Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers - Flashlight Felon, Hotel Head Butts, & Guido in Greece: Listener Episode #15

Episode Date: August 28, 2025

Seth and Josh are back with the monthly listener episode! We hear a few hilarious stories from listeners including the unexpected way two siblings burnt their hair off, the perpetrator behind the “flashlight felon,” the aftermath of an epic hotel employee head butt situation, the adventures of Margot and Guido in Greece, and more! Plus, Seth and Josh answer some questions! Want to submit your family trips story for our next listener episode? Or send a question in to Seth and Josh? Submit your voicemail to speakpipe.com/familytripspod! Interested in contributing to the Grand Canyon Fundraiser? Visit tinyurl.com/familytripsfundraiser Watch more Family Trips episodes: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlqYOfxU_jQem4_NRJPM8_wLBrEEQ17B6 ------------------------- 00:00 Introduction with Seth and Josh 00:23 Nostalgic Memories of Amsterdam 01:54 Listener Story: Static Electricity Adventure 09:30 Listener Story: Felon Flashlight Incident 18:12 Listener Story: Headbutt in Mexico 24:08 Fantasy Football Draft Preparations 25:42 Secret Santa Excitement 27:22 A Greek Adventure 34:26 Government Services and Travel Tales 38:35 Creative Process and Music Insights 42:47 Listener Questions and Feedback 46:11 Fundraiser for Grand Canyon Conservancy 47:44 Buffalo and Upstate New York Shoutouts 47:50 Final Thoughts ------------------------- Support our sponsors: Quince Go to Quince.com/TRIPS for free shipping on your order and three hundred and sixty-five -day returns. DeleteMe Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/TRIPS and use promo code TRIPS at checkout. ------------------------- Family Trips is produced by Rabbit Grin Productions. Theme song written and performed by Jeff Tweedy. ------------------------- About the Show: Lifelong brothers Seth Meyers and Josh Meyers ask guests to relive childhood memories, unforgettable family trips, and other disasters! New Episodes of Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers are available every Tuesday. ------------------------- Executive Producers: Rob Holysz, Jeph Porter, Natalie Holysz Creative Producer: Sam Skelton Coordinating Producer: Derek Johnson Video Editor: Josh Windisch Mix & Master: Josh Windisch Episode Artwork: Analise Jorgensen #familytrips #sethmeyers #joshmeyers Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, Baji. Hi, Sufi. It's time for a listener episode. Yeah, we missed. We didn't do one last month because we did that live show in Amsterdam, and that sort of fit that bill. We didn't want to sort of flood the zone with too many family trips episodes, so apologies to any listeners who were like, hey, you missed one. Yeah. I was in Logan Airport for the first time since I flew to Amsterdam.

And I had, I already have a nostalgia pang for how special that trip was to go with Ash. Oh, yeah. I could see that. Also, Alexei and I were sitting around talking about what was the best part of our summer and neither of us could come up with anything that included the other person. But we did agree we both had a good summer. There was very little overlap. Right. Well, I mean, yeah, there's something to be said for that. The person that you spend most of your time, most of your life with, sometimes those things get...

Yeah, and I think a lot of the best times we had were with our kids, and, you know, one could argue, I played a role in them. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And they're the very existence. Yeah. I think half of them. Half of them's you. So Jeff told us, Jeff's in for Sam today. Right. So if you're here for Sam... Don't talk, Jeff. I don't know how this is done. I'm sorry.

Already, you have to a terrible start. Our listeners have heard Sam maybe three times in like 100 plus episodes. Jeff's just yapping away, right? For the time you say his name, hey, hey, everybody. Oh, finally, my moment. Anyway, Jeff said we have four good stories and two that he thought were maybe a little shirky. So we might just do four. Let's start with one of the good ones, Jeff.

All right, here we go. This is from Alex. Hi, Seth and Josh. Love the podcast. My name is Alex, and while my family is from Pittsburgh, my brother and I grew up in Buffalo, New York. Go Bills. Being that we were the odd family out, we spent a lot of time driving back and forth from Buffalo to Pittsburgh for holidays, birthdays, and summer vacation trips. This particular trip would have been in the late 80s. My brother and I were in elementary school. My dad was in complete control of the radio when he drove, Fleetwood Mac, Enya's first album, and AHA. My brother and I sat in the backseat, subconsciously learning lyrics to an entire AHA album and not just take on me. My mom is big on reading, so we always had library books to flip through, and the rest of the time we played soldiers shooting at radio towers and gas station spotlights outside of our windows.

My mother had an amazing ability to fall asleep before leaving the driveway, but always woke up in time to see home approaching. It was dark outside when this particular incident occurred as we were returning home to Buffalo. Too dark to read, we were fidgeting around in the backseat, and by a stroke of luck, my buzz cut brushed against the backseat material just right and set off a spark of static electricity. It was like a sudden flashbulb of excitement, startling at first, but then funny. And since kids always need more, I rubbed my head against the backseat over and over and over until sparks were flying as if I was cutting through metal. We all laughed. My brother joined me, seatbelts off, facing the backseat, rubbing our heads in circles against the backseat,

filling the darkness with a static electricity, firework extravaganza. The sparks coming off our heads were brighter than anything on the road that night. My family laughed and laughed, tears streaming down our cheeks. Our sides hurt. We couldn't breathe. We would have kept going, but my mom managed to gather her breath and pleaded for us to stop. Something was burning, she said. we looked around the back seats they looked around the front but we found nothing unusual in that moment of calm i felt the top of my head hurt the way when you suddenly realize you have a sunburn i touched the top of my head and sure enough the smell filling the car was from my brother and i frying the tops of our heads our hair was burnt stiff some patched

fell out, just being touched, and we had terrible brushburns across our scalps. I can still picture holding a climp of tiny hairs in my hand. All in all, it didn't take too long to heal, so I figure the pain was worth the wonderful light show on the way home to Buffalo. Thanks for letting me share the memory. Keep up the good work. Go bills. Well, I'm going to say a couple things.

One, you know, Axel's got the buzz cut. And I was thinking, oh, it's a bummer that, you know, cars these days don't really have. I feel like that good static electricity seat covering. Right, that little like almost felty. Yeah. Because I thought, oh, that would be really fun if I taught Axel to do that. He would love it. Yeah.

But then, of course, Axel would do it to the point where he set his hair on fire. Yeah. I mean, it's totally worth it. It was totally worth it. If it healed. Since it healed up, it's totally worth it. I mean, hair famously when it burns, smells terrible. Yeah, it's not a good smell.

Yeah. And but I love that, yeah, that it was the smell that made him stop and then they looked for fire and that it wasn't actual fire. It was just the burnt hair. I also will say as a parent, I would definitely be the parent. Alexi would be like, stop, stop. I smell something. and my initial reaction would be like,

can you let them have fun? They never have any fun. Also, you can't smell. Right, I'd be the last to know that the entire car was on fire. Yeah, that's really something else. Also, just that fun thing of kids just being dumb

in a way that leads them to incredible scientific discoveries. Yeah. Like, in order to do that, you just had to want to rub your head against the seat for no reason. Right. and that on accident you stumble upon this wonder of science.

A real eureka, yeah. And then you get your seatbelts off and you turn around, and I can just imagine that's sort of almost like on all fours or like holding the back of the seat, just rubbing your head as furiously as you can. And now you go, now you go. Can you name another aha song that's not take on me? No.

Yeah, I was thinking about it. I can't. Yeah. I guess I was going to say no disrespect to them, but I think it's sort of, it is in a weird way. But that song's so good. Aha and Enya. I feel like if those are your two favorite bands,

there's probably a lot of confusion. Yeah. You know what I mean? When you're like, put up you on you on. It sounds like Alex's dad needed to just chill out a bit on those tracks. I mean, I will say Fleetwood Mac, aha, and Enia. Pretty chill vibes. Yeah.

I'm definitely, I'm going to dip in to, to some aha, find some deeper cuts than the clear surface that we know. The one song off top, off the top we have. Yeah. There's also, that story kind of reminds me of when you learn to snap very late in life. Uh-huh. You, it was like, were you in college? No, it was younger than college.

But it was later than most people. Yeah, it was like high school. I don't think it was before high school. But you finally learned to snap And you snapped so much You snapped your fingers raw Yeah, I got like bad blisters I got snap blisters

Just because it was like a new A new thing It was like these kids But now look watch Ow Ow Ow Ow

Ow Out Ow Out Um Uh huh Posh Is a band

That is a palindrome Mm-hmm Name another one Another band that's a pal Abba Well done Thank you Really well done

You name another one. Anya feels like it should be and it's not. It's totally not. You can't ask me to come up with the third. Did you have Abba in your head when you asked? Yeah, 100% I had Abba. Okay. Oh, I know one.

Duran Duran. Oh, no, that's not. It is if it's a Duran Duran Naurud Naurud. Right. If the band was called Duran Duran, that was their original name, wasn't it? Randa, rand, the red, no, red. Yeah.

Yeah, like, Fleetwood MacCham, dof, tuffla. All right. All right. Thank you, Alex. Hey, we're going to take a quick break and hear from some of our sponsors. Support comes from Cayman Jack, America's number one, a margarita. What's up, Baji? Hey, Sufi.

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Personal data. You know what? The most important word and that two-word expression is to me? personal? Yeah. It's not for you. And it's certainly not for people I've never met. I mean, if anybody could have my personal data, I would let you have it because I trust you.

Thank you. But I wouldn't want you to get it, you know, by nefarious means. I'd want to give it to you with my consent. But here's the thing. There's these data brokers, Posh, and they make a profit off your data, which is a commodity.

Yeah. But now anyone on the web can buy your private details. It can lead to identity theft, fishing attempts. harassment. So you've got to protect your privacy. And you know who I think does a good job of that? Who's that? Delete me. Yeah, they definitely do. Delete me. You sign up with them and they're going to pour through the internet. Find out where all your data is listed. Get it taken off. Get it deleted. That name's no accident. And then it just gives you peace of mind that nobody out there is going

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Thanks. Thanks, data brokers. Yeah. Can't trust them. Here's the thing, guys. Take control your data. Keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me. Now at a special discount for our listeners,

get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to join DeleteMe.com slash trips and use promo code trips at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is, go to join deleteme.com slash trips and enter code trips at checkout. That's join deleteme.com slash trips code trips. This message is a paid partnership with Apple card. Planning family trips can get chaotic. But my Apple card makes things way easier. I applied right for my iPhone, got approved in minutes, and now I can get daily cash back on everything travel related. I saw it in action when you picked up the bill last time I was in L.A. Well, you didn't have your

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No sugar added? Neutral. Refreshingly simple. Thank you, Alex. Without talking. Play our next one. Hi, my name is Barb and I'm from upstate New York. This family trip took place in 2002, but I'll never forget it. We were heading to a family event in Puerto Rico, so everybody was packed and ready to go,

except that my son, who was 11 years old at the time in an inveterate reader, wanted to bring the book light and it was broken. So I said, just grab a light out of the garage. Fast forward, we get to the airport. The 11-year-old is the last one through security. And all of a sudden I hear, where are your parents? And he says, well, that's my mom. Ma'am, follow me.

I was questioned by the airport security police, the police of the city we were in, and the New York State police, all because inside of that flashlight, there was a little all-purpose tool. I'd gotten those flashlights as a Christmas gift to my kids. So one of the sets of cops says to me, ma'am, did you make this? My son burst out last and said, sir, my mother can't draw a straight line. And that has Rayovac stamped on it. I don't think she could make it. They asked me questions for two hours. And the last question was, what do you weigh? And I said, excuse me? And they said, what do you weigh? Answer the question. So I did. I cried all the way to Puerto Rico

as my kids were cracking up watching some funny movie but okay I survived we get to this event we're attending and my son asked multiple people do I want to know what my mom weighs because she had to tell the cops and she couldn't lie in my family

we still refer to this as the felon flashlight. The often never take a flashlight on a plane. Thanks guys, love the pod. Oh, thanks, Barb. That seems like real overkill by

all the people involved. Yeah. I mean, I feel like it's, you know, it was a Christmas gift. It probably wasn't like the number one most beloved Christmas gift if it was just in the garage. Yeah.

I'm probably betting that they were like, you can't bring this on the plane, you're going to have to throw it away, and she would have been like, yeah, fine. Yeah, two hours. I'm glad they weren't operating with a family separation policy where they took her way from her kid, although it seems like by the end of it,

Barb probably wishes they did. It seems like a real drag that it was very much her son's fault, and he was just shooting Zinger after Zinger at Old Bar while she was getting grilled. She's getting a whole third degree. Yeah. Uh, McKenzie's, uh, father was just out here, uh, for a sort of a belated birthday, uh, birthday trip. And McKenzie bought him, uh, this little sort of like hammer that has a

multi tool on it. And he like, was like, oh, great, I'll just like, fly back with it. But then he realized last minute it has like, he's like, it's everything you would possibly need to, like, cause havoc on airplane. Yeah. Um, and he was like, I'm going to leave this and let you guys send it to me, which was 100% the right call. Yeah, you never really hear the term travel hammer. No, also a multi-tool means it has like

a blade that folds out of it and all like all these like screwdrivers and like, yeah. Pilots door opener. Yeah. You know what I'm not you know what I feel like I don't need based on how I'm living my life? what's that a multi tool yeah you think you have you got just one tool and that's enough for you

the old my old noggin the old bean the old index finger that calls people with tools um yeah what the justification is for the what do you weigh like what's that seems weird yeah and that's one of those things you're sort of like can you guys be recording this because Was it also a carnival, do you think? Maybe. Was it one of those airport carnivals where it's half airport and half carnival games? Because I'd sort of want to be like, hey, I want to raise a stink about this with your superiors. So I'd like a transcript of this conversation.

I'd like to know what my weight has to do with anything. Right. I feel like in this day and age, they just say no when you're like, can I talk to a superior? Yeah, yeah. I feel like nobody has one anymore. Yeah. Like no one's in charge. Years ago, because it was Aunt Beebe, our great aunt.

Yeah. We were getting them on grandma and Aunt Beebe. She wasn't, by the way. She was a fine aunt. She was just really old. I say great aunts. You say aunt instead of aunt, huh? Because I get a lot of shades.

No, sometimes I say aunt. Okay, gotcha. But she was an aunt. She was an aunt. Yeah. I would say, you know, Aunt Christy, on Cherry, on Alex. Yeah, I think our New England aunts are on. and Aunt Beebe was Aunt Beebe.

Yeah. Aunt Bee was in a class by herself. But I remember she was getting, this was, you know, pre-9-11, she was going through security. And she was a bit sort of flustered. And I was standing nearby. And I was like, they just got to make sure you don't have a bomb on you. And the nut, like, I was yelled down so quickly by security.

Rightfully so. But I was like, I mean, if you saw Aunt Beebe, You know, she wasn't, she wasn't going to be a problem. Well, she might be a problem for the people working on the plane. We were, when I hosted the Emmys, we were shooting a promo video for the Emmys. And it was basically, we built like a TSA set because it was, I was traveling and they opened up my luggage and it was all just like different props from TV shows. Like, that was basically the promo we had. And there was a gun, a prop gun.

and you've been on sets where a prop master comes and really stresses like this is a rubber gun there are no bullets in this gun however you are not to pick up this gun you are not to point this gun at anybody and it look it you know obviously you know based on recent events you can appreciate like how seriously people take this and sure what a massive part of set safety it is connor o'malley who is a genius and was a writer for my show at the time he was dressed up as a tsa agent and he was in the bathroom during the speech and he walked out literally when the speech was open picked up the gun without stopping pointed in my face and said eat lead joke man and he got yelled down so hard and felt terrible kind of also and connor for a for someone who seems like a complete punk rock rebel he has an incredible amount of respect for the rules and especially professionals whose job it is to keep it safe but yeah um yeah i wouldn't i wouldn't expect to just from Some of his material that I've seen that he would have respect for the rules, but...

He's a real rule. Yeah. I like it. I love rules. Yeah. We need them. Yep. All right, Jeff, you can say something this time if you want before you play the third one.

I feel like you've been to the penalty box long enough. Can I show you something? Oh, look at that. It's a multi-tool. Just got a multi-tool. I love that you was holding it up, and Seth was like, what's that? I knew it was a multi-tool. It's got all kinds of things on it.

Yeah. Now, Jeff, when was the last time you... used your multi-tool for something other than showing it off on a podcast? Like 10 minutes ago. That's why I have it out. What'd you use it for? I was setting up the microphone so I could talk to you. You were a podcast producer. You need a tool every time you set up the podcast? I'm in a different location than I normally am.

Oh, gotcha. Yeah. All right. So it doesn't just live on your desk. It lives in my desk. Gotcha. Yeah, that's a good place for it. Okay. Here's Andre. Hi Josh. Hi, Seth. This is Andre from Montreal. A few years ago, my parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary by taking the entire family, all 15 of us, to an all-inclusive resort in Mexico

for a week. It was amazing. We really had a good time together. We did all the things, rappelling into sonotes, climbing Mayan pyramids, and making the most of the all-you-can-eat buffet. It was really great. By day five, the pace had slowed. We were mostly lounging by the pool and by the beach. My wife took some much-needed solo time, so I was with our two kids, then aged five and eight. While playing by the pool, my daughter peer pressured me into joining a pool-side resort-organized relay drinking game that was, in hindsight, deeply flawed in its design. I volunteered, and I was assigned the anchor position in our team's relay. My task was to chug a beer, then lunge across the table to kiss the last player on the opposing team on the cheek for the

win. My counterpart happened to be a hotel staff member dressed up like a boxer. Don't ask me why. The relay started and when my turn came, I slammed the beer and launched myself across the table only to get violently headbutted by the hotel employee who had the same mission. I fell to the ground. My eye split open, blood everywhere, gasps from the crowd. Now the hotel medic took a look at me eventually and promptly sent me to a nearby tourist hospital down the road for some stitches. Now my Spanish is decent. It's pretty good. I studied in Columbia years ago and I've kept it up with friends and neighbors. I'm usually that annoying tourist who loves chatting with the locals in Spanish. But at the hospital, I decided to play it dumb. I didn't want my lack of medical

Spanish vocabulary to become a problem. The staff's English was great, so I stuck to that. They stitched me up, five neat ones just above the eye, and the nurse covered it with a simple bandage. All good, I was ready to go. But the doctor suddenly switched to Spanish, thinking I didn't understand. He turned to the nurse, and with no attempt to lower his voice, because he thought I didn't understand, said, ask the hotel pague, envuello, come if he I just had to have a syrujia cerebral. Pardon my terrible accent. Basically, he said,

make the hotel pay, wrap him up like he just had brain surgery. The nurse chuckled and got to work. Gauze, more gauze, wrapping me up, they wrapped me up like a cartoon mummy. I looked ridiculous. When I returned to the hotel resort, the front desk staff looked horrified. I looked far worse than I felt

like I'd just come out of intensive care. Later that night, I found out that my daughter had recorded the entire thing on my phone, the drinking game, bloodbath, and more importantly, the head butt by the hotel employee. I can send you the video if you like. It's a doozy. Word got around. The hotel manager approached me the day before a flight home, offering 10% off a future stay if I signed an NDA. Now, I'm Canadian, so suing wasn't my instinct, but I did remember the doctor's voice. Make them pay. declined and casually mentioned I had the whole thing on video.

The next morning, just before checkout, the manager returned with a far better offer. Four nights, all-inclusive for my family. I agreed, took the deal, black eye and all. I felt like I had won. The following November, we were back in Mexico on the hotel's dime and enjoying the sunshine, margaritas, and not participating in any resort-organized drinking games. Big thanks to the Mexican medical team who went above and beyond that day, you guys are the real heroes.

Thanks, Josh. Thanks, Seth. Talk to you soon. That's wonderful. I really wish on the first day of his second trip, they just head butted him when he checked it. I have a thing when I see it in TVs or movies, when people get their head wrapped, it always looks fake.

Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? Like a big white wrapping? Uh-huh. Like, and I know that's how it looks when you first get your headwrapped, but it's still like, it's so cartoony to me to have your entire head wrapped. Yeah. Like, you mean like your hair and...

Yeah, like that big white, like white, like, white, like, gauze. Yeah. I'm like, this looks like a Halloween costume. Yeah. All right. Yeah, I don't know. I'm trying to think. Have you ever had your head wrapped up?

Yeah. Yeah. I'm in a wait. Here's the thing. I'd like to wait until I have amnesia. I feel like the rapt head is a good way to let your friends and family know you're probably not going to remember much about them. Right. Yeah, yeah.

How are you going to remember that that's your plan once you have amnesia? It's like I crashed out the organ donor thing on my driver's license. Okay. It just says only rap head. It's like an advanced directive. just for head wrapping. It says if he remembers how he hurt his head, don't wrap it. It's a weird devil.

Yeah. If he doesn't know where he is, wrap it up. And then send him on his way. And then send him on his way. Because he wants to go see his friends. Yeah. I mean, he thinks he does. He doesn't know what he wants to do at that point.

Yeah. That's, I love sort of a trip, an all-inclusive trip. It clearly starts with like, you know, on all cylinders. And then day five, you obviously slow down. Yeah. And then to get pulled into a competitive drinking game is. By a child, by your child. Yeah.

Trying to show off. Yeah, we're about to, we're about to head to our fantasy football draft. Yeah. And there's not really, we drink so much less than we used to. Yeah. But a competitive drinking game, I don't know. There's something. We really do.

It's kind of nice. Like, I had a, because I feel like there was, like, the last five years we were still drinking a lot. Like, that was actually part of, like, I felt a little dread. Yeah. Like, oh. And we'll still do things where it's like, you have to do a penalty shot because of X, Y, or Z. But then if someone pours you like a full shot, you're like, oh, come on, man. Yeah.

I don't want to do this. At this point, a shot of tequila is you have to smell the cap. Or like a teaspoon. A little teaspoon. Very excited about our draft. Yeah, Tomi, I just sort of veering off of Andre's story a little bit here, but I just finished the songs that I do for this podcast were born out of doing songs for these drafts. And I just finished the song for the draft with a lot of lead time because I'm going to be so busy sort of getting a lot of things out of the way in my life before the draft.

and then I'm going off to Ireland for a wedding. Do you feel a lot of relief having the song done? An insane amount of relief. It's a big part. The song reveal, and this was, you know, the inspiration for, yeah, the podcast. There's Joshua Doody songs. We all sit around late at night on Saturday. I mean, it's like the biggest tradition of the many annual traditions.

We added a new one this year. We're doing a Secret Santa. Yeah. I'm very excited. We all got to sign up one of our 12 friends, and we have to each. I'll spend $50 on a present. It's $100. Oh, well, I might be pocketing the difference.

I will say. I mean, as we're recording this, we're probably, I don't know, we're like 10 days out, something like that. Oh, you're 10 days. That's right. No, it's more than that. No, you're right. You're right. Yeah, I'm 13 days away.

Have you bought the Secret Santa gift yet? It's in the works. Okay. Have you bought yours? Uh, yes. Gotcha. Yeah. I can't tell you who it's for because it's secret.

Yeah, I know how it works. Hey, we're going to take a quick break and hear from some of our sponsors. Support comes from Quince. Hey, Bajie. Yes, Sufi. Uh, look, I don't understand why you keep insisting on dropping a fortune on basics when you don't have to. I haven't. I stopped.

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Here we go. I just want to say one last thing on Andre. Yeah. And Barb. Yeah. As much as I enjoyed Andre and Barb, I wish Barb, just because it would have thrown me, I wish Barb had been from Montreal and Andre had been from upstate New York.

Because they were just, you know, it's just they were so on the nose, you know. Yeah. Yeah. I do. We're very, we're very sort of northern, northeast heavy today. Yeah. You know, we got Alex, born in Pittsburgh, lives in Buffalo, Barb, upstate New York, Montreal. Let's see where our next storyteller is from.

let's see if hey jeff take out your screwdriver and unscrew the next question from the box yeah no problem all right this is margot i don't know if she says where she's from but she's stories about where she went and it's a little bit of a longer one but it's a journey hey josh and set this is morgo currently living in coastville pennsylvania but i'm from johnstown pa go stillers And this is a family trip from 1998 with my at-the-time boyfriend Guido, who's from Florence. We met as bicycle tour guides in Italy, and post-tour season, we took a trip to Greece for 10 days to see if our burgeoning relationship would stick.

We married in 1999. Important to know about Italians, when they come back from vacations, the first question they get asked by other Italians is, Simonjebene, did you eat well, not what did you see, or how was the weather? All righty. We landed in Athens and decided to take a day or two to see the usual tourist spots, Parthenon, Acropolis, National Archaeological Museum, and we were eating Greek cuisine, goat, yogurt, etc. And the first thing I learned about Guido is that his constitution, shall we say, is finally tuned to Italian food. And the first time he visited the restroom, he exited dejected, explaining that his usual clockwork digestion was off kilter. We had planned to leave Athens for the Peloponese, but now we had to stay within a short

distance of a bathroom in case Guido's nature called. Fortunately, the next day, he exited the motel room with two thumbs up and a giant smile. So we were on our way, taking public transportation. It's how we get an immersive experience, to Sparta, Olympia, Corinth, and sometimes small villages that weren't even on our map. We had a couple hour layover in one where we were transferring buses. It was locked down against the afternoon sun, not a person in sight, until we saw a second floor shutter open, revealing an old man who recognized immediately that I was American and shouted,

Monica Lewinsky. It's during these rides that we met the locals and got a sense of daily life and ideas about off-the-beaten track experiences. riding a bus includes learning that buses deliver mail by tossing mailbags from the door onto pavement in front of gas stations or other determined stops. No one may be around, but out it goes. This will be an important thing to remember later. About day four, I started to get really sleepy, sleeping sickness sleepy.

I had had mono 15 years earlier. Spooks. Basta. that is my cat spooks so let's see where was i so i was getting really sleepy sleeping sickness sleepy i had had mono 15 years earlier so i knew it wasn't that but something like it because i could wake up for meals but otherwise i slept so we rented a car because buses wouldn't hack it for me in that condition i don't know what other places we visited because guido would pull into a motel deposit me in bed, and then site see, come back and take me out for meals, and then

re-deposit me in bed. I was sleeping about 22 hours a day. On day seven, I told him that I would fly home the next day if I wasn't feeling better. Our wonderful Greek grandmother at our motel heard about my illness and brought me a delicious soup that night, and I felt fine the next day. We continued our traveling on the peninsula, and on our ninth day, after leaving the motel, I discovered that I'd left my passport at the front desk. This was back in the day when you would have to leave your passport when checking in. We no longer had the car and couldn't get back to the motel and called to see if they would mail my passport to the American Embassy.

Visions of a mailbag being thrown to the pavement made it unlikely that it would arrive, but they said that they would send it. We arrived back in Athens and I to the embassy where incredibly they had my passport. and we had three hours to spare before our flight. We boarded a local bus to the airport, so sardine packed with locals that Guido and I got separated. My backpack was between my feet where a small child was unzipping it. When he saw that I noticed, he scurried off between legs.

I tried yelling to Guido to be aware of pickpockets, but the loud music and bus motor that circulated with the hot air from the open windows made communication impossible. So when I saw another pickpocket reaching under Guido's shirt where he carried our cash, I elbowed my arms into the air and yelled, attentione! The pickpocket and everyone else nearby saw me, and Guido's cash was safe for now. When the bus stopped, a lot of people got off because the bus police, people who checked to make sure that you've punched your bus ticket, got on.

We hadn't been able to get to the ticket punch machine because it was so crowded, but we figured we could explain what happened. happened, and that we did have tickets and were going to the airport. Instead, they escorted us off the bus and really tried to scare us into thinking that they would take us to the police station and we would miss our flight. Shakedowns are the same all over the world. I lied and said that Guido had all our cash, and it wasn't much because we were leaving the country. So Guido gave him the few bills that he had while I kept my cash tucked away. Greece is a beautiful place, but I will never, ever go back. Hello to Hillary and Larry. I hope that this story passes muster with the

mustachioed one. Thanks. Because you got the shakedown. Yeah. Oh man. That's a that's a rough trip with some digestive issues and then a weird sleeping sickness. Yeah. And then we've talked about signs about the Dutch pickpockets. Yeah. on the trams. Yeah. They made us laugh very hard when we first moved to Amsterdam. And I never got pickpocketed.

I mean, you, you kind of did. In Italy, though. Yeah, Italy. Yeah. And you were, I don't know what the Italian word for asking for it is, but that's what you were doing. I do like that you married an Italian guy and now yells pasta to her cat. Yeah, to Spooks, who's just like, yeah, meowing in the back.

Um, yeah, it's, it's amazing. Like, I will say, when you need an embassy, uh, and an embassy comes through for you, it really makes you, you're like, oh, man. Oh, yeah. USA all the way. Oh, my God. It's incredible. Yeah.

And also, it feels weird to sort of be like, where, how do I deal with this situation? I'm overseas. Yeah. And then you're like, do I go to the embassy? And like, when you have to, it's just, it's amazing. Because it feels like, oh, I shouldn't be allowed to go in this building, but absolutely you can go into that building. You know what? I'm going to say real quick, while we're talking about government services, I had just a great experience at the New York City DMV recently. Oh, yeah?

And just like everything went, I mean, again, like, it looks, New York City is a lot of people. So it wasn't like I walked in and out. But everything about it was like really smooth, like take your number, wait here, five minutes, then this. and just really, really impressed with the whole thing. And again, when government services work well, you're like, thank you. This is more than a fair exchange for my tax dollars. I really appreciate it. Yeah. Yeah, so I feel like we definitely, I think that like sweaty foreign bus thing is a real right of passage.

Yeah. Yeah. I did some of that. Not great at the time. Yeah. I did some of that when I was in Thailand for sure. Yeah. But it all worked.

I mean, I got ripped off all over the left and right on that trip and got sick. And it wasn't, I wouldn't endorse the way I did it. But I got from point A to point B for sure. That's good. Yeah. I think that's a good, a good takeaway for how shitty your trip was when the best thing you say is like, the buses got me. Are you going to Thailand? I can't say enough about the buses.

I recently, not a lot of people. ride the metro in L.A. doesn't go from where you are to where you want to go very often. But I use it. And I was going to the Rose Bowl. I talked about going to that show. But I got to walk like maybe 20 minutes to get to the station. And as I'm walking in, I've got the sort of the tap-in app on my phone. And they also have screens that tell you when the next train's coming. And it was coming in one minute. And I looked and a guy in front of me, and I looked and a guy in front of me looked or saw this sign that said a minute and then he started running and I started running after him because he don't want to miss it like then it's going to be I don't know 20 minutes for the

next one and I was trying to open the tap app on my phone and I just couldn't get it fast enough and I was worried and the like door was closing instead of the turnstiles that you have to go through and this guy sort of edged a foot in the door and cheated his way onto the tram or onto the Metro and I followed him. I felt terrible about it. But I was like, just don't want to miss this train. And then I had a transfer. And on my next train, they made an announcement. And they were like, you know, ticket people might be coming by. So be sure that you have your like confirm tap thing. And in my head, I was just like, if they come onto this train, I'm going to be like, charge me everything. Like, give me the fine, full fine. I feel terrible. And my wife was like,

you're such a nerd. Yeah. Would you have been like, that guy did it too? No, he was gone. I wouldn't have called anyone else out, but I would have been like, I just couldn't find the app fast enough.

I couldn't find it in my wallet. I had a bunch of expired passes that I got to go through. That's great. You know how it is. Yeah. Catching a bus last minute. Still one of the great thrills in the world.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I really do dig it. I sometimes are the boys, you know, when we take our subway, if we get a subway. I mean, they're almost at the age where I'm like, let's make it. But they're so clumsy that I'm always like, don't worry about it, we'll get the next one. Yeah. But I feel like next year, their next school year, it's going to be like, come on.

Let's do this, guys. Yeah. All righty, well, I think, was that four? That's four. But then I think we got a couple questions, yeah. Yeah, let's hear a question. Yeah, we got two questions. This is from Blake

Hey Pasha and Sufi This is Blake from Buffalo, New York A stone throw from Niagara Falls Which I personally think is worth it And it also has a leg up on the Grand Canyon Because it does in fact have railings I have a question for Josh Which is a sincere creative question

But I can't figure out a way to ask it Without sounding pretentious So I'll just lean into it I guess Whenever I listen to the songs you make Which are creative feats I notice that you seem to have multiple takes of the melody recorded. So I was just wondering, is that a creative choice to fill out the sound a little

by adding layers of the same melody, just sung slightly off from each other? Or are you attempting to add harmonies, but don't realize that you're just singing the melody again? Either way, love the pod, love the songs, and thank you for answering my curiosities. If you're wondering where the sunlight is, Posh, it's because he just threw a little shade. No. I appreciate it, Blake. And I don't know how to sing harmonies. I don't read music well enough. I know like I've tried to do it. And I've, you know, gone to like learning how to read music 101 types of things. I know that sort of a chord is made up of three notes. And if you sort of sing something within that same chord, it should, work and it should make it sound pretty. I love when I hear people or bands singing in harmony. I do not know how to do it. So what I'm doing is I'm singing multiple takes of the same thing, sometimes a full octave up or a full octave down, but never any sort of variation to create

harmony because I don't know how to do it and I wish I knew how to do it. And also sort of a lot of times by singing it twice I can sort of cover up some of my failings in singing I feel like it sounds a little bit nicer to have sort of two tracks of the same voice going together

sometimes if it's too high and like you have three versions of the same thing it really will start to warble in a weird way so I'm just trying to make it sound as good as it can and there are certainly tracks where I'm out of my depth and I know I am, but I've already written them and I've sort of committed to it and I can't, I just don't have the time to, to bail and do

something that I can, that's more in my range. I think it's fun. I will say as a listener, I enjoy when you are going for it. Yeah. Even, even on the ones where you maybe don't have the full set of goods that you're. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, these pipes are, you know, are rusty. at least you've got pipes I got a couple of paper towels over here what's that? It's one of those things about that I didn't I took a couple voice classes in college

and I obviously wish I would have taken more and I feel like now I'm like if I take voice classes it's going to be like so expensive and just time consuming and I don't know if I have that time but I have considered it which is a weird thing to consider it for No, I don't want you to take voice class.

I just want to jump in and say, on behalf of all of us, me and the listeners, we don't need you to do that. Yeah, but I think it would be nice, just in general, to learn how to sing better. Okay. Okay. I mean, look, if you want to do it, I obviously support you because I love you very much. Yeah. I mean, and sometimes it does make the recording of the songs significantly longer because I have to record multiple. multiple tracks.

If you take singing lessons, I'm going to take juggling lessons because it's equally as useful. I will say for the song coming up for our draft, which is NSFW, whatever they say, and we'll never play it for you guys. But I feel like it has 17 vocal tracks on it. When you hear it, you'll know

why, but it's, you know, it's, yeah, so that can add some time. But anyhow, that, that should answer it, Blake, you're probably better at all this stuff than I am, and I don't claim to be an expert, so. Thank you, Blake. All right, this is from Josh, but I don't think it's from you, Josh. Okay, that would be so passive, aggressive if it was you. Hello, Josh and Seth. My name is Josh, Joshua.

My brother's name is Seth. Whoa. So look at that. Seth, you know. Love your podcast. Your questions at the end when you ask, would you recommend your hometown as a destination for a family trip? I think you would get way better answers and a little more fun game out of it if you asked your guests to recommend their hometown as a destination. for vacationing period.

That way, it forces them to come up with cool things to see rather than a closed-ended yes or no question. You know what I mean? Keep it up. Yeah, I hear that. Sold. I'm sold.

You feel like you're not sold. I'm totally full. No, no, no. I am sold. I forget the woman from Minnesota's name who sort of tallied up our stats. Right. who we had so much love for. And to change the questions is just to sort of throw that Excel spreadsheet out the window.

This is, by the way, let me just sell you something, Josh. I'm going to jump in. Every now and then we try to change the rules and our fans for bullying and the amount that people are purists like Josh, we're like, but this is not the way it has been done. I got people who support my position. No, you do there. You're a bunch of like just like the very, village elders.

No, young man. We can't do point for per reception. That is not the old ways. Yeah, well, those aren't the old ways. I have often thought, like, what is a place you've always wanted to go on vacation? I think that... Boo. Just do it Joshua's way.

Hey, where's your hometown? Great. You're now, here's how we're going to do it. You're now the head of the local board of tourism. have to convince Josh and I to go on a vacation area of 30 seconds go. Yeah. Okay. I think you should only do that.

You should only do that if they say no. Okay. I think you should only talk, Jeff, when we ask you a question. I spend all this time putting my mic together, though. Oh, my God. Yeah, if they say no, maybe. But I don't know. I'm going to just say, first of all, I just like everything about Joshua's vibe.

and I'm sorry Josh had to go rain on your parade he's probably just still in his head about the fact that Blake pointed out to everybody he doesn't notice a garment go take it personally he's spinning out

Joshua he's spinning out no I would happily make that shift I get what he's going for too just a not a simple yes or no question answer and by the way some people might just choke in the moment and sometimes it's nice to give them a little yes or no, yes or no. Because I will say, like, living or dead family, you want to go on vacation with,

or real or fictional. That's a tough one. Yeah. So, you know, it's a balance, Joshua. It's a balance. Hey, I do want to shout out one thing real quick. There's been a terrible fire on the north rim of the Grand Canyon recently, and it's burned a lot of structures down. There's a historic Grand Canyon lot.

That's gone. A lot of other structures are gone. I reached out to Lauren Cisneros, our friend who works for the Grand Canyon Conservancy. And she said a lot of people up there, a lot of people who work for the conservancy and for the park have lost everything. Really devastating fire that at the time of recording this has been burning for 49 days. And they've got it now under 64% containment. But it's still burning. And it's going to take a long time to rebuild. And then for all those people who lost everything. It's a really bad situation. So we're starting our first ever fundraiser. And if you want to help us support them and support those people and support the rebuilding efforts, you can go to tiny URL.com slash family trips fundraiser. That's tiny URL.com slash family trips fundraiser. And we will match you dollar for dollar up to $10,000. And we would really appreciate your support. And we want to support them as much. as we can because as much as Seth likes to tease the Grand Canyon. I have a, my saying has always been, if anybody burns it down, I want it to be me.

Right. So I, my whole goal here is to build it back up. Right. Because I take no joy and if it happening, you know, via nature. So yeah, so if you want to help us out, if you want to help them out, please go to tiny URL, t-in-y-U-R-L dot com slash family trips fundraiser. We really appreciate it. And thanks, everybody.

Thanks for all your stories and your questions. And, yeah, we really appreciate you. And, yeah, thank you guys for all your questions and stories. Yes, just great. And sort of rock and roll Buffalo was so well represented today. Yeah, good. Upstop, St. New York, Buffalo, crushing it. All right, thanks, everybody.

We'll talk to you soon. Bye, Poshy. Bye, Sufi. I'm going to be able to be. Alex from Buffalo His dad was in charge of the radio They were coming home Discovered a buzz cut

And the car seat electric combo Backseat became a firework show It was dark It was darn made a spark Made a spark-pump system Your head's on fire! Farn family We're heading out

On a vacay's son, can't you say He needed a light to help with his reading, Insecurity was subjected to me questioning Did you make this Motie to? Motte to know you fool No you fool Why do you

hear what I wait Andre got pulled into a drinking game super revved up. And when his turn came, don't cross the table to kiss their last guy, that guy know to Frank Andre over the eye, got some stitches over. Oh, was okay. Dr. said they should take the hotel pay, rob him up good, which caused the hotel fear inviting him back for free the next year.

Then there's Mago, she went to Greece with her boyfriend, Italian Guido. The Grecian food was tough on his belly, but got her passport. After dealing with the sleeping sickness as she had soon, Had soup, we don't poop We don't poop

Hasport key To the ember Sea Pocket Pit Pocket Margo yelled Margo yelled Attency

Thank you.