Judge John Hodgman - TEASER: Members Only Mailbag April 2025

Episode Date: April 25, 2025

The new episode of the Members Only Mailbag is in the members-only bonus feed! This month, the J Squad is talking about an airport dog for some reason. We hope you enjoy this short clip! For the entire episode, and the back catalog of ALL of our bonus episodes, join Maximum Fun at $5 a month. Just go to maximumfun.org/join! Judge John Hodgman is member-supported! Join at $5 a month at maximumfun.org/join!

It's the Judge John Hodgman podcast. I'm Bill of Jesse Thorne. With me is Judge John Hodgman. Hey, if you're a member of Maximum Fun, first of all, thank you. And second of all, great news. The new episode of the Membo Mailbag is now in your bonus content feed. As you may know, this is our members only mailbag where members write in letters to us that may or may not be disputes.

They might be life events or requests for advice or advice for us. We read them all, we comment on them. It's me and Jennifer and Jesse having a real old fashioned, rollicking, docket good time. And if you're not a member, here's what you're missing. And of course, if you want to hear the full episode,

Memberships at Maximum Fund start at just five bucks a month, maximumfund.org slash join. Let's go to that little bit of the Membo mailbag. I know we just talked about this. Maybe it was on a podcast or a Membo mailbag, but so forgive me if we're repeating, but do you remember that time? We were in the Portland airport in Portland, Maine, excuse me, Portland jet port. It's called. I've never stopped thinking about it, John. I mean, I love Maine for a lot of reasons, but this one time, this guy is walking around.

Now was it a St. Bernard or a Bernese Mountain dog? Do you remember? I think it was something a little smaller than a, it might've been a St. Bernard, but it was sort of like a, generally speaking, a sort of, I would call it the category I would describe it as, is Barclay-style dog. Yeah, a real walking sofa. Yeah.

And we're like, look at that incredible dog, and the guy walked right over to us, and he says, you wanna pet it? It's our designated emotional support animal for the airport. Jennifer Marmarie, were you there with us on that one? No, I wasn't. I really missed out. Not only did we get to pet that incredible dog in that lovely airway, it's a very nice little airport.

Nice little airport. Jetport. It's called a jetport. I don't know why. No one knows why it's called a jetport. But no, we didn't come in on a prop plane, John. No, that's right. But we were we were there hanging out in this airport, talking about maybe Dave Foley and Fondly. And this dog came up, we got to pet it as much as we wanted. And then when this dog left,

the man gave us dog trading cards for the dog. Do you still have it? I kept it for quite some time, but I don't know. I couldn't tell you where it's located right now. Yeah. I've never seen that. I've been through that jet port more than a few times since then. And I've never seen that big old emotional support dog, but I think

all airports should have them. And I'm going to make another, uh, this is a non-binding resolution. And I'm gonna make another, this is a non-binding resolution. You know what? It's binding, we'll just see what happens. If you are bringing a dog on an airplane as an emotional support animal, first of all, with rare exceptions,

we know what you're doing. We know what you're doing. If you went to a website and got a vest for money to bring your dog onto an airplane because you want to, who could blame you? I'd want to. I think you need to offer that emotional support animal to everyone on the plane. Everyone gets a pet.

Everyone gets a pet, or at least me. It's only fair. At least if I'm sitting next to you. That's a time when it is particularly important to talk to the pet's owner. Simply because when a dog is in a place like that, they may very well be working, and it might disrupt their work to pet them. Generally, it's fine.

Of course. working. And it might disrupt their work to pet them. Generally, it's fine. Even, you know, like I have an old buddy who has a seeing eye dog. And if he comes and visits, like I'm allowed to pet his dog. You know what I mean? But it is important to ask in case the dog is working. Well, of course, you should always ask to pet a dog under every circumstance. But yes, I'm not talking about distracting working animals. No, we all deserve the emotional support of a dog. That's what I'm saying.

When we're in a freaking airport or an airplane. Yeah, if you have an emotional support animal and you know the kind I'm talking about, right? The kind that is not actively working, but you know what I'm talking about. Jennifer Marmor? I know. You ought to share the emotional support. I would just say, you know, you're walking onto that plane and people are kind of looking

at you going like, we know what you're doing. But if you were to then take the dog and go, would you like to pet my dog? I would be so happy.