Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher - Ep 396 | Coronavirus Cancels 7-Eleven Free Slurpee Day | Guest: Gordon “Uncle John” Javna

Episode Date: June 18, 2020

Just when we thought it couldn't get worse coronavirus takes something else from us. 7-Eleven cancels free slurpee day due to COVID-19. Twitter just added a new feature and they seem to be copying another social media platform. The US has a coin shortage and when was the last time you used a penny? Atlanta police officers are getting sick, but is not with COVID-19... Lift is going electric, but not until 10 years from now LOL. Are you a happy American?, Jeffy is here to ask the big question. Father's Day is approaching and Gordon “Uncle John” Javna joins us to talk about his books. Uncle John's Truth, Trivia, and the Pursuit of Factiness Bathroom Reader is filled with the latest tidbits from the world of pop culture, history, sports, and strange news stories. Strange History contains short history articles from over 30 Bathroom Readers—along with 50 all-new pages. From the 20th century to the Old West, from the Age of Enlightenment to the Dark Ages, from ancient cultures all the way back to the dawn of time, Strange History is overflowing with mysterious artifacts, macabre legends, kooky inventions, reality-challenged rulers, boneheaded blunders, and mind-blowing facts. This Week Sponsor: Get your life back with Relief Factor and its 3-Week Quick Start for only $19.95. If you are in pain, what have you got to lose? Go to https://www.relieffactor.com Subscribe on YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And now, a Blaze Media podcast. Yeah, I'm starting early today. Welcome to it. How in the world are you? I know. You don't know what we're going to get into today, so it's time to break out the liquid refreshment early. Is this even really America that we live in anymore? I ask that question because we find out that 7-Eleven is officially canceling free slurpy day. This is not America anymore. Sure, 7-Eleven's birthday on July 11th is free slurpy day,

and it's there right here in America to cancel their day. But I'm sad. Now, sure, you can download the Seven Rewards app. You can sign up and get a free medium slurpy any day in the month of July with that app. but without free slurpy day I ask again is this even America that we live in anymore okay so I ask that question

and then I see an ad for these stretchable instillids I don't know if you've seen them or not I want them so you know how you're always looking for at least you know we are always looking for the lids of your rubber made

and Tupperware products, and you know, you try to keep them all together, and then it end up being in one thing, and they're over here, and they're over there, and sometimes you use your container without the lid, so they're not together. Well, now I see that they've got these stretchable instillids that you just stretch and put them over the top. They're just like extra lids. So maybe the answer to my question is, yes, we still are America, because that right there proves that we are still America.

Now, did you see that Twitter has rolled out their new, tweet your voice? Yay! So they rolled it out yesterday on the iOS platforms, and then they're going to roll it out on all the platforms, all the carriers in the coming weeks. I mean, that's just Twitter's answer to Parlor. Remember when Parlor made the news like Trump,

should move to parlor and everybody should just go to parlor and leave twitter alone so i go to parlor and i see that it's just an audio recording social media app no that's not what makes it good i'm sorry no it's a cute little thing and it's agonizing and i didn't really like the app if you go to parlor you can check it out but that's twitter's answer to parlor right there now you can you know audio record your tweet so if you think you are going to get in trouble now for your written word tweets. Wow. Wait till your audio tweets become available. Then you're really going to get in trouble. I mean, you'll have fun and it'll be well worth your time and it just will be, you know, fun, right? Of course it will be. And I want to also kind of tell you a little,

it wasn't necessarily a mistake, but since it seemed like a mistake, I'll go ahead and, you know, put it out there for you. Yesterday we talked about the, you know, exploding whale park, the memorial exploding whale park in Oregon in honor of the exploding whale day in the 70s, where they actually blew up the dead whale on the beach. And we, you know, played the audio from the video, the news report. And, you know, giant pieces of whale blubber are dropping on cars and smashing them. And now they celebrate it. November 12th is the exploding whale day. along the coast in Oregon. But the park, the Exploding Whale Memorial Park,

we may have misled, and far be it from chewing the fat, to mislead the audience. It's not the actual space where the whale exploded. I know. I was bummed to, but it's down the road a piece,

or up the road a bit. But it is not the, actual space. So if you were misled by that, I apologize because I do not want to be anywhere close to giving you misleading

information here on chewing the fat. So you know that the actual park is not the space where the whale actually exploded. So, you get to celebrate the exploding whale day, but if you're going

to celebrate it at the memorial park, it's not the actual beach where the whale exploded. So you can either be sad or not sad on that news. Did you know that the U.S. is facing a coin shortage? I know. Dry your eyes. They're saying that we're facing a coin shortage, so it's forcing the Federal Reserve to ration the distribution of coins.

How bummed are you? I know. So I guess people are hoarding coins and they're just not out there. And with, you know, with, you know, the use of credit cards and debit cards, you know, nobody's, you know, they can't use cash. I guess, you know, there's a shortage of coins out there. So I don't know what to tell you how to get over that. But there is. And it's kind of sad news.

I mean, we have this argument all the time, especially about the. penny. Do we even need the penny anymore? Is that a is that a money thing that we even use? I mean, we use it in pricing 1999, but do you get a penny back when you buy something? No. It's just a strange way that we that we do our ads and price things with coins. And I can, I remember my grandfather always had his little change purse around. And keeping, you know, is coins to buy things. Things don't cost 26 cents anymore. So,

A, the question is, do we really need the penny anymore? And then we reach out to actual change. I mean, if we're going to go to a cashless society, mostly, especially now with the Rona,

I mean, do we even need coins at all? We're wasting time, energy, and money on coins. How many of you have a bucket full of coins at home? That maybe you count once a year, maybe, or once every couple of years, you pour it out and count it and roll it up? I mean, it's been a long time.

I mean, it used to be nice to dump out your coins and roll them up and have, you know, anywhere from 50 to a couple hundred bucks vacation money summertime beach money you know when you wanted to go celebrate exploding whale day at Memorial Park we'll just take the coin money and we'll party with that

I don't think people are doing that anymore maybe I'm wrong maybe I'm wrong but it could be time that we just evolve and get rid of coins altogether now for those of you wondering well, I need money. Well, I mean, it was reported that the White House is busy drafting a new

$1 trillion infrastructure proposal. Yay! We haven't printed enough money. We haven't given out enough money. We're going to create an even bigger stimulus package, an infrastructure package, because we need roads and bridges, and we need people to get paid to do that. And we're going to set up the new 5G wireless networks. So don't worry about it. It's just another trillion dollars. Trillion here, trillion there. We're all fine.

I mean, who cares? Who cares? Does anyone care anymore about printing money and it just doesn't mean anything anymore? We're going to have to reset to zero soon. I don't know how to do it, but at some point they're just going to be, well, we're back to zero.

That's what you get. Have fun. and you still owe the money, but everybody else, the government, it was zero. See, that's what I mean. I don't know how you reset to zero and not have the debt. So, just keep printing it. Just keep printing the money. Now, some of the things that you need to know about that's going on,

and we'll get into some, you know, some stories that are worthy of chewing the fat. But just know that for the eighth time this year, the Russian military aircraft has penetrated our Canadian and Alaskan air defense identification zones. So, no, it's no big deal. I mean, every time they were there, our NORAD forces were ready to meet the challenge, according to General Terrence J. O'Shaughnessy, the commander of NORAD. But, know this. This past weekend, three American B-52 bombers from Louisville.

Louisiana, which I thought they were housing those in Missouri. But anyway, we're dispatched to Alaska. You know, just for a bomber task force deployment. That's fine. Don't worry about it. So we're not worried, but we are just sending the B-52 bombers up there. You know, just for safe measure. And we've got fighting going on between China and India.

apparently 20 Indian soldiers died, including one of their colonels. Chinese troops were killed. And that was a standoff going on for the last month. So, I mean, there's a battle starting there. The prime minister of India is saying these casualties will not go in vain. Okay, let's have the India-China war. That'll be great. And now China's pissed at the U.S.

over our sanctions. So they are saying, we'll, you know, we'll fight back on that as well. Yay! That's what we need. We need that. And look,

Beijing, under lockdown again, as long as, you know, you talk about the Rona, they've got a spike in these new COVID-19 cases. So they've locked down Beijing. 1,200 flights are canceled. The airports are shut down. And it's a,

According to, you know, the outbreak was linked to another food market. So people are still, you know, eating bat soup in China. So you got that to look forward to. And everyone is talking about the police shooting and killing of Rayshod Brooks in Atlanta. The police officer was charged. I mean, he's charged with felony murder. he's charged with another 11 counts. Apparently one of the shots went into a car that was in the line.

And the other officer, they say, is testifying against Garrett Rolf, the officer that shot Brooks. He says that's not true. Obviously, he's cooperating with the investigation, but he's not testifying against the police officer. And even if he was, he doesn't want that information out there, right? No way, he's got to, he's got to deny that. And they're talking about police officers in Atlanta being sick.

And the Atlanta blue flu is taken over. And of course, they, you know, deny it. The police department in Atlanta, oh, no, we're fine. Stop it, what they would have to do, right, just to try to keep people calm down. But, I mean, there's plenty of cities around America now that are struggling with officers I don't feel good. I can't come in. And I don't necessarily blame them.

I mean, I hope they don't, and I want them protecting us. Maybe that's my white privilege speaking. But I don't necessarily disagree with them feeling sick for the next few days just to make a point. But, you know, I get it. my white privilege. And good news coming from Google Netflix and Target. I mean, Google has pledged more than $175 million to black businesses, said it would diversify its leadership to include more black representation. Netflix CEO, Reed Hastings, and his wife are donating $120 million to scholarships at historically black colleges and universities.

Good for them. Glad to, they could do what they want with their money. It's just surprising that they're doing it now, isn't it? Yes. Yes, it is. It's surprising that it's doing it now. And, of course, Target says they're going to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Now, they claimed that they were going to do that anyway.

They're just doing it earlier than planned. Oh, okay. I mean, you want to work. And now, $15 an hour minimum wage is great. I don't know if they're cutting everybody back to, you know, two hours a week. But that's a good gig if you can work, you know, your 36 hours a week at 15 bucks an hour. No, you can't get close to 40, though, or you've got to be full-time. I mean, that's just bad business having full-time employees.

Now, there's still some companies that are struggling. I know that, you know, there's plenty of companies. we'll get to some of those that are struggling because of the because of the Rona. But I know that Lyft, and I'd like to, I'm interested to see if this actually takes place. All right. And this is just their goal that they're going to have their entire fleet be electric in 10 years, 9.5 years. Okay. Okay.

I, you know, I, okay. I doubt that's going to be actually true. It's more of a goal, right? I have a goal of being worth $800 billion in 10 years. Will it happen? Very doubtful. Maybe you didn't hear me. I've not done.

So if you've got a couple extra bucks and, you know, who doesn't? Who isn't rolling in the cash right now? Now's the time to buy. J.C. Penny, liquidating like, hundreds of stores and now's the time and of course they're selling all their clothes

at a discounted rate and they want people to buy all their stuff and get rid of it because they're liquidating them and shutting them down but I always, some of the display tables are really cool and I remember going into a what store was it? Shoot.

I think it was a Montgomery Ward's and I was like, oh these tables are so cool I want them. Yeah, no, we've already sold all those. Get your hands off, Fat Man. So if you can go into these stores and get some of the wooden display tables, not the cheapy metal ones that they have. But some of the stores, maybe those are all gone

now, but some of the stores still have those. Like the, my favorites are the three different sized tables for displays that slide underneath each other. Those are so cool. And they have, they look nice

and you could shine them up, you can re-shellack them because there's no nobody shellax wood better than me you can quote me on that by the way and uh i always wanted those but now's the time get out there if you got some money get into you know pier one jc penny and start looking at some other display things now sure you could buy a you know a lamp sure you can get a you know a dummy not the employee Just the mannequin. And, you know, you can get all that stuff. But it's the display tables that are worthy if you, you know, if you're looking for something.

And I see where you can get the, there's a government surveillance van that's for sale. And where is it for sale at? I was just reading this stupid story of the surveillance van that you can get. It's a 1998 Plymouth Grand Voyager in Chicago. The Chicago suburb of Streamwood, Illinois. Who doesn't love Streamwood, Illinois? So it's a government surplus auction. And right now it's only like somebody's bid is $1,300 on it.

You can get it for pretty cheap. But it's got all the surveillance stuff inside. It's got a TV mounted back of the driver's seat. It's got electronic equipment, battery chargers, cameras. It's got a flashing light on the roof, which is, you know, good luck. flashing that and have people actually believe that you're a, you know, some sort of police vehicle. It's got a camera periscope that goes up. That'd be kind of cool to have.

It'd be kind of cool. For $1,300, I'd be really cool to have. But, you know, by the time you get to bidding, somebody's going to say, oh, I'll bid $1,500, and then you're out. Then you're out. But, I mean, you know, there's government surplus deals all over. Now I feel like the guy, I feel like the guy that, uh, I'll bid, you know, I'll bid, you know, I remember getting a letter or an email about the government surplus stuff. And you could buy pallets of stuff from these government surplus auctions.

But you've got to have a huge amount of money in the bank before they even let you in the building. So that was always a little bit of a problem. And I just make up as a surprise to you with me because you have to have a huge amount of money on the bank. to set that up and I really really don't have that. I know. I know. But, you know, it's just

the way it is. Anyway, you can still get and good news if you're looking for a dog. I know that in India they have a rental dog, which is kind of weird.

Why would you want a rental dog? But you can get it. They've got, for four, 40 bucks a month. 40 bucks a month. You rent a dog. And by renting a dog, I mean, you log on to a website and you watch a dog online.

And that's your dog. That is actually genius. I love it. In fact, I think I'm going to start doing that. You can rent my dog for 40 bucks a month. You just got to log on. I'm going to put my dog on a room. And every day at 7 o'clock at night.

And you can log on and watch my dog. I mean your dog from 7 to 10 at night. He's your dog. And you just pay me the 40 bucks a month. And you get the, you can name the dog any name you want between 7 and 10 at night. You just log on and you can play with your fluffy for three hours. Just offline. That's awesome.

But why do that when you could spend, you know, $7,400? I mean, I'm sorry, did I say $7,400? Oh, Jeff, you are crazy. $74,500 for the Boston Dynamics robot dog. 75 grand for the Boston Dynamics dog. That thing better do more than what I saw. I'll tell you that. $25 grand.

I would much rather rent Fluffy for $40 a month and spend $75,000 on that robot dog. That dog better attack people. I want that robot dog just perusing my exterior of my home, 24-7. That's actually not a bad idea, actually. You don't have to feed it. Once in a while, you've got to go out and lube it. And the dog, too. And for 74-5, it just patrols the perimeter of your house.

That's not a bad idea. How much does a pack of Dobermans cost a year? Got to be quite a bit, right? And for, like, say, you use the same dogs for 10 years, probably more than 74-5. So if one Boston Dynamics dog can do the work of 10 Dobermans, It might be worth 74-5. Never know. Reminder to subscribe to this podcast, chewing the fat. Okay, very simple.

Just pick a platform, let's say iTunes, or Spotify, or I-heart radio, or Stitcher. And then you search Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher, and you become a subscriber. click, subscribe. And then if they allow it, you can rate and review the podcast by saying, you know, 20 stars best podcast ever. Just so lets other people know on the platform that, hey, chewing the fat is worth listening to. And then you're good. You're good to go.

Okay? So just subscribe to chewing the fat. So all you got to do. I'm not asking very much. It's just subscribe to the podcast. Thank you very much. And you know, I mean, as long as you, I want to interrupt you there because I feel like we need a goal. You need a goal for the podcast

We keep telling people To subscribe, rate, review Blah, blah, blah, blah I mean, goals are dope And I guess What I'm seeing here That it goes in one ear And then go out the other

And people are still being losers And it's 2020 So I feel like As a show We need a goal And you hear me out, Fisher If this is a good goal For the show

And the goal is to get bought out by Spotify. I am a fan of that so far. Did you see the latest acquisition to Spotify? Well, we know Rogan got the big deal. Who's next? I don't know if Rogan is the big deal anymore because Kim Kardashian just landed

Spotify. You've got to be kidding me. Or if I should say this way, Spotify just landed Kim Kardashian. So. Yes. I feel that we need to like have a goal or something, be goal oriented, like be bought out, you know, by Spotify. Because in a quote, this is the last sentence of the episode.

This is going to hurt me. This is going to be the Netflix of podcasts. So you know what that means? That means that Spotify has money to throw and throw and throw and throw. throw away. Yeah. So shooting the fat goal is I feel that everybody must go and download Spotify on whatever Android or iPhone you have, create an account, follow chewing the fat.

And then drop everything else, but still maintain it as a subscriber and all the other platforms, but you start listening on Spotify. What do you think, Fisher? I love it. You know what? It's good. Did I say goals were stupid? Boy, I am dumb.

Now, it's good to have goals. Now, full disclosure, I do own stocks at Spotify. So. But me saying, you know, go down. That's not why you're talking about it. No, no, no. God forbid this is financially gained, you know, helping me. This is for the show.

I feel that there is an avenue where we can gain some followers and in Spotify. And really, when you come right down to it, Chris, it's for you the listener. Absolutely. This is for the listener. You don't know how easy and user-friendly Spotify is. And like I said, there has nothing to do that I own shares on Spotify and is dancing on money right now. Thanks to that King Kardashian signed with Spotify. But all I'm saying...

How much? It didn't say how much they paid. No, that's one thing that I'm kind of upset about, which also says a lot of why the Spotify market hasn't risen good enough because it rose a little bit. It rose 12%. But the roguer deal was 100 million. 100 million.

I'm sorry, but Kim peas $100 million in that morning pee that she does every day. Plus, I mean, Spotify's, I mean, they want, when you talk about Netflix, I mean, they're talking about audio and video. And yes. And by the way, the podcast that she will be doing, are you ready? Oh, I don't know if I am or not. Kim Kardashian focuses on criminal justice issues. Oh, wow. So you know that that contract is more than $100 million.

I don't know. Maybe not. Maybe not. It might be worth, you know, they might have made a deal for, you know, 25 or 30 million with a percentage of sales. You know what I mean? Because that's not Kim. I mean,

she's going to be talking about the criminal justice system in her clothing line half naked, which, you know, are you going to watch that? Sure. Oh, I thought you were I thought you had a heart attack or something Because I was deciding Whether I was going to watch it or not Oh, okay, because I was going to say

I might not watch the whole show I don't watch a thing But you're looking But you're looking Well, yes Yes Because you're not telling me You did not go on the internet

And find her Her come to fame video You tell me that you did not go into internet And go to see that coming to Fain video that she got? Within the last month, no. Oh, okay. Okay, no.

My answer to that is no. Okay. But a goal for CTF is to gain some traction in the platform of Spotify. Do I want to get into the, like say Netflix, you know, has what, you know, just added rotation? Yes. You know, does Spotify have to put me in? that rotation right off the bat? No. No. No. I mean, sure, yes.

But I'm willing to, you know, does my shareholding of the company influence? Where do we fall in the platform? Like if you just need me to buy more shares, I can do that. Yeah. In fact, I'm willing to, you know, if I have to dump a couple of bucks, if you, you know, in fact, well, just to let you do. This is a contractual deal going on here. But if Spotify wants to, you you know, grab the show. Uh-huh. And, you know, it could be, you know, a Spotify production chewing the fat that, you know,

we can do part of the deal in a stock trade. Ooh, I like that. You know, they don't have to come up with all the cash right up front. As sort of, the recording of this podcast is about $228. I don't care about that. You know, I don't care about that. You know, it's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the future.

14%. So. Just talking about the future. I don't care what's going on right now. Yeah, I'm a fan of that, actually. I'm a fan of that happening. So, you know what? What Chris said.

And I know that we have, we still have some entries in the, in the dumb email pile of the, remember we had the acronym contest for dumb because of a capital hill autonomous zone chaz or now chop capital hill organized or occupied protest and people are still sending in to chewing the fat at the blaze.com I know we have

you know democratized underground mobilization block as an entry. We have derelict unemployable man boys. You know that's kind of cute but uh you know I don't know if that's going to be the winner.

But you can still you can still enter until tomorrow. Cheweth the Fat at the Blaze.com and then someone will be a winner of a brand new and we'll let you know what that brand new is tomorrow. And another reminder that my wife and I are having a little meet and greet question and answer

get together on Zoom Monday night, 630 Central. I love to see you. Answer any in all questions. The answers for me may not be the truth, but my wife doesn't know how to lie. So if you follow me on Twitter at Jeffrey JFR, Facebook and Instagram, Jeff Fisher Radio, or Frame Life Photography, which is my wife's account. There's a link there for the Monday Night Meet and Greet. So, you know, we look forward to seeing you there.

I also saw yesterday a couple of stories that were a little concerning, and it kind of pissed me off. Like I saw the U.S. trade talks with the. European Union and Britain have stalled. And originally, I normally, you know, I read those stories and I don't share them with you because it's not what chewing the fat is. But this story kind of ticked me off because the talks have stalled due to suspicions of poor American food standards. Okay, so here's what I think we do.

And maybe President Trump will be big for this, but maybe we just tell them, okay, no problem, EU and Britain. America will eat our own damn food, and you can get your food from China. Good luck. God bless. Because of suspicions of poor American food, screw off. I just want to tell them to take a hike is all really is most important. I want President Trump to just tell him to take a hike. And I see where I'd like to hear from some of my trucker friends about this. I see where an amendment bill circulating on Capitol Hill is going to raise insurance rates for the minimum coverage on truckers from $750,000 to $2 million coverage on commercial motor vehicles.

If they do that, I mean, now you're talking about putting independent truckers out of business. That's not, they're talking about, well, it makes the industry safer. And we can, it makes us the amount to help families who have survived a truck crashes.

Well, I don't know what you're doing is it's a big truck. It's a big truck putting a little guy out of business. And I'd be interested to hear from my truckers who listen to the Jimmy the Fat on how they feel about this new investment act on the raising of their insurance rates because it cannot be good. It just can't be. There's no way that that makes the trucking industry safer. It makes big trucks safer.

That's for sure. Big trucks a lot safer. But not the independent trucker who we, no one supports the independent trucker and all truckers more than chewing the fat. No one. I won't hear of it. I will not hear of it. Also, I saw a poll, and this may be one of the reasons why, because of stories of trying to put the little guy out of business, but a new poll shows that Americans are the unhappiest they've been in 50 years. Right? I know. Is that, are you one of them? I mean, I don't know. The unhappiest? Are you unhappier right now than you have been in the last 50 years? I guess so. I guess so. 14% of American adults say they are very happy.

Wow. And in 2018, it was 31%. It dropped by more than half. Now, I've only been alive for 30 years. So does that apply to me? Oh, sure. They're saying that they tracked American adults. Can you, do they have the questions they asked?

Within the last 50 years. Do they have the questions they ask? Well, they said, American adults say they are. very happy, 14%. Let's see. Am I very happy? Are you very happy? At this moment. Yeah, I'm very happy.

Are you, are you pretty happy? Okay. Not too happy or very happy. Very happy. See, you're in that 14%. You are an elitist white privileged American. There's no wonder

that you're very happy. Okay. If I am those qualifiers, I would like to ask you the same question. Are you me happy? Are you happy or are you very happy? I am. I am. Don't stop. Don't stop. You still have five minutes to answer this question and I'm not going to let you stall for five minutes. So I have to think about whether I'm not too happy or pretty happy or very happy. Yes. All right.

Well, all I'm doing that, I'll tell you that, you know, optimism about their children's future also dipped. Are you much or somewhat worse off than for your children's future? Are you about the same or are you much somewhat better in your children's future? Now, if you ask me that, I'm not very happy with my. children's future. So you're somewhat worse or about the same? Worse. Wow. See? See what? Like what? Huge. I mean, I'll go back to you. I'm not going to let you drag this out.

Where do you fall on the happy scale? About the children's future. No, you. Are you very happy? Oh, pretty happy. Pretty happy. Not too happy. Not too happy. All right. Okay. I'll answer that. But I just want to talk about. the Americans that reported more likely to report feelings of isolation and loneliness. Rarely or never feel that way. Sometimes you feel isolated and lonely. Often, very often, do you feel isolated or loneliness?

And in 2020, wow, 55% still rarely, down from 77%. Yeah, I'm on the rarely. Now, the people, I'm on the rarely side. I rarely feel, you know, lonely. Lonely or isolated? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

The percentage you felt, let's see, often, rarely or never, yeah, that's 55%. More than half of Americans feel like they're not isolated or lonely. But that's down from 72%. Now, you got to give it credit because these are adults, just are the people that are not able to do the tender hookups. They're not able to go to, you know, like me and you this weekend. Me and you this weekend, we're going to go to the adult playground down in Fort Worth and have our Spike Caprisons at a titter-totter.

So, you know, I can see that. But then I go back and ask you, Jeff Fisher, are you very happy? Are you someone happy? Or are you not happy? Well, according to this poll. Uh-huh. Like I said, more Americans than ever. You're not going to milk it.

are less happy than they have been in the last 50 years. Now, I don't want to go down the list, but you know, you should be happier than you were last year. Last year, a tornado came by and blew your house away. I know it's been a year now. You have a... This is Father's Day weekend coming up. And according to my wife, I think yesterday or the day before was the actual date. The day before.

That was... Tornado. Tornado day. Yeah. And, you know, the heart attack, you know, you lost weight. The heart attack wasn't last year, my friend. No, but you are happy. You and my wife keep bringing that up and just pissing me off.

You know, you got the heart attack. You know, you survived that. You survived the tornado. You're losing weight. Last year was the gallbladder. The goldbladder, oh my gosh, the goldbladder scare. It's like, can you even taste? Oh, so you're not very happy.

That's why. what do you mean that very happy you miss your gold bladder i do i do miss my me and me and gall we're pretty tight but uh you know i've learned to live without gall and you just do you just keep moving on with your life you know and then i was right for those that's why that's why i feel a little bit uh isolated and lonely because i don't have you will you're willing you willing to answer that but you're not willing to answer if you're happy so like i said for those of you keeping track at home not too happy, pretty happy, or very happy. Huh. Now, no less than 29% of Americans have ever called themselves very happy in this survey.

No less than 29%. So, I mean, still, people are pretty happy in America. Can I quote you on that? Can I quote you on that? Yes. Yes, it's America. They should be. Gosh, darn it. For those people that think that, you know, we don't live America anymore we do see that's the good thing we do live in America I know sometimes and especially the last few days it seems like we don't but we do it's still America no question about that no question now am I you know very happy am I pretty happy or not too happy that was the that was the question though right I you were waiting for me to answer that.

Is that right? Sure. Why do you say it like that? You're the one that asked a stupid question. Sure. You did not answer it when I wanted you to. Once again, it shows that you just don't respect me or appreciate me. Well, it really doesn't have anything to do with that.

I mean, I'm just trying to think of how I actually feel, whether I'm, you know, very happy, pretty happy, or not really happy. So, you know what? tell you a joke and we'll see how I feel after the joke okay leave today with the joke put a smile on your face I want people listening to chewing the fact to answer the question very happy today doesn't have to be overall or this year although that's what the question was was about the year but now you know today at this time all right I want to leave you with a joke and make sure if you're listening you're only listening on Spotify make sure you go download Spotify and follow

chuneify with Jeff Fisher that's the only approved listening tool on this program A duck, a skunk, and a deer go out to eat. Now, it's time to pay the bill. The deer didn't have a buck. The skunk didn't have a cent. So they just put it on the duck's bill. Download and subscribe to more content at the blaze.com slash podcasts. All right, so we all know that Father's Day is just around the corner, right?

It's the 21st of June, uh, 20th. 20 and everyone, you know, wants to find something different, something entertaining, something that would, you know, bring a smile to dad. And, you know, guess what? The tie ain't doing it. Okay. But what would do it is the one of the Uncle John's bathroom reader books. Now, personally, I don't read in the bathroom, but I love the bathroom reader books. Now, they have a series out and he's already sold Gordon Javna or Uncle John as he goes by now has already sold 15 million copies. That apparently is not enough for him because he wants to sell them. So John, 15 million not enough. What's the goal? Yeah, it seems like, you know, what have you done for me lately? but my goal is just to bring more trivia joy to readers.

I don't count the books they're sold. I really just love the fact that I collect this trivia, which I always have loved trivia. I've always wanted to collect it, and I'd be doing this anyway, you know what I mean? I'd be fascinated by trivia regardless. The fact that I get to put it into a book and people read it and like it is fantastic. That's a great thing.

So did it start with you just posting, you know, post-it notes in the back room of ideas of, oh, wow, that's interesting, that's interesting. You know, I should write this down. Is that how it started? It started because my brother and I had done a few book projects together, and he called me up one day. And by the way, his name is John. He called me up one day and said, I have a great idea for a book. What is it?

Bathroom reader, I cracked up. I just started laughing. That's like brilliant because we all read in the bathroom, or at least my family, we all read in the bathroom, and you're always looking for something quick and fun to read. And so I said, but you know what? You should call it Uncle John's bathroom reader. And then he cracked up.

And next thing is he goes to a bunch of publishers, and most of them aren't interested in the book. But all it takes is one, which we found one publisher. And bonus, they didn't care what we put in the book because they didn't expect it to be, you know, a series or anything. So that gave us the opportunity to do, as you say, take all these little ideas for things that we loved, you know, which is pop culture. and phony history. I mean, really, myth history, not fake news, but real crazy history and, you know, wacky, oopsie kind of stories, you know, mistakes that were made.

Well, that's the kind of history that happens, you know, when you put, you know, the old scene where you have 10 people and you start with one thing and by the time it gets to the end, it's something else. And that's exactly. And that's exactly what happens with so much of our history, right? We lose. I mean, we see that the loss of history happening around the world as we speak, Gordon.

But we don't have to get into that. But I will say that I love the strange history as well. You know, all the stuff that's real, but you find yourself going, wait, really? and, you know, some of my, especially since we're, you know, I just, you know, mentioned what's happening in today's world, talk about some of the, you know, the gatherings at Rome's Coliseum, where it was fun, right? For some people it was fun. Not if you're a gladiator or, but, yeah.

And, you know, one of it, there's a. story in the bathroom reader that that is exactly uh it's not the telephone kind of story but it's one of those stories like you end with wow i didn't know that that is uh i don't know if you remember the tv series called uh life and times of grizzly adams oh yeah yeah with uh uh yes i do i sadly i'm old enough to remember that okay so it was dan haggerty is the name of the guy you're trying to think of so uh you know that was a very popular show One of the writers in my tribe said, you know, I love that show. Could we do an article about that show?

And I said, yeah, we could. But let's also look into the real grizzly Adams because I think there was a real grizzly Adam. So that's what we did. Yeah, there was. And so we have an article here about Dan Haggerty. And it's a sort of a rags to a rickester rag story. It's kind of both fascinating.

how he came on the role, but also kind of sad because when the show went off the air, he sort of fell apart and was unable to get back. It never got back on his feet, really. But the real Grizzly Adams really was a mountain man.

He learned to trap in Maine, and then he went out to California during the gold rush. So now we're talking to 1850s, and he didn't do very well as a minor. lost everything. So he went up into the mountains and became the mountain man that he's, he's the,

that's in the TV show. Later, he, um, went to San Francisco and had a, you know, he was a conservationist. He actually did make friends with animals.

Uh, he had pet bears. He opened a show like a Barnum kind of a circus, circusy thing, except that it was in a basement of a building, uh, where he did tricks with his pet bears. Wow.

And, And he was written about a lot, and there was a book where they did drawings, they were actually woodcuts of his bears. And the most famous bear was named Samson. Now, here's the part that got me. Samson, if you ever seen the state flag of California, there's a bear on that. That is the picture. That's the picture of Samson.

That is Grizzly Adams bear. That's amazing. I love that. You know, that we also, I mean, we had, you know, the, sometimes now he just had a show in the basement, right? I mean, like, almost like a, you know, a pop-up, pop-up entertainment cloud where you lived in San Francisco and you knew, you know, that he put on these shows and you went to it. It's surprising. I mean, people, we used to have the traveling shows, right? The cowboy and Indian shows.

And, you know, P.T. Barnum, as you mentioned, traveling around the globe showing off his animals. And it was a huge thing when it came into. town and now those I mean those are completely gone now have a nice day yeah well that i mean yeah conservation and all that we we don't we have still have zoos but now we have youtube so we don't we don't need those right don't tell that to the zoo people nobody supports the zoos more than this program chewing the fat gordon so i don't want to i don't want to make the zoo people mad at me gordon javna uh author of the uncle john's bathroom reader series uh you know some of my uh Some of my favorite things are also when you find out things that, you know, crazy leaders did.

You know, I love, and that's, again, part of, you know, strange history. But, you know, if you think to yourself, if you were a leader and it was up to, you could just, you know, what I say goes, what would you do? And, you know, would you declare a war on fleas as the Swedish queen did? I don't know. Right. Right. Queen Christina of Sweden. She ruled in the mid-1600s.

She felt that the biggest threat to her kingdom was fleas. So she declared war, as you say, she declared war on fleas. And to carry out her war, she had, she commissioned the construction of a tiny cannon with a barrel one inch long and little bitty, flea-sized cannon balls, which she used to then eliminate, try to eliminate fleas in the palace by walking around. Every time she saw one, she'd fire her little cannon and sometimes hit, but not usually. Great. And of course, you know, her followers, ooh, you just wipe some out.

Well, yes, of course. That is, I mean, really it's kind of agonizing, and it's funny at the same time. And true. And true, right. Right. I mean, that's what makes so many of these stories great. Well, really all of them, but I mean, so many of them, there's come and stick out. When you were first putting it together, now obviously, you know, with you've come, you know, years and years. How long has it been? A hundred years since these started? Yeah, no. It was, yeah. It was 1987, I think, was the first bathroom here. Wow. So, I mean, it's been quite a while. And so when you were first putting it together, were there, what was the story that jumped out at you?

Like, nobody's going to believe that's true. Oh, well, you know, back then, we were into the fact that things like pilgrims, you know, all the fallacies about pilgrims, you know, everything from friendly relations with the Indians to buckles on their shoes, all lies, all things just generally. generated to, you know, for promotional purposes. But also, you know, John and I had written a book called 60s, which was about, you know, pop fads. In fact, that book got panned by, I don't know if you remember the village voice in New York City, but it got panned by the village voice because all we talked about was pop culture and we didn't talk about politics at all. So they said there's a crappy book because,

but now, of course, we forgot about the politics and all we don't know about is the pop culture. But we include some of the stories that we learned from that, like the, you know, the origin of the Mustang and things like that. Those, that's really how we started. We just picked these things that we, stories that we really loved and put them into the, into the bathroom reader. That's, I mean, I love it. And like I said, you know, perfect.

This is much better than the tie that you were going to get dad. Yeah, because what can you do with a tie? You know, you can hang yourself. And who wants to do that? I don't want to do that. No, you don't want to do that. That's just silly. That's just silly talk.

And you'd rather go to your little reading room and read and read the Uncle John's bathroom reader series. Right? Right. The Fortress of Solitude we go out. Thank you. Yes, absolutely. And look, hey, since we're still in, you know, lockdown mode in a few places around the country and around the globe.

That's one of the few places you can go and be alone these days at your house. There you go. So if I want to get it, do we have the, you know, Uncle John's bathroom reader.com? Can I pick it up there or do I have to go to Amazon and pick up your books? I think you have to go to Amazon. We used to do our own fulfillment, but it got to be too much. After the first million, you were tired to lick at stamps? Okay, I got you.

You just dated yourself. Nobody licked stamps anymore. I know, nobody licks stamps anymore. I got it. I got it. I'm sorry. So, you know, I really enjoy, I do really enjoy it. And it's so much fun to, you know, just thumb through it, whether you're in the, you know, the living room or the bathroom.

And I get the, you know, the bathroom reader series. But for me, I just, I mean, I love just fingering through it. and finding, you know, if you've got, you know, you've got five minutes and, you know, you're waiting for, waiting for your wife to ready herself to go somewhere, you know, just open up the truth, trivia, and pursuit of factness and learn a couple of things while you're sitting there. So what, the, the, the trivia book, what was, and I know it's difficult to find a favorite piece of trivia that you say, oh, wow, that was, that was probably one of my favorite things, but I'm going to ask it for you anyway. What was one of your favorite thing?

Well, like, you know, I don't have a favorite child. I don't have a favorite piece of 30, but you said, you know, you said, lick stamps and that reminded me, and I said, you know, David yourself, that reminded me of the story of, we did have a lot of, like, the worst business decisions ever in the book. And one of them is Kodak. Now, most, if you're under 25, you probably don't even know what Kodak is. I remember my grandfather talking about Kodak. There you go. Well, Kodak was photography. And they were, you know, film.

They made film and cameras. And they would still be around today if they had just taken advantage of something they invented, which was the digital camera. They invented the digital camera in 1975. but they didn't pursue it because they thought it was going to cannibalize their, or they feared it was going to cannibalize their film business. So they didn't release a digital camera until 1995.

And by that time, it was too late. They missed the boat and they actually, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. They did cannibalize their film business out of existence. Yeah, out of existence, gone. Have a nice day. I mean, there's, I mean, we have, we have movies about, you know, the last Kodak store that, you know, they rush to have their, the last of the film printed, right? I mean, I mean, my wife is a photographer, and we have some old cameras that take film, but it's, those are for the shelf. Yeah.

Yeah, we were. Yeah, that's all those are for. That those, that's an, there's, there's a number of those. I mean, you could do, is there, is there a blockbuster story? We have done the Blockbuster story. Blockbuster, not in this book, but the Blockbuster story is that Blockbuster knew that they were going to face competition, but they thought it was going to be streaming, not the mail. That's what Netflix did. It originally was mail.

It was by mail, and that's what killed, that's what destroyed Blockbuster. they couldn't, they, they, they, they miscalculated what the future was going to be. They were right, but they missed a step because, of course, Netflix is now streaming, but at the time, it was the mail that killed them. Wow, that's, that's incredible. I mean, how the companies, you know, one, what seems like a decision that's going to save you is actually the decision that, uh, that puts a knife in your heart. That's a, yeah, that's, yeah, it is tough.

We also have a, I mean, another one that jumps out of me, is the story of how when George Lucas came up with Star Wars, he made a deal with Fox, and he agreed, he got them to take, in exchange for a lower fee for directing the film, he got to keep the rights for merchandising and for sequels. Because they didn't believe that that was where the future was, and that, you know, that alone made him a billionaire.

Right. I mean, that's just huge, right? They had the opportunity and they dropped it. So much lost in the back end. And of course, I mean, that's been proven with many actors and directors and producers today. That's where you make your income. That's incredible. All right.

Gordon Javna, I appreciate it. I know you're busy. And I just wanted to chat with you a little bit about your book, the Uncle John Bathroom Reader series. And I love them. and you can get them at Amazon anytime day or night, but get them now so you have them in time to give them to Dad on Father's Day. It's just that simple. I mean, I don't know how easy we can make it for you.

Thank you. When you have some new stuff, Gordon or Uncle John, I would love to talk to you about it. I'm fascinated by it. I appreciate your work. Thank you very much for coming on to the fat today. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.