Doughboys - Popeyes 6 with Tim Baltz

Episode Date: May 8, 2025

Tim Baltz (@tim.baltz, Righteous Gemstones) joins the 'boys to talk Megaman, Chicago sports, and favorite Chicago eats before a return to Popeyes to review the limited-time Pickle Menu. Plus, another edition of Drank or Stank.Watch this episode at youtube.com/doughboysmediaGet ad-free episodes at patreon.com/doughboysGet Doughboys merch at kinshipgoods.com/doughboysAdvertise on Doughboys via Gumball.fmSources for this week's intro:https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/films/news/gene-hackman-wife-cause-of-death-betsy-arakawa-b2742364.htmlhttps://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2025/02/28/gene-hackman-will-be-remembered-as-the-hollywood-actors-actor.htmlhttps://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000432/bio/https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/entertainment/gene-hackman-guy-fieri-diners-drive-ins-and-dives/https://news.popeyes.com/blog-posts/the-history-of-popeyes-louisiana-kitchenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is a HeadGum Podcast. Want to watch this episode? Check it out on our YouTube channel by going to youtube.com slash doughboysmedia. The new McCrispy strip is here. Dip approved by ketchup, tangy barbecue, honey mustard, honey mustard, Sprite, McFlurry, Big Mac sauce, double dipped in Buffalo and ranch, more ranch, and creamy chili McCrispy strip dip. Now at McDonald's.

Hey buddy! Mitch, we're going to be doing our 10th anniversary Dough Boys live show in your hometown of Boston, Massachusetts on Saturday, May 17th at the Wilbur. Wow! Wow! Tickets are still available, Wags. Get out and see the 10th anniversary show. We got John Gabers, we got John Hodgman, We got Nick Lager and Mike Mitchell But don't worry about that. It's gonna be a great time. There's gonna be fun surprises It's gonna be it's gonna be a blast John squared Hodgman Gabris two of the best around truly two incredible guests one incredible show One 10th anniversary night. You're not gonna want to miss tickets Tickets at Birdfuck.com. Birdfuck.com

get your tickets. Wilbertheater May 17th 7 p.m. See you then! On February 26th 2025 Santa Fe authorities announced the discoveries of the bodies of actor Gene Hackman and his wife pianist Betsy Arakawa. The horrific news ready-made for true crime obsessives with grisly terms like mummification, shocked the American public, and among the reactions included a wave of tributes for Hackman, a beloved character star turned recluse in retirement. With roles in hit films like The Conversation, Hoosiers, Crimson Tide, and The Royal Tannenbaums, as well as a turn as Lex Luthor in the Christopher Reeves' Superman franchise, and an Oscar win as the villain of the film, the film's most famous actor, the film's most famous films like The Conversation, Hoosiers, Crimson Tide, and The Royal Tannenbaums, as well as

a turn as Lex Luthor in the Christopher Reeves Superman franchise, and an Oscar win as the villainous Sheriff Little Bill Daggett in Clint Eastwood's anti-Western Unforgiven. Hackman's presence elevated each of his movies. But his signature performance was in the 1971 William Friedkin film The French Connection, where among its five Oscar wins was a Best Actor statue for Hackman as Detective Jimmy Popeye Doyle. Both a critical and commercial smash, the character of Popeye Doyle was so well known in pop culture that when Al Copeland opened his fried chicken chain

down in Dubai in 1972, he named it for Hackman's Hardboiled Cop. Over the next five decades, as Popeye Doyle receded in the collective consciousness, the breaded bird broker expanded globally, buoyed by the introduction of a Chick-fil-A killer sandwich in 2019. In April 2025, just weeks after Morgan Freeman offered a touching tribute to Hackman at the Academy Awards, the fried chicken chain named for his character launched a pickle menu featuring pickle-glazed wings, tendies, and sandoes, as well as fried pickles, and lemonade. And speaking of food, Hackman's only on-camera credit since his final film role, 2004's

Welcome to Mooseport, was a surprise cameo on an episode of Guy Fieri's Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives when he just happened to be dining at a Santa Fe restaurant, Harry's Road House, while cameras were rolling. While enjoying breakfast at the counter, a happily retired hackman told Fieri his favorite feature of the eatery. Quote, nobody pays me attention, you know. It's great. Rest in power, Popeye Doyle. This week on Doughboys, we return once again to Popeyes for the Popeyes Pickle Menu. [♪ music playing, crowd cheering, and cheering for Doughboys! Doughboy Doughboy! [♪ Welcome to Doughboys, the Podcast about chain restaurants. I'm Tiger Weiger along with my co-host Dejaun Wayne Gacy, the spoon man Mike Mitchell.

Dejaun Wayne Gacy. Off of Jaun Wayne Gacy. Off of Jaun. Dejaun Wayne Gacy. Jaun Wayne Gacy. I should have named the Dejaun Wayne Gacy. The French clown. Jaun Wayne Gacy. Dijon Wayne Gacy. Jean Wayne Gacy. I should have named the Dijon Wayne Gacy. The French clown Jean Wayne Gacy. Been a big fan for years,

saw you live in Chicago a couple of years ago. Wow. And it was a blast. Thank you for the endless hours of entertainment. Spencer roasts at birdfuck.com. I was clowning last night and there was a big difference between French clowns and American clowns, right Amelia?

You're nodding along. Amelia's nodding along. That is correct. Yeah. Wait, you were clowning last night? You just said that so casually. Yeah, I was clowning last night. I did a clowning show last night.

It's the truth. Amelia knows. What was the show? Stand Up and Clown. Okay, stand up and clown. But you say you were clowning. What does that mean exactly? Is it like an improv show, but you're doing like,

you know, you're not being verbal? What are you doing exactly? You take it from here, Amelia. Explain this nonsense to me. I don't even know how to describe clowning still, but Chad Damiani, one of the LA clowns, throws a... Very funny guy. We got him on the show at some point.

He's a great guy. We got to. Yeah, he throws clowning shows. It's basically, it's kind of improv-y. It's improv-y. It's basically looking as foolish as possible on stage, failing in front of audiences, being dumb. Mitch didn't have to do anything.

Yeah, that's what I was gonna say. It's... I'm glad I had you set this up. It sounds like a Doughboyz podcast. What is the, but what makes it specifically clowning as opposed to improv? Like, are you doing more like, woo, like that kind of shit? Like, what's going on?

There is a little sound and movement stuff going on. Okay, so that I can kinda get. There's some like, no talking stuff. It's like very, there's some physical, physicality. So it's just mine. Not all of it is. So they'll give you a, what's it very, there's some physical, physicality. So it's just mine. Not all of it is. So they'll give you a, what's it called?

Like a little- A suggestion? Prompt, thank you. A prompt, okay. Not a suggestion, a prompt. All right. It'll be like the soup's down, you know, instead of soup's up, soup's down. Okay. So then what the fuck are you gonna do with that?

There you go, that's how, you know, ho, ba ba ba ba, you know, you do that sort of thing. Okay. Except if you're not supposed to make any noises. I think you can go like bup bup, I think you can do that, you're not supposed to talk. But then does that turn into an improv scene where you're, with dialogue?

No, there's no dialogue. The whole show, there's no dialogue. I mean, like he talks to you. Okay. He like kind of directs you, right? Like he'll be like, yeah, he'll be like, do it bigger or do it less or whatever. Hey, you know what? You know who'd be great?

Yeah. Your dad. Clown ass dad. How dare you? Clown ass dad. Mitch, I have my own. We text all the time. That's a lovely man.

He's a great man. I have a, Mitch, I have my own business that I wanted to get to before we introduce our guest. Earlier this year, I was dealing with, this is actually an interview with a friend of mine, have a, Mitch, I have my own business that I wanted to get to before we introduce our guest. Earlier this year, I was dealing with, this is actually in the last part of last year, I was dealing with jaw pain that was like quite debilitating

and was like made it really hard for me to eat and to talk, which are what the, are the core elements of this show. Your jaw, during an episode popped at one point. Yeah, I mean, it still pops sometimes, but it's less of an issue. Very snake-like, it would, you'd have an apple and it would pop open and you would just kind of swallow the apple whole.

I can naturally kind of unhinge my jaw. I mean, it's a, anyway, so we had a Snoopy Bla, and our Discord server, the DoeScore, recommended me looking out for an orophacial pain specialist. I found one who I talked about earlier this year, Dr. Rich Hershinger, who helped me out a lot. Things are a lot better pain wise,

popping is a lot better. He also had invented a jaw stretching device called the gentle jaw, which I brought in the studio. And then I demonstrated for you and you tried it out. Yeah, you gave me the smaller one. That's right. He gave you the smaller one. Because he's in the, Dwight is in the one percentile.

I'm in the top 1% of mouth sizes I've learned. Yeah, and you're in the top one percent of a lot of things. Okay. Anyway, he emailed me this past weekend, Dr. Hershinger, and said the following, Nick, an oral facial pain resident in Minnesota informed me you talked about the gentle jaw on your podcast.

It was fun to watch, especially since your colleague, meaning you, used the gentle jaw backward. He put the large end in first and he sent along this picture attached. A doctor sent this photo? All right, you know what? You're right, Amelia. I am a fucking clown idiot. It sucks. It sucks if that's the truth.

Yeah. It's a good pick. I'm tired as hell today, Wags. Chankton is coming. Chankton's on the way here. I love it. Am I gonna get to see him? Chankton and Angelica, his lovely wife, and maybe, yes.

Are they coming back to the studio? I can tell them to come back to the studio. Okay. He's leaving Thursday, and my goddaughter, Emmy. Wow. So we're going to- Does he want his goddaughter doxed on the podcast? We'll bleep it if we have to.

Okay, we'll put the name. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we can bleep it out, it's fine. But they're staying at my house. Wow. So I clowned last night, I got home. And I had a radio interview on 98.5 in Boston this morning. Very cool.

Yeah, Toucher and Hardy. Wow. It was great. It was fun. They were like, what is your show about? And I was like, do you like doing the show in Boston? That's what they asked me. I was like, no, it sucks.

Like the Boston people will be like, you weren't funny. Like all my friends will be like harder on the show. Yeah, sure. And then I was like, and also like, I'll like talk about masturbating and then look in the crowd and see my mom straight faced in the audience. And when I was done, my mom called and she was like,

that was a good interview. And it was this awkward thing where I was like, oh, I shouldn't have said the thing about masturbating and you being straight faced. Like, it's all I could think about. And it's truly the only time I've ever had an awkward thing from this show with my mom, where I was like, thinking about, you know, it was in it, it sucked. But it was great.

Adolfo is one of the guys who calls in that show and he hooked us up. And he's gonna come on. He's coming on our show. Oh, how about that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was fun. Okay, so we booked two guests so far based off of shows you've recently done. Look, yes, yeah, yeah.

And you know what, we're gonna book a lot more. I'm gonna meet people, I'm gonna have, I'm gonna tell them, come on the podcast. And you know what, today we're lucky, we're lucky we met this guy. 100%. Yeah. One of the podcast greats, Mitch,

you have a drop to play and then it can introduce you. I'm gonna hit him with a drop. Landman. Landman. Landman. Landman. Landman. I am Landman.

It does seem like a later Mega Man kind of guy. The bad guy is a Landman. I've come to kill you with my land. It'd be cool though. I bet the result would be that you could shoot out little platforms you can jump on. Oh, yeah, like you make little, like he creates land. He makes little land masses.

Mitch, that is pretty great. Thank you. I hate hearing our podcast. I like hate hearing snippets of it. Me too, dude. The, the, that track is from... We shouldn't have to hear it though. It's true.

That track is from Mega Man 2. I'm trying to place it specifically. I think it's maybe Metal Man. Maybe the email will say. All right. Let's see here. Hey, Doughboys and Jamilia Donahue. Here's a little drop I made with a recent discussion of the new Mega Man villain, Landman,

on the episode with Matt Singer. Hope you enjoy. Nope, it does not. Best Joe, I shouldn't say his last name, should I? He wrote it. I don't know if he wrote it out, he probably can. Best Joe Bastion. Wow, thanks Joe.

Thanks Joe. Docs and everybody today. Drops at birdfuck.com. I'm sorry that there's no, there's no, look, I gotta say this. Yeah. I realized last night a thing about Mission Impossible, which we, when this episode comes out as Mission Impossible, is Mason Impottable done?

We should be in the thick of Mason Impottable. I realized that Kittredge sounds a lot like The Matrix, Mr. Anderson. He sounds like that guy from... He sounds like Hugo Weaving. Oh, yeah, the actors have similar deliveries. I can see that. Yeah.

It just popped in my head, so I was just thinking of that. And also, we recorded an episode yesterday with Lily Sullivan, and she was wearing a very familiar shirt. Wow, Mitch, what a segue. From the Righteous Gemstones and Deli Boys and CBB World joining us today, returning to the studio, Tim Balz.

Hi, Tim, thanks so much for being here. Hey, thanks for having me. So a Gatorade shirt, yes, we'll get right to it. You're wearing a Gatorade shirt. We recorded an episode with your lovely wife, Lily Sullivan, also wearing the same shirt. That episode is coming out in the future over on our Patreon feed.

Yes. She stole the shirt from me at my most vulnerable moment. Were you shirtless the whole day? Yeah, I got rid of all my shirts. I only own this one. Lots riding on my ability to wear the shirt. Couldn't leave the house. No, but I was, I mean, full disclosure,

I was taking a shit. And Lily was leaving the house. And so I hear through the bathroom door, she's like, can I borrow one of your shirts? I'm like, what? And she always wants to borrow like the highly sentimental ones or like the, like my favorite stuff. And I'm like, what?

Why are you asking me this now? She's like, I have to leave, I have to leave right now. And I'm like, what? Why are you asking me this now? She's like, I have to leave, I have to leave right now. And I'm like, which shirt? She's like the Gatorade one. I'm like, I was gonna wear that tomorrow on the podcast. And so I'm sitting there, I'm like, I can't get up. I can't go like face to face reason with my wife. Sure.

So- By the way, oh no, I was just about to ask this question. I know the answer. I was gonna say, do you have a bidet? And you do not have a bidet. You used to have a bidet. We used to have a bidet. And yeah, you're...

Yeah, that would've really sped up the process. Well, hold on, I'll just bidet myself. Walk out, I'll Donald Duck it out. No pants on it, and then we can talk about this. And so finally I'm like, okay, fine, just wear it. Like please don't get any makeup on the collar or something like that. I don't know why, it's a white collar.

So I guess that's what popped into my head. I think that makes sense, yes, of course. So then when she got home, I was like, oh, how'd it go? I'm glad you wore it, ha ha ha. Now I think I'm gonna wear it tomorrow anyway. That'll be fun, oh, how cute. But then we had to put a shirt over her head to take this off so that she didn't get any makeup

on the collar, which I was like, can we put a bag over your head? It's like, no, women know how to do this. You just put a t-shirt over your head and like, oh. And so that was funny, I learned something new from it all. I didn't know that trick, you must know that trick back there. Yeah, like sometimes if you're doing makeup stuff, I'll wear something like a hoodie or something

so you don't even have to pull it up over your head. You can just wear a button up as a common one so you can just take it off like a jacket. You said, oh wow, how about that? But yeah, it's kind of like putting a bag over your head, though you cover your face and everything, so. I thought your neighbor just looking in, seeing you put a bag over your wife's head.

That's my thing, I just put a bag over your head. That's head. That's my thing, I just put a bag over your head. That's true. I did the Hey Randy show, live show, and I had a bag put over my head as they thought I was, what you talking about? Probably had to get a lawn bag. Would you fit over that noggin? It was not a lawn bag.

A lawn bag that goes down your waist. Your arms are popping out here. Sadly, I feel like I would fit pretty well. If I just punched my arms through a lawn bag, I would fit me pretty well. Would this be your new look? That should have been what I did to school every day, just put a fucking lawn...

Push my head through a lawn bag and put my arms through. Um, I, uh... Lawn bag man. ["Mega Man 2D"] Mega Man needs to be rebooted in a different, they've done the 2D, I mean, I guess, is it just only ever gonna be in 2D? I don't wanna get too deep into the Mega Man canon here

unless our guest has an interest in it. I love Mega Man. Oh, you do love Mega Man? Yeah. Okay, let's get into it. Beating Mega Man 2 is one of the proudest achievements of my life. Oh my God, I love Mega Man 2 so much.

I also beat Mega Man 2. I was about to say I didn't, but I did beat. That is the only Mega Man I think I beat. I felt like it was the hardest. I had Mega Man 4 and maybe Mega Man 2 so much. I also beat Mega Man 2. I was about to say I didn't, but I did beat. That is the only Mega Man I think I beat. I felt like it was the hardest. I had Mega Man 4 and maybe Mega Man 10, and I would play other ones. Yeah, Mega Man, or is it Mega Man X? Mega Man 10 was like the more recent one, yeah.

Yeah, it's X. That's the one with the Robo-Dah, right? That's the Super Nintendo one. So Mega Man X was the Super Nintendo franchise, and they made a few of them, and then Mega Man 10 they made more recently, and it had like the throwback, like 8-bit Famicom NES aesthetic. So you were Mega Man 10 they made more recently and it had like the throwback, like eight bit Famicom NES aesthetic.

So you were Mega Man X. No, two, two is the one that I played the most. Two is awesome. I love two. That's my favorite. Yeah, I do think Metal Man was the- You think that was the music? Oh, wow. I hope we're right. Because that's the one that I went to first every time I played the game.

So it stuck in my mind. Oh, right. I'm trying to remember the order. I think you go to, because it's, you want to go to Flashman. I think you go to Crashman last. That's what I remember the most. I think it's Flashman, Quickman,

Metalman, Woodman. Then you go to Airman, is it? We don't have to follow your rules of which robot to face first. There is an optimized version. There is an optimized way to do it though. You do, but Metalman also gives you a good gun. That's the other thing is that you do- your rules of which robot to face first. There is an optimized version. There is an optimized way to do it though. But a metal man also gives you a good gun.

That's the other thing is that you do- Yeah, metal man gives you the saw blade. And then you go to, wait, there's heat man. I forget where heat man goes. Heat man might go before wood man. There are some that you can't beat without a specific weapon. Right, because you use the weapon that you get from the robot master

that becomes your ability and then you can use that to defeat other robot masters sometimes very easily. Sometimes it becomes a trivial thing. Unproduced Mega Man script written by Jeff Dutton. Remember he wrote that movie? Great script, I do remember. It was a Mega Man movie at one point. He did and it didn't get made? It did not get made. It did not get pretty. It's in the junk pile.

Who would you cast as Mega Man? Jim Caviezel? Caviezel's pretty good. I mean, like, I feel like, like, you know, the unimaginative castings... I think Caviezel's tough to top already. Caviezel's pretty good. I think the unimaginative casting for, like, a boyish type, who I'm a fan of is, I think he's good,

but we see Chalamet and everything. We're kind of at a Chalamet saturation point. So, like, who's the other Chalamet? Who's the other youthful? Who's Jacob Elordi? Jacob Elordi's pretty good, yeah. Jacob Elordi is not bad. He brings like a, like Shalime brings this like kind of,

you know, mischievous, playful, you know, I'm in my room reading, don't worry about me. And Elordi plays just like a guy who shows up who's, no shade, no shade. Yeah. But like there's a power to his presence, which is just kind of like, huh? Yeah.

What? Babe. Like that's powerful. It kind of like, huh? Yeah. What? Babe? Like that's powerful. It kind of is like what Mega Man is, which is like Dr. Light invented him and he's kind of a, you know, a cipher. You know, Haley Joel, our- Oh yeah, Haley Joel would be a great cast in Mega Man.

I was saying when he was younger, like I think that you need a young, kind of youthful, innocence kind of thing. You didn't cast a straight up boy. That's a way to go. I don't wanna see boys in the, no Stranger Things kids, they're axed. I don't wanna see a Stranger Things kid in the movie.

No, you don't wanna see the one that had that prank show? I do. I wanna watch that prank show. But the, who I'm, the Spider, I don't love the Spider-Man guy, who I'm the spider. I don't love the Spiderman guy, but I do think it is that sort of vibe. I don't, I don't dislike the Spiderman guy. Tom Holland?

Tom Holland. I just think he's in so much stuff. Mega man sipping on a Biro. Have you done Biro on the show yet? We have not done Biro. We haven't done Biro. Hey, Biro is pretty good. Is it really? If someone's listening wants to send me

a couple cases of Biro. I would, what? I've had them all, they're good. I gotta be honest, what is Biro? It's a non-alcoholic beer, but there's like an IPA, a wit, and a lager. Oh, I'm into it. Yeah.

You're big on non-alcoholic beer. I would do a lot of the athletic brewing these days, but that's also like the one that's like very easy to find at a market. They had athletic brewing at fucking Costco last time I went there. So yeah. I have a feeling that like the US market

is gonna go pretty hard on it. Oh, I love it. Because it has a lot of options, so. I spent too much time looking through the Mega Man. Jesus. Wikipedia. Mega Man 11 is the most recent in 2018. Before that, not a proper entry since Mega Man 10 in 2010.

So the franchise is really, the mainline franchise has really fallen off. I don't know what the move is. I don't know if they just make 12. I mean 11 was pretty well received. Did they do a 3D Mega Man at some point? They did do, those are the Mega Man Legends games back on the PlayStation era. Yeah, they had like, I think they had three of them, three Mega Man Legends, maybe just two, and then they had the Misadventures of Tron Bon, which was like a kind of a spin-off game. I think the way you do a Mega Man 3D game is, I think you do it like Metroid Prime.

I think it's gonna be like an action adventure. Oh, you think first person? Yeah. I wanna see my little guy. I wanna see the blue bomber. Oh, shit, you're right. It is the blue bomber. Because that's the problem with the Robocop game,

is like the Robocop game is first person. Some people are saying like, hey, this is actually one of the better games of last year, sneakily. You wouldn't think of it with an IP, it was a licensed game. But I want to see fucking Robocop. And I understand why they do it

because then you don't have to animate the player character and that's so labor intensive. You just see it from their first person perspective. But I don't want to be in Robocop's HUD. Like I want to see Robocop walking around. Yeah. That's part of what's fun about it. I want to see, yeah, I want to see Robocop walking around.

I agree with you here, Wikes. Are you still a gamer or no? I like retro games. Yeah, sure. So like if I'm playing on Switch, yeah. It's kind of corny, but I like sports games. I like racing games. Sure.

Hey, nothing wrong with that. But I go back to, I have a Delta simulator on my phone. Oh, wow. That's dangerous. Delta simulator? Yeah, do you not have that? No, is it like that? You can get almost any game on a Delta simulator on my phone. Oh, wow. That's dangerous. Delta simulator? Yeah, do you not have that? No, is it like that? You can get almost any game on a Delta simulator,

and it takes up very little space on your phone. So if I'm traveling or something, I'll play Dr. Mario. I'll play, like, I have a bunch of Super Nintendo NES games. Can I just quickly tell you what I thought it was? I thought it was like a Delta flight simulator where you're like, the guy like goes and sits in a Delta seat and then it's just on the plane, I guess. I thought that that's what it was.

Yeah, it's first person just like going through the airport process. And I'm on a plane and I'm going through TSA security on the phone. I'm like, oh nice. Oh shit, I picked the wrong line. I weirdly could see a game where you just sit on a commercial flight and you don't have to actually pilot it

as being kind of soothing. Because it's just like I have the feeling of like, I got nothing to do. I'm just kind of captive, but without actually being captive, which gives me claustrophobia in real life. Yeah, I've not messed around with the phone. It would be fun to tap the button to nudge the person who's laying on you.

You know what I'm saying? Oh, sure. The middle seat, that's fun. It's like, fat guy in the middle seat it'd be fun to tap the button to nudge the person who's laying on you. You know what I'm saying? The middle seat, that's fun. It's like fat guy in the middle seat and your health goes down or something. You know what I'm saying? I mean, I'm trying to gamify it. I don't know how to... Your friendship goes up.

Your friendship goes up. How do you respond? It's like, hey, you've got a soft shoulder. Get the fuck away from me, dude. I've been the big guy taking the middle seat and I've seen people not be thrilled, but they slim, look. We're about to travel.

We're about to travel as of this recording. Gets worse every fucking year. There's just like everything that used to be taken as a given is now, there's a paid up charge for it's just Hor it's just the erosion of absolutely everything and and it and it's just I'm it's it's a bummer and then especially if you're You're a larger man sure and I'm not the biggest guy, but you know I'm like six one fucking Fuck I would not be happy with you. Oh, yeah, your shoulder rubs up against it. I'm choosing the option that says like sir you're sitting next to me on the airplane, I'm like, fuck, I would not be happy with you. Oh, yeah. Your shoulder rubs up against it. I'm choosing the option. Oh, hey.

What is this game about? Is there a mile high part of this game where you go to the bathroom with him or something? I guess so, yeah. That's gonna happen to me. Yeah, like as he's going down on you, you're like, would you like to go to the bathroom? Holy counts of when the lavatory.

What? If I saw you getting on a plane, I guess I wouldn't worry about your size first. I think I'd worry about a few other things before. I see the buzz cut. Plane's not making its destination. He has no bags. There's no bags in a flight training manual?

What's going on? I think the... It sucks to travel. It's a bummer. Mitch, I feel for, I feel for you, because, like, you know, as a larger guy, it's like you... I just do first class almost all the time now. That's my solver on it, which is thousands of dollars you have to spend. It sucks. That's the tax you have to pay, and you're lucky that you have

the ability to do that, because some other people who are of size can't afford it. It sucks. I didn't forever. When I shot Tomorrow War and I went to... Which, by the way, I know that you were just in Atlanta We should write your where you're Austin. Oh Charleston. That's where it was. That was that's where deli boys was No, that was that was no deli boys shot in Chicago. Oh shit gemstones was Charles Yeah, Jim, so we would connect through Atlanta. So I fuck I fucked this up, but that's okay. Yeah, you really couldn't be more wrong there

Every element he connected through Atlanta. Yeah Every element. They can't. He connected through Atlanta. Yeah, yeah. You're right. Fuck. Yeah.

God, you brought this up. Atlanta airport is huge. It sucks. It sucks. There's like a Atlanta Hawks fan experience. There is. There's a Bojangles. There is a Bojangles there, which is a, which,

have we ever officially, oh, we did. We did Bojangles when we were in Nashville. When we were in Nashville. And yeah, I don't feel like we got the proper experience. But Bojangles is coming to LA. We're talking about a fried chicken chain today, but Bojangles, they're supposed to open five outlets within the next year.

When I flew to Atlanta for tomorrow, where they just flew, you know, they fly first class. So like, and they just were flying us all the time. And then I got platinum, whatever it was. I got like platinum medallion or whatever. And then I was just like, I'm just going to use this forever. And I got a Delta card and now I just fly. I just do first class, but it is expensive and sucks. Yeah, it sucks.

But it's also that price is better than me being like, sorry, like, I don't want to, that sucks way worse. So they have to like apologize for being a big guy to some poor person who sits next to you. Everything's a nightmare. And the only way to make yourself less miserable is to spend a considerable amount of money. And that's just how society is structured right now.

It's fucking, fucking sucks. It's horrible. It sucks. Anyways, we're starting this episode on a high note. No, but we were talking, you mentioned, you mentioned playing sports games. You mentioned going to Chicago, bouncing all over the place. I know you're wearing a Spurs hat now,

but I know you're also a fan of your Chicago Bulls. Oh yeah. How do you feel about the Bulls? Obviously they're out of the postings at this point. The Bulls' future. Well, I mean, I'm glad that we offloaded Levine and DeRozan. I took heat years ago.

I was on some NBA SiriusXM podcast or show or whatever, and I'm like, yeah, I don't think Levine's like a number one guy. And they're like, whoa, that's so like, you can't say that. I'm like, no, I can. He wasn't, I'm vindicated. I loved DeRozan, it was sad to see him go, but he's old, Vucic we got to get rid of.

This guy, Matas Buzelis, who grew up in the suburbs, it's kind of fun to have him on the team. Yeah, he's a fun player. As long as the last, you know, whatever a few weeks of the game after the season after that trade, they had an identity and they were running and they were beating teams

that they hadn't beaten all season, that they hadn't beaten in a few years. You're like, okay, all that city wants is a team with an identity that plays hard. Even if they're getting blown out every once in a while, they don't play good defense, there was like a mid 2000s Bulls team era with Ben Gordon and Kirk Heinrich. Oh, right. They had a hard identity.

Yeah. Right. And they would get maybe no higher than the sixth seed, but you're like, it's so fun to root for them because they can play spoiler and they know it. We don't have any illusions about this team, but they have an identity. And so you care about the identity. And I liked those two, those two specifically quite a bit. Yeah. For the last few years, three, four years, like they just didn't have an identity. Yeah. And we're playing for the nine or 10 seed. That's humiliating. Yeah. Chicago is in, you guys need to have a good sports

team. It's, it's been far too long and ever the Bears or the Bulls need to be get good Yeah, what's crazy about the Bulls? Cuz you know the fandom has is still so rabid there and I learned this recently that they have led the NBA in attendance the Past four seasons like they're still just like despite that team basically being a 500 team That's always in the play-in tournament, they're still consistently packing that house. Yeah. Wild. Yeah, that's crazy. It's a fun experience to go there.

United Center's really fun. I gotta go. I know, I love to go. Are you guys going through Chicago on tour? We're not, unfortunately. I love Chicago when we visited in the past, but you did get to spend some time there while you were working, which was nice,

because you were from the area. Yeah, Deli Boys was great. We saw a lot of friends and family. I was there for like, I don't know, six or eight weeks. Oh my God, what a dream. Yeah, it was February. Yeah, sure. So, good night.

But I, you know, I don't always get a chance to go back a bunch of times throughout the year. So that was great. And it was the first time that I'd filmed there since we filmed Shrink back in 2016. Oh wow. And a bunch of crew were working, from Shrink were working from shrink

were working on Deli Boys and I hadn't seen them in, you know, eight or nine years. So that was really special. That's crazy. To come back. Cause when we filmed that back in 2016, the Dick Wolf NBC shows had only been on for a few years. And so prior to the Dick Wolf shows,

there was maybe one A-list crew, maybe one and a half in Chicago, and they would work on the Vince Vaughn Summer Movie. You know, or something like that. But that kind of was the step. By the way, that's the exact title, the Vince Vaughn Summer Movie. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Starring like sitcom woman. And then the Dick Wolf shows came and they started to expand and then they got a Cinespace studio lot down there. And so seven or eight shows are going at a time.

So all of a sudden you have seven or eight A-list crews that are working there. And when Shrink came in, there were probably, I don't know, three or four shows. And those shows have been going long enough that we siphoned all of their, not department heads, but like the second in command. And they basically went to their bosses and they said, you know, it's a two-month shoot, let me leave for two months or I quit.

Because the Dick Wolf shows are like kind of a grind. They're like ten months out of the year. They're like, okay, cool. So everyone on our crew was so happy to be there. They loved the tone of the show. They loved the pace at which we were going. They were like, you know, it was just a welcome environment for them.

Um, so we all had a great time, and then we filmed really fast. It was over in a flash. Uh, and to have that experience, and then, you know, we got a second season, and then the entire platform goes under. So there was all this promise, and then it gets dashed.

You know, at the time, it was heartbreaking. Now I just see it as this anomaly. We kind of beat the system and got a season of a show out there, which most people can't say that. So I'm very grateful. Shrink, a casualty of CISO falling apart. Can people watch Shrink these days? Yeah, it's on Peacock.

Oh, there you go. Yeah, that's great. Go ahead and check it out. Yeah, it's great. I do think that it kind of stands the test of time. And our main EP, Patrick Daly, when we were making it, he's like, look, there are no guarantees. Go as hard as you can on this.

Make the best possible show. Make it an ending that has a cliffhanger that we're really proud of. So that if this is it, then we can walk away and we're happy about it. And we did that. I mean, by the skin of our teeth, literally, because we improvised probably like 30% of it

in this like patient sessions. And Abominable was our production company and Amelia was working there. She actually worked on Shrink. And when we came back, we were cutting together all the improv that we had to like slot into these montages in the script. We have basically like six empty pages per script

that the network made us put like strike throughs and like dummy like scenes in because they were nervous by blank pages. But essentially they were blank pages that we would account for by improvising and then putting them into montages. Man, writing those fake blank pages, I want to crush that.

It's some writing that'll never be on TV. Hell yeah. I can't operate on you, doctor. I'm a doctor. We'll operate on each other. You're 69, and you operate on each other. So we came back, and we cut all the improv together. And after we'd finished cutting everything

that fit into these montages that fit into All eight episodes we were left with about less than 90 seconds of usable material from the improv and When we figured that out that was when the abominable people were like We didn't want to tell you how risky we thought it was we thought there's no fucking way You're gonna come back with enough material to fill all these things. We made it by 90 seconds. So it was a really like, yeah,

it's just this kind of weird magical anomaly that I don't, hopefully, love to sell another show and get to make it, but we all know that's really tough. It'll happen again, yeah. That's right, that exists. But to get to see those people again and they're eight years further along in their career

and some of them in the department heading on Deli Boys. Right. And that was really meaningful. That's cool. That's awesome. It's rare that you get that. Yeah. Do you have a... By the way, what did you think of Amelia when she was working on the

show? So supportive. Yeah. Incredibly supportive. But also, were you like, this person's a freak? Did you feel that way at all? I do remember clocking your Instagram handle. Skid mark?

Skid mark. Yeah. And I was like, OK, all right, this is a swing. There's more to this person than I thought. It hits. She's not just very supportive and nice. There's something underneath there. Freak.

She told us when we interviewed Amelia for this job. Yes. She was like, I have an Instagram handle, but it's weird. And maybe you didn't tell us in our, when we interviewed Amelia for this job, she was like, I have an Instagram handle but it's like weird. And maybe you didn't tell us in that first interview. I think you did. I think I did. You thought about not, you were like, I don't know, I think I'm going to change it soon.

And then you're like, I guess it's skid mark four. Like you almost did it. That's what you changed it to? No, it was always skid mark. I think she was trying to avoid telling us, saying, I'm going to change it. And then I'm glad you didn't. There's four other skidmarks. Still, you're a pretty early adopter

to get skidmarked four. Yeah, I think I claimed it in like 2015, 2014, I want to say. Wow. Yeah, that was my memory of it. What you were saying. I was like, there's POV here. Ha ha ha. You go back in time and claim Skidmark IV, man.

I would love any of the Skidmark handles, wise. Where are we going back to? So we're going back to like the 1910s, and we kill baby Hitler? No, I'm getting Skidmark I. Skidmark I, that would be quite the, that would be a steal. I loved working on Trink. That's what I was going to say.

I got to see all the raw footage. I had to transcribe some of those interviews. Oh, that's right. Yeah. It was a blast to work on and I really liked, I loved all the performances and the improv and yeah, it was, I was very proud of having to been a small part of it. You know I just saw Nick Gallucci one of the editors. Oh

really? Yeah we just caught up for the first time in years and that was really meaningful too because they you know we were nobodies to like everybody right I had like 4,000 Instagram followers and they were all Chicago people so when we made the show I'm not surprised that it didn't do numbers, you know, but it's odd to have a show that quality-wise we felt accomplished everything. Yeah, sure. And then it enters the marketplace and you're like, oh wow, there are significant roadblocks and obstacles to its success. There was no money for PR or marketing, you know, and so you couldn't call it, CISO was done calling in favors

because we were like the sixth original that came out. And CISO is also, CISO was a tough thing to get around to. The name, the font, the colors of the fucking font, like all of it was DOA stuff, you know? I essentially show ran a show on CISO, which is insane to even, for me to even say, the Hidden America Wags. Oh, right, right. Yeah, which Wags touched me up to even, for me to even say, the Hidden America wigs. Oh, right, right.

Yeah, which wigs turns me up with. I just want to quickly say, Amelia said all this nice stuff about you and your show. You got to say that. And then, well, no, and then when she started the episode off, she said I was a clown, basically. Yeah, it's. By comparison, she's being very kind.

Tim, what you were saying about, like, you worked with, I was trying to pick up the CISO logo here. Um, there we go. There's that old guy. That's, there's that classic logo. Do you know a show that did numbers? What? Numbers, num threers.

Yeah. Num threers. Have you had the Chrome on yet? We have not had the Chrome yet. We have not had Chrome on. I met Chrome once. He was the first celebrity to play the Second City improv set when I was on ETC stage. Wow. Yeah. No, no, no, he refused to play. He celebrity to play the Second City improv set when I was on ETC stage.

Wow. Yeah. No, no, no. He refused to play. He refused to play. Chrome. We were begging the Chrome. We're like, please.

And he's like, no, absolutely not. Wow. I called him Chrome, which doesn't make sense, but sounds cool. He just didn't the Chris Nolan. He's done Blackjack, yeah, yeah. Oh, no, the Christopher Nolan. Oh, yeah, and Oppenheimer, yeah.

He's an Oppenheimer. Yeah, he's a legend. He is. He's doing veryjack, yeah, yeah. Oh no, the Christopher Nolan. Oh yeah, and Oppenheimer, yeah. He's an Oppenheimer, yeah. He's popping all over. He's a legend. He is, he's doing very well for himself. Good for, good for, we'll get the crumb on at some point. Love to get the crumb. But no, Tim, what you were saying a moment ago about like you work with people on Shrink

and then you'd run into them, you know, eight, nine years later and you're working with them on Deli Boys and just seeing where they are in their lives. It's like we have a similar, we have half of that experience as you're describing work with Amelia back in the day and we work and talking about how supportive she was and we work with her now and all she does is dunk all over both of us.

Yes. Yes. Yes. But look, she's in the dunker spot. It's true, yeah. Yeah. Speed of dunks, we do, gotta go to Chicago, not in the winter time, but I think when we tour there,

we usually are, oh, we went one time in the summer, but we did go in the winter time. We gotta go for a nice summer, we usually are, oh, we went one time in the summer, but we did go in the winter time. We gotta go for a nice summer Chicago tour. I love Chicago. I've always had a blast in the Midwest. This is, here's my question. When you were back in Chicago, for me, I love pizzeria, Regina,

what's your, what is the spot you go to? Like I'm gonna go eat at this spot in Chicago. Right now there's like two or three spots. Okay. I'll give you like, I'll give you all, well, they're kind of like all the ranges. My pizza place is Millie's in the Pan. Okay.

In Uptown, I think it's the best pizza in the city. The guy only makes 65 pizzas per night. Wow. And he makes rent off it. Wow. And he's just like, that's it, you have to reserve days in advance. And my father-in-law was telling me about it, I was like, oh my God, this is so bougie, you know? Yeah, sure. You walk in and it's not, it's just this guy just like, that's it. You have to reserve days in advance. And my father-in-law was telling me about it.

I was like, oh my god, this is so bougie. You walk in and it's not. It's just this guy's like, these are the numbers that I need to do to pay my employees, to pay my rent, and to keep a little money for myself, and to keep the ingredients where they're at. Man, it's not quite, it's pan style. It's not deep dish.

Because deep dish, I'm like, that's once a year for like tourists and family. Yeah, sure. It's own thing. Yeah. Pequ it's not deep dish. Sure. Because deep dish, I'm like, that's once a year for like tourists and family. Yeah, sure. It's own thing. Yeah. Pequod's is very good. Pequod's is good, but Millie's in the pan, I think is the best in the city.

Wow. Then my like favorite nostalgic place, which Lily actually was a waitress here, and I didn't know that until like months into us dating, is this place called Penny's Noodle. Okay. Wow, Penny's Noodle. And that's right under the L tracks. It's this like really quaint,

like triangle shaped restaurant, just like under the tracks, a couple blocks south of Wrigley Field. And it's Thai food, but it's like Northern Thai. It's kind of, it's not fast. I mean, it comes out fast. And it's just like, I just love it. I mean, it comes out fast and it's just like, I just love it.

I love it, I fucking love it. And I also, you just mentioned the L and I was just like, oh yeah, I went to some, you know, when we were there, like, hey, you just go to like a restaurant under the L. It's just like, oh, that's so fun. I mean, you would love it. You would hate the cold is horrible.

The cold's tough for me, but I do like the transit. It also is windy. I know it's about the politicians being, you know, bloviating or whatever. Yeah, sure. But it is fucking windy and cold in that city. Cold's tough for me, but I do like the transit. It also is windy. I know it's about the politicians being, you know, bloviating or whatever. Yeah, sure. But it is fucking windy and cold in that city. It's brutal. It's freezing fucking city.

It's brutal. It's a brutal city. When you're there on a windy day, it goes in every direction too. Yeah. You'll be walking against the wind and you'll be like, okay, it's no big deal. I'm about to turn left on this other street

and you turn and it's also hitting you in the face. You're like, what the fuck is happening? How is this possible? And then sometimes you'll get one and you're like, ooh, that feels kind of nice. When you're really in on like, one of them will blow you one way or the other. When it goes up your,

When it goes up your, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Right on. Gives me a solid there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Penny's Noodle, you had one other place? One, but the third. Yeah, like the higher end place. This also an institution, I think it was featured in The Bear, which gets most things about Chicago right. Except an Italian beef place would never make their own bread. My brother-in-law who grew up in Chicago is like that. He's like, that's inexcusable.

You would never make your own bread. Because it would cost so much and would be so like, the time that it would take to do that is, it's insane. You would go to an Italian bakery, most likely within a mile, and bulk order Sure. the actual Italian bread. Yeah. So that was the only thing that my family was like,

my family was like, no, no, no, no, no. But they go to this place called Avec. Our friend Joanna Kalo, of course. Joanna, no, no, no. Past dope was guest. Joanna, no, no, no. Past dope was guest. Joanna, the bread of the bear. You gotta, mm.

We will be watching for a correction this season. They apologize for season one. No, but I love that. Eben Moss Bachrock is like, goals. That guy, I fucking love that guy. I actually saw him when we were filming Deli Boys. We were on the same soundstage as The Bear. Wow. When they were doing season three, I guess.

And I was in this, I was in Deli Boys at one point. I'm pretending to be an Italian mobster. So they like slicked my hair back and I had like a white t-shirt and like a gold chain and like a bad blazer. I looked so stupid and I had big sunblock. Billy's pissed off right now. And I'm walking, I'm walking like down the soundstage

and then Jeremy Allen White and Matty Matheson and Eben Moss Bachraker walking. And he's like, hey, what's up, man? You recognize me from Gemstones? And I'm looking so dumb and I'm like, big fan, you guys. But I was, I, that dude, he's in the lake house, and for some reason I clocked him in the lake house as Keanu's brother, and I didn't say this to him,

but I'm like, man, so cool, this dude's so cool. Yeah. Yeah, he's cool. I've seen the lake house, like, six times. Really? I saw it four times on planes. Wow. Yeah. I've never seen it once, I'm gonna go see it.

But he's a good actor. Yeah, he's great. He's in it for a short amount of time, but for some reason I was always like, hey, it's the guy from the Lake House. By the way, that character that you were dressed up as, we're about to see a lot of him in N.E.W. Jers. We're gonna see a lot of those.

That's right, we're going to Newark. We're going to Newark, so we're gonna see, well, maybe not Doughboys. I don't know. You don't think it's gonna be all those guys in the crowd? I think it's gonna be fat grease those guys in the crowd? Yeah. I think it's going to be fat greaseball guys in the crowd instead. I think we have some guidos in our fan base.

Oh, there's for sure some guidos. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, look, I know I give them a hard time, but I love the guidos. I love them. You give them a hard time. I give them a hard time, but I love those guidos. Quote, tweet, guidoshit. I had a, just what you were just saying,

that story you were just telling reminded me of a thing. Many years ago, I was writing for this show. And it was like a panel show, so like you're, that you'd have guests on and you'd be like, you know, writing jokes for them. And just so they'd go out and they'd be, you know, like, hey, whatever the topic is, they're gonna have something ready to say.

And so you, like, but I was working on that show, but I also was doing an on-camera bit in it. And as part of the on-camera bit, I had like a, they put me in like a, you know, 2010 era like douchebag outfit, where I had like a double polo shirt with a pop collar. And like, I had longer hair at the time, I was like greased up, you know?

And so I'm just talking to this guy, just sort of saying like, yeah, and you know, we'll show this video of this, you know, woman falling down'm just talking to this guy, just sort of saying like, yeah, and you know, what, it goes up, we'll show this video of this, you know, woman falling down and then you'll maybe make one of these jokes or whatever. And the guy the whole time was like, okay, yeah, sure, whatever, man. And he went out there and, you know,

he did some of the stuff we worked on and it went great. And then afterwards he was like, hey man, I'm sorry, I was weird earlier. I thought you just wore that guy. That's the representation the show was like, Like, that's the representation the show was like, but we also have to have one of these. Yeah, yeah. Eben Moss Backerat, oh God.

Eben Moss Backerat, is that how you say it? Back rock, I think. Back rock, he's the thing. Yeah, yeah. Which I auditioned, I told Marvel I could save him a lot of money with CGI if they just cast me. Just like put a little, you know, like sprinkle a little gravel on me.

But they gave it to him. I mean, he's a much. Sprinkle a little gravel. Just like dip it in glue and then toss it. Yeah. Yeah. They would have saved a lot on effects. That's what I was trying to, you know,

I was trying to sell him on this. Yeah, I get what you're saying. My audition went really bad for the thing. Give me a little thing. You gotta have some, it's clobbering time. I said it's clobbering time. Oh, that's a big, big thug. Hold on, wait, no, hold on.

Can I take that back? You wanna hear something? Is that what you're saying? No, you just did it, it's fine. All right, good, thank you. Thank God. I just wanna hear you say it's clobber saying? No, you just did it. It's fine. All right, good. Thank you. Thank god. I just want to hear you saying it's collaborate time.

I'm too tired today. I cannot function today. What's your third place? Because I have a follow-up. Oh, it's called Avec. I've heard of Avec. I've heard of Avec. That is great.

The original location on Randolph, I think, because they have a second one in the river north or something like that. But the original one's great. It's just one of those places you walk into and you're like, oh, you can feel like the atmosphere is kind of electric. They have a big counter that you can sit at.

They have a couple of staples. Infatuation Chicago just had Michael Shannon there, which is really funny because he's so intense and he had like half his head shaved but the other half not shaved. And he's like, these bacon wrap dates, they're so good. You know, it's just, yeah, that one's worth checking out. Wow.

Is it just, is it a gastro type? Like what exactly? I know, I feel like I've just read this on a Chicago Eater. I've heard of it before. It has like maybe Mediterranean or Lebanese, New American influences. The wine list is really good, but pretty eclectic. Sure.

They'll have random stuff from the Middle East, like a wine from the Middle East. Yeah, it's very hard to describe, but also a real magical place where you're like, man, that was an incredible meal. You know what I hold dear in my heart? And it's a very touristy spot, but I do love it. And I went there when my dad was sick,

and we went to Chicago. That's one of the trips we took when my dad was sick. We did the Wendella cruise, which people love to point out that Dave Matthews' shit got poured on one of the boats there. Yeah, we do love to point that out. It's very funny. And his piss.

And his piss. And his piss. Probably should come. Do you know? In the toilet? Oh, definitely. Yeah, we do love to point that out. It's very funny. And his piss. Probably should come. In the toilet. On a tour bus, you got a jack in the toilet. There's no other option. Can you please jack in the toilet? I'm going to call this Jack Do-It-All in the toilet. You're going to pee?

Yelling at the violinist. I have heard a theory, by the way, You're gonna play that. Yelling at it. Yeah. Yelling at the violinist. I have heard a theory by the way that it was actually the opening band and Dave Matthews took the hit for them. He would. Wow. He is a good, Dave Matthews is a good, good man. What wasn't the whole thing though,

it was the like the driver. The Chicagoan should feel fucking lucky to be covered in his shit. But. And piss and cum. And then it's piss and cum. But it wasn't the whole thing. I thought the whole thing on that was just,

it was just the driver going rogue. Like it wasn't like anyone egging him on. I don't think Dave Matthews has any control over the functions of the bus. The driver thought it was funny. But I have heard that at times Dave Matthews drives the bus. Oh shit. So it could have been that.

Well, I actually know that's unsubstantiated. That'd be interesting if he's like, we're going over a bridge, I got this, I got this. Get up, get up, get up, get up. Man, imagine that, you're like, oh, brown, yellow, white, you know? That's when you find out there's cum in there, you know? When you're covered in shit and piss or cum,

the first thing that everyone's brain does is describe the colors. So to go back to the heartfelt thing. Can I say one more thing about that? Well, yes, please, of course. The funny fact about that whole fiasco is they cleaned the boat in time for the 2 p.m. tour that day. Oh my God. Oh.

Wow. I was actually, I was working in a high rise building when that happened that overlooked that bridge. Whoa. Wow. Yeah. You could have seen it go down. Yeah.

Jesus. Yeah, I worked at like Michigan Avenue and the river, the Chicago River. And so you could see a bunch of bridges down the river. And then that happened and words started circulating. And then we're all looking out there, we're like, oh my god, oh my god, this is crazy. You could have pissed and shit on them too. And they wouldn't know that they would be none the wiser.

The perfect crime. Yeah, you go out there and actually there were a ton of Chicagoans that you could see them running, streaming out of the building, almost like they were zombies or... Like they're in The Last of Us and they're just going there and everyone's dropping their pants and shitting. Like people jerking off. It's the only time the cops are just like...

Yeah. Those old Irish cops. As you were. I think they didn't even clean up the boat for the 2 p.m. and those fucking filthy Chicagoans didn't notice a thing. I like to shit on Chicagoans. This is a new thing. I... Everyone gives Boston so much shit.

I like to shit on other cities. Chicago, such a fun city. And when I went there with my dad and we went out in the lake for the 4th of July, it was great. But we went to Gibson's steakhouse. And I got to go to Gibson's. I know it's touristy. No, Gibson's is July. Oh, nice. But we went to Gibson's Steakhouse. Yes. And I got to go to Gibson's.

I know it's touristy. No, Gibson's is great. I love it. I love, I love, I love Gibson's. There's sometimes those spots. Morton's? Morton's is great. Oh, yeah.

I love Morton's. The LA equivalent might be like a, you know, a Musso and Frank. You know, it's like this is touristy, but this is a landmark for a reason, and it's kind of a fun night out to go for. Musso and Frank, we went the end of year, me, you, and Sus went for the steak and shake.

That's right. We had a lovely time. We had a great time. Oh, yeah. I was looking it up because this is a newer chain that we visited Mitch in 2023 when we were there with our buddies Carl Tart and Jamie Loftus. Do Write Donuts, which has donuts,

but is also a fried chicken place, and specifically fried chicken sandwiches, which is something we're talking about today. But I don't know if you've had a chance to, Do Write Donuts, which has donuts, but is also a fried chicken place, and specifically fried chicken sandwiches, which is something we're talking about today. But I don't know if you've had a chance to have Do Write. We had a great time. No, was it good? Yeah, it was real good. Donuts too?

Yeah. Everything was great. By the way, I want to say, Chicagoans do love when I'm like, this place sucks shit. They are one of the cities that are like, yeah! They love to get shit on. It's very funny. Well, because you don't want too many people moving there. Yeah, maybe that's a part of it.

The summer and the fall are great, but the winter breaks people. And it's this nice kind of like, and also like conservatives go nuts in their Chicago. It's a hell hole. Oh, sure. Cool, stay the fuck out of it. Wait, we have enough corruption.

We don't need that time. OK, you don't like it? Great. I wonder why you don't like it. We only want one conservative. Vince Vaughn for his summer movie. Come on in, Vince. Oh God. I gotta ask one more place.

There's the famous Osh-Osh-Ovel. Do you like that? I got to ask one more place. Yeah. There's the famous, O'Shavel, do you like that? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And they have small Shavall now. Small Shavall, yeah. That's like the big burger I think I've never had. Yeah, that burger's great. Kumas Corner I've had.

We've had the Billy Goat Tavern-wise. Yeah, that's fun. That is fun. Billy Goats Fire, I remember the first time, I grew up in Joliet, which is like past the Chicago suburbs. So you hear about Billy Goat. The Blues Brothers Prison, which we, yes, yeah. Which was three blocks from my elementary school.

Wow. Yeah, so we would pass it in the bus like every day. Wow. Really crazy. And my dad actually taught there for like two years, I think he taught like speech and English to inmates. Wow. Yeah, my grandpa taught it at prison.

Canonically, he would be teaching Jake and Elwood. They're canonically back in the slammer, aren't they, at the end of, yeah. Yeah, that is canon. And then I toured that prison, because that prison's been decommissioned for at least a decade. And so now it's like a historical museum.

And actually, this is weird. Do we have time? Yes, of course. This is a reforming story. So this is really weird. It's very random. Jim Downey's from my hometown. Oh, right, yes.

So is Paula Pell. And I think Melissa McCarthy grew up in Plainfield, but then went to high school in Joliet, and my aunt was her guidance counselor. Wow, so a lot of the comedy pedigree in your- And Andy Dick is from Joliet too. Okay, wow. And Anthony Rapp.

Oh, wow. I think it stops there. Yeah. And Anthony Rapp. Oh, wow. Anthony Rapp. I think it stops there. Yeah. Still pretty good. You can toss Dick in the prison there, until you... He's breaking in, buddy. So, I met him senior in high school when he was going on this Goodwill PR tour after that

guy from Suddenly Susan killed himself. Anyway, that's not the story. So the story is Jim Downey gets wind that I'm from Joliet, um, like five or six years ago, I was doing these spots for AT&T during March Madness and he thought they were really funny. And so his assistant hits me up and she's like, Jim Downey wants to get in touch with you. I'm like, oh, okay.

Yeah, here's my number. And she's like, no, he, you'll have to reach out to him and he's got like a burner phone that you can reach out. I'm like, oh, you'll have to reach out to him. And he's got like a burner phone that you can reach out. I'm like, oh, okay, all right. So like six months go by and I run into her again. She's like, did you ever call him? I'm like, no, I thought this was like a joke or something.

And she's like, no, no, he wants to hear from you. Okay, so I call him and he's about to hang up and I'm like, no, no, Timbales, Juliet, Juliet, Juliet, Juliet. And he's like, oh, hey, what's up? Oh my God. You thought I was a spam caller. Oh my God.

So then I talked to him for like 45 minutes and find out that like my parents and him have these mutual friends because he went to the same high school as my dad, but like eight, 10 years later. And he's like, okay, well, we'll keep in touch. Well, years go by, I don't hear from him. And then out of the blue, maybe like April of 2023, he calls me out of the blue. I'm like, Jim Downey's calling me. I answer

the phone and he's like, Hey, hey, how are you? Hey, my birthday is coming up in October. Um, are you going to be in Joliet? You know, I mean, I go to Joliet like three times a year. Sure. And I'm like, well, actually, yeah, I am going to be there. My mom's moving and I have to help her move. And I can't really lie about it because we have mutual friends. Sure. Not that I would have lied about it, but I said, yeah, actually I'll be there.

He's like, okay, great. John Mulaney's playing the Rialto Theater in town and Pete Davidson's opening for him. So I figured we could all tour the Joliet prison and then go out to dinner together before the show. Okay. There's no way this is going to happen. Yeah, sure.

So then I'm home at my mom's place. And like two days before Jim Downey calls, he's like, okay, great. So we'll meet at the prison. All right. So I meet at the prison, John Mulaney shows up. Pete can't do it because he has to host SNL last minute. That was what happened a couple of years ago.

So we just tour the Joliette prison. Oh my god. With someone giving us a historical tour. And John-Melanie is just kind of doing bits with Downey the whole time. I'm like, what the hell is this? That's fantastic. My elementary school is a couple of blocks away.

And then we leave and we go to this restaurant in Joliette, which some people love. Not my favorite, but some people love it. And Downey loves it. And we eat at this place and then we go see Mulaney's show. And then the show's over and Downey's like, great. Okay. Great.

All right. Well, I'll get in touch soon. Every once in a while he'll text. He's like, are you in LA? And I'll be like, no, I'm not. He's like, no response. That's wild. Wow. The connection of a, of a hometown guy, just a.

Yeah, sure. Which, how, like this really could have helped me earlier in my fucking career. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like, he was like,

ah, it's too bad you never auditioned for SNL. I was like, I did. Yeah. Yeah. I did, Jim. Yeah. It was like, what year? I was like, 2012.

He's like, hmm, I was gone by then. Wait, no, I wasn't. I'm like, what the fuck, was like 2012. He's like, hmm, I was gone by then. Wait, no, I wasn't. I'm like, what the fuck, man? All it took was for you to know I was from fucking Jolie. That's fucking, I mean, it would drive me insane too, of course, but. No, it's okay, it's okay. Yeah.

Hey, you got the prison tour. I got the prison tour out of it. That's as good as SNL. What a, not since Jake and Elwood has the comedy pedigree in that building with you and Jim Downey and John Mulaney. What a, what a trio. What a trio. Yeah.

Plus some Joliet people that were real funny guys. I guess. That's a wild story. Also just Jim Downey, I mean, who is legendary to, to, you know, am I like a, just the fact that he would want you to reach out to him. That's a, that's very, that's crazy. Yeah. I, I'm still like a little kind of stunned because he's kind of the first person that was on my radar of comedy people were like, Oh, you came from here and you've made it weird.

Um, you know, we got it. We got to do it. We got to do a Joliet tour for back in Chicago. I guess that would be fun. Um, I love my hometown. I'm super proud of it. But if you're in the Chicago area and you say like, I'm that would be fun. Um, I love my hometown. I'm super proud of it. But if you're in the Chicago area and you say like, I'm from Joliet, people will like, they'll instinctively flinch.

Oh, okay. Or they say, I'm sorry. Oh man. So we should not go to Joliet. If you do, I'll give you all my recommendations. All right. You go to home cut donuts, best donuts in the world. Wow.

Home cut donuts is fucking amazing. Okay. Open 24 hours. Wow. All right. 363 days a fucking amazing. Okay. Good to know. Open 24 hours. Wow, all right. 363 days a year. I mean, I love it. And also, I don't know if we should,

I'm not sure if we should just tempt the thing of putting you in a prison. I don't know if they'll just. I love it here. I love it here. It sounds like what you're saying about Joliet to Chicago. It's kind of like what Quincy is to Boston. That's...

People don't flinch at Quincy. I mean, people do not. Quincy was a working-class city for sure at one point, but now it's just as gentrified as anywhere else. Well, Joliet, people flinch at it for, you know, for cruel socioeconomic reasons. Sure, gotcha, gotcha. It's a classist, racist thing.

100%. Which, that's why I stan Juliet now. Yeah. Wow. I want to visit Juliet. And I only knew it from now I know so much more about it, too. But we got to segue quickly, Wags,

before we get into food. Yes. I got to know the origin of this Gatorade shirt. Are you a golfer, by the way? Yeah, but only for the last two or three years. OK. And I actually haven't golfed in a year because I got golfer's elbow from pole dancing, from learning pole dancing and gemstones.

Oh my God. Yeah. That's, that's. It sucks. Yeah, that's golfers elbow is fucking awful. It's so much worse than tennis elbow. You were golfing, but you got golfer's elbow from an activity that wasn't golfing. Yes.

Wow. Yeah. That's wild. It's brutal. It happens. I didn't know either, Wags. Um, I'm sure I'm trying to get into it. Yes. Wow. Yeah. That's wild. It's brutal. It happens, I guess. It happens, yeah.

I didn't know either, Wags. Yeah. I'm trying to get into it, so maybe we could golf or something. Oh, pole dancing? I'm not getting into pole, I'm not gonna fucking bend a pole. We should go to the Los Feliz 3,

the swingers clubs. I love it. Right off the five. I love it, let's do it. That's like the, we call it the people's course. It's so, man. It's an easy, it's like a shitty easy course. Oh man, yeah. What'd you call it, the swingers course? the people's course. It's so man. It's an easy, it's like a shitty easy course. Oh man.

Yeah. Would you call the swingers course? People's yeah, it's in swing. It's in swing. Oh, it's in swingers. Okay. But we saw the people's course cause it's, um, it's, it's not for the elites. There's a, we were talking about mess hall or else area, which was in swingers.

That was the Brown Derby. And then also it's called the Derby. And that's where they, they go and like, they go in the movie, they go there. That's like where the big dance number, that's what, that's what mess hall once was. Oh, wow. Um, but I, wait, it's a hundred percent. What, how did you get this Gatorade? How'd I get this?

Okay. So the pandemic, I went a little, we all went crazy in our own separate ways. Sure. I, uh, I started going on eBay and finding like boxes of basketball cards from when I was in junior high. I collected basketball cards just the three years I was in junior high. And there was this run on like on cards

and collecting during the pandemic because everyone was trapped inside. And I was like, you know what? I just need something to make me feel, I don't know, tap back into like some stimming thing that made me feel good as a kid. Yeah. My mom found Gulf War cards during the pandemic.

That's what she got into. Your mom's like Alexander Skarsgard in Garden State all of a sudden. COVID turned her into that. Michael, I have a PSA-9 Norman Schwarzkopf. Don't know who it is, but I know it's a reference. This is an investment. So I started with that, and then that got pretty out

of control, but Lilly was very supportive. But it got out of control. And so I was like, I got to shift gears, but I love the NBA. Um, and I love all teams. So I started going on there and finding hats, uh, of specifically like early nineties, mid nineties before the logos sucked, um, before all the redesigns and like the late nineties, which too sleek. Oh yeah.

And now, yeah, now it's like weird, like, it just feels like, I don't know, tech, everything feels automated and. I feel lucky with Celtics that it is just a classic. So lucky. It's great. Look, all of our primary fandoms, Celtics, Bulls and me, I've lived in Southern California my whole life, Los Angeles, Lakers, these are all like kind of logos

that stand the test of time. And, but yeah, a lot of these teams keep reworking things. And I mean, like, like the Detroit Pistons have a great classic logo, but they had a time in the late nineties where they had a redesign that was pretty aggressively ugly. Ooh, really ugly. Yeah.

There's a ton, yeah, those redesigns, that was gross. So I went back and I started finding hats, the specific brands, and you just keyword search and find stuff. And then I would get them. Sometimes they were in bad shape. This is right at the beginning when I had shifted to hats. And so I figured out this method on how to clean them and basically make them look brand new. Wow. Because they're used.

Yeah, sure. I might be getting some sweaty hat from like a guy from 30 years ago. Sure. So I clean them and then I'm like, oh no no. Now I know how to redeem all these hats. So then I bought like 50 or 60 old hats like this. And I almost wore a Timberwolves one. I'm glad I didn't. Oh, wow.

OK. Because it's, you know. That's fine. OK. Seriously, we over by the time this episode is out. Is it 3-1? It's 3-1. I mean, yeah, whatever.

It's not a great match up. Look, you're set up for the future. Look, you're set up for the future. Yeah, true. Charmed life. And yeah, and then I stumbled across this. I don't even know why. Maybe it was because I started golfing and I looked for like polo or something.

No, actually it was because Lily was kept trying to wear this one polo that I've had since sixth grade. I'm like, absolutely not. Sometimes I'd come home, she'd be wearing this polo. I'm like, this is unacceptable. Like, I'm trying absolutely not sometimes I'd come home. She'd be wearing this polo. I'm like, this is unacceptable I'm trying to take a shit here Vintage polos, you know, what is it? I mash it with the open. It's my own fault You can't shit you gotta hold it in my man, I know and the house you gotta hold it in it's true

Yeah, I gotta book it outside. So yeah, I found this, and I was like, wow, this is really... Oh, I did? Was this the wrong guy? Yeah. And I can't say it? I'll say it now. But this was a...

I had a friend who worked on a sitcom, and I don't know if you've known from Chicago. I've never met him. But he was so lazy that he refused to leave the set to use the restroom. So they had a bucket for him in the closet. Piss bucket. That he would piss in. And at the end of the day, PAs would draw straws and one of them would have to go empty it.

Isn't that a nightmare? It's disgusting. All right, what a fucking fool. I had to do a shrink. Oh, man. I wish we'd keep that in. That's too funny. Yellow, brown, white. Damn.

Tough day for bolts. Good day for bolts. I guess we'd keep it in if we bleeped both names that were just said. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's good. That's good.

Great call back to the shit pissing con You don't lose that Yeah, we can bleep out the can we bleep out the names is that okay? I will talk about it. We'll talk about but anyway We're we're not let's pick it up here. Yeah, we just got back from a story about some actor that has a piss bucket Don't worry about some actor that has a piss bucket. His name is Mike Mitchell. Wait, we were in the middle of something. What were we talking about? Oh, your shirt. We were talking about the origin of your game, Ray Chess.

Oh, yeah. I just went down to eBay rabbit hole where I'm like, you know, I couldn't afford stuff like this when I was a kid. I'm like, now I can. Fuck it. I'm buying the old stuff. And if you learn how to, you know, make something like new, you get a tremendous amount of satisfaction.

Wow. The, you know, maintaining like old stuff, it's nice. That to me is, I love Gatorade already, and that is just a good classic. I am a big Gatorade fan. Are you a Gatorade, are you not a Gatorade fan? I just, I don't give a shit. I'm a Gatorade? Are you not a Gatorade fan? I just, I don't give a shit. It's Gatorade.

It's not like this shirt isn't making me thirsty. You know what? I don't know why that's killing me. I think Lily is right to steal your shirt, then, if you don't care about the Gatorade factor. No, I do. It's cool. And it's the 90s.

It's the retro one. Yeah, the looks are great here. Wait, do you have a favorite? Because you're wearing the Spurs hat. The Spurs hat is great. That classic, I'll go, do you have a favorite? Because you're wearing the Spurs hat. The Spurs hat is great. That classic, I'll go, do you have a favorite in your collection or ones that are your go-to? This one's really high up there.

Yeah, for sure. I love Wemba Nyama. I'm half French, so I'm really proud of Wemba Nyama. I'm very excited about Wemba Nyama. Oh, yeah. And I also, there was this card shop down in South Carolina in Charleston. Shout out to Collector's Corner.

And they were in the mall. Ruff House, the production company, had basically taken over the old Sears when it went bankrupt, and that was their production headquarters. And so one day I was wandering around the mall and I stumbled on this little card shop, memorabilia shop. And I'm like, uh-oh, this is bad news, you know?

Because I'm there alone. Lilly comes out and visits for short periods of time. And so I start buying cards from this guy. And we become buddies. And I'm going in there a lot. And he kind of talked me into buying this expensive box. And I show up, and he's like, hey, I kept something for you in the back.

And he brings it out, and it's kind of expensive. And I'm like, well, OK, let's do it. And I pulled a Wemba Nyama autograph. Wow. That's wild. Holy shit. It's in a safe place. That's cool as hell. Can't be stolen. Wow.

By the way, when Lily visits, when she leaves, how many shirts do you have left? She goes on the road. Yeah, she went on the CBB tour and I only had pants. I had to put pants on and walk around with my head through the crotch. Yeah, head through the fly. Yeah, that makes sense. I'm eating them at all times. Like, ugh, ugh. Wags, you know those days when you want to just get home and get in your bed?

Oh yeah. Well, guess what? That's every day for me. Wow. Cause I have a Helix mattress. That's right. I love my Helix mattress, Wags. I've had it now for about seven years almost.

And how has your sleep improved since you switched to Helix? Fantastically, Wags. I feel like I'm sleeping on a cloud. I love it. Wally and Herman love it. My mom loves it when she comes to visit. I'm a good son and sleep on the couch. Yeah.

It's a fantastic mattress. Uh, I, I have the Moonlight Lux. That's the mattress I have. You know what? I took the Helix Sleep Quiz, answered some easy questions, they matched me with the mattress. It was sent right to my door. Setup was easy. It was a fantastic experience. Mitch, you and I both have a number of ailments that are affected by sleep. I snore, I think you snore. I got a CPAP machine. You talk about your CPAP machine.

I have a lower back pain, and that can be exacerbated by a bad night's sleep. And I have trouble just sleeping through the night oftentimes. Well, Helix will help you with all those wags. And if you're too hot when you sleep, it will cool you down. They got some cool mattresses. They got anything you want.

And I have used it. I'm a proud supporter of Helix for seven years ago. And my next mattress, guess what it's going to be? A Helix? And guess what? What? Your next mattress is going to be Helix, too. Wow.

Go to helixsleep.com slash doughboys for 27% off site wide plus free bedding bundle, sheet set, and mattress protector with any Luxe or elite mattress hoarder. Exclusive for listeners of Doughboys. Wow, do it. This show is sponsored by Liquid Ivy. Mitch, I don't know about you, but I got big summer plans. Really?

Oh yeah, I'm going to the beach, getting some sand between the toes, watching the waves rolling in, I'm going on some hikes. Well, no matter what you do, you're gonna be hydrated. That's right. Prepping for a big summer means planning to stay hydrated so you can get the most out of your body and live more during those warm summer months. Visit liquid IV calm and maximize your summer plans with sugar free hydration featuring the new raspberry lemonade hydration multiplier. Get 20% off your first order with code dough boys at checkout. Wags, you can't go swimming in the ocean

without being hydrated. You'll sink like a stone. You gotta drink that Liquid IV. I drink Liquid IV and I love it. I'm a fan of the strawberry flavor. I actually got some at my house right now. This is true. I bought some on my own,

not even sent to me from Liquid IV. Wow. I am just a purchaser of Liquid IV. I love it, I drink one every night before I go to bed. This is the truth, I put some water in my little thermos, I mix it up, I drink it down, and I love it. I'm hydrated and feeling good the next morning. It's great for workouts, late nights, and traveling.

Mitch, what do you get out of Liquid IV? What are the benefits you feel? Well, as for me, I use my CPAP. I can get pretty dehydrated at night. So before I put that on and go to bed, I'm drinking it down and I wake up and I don't feel as dried out. I feel nice and full of fluids.

And those fluids have true to fruit flavors that keep you hydrated. Find all your favorite hydration multiplier flavors on their website from us, Acai and lemon lime to pina colada. Or choose from their line of sugar-free flavors like raspberry lemonade, white peach, and rainbow sherbet. Wow! Break the mold and own your ritual. Just one stick and 16 ounces of water hydrates better than water alone. Powered by LIV HydroScience, an optimized ratio of electrolytes, essential vitamins,

and clinically tested nutrients that turn ordinary water into extraordinary hydration. Three times the electrolytes of the leading sports drink, eight essential vitamins and nutrients, always non-GMO, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and soy-free. Get ready for summer with extraordinary hydration from Liquid IV. Get 20% off your first order of Liquid IV when you go to liquidiv.com and use code doughboys at checkout.

That's 20% off your first order with code doughboys at liquidiv.com. Let's talk about the Popeyes pickle menu. Popeyes founded in 1972 in New Orleans by Al Copeland, Copeland and infamous huckster Mitch, who we've talked about in the past, who named his chain Popeyes because he wanted the free IP association

with Popeye the Sailor Man. And at the time, Rip Gene Hackman, the French connection, the movie was very, very big and Popeye Doyle, the character from that, was the other association he was trying to claim. He also publicly feuded with interview with a vampire author, Anne Rice, later in life, another New Orleans legend.

Why? Yeah. What was the feud, you know? It was over real estate. It was like basically he owned a property that she wanted and they publicly... A rich person. It was a rich person. Basically, yeah.

Oh, great. One of those. Anyway, there are around 3,000 locations worldwide, which puts in the top 20 of American chain restaurants. It's approximately the size of Jersey Mike's. This is our fifth canonical review of Popeyes, most recently reviewed in 2022 with Van Robe's show, where it entered the Platinum Plate Club. We all gave it five forks. Bug Main, who also made an appearance in that episode,

gave, quote, "'New religions being started by the movies Coco and Soul,' end quote, zero forks. I don't remember what that was in reference to, but. You neither, this is in our Wikipedia. Yeah, it's in our Wikipedia, shout out to the node. Also, apparently I applied the dough boys lock, which means it cannot be unmoored from the PPC.

It is in the Platinum Play Club. I don't know, I guess I did it. Anyway, the pickle menu launched on April 1st of this year. It sounded like an April Fool's joke, but it is a real thing. It's real. No way. Yeah, has been heavily advertised

during the NBA playoffs. The quote is, no one pickles like Popeyes. Perfect for the NBA. Perfect. Yeah. God. Are you a pickle fan? Yeah, where do you stand on pickles?

Yeah, I like pickles. Also, I love cornichon. Oh yeah, those are fun. Yeah. What about fried cornichon? Has anyone done that? No. That's a good idea.

It's like popcorn chicken but pickle version. Jemmy woke up at that notion. Jemmy, hey, what do you think of this clown's idea here, huh, Millie? Fried cornichon? That's interesting. I do like fried pickles, but I like? Yeah. Yeah. Fried cornichon. It's good. That's interesting. I do like fried pickles,

but I like pickles just in general. And I'm more of a, you know, I'm not as much of a, what'd you say? Pickle freak? You're not a pickle freak. I don't know if I'm quite a pickle freak, but I love like- My sister big time pickle freak.

I love more of a dill pickle as opposed to like a bread and butter, as opposed to like, I like a dill relish as opposed to a sweet relish. Speaking of Chicago, just this funny thing of Koalik's cousin, remember the Hannibal Burris? There's, Hannibal Burris has a bit about pickle juice. Oh yeah.

And how he likes to put pickle juice on stuff. And then he got mad at his roommate for throwing it away and the roommate is Koalik's cousin. That's right, yeah. Which is just a very funny Koalik connection that doesn't make sense. Our buddy Koalik. Yeah, which is just a very funny Koalik connection that doesn't make sense. Our buddy Koalik. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The rat man. We love him.

We love him. So right now they have a, I'll just run through all the menu items that they have. Wait, where do you stand on pickles? You like cornichons? My sister's a huge pickle freak. I love cornichons. I love pickles, but the way Hannibal Boris is and the way my sister are like, put like dipping bread into pickle juice. I'll sometimes drink pickle juice. It's also, I'll say this, pickle juice. And I think for this, for, for the Popeyes

pickle menu, if you had one of those pickle lemonades, very strong, we'll get, we'll talk about them. But if you had a hangover, pickle juice I found out is great for a hangover. It's very helpful for a hangover. And I like ate a big pickle once when I was hungover. It was like a lifesaver. I know that sounds insane, but it worked great.

A lot of people sip pickle juice after like an intense workout too, like after a run. You ever heard of this? I believe that actually has something to do with the genesis of Gatorade, is the same sort of restorative properties. So I'm like- Wow, look at that. Yeah, heard of this. I believe that actually has something to do with the genesis of Gatorade, is the same sort of restorative properties. So I'm like- Wow, look at that.

Yeah, look at that. That's nuts. That's crazy. That's the craziest thing we'll find out on this podcast. I am not, I'm not dipping bread into pickle juice. I'm not pouring, I like pickles. I do like them. It's for some people, you know, I'm a bit of into pickle juice. I'm not pouring. I like pickles. I do like them.

It's for some people, you know, I'm a bit of a heat seeker. I do like spicy foods, but for some people, like hot sauce is like an identity. Like I'm putting hot sauce on absolutely everything. I feel like pickles are a similar sort of thing. There's some people who are so into pickles that they gotta have pickles like with basically every meal.

Yeah. But it's not quite that. You know what, my sister loves mustard too. And I feel like the two kind of go together quite a bit. Yeah, they're kind of linked. They kind of both have that sort of sour, sort of pungent quality to them. Yeah, vinegar, I don't know what the deal is.

If you have a sandwich and it has mustard on it, it could also have pickles on it. 100%, yeah. That's your sister, right? That's my sister, 100, yes, yes. She's lifting it up and she's, oh good. Yes, extra pickles always, and pickles on the side. That's in the, and mustard and pickles,

I think do work well together. Well, yeah, there's, I mean, for me, the hot dog is a natural context, and we can talk about Chicago hot dogs if you like, but like, I, if I can get a hot dog with yellow mustard, relish, and then, you know, like ideally dill relish, but sweet relish will do, and then like raw onions.

That's like my favorite. That's like my ideal. Sounds like you don't wanna talk about the Chicago dogs. No, we can talk about them. You wanna talk about them? Sure. No, we can talk about them. You want to talk about them? Sure. What do you think? They're good.

Yeah, they are good. I like the charred dog. Charred dogs are great. Yeah, I like a little ketchup on it. I know that some people will be like, you can't do this, I go, what you doing? Arnold. You got me fucking kidding.

Yeah, Arnold. What if Arnold Schwarzenegger was from Chicago. But yeah, I like ketchup, mustard, relish. I love celery salt. Oh yeah, that's fun. Love celery salt, raw onion, same thing. But I like all the fixings, I guess. Tomato, sport peppers.

Sport peppers, fun. Man, I've had some bad experiences too. God, I had a sport pepper there when I was there in February, I think. Yeah, it was at a Super Bowl party. Oh man. It was bad. Was it too spicy?

What was the deal? It just like hit one of those, like I inhaled and it was like in the nose and then. Oh man. It was the worst. You sometimes bite into a spice, like one of them small, those small guys, those spicy peppers,

it's like hits you in the back of the throat, like rocks your uvula. And it's like, it's just over. I'm a heat seeker too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Da Bulls, that's Arnold's super fan. Da Bull, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. As a super fan, that would have been great. Yeah, one of the super fans. That's what we need AI for. You know, to do that. Barley's getting the heart attack and he's like, oh no, help him with the heart attack.

Get him to the copter. Yeah, get him to the copter. Jim Downey texts you after this episode is out. I'm making that. I'm not gonna make it happen. Okay, so I'll run through the whole menu, and we can just talk about our reactions to them. But we were able to get everything, I'm pretty sure.

Because Amelia went in store, they don't have the fried pickles on the app, but in store, some people were saying they had some success with it. You were able to pick them up there. We got everything except they ran out of the chilled pickle lemonade. Right. The frozen. The frozen.

There's a frozen version of the pickle lemonade, and we did not get that. We got everything else. So there's a pickle glaze sandwich, which is their Popeyes chicken sandwich with a zesty pickle glaze in addition to the standard pickles that come on it. There are pickle glaze bone-in wings and boneless wings,

which is again the pickle infused glaze on those two different wing preparations. There are fried pickles. I'll read the top here. Which a lot of places have not had the fried pickle. We're lucky that we got the fried pickles. That's what I just mentioned. Yeah, that we had to go in person to do it.

Crispy golden brown fried pickles are battered in Popeye's signature seasoning and fried to perfection. And we also got the pickle lemonade and we talked about how we only got the regular one, not the frozen one. And we got some other items, but we'll start with the pickles.

I mean, I will just say this. The fried pickles? I think the pickle stuff in general, the pickle side of the menu. The pickle glaze sandwich, we all got with the pickles. I mean, I will just say this. The fried pickles? I think the pickle stuff in general, the pickle side of the menu. Yeah. The pickle glaze sandwich, we all got one for ourselves. That was kind of my main thing that I ate.

I love the Popeye's chicken sandwich. Have you had it before? Yes. Yeah, it's fucking great. I love it. I'm eating this sum bitch and I'm like, I don't even know that this is a pickle glaze sandwich. Like it's until I basically reach the midpoint

of the sand dough, which is where all of the glaze is concentrated, because they basically just put, like, one I get that they're making these things in a hurry. But they kind of just put one dot on it and then just slam the bun on there. And then I'm not getting that pickle glaze throughout. Whereas I thought the whole breast was going to be coated with a pickle glaze.

That's what I expected. Yeah, tossed in. It's kind of slathered. Yeah. You're saying pickle glaze too much, by the way. I just want to give you a heads up. OK. I like the pickle glaze. I don't think we're going to get through this episode without saying pickle glaze. That's what I expected. Yeah, tossed in. It's kind of slathered, yeah. You're saying pickle glaze too much, by the way. I just want to give you a heads up. Okay. I like the pickle glaze. I don't think we're going to get through this episode

without saying pickle glaze. You just wrote it. I am saying pickle glaze too. I guess it is kind of- Stop saying pickle glaze. So my thing with the pickle glaze is- It is kind of contagious when you say pickle glaze. You do kind of have to say pickle glaze quite a bit.

Anyway, you're talking about the pickle glaze. Yeah, sorry. I was just talking about that pickle glaze. Yeah. I actually, you guys were saying I don't taste any pickle glaze. And I was saying, I actually about the pickle glaze. Yeah, sorry, I was just talking about that pickle glaze. I actually, you guys were saying I don't taste any pickle glaze. And I was saying, I actually do taste pickle glaze, immediately, the sensation, the tastes of the pickle glaze

immediately was resonating through my mouth. You guys were not tasting it. And I got it immediately. Towards the end of my sandwich, the last couple of bites, I was like, oh, there's not pickle glaze on this part of the sandwich. The distribution of the pickle glaze was more on yours. My pickle glaze was, my, mine, it was pretty, it was pretty glazed.

Yeah, they kind of petered north the pickle glaze onto yours. They squirted more onto yours. Yeah, they squirted, they definitely squirted more pickle glaze on yours. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't taste it, I didn't taste it at all in the sandwich. Yeah. I tasted that something was different.

I didn't, and I guess that was the pickle glaze, but it didn't taste it at all in the sandwich. I tasted that something was different. I didn't, and I guess that was the pickle glaze, but it didn't taste like pickles enough for me to think that it was what was advertised. It was pretty subtle. And I'm not saying- Can I ask you a quick question? What is a glaze? Is there a way-

Is it the sauce? Yeah. So you want us to describe pickle glaze in fewer than two words. It's kind of, I feel like glazes are generally sweeter sauces. I know, but I never am talking about, I want to, you know what I could go for is I want to glaze,

give me some sort of glaze, you know what I mean? Well, you have less- And now I'm going crazy about the pickle glaze. You have less of, I will just, I'll just say, you have less of a sweet tooth than I think a lot of people. Like you're not as much of a, right? Yeah, but still sweet tooth people are like, I will need glaze I think some people who like like sweet meat like sweet with their meat will be more into glazes

Yeah, glazes usually applied like during cooking as opposed to a sauce which is applied after Well, not donuts donuts are glazed after the fact See no one knows what the fucking glaze is Before that you're a heat seeker and you what the fucking glaze is. I love it. Have you said this before, that you're a heat seeker and you're a sweet seeker? I am, I've actually, we kind of, but here's the thing, I'm not really a sweet,

I like sodas, which I guess makes me a sweet seeker. But I'm not like, I don't have like a huge sweet tooth. Maybe that isn't even true. I'm looking for a definition of glaze. Maybe I am, maybe I just am a fucking sweet seeker, and I can't fucking come to terms with it for whatever reason. I like sweet drinks the most, though.

And I try not to drink them ever. But sweet drinks I like more than desserts. Glazes generally are, this is, I'm just looking to one definition here. I think we maybe have said sweet seeker and seed seeker. Fuck, that sucks. Smooth, shiny coatings. Smooth, shiny coatings. Smooth, shiny coatings applied to the surface of a dish,

generally sweet or savory, and usually made by reducing a liquid until it thickens. So yeah, a lot of times they are sugar-based or fat-based, and so that's why they're not necessarily sweet by definition, but a lot of them are. Okay. But yeah, I don't know. I mean, like, I hear it's basically just a sauce.

It's just, just think of it as a thicker sauce. I would say it's not. I think the glaze part is fake, maybe. It is just a pickle sauce. It's just a pickle sauce and they could have used more of it. But I don't know. What did you, like, like, like, beyond it not quite meeting your expectations.

Well, well, cause also there wasn't enough sauce on my sandwich. So when I had the boneless chicken wing and that was covered in sauce, then I really hit it. And it was spicier than I thought. And it wasn't too chemically, you know? But I did say when we were eating it, I'm like, I wonder if they just were experimenting. They made a new sauce.

And they were like, uh, like it's not, you know, it's not poison. What flavor is it? And someone was like, I don't know, pickle? And they were like, oh my god, pickle. Yes, great. When do we do it? And they're like, NBA playoffs.

Ha ha ha ha. Were they working backwards from the sauce, or did they have the idea for a pickle menu and were like, let's try to approximate that as much as possible? I do think not enough sauce on the sandwich, at least our versions of it. Did you all get the sandwich? Emma, you got something, didn't you? I got just some chicken tendies.

Okay, how are those? They were great. Yeah. I mean, Popeyes' fried chicken is delightful. The wings I thought were good, we got both the bone-in and the boneless with the pickle glaze, as I mentioned. Yes, you're right, Tim, that there was like a reservoir in one of the boneless containers of pickle glaze,

and that was the best way to taste what it actually, like, you know, was supposed to taste like. And I took one of those bone-in wings and just kind of, you know, dipped it in there. And I was like, this is pretty good. I don't think I'd ever order this if this was like, hey, here are all the options and one of them is pickle glaze. I'm going to choose pickle glaze over a hot buffalo

or a barbecue. I don't know why I'd do that to myself. But I do think it was a pretty good, in terms of delivering on that expectation. Yeah, and it was a weird little reservoir, like you were saying. It was really strange. I don't know why there was so much in that we, we hit, we definitely hit oil in that one container.

The spirits were completely uneven. Yes. For all our experiences. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm the same. It didn't ruin any of the chicken. No.

It was just a sauce that I'm like, well, I wouldn't naturally go there. And they should have had sauce on the side, right? That we could have dipped. Yeah. Like they, but they can't do it, cause they called it a glaze. Yeah. It would have been nice because we got,

they have so many sauces on the side there that you can get and we got a bunch of them. It's like Chick-fil-A, they got eight different sauces. We got a bunch of them. I love their black and ranch. I wanna just give a word to these restaurants. The dough boy's like uniform squirts. Give us uniform squirts.

Right, Wigz? Uniform squirts. We want the uniform squirts. Yes. This does not have it. And also, to get into the, there's one item that had arguably too much pickle, a liquid item, a little too much squirt of pickle in it.

Yeah, we'll get to that. But what did you think of those wings? Because you're a boneless guy. I liked them quite a bit. And I also think that Popeyes for fast food wings, I'm not even counting like fast casual, like wing stop and even though wing stop is fast food, basically, but wing stop and Buffalo Wild Wings,

I won't include in this. And I think that Popeyes has good wings for fast food. Like, I'm like, a place that has a drive-through and has wings that level, I can't think of many others that are that good. I'd rather just have their fried chicken. Same, yes, of course. But if you want wings, the thing is they are like breaded,

and that makes them pretty heavy. And it's not necessarily always like, to me, that's just like, oh, it's just the wing part of the fried chicken. Just give me the, just give me a quarter. But they are, me the just give me a good they are too. They're tasty. They're pretty good. Yeah, they're good I think they're well fried and and you I know you like boneless over bone in I like bone in I thought they were Good bone in wings, but what do you think of the boneless? I just look I talk about how they're back East There are good boneless and I everyone makes fun of me for that

But they're like when you come back can I just show you good boneless wings? Yeah, fine. Sure. Whatever. What do we want? Why are you mad at that? I'm not. I just want to do it. Let's go. Let's do it. Let's get boneless wings. All right. Fuck yeah. Where are the good boneless wings? Yeah. Where are we going?

We'll go to a place in Quincy. Maybe we'll go to Fowler House or something like that. OK. But there are good boneless wings. And like, I do like, but I also do like wings. I'm not like anti-wing. Yeah, sure. Yeah.

Tim, where do you stand? Boneless, bone and wings? Either one. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Tim, where do you stand? Boneless, bone-in wings? Either one. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? Honestly, that's the same.

That's the reasonable middle we need in this country right now. Yeah. That is a dose of sanity. They're both good. It's more about how it's cooked, if it's what the rub is, what the sauce is. You can fuck up both. Yeah.

Are you advocating for more centrists? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, radical centrists. that's what we need. I'm the Pete Buttigieg of this. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I go on Flagrant talking about this and they're like, oh wow, really, no kidding. Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Oh, okay. Yeah, yes, this didn't occur to you? Ha ha ha ha ha ha. Jesus Christ. This is propaganda but not the shit you're regurgitating? Ha ha ha ha ha. Oh, my God. Podcasters are America's thinkers now.

Those clips drive me fucking crazy. Oh, I love it. Like, oh, I just thought that was fact. You did? You fucking idiot. That's what you thought was fact. You ate that shit up? Talk about getting fucking glazed.

Jesus Christ. It's such a misinformation problem in this country. Fuck, anyway, sorry. We can cut that out if you want. No, no, country. Fuck. Anyway, sorry. We cut that out if you want. No, no, I love it. I love it. And also. Doughboys needs that energy more.

Yeah. The fuck you talking about with pickle glaze? Dude, people are so like, it's one thing to act hard. If a brand is like, all I do is act hard, and I punch down on people because they're weak, or they're stupid, or whatever. That's what we want Doughboys to be. But, oh, that's what you want it to be?

That's what we want it to be, yeah. So you want to be that. Yeah, we want to be that. We're aspiring to that. Yeah, we're aspiring to that. Seems pretty lucrative. What's crazy to me is that it's like, okay, fine, that's your brand.

You can't be so easily disproven. Yes, yeah. You know? You can't be like, I'm taking on the nerds. You're like, well then, you can't be wrong all the time and easily disproven. You can't be hard and fucking stupid. And I get if you're fucking stupid,

that's your main option. But man, you don't understand how dumb you look. You don't look hard. You don't look hard. You look fucking stupid. I love this. I love it. It's like we're all paying the fucking price

for this stupidity. And what do we get from it? A couple dudes looking hard? Who gives a fuck? We're all worse because fucking price for this stupidity. Yeah, and and what do we get from it? A couple dudes looking hard who gives a fuck? We're all worse because a couple dudes are like I'm fucking hard. Yeah, nobody gives a shit We're all suffering now because a couple dumbasses are like I'm on fucking top man You know, I'm fucking making it with my fucking fans Lee or you know, my fucking patreon or whatever They fuck it whatever the fuck it is. Who gives a fuck? All these people are misinformed now, and you're like,

-"I'm on top." Of what? A fucking mountain of stupid? Oh. I'll say this. No one has ever accused the Doughboys of being hard. In many different ways. They have. It's not just in podcasting. Cool doesn't exist. It's a fucking social construct. It's malleable. It changes based on every situation. You go around a bunch of band geeks,

they're making fun of jocks. You go around a bunch of jocks, they're making fun of band geeks. Like, it doesn't fucking matter. You're gonna fucking die, and the hill that you died on is like, I was hard but wrong. Right. Fuck off.

I think... Fuck off. I think Joe Rogan is one of our most important thinkers. I didn't even, I didn't mention any names. I, well, I just, I just want to put that out there that I think Joe Rogan is one of our most important thinkers. I didn't mention any names. I just want to put that out there, that I think Joe Rogan is one of our most important thinkers. What do you think of that?

I think that if you look at the, you're right, Tim, that if you look at the broad swath of time, that's the thing that gets it for me. Because you could be the coolest guy in like 1920, and you look back at that guy, it's like, look at this fucking guy. Yeah. What the fuck's he doing? He was wrong like 99.5% of his fucking life.

Yeah, sure. But he lived in a cool way at the time, and then in hindsight, it's like, this guy was a fucking loser. Like, that's what you want? Right. Those are goals? Yeah. Okay.

Do you think there's any time I could go back to where I'd be the coolest guy? Any decade? For sure. Do you think so? Prehistoric? All these animals. Prehistoric? All these animals are right. Prehistoric decade?

Oh, oh, oh, what is this? We're just picking leaves off the tree. We're like, you can't do that, oh fuck. I just get dunked on by some fucking caveman at some point. I don't want to, I agree with you. Just goes up in points and laughs at your dick. I'm like, ooh. Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.

Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh.

Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh.

Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. I'm not even trying to point that out. Because the influence of these networks are, they're vast and sadly they are important, right? Because of the influence that they exert. I'm just baffled that critical thinking

is at such a low point that you can't say like, hey, a year ago I heard this thing and I took it for fact and then it turned out to be fucking wrong, but I keep listening to the thing that is consistently wrong. Yeah. And I ascribe like a coolness or a valor to it, which means nothing and only keeps you misinformed.

Like, that to me, you don't have the capacity to stop that cycle in your life. I have a name for it. Why? I mean, it's peer pressure. You know, it's the same reason like abusive people are all around and nobody denounces them. It's cause you know what? My fucking neighbor is an abusive piece of shit.

If I start spouting my mouth off about it, I'm gonna get repercussions. That's how abuse persists. Your neighbor hears this podcast like, hey, what the fuck? Yeah. Yeah. Fuckin' dog.

Let him come for you. Yeah. If your neighbor's a piece of shit, I wouldn't be surprised if he's listening and watching this podcast. No, I'm, yeah, I have great neighbors. No, yeah. Oh, actually, no, no. It's the weird part of the Venn diagram for Doughboys.

Like, all my neighbors are pieces of shit, but they do listen to the show. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I call that culture, by the way. You're not going to like this. Let's fucking go culture. That's like, it reminds me of like Pat McAfee or like these guys who are like, fucking, let's fucking go dude.

It's like, well, you should, before going, you should sit down and think about it for a minute and what you're saying and what you're saying is wrong and dumb. You know what I mean? Like- It's all short-term adrenaline-based. Yes, yeah. It's like just everyone's going until they crash.

It's crazy, cause I, you know, I got off of social media almost completely a few years. I mean, man, two or three years ago at this point. And so I'm realizing how much of the stuff is just like something I miss entirely outside of people telling me about it, or I'm in a group text and someone posts a clip and I was like, what is this?

And the people are like, oh, this is some huge thing that I'm just completely aware of. Cause it's like, so much of this is coming via algorithms, right? This is stuff that's just fed to you if you're just on these platforms. Yeah. And we're so deep into that,

that people not understanding that and being like, wait, I'm being manipulated is just irresponsible. And it's also for many, it's a privilege that I am able to opt out because a lot of people is like, hey, either this is my job or I have to do this to have this platform to be able to get work or whatever the fuck. It's like, yeah, you know, be able to get work or whatever, whatever the fuck, you know?

It's like, it's, yeah, it sucks. It's a bad world. Anyway, the Popeyes, the Popeyes Pickle Glaze, the Popeyes Pickle Glaze itself, I agree, is pretty tasty. I just don't know if it actually enhances any of these. Like, wouldn't you rather just have all of these things just with a different sauce or with no sauce? I don't know if it actually enhances any of these. Like, wouldn't you rather just have all of these things just with a different sauce or with no sauce? I don't know.

Here's a question for you. What would that glaze enhance for you? Like, if you were dipping fries in it, so it clearly didn't do it for fried chicken, what would you dump that on? I think fried chicken is the best option. And I think I just don't think this glaze. I think it's just not for me.

Maybe some people really like pickles. I it's glaze. I think it's just not for me. Maybe some people really pick things like it. I was nicer, too. I do like pickles. No, I don't even dislike it. I'm just saying, like, anytime, it's like you get an Oreo varietal, right? And you're like, OK, I'm going to have the new, you know. Dill Oreo.

Yeah, the new Dill Oreo. Pickle glazed Oreo. Pickle glazed Oreo. Green center. I think the comparison point is always, do I prefer this to the default? Or is the gimmick enough where it's just like, even if this is a one-off, I'm enjoying it. And I'm not sure if that's even really the case with either of these, right? It's almost not quite gimmicky enough to be notable.

And it's also certainly not better than just like a regular Popeye's chicken sandwich or regular Popeye's wings. So when it comes to gimmicks like that, you need a hard gimmick. Like you need a Dave Matthews band Oreo. Exactly, yes. Hell, yeah. Brown, yellow, white. Or whatever.

Like, each one is like, it's different. It's like the brown's in the middle, and the white and the yellow. And so it's like coming with shit in the middle. You're down with this? Yellow would represent golden Oreo. White is the cream. And then a brown Oreo, this idea is enticing to me.

What song from his catalog is playing over the commercial for this? I mean, the worst part of it is- I wanna hear both. Well, I don't know DMB's catalog particularly well. I mean, Too Much would be a great song because- Which one's Too Much? I eat too much, that one.

Oh yeah, that's a good one. Too much, but you know, like, that is even almost too much of a D cup, you know, that was one of the singles. If you don't have one, I'll give you one. Yeah, go for it. You can take Crash. Crash, yeah.

Which one's Crash? Crash into me. Milk. Crash into milk. Oh yeah, you can do that. Oh, so you're changing the lyrics? Dunk into milk. I think the funniest choice would be S Oh, so you're changing the lyrics? Dunk into milk. I think the funniest choice would be satellite. I just think it'd be so funny.

That's good. The satellite's one of the most funny. The satellite sheep cookies. Satellite, and then it's like, oh, in my eyes. And then it got to be singing. They're jacking off. And it's like shitting, and then it's all going into a bucket, and like, how I wonder.

And they're pouring it into the Oreo tins. Remember? These guys are disgusting. Let me say this. Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum. Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum. This is a fan right here. I can feel it. No, no, I just had that album. It was one of my first 11 Columbia House albums.

It's a great. Under the Table in Dreaming is a great album. And I'll tell you this, Dave Matthews not a guy who tries to be hard. And also, fled South Africa because he didn't want to join the apartheid army and would stand up to the restaurants in South Africa. And when they were segregated, he

would have his friends come in and sit on his lap in the restaurant. Dave Matthews is the man. The opposite of these fucking stupid podcasters that we have to deal with, who we are too of, basically. Yeah, sure. You guys are complicit. Yeah, we're 100% complicit.

I can't wait for our trial. I hope that we're both hung. Caveman's not gonna think so. Maybe he'll be pulling. This guy's not hung enough. This is also a scenario of hanging from a noose and my pants fall down. It's like the most embarrassing thing in the fucking world.

No, no, no, no, no. Oh, fuck. Not like this. The gallows breaks. Oh. Land on your butt. You don't die. What's worse is you don't die, and everyone knows you have a small penis.

Weger's dead. Weger's dead, and you're not even mourning. You're just like, oh, they all know. They all know. They saw my penis. Oh, jeez. If there's a nooseger's dead. You're not even mourning. You're just like, oh, they all know. They all know. They saw my penis. Oh, jeez. You're going to start.

If there's a noose around your neck, you're going to, by habit, start cranking it. Worst case scenario for both of you guys. You can't get hard. Weger's super hard. Oh, god. Let me come before I die. Fried pickles. I thought the fried pickles were great.

I really liked them. Do you want one last nut? I guess that's just what you made me think of. Like as you die? Not as you die. I mean, that's a crazy experience. I'm sure it's happened to people, because it's like such a like, people have heart attacks

as you're nutting. Yeah. Keradian. Oh, yeah. Ohadian. Oh yeah. Oh God, yeah. But there's, people are like, oh, was it that? Was it set up or whatever? Yeah, I know, I think there's a lot of cases like that,

which are people who are doing that and then they pass away sadly. Yeah, yeah. But would you want that? It's too much of a sensation for me. I think I would just rather die. So much of this is contextual. Like I don't, how are we,

what kind of death are we talking about here? Okay, that's fair enough. I don't know. Are we talking in a hospital bed or are we talking on a battlefield? I mean, there's different things. So one was where you would not and one is where you wouldn't not?

Well, I don't know. It just changes the calculation a little. All right, you know what? I shouldn't even have gotten into this. We'll just get rid of this entire conversation. Like, am I being murdered? Because you're definitely nothing. LAUGHING

The guy is strangling you or stabbing you. They said at Gettysburg, Gettysburg Field was covered in cops. LAUGHING And Lincoln, there's a ton of like scratched out stuff in the Gettysburg address. It's just like, should I, shouldn't I? Four score and seven loads ago? No.

No. The Gettysburg address is kept under glass because it's super sticky. Like if anyone touches it, it will stick to their hands like forever. Uh, uh, uh. He was, as he's reading it, he's like, uh, damn.

Uh. Yeah, would you, what's worse, would you, to come on a battlefield or in a hospital bed? I think, well, again, it depends on, are we surrounded by loved ones, you know? Or is it like- No, you're found either way by someone from the medical profession.

So I'm alone in either one. Then I guess it probably doesn't matter. Wow, you've refused to answer. I think both would be fine. Oh, okay. I'd rather die in a hospital bed, certainly than be like shot to shit. I don't think that you'll die in a battlefield

at this point. Yeah, I don't think, probably not. Unless things really go south. Yeah, conventional battlefield. Yeah. Fried pickles. Yeah, the fried pickles. The fried pickles are good.

Yeah, they were great. Here's the thing, it comes with, I thought that was actually the standout of this whole thing. And I was like, they fried pickles. The fried pickles are good. Yeah, they were great. It comes with a, I thought that was actually the standout of this whole thing. And I was like, they could have just added fried pickles and that could have been the, instead of leaning so hard into the gimmick. Then again, we're probably not doing an episode about it if it's just that.

But the fried pickles as a one-off side were, I thought, just like they were so crisp. They were so, especially like them traveling over here. I was like, this is just a really good execution of a classic app. And they have that, the ranch dipping sauces default, but they got so many dipping sauces there. I love their blackened ranch.

And that's what I dipped these bad boys in. And I was just having a ball. They were so much better than I expected. You know what I wish I had done? I wish I'd put the fried pickles on the sandwich. Oh, that would have been smart. The fried pickles maybe could have just also been on the sandwich, because that would have differentiated it

from the regular sandwich just a little bit more. And then if the glaze doesn't taste enough like pickles, you're like, oh, I don't know. I'm tasting pickles anyway. Exactly, yeah. Here's the thing. The pickle glaze, it's basically just dill flavor, right? I mean, like, that's mostly what you're getting here is like a p-

it's maybe a little more. But it had a little bit of spice to it. It had a little, a small amount of burn. And it had also a little bit of sweetness to it. I don't know. It was hard to place exactly. Okay, all right, fair enough. I liked the, I liked the chicken.

I liked all the chicken fine. I don't think it's the best sauce in the world, but I did not think it was bad. And I don't think it's chemically, which is huge. Not chemically, no, not too sciency. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which is, I think a lot of the times when you get something like this,

it is sciency and not good. Just kidding. Does anyone want to know how the glaze works chemically? Let's think about that earlier. Let's talk about the pickle lemonade. So I have, I mean, I'm sure, I'll hold this up to camera here, you can see I have about 9 tenths of this left. I've had very little of this to sip on.

It is, I mean, I'll take another sip of it here. Obviously the ice has melted, so it's changed the composition of a little bit, but. It's so aggressively pickly in a way where I don't think I could drink a whole one of these unless I was like, kind of like I had to for some reason. I mean, it's not terrible, but it's just like,

you're drinking, you're just drinking sweet and pickle juice. I will give them credit that it's not terrible, but it's just like, you're just drinking sweetened pickle juice. I will give them credit that it's the most authentic in that it tastes like they just dumped pickle juice into lemonade. It really does. And so I give them props for that and- Yeah, they went for it. I guess if you're really looking for the pickle flavor,

that's the one that nails it more than anything else. For sure, yes. It's a lot, it is a lot. I took three sips and I was like, what am I doing? Yeah. Yeah, again, if you were hungover, I think it would be pretty good. It needs to be a little bit more sweet.

There's just, and I wonder if the frozen one is a little bit more sweet, or maybe it just tastes the same thing but frozen. I have no idea. It could be, I mean, it's a pretty intense flavor, and the aftertaste really lingers. Would it work with like alcohol, like a pickle back? I think it's a pickle back, yeah.

But we're talking about pickle back, what are you doing? You're basically doing another shot, right? You're just taking a shot of whiskey with a shot of pickle juice. But I'm curious if like you made that like a cocktail somehow. I think it could maybe work, yeah. Is there a whiskey lemonade cocktail? Is that called something?

Probably, we used to make dirty Arnold Palmer's with like like a lemonade and a sweet tea vodka something like that So yeah, you could put like maybe like a sweet tea in there. Emma was a bartender for like that Oh nice. It's like pickle and alcohol tends to go well together. So it feels like sweet pickle chaser Did you work at a place in town? No back in Boston So, you know it I I actually don't know. Where were you? Mass Ave Tavern, which is now closed. It was like a sports bar on the corner of Mass Avenue,

Newbury Street. OK. And then the Salty Pick, which is still there. It's on Dartmouth Street right across from Back Bay Station. Did you guys see the, you know how you're talking about new, what? What are you doing? What are you setting up here?

You're just talking about how like the new, like, like they change the mascots all the time. Uh huh. Do you see the new Hugo the Hornet? And no, I didn't for the Charlotte Hornets. It's just crazy. They got them jacking off. Did you just draw that?

What did you do? Did you just draw a picture of the Charlotte Hornets mascot jacking off? You think I drew it in the time? Where did you get that? Rule 34, Charlotte Hornets mascot jacking off. You think I drew it in the time that- Where did you get that? Rule 34, Charlotte Hornet. It was the thing I meant to do earlier. I forgot to do it and I want to do it. And so I did it.

You want to see every NBA mascot jacking off? I mean, that is also fun, but look, I'm tired today, all right? What do you want from me? You're thriving. Fuck you, I guess. You're breaking shit. You're gonna cut yourself. No, it's not sharp.

It's very, it's actually very- The edges are sharp. It looks sharp. It's actually very not sharp. It's very actually blunt. It's very blunt. Okay. It's very actually blunt. It's very blunt. OK. Actually, it is kind of sharp.

Um. You can just leave it. Mitch is for audio listeners. Mitch disassembled his microphone arm, and Tim is helping him reinstall it. I shouldn't have looked up Hugo the Hornet rule 34. No, I think that was a good use of our time. I think that the pickle lemonade was, I'd rather have looked up Hugo the Hornet rule 34. No, I think that was a good use of our time. I think that the pickle lemonade was,

I'd rather have like a, if we're gonna go for this sort of direction, what is a pickle but a pickled cucumber, I'd rather just have like more of a cucumber sort of treatment. And it's true for cocktails too. It's like the sourness of pickle I like in certain contexts. Emma, I do like a pickle back.

I've had that before and I think that is a lot of fun. But I, but like, again, a whole pickle cocktail, that to me seems overwhelming. I'd rather be in Cuketown. Cuketown, speaking of, this might be controversial. My favorite Gatorade flavor, lime, cucumber. Wow, you'd rather be in Cuketown than, you'd rather be in Cuketown than Pickletown?

I think so. For a beverage, for a drink? Yeah. You like this more than a cucumber lemonade? Cucumber is just, I don't, I- You don't like a cucumber cocktail? I don't like a cucumber cocktail. Oh wow, interesting.

I know. Cucumber lemonade, cucumber lime, is that what it is? Yeah. That's your favorite? Yeah, I don't know why. No, it's a good flavor. I love it. I like it.

It's also, that's my hangover helper right there. Sure, okay, yeah, that makes sense. I mean, like I think pickle also is helpful. But the Gatorade cucumber lime is your, that's your- That's my go-to, yeah, that makes sense. I mean, like I think pickle also is helpful. But the Gatorade cucumber lime is your, that's your- That's my go-to, yeah. Wow, okay. I know. Deas, did you try the pickle I made? I didn't, I'm kind of scared.

Yeah, you don't have to. No pressure. I like, this is a thing that I'm glad we got it to be comprehensive. And I do, again, in terms of the gimmick, this and the fried pickles are really delivering whereas I think the other the chicken items are under delivering but I don't feel like I think it's particularly pleasant to drink.

I agree I think it's I think it's a I think it's a swing and a miss but but but it's your if you're if you're a pickle fanatic I think that you would like it. It feels weird to add something salty to what is notoriously a very sweet drink like lemonade is super super sweet usually, so adding salt feels off. I agree though, if you're a pickle freak, like you'd probably go nuts for that. I just don't think that's a critical mass of people

to justify ever keeping that on. But we're gonna have it till June because of the playoffs. That's true, I wonder if they're gonna keep it going through all the playoffs, because again, it seemed like it was just gonna be an April thing, but it's had a long tail. And they put up ads with Anthony Edwards sipping on it and being like, get your pickle freak on.

They should. It's been very, like a lot of places don't have all the items. It feels like a half campaign. It feels like a lot of people can't get what they're advertising. But again, we were able to get everything. And I was using the app. And the app had the app just had the sandwich and the pickle lemonade.

That was all you could order directly. However, if you went and ordered wings, you could specify the pickle glaze among the wing options. And then, like as you said earlier, if you go into the store, they will sell you the fried pickles at certain locations. So I think it's just like kind of locational dependent. Can I just tell you something? Yeah.

Hugo the Hornet, Rule 34, came back with only that one picture. That's it. Benny the Bull, there's so many Rule 34 pictures. I would imagine, much more iconic mascot. Yeah, do you want to see this one? Yeah. Is he jacking off? He is jacking off. Yes

That's disturbing. Yeah, no load there. That's a big load. Yeah No, he's shooting like a crazy rope would you be okay? This is a different one would you be you were talking about mascots remade. Would you be okay if this was the new Benny the Bull? Okay, so this one is not, this we can show, this is PG-13, he's wearing basketball shorts. You do see some of his pubes. He's pretty buff. Yeah, I guess we're seeing a little bit of pubes.

I think with the NBA, they'd at least, they'd, But it's fur. Yeah, it's fur, but it's also like, he's clearly trimmed, he's trimmed above and below. Yes, he's left a little, it's like, but it's also like he's clearly trimmed. He's trimmed above and below. Yes, he's left a little, it's like a moustache, a pub moustache. Okay, sure. It's stylized? It's a stylized...

Is it the same guy as before? And then you can see his hog going down the left leg of his shoulder. Oh, is it the same guy? Yeah, it's pretty substantial. It's as big as his fucking thighs. Yeah. Should I search, uh, Jamie Doughboy's rule 34? No, Mitch.

For the love of God, no. What's wrong with you? No, but I'm terrified if that exists. Don't do that. I have to delete it. Don't even say that. What do you mean don't even say it? I didn't make it that.

If someone makes that because I said it, that's on them. That's not on me. Will you search, uh, Philly's Fanatic? Philly's Fanatic, 100% I will. See, I think this one right here actually I think could be, but if they'd obviously have to shave the pubes and maybe take in the groin a little bit. But I think that this could almost be a mascot.

They could do a hot version of Benny the Bull if they wanted to, but it's also these things are for children, right? Yeah, this is a good point. This isn't for the adult furry community, which is thriving, and God bless them. But I mean, this is, that is the purpose of a sports mascot. I'd say this should be for, all the G League mascots

should be this horny. That's a good idea, honestly. They pander to furries with a G League, specifically. You beta test them in the G League. Rule 34, Philly fanatic, there are hits. I'll say that. There are hits. There's just, OK, there is one hit. Basically, this is say that. There are hits. There's just, okay.

There is one hit, basically this is almost like the Charlotte Hornet, Hugo the Hornet. There's gotta be more than this, because the Philly Fanatic is well known. I'm sure more people are doing it. Did you search pH, A-N? Yes, yes, yes, of course I did. I don't know.

There's this one, it's just the Philly Fanatic has one tit out, basically. There is just the one tit coming out. I guess we're not really sure what the Philly Fanatics Anatomy is. So I guess that's, that's a fair guess. Yeah. As to what's going on under there.

I have a feeling this is going to maybe for a few hours, like temporarily ruin my household. I'm just walking from one room into another and showing Lily another rule of 34. Until she tells me to stop. Okay, there's a second, all right. Oh yes, yes, yes, yes. There's a second hit.

Okay. And I'll just say this, the Philip Fanatic is on the, is on a floor and it looks like, I don't know who the mascot is that he's like, has his little tongue, his little tongue coming out of his nose is licking the balls of this one guy. But also the Hamburglar is licking that guy's foot. Okay.

And then you know who's sucking off the Hamburglar? Grimace. Bugs Bunny. Bugs Bunny, okay. And then you know who's sucking off Bugs Bunny? Now this is taken over to a couch. You know who's sucking off Bugs Bunny? So now we've got to really think about, okay,

because each one is really disconnected to the previous one. Someone's sucking off Bugs Bunny here. What does your head say? What does your heart say? The first thing that came to my head was SpongeBob. SpongeBob's a pretty good guess. I was going to guess Stitch. Pretty good. I think you should think

in the area of Bugs Bunny. So another Looney Tunes character? No. Elmer Fudd. A classic. Oh, a classic. Felix the Cat? Mickey. That's right, Amelia. I knew you'd get it. Itmer Fudd. A classic. Oh, a classic. Felix the Cat? That's right, Amelia.

I knew you'd get it. It's just Mickey. Mickey is sucking off bugs. I've seen enough of this shit to know. I'm gonna say, oh, this kid marked four. And guess who's jacking off Mickey? Goofy. Close, Kermit.

So each one is from a different universe. This is like the crossover of crossovers. Meanwhile, on the top of the couch, Pac-Man is getting railed by who? Pac-Man? Yeah. Is it another video game character? Yes.

Captain America. Good guess. But it's another video game character specifically? Yes. Okay, so is it Sonic the Hedgehog? Nope. Megaman? Is that Mario?

It's Mario. It is Mario, okay. Here it is. You can see that I'm not lying. It is Mario, okay. Mario. Here it is. You can see that I'm not lying. That is exactly what's happening. Yeah, so okay. But wait, where's the Philly Fanatic? The Philly Fanatic's over here in the corner.

I don't know who that bug is that he- Kind of crazy that Philly Fanatic slid into this group. Yeah, I guess if they're just kind of like, who is the most iconic sports mascot? I can kind of understand. Sports mascot, food mascot, and then we've got just a bunch of like the cartoon A-listers. There was also a health thing

that said my heart rate was raising. It's kind of just a weird coincidence. The phone's tracking you and it's gonna be like, here's the one that like made your heart race the most. Kermit fucking Mickey. We got a couple of other, or a handful of other items that are just evergreen. We got the red beans and rice, which

is one of my favorite fast food sides, I thought. That was great today. The mac and cheese and the mashed potatoes. I don't necessarily love their mashed potatoes. I think they're very functional. I think the mac and cheese was pretty solid today. And then the other LTO they have right now is the strawberry biscuits, which they have periodically,

but we've never reviewed them on the podcast. This is a little sweet, little salty, and then it's got a strawberry bits inside and a creamy icing on top. I mean, I like the strawberry biscuit kind of bit. I like it too. I think I like just a regular biscuit. I'd rather have a regular biscuit,

but it's a sweet treat, it's fun. Yeah, it was good. And also like the icing, not too much. It doesn't cover the regular biscuit, but it's a sweet treat. It's fun. Yeah, it was good. And also like the icing, not too much. It doesn't cover the whole thing. Just a bit of Dave Matthews icing on there. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm gonna say this too, by the way. There is rule 34 MBA I have found. So there is just like a- MBA? Yes, there is- Like the logo? Jerry Webb.

Yeah. But the shadow of it. There's like the Milwaukee Buck is like showing it's like butt off, stuff like that. There's just one. And balls. Yeah, there, I just realized that there's a little more going on down there.

There's just an NBA category. I do love that classic Buck's logo. Now they have the fear of the deer, it's like kind of aggro, but there was a time when it was just a little bit more wholesome, it's fun. Yeah, it feels very like, almost like Jetsons animation style. There's some good stuff in there. very like, almost like Jetsons anime style. Right, right.

There's some good stuff in there. I'm gonna go with that hat too. Oh, wow. It was close to the green. I have a Dallas Mavericks on a Milwaukee Bucks one. Just like everything else, it just, we're in Tomorrowland future, like we were saying recently, of like just a shitty glossy, there's no flavor, you know what I mean? It's all gone. But there's a lot of, there's almost arguably too much flavor in all of these items.

Thank you to Aura Frames for sponsoring this episode. Thank you, Aura Frames. Yes, Mother's Day is coming up and you can give the perfect gift that keeps on giving and that's an Aura Frame. Aura Frame, folks. A-U-R-A. Aura frames come with a vivid HD display, unlimited storage, and the ability to preload the frame with photos and videos of your family. Yeah, mom's gonna really like that one.

Of course, it's easy to set up. It's the perfect gift for any occasion, especially Mother's Day. And you can play live photos, videos up to 30 seconds. It's private. The photos look like real prints. It's got it all. Yeah, you can even preload this thing. So it shows up with photos of you already on it. They can't get mad at that because it's photos of you.

So they can't be like, I don't like this gift. Cause at the end of the day. Cause it's saying, I don't like you. And that's messed up to say on mother's day. Exactly. I mean, why would they do that? Yeah. No, they have to like it.

So if you want to give that perfect gift, Aura has a great deal for mother's day for a limited time listeners can save on the perfect gift by visiting AuraFrames.com to get $45 off plus free shipping on their best-selling Carver Mat Frame. Great deal, great frame. That's aura, A-U-R-A, frames.com. Use promo code PHOTO, terms and conditions apply. PHOTO, folks, don't forget it. Thank you, Aura.

Thanks. This new year, why not let Audible expand your life by listening? Audible CA contains over? 890,000 total titles within its current library including audiobooks podcasts and exclusive audible originals That'll inspire and motivate you Tap into your well-being with advice and insight from leading professionals and experts on better health relationships career finance, and more. Maybe you want to kick a bad habit or start a good one.

If you're looking to encourage positive change in your life, one day and challenge at a time, look no further than Tabitha Brown's I Did a New Thing, 30 Days to Living Free. In the audiobook, Tab shares her own stories and those of others alongside gentle guidance and encouragement to create these incredible changes for yourself and see what good can come from them.

Trust me, listening on Audible can help you reach the goals you set for yourself. Start listening today when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.com slash wonder ECA. That's audible.com slash wonder ECA. That's audible.com slash wonder ECA. We should get to our final thoughts. So Tim, you know the podcast before you know this works. We'll each go around and give our closing argument on Popeyes and end by giving it a score from zero to five forks.

You can talk about the pickle menu. We can also talk about Popeyes in general. Tim Balz, our guest, we'll start with you. I am a big fan of Popeyes. It was a Popeyes in my hometown growing up, so no stranger to it. I also think the chicken sandwich, kind of revolutionary, set a pretty high bar that other fast food chains

have tried to reach. 100%. Some successful, some not so. So in general, I like it. I like the boneless wings probably from there about as much as any other fast food place. So I'd give Mitch on that. I'd say the pickle glaze, at least it wasn't chemical.

So I support the swing, I guess, because there might be pickle freaks out there. It's like catering to a fetish in a way. So I don't want to downgrade it and shade any fetishists. Yeah, like if you want to jack off to the Philly fanatic, like there's, you know, that exists for you. It exists for you. Yes, yeah.

It seemed like that was, it seemed like those were pictures on Mitch's phone, not the website. Yeah, that was just his camera roll he was going through. You're talking to the wrong guy because you have a saved photo album that is very funny. Wait, I do? You always will send stuff that you have like, you have certain saved photos that you'll

send stuff. I do have some funny saved photos. You do? You made me sound like I was lying. No, you're right. You're right. I figured out what you're talking about. So I would like out of respect for the Pickle freaks, I'm going to give it three out of

five forks. Wow. By the way. Because it didn't ruin the Popeyes. Yeah. It was just a bit mystifying as to why they would do this and also gotta keep it at three because it's about the NBA playoffs

and I gotta support my league. What if we're just, what if? I just wanna say, do you remember what your phone background was for a moment, your lock screen? It might just, wait. It still is, I think. It still is, I think. It still is, I think.

Oh, uh, Galeen Maxwell at Mindy Kaling's book party? I shall not be shamed. I shall not be shamed for the photos in my. Yeah. My favorite is when people catch it, like, over the shoulder and they're like, is that? What is that? Happened to TSA once. Yeah, exactly.

I was going to say. She wrote, and she's doing well, by the way. Good language. She sent in the email, the feedback? I heard she wrote on Running Point from jail. Oh, that's wonderful. Three out of five forks for the pickle glaze. If you were just going to evaluate Popeyes based off of your, like, in general, would you also go three out of five forks for the pickle glaze. What if you were just gonna evaluate Popeyes

based off of your, like in general, would you also go three out of five? What would you do? No, no, no, I'd give Popeyes like, it's hard to think of a chicken, fast food chicken place that I'd rank higher. Yeah. So I, man, yeah, I guess I'd go,

I'd go five out of five. Wow, okay. Yeah, I love Popeyes. But three out of five for the pickle menu. Mitch, what do you think? I think that's a good, I think I go a little higher than you guys would say. I like the chicken sandwich.

I wouldn't get it. I think I would just get either the spicy one or the regular one next time. I'm gonna go for the pickle menu with three and a half forks. And for Popeyes itself, I'll still go five forks. I like fuck eyes. Five. You all right?

Yeah, I'm fine. Yeah, yeah, no, everything's fine. Why, you think something seems weird? I like fuck it. I like fuck it. I like Popeyes. Why, because a long time ago, I said, begun the chicken wars have, or whatever.

I quoted Yoda. That's right. And they are now, they're now, the chicken wars are now kind of over. Can you, can we say this now? I mean, like. Yeah, I. And they are now, the chicken wars are now kind of over. Can we say this now? I mean like- Yeah, I mean like, look, as Tim was saying- There's a long pull out of the chicken wars.

It was like Afghanistan. Once they introduced the Popeye's chicken sandwich. Yeah, Mitch, it was. You're fair to compare it to the withdrawal from Afghanistan. It was similar to the- It is. Similar historical analog.

It just, you know, like things weren't going right for a lot of these places that like Burger King and all. Burger King introduced the Cha-King. Jack in the Box, which is now closing a bunch of locations, possibly selling off the Del Taco brand. Oh my God. They are, you know. Chain Rescue.

They had their, we might need to do Chain Rescue for Jack in the Box. They had their own upscale chicken sandwich. They're, you know, McDonald's has a version of it. Wendy's has had chicken sandwiches as part of their menu for a long time, but they had like a revamped version of it. It's like everyone was trying to compete for what Popeyes was doing.

What Popeyes was doing was trying to iterate upon what Chick-fil-A had established. And you're right, we've reached the point where that kind of, all of those kind of collapsed and people are, don't have the curiosity of just trying everyone's version of the Popeye's chicken sandwich simulacra. And I would say Popeye's won.

Popeye's won, yeah. Popeye's, I think we can declare the victor of the chicken wars as Popeye. Well, and also Chick-fil-A is still so ubiquitous. Chick-fil-A is like, I think in terms of per store revenues. Honestly, they never even really got in the chicken wars. The chicken wars were fought amongst. I don't know.

I mean, like, look. I guess, you know what? I guess Chick-fil-A was in the position where they could kind of got in the Chicken Wars. The Chicken Wars were fought amongst... I don't know. I guess Chick-fil-A was in the position where they could kind of sit out the Chicken Wars, because they were kind of doing their whole thing. They had their established fan base. Yes, yeah. And Popeyes just always has good quality. Oh, God. I just saw the things that we're going to have in a second.

Um... Something that's like so unnatural, it catches your eye. Yeah. I like that you were just looking at a bunch of cartoon porno, and then what we're putting into it is you're like, oh, god. It's something that we're going to put into our bodies. The Popeyes has won the fast food chicken wars.

I'll leave Chick-fil-A out of that or whatever. I don't even like Chick-fil-A that much, though. I don't care about Chick-fil-A out of that or whatever. I don't even like Chick-fil-A that much, so I don't care about Chick-fil-A. But they're going to try new stuff. They're going to get people back in there. And I think I appreciate the attempt, but I don't think that this is anything worthwhile. If you're a pickle freak, you're going to like it. Let me close this tab of Colonel Sanders' rule 34.

I didn't really pay off. Let me close this tab of Colonel Sanders rule 34. It didn't really pay off. Was the Colonel Sanders rule 34? No, yeah, it wasn't exactly. I mean, you can look for it. I wasn't as- Dave Matthews, man. Everything that's the staple of their menu, I thought all the sides were good.

I like those large, we got a large size, but I liked the red beans and rice quite a bit. Strawberry biscuits I thought were a lot of fun. Fried pickles were great. Pickle lemonade, not for me, but at least it delivers on the promise of the premise. As far as Popeyes goes. I kind of liked the Colonel Sanders Rule 34.

At large. Him and the Burger King. Jeez Louise. They're both ripped. Yeah. The... Our buddy that I, I'm in the hand only club with our guests as far as Popeyes at large.

I go five forks for Popeyes. I love Popeyes. It's just, to me, that's one of the best chain restaurants out there. And just as far as fried chicken goes, I mean, I don't think you can do any better for a national chain. As far as this particular menu,

I'll be in the Handling Club with our friend who joined us for this meal, the commissioner, Evan Susser. Wow. I got to watch Susser meatballs. What a moment that was. You never met Suss? No, no. How about that?

It was great. He was awesome. Lovely. Yeah, great guy. Texted at 4 a.m. last night to say, I'll have the chicken sandwich. You noticed that? A 4 a.m. text from Susser,

I think he must've woken up in a cold sweat. He wake up thinking about chicken. There must have been some second sense there, or sixth sense there that something was happening. It is a, but you know, anyway, Susser, in terms of evaluating this menu, I think he said a lot of the same stuff that we're saying on this podcast,

and he landed at three and a half forks. And I think that's what the pickle menu approximately deserves. I just, I think it's slightly better than you'd expect, but it doesn't go all the way. And so that's where I think it landed. It just is funny when Susser comes and he eats this stuff and then he's mad about it, and it's like,

you came to get the free food, and then you seem mad at us. You had a free meal. You had a free meal. And then you also like, were not a part of the show. Like you just showed up to eat. Yeah, 100%. And then he's mad. And then he gets mad.

And then he's like, nah. Nah, it's not good. I didn't like it. And you're like, well, sorry, what the fuck? You cost us an extra like 20 bucks. Anyway, we love them. We love them. Yeah, I think.

Hey, that was our review of Popeye's Pickle Menu. It's time for a segment. I got a beverage and we're gonna decide if you should pour it down your throat. It's drink or stank. And we have these Skittles bottled drinks. These were originally released in 2024. We have not had them on the podcast.

There are, I believe, four flavors. We have three of them. There is original. Original might be the one we don't have. Yeah, so we have- I'll just wanna say. We have tropical, yeah. There is no commissioner salsa rule 34, I just looked.

Wow. We have wild berry. You wanted to see it? Yeah, that's your friend. And we have sour, those are the three flavors. Sour, all right. Wild berry is purple, kind of a hazy purple. This is kind of like almost like a gray sort of fog

quality to it. And then a very vibrant blue for the tropical and a neon green for the sour. There was no red. We never had a red. Not where we found these ones. And where did you find these? We found them in the.

We found these in San Francisco when we were going to different comedian stores and grocery stores to find distilled water for Mrs. CPAP machine. This is what we were up there for sketch. We were driving around in a Wemo. Look, this makes it sound like I was bringing you guys on a terrible night. No, we were having a blast. We were having a blast.

To be fair, we were looking for my distilled water and then we found the distilled water and these across the street from our hotel, which was very frustrating. We went on an entire Waymo journey we didn't have to go on, but we had a blast doing it. And you didn't think to put some of this in your CPAP machine? Honestly? We would have had wild dreams. It would have been awesome. I'm going to propose we start with the tropical because I feel like this is the closest to a neutral. Oh my God, 31 grams of sugar, 62% of your daily allocation in one of these.

Nice. Amelia got you guys cups and then we got a dump cup in case you don't end up wanting to drink everything you pour in your cup. I'm just gonna pour myself a little bit. I'll let everyone handle their own pours. I'm gonna pour the dump cup off the Chicago River when we're done. I wonder what color it'll make if you mix all three

of those in one cup. That's a great question. This is very much like barber fluid for audio listeners, like that color. Yeah, it looks kind of like what I put in my car to wash my windshield. It is, it is like wiper fluid. This is a little kid's dream, I'll say that much.

This is like a- Boy, I don't know about this. This tastes like medicine. Yeah. Medicine, interesting. This straight up tastes like something you'd take if you had a cough as a kid. Yeah. I think it's actually helping me feel pretty good.

I've been getting over a sinus infection. Where do you stand on Skittles in general? I used to love them. Yeah, I liked them as a kid a lot. I love them. Like, no bad color. That's what I got excited about with Skittles. Obviously, I'd separate them all, because you know.

Yeah, of course. I was like that. I was nice with it. But yeah, I loved them. I was always worried. I've never I loved them. I was always worried. I've never had a cavity. I was always worried they would give me cavities. So I think I moved away from them the older I got.

Sure. Yeah, they're a cavity treat, I feel like. Um, I do think you take the Skittles. The aftertaste tastes like Skittles a little bit. You taste the rainbow a little bit. I think that it is very medicine-y though. Like, that's definitely what the kind of quality I got from it. I'm gonna pour some of the sour.

This is kind of like an ecto cooler quality for our audio listeners in terms of color. Sour, this one scares me. Yeah, I don't know if I want a sour beverage. Yeah, just, just, ooh. I'm also old enough to remember when there was just one kind of Skittle. And they were just like, hey, you know what?

We're doing a bunch of different Skittles. There was just one kind, no, there was just the red Skittles. Oh, I thought you meant like you were old enough that it was like, it was all yellow Skittles. I was like, Jesus Christ. Oh, old, this is a guy. Funny old man candy, just lemon Skittles. Yeah, they just had the red ones for a long time.

They just had the regular Skittles, the default bag. This one sucks. You hate this one? Yeah, yeah. I like red ones for a long time. They just had the regular Skittles, the default bag. This one sucks. You hate this one? Yeah, yeah. I like this one. Oh my God. This to me is better than the blue. Really?

Yeah. I'm not dumping this, I like it. I'm trying to think of what this reminds me of exactly. The first taste of this one tastes so weird. And then it does, the aftertaste isn't bad. It's kind of citrusy. Yeah, what's the sour? Is it sour like sour candy or sour like,

yeah, lemon sour? Oh my God. It's not sour. It's not super sour. Yeah, I don't know. It kind of reminds me of like a tangerine juice almost. You're mixing them? I wanna see what the end result is,

what it looks like. And it does look kind of crazy right now, actually. Yeah, it's very tropical blue, kind of. Wait, does the deus want to taste any of these? Um, I'm okay. Okay. The colors are so unnatural. Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know why I like that. This is like when you're getting a colonoscopy, this is like the type of stuff you drink to like see inside your body, basically. Colors, yeah. Color-wise, for sure. Mitch, me and our, I've said this on the podcast before, me and our buddy, Danny Jelenik, a

great director, past Doughboy's guest. Great guy. Made a couple Skittles ads years ago, and the thing I learned from the Skittles internal documents is, because they're so, as we're pouring this cloudy, purple- Oh, this one is not good. This is fucking nasty. Cloudy, purple, wild berry right now. Oh, it's disgusting.

The thing I learned from their internal Skittles branding documents, because these brands are so strict about, there's no such thing as a Skittle. Skittles is the brand. There's an individual Skittles candy, but the terminology they use is Skittles Lentil. Yes, he loves it. So each individual Skittles piece

is called a Skittles Lentil, according to their company. It looks nice. This looks nice. But I'm gonna pour the purple one too. What the fuck is this supposed to taste like? This is bad. This is fucking awful. Is that the wild berry one? Yeah, did this go bad?

Maybe it went bad. Maybe, is there an expression on it? Smells like shit, smells like an old dusty closet. It does taste like dust. Ew. Like the color it has, right? It actually looks like dust. It looks like a dusty water. Yeah, it looks like dirty, like, dishwashing soap.

So you wash your dishes in this. Looks like a sample. Oh, wild berry dup. Wait, what did you say? Looks like a sample. Ha ha ha. Is there an expiration date on that bottle, Mick? Yes, and it's rubbed out.

Oh, good. But it is 25, so it is this year. Okay. There are two more expiration dates on the bottle. They might be also rubbed out. This is one of the worst things I've had for the show this year. This is really bad. Really?

Yeah, I fucking hate this. By the way, this was April, 2025. Okay, so we're- Oh, so we're- We're really less. Barely in the clear, I fucking hate this. By the way, this was April, 2025. Okay, so we're- Oh, so we're- We're way less. Barely in the clear, I guess. Yeah. So maybe that purple one is a little older.

Maybe it is better. Yeah. The mixed one tastes good. I was wondering. You wanna try it? I'll do it. It was almost the color of your shirt, actually, now. Just mixed all good.

Yeah, it is. The green and blue. Why can't I have yours? You can have mine. It seems like you have the purple, and you have the color of your shirt actually now. Just mix all the- Yeah, it is. The green and blue. In your drink. Why can't I have yours? You can have mine. I think it seems like you have the purple. I'm getting older. I've been on antibiotics for 72 hours. You had the golden ratio, it seems like you hit on.

So let's see how this works out. That ain't bad. I'm telling you, you should do a mix just to see what you think. But I think this might also be the unique alchemy that you stumbled upon by having like two parts blue, one part purple and like one and a half parts green. I don't think you intentionally created this.

I guess you could try to match the color. I think that's pretty close. It's pretty close. Pretty close. Tim has taken a sip. It's literally the same color as Tim's shirt, the stripes. Wow, it is. Yeah, that's the best flavor.

Yeah. Mix them all together. It's the best flavor. I think, you know why? Because it tastes, when you eat Skittles, a lot of people, do you just eat them all at once? Yeah. I know that you-

Wow, Mitch, this is a great insight. And maybe that's what it is. What an observation. You're getting the Skittles experience. I think that's totally it. Yeah, I think that's exactly it. I would give the green a mild drank. I'd give the other two a stank, hard stank to the wild berry,

but the mix I think is a solid drink. I give a big old drank to the green one. Yeah, green one's good. I think stank to the, huge stank to the purple. Blue is like a light drink. Blue and green are a light drink, but I like the blue more than the green, but. Blue is like a light drink. Blue and green are a light drink, but I like the blue more than the green,

but they're both barely in a drink. Honestly, they should be stanks. They suck. They're bad. They're bad. They're bad, but good job crafting that cocktail. Hey, just like a restaurant, I value your feedback. Let's open up the feedback.

Today's email is from Kyle. Kyle writes, Mitch mentioned on a recent episode that he was treated at Boston Children's Hospital as a child. I work at said hospital. Wow, thank you for your service. And I'm often listening to podcasts at my desk

with this show being a recent edition. I thought Mitch would be glad to know that we have a Regina Pizzeria in the cafeteria and the two slice combo is the best lunch value available. As someone not originally from Boston, I was delighted to find Regina's as a good buy the slice option and quickly deemed it quote, Zbarrow if it didn't suck shit.

My question for the group. I like that. When you were watching cartoons, what cartoon food looks the tastiest? I can't decide between the gooey cheese stretch when a Ninja Turtle pulls a slice off or the towering deli sandwich that Shaggy unhinges his jaw to eat in one bite.

Thanks for the laughs, new fans, we're gonna go to my new favorite shows, your bean town buddy, Kyle. Favorite cartoon food. Thank you for your service, Kyle. Boston Children's Hospital, great hospital. Yeah. Also, Regina's are the quality of place to place, it can be up and down.

Don't the Ninja Turtles put like weird shit on the pizza, too? They do, but there are times when they're just like stretching the pizza. I get exactly what the image they're talking about. And it's like a super cheesy pizza. And it does look like a very toothsome slice. I always think about.

Little did he know that we would be really looking at cartoons today. It's true. Rule 34, Ninja Turtles. There's going gonna be a lot of Rule 34 Ninja Turtles, and I'll take a look right now. Did you ever see the animated, this weird like Harvard project from like 2004, the animated Ninja Turtles porno?

No. Oh my God. It's insane. It was a Harvard project? I didn't know that. Like some friend, when I was touring Second City, some friend had it on their phone and they showed it and were like, what the fuck is this?

Like, what did I just watch? Like, this is awful, it's crazy. And at the end, like, like Krang is sucking off Donatello. Okay, sure. It's really, it's kind of nuts. Yeah. And then this guy like is jerking off.

It turns out it's all a video and that newsman, April's like camera guy is like jerking off and then he shoots his load on himself, but it's radioactive and he turns into a big penis with a hand where his cock was. Oh, right. You heard of this? I have seen this. And then a couple years ago, I'm like,

I'm haunted by this and it comes up in conversation. I go try to find it and instead of finding it, I find an article from the Harvard Crimson or whatever describing the project that this guy did in class Instead of finding it, I find an article from the Harvard Crimson or whatever describing the project that this guy did in class and just veered off into left field and made this porno and his professor was like, okay. A. Everyone at Harvard just gets A's.

Yeah, sure. A. So I actually know the origin about it. It's insane. And that's like the guy who invented Uber. Probably. There's a lot of Ninja Turtle, there's a lot of women in the Ninja Turtle world that I don't know. Yeah, that's one of the things with the Rule 34, it sometimes skews towards the male gaze and all of a sudden it's like, well, this, you know, whatever, I'm looking for Ninja Turtle portal.

I'm not looking for April O'Neil portal, but that's what the, you know, whatever. I'm looking for Ninja Turtle Porto. I'm not looking for April O'Neil Porto, but that's what the, you know, whatever the fan base tends to glom onto that. Let me tell you this. Not Benny the Bull. That's for the, I don't know, androgynous gaze. Yeah, sure. Anyone's gaze.

The very jacked April O'Neil here. Okay, now we're talking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there's also a very, there's also a very... It's too jacked. Why they made her head so small? Her head should have gotten the same size of her body. There's also an anatomically correct ninja turtle penis.

I don't want to show this to the camera. Yeah, so that's the whole thing. I'll learn everything you showed on this. The reptilian anatomy doesn't quite resemble human anatomy one-to-one, so if you're gonna, if you see a realistic depiction of it, it can look a little unnerving. A lot of good stuff in there.

Yeah, a lot of good stuff in there. Best cartoon food. Look, the Big Deli Sandwich did make me think of, I know this is not a cartoon, but this is a comic strip. Not that I'm too, you know, like Dagwood and Blondie were not really my generation, but that was a comic strip that was in the zeitgeist that I was aware of.

And I knew that Dagwood would make a big, tall sandwich. And I always wanted to have one of those impossibly tall sandwiches. They always look good as shit. So that's where my mind goes to. But the other thing this makes me think of is, we were talking about video games earlier, and certainly not Mega Man, where you get,

you know, you have like power capsules that restore your health. But, you know, like adjacent franchises, like Konami's Castlevania, you would find a wall chicken or a floor chicken. It would just be like a whole rotisserie bird, and it would install, like, you know, reinstate your health bar.

Those always looked really good to me. And that was always like, oh, I want to just find like a big meat and a big hunk of meat in a barrel. And then my, my, I have more energy to go about my day. I like this. I have an answer. Yeah. Cheesy poofs.

Cartman can't be wrong. Yeah, those are pretty good. I bet you they're really good. Yeah. Cartman's Cartman's like, I feel like Cartman has similar taste to me. So I think cheesy poofs would be really good. Man, I can't think of a single thing outside of Chip and Dale rescue rangers for some reason.

I don't know why. I'm just thinking of like the big cheese that that big mouse always eats. Oh yeah. Or the acorns. I got some stuff here. The extra gooey pizza. they said the Ninja Charles pizza, but they also showed the pizza from the Goofy movie,

a Goofy movie. Sure. I always thought animated eggs, like fried eggs, always like animated breakfast always looks really appealing for some reason. Like a good sunny side up egg or something, it always looks really pretty. How about that feast in that Studio Ghibli movie

where they turn into pigs? Yeah, that was going to say is like when we're talking about cartoons, we're all talking about Western cartoons. But certainly if you open up to anime, there's such gorgeously drawn anime food and all the Ghibli movies. You're thinking of Spirited Away.

Spirited Away. Spirited Away has some really good looking food. But there was some good looking food in Boy in the Heron too. I mean, like, you know, a lot of these movies have some good looking fights. Would you like to try the Ratatouille from Ratatouille? Yeah, I guess I would. Yeah, I don't know.

I guess it's made by a mouse. Does that bother you? I mean, this is the whole question in the movie. It looks really good. And that was one where it was the French laundry chef who helped design that dish, right? Oh, right. You know what I would go for, just because it's kind of comfort food would be

the marmalade sandwich from Paddington. Oh yeah, sure. That's good. That's good. Really good. Also Garfield's lasagna. That pretty good. We, we've been to the French Laundry since I went with Gavin during, during the

pandemic, we of course had the Gavin DeGraw. Oh, me and Gavin Newsom went during the pandemic to France Launderer. Yeah. Unbelievable. There was the, they did have the Wendy's Krabby Patty and that was like kind of disappointing. It did not really deliver in terms of what you want from like the SpongeBob Krabby Patty,

but it did make me think of the, you know, a classic cartoon, but the big ass ribs that you get from the Flintstones. Remember that big ass rib that they'd tip the car over? Tip the car over. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Ooh, actually, there's this French cartoon called Asterix, I don't know if you know it at all,

and they are always like hunting boar. Okay. And then they would have these huge feasts where they would like spit roast the boar over an open flame, like, oh man, it always looked so good. And the characters are always like, they're drooling over it and one of them's obsessed with it. And as a kid, I was always,

I was like, damn, that looks really good. Can we have boar? And my mom would be like, no. No, it's not a thing. It's a cartoon. I remember when you were on previously, you talked about it was living in France, right? When you were in college?

Yeah, I did a semester abroad there and about it was living in France, right, when you were in college? Yeah, I did a semester abroad there and I played college basketball. Right, right. Yeah. That's cool as hell. Which was crazy. And my hair was down to here.

Wow. That's cool as hell. I did Beck Bennett and Kyle Mooney's podcast and it ended up being mostly about that. It was just fun. I never really talked about it and it was just a wild six months of my life where I was there and completely immersed.

I went to this poli sci school. Instead of going to like an American university, I was like, fuck it. I want to be really challenged. Yeah, sure. I want to get my ass kicked. And it was so hard, but it was fascinating because you're learning poli sci

from like a completely different perspective. Yeah. And then just going and like playing basketball with a bunch of like sweaty dudes that have never heard of deodorant. It's intense. That's like going to a doughboy show. I have two last, fruits, if you could believe it.

One of those Yoshi apples. Yeah, sure. I thought of that earlier when you were talking about Wiger's jaw opening like a snake and eating the apple and I was mouthing Yoshi, but I hadn't been introduced yet so I couldn't talk about it, but Yoshi really chomps that apple. Yeah, he really does.

Those big shiny apples that he's got, I would love to try one of those. And look, I wouldn't try to take one from him, but a DK Banana, you know he's got good bananas. Fuck, yeah. Donkey Kong's got good fucking bananas. You know he does. That banana hoard he's got, big stash.

And he could give me one, he has got a ton of them. What the hell, you know, what's the, well come on. Yeah, I mean, then we're back in video game town, but I mean, like again, I guess. Do you think he'd think I would be an ape from a fucking other tribe or some shit? Ha ha ha, whatever the fuck you guys said earlier. This banana's bigger than your dick. That's normal Donkey Kong. The banana's a huge. That's a plantain.

The Donkey Kong sounds like Jerry's eyes. Hey, that's a plantain. What's the deal with Mitch's dick? He's Donkey Kong but it looks like a plantain. It's so small, you peel it off, there's barely any fruit inside. And what's going on with these college campuses? If you have a question or comment about the world of chain restaurants, you can email us at feedbag at birdfuck.com or leave us a voicemail at 830-GO-DOE. That's 830-463-6844. Our producers Emma Erdbrink, our associate producers Emilio Moreno, our supervising video producers Casey Donahue, our video editors Mike Dorfman and hey, Doughboys

apparel and merchandise is available in partnership with kinshipgoods at kinshipgoods.com slash Doughboys. You can also get the Doughboys double our weekly bonus episode plus our entire pre 2018 back catalog over at patreon.com slash Doughboys and reminder we are currently doing Mation Impadoble, which is a month long revisit of all of the Mission Impossible films in the run up to the final reckoning.

So check that out over at our Patreon, Patreon.com slash doughboys. And we may have someone wearing that shirt as a very guest. It's the exact shirt which we watched Mission Impossible 7 together two nights ago. Yeah, two nights ago. I love it. It was great.

Yeah. I know you already covered it, so I can't spoil it. We won't spoil it either, but I did not love it the first time I watched it, and you'll have to watch the episode to see what we thought. Check it out to see our current assessment. Tim Ball, it's such a treat to have you. What would you like to plug?

Thank you so much for being here. Well, let's see. I think the last ever episode of Gemstones will come out. This comes out Monday, right? Next Thursday, so it will have just come out. Oh yeah, so it's like, the last episode of Gemstones ever comes out, stream all four seasons on Macs.

Congratulations on that. Thanks. Congrats, that's so cool. Yeah, it's crazy to, I mean, it took like seven years to make four seasons, but it's weird. It's weird to be on the other side of it. In a good way, bittersweet. And then Deli Boys streaming on Hulu,

the whole first season, which is fantastic. Starred some amazing people, and created by Abdullah Saeed and Hey Randy podcast on CBB World Patreon, which we have a blast doing. Mitch did the live show. That's right. Audio version of that will come out,

I don't know, months from now. Yeah, yeah. And we talk about that a little on the- Oh, you did? Yeah, yeah. OK, good. So that's paywalled too, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Good, right? No spoilers. I want to do a quick shout out, Wags. Is that OK? Yeah, sure. I just want to give a shout out to one of our listeners, Brendan Mullen, who lives all the way down in South Africa. And he's just, he's had a tough month.

And I said the podcast has been very helpful for him during that time. So I just want to say, send some love and thank you for listening Down Under. Um. In South Africa. Put another shrimp on the barbie. The home of Dave Matthews.

Oh, that's true. Yeah. Right. Watch out for that. Watch out for the big trio. Shit, piss, and cum. The shit, piss, and cum trio. Of course.

Yes. Right. You never know when you might encounter those three. He's having a hard month. Yeah. You make South Africa sound like Australia, and then you tell him he's going to get shit, piss, and cum down? He won't. that won't happen. He's a good buddy of my friend Colin,

who's my neighbor back in Quasar. I love Colin, any friend of Colin is a friend of mine. So thank you for listening, I hope you're doing all right. Hey, there you go, that'll do it for this episode of Doughboys, until next time for the Spoon Man, Mike Mitchell, I'm Tiger Warrior, happy eating. See ya. Hi, I'm Rachel Billson.

And I'm Olivia Allen. And we host the podcast. Broad Ideas. Yes, that's now on HeadGum. On our show we chat with people like Brittany Snow, Lucy Hale, Kristen Bell, Margaret Cho, Jake Johnson, and so much more. And we talk about all the things you would talk about with your best friend. Like your periods.

And mental illness. And the food you ate for lunch. Most importantly. Listen to broad ideas on Spotify, Apple podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.