Judge John Hodgman - Return to Chambers

Episode Date: November 13, 2014

Judge Hodgman and Bailiff Jesse clear the docket (be forewarned: there's nightmare gerbil talk).

Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman podcast. I'm bailiff Jesse Thorne. This week, we're in chambers, clearing the docket. Hello, Judge Hodgman. Why, hi, Jesse. How are you? You know, we get a lot more cases than we could ever possibly adjudicate in the course of a single episode.

That's true. Or, I guess, a series of single episodes. Or, my explanation of this is really poor. But the moral of the story is sometimes we have to do one episode where we decide a bunch of cases. That's a clearing the docket episode. Does that make sense? Absolutely. There are issues where maybe a precedent has already been set or the decision is so clear cut and the opportunity for me to be brutal and harsh is so delicious. And yet I don't want to have to say it to someone's face. So we settle it behind their backs. Yeah.

Well, let's kick things off with something from Lewis. Lewis, you're terrible. No, no. We haven't even heard the judgment. Is it not appropriate for me to prejudge? No. Oh, all right. What does Lewis have to say?

My mother bought me a portable battery charger earlier this year, which works very well for charging my phone. However, it does not have enough power to charge my portable handheld gaming device. My mother recently bought a new charger for herself which does have adequate power to charge a gaming device i proposed that we trade chargers she doesn't need the extra juice from the super charger i do but she doesn't want to she doesn't want to trade she believes that because she bought it she deserves to keep it what do you say judge hodgman? See, I told you. I was right. He was terrible. I didn't need to hear this thing. I'm going to presume. I'm going to give everyone the benefit of the doubt here and presume that Lewis is a child because his mommy is buying him chargers for his phone and for his gaming console.

And presumably also to go underneath his dining plates. You don't eat without chargers at hero home do you wow wow i you know what i have to walk out of the room for a second and just and just process that that was amazing thank you wow i i have never i have, I'm honestly speechless. It opens a whole new area of table service comedy that I've never even considered before. I was like, you broke my brain like Monty Python in 1980, my man. Wow, chargers, right. That's the big plate, the biggest plate there is, right? Yeah, it goes underneath your regular plate. Right. That just sits on the table and your regular plate goes on is, right? Yeah, it goes underneath your regular plate. Right.

You don't clear it. That just sits on the table, and then your regular plate goes on top of it. Yeah, it's purely decorative. Purely decorative. Can we do some fish fork comedy later, too? Absolutely. I insist that we do. But let's get back to Lewis for a second,

because he's waiting over there for me to tell him why he's a monster. No, Lewis, I'm presuming, I can only guess from this letter that Lewis is not of age. He is living at home with his mom. She's buying him chargers for his stuff. And he's got time to play video games. And his mom's charger is a little bit better than his charger. And he feels entitled to take it even though she bought it. Only a child would leap to such presumptions. But now it is the case, Lewis, for you to put aside childish things and realize, if you want something in life, you may need to go out and get it for yourself. And yeah, it is a pretty well time-honored principle that someone who buys a thing

gets to decide what they do with it. It's, you know we we live in a capitalist society you may not like that but that is pretty much the basis of it lewis you uh you're wrong and uh use your own charger but save up save up your allowance and get whatever charge you want judge hodgman do you know that the uh Diego Chargers football team are otherwise known as San Diego Superchargers? Don't do this, Jesse. Don't ruin your great dinnerware joke with a sports joke. Come on, man.

No, this is a sports song. Do you know the San Diego Chargers song? Charge! No, it's way, way, way better than that what is it san diego superchargers san diego it's a disco song too so imagine a four on the floor beat san diego superchargers. San Diego Superchargers. Charge. I have a new ringtone. I have a rough time transitioning between my chest voice and my head voice.

That's okay. Let's all stay in our chest voices for the rest of the podcast. Somebody is going to find a YouTube video of the San Diego Superchargers theme song and post it on the Maximum Fun Reddit at MaximumFun.reddit.com, it's going to get a lot of upvotes now because that song is the jam. There's some great sound effects. There's a part where it goes, do-do-do. Well, that's the supercharging.

Yeah, exactly. Why are the San Diego Chargers called the Superchargers? Is there a big electricity power generation going on there? Is that the big industry? I thought it was the Navy. I don't know why they're called the Chargers. Were they always the – Originally part of the American Football League, AFL.

I don't know. Were they originally from San Diego? According to the official site of the pro football hall of fame yeah baron hilton who was the original owner of the chargers son of hilton hotels uh founder and uh paid character on madman comrade hilton yeah yeah baron hilton baron that's his middle name his full name is robber baron hilton by baron Hilton. Baron, that's his middle name. His full name is Robert Baron Hilton.

By Baron. Little on the nose there, Hiltons. Did you know that whole subplot? Do you remember on Mad Men when they had that whole subplot that didn't really resolve itself about Conrad Hilton being Connie. Yeah. He was Don Draper's sort of like mentor and tormentor.

Yeah. Don Draper was finally going to make Daddy happy. That was sponsored content. Hilton paid for that. He didn't give him the moon. How do you say ice in Italy, Hilton? Still, I feel very pleasurably sold by that whole thing. Okay, here's what it says. Baron Hilton agreed after his general manager, Frank Leahy,

picked the Chargers name when he purchased an AFL franchise for Los Angeles. I liked it because they were yelling charge and sounding the bugle at Dodgers Stadium and at USC games. Da-da-da-da-da-da! Charge! They played one season in Los Angeles before moving to San Diego. Yeah. In 1961. See, but the point is, I was right all along.

Their song is Charge, and Lewis is a monster. So let's move on. I want to hear the San Diego Superchargers song. It's, it's, just tune into that part of your head where it's constantly playing. Oh boy. Here it, here it comes. You opened up up that hatch in your head we can hear the music come out see is it jam tell me you're not dancing right now judge hodgman i'm recording this on a cassette tape off the speaker like i used to do the old radio shows so i can send it to david re Reese so he can turn it into a mashup. Superchargers San Diego. Superchargers San Diego.

Superchargers San Diego. Superchargers charge. Charge, charge, charge, charge chug, chug. We're coming your way. We're going to dazzle you with our play. Written by Sid and Marty Kroff. Thank you, Jim. Here's something from Jillian.

She writes, I live in Portland, Maine. On a recent trip to a convenience store, I found a friendly cat wandering around the parking lot. The cat had a collar with tags, which let me know the owner's phone number and that the cat's name was Pippin. I assumed Pippin was lost and called the owner to leave a passive-aggressive voicemail about where and when I'd seen the cat.

My friend said that Pippin probably lived outdoors and that the collar was in case he was hit by a car. If a person feels enough ownership to give a cat a collar with personalized tags, why would they let it roam free in a city full of cars and possums? Should a person expect snooty voicemails when they put their phone number on a free-roaming cat? Also, I've heard that you shouldn't put a secure collar on an outdoor cat because it can easily hang itself. Judge Hodgman, please tell me if I was right in shaming the owner.

Please tell me if I was right in shaming the owner. Well, first of all, big shout out to my third semi-hometown of Maine, Vacationland, USA. Specifically, Portland, a city I've never been, but I believe it's known for its cars and possums. That's why it's called Cars and Possumsville, Maine. And I'm only hoping that this could be that Pippin is a Maine Coon Cat, largest the largest of the domesticated cats because main coon cats are hilariously huge they look they look like children in cat suits do you know who's got a main coon cat jesse who's that if you were gonna guess john cleese you would be wrong you know why why he's got two if you google Google, if you can get your keyboard fingers off the superchargers for a sec and just Google John Cleese Maine Coon cat, you're going to see some delightful pictures of an incredibly large man holding an incredibly large cat or two.

He has to. He's such a huge man that he has to have oversized cats. These cats are ridiculous. Anyway, Jillian's whole thing is that she saw a cat in a parking lot. It got a tag, and she figured that it was lost. So she called the owner and just was sniffy with the owner about it. And then apparently let the cat go. It was like a transitory thing. If you assume the cat was lost, Jillillian why didn't you rescue the cat this could be no be no greater illustration of uh how you are not minding your

own business enough jillian yeah it was inappropriate for you to to call up and shame a cat owner under any circumstances if their cat is in the wild and you want to alert them that it is in the wild then you they have the tags that's is in the wild, then they have the tags. That's what it's there for. Don't call up and be mean about it. And if you think in good faith that the cat is lost, you should do something about it. And if you can't do something about it, then call and say, yeah, the cat was in the parking lot. It seemed a little disoriented.

I tried to pick it up, but I couldn't. I hope you find it. Good luck. Not, you're a terrible owner. I only had a chance to read the phone number off its collar. I couldn't quite pick it up. I know. It was moving so fast.

It was moving so fast. I could just get its name, Pippin, and telephone number off. And, yeah, so who knows? Look, I had a cat once. The cat passed away, which is to say I brought it to a room to be killed because it was 19 years old. But, you know, you would put a collar on the cat specifically for that reason. So the cat could go outside and be found if he were lost or identified if he were murdered. And your point about the cat collar being a danger to an outdoor cat is easily

remedied by the many, many, it turns out, hundreds of brands of breakaway cat collars that are out there. A cat collar, no need for a cat to choke on its own collar in the outdoors anymore. There's technology to do that. So no, Jillian, you may consider this my voice, my snooty voicemail message to you. You are wrong. And you and Lewis both go in the monster box. What kind of monster has that reaction to finding a lost cat? Like, if she thinks it's a lost cat, can you imagine how distraught the owner that loves that cat is. And her whole deal is she's just going to figure out the phone number, let the cat go, and then call to be a jerk to that lost cat owner? Yeah.

John Cleese is dissolving in tears over his lost Maine Coon cat who has left England to return to its homeland. And she's going to call up his, I presume, ancient cassette tape answering machine and be mean to John Cleese about it? The guy helped to revolutionize comedy. Makes no sense. Here's something from Gretchen. I bring the case with my sister Marta against my brother Stuart. In the 1960s, my grandparents acquired a carved lion figure

about one foot by two feet from the Philippines. Was it possessed by a demon? If it's not possessed by a demon. I'm just scanning quickly here. Oh, control F demon. No dice. Was it a puzzle box that if you pushed the eyes in, then it would release a demon centibite that would cause you pleasure and pain at the same time. What's weird about it is I don't even see anything supernatural in this whole question.

What's the point of acquiring a carved lion figure from the Far East and bringing it home and bequeathing it to your grandchildren if it's not going to curse and haunt them for the rest of their lives? All right, well, go on, read about this dumb lion statue. I don't even feel like it. I mean, there's not even a ghost in here. Like, just a basic garden variety, sheet-over-the-head ghost. I would have taken that. You know, like, oh, I got this, I got the lion.

And there's a ghost associated with it in some way, loosely associated with it. That would have been enough to juice this question up for me. But now I feel like the whole rest of the thing is going to be a disappointment to both of us. Well, let's get, you know, this is a triple monster box now because Gretchen's already a monster for even writing in with this non-ghosty question. But let's hear her out.

Maybe I'll come around. You know, I haven't searched for ghoul yet. There could be a ghoul. My siblings and I have each expressed interest in owning this carving. It's nice looking, but most importantly, it has sentimental value. Our youngest brother, Stuart, recently moved into a house with roommates and took the lion carving without telling the other siblings. Stuart says he gets to keep it because he took it first. I realize at some point we'll have to resolve this for good, but for now, I'd like Judge Hodgman to order Stewart to return the wood carving to my parents' basement.

This is an urgent situation because Stewart and his roommates are in their early 20s, the lion is in the living room, and I'm worried something will happen to it during a party. Please help. First of all, I like that this is our first case from someone concerned a family heirloom will be turned into a bong. I was going to say he's going to make it into a gin funnel, which is what I did during my college days. Yeah, this, you know what? I'm glad you read the whole thing because I've come around.

Gretchen is the opposite of a monster. is a concerned, righteous human being who does not want this heirloom to be destroyed by this disgusting creature of a brother who was taken into his party house with his friends to put his smelly feet up on and hollow out into a punch bowl or whatever. And so, yeah, just because you're 20 years old and mom and dad are exhausted all the time and hope that you'll just go away by now doesn't mean you can just

take whatever you want out of the basement and make it your own, particularly if you have siblings. Stuart, you got to return that lion. Actually, Gretchen, what I would do is just wait. Wait until that lion invariably comes alive, like the warrior Tiki doll in the Karen Black segment of Trilogy of Terror, and bites your brother in the leg repeatedly with his little needle teeth. And then he'll say like, oh, you can take it back and then you can avoid all kinds of conflict. In the meantime, can I just point out to you, Gretchen, that there are a lot of great carved figures and statuettes in the world. And just thinking about it, you're a dumb lion. I was just reminded. On my desk, I have a plastic figurine, a very beautifully sculpted figurine that I got at a toy store of a gorilla, of a big gorilla who's holding a samurai sword and has a cybernetic arm and leg,

and on his non-cyborg leg, he's wearing a tennis shoe. And it's one of my most prized possessions. And until your brother gives that thing back, you can just go out and get something good for your own house. That's fair. Are you not feeling my cyborg gorilla with a samurai sword? I'll take a picture and we'll post it and everyone will understand.

It's better than your dumb lion. So far it sounds a little Rococo. Here's something from Tim. Robin and I met while getting graduate degrees at an art school in Boston. While in school we wrote and staged a musical together. We enjoyed collaborating, but now we're working separately on different projects in different states.

We recently realized that we're both launching Kickstarters. Mine was to help finance a literary zine publication based around Boston artists, writers, and poets. Apparently, he's launching his Kickstarter in 1994. Robin's Kickstarter focused on raising money for her and a friend to go on a TMZ tour of the stars or something. I don't know. Here is where our dispute comes in. While Robin's Kickstarter was successful, mine was not.

We both pledged, in my mind, symbolic contributions of $5 to each other's campaigns. For my $5 sponsorship, Robin is showing her thanks by sending me a pencil. However, Robin is reluctant to give me my $5 because my Kickstarter did not succeed. I've asked her to send $5 anyway, but she says that's not how Kickstarter works. Due to a credit card malfunction, my $5 payment to Robin was not processed, so neither one of us has actually fulfilled our $5 pledge to the other. I would like a firm, unbiased ruling on this. Does Robin have to

give my project her $5 pledge, even though the Kickstarter was unsuccessful? I assert that she does indeed owe me, since we're friends who are mutually supportive of each other's projects. Robin is reluctant to fulfill her pledge that that that might that argument might hold water if indeed you were friends who were indeed mutually supportive of each other's projects but your whole argument tim

is premised on the premise that uh robin's kickstarter was dumb and unworthy. You couldn't even bring yourself to describe what it was, a TMZ tour of the stars or something. I don't know. That's a direct quote from your letter. And it does not surprise me, given, as Jesse pointed out, that you live in 1994, that you don't understand how Kickstarter works. If you pledge $5 to a thing and it gets funded, then your credit card gets charged. Or in your case, they ask you to scrounge up $5 out of your jeans

pocket and put it with a slice of pizza in her mailbox or something. But if you don't, if your Kickstarter is not funded, no one pays any money. That's just how it goes. You can't cash five bucks off of your friend just because you didn't get funding for your zine. Kickstarter isn't around to allow you to get money from your friends because you have the idea. Kickstarter is designed to help fund things that get funded. And I'm afraid that you don't live in 1994 you live in the year 2014 that's 20 years later kickstarter of course is going to be more quickly to fund some weird probably ironic celebrity spotting adventure than it is your version of quimby quarterly the zine that i used to buy all the time at primal plunge in alston in 1992 in boston primal Plunge was the place, you guys.

Quimby Quarterly, the founder of Quimby Quarterly, which was the big art zine in Boston in the early 90s, moved to Chicago and opened a bookshop called Quimby's Books, which is still there. And it's a very good bookstore.

So what's the count now, Jesse? We have one, two, three monsters to one non-monster. Yeah, well... Which is about right for the American population, unfortunately. Well, I think also you have to consider the fact that monsters are presumptuous. Yeah, they're a self-selected population. They are more likely to think that they're so right that they're going to write an email to me. Here's something from Beth. Oh, by the way, by the way, Lewis and Jillian

and Tim, I love you. I don't really think you're monsters. You're wrong, though. But you know. Here's something from Beth, some notes about episode 170, Monty Belmonte Python. I was delighted by your ruling in favor of Beth from Australia, who will soon be welcoming home her adorable new pet snake, Monty Belmonte Python. I wrote a PhD dissertation on the mating behavior of a Mexican lizard and wanted to offer some herpetological thoughts. Oh, yeah. First, you are quite disturbed by the thought of feeding snakes, quote-unquote, pinkies. Should you decide to get

a scaly pet in future, don't worry, they don't all eat frozen dead mice. Most lizards are insectivores and there are even a few herbivorous lizards like iguanas. Yeah, but... Herbivorous, excuse me. That's fine. It's not the frozen dead mice that bother me so much as the name pinkies. That's where it turns gross. But go on. One note of caution, however. Your statement that it takes two snakes to make a baby snake is generally but not universally true. There has been a case of parthenogenesis or virgin birth in a python from a Dutch zoo.

What? or virgin birth in a python from a Dutch zoo. What? She has submitted a scientific article by Groot et al. from 2003 to this point. This happened with a very different kind of python than the one desired in the court case, and parthenogenesis in reptiles is extremely rare. However, if Beth and Ross want to be 100% certain they won't end up with a writhing mass of snakes, it might be a wise idea to make sure their new pet is male. Thanks for your efforts on behalf of herpetological justice. Molecular genetic evidence for

parthenogenesis in the Burmese python, Python Maluris bivitatus by T.M.V. Groot. And it does not just say I am Groot over and over again. It's talking about how a female python in a Dutch zoo reproduced asexually, just like in Jurassic Park, nature found a way. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, you know, this was not the first I heard about this. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, you know, this was not the first I heard about this.

Beth wrote in and also Zachary H. wrote in about parthenogenesis in snakes in a National Geographic article, too, which we can put a link to up on the thing. It happens. It's real. I apologize. I thought that it was simple science to say it takes two snakes to make one snake. But, in fact, one snake may make many snakes, and that's terrifying. And therefore, I hope those lovely kids in Western Australia, if they are indeed still alive,

make sure that they watch their snakes for sudden doubling. So at this point in our episode, Judge Hodgman, things are about to turn somewhat more nightmarish. Wait a minute. We just talked about, we just talked about a snake dividing itself into two snakes in a Dutch zoo, which frankly is the creepiest part. That's the detail that really sends it home. In a Dutch zoo. I feel like I'm watching a weird Dutch horror movie, but go on.

What else could get weirder? So do you remember the episode Bleached and Mounted Bones of Contention? No, I do not! No, of course I do. That's the one where the guy wanted to start collecting skulls and his girlfriend was like,

that's gross, weirdo. And I said, it's not gross. And I don't remember the reasoning that I gave him. But the real reason that I wanted him to pursue his hobby of collecting skulls and skeletons is that it gave me a chance to talk up Skulls Unlimited in Oklahoma City, the fine purveyors of medical reproductive human skeletons and actual animal skeletons. They do a very fine job. They were the ones who put together my ferret skeleton for me. Beautiful articulated ferret skeleton for a very reasonable cost.

I highly recommend it for all your articulated skeleton needs. And so I did. And in fact, those two lovely people came to see me in philadelphia and they seemed perfectly normal and not uh not haunted by anything but you're saying there's something going wrong in their lives um well they were they sent us a letter i'm going to read the letter all right you may recall us from an episode from january 2013 which we debated whether or not i was allowed to collect skulls. You may also recall

that one of the outcomes of the case was our being gifted a nightmare gerbil from the Max Fund offices. That's Jesse Thorntalk for gerbil, everybody. Yeah, and this gerbil had been sent to us by a nice man named Guy and his lovely wife, Mary Beth, in the Pacific Northwest, they knew

that I had a taxidermied squirrel named Nutsy, the erstwhile logo of MaximumFun.org. And I also have a few other creatures in my life that are formerly alive but no longer. For legal reasons, we'll just leave it there. They sent me these beasts that we don't know exactly what animal it is. But it's a gross animal and it has red-tipped teeth that look like it's been biting your feet while you're trying to sleep. It's really horrible. Like that lion statue's going to come alive and bite Stuart's ankles.

And very poorly taxidermied as well, like in a grotesque position this grotesque creature was. And we gave one of them to Nick and Sarah, and then I believe we gave one away them to nick and sarah and then i believe we gave one away as a contest we punished we punished some listeners with the other we had much more listen we had

much more interest in owning a nightmare gerbil than anyone ever should have now i had never seen a photograph of either of the night well maybe i saw the one that we gave away in the contest but i had never seen a photograph of the one that we gave to Nick and Sarah after Nick won that case and got the right to collect skulls. And you're telling me that something happened to it? Yeah, so it was pretty terrifying to begin with. I'm not going to pretend like it was anything else. And Nick and Sarah have sent us some photographs. Nick says,

we first noticed about two months ago that small clumps of hair were falling out entirely on their own. I keep telling Sarah that I'll throw it away, but honestly, I'm a little scared to go near it. Maybe it's molting before it transforms into something even more horrific? And they've sent in some photographs of this.

I'm not going to pretend that I haven't seen these photographs already because I had seen them, obviously, before we started talking. But I hadn't seen them for a while, and I was just scrolling through them again as you were describing, as you were reading the letter. as you were describing, as you were reading the letter. And I got to say, it's taking both my breath and most of the contents of my stomach away once more as we speak. This is seriously humans who are listening. I know that some of you listen with your kids. Don't let your kids look at these photos of this horrible taxidermied gerbil. I'll call it that because I don't know what kind of animal it is just losing its hair in clumps over i think and when i saw i talked to nick and

sarah in philadelphia when they came to see my show there thanks you guys that was a great show i i think that they told me that it all happened sort of over the course of 24 hours like this like this long day i could be wrong but i'm pretty sure what they said was this long dead uh spiteful creature was so you know finally was hanging on to some little thread of life just keeping its hair on and then one day it lost it and then it just all the hair just went. And it is truly a monstrous thing to behold and far scarier than snakes dividing themselves in Dutch zoos.

You're absolutely right. Have I ever told you why I call it a nightmare? Gerbil? No. One time when I was a kid, I had a lot of hamsters as a kid, but only one of them was ever nice. Hamsters are kind of nasty animals and they're cute though. And I had one, it was a teddy bear

hamster. It was named Cora. And usually my hamsters lived at my mother's house. My parents were divorced. But I think my mom was on vacation. And so I brought Cora and her cage to my father's house when I was staying at my father's house. And there was an earthquake, and Cora escaped. And Cora was out for a couple of weeks, or maybe a week. And I had sort of triangulated where in the house Cora was by, like, leaving food different places and tracking her poop pellets, you know? Sure. Classic poop pellets, you know? Sure. And. Classic poop pellet triangulation.

And one morning, my dad yells down to my room, which was down in the basement, and he says, Jesse, come up. I got to talk to you. And he brought me upstairs and he said, sit down at the table. And he said, last night, the baby cried and I went out to get it. Anyway, I stepped on your gerbil. Oh, no. Yeah.

Oh. And then he goes, my stepmother's name is Bernie. And then he goes, I wasn't going to tell you, but Bernie made me. So all small rodents in my mind are now gerbils thanks to the power of my dad's weird Kansas City, Missouri pronunciation combined with just the raw power of trauma. Well, the fact is everyone out there is going to think that I'm using some ploy to drive traffic to MaximumFun.org and the Judge John Hodgman show page by saying how horrifying these photos are. And it's some kind of P.T. Barnum trick. But you will see when you get there, you're going to go there.

I know you are. When you get there, you're going to be like, I wish I hadn't. These pictures are basically the human centipede of listener-submitted photos, and it's really awful. They're genuinely pretty terrifying. I mean, yeah, they're upsetting. But Nick and Sarah were so nice when they came to see me in Philadelphia.

And I'm very sad that as you are listening to this, my tour of the various cities of the United States this fall is basically coming to a close. Depending on when you hear this, I will have just begun or maybe I'm'm in the middle of, or maybe just finished the New England leg of my tour. If you happen to be listening to this before November 19th, won't you please come and see me and David Reese in Burlington, Vermont, and then on the 20th in Lebanon, New Hampshire at the Opera House, the 21st in the Academy of Music, Northampton, Massachusetts, one of my many hometowns. And then finally, Hartford, Connecticut, with not only David Reese, but also Jonathan, the fresh banana man of yore from Kennebunkport, Maine. Please do come and see us. All the details are on johnhodgman.com slash tour. Did I fit that in sneakily enough, Jesse? Yeah, but I'm going to do this pretty much shamelessly. Jesse? Yeah, but I'm going to do this pretty much shamelessly. No matter where you live, you can go to maxfundstore.com and check out the new Judge John Hodgman t-shirts,

including the podcast justice t-shirt and the advertisement for the Bat Brothers Home Bat Remediation Company of Paola, Kansas. Both of those online at maxfundstore.com alongside numerous other products from all of MaximumFun.org's great shows including our new skateboard deck which is really cool I think you can buy a print of the painting of Judge John Hodgman as a cat all kinds of great stuff all online at maxfundstore.com

Canadian House of Pizza and Garbage t-shirt. How about that? That's the classic. I'm sorry that I wasn't giving you more feedback while you were doing your spiel, but I was busy trying to take a really sweet picture of my figurine of my cyborg gorilla holding a samurai sword wearing one tennis shoe that I want to get off to you guys so we can post it as a sort of a palate cleanser after you look at this horrifying nightmare, Gerbil. You can see this great figurine that I want to get off to you guys so we can post it as a sort of a palate cleanser after you look at this horrifying nightmare gerbil. You can see this great figurine that I own.

The best part about it is that he's got a tennis shoe on. I, by the way, to the people, to the folks with that nightmare gerbil in their possession, and when I say the folks who have it in their possession, I'm not only talking about Nick and Sarah. I'm also talking about whoever won the other one. I can't remember. My recommendation is do not move it. Do not touch it.

If anything, maybe put like a velvet lined box over it so you can't look at it. You do not want to disturb the evil spirits in there because they will get out. Even if it's just a garden variety, you know, sheet over the head ghost, you don't want to if it's just a garden variety you know sheet over

the head ghost you don't want to mess with that kind of stuff you know yeah put a put a uh you know what you do is you put a a dust bin over it and you put some heavy bricks on top yeah good idea good thinking yeah and just that's horror that's horror movie thinking how much do you need a bedside table anyway get a second bedside table and build it around build it sort of built in around the nightmare gerbil so so it's sort of locked in between the two bedside tables one on top of the other maybe maybe you should just leave your house yeah just just go amityville horror style the point is is I'll be the point is David Reese and I are going to be touring through New England

and we'll be sticking around after each show to meet and greet everybody whether your name is Nick, Sarah, or something else because I really love it when Judge John Hodgman listeners come particularly if they've been on the podcast and even if they haven't been I still consider them future potential

litigants. Yeah, I agree. I'm also excited for you to meet Judge John Hodgman listeners. If you want to submit a case to Judge John Hodgman, go to MaximumFun.org slash JJHo, J-J-H-O, hashtag your Judge John Hodgman posts on Twitter, hashtag JJHo and on Tumblr and so on and so forth. hashtag JJ Ho and on Tumblr and so on and so forth. You can join our Facebook group at Facebook.com slash MaximumFun.org and discuss the show at Forum.MaximumFun.org and at MaximumFun.Reddit.com, our MaxFun subreddit. And this week's episode of my public radio program, Bullseye, is a Judge John Hodgman special. Two classic Judge John Hodgman special. Two classic Judge John Hodgman cases from the archives, two of our all-time favorites. And it's going to be airing

on public radio stations around this great nation. On the actual radio? Yeah, on the actual radio. That's very exciting. I know, right? One of the cases that we're going to be reexamining on the Bullseye Judge John Hodgman special, John, is the pony case. Do you remember the pony case? I cannot stop thinking about it. Yeah. So this woman had a flock of ponies, which I believe is the correct collective noun.

And it's a quarrel, a short quarrel. Yeah, exactly. And Nancy is a woman. She sent a nice follow-up email to our producer, Julia. Here's just a little excerpt. Dot, dot, dot. And Becky, that was the other person in the case. And Becky hasn't said anything mean about my ponies,

except we both agreed that video of the two panda cubs crawling all over their handler, which if you haven't seen it is very funny, is similar to my ponies being all over me when it's deworming day, which is a highlight for them. So thanks for the update, Nancy. And good deworming day to you all. The program produced by Julia Smith, edited by Mark McConville. Thanks, guys. We'll talk to you next time on the Judge John Hodgman Podcast. Court is unborn! MaximumFun.org

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