Hey Riddle Riddle - Patreon Preview #267: The BBC Presents: Inside Penguin Baseball

Episode Date: April 19, 2024

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Hello, I'm Eric Morton Wimberley of the BBC. You may know my work. For the past decades, I have reported on war-torn areas experiencing strife, all the way to domestic extremism a little closer to home. But for this series I wanted to take a step back from the more serious issues plaguing our world and explore something a little more light-hearted. So I hopped aboard a plane to America to talk about the Penguin Baseball League. That's right, dear listeners, you heard me correctly. In America, they're playing baseball with penguins.

To begin my journey, I sat down with two of the more prominent proponents of Penguin Baseball a Mr. Adel Rifai and a Miss Irian Kyaif okay I'm being told by my producer that I nailed both of those pronunciations to talk about their two new entries into the League of Penguin Baseball the whole League is kind of a new entry to begin with. And that is the Chicago Coolbirds and the Boston Wartlers. So what brought you two to Penguin Baseball to begin with?

Well, like so many things that happen on Hey Riddle Riddle, somebody said some bullshit and we decided to focus solely on that for the rest of an episode and the rest as they say is Penguin history. That's right. And speaking of Penguin history, I think, um, you know, uh, Aaron and I were talking with a third friend of ours, I forget his name. We were talking about like baseball is America's past time.

And a past time should stay in the past. Right? So we're thinking of like, what's a future time? What's America's future time? And so when Penguin Baseball was sort of thrown out on the podcast, we decided to sort of double and then triple and then quadruple down on that and say hey is this something and we still don't know if it is. So you went from inventing a game on a podcast to building stadiums hiring hundreds of penguins all across the United States are building teams and playing

professional penguin baseball. Was that a question? You're right, I guess there wasn't a question in there. So I'll put the question to you this way. Why? Seems like a lot of trouble. If Erin and I can put a question to you, why not? Great response. Novelty is king in America. I mean, have you been to any of our convenience stores?

Have you been to any of our, there's a fast food place where I think you can, it's like all you can eat burgers or something. Listen, it's called Heart Attack Cafe, look it up or don't. We need more novelty. Americans love novelty and we thought, you know, let's get some birds involved.

They were right. I had no idea what I was wading into here. The world of American novelty was fallen to me completely. So I sat down with the owner of the heart attack cafe, which I had to Google to learn more about American novelty. How'd you find me? Oh, I'm sorry. I just Googled your name and Heart Attack Cafe and it came up. I'm Eric Morton Wimberly from the BBC. God, I'm on the internet? I told my nephews to scrub me from the internet.

I paid them $600 each. Did they not do that? Oh, I'm gonna kill them. I'm gonna kill him. I know I'm sorry This is it pulled up your home address. I assumed you wanted people to know the Again, this is this is for a podcast for the BBC. I'm not I'm not here to do you any harm I just really wanted to understand about American novelty. Okay, fancy pants You got to get out of here and you you gotta not tell anyone what you saw today. Of course, of course. I love your sculptures.

I just wanna say, a lot of yard sculptures. Not really used to seeing so many yard sculptures. Those are not sculptures. They're people I hired to stand very still. Now scram. Help us. Help us. Help us. My experience with the owner of the Heart Attack Cafe, whose name I redacted from the podcast for fear of reprisal,

left me even more concerned that I had no idea what was in store for me in the world of Penguin Baseball. So I decided it's best to get a hands-on experience. So I headed to Chicago and the Bic Pin Ice Palace to talk with Mr. Donnie Lembruski, the equipment manager of the Chicago Coolbirds. Donnie, thank you so much for joining me on this podcast episode. Yeah, sure. Thanks so much for having me. Sunflower seeds?

Ah, yes, those are sunflower seeds, correct. Yeah, just wanted to confirm. Oh, you were. Yeah, oh, sure. Thanks so much for having me. Sunflower seeds? Ah, yes, those are sunflower seeds, correct. Yeah, just wanted to confirm. Yeah. Oh, perfect. Yes. Now, Donnie, you are the equipment manager for the Chicago Coolbirds. That's right. How did a person like you find a position like this? Well, I was a line cook. I worked at various Golden Corrals across the Midwest and I was

doing a brief stint of unemployment and I thought you know what am I gonna do? And then my wife Gloria she said look at the would you look at that penguin baseball and I thought she had gone mad I'd you know those are not words that I'd ever heard in combination. Yes. And she showed me a link in Craigslist for a job opening and I said, who the fuck uses Craigslist anymore? Can I curse on the BBC? No, no, you can, but it's okay, we will probably be able to take that out in post. Don't you all say like cunt constantly? Okay, so Donnie, maybe you could guide us through a little bit of a day in the life

of an equipment manager in the Penguin Baseball League. Don't you all have a newspaper where every single copy of it has like a naked girl on page four or something? So, what kind of equipment is this? Those are the egg warmers. So, as you know in Penguin Baseball, or maybe you don't know, the ball is the egg. So what we have concocted here from Spaulding, because Spaulding wasn't interested, from Spaulding we have these sort of bespoke egg balls. Now, they're half egg, they're half ball, they do have seams along the side, but it is egg shape. So it's very hard to throw, incredibly hard to catch, impossible to hit, some people say. When you say, when you say half egg as well, is the half the shape is, is, okay.

So shape is half of egg. Okay. Yes. I'd say hat, you know how they say, I don't know if you know this, cause you're not from here, they say possession is nine-tenths of the law. I'd say shape is 50% of anything. Okay, yes. I believe I understand where you're coming from now, Donnie. Yeah, and so the penguins aren't going to care about the ball egg unless it's warm because that sort of replicates their

own children when they're in egg state or egg form. So we heat up, we have these egg warmers and these heat up the ball so that the penguins give a, give a, well I want to say shit here but you said I can't say shit. Well okay, yes, you've said it twice. Donny, I do have a question. These appear to be, and pardon me for not understanding a local custom, hot plates. Like you would find in a, perhaps a university dormitory. Yeah, that's the thing is, once the penguins hit the ball, if they can, we found that they didn't want to run to the first base, second base, third base, etc. home plate.

So we said, let's replace all the bases with hot plates that way the penguins rush there to get warm because the stadium is so cold and we are having a trouble where a lot of them won't continue to run so every once while we'll get a home run the penguin runs and slides in the first base and then just stays there for weeks on end so that's been something we're trying to iron out before the but you know before the league gets cooking. In my research I also read that the Penguins like playing the game and they're not being forced to play the game and they can leave at any time is that also correct? Okay looks over to the left I'm being told I should not answer any questions

about this. He's looking at a picture of, it looks like Adelrithaea? Who butchered that name? A portrait, a portrait, I'm sorry, pardon me, a portrait that is drawn of him on the wall. Drawn. Portrait. Yeah, we had to cut corners. You would not believe how much ice we have to ship in daily just to keep this thing afloat. I'm not sure if my interview with Donnie was officially sanctioned or not.

He seemed to be giving me a lot of information that maybe he should not be giving me. But that's the life of an equipment manager in the Penguin Baseball League. Next I headed all the way to sunny Boston for a little slice of spring training with the Boston Watt Watlers and their trainer Mr. Louis Monster. Hey, I can only give you five minutes of my time. I'm really busy over here. No, yes, I can see that you absolutely have your hands full.

Could you just describe for our listeners a little bit of what goes into spring training in the Penguin Baseball League? Yeah, it's a real chore over here. Can I tell you something? These penguins get out on my field and they forget all their natural instincts. Why are we practicing sliding on my time? We should be practicing things like baseball, hitting the ball, throwing the ball, catching the ball. I'm teaching these penguins how to fish. What happened? These penguins are worse than any ball players I've ever worked with in my 60 years in the business.

Yes, well, they're penguins. Yeah, and whose idea was this? 1, 2, 3, 4, Hey Riddle Riddle's Clue Crew! Listen to the rest of the episode now by starting your free 7-day trial at patreon.com slash hey riddle riddle.