Ep. 266: "Ham-Fisted Steak Cooker"
John: Hello.
John: Hi John.
John: Hi Merlin.
John: How's it going?
John: Uh, it's going, uh, super duper.
John: Oh, that's good to hear.
John: Yeah.
John: I, um, I, oh, is that you?
John: Um, hello.
John: Hello.
John: Hello.
John: Why, why is that happening?
John: What's what happening?
John: Oh, someone is calling me on the phone and it's ringing in my computer.
John: No, no, no.
John: That shouldn't be.
John: I think you got hacked.
John: Oh, did I get hacked?
Merlin: You got hacked.
Merlin: Oh, no.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
John: I don't want to be hacked.
Merlin: I'll turn on your screen sharing.
Merlin: Let me in and I'll fix your computer.
John: Girl.
Merlin: I'm not giving you the permissions.
Merlin: I'm going to give you the Trojan horse.
Merlin: Now you have Trojan horse.
John: It's the North Koreans.
Merlin: Oh, the North Koreans.
Merlin: Yeah, that's what it is.
Merlin: Little Rocket Man.
John: Oh.
John: They're heckin' us.
John: I had some roast boof.
John: Oh, nice.
John: Here's what happened a couple of years ago.
John: I got almonds.
John: A couple of years ago, a friend of mine who owns a farm.
John: I may have mentioned him before.
John: His name is Kurt Timmermeister.
John: That's an excellent name.
John: It's a real name, Kurt Timmermeister.
John: He used to run a restaurant in Seattle called the Café Cetienne because he'd gone to France to learn to cook.
John: And this was before I'd ever heard someone really use the word chef outside of either Chef Boyardee or a context of like, oh, at the Four Seasons Hotel, they had a chef.
John: A long time before I ever heard the word chef used without any other...
John: conjunction of any kind.
John: I was talking to Chef.
John: Oh, that way.
John: There's no article.
John: Have you heard of this?
John: I learned about it from the Top Chef TV program.
John: Thank you, Chef.
John: No, I had never heard that before.
John: Even if you're talking about
John: Your captain, my captain, stand on a desk.
Merlin: You would say the captain or a captain or... It's another one of these Britishisms probably.
Merlin: Or like the continent.
Merlin: Like you say you go to hospital.
Merlin: You say you went to university.
Merlin: You say you talk to chef.
Merlin: Actually, you know what?
Merlin: God damn it.
Merlin: Faulty Towers.
Merlin: On Faulty Towers.
Merlin: Faulty fucking motherfucking towers.
Merlin: They refer to him as chef.
Merlin: Well, they do.
Merlin: The guy who's got the karate class?
John: There it is.
John: That makes sense now.
John: Oh, it's a European thing.
John: There's a character here in Seattle that talks about table.
John: What?
John: He has this idea that he has these big dinner parties where he tries to put interesting people together to all talk about stuff and be interesting.
John: Largely to just sort of feed his ego that he is somebody that brings interesting people together.
John: Oh, he had just a salon.
John: Yeah, that's right.
Merlin: And by the way, just for what's worth every possible opportunity for the rest of this program, I'm going to try to avoid using articles whenever I can.
Merlin: Now back to podcast.
Merlin: Okay, host.
John: Or no, I guess host is like, yeah, that even makes sense to me.
Merlin: Whatever is in show is in show.
John: Thank you.
John: Whatever's in show is in show.
John: He always stands up at these events and says, it's so wonderful to have everyone at table.
John: And you just you know, you want to throw your braised rutabagas on the floor at that moment.
John: But but the person sitting next to you is so interesting and entertaining that you don't want to leave table.
John: Anyway, so Kurt Timmermeister was very early on a character that did this farm-to-table thing where he sold his Café Cetienne and moved to Vachon Island, or as Maria Semple would say, Vachon Island, which is an island very near to Seattle, but very rural.
John: So it's, you know...
John: 25-minute ferry ride, but it's like going back in time, and you can own a farm there, and you can raise your children with bare feet.
John: Right on farm.
John: Right on farm.
John: That's right.
John: And so, and I used to, I lived at this ETM.
John: Uh, uh, but, uh, he decided he didn't want to be a restaurateur anymore.
John: He wanted to be a farmer.
John: And so he has this wonderful farm where he grows all these wonderful things.
John: And then he had these dinners.
John: He had, and we went at dinner, uh,
Merlin: i'm sorry i'm just laughing because our generation is so fucking stupid and funny i'm sure he's a very nice man but it's so funny what would make you go from like i like drinking out of loon with cans to i'm going to become a metallurgist it's so odd it's so odd that like that just seems like such a normal thing now well first i used to do this fruity thing with food so i decided to go closer to the source so now i'm on farm and that he's on farm and he and the thing about curtis he's wonderful but he's also awful like he's well he's a very difficult character he would be the first to admit it
John: Um, and, uh, so he moved out there and then he, periodically he would have these dinners where, uh, you would come to farm, come to farm and he would have table.
John: You would sit at table and he would, he would serve you meal.
Merlin: It's so cute.
John: He would serve you meal.
John: And it was, again, it was, um, it was just the food that he grew.
John: and raised on his farm the only things that he didn't make himself were sugar salt coffee wine and wheat i think he'd go buy at store from merchant at store from merchant or merchant would deliver uh oh he's probably got a fucking milk truck drawn by an old mayor yeah deliver by truck here's milk
John: And so it was—oh, no, we had milk.
John: He had milking cows.
John: Of course he's got milk, yeah.
John: And he made his own cheese.
John: But if you wanted Snapple or something, you have to go to a store.
John: If you wanted Snapple, yeah.
John: And, of course, he served wine with the dinner because these are fancy people.
John: And he had a big, long table in an old—and he converted, like, I think one of the structures on his property was the oldest cabin on Vashon Island—
John: That he eventually turned into his house.
John: And then there were these barns and stuff that he turned into big sort of spaces.
John: Anyway, it was wonderful.
John: And he would prepare the meal and he had.
John: And so he he also apprenticed.
John: young chefy people from Seattle who would come over and I think probably work for free or work for less than free.
John: They probably had to pay with like a pound of flesh to have the privilege to stand in this kitchen and make this food for these swells.
John: And initially it was just friends of his.
John: And then he extended the franchise to, if you knew a friend of his...
John: You could come to this dinner.
John: It was friend of friend.
John: And then you had to know someone who had been to a dinner before.
John: And pretty soon a legacy.
John: Right.
John: Pretty soon that became too unwieldy.
John: There were too many people who wanted to go because these dinners didn't happen all the time.
John: It's a lot of work and it sounds like it could get kind of costly.
John: Well, and it was costly.
John: I didn't drink wine.
John: Uh, and also I was a friend, so it didn't get too costly, but there were, but people were paying money for sure to go.
John: And, and it went from being a thing where you would sit, sit at table and everyone around table was somebody that you knew from town or they were all artists and, uh,
John: And Kurt was gay, so he had access to a lot of very interesting people that were middle-aged people that had lived a lot of lives.
John: It was a very fascinating salon.
John: Oh, that sounds like fun.
John: It was great.
John: But then it became more and more rich people who were less and less fascinating.
John: They thought they were fascinating.
John: But they were the type of rich people who went to things like this.
John: Because they were rich.
John: Because they were rich.
John: Not because they were interesting.
John: They were lawyers, and they were more interesting than the people that worked at their office.
John: That's the thing.
John: They thought they were the interesting ones because they went to this thing and bash on.
John: But then you're sitting next to them, and you're like, oh, wait a minute.
John: I'm the interesting person here.
John: I'm the one that's going to make this interesting for this person to go back to their office and feel like they'd had an interesting experience.
John: But you're not helping me at all.
John: Why don't you give me your watch?
John: Hey, buddy, let me hold your wallet.
John: Is this your card?
John: You're so amusing, Mr. Roderick.
John: But so Kurt eventually was like, as soon as I say I'm having a dinner, it sells out immediately.
John: So now I'm going to insist that if I don't know you personally, that you write an essay or do a piece of art.
John: in order to come to the dinner okay and then what he did was he gave himself a job of grading 300 pieces of art and he was like no screw that it sounds like the beginning of a pbs special i would never finish and eventually he said i'm not doing this anymore kurt discovered something very interesting he began as restaurateur moved to farm and soon found himself art
John: So he said, I'm not doing that anymore.
John: Now I'm just going to make.
John: So he wrote a book about the about farm to table, which was very influential.
John: And I think he influenced a whole generation of of cooks here in Seattle.
John: Who aspire to chefdom.
Merlin: Oh, look at that.
Merlin: Kurt Timmermeister.
Merlin: Kurt Timmermeister.
Merlin: Growing a feast, the chronicle of a farm-to-table meal.
John: There it is.
John: He was pretty early on in this game.
John: Almost anyone who's cooking in Seattle now who believes in farm-to-table is influenced by or has some connection to Kurt.
John: So Kurt decided to start making cheese, which was the new...
John: farm to table thing to do.
John: Cheese requires that you do interesting things to make it good.
John: So he started making cheese and then he started making ice cream and then he opened a shop on Capitol Hill that is a very very cute ice cream store.
John: And on Capitol Hill in Seattle now there are like five or six different places that you can go get some expensive ice cream.
John: I think Kurt's is the most expensive, but it's also, like, it's very good.
John: If you're going to pay $10 for a pint of ice cream, I would highly recommend that you go to.
John: Anyway, Kurt contacted a small group of his friends at one point and said, I am butchering a cow, and if you want some, tell me.
John: And I wrote him and said, I want some.
John: And he said, okay, give me $250.
John: And I said, okay.
John: And then he said, come by the ice cream shop for your boof.
John: And this was a cow I knew, right?
John: I'd met this cow.
John: I had patted this cow on the nose.
John: I had consumed some of this cow's milk, I presume.
John: So I arrived at the ice cream shop.
John: I think the meat cows are usually boys.
John: Oh, okay.
Merlin: I think that's usually a steer.
Merlin: But I don't know.
Merlin: I don't know if he had an intersectional farm.
John: Maybe I didn't drink the milk.
Okay.
John: Maybe I didn't drink milk.
John: I drank milk.
John: Maybe this was a boy that he didn't want, right?
John: Because the cows were making other cows.
John: And then you get a boy and you're like, you got to get rid of these boys.
John: They're just gumming up the works.
John: Too many boys.
John: Too many boys, not enough.
John: Cow cows.
John: Right.
John: So anyway, I knew all his cows.
John: I'd patted them all.
John: I mean, it's not like I knew them like we talked or like I wrote them when I wasn't there.
John: But I show up at the ice cream store, and here's this big package of boof.
John: And I took it home, and I unwrapped it, and it was all kinds of boof.
John: And then I'm confronted with kind of a confusion, right?
John: Because I know, like, I got some ribeyes.
John: I got some short ribs.
John: I got some tenderloins, you know, things that I know what to do with.
John: And then I got some hamburger, which I also know what to do with.
John: But then there's all those cuts of meat that I never quite figured out what the hell to do with them.
Merlin: They call it a variety meat.
John: Yeah, all these meats where it's like, hmm, what is that?
John: I don't know what a London broil is.
John: I don't know what I'm supposed to do with these things.
John: And so I started...
John: putting the name that was written in sharpie on the white butcher paper on a on a thing of meat in the freezer i would type that into the internet and invariably there was some very cheerful person on the internet who had made a short video about how to make it okay how to make this thing and i honestly merlin one of the things that one of the areas
John: of adulthood that i feel like i am a flop cookie cooking the recipes i cannot cook a steak oh no come the simplest of all things the thing that everybody thinks is so easy it's so subtle john it's very subtle and i'm i'm a ham-fisted steak cooker i always overdo it i always think like oh well it just needs another second and then it's all i ruin it yeah
John: I don't know how to do it.
John: And I cook them outside.
John: I cook them inside.
John: I cook them in pans.
John: I cook them in the oven.
Merlin: I really admire you for saying that.
Merlin: There are so few men that would admit that.
Merlin: I really respect that.
Merlin: And I come at this, understand, I come at this as somebody, I think I make a pretty good steak, but I also feel like I'm a student for life.
Merlin: I'll always be.
Merlin: I improved my process vastly last week.
Merlin: This is a constant, ongoing process.
Merlin: You never really arrive.
Merlin: What happened?
Merlin: What happened last week?
Merlin: Well, I can tell you if you want.
Merlin: It's kind of boring, but I learned how to do some stuff with herbs and butter that was very exciting.
John: Herbs?
Merlin: Oh, you're so far ahead of me.
Merlin: You're like a thousand years ahead.
Merlin: No, no.
Merlin: There's some life hacks, but no, let's come back to it.
Merlin: I don't want to derail your story.
Merlin: Well, I mean, I got all these friends.
John: I got, you know, Jonathan Colton and Jason Finn both have those big green eggs.
John: Oh, they got eggs.
John: They're stoking these eggs all day.
John: I can see Jason getting really into that.
John: Oh, he's so into his egg.
John: And the thing is, Jason can make a pork tenderloin.
John: I bet he's a good cook.
John: He's really good.
John: And he makes these pork tenderloins where it's just like where I like the first 15 times that he served this to me after I started like eating.
John: If anybody came near me, I would like stab at him with a fork, like, get away, get away.
John: Good fork can do that to you.
John: Oh, it was so good.
John: And then I would say to him, like, where did you get this magical food?
John: And he's like, Costco.
John: I'm like, screw you, Costco.
John: How do you, how, how?
John: But he's doing the thing.
John: He's got the thermometer.
John: He's like thinking about it, you know?
John: Thinking about it.
John: Anyway, so I get this, I got these things in the freezer.
John: And I and I have some people over and I'm like, I'm just going to make I'm going to make these three.
Merlin: And they're unrelated.
Merlin: These three white wrap things with magic marker with Sharpie on it.
Merlin: That's one of them.
John: One of them is a London broil.
John: One of them, I think, is a tenderloin.
John: One of them is a flank steak.
John: I mean, there's just like these words that I know that I heard them.
John: I know they mean something.
John: When I'm in a restaurant, I either go, I either get the filet or I get the ribeye if I'm feeling adventurous.
John: And if you're in a really nice restaurant, you get the ribeye because it's always great.
John: If you're in a medium nice restaurant, sometimes the ribeye can be a little bit too much.
John: Too much connective.
John: Not enough information.
John: Not enough yummy.
John: I mean, I don't like to order a steak where I leave half the steak behind because it isn't steak.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: If you get one that's not very well marbled, you get a big funk of fat in it, you just paid a lot for a bone and fat.
John: Yeah, right.
John: I don't want that.
John: I don't want bone and fat.
John: They were a great mid-90s hip-hop group.
John: Very blues-influenced.
John: Yeah, bone and fat.
John: So I go on the internet and I go, London Broil, what is it?
John: And there's a woman that says, here's what you do with London broil.
John: You fill a pan.
John: You fill a skillet with oil so that it's like two inches deep.
John: And then you deep fry it.
John: Flying steak?
John: Well, no.
John: London broil.
Merlin: You deep fry it.
Merlin: Well, it does say kind of right there on the name how they want you to make it.
Merlin: Well, and then you put it in the oven.
Merlin: Oh, you give it a sear and then you finish it in the oven unit.
Merlin: Yeah, but the sear is a deep fry.
Merlin: Then you put it in the oven.
John: And then you bring it back out and just plop it in the oil one more time to, like, deep fry it.
John: Oh, brother.
John: That sounds pretty good.
John: And then you pull it out, and then you put a bunch of butter on it and herbs, which I don't know what those are.
John: So good.
John: When people say herb, I usually just put garlic salt on it.
John: Yeah.
John: I mean, that should count.
John: Yeah.
John: And so I was like, well, if that's going to work for London broil, it's also going to work for these other steaks.
John: Yeah.
John: So I get a little factory going.
Merlin: Just so we're clear here, just to remind our listeners, you're making three sets of meat for table, all at the same time, prepared the same way.
John: Right.
John: And they are all frozen solid because they've been in my freezer.
John: So I'm dropping them frozen into the oil.
John: No, no, no.
John: And deep frying them frozen, which I figured was like, this is how you get... Do people have to make art to come?
John: This is how you get it crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside.
John: So I do it.
John: I do all this.
John: I put them all in the oven.
John: Oh, boy.
John: I cook them for some amount of time.
John: Somewhere probably in between what she said, because it's like, well...
John: You don't want to overdo it.
John: And then I do it.
John: Then I flop them again.
John: And then I know you're supposed to let them rest.
Merlin: You got to let them rest.
John: So I let them sit there for a while.
John: Think about what they did.
John: And then I'm like, ta-da!
John: Hey!
John: And everybody's sitting there with their little lobster bibs tucked in their shirts.
Merlin: I got a knife and a fork in each hand sitting at the table.
John: And they're like big, big tongues licking their lips like nom, nom, nom.
John: That smells good.
John: And I put them down and I'm like, here they are.
John: And you cut into them, and they were, like, very pink inside.
John: One of them was red.
John: Like, you know, they're rare.
John: The most cooked ones were rare.
John: The uncooked ones were, like, very rare.
John: Undercooked.
John: But, like, crusty on the outside.
John: And I was like, these are going to be amazing.
John: This is going to blow everybody's mind.
John: But then I started eating them.
John: And they were very chewy.
John: And I didn't understand how they could be so chewy because they were... They looked steaky.
John: They looked very steaky.
John: I don't understand what happened.
John: But everyone was very polite.
John: My daughter had some.
John: My house guest had some.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: She said that it was delicious.
John: I was doing that thing that chef does sometimes, which is say, this isn't delicious.
John: Don't pretend that it is.
John: And the reply was, it's great.
John: It's wonderful.
John: I knew it wasn't.
John: I mean, lots of steaks.
John: I like steak.
John: The problem of not being able to cook it is not that I don't like it.
John: That's how I know I've failed.
John: Oh, man.
John: So then...
John: The people at the table were not, they didn't eat all the steak by a fair margin.
John: I had a lot of leftover steak, which isn't, you know, like at Jason Finn's house, there's no leftover pork tenderloin.
John: I see what you're saying.
Merlin: So all the mouth words say it was really good, but you feel like their mouth usings indicated otherwise.
Merlin: They left some on the plate.
John: Awful, awful lot of steak laying around.
John: Oh, boy.
Hmm.
John: So then I had a refrigerator where I had these steaks, these separate...
John: half steaks sitting in containers.
John: Is there leftovers?
John: Leftovers.
John: And I'd open the refrigerator and I'd look at them and I'd go, what am I supposed to do with you now?
John: Microwaving you isn't going to help.
John: Right.
John: But yesterday, I pulled them out and I took them all out and I put them on the cutting board and I'm looking at them and I'm kind of rolling my fingers like trying to figure out what to do next.
John: And I take out my fancy Japanese knife
John: And I start slicing them real thin, slicing them across the grain.
John: Slice, slice, slice with my little Japanese knife, just like doing a whole slice them up thing.
John: And then I realized that I had made fantastic roast beef.
John: Oh, that would be good on a sandwich.
John: And I started making sandwiches with this roast beef.
John: That was very rare in the middle and kind of crusty on the outside.
John: Were you eating it at refrigerator temperature?
John: Refrigerator temperature.
John: Boy, that sounds good.
John: With a piece of Swiss cheese on some nice artisanal bread.
John: Oh, boy.
John: And all of a sudden, I had gone from being a total steak flop to being like roast beef ninja.
John: And I don't even know how I got there.
John: It was like...
John: So now I'm all about how do I intentionally make roast beef where it's not that I just don't know how to make steak.
Merlin: You feel like maybe a little bit you got a little bit lucky with that one.
John: Well, I pulled the fat from the fire, if you know what I'm saying.
Merlin: I do.
John: I do.
John: But there was nobody there to share it with me, right?
John: I didn't have my dinner table people and I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute.
John: We're actually making sandwiches.
John: I ended up like...
John: This was a private moment I had with the roast beef.
John: But then I went online and I was like, how to make a roast beef.
John: And all of the recipes were talking about how to make a roast beef.
John: Like back in the old days when we were kids and people would serve a roast beef for dinner.
John: Like, here's a beef recipe.
John: And there's gravy and there's vegetables and potatoes like a roast beef instead of – I didn't even remember that.
John: I didn't even remember until I was reading these.
Merlin: Are you talking about like there's a distinction between like what you get at a deli versus what in England they might call like a Sunday roast?
John: Right.
John: I'd forgotten about a Sunday roast.
John: I'd forgotten that that even was a thing.
John: Oh, that can be such a nice thing.
John: Only the roast beef that I get at the deli is that's the only kind of roast beef I –
John: I've experienced in 20 years, but when we were kids, you'd go to Sunday dinner at somebody's house.
John: Roast beef dinner.
John: Make a beef or at a holiday, right?
Merlin: Wasn't Christmas a roast beef?
Merlin: That kind of beef done well, I mean, it does not have to be a standing rib roast.
Merlin: You can make a pretty nice roast beef.
Merlin: It doesn't have to be super costly.
Merlin: It's all about the preparation, I think.
Merlin: Oh, this is a good... You know what?
Merlin: This is an exciting experiment for you.
Merlin: You got a nice oven.
Merlin: You could do this.
Merlin: I need this.
Merlin: What is it?
Merlin: What do I do?
Merlin: You know, it'd be kind of boring to talk about on an internet radio show, but you know... What about herbs?
John: Tell me about herbs.
Merlin: Well, you know, I realize you will understandably be resistant to this, but one thing that's kind of fun and counterintuitive is sous vide, where you cook it in like a water bath in bags.
Merlin: I know, I know.
Merlin: Okay, so if you don't want to do that, okay, here's the very, very short version of how to make a steak.
Merlin: Like, don't get the nicest steak in the world, but get a nice steak.
Merlin: Maybe get New York Strip.
Merlin: Or you could get a ribeye.
Merlin: But I would say start with a New York strip.
Merlin: It's more forgiving.
Merlin: Let the steak come to, you want probably rare to medium rare, right?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: My quickie would be get your steak.
Merlin: Let it come to room temperature.
Merlin: So have it out for like an hour or so.
Merlin: Get a pan.
Merlin: Get a fan going.
Merlin: Get a pan going.
Merlin: Very, very, very hot.
Merlin: And put a little bit or probably a little bit of like oil in there.
Merlin: Maybe canola oil or lard you could use.
Merlin: But canola oil will be fine.
Merlin: Get a fan going.
Merlin: Get a pan going.
Merlin: Get a fan in a pan.
Merlin: Put lots of kosher salt.
Merlin: on either side of the steak and on the edges, and then any of the other kinds of things that you would like.
Merlin: It actually does not need to be a ton of stuff.
Merlin: I would say pepper.
Merlin: You might put some garlic powder, or you could use fresh garlic, but garlic powder actually works pretty well.
Merlin: You could put on some secret salt.
Merlin: I think you're not a fan of secret salt, but you could put that on if you want.
Merlin: Talk about Lowry seasoning salt?
Merlin: Get some MSG, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Merlin: And then the idea is, when it's super hot, you kind of like gently, real gentle, like you put it in there with your tongs,
Merlin: You should hear lots of sizzling.
Merlin: And what you can do is, what I do is at that point, you get rosemary, you get thyme, and you get a little bit of bay leaf.
Merlin: And I put that on top of the steak.
Merlin: And then I got this little iron deal that I put on top that holds it down and sears it.
John: But now, wait a minute.
John: Aren't those three things, rosemary, thyme, thyme?
John: Bay leaf.
John: Bay leaf.
John: And I like bay leaf in a spaghetti sauce.
John: I'll always throw a couple of bay leaves in a spaghetti sauce.
Merlin: I've never been quite sure what a bay leaf does.
Merlin: I think it might be a jam up, but it seems to do something.
John: My aunt, Martha, had a famous spaghetti sauce.
John: Every family's got somebody that's got a famous spaghetti sauce.
John: Martha had this famous spaghetti sauce.
John: None of us could figure out what it was that made it so good, that made it so distinctive.
John: And I think it was the bay leaf.
John: So I started throwing bay leaf in my spaghetti sauce, but I don't think I throw enough bay leaf in there.
John: You have to kind of break them in half and throw them in there.
Merlin: Usually you put them in a hole and take them out at the end.
Merlin: Oh, right.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: This is a real simple method, and there's more sophisticated ways to do what we're talking about here.
Merlin: What I do then is, like I say, I put those herbs.
Merlin: I don't put the herbs, I don't smash them into the steak before I sear it.
Merlin: At that point, it's mostly salt.
Merlin: Salt's the most important part.
Merlin: And so at that point, now it's searing a little bit.
Merlin: You got your herbs on top of the steak with a little iron thing.
Merlin: You're pushing it down or similar.
Merlin: You could also use another pan to kind of push it down.
Merlin: We don't get a lot of BTUs, so it needs some help.
Merlin: Now, at this point, what I would do is take about two tablespoons of butter and put that into the pan.
Merlin: Now, you're going to kind of lift up the thing.
Merlin: You scrape off the herbs so that the herbs go into the butter that's melting really fast.
Merlin: Now, you're going to redistribute all the oily stuff.
Merlin: You flip the steak back over.
Merlin: At this point, you spoon some of the herby butter.
Merlin: onto the top of the steak that's cooking.
Merlin: Spoon the herby butter.
Merlin: Spoon the herby butter.
Merlin: You get yourself a tablespoon.
Merlin: Be careful not to burn your hand.
Merlin: It's really easy to do.
Merlin: But when you kind of turn the pan a little bit, you get some herby butter, you put that on there, you let that sear real good.
Merlin: Now, you're going to have to do this a few times to get the done-ness that you want.
Merlin: But I would say try that.
Merlin: You could flip it again and do the butter on the other side too.
Merlin: But at this point, that's going to be a pretty good steak right there.
John: Mm hmm.
John: I know.
John: I'm just I'm so confident that I could do that exact thing and screw it up.
Merlin: Anybody can.
Merlin: I mean, it's it's it's it's the problem is like it is kind of a game of seconds in a lot of ways.
Merlin: You know, you know, look at like hamburgers.
Merlin: A hamburger seems like the easiest thing in the world to make.
Merlin: But how many shitty hamburgers have you had that somebody made at their house?
Merlin: like a hamburger is easy to screw up there's all kinds of ways people try to get cute with a hamburger and they fuck it up and that's either like two kids and then it's got fucking cheese in the middle and it's burnt and it's weird and you're like but you think about like think about like a burger that you get even at a fast food place it's so good you know what it is one thing is that men play with the food too much you can't play with the food don't play with it don't play with the food don't poke the food i mean you could touch the food to see how done it is but don't
Merlin: poke it don't see if blood comes out stop doing that you're gonna drain all the juices don't do that you don't want that don't drain the men fiddle men get bored and this is one way a lot of men screw up on the grill is they feel like they need to be touching the meat a lot don't touch the meat so much when it smells like meat when it smells like steak it's steak that's when you're getting near steak oh you should be able to hear steak and you should be able to smell steak
Merlin: When it smells, hears, and... When it hears and smells like steak, you're getting close to steak.
Merlin: If it doesn't sound like steak, it may not be steak yet.
Merlin: And if it smells like steak for too long, now you've got another thing.
Merlin: Oh, now it's post-steak.
Merlin: Now it's post-steak, and it may be only good for sandwiches.
Merlin: Well, sorry, that was super boring, but it's actually the butter thing sounds crazy, but butter, butter on hot dogs, butter on steak.
Merlin: I'm telling you, it's so good.
John: You know, I think you're helping people.
John: I mean, you're certainly helping me, although I'm going to do exactly what you just said and I'm going to ruin it.
John: No, no.
John: I don't know why.
Merlin: Here's another tip.
Merlin: If you get fresh herbs, I'm not a foodie, so fuck that, but what you might do is if you get fresh herbs, you don't want to have powdered herbs, thyme, bay leaf, and rosemary, if you don't have a bush, excuse me, all three of those freeze just fine.
Merlin: You put them in a zip-up bag, zip-up, put them in.
Merlin: My problem with thyme and rosemary is I do have those in the garden.
Merlin: Thyme is very good on lots of meats.
John: But doesn't it just make everything taste like dirty grass?
Merlin: No, that's cilantro.
Merlin: Just try a little bit of thyme on a steak.
Merlin: It'll rock your world.
Merlin: You don't want tons of this stuff.
Merlin: I mean, rosemary, any of these herbs, people use them too much because they're, again, men.
Merlin: You put too much of stuff in.
Merlin: You're having a steak.
Merlin: You're not having a pile of rosemary with meat in it.
Merlin: Yeah, thank God you said something.
John: Do you know what I'm saying?
John: I don't want to see rosemary.
John: I don't want to even know it's there.
John: I just want the thing to be good.
Merlin: And then when it's done, I would toss it into, this is not super critical.
Merlin: Some people say it is.
John: I don't care.
Merlin: Yes, garbage.
Merlin: Don't email me.
Merlin: Wrap it up a few times in aluminum foil and let it sit for about 10 minutes.
Merlin: You'll be good to go.
Merlin: All right.
Merlin: You can slice it thin for your guests.
Merlin: That's tempting it is what you're saying.
Merlin: Well, tempting, I would say, is more like you don't want to burn the top of your breast or your turkey unit.
Merlin: But this is more of a setting or the, you know, kind of letting the juices settle.
Merlin: As they say.
Merlin: Uh-huh.
Merlin: I'm very tempted to buy you a sous vide dingus right now.
Merlin: They are very, very fun.
John: You can be a food scientist so fast.
John: I wouldn't know even what that is.
John: If you gave me a piece of pen and a paper and said, draw a sous vide dingus.
Uh-huh.
John: I don't know what I would do.
Merlin: It's a lightsaber with a cord that brings water to a very precise level and keeps it there.
Merlin: So you can cook stuff.
Merlin: I still have no idea why I would want that or what I would do.
Merlin: I get some beef.
Merlin: This is so fucking boring.
Merlin: This episode will never air.
John: Let's not do it anymore.
John: Let's not talk about it.
John: Except I just want to know what... Well, no.
John: No, you don't.
John: No, I don't.
John: I have a hamburger hack.
John: Bring it.
John: A hamburger hack that helps your hamburger help you.
John: I got hacked.
John: Make your hamburger a hick, which is, are you ready for this?
John: Mm-hmm.
John: Best hamburger.
John: Ready.
John: You ready for best hamburger?
Merlin: Okay, my eyes are closed.
Merlin: Denny's.
Merlin: Denny's hamburger.
Merlin: How do you get?
Merlin: Do you get medium, medium rare?
Merlin: Denny's hamburger medium.
Merlin: What done is do you get it done?
John: Medium rare.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: Medium rare Denny's hamburger.
John: You're not going to believe it.
John: Okay.
John: It's Denny's.
John: The only reason you go to Denny's is it's 2 o'clock in the morning and you want to smoke cigarettes and be gone.
John: Oh, I smoked so many cigarettes at Denny's.
John: Except, A, you can't smoke cigarettes at Denny's anymore.
John: B, neither of us are gone.
John: But there is a great hamburger there and I think
John: Something like Thursdays or Tuesdays, kids eat free.
John: Kids eat free, good hamburger.
John: Denny's.
John: Now, Denny's was very problematic.
John: Denny's was one of those companies like Domino's and Nantucket Nectars that the left boycotted because they were racist or... Because of the causes.
John: For causes.
John: But I think Denny's was actually...
John: Denny's actually like was demonstrably racist.
John: Sambos.
John: Sambos was visibly racist.
John: We boycotted Domino's because the owner gave money to anti-abortion people.
John: That's correct.
Merlin: That is why we did not get Domino's in college.
John: We didn't go to Home Depot because that guy is just a crank, right?
John: A bad crank.
Merlin: Oh, I'm sorry to hear that.
Merlin: I like a Home Depot.
John: But apparently Home Depot itself says that bad crank guy is no longer involved.
John: So don't be mad at their nuts and bolts.
John: They're no longer problematic.
John: Yeah.
John: Well, but bad crank guy is still around.
John: I don't know what they're talking about because he's still around, but he's not.
John: They are trying to distance themselves.
John: And then there was something about, was it Snapple?
John: i guess it was snapple that was they were all cutesy pie but when you got behind the curtain there was some kind of they were all like they were dark malls snapple boycott there was a snapple boycott snapple boycott i think we boycott papa john's because that guy's just like super creepy right he's a bad guy bad guy 1993 that's probably not it that's probably not it
Merlin: Well, no, I think it dates to then.
Merlin: Is that right?
Merlin: Snapple Rumors.
Merlin: Snapple Rumors.
Merlin: I'm on Snopes.com looking at Snapple Rumors.
Merlin: Snapple is affiliated with the Ku Klux Klan or donates money to the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue.
Merlin: There you go.
Merlin: 1992.
Merlin: It's false, according to Snopes.
Merlin: We'll see what else Snapple's into.
Merlin: Yeah, so anyway, steak, you know, but you know, that's a good place to start because that's, I think part of it is like, you know, one of the little tricks in there is the letting it come to room temperature.
Merlin: Having it be frozen, not as good.
John: Well, you know, the freezer plays a large role in in my bachelor hood because it all goes in the freezer.
John: And there are some things that when they come in the house, they go into the freezer.
Merlin: I imagine you like Leonard Bernstein.
Merlin: You're like Leonard Bernstein.
Merlin: You come in, you're deciding like what orchestra members are here?
Merlin: What what what are we going to produce together today?
John: Yeah, right.
John: That's right.
John: I get my conductor's wand out.
John: I open the refrigerator.
John: Your conductor's wand.
Merlin: You pick up baton.
John: Uh-huh.
John: I pick up baton.
John: I open the refrigerator.
John: I look inside.
John: Here's what's inside.
John: Tortillas.
John: Eggs.
John: Okay.
John: 65 kinds of mustard and hot sauce.
Okay.
John: Some... It's your own little home version of Chopped.
John: Some mayonnaise.
John: Okay, okay.
John: That is best foods mayonnaise that I buy for myself.
John: There is some vegan mayonnaise left over from a time when vegans populated my house.
John: Yeah.
John: There is some other mayonnaise...
John: Which someone else brought into the house who didn't understand that best foods is the only mayonnaise.
John: Like you don't bring in another kind of mayonnaise.
John: Oh, and then in the cupboard, there's some mayonnaise that has John Hodgman's name on it from his Apocalypse Mayonnaise series.
John: Okay, okay.
John: And then in the fridge, there's cream for the coffee.
John: There's 2% milk.
John: For some reason right now, there are two containers of 2% milk.
John: And then in the CRISPR drawer, there's a bunch of different kinds of genes.
John: Are you doing this from memory?
John: Well, because this is all that's in there.
Merlin: Are you looking at it right now?
Merlin: No.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: That's amazing.
Merlin: That recall is incredible.
Merlin: I don't think I could do that with my refrigerator.
Merlin: Oh, I could tell you everything that's in there.
Merlin: Can you tell what's in mine?
John: That's okay.
John: Don't worry about it.
John: Like seven cases of fizzy water.
John: Oh, God.
John: It's an issue.
John: And then in the back, there's an open box of Arm & Hammer baking soda.
John: Oh, that's nice.
John: That keeps it fresh.
John: That keeps it fresh, although it's been in there for eight years.
Merlin: you want to feel you're ready to feel old next time you do that like today go replace that write today's date on there it's going to blow your mind the next time you look at it like wait a minute 1989 what i'm having a synecdoche new york moment what has happened where did all the baking soda time go i think you got the fixings of some good stuff because you know the key is like all great mysteries you've given us too many clues
Merlin: Oh.
Merlin: You know what I'm saying?
Merlin: Yeah, sure.
Merlin: You've got a refrigerator full of MacGuffins.
Merlin: La la la.
Merlin: There's got to be a way that you can really get your laser vision right on the few items that you could really curate into a delicious meal for table.
John: Well, what happens in the fridge is it's just a weigh station.
John: Things either come in there and hang out in the refrigerator area for three to five days before they are consumed or
John: Or they go into the fridge and it just slows them down on their way into the freezer.
John: Okay.
John: Right?
John: Because they're in the fridge and they're either like, oh, that's been in there five days.
Merlin: And the freezer is like hard time.
Merlin: Like you could be in there for a while.
John: You could be there for a while.
John: And so if you spend five days in the fridge to the point where I'm looking at it like, hmm, how many more days in the fridge before this is no longer...
John: a viable thing you gotta transfer them from county you send them you send them up to freezer that's right they go upstate and then in the freezer if they're there long enough i forget that maybe they were in the refrigerator for too long because they've been frozen now for a long time freezer
John: No, no, no.
John: I trust it.
John: Eventually it all comes out.
John: I look at it.
John: I go, how long has this been in here?
John: And then I make it because I'm a bachelor and I don't have very high standards for myself.
John: No, you're a man who's more than comfortable eating out of a pot with a large spoon.
John: That I will eat out of a can.
John: You know, I will eat out of a can with a fork, with a spoon that I got in a takeout thing from a long time ago.
John: Just two filthy fingers in the ravioli can.
John: And I'm eating like beans out of a can, cold beans out of a can.
John: So, and then the things that come out of the freezer and I'm like, either, I don't know what this is.
John: I don't even know where this came from.
John: Or you look at it and you're like, this is freezer burned.
John: Like, this is bad.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Well, you know, I mean, a good rule of thumb is if you can't tell what it is, you probably don't want it.
Merlin: In my case, you can't tell what it is.
John: It goes in the crock pot.
Yeah.
John: Go in the crock pot, cook it for 10 hours.
John: Let's see what you got in you, buddy.
John: And then open the crock pot up with a wood spoon.
John: Oh, boy.
John: And mash, mash, mash, mash, mash.
Merlin: Whatever it is, you put it in there with some onions and some bay leaves, maybe some beans.
John: That's good eating.
John: That's exactly what happens.
John: I'll get like, oh, you know what?
John: I was very aspirational about this kale.
Merlin: I think onions could make a lady's shoe taste good.
Merlin: I mean, there's certain kinds of things there.
Merlin: If you stick it in the pot and leave it in there long enough, you're going to be fine.
Merlin: Yep, yep.
Merlin: And it gets out all the toxins.
Merlin: It sweats it out, I think is what it's called in Sweet Safety.
Merlin: It sweats out all the toxins.
Merlin: And then the onion helps suffuse it.
John: Lately, when I'm backstage at an event and there's one of those...
John: There's a courtesy plate of vegetables.
John: Assuming that everyone that does events is just pacing around thinking, God, if I just had some broccoli that I could dip in some ranch.
Merlin: Yeah, just a little bit of crudité.
Merlin: Such a nice treat.
Merlin: You don't really get that very much.
John: Yeah, I don't know.
John: It always happens.
John: And I usually just sort of walk out of the dressing room, look back at this enormous...
John: like plastic tray covered with vegetables and I just sort of look at it and then turn out the light and close the door and keep going on my way home.
John: But lately I've been taking it because then I put all those vegetables in the crock pot with whatever I pull out of the
Merlin: what i pull out of the back of the freezer and it turns into you know some kind of like meaty mush it must also be i mean i'm just guessing but like you don't really exactly know what all of that stuff is what the quality what the age it must be a little bit of a fun mystery it's almost like a surprise meal when it's done you may not know exactly what you're in for right isn't that part of the fun
John: Almost every meal I prepare at home is going to produce a surprise.
John: Oh, boy.
John: That's cool.
John: When it's good, it's like, what a surprise.
John: When it's awful, it's like, whew, that was a surprise.
John: And when it's like somewhere in the middle where you go, either I turned garbage into something edible or I turned something edible into garbage.
John: But neither time I know for sure what's going to happen until I put that first fork to my mouth.
John: Uh-huh.
John: I made some soup and served it to my daughter and myself the other day.
John: And I put it down in front of her and she took a bite of it and said, I don't like this soup.
John: Oh boy.
John: And I said, you're a child and you don't get to choose all the time what your food is.
John: This is good soup.
John: And I need you to eat some of the soup.
John: And she was like, I had another bite and was like, I just, you know, she, but she was doing it in a kid way.
John: Like,
John: I don't want this soup.
John: It's gross.
John: And I was puttering in the kitchen, getting the rest of the stuff ready.
John: And I was like, listen,
John: We're having soup.
John: That's what we're having.
John: Oh, I've tried that.
Merlin: You're going to have to get right with Jesus here.
Merlin: As the words are coming, at least for me, as the words are coming out of my mouth, it seems so patently obvious that I've just identified a state of reality in the world, which is that there are meals in the world, and there is our home.
Merlin: And the Venn diagram is that the meal in our home tonight is soup.
Merlin: This is the thing we're having.
Merlin: Mom and Dad want Indian food tonight, and that's the thing we're having for dinner.
John: That's exactly right.
Merlin: What part of Indian meal are you interested in?
Merlin: This does not mean you get a cheeseburger.
Merlin: There is no Indian cheeseburger.
Merlin: Maybe at table, but not at our table.
John: Not at our table.
John: Well, so then I sat down and I tucked myself under this bowl of soup and I said, look, here's how a person eats soup.
John: And I took a bite of the soup and I was like, oh dear, this is terrible soup.
John: And she said...
John: She glared at me.
John: And I was like, oh, dear.
John: This would be a very good cartoon.
John: I took her soup away and I took my soup away.
John: And I said, let's find another thing to eat that isn't this soup.
John: And so she was like, yeah, thanks.
John: Thanks.
John: I was trying to tell you.
Merlin: Have a job, Dad.
Merlin: I was trying to tell you.
Merlin: Hey, John, let's talk about a sponsor.
Merlin: Oh, yeah, let's do it.
Merlin: I'm springing this on you.
Merlin: I want to talk about Squarespace.
Merlin: Can I tell you about Squarespace?
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Squarespace is where you can go to make a beautiful website for yourself.
Merlin: You can turn your cool idea into a website to showcase your work.
Merlin: You can blog or publish content, sell products all in one place with beautiful templates.
Merlin: John, did you know that our website is a Squarespace website?
Merlin: Were you aware of that?
Merlin: I did know that.
John: You know, I have several websites that are on Squarespace.
John: Oh, boy.
John: Is this going to be like the mattress?
Merlin: I mean, you know, I feel like I'm deliberately doing it now because I want to do a lot of time.
Merlin: What kind of stuff are you doing on Squarespace, John?
John: Well, I feel like I need websites.
John: I need more websites.
John: People are always telling you you've got to get on the Internet.
John: Get on the Internet, right?
Merlin: Well, and, you know, e-commerce.
Merlin: Think about all the e-commerce.
Merlin: That's so good because they have powerful e-commerce functions.
John: powerful e-commerce functionality why do i do this that lets you sell anything online they have e-commerce functionality e-commerce well i also get the ability to customize look and feel the settings the products more with just a few clicks isn't that amazing this is exactly what i need i need this it's optimized for mobile right out of the box so i have them i have them and then i have people that are like let me help you uh uh do your squarespace i'm like awesome
John: And so right now, I think I have several Squarespace websites that are being managed by several different people.
John: And I think that they're probably conducting e-commerce or putting things on the Internet.
Merlin: One imagines the sites are fine, raves John Roderick.
Merlin: Yeah, I think they're great.
Merlin: I think they're fine.
Merlin: I like it a lot.
Merlin: I have lots of things on Squarespace.
Merlin: There's our internet podcast, which is on Squarespace, and we put the episodes up there, the short that I steal from other places.
Merlin: That goes up there.
Merlin: My Merlin Man meetup site.
Merlin: That's at merlinm.com slash meetup.
Merlin: You can even learn about the stuff I do.
Merlin: And I love it.
Merlin: I've been with them for years and years, and I think they're great.
Merlin: And I'll tell you a secret.
Merlin: I don't know if this is within the terms.
Merlin: We're setting up a site for my kid.
Merlin: It's going to be a private site.
Merlin: But we bought her a domain name that she wanted, and now she's going to have her own little website in Squarespace.
John: How cool!
John: How sweet is that?
Merlin: Can you believe how fast they grow up?
John: Oh, she gets her own website.
John: What's she going to put there?
Merlin: I couldn't say.
Merlin: Well, she and her friends have developed a character, and they have a club, and they've made business cards, and it's an entire enterprise that she's undertaken.
Merlin: Well, it sounds like the Roderick Group, basically.
Merlin: It's right.
Merlin: You've got the nice girls and the funny boys.
Merlin: See, also, the other thing to know is it's a new way to buy domains.
Merlin: You can choose from over 200 different extensions at Squarespace.
Merlin: They have analytics that help you grow over time.
Merlin: It has a built-in search engine optimization, which I know is very important for John.
Merlin: That is SEO.
Merlin: SEO.
Merlin: Look it up.
Merlin: Do your research, sir.
Merlin: And you know what?
Merlin: There's nothing to ever patch or upgrade.
Merlin: And you get 24 by 7 award-winning customer support whenever you need it.
Merlin: You go and you make it with Squarespace.
Merlin: So if you're in the business, if you're in the market for a website, you go to squarespace.com.
Merlin: You get a free trial, no credit card required.
Merlin: And when you're ready to launch your beautiful new site, use the offer code ROTL, just like it sounds, R-O-T-L.
Merlin: R-O-T-L.
Merlin: R-O-T-L.
Merlin: That'll save you 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
Merlin: Booyah!
Yeah.
Merlin: Thanks to Squarespace for supporting Roderick Online and all the great shows.
John: I don't even know how internets were done before Squarespace because right now, everybody I know uses Squarespace.
John: I don't even know what the other options are.
John: I mean, we're advertising to people who are probably out there thinking, I have my internet on a different place.
John: Yes.
John: And we're saying, you should go to Squarespace and
John: But from where I'm sitting in my chair, all I know is Squarespace because it's doing such a good job that I don't even know why there's another.
Merlin: I don't even have a particularly great analogy for it, except to say that there was a time when idiots like me made their living doing the kind of stuff that Squarespace does automatically and flawlessly now.
Merlin: And now that I have other ways to make income and stuff, I'm very happy to not be in that business because it has gotten very complex.
Merlin: I would not want to have to make a website nowadays that looks good on a phone and on a giant screen and on a TV and all that.
Merlin: That's one of the nice things Squarespace does.
Merlin: This ad's going on longer than I wanted.
Merlin: But I actually do recommend them.
Merlin: And John, here's what I'd like to tell the kids.
Merlin: Here's the thing with Squarespace.
Merlin: Even if you're like the kind of person John's talking about, even if you already have a website you made yourself out of stuff you found in your freezer...
Merlin: Keep in mind that someone you know may not be as cool and nerdy as you and might want to know about this.
Merlin: There you go.
John: There it is.
Merlin: We need a new web page for the day school.
Merlin: Can you make me want, can you roll the GitHub on my word monkey?
Merlin: And you're like, no.
Merlin: You go to squarespace.com and get yourself a website and just go do that.
Merlin: You're out of the webmaster business.
Merlin: Just get a website.
John: I was talking to my mom the other day and I said, why?
John: Because she was talking about, because she's very frustrated with the fact that programmers now, we've talked about this, programmers now, she says, they just put out stuff that's in beta and then they make all of us into beta testers and that's not how it used to be.
Merlin: That drives her crazy.
John: People used to make sure that before they released a product that it worked.
John: And she's like, they don't even care if it works now.
John: She's so mad.
John: And she's talking about programming and how programming works and how, you know, she still thinks like a programmer and
John: She's like, I don't understand how somebody could listen to a podcast while they were programming.
John: Like, you have to be using your brain to program.
John: And I was like, I don't know if that's true anymore.
John: And at a certain point, she was like, well, you know, this, that, and the other.
John: And I said, wait a minute.
John: Never occurred to me before.
John: Why don't they write a program?
John: To program.
Merlin: Oh, it seems like it's something a program would be good for.
John: And she said, well, that is how they program now.
John: They wrote programs to program.
Merlin: It's programs all the way down.
John: Yeah.
John: And you had to learn how to use the program that programmed.
John: And then they made a new program that programmed the program that programmed.
John: And I was like, I was just like thinking about all these stacks and stacks and stacks of programs.
John: Yes.
John: That are running programs.
Merlin: Yes.
John: And I said, wait a minute, mom, are you telling me that there are ones and zeros at the bottom of all this?
John: And she's like, that's all there is.
John: All there is is ones and zeros.
John: All this other stuff where people are like, do, do, do, do, do, I'm programming somewhere down the line.
John: There's.
John: ones and zeros, which is what we used to have to do.
John: We had to use to play with them.
John: They pull the strings, but they're not the puppet.
John: Do you know what I'm saying?
John: People are there for the puppet.
John: And I'm hearing you say that Squarespace is a program that programs the program that programs.
Merlin: That's a really good way to put it.
Merlin: I think they should probably use that.
Merlin: That would be a very good catchphrase for them.
Merlin: For Squarespace.
Merlin: I get it.
Merlin: I get it.
Merlin: Program the program that programs the program.
Merlin: Buffalo, Buffalo, Buffalo.
Merlin: Buffalo, Buffalo.
Merlin: Thanks to Squarespace for putting Roderick on the line and all the great shows.
Merlin: I thought I'd try that just for once.
Merlin: Let's be honest, we're recording two episodes in a day and I thought we should try that.
Merlin: Isn't that fun?
Merlin: Did that work?
Merlin: It's going to be flawless.
Merlin: I'm just so winded.
Merlin: Are you tired?
Merlin: I'm kind of tired.
John: Maybe I should have an almond.
John: I'm tired.
John: I do.
John: I feel tired.
John: I started writing song lyrics yesterday, and they were all like, I give up.
John: I surrender.
John: You got me.
John: You beat me.
John: You finally beat me.
Merlin: They had a big spill of that Keystone pipeline.
Merlin: Did you get your mom programming on that?
Merlin: They did just now?
Merlin: I think I got 200,000 gallons, I want to say.
Merlin: Oh, Jesus.
Merlin: Keystone spill or leak.
Merlin: Spill.
Merlin: That's no good.
Merlin: You don't want that.
Merlin: Nope.
Merlin: 210,000 gallons of oil.
John: That's so awful.
Merlin: It's sort of like, I'm sorry, I'm eating.
Merlin: You get a little kid, little kid wants a cat.
Merlin: You say, all right, hang on a second.
Merlin: You say to the little kid, all right, I'll get you the goddamn cat, but you need to take care of it.
Merlin: And what does the kid say?
Merlin: The kid says, oh, of course I'll take care of the cat.
Merlin: Well, you don't understand.
Merlin: You've got to feed it.
Merlin: You've got to give it water.
Merlin: You've got to groom it.
Merlin: You might have to express its anal glands at some point.
Merlin: You're going to have to do stuff with this cat that you may not be... Don't worry.
Merlin: I really want a cat.
Merlin: And then you give it to the cat, and the cat's fucking dead in three days.
Merlin: Keystone people say, let us have the pipeline.
Merlin: Please and thank you.
Merlin: This is not going to be a problem.
Merlin: We promise nothing will leak.
Merlin: 210,000 gallons.
Merlin: And then you say, well, you know, shit happens.
Merlin: That's a lot of oil.
Merlin: 210,000.
John: Well, you know, it's a drop in the bucket.
John: Do you still see Kurt?
John: Um, he's, he's kind of famous now, right?
John: He's famous.
John: Kurt is, um, very prickly and, and, you know, he's spectrumy, right?
John: So if you want to sit and talk to Kurt, he's very social and like, but he's obviously really trying.
John: And then after a while it uses him up, right?
John: He's, I'm very sympathetic to him too.
Merlin: I am too.
John: And so, um,
John: We see each other.
John: We have a good time.
John: We laugh.
John: We exchange some, like, old memes, which is part of how people socialize with one another, right?
John: Like, ha-ha, remember that time?
John: Oh, I do.
John: We talk about it every time.
John: Okay, great.
Merlin: All your bases are belong to us.
John: Yes, I agree.
John: You're the man now, dog.
John: I adore him, right?
John: Wazzup!
John: Bud flies.
Merlin: Where's the beef, she says.
Merlin: She didn't know where the beef was.
Merlin: And it's really little.
Merlin: So she says to the guy, where's the beef?
Merlin: Where is it?
Merlin: Where is the beef, Clara Peller?
Merlin: Bless her heart.
Merlin: Pizza, pizza.
Merlin: Pizza, pizza.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: We could do a whole show just to this.
Merlin: Borgesmord.
John: And, you know, then there are all the regional songs.
John: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: You got Cal, right?
John: Cal.
John: We have Cal.
John: What's Cal?
John: Cal is... Oh, go see Cal, go see Cal, go see Cal.
John: Cal's the car dealer, right?
Merlin: Cal Worthington Ford.
John: Cal had... What's crazy is that he was a Ford dealer in Alaska, but I think he was a Chevy dealer in California.
John: And so they would repurpose these commercials.
John: They'd show like
John: these great california shots of right cut in a little bit of local color yeah and then cut in some pictures of some fords and then go back to him playing with a with a tiger or something pennants with snow on them but we all knew we all knew all the songs right i mean it had multiple verses wow if you're looking for a better set of wheels i will stand upon my head to beat all deals
John: He's got a cowboy hat.
John: I'll stand upon my head until my ears are turning red.
John: Go see cow.
John: Go see cow.
John: Go see cow.
Merlin: Follow the signs.
Merlin: Follow the cars.
Merlin: To cash.
Merlin: I'm Berkey's Big Bargain Barn in South Lebanon, Ohio.
Merlin: I don't care about making money.
Merlin: I just love to sell carpets.
John: Yeah!
John: Cash Hamburger!
John: It's Crazy Eddie!
John: We didn't have Crazy Eddie, but when we got cable TV, they had... I hope you got the help you needed.
John: Yeah.
John: Oh, Crazy Eddie?
John: No, I don't think you did.
John: A little bit ableist.
John: We had a lot, you know, there was a song called... There was an Anchorage Tourism Campaign.
John: in the 80s called Wild About Anchorage.
John: And it's kind of funny about those local tourism campaigns because they put those ads on Alaska TV where it's like, yeah, we're all in Anchorage.
John: I mean, if we're wild about it, this is as good as it gets.
John: Your commercial isn't going to like psych us up about it.
John: These commercials should be on TV in California.
John: But it had a great song, Wild About Anchorage.
John: Wild about Anchorage.
John: It's a marvelous time.
John: And then there were like these animals, moose and bear and raccoons and stuff doing a can can style animated ones.
John: Yeah, that's adorable.
John: And it was very cute and very wonderful.
John: It was a it was a it was a thing that we all actually kind of it did psych us up.
John: We got into it like this is a thing.
John: We're wild about Anchorage and people had buttons and T-shirts wild about Anchorage.
John: I'm not sure if that exists to this day, but we all knew the song.
John: Yeah.
John: John, I don't have anything else to talk about.
John: I'm exhausted.
John: Oh, yeah.
John: Okay.
John: Well, I feel like we had a good show.
John: It was a very good show.
Merlin: You know, as this is coming out on Monday, which is today, you go over to Cotton Bureau.
Merlin: Oh, Jesus Christ.
Merlin: Here we go.
Merlin: Go to Show Notes to find it.
Merlin: Get one of our T-shirts.
Merlin: They're really nice.
Merlin: Oh, you should.
Merlin: It's getting to be the holiday season.
John: And you want to do this.
John: You want to go and get a shirt, because I think they're the best shirts.
Merlin: All the great shirts you go.
Merlin: And the truth is, you go to... Oh, Jesus Christ.
Merlin: CottonBureau.com slash people slash Roderick dash on dash the...
Merlin: And we've got the Super Train Pound Sign Super Train shirt.
Merlin: We've got the Roderick on the Line orange bell.
Merlin: It's lovely.
Merlin: And, of course, the brand new All the Great Shows t-shirt.
Merlin: And the thing is, some of them are available as what you call hoodies and sweatshirts.
Merlin: Did you know that?
Merlin: Oh, I didn't know that.
Merlin: Yeah, my Super Train shirt that I wear the most is a hoodie.
Merlin: It's got drawstrings and pockets and the whole nine.
Merlin: I'm going to get one of these All The Great Shows hoodies.
Merlin: I gave a code to Sean to get a free shirt.
Merlin: Oh, nice.
Merlin: Don't you feel like we kind of owe it to him, but I think it's a nice gesture.
Merlin: It's great.
Merlin: It's wonderful.
Merlin: He was there when you said it.
Merlin: And then he did canonize it by making fun of you about it for years, right?
John: Yeah, he was the one that turned it and made it into a meme directed at kicking me in the knee.
John: But that was fun for us both because I love being kicked in the knee.
John: So, yeah, all the great shows became synonymous with my inability to...
John: navigate simple social situations.
Merlin: I hope you get the ability to, um, sit down with Dan, uh, Dan Harmon at some point.
Merlin: We'd be able to visit and like, one of these days, a chance to sit down and visit and interview and really get inside the create or create T process.
Merlin: Oh, sit down, sit down that microphone.
I can't wait.
Merlin: I can't wait.
John: Do you have a bell or shall I ring us out?
John: Oh, hang on.
John: Let me get, let me find my bell.
John: I did.
John: I got it.
John: I brought, Oh, hang on.
John: It's over there.
John: Let me get it.
Merlin: Hang on.
Merlin: Uh, John stepped aside for a moment.
Merlin: He's going to get his bell.
Merlin: He should be back in just a moment.
Uh,
John: Now, this isn't my actual orange bell.
John: Okay.
John: This is a bell that we got during our phase of like, maybe we should make bells.
John: Oh, we did.
John: We got test bells.
John: And we had a couple of test bells.
John: And then this was one of the test bells.
John: And it's still kind of floating around here.
John: So here we go.
John: Ready?
John: Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.
John: Happy Thanksgiving.
Merlin: Oh, that's pleasant.
Merlin: Pardon that turkey.