tore them all down to build this subway.
John: And they built a huge fence around the whole two square blocks.
John: So you couldn't see what was going on.
John: It was like, what's going on in there?
John: You know, they're building something.
John: They're digging a big hole.
Right.
John: And then just the other day, they took the fence down to reveal that at least so far, all they've built there is one of those municipal, like West Coast municipal style subway tunnel entrance kiosk.
John: You mean steps?
John: Well, because Seattle has a geography that really is not at all suited to subways, the only way to access the tunnel is by express elevator.
John: So there's no stairs.
Merlin: Oh, no.
John: There's no escalator.
Merlin: That's a terrible idea.
Merlin: Oh, I know.
Merlin: You need that for people with motion things.
Merlin: No, I don't want it.
Merlin: If that's the only way?
John: Express elevator because it's so deep under the ground.
Merlin: They couldn't put it in a slide?
John: So here's how you access this thing.
John: You get on an elevator with a bunch of strangers and go down so deep into the ground that you can't even take a stair if you wanted to.
John: And that's their proposed, like, we're all supposed to just be, like, fine with that.
John: But leaving that aside, what they have done is they took away two blocks of businesses and apartments.
John: And my presumption was behind that giant wall when they were beavering away at digging their hole that they also had a plan to build a six-story building with apartments and ground floor retail.
John: At what is basically the busiest intersection on Capitol Hill, certainly, but one of the busiest intersections in the town.
John: And they took the wall down and it's just like, it's basically a elevator door.
John: Oh, I see what you mean.
Merlin: You mean like the kind of thing you'd see like in Civic Center where there's just this creepy elevator tip.
Merlin: It's just an elevator door sticking out of a plaza.
Merlin: Oh, that sounds very anticlimactic after all the wall.
John: It's terribly anticlimactic.
John: And I just look at it and I'm like, well, what's going to happen here now?
John: Like, what?
John: what there's no commerce happening there's no no one can live here that's so depressing john it's basically cut one end of broadway off from the other end because you're going to walk along broadway you're going to be looking in the shop windows you're going to come to this elevator shaft and you're going to look past it you're going to see two blocks of just baked plain there's no landscaping
John: As far as I can tell, none.
John: And so you're going to turn around and walk up the other side of Broadway and you're not going to... The two sides of Broadway now are not connected, the two ends of it.
John: And huge missed opportunity to have this be a thing.
John: And instead what it is is it's just a big plaza where Occupy Wall Street is going to stand around handing out flyers and chanting and wearing Guy Fawkes masks and
John: And like, it's just a, they thought that they were building some kind of Logan's run minimalism, but like shitty human beings are going to fill that space with shittiness immediately.
John: The best thing that is going to be there is maybe somebody doing some juggling.
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John: Maybe a couple of mimes, a couple of friendly mimes.
Merlin: Yeah, it's mime friendly, but also maybe an encampment.
Merlin: You could have an encampment there.
Merlin: Oh, that'll be nice.
Merlin: I don't understand.
Merlin: I mean, I can't tell how much of this is...
Merlin: John joking, but the idea of like, so there's an elevator, people get in it, they go way down to the subway.
Merlin: Are there constant elevators going up and down?
Merlin: Is there one elevator?
Merlin: They go way down now.
Merlin: They go way down now.
Merlin: Name it.
Merlin: It sounds a little bit like this corrosion by Sisters of Mercy.
Merlin: What were you going for?
John: Well, the song Way Down Now.
John: I'll try this one.
Merlin: Way down, way down now.
Merlin: Oh, I like that.
Merlin: Way down, way down now.
John: Way, way down.
John: Seattle's erosion.
John: I did not just type Casey James.
John: I don't even know what that is.
John: Casey James?
Merlin: That sounds like a missing child.
Merlin: Exactly.
Merlin: It's a Casey James bill.
Merlin: If I were going to write a missing child, it would be Casey James.
John: I hereby encourage my fellow senators to endorse the way down Casey James bill, which is going to protect the children.
John: From being abducted.
Merlin: To quote the great song of a day past, hey now, hey now, now, sing this corrosion.
Merlin: Hey now.
Merlin: Now, is it a bank of elevators?
Merlin: How many elevators are there extant?
John: I don't know if you've ever ridden a municipal elevator that just opens into a park.
Merlin: I've spent just under 49 years avoiding municipal elevators because I know it's just a moving toilet.
Merlin: Yeah, well, that's exactly right.
Merlin: Like, a municipal elevator... People need them.
Merlin: People need them here, and I'll get a pop-up on my phone sometimes going, hey, the elevators, Bart elevators are out at Civic Center or wherever.
Merlin: But, like, people just shit at them.
Merlin: That's what they are.
Merlin: They're just moving shitters.
John: I mean, an elevator in a city building where they lock the doors at night and they have cleaning crews, those elevators most of the time don't work and are, like, yeah, right, people use them as bathrooms.
John: Now, picture an elevator that's just open to the world.
Ugh.
John: And tell me, even if they had 20 banks of them and even if they were the fastest self-cleaning elevators in the world.
Merlin: It's like there's so many points of failure.
John: Would you ever get on one?
John: I would not ever get on one.
John: How long is the ride?
John: Like 11 minutes.
Merlin: Can you imagine an 11-minute elevator ride every day?
John: Basically, it feels like you're standing there and you're like, am I the Chilean miner?
John: Am I the Chilean miner?
John: I'm going to get on this elevator.
John: All I want to do is take the train downtown.
John: And I'm going to get on this.
John: I'm going to go down and then I'm going to be down there and they're going to be drilling a hole and sending me like cheese sandwiches through a hole.
Merlin: There's only one stop at the top ground level and there's one stop at the subway.
Merlin: You don't even get the satisfying ding, ding, ding of making progress, right?
Merlin: Is there a thermometer to show you when you're getting closer to the subway?
Yes.
John: That's a really good question.
Merlin: You haven't been on this, have you?
John: Well, it's not open.
John: You should get a tour.
John: The thing is, this is, well, I would have loved a tour, and during my political... You almost came in second for an election.
Merlin: You should be one of the first people in that elevator.
John: I know.
John: During my aspirant days, there were people who were already, you know, public officers who were given, like, advanced rides on the train.
John: And it looks amazing.
John: It looks really cool because Seattle has never had a subway.
John: And also, since this subway only has three stops...
John: It's just a huge, long tunnel that the train can go really fast in.
Merlin: I just can't.
Merlin: I've got to read about this.
Merlin: This sounds like a – you know what it sounds like?
Merlin: John, you know me.
Merlin: I do not use this word lightly.
Merlin: I think this sounds like a boondoggle.
John: Seattle is so characterized by boondoggles that I don't even know anymore whether... I have to really resist the impulse to start saying things like, Seattle gets what it deserves.
John: Because it consistently votes against good practical things, including me.
John: And it votes for...
John: Like a kind of rule by committee process that produces half-acidness, but also mega, mega expensive half-acidness.
John: So it's like, okay, we've got the train, which strokes...
Merlin: A train feels like – no, I totally get what you're saying.
Merlin: Like the outline of that is, oh, trains.
Merlin: Trains are great.
Merlin: Subways are great.
Merlin: Yeah, exactly.
Merlin: It sounds to me like they're very attracted to these novel solutions that don't actually address the problem.
John: And here's the thing.
John: I feel like in 1967 when we proposed building a network of subways here and it was voted down by the voters, in 1967, if we had used the technology available to us at the time to build a subway network, we would have built –
John: a perfectly good network of interconnected trains using 1967 technology we could have done it using 1912 technology and built a built a workable system but what ends up happening out here is that we don't do it don't do it don't do it and then when it's finally time to do it we decide we
John: On the one hand, the people who are pushing for the subway are the people who are still mad that we didn't do it 50 years ago.
John: So in a way, the plan is based on this almost retro desire to finally have the thing that we should have had.
John: But then other people attach themselves to it who are like, well, you know what?
John: Tunnel drilling technology has really improved in the last 40 years.
John: And now we can build the real technologically advanced super version of this thing.
John: And so what was cool and quaint and good about the idea was
John: from 50 years ago now gets turned into a thing where it's like, well, modern tunnel technology requires that we put this thing 500 feet underground, which means that every time we build a station, it costs another billion dollars.
John: So in order to keep prices down, we can't build that many stations.
John: So we're only going to have one station.
John: and it's going to be 500 feet underground.
Merlin: And suddenly you're so many intellectual and practical steps away from a good idea.
Merlin: Yeah, right.
Merlin: It's still kind of a good idea.
Merlin: It's just each one of those steps took off like 20% to 50% of the coolness.
John: Yeah, the coolness of the technology now is dictating the usefulness of the train, which is only useful if it...
John: is accessible and
John: the accessibility people who are like, well, wait a minute.
John: I mean, like, I don't even know if I would ever take the stairs, but I'd like there to be some stairs.
John: That's just a comfort level thing.
John: You know, like I'd like to be able to smell the fresh air and look up and see the daylight, even from 500 feet below.
John: But they're like, well done.
Merlin: I don't think you have to be a raging claustrophobic to find that a little bit unsettling.
John: Oh, my God.
John: Or just get, you know, I don't want to get on an elevator unless I really, really have to.
John: Let alone if that's my only connection.
Merlin: If it's fewer than three stories, I will almost always take the steps.
John: Yeah.
John: And that's the thing.
John: This subway is not fewer than three stories.
Merlin: It looks like it's at least, I sent you a couple there.
Merlin: I don't know if this is the same station, but it looks like it's about, I would estimate, four to six stories now.
John: 300 stories?
Merlin: It's 300 to 700 stories down.
John: Three to 700 stories.
John: And the thing is... That's just a spitball.
John: To be against it... To be against... No, wait a minute.
Merlin: I don't think that that... Is that the... It might be this other one.
Merlin: I sent you two.
Merlin: There's some that look like they have escalators.
Merlin: It's hard to do a podcast and do extensive internet research.
John: Ooh, West Head House.
John: I think that you're looking... This one that has...
John: Oh, no.
John: See, that's Beacon Hill.
John: So that's not even... That's not the one.
Merlin: The big wide one.
Merlin: What is that?
Merlin: Construction of a brand new subway.
John: That's the University of Washington.
John: So what you're looking for is the Capitol Hill station.
John: Okay.
John: And I think you will find...
John: See, this one that you sent me from the University of Washington, that looks like a decent subway station.
John: It's like four or five stories underground.
John: You got some elevators, sure, but there are escalators, too.
John: The Beacon Hill one...
John: It does not have stairs.
Merlin: Well, let's cut right to the chase, though.
Merlin: The current number and – see, I'm thinking here of, like, the way that they built the central subway system in San Francisco and how even today people laugh at it because it's a diagonal line.
Merlin: Like, that's the subways.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: But it actually does – it does serve a purpose.
Merlin: I mean it is extremely busy during the day and the stops are pretty sane.
Merlin: Like – but they move a lot of people over that – whatever that – two or three miles.
Merlin: And it does – I can't imagine not having it.
Merlin: Because now, I mean, now they're like trying to get less and less stuff on Market Street because it's such a shit show on Market Street right now.
Merlin: I think they recently passed a law about, was it no private cars during the day or something?
Merlin: You can't like make a left turn.
Merlin: Anyway, there's all kinds of things they're trying to do with that.
John: What a mess.
John: I mean, it's all a mess.
John: And I really don't want to slip into this posture of like, Seattle just deserves what it gets.
John: Because...
John: Because something about the process of making decisions here is so irretrievably broken and has been for so long that it's just, it's baked into it, you know?
John: Like, you cannot propose something good here without it...
John: being ruined, not, not by any one person, not by the big moneyed interest, but just by a collective action of people here that, that, that combination of like busy body, nimby Democrat.
John: I don't like this person already.
John: You know what I mean?
John: Like they just, everybody's got to have, everybody's got to stand up at the public meeting and say their two cents.
John: And, and, and yet they,
John: You know, it never gets like at the end of the meeting, they just adjourn until the next meeting.
John: No decision ever really gets made until it's just too late.
John: And then the decision gets made by somebody in, you know, by somebody in an office somewhere who just had to, you know, just had to choose because they're breaking ground tomorrow.
John: I don't know.
John: I don't understand how.
John: How we could be on the one hand in this town screaming at each other about density and affordability.
John: And on the other hand, two square blocks of...
John: businesses in the very central core of Capitol Hill have been reduced to an elevator shaft.
John: And it's nobody's fault, right?
John: There's nobody to point out and say, well, what were you thinking?
John: Was there a public comment process?
John: Oh, yes, there was.
John: For six years, we took public comments.
John: And it's like, oh, can I see a record of those comments?
John: And, you know, it's like six years they held hearings where people in tinfoil hats with like a dog in the front basket of their bike stood up and yelled about chemtrails.
John: And the city and county administrators sat there and took it.
John: never never hammered the gavel down never said this is not a productive process they just sat and listened to all those public comments and then they decided then you know then they went back to their office and were like you know what we need an elevator shaft wouldn't that be cool
Merlin: In thinking about planning for the future, I mean this is a lot of infrastructure to – I guess you already said this sort of.
Merlin: But it's a lot of infrastructure that will end up committing you to an increasingly costly and not very flexible way of growing the system.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Because no matter what you do, it's going to have to be two to five stories underground and disrupt everything above it and then make an elevator nipple.
Yeah.
John: Yeah.
John: Now, if I were in charge, I would have just left that swords and butane lighter store because... Eternal flame.
John: Well, yeah, because you could get your horoscope and a little scroll there.
John: After you bought your magic gathering cards, you could go over and
John: And get some essential oils.
John: Some filters for your faucet, quote unquote.
John: Faucet filters.
Merlin: Faucet filters.
John: That's right.
John: That's right.
Merlin: It's a water pipe for smoking tobacco.
Merlin: It's a water pipe for tobacco only.
Merlin: See the sign?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Look at the sign.
John: It says right there.
Merlin: When are we going to open a restaurant?
John: You and me?
John: Yeah.
John: I feel like opening a restaurant, I feel like this is something I've been saying to my friends for many, many years, which is...
John: If you don't like working in a restaurant... This is the barista problem.
John: Yeah.
John: Why would you open a restaurant?
John: You're just giving yourself a job working in a restaurant.
John: Okay.
John: Can we pay someone else to open a restaurant?
John: I feel like making food and selling food... The only way to do it is to sell one thing, which is to sell gourmet corn dogs.
John: Okay.
John: If you become the gourmet corn dog king...
John: And all you sell is gourmet corn dogs.
John: And let's say one other thing, chocolate milkshakes.
John: Gourmet corn dogs and chocolate milkshakes, that's all you sell.
John: Yeah, yeah.
John: Then you don't have to worry about anything.
John: You don't have to pickle anything.
John: You don't have to explain your menu to anybody.
John: Gourmet corn dogs are expensive because they say gourmet.
Merlin: So you can... Oh, sure, you can charge a lot more.
John: You can actually profit from your job, right?
John: You can sell a gourmet corn dog for, what, eight bucks?
Merlin: What if we had six kinds of sauces and then some bread?
Merlin: It would be called Johnny Sauce.
Merlin: And you come into Johnny Sauce.
Merlin: You're just eating sauce.
Merlin: It's really all about the sauce.
Merlin: You get a flight of sauces and whatever fucking bread, nobody really cares.
Merlin: It's just whatever.
Merlin: It's locally sourced.
John: You're talking about gravy.
John: What are the six sauces?
Merlin: Oh, the six, what are they called?
Merlin: The parent sauces?
Merlin: The God sauces?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: But you got a bechamel.
Merlin: Top sauce.
Merlin: You got raviolios.
Merlin: What's your top sauce?
Merlin: What's my top sauce?
Merlin: What's the top sauce at the six sauce?
Merlin: At the top of the sauce chain?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Geez, I don't know.
Merlin: I saw this on Top Chef not too long ago, and I don't remember them.
Merlin: I think bolognese.
Merlin: Bolognese is the top sauce.
Merlin: That's a meaty tomato sauce?
Merlin: Yeah, but it's more meat than tomato.
Merlin: That's a ragu, isn't it?
Merlin: See, we could work all this out at Johnny Sauces.
Merlin: You come on in there, and it's mostly going to be about the sauce.
Merlin: You get a cup of sauce, and then maybe the spoons are made out of bread.
Merlin: Red spoons.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: We should stay out of this business.
Merlin: I have a dream.
John: What if they're gluten-free?
Merlin: I guess they could just use a compostable spoon.
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: It's too confusing already.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: It's too confusing.
John: She's stuck with the corn dogs.
John: But now, yeah, that's right.
John: Gourmet corn dog.
John: How much would you pay for a gourmet corn dog?
John: Would you pay $9?
John: I'd pay $6.75.
John: What if it was $9?
John: Sure.
John: Does it come with a sauce?
John: It comes with a ramekin of homemade ketchup.
John: Do you have pickled cucumbers?
John: No.
John: Gourmet corn dog chocolate shake.
John: Those are your options.
John: All right.
John: I'm in.
John: I'd go.
John: Would you spend $9 on a gourmet corn dog?
John: How gourmet would it have to be?
Merlin: I would try it at least once.
Merlin: I would have to know to a fair certainty that it has artisanal ingredients and isn't some kind of a switcheroo.
John: No, the hot dog is made all locally sourced from within 100 miles of here.
Merlin: Okay.
John: The corn meal that goes into the corn dog part.
John: is from non-GMO corn.
John: That's heritage corn.
Merlin: Oh, heritage corn.
Merlin: Everybody's got good insurance.
Merlin: They're free-range farmers.
John: That's right.
John: Native American heritage corn.
Merlin: It's called the Maze Runners.
John: It's fried in artisanal pork fat.
Merlin: Which is then used to power the food truck.
John: That's right.
John: The pork fat, it's a biodiesel truck.
Mm-hmm.
John: And then the chocolate milkshake is made out of 100% sustainably sourced cocoa where we have relationships with all those farmers, all the cocoa farmers.
John: And you or I, it's probably going to be me, we have to go down to Central America all the time and meet with them.
John: You and your daughter could drive there.
John: That's right.
John: We'll drive there in our Jeep.
John: All that stuff is shade grown.
John: Oh, I wasn't going to say anything.
Merlin: Yeah.
John: And then we know the milk producers and the cows all have names.
John: Hola, Luisa.
John: That's right.
John: This is Luisa's.
John: Today we're drinking Luisa's shakes.
John: Gracias.
John: And the milkshakes are also $9.
Merlin: It's not exactly what I had in mind, but I would invest in slash eat there sometimes.
Merlin: I would.
Merlin: I would.
Merlin: You would invest, though.
Merlin: That's what really matters.
Merlin: I mean, not a lot.
Merlin: I don't have a lot of dough.
Merlin: But I would put something into that if it's something you really care about.
Merlin: Is this a passion project for you, John?
Merlin: You know what?
Merlin: You could drive this up right next to the elevator nipple.
John: I feel like, no, I'm not passionate about this.
John: I feel that I do not want to be in the food service business.
John: I don't want to work at a shop at all.
John: I don't want to, I mean, I don't even want to sell vintage menswear, which is a thing I actually am passionate about because I think I would be disappointed every day.
John: Guy would come in.
John: I see this all the time.
John: Guy comes into the shop.
John: He's looking around.
John: I go, hey, how you doing?
John: Nice to see you.
John: What are you looking for today?
John: Just browsing.
John: okay.
John: The guy takes a jacket down off the rack and I kind of stand up from my stool and I go, oh, that's a cool jacket.
John: It's Kennedy administration.
John: It's sold by kind of a venerable and the guy's already hanging it back up.
John: And I'm like, okay.
John: So I sit back down and I look at the internet for a while and he walks around and he
John: Picks up another thing, and I see it, and I'm really into this, and I stand up, and I go, oh, wow, very nice choice.
John: Like, you have a really good eye.
John: That is a pair of Cordovan Aldens, but, you know, sold by Brooks Brothers, and he puts them down.
John: And wanders around.
John: And then he comes and I'm just like, oh, Jesus.
Merlin: You're crushing the bunny.
John: And I sit down on the stool again.
John: And then he comes over and he buys, you know, like a pair of Chinese made socks that I'm selling just because I have to, you know, I have to have something in there that actually sells.
John: Wooden lighter cases.
John: Yeah.
John: Or then he comes over and he's like, can I use the bathroom or whatever?
John: And I'm just like, oh, nobody gives a shit about the stuff that I care about.
John: And I'm here to serve them.
John: Or he comes over and he says, do you have anything about Hugo Boss?
John: Or just something like that where I'm like, oh, fuck you.
John: No.
John: Get out of here.
John: Hit the streets.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: It's a recipe for heartbreak.
John: that's the thing I don't need to be any more sad no