Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Nick Offerman Returns

Episode Date: April 11, 2022

Nick Offerman feels earnestly grateful about being Conan O’Brien’s friend. Nick sits down with Conan once more to discuss processing feelings of intense jealousy, pitching his new book Where the Deer and the Antelope Play on its own merits, why creating things is critical to overall health, and his Substack column Donkey Thoughts. Later, the gang reunites in person for the first time in years. Got a question for Conan? Call our voicemail: [phone]. For Conan videos, tour dates and more visit TeamCoco.com.

Hi, my name is Nick Offerman. And I feel earnestly grateful about being Conan O'Brien's friend. That's very nice. Well, it's fun to make a cheap joke involving farting, but I knew this. Is it really that fun? It is fun. Okay. I'm 51 years old, but it hasn't gotten old yet.

No, it's a lure. It's still in my bag. Fall is here, hear the yell, back to school, ring the bell, brand new shoes, walking blues, climb the fence, books and pens. I can tell that we are gonna be friends. I can tell that we are gonna be friends. Hey there, and welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, voted, I believe, podcast of the century by Time and Newsweek.

No. I didn't hear that. I just made it up. I thought you said Newsweek too. Yeah. Is there still a Newsweek? I don't think so. What are you, going on a computer to find out?

No, I'm gonna order an edition of Newsweek. I think it's online, but I don't think the print edition exists anymore. All I'm saying is, I don't think anyone's gonna look into it, so I'm gonna start making outlandish claims about the success of our podcast. Oh, yeah. And, you know, we are a successful podcast, but I'm just gonna start throwing out, right after the introduction, hey, and welcome to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend, just voted Best Hour of Entertainment by Good Housekeeping Magazine.

Oh, Best Hour of Entertainment. Yeah, and that's all time, meaning it stacks up against any movie, it stacks up against any book that takes, you could read for an hour, anything that would take an hour of your time, hey, it was Good Housekeeping, it wasn't me. Okay. L Magazine said that we are the most fashion-forward podcast. No, that's true, I think. Yeah.

I wear incredible outfits. Yeah. I don't think people realize. Just for the podcast. And don't bother trying to look up online at the video, but... Well, yeah, there's a video component to this. You were wearing a dark polo shirt. No, he's wearing Eddie Murphy's red suit from Raw, the leather zip suit.

I bought that, and I didn't realize that it's made of pressed and dried beet. It's entirely a vegetable made suit. I did wear on tour, we did a takeoff of that, we wore a copy of the other suit that Eddie Murphy wore. The purple. It was kind of a purple yellow one, and I got measured for it, and I wore that, this is whatever, 11 years ago or something, and I wore it on tour, and I lost so much weight on the tour because I would burn 9,000 calories a night doing this show, and we would do a

show a night and travel all around the country, and at the end of the tour, the thing is falling off of me. Yeah. You were sickly. But I mean, I had it, you know, and so it just looked, I looked like a prisoner in like a Confederate soldiers camp who put on an Eddie Murphy Raw suit and tried to do standup. What a picture. I know.

Yeah. It's the most ridiculous. I wonder where that suit is, it must exist somewhere, you know, we have a crazy, this occurs to me, I have saved everything from the very beginning, you know, from my time with Saturday Night Live, Simpsons, I found legal pad page where I came up with the idea for the monorail. Oh my God. You're kidding.

No, and I have it, and I put it in my drawer because I just thought like, oh, this is cool, but you can see me come up with it and then sketch out monorail question mark, and then I sketch out a couple of things. But in addition to that, any kooky prop that I particularly liked and think of the billions of them, we would, I would always say, oh, just put it in storage, just put it in storage. So you know, at the end of the famous movie, Citizen Kane, they're going through, Citizen Kane has died, Charles Foster Kane has died, and they're going through his massive estate and they're just throwing everything in the fire.

And that's where you see them throw the sled in, but they're throwing in paintings and all this stuff that he collected in his life. My ending, my Citizen Kane ending is going to be the funniest thing in the world because it's going to be literally like a toilet seat that somebody made into a guitar and sent to me. And I was like, wow, this is so weird, but I got to keep it, put it in storage. Do you know what I mean? Yeah.

Or we once had a, we had a stuffed squirrel with a backpack that used to go in circles. I think I have that on the show. I have, it's just going to be workmen and Conan O'Brien passed away and his many goods were thrown into the fireplace above his palatial palace. And you're just going to see. Is that what's going to happen? Master beating bear diaper. Oh no.

What is your rosebud though? What's that one thing? Oh my God. That's a really good question. What is the rosebud? What is the thing I'm going to be saying as I leave this earth? From your youth probably. Is it that?

No, it's going to be something from my... Costume that you're, remember we brought one that like sad? My mom tried to do a sweet thing and she bought a costume for me for Halloween and it was at the height of like Watergate and people hating America. And she bought me, she wanted me to dress like Uncle Sam and I mean, Vietnam protests were still going on and Watergate and it was a plastic Uncle Sam face. Oh yeah. And then Uncle Sam and I was not happy and I let my mom know it and I think I heard her

feelings which to this day hurts my feelings, I mean bothers me. Yeah, of course. But yeah, I'll be like Uncle Sam, Uncle Sam and then you'll see that mask being thrown on the fire. Yeah. I don't know if it's going to be that or something from the comedy career, you know, like a fake mustache I wore in the old time baseball remote. Oh yeah.

Or you find out there actually was little threads connected to your pockets when you did that dance. I did that dance at the top of the show. Yeah. The only thing anybody knows about me all around the world, I swear to God you could drop me down in a rural province in China and they would point at me and then do the string dance thing. Yeah.

Where I act like there were strings attached to my hips. It transcends languages and cultures. And common sense. Yeah. It transcends all intelligence. Yeah, it does. That'll be, that'll be, I don't think they'll burn your stuff. I would sell it and keep all the money.

No one's going to buy any of that shit. Surely. No one's going to buy any of it. I mean, people buy anything. They'll buy it to burn it. Conan's burning his stuff. I want to burn his stuff. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We should do that. I do want to make sure, Sona, you're to see the things. Yes. What are the two things you're to see do? Yeah.

The first is the burning of all my stuff. Okay. And you have to make sure that it's filmed in beautiful black and white in a giant warehouse. Okay. And all the weird crap that I've gotten over the years. The second thing is, what have I, I've always asked you, please make sure they don't. Don't bury you at the Forest Lawn Cemetery in that bank. Yes.

Yeah. I don't want to be buried at Forest Lawn Cemetery. Yes. Is that a danger that that could happen? Because no one ever thinks ahead and I'm noticing that everyone gets married, married there. Why did I confuse marriage with death? Oh, dear.

Oh, God. Oh, my. Do you want to take that again? No. Yeah. Maybe my wife should listen to this episode. You know as a joke, I'm going to not burn your stuff and bury you at Forest Lawn Cemetery. I just don't want to be.

I'm going to get the last laugh. I want to be someplace leafy, you know? Yeah, I know. And the fact that you're just on a hill and overlooking the 134 freeway. Overlooking the 134 freeway. Yeah. They're on their way to go see Michael Jackson and they step on my grave. I don't want that.

It'll be so funny. No. Yes. No. In the future, everyone. I don't even need to be buried as I've told you. Just leave me naked in a field somewhere so that people can find. I want a jogger to find me like on every episode of Law and Order.

Yeah. I want a jogger to go like, what the? Hey, look at that. Hey, someone dropped an alabaster statue of a woman. Oh, my God. It's the body of Conan O'Brien. They're naked and they still mistake you for a woman. They still think I'm a woman.

Coyotes have eaten part of you. No, no, no. No, no, no. That's right. That's what the court. They don't want to eat him? No, no, no. It doesn't.

No. The excuse that my publicist tries to make as well, why do they think he was a woman? Coyotes got to his genitals and then the corner speaks up and goes, actually, no. That's the one part that coyotes didn't get. Coyotes were intact, he still looks an awful lot like a woman. If anything. Why would the corner have to pipe up at that point? There are little swollen just from decay and gases, if anything.

In the sun, they grew to twice their size, but still looks a lot like female genitalia and people were like, would you shut the fuck up? Anyway, he'll be laid to rest at fours long sedatives. So by the preservation, not burning of all of his useless crap, all right, well, enough of that. What better time than going from coyotes to chewing on my testicles to our first guest, my guest, my first guest, my first and best guest, my only guest, the guest that beats the rest, the guest that passes the test.

My guest today played Ron Swanson on the hit NBC series Parks and Recreation. He's a best-selling author and his new book where the deer and the antelope play the pastoral observations of one ignorant American who loves to walk outside is out now. And I have perused this book thoroughly. It is very enjoyable. He also has a newsletter, Donkey Thoughts, available on substack.com. I'm thrilled. He's with us today.

Nick Offerman, welcome. I am very grateful to know you from the day I met you. It was some big shindig at Saturday Night Live. And you were, I was meeting, I think, Megan for the first time, and she introduced me to this lunk she was with in a black leather biker jacket. And you had one of those big chains that holds probably one key to a safe deposit box in Switzerland. Not a motorcycle key, but, and I immediately liked you very much. And we got to know each other really well over the years.

We've had a few adventures and misadventures. We may have discussed this once, but you and I took a long bike trip that ended with your chain exploding, and I saw you rebuild the bike using rocks. And I tell people that, and you gathered all the pieces and said, I must now, in that Offermanian way, I must now reassemble this chain using the tools available. And then you proceeded to rebuild the chain, and I thought, this is before, is how long ago this was. There was no Uber.

There was no getting on a cell phone and saying, let's get this, let's just leave our bikes here and throw them in the weeds. You have had a explosive career since then. You've accomplished many terrific things. You're known around the world for your work in television and in film. You're also a world-class worker of wood, and you've written many books. I still think watching you rebuild that bicycle with, I think, three rocks, and it took about an hour and a half, but you did it, was one of the most impressive things I've seen anybody

do. It puts all your other work to shame. Well, thank you. There was a lot of over-egging in that pudding that you just prepared. And I mean, there was just a lot of… No. There's not. I saw it.

The chain blew apart into not every link separated from every other link. That's true. That's the only egg I added to that pudding. Only the master link blew open, and I was luckily able to find the pieces that had to be knocked back together. See, again, I'm contrasting what you did with what I would have done in the same situation. Where I alone and my chain had exploded, and there was no way to contact or ask for help, I would have taken my own life.

I would have killed myself in those woods in the southern part of Lake Washington. Because you wouldn't have been able to because you'd get a rock and you wouldn't know how to use it. I would try several times to kill myself with a rock, and then a passing motorist would notice, I think that's Conan O'Brien, smashing away at his own head with a rock, and they would pull over and take a photograph. They wouldn't try and stop me. Anyway, we have a lot to talk about because we are friends, and one thing I tell everybody,

if and when your name comes up and invariably does, I say, Nick is exactly the guy you think he is. This isn't a put on. He really is that person. In an apocalypse, and I think we all keep thinking, maybe there's one right around the corner, I'm finding me, Nick Offerman, and I'm sticking real close to that guy. Well, I mean, again, to take the hot air out of my balloon a little bit, I will cop to being a very capable person among actors of our nation's BFA, our army, and we're

going to have to do that. Let's do subsets of my castmates on Parks and Recreation. I am probably going to last a little longer in the woods than Rob Lowe, for sure, who, by the way, can live off of the moisturizers that he keeps on his person. He has pouches of various creams and ointments. I'm sure if we were stuck in the woods, we'd notice that he's not losing weight. The rest of us are starving. Then we'd notice him sucking on little packs of coconut oil, and he's actually gaining

weight and looking better than the rest of us. He's incredible. You've always seemed to me like a man who'd be impervious to jealousy, but not when it comes to Rob Lowe. It's funny, actually. Rob Lowe, in my life, I've had two jealous fires in my belly. When I was a teenager, so this is going all the way back to the 80s, that's when I first got into serious relationships.

That's when I learned I began to feel with great love came great peril, and I was dating this cheerleader, and I first felt powerful jealousy. I thought, you know what, as long as I make sure I'm taking care of my side of the relationship and providing everything that I should be, in other words, if I'm practicing fidelity the way one should, then I never have to worry about jealousy. If you were that mature as a teenager. And that naive. And that naive.

And that naive. And that naive. You idiot. No, there's plenty to worry about when you're dating a cheerleader, said the guy who wouldn't know. Yeah, I know what you mean. When I was dating cheerleaders, coming struggles to make up a story. But the funny thing is, I had, let's say it was 1986 or 7, and I had this thought.

So I was like, I will never be jealous. I always can understand how to avoid that pitfall unless my significant other is around Alec Baldwin. I thought that thought then, in like, 86, 87. You should still have that thought. Well, so then. He's what we call a chick magnet. Cut to.

I say we call, meaning no one has said that in about 20 years. But yes, I would still feel that way about Alec Baldwin. But maybe 20 years later, I'm on the set of Will and Grace. And for an entire season, Alec Baldwin is cast as my wife's love interest. And they're doing things like make out in Karen Walker's bedroom. And I thought, you son of a bitch, like that the one. You foresaw this. I called it.

I manifested it. And the good thing was, we became good friends with Alec and when we would hang out, besides being a fascinating, intelligent, ridiculously charming, and here suit chick magnet, it was also clear that the chemistry wasn't there. And so that. You were safe. I was then safe from worrying about him and Megan. But you did have a moment of jealousy with Rob Lowe.

With Rob Lowe, I did. You know, early on, I think when you, even between actors anyway, when you get into a serious relationship, whether it's in Chicago theater, or in Hollywood, or what have you, or Bollywood, there's a step that you take where you sort of reveal your history, your butcher's bill of past relationships. Like just so you know, if you and I were doing it, I'd be like, you know, just so you know, Gourley and I went to prom together or just so that. I would feel nothing.

There's any sort. I have no jealousy about Matt Gourley. So that later, something doesn't come up and you're like, why didn't you tell me. Right. Right. That you and Gourley had, you know, shared a night of passion. Yeah. Yeah.

And are continuing it. And are still dating. Well, we'll see. I mean, let's see how it goes. I understand. But Gourley was just, he just broke up with you, Gourley, and you were on a podcast and you were very, you were like, I understand, frankly, I'm surprised at last to this long. I truly am just not that into you.

Now you're speaking my language. Yeah. So. But so when we did that, when, you know, when we sort of covered who each of us had been with, one of the things that came up at some point was that Megan had had this supporting role in the movie about last night and her role was mainly, she played a friend of Demi Moore and she had this scene where she had to try and seduce Rob Lowe and do this crazy French kissing scene with him in a bar.

You know, I've established that I'm cool with that subject matter and I shrugged it off and said, that's fine. I will make sure that I'm satisfying our relationship. But then one day randomly, it came on TV, the movie. In fact, I think I heard, I heard her voice before I even saw it and I turned and watched this scene where if there was an Olympics and French kissing, Megan would have taken home the gold. It was really upsetting and I legitimately said to her, honey, do you love Rob Lowe?

And she said, no, but I was unsure that I could believe her. Yeah. I have to say, I like to think of myself as a guy who doesn't get jealous and I've been married for quite a long time. My wife and I just celebrated 20 years of marriage. Congratulations. Thank you. You know Liza well.

I'm a big fan. Yeah. I've been married 14 of them quite happy and I don't get jealous. We went to this party recently, this gathering and it was Joel McHale, you know, wonderful fellow and his wife, Sarah had us over and some other people were there as well. Strapping that Joel McHale. He is. And he's not the one I'm jealous of because I've seen what he has to do to get those muscles.

A number of chemicals he takes legal and illegal. And some of them are just tied on with twine. Just fake. American athleticism. So but he gathers a couple of people and I didn't know and at one point the door opens and in comes Colin McLaughlin and he is, take it easy, Sona and Matt and Matt, he comes in and of course I had worked with him many years ago on Saturday Night Live and I also always like him.

I always think he's fantastic. He's a beloved actor, kind of iconic. He comes in the door and damn it, he looks good. And then he turns out of course to be the nicest guy you'll meet, very intelligent, lovely and he seated next to my wife at this dinner and it's one of those things where they, let's break up the couples. Oh boy. Joel and I are over in the corner and I'm noticing that his right bicep doesn't match

as his left. What? Well, they're fake. I'm just trying to get that out there. He ties them on before the party, the way you put on a cummerbund. They're made of rubber and so they don't line up quite and I'm noticing that and Joel's there saying, yeah, so I do reps and I'm like, okay, that's great Joel. But down at the end of the table, I see that my wife is having the greatest conversation,

better than any conversation she and I had. Throwing her head back, laughing. Getting in a way that I didn't think she could laugh. On the way home, she's going on and on about, he is the nicest, loveliest man and you know, he's also from Washington state, just like me and they're going on and on and on and I started to grip the wheel tightly because I realized if it came down to it, I lose to Kamma Cloughlin and I don't even blame my wife. I say you've made the right call and I also claim nothing in the marriage.

I say you can have it all. I'll just walk away into the ocean like James Mason in A Star is Born. You had a good run. I had a good run and it's over and I wish you two the best. Enjoy the children. Enjoy the children who I never really got to know well. I'll be honest with you. They're nice.

I'm told, yeah. They're good kids. They're sharp, sharp as hell. Yeah. My agent says they're doing well. You know, when Meg and I were first together, I'll try to nutshell this, but we had just started dating and I moved onto her couch almost immediately, but she wouldn't let me into her bed for months.

She really made me wait because I think she suspected that it could be something lasting so she didn't want to have a fling. I immediately established myself as a staunch suitor and she said, you know what, I got a run up to BAMF and Calgary to work on a movie for a couple of weeks and the timing is great because this is getting pretty hot and heavy and I would love to put it on pause for a moment and make sure that I'm serious about this and the next day I was cast in the same movie. Oh, that's so lovely.

I thought the story was going to be, she went up to BAMF, the movie starred Alec Baldwin, Rob Lowe, and Palma Coughlin and she plays the Goddess of Love. I've never seen it, yeah, it's called Freasome. Oh, it's a good movie. Well, technically, Foresome. So, three dudes find a time machine and they hook up with the Goddess of Love by making them a bowie. So I was kind of freaking out and bummed that she was going and then literally the next

day Ted Levine was supposed to play the sheriff and he dropped out and I was so excited that I was going to get to go be with Megan but also that I got to replace Ted Levine, a mustache hero and also a deep voice, a terrifying hero. And so we went up and I watched Megan do a scene where she was just at a bar flirting with Hart Buckner and that for me was the most powerful, I had to go outside and then later when she got wrapped from work, I said, we need to talk about this, I'm going to burn down a building, I'm really upset. And that was when she taught me about how, you know, our spouses in a healthy marriage,

it's when you learn where the give and take is and what your baby husbands need to be coddled so that they don't commit hate crimes when they see you simply doing an acting scene. When I first met Liza and we were just going out, I had some party at my cool bachelor loft and, you know, a bunch of people from the show came and I forget how this happened but Lucy Lawless, of course the actress who plays Zena, warrior princess, she showed up at the party who I had only known as just being a guest on the show and at one point I'm just, you know, Liza's there at the party but I'm just in the corner chatting. Oh, and also the James Lipton, Dean of the actor studio was also at the party because

he used to do a lot of bits on her show. So I met a party with James Lipton, author of the famous quote for anyone who listens regularly to the podcast, Katakai as God made her and Lucy Lawless and I'm chatting with Lucy Lawless and then at one point I think Liza came over and said, okay, I think you've talked long enough to Zena warrior princess and I thought, really, that was nice. I actually felt pride that because Lucy Lawless had absolutely no interest in me in that regard and I was seeing Liza and I'm an honorable man, as you know, I would never have done something so crass but still I felt good that I think now Liza would just find that she

wouldn't be able to muster up that kind of jealousy. No, I mean, and I love Lucy by the way, she eventually played my love interest on Parks and Rec. That's right. She's the paragon of like to imagine a statuesque person with whom to speak in this context. Yes. You can't beat Lucy Lawless. Oh, no, she and I in a corner and I could see why, but I felt glad that for a second

Liza thought I was even capable of attracting the eye of Lucy Lawless and it made me happy and then she later found all the letters I was writing to Lucy Lawless, which all went unanswered to her credit. You had a good run. She says, stop calling me Zena Geek. Stop sending me photos of yourself in the leather skirt and the sword, which was just a thing I was into. I want to congratulate you.

You've written many books. I really have enjoyed your latest book. I have one, only one problem with the book. The book is called where the deer and the antelope play the pastoral observations of one ignorant American who loves to walk outside and it's a really lovely book about your musings after a sojourn into the woods with your good friends and what cooler friends could you have, Jeff Tweedy and George Saunders and you guys are in Montana and you're having this great time together at Glacier National Park and you have so many great observations

in the book. My only problem with the book is that it has been on my bedside table for some time and actually took a picture and sent it to you because the cover of the book, it's unmistakable. This book is doing quite well. It's at your local bookstore and you should get it because it's wonderful. But there is a wonderful depiction, painting of you staring out with that nick off from in glare with raised arched eyebrows that look almost angry and that's been on my bedside table.

And when I turn out the lights, I swear to God, the eyes glow and it got to the point where I would go to bed and I'd be reading it, I'd put it down and then I'd notice that the cover was face up. I would turn the cover over because I couldn't sleep with those nick off from in papers burning through the night. I couldn't do it. I apologize. Don't do that.

For a few books now, it's funny and I think this book has been a shift. It's the first of my books that all of my ideas kind of have come together in a way that it's not just a book about woodworking for my guy on TV. And so I'm hoping that my publisher will finally relent. If I do a sixth book, this is my fifth and let me do a book that doesn't have my face on the cover. Because of the fear of capitalism, they're like, well, we somehow need to people still connect you to Parks and Recreation so we can sell books and I say, well, it'd be cool

one day if we can just sell the books on their merit, rather. Well, the books you've done have a lot of merit and I don't think that's why people like them so much is that your picture is on the cover. They're duped into discovering that merit by my cheekbones and my glistening blue eyes. They're like, ooh, is this? It's funny, whenever I would like to write a book someday, a serious book, I'd like to take a stab at it and I know that my face on the cover will not be the problem. I'll be telling them shouldn't my face be on the cover and they're like, we think we're

good. We think just maybe a blue-black. What about a cannon? Really? I'm sure we can get a good picture. No, no, we've tried to get a good picture. You just have no lips and so there'll be no photo of you. It's funny because we were talking earlier about jealousy.

I got a twinge of jealousy because we're friends and you did something that I would really love to do, which is hike in this amazing national park with incredibly cool friends. This is what your book is about and at one point it did occur to me. How come I didn't get a heads up about this trip and would I have fit in? I'm not sure, I might have been a little needy, I might have been my japes and my jests, might have worn a little thin on the trail, I might have done some shtick for an elk and probably ruined everything. I don't know, I'm just saying next time I hope I get...

I will pass that along to our weekly triumvirate text thread. I think we would love to have you because the thing, as you can imagine, it was much more banal and like three friends having a good time, but I have to remind myself constantly with Jeff and George, even though they're brilliant and prolific and gorgeous, they're also real humans as are you and so when I think about you... Less so, yeah, with me. I'm delighted, you know. But then when we spend enough time together, that's one of the comforts we take is that

we're not always hilarious or delightful. I have a pretty good batting in everything. I'm sorry. I'm just... Come on. And I'd be keeping track too, I'd be keeping track of how many quips, how am I doing so far, that you'd notice that you'd no longer hear wildlife, all the birds would have left the area.

I think it would be really fun. Bears are streaming out of the park. We've never seen this happen before. No, it's really... It's funny because if we went camping, I think you'd get annoyed because I would be breaking out this weird German mini stove that's made of tiny copper pieces that I'm putting together and it's got a little saucepan and I'm adjusting all kinds of little gadgets that I brought and they're hissing and burbling and they run off of solar power and batteries and you'd

be getting irritated. Well, it depends. I mean, it depends on how good your fondue is. None of it would work. I wouldn't know how to work it. That's the problem. I tell you, you'd look over and I'd say, hang on, in two hours, the baked Alaska will be ready and I'll have this device that I purchased at REI for like $800 that's made of bake light

and special rods and coils and I'm adjusting knobs and then later on I just come to crying and say it melted. Everything would be said in metric would be the problem. Here's your three kilometers baked Alaska. I think I'm in touch with the... Most people are. I'm in touch with both sides of my humanity. I appreciate the simplicity.

I love the notion of like, let's take some waterproof matches and a hatchet and just head out. But then again, the idea of like, well, if I can carry this 12 pack of coronas and everything I need to make pulled pork high in the mountains, that's also attractive to me. And I'll think, I just want to walk deep into the woods and then eat this incredibly indulgent meal. Yes. And then on the top of a mountain, who's ready for some duck a la ronde?

You want the sauce? And you also, you do, you get out on the water, you do some serious rafting in the book on this journey. Yeah. That's something that I... Which sounded perilous actually when I read it. I mean, it's not. I try to live on this side of the line of peril.

And they have some pretty scary names, these raffles. They do. Some of them are ironic. The Fluffy Kitten, I think is the first one. I guess that's... What a terrible place to die. What on the knit? Well, he drowned in the Fluffy Kitten.

We lost him. But the last place we saw him was Cuddly Teddy Bear Rock. But then, yeah, then they've just become... The rapids are coincidentally have the same names as the frozen daiquiris you get at the drive-thru when you land in New Orleans, the lobotomizer, like the bone crusher. You talk a little bit about something that also appeals to me, which is during COVID, you and Megan decided, let's get an airstream and let's fit it out and let's hit the road. I've seen some photographs of this vehicle, and it's like everything you guys do, you

both have amazing taste. The credit for that has to entirely go to Megan, and in fact, I don't have much taste whatsoever. You don't? I don't. Not only do I not have taste, I don't care that I don't have taste. So whatever outfit I choose, I don't look in the mirror to think, how's this going to play at the dinner party?

Right. I just never give it another thought. I understand that you're supposed to cover your body to a certain extent. As the Old Testament tells us, we must cover our... With raiments. But I mean, she has exquisite, like crazy, sophisticated taste. Her taste is one of her talents. The times that I've visited you guys in your homes and you think, who is the master interior

designer that you hired a great fortune, it's like, no, no, that would be Megan. She does that. And of course, Megan says, no, let's do this with the greatest taste possible, which ended up being this 30-foot airstream that was just magnificent. And the way it was decorated was very cool. She did everything, soup to nuts, and I'm very proud then to be able to satisfactorily operate the machinery and take care of the systems. There is some complication to it, the plumbing, the water system, the heating system, et cetera.

I didn't realize how complicated all this stuff was until I was on tour in 2010, and I was on a tour bus. They gave us these long lectures about, you cannot try to flush anything other than human waste down the toilet in this, and it was a very fancy big bus, tour bus. You cannot, and they gave us these long lectures, and we were in the middle of nowhere, and I'll just out him now, Andy Richter, decided that he had had himself a nice cocktail, had a giant old lime in it. Were you on the bus then, Sona?

I was, yeah, I remember this. And Andy decided, where am I going to throw this empty glass with some ice and a massive lime, desiccated lime, I'll just toss it in that toilet and flush it, and the whole underside of the bus exploded all over the highway. Shows the perfect item to plug. Oh, oh, he might as well have had, yeah, yeah, he might as well have just put a giant rubber bathtub stopper in his drink, and then. Should I dump this jar of epoxy?

I guess I'm in the toilet. I remember, I remember, we were, I don't know, I want to say we were somewhere on the east coast, we were in the middle of nowhere, it was summer, we were doing this tour, it was really humid, it was pitch black, the tour bus pulls over, and the guy, the tour manager, Gus was like, damn it, who did this, who did it, and everyone's saying, we don't know what you're talking about, we don't know, we all get out, I just wander into this tall grass in complete darkness, and I wandered really far away from the bus, and I don't know where we were, but I got so far away from the bus that I could just barely hear

noises, and then I heard the tour manager said, a lime, a lime, and it echoed, there's this tall grass, pitch black, nighttime, I think Richter came forward and went like, so what, I threw a lime in there, what's the big fucking deal? We've all been there. Richter or Roseanne Barr, I don't remember. But yeah, I take solace, a lot of us have been struggling the last two years, people's mental health has been somewhat precarious people feeling like we've all been left stranded high and dry by COVID and isolation, and I would think a saving grace for you is you

are one of the most industrious people I know in every way, but you also are constantly looking for new ways to keep yourself busy, and I would think that would have saved your ass these last two years that you're like that. I mean, it always has, the sort of work ethic I grew up with has allowed me to succeed despite my paucity of talent. For many years would get hired and plays just to carry the good-looking people on and off stage and build the scenery and so forth, and then eventually I convinced people to let me say lines of dialogue, and I'm still hopefully on the ascendant side of that deal.

I doubt you're going to, I don't think at this stage you would go back to being a guy who's sawing things. You'd never know. I mean, you'd be very good at it, but I think you've reached a certain level where- I hope so, but- It's been funny, I've been two years, I hear Nick's on this picture, well, yes, he's not on the picture, he's in the background. He's driving the cable truck.

I'm super good at coiling cables, but I mean, yeah, that's, it's part of what I try to impart to my audience on our show, Making It, that I do with Amy Poehler, that's just a really important part, I think, of human health to be making something, and that the spectrum is incredibly wide. You could be making children smart, or you could be making tables out of wood, you could be making a podcast, you could be making a talk show. Figure out what it is that you're good at, and make things using that talent, whatever it may be.

For me, that keeps me from spending money, it keeps me from being addicted to something, it keeps me from like looking in the mirror and having to reckon my flaws, you know. Right, right. Instead of saying, no, I don't look in the mirror, go chop firewood. I don't have, it did make us a Sop with Camel. Remember Sonar, early in the pandemic, I, years ago, I had found an old fashioned, like I think this was like from the 1950s, intricate balsa wood kit, very complicated for a quite large Sop with Camel model, and I decided early on, and I went crazy, I went down to

the point where I was, and it was done, and it hangs over my desk, and I look at it, and I think that was a project meant for a 12-year-old boy back in 1955, but damn it, I finished it, and it looks, doesn't look great, but I finished it. There's a lot to be said for that, you know, obviously you have an incredible body of work, and I've never understood the sort of fallacious side of the American dream, that once you make it, once you hit it big, you no longer should have to work. You should just live with the luxury of your riches. Like once, once-

What is, yeah, what is that? Once your ship comes in, yeah, and I've tried it. I wrote about it in my first book, where I moved in with Megan, she was on Will and Grace. We lived in the Hollywood Hills, like I had made it, and she went to work one day, and I smoked a joint and put on some Neil Young, and I floated in our, we had a little swimming pool, and I floated in the pool, listened to Neil Young, I was like, I made it, like I'm living the Hollywood dream, and I got, I put on his early record, everyone knows this is nowhere, and I got into the second song, I made it as far, so I made it about

six minutes into the reverie, and just thought, what are you just, are you gonna become an asshole? Like, is that the dream, like, are you gonna quit getting anything done? And if I realized that if I'm not, if I don't feel like I'm being of service to someone or something, that's what my whole life is about. Like if I'm not doing anybody any good, then I might as well just go jump in a lake. You're so industrious, and you believe in work, and you believe in making things, and being a good person, and that is, I think, a real tonic.

That's something that, if for no other reason, do it for yourself. Oh, yeah. Those are substantial medicines that don't involve any superficiality or any show business or any marketing. Your household and your family and your loved ones and yourself are all things that you can lay your hands on every day, you know, you don't have to sign up for anything to give somebody a hug. And I was just smiling because on the way here, I was talking to my mom on the phone

in Illinois, and I was telling, I was saying these exact things where I was like, when you don't plant crops in your field for a couple years, it's called letting it lie fallow. And it's to let the biome, the nutrients grow, you know, the microorganisms. I love that I'm cutting you off to explain how firms work. Shut the fuck up, Nick. What you mean is to make the stuff go back into the thing. That's right. To regenerate the health of the soil.

And so, figuratively, I'm letting myself lie fallow for a period to see what sort of, what fungus presents itself and says, oh, maybe you should focus on this project or that project. And so, I'm telling my mom this and talking specifically about wondering what I might write next. And she said, well, you better, you sound really serious. You better lighten up if you're going to talk to Conan. And so, I can't wait to tell her that.

It's exactly what we talked about. I take something, because I've been, like a lot of people, I've been in a little bit of a funk lately that this, you know, pandemic just seems to continue and go on and on and on. And all of us feel, what's happening now? When is this done? And I feel like talking to you today, I thought this is going to be good for me. It's going to be good for me to get my Nick time, because I do think you, although you're

very self-effacing, you have a lot of those qualities that I think would inspire people right now. I mean, what would Nick do in this situation? He'd probably grab two rocks, go out in the parking lot, and build something, you know, using pieces of other people's cars without their permission, which is called vandalism, Bob. Well, yeah, you say tomato. You do that a lot.

People don't know this about Nick, but he does go randomly into parking lots and just removes someone's mirror, a tailpipe, you know, wheel rim, and then you'll build an incredible coffee filter, but it's not, you shouldn't really be doing that. Well, you know, they'd be welded on if they didn't want me to. If it can be removed from a car, then it's your property. We all need to have our fun. Let me ask you about, there's a newsletter that I want to make sure I mention, because I will be a subscriber that's going to be dropping soon, as the kids say, called Donkey

Thoughts. Is that right? Donkey Thoughts. That's right. Donkey Thoughts. I love that. The thoughts of a donkey. That's right.

And this is going to be available on substack.com. Is that right? That's correct. Yeah. You sound like someone that I've pulled over and you're at a police station. And so I might understand, Mr. Offerman, that you have a newsletter called Donkey Thoughts. Yes. I mean, I think I was going within one mile per hour.

We have it right here. You were three miles under the speed limit. I'm starting a thing. It's funny. I have a website where that I started where people can like find my books and my comedy shows and stuff. And when I started that website, my friend who built it said, there's an option you can do a newsletter.

I was like, okay, sure. And so this is a few years ago. And of course, I've never even, it's never even occurred to me to begin writing the newsletter. And so finally, some friends of mine inspired me to start this substack thing, which is just, it's a subscription. And once or twice a week, I'm going to answer questions from my readers. And I think partly it's inspired by Nick Cave does something like this where he answers letters.

And it's something I really love doing because when I'm presented with a list of questions, then some of them occur to me that, oh, here's a couple funny jokes that I can answer with. But then here's one that I can answer earnestly and try to pass along whatever donkey-like lessons I've learned in my years in the field. Part of me pictures. It's almost a shame that this is going to be available on the internet because there's part of me that pictures you getting an old press and cranking these out and putting them in like a wax tube and having them delivered to people's doors for a shiny copper penny.

But I mean, it's just like it's such an old fashioned way of, but you know what I mean? Like, you having ink on your hands, a little time to run off. I love that idea. Some more. Yeah. The way. That may become a premium item for astronaut status. You will receive a letter pressed in turnip ink once a solstice.

I'm telling you, it would be your version of an NFT. It would be, the Nick Hoffman version of an NFT is not some digital thing that's available that you can buy. It's I've ground this out. I found a printing press in Philadelphia from 1835 and I've oiled it and I've worked out all the parts and I do my own type setting and I grind this thing out and then I put it in a wax cylinder and it's mailed to you and all you have to do is give me $6.5 million. I don't see the fault in that plan.

I don't either. What I'm after with this book and with my donkey thoughts is, I mean, the older I get, the more I'm aware of how flawed we human beings are. When I'm talking about politics with people, I say, just imagine driving a station wagon with a family, with kids and how hard it is to make everybody in that vehicle happy. Even if you do, even if you get everybody happy with ice cream for 20 minutes, that passes very quickly. So extrapolate that to the size of a school board or a county or a state or a nation.

It's impossible. We will always be trying to get everybody ice cream and always failing. I think we should always start every conversation, whether it's the president making a speech or us doing a show, start every conversation with, okay, obviously I'm a jackass, but I've prepared this evening of entertainment or here's the state of the union. I mean, I'm as big a dipshit as any, you know, the fact that people are too insecure to admit to our foibles, I think is one of our greatest failings. Oh yeah.

I think the greatest sign of intelligence, I'm always impressed. When someone speaks like that, they have my full attention. I want to end on a quote that you, this is not you that you end your book with this quote, which I really liked by Aldo Leopold, ethical behavior is doing the right thing when no one else is watching, even when doing the wrong thing is legal. And that's one of those quotes that I really love that you need to, and I had not heard that quote, you need to think about it. It doesn't necessarily roll off the tongue, but it's one of the truer things I've read

in a long time. And I really liked that you ended your book with it. Well, thank you. It always makes me think of, I have these moments pretty regularly where you wad up your potato chip bag and throw it at the trash can and you miss and you're, but you're on your way somewhere or whatever. And you do that thing where you stop and you're like, well, no one saw me miss. God damn.

And for me, I, nine times out of 10, I, I, I'm like, God damn it. I like, No, I understand. I'm going to erase it in my head. I'm going to now be, make myself late. Also, yeah. And it's not just Catholicism, but you were, I didn't, for a long time when I knew you, I didn't realize you were raised Catholic as was I, but we were raised with the idea

of the hell. Hell yes. There's always someone watching. That's true. But so sometimes it's hard for me to know, am I really being a good guy? Because I walked back there and I threw the potato chip bag properly in the trash. Or did I just do that because I want to think of myself as a good person. And I know that somewhere, somebody might have seen, I don't know, it gets very complicated.

But either way, put the fucking potato chip bag back in the trash when it doesn't make it in. Sure. I mean, and there's always that 10th time when like, that's, and that's the thing to, like when I do succeed in, in being ethical, nine times out of 10, and that might be a generous, very generous for you, but let's say seven out of 10 times. Even then it's not, it's not like I'm like, okay, now I'm good. Yeah.

I'm just like, okay, few. I made it through that moment. Just one time. I did the right thing. Right. Now to go steal some cocaine. Now what's next? Yeah.

Distribute it in an elementary school. Let me take the mirrors off this Corvette. Well, thank you for making me feel better. I just, you were, I said this earlier, you're a tonic. You're a bracing tonic, but also you're a, you're a really fine human being. So it's nice to just get to sit here with you and sort of soak up some of that offerment goodness. So thank you.

Well, I appreciate it. And I, I'm a huge fan of, of your podcast and Sona and even gorelly as long as he's not doing Sean Connery. Again, I understand that. Yeah. It's really, when he does the Sean Connery, it's, yeah, sounds like one of the Muppets. Yeah. The Sean Connery Muppet.

Yeah. Yeah. Now you have to do it, gorelly. I was a way out. Oh God, I've known for this thing that I don't even really do. Yeah, I know. It's time to get things started. It's time to get things right on the Muppet show tonight.

That's Sean Connery dying in a field. Moments before his death. Getting very little air. I'm convalescing in a castle in Scotland. My God, he must be passing because he doesn't really sound to anything like himself in his prime. Zarpos. Don't ever, don't ever stop.

Don't ever stop. All right. Well, God bless you, Mr. Offerman. Thank you. Thank you. And kick, kick into the, the white stripes. Yeah. Let's do it.

Wow, it's incredible. Can you feel it? Let me just explain that for the first time since the pandemic began, we're all in the same room. That's because Matt Gorelly has joined us in person. Yeah. You've been at your beautiful residence in Pasadena and just gorgeous. From the background unless it's a fake background.

It is. Okay. But you haven't been here. No. But now I feel like. The gang's back together. Yeah. We got the gang back together.

It feels good. It feels complete. It does. And I felt a little alone and vulnerable without you here. Yeah. So it feels really nice to have you here as, you know, because I think the two of us are stronger together. I agree.

I liked you being gone. Oh. No, no. It's not because I dislike you or anything, but because when Sonia's here by herself, I can just go after her and you always go come right to her aid to her assistance. But there's that little lag on Zoom. And if I'm going after her, you know, and sometimes I can just turn your volume down a bit.

Yeah. Because you know how to do that. I'm sorry. Come on. What are you talking about? Control all seven. You do the levels? Oh, okay.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm very technically savvy. Oh. Yeah. You just go into a different digital modem and then take it down a generation. Generations. I think you did do that somehow.

But you did. Yeah. But anyway, it's nice to have you back and it is good to see you, Matt Gorley. You know, we joke and we josh and there's a lot of, you know, little snappy snipes going back and forth. But you know that you're an admired member of the team. You have such a hard time being sincere. I know, I know.

It is, like I see smoke coming out of your face. You are. You're a pen and a half. You're a human who breathes and you exist. That's the most basic. Why are you wetting your pants right now? You have certain inalienable rights guaranteed to you through the Constitution. And then, so therefore you mean a lot to the person who is me.

Cut you off and say, this is how you do it. I am really glad to be back. In fact, I knew I'd be excited to be back, but until I got in this room, that's when I really felt like this feels good. I missed you guys. Yeah. Full stop. See, that's how normal people act.

And I too am so happy to see you. And I'm just, I feel like everything is complete and we're good. And that's, this is a nice moment, Conan. If I could just venture to say that you are a property owner, you're a tax-paying citizen. You have told you have your merits. How did you get my census data? You reside on 1.3 acres of land that rests on a shelf of what's predominantly shale. There's shale and then there's some limestone as well.

Basically, limestone runs through the whole area. I'm not happy to be back. This is the best you're going to get. You're four miles from a fault line and want to look into that. So anyway, good to have you here. It takes so much work. I want to have a Christmas card, I mean a greeting card made that says all those things and then they clearly just send it to you.

Just have it made. Just one that just goes on and on and on. This is how much water you displace when put into a tank. It's yeah, 35.6 liters of water. And then they just get unrelated. This is how much a gallon of milk costs right now. The day you were born, the stock exchange was up. Two points.

Oh my God. It literally has been two years since we last were. We got together for that live show, but to do an episode was at My House two years ago. Right, because the pandemic was just breaking out. March, late March. Yeah. It was late March and none of us quite knew what it meant yet, but they had shut down the studios, but we all met in your backyard.

Which is so funny. Like, well, we can't record in the studios. Let's just do the same thing in close proximity at My House. Right. And it wasn't in the backyard. It was in an enclosed space. A small enclosed space. Yeah.

And then we played the face licking game. That's right. That was the comedy that day. Yeah, it was. Followed by a visit from my new character, Uncle Sneez-A-Thon. But yeah, we went, and then we went someplace, we all went someplace nearby that was really cool for the rain. The rain is.

For lunch. Yeah. Was it lunch or dinner? It was lunch. And you had your Crocodile Dundee hat on? Yes. Yeah. I was wearing it all the time then.

And then I was sued by a toothless croc. Oh. Hello. Didn't see that joke coming, did you? I thought you were going to say toothless Paul Hogan. Oh, please. No, the crocodile sued him. Yeah.

Yeah. Whose teeth he was wearing on his hat. I see, yeah. That was the joke. Yeah. This is, you've made it so much fun. Yeah. Yes.

Yeah. And that cut to me in court and testifying is a crocodile with gums and pointing at me. That's a New Yorker cartoon right there. Yeah. Anyone want to draw it up? Yeah. I'll split the money with you 50-50. Yeah.

That's comedy gold. That is called comedy gold right from the mind. Right. So it is good to have you back. And I think this is a sign that we are hitting on all cylinders now. Feels like it. Am I getting all sexy? Yeah.

Sexy. Welcome to what? You don't find this sexy? This is not a jazz, late night jazz gin. Oh, it could be though. This is awful. Yeah. If you're going to be, why are you doing this now?

You didn't do this when you were virtual. Wow. Welcome to Coon and the Chiljums. That's your sexy voice? That's my sexy jazz voice. That's also your emphysema voice. That's your, it's my lungs are collapsing because I smoked for 40 years of voice. Could you hand me that respirator?

Take off your clothes. People always think you're trying to come on to them, but really you're just trying to get a hit of oxygen. Well, anyway, back home for me. We are, no, it's good. We're here. We're stronger than ever. And I think now that we've been united, it's like those, you're going to know the name

Matt, those special stones that go into the glove. The chancrest? Oh no, the infinity stones. I thought you meant, I only barely know those. I thought you meant the three stones from Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Doom that light up when they come together. Let's go with that. No, I was trying to go with something that the kids would care about.

Come on. How about the grandparents? The glove. What's it called? The glove? The infinity gauntlet. No, the gauntlet. Is it the infinity gauntlet?

If play is nodding and if anybody would know it's play. The infinity gauntlet. Yeah, play is nodding so hard that his throat just ripped open. Yeah, he's wearing two infinity gauntlets right now. Yeah. He's rubbing his chest wearing two infinity gauntlets. That's a Friday night with play. Sorry, play, but you know you're a big fan.

Yeah. Incredible. Incredible. That's what it's like. Yeah. Whatever that glove was in that Marvel movie that I didn't see, this, this is us. We've now been assembled. Yeah.

This is us. We're more like the cast of This Is Us, I think. Oh. That's what you just said. This is us. Oh, I haven't seen that either. I haven't either. I used to watch it.

You did? You used to? This is us. We're not? No, not at all. What about if I talk like this? Oh, deep and further away from it. Yeah.

No. I think you should go back to Zoom. Yeah, I think so too. I think it's better for all of us. It's been lovely seeing you and getting... Yeah, one's good. One's good. One's good.

One of you. Yeah, proof that you're alive and I think you should go back. I understand that. What I understand is a lovely home in Pasadena. Yeah, that's just a fake background and I'm in a kind of lean-to outside the house. Yeah, you smoke meats there. We'll be right back. We'll be right back.

Conan O'Brien needs a friend. With Conan O'Brien, Sonam of Sessian and Matt Gorely. Produced by me, Matt Gorely. Executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joanna Solotarov and Jeff Ross at Team Cocoa and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Year Wolf. Theme song by the White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy.

Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples. Engineering by Will Beckton. Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista and Britt Kahn. You can rate and review this show on Apple Podcasts and you might find your review read on a future episode. Got a question for Conan? Call the Team Cocoa Hotline at 323-451-2821 and leave a message. It too could be featured on a future episode.

And if you haven't already, please subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded.