Ep. 197: "Diamond Holes" - Roderick on the Line

00:00:00 Merlin: This episode of Roderick on the Line is brought to you by Casper.

00:00:04 Merlin: Casper is an online retailer of premium mattresses that you can get delivered to your door for a fraction of the price you pay in stores.

00:00:11 Merlin: To learn more now, visit casper.com slash super train.

00:00:21 Merlin: Hello.

00:00:22 Merlin: Hi, John.

00:00:23 Merlin: Hi, Merlin.

00:00:24 Merlin: How's it going?

00:00:26 Merlin: Pretty good.

00:00:27 John: It's been a while since we've talked.

00:00:30 Merlin: Yeah.

00:00:31 Merlin: Yeah.

00:00:31 Merlin: We usually record on Mondays like clockwork.

00:00:35 Merlin: It's like clockwork, although it wasn't always, was it?

00:00:40 Merlin: We recorded on Tuesdays, I think, at one point.

00:00:43 Merlin: Yeah.

00:00:44 Merlin: We're pretty clockworky.

00:00:45 Merlin: Are you aware we are on episode 197 of this show?

00:00:50 John: You're kidding me.

00:00:51 Merlin: That's like 13,000 hours.

00:00:53 John: What does that mean?

00:00:55 John: When we get to 200, what's going to happen?

00:00:57 John: I don't know.

00:00:58 John: Flip the odometer?

00:00:59 John: I don't know.

00:01:00 John: I feel like at 200, one of us should die in some kind of fiery car wreck.

00:01:06 John: And then it's just whatever.

00:01:08 John: It's just complete.

00:01:09 John: It's a box.

00:01:11 Merlin: You're saying maybe you and me, we do a Thelma and Louise?

00:01:14 Merlin: Yeah.

00:01:15 Merlin: Wouldn't people love that?

00:01:17 Merlin: You're a pretty good driver.

00:01:19 Merlin: We just slowly drive the RV off a cliff.

00:01:23 Merlin: Grrr.

00:01:23 Merlin: Almost there.

00:01:27 John: 197 episodes.

00:01:33 John: That's really something.

00:01:34 John: That's the best news I've had all day.

00:01:37 Merlin: Oh, I'm so glad.

00:01:38 Merlin: It's good to hear your voice.

00:01:39 Merlin: Yeah, it's nice to hear your voice.

00:01:41 Woo.

00:01:42 Merlin: Is that right?

00:01:44 Merlin: Oh, yeah, I'm back.

00:01:44 Merlin: You know, yeah, I got a lot to talk about.

00:01:46 Merlin: Yeah, I'm back.

00:01:47 Merlin: Shady's back.

00:01:48 Merlin: That's true.

00:01:49 Merlin: Mom's spaghetti.

00:01:51 Merlin: Uh-huh.

00:01:52 John: The whole nine.

00:01:54 Merlin: Spaghetti incident.

00:01:54 Merlin: The last episode really sent me back to some old 80s rap.

00:01:59 Merlin: Oh, did you go through a little mode?

00:02:01 Yeah.

00:02:01 Merlin: Well, you know, we've talked about Falco, and I guess Falco was kind of slightly famous for the original German version of Der Kommissar.

00:02:11 Merlin: Yeah, I think he was.

00:02:12 Merlin: But when Falco 3 came out, you know, my friend DJ made me a cassette, made me a little Maxell.

00:02:17 Merlin: It had Falco 3 on one side and whatever the breakthrough Robert Palmer album was on the other.

00:02:24 Merlin: Oh, uh-huh.

00:02:24 Merlin: The one with Addicted to Love and all that.

00:02:26 John: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:02:27 Merlin: And boy, what would that be?

00:02:28 Merlin: 1984?

00:02:29 Merlin: I think.

00:02:30 John: I think.

00:02:31 Merlin: Oh, man, that was a soundtrack for me.

00:02:34 Merlin: Putting that in the Jetta.

00:02:36 Merlin: Oh, no, I'm sorry, the rabbit.

00:02:37 Merlin: I didn't even have a car.

00:02:39 Merlin: Put it in other people's car.

00:02:40 Merlin: Put it in DJ's LeBaron.

00:02:42 Merlin: Vienna Calling.

00:02:43 Merlin: The LeBaron.

00:02:45 John: That was a class.

00:02:45 John: You know, that had Corinthian leather.

00:02:47 John: Oh, is that the one?

00:02:48 Merlin: Yeah.

00:02:48 John: No, I think it had the Chrysler Cordoba.

00:02:50 John: Oh, the Cordoba had Corinthian leather.

00:02:52 John: But, you know, the LeBaron was built on the same platform, maybe?

00:02:57 John: Yeah, yep, yep.

00:02:58 John: I don't know.

00:02:59 John: I don't want to get too deep into the Chrysler Marquet.

00:03:03 Merlin: You're going to get, was that from the French?

00:03:05 John: Yeah.

00:03:06 Merlin: You're going to get letters.

00:03:07 Merlin: You're going to get letters from the Chrysler fans.

00:03:08 John: Remember the K car?

00:03:09 John: Remember how terrible that was?

00:03:10 John: You know, I used to, the K car, obviously, for those of us who lived through that time, the K car was kind of a universal joke, an example of like the shitty car.

00:03:21 Merlin: I mean, it's like, how long did they take on that name?

00:03:24 Merlin: The K car?

00:03:24 Merlin: You used to have cars like you'd have a Charger or a Barracuda or a Comet.

00:03:30 Merlin: And now this is the K car, it's fine.

00:03:32 John: The K car, it's Special K. But I had a friend whose father was a bush pilot.

00:03:37 John: And their old car was like a 1968 Jeep pickup, which was probably the burliest.

00:03:51 John: It was just one increment below being a military-grade truck.

00:03:58 John: It was huge.

00:04:00 John: It's not what we think of as Jeep scale.

00:04:02 John: It was like...

00:04:03 John: sort of vietnam era jeep uh half or like three quarter ton pickup and uh and he only referred to it he never pronounced the j it was always the eep eep eep but his father at one point decided to get a new car and he bought a k car

00:04:25 John: a k-car wagon oh dear and oh it was laughing stock ha ha ha the k-car wagon lol oh no this is awful but did it have panels it didn't have panels it was even it was even lower grade than that and it had a manual transmission

00:04:45 John: Which I challenge you to find a K car.

00:04:49 John: Well, first of all, I challenge you to find a K car that still survives.

00:04:53 John: But find one with a manual transmission.

00:04:55 John: Even at the time, it was like you'd get in the car and you'd go, what the hell is that?

00:04:59 Merlin: What is this?

00:04:59 Merlin: By that time, I mean, I feel like the only reason to buy a manual at that point was to save $100.

00:05:07 Mm-hmm.

00:05:07 John: Honestly.

00:05:08 John: Yeah, this guy, as he was going down the sheet, he was just not ticking any box.

00:05:14 John: No, I don't want the undercoating.

00:05:15 John: No, I don't want the cloth on the inside.

00:05:22 John: I don't want a tachometer.

00:05:24 John: I don't want a clock.

00:05:25 John: They put that on at the factory.

00:05:26 John: I'll have to talk to my manager.

00:05:27 John: Yeah, no.

00:05:28 John: Oh, that true coat.

00:05:30 John: True coat, right.

00:05:32 John: But then you get in the thing and it was like this totally windy, like zippy, crazy little, I mean, it felt like you were driving a shoebox, but the manual transmission just brought it alive.

00:05:48 John: And all of a sudden, you know, he was beating like Scirocco's off the line in this K car.

00:05:53 John: And he drove the crap out of it.

00:05:57 John: But, but it, it was like at GTI level of acceleration in, in 1984.

00:06:03 John: Wow.

00:06:03 John: And I had to say, you know what?

00:06:07 John: K car.

00:06:08 John: Respect.

00:06:09 John: I can't, I can't say shit about K cars anymore.

00:06:13 John: And I don't even know what, where do you direct your ire at that point?

00:06:17 Merlin: Yeah.

00:06:18 John: The pacer, that's not even a contemporary thing anymore.

00:06:21 Merlin: Yeah.

00:06:23 Merlin: Yeah.

00:06:23 Merlin: You know, I'm looking at this now.

00:06:24 Merlin: And I mean, at the time, it struck me as very much an American car.

00:06:28 Merlin: But looking at it now, I mean, I'm not a car guy, but it looks a lot like a cheap Toyota.

00:06:34 Merlin: Yeah.

00:06:34 John: It looks like a Corolla or something.

00:06:36 John: Yeah.

00:06:36 John: It was their import killer.

00:06:40 John: Remember how every third car was like, oh, this one's the import killer.

00:06:45 Merlin: For all those years, people buying these crappy Japanese cars, you really want this old world American craftsmanship.

00:06:51 Merlin: That's right.

00:06:52 Merlin: This is the one.

00:06:53 John: It gets good gas mileage, this one, and it's going to kill all those Japanese cars that are pouring into our shores.

00:07:02 John: Didn't kill them.

00:07:04 John: Didn't kill them.

00:07:04 Merlin: Oh, yeah.

00:07:19 Merlin: You know?

00:07:20 Merlin: Sure.

00:07:21 Merlin: Often it would go in like sideways.

00:07:24 Merlin: Remember that?

00:07:25 Merlin: Of course.

00:07:26 Merlin: When I got my VW bus, one of the first things I did was I went to the audio place and had to put a little Sony stereo in it.

00:07:34 Merlin: Yeah, because you wanted to live.

00:07:35 Merlin: But of course it was a VW, so the windows leaked and then the speakers got all crackly.

00:07:39 Merlin: Did the engine ever catch on fire?

00:07:42 John: That's kind of a signature mode.

00:07:44 Merlin: I told you.

00:07:45 Merlin: I told you.

00:07:45 Merlin: I didn't change the oil enough and it seized up.

00:07:47 Yeah.

00:07:47 Merlin: Oh, tragedy.

00:07:49 John: I'm reading here the Chrysler K car platform.

00:07:52 John: They made them in all-wheel drive, which I have no way.

00:07:57 John: So looking down here at the possible options, you could get a 3.8 liter V8.

00:08:02 John: Oh, no, I'm sorry, V6.

00:08:04 John: Still.

00:08:05 John: It's a big motor.

00:08:06 John: You could get four-wheel drive.

00:08:09 John: There's even a four-door limousine.

00:08:11 John: Oh, right.

00:08:13 John: Look at that.

00:08:15 John: There was a convertible?

00:08:16 John: I don't know where.

00:08:17 John: I didn't see any of these.

00:08:19 John: 2.2 liter Turbo 4.

00:08:22 John: A turbo four, they put a Mitsubishi motor in it at one point.

00:08:26 John: Come on.

00:08:27 John: This was a hell of a car now that I'm seeing it.

00:08:29 Merlin: I just think of K cars as being, I mean, you know, they were even then kind of famously generic, but also it was always the driver's ed car.

00:08:38 Merlin: Oh, right.

00:08:39 Merlin: So your memories are of being like stuck in a car.

00:08:42 Merlin: Of course it had no air conditioning because they wouldn't pay for that.

00:08:45 Merlin: And you're stuck in there with a bunch of teenagers waiting to drive.

00:08:48 Merlin: You know, I worked at the...

00:08:51 John: I worked as a canvasser for the Public Interest Research Group, or PERG.

00:08:59 John: Are you kidding?

00:09:00 Merlin: No.

00:09:00 Merlin: That was almost my first grown-up job, working in Boston.

00:09:04 John: Yeah, I worked in Washington, D.C.

00:09:06 Merlin: What do they call it, WPERG?

00:09:07 Merlin: What do they call it?

00:09:08 John: It was US PERG.

00:09:09 John: US PERG.

00:09:10 John: And then it was sort of the era of the campaign to pass the Clean Air Act and support the Clean Air Act.

00:09:21 John: Clean Water Act.

00:09:22 John: We were working on a lot of acts.

00:09:24 John: Sure.

00:09:24 John: Just like the Apostle Paul.

00:09:26 John: We had a lot of acts to grind.

00:09:29 John: And so I moved over to the National Environmental Law Center, still working kind of as, at that point, a canvas manager where I was wrangling canvassers.

00:09:42 John: That was the opportunity that I had to chauffeur

00:09:45 John: uh, Ralph Nader around one afternoon.

00:09:48 John: That's right.

00:09:49 John: We should remind listeners that you had a Ralph, Ralph Nader period.

00:09:51 John: Yeah.

00:09:52 John: And that, uh, during those days we were driving K cars, right?

00:09:58 John: Like in the morning we would have a big meeting.

00:10:00 John: There'd be, uh, 80 kids all in the, you know, we'd get it pumped up.

00:10:05 John: Everybody had their clipboard.

00:10:07 John: It was like, all right, let's go out there and fight for the environment and get the water and the air and the Eagles and America go.

00:10:15 John: One time, the Kennedy that had kind of red curly hair, he didn't look like a Kennedy in the same way that Sonny didn't look like a Corleone.

00:10:31 John: Oh, sure.

00:10:32 John: You know what I mean?

00:10:32 John: This guy's not really even Italian.

00:10:36 John: How did he get the...

00:10:37 John: What is he doing here?

00:10:38 John: He's got the undershirt, but the hair doesn't match.

00:10:41 John: The hair doesn't match.

00:10:42 John: And there's the one Kennedy that's like the son of Robert, maybe.

00:10:47 John: The Kennedys were not above putting somebody in an attic.

00:10:50 John: No, no, no, that's right.

00:10:52 John: But he was a charismatic guy.

00:10:54 John: He was a congressman, right?

00:10:56 John: Which one was he?

00:10:57 John: George Kennedy?

00:10:58 John: No, he was a different guy.

00:10:59 John: I think he was the Blue Knight.

00:11:00 John: Fred Kennedy.

00:11:01 John: Hey, no man can eat 50 eggs.

00:11:05 Merlin: But this Kennedy came one morning.

00:11:08 Merlin: George would be so great.

00:11:10 Merlin: If it turned out all along, George Kennedy was part of a whole Hyannis Port crowd.

00:11:16 Yeah.

00:11:17 John: The whole time.

00:11:21 John: Let's see.

00:11:23 John: What was his name?

00:11:23 John: This is going to drive me crazy.

00:11:25 John: He's an environmental Kennedy?

00:11:30 John: Yes, he was an environmental Kennedy.

00:11:33 John: He was an up-and-coming Kennedy.

00:11:36 John: He was a young Kennedy.

00:11:38 John: Jesus.

00:11:40 Merlin: I'm getting there.

00:11:41 Merlin: Okay, I'm on the Kennedy family tree.

00:11:43 Merlin: Who would he be a sibling of?

00:11:45 John: Let's see here.

00:11:49 Merlin: Was it Joe Kennedy?

00:11:50 Merlin: Young Joe Kennedy?

00:11:51 Merlin: No, I think young Joe was the one who died in that horrible accident.

00:11:56 Merlin: Well, young Joe had red hair.

00:11:59 Merlin: Joe, John, Rose, Kathleen, Eunice, Patricia, Bobby, Gene, and Ed, otherwise known as Ted.

00:12:10 Merlin: No.

00:12:11 Merlin: Ethel Skakel.

00:12:12 John: No, it wasn't Ethel.

00:12:15 Merlin: Anyway.

00:12:16 Merlin: William Cavendish, Marquis of Hardington.

00:12:18 Merlin: Maybe, maybe his, maybe he was.

00:12:20 Merlin: No, he married, he married Kathleen.

00:12:22 Yeah.

00:12:22 John: It could have been, it could have been Liev Schreiber.

00:12:25 John: I know, I always get the moment.

00:12:27 Merlin: Liev Schreiber and Sergeant Schreiber.

00:12:29 Merlin: It's a common mistake.

00:12:30 Yeah.

00:12:30 John: Anyway, he came by one time.

00:12:32 John: Isn't that a cool name?

00:12:33 Merlin: Wouldn't you love to be named Sergeant Shriver?

00:12:35 John: Sergeant Shriver.

00:12:35 John: Well, that's the thing about wasps, right?

00:12:37 John: They have the craziest names.

00:12:39 John: People with the first name McGeorge.

00:12:42 John: McGeorge Bundy.

00:12:43 John: What a terrific name.

00:12:44 John: How do you get the name McGeorge?

00:12:46 Merlin: They all have terrific names.

00:12:47 Merlin: McGeorge.

00:12:48 Merlin: McGeorge, come in.

00:12:50 Merlin: Now, okay, here we go.

00:12:52 Merlin: We got sons of Ted.

00:12:54 Merlin: No, he's not a son of Ted.

00:12:56 Merlin: Not a son of Ted.

00:12:56 Merlin: Okay.

00:12:57 John: I don't think so.

00:12:58 Merlin: You got Robert Shriver, William Kennedy Smith.

00:13:04 John: No, no.

00:13:04 John: He was a bad guy, William Kennedy Smith.

00:13:07 John: He was a date raper.

00:13:08 Merlin: Oh, was he the George Magazine guy?

00:13:10 Merlin: No.

00:13:11 Merlin: Which one was that?

00:13:11 John: George Magazine was John F.K.

00:13:14 John: Jr.

00:13:15 John: Oh, right.

00:13:15 John: John John.

00:13:16 John: John John.

00:13:18 John: Right.

00:13:18 John: No, let's see here.

00:13:20 Merlin: He was tall.

00:13:21 Merlin: He was charismatic.

00:13:22 Merlin: Just to be clear, I'm fine taking literally an hour and a half to do this.

00:13:26 Merlin: I'm just really enjoying the Kennedy family tree right now.

00:13:29 John: I feel like he was, you know, he came in, he had the Kennedy smile, but he looked a little bit like Sonny Corleone.

00:13:36 John: Uh, it was 1990.

00:13:38 John: He was in office.

00:13:40 John: He was in office at the time.

00:13:42 John: He was, um, he, you know, I'm, I'm seeing now how many redheaded Kennedys there are.

00:13:49 John: If you want to, if you want to really talk about redheaded Kennedys.

00:13:53 John: Yeah, no, I do.

00:13:54 John: I do.

00:13:55 John: Um, anyway, he came by.

00:13:57 John: So we were driving K cars a lot at that time.

00:14:00 John: And I came, that was, this is after the Alaska K car experience.

00:14:03 John: William Kennedy Smith.

00:14:05 John: No, no, no.

00:14:05 John: We talked about William Kennedy Smith already.

00:14:07 John: That's not him.

00:14:08 Merlin: Oh, sorry.

00:14:09 Merlin: I was confusing him with Patrick Joseph Kennedy.

00:14:12 Merlin: Patrick Joseph Kennedy?

00:14:15 Merlin: Let's talk about Patrick.

00:14:16 Merlin: I think it was Pat Kennedy.

00:14:18 John: Patrick... Oh, his eyes get kind of like... Yeah, I bet that's him.

00:14:24 John: Uh, ooh, no, no, no, that's not, no.

00:14:27 Merlin: God damn it, he's younger than I am.

00:14:29 John: He looks, uh, he looks, he looks like a Kennedy, a little fleshier than a typical Kennedy.

00:14:33 John: That's like somebody who works for a Kennedy.

00:14:36 John: Yeah, yeah, but then when he, when he starts, uh, when he starts pounding on the table, you're like, ah, there it is.

00:14:42 John: Uh-huh.

00:14:42 John: There's the Kennedy in him.

00:14:44 John: Yeah.

00:14:45 John: You know, I, the Kennedys have played an, uh, an outsized role probably in all of our lives, but in my family's life, I think, the Kennedys were always a,

00:14:55 John: What were they?

00:14:55 John: They were always a shadow that came across the land.

00:15:00 Merlin: For a lot of reasons.

00:15:02 Merlin: Yeah.

00:15:02 Merlin: I mean, honestly, I mean, you know, there's all you, you know, you grow up with friends, your Catholic friends have like pictures of Kennedy and the Pope in the house, right?

00:15:11 Merlin: That's a thing.

00:15:12 Merlin: That was actually a thing.

00:15:13 Merlin: And there's that whole sense of like the Camelot thing.

00:15:16 Merlin: There's the sense of like what was lost with that.

00:15:18 Merlin: But there's also that sense of like, why can't our family be like this?

00:15:21 Yeah.

00:15:21 John: Right, we're so close, and yet so far, they're just Americans, just like us.

00:15:28 John: They're not royalty.

00:15:31 John: How did they come to be royalty?

00:15:33 Merlin: You've got to really be willing to rig an election.

00:15:35 Merlin: You've got to pay off some Southern sheriffs.

00:15:37 Merlin: That helps a lot.

00:15:38 John: Well, and you've got to, yeah, you know what it is?

00:15:41 John: There's so much in life that is the product of just ambition.

00:15:45 John: which is a thing that you either have a lot of, a medium amount of, or none.

00:15:52 Merlin: Also, what it takes to scotch your ambition.

00:15:54 Merlin: You can be somebody who has a lot of ambition, but if it gets scotched easily, then it kind of dies, like a campfire.

00:16:02 John: I like that scotch your ambition.

00:16:03 John: Scotching the ambition.

00:16:05 John: I think about ambition all the time.

00:16:07 John: I think about my own ambition.

00:16:09 John: I think about other people's ambition.

00:16:10 John: You know, you read that you open those magazines and it's like 100 young people under 100.

00:16:15 John: Oh, those are really getting under my skin, John.

00:16:18 John: And you go, all right, let's see what's going on here.

00:16:20 John: And it's like, well, 80 of these had rich parents.

00:16:23 John: But some of these people really did say never say die.

00:16:27 John: Yep.

00:16:28 John: And you go.

00:16:28 Merlin: They had nobody even really encouraging them.

00:16:31 Merlin: No.

00:16:31 Merlin: And they still worked really hard.

00:16:33 Merlin: They did the stuff that they needed to do.

00:16:35 Merlin: They eventually got recognized, but it didn't even have a big impact.

00:16:37 Merlin: They're just like, whatever, it's another thing.

00:16:39 John: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:16:40 John: They were just go, go, go.

00:16:41 John: Let's, you know, deep, deep, deep.

00:16:44 John: And I admire it.

00:16:45 John: And I feel like it's another trait, like being able to throw a javelin.

00:16:51 John: And we all know not to, we watch the person throw the javelin on the Olympics and you say, wow, that's great.

00:17:01 John: But very few people say, I wish I could do that.

00:17:04 John: And almost no one measures themselves or their performance against the Olympic javelin thrower.

00:17:13 John: It's like, oh, you're right.

00:17:13 John: I'm not a javelin thrower.

00:17:15 John: I work in an office.

00:17:18 John: Right.

00:17:19 John: But to have a corresponding, like a trait that's maybe just as unusual or just as much a kind of

00:17:32 John: not a product of environment, not a question of how you were raised or educated, but just something that you came onto this planet pre-equipped with to sit in your basement laboratory and work on a thing until you have devised something as universally life-changing as the segue.

00:17:53 John: Or, you know, like somebody who just has a single-minded dedication to...

00:18:00 John: either science or or business or whatever but we we we all kind of measure ourselves against those people right and you know and search our history and search ourselves like why did i not why am i not capable of this level of achievement but i really do i really do suspect that it's

00:18:23 John: that it's a trait kind of like almost like the color of your eyes.

00:18:28 John: I don't know.

00:18:30 John: But, you know, like not to dive too deeply into this, but like you were in San Francisco through the whole boom.

00:18:38 John: You knew all those guys.

00:18:40 John: They respected you and loved you.

00:18:42 John: And, you know, you were like a person, a known person in that time.

00:18:52 John: But you didn't, and it's not like you weren't, it's not like you were any less brilliant.

00:18:58 John: Um, but you didn't, you didn't decide to make an app counting.

00:19:02 Merlin: Oh, right.

00:19:03 Merlin: I didn't, I didn't achieve.

00:19:04 Merlin: I didn't achieve.

00:19:05 John: Well, or just like you didn't, you didn't super achieve.

00:19:08 John: There are so many, so many of those people that were just kind of wandering around the same chat rooms that you were, who were like, you know what, what we need right now is an app that, or, you know, or invented the app or invented the word blog or whatever.

00:19:22 Merlin: Yeah.

00:19:23 Merlin: But, you know, the other thing about I like your javelin example, because I think that's somewhat indicative of why this becomes complicated.

00:19:29 Merlin: Like you've met, you've had good hamburgers and bad hamburgers in your life.

00:19:33 Merlin: And in a given month, you've probably had a handful of hamburgers.

00:19:36 Merlin: You go, this one's really good.

00:19:37 Merlin: This one's not.

00:19:38 Merlin: The problem is you're only probably aware of like one javelin person.

00:19:41 Merlin: And that's somebody who's in the Olympics.

00:19:43 Merlin: So you might look at javelin and go like, hey, that's a thing I could do.

00:19:45 Merlin: Or like Fonzie with snatching the coins off his arm.

00:19:48 Merlin: See, I disagree somewhat in that I would often see an obscure talent on TV and then think this is going to be my ticket.

00:19:56 Merlin: And for a while, I thought it was snatching coins off my arm.

00:20:00 Merlin: Really?

00:20:00 John: I was a latchkey child.

00:20:02 John: Did you try that for a long time?

00:20:04 Merlin: Got some rolls of pennies.

00:20:06 Merlin: I unrolled them.

00:20:07 Merlin: And then I would see how many I could do.

00:20:09 Merlin: And what was your top run?

00:20:12 Merlin: I don't remember.

00:20:13 Merlin: I just remember pennies scattering all over the living room.

00:20:16 Merlin: And now I'm also just perplexed by the idea that somebody wrote an episode of Happy Days that was mostly about snatching coins off your elbow.

00:20:25 Merlin: Do you remember that?

00:20:27 Merlin: Was this the Jump the Shark era?

00:20:30 Merlin: This might be a fever dream, John.

00:20:33 Merlin: I'm pretty sure there was an episode of Happy Days.

00:20:35 Merlin: And I don't even think it was like an 80s Happy Days.

00:20:37 Merlin: I think it was still while Fonzie was wearing a white shirt.

00:20:39 Merlin: I could be wrong.

00:20:41 Merlin: I was in Ohio.

00:20:42 Merlin: I do remember this.

00:20:43 Merlin: And there was an episode that involved the ability to stack a bunch of coins.

00:20:48 Merlin: So basically, imagine that you're bending your arm so that your palm is almost on your shoulder facing up.

00:20:53 Merlin: Your forearm is parallel with the ground.

00:20:56 Merlin: You stack coins just above where your elbow would be, and then you go snap, and you see how many coins you can grab off of your elbow using your hand.

00:21:05 John: Oh, yeah, I was all over this.

00:21:07 Merlin: And then Fonzie got involved in a competition about this.

00:21:10 Merlin: is what I remember.

00:21:11 Merlin: So somebody wrote that.

00:21:12 Merlin: Somebody was spitballing that.

00:21:13 Merlin: And this could be cocaine.

00:21:14 Merlin: This could very easily be cocaine.

00:21:15 John: It seems to me that this was one of those things where you're sitting around and you're like, oh, we've got to come up with an episode.

00:21:21 John: We've got to come up with another thing.

00:21:22 John: And it's like, what can you do, Henry Winkler?

00:21:25 John: And he's like, well, I mean, I can stick a cigarette up my nose.

00:21:27 John: They're like, I don't think so.

00:21:30 John: It's like, have you ever seen this?

00:21:32 John: And he snapped the coins and they were like, that's it.

00:21:37 Merlin: Okay, I found a clip on YouTube.

00:21:40 Merlin: It's back.

00:21:41 Merlin: They're still at Arnold's.

00:21:43 Merlin: Fonzie is in the white t-shirt.

00:21:44 Merlin: He has not moved to the black t-shirt, the slimming black t-shirt.

00:21:46 Merlin: So he's still in the white t-shirt.

00:21:50 Merlin: And it looks like, oh, and look, here's a video of Henry Winkler doing the trick today.

00:21:53 Merlin: Look at that.

00:21:54 Merlin: He can still do it.

00:21:55 Merlin: I guess so.

00:21:55 Merlin: He seems like a very gifted guy.

00:22:00 John: Now, for those of you at home who were shouting at me about the Kennedys, it was Joe Kennedy 2.

00:22:08 John: Oh, Electric Boogaloo.

00:22:11 Oh.

00:22:11 John: He was the oldest son of Robert F. Kennedy.

00:22:16 John: So RFK's oldest boy, born in 52, which means he was eight years old when his uncle was elected president.

00:22:25 John: He was there for the whole show.

00:22:27 John: Okay, wait, wait.

00:22:27 John: Give me that name again.

00:22:28 John: Joe P. Kennedy II.

00:22:30 John: Joe P. Kennedy II.

00:22:31 Merlin: Joe P. Kennedy, too.

00:22:34 John: Eldest grandson of Joe P. Kennedy, Sr.

00:22:39 John: I met the man.

00:22:40 John: He was wonderful.

00:22:43 John: And he was in the House of Representatives until 1999.

00:22:49 Merlin: Patrick Joseph Kennedy, too?

00:22:51 John: No, Joseph P. Kennedy.

00:22:52 John: Oh, for the love of Christ, they all have the same name.

00:22:54 John: I know.

00:22:55 John: And then there's Kennedy P. Kennedy, too.

00:22:58 John: There's Kennedy P. Kennedy the Kennedy.

00:23:00 John: There's P.P.

00:23:01 Merlin: Kennedy.

00:23:02 Merlin: P.P.

00:23:02 Merlin: Kennedy.

00:23:03 Merlin: I was just reading about Rosemary's lobotomy.

00:23:05 Merlin: You know, Joe asked for that.

00:23:06 Merlin: Joe asked that Rosemary be lobotomized in 1941.

00:23:09 John: He regretted it the rest of his life.

00:23:10 Merlin: He did.

00:23:11 John: Was that a fact?

00:23:12 John: Yep.

00:23:13 John: You know, Hodgman met Kick Kennedy.

00:23:17 John: Oh, Kick Kennedy, Kennedy, the Joe second.

00:23:20 John: Kick Kennedy.

00:23:21 John: He was at the Chateau Marmont and he was talking to somebody and he was like, wow, I met this person today.

00:23:28 John: And she was so dynamic and so like captivating.

00:23:32 John: Well, she was so cute.

00:23:33 John: Her name was Kick.

00:23:35 John: Who was?

00:23:36 Merlin: uh oh this is kathleen kaffen dish otherwise known as kick is there a younger kick well so yeah there's a contemporary kick oh my goodness there's a there's a millennial kick oh yeah she's got the job look at her yep she could be on a television program john he talked to her for a while uh not realizing that she was a kennedy and came away from the experience thinking like wow what a dynamic person and then later on

00:24:00 John: Somebody was like, oh, you mean Kennedy?

00:24:02 John: He was like... Yeah, right, right, right.

00:24:05 John: Because, you know, he's a Bostonian, right?

00:24:08 John: The Kennedys don't... I mean, you know... And a liberal.

00:24:11 John: It's not a real college town.

00:24:13 John: Yeah.

00:24:15 John: So, yeah, so Joe Kennedy.

00:24:17 John: I didn't mean to derail, though, what we were talking about, which was, oh, right, the Kennedys.

00:24:24 John: No, I didn't derail it at all.

00:24:25 Merlin: Like all world records, apparently, the world record is called coin snatching.

00:24:31 Merlin: And like all world records, it's come a long way.

00:24:34 Merlin: Back in 1973, and all of these are apparently held by people in Great Britain.

00:24:39 Merlin: So maybe there's something about the coins there.

00:24:41 Merlin: In 1973, the record was 39 coins.

00:24:45 Merlin: By 1985, you get up to 70 coins.

00:24:49 Merlin: A man called Dean Gould, as of April 1993, and I don't know how long ago this page was updated, he's caught 328 coins, and there's an amazing photo of him snatching coin.

00:25:00 John: This is incredible.

00:25:00 John: But then underneath it, it says the record for a perfect catch with no drops is 100 coins.

00:25:07 John: Also by Dean Gould.

00:25:09 Merlin: Okay.

00:25:09 John: What does that mean?

00:25:11 John: What does that mean?

00:25:11 John: No drops.

00:25:12 Merlin: Oh, I see.

00:25:13 Merlin: The idea is, oh, you just see his spray and pray, right?

00:25:16 Merlin: You just, you do as many as you can.

00:25:17 Merlin: You catch what you can.

00:25:18 Merlin: That's, that seems pretty lame.

00:25:20 Merlin: Well, so he puts 500 coins.

00:25:22 Merlin: So it explodes.

00:25:23 Merlin: 290 coins fly everywhere and he catches 100.

00:25:26 Merlin: Boy, talk about venture capital, am I right?

00:25:29 John: Whoa.

00:25:30 John: But this is very impressive.

00:25:32 John: Like 328 coins.

00:25:35 John: This begs the question, how many coins can someone stack on their arm?

00:25:39 Merlin: That's a whole different question.

00:25:41 Merlin: I'm very interested.

00:25:41 Merlin: I don't think I could even afford to do this stunt.

00:25:43 Merlin: I don't think I have the cash reserve to be able to even attempt that, let alone the arm strength.

00:25:47 John: Yeah, I want to see like...

00:25:50 John: Basically, the world record for the number of coins a person can stack on their body at any time and still be standing on their feet.

00:25:58 John: I don't want you laying on the ground how many coins you can stack.

00:26:01 John: I want you to be standing on your feet with your arms spread wide, presumably.

00:26:05 John: Yes.

00:26:06 John: And then how many coins can you stack on this person?

00:26:09 Merlin: Just for what it's worth, I get the feeling from looking at Google Images, Dean Gould of the United Kingdom, he's moved on from coins.

00:26:16 Merlin: Now he's all about catching bar coasters.

00:26:20 John: Well, so, yeah, right there.

00:26:22 John: They have a little bit more hang time.

00:26:24 John: I guess so.

00:26:25 John: What's crazy for me here is that this world records for coin snatching has no – there are no hyperlinks.

00:26:32 John: You can't meet Andrew Glead.

00:26:34 John: You can't talk about – you can't go to see Chris Redford or –

00:26:38 Merlin: like and you know andrew gleed stayed in the running all the way through the 90s i wonder if he got sick or something andrew gleed was right in the running up until the early 90s he started in 78 and he and dean gould were going head to head starting in the mid 80s when the first big coin jump happened that's right oh you like 132 how do you like 140 oh really let me try 150 see how that goes yeah gleed is like 151 and then gould is like boom 186 in your face and dean andrew gleed says you know what this is far from done let's try 217 just

00:27:06 Merlin: 217.

00:27:07 Merlin: Glead was the first one to go above 200.

00:27:09 Merlin: And then there was a prophecy.

00:27:10 John: One day there would be one who would do 248.

00:27:13 John: Stuart May.

00:27:14 John: He's just some prodigy, some kid that comes in off the street and then probably suffered an aneurysm or ended up as a chess person.

00:27:25 John: Choked on a Scottish egg.

00:27:27 John: And then Gould comes back.

00:27:29 John: 254.

00:27:29 John: Boom.

00:27:30 Merlin: The Re28, suck it.

00:27:32 Merlin: Oh, my gosh.

00:27:33 Merlin: You know, Stuart May, I bet being Stuart May is a little bit like being a slightly well-known podcaster, where, first of all, nobody knows who you are, and then, second, you have to explain why someone would know who you are, and that makes it horribly awkward.

00:27:44 Merlin: Yeah, right.

00:27:45 Merlin: So you did what now?

00:27:46 Merlin: Well, here's the thing.

00:27:47 Merlin: It was back in March of 1991.

00:27:48 Merlin: Let me explain.

00:27:49 Merlin: It was in March.

00:27:50 Merlin: I was around the 20th of March, 1991.

00:27:52 Merlin: I put 248 coins on my arm, and I caught them.

00:27:56 Merlin: Okay.

00:27:57 Merlin: And Stuart May, that's your name?

00:27:59 Merlin: Yeah.

00:27:59 Merlin: Oh, Stuart May.

00:28:01 John: I met Ben Gibber once.

00:28:05 John: I was reading some article where it talked – invariably, you end up talking to the – I guess the same 100 people.

00:28:14 John: But they were talking to –

00:28:16 John: Teller, right?

00:28:18 John: Yeah, of Pennant.

00:28:20 John: Of Pennant.

00:28:21 John: And Teller to me has always been the interesting one or the one that I've wanted to know more about probably because he didn't talk and that makes you want to know more.

00:28:30 John: But he was saying kind of this, he had an origin story like so many successful people where he was like, I was eight years old and they had an offer for a magic kit on the Howdy Doody show.

00:28:47 John: And I sent away for it with three box tops and half a pickle.

00:28:53 John: And they sent me the magic kit and it came and it was like totally shoddy and garbage.

00:28:59 John: It was like the sea monkeys except...

00:29:03 John: made of cardboard but it did a trick and I figured out the trick and on Christmas morning I showed all my relatives the trick and they all politely applauded and that hooked me on magic forever and you know I read those stories and I'm like well yeah I did the same thing I got the magic kit from the Howdy Doody show and I learned the one trick

00:29:25 John: And it made me want to become a consumer advocate.

00:29:29 John: Yeah, I got you want to become the Ralph Nader of magic.

00:29:32 John: Yeah, I was like, this is horseshit.

00:29:34 John: You know, I did the trick.

00:29:36 John: The people in the family clapped and it gave me no feeling at all.

00:29:40 John: Like it didn't it didn't fill up the void inside me.

00:29:44 John: Just, you know, the thing fell apart in my hands and I was like, maybe I'll be a lawyer.

00:29:48 John: You know, I didn't have that moment.

00:29:52 John: And multiple times over the course of my life, right, a thousand times, I've held some Excalibur in my hands and tried to pull it from the stone.

00:30:03 John: And half the time did pull it from the stone.

00:30:06 John: And then I was like, eh, that was pretty good.

00:30:07 John: And put it back in the stone for the next guy.

00:30:10 John: Yeah, sure.

00:30:10 John: That's a polite thing to do.

00:30:11 John: It's like putting the seat down.

00:30:12 John: Yeah, what do you take this Excalibur and you think it's yours?

00:30:15 Merlin: You don't just leave it by the stone.

00:30:16 Merlin: Well, you know, I feel like that's a little rude.

00:30:21 Merlin: It would be like walking up to a water fountain, taking a drink, and then tearing it off the wall.

00:30:27 Merlin: Sure.

00:30:27 Merlin: That Excalibur was like, I'm sure that people... I assumed this was for me.

00:30:32 Merlin: I have to take every flag I see.

00:30:35 John: People in the neighborhood were using that as a way of navigating around.

00:30:39 John: Like, oh, you go up to the sword in the stone, you take the left, you know, and then all of a sudden the sword is gone.

00:30:45 John: It's like, ah, you see the stone with the kind of sword-shaped hole?

00:30:49 Merlin: You'll see it when you get there.

00:30:50 Merlin: It's the ultimate example of imperialism.

00:30:53 Merlin: You just assume that if you find something and can take it, it should be yours.

00:30:58 Merlin: Sure.

00:30:59 Merlin: Not only that, but the ability to steal something that used to be community property now makes you the king.

00:31:06 Merlin: It makes you the king, right?

00:31:07 Merlin: I'm the king now.

00:31:08 John: All of a sudden, boom, you're Mr. Big Wheel.

00:31:11 John: And I'm sure that's what Teller did with the fake magic box.

00:31:15 John: And, like, everybody's pulling swords from stones all around us and walking out into the world like, well, now I'm the king.

00:31:20 John: Because, I mean, what it meant, of course, was that Teller then pursued 17 years of single-minded...

00:31:28 John: like learning card tricks and making people making uh quarters appear in people's ears right yeah and then uh and then he's a genius and so so i'm wondering what it is inside me or you or most people or or i guess it's a better asked what is inside them where it really was a switch and then they just knew what they wanted to do

00:31:51 John: I mean, I had that conversation with Paul F. Tompkins one time where I was like, yeah, you know, comedy seems like a doable thing.

00:31:57 John: I like to make people laugh.

00:31:59 John: Sure.

00:32:00 John: My friends tell me I'm funny.

00:32:01 John: Yeah.

00:32:01 John: And he said, I have never wanted to do anything else, and I have done only this my entire adult life.

00:32:07 John: From the time I was a young boy, I wanted to be a comedian, and I have pursued it single-mindedly my whole life.

00:32:12 John: And in a way, he was saying, no, comedy is not a fun thing that you can just do.

00:32:19 John: And I was like, okay, that's received.

00:32:22 John: But at the same time, he's absolutely right, right?

00:32:24 John: I mean, I wanted to be a comedian when I was 10 years old, but I also wanted to be an astronaut and a sword juggler or whatever.

00:32:31 Merlin: You also, like, whatever it is that you do, and I'm trying not to go too far into my other persona here, but part of it is also you got, there's got to be something about the business of what you do, not necessarily the economics and finance of it, but there's got to be something about the business of what you do that you find you are...

00:32:47 Merlin: either really good at um and or enjoy doing like you know like you arguing with the guy with the cigar and the roll hundred dollar bills about getting paid for a gig like if you can't get with that as part of your job then that's going to be a tough job for you right there's got to be the thing is it's one thing like we always notice this one thing about it we go like oh yeah you know um i like to ride around in cars i'd probably be a great mechanic

00:33:10 Merlin: It's like, well, not necessarily.

00:33:11 Merlin: I mean, do you like invoicing?

00:33:13 Merlin: There's a lot to it beyond just enjoying that field.

00:33:17 Merlin: And I think comedy is definitely like that.

00:33:19 John: Well, my sister was walking around a party the other day, as she sometimes does, asking everybody the same question.

00:33:27 Merlin: Was it about joy, John?

00:33:29 John: In a way.

00:33:30 John: In a way.

00:33:31 John: She was saying to everybody...

00:33:33 John: what is the one thing that you unashamedly would say that you were good at?

00:33:40 John: Like not, you don't qualify it.

00:33:44 John: It doesn't have to be anything big or, or impressive, but what's the one thing that you will say, you know, without shame, um,

00:33:52 John: I'm actually good at this, right?

00:33:54 John: Like people say, are you good at ping pong?

00:33:56 John: And you go, yeah, I'm all right at ping pong.

00:33:58 John: And maybe you're killer at ping pong.

00:34:00 John: Maybe you can't play at all.

00:34:01 John: But most people are like, yeah, I mean, I can play.

00:34:03 John: Yeah, I'm fine at ping pong.

00:34:04 John: Yeah, I'm pretty good at pool, I guess, you know.

00:34:07 John: But what's the one thing that you are just like, yeah, I'm good at that.

00:34:13 John: I'm actually good at that.

00:34:14 John: And she was going around and getting like surprise answers like,

00:34:19 John: Um, I'm actually, you know, her answer was I'm really good at snowboarding and skiing and everything else in my life, photography, you know, dancing, whatever I'm, you know, like, yeah, these are things that I'm pursuing.

00:34:32 John: Photography is my passion, but I will walk into any room in the world, stand up at the lectern and say, I'm fucking great at skiing.

00:34:41 John: And, you know, and she's right.

00:34:43 John: And, and so I'm standing next to her and, and, you know, and there was a, uh, uh,

00:34:47 John: Like a lot of different answers.

00:34:48 John: A young lady I know well was like dancing.

00:34:53 John: And I looked at her and I was like, dancing?

00:34:54 John: You dance?

00:34:55 John: And she was like, yeah, I'm a great dancer.

00:34:58 John: That's the one thing that I would say.

00:34:59 John: I've never even seen you dance.

00:35:01 John: At which point my sister's boyfriend said, I've never even seen Susan ski.

00:35:06 John: But these are the things that they're like, this is the thing that I'm actually good at.

00:35:09 John: And then so they turned to me and they're like, what's the thing that you're actually good at?

00:35:12 John: What is the one thing you would say?

00:35:15 John: And I was like, uh, uh, ping pong.

00:35:20 John: Like, I don't, I don't even, I don't even know.

00:35:22 John: Talking extemporaneously.

00:35:25 John: Is that a thing you can say?

00:35:26 Merlin: It's just, but it's also like, I'm with you.

00:35:28 Merlin: It's also just not how I think.

00:35:30 Merlin: it's not how I think about myself and other people.

00:35:34 Merlin: I think it's a difference.

00:35:35 Merlin: And I'm not saying, I mean, first of all, I agree with you.

00:35:37 Merlin: Like I would hate to be put on the spot like that.

00:35:39 Merlin: I would feel the need as a funny guy to come up with some kind of an answer.

00:35:42 Merlin: Like I'm really good at doing the dishes at the last minute or something.

00:35:46 Merlin: But like, I honestly, I couldn't tell you.

00:35:47 Merlin: And that's actually not how I think about myself.

00:35:50 Merlin: It would be, I would have to make something up.

00:35:53 John: Well, yeah.

00:35:54 John: And, and,

00:35:55 John: That's how I felt too.

00:35:56 John: I don't know.

00:36:01 John: Extemporaneous speaking?

00:36:03 John: Yeah, right.

00:36:05 John: What is the thing where you walk into a room and you feel like you're fine?

00:36:08 John: I can do that.

00:36:11 John: Oh, yeah.

00:36:13 John: If you handed me a microphone right now and told me to go up on the stage and keep everybody's attention distracted for 45 minutes while we conduct this bank robbery across the street.

00:36:25 John: Oh, look at me.

00:36:26 John: Like I would get up to the microphone and be like, excuse me, everybody.

00:36:29 John: Hi.

00:36:30 John: So anyway, one time, you know, and I could do that.

00:36:35 What is that?

00:36:37 John: And the thing is, there are way funnier people than me.

00:36:39 John: There are way smarter people than me.

00:36:43 John: I wouldn't even claim to get up there and actually be entertaining for that 45 minutes, but I could do it without...

00:36:50 John: without fear.

00:36:52 Merlin: Yes.

00:36:53 Merlin: That's definitely unusual.

00:36:55 Merlin: I feel the same way on that one.

00:36:56 Merlin: Yeah, definitely unusual.

00:36:58 Merlin: I think we're both probably pretty fun in the room.

00:37:00 Merlin: We're super annoying on a podcast, but in the room, I think we're both pretty good with people.

00:37:03 Merlin: Yeah, pretty good.

00:37:04 Merlin: People would be surprised

00:37:07 Merlin: To hang out with us, I think.

00:37:09 Merlin: We are much less insufferable than you would guess.

00:37:11 John: I've seen this happen.

00:37:13 John: When the Long Winters play in San Francisco, Merlin generally comes to the show.

00:37:18 John: And then after the show, everybody's standing around, right?

00:37:21 John: There's a lot of people there.

00:37:22 John: They're all happy to be there.

00:37:24 John: It's a rock show.

00:37:26 John: They've seen their favorite band or a band that they like.

00:37:30 John: that they don't get to see that often, and they're socializing with each other and stand around the merch table.

00:37:35 John: And then you look across the room, and there's Merlin, and there are between six and ten people standing around Merlin, just trying to get into the action.

00:37:46 John: Does that mean including security?

00:37:49 John: Security is watching, right?

00:37:52 John: They're hanging back.

00:37:53 John: They're hanging back.

00:37:53 John: But, you know, you're holding court a little bit.

00:37:56 John: I'll hold some court.

00:37:57 John: You hold court.

00:37:58 John: Well, I love to hold a little court.

00:38:00 John: And it's very fun.

00:38:01 John: People are – it's social.

00:38:04 John: It's like this is a – yeah, right.

00:38:06 John: Okay, that's it.

00:38:07 Merlin: Holding court.

00:38:08 Merlin: Is that a thing?

00:38:09 Merlin: Okay, you know what?

00:38:10 Merlin: I'll do that.

00:38:11 Merlin: Yeah, sure, holding court.

00:38:11 Merlin: I was going to say either –

00:38:13 Merlin: Having a near certainty that everybody in the room is very close to permanently hating you.

00:38:19 Merlin: I'm great at that.

00:38:20 Merlin: And I'm also pretty good at being amusing in a certain context for up to 90 seconds.

00:38:27 Merlin: That seems a little too precious.

00:38:29 Merlin: You're supposed to say something like, I make great cookies.

00:38:32 Merlin: Yeah.

00:38:33 Merlin: This is like, I'm remembering a wonderful episode of the TV program, The Simpsons, where Mrs. Hoover thinks she has Lyme disease, and so Dustin Hoffman comes in.

00:38:42 Merlin: He's Mr. Bergstrom.

00:38:43 Merlin: Remember?

00:38:43 Merlin: He comes in, and he's the nice teacher, and he goes around, and he asks all the kids what they can do.

00:38:47 Merlin: It doesn't matter how stupid it is.

00:38:48 Merlin: If you can make a face, and you're the best person in the world at that, and he makes all the kids feel good about themselves.

00:38:53 Merlin: I could use a Mr. Bergstrom today.

00:38:55 Merlin: Aw, man.

00:38:55 Merlin: Me too.

00:38:55 Merlin: I woke up.

00:38:57 Merlin: John, that is the only episode of The Simpsons that still consistently makes me cry every single time I watch it.

00:39:03 Merlin: Because you remember how it ends?

00:39:04 Merlin: It ends with Mr. Bergstrom leaving on the train and he gives Lisa a note.

00:39:09 Merlin: Remember that?

00:39:09 Merlin: And it says, I am Lisa Simpson.

00:39:12 Merlin: Or you are Lisa Simpson.

00:39:14 Merlin: Okay, I'll cut that out.

00:39:15 Merlin: I got the quote wrong.

00:39:16 Merlin: But it still makes me cry.

00:39:17 Merlin: Yeah.

00:39:17 Merlin: Are you crying now?

00:39:18 Merlin: You are Lisa Simpson.

00:39:19 Merlin: I'm crying inside.

00:39:20 Merlin: I'm good.

00:39:20 John: I'm good.

00:39:21 Merlin: I'm really good at crying inside.

00:39:23 John: I really want, I want to just come up, come right out and say the first time I saw the Simpsons, I was in Little Rock, Arkansas.

00:39:31 John: And you'll notice that I pronounce it L-I-L, Lowell Rock.

00:39:34 Merlin: Lowell Rock.

00:39:35 John: Because that's how it's pronounced.

00:39:36 John: Lowell Rock, Arkansas.

00:39:37 John: And I was, like, crashing on some guy's floor.

00:39:40 John: And Lowell Rock.

00:39:42 John: And he said, have you ever seen The Simpsons?

00:39:45 John: And it was 1990, I think.

00:39:48 Merlin: But it was already kind of a phenomenon, probably.

00:39:50 John: Yeah, it was going on by this point.

00:39:52 John: And I said, no, I guess I haven't.

00:39:55 John: I mean, I've seen Life in Hell on the back page of many alternative newspapers, and I think it's very funny.

00:40:01 Merlin: He's from Portland, right?

00:40:03 Merlin: Or not Portland, but Portland area.

00:40:05 Merlin: So he was probably a phenom in the PNW at that point, right?

00:40:07 Merlin: Yeah, he went to read.

00:40:09 John: He was one of the alternative comic strip...

00:40:14 Merlin: He had one of the best strips in your local liberal throwaway paper, for sure.

00:40:20 Merlin: I love Life in Hell.

00:40:20 Merlin: I had a Life in Hell book before The Simpsons.

00:40:22 Merlin: I love Life in Hell.

00:40:23 Merlin: How did you feel about Zippy the Pinhead?

00:40:25 Merlin: I enjoyed Zippy the Pinhead for its da-da humor.

00:40:29 Merlin: I didn't always get Zippy, but I liked the idea of Zippy.

00:40:32 Merlin: Yeah, right.

00:40:32 Merlin: Or Bizarro.

00:40:34 Merlin: Yeah, I liked all of those.

00:40:35 Merlin: Yeah, that was good stuff.

00:40:36 Merlin: A lot of good stuff out there.

00:40:37 Merlin: Bizarro, you cut those out and put them on the fridge.

00:40:39 John: Sure, of course.

00:40:40 John: Those were like... Those were what you call Way Homer.

00:40:43 John: Those were like mini TED Talks.

00:40:47 John: Bizarro was the original TED Talk.

00:40:48 John: It was the original Turns Out comic strip.

00:40:53 John: But, you know, Life in Hell with the enigmatic one-eared rabbit.

00:40:57 John: And the two little guys in fezes that appeared to love each other and appeared to be gay.

00:41:01 Merlin: Akbar and Jeff.

00:41:02 Merlin: Yeah, those were all wonderful characters.

00:41:03 Merlin: Akbar and Jeff.

00:41:04 Merlin: Brothers?

00:41:05 Merlin: Lovers?

00:41:05 John: Or both?

00:41:06 John: Or both.

00:41:08 John: But so I'm in Little Rock, Arkansas, and this guy sits me down.

00:41:12 John: I think probably puts a bong in my lap and then puts in a VHS cassette.

00:41:18 John: and forces me to watch between 14 and 40 VHS-recorded Simpsons episodes.

00:41:27 John: Oh, I don't know if that's the best way to do it.

00:41:29 John: Starting at number one and all the way with the kind of VHS-like skew problems along the top of the screen.

00:41:36 John: Yep, yep, yep, yep.

00:41:37 John: Until I felt like I was in Clockwork Orange.

00:41:41 John: He got a Ludovico technique.

00:41:42 John: Just like, no, not another one, not another one.

00:41:44 John: He was like, no, no, no, you got to watch the next one.

00:41:46 John: It's amazing.

00:41:47 John: And from, uh, from that experience, right?

00:41:51 John: Like I, I eventually left little rock in a daze, um, uh, maybe dragging the bong.

00:42:00 John: I don't know.

00:42:00 John: Uh, and, uh,

00:42:03 John: From that point on, if I stumbled upon a Simpsons episode as I was flipping through the channels in a hotel, I would greedily watch it, yes.

00:42:15 John: I mean, it's not like it turned me off the Simpsons.

00:42:18 John: But also...

00:42:20 John: I pursued no methodical watching of The Simpsons.

00:42:25 John: So a lot of, I mean, there are a lot of people that presume that I have seen 1,000 Simpsonses like everyone else has, but I have not.

00:42:34 John: Yeah.

00:42:35 John: And I've seen, because I went on the internet and watched the, are they saying boo or boo-urns?

00:42:46 John: I watched that like 40 times because I loved it.

00:42:50 John: I thought it was wonderful.

00:42:50 John: But anyway, so no, I don't remember the one.

00:42:53 John: And I'm always forced to do that.

00:42:55 Merlin: Oh, that's okay.

00:42:55 Merlin: That's okay.

00:42:55 John: Because they're like, do you remember the one?

00:42:56 John: And I'm like, I don't remember the one.

00:42:58 John: No, I hope that I'm not that guy.

00:43:00 John: No, you're not.

00:43:00 John: You're not.

00:43:01 John: You're not.

00:43:01 John: But like, I want to have watched... Oh, so I did.

00:43:06 John: I went on the internet and I said, I want to watch all the Simpsons at one point.

00:43:11 John: And the internet said, you cannot watch

00:43:14 John: They said you can buy a DVD.

00:43:17 Merlin: Oh, yeah.

00:43:17 John: That was the way for a while.

00:43:19 John: Yeah.

00:43:19 John: But you tell me now.

00:43:20 John: How would I go watch The Simpsons?

00:43:23 John: They're not on YouTube, are they?

00:43:24 Merlin: No, they're on the cable.

00:43:25 Merlin: You can see them on, I think, FXX.

00:43:30 Merlin: Oh, I see.

00:43:30 Merlin: So I would have to have cable TV.

00:43:32 Merlin: Yeah.

00:43:34 Merlin: Yes, that is something you need a TV to know about.

00:43:36 Merlin: I see.

00:43:37 Merlin: No, you're okay.

00:43:38 Merlin: You're okay.

00:43:39 Merlin: Yeah.

00:43:39 Merlin: I mean, part of this problem is also then people get very like, not snippy, but they're like, well, I've never seen Seinfeld.

00:43:46 Merlin: And you're like, well, okay.

00:43:48 Merlin: You know, I've never been to Paris.

00:43:50 Merlin: Who goes next?

00:43:51 Merlin: Wait, have you never been to Paris?

00:43:52 Merlin: Of course I've never been to Paris.

00:43:53 Merlin: Oh, Merlin, we need to go to Paris.

00:43:55 Merlin: No, no.

00:43:56 Merlin: I've been to like four places.

00:43:58 Merlin: I was out of the country a couple times, you know.

00:44:01 Merlin: Let me ask you this.

00:44:02 Merlin: Yeah.

00:44:03 John: Between the time you were born-ded and the time you graduated from college, how many houses did you have?

00:44:13 Merlin: Oh, yeah, that's a really good question.

00:44:15 Merlin: Well, okay, let me for a minute set aside college because that was a black swan.

00:44:20 Merlin: Right, okay.

00:44:20 Merlin: Let's say the end of high school.

00:44:22 Merlin: Mostly probably four or five.

00:44:25 Merlin: Four or five.

00:44:25 Merlin: Yeah, I mean, it's a long, sad story.

00:44:28 Merlin: But college, man, I did an Excel spreadsheet one day of where I lived, because that's the kind of thing I do.

00:44:34 Merlin: Remember my ephedrine spreadsheet?

00:44:36 Merlin: You remember that?

00:44:37 Merlin: Yeah, sure.

00:44:37 Merlin: That was a great spreadsheet.

00:44:39 Merlin: I can tell you the trend on the cost of ephedrine.

00:44:41 John: Yeah, you had where to buy ephedrine down to zip codes.

00:44:46 Merlin: Yeah, I was like a crazy This American Life guy, like, writing, putting his meat stickers in the notebook.

00:44:53 Merlin: Today, the day on the porch, it was 62 degrees, and the newspaper weighed eight ounces.

00:44:58 John: You sent me a jar of ephedrine one time, and I fear that I lost it.

00:45:02 John: Oh, God, I would kill for that right now.

00:45:03 John: Or I fear that it went into some kind of thing where it's like, this is a bottle of undifferentiated pills that I'm not sure whether I should take them out.

00:45:11 Merlin: I've given you some strange, strange things.

00:45:14 Merlin: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:45:15 Merlin: I've given you cold medicine.

00:45:16 Merlin: I've given you ephedrine.

00:45:18 Merlin: I gave you a bag and then a strap for a bag.

00:45:21 Merlin: I gave you another bag.

00:45:22 Merlin: I think I gave you another bag one time.

00:45:24 John: You gave me a few bags.

00:45:25 John: I gave your mom a man's wallet.

00:45:28 John: You gave her a wallet, which ended up being mine.

00:45:31 Merlin: Which ended up being yours.

00:45:32 John: You gave me a handful of space pens.

00:45:34 Yeah.

00:45:34 John: It must be so strange to be my friend.

00:45:38 John: One time you gave me a little pouch for your cell phone that would strap on to the... Oh, to a Timbuktu bag.

00:45:45 John: To a Timbuktu bag.

00:45:47 John: That was a good pouch.

00:45:48 John: Yeah, a little pouch.

00:45:49 John: And I think actually when you gave me that, you said, I might want this back.

00:45:54 John: But for now, I don't usually do that.

00:45:57 John: No, it was not.

00:45:59 John: And I felt like you were I felt like you were saying it for some other reason.

00:46:02 John: You didn't actually want it back.

00:46:03 John: And in fact, you didn't because I still have it.

00:46:06 John: And every time I pull it out, I'm like, well, here it is.

00:46:09 John: It's a pouch for a cell phone from 2002.

00:46:13 John: I'm not sure what to do with it, but I can't throw it away because I got it from Merlin.

00:46:18 Yeah.

00:46:18 Merlin: Yeah, no, this is, this is, we've talked about this before.

00:46:20 Merlin: This is the good box problem.

00:46:22 John: Yeah, exactly.

00:46:23 Merlin: Right.

00:46:24 John: And I think like, well, I could put Tic Tacs in here.

00:46:26 John: I could put, what else could I put?

00:46:28 John: A first aid kit, a tiny first aid kit.

00:46:30 John: What about a sewing kit?

00:46:31 Merlin: You know what you could do?

00:46:32 Merlin: It would be, you know, you got your small bag in your small bag.

00:46:35 Merlin: If you're like me, like I use those packing cubes.

00:46:37 Merlin: Like I don't have anything loose in my, in my suitcase.

00:46:39 Merlin: I'm not an animal.

00:46:39 Merlin: Oh, I got a great new suitcase by the way.

00:46:41 Merlin: But anyway, you know, I'm a bag man.

00:46:43 John: And so I know you are, you've always been my bag man.

00:46:46 Merlin: I got bags in bags.

00:46:47 Merlin: So, for example, I've got a Tom Bim backpack that I love.

00:46:50 Merlin: Tom Bombadil backpack?

00:46:52 Merlin: Tom Bombadil.

00:46:53 Merlin: That's Lord of the Rings.

00:46:54 Merlin: Is that right or is that a hobbit?

00:46:57 Merlin: That's a hobbit.

00:46:57 John: No, he's not a hobbit.

00:46:59 John: He's like an eternal.

00:47:00 John: He's probably an Oak and Shield.

00:47:01 John: He's got an eternal life, and he's confusing enough that he's not been included.

00:47:06 John: Isn't he a controversial character?

00:47:08 John: Not to me.

00:47:09 John: Okay.

00:47:10 John: But I do believe he's been X'd out of the digital.

00:47:14 Merlin: Yeah, like the poltergeist in Harry Potter.

00:47:16 Merlin: There just wasn't room for him.

00:47:17 Merlin: There wasn't room.

00:47:18 John: Not room for Tom Bombadil.

00:47:20 John: He doesn't advance the narrative enough or at all.

00:47:24 John: Yes.

00:47:25 John: And I think maybe he reappears at one point, but not enough to turn the tide.

00:47:30 John: Okay.

00:47:31 John: Okay, so... He's not a Boromir, right?

00:47:33 John: You couldn't tell the story without a Boromir.

00:47:35 John: Oh, no, or, yeah, orcs.

00:47:39 John: Orcs, yeah, right.

00:47:41 John: Remember the one where Lisa catches 400 coins off of her elbow?

00:47:46 Merlin: Oh, right, and she goes, hey!

00:47:48 Merlin: She's about to comb her hair in the men's room mirror, and she goes, ah, perfect.

00:47:51 Merlin: Yeah, the one where Tom Selleck marries the Kennedy.

00:47:56 Merlin: Oh, I remember that.

00:47:57 Merlin: That was Dynasty.

00:47:58 Merlin: Yeah.

00:47:58 Merlin: I remember that.

00:47:59 Merlin: Tom Kennedy was a game show host.

00:48:01 Merlin: Is that right?

00:48:02 Merlin: Tom Kennedy, I think, wasn't he in the Dirty Dozen?

00:48:05 Merlin: Dirty Dozen.

00:48:06 Merlin: I think that's Trini Lopez.

00:48:07 Merlin: You're thinking of Trini Lopez.

00:48:09 Merlin: Right.

00:48:09 Merlin: I had his signature guitar for a while.

00:48:10 Merlin: Lemon Tree smells so pretty.

00:48:12 Merlin: I like Trini Lopez.

00:48:14 Merlin: David Grohl.

00:48:16 Merlin: David Grohl.

00:48:17 Merlin: He was in the Dirty Dozen.

00:48:19 Merlin: Jim Brown.

00:48:20 Merlin: Jim Brown versus Board of Education.

00:48:23 Merlin: He killed all those people in Guyana, right?

00:48:25 Merlin: That's right.

00:48:26 Merlin: Jim Jones Brown.

00:48:29 Merlin: This episode of Roderick on the Line is brought to you by Casper.

00:48:33 Merlin: You can learn more about Casper right now by visiting casper.com slash super train.

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00:49:35 Merlin: Let's talk Turkey Gang.

00:49:36 Merlin: To understand how Casper is different, we have to start by looking at how this entire mattress racket has historically worked.

00:49:44 Merlin: It is a mess.

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00:50:28 Merlin: It's literally that simple.

00:50:30 Merlin: Now, let's be honest.

00:50:31 Merlin: Lying on a bed for four minutes in a showroom has zero correlation to whether it's right for you.

00:50:35 Merlin: Is this how you want to spend one-third of your life?

00:50:38 Merlin: That's why Casper has turned this buying process into a risk-free proposition.

00:50:43 Merlin: casper mattresses are shipped to you in a box you carry them upstairs like a gentleman and opening them that's an awesome experience all in its own it inhales it goes not in a creepy way but like in a really nice satisfying way your mattress breathes it inhales it's nice comes to life as you remove it from its bag not like a korean water ghost i just want to be super clear about this listen i traveled recently and

00:51:07 Merlin: I had to stay in a hotel.

00:51:08 Merlin: I got on a bed that I thought was going to be nice.

00:51:11 Merlin: It was not nice.

00:51:12 Merlin: I woke up in pain.

00:51:13 Merlin: I felt like somebody had been hitting me in the pancreas for nine hours.

00:51:16 Merlin: I was so glad to get back home and get to my Casper.

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00:51:22 Merlin: And I think you will too.

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00:51:37 Merlin: I must tell you that terms and conditions apply, but that's kind of how life works.

00:51:42 Merlin: There are terms, there are conditions, and they apply.

00:51:44 Merlin: But you got to try this thing.

00:51:45 Merlin: You got to go to Casper.com slash SuperTrain.

00:51:48 Merlin: Our thanks to Casper for so many great nights sleep and for supporting Roderick on the Line.

00:51:53 Merlin: Anyway.

00:51:54 John: The Trini Lopez model guitar was a great guitar.

00:51:58 John: Is it little?

00:51:59 John: No, it was big and nobody wanted it because it was weird.

00:52:03 John: And then Dave Grohl started playing them and all of a sudden you can't buy them for any amount of money.

00:52:07 John: You're kidding.

00:52:08 John: No.

00:52:09 John: Isn't that weird how that happens?

00:52:10 John: Yeah, it was just like, no, don't do that, Dave Grohl.

00:52:13 John: Stop taking the cool things and making everybody.

00:52:15 Merlin: Oh, is it kind of a little like an SG?

00:52:19 Yeah.

00:52:19 Merlin: Or no, it's an ES.

00:52:20 Merlin: Oh, I see.

00:52:21 Merlin: It looks a little bit like an SG.

00:52:22 Merlin: It's got double cutaways.

00:52:23 Merlin: Yeah.

00:52:24 Merlin: See, but, but look at the cutaways.

00:52:26 Merlin: They're sharp.

00:52:27 Merlin: They're sharp.

00:52:28 Merlin: It looks like, it looks like a Japanese guitar that wants to be either an ES.

00:52:32 Merlin: What is that?

00:52:33 Merlin: An ES three combined with a Rick.

00:52:36 Merlin: It looks like a bit of Rick styling to it.

00:52:38 John: It's a, yeah, it's, there's a lot going on in a Trini Lopez.

00:52:42 John: Um,

00:52:42 John: It's a little too sharp for my liking.

00:52:44 John: There were a couple of different versions of it.

00:52:47 John: There was one that was really sharp, and then there was one that was just a 335 body.

00:52:52 Merlin: Oh, this is weird.

00:52:54 Merlin: It's got a weird, what do you call it, not the bridge, but the tailpiece.

00:52:58 Merlin: It's got a strange-looking tailpiece, and it's got like a fender-type head.

00:53:02 John: So the headstock is like, yeah, from a firebird.

00:53:06 John: and it's got diamond shape f-holes anyway nobody wanted him you used to be able to buy these things like homers car that's a reference from the simpsons it was they were like seven hundred bucks because they just they didn't look like a three thirty five they just look weird right uh... by the uh... to our eyes at the time they just looked strange i never owned one because i thought they were weird

00:53:27 John: I was like, ah, I don't know.

00:53:29 John: Shouldn't the F holes look like Fs?

00:53:32 John: These aren't even F holes.

00:53:33 John: It's just diamond holes.

00:53:34 John: They're diamond holes, and that's not what you get.

00:53:36 John: And 335 with the weird headstock.

00:53:39 John: Like I saw, one time I saw a guy play a show.

00:53:43 John: The bass player of the Sound Gardens had a band called Hater, and Hater was an extremely good band.

00:53:51 John: I highly recommend if you can find Hater's first album that you get it because it's awesome.

00:53:55 Merlin: Hater.

00:53:56 John: But he was the lead singer of Hater and he had a, I saw him play a show one time where he had a Telecaster with a Fender neck.

00:54:04 John: I'm sorry, a Telecaster with a Gibson neck.

00:54:07 John: What?

00:54:07 John: A Telecaster with a Gibson neck.

00:54:09 John: Now just picture it for a second.

00:54:11 John: And it was so wrong looking.

00:54:14 John: that it wasn't cool, right?

00:54:16 John: You want to think, oh, that's cool.

00:54:18 Merlin: That sounds like something your dad would, someone's dad would make for them.

00:54:22 Merlin: So it's got that wide, it's got the wide fretboard, it's got the tuning pegs on either side of the headstock.

00:54:30 John: Yeah, it does.

00:54:30 John: It sounds like something that on Christmas morning you'd open up the wrapping.

00:54:33 Merlin: You said you wanted a guitar.

00:54:35 John: He got me a guitar!

00:54:36 John: He got me a guitar!

00:54:36 John: And then you open it up and it's a Telecaster with a Gibson neck.

00:54:40 John: And it was just, through the entire show, I could not

00:54:44 John: I couldn't even get into the music because I was just looking at this guitar like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

00:54:51 John: The neck is too heavy for the body.

00:54:53 John: No, the square doesn't work with the round.

00:54:56 John: No, je, je, je accuse.

00:54:59 John: Je refuse.

00:55:00 John: Je refuse.

00:55:01 John: So, you know, but now I look at that guitar and I'm like, oh, God, why didn't I buy six of those?

00:55:07 Merlin: Yep.

00:55:08 Merlin: I just saw one for five grand.

00:55:10 Merlin: Yeah.

00:55:10 Merlin: You can ask anything for stuff.

00:55:13 John: That's true.

00:55:13 John: Yeah.

00:55:14 John: Asking five grand and getting five grand.

00:55:17 Merlin: Different story.

00:55:18 Merlin: We got a lot of threads here.

00:55:20 Merlin: Magic, guitars.

00:55:23 Merlin: What were we talking about?

00:55:24 Merlin: Oh, yeah.

00:55:24 Merlin: Yeah.

00:55:24 Merlin: What's your special gift?

00:55:26 Merlin: Right.

00:55:26 Merlin: So have you thought more about it?

00:55:28 Merlin: Obviously, you've thought more about it.

00:55:29 Merlin: Have you arrived at an answer?

00:55:30 John: My special gift.

00:55:32 John: I mean, this is so...

00:55:35 John: I wanted to be good at magic, right?

00:55:42 John: Like so many of us who grew up in the 70s, it seemed like... Magic was everywhere.

00:55:47 John: Yeah, and if you wanted to end up somebody who wore a ruffled shirt and a big bow tie and maybe was on late night television with Rich Little, magic might be the way into that world, right?

00:56:00 John: And I just wanted, you know, it seemed even now to be Ricky Jay...

00:56:05 John: And to be able to just go anywhere in the world with a deck of cards and amaze and delight people?

00:56:11 John: Yeah.

00:56:11 John: Oh, wouldn't that be wonderful?

00:56:12 John: But it requires that you practice.

00:56:15 John: And that's the problem with my special gift.

00:56:17 Merlin: And that's what he does.

00:56:18 Merlin: You see, if you're like me, see, I think Ricky Jay is kind of like the, he is to magic.

00:56:24 Merlin: I feel like him with magic like I do about Krautrock, where sometimes I enjoy it, but I'm way more interested in learning about it.

00:56:30 Merlin: So, like, I love learning about Ricky Jay.

00:56:32 Merlin: I'll watch every Ricky Jay documentary, and I love his performances, too.

00:56:35 Merlin: But, like, the documentaries, he just spends hours a day shuffling cards.

00:56:41 Merlin: That's what he does.

00:56:41 Merlin: That's his thing.

00:56:42 Merlin: He has a mirror.

00:56:43 Merlin: Have you ever seen these?

00:56:44 Merlin: He just sits there, and he just does gorgeous things with cards all day long.

00:56:47 Merlin: It's what he does.

00:56:49 Yeah.

00:56:49 Merlin: He's also really smart.

00:56:51 John: Well, see, and that's confusing to me, right?

00:56:54 John: He's really smart and he shuffles cards all day.

00:56:57 John: Right.

00:56:58 John: It seems like a disconnect.

00:57:00 John: And I guess for me, nobody ever explained to me that being kind of good at everything as opposed to really good at one thing.

00:57:11 John: that that was actually a goal to have, that that was something that you could shoot for.

00:57:16 John: And it turns out that my instinct is to be kind of good at everything.

00:57:20 John: We've talked about this before.

00:57:21 John: Go deep on nothing, go wide on anything.

00:57:23 John: I totally agree.

00:57:24 John: But that's not a thing that there's really that much use for.

00:57:30 Merlin: There's only a few people that are allowed to be public figures that are famous for that.

00:57:34 Merlin: You have your George's Plimpton.

00:57:35 Merlin: You have your Gore's Vidal, I guess.

00:57:39 John: Well, and see, this is the thing.

00:57:41 John: It's a very rich wasp thing to be.

00:57:45 John: That's true.

00:57:45 John: It's a privileged thing.

00:57:47 John: Yeah, if you can just sit around and learn a little bit of everything, isn't that nice for you?

00:57:54 John: But the rest of us have to get a job.

00:57:56 Merlin: And you're always, you're skating up against that word nobody likes, deletante.

00:57:59 Merlin: A dilettante.

00:58:00 Merlin: Or a sealist, right?

00:58:01 Merlin: Somebody who's pretty, maybe broad, but pretty shallow.

00:58:06 John: And that is a legitimate thing to be good at.

00:58:09 John: A polymath.

00:58:10 John: In a sense.

00:58:11 John: An autodidact.

00:58:12 John: There's almost, and I think you and I both are that.

00:58:15 John: I think I might be good at words.

00:58:17 John: And good at words.

00:58:19 John: So, I mean, one thing, if you say, okay, what are you good at?

00:58:23 John: It's like, well, all right, on any topic, I can be conversant.

00:58:28 John: You cannot really throw at you or me a thing that we wouldn't have something to say about it.

00:58:35 John: And it's not like we profess to know, but you've heard something about everything.

00:58:41 John: I've heard something about everything.

00:58:42 John: If somebody says, oh, I work with bats, I will say, oh, that's interesting.

00:58:49 John: Have you ever heard of the bats that live under the bridge in Austin?

00:58:53 John: And of course they have, and now we're talking about it.

00:58:55 Merlin: Right.

00:58:56 John: And that is a whatever it is.

00:59:00 John: Right.

00:59:00 John: But it's but it's a I mean, you could say it's a gift.

00:59:04 John: You're a gift gifted conversationalist.

00:59:06 John: But that seems like something that a rich wife would say about like the wife of a congressman.

00:59:14 Merlin: Oh, yes.

00:59:15 John: You're right.

00:59:16 John: Right.

00:59:16 John: And that is something that maybe I would be good at.

00:59:19 John: The wife of an ambassador.

00:59:21 John: Right.

00:59:21 John: I would be a great wife of an ambassador.

00:59:23 Merlin: You would be such a great wife.

00:59:25 Merlin: You know, you can be very polite.

00:59:28 Merlin: You can definitely seem like a really good listener.

00:59:31 Merlin: I am one.

00:59:33 Merlin: Sure.

00:59:33 Merlin: And you know which fork to use a lot of the time?

00:59:36 Merlin: Most of the time.

00:59:36 Merlin: You work from the outside in.

00:59:41 John: Let's call her my wife.

00:59:43 John: Let's say she is the ambassador to France.

00:59:46 John: And I am her wife.

00:59:47 John: Is she a little bit short, kind of Jewish?

00:59:50 No.

00:59:50 John: Yeah.

00:59:50 John: She might be a little zaftig, but she's a great ambassador and she's working all the time doing ambassadorial things.

00:59:57 John: And I am hosting galas.

01:00:00 John: Sure.

01:00:00 John: And, you know, and I'm wearing a very becoming clothes and everyone who comes in, I make them feel comfortable and I, you know, and I direct them to, uh, the, the, the conversations that I feel like they would be interested in.

01:00:13 John: And I laugh appreciatively at their stories and I say, Oh, you know, uh,

01:00:19 John: Oh, this is the Duke of Ellington, and here's the Count of Basie, and aren't they spectacular?

01:00:29 John: Let's talk about pop music.

01:00:33 John: Like, I'd be spectacular at that.

01:00:35 John: But again, it's a job that's not really a job, right?

01:00:39 John: We don't appreciate ambassadors' wives like we should.

01:00:44 John: And that's not a – there's no job description for that except maybe podcaster.

01:00:53 John: But that, again, as you say, doesn't even seem like a job.

01:00:58 John: Not a real job.

01:00:59 Yeah.

01:00:59 Merlin: No, I aspire.

01:01:04 Merlin: I used to think that I was really smart.

01:01:07 Merlin: And in certain contexts, I think I could be.

01:01:09 Merlin: The truth is I'm not very smart.

01:01:10 Merlin: I'm fast.

01:01:12 Merlin: I'm not smart.

01:01:12 Merlin: I'm fast.

01:01:13 Merlin: Sometimes on a good day, I'm clever.

01:01:15 Merlin: The thing over the years that I don't say I'm proud of, but something that I... I'll tell you what, an aspiration of which I am proud is that I do aspire to be increasingly curious.

01:01:29 Merlin: And I think that's a good aspiration.

01:01:31 Merlin: Now, it is merely an aspiration.

01:01:32 Merlin: I'm not as ceaselessly curious as I could be.

01:01:36 Merlin: My friend Gabe gave me a book about Juggalos to read, just for what it's worth.

01:01:40 Merlin: The Juggalos?

01:01:40 Merlin: He heard us talking about the Juggalos, and he gave me a book about understanding Juggalos that I'm going to read.

01:01:44 Merlin: Do you understand them better?

01:01:46 Merlin: I haven't even cracked it, but I'm going to.

01:01:47 Merlin: It's there.

01:01:47 Merlin: It's right by my keys.

01:01:48 John: You know, I feel like I understand them a lot better from having met George the Dragon or whoever that was.

01:01:54 John: Is that a problem?

01:01:55 John: pro wrestler john who is that uh no charge the dragon steamboat so i didn't i tell you about this i uh i was hosting a series of conversations up here at bumper shoot a couple of years ago and i invited the dragon and i think he spells it d-r-a-g-a-n maybe uh

01:02:17 John: Uh, who had, who had directed his first film was a film about juggalos.

01:02:23 John: He himself is a juggalo and he wanted to dispel some of the misconceptions, uh, by doing a film about juggalos.

01:02:31 John: So his name is the dragon.

01:02:34 John: I think.

01:02:35 John: I don't remember exactly.

01:02:36 John: And then on the other side of the panel, I invited a brony.

01:02:43 John: The bronies were really in the news at the time.

01:02:47 John: Everybody was talking about bronies.

01:02:49 John: And this man presented himself as the world's manliest brony.

01:02:54 John: He was a Harley Davidson mechanic somewhere in the Midwest and also an avid brony.

01:03:01 John: And so we, Bumbershoot flew them both out to have this big discussion with me.

01:03:07 John: And, uh, and it was a full house in a, in a auditorium.

01:03:13 John: And we started talking about juggalos and bronies and,

01:03:16 John: And both guys kind of gave their like, you know, the dragon was just exactly as you would imagine, Juggalo, who's like, Juggalos are killer and awesome.

01:03:26 John: And then the world's manliest brony was dead serious about bronyism and how it makes everything better in the world.

01:03:33 John: And then it opened up to questions in the audience.

01:03:36 John: And right away, I understood that there was tremendous hostility towards juggalos in the assembled crowd.

01:03:45 John: And hostility towards juggalos, not just from young people, but especially from older members of the crowd who were well-informed liberal people.

01:03:53 John: And so there were all these questions like, how do you, how do you respond to this?

01:03:59 John: And then extensive quoting of insane clown posse lyrics that were violent and misogynist.

01:04:07 John: And the dragon kind of was like, yeah, well, that's a thing.

01:04:12 John: And then after a while, it became kind of clear that he was under siege.

01:04:17 John: And I was moderating.

01:04:19 John: But to a certain extent, people would stand up and say, I have a question for both guys.

01:04:24 John: And it's like, OK, let's hear from you.

01:04:26 John: And then they'd say, well, how does the juggalo reply to the following accusations?

01:04:30 John: It's like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.

01:04:32 John: Let's have some questions.

01:04:33 John: Let's have everybody settle down.

01:04:36 John: But then the dragon made this kind of eloquent within juggalo vernacular defense of juggalos by saying, look, there are all these mixed up kids in the world who live in violent, drug addicted circumstances.

01:04:54 John: And we attract them.

01:04:56 John: The insane clown posse attracts them by speaking to these matters.

01:05:02 Mm hmm.

01:05:02 John: And by presenting this kind of ugly reality, which makes these damaged people feel like they're speaking the truth.

01:05:12 John: And then once they're in the juggalo family, we domesticate them with our family, mutually supportive love vibe that we have.

01:05:22 John: And in a way, we are defanging this entire generation of angry, damaged people

01:05:32 John: like violent kids by you know by offering them a safe place in the world and uh and a you know a pink cloud went across the audience and everybody was like huh and you could see people kind of looking at the floor and nodding their heads and and wondering were any of the black people nodding

01:05:53 Merlin: Uh, cause I think if you, it was a Seattle event, there were only a few black people.

01:05:58 Merlin: You change a couple of those nouns around and you can get away with anything with that pitch.

01:06:03 John: Well, yeah, but, but in, and that's the thing, right?

01:06:06 John: Like everybody was nodding, not in agreement, but like, did a juggalo just score a point here?

01:06:12 Merlin: Right?

01:06:13 Merlin: No, I know the bar's low.

01:06:14 Merlin: So yeah, I mean, sure.

01:06:15 Merlin: 10, 10 points to juggalo.

01:06:17 John: Yeah.

01:06:17 John: Are we trying, are we now forced to confront the idea that, that,

01:06:22 John: that the gathering is some kind of peace situation and not just a thing where a guy will cut off his own lips for $14 just to show people that he can.

01:06:37 Merlin: I would ask for a little more than that.

01:06:40 John: How are you going to drink your Faygo?

01:06:42 John: Well, I think you just suck it through a straw.

01:06:45 John: You shotgun it.

01:06:46 John: You take it in through your nose.

01:06:47 John: I don't know.

01:06:48 John: I'm not a juggalo.

01:06:50 John: No.

01:06:50 John: But in the end, in the end, I have to say that the dragon was...

01:06:58 John: the more sympathetic of the two, not because juggaloism is more attractive than bronyism, but just because of the degree of self-seriousness that was on display.

01:07:11 John: I mean, the juggalo was not claiming that juggaloism is going to sweep the nation and become the new way that we interact with one another.

01:07:21 John: And I think the brony really was pushing that angle.

01:07:26 John: A little bit more.

01:07:27 John: I don't want to revisit that whole panel.

01:07:31 John: But you learned a lesson about love.

01:07:33 John: I learned a lesson about tolerance and acceptance.

01:07:37 Merlin: Yeah.

01:07:37 Merlin: Yeah, maybe.

01:07:38 John: Maybe.

01:07:39 John: I mean, it's hard to be tolerant of people that are ugly.

01:07:45 Merlin: It's... Harder.

01:07:48 Merlin: It's...

01:07:49 Merlin: There's something I'm not a very logical thinker, but something in the little logic closet of my mind rings a little bit when we try to find the way to show how one person in a group didn't get treated as well as we would like and therefore things.

01:08:08 Merlin: So, I mean, I feel like you could do that with practically any group because we're all sympathetic for people.

01:08:14 Merlin: We're especially sympathetic for young people.

01:08:16 Merlin: Any decent, humane person is very sympathetic, but for any young person who feels like an outsider.

01:08:22 Merlin: But also, I guess I feel like I'm a little, I want to be somewhat careful about organizations that find ways to explain their ethos by saying we help outsiders feel like they fit in.

01:08:35 Merlin: Yeah.

01:08:36 Merlin: Part of that I 100 percent buy.

01:08:38 Merlin: But again, all I'm saying is you just you change some of those around.

01:08:40 Merlin: I'm not saying name any names here, but there's a whole lot of things that you could say, you know, well, it's you know, it's not really about states rights.

01:08:46 Merlin: It's about youth pride.

01:08:48 John: That's true.

01:08:49 John: That's true.

01:08:49 John: But there's, you know, in traveling around America and in reading the news.

01:08:56 Merlin: Mm hmm.

01:08:58 John: over time you are forced to confront the reality that there are, you know, there are a lot of situations where you can't even, you can't even fathom.

01:09:11 John: You'll never be able to fathom.

01:09:12 John: Did you read the thing the other day where, where dad, a dad with seven kids came into the room playing with his gun and like pretend, uh,

01:09:22 John: pow pow pow oh no to his uh seven kids and killed his four-year-old daughter uh uh like bang bang bang pow and shot her right in the head and then

01:09:36 John: took, like wiped his hand in her blood, wiped the blood across the face of his five-year-old, slapped her in the face and said, you did that.

01:09:50 John: And then ran.

01:09:51 John: And when the police arrived, the initial story was that this five-year-old had killed her four-year-old sister.

01:10:00 John: And that's the one that Good Morning America ran with.

01:10:05 John: And so for a couple of days, the story was this family tragedy until until the guy, the dad finally walked into a police station because they were searching all over for him.

01:10:18 John: Why did he run?

01:10:19 John: Right.

01:10:20 John: And then and initially denied it and blamed it on his own other daughter.

01:10:24 John: And then the police were like, wait a minute, you seem a little bit not that cool.

01:10:28 John: And eventually he confessed.

01:10:31 Merlin: Yeah, it's like in watching that O.J.

01:10:33 Merlin: Simpson series that I've been kind of guiltily watching.

01:10:35 Merlin: I mean, there's one piece of evidence that pops up in that evidence.

01:10:37 Merlin: It's one piece of testimony that's so interesting, which is that when they – and I don't have an opinion one way or another, but I think it's interesting.

01:10:42 Merlin: When they called O.J.

01:10:43 Merlin: Simpson to say that his ex-wife that he had very strong feelings about was dead, he didn't ask how she died.

01:10:49 John: Yeah.

01:10:50 Merlin: And the thing is, in that case, you know, if you're a five year old and just shot your other kid, it seems like you would more than anything want to be there to like suss out what's going on.

01:10:59 Merlin: And it seems like.

01:11:00 Merlin: Yeah.

01:11:01 John: But but but what's interesting about that story to me is not the dad.

01:11:06 John: Right.

01:11:06 John: Like whatever.

01:11:09 John: Fuck that guy.

01:11:10 John: The the the terrible thing is that that five year old will one baby a 25 year old.

01:11:16 John: And how we could ever know, how we could ever think about her challenges entering adult life.

01:11:25 John: Oh, absolutely.

01:11:26 John: You know, and you just go...

01:11:29 John: There is no social service agency.

01:11:32 John: There is no church.

01:11:34 Merlin: There is not that many.

01:11:36 Merlin: Not that many talk it out groups.

01:11:37 Merlin: No.

01:11:38 Merlin: Who are her peers?

01:11:39 Merlin: Who's exactly who's who's she going to.

01:11:41 Merlin: Yeah, exactly.

01:11:42 John: Yeah.

01:11:42 John: Who is, you know, like apparently Gary Ridgeway.

01:11:49 John: The Green River Killer?

01:11:50 John: The Green River Killer.

01:11:51 John: Apparently he has a child.

01:11:54 John: You know, apparently Bundy fathered a child with somebody.

01:11:57 John: Like these are people whose life experience is not comparable.

01:12:04 John: And these are just like the ones that pop to mind.

01:12:07 John: But all across America and around the world, there are people who have witnessed and been subjected to horrors

01:12:17 John: that I just don't have any, that there's no place for them to go and feel like anybody is ever going to get them.

01:12:26 John: And it's so different from our contemporary culture where everybody's a victim.

01:12:31 John: There are really people who are, I mean, she's 25 years old.

01:12:37 John: And a lot of the time, I mean, I dated a girl who had an awful, awful childhood.

01:12:43 John: And she's an amazing person and an amazing mother.

01:12:46 John: Like she overcame.

01:12:47 John: But but but how do you there's no institutional solution to that stuff.

01:12:55 John: You can't say if we had more money, if the if Congress put more money into social services, then then these people would be healed.

01:13:05 Merlin: Well, yeah, that's the whole thing.

01:13:06 Merlin: I mean, like, it's easy to say, fuck that guy or whatever.

01:13:08 Merlin: But like, and you know, that probably could have gone better.

01:13:11 Merlin: But like, also know that guy, you think he meant to do that?

01:13:14 Merlin: Like, the initiating incident?

01:13:15 Merlin: I'm sorry to show empathy for somebody who's horrible.

01:13:18 Merlin: But like, imagine how that guy felt.

01:13:19 Merlin: Like, I think about that all the time.

01:13:20 Merlin: Like, what if you leave your kid in the car?

01:13:22 Merlin: There's all these kinds of things where you're like, you know what, it's game over.

01:13:24 Merlin: Yeah, he accidentally shot his kid.

01:13:27 John: The most awful thing that could possibly happen to a person.

01:13:30 John: And then he panicked.

01:13:32 John: His fucked up panic reaction was to look around and say, here's a story that might work.

01:13:39 John: But then he actually slapped and hit the five-year-old both to put blood on her and also...

01:13:50 John: like in some way to convince himself and the five-year-old that she was actually culpable, like he's partly convincing himself, like, you did this, pow, pow.

01:14:01 John: Right.

01:14:02 John: I mean, broken guy, but also he just shot his own daughter.

01:14:08 Merlin: I'm not defending him.

01:14:08 Merlin: And then imagine what his wife thinks.

01:14:10 Merlin: I know.

01:14:11 John: Imagine his wife comes home from work and she's probably supporting the family given the fact that he's there during the day shooting his kids.

01:14:18 John: She comes home and, you know, like, and this is the news.

01:14:23 John: There are TV cameras out front.

01:14:25 John: So compared to the worst thing that's ever happened to me, there's no comparison.

01:14:31 John: Right.

01:14:31 John: And I'm, you know, I'm not fit to judge.

01:14:34 John: So the Juggalo guy is telling me this story and I'm thinking about all these kids in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, whose, you know, whose parents are like feeding them pop rocks.

01:14:46 John: And, you know, and disciplining them with a tractor.

01:14:51 John: And I just go, well, I don't know.

01:14:53 John: Beats me.

01:14:54 John: Beats me.

01:14:55 John: I got nothing here.

01:14:56 John: Yeah.

01:14:58 John: You know, I got disciplined by my mom going in her room and shutting the door.

01:15:04 John: Stomping on your toys.

01:15:05 John: Stomping on my toys, which had a lasting effect.

01:15:10 John: Uh-huh.

01:15:10 John: Maybe it's why my house is full of toys now.

01:15:13 John: Oh, interesting.

01:15:14 John: And how does it make you feel?

01:15:15 John: Maybe it's why I collect unwrapped, or I'm sorry, why I collect still in box Star Wars figures.

01:15:26 John: I don't really.

01:15:27 John: Can you tell me why the original Luke Skywalker Star Wars figure had such a weird lightsaber?

01:15:34 John: The little yellow one?

01:15:35 John: Well, you know the one where the lightsaber halfway up got smaller?

01:15:39 John: That was a terrible design decision.

01:15:40 John: And every kid immediately— They all broke off.

01:15:42 John: Well, either broke off or bit off.

01:15:45 John: There was nothing more satisfying than biting the tip off of it.

01:15:47 Merlin: Oh, I know.

01:15:48 Merlin: It was perfect for biting.

01:15:48 Merlin: My Obi-Wan has the end ripped off, but my Luke still has the full lightsaber today.

01:15:55 Merlin: No, no.

01:15:55 Merlin: Did you, I mean, survived from when you were a child?

01:15:58 Merlin: Original summer of 1977, sent from Kenner in the box.

01:16:02 Merlin: You get, you pre-order it.

01:16:04 Merlin: You get Luke, um, R2-D2, uh, Princess Leia, and I want to say Chewbacca.

01:16:11 Merlin: I still, I still have, Luke still has his lightsaber today.

01:16:14 John: Did you also, did you also get like a Pepsi glass that had Sylvester the cat on it?

01:16:18 John: At Arby's?

01:16:18 Merlin: Sure.

01:16:19 Merlin: I'm not an animal.

01:16:20 Merlin: Okay.

01:16:20 Merlin: But wait, you still have those things?

01:16:23 Merlin: No, no, no.

01:16:24 Merlin: I wasn't going to interrupt you when you were at Hodgman's house, but no, that sent me right down memory lane because I gobbled those up.

01:16:29 Merlin: My favorite was Shazam.

01:16:31 Merlin: I had a Shazam one that I liked a lot, Captain Marvel.

01:16:34 Merlin: I had, I think I had like Cool Cat.

01:16:36 Merlin: I didn't really know what Cool Cat was, but I had a Cool Cat glass.

01:16:39 Merlin: Wasn't he the Cheetos cat?

01:16:42 Merlin: Oh, I think that's Cheeto the cat you're thinking of.

01:16:44 John: Oh, Cheeto the cat.

01:16:45 Merlin: Yeah, but I love those.

01:16:45 Merlin: Those were great glasses.

01:16:46 Merlin: They were really, and they were hearty.

01:16:48 Merlin: Those glasses, those glasses like, oh, I had an Aquaman that I loved.

01:16:51 Merlin: And those glasses lasted into the 90s.

01:16:53 Merlin: I was, I remember going up to college and my friends were still like, my friend Alan always got the Aquaman glass.

01:16:58 Merlin: Oh, he would take it down from your shelf.

01:17:01 Merlin: Did you ever have your own glasses and your own things at places?

01:17:03 Merlin: Like at my grandparents, I always had a certain cup that I would use.

01:17:06 Merlin: Yeah.

01:17:06 John: Well, I never went to very many other people's houses where they would have things.

01:17:11 John: Like I had no grandparents.

01:17:12 Merlin: Oh, no.

01:17:13 Merlin: Somebody should invite you to a conference.

01:17:17 John: You know, she smashed my toys in the closet.

01:17:20 John: You know, I last two years ago.

01:17:22 John: Was it two years ago?

01:17:23 John: I went to the conference on world affairs.

01:17:25 John: Right.

01:17:25 John: And I felt like a really big wheel.

01:17:28 John: This is two years ago.

01:17:30 John: I felt so good.

01:17:31 John: I was there at the conference on world affairs there with generals and scientists and and and old people.

01:17:37 John: Basically, everybody there was old except me.

01:17:39 John: And I was like, this is it.

01:17:40 John: Now I'm going to be a conference on world affairs guy.

01:17:43 John: I'm going to go every year.

01:17:44 John: When I die, they're going to say he went to 40 conferences on world affairs and was a treasured member of the community.

01:17:54 John: And then they did not invite me back.

01:17:58 John: yeah and sometime between last year when they didn't invite me back and now they realized that uh that the internet and email was not going to go away it was here to stay and so they compiled a list of conference on world affairs attendees

01:18:14 John: And started sending them Conference on World Affairs spam emails all the time.

01:18:20 John: They put you on the list?

01:18:21 John: They put me on the list.

01:18:22 John: Oh, the temerity.

01:18:23 John: And so the Conference on World Affairs just happened this past week.

01:18:28 John: And every day there was a like, today in Conference on World Affairs news.

01:18:33 John: And thanks so much, everyone.

01:18:34 John: And you're the best.

01:18:35 John: And here's where you can donate and all this stuff.

01:18:39 John: And I'm just like...

01:18:40 John: Fuck you a thousand times.

01:18:43 John: Like, I am not a enthusiastic conference on world affairs alum.

01:18:47 John: I am a bitterly disappointed.

01:18:49 John: I think you're disgruntled, John.

01:18:51 John: I'm disgruntled, you know, of all the things, of all the places that I felt like I belonged.

01:18:56 John: Finally, someone had recognized that I belonged at a conference on world affairs.

01:19:01 John: Maybe you were too real for them.

01:19:03 John: You ever thought of that?

01:19:04 John: I feel like what they thought was that I was going to sing for my supper.

01:19:09 John: I was going to come and the generals and the captains of industry and the titans were going to, at the end of the day, relax to me shucking and jiving with my guitar.

01:19:22 John: with a bunch of other guitar players and that that was where I belonged.

01:19:28 Merlin: Is this where you played with the band?

01:19:31 John: Yeah, I played with the band and I turned the volume on my guitar all the way down because I had no idea what they were doing.

01:19:39 John: Right, I love that story.

01:19:40 John: Because they were jazzing and I do not jazz.

01:19:43 John: I don't know how to diminish anything.

01:19:48 John: The only thing I know how to diminish is other people at the cocktail party.