Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard - Jake Johnson Returns

Episode Date: September 4, 2023

Jake Johnson is an actor, director, and podcaster. Jake returns to the Armchair Expert to discuss what he remembers about being on the show in the early days, why he stopped going to casinos, and how much he respects AA. Jake and Dax talk about why they wanted their daughters to learn self-defense, how they feel about doing manual labor, and how hard it can be to see the red flags in some situations. Jake explains how he is usually 5 years late to trends, what kind of advice he gives on his podcast, and how he thinks it’s funny when someone calls him out for being wrong.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan Shepard. I'm joined by Mr. Monica Padman. Hello there. We have a returning guest today. Yes, he was early days. And one of my favorites. I told him that and I very much was sincere about that.

I found him to be so fun the first time we talked to him and then equally fun this time. Yes. Jake Johnson. He changed the show fundamentally. Foundationally, fundamentally, He changed the show, fundamentally. Foundationally, fundamentally, he changed the show.

He is an actor, a filmmaker, New Girl, Minx, Spider-Man, Let's Be Cops, Drinking Buddies, the whole thing.

He has a new podcast right now that is very, very fun. It's called We're Here to Help with Jake Johnson and Gareth Reynolds. And they're not great at help, which is what makes it.

Yeah, they give kind of like, not bad, well, bad advice sort of, but advice that like your uncle would give you. Buddy advice from the bar. Yeah. Yeah. It's fun. It's incredibly entertaining. So please enjoy Jake Johnson.

But before you go, I would like to announce the October prompts for Armchair Anonymous. We have four coming your way. First one. If you're in the service industry, tell us a story. Service industry nightmare. Yeah. Service industry nightmares.

I don't want to limit it to nightmares. It could also be incredible. Someone could have tipped you $10,000 because they won. Exactly. Craziest story from the service industry. Yes. This is not an invitation if you are not from the service industry. Yes. This is not an invitation if you are not in the service industry to tell us a bad story about service.

Correct. This is from a service provider. Yeah. Like AT&T or Verizon or T-Mobile. Or a server at a restaurant. Comcast, yes. Okay. Number two, crazy teacher or principal stories.

Again. Again, you're the teacher or the principal. You're not the student. That would be crazy student stories. That's right. These are very confusing. Story about a real life encounter with Dax or Monica that you think is crazy. Yes. This is very scary.

I want to say this was your idea. Dax is really worried. Okay. Yeah, let's give some context. My assumption is that these stories are going to be mostly from people who we know who want to tell a funny story about us. Oh, right. Okay. But then what was my hunch?

Well, for the audience, then they get to hear funny stories about us that we might not tell on our own. Okay, right. Okay? And you're worried that this is going to get you canceled. Well, just I think it might be someone I may love to, Mike. Which is, I guess, fine. Let's listen to that. I mean, we probably won't pick you. I'm sorry.

No, I still don't think we need to sit through that. So I don't think that's going to get picked. I'm warning now. Okay. Regardless, story about Taxer Monica from real life. Who do you hope writes in? Aaron? Oh, man.

No, I'd rather hear like a blast from the past. Yeah, me too. Like an old teacher. Yeah, teacher, high school. Oh, my God. Do you think my hot teacher will call? By the way, this could combine two things like i could be someone's nightmare service experience i could be a principal's nightmare

it's true yours could be the teacher story oh hot for teacher this is a long intro um okay number four an extremely generous act of hospitality that you received. Again, just for context, this was a prompt that someone suggested after I told the Boston Airport story where we were taken in by strangers and shown great hospitality. So if you have a story like that where you were really fucked and then someone showed you an extreme generous act of hospitality. Please share. Please share. Longest prompts ever. Love it. Please enjoy Jake Johnson share. Longest prompts ever. Love it.

Please enjoy Jake Johnson. Trip Planner by Expedia. You were made to have strong opinions about sand. We were made to help you and your friends find a place on a beach with a pool and a marina

and a waterfall and a soaking tub. Expedia. Made to travel. A fresh voice can speak to you Expedia. Made to travel. As a chorus of fresh voices moves you, taking you to greater heights, add your voice to the mix and let fresh answer back with perfect harmony in pure Michigan. Keep it fresh at Michigan.org. He's an object's man. He's an object's man.

He's an ultimate star He's an instant star Do you recall this? I'm putting it all together. I'm having memories. Since memories are going back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was a while ago. It was a very long time ago. You're for sure one of my favorite guests we've ever had.

Oh, thanks. I weirdly thought, optimistically, somehow that one thing would have led to like some regular check-ins like that's how much i enjoyed me too okay good well i had a really funny thing about you because i didn't know what this was you guys were kind of first in my eyes in the podcast world and i think it was spider-man and i was just doing press and they said like do you want to go to dax's house and talk to dax and i told you i've been a fan so i was like which is hard to believe yes and i was like sure we'll just do bits yeah and then we sit down and i was not prepared for the tone yeah vulnerability forward we did a lot of dad stuff right we walked in and you go we have

something in common and i thought you were gonna do like a silly voice. And you're like, our dad's weird. And I was like, oh, Homeboy's doing his research. He's taking this shit seriously. And he's really interested in the childhood trauma. Wasn't he a groundling or something? His background's in comedy, isn't it? It was a wake-up call to what you guys were doing. And obviously you guys have proven it. But you guys had started a path that is now becoming a thing.

But for me in 2018, I didn't see it. Right. I was like, we're up in his garage. What fun. When you're talking about like lifting weights in your garage, I have a gym in my garage. Oh, you got to. I thought this was like Midwest shit.

Yes. Yeah, we're going to hang out, do some bids. Maybe you'll release it. Yeah, maybe not. Who knows? Let's see. Maybe we'll forget we even released them. Before we get to it, I do a big thank you to you.

We bring it up a lot on this show, but it's very important that I say it to you. You're the reason that this seating arrangement is the way this seating arrangement is. You probably don't remember this, but I obviously do. I used to sit there. I do remember, and it was a lot of this. Exactly. And you said in the middle of the interview, I used to sit there. I do remember. And it was a lot of this. Exactly. And you said in the middle of the interview, I don't like this.

I can't see her. Can we rearrange this? And so we did. We must have pulled up that chair or something. It was your episode. Why do I remember that you've said that about someone else too? No, only you. Only you.

No, no. I'm not saying that to throw you under the bus. By the way, even if you do, it feels good. I'm 100% with you. Maybe it was someone who said, why aren't you in the picture? Some other person. Mike. Sure.

Mike sure was the first one that was like, hey, get in the picture. It would be you and Mike, of course. A couple of good guys. But I'll tell you where that comes from just in terms of our business i had been in a lot of pitches especially when i was coming up and you would notice certain executives wouldn't look at you i don't know if you've ever had that but if you're with like a heavy hitter yeah and you're like i'm fucking excited about them too but we came up with this that's a legit friend like i get it we're all excited blanks in the room yeah and then some executives are looking around and i would be in the middle of like my section

of the pitch where i'm like well if you like the jerry character let me tell you about bob and i'm like how about a little eye contact and i would be like mother fucker that's brutal no but it changed the whole vibe of the show, I think. And I really credit you. It really did. Thank you for that, really. Oh, yeah. Cool. Yeah, first of all, it was just very cool of you. But also, it made clear one of the debates we were having. Because we would go like, well, why does some guest pretend Monica's not even there?

Is it a female thing? Is it a misogyny? Is it my status because they know who I am first? All this debate about it. And we never thought, well, just it's logistically impossible to look at both of us it's sad when it's simple yeah i know when i came here i was like yeah i'm gonna come and talk to dan and i was like okay cool this is the whole thing i remember thinking this is tricky because i'm icing you out but i don't mean to but this especially with like my body type when your body, you don't want to be like...

Hold on, hold on. Homie's taking photos and you're like, no, no, I'm going forward. You have to somehow bend over and touch your toes to look at Monica and take your shirt off. For some reason, you can't see her if you don't take your shirt off. It was whiplash.

You'd have to jolt her ass. We could paint it as an altruistic act, but I also think it was just out of preservation of your neck. I think you were like also- It was actually a physical thing. Yeah. Well, congrats to you. You've killed it.

Thanks. Yeah. You guys have created a whole thing. It's nice to see. I love saying this. She's building the house across the street from our house. Is that true? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Big, beautiful house. No kidding. I know. Isn't that great? How did this all start for you? I came out for acting. Okay. And then I started nannying for them. Okay. And what year? I came out for acting. Okay. And then I started nannying for them.

Okay. And what year? I came out in 2010. Okay. But you got to add, starts taking classes at UCB. Theater major in Georgia. And 2010 was huge at UCB. Yeah.

I mean, it was like its height. Yeah. Right on Franklin. 100%. And it was so sad to see it now. It's a whole different era. It really is. Although I just drove by there the other day and there was a fucking line doing stuff yeah yeah but even just apart from that place what i'm starting to love

about our business and i'm finally accepting it at 45 is every five years there's going to be a major shake-up yeah and if you don't see that as fun this isn't the game but even what you were saying outside where you said like i was was almost quitting. I'd been done. And then you got a new charge. Well, really quick. You go, you're jacked. I was like, you're a monster. Ultimate compliment.

Like a gargoyle. You're hideous. You're a monster. You scare children. Thank you. Thank you. You're veiny and disgusting. I go, well, yeah, you know, I work out and I bang testosterone.

You go, you're on testosterone. I go, yeah, I've been at it for six years. And then I said, one of the things that was good about it is I was retiring. And then it made me hungry to like start this with you and start acting kind of too much. And then I enjoyed it. But those dips, I had that in the pandemic. When it first started, I thought, oh, thank fucking God I'm done. Right.

You go like, what a weird game we all got into. They mercy dust. Yeah, but now it's over. Yeah. Like, it's really fun. You love it. Now, deep down, you're like, what a fucking nightmare. This has to end.

Yes. And then when you see an out, you go, this isn't even quitting. I'm not a quitter. Right. I've just naturally gotten 50 pounds fatter and like moved somewhere else shaved your head in the middle of it i did shave it in the middle of the pandemic yeah just a photo of it incredible but then there's like a turn and something kicks in and you go like all right i guess i'm gonna try to adjust with the times i guess i'm gonna play

yeah and then something kicks in or it doesn't but but you go like, I guess I'm still fired up. Yeah. And do you think that's generally, are you brought back online by seeing something or just it strikes you? The chess of this whole business, the gamemanship of it, the like staying up late and thinking, the strategizing, the like, oh, I'm doing this. What if I did that? And then failing feels really good for me. Like I hate it, but I love it. I'm a gambler.

So I realized deep down, the reason I stopped going to casinos is I'm not playing poker to win. I'm playing until I hit a moment that it's 4 a.m. and I have no chips. And I go like, ah, tens. Yeah. Oh, you're fucking. And then I'm like, I'm in a hoodie. I'm 41.

It's Tuesday. Yeah, I'm at commerce. That's where the moment hit me. And I'm sitting at now an empty table regrouping. Oh, it's this feeling I like. That feeling of like, fuck, now if I'm going to grind back, how do I do it? That's what I like. You know, my old man had a thing.

He was talking about business and he goes, no matter how successful you get, when I look back, I look at the drive up as the best years of my life. And the beauty of our business is every sandcastle we build gets knocked down in a couple of years. That's true. Even if it was enormous, it just fades into memory. And then once it fades, when people are like, oh, that was great. What'd you do that 30 years ago? You're like six months. When you get tired for me, I'm like, I think I'm done.

And then something happens where I'm like, all right, I'll try to build another sandcastle. I guess it's fun. Yeah, that is so true. And I, too, love the kind of strategizing. And you are just like this one-man business, right? You're just like, you're the product, right? And you're like, how am I going to revamp this thing? And then you'll feel when, like, the town's not excited about you.

Oh, yeah. And then you'll feel when like the town's not excited about you. Oh yeah. And then you'll feel when the town is. And when you realize that doesn't do anything for your inner feelings. I saw that Taylor Swift doc. She's a killer. Early on in it, she was saying how the crowd telling her she was good meant a lot to her. Yeah. I wish I had more of that.

Cause you're like, if that's your validation and it's filling you up, you're going to keep going better and better and better yes and so i don't really have that thing but what's really fun is to see where i'm like oh jakey j's not having a hot moment is there something i can build to get that momentum back as if it's poker just to have more chips yes but when it's really going down i still have the like okay fine that's wonderful we're at the nadir is this the bottom at this event and i'm like talking to one friend and no press is coming our way you're like oh fuck it what a game man i do feel like part of this business is just a really weird fantasy. It is a dream. You said you moved out here.

Well, most of us moved out at a certain point with this really silly dream. Oh, yeah. Delusional. Delusional. So much ego. Yes. Limousines and cash. I had a fantasy of convertibles and a pool in the hills and being on a 90s sitcom and

being like, I just think all that's going to happen and it's going to work. And then you come out here and it's just not what you think it is, even when it's working, but it is still great. Even when it's dog shit. I have a thing where, you know, we can't talk about any projects, but I was doing like press for projects and I was doing a photo shoot and I'm just done. I don't ever have to do this again. I never have to do a red carpet again. And then the woman who couldn't be nicer, we were in my backyard. She goes like, do you want to put shoes on?

And I realized like, there's no thought anymore. This was a Hollywood reporter interview. I noticed you were barefoot now that you're saying this. I didn't think about it until Max Greenfield sends a text being like, hey, idiot, throw shoes on. You look terrible. I feel like that's Max's cottage industry, is he somehow hears of everything that's going on and then blasts you.

Well, he also does something that's so annoying, where it was me, him, and Damon Wayans Jr. on the text. And so then I wrote, I didn't post about it because the strike happened. So how'd you find out? Because there's so much content. So if anybody comes to you and goes like hey i saw that article and it's a slight nag why are you googling me my man i got an alert on you i'm not googling you my god max must have an alert on you and all his friends maybe he's into it it's almost worth you know what i might do my first google alert and do it on max

just fuck with him back he is a shockingly funny guy he'll go on runs where i'm like that dude murders me he knows i'm sober so i got the funniest text from him it was like when smartless launched and they were overly kind to me as they were interviewing me about my place in this podcast world he wrote me he's like well i knew you'd be relapsing within a few weeks of that session of them stroking your ego that bad i knew you'd be out i was like oh it's so dark and funny how long have you been sober now well i haven't drank i'm coming up on 19 years of having not drank or done cocaine but i also have relapsed on opiates a few years back wow i had a really trippy thing after my dad passed we were

going through all his old stuff and i'll tell you what really hit was seeing his aa tokens yes you know there's certain things that like you would see my brother would be like all emotional and he'd be like you want these old shirts and i'm like fucking pass no emotion right and then you'd be like his old lighter and i'm like yeah he smoked like no i don't feel anything i'm not in the program but i have some good friends who are seeing those i'm like oh that's a really earned thing and you're like that's actually pretty cool you know what's so funny is when my dad died same thing i go into his place he's staying at and i'm like what do i do with any of this stuff you immediately become aware of the fact that all the stuff is meaningless unless you're there to care about it. Now it's just a room full of junk. The only thing I took is he has this elephant. It's like carved

little, well, I don't know what you'd call it. Jewelry box. Jewelry box. Yeah. With a little elephant on top. And when you open it, it's all of his chips for like 26 years and multiples of something. And that's the only thing I took. That's so weird. We both have that, but it's neat because I wonder for you, him getting sober and staying sober sponsoring guys and being of service that was the one thing i couldn't even find anything negative to spin about it by the way same and the whole program yes i love poking holes in programs yes i love being like that's an amazing opportunity and it is very cultish and i'm going to tell you why i'm glad you're getting spiritual healing yeah like did you know the guy who runs it was in

jail for who cares though yes when you try to be a little piece of shit about a no one's paying there's no top guy earning so all my go-to's just a self-sustaining thing that helps people my buddy was walking me through it and for no reason i was trying to poke the hole in of like well if you relapse a lot and keep coming back it's probably not great for the program right and he's like no that's not it he's like of course you can come back we're here to try to help you and i'm like well then they must not be taking it and he's like you're seeing it all wrong and i'm like i really am i'm just being a piece of shit for no reason like there's no value well no there's a very clear reason. It's a group that you're not in. So naturally you have to debase it because if it were of any value, you'd be in it.

It's like the reverse Groucho Marx statement. I don't trust any group that wouldn't have me as a member. That's sadly more accurate. That's a great new spin on it. That's why I didn't like jocks. Fuck jocks. I should have been invited right into that group. Cheerleaders.

Cheerleaders. You can get yourself in there if you work hard enough. I probably could. You just didn't work for it. Were you a cheerleader? Yeah. Two times the change. Oh, you did like the cheer type stuff.

High fire. No kidding. Yeah, it was so fun. Highlight of my life. And no fear of a massive neck injury. No, which is fascinating because I'm so fearful. I'm such a scared person. And now I can't even believe that I was fine with that.

Just flipping around and trying stuff. Trying stuff means you crash, you know. But I was drunk on winning. Yeah, you were. Bumped up. Yeah, once you win once. What a blast. It really was a blast. Doing key bumps of victory that is a good drug it is fun going back to where we're talking about the game i got into

jujitsu in the last like eight months oh really what was the gateway to that honestly daughters and i was googling self-defense for smaller frames because there is something to be said about if i'm in a bad neighborhood i do walk around at about 190 pounds and i did wrestle a lot yeah yeah yeah so unless there's a monster coming my way i don't have a sense of like utter panic yeah you get to the ground and you can survive i started thinking about them growing up and one of my daughters is just small they're twins twins fraternal but, fraternal. But I'm like, she's never going to be a monster. Well, send her over to Uncle Zach. They'll get bumped up on tea.

But I started Googling best self-defense for females. I thought it was going to be like karate or some like striking thing. Handgun. Well, obviously. Yeah, Lady Remington. Jiu-Jitsu. And it's all because you're just using the other person's body. And I was like, oh, that's neat.

And so we started doing it together. And then I've kind of got it. Oh, great. So you do it with your daughter. Yeah. Because Kristen's been doing it with our 10-year-old for two years now. Oh, no way. Yeah, with Cecilina Gracie.

Oh, no way. She's granddaughter of the- The Gracie clan. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And how are they liking it? They fucking love it. And because it's a woman teaching all little girls, Kristen and two other moms and their two daughters so it's six they go every monday to a friend's house and they train

there but your homework is like using your voice so you got to come in next week and talk about how you're going to use your voice oh no thank you i'd rather have a handshake things to like help you navigate all the weirdo dudes in the world that are going to try to put their hand up your ass when you're taking a photo it's cool stuff it is it really is really neat do your daughter love it they do it's rough so we wrestle a lot and then there's just moments where a knee will come across and graze the face you get hurt they'll kind of give me a look and i'm pretending that they're not four which is what your feelings are and i'll just be like that's why we're here that's the good stuff but i'm like i think if you push past it's like when you go to cheerleading you go like which is what your feelings are. And I'll just be like, that's why we're here. That's the good stuff.

And I'm like, I think if you push past, it's like when you go to cheerleading, you go like, well, you try something new, it hurts. But when you land that motherfucker, it feels good. Also, I've been noticing so clearly that when my daughters get hurt doing something they want to do, they don't give a flying fuck.

Yeah, that's exactly right. When you get hurt doing something you didn't want to do, they don't give a flying fuck. Yeah, that's exactly right. When you get hurt doing something you didn't want to do, you hate it and it hurts. Going off of that, who wants to learn to read? Who wants to work hard for something? So I am in the phase of I'm forcing them to do certain things that I'm like, I think you're going to eventually like this, but I'm not sure. Yeah, I know. It's hard to know. But it's hard, but you also only get 18 years. Let's be honest, you might get really 15

and they totally stop listening to you. I don't know how much advice you were taking at 15, but I certainly had shut down. Nine, I was done. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Me too. I think it was pre-puberty. Wait, how old were they?

Almost 10, nine and a half. Okay. So they're right there. If I go back to drinking, what we should do is get drunk one night and have our daughters fucking roll to a cage match in the backyard for our amusement. That would be a very 80s Midwest. You know, if we had two boys, we'd have them and they both box. We would certainly do that for our amusement.

Let's just see. See what your moves are. But also the confidence. Lincoln said it multiple times. Like, well, I do jujitsu so i'm good she's been going on walks and stuff all around the neighborhood and like are you scared well no i know jujitsu yeah and it's just like it does it matters good to have that confidence by the way yes agreed that's the game anyways you've walked down a lot of streets i've bought

crack in a lot of neighborhoods. Blackout. This episode brought you back. No, but it's true. And you don't have to win. You just have to send the signal that I'm confident and you'll have your hands full. There's probably an easier target. Literally, that's all you're doing. The same reason you get a dog.

You could break in. This fucking annoying four-legged thing is barking. Nobody's barking across the street. It's just a problem you don't need. Yeah, it's another variable. I do want to ask you about, because in that article where you were barefoot, you've built yourself by hand an 8x12 cabin in your backyard.

Yeah. Tell me from start to finish, did you just draw the plans yourself? Where'd you get this idea, and how'd it turn out? I grew up always doing, my mother had junk shops. So we were always in different shops around the city. We would get old furniture and fix it up. It was always my job to deliver it, some funky furniture. And then we would hire random homeless guys in Chicago and that would be my group. And we would deliver together. And at 15, what a blast. Some of the hardest funny people I've ever met are in the back of my mom's old truck.

They go like, can Eve hear us? And I'll be like, feel free to go. You're in a safe space. Please let it rip, my man. But it was always building. It was always making. And the part of this business, I directed a movie this last year. I've been going through a lot of that.

It's so much goddamn work. And in the end, the thing you have, it's not physical, even though it's film. I don't feel the way others feel of like, it's just like a memory for other people's experiences. And you work on set, you're doing 10 hours a day, 12 hours, you're really grinding. And then it just kind of comes and goes and it doesn't feel like a physical accomplishment there's something about it from growing up doing what i did where it was the physical thing that was something i was really missing i hated doing manual labor but i really liked doing manual labor

because you were part of a group you worked really hard you were physically beat but you had like three more hours then when you were done you'd be like fucking two burritos, six beer. You're like, I get to now reward. You've earned it. And I don't feel like when I leave set and I'm like 11 hours, I'm like, I deserve. I gotta get these boots off. You're like, great day. And I'm not discrediting it. Yeah, you're right. Like I was a roofer. My best friend Aaron and I would get off work and we'd be just fucking covered in filth. We'd pop in. We'd each get two 40s, an MGD, start drinking them in the truck on the way home. You'd get home and you'd take off all that crap.

But I guess this is a disposition too. You felt like I earned whatever the next three hours gives me. Yes. Guilt free. And now that I'm 45, that's not partying the way I used to party. Even if it's just, I'm just going to sit and watch television. Yes. You're like, well, I need to do this because tomorrow I'm back in the sun doing blank.

I don't have that if I'm like, I did a Zoom editing session for 10 hours. Yeah. With like a super sweet guy who I like. And then we got some really intense notes from the studio. We got pretty pessimistic for about 90 minutes. But we clawed our way out of it. We pushed through. And then I'm like, man, we have a really nice relationship.

I think this is a friend for life. And that executive I don't love. But I see what they see. I'm not like, I deserve a nice, chill night. The night goes on for me. Then I'm up in the middle of the night watching dailies. Or if it's right, you're back to work. And I really wanted something where there was a mission,

there was a job. How like Nebulas is finishing a movie or a script. You could choose to never, ever be done. Well, that was the big thing I've learned with mine is that I'm not done with it. We just ran out of time. Yes. You know, I was like, can I do more?

And you know, the game was like, ha ha. And I'm like, I'm saying in a playful tone, but we all know what we've profited. I will go backwards financially. A movie's good after a year and a half. Imagine it in three years. Yeah. In 10 years, I might win an award for this fucking thing. There's a great story and it sucks because I've forgotten all the players in it.

And I only know half the title, but I do know there's a very famous director. I think his movie was Sunset Boulevard or something. Does ring a bell the name does yeah it's like one of these very famous 40s movies or whatever it's in one of these books i read and then the person telling the story got a call from this director who's now in his 80s i need you to come over he gets there and he's like yeah what is it he's like come downstairs i've just finished the perfect edit he had been working on sunset boulevard 30 years after it came and he finally in his mind got it that is it and that doesn't feel great always no it's torture but like but guess what like that's what we all sign up for that's the game and earlier when i say wouldn't

it be nice to be done it's done with that internal thing you go like i fucking left some shit on the table and i know i did that's probably because I'm not talented enough yet, but I might be. Just give me a little bit more time. And I don't have that with like the cabin. My daughter and I just built a pavilion, her and I. That's why I'm so interested in this thing. Yeah, because she got the buzz that you could never explain.

Like we had been working on it all fucking day long. And by the time we were done, we had the walls up in the roof. We walked away. There was still stuff to do. For the next three hours, she was like in such a great mood. And I the time we were done, we had the walls up in the roof. We walked away. There was still stuff to do. For the next three hours, she was like in such a great mood. And I go, do you feel that?

You got to focus. You got to be busy. And time's traveling in this wonderful way. A hundred percent. To be ridiculous, it's a meditation. You don't go like, oh, there's going to be 240 screws. You just start. Yes.

It happened pre-pandemic. I wanted a rip and dip. God bless you. We are in the middle wanted a rip and dip. God bless you. We are in the middle. I love her hair. Good for you. Should we pause and do some bench presses downstairs? Yes, man.

But it started pre-pandemic. I wanted like a little space to get out of the house. And I didn't want to go to an office. That'll never happen. And it'll be shameful to have like space in Altadena. Yeah. Then I'm like, I put a pinball machine. It's very cool. And I'm like i put a pinball machine it's very cool and i'm like

asking a friend to go with me and they're like i don't want to hang out in your dorky space and like compliment your aesthetic yeah i thought we were at lunch yeah but just meet at my office and then you walk in you go i just threw these on the wall and they're like i don't care i have my own spaces i'm not that interested so i know i don't want to do that i don't even like it when my wife does it. And I love her. Why do I care about what you're doing? You're like, wow, pretty cool. So these are all old pictures of Chicago.

These are black and white, but these will be changed. Don't care. You see it in people's eyes as you're doing yours. And I'm like, I know you don't care, but for some reason I got another three minutes. I gotta finish. So here's what's cool about these floors. And your friends are just going, oh, yeah, neat.

There you go. It's still on it. But so I wanted to put one in my backyard. And this was during the tiny house craze, which is not a craze I think is cool. I've never gotten it. I don't understand why you'd want to live in a tiny little space. But there was so much out there for the 8 to 12 size place. I just drew up on a piece of paper, laminated it, and then went to YouTube and had YouTube teach each phase. Yes. And I realized

I've got pretty bad dyslexia and part of it is hearing it. So I have to put my hands in something to get it. All the years I did construction and you would have some thick old chicago foreman who would explain to me and two other people how to do something i wasn't hearing it so it would be like you know that wasn't 8 by 12 jake so you what you gotta do is you gotta go right through the two by six you gotta push in jack and i'll go like yep yep and then cracking jokes because you're not getting it yes then your work is shitty so you have to crack a joke of why your work is bad because you don't want to go my work is bad i think i have a learning challenge i don't understand one thing you said you don't have that so you're making eye contact with me

and going like hey shit for green i'm fucking gone some guy on youtube would explain it and then in the middle of it my brain brain would go to Garbage Town. And I'd go, let's play it back. Just rewind it. Go from the top. Nobody's counting. And it just turned out to be like such a blast. How long did it take you?

Probably about eight months. It was probably like a three-month job. But there was a lot of screw-ups, a lot of mistakes. How many trips to Home Depot? That's the best. Well, Ganahl Lumber. Oh, that's your spot. Well, during the pandemic, when it hit and everything shut down, I was like two months in. Oh boy. I could still go get lumber.

Good hat. Yeah. Yeah. I got a game. And then when you're in it, never wears off, right? Well, I'm still always working on it. The fun game of it is you look at a wall and you go like, you know, it could be neat here. So it is like doing a movie. Well, you get to keep evolving. We turn it into a tiny house. Yeah. My wife and I, if we're going to have a date night, there's the fantasy when you watch TV,

or if you're not an actor, you're not recognized at all, of what that date night is. If she and I go out to a restaurant, it's just not the same intimacy as we expect. It's still a fun night, but it's not what it was when we first started dating because other people are part of our experience. And so those nights are fine. And my kids have made it very clear. They actually like when I get recognized. Oh, great. Yeah. So I don't have any of that like sensitivity about it, but my wife and I've started to do if like the kids are out, we'll order in and go to that cabin and have a date in there because she never goes in there. Of course.

So she's only in there on those nights. And so then I get to like curate it. You get music. You get the food for the. That's cute. Right? And so that's what. It's turned into that.

I want to be married to you. Doesn't that sound so. It's very romantic. Yeah. If you were there. This wouldn't be the tone. Remember the whole thing about the posters on the wall? Yeah.

She's my friend I'm talking about. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert if you dare. Sasha hated sand. The way it stuck to things for weeks. So when Maddie shared a surf trip

on Expedia Trip Planner, he hesitated. Then he added a hotel with a cliffside pool to the plan. And they both spent the week in the water. You were made to follow your whims. We were made to help find a place on the beach with a pool and a waterfall and a soaking tub and, of course, a great shower. Expedia. Made to travel. See yourself buying a home one day? Do future you a favor. Expedia. Made to travel. online. No bank appointment needed. It's easy and only takes a few minutes. The sooner you get

started, the more time your down payment has to grow. Open an account today at questrade.com. This episode is brought to you by Secret. Secret deodorant gives you 72 hours of clinically proven odor protection, free of aluminum, parabens, dyes, talc, and baking soda. It's made with pH-balancing minerals and crafted with skin-conditioning oils. So whether you're going for a run or just running late, do what life throws your way and smell like you didn't. Find Secret at your nearest Walmart or Shoppers Drug Mart today. i do want to go back though because we left it kind of hanging so it's not the convertible in the pool but it's awesome for a completely different reason and we've like hinted at it but it's really hanging with other folks who have the same weird fantasy but even then going, yeah. But even then going to what we're doing right now,

you know, I was talking to my brother coming here and we were talking about like the changing landscape of the game. And I was thinking, it's just really trippy. I'm going back to Dax's house. We are doing an interview that'll get a lot of views. And this has become part of the business. When I was here the last time, I did not view this as the business. It wasn't then.

No. There are certain times when YouTube started, everybody was making shorts. And then old timers were mad. And I remember when we were doing Drunk History, the generation above us was like, none of you guys are getting paid. You're missing it. And for us, we were like, paid? Yeah.

A bunch of us are in a backyard, man. It's a fucking blast but the game then changes and then everything's youtube now when someone starts doing something now five ten years ago i might have viewed it as more like whatever now i'm like you might enter a 10 year period it's really tempting to think you were part of an era that ended. For instance, I was lucky enough. You were lucky enough. I did studio comedies. Totally.

You could go like, oh, well, there's no comedies anymore. And I'm so destroyed by that and that I'll never get to do that again. It's easy to get stuck there. There is no version where you're going to go do 24 episodes of network television again. But something really rad yeah other people will miss i loved that era comedy yeah idiocracy by the way i saw a great thing about it where they were talking about the costume designer oh in the crocs yes oh wait what if this is real it's the best i think it's real i know that when we all looked at those, we were like, oh, my God, what did it cost to invent these stupid.

Oh, no. So the costume designer was thinking of what would the dumbest of the dumb wear in the future? Oh, my God. And it was these ugly rubber shoes with holes in them and a strap on the back. And then the company happened to just explode. Well, what's been really funny over the last five years is that kristen's obsessed with them as is everyone right they're very high fashion right not high fashion whatever please give me the right attitude but you know they're very wearable they're very waterproof

but she's always been urging me and by the way way, I need them all the time. I'm like walking around the river and I don't know what to do about that. I honestly had forgotten why I have this aversion. And then I saw that same meme and I was reminded, yes, that is exactly what happened. Yes. They came out like, look at these things. So they're forever in my mind is that. But I had forgotten it and couldn't figure out why I was so resistant to trying them. I've since got a black pair and i wear them in

the water well it's so i got it and my wife and kids had them and they were all talking about them and i had in the back of my head and it might have also been generational yeah it might have been when they came out i was already too old yeah but i just always wear like boots and in that era in the summer i'd have like jeans and boots on like i was working and i wasn't working i was like dressed like a dock worker at the time and then i did throw those on and i thought i get it really oh yeah okay i'm not on you have that's shocking though have you worn them no that's the thing what a child what a child you're in the dark let's turn the goddamn lights off so i was a hundred percent no yeah and then

my group got it and my daughter goes like we'll get you a pair i was thinking more like home slippers yeah you know because they're easy on like in the kitchen then all of a sudden one day you go to a restaurant and you do feel a moment of shame it's what uggs also was yes similar situation but going back to that movie those kind of movies which were so funny and so big at the time they have gone away right but i'm also like who knows what's gone away i won't do another network show i don't want to do the 22 24 and there was a whole period of time and i felt like we were all chasing it as actors but like you do comedy to do drama right but there was a

whole model of what was cool it used to be you didn't do commercials when i came up my whole dream was the one day i pass on them yeah yeah i would do commercial who cares the whole old models don't matter yeah it used to be you did movies you couldn't do tv if you did tv you couldn't do movies then that got blurry but then it keeps blurring but i even feel that way when we say this stuff about comedies i'm like who knows what's next because in many ways barbie have you seen it not yet but i want it you're going to love i can feel it i went with my girls on sunday and i was laughing as hard as i've laughed in a movie in a decade that's a blast the send-up of us is so fucking funny and embarrassing and i think you too i love the feeling of embarrassment

so i was cackling uncontrollably but over the last few days i'm like well why aren't i calling that a comedy that's a comedy exactly and it's a billion dollar comedy i would have said a year ago there'll not ever be a comedy it's over 100 million again when you were talking about six years ago when you wanted to quit and then you got fired up again. If you really think about as an actor, what fires you up? Like when you moved out here and you were like, I want to get into the game. What is it you wanted to do?

And I'm like, bits. Yes. Yes. That's it. I wanted to be in a room with people who I find really funny. Who want to laugh their way through this tragedy. That is human.

That is. And I want people watching it to laugh. Yeah. And I didn't go to acting school. I don't care. I've got a friend now who's like trying to get me with his acting coach guru. And I'm like, I'm not going. I'm just not interested. But if I'm cross-covered and the person I'm with is on fire, I think like, man, I got the best seat in the house. If that could be the job again, I went away from it for a while where, you know, you just take gigs, but that's where it's fun, man. Let's talk strike for one second, because you're actually the example I would use of when it's really heartbreaking, which is you did spend presumably a year of your life directing

something that's coming out in September and you're obligated to not promote it. Yeah. That feels unfair. Do you accept that just lock stock? I was disappointed. I do believe in the strike. I have seen the middle class of actors get murdered. It wasn't that way when I was coming up.

So it does feel deeply unfair. I did an episode of The Unit, David Mamet, a CBS show. I think I got paid $24, 000 and then four years of residuals yeah so for one episode i paid for my apartment i had a life and i have watched over the years my character actor friends are dying yeah and if you're not the brand for lack of a cooler way of saying it yeah one and two on call sheets are getting your name's not above the title yes but you're getting paid still then i'm looking down i'm starting when i'm talking to people who are deeper on that call sheet and hearing their numbers i'm like that's fucking garbage you can't

live and so i am disappointed i don't get to promote it but i also have a thing and maybe i'm wrong on this but i was doing press for this before and they said like do you feel more pressure on this than others and what i really feel is each individual project, you feel like it really matters when you're in it, but it's all a novel. And as long as I'm allowed in this game, it started with some stuff in like 2005 and it's hopefully going to end in X amount of more years. And this is just part of it. Those who are going to find it are going to find it.

It's not an opening weekend movie. It's not like Oppenheimer, Barbie, my movie. And so the way people find these things are someone's going to talk to somebody and it's going to spread and it will have a life. It's something I'm really proud of. I got hit in the face with that news. And then I thought like, well, that's the game, man.

That's so healthy. I also read you say that the wins and the losses, they used to be kind of separated. They were wins and losses. And now they're just kind of one blob of a thing, right? Now I look back and I look at the whole experience and it's just like a nice mid-level. You average the whole thing out. It's like we're above 51% and I can live with that. But I also have a thing in terms of the wins, losses.

When you're in it, it's really confusing. So I did a show on ABC called Stumptown. It was a procedural. Kobe Smulders was the lead. Michael Ealy was in it. A guy named Cole was in it. It was just a really fun cast. We got along great.

And this show came out, pandemic hit, went away, whatever. A net loss, if you're an investor, and you invested in the pilot of Stumptown which we all did you know we got paid for two seasons but it lost Michael Ealy's wife reached out about making a little video for his birthday and was talking about his reaction when he and I text and how much fun he had on set and I remembered how many laughs I had with that fucking guy how great Kobe was as a lead and being like, oh, she is a fucking dream. And I'm like, no, that's a net win.

I really liked those people. The material I liked. I wasn't like, this is my dream thing. But even this movie. It's not a year of your life you want back. No, but also you make these projects. And I have learned now some people are going to like them. Some people aren't.

I could do a bunch of press. Some people are going to like them, some people aren't. I could do a bunch of press. Some people are going to like it, some people aren't. That's true. I won't change their reaction to it. And those who like it, I do have a base. It's not huge. But those people will go like, you kept it weird for us, my man. And I'm like, well, it's what I like.

Yeah. Okay, so when you decided, first of all, I didn't know Gareth Reynolds. Yeah. Gareth is your co-host on We're Here to Help. So you have a podcast now. Yes. With Gareth, who wrote on Ar on We're Here to Help. So you have a podcast now with Gareth, who wrote on Arrested Development and Flake and Hoops. Okay. But you guys met- Gareth was a guy I met in 2004. We were both improvisers and he's truly, and I say this as

a guy, we've maintained friendships throughout. He's one of the dumbest guys I've ever met. But in terms of being like a great friend. We. Like we used to call him option one. And that is because he always says yes to the first option. So like as a friend, it's really lovely. Yeah, that's great. All right. So you guys want to eat and somebody go, yeah. And I'll go, I mean, I got a box of cereal here. He goes, I love cereal. And you're like, let me finish. I didn't even finish. And so he had gotten into the podcast world for years. He does a thing called The Dollar. That's big. It's how he's been making his money for years.

He's been talking to me about doing a podcast for a while. I've always seen the podcast world as something other. That's not what I do. It's very foreign to you. Yeah, and I learned it when I came here the first time. I was like, oh, motherfucker's doing his homework. I mean, you have a sheet of paper ahead of you. Yeah, but it's just my credits.

But I mean that as... It's a mirror. I mean, you have a sheet of paper ahead of you. Yeah, but it's just my credits. But I mean that as... It's a mirror. I gotta keep myself confident. But like, there's homework to be done. I know I'm not gonna do that. Right, you're not a homework guy. I'm not a homework guy. Depending on the type of podcast. Yeah, but I was talking for a while with somebody who was like a

hero of mine, who reached out about doing a podcast where I'd interview different people. And I thought like, man, really cool. I was really thinking about it a couple of years ago. And then it was like, you know, you get different people on and you could learn. And I was talking to one of the producers and I'm like, and so what, what I have to do? And they're like, you know, you just have to like read the book of the person. And I went literally pass. We were about to tell you how much money I don't need to know what i also didn't want to do in terms of podcasts is just get a bunch of friends and just fully bullshit stand-ups are doing a really good job with that where you're like some of them are

very good but i don't want to do that and then gareth pitched me an idea and it was just something i thought like all right that's a fun enough premise and i go let's make 10 and i'll pay our producer out of pocket if If it's not fun, we'll never release it. And then no harm, no fault. We're friends. And it was a dear Abby advice show. But our version of the advice is saying, if you had uncles, like I had uncle Eddie, nice call. They were always on my team. They weren't necessarily right or good for you, but they're on your team. Yes. Really quickly, tell Monica about Uncle Eddie coming to live with you when you were 15. My uncle got arrested in Florida for, I still am not positive, something like stealing computers.

And they brought him back to Illinois. And so I was 14 or 15 at the time. And my mom said, my brother, who's wild, is going to come live with us. And I remembered we picked him up from jail. Wow. And his first thing was, you got to tell everybody you fucking shit your pants. And I'd be like,

totally. In order to get out of, when you're in jail, you're in the yard, you got to fucking act crazy, man. And I was like, absolutely.

I, you know, from the suburbs, believe me, I get it. When I'm at my very good public school, I will pretend to have shit in my pants too but then eddie came back lived with us for a year that was still when i wasn't close to my dad

so i was really craving that thing and he used to make neon signs and would sell them around chicago he would walk into a shop he was a hell of a salesman yeah and he would go like you got a fucking beautiful fucking shop here man but you don't have advertising. Let me do it. The catch is his craftsmanship was dog shit. Oh, okay. And so I would be with him and he was so good at selling that somebody would be like, how much? He'd be like, 800 bucks. I'll get the name.

I was his worker. As I would be hanging as like a 15 year old stoner. At that point, I was out of school. I dropped out for a little bit. Did we know that? I don't remember that took a little time okay i would be hanging a sign up and i would be thinking this looks bad like you know like when you're a kid and you're a worker you don't really think to question but i'd be like first of all it's a little crooked but i was like the lettering's weird i'd be like the l e the m is really and I'd be like, the L-E, the M is really, and I'd go like Eddie.

And he'd go, shut the fuck up. And then as the person saw it, we would literally have to run. Oh, my God. Oh, man. Oh, my God. Was he bending the glass or what? He did everything. He did.

Wow, that's kind of ingenious, I guess. Yeah, I mean, he was a big part of the late 60s, acid, stonery, drug world. Right. So that whole world was very cool to him yes an incredible character and then he suggested to jake at some point you should do a betting pool the football pool so this was while i was still in school he goes you got a lot of friends and i was like yeah i mean i don't know i have friends i have humans i talk to people and he goes let's do a thing together you want to do a thing together?

We both like the bears. I was like, I love the bears. Fun. He goes, let's do a football pool. And I go, cool. Didn't know anything about it. Here's all you need to do. You print it out every game and then a numbers things like nine through one.

You need to pick a winner, go nine through one, five bucks to play. Winner takes all. And they'd say, tell them you're going to take like, you know, 5% for you. So you don't want to lie to people. I who cares tell just my friends you know five people hear about it fucking thing spreads so random people are coming up to me going can i get one of those sheets at school at school okay so people are coming to me with their name their sheet and five dollars and it's happening fast are you getting nervous as it starts you're not you feel great about it there's a part of my brain that's just utter dog shit yeah i can say this affectionately

but i know you can relate there are moments i've been in where people are like criminal many times and they're like did you not see the red flags and i'm like i swear to god no looking back i can rewrite it at the time i was like no also i had a story about myself which is like i didn't have what i deserved yeah like i grew up broke and i deserved more and if i got it i didn't really care because i knew it was owed to me and this is mine now yes i think mine was more when your kids are young and they're all in preschool all the kids are cute then you're talking to some parent and you're like that one's yours yeah and what you want to say is like i hope they come around i was that where it was like just I'll fucking block it.

So at the end of the week, I have, my memories are on 600 bucks, but I don't know for sure. But a lot of money. Enough money where I thought like, we're in good shape. Pre-internet. So Sunday, while the games are going on, I'm just writing everything down. We did not have Monday night at the time. So like back then you'd have like three minutes for scores. You'd be like, Jets, Giants.

So Sunday night, I go down to my uncle he was in the basement and i go hey eddie so i got all the scores and he was like yep and i go what's your system like how do we do it and he goes there's no fucking system and i go that's what i said i go what's that he goes there's no system and i go well no the nine through one i go like i'm willing to do it i just don't know what it means yeah you're back on the framing crew literally walk me through it i'll do it all i don't care i like this i'll do this every week this has been fun and he goes there's no. And I had that moment where you realize like, oh, I'm in a world of shit. And I went like, huh? And then he goes, who do you trust at school?

And I go, who do I trust? And he goes, who has your back no matter what? In retrospect, it was a really interesting moment because you look at your crew differently. Because it's probably not your best friend. It wasn't my crew. There was a kid who ended up becoming a school social worker oh who i grew up with a guy named aj gomberg who was just one of those guys i just

trusted aj yeah and he goes call aj tell him you won the fucking pool shut your fucking mouth i'm giving you 200 bucks and you keep the rest and i went like no no and he goes there's no system so you could either tell everybody at school you hustled them because you did it not me or you can call aj so i called aj gomberg and i went like hey aj it's jk you won the pool he goes i didn't win any games i go shut your fucking your fucking mouth. I gave him the money and that was it. Oh my God. Oh my God. When I was 15, my father, he hired me and my friend, J-Rob, to call up businesses and ask if they wanted to take an ad out in this Hugs Not Drugs coffee table pamphlet that would keep all kids off drugs if we could just get this thing in

circulation and you could buy an ad we would call businesses but we also called like an elk's lodge and they were like okay well here's how it works for us we do make charitable donations but we decide at our monday night dinner so if you could come to that and pitch what it's all about so me and my friend j-rob go to a fucking elk's club. He's 16. I'm 15. And we explained to them that we were bad drug addicts and that this system changed our life. And while it was happening, I was just like, I know what I have to do, which is like, I got to get an ad from the Elks Club. And I was okay with just saying that I had been a bad addict and I wouldn't have been without this Hugs Not Drugs thing. And, you know, we never put out the pamphlet. Like, we certainly sold

a bunch of ads but we never it never went to print yeah so grim it is did you think uncle eddie was smart for doing that once you sat with it were you like okay he always felt very other than me in retrospect there was a few things that happened. When I was diagnosed with dyslexia in the 80s, my mom referred to it as laziness. So it wasn't the kind of thing where you got help with stuff. Yeah. I try to explain this to people all the time. I went to Learning Disabled every day. Yes. You put these little cards through

this machine. It said cat on it. You put it through and then some computer voice went cat. And somehow that was the solution to dyslexia. They put me in the same thing and I didn't like it. Right? Yeah, obviously. Well, you're with kids that are actually handicapped. It was like me and like four other kids.

And I'm like, I know this isn't my group. I know. It's almost like getting wrongly convicted. And you're like, why am I in here? But so that's exactly it, by the way. I love that term. Because I remember being like, this is fucked up and this is wrong. And my reaction to it was, nobody knows anything and so if they would say like hey what's the answer it was always a joke now i'm going to be such a fucking social

problem for you yeah that you're not going to put me in that class you might want to kick me out but you're not going to put me there so i think what eddie was doing because i kind of loved him and i kind of hated him but we had like a moment later where we were in his truck and it was winter and I didn't have a jacket on. I wasn't cold. And he did this like huge, weird fight about me putting a coat on. Tried to dad you a little bit. Yeah, but he never had kids and he didn't know how to do it. Some really weird energy.

We were like all joking around, having fun. And then we were going to like go to get a burger. And then he's like, put a fucking coat on. And I was like, I'm okay. And he's like, put a fucking coat on i was like i'm okay and he's like put a fucking coat and i'm like i'm okay like mom doesn't make me so i'm fine and it kept going and then he said in anger if we got in a fucking crash and i couldn't reach you and had to watch you to fucking freeze to death that's not happening yeah and i'm like in a really fucked up way this is you caring about me so at the time i didn't but when i look back him making me do the neon signs and

being for all the pitches i think he thought you don't have a fighting fucking chance of making money you dope yeah you're not gonna make it through high school this is how you're going to do it and if i'm your parental figure, you're not going to be a banker. Right. It's not going to be. An oncologist. Yeah, it's not going to be like, well, you're going to be a doctor because you can't pronounce any of the words. So this is a path.

And in retrospectives, I've gone back. I'm like, not how I would have done it. Of course. But it was really loving. Yeah. Clearly well-intentioned. Clearly that you don't see it. So even at that time, I didn't done it. Of course. But it was really loving. Yeah, clearly well-intentioned. Clearly that you don't see it. So even at that time, I didn't think like he's smart.

I thought, what a fucking prick. Because then I was really afraid of word spreading. Right. And people being like, you and AJ hustled us? And then I got afraid of the cops. And I had money to burn. I went to a CD store and bought like the most expensive CD, which was a double disc Bob Dylan greatest hits,

which got me into good music from there. But before that I was listening to like radio. I was like, well, this old man's pretty interesting. Talk about the butterfly effect. Yeah. He's a character.

He passed away years ago, but he's one of those humans that there's certain people who should have a big effect on you. And they have none major characters that you think like even their vibe to you is like this is a big relationship and i'm like you're not penetrating at all and i wish you were because you're very positive you're very smart but you just mean nothing to me yeah those figures when they materialized in my life in truth i just didn't feel worthy of them or actually good. I felt like you're seeing good in me that's not there. I hear that, but mine would be, even if I would want to get, I'm like,

you're just not speaking my language. Right. And I'll still see people where I'm like, you're a great influence. That's a good human. And I'm like. Not for me. Not even negative. Yeah. Just not for me. For me, I just would always immediately feel guilty. I'm not going to live up to this thing. I know I want to run with the wolves a little bit, and I'm going to disappoint you, and I'm not as good as you think I am. Yeah, that's interesting. And there's this horrendous guilt about that. So you must have had a really crazy time in Hollywood when you started really popping.

Because you started popping, and I know we'd mentioned this last time we were here, but you were one of the first of our group. Uh-huh. You rose up. I was auditioning for Punkton. Everybody was out here doing that game. And you were an example of it. And now it worked. Yes, yes, yes.

That's a core feeling. Man, that must have been a wild-ass era. Well, I will say, though, I had gotten older. I'm mostly talking about when I was younger. I mean, I don't want to get too dark on you, but just knowing that you were molested and you've not told anyone yet. Something as simple as that at your core. And then some nice, benevolent figure that comes across you in high school or a teacher. And they're saying, I see you.

And I'm like, I'm a vile piece of shit, right? But by the time that happened, I had already been sober once. You had lived a lot. I had done an inventory. I had told people I was a monster. I didn't feel shame about it anymore. So some things had allowed me to like myself enough to accept some of that. Yeah, that's neat.

But always probably tricky. Yeah, but still, that middle ground was the missing piece for my narrative. That makes sense. You had gone through shit enough and come out that that period wasn't as insane. Yeah. Although tons of distrust always. You got it. Chill death! Chill death!

I'm going to die with some of this shit. That is interesting what you say about the... It's really interesting what you say about your molestation. Oh, thank you. I try to keep it fresh. I know we're talking about nauseam. We got gotta revamp it no but i do think when you have a secret like that that you are just like well this is a secret that i'm dying with no one's ever gonna know you're always gonna feel

a little isolated because you know no one can ever really know you there's a part of you if there's a piece that is broken well no it's just even if it's like no one can ever really know you. There's a part of you, there's a piece that- Is broken. Well, no, it's just even if it's like, no one's going to know this thing about me. I've decided it. I've declared it. It's not happening.

So even if I fall in love, that person isn't going to know all of me. The whole year. They don't- It's a weirdly isolating. That's hard. That's why secrets kill people. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Mine was different than that. I didn't have a secret, but I did feel like everybody else had other stuff I didn't have. And I think that's partly when one of your parents isn't around. Well, look, dude, we had friends who had dads who practiced sports with them in the front yard. And we're just there. Simply, you would go to someone's house and you would just see a man on the couch. And I used to have a really weird thing.

When I was around adult men, I would have a physical reaction. So like if a coach went like, all right, when his hand left, it would still be something I craved and I hated craving it. So I'd be like, fuck, no, no, no, no, no. So certain people would have an effect

and others like my uncle Eddie, even then I'm like, you're just penetrating and it's going to take me a long time. And I'll have people now where I'm like, I'm not sure why it's penetrating, but later I might get it. You just seem like a really interesting person. But I had a buddy of mine, Craig Anstant, nicknamed me Jake five years ago. And he goes, cause you're always into stuff about five years late. And he goes,

but you talk about it like it's new and exciting. But we all did this talk literally five years ago. But it will take some time. Kind of like Crocs. That's old news, Crocs. What's your thing right now? Like quinoa? Like acai berry?

Acai, they're healthy. It's healthy. It's like dessert this time. What else do we got? I mean, sadly my jake five years ago's podcasts yeah well that's just kind of you know but podcasts are what they are now the established players are the established players there's a marketplace and then there's a lot of people who are doing it as a hobby yeah and you do it fun and you get like 11 viewers and you're like dd dd dd hey this is jimmy james and you're like okay fun and that. And you get like 11 viewers and you're like, dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee, hey, this is Jimmy James. And you're like, okay, fun.

And that's where I get like the excitement of, ow, what a wild Jake five years ago moment. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare. This episode is brought to you by Tresemme. Want silky smooth hair that's still full of natural movement? The Tresemme Keratin Smooth Weightless Collection is your simple solution. This new collection features a wide range of products from nourishing shampoo and conditioner to lightweight heat protectants and a silky smooth serum for a sleek finish. Wave goodbye to frizz and say hello to three days of smooth hair with the Tresame Keratin Smooth Weightless Collection.

Visit Tresame.com to learn more. For just $4.99, you can get a Subway 6-inch Black Forest ham sub made with our new fresh sliced deli. But the fresh slicing doesn't stop at beautiful Black Forest ham. We're talking tantalizing turkey, perfectly piled pepperoni, sensationally sliced salami. So you can lunch legendary, dinner deliciously, breakfast brilliantly. We're talking friggin' fresh slicing, and I'm yelling, yes way!

Get a six-inch Black Forest ham for only $4.99. Only at Subway. Price and participation may vary. Extras, taxes, and delivery additional. Expires April 8th. Hey, I just got us a new Coca-Cola spice. Nice. What's it taste like?

It's like barefoot water skiing while dolphins click with glee well let me try nah it's like gliding on a gondola through waving waters as a mermaid sings nah it's like coca-cola with a refreshing burst of raspberry and spiced flavors. Yeah. Try new Coca-Cola Spiced today. So even when we started, and Monica will remember, I already felt way behind. Because we weren't by any means first. Marc Maron was there.

Rogan was there. Anna Faris was there. So I started this process in my head six years ago thinking, you're a poser. You already missed the train. We were going to call it the millionth podcast. That's right. Which, by the way, now I just had lunch with our Spotify boss yesterday. You know how many there are right now? Four million?

Five. Every time we hear it, it's crazier. I had been saying three million for a while. And now it's it's five. Oh my God. Well, half of them are ours. That's true. That's true. Do you have the voice, the shadow that's saying to you like, you can't do this. You're too late. Yeah. But that was the thing for years. I guess it's already kind of over. And then finally Gareth came to me with this idea and i said well that could be really fun because one of the things i like about doing press is i love a q a after a screening fucking a probably what i do the best i love it man i'm better at that than an actor but it's also really fun i'm not interested in doing like the fan events where you stand there you take photos

you do i'm like that's no fun for me But when you're there and someone stands up, people are funny. Oh, absolutely. And when they can let it rip a little bit. Yeah, yeah. And you're just in this interaction with somebody. I'm like, well, I really like that. And can I add, you make a decision. I'm going to go for it, even though this is in public and it might be being recorded.

Yes, exactly right. And there's something very exhilarating about that. There's something fun about it. Where I'm at in my head is if it doesn't work the fucking risk is nothing yeah yeah yeah the amount of money spent oh god you couldn't shoot one scene no and then you go all right so let's say we do it for a year and people don't listen i've got to hang out with my buddy gareth more in this last stretch of time and by the way i do believe i'm sure there's exceptions but in general,

I think that's the only ones that work. You have to really just want to do it. We had zero illusions of making money. That was not the goal. That's kind of our game. And I've had the goal of making money. I'm a greedy pig. Me too. And I didn't, because it seemed preposterous. Here's my personal hope for it, is that we have enough of a base that the random time where Gareth goes, hey man, if you're going to be in Chicago, want to do one at this theater? For sure, you must. I don't know how long we're going to do it. I hope we do it for a while. When Gareth and I, the first time we became buddies, we were at the Rustic Inn.

A bunch of improvisers are around. Everyone's hanging. And he and I were similar roles in our groups. That could clash. It was. So that was the competition. Like Gareth and I, we didn't audition for punked but we did wedding crashers that was the one that was copying punked he got it i didn't we were those guys together and we sit down next to each other and we're all drinking and i turned to him and just say we should probably

pour our own beers on our own heads with no really thought of the bit of where we're going without hesitation he just pours a beer on his head and i thought like what an idiot you know and then like years later we bump into each other on a plane we were both going back to midwest we did the same thing in the back and i kept being like his decision making is like so flawed but like he really makes me laugh he's a really sweet guy he's very articulate and smart though i think the way you're describing him could be a hair misleading he's actually very articulate and fast thinking yeah yeah he's great it's no wonder he went into improv yes so then we started doing the calls and in doing it i'm like this is a fun hang oh my god yeah it is virtually a q a after a screen yeah because in the pilot this this gal Shannon calls up.

She's ostensibly calling for advice. We can get into what she's really calling for, whatever. But she's calling for advice, and she wants to achieve more nerd clout in her Dungeons & Dragons life. And she does a German accent as her character, Vilamina. Genuinely funny hearing you talk about this. Well, right, because it's preposterous, right? But even in doing it, it was like,

yeah, this was a weird thing we did in our closet. So Monica has a great, great show with her friend Liz Plank called Sinked. And they kind of give similar advice, but acknowledging we don't know shit and we're fucking up all the time as well. But what I love about yours is it's anything. Neither of you have any fucking insight on Dungeons and Dragons.

What I didn't want to do is I personally don't want to do real advice. So in terms of the uncle advice or the in a bar advice, we really want to thrive in kind of ridiculous. Yeah. Because there are people who could give you real advice, but we don't know you. For example, we've got one that was really fun where there's a woman who's going on a high school reunion and she called and her question was, I have anxiety. And I thought like, what a drag this one is. Cause I'm like, I'm not a fucking therapist. I don't know. I'm literally doing this with my buddy Gareth because we text after really funny ones and it makes our texts funnier. Like the Shannon, the D and D one,

we were dying about it. Then we had her friend who plays the uh irish character tube talk or whatever she calls in right and we're gonna try to maybe go to the game at some point because it's a blast but it has to be that level we're there for bits and then when we fall into good advice it's shocking so this woman calls up she has anxiety. We can't help. I'm literally texting Gareth. We got to wrap this one up. We're not going to-

Because are they calling in? They call in, but we tried doing one where we all see each other's faces and it changes it. Because when they see us, their vibe is different. So Gareth and I can see each other and they call in. Got it. So it's the voice of God thing. You just go like, hey, how are you?

And we don't know what that call is going to be. Yeah. So we're discovering it. Oh, wow. Yeah. And I was going to say, there's something production-wise that I love about it because it actually, let me back up. I did want to ask one question that will lead into this observation.

When you would go do press tours for shows and movies, I'm going to guess you loved going and doing the radio shows. Yes. Yes. So I discovered that quickly too. I would go in and you'd be in fucking Kansas City or Cleveland. You go to all the radio shows in the morning and I immediately thought, oh, I love this.

It's so weird to want to do this because I'm doing movies and that seems like something backwards. But funny enough, I did end up doing this. But I knew immediately I loved putting the headset on and talking in the microphone. movies and that seems like something backwards but funny enough i did end up doing this but i knew immediately i loved putting the headset on and talking in the microphone and callers i did love line and talk about giving advice that's unsound you put me on love line but that feeling i'm totally with you i loved it but the generation we came up with there was a little bit of shame of loving it because all the actors who i loved hate press it takes away for the art

for me yeah it's all art but like it's also commerce my father sold cars we had a junk shop yeah so i'm like you're making something you want to sell it right yes then i also found it really fun like my mom who had a junk shop she's a purist and she used to get really mad at me because if she would leave the shop i would negotiate so somebody comes in with how much for the couch we found the fucking thing in an alley the couch was free we cleaned it we painted it we put new cushions on it the work was me and her so right now we've spent zero on the couch you put an arbitrary sign that said 350 they offered another arbitrary number of 250. So the market's 250. If I can get it to 275, what a win. Big win. That back and forth, I would get such a rush.

And when I would do the morning show or I do the podcast, some of them are kind of boring. And then I'll go, I'll be like, I don't know how many of these we're going to do, Garrett. He'll be like, you make a big claim. I'll be like, all right, I think we did it. We're done. He'll be like, shut up. You liked the last three. Because when somebody comes, like this woman calls, she has anxiety.

I'm thinking, what a drag. I don't want to do this anymore. And then we go, well, hold on. What do you want to do at this reunion? And she goes, I didn't have a lot of friends and I wasn't popular, but I wasn't a loser. I was just there. And she goes, I'm now in my late 30s. I don't have kids.

And I want to go back with three of my friends, but I don't want to just be that same thing and have everybody talk to me about their kids and go like, yeah, cool, and leave feeling bad. So we said, can we pitch an enormous lie to you? And if you're into it, do it. So we come up with this whole gag that she sold some artwork to Madonna. Oh my God, that's wonderful.

Because she's an artist. Madonna flew her out. Then that she sold some artwork to Madonna. Oh my God. She's an artist. Madonna flew her out. Then that night, Madonna happened to have a party and invited her. And at that party, like fucking Lionel Richie was there. There was just like, and as we're going,

Gareth and I are just doing bits. We're heightening, making each other laugh. And then when the magic occurs for me on it is we go like, are you going to do any of this? And she goes, I'm going to try. Well,

then she pitches back her take on it. She funnier than us oh wonderful then her friends come on the podcast and her husband and they then pitch what they've been talking about she then did it then we have a follow-up after so that's why i'm like oh i'm seeing the meat and potatoes on this they're like it's not a random person calling, being like, my boyfriend dumped me. What do I do? I don't know. And I don't care. But like, that's why you have like a real therapist

or a different show. And I'm sure you can get a lot of benefit from that. But when I talk shit about Gareth, it's because I love him. We kill each other. Yeah. So the way I talk about him is the way he talks about me behind my back

and to my face. Yes. We both think the other guy makes really dumb choices and so when you're in it with somebody and we're like we don't want you hurt are you into this game when they say yes you're like oh what a fucking game yeah and then you go how far can you stretch it and so in terms of being late or where the money comes i don't know but i do know i can play this and if we do a live show we'll have people call in i mean we're discussing it but they're not there right so they're not you know like when somebody who doesn't do this gets in front of a live audience

they change yes and you're like i promise you you're so much funnier when you're not being funny yes well i was gonna say so the production value of it there's something about the audio that sounds very landline yes totally and it's very retro radio and it brings me back to like click and clack listening to them like talk to somebody there's something wonderful about how it actually sounds so i had listened to this thing called the apology line about a guy in new york back in the 90s and it reminded me of a different era where he put a note up in New York City that said, here's a phone number, a landline,

call in and leave a message and apologize for what you have done. There will be no punishment, retribution, nothing. What a genius. So for years, people would call it and be like, I did this to my wife. Nobody knows. I feel fucking terrible and in

listening to those little calls that was the era of my like creative consciousness that era of the 90s when all of a sudden some cool friend of yours who was older would lead you to some hip radio station on am you would hear that and then people are talking and you felt like i'm in your world yes the internet has now exploded that then not only do we see in everyone's world we see in everyone's bodies there's too much there is a game to this i don't know man it's still exciting to me right now i'm the guy pushing being like let's do more right but what we need the only way it's going to work for us is if we need the right kind of callers well back to shannon whose dnd character is vilamina her ostensible problem is

that she has a character and she does a german accent and it's not really working in her group and gareth says it best you're edging i want to hear this accent so bad you start wanting to hear her accent so bad but jake is edging He wants more details about this and more about that. And then all of a sudden, it's almost like Jaws. You can't wait to see Jaws. And then she does the accent. And it's incredible. At this point, you've convinced yourself it's going to be the craziest, dumbest.

And she already has, which I'm surprised you were confused by this. She's from Indiana, but she has a fucking deep southern accent. Which, by the way, tons of kids in my rural Michigan town did. It is a white trash accent. But then she hit them with this German accent, and it was dynamite. Their note was, it's too good. You need to cartoon it up a little bit. But the fun of that one for us was, and the big catch, and I don't know if you're having this with yours too, with the people calling in, you just got to make sure it's real to them.

We read the questions. Oh. I do that specifically. Because of that. Yeah. Because we have another show that we do on Fridays where we have callers submit insane stories like unauthorized evacuation at a gym, all that stuff. I love it.

And so we do Zoom and we look at them. But as you learn the hard way, I kind of am looking for that emotional weird thing to happen. So it actually ends up helping that we're looking at each other because you can see I'm sincere. It's really worth it. But in that one, we know that how you wire up. Yeah, I think it depends.

What I love about your podcast, it sounds so funny and so good. It's so authentic to you. And I think that's what makes podcasts work. Because you can have a great premise. You can have whatever. It can be super highly produced. It has to be so authentic to your personality in order for it to work.

And I think for us, we could never do what you're doing. We could never be doing bits. Because Liz and I, we just want to have a question, give our two cents, but also talk for 15 minutes about what this makes us think about. Exactly. Then that's what we are good at.

So that's what we're going to bring to the table. And that's our personality. It has to just be so you. I totally agree. And I don't say this negatively. It's just a completely different relationship than we have with our audience. And I enjoy it. You're not necessarily nice. No. Which I love. You're not mean. I love that part of it.

Well, that's a big important part that Gareth and I talked about. Because when you do press in our business, likability matters so much. In life, if you're in a bar, when I think to my uncles and I think of funny stories, the hardest I laugh is when somebody kills me because I'm wrong. Right. When I'm telling some story and somebody goes like, honestly, you're lying. And then you realize like, I'm not lying, but yeah, emotionally I wasn't being truthful. You're right.

I'm retelling it like a hero. And the truth is, yeah, you know what? I did want that. And then you get that like great juice. So our big thing, I mean this sincerely, we are on the person's team. Now that doesn't mean we're going to tell you how great you are. You're on their team like a brother. Yes. Which is my brother is going to fight anyone who shows up to kick my ass, but he's going to let me have it. So that was our kind of bit. And if somebody

is a little bit crazy and they're in the wrong, we had somebody call in that has been a really fun one. He was at work, you know, regular 24 year old kid in Atlanta. And he had sunglasses that had rainbows on them. Thoughtless. Sure. Truly. When you get to know this kid, thoughtless kid. At the end of work, his boss said, happy pride. He just said, thank you. Then he said, I realized the next week people were treating me a little differently. Oh. And he said, in a good way. He said, I liked my new role.

Now, the real advice, right, is you have to say, like, what you're doing is wrong. You can't false that. You can't act like you're gay if you're not. He doesn't have to act like he's gay. He can just be normal. Yes, but then, hold on. So for me personally, when I i heard that my first red flag is no no no man people who are actually going through this and struggling yeah yeah you can't just wear

the cap asshole because you're not right that's like saying you're a veteran exactly right yes so then we keep going we go so how do you know and he would have really funny examples where he'd go like you know somebody would say did you hear the new taylor swift album and he would say like i did and they go what do you think and he goes i loved it and so you're like that's fair and then he never did anything he never lied he never like but then they go he had jury duty and he's friends with a bunch of women at work now because they trust him yeah and he said one of them said hey jury duty might not be so bad there might be a hot guy and we go what'd you say he goes the truth there might be and so you're like you're the fucking best that's great so then you go all

right so now for this show we're on your team so we're not going to give you the outside advice of what you have to do is be real because that's going to be bad for you so in the world of this show you're fucking out of line but we're on your team then we go what is your problem and he goes one of the girls i work with i have a crush on and it's genuine and we text outside of work and i would like to see what happens this is quite a conundrum no i think to me it's so straightforward he's not doing anything wrong i really don't really i think it's the guy's fault if he's wearing rainbow sunglasses. It's that guy's issue for making an assumption.

So he's just saying, happy pride. Great, happy pride. He's been going on this now for almost two years. Hold on now. So he's in a spot now where he goes, but I like this woman. Okay. So then what's the- I got to add one thing. Yeah, please.

I've sat out long enough. Okay. So then, what's the- I gotta add one thing. Yeah, please. I've sat out long enough. When they say, maybe there'll be a hot guy on the jury, you have to go, there probably is. I do like girls. That's to me where the line was, because now you're perpetuating it.

No, that part's bad. We all know what they were saying. Jack's leaning in. He should have said, or a hot woman. Yes, agreed. And then they would have been all fucked up yeah but now for the game of the show yes right because you're right that is very real advice that is where you cross the line but for the game of the show which i also believe it

you got a hell of a great attitude about life because guess what i noticed good looking guys if i have a jury duty and the guy next to me is a 10 out of 10 when i saw you what the first thing i say oh jesus christ man you look like a beast that's a compliment listen i think we would agree i know way more hot guys in hollywood than i know women you go like this jesus christ you fucking hunk i'm gonna crack an egg on your head you You're on fire. Yeah, Josh Brolin, who we interviewed, he happened to stop by the other day out of nowhere. And I'm just looking at a table.

And I'm like, look at you, son of a bitch. You're the most handsome son of a bitch ever. You look like a piece of leather. The dicks on your show that we wouldn't say the title to? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We can't say the title to it. By the way, you're brilliant on that show. I think you're so good on it. Thanks, buddy.

But I love looking at dicks. So, Sam, when I saw Boogie Nights on it but i love looking at dicks so same when i saw boogie nights and burt reynolds is looking at mark walberg's dick just as money yeah yeah i thought like i find that so perfect you see a great hawk and hog if you're making money off this the bigger the better, baby. Let me give you my business card. And the way he tilts his head in that kitchen and then smiles, I'm like, well, that's just wheelhouse for what I find excellent. It's like he's seen a Van Gogh. Yeah, and he has.

It's like he sees a million bucks. So the fun part of that job for me has been, there's nothing funny about three straight men with a beautiful woman going by making a comment on the body. No, it's not safe. That, in the 80s, in the 90s, there was a lot of comedy in that, especially if the guys are goobers. These fat goobers, they're never going to get her. Somehow culturally, that was really fun.

It's not anymore. Correct. We can still live in that immaturity when I'm at work and there's a guy who takes his robe off and there's an intimacy coordinator, but the guy and I are doing bits and there's a guy who takes his robe off and there's an intimacy coordinator but the guy and I are doing bits and I go like you got a great body my man and he goes don't I know it and I go what the fuck are you doing in the gym and he goes lifting everything and then his dick is clearly huge and I go and you got a little lucky and he goes like god is good and we crack up I'm like you just made my tuesday morning so funny man this movie i directed

hit and run i had a scene in it or we get the wrong hotel key and we walk in and there's it's not an active orgy they're post coital but it's seniors amazing and i just cast this out of like fucking craigslist for this thing and a gentleman arrived and he just had the most glorious dog. And he was so thin and wonderful looking and wispy hair and this huge hog. I shot every angle of that dog. Three hours of overtime. Certain random guys hogs. I know you tried to transition.

I jumped on it. I really did. I just will say, it's shocking. And you go, never in a million years would I guess you were packing that. I judged you so incorrectly, my king. Okay,

get us out of it. The advice. We never heard it. What was your advice? Get yourself a nice big dick. Get a big old hog. Get yourself a big hog. Life works out. Get really lucky. Get a great big hog who cares about everything else you'll be rich for life so no the advice for him and gareth and i always have slightly different advice was what do you value more the potential relationship with the girl or the job okay really salient because you can't have both you might but i think you could lie at work

i don't think you can lie and start a relationship yeah i think that makes you a shitty person i think letting them believe you're gay makes you a gray area person but starting a relationship that starts on a big lie i think you're shitty yeah so if you're gonna go with her you have to come out and say here's the truth you gotta come out and say this is something that happened yeah i'm only telling you but this is reality i would like to move forward there are so many landmines and as your corner person on this i don't recommend that my advice was let the girl go oh keep doing the job because if i'm truly on this person's team i said do you want to look for another job and he's like no the market's hard and I need the money.

Okay. And I go, do you see her as your future? He's like, I don't know. I like her. If I'm your friend and we're at a bar and you're telling me and I got your back 100%, don't pursue the girl. Wow. This is so interesting.

That's what I mean. Part of the game is the advice is not the good advice. It's what a friend would say to you. We say at the end, you've heard our thing. What are you going to do? Sometimes I say, I'm going to just do this other thing. And you go like, all right, great. We're not experts.

God bless you. I bet he told you he's going to give up the girl. I bet he didn't give up the girl. I mean, when you like a girl, you don't really give a fuck what anyone says. What we didn't realize at the beginning and now we're realizing we really like is the follow-ups. Yeah, absolutely. We had one where some guy came on and he was talking about how he's not good enough for his girlfriend. And it was a little bit whatever.

And then she came on and had a very different point of view on him and the dynamic. And that was when we were like, well, isn't that fascinating? The narrator's telling the story. So when we can get other narrators in there. Yeah, that's cool. The truth is it's just been really fun. It's really we've done like 40 calls so far so far i don't know what it's going to be in a year i don't know how long i'm going to be passionate i'm very manic i get like really into something and then i'll make a big claim and i'll be like i'll never record in

a microphone again and my wife will roll her eyes and i'm like no like this is real uh take me serious yeah take me forget the fact that i've been wrong about every other prediction i made about my own behavior take me serious on this one this is the one and yes i did just have coffee and yes i'm talking very fast and loud but i will say we are loving it now and we're gonna push it as hard as we can in this era well it's great i'm glad that you waited and found the thing that's just a perfect fit for you. But you guys are a legit inspiration. Oh, well, thank you. But I'm not kidding.

This room, when I left here, I don't think I've told you, I've told a lot of people, you really threw me. Oh, yeah. I had no idea about that. You rolled with it very effortlessly. It was an out-of-body experience.

I had to adjust. I imagine people post you, and over the years they know what they're coming into, but yeah, you were early. Also, I mean this as an ultra compliment. I didn't realize you were like a deep thinker. A lot of people have that with him. All his roles are like that. Yeah, but I also thought like the dude's hard funny, really fun. I just thought I was going there. One of the reasons I didn't do the other one in the middle was I'm not going to do all that homework. If you're going to play this game, you got to get

in the bone marrow with each person. That's the fun of it. And I can do that, but the fun has to be like the show Catfish was a big inspiration of why I said yes, because I got into it with my kids, probably bad parenting because they're young. But partly what i wanted to show was apart from being entertaining is don't trust the internet oh yeah and what i found really fun about that show is the hosts are great but each week there's a new thing that starts and i was like oh that's the caller to me i can be really interested for 45 minutes i think we both have a short attention span lives lives. You got to be productive in that window. And then it's over. Well, Jake, this has been a blast, just like it was the first time.

And I hope we do it a third time. I would love it. You guys are the best. All right. Everyone listen to We're Here to Help. It's out now. And I imagine Vilamina is the first. She's our number one.

Yeah, it's wonderful. And anywhere you get podcasts? Yes, I believe so. Okay, great. From what I'm being told. I believe it's going to be anywhere. All over. All right, love it.

All right, Jake. Adore you. Stay tuned for the fact check so you can hear all the facts that were wrong. Oh my gosh, I feel so soothed. We just had the most soothing expert on. Golly. He was great. Oh my Lord. Well, don soothed. We just had the most soothing expert on. Golly. He was great. Oh my Lord.

Well, don't give it away, the gender. They might be able to narrow it down. They were great. I had to wake up early today. Me too. Why'd you wake up early? I went to get my egg count looked at. Is that something they tell you real time?

Yeah. And? It's better. It's better. It's better than it was good so that's good um is that what you want but it's improved it's still it's it's pretty good actually i thought i could smell something no a lot of eggs no no there's a lot of eggs it smells like eggs in this room no don't say that it's disgusting you're not on any hormones. No. So the protocol, like I went in today, they took my blood, my body blood, not my fly blood.

Okay. Is there a difference? Yeah. Okay. Fly blood has flies in it. Well, sure. And fly ointment. Fly blood's kind of a fly ointment.

Kind of. And I- Are you on your flies? Do you have to go during your flies? Yes. Oh. On the third day of my flies. Okay.

So then they did a vaginal ultrasound, as they do. And then that's when they're counting the follicles. This is, they put the wand in the vag. Yeah, in the vagina area. Okay. And it looked good. I had this this cycle it varies a little bit per cycle okay this cycle if we were to do it this cycle which we're not yeah by 14 she said if we did it this time max would be 14 wasn't the last time like six or three well it was eight follicles. Okay. So this is 14 follicles.

14 follicles. You never know, though. You never know. That's almost a 100% increase. It is a good increase. Yeah. We're working with more. Which probably would lend to the theory that you were still suffering a bit from the pill.

Definitely. That was while I was still on it, really. Yeah. Yeah. So that was, I've been off of it for a year. The hope was that there would be some change. And there is, so that's good. Yay.

Congratulations. Thanks. So I'm nervous, though, because when I start ovulating, which is probably around the 18th. Up September. Yeah. I'm going to have to start estrogen for a week. Okay. And I'm nervous.

You didn't like how? I didn't do that last time. You didn't? Mm-mm. We're doing a new protocol. Okay. Based off of last time's poor results. Uh-huh.

Small eggs. Well. Big eggs, but minimal. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Just a few big eggs. Just a few big eggs. Only a couple big eggs. So we're doing a different protocol.

It's a little more intense. This is one of those things I just got to flag real quick. It's like for people who maybe weren't with us at Spotify for two years that are now back, like they've missed the whole that Padmans have big eggs. Exactly. There's so much. They're probably like, they would just take what I just said as an actual fact, like that we know this about you, you have big eggs. Which is, of course, is just a bit that's now going on two years old.

Well, and it's a weird bit because it started as a bit before we knew about. Your eggs. Any eggs. We were talking about me thinking about doing egg freezing and then you made a joke about I have big eggs. And your mom has big eggs. That's a joke. Then when we started egg freezing, size is a factor, and you want them to be big. That's the whole point.

Oh. I mean— Bigger is better? In order to retrieve them, yeah. Okay. That's the whole point of the hormone injections that you do are to increase the size. You're trying to get them as big as possible so you can retrieve them. Anyway, if you've missed this and you're back, I did this last year.

I got two mature eggs from that retrieval, which was not the best showing. And we're hoping for more, and we'll see. But I have to get on estrogen first, which I'm anxious about. That's fair. Yeah. I love my hormones I'm on, so maybe it'll go well. Maybe you'll feel more of something positive. Maybe.

Might feel cranky, though, too. I think it makes you very emotional. Emotional. Yeah. Okay. So we'll see. Well, you're welcome to be emotional on September 18th. Through.

I put that in my calendar. Through. Tread lightly from the 18th to the 27th. Yeah, I might need some gentle behavior. Okay. The 18th to the 25th. 18th to the following 18th. Well, a month, but I think it was-

No, a year. Oh my gosh, you mean a long year? I need gentle for a year. Oh my God. This is my outlet. I got to be gentle around these, like, this eight and 10 year old. They're so sensitive. Well, I'm sensitive too. I'm like, well, I know. I'm just saying now it's, I'm going to have to join a bowling league or something. We might. We might. So anyway, so I woke up early. Why'd you wake up early?

What happened was I woke up at 3 a.m. I resumed my book on tape. Mike Nichols, I was just telling you about it. I'm so into this biography. It's so good. Set my timer for an hour. Laying in bed. Hear it go off.

Yeah, I hate that. Fuck. I'm like, fuck. Reset it for another hour. Hear it go off yeah i hate that fuck like fuck reset it for another hour here i go off now i'm like well fuck me it's 5 a.m yeah i should probably get up and work out right now because i'm not gonna have time the rest of the day right i'm kind of whipping myself up into that we're gonna fuck it we're waking up at three today but we have a whole day and we had an expert that recorded a lot of mental you know it wasn't like chit-chatting about rock and roll music or movies. Yeah.

So I'm like, that's not going to work. Anyways, I was able to go back to sleep from five to six. Great. So I guess that was a win. What time did you have to go for your egg retrieval? It wasn't. You look like a hen. I don't.

You're not a hen? I don't love it. Okay. I don't love it. Okay. So I had to be there at 8.30, which is not early, really. Well, it is for me. Yeah.

And it was in Pasadena to make sure I got there on time and stuff. So I woke up at 7. Okay. I did go back to sleep when I got home. Oh, wonderful. For like an hour. Because my sleep's been bad because a couple days ago, right before bed, I was walking through the kitchen and I just like kind of out of habit touched the knobs on my stove.

To make sure that they're off? Exactly. Just like click to make sure they're off. One, I felt like I clicked it. I clicked it in. And then I got panicked. That you were getting carbon monoxide poisoning? Hasn't your father sent you a carbon monoxide detector?

Of course. And it got unplugged. Oh, okay. Okay. His nightmare. Yeah. I, of course, thought that. They're far less effective when they're unplugged.

Yeah. But doesn't it have batteries in it for backup? No, like it just got removed out of the wall. Okay. But doesn't it have batteries? No. Oh. And yeah, I felt guilty because I was like, my dad even tried to prevent this.

My daddy. My daddy would try to look after me. He tried everything he could. He didn't. He can't protect me from everything. No, he can't protect people from themselves. Exactly. Especially me.

And he tries to make me not go out in hurricanes, and I do. And it's like, what am I doing? Yeah, you're wild. and it's like, what am I doing? Anyway, so then I opened the window, but it felt like that's not enough if it had been on all day. Right, but you would have smelled it. That's what I thought.

Yes. That's what I thought. It's very likely that the valve was off long before the click. Okay. Because there's a lot of real estate between low and off. But do you think that a tiny leak would be happening, though, unless it's fully clicked off? Also, is yours old enough that the pilot lights always lit? Is there always a little blue flame in the burners when you look over them? Uh-uh.

Okay, never mind. That's how mine was in my old apartment. Oh. I mean, it is old, but no. Yeah. Anyway, so I— You kind of were neurotic i was and i couldn't sleep and i also had a headache oh did you ever door closed no well why wouldn't you close your door if you thought there was carbon monoxide coming from the kitchen well then i opened also a little bit I cracked open the one in my bedroom and I thought two would be a little better.

But it was also the middle of the night and I was worried about crazies coming in the window too. Of course. Lots of fears to juggle at once. And not to mention the mice that are scampering around. Oh my God. Yeah, because last night I was listening to Nobody's Listening, right?

My favorite podcast. And they were telling a horrifying story about maggots. Oh, we just had one of those too. And I knew you guys just had a whole situation. We found maggots in my butt. No, do not say that. That's so disgusting. In case people were wondering what it was. No, we had a trash can we opened and it was full of maggots.

That's what happened to them. It's so like, Elizabeth said something really specific. Maggots or snakes, just really quick. I need to know where they're at in the hierarchy. What are you more grossed out by, snakes or maggots? I'm grossed out by maggots. I'm scared of snakes. Okay, but you're also scared of maggots, I'd imagine.

Well, I'm scared because they're so gross. Like, they can't be near me. Yeah, they're swarming. Oh, God, don't. Elizabeth said it really well because she was having this reaction, too. She said, these are the types of things that make me feel, this is what she said, and I fully agree, make me feel like I can't, like, be a person. Like, I can't be human. I can't be a person. I can't be human. I can't handle this world.

Okay. It's overwhelming. Yeah. When I think about so many maggots in the trash can, I can't live in a world like that. There has to be something evolutionarily happening that we have such an outsized fear of maggots. They can't do anything to you. It's because it's death-related, I think. Right, exactly.

I think somehow we know that they're generally present when there's some old food decaying or a body decaying. There's decays. Did you figure out why you had them? Like, what was it that caused it? Well, just, we have some holes in the top of our trash can, for worse. I won't say for better or worse.

For worse. And so the flies get in there and they nibble on all that trash and then they lay all their eggs. And that's the larvae. Oh, my God. Oh, God. I think I got bit by a larvae. Oh, my God. A larva.

Ow. Oh, Jennifer. That's a real object, though. That hurt. Oh, boy. Oh, my God. Oh, my gosh. Okay. But are you sure it wasn't like something dead in the trash?

Well, it was food. It's rotting food. But Elizabeth thinks on theirs, because they had a situation with these rats. Okay. And the man like caught two rats, and she thinks they were put in the trash. Oh. Which seems. Could be.

I think it's normal. We had them under our trash once. Ew! We have like the slide out. And when we took them out to clean, we saw some hanging out underneath. Sure. Alright, we gotta clean this floor. Well, where there are flies, there are gonna be maggots.

Now, I will say this. I just wish you guys would. Can I put a positive spin on the maggots? You can try. If they're on your body eating necrotic flesh. Stop. That's a good thing. You want that necrotic flesh gone. I don't know.

Yeah, so they can be a lifesaver. Oh, my gosh. Good for who? The necrotic flesh? Well, they're good. That's a dead guy. The dead guy doesn't care. No, because you know my most favorite medical story of the guy with the.

Oh, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why are you doing this? I'm sick. I have a similar one that I've heard from a nurse. Yeah, yeah. This is from an ER doctor at Cedars. He had maggots in his dick.

But it was a good thing. Not on his dick, under his balls. Right. Yeah. Yeah, mine was a vagina maggot one. Stop, you guys. Seriously. The whole thing sounds like maggot Beckett.

Maggots Beckett, which is a turn on Silverstone. And it's so weird to me that it's called that. Why would they call it that? I know. Anyway, I hate that. You can't even say the word, can you? I can't. I really can't.

I want to point out something gross about it, but I don't think you can handle it. Oh, my God. Let's try. Well, just part of what makes the word maggot. Do it as a riddle and see if I. Part of what makes the word maggot gross is it kind of sounds like mayonnaise. Max, don't. I have to cut that. And they kind of look like. Stacks. Don't. I have to cut that.

And they kind of look like. Stop it. Mayonnaise filled. Don't. Mayonnaise organisms. Ow. Oh, my God. I hate you.

Okay. I didn't bring that. I didn't bring up that. Yes, you did. No. You were listening to your favorite. Elizabeth and Andy. Elizabeth and Andy.

But you brought up mayonnaise. Right, but I didn't bring up the M-A-G. Now you're smelling it now. Well, you're starting to hurt yourself over there, so I got to rein it in. I feel really uncomfortable. I feel like it's already September 18th. And September 18th came early this year. Hey, be careful.

I am. I'm being careful. Are you? Yeah. I don't think you are. Trying to ride that line of making you laugh. I'm still on my regular period. And it's a tough one.

With all the big old eggs up in there, I'm sure. 14 big boys up there? That's more than a dozen. They're not big right now. They're regular size. More than a baker's dozen, even. Yeah. But maybe next cycle, maybe they'll have an extra one or something.

20? What's an outrageous amount? Ideally, you want between like, you want like 25. 25. It's really hard. Like, that's very hard. Yeah. That's what an 18-year-old has?

Maybe. 13? I don't know, because maybe 13. Well, I don't want to shame anyone if they're 18 and they get theirs checked. And it's, for real, because it makes you feel really inadequate. Right. Like you're not fertile. Yeah.

And that you're not performing like a woman's supposed to. Yeah. Same. Same with boys and their sperm count. I told you I tried to sell my sperm at UCLA. I needed some money. And there was always ads in the Daily Bruin. Bree looked into maybe selling some eggs.

And I went down there to the clinic. And I relieved myself there, as you are instructed to do. Yeah. And then they call and tell you whether they want it. And they said, these are average sperm counts. You need an elevated sperm count to be a donor. Which is kind of a blessing. I don't

i don't want your kids out there now yeah now i might be curious would you do you think you'd go find now that i have two children absolutely you would yes i i definitely would but when i was 21 years old i didn't i didn't think i i didn't give a shit do you think you'd walk around the city and just be looking at everyone around that age? Let me see that cowlick. Yeah. Let me see that cowlick. Where's your birthmarks?

Show me your body. Every time you're at a restaurant. Let me examine your body. Your toe weird? Yeah, you look at their toes or hair. What would be interesting is that, because I have a couple of deformities that are identical to my father's, which is so weird. But that's because you said the knuckle,

but you punched someone for that. Yes, and he got in a car accident, but that was weird. We both were missing the same knuckle. Then we both broke the same collarbone and then had to have surgery. Our hands look identical. Shoulders, when I tell you sometimes I touch my cheek on my shoulders, I feel like I have my head on my dad's shoulder.

That's really cute. The skin feels identical. Same freckles. So I think I could identify a young shepherd. Yeah. I was like, let me see your knuckles. But what if it's a girl? You're not as used to.

Well, then I'd go, you look just like Lincoln. Get in the car. Oh, my God. You're going to steal her? No, I was going to say, I'm your dad. You're my baby. I'm your dad. Get in the car oh my god you're gonna steal her no one's gonna say you're i'm your dad i'm your dad get in the car at this point 2000 child would be 22 years old exactly so you wouldn't really know because hey hey co-ed get in my car i'm your dad or maybe i was gonna say they'd look like carly but that's not what maybe because your mom's jeans are in there.

That's right. Half of Carly is my mother. Half of me is my mother. Yeah. But Carly looks like a hatter and I look like a shepherd. Neither of us look like labos too much, which is my mother's. What are you doing? I know, so loud, Rob.

He's clucking away. I'm trying to wait for a good moment. A little further away from the microphone is what I might suggest. Well, then I can't see when you're going to have a good break. Okay. No. You look like your mom a little bit. Probably.

Everyone looks like their mom a little bit. It's just when your story is one thing. Exactly. As we know, you can't see anything to the contrary. So I look like my dad. I look like my dad. You could. The same everything. Yeah, but you also look a little bit like my dad. You know, I look like my dad. You could. Same everything.

Yeah, but you also look a little bit like your mom. Yeah, just like her. Olive skin, short, green eyes. No, that's so superficial. Oh, my God. No, features wise. When like you guys are next to each other, it doesn't look like. It doesn't look like she adopted you.

Yeah. Right. You look like her kid. Yeah. But if you saw me next to my dad, it was kind of uncanny. I saw you. I hung out with you and your dad. I saw a picture once. You know, the thing that blows my mind now is, oh, God.

Occasionally, I would go snuggle him, right? He would want me to snuggle him when I was a teenager. Or I would go in there and he'd be asleep. Whatever the case is, I know exactly how he slept. And he always, always slept on his left side with his left arm out, raised up on another pillow. Oh, okay. Yeah. And I was so aware because he

was such a big man he was like slept like a little baby on the side you know his arm out yeah and although i didn't in my youth now my signature sleep move is is that really yeah like i definitely when i'm trying to fall asleep what i I do is left side, left arm out. My knees are at a certain, and I'm like, in that position, I'm like, this is exactly your dad's position. It's crazy to think of genetic stuff. Yes, and it could be subconscious chicken or the egg. It's like you have that image in your head of, that's the model of a man sleeper. But here's what's crazy too.

I was like connecting those dots and I was remembering Papa Bob slept the exact same way too. Right. He'd take his, he'd go read, quote, read in the afternoon. He liked to read from his novel on a Saturday. It was really, it was a nap. Oh. And we'd always catch him and he'd be on a Saturday. Yeah. It was really, it was a nap. Oh. And we'd always catch him and he'd be in that position. Right.

And I was, I mean, I know what you're saying, but at the same time, A, I only lived with him for two years of my life. I know. And B, I was trying to be the opposite of him. I know. And then my hand turned out the same way. My shoulder turned out the same way.

I still think it could be. Just a lot of nurture there. The thing about your Papa Bob, it reinforces your idea and mine. Okay. That like what you saw now twice in two different men in your family, I feel like it could have just got embedded that like this is. Yeah. We don't know. We'll never know.

I did see my papa bop's penis though okay how similar to yours was it it was very similar yeah as i grew up but i don't think it's oh god way too often so then was that similar yeah yeah identical okay that's okay first of all yeah that can't be nurture. That's your anatomy. But this sleep is much different. I think you might have a genetic predisposition for how you sleep. That's what I'm now coming to terms with. Also, you know, the other thing, the rubbing the finger thing is, I've already told you about that. I know, and I think that's the same.

Hey, I don't know. Because why wouldn't I do what my mom did? Like, my mom has signature things, too, but they just don't feel natural to me. Not everyone. My mom would pet your ear gently. Well, that's sweet. That was lovely. I don't know.

And I saw how she slept, but I don't sleep like her. Okay, listen. All right. It's the male thing. You're not considering. I was trying to be like my mom. No, you weren't. You wanted to be a big boy.

My mom slept weird. She, or sleep. I don't know if she still sleeps this way, but she would sleep with an arm over her face. Do you find yourself doing that? No. No. Tell my mom sleeps.

Because moms are like, I guess they feel like they want to just die at night. No, they're just so tired of the day. I know, yeah, yeah. Did your dad snore? Yeah. Because I think my mom had the pillow to like block the snoring. Oh, God.

Moms have to deal with so much. Oh, fuck, yeah. Poor moms. It's funny you bring up Papa Bob, though. Or maybe I brought up Papa Bob. You did. His penis. Right.

Monica brought up his penis. I just brought up him um we were i was laying with lincoln last night before bed and she said you're the nicest man i've ever met and i said that's because you never met papa bob that's nice yeah and i had the most warm fuzzies thinking about him that's nice oh what a guy grandpas nice. They're the best grandpapas. Yeah. I waited too late. I don't know if I'll get a turn as a grandpa.

Yes, you. Don't knock on wood right now. Let's just say I was 38 when Lincoln was born. And if she waits till she's 50. Okay. Can you just please knock on wood? Okay. Thank you.

Like, even if I live to be 90 or 100, I still might not be a grandpa. Well, you might also might not because they might decide not to have children. Like, we don't know any. Also very true. And they could have them at 55. Like, it's getting later and later. I hope. Or 22.

Or 18. Or, exactly. Also, no shame if, like, if that happens, great. What part? Any of it. I can't remember what thing we said. Any of it. Okay, waiting long, not having it.

Any of it. Everything's perfect. I got poison monoxide you got carbon monoxide poisoning yes okay poison monoxide yeah you look great your skin looks great you should get more poison monoxide because it's you really should arrive today looking fresh face and tons of eggs. This is working for you. Oh my God. What if I had 25 before the carbon monoxide? Wow. Fuck. I don't think. It wouldn't have been that quickly.

Yes. It can make them grow that quickly. No, it kills cells. But if it's cycle based, you're just extracting them, right? At this point. No, you don't understand. You're not my OBG. You guys don't understand anything. You my obg you're my producer not my ob

um i'm going home tomorrow oh yeah i'm gonna see aaron weekly and aaron tyrell fun to hold your enthusiasm i'll miss you i'll miss you but isn't it fun i'm gonna get to see best friend aaron weekly it's been a long time. Too long. Yeah, why haven't they come visit? We were gone all summer, virtually. Yeah. And now I'm going there.

All right. And we're going to go film some stuff, which is funny. I've never filmed anything with Aaron. That'll be cute. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. For Ted Seegers. Are you guys going to drink any? Fuck yeah.

We're going to pound Seegers in some of these. Oh my God. Because I've written little spots. Oh wow. Mm-hmm. Cute. And they involve, some of them involve like shotgunning some Ted Seegers. That's fun.

Yeah, yeah. We're going up to Traverse City. Like right after I land next morning, we'll drive up to Northern Michigan to where the hops fields are. Oh, cool. Uh-huh. And it's harvest time by pure luck wow yeah but i'll miss you i'll miss you happy labor day yeah you

don't even be here for labor day your favorite holiday yeah it's your birthday holiday oh You might as well. Actually. Tell me. Happy early birthday for tomorrow. Oh. For no cocaine, no alcohol. No cocaine, no alcohol. Congratulations. Thank you.

How many years? Unbelievable that I have not had alcohol in 19 years. That would be 19 years. 19. That's so cool. Yeah. I really, it's hard for me to believe. Certainly, if you would have told me in 2004, like, you're going to go night, you're not going to have a drink. I would have been like, I don't know, man.

Yeah, I know. It doesn't seem. It's so funny because, you know, they say this in the book, like, you get relieved of the obsession, which is totally true. The first few years you're sober, it's like, you're so aware of like, alcohol is everywhere. You are never more than a hundred feet from alcohol anywhere in this country. For sure. And you can feel it when it first starts.

It's like, fuck, now I'm at this restaurant. Oh, everyone's drinking there. I'm at this pool. Everyone's drinking there. Oh, there's a guy on the street drinking on the sidewalk. There's a liquor store. It's so ubiquitous. Now i don't see any of it i haven't for decades you know wow 16 of those years i finally stopped noticing it that's crazy

or i'll even sometimes i'm like digging through the freezer and i'll discover oh there's a couple bottles of vodka in here i don't even know that that's in there you know i don't even see that i'm in and out of the freezer all the time i don't even see that that's in there. I don't even see that. I'm in and out of the freezer all the time. I don't even see that. But the first couple years I got sober, that's all I would have. That's all I saw anywhere. Yeah. Wow. Well, thank you.

Thank you. That's kind of a ding, ding, ding because this is for Jake Johnson. What a fun hang Jake Johnson is, isn't he? Yeah, he's so fun. And he was talking about his dad's chips. Oh, right, right, right. Okay. So I just picked a little bit of my toenail. Like a bit of the paint?

The nail. The nail itself, not a polish. No. I tore a little bit of my toenail off. There we go, you tore it off. Yeah. It sounded scary when it was just like, oh, a piece of my nail just fell off.

No, I pulled it off. Okay. And I don't know where to put it without grossing you out. Put it on top of the kegerator. And then we'll get it later. Okay. I hope we don't forget. You don't need to hold it for the next.

Well, I hope we don't forget. And then when our next guest comes. This could be, though. Oh, is this a trick? I think, like, we might have a guest, probably an NBA basketball player. And they'll be talking, talking, talking. And then all of a sudden, they'll get distracted. And then they'll, like, pick it up.

And then they'll go, they'll go. And then they'll go, oh, my God, whose nail is this? And it'll be a love star cross lover connection. Oh, because it's like pheromones? Uh-huh, and it's a piece of you. Oh, okay. So that's kind of a lure. Okay.

Mm-hmm. I feel like it makes this place look really gross. Well, certainly. Before the NBA player eats it, a lot of people are going to be like, like accidentally see it and pretend like they didn't see it and be so grossed out and not be able to unlook at it. A lot of the people that aren't in the market for a love connection are not going to like it. Okay. Would that, where would we put, is basketball player high on the list?

I'm just observational data. You've responded so favorably to, yes, most of the basketball players. I do really like all the basketball players yeah every one of them um it's funny because i wouldn't say that you wouldn't have thought that i wouldn't have thought it yeah but i do in person like them things happen well they're so disciplined is that it yeah that's what it is okay so you love like most of the mit math department and stuff no that's different it's a different kind of discipline it's a physical discipline okay there we go i can relate okay i think there's a lot of things that they're confident very they're like some of the most confident people we've interviewed have been these

these basketball yeah and not in a way that actors are confident because actors are often confident. True confidence. Exactly. Actors are often, it's a massed insecurity parading as confidence or arrogance. Absolutely. But the athletes have some quantifiable proof. Yeah. They've all been like Hall of Famers too.

Yeah, that helps. They're quite successful. Also, the actors have also been Hall of Famers. That's true. There's been Academy Award winners and they're fucking scared as a... No, I love scared. Scared as a... You know, I told Andy and Elizabeth about my proclivity.

Which one? About sickness. Oh, good. You shared that with them. Yeah, I did. They were perturbed. Like they hadn't heard it. Okay. And if you guys forget, I used to. good you shared that with them yeah i did they were perturbed like they hadn't heard it okay

and if you guys forget right i used to fantasize yeah fantasize about little boys puking and you when i was a little girl yeah not me as a grown-up fantasizing about little boys i was a little girl and i had fantasies of the boys in my like class. Yeah. Getting sick. Puking. Yeah, lots of different kinds. And diarrhea. And then you would care, you would nurture them.

Yeah. Yeah. And what was their reaction? They were shocked and a little disgusted, but intrigued. They liked it. It's incredibly intriguing. Yeah. I loved it if you recall my first response. Yeah, you found it intriguing too. Yeah. I loved it, if you recall my first response.

Yeah, you found it intriguing, too. Yeah. I liked the whole thing. And then on my birthday, they sent me a pieced together image of a man over the toilet and me there. And it was a happy birthday message. Like a Photoshop thing? Yeah. I think they said, hoping you get everything you want this year.

Which was very funny. That is funny. Yeah, but yeah. I don't know why I thought of that. Oh, yeah, because weakness. I like it. I do like it. What, weakness?

Yeah. No, I don't. You think so? I think. We've already unpacked this. When we were talking about the basketball players. Well, you would love it if they got sick. Yeah, I'd love it.

But that's unrelated to confidence. Confident people get sick. Exactly. In fact, confident people get sick more often because, like me. They're stressed out. No, they're brazen in their, what, the leap? Because they're so confident in their, what, the leap? Because they're so confident. Oh, yeah.

If you recall, I was in a Kuwaiti first class lounge and I was pounding the salad bar. And Cooper was saying, wow, you're going really hard on the salad bar in Kuwait. So he was there when you were sick? On the airplane. Did he nurture you? He made love to me, yeah. Oh, my God. Uh-huh. He took me in his arms.

Wow. What was that like? He said, we got to stop this puking. I'm going to kiss you. That's what I say. Yeah. We got to plug this up. In my mouth.

That's what I say in the fantasy. Did he really nurture you or no? No, no. He didn't? He was not seated next to me, thank goodness. Because I drove the person next to me crazy. Remember, I'm so mad at that person still. Why?

It was like a fucking 11-hour flight to Germany, and I was in the inside seat. Why didn't they switch with you? Oh, my God. Did you ask? No. Yes. And they said no? Yeah, they didn't want to sit by the window.

Oh, my. And I had to crawl. I had to climb over them. Because it was like lay down. You should have puked in their lap. There's just shit on their lap and their chest. And then they had them. Oh, they probably would have liked that.

I think Cooper would have got involved. So he wasn't close by. So he couldn't nurture you. He didn't really know what was going on. Oh. When we landed in New York, he was, oh gosh. He would have known in Germany. I think we flew to Germany and then we flew to New York.

He got off in New York. And then I continued on to fucking LA. Oh my God. I was in the airplane for 20 some hours. You should have just stayed in a hotel. Ding, ding, ding. That is the only time in 19 years that I almost drank. Yeah.

Because I literally was like, I need some relief from this which is also so funny and goes to show how much it's not about alcohol and it's just about relief yeah because no one with the healthy-ish relationship to alcohol wants to drink when they're sick as they're throwing up in diarrhea yeah it's and diarrhea. Yeah. There's nothing that sounds worse. Right. But to me, it was like, if I got drunk right now, that'd be some relief. Yeah. Yeah.

That was a real ding, ding, ding. Came out of nowhere. I just want to know. Are you going to remove your entire toenail while we talk? Now I'm on a callus. Now I see you really. Okay. I just want to add to the pile.

I noticed that callus when we were recording yesterday. You did? And I meant to ask you about it, but then I guess we went outside for photos. Because I'm ugly. No, but you have a callus and that's from all that walking you did while. No, I always have it. That's the first time I've noticed that. It's worse right now.

And now I'm pulling all the skin off of it so it and making a pile there's a nail and some skin i might want to leave one of your eggs behind maybe the maggots will find it oh gosh it's a big mountain of oh god um what did you think when you saw this callus like Like, ew, she's gotten gross? No, I was just really curious about it. I was like, was that a blister that has popped and now the skin's there? Or is it, you know, what's going on? What do we got?

I want to cut it off. You know, it's funny. I should probably do that. Ding, ding, ding. My dad has one. He does? Yeah. Well, that's, you interrupted me.

But I was going to say, yeah, you probably don't sleep like your mom. I bet you sleep like your dad. I don't think so. Have your mom take some pictures of him tonight while he's asleep and look at his posture and see if that's how you sleep. I bet you. I really don't think so. I sleep all crazy. I bet he does too.

No, he doesn't. We've all been in a hotel room. I don't know, actually. You're both snorers, he doesn't. We've all been in a hotel room. I don't know, actually. You're both snorers, right? No. I don't know. God.

I'm always paranoid about that, though. I just want to know if when you were sick on the plane. Yeah. And you were getting up and you were like holding your, like, how did, what did it look like? Like, were you like running or did you tell them? No, because, you know, you know, like, or at least I know 20 seconds out, like it's starting to turn and starting to turn. Oh my God, I'm going to, I'm going to throw up again. I'm going to throw, you know, you know, that feeling for a bit.

So I was ahead of it always. I didn't have any accidents in my shorts or anything. You didn't? No. Do you think he was behind you and he was like, what is going on? You already know this part of the story, but it feels like it has to be said, even though it's already been such a gross fact check between the maggots and the nails and the skin and the meat,

my food poisoning. and the skin and the meat, my food poisoning. But if you recall, I sat down in my seat before we had taken off and I felt some gas. And I cracked just the tiniest squeak. You tried to do that pop of the Coke bottle. Yep. It was just a whisper of a two, like truly 1% of what was there. Yeah.

In the 1%, I knew immediately I had food poisoning. Yeah. And I'm sure my seatmate did too. I don't think anything was a secret and yet the person didn't switch. That's so mean. Yeah.

International travel, you never know what you're gonna get You're in different cultures Right You don't know what protocol is I guess I just wonder If he was like What is going on

With Dax And does he need some nurturing? No There is no Does he need me to like rub his back? The only other explanation Would have been I'm doing an eight ball of coke on this flight.

Because why else would I be in the bathroom every 15 minutes? Right. And then come back with white skin. But why didn't he check on you? Why didn't he pat my back? And like play with your hair and stuff. That's a big missed opportunity for him. People don't understand. He didn't know. He didn't know. Okay. What people don't know. You don't him. People don't understand.

He didn't know. He didn't know. Okay. Well, people don't know. You don't know what you don't know. But he did know. He knew I was sick. There's no way he didn't notice you up and down a ton.

I know this asshole's having cocktails and eating dinner and shit. Oh, he was? Yes, it's a 12, 11, 12-hour flight. Maybe it's not. I don't want to say it's an 11-hour flight. I actually don't know what it is. It is a long flight. It felt like three flights to LA from New York, basically. Okay.

All right. Well, so the director. Will you look up flight time from Frankfurt to Kuwait? Just out of curiosity. I bet I'm way off. One hour. 45 minutes. I bet it's more like five and a half or six. Five and a half. Okay.

But then Germany did. She said 12. I did. You know what I was doing subconsciously as I was adding? You were conflating all of them. Because Germany to New York is another six. The whole thing. Kuwait to New York was 11. And then I had five to is another six. The whole thing. Kuwait to New York was 11. And then I had five to LA. Okay.

The director of Sunset Boulevard is Billy Wilder. Oh, that is who the story is about. Is it? Yep. Okay. That's absolutely it. Now, the Gracie family is a big jujitsu family. Horian, Hicks, Boyce.

I'm going to read some of this stuff. Okay. Grandfather has a world record for the longest fight. I wanted to read some stuff. Okay, read some stuff. I don't want to read any of this. You don't want to? No.

Okay. I don't. Gestau? I just don't. Gastau? I just don't know how to pronounce anything. Oh, it's so hard because even hoist, Gracie, is spelled R-O-Y-C-E. Hoist. Because they speak Portuguese in Brazil.

Right, they do. Okay, let me do family tree. Oh, great. What is the woman's name who is doing? Cecilina. Okay, Cecilina. Let me find Cecilina. Okay, Cecilina. Let me find Cecilina on here. Cecilina.

I believe is the granddaughter. Of Gustau? Yeah. Okay, Gustau has George and Helena. Nope, you've been duped. Okay. You've been duped. This is not updated then. It's not helping. It's's not helping it doesn't have cecilina on here she should guys you know i don't know how to spell that name i wouldn't even know

where to begin c-e-s-a yeah i would i would imagine it to be c but it's not on this tree is she older no she's young she may maybe there's like a her mom's name there's another family member named cecilina there's one there's a cecilina in this family tree that has eight children wait where who's kid uh helio gracie the youngest son of gustow and cecilina gracie's eight children wait i don't see this is a different i'm you're on a different. I'm searching just Cecilina now, yeah. Oh, you can't do that because that's made up to make it look like she's real. Fair. Is it at Cecilina.com?

It's GracieMadison.com. Okay. Well, anywho, that got us nowhere. But it's really cool that everyone's doing jujitsu. All these daughters. It is. And do you care why it's even popular here in the u.s it's kind of a fun history sure um hoist's brother founded the ufc

with another guy or it could be two other people actually and they sent promoter art Davey the up and then they they sent hoist to fight in it even though he wasn't the toughest of the Gracie's and the original UFC you fought all day long it was an elimination day and you would have like three or four fights and everyone he fought was so much bigger than him it was crazy he was like 170 pounds in six, two or three. And he was undefeated. He beat dozens of people over the first three or four UFCs. And the whole world went, whoa, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is the thing. Look at this small man beating all these huge people from every different discipline.

And then they came here the family and they opened up tons of schools around california yeah it's very cool it is and the granddad has i think he is the world record for the longest fought he fought someone for like 23 hours carlos has 21 children 106 grandchildren so that's probably why you're not fighting. Whoa. 128 great-grandchildren. Whoa. Oh, my God. What a family reunion.

A bunch of people grappling all over the place. Oh, that'd be fun for you. Yeah. I'd be scared. Okay. So, how much currently has the Barbie movie made? Worldwide. Okay.

1.34 billion. Wow.37 million wow making it the highest grossing domestic movie in warner brothers more than any of the harry potters it says barbie beats batman becomes warner brothers highest grossing domestic release oh domestic release yeah domestic yeah that's awesome it deserves it yeah i'm gonna go again you are oh yeah i want to go again for sure over labor day no no no very limited time frame back in michigan okay so he said he said it was funny he was talking about kids and he said that he was a blockhead. And I felt like, is that offensive? Like, what is the origin of that? That's what Charlie Brown is.

He's a blockhead? Yeah, they call Charlie Brown a blockhead. Yeah, yeah. Well, I looked up what it means. Okay, great. Origin. Stupid person. Stupid.

Stupid person. It says it. It says, quote, stupid person. 1540s from blockhead. Probably originally an image of the head-shaped oaken block used by hat makers. I got it because it was a head with no brain in it. Oh, I like it. Empty head.

It's smart. Unlike blockheads. Unlike blockheads. Unlike Charlie Brown and our guest. Okay. I have a list if we want. A block, famous blockheads? Unlike Blockheads. Unlike Charlie Brown and our guest. Okay, I have a list if we want. Of famous Blockheads? Mm-hmm. Oh, my gosh.

No. 22 all-time great directors and their final films. Where does this come from? Because Sunset Boulevard guy. Oh, okay. I should have done that. Billy Wilder. Yeah, Billy Wilder, because he was working on that movie for his whole life, basically.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So wait, what's this category? Okay, this list is the 22 all-time great directors in their final films. Okay. Okay. Okay. Alfred Hitchcock. What's his last movie, you're asking?

Family Plot. I never even heard of that one. Me neither. That's probably why he died. You know what's really sad? This is going to be a sad list. We don't have to do it. Directors' movies at the end of their career are never their best.

Oh. The only person that may achieve this is Tarantino. Because he's going to do his last movie. Oh, right. You know, semi-soon, I guess. Like he's going to retire. last movie. Oh, right. You know, semi-soon, I guess. Like he's going to retire. Yeah. Not just keep going until.

Right. Okay, yeah. Because, okay, John Ford, Seven Women, Ingmar Bergman, Sarah Band, Federico Fellini, The Voice of the Moon. Okay, hold on. Let me just see if there's any movies I recognize on here. Oh, Billy Wilder's on here. Buddy Buddy.

Okay. John Huston. Love John Huston. The Dead. Is that a movie that you know? I don't know it. Okay. I think it's just demonstrating what I'm suggesting.

Charlie Chaplin. Accountants from Hong Kong. Accountants from Hong Kong? I love that movie. Oh, okay. Robert Altman, A Prairie Home Companion. I do know that movie.

I know it too. It might not be his best movie. I hate to tell you some stuff about that movie, but. What? It was racist? I don't think I should say this. What?

I'm going to tell you this off. Yeah. Off mic. So Maya was in that. And Paul Thomas Anderson, who of course loves Robert Altman as every director did. Just off mic. So Maya was in that. And Paul Thomas Anderson, who of course loves Robert Altman, as every director did. He was there. It says that here.

Oh, it does? Yeah. Oh, then I can say that out loud. Yeah, it says 80 years old and suffering from leukemia. Was asked to pick out a standby replacement. And his friend, Paul Thomas Anderson, happily stepped up. Right. So that one's a little hard to evaluate. Unfortunately, happily stepped up. Right. So that one's a little hard to evaluate.

Fortunately, it never came to that. Altman was able to complete his film, but he obviously helped. Yeah, you're right. I don't, that's the only one I know on this list, but I don't know a lot of stuff. Of like old Hollywood. Yeah. Well, you were trying to be on a sitcom. We just figured this out. Well, you were trying to be on a sitcom. We just, we just figured this out.

No, no. I mean, I was for a while, like once I got into Good Will Hunting, then I did really. Get into directors? Get into movies, but not old movies, big movies or zeitgeist movies. But I never was interested in like, yeah, Hitchcock or classics. I was never interested in classics. I'm not classic. You're kind of classic. No, because I'm brown.

Timeless. Well, you're the original people are brown. So that's the most classic you can get. Yeah. We all come from Africa and it wasn't white people leaving Africa. Well, that's true. But everyone was white in all these old movies. Mostly. Yeah. But I just, I Africa. Well, that's true. But everyone was white in all these old movies. Mostly, yeah.

But I just, I was never drawn to that. Right, sure. I think there's some gender element to it, I think. Like, in Hollywood, boys seem to be like, they're directors, and all the directors are male, and this person's a genius. And there's something, I don't know, it feels like it it um over indexes males being super obsessed with well i guess we'll think about the joke in fucking uh barbie about explaining the godfather to women exactly boys like the godfather they like coppola right and i and i do think you're right i think so much of that has to do with them being all men yeah it's aspirational

you're right and women didn't really have that to like look towards but also like in film school i'm trying to think like like callie liked a lot of that stuff because she was in she was a film film major yeah but in film class for me i didn't i didn't i was not drawn to the old movies i liked amelie that's a great movie it's not very old but it's a great movie not old at all yeah the 90s probably to me um 2001 2001 god you're a quick one i liked amelie quite a bit too yeah great movie i like that name yeah it's beautiful should i name my self amelie my dog my unborn dog amelie i'll name one of my eggs amelie padman is nice god it doesn't really go does it it does amelie padman do you think so absolutely because then you start thinking like oh is that an indian name and

kind of like oh yeah like we we of course think of it as French because we know Amelie. Right. But Amelie is not a common name. It could be Indian. That's right. That's exactly right. Because it's certainly not British. We had a guest on yesterday, an upcoming Thursday. It was a very personal story about a person. Mm-hmm.

And she's Indian. Mm-hmm. And I's Indian. Mm-hmm. And I was really thinking about it a lot yesterday. Were you? Yeah. What were you thinking about, Neal? Yeah, and my dad. Yeah.

And like, it's just really sad. Yeah. Really, really, really sad. Yeah. There's some sad stuff coming up, guys. Easter egg. Not all these things are parties, you know? Well, that's life. That's some sad stuff coming up, guys. Easter egg. Not all these things are parties. Well, that's life.

That's right. I try to remind you that life is sad sometimes. All right. In case you were having too good of a weekend or something. Because remember, tragedy is all around you. They can happen at any moment. And it's waiting for you. Not going to look.

Not going to look. Okay. Hey, congrats on your eggs. Congrats on your sobriety Thank you Oh my god it was almost If you would have had 19 eggs Oh

That would have felt very I did before my poison monoxide Fuck that might have been the number Yeah I hope you have a great trip Labor Day trip Thank you I'm very much looking forward to being in Michigan

For some lake swimming Fun And some Ted Seeger's guzzling I'm much looking forward to being in michigan for some lake swimming fun some ted segers guzzling i'm really looking forward to it good it'll be fun okay all right bye bye happy labor day you too