Lovett or Leave It - If You Give a Mouse a Pronoun

Episode Date: March 8, 2025

This week, DOGE continues to gobble up federal jobs, and the Secretary of Agriculture suggests you suck eggs. Natalie Morales eats in Was I In This? Emily St. James’s new book Woodworking gives us something to chew on. And Lovett digs his teeth into two terrors, cannibalism and high school.Upcoming shows: crooked.com/events. Order Woodworking by Emily St. James at crooked.com/books. 

Love to leave it as brought to you by Bombus. I got a lot of copy here, John. I'm skipping it. Okay. I'm skipping it. Let me tell you why. What's on these feet right now? Bombus!

I know that I'm working out of those anywhere. Every goddamn day. But I switched completely to Bombus. All right, I switched completely. Look, I always had a couple Bombus in the drawer, but when Trump became president, I said, you know what? Something's gotta give.

And I want my feet to be just a little bit more comfortable. So I went on the internet. I went on Elon's internet. And I bought a ton of bombas. I bought a whole bunch that are all the same so that I don't have any decisions in the morning. They're different, different color stripes. These are the, these are the gray stripes.

Yeah, I know I've seen that. But I got every stripe so that I have, I have a different color stripe to match whatever clothes I'm wearing. So my stripes from my bombas are always coordinated with my outfit every day. Sometimes that's just for me, because they're in my pants, and you don't know that. But sometimes it's for my gym shorts,

because they're great when I go to the gym. They're great when I go to the office. They've got dress socks. I'm a complete bombas boy. I'm a bombas boy. Enjoy worldwide shipping to over 200 countries. Go to bombas.com slash love it and use code love it for 20% off your first purchase. Let me see if I should have covered anything else here.

They got dress socks. I got those. They're fantastic. Any other choice? Cushioned arch hugging pairs. That's what I've got on right now. You know, it goes great with new spring socks, fresh white t-shirts, waterproof slides.

I also have the slides. I also, those slides I've been wearing, Bombus. Wow. Head on over to bombus.com slash love it and use code love it for 20% off your first purchase. That's B-O-M-B-A-S dot com slash love it. Code love it for 20% off your first purchase. Bombus.com slash love it, use the code love it

because if it's your first purchase, getting 20% off, just get all the socks you could ever need till the day you die. That's what I recommend. Bombus.com slash love it because it's your first purchase getting 20% off just get all the socks you could ever need till the day you die that's what I recommend bombus.com slash love it what's up los angeles welcome to love it or leave it live from dynasty typewriter good news adrian brody with trump's joint address to Congress behind us, your Oscars acceptance is now the second worst speech of the week.

Putting the brutal and brutalist that guy. I've been here before. Don't play the music. I have a point to make. Says nothing forever. That was unbelievable. That was like the gall, the actor hubris to be winning an Oscar in front of one of the biggest television audiences in the world.

The music starts playing and you say, how dare you? I haven't yet said that love is important. We've got a great show for you tonight. Natalie Morales is here to comb through her catalog. Writer and author of the new novel Woodworking, Emily St. James is here to talk about my greatest fear, teenage girls. Then we all debate the worst of two evils, cannibalism and high school. But first, let's get into it.

What a week. On Tuesday, Donald Trump delivered a speech to Congress filled with lies and grievances and what sounded more like a MAGA rally speech than a presidential address. It's Trump's special talent that he can make a speech both completely insane and deeply boring. It's one of those combinations that should be impossible, like being Jewish and digesting dairy. As promised, some Democratic Congresswomen wore pink in protest.

Powerful stuff. I see they borrowed a page from Sun Tzu's classic text, The Art of Putting on Fun Little Outfits. Congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez, head of the Democratic Women's Caucus, told Time magazine that pink is a color of power and protest. It's time to rev up the opposition and come at Trump loud and clear. But wearing a color is not a protest. It's a statement. It's not a protest. You're allowed to wear pink. You're coordinating your outfits, but the outfits aren't loud and clear. No, they're maybe loud, but they're not

necessarily clear. It's like watching Meghan Markle make popcorn. I know you think this is something, but until you explain it, it's nothing. Trump began his address with a declaration. And to my fellow citizens, America is back. Yeah, we're back. Measles is back. People needing their own chickens is back. Flying being an adventure is back. The speech was briefly interrupted when Democratic Texas Congressman Al Green caused a disruption

and House Speaker Mike Johnson had him kicked out. Mr. Green, take your seat. Take your seat, sir. Take your seat. Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant-at-arms to restore order. It was a bit excessive when Lauren Boebert rolled out the congressional guillotine, but... Rules are rules. Green's shouts weren't exactly audible to TV viewers, but he explained his protest to reporters after getting the boot.

The president said he had a mandate. And I was making it clear to the president that he has no mandate to cut Medicaid. Go off, King. Just go off a little louder next time, maybe. I don't know if that's as effective as wearing a color. I don't know if that's as effective as wearing a color. I mean with fascism on the rise we're gonna have to wear pretty bright color. The president then bragged about being re-elected in spite of his criminal prosecutions. We've ended weaponized government where as an example a sitting president is allowed to viciously prosecute his political opponent

like me. How did that work out? Not too good. Not too good. Honestly, got our asses. I mean, that's pretty cool. How did that work out? Fucking terribly. We have, we got absolutely bodied. You're right. right. Got us fully fucking got us. Damn it. The president's speech leaned heavily into culture war issues going after trans people pretty hard as summed up in this applause line. Our country will be woke no longer. Stock markets tanking. There's going to be a black market for maple syrup. You need a small business loan to make a Denver omelette. Biggest job losses since the onset of the pandemic. But on the bright side, five trans bring down soaring prices, but to blame Joe Biden.

Joe Biden especially let the price of eggs get out of control. The egg price is out of control. You know what Trump? Okay. Fine. You can still blame Joe Biden. You can't be expected to have solved every problem. You still get to seem young and engaged by virtue of comparison, but TikTok bitch, you promise pizza day every Friday, and it's already been six Fridays, no pizza. Pretty soon America's gonna forget who Joe Biden was

because Joe Biden already forgot who Joe Biden was. Aw. Aw, he destroyed the country. Looking back, I regret not realizing how much he was fucking us sooner. That's my great regret of 2024. Obviously, we got a little bit of a hot stew for pointing it out, but even still, sort of speaking to the obvious long after it become obvious all these people that are gonna run for president 2028 not one of them had the stones to challenge Joe Biden and it's like well isn't the person that's right to be president the kind of person who understood the need to step up and and

fight really hard or you're gonna wait your turn it's Donald Trump wait for his turn is this a kind of politics moment in history where people seem to wait for their turn? No? Just our sign, just our sweet, sweet Democrats always looking for a line to stand in while Republicans run over the barricades. The Democratic Party as a group of people are in zone four, looking as Republican in zone six just walk right in front of them right onto the plane over and over again we're just a party of people in zone four watching people in zone six put their bags in the overhead while we wonder if there will

be room when we get on the plane Republicans are like we got bags these people are idiots we're getting on the fucking plane our bags are going the overhead and we're like I wish somebody would do something about this. Just get on the plane. Yeah, all right. Trump got big laughs when listing purported examples of fraud that Doge had uncovered. Eight million dollars to promote LGBTQI plus in the African nation of Lesotho, which nobody has ever heard of.

Eight million dollars for making mice transgender. What, you think it's cheap to make a mouse trans? You think tiny little androgynous mouse clothes grow on trees? Do you know how hard it is to dye a little mouse's hair blue? To make the air pods small enough to play Mitski. Also, the president is actually supposed to have heard of all the countries. Like we, the people, don't necessarily have to have heard of Lesotho, but the president is supposed to at least pretend to have heard of all the countries. Trump also defended his tariffs on Mexico and Canada with an uplifting message to Americans.

There'll be a little disturbance, but we're okay with that. It won't be much. No, you're not. Oh. A little disturbance is when your mom asks a question at the movies, not when we've got troops at the border between Detroit and Windsor. The president also warned farmers worried about the tariffs that they may face a little bit of an adjustment period.

Iowa pollster Ann Seltzer wasn't wrong. Iowa pollster Ann Seltzer was simply ahead of her time. Trump made the dubious promise that the tariffs will ultimately help American farmers saying this. Our farmers are going to have a field day right now. So to our farmers have a lot of fun. help American farmers saying this. Every day is a field day for farmers, you fucking idiot. In international news, uh, unfortunately, the Zelens Trump-Vance bitch session folded after we recorded

last week but the fallout continues. JD Vance went on state TV to continue to trash talk Zelensky and insult some other allies while he was at it. If you want real security guarantees, if you want to actually ensure that Vladimir Putin does not invade Ukraine again, the very best security guarantee is to give Americans economic upside in the future of Ukraine. That is a way better security guarantee than 20,000 troops from some random country that hasn't fought a war in 30 or 40 years.

So eat shit, families of British and French service members who died in Afghanistan serving alongside Americans answering the call to defend an ally. British and French newspapers attacked the vice president for his comments calling him a clown, a disgrace, and JD Dunst. Wait, am I British and French newspapers? Either way, I for one am proud to fight alongside Britain and France in the war against Jizdai Pervance. Got em. On Monday, Trump ordered a pause on US military aid to Ukraine and on Wednesday CIA Director John Radcliffe announced the end of intelligence sharing with Ukraine in an attempt to force Zelensky's hand. Of course, under Tulsi Gabbard, that intelligence is just bulletins like Putin's still handsome.

So not sure how big a difference this is going to make. In domestic news this past week, Trump announced the creation of the crypto strategic reserve in which the US would hold billions of various cryptocurrencies. God only knows why. And I'm not even talking about normal God. I'm talking about the new God Elon Musk believes in. By the time these lawsuits are decided, we'll have digital God. So. By the time these lawsuits are decided, we'll have digital god, so... I can't wait! Analog god made me 5'6 and like 20% more ambitious than my talents allow,

which is just enough of a delta to make life basically torture. The president announced on social media that the reserve would contain lesser known crypto like XRP, Solana, and Cardano, as well as more commonly used currencies like Bitcoin and Ether. Now, you might ask yourself why on earth would we need a strategic reserve of a volatile speculative digital currency other than to reward the crypto allies who spent millions getting him elected? In other news, Trump announced...

By the way, before we came out out they actually did some kind of an announcement basically saying that the crypto reserve is, it's bullshit, it's just, it's just bullshit. It's going to be, it's made up of the currency they've already seized and it just seems like a way to save face for some of these crypto bros that are constantly sucking Donald Trump's dick digitally. In other news, Trump announced a 25% tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico, which sent markets reeling just before his joint address to Congress. We were always telling President Obama to wreck the stock market the day before his

big speeches, but he never listened. I guess that's why he's not president anymore. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Claudia Scheinbaum, Jewish, threatened— I think it's cool— threatened Swiss countermeasures in the escalating trade war, with Trudeau saying on Tuesday, this is a time to hit back hard and to demonstrate that a fight with Canada will have no winners. What a Canadian thing to say.

Not that Trump will lose a fight with Canada, not that Canada will triumph, but just that a fight with Canada will have no winners. Trudeau addressed Trump at the news conference saying this. Flattering Trump's ego. Good strategy. Probably a tactic he learned from his father, Fidel Castro. Just a conspiracy theory. Just another conspiracy the mainstream media has claimed is debunked. I'm not saying it's true, I'm just saying it hasn't been debunked.

What about the second honeymoon? What about the second honeymoon? I'm serious. They all say the timing doesn't work out because of when the first honeymoon was, but they got a dig in to the reported second honeymoon. The timing lines up on the second honeymoon. Pierre and Maggie had a lot of fun. Just saying. The Yaves went into a bowl and who knows whose Yaves came out. whose yaves came out. Can't remember the word for bowl. The Canadian Prime Minister also accused Trump of hoping for a total collapse of the Canadian economy because that would make it easier to annex us. Which makes sense because breaking somebody's spirit until they don't believe they deserve any better wasn't

just his trade strategy. It's always been Trump's dating strategy. And then on Thursday Trump backed down completely pausing tariffs on the vast majority of both Mexican and Canadian goods until April 2nd. That's only four weeks away so be sure to stock up on your everything. Meanwhile the former head of the Social Security Administration, Martin O'Malley, told CNBC that Doge's proposed cuts to the department will jeopardize payments to the over 72 million people who receive Social Security, warning of a system collapse, and the interruption of benefits in the next 30 to 90 days.

I'm hoping it's 90 because I'd like to finish this season of White Lotus in peace before my parents have to move in. Do you always keep the house this cold? You can just ask for me to turn it warmer. That's just simply, you don't have to ask, you know what I mean? It's just ask the question. I'm happy to make it warmer. Do I always keep it this cold?

Okay. Considering the likelihood that the payment system could become unreliable, O'Malley warned people should start saving now. Don't worry, I'm sure your grandpa will be fine if he just cuts back on luxuries like baked potato and the lady that comes to his house to make sure he's not dead. Unbelievable.

In other Doge news, the Trump administration will reportedly cut 80,000 jobs from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Keep in mind, the VA not only serves veterans, 25% of the VA's employees are veterans themselves. Just a little math, cutting 80,000 employees from the VA would save you around $8 billion per year while making life worse for millions of veterans.

Unless you think a 76-year-old veteran being told by an artificial intelligence kiosk that he has abdominal pain because he might be pregnant is a good time. Extending the Trump tax cuts will cost four trillion dollars over ten years. Eight billion, more trillion. Fun fact, a family making over a million dollars would get an extra seventy thousand dollars on average from the tax cut, roughly equivalent to the salary a lot of the veterans who are about to be fired.

Isn't that fun? Isn't that one-to-one comparison kind of fun? They don't like that the Republicans, when you actually break out the numbers and say, oh, the Trump tax cuts will give a family with a million dollars, just an extra $70,000. Just an extra $70,000 in the pocket, roughly the amount you might pay a nurse working at a VA hospital somewhere. That's the code That's the choice we're making they don't want to make it like it's a choice, but that's the choice we're making I'll tell you something

I Went for making government money. I made some sitcom money, and I spent it in a period of clinical depression And then I made some podcast money And that was surprising because I was really never the goal and you'd think it would make me kind of maybe relate more to these rich people right like I you know I understand there's always more there's always more you could want the idea that there are people out there with millions of dollars let alone billions of dollars complaining about federal taxes these people are fucking sick they are sick sick. They are sick. To be anything other than appreciative

for the luck and good fortune to get to be in America and make money in America that they are fucking counting every penny going to the federal government when the fact that we have some redistribution to make palatable this system that allows you to live this incredible life how fucking dare you it is sick and all of this all of the fucking attacks on the trans people and targeting the immigrants and vilifying DEI all of it is part of a big circus funded by billionaires to distract us from the very simple fact that on one side you're gonna give millionaires an extra hundred grand and on the other side you're gonna fire a nurse. Everything is about distracting us from that.

And it just has been bothering me lately. Oh, yeah, yeah. Donald Trump also signed an executive order declaring English the official language of the United States. This is obviously divisive, but it pulls 80-20 among people who say chipotle. In the meantime, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins has a suggestion for Americans looking for cheaper eggs. I think the silver lining in all of this is how do we in our backyards, we've got chickens in our backyard, how do we solve for something like this?

And people are sort of looking around thinking, wow, well, maybe I could get a chicken in my backyard. And it's awesome. This just in, Trump's secretary of agriculture, Brooke Rollins, has been revealed to be a coyote. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also helpfully suggested that Americans start chowing down on nutria, a large amphibious rodent, to help control the invasive species population. I hope they taste as good as they look. I'm not sure why eating them is a necessary step. Can't we just kill them? All right, it's an invasive species. Let's kill them.

It seems like we don't have to eat them. Eric Adams didn't tell New Yorkers to start snacking on the rats. And you know what? He's usually on the wrong side of stuff. I'm sort of changing my mind on this. A New Jersey man was arrested this week after robbing 14 Dunkin' Donuts in two months. Hey man, I know you're going through a hard time, but I don't think that's going to impress Jennifer Garner.

A Danish performance artist left three piglets to starve to death in protest of the pork industry only to discover that the trio were stolen in a heist organized by his own employee. Looks like these little piggies are going to the black market. I hope they taste as good as they look. Okay. Pretty confusing protest, I have to say. I'm gonna kill these three pigs to protest killing pigs. Okay. Do you have a second idea? LA's pricey Arowan grocery store chain is once again going viral online this time thanks to a fancy strawberry from Japan that is being sold for $19 per berry.

The strawberry has been described as delicious by at least one emperor parading naked before his subjects. Kennedy, bring out the inequity berry. Oh, in fact, we discussed getting a berry from the Aeron on our company card, but it was sold out. That's right. The $19 Japanese strawberry sold one at a time. It's sold out.

What a society. I thought it'd be funny if we had one and then I dropped it and stepped on it. Or even pretended to have a little basket of them and just like, whoa. Mr. Beaned it. Some of my famous prop work. And finally, scientists have bred wooly mice, seen in this clip being extremely hairy and adorable as part of their effort to resurrect the wooly mammoth. So cute. I hope they taste as good as they look. Scientists say the next

step is to turn the dial on those wooly mice all the way up to trans. It's gonna be expensive though. Up next, from my dead friend Zoe, it's my live guest, Natalie Morales. Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up. Love It or Leave It is brought to you by Armra Kulostrum. Everyone's looking for ways to be healthier and stave off winter illnesses. Give your immunity and gut health their best chance with Armra Kulostrum. Discover the transformational health benefits of Armra Kulostrum that have earned tens of thousands of five-star reviews.

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Welcome to the stage, an incredible actress who always makes you go, she's in this, I love her. Please put your hands together for the amazing Natalie Morales. Hi. Hi, thanks for being here. Good to see you. Welcome.

First of all, we were reminiscing briefly backstage that you were on this stage in a very early iteration of this show when we were in San Francisco for Outsideland. And it was shortly after Trump got elected, and we were thinking, how do we get through this? It's so strange, it's so different. And here we are, eight years later, and it's so different now. Yeah, here we are again.

John, who would've thunk? Right, right, no, it does feel, a hyperreal feeling of the era, and the kind of slow disintegration of your connection to reality. That once you start to accept that this is a timeline, it starts to make it hard to think about. And that you're in it, and that you're living it, and that you also need to get lunch. And you do always need lunch every day. Every day lunch comes.

It's a weird dissonance, yeah. But sometimes it's fun to think about lunch. Not for me. Sometimes it's a nice part of the day. I hate thinking about that. Really? I hate thinking about what I'm going to eat. Really?

Yes. Unless I really want something. You know, you guys know. You hate thinking about what you want to eat every night. Yeah. Thank you for joining me. I'm so happy to be here, Jon. Give me some questions.

Tonight in honor of Natalie's incredible career, she and I will take turns asking you the audience about her film and television credits, which if you Google them do come up alongside those of the other Natalie Morales, the journalists formerly of CBS's The Talk. This is not embarrassing for me at all. Let's do it. So it's time for us to play. Was I in this Natalie Morales edition? So here's how it works. We're gonna bring the lights up. Oh, people are gonna actually answer this on a mic?

Okay. Yeah. This is exciting. Hi, what's your name? My name is Jason. Jason, oh, you have a very gravelly tone. Yes. Wow. Every time I get a call, someone asks me if I'm sick. I was gonna say, are you single? You know what I mean?

Yeah. That's what I, yeah, I was gonna say that too. Yeah. You got a great voice. Still on Don't Ask, let's do that. Thank you. Just say like, no, I'm not single, I'm sexy. That's all.

All right, Jason. I play the deceased best friend of a US veteran struggling to cope with life outside of the military. True. Correct. Correct. True. Good job.

Good job, Jason. I star alongside Zuniqua Martin-Green and Ed Harris and Morgan Freeman in my new dramedy, My Dead Friend Zoe that is out in theaters right now. Yes. Hey. Hey. What's Ed Harris like? He's exactly what you think he's like. He's serious. He's he he can be pretty goofy.

He loves dogs. He's a delightful man, but he's so unreadable that it's terrifying. Because you'll be like, you'll say a joke, he'll be like, yeah, you know, because you love dogs, Ed, and he'll be like. Yeah, I do. And you're like, oh God, I got it.

But he's great, and I loved working with him so much. I was thinking about how in like the Truman Show, Ed Harris plays Christoph and he lends it this sort of seriousness, like kind of, because Ed Harris is this sort of gravitas as an actor. And then you read that it was actually originally supposed to be played by who is the villain in the movie Speed? Dennis Hopper. Dennis Hopper.

And you're like, oh, this was written to be like a cartoon villain. And then Ed Harris gets in the role and it's like, he's just Ed Harris. And then Morgan Freeman's there. Yeah. That was crazy. I do want to just talk about Ed Harris again. The other day we were doing a lot of promo together and I was like, Ed, have you ever done a rom-com?

And he was like, I don't think so. And I was like, would you do one if I wrote one for you? I would love to see you in a rom-com. Can I make one with you? And he like you got my email. It's like All right. Wow. All right. That's cool. That'd be great to see him in a rom-com. Yeah Love to see that kind of brooding energy in a rom-com. Uh-huh. It's like what if Notting Hill made you really sad? No, you want to see Adam love Yeah, okay. All right up next made you really sad. No, you want to see Adam love. Yeah.

Sweet guy. All right, up next. Who else is going to go? Oh, this person has their hand up. Hi, what's your name? Rexie. Rexie. It's a nickname.

I love it. Natalie starred as the titular bisexual ex-Marine bar owner at the center of an NBC sitcom. True or false? I'd love to see it so let's say true correct correct good job in 2019's Abby titular titular character I noticed and another show with a Latino lead that NBC buried oh it's true oh look at that that's us and Abby was bisexual.

You keep saying that, yeah, she was. I said it twice. Yeah, you did say it twice. She was, I was actually the first bisexual lead on a network show. That's cool. Was it central to the story, or was it just a part of the character?

Was the pilot about, I got a date with a man, and I got a date with a woman? No, no, the pilot was about, and it would have been, it was in 2019. And it would have been perfect in 2020 because it was a pilot. It was a show. We did the whole first season. It was shot all outside in front of a live audience outside, because it was a backyard bar and it was Mike Schur was the executive producer. It was, it was, it was awesome it was really funny but the the president of NBC who bought it left and then the two new

presidents came in we're like that's not our show let's not ever talk about it and that's what happened with that Hollywood Hollywood Hollywood tough town yeah tough town tough town now there's a surprisingly there's now a show with Reba who owns a bar and um. Is she bisexual in it? That's on NBC probably. That's cool. Bisexual Reba. I'm in. Yeah. I'm in. All right. Um. Oh it says here that you were the first Cuban woman to lead a sitcom in the U.S. Well since Desi Art, well Cuban woman yeah but uh since Desi Art and Iz the first Cuban person. Yeah right. Since I love Lucy. Wow. Yeah. Yeah because I think Desi

identified as a man. He did. Until his death. So Cuban woman. Little fact about Desi Arnaz. Yeah. Married to Lucille Ball famously. Famously, Desi Lou. All right, let's go to somebody else. Yeah. Okay, who's sitting next to Rexy? I'm Mandy. Love that name. Hi, Mandy. All right, I had a blink and you'll miss it cameo in Zoolander 2.

Probably true? True. False, unfortunately. False. That was Natalie Morales, the journalist. Oh. For some reason. We couldn't find a photo of her, so here's Ben Stiller as Derek Zulander giving Blue Steel. Did you see him do the glam bot of that in the Oscars?

I did it. It's great. He did the glam bot and he goes, he does the thing, it was amazing. Yeah. All right. Make it severance now. Yeah, we're moving on. Let's do, I'll do one.

Now that we played as Sophic Sheriff. Sophic? I think it means lesbian. Yeah, no, it's sapphic. Sapphic. Yeah. I know what it means. I'm just correcting your pronunciation.

Sophic, sapphic, sapphic. No, sapphic. Safik? Safik? Safik? No, Safik. Safik or Safik? Safik. Alright you dykes. Fucking classic lesbians. Persnicky as always. I'm just gonna say you should trim that.

Nah, nah I bully the lesbians on their show. Okay, alright. It wouldn't be the first time a gay should trim that. No, I bully the lesbians on their show. All right. It wouldn't be the first time a gay man did that. I want to have a mom, but they can still buy tickets. Okay. I'm not going to have a lesbian on this stage. I don't recognize that stripe of the flag. It would be GBTQ if they're up to me.

They can get their own flag. I'm sick of it. Those letters are the only time women come first. Yeah. Okay. That's true. All right. He's pissed.

Okay. He's pissed that way. Who wants to go next? Read it, read it, read it. Go ahead. Oh yeah, no, we need someone to go next, right? Yeah, we need someone to go. Oh no, it's Mandy. No, He's pissed that way. Who wants to go next? Read it, read it, read it. Go ahead. Oh yeah, no, we need someone to go next, right?

Yeah, we need someone to go. Oh no, it's Mandy. No, she already went. Wait, who has the mic? Hi, what's your name? Vicki. Vicki. Natalie played a sapphic sheriff.

Seems wrong. In the Drew Barrymore cannibalism comedy, Santa Clarita Diet. I'm going to go with true because I really want to be true. It is true. It is true. It is true. She was a, I was deputy Anne Garcia and she was also ultra religious. It was one of my favorite characters I ever played. She was like this really religious lesbian cop.

And I loved every second of it. I only wore Wrangler jeans when I wasn't wearing my uniform. And it was awesome. That's fun. It was really fun, even though you hate lesbians. It was really fun. I just don't see them. I just see clothes floating. Yeah.

Makes it hard to watch women's soccer. It's like, what is happening? Oh wait, I read that, I'm sorry. No, it's fine, we're doing great. You don't even ever have to apologize. No, you read that, I read sorry. No, it's fine, we're doing great. You don't even ever have to apologize. No, you read that, I read the next one. You read the next one. Okay, sorry.

So are we ready for that? Should we find an audience victim? Yeah. Okay. Hi, what's your name? Adam. Hi Adam. Hi Adam.

Okay, I voiced a newscaster in Rio 2. Rio 2, Rio 2... Um... Yeah, okay. False! False, come on! Think it fucking through! Sorry, Adam.

Newscaster was the clue. Newscaster is the other Natalie Morales, you dumb fuck! Although, like, also, like, I-I-she's very sweet. I really do like her, but, like, I, she's very sweet. I really do like her, but like, step off. Like, why are you acting? Yeah, other Natalie Morales.

Back off. Back off. She's really nice, okay. She's wonderful. Wonderful. Good people. Salt on the Earth. Natalie directed and co-starred

in the 2021 Coming of age comedy, Plan B. What's your name? True, Rabia. Rabia, you say true? True. Wrong. Thanks for volunteering. Natalie only directed Plan B. That's true, but I do make a cameo in it.

You do make a cameo? Kind of true. Kind of true. Kind of true, Rabia. Let's give her the good ding, I feel bad, I was too harsh. If you've watched the movie, I draw a dick on someone's face while they're sleeping, You mean? Kind of true. Kind of true. Let's give her the good ding. I feel bad. I was too harsh. If you've watched the movie, I draw a dick on someone's face while they're sleeping because I felt like I should be the one to do that.

You know what's funny about the drawing a dick on someone's face prank? I'll tell you. Tell us, John. Drawing anything on someone's face is annoying. You know? But you were going to say what was funny about it. Well, I just think like draw anything. Like, oh my God, you drew a dick. Like drawing anything.

Drawing a dick is like, at least for me, pretty much always funny. It is always funny. Yeah. Now, in the movie, it's about a... No, vul those are very serious Those are serious they are vulva Nobody laughs at a Georgia O'Keeffe. Everyone just cries but a penis hilarious. Okay people cry You think when they look at a Georgia? I have Wow

Okay, that's am I the next Well, I wanted to keep asking you. Oh, sorry, please. So, Plan B follows two teen girls as they try to obtain the morning after pill. Correct. Politics. Yep. Did you get any pushback? Was it hard to get it done?

Like, was it hard to get it made? No, it wasn't hard to get it made. What was shocking, but maybe shouldn't have been a shocking, was when we were promoting the film and when I was doing press for it, which I did a lot of press for it, journalists, many, many, many journalists were like, so, you know, this is a movie about them

getting the abortion pill, and I was like, nope, it's Plan B, and they were like, so, the abortion pill, and I'm like, nope, it's contraception, it's contraception. It's contraception, it's not that. And like so many people don't know that, which is shocking. And I knew that ahead of time,

so I made sure that in the movie so many times we say what it is, what it does, contraception, that it doesn't work if you're already pregnant, that it won't kill a baby, that you can't get pregnant immediately after having sex, that it takes a few days, which is why Plan B works. And like, but it's insane that the sex education in America is such that people have no idea,

grown people that are doing news and interviewing people don't know that. But do you think that's led to any other problems? Uh. Let's do one more. Sure. Is this me? Yeah. Okay, who is our next victim? Hi, I'm Maria. Maria. Hi, Maria. Okay, and finally, I played myself in the iconic 2016 picture Sharknado 4, The Fourth Awakens, and I got to wear an eye patch. I'm going to go with yes. It's false. That was somehow the other Natalie Morales.

Yet again. And now we do have a photo. Yeah. Is that it? I want to see that. Yeah, I want to see that, too. Yeah, I want to see that, too. That's Al Roker as himself as well. Yeah. Oh, wow. You ever yell at him? No, but I don't think it would make me get. Yeah. I've yelled at him once. At Al Roker? Why was he in your way? He knows what he did.

He was in the bike lane. He's in the bike lane. Nellie, everybody should go see my dead friend Zoe and you play it. Is there a spoiler if I tell you what? No, I play the bike lane. He's in the bike lane. Natalie, everybody should go see My Dead Friend Zoe. And you play it. Is there a spoiler? If I tell you what? No, I play Zoe. You play it. Who's dead?

Yeah, no, it's in the title. Right. So you're a ghost. No, I'm not a ghost, but I'm dead. I'm more of a guilt demon, I would say. Oh, a guilt demon. Everybody should go see My Dead Friend Zoe. Thank you so much, Natalie.

When we come back, she's a small town girl living in a lonely world. It's Emily St. James. Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up. Today's episode is sponsored by Acorns. They say money can't buy you happiness. Sounds like something people without money would say, but money sure can make you feel like a lot of things.

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which is getting further and further in the past, I was busy, I was not making a lot of money. which is getting further and further in the past. I like was busy, I was not making a lot of money. I didn't think, I like, I knew I needed to start dealing with things like saving for retirement and having some sort of retirement account. I didn't understand how it worked. I didn't do it. And it was stupid because the money you save

when you're younger, it grows your whole life. incentive to positively promote Acorns. Tier 1 compensation provided. Investing involves Risk Acorns Advisors, LLC and SEC Registered Investment Advisor. View important disclosures at acorns.com slash love it. And we're back. Please welcome to the stage the author of Crooked Media's latest release, Woodworking. It's the wickedly talented what Emily St. James. Come on out. Hi, hi, hi. Welcome back. Good to see you. Hello. Thanks for being here. Okay. Now about the book. It's a prop. Let me see. We got the book right here. We got to put it right there. Yeah. You know, we can put it there. You can gesture to it. I will gesture to it. Yeah Here we go we did it

So first of all, welcome. Good to see you. It's good. Yes. Thank you John Tommy And I wrote a book with Josh that was four people writing a book that it did have pictures and it basically destroyed Us okay, this congrats anybody that writes a real book. Holy shit. Holy shit. And I just want to tell you, I love the book. Thank you. I genuinely love the book.

And I'll just be honest. Like I was excited because, um, when, when the proposal came, I like, this isn't, I thought about the politics first, sincerely politics. And I was like, I love the politics of this book. I love the messages it has. I love you is a I thought about the politics first sincerely sure sure politics and I was like I love the politics of this book yeah the messages it has I love you as a person I'm interested let's do it and then I read I was like oh my god it's so fucking entertaining it is such a good read everybody should go to crooked comm slash books and buy woodworking it's an incredible novel it is such a fun read I promise you the message is great the politics of the book are great but you won't care about that because it's an incredible novel. It is such a fun read. I promise you the message is great

The politics of the book are great But you won't care about that because it's an amazing story and I just want to say that on the front right here It's this big hearted and hilarious And that they don't lie in those pull quotes ever So we're going to dive into the substance of it but I just want to start by saying that like truly like It's just like it could be a beach read and it actually reminded me a lot like of um of like of like normal people just in that it's like you don't know that I don't hope that's not an insulting comparison but like I think like there's something it's

just you'll really like it. I knew like I knew when I went out with the book that uh it was going to be it's a book about trans people and people were going to hear that and they're going to be like oh this is going to be so like heart wrenching and boring and I'm going to hear that and they were going to be like, oh, this is going to be so like heart wrenching and boring, and I'm going to sit down. It's going to be like, finally she put on the dress and saw herself as she truly was unfolding like a flower before herself. And I was like, I don't want to fucking do that.

And so I just did a lot of jokes. That was my strategy to overcome that. I just thought, what if it was funny and entertaining and there were plots. And it really is. Thank you. Look, this show is pretty gay and we have a lot of amazing queer guests and no lesbians, but everybody else and always welcome. But we wanted to have you on as a writer and as a member of the larger crooked family.

But like, I struggle with this. Like I hate the idea of like, oh, we have a trans guest on let's talk about trans issues. Sure. And you know, we had Norrie Reed on a couple, one show or two shows ago and we were, she was talking about that, that like you just want to be a comedian, but you're a trans comedian and so you have to be an activist. But like this is a book about the trans experience, so let's talk about the trans experience.

What is woodworking? Woodworking is a term from the trans community in the 70s and 80s, which basically the idea was that you would transition and you would get to a point where you could pass as a cisgender person. You would cut off all contact with your past life and you would disappear into a large city and you would disappear into the woodwork

is how the term came to be. And there are a number of women who did this. I talked to several of them as I was working on the book. And they would have husbands, they would have whole lives where maybe their doctor knew that they were trans and like nobody else did. And so they were there having these quote unquote normal lives and they had this secret eating away

inside of them and then as trans acceptance started to sort of creep toward the mainstream in the mid 2010s, like more and more of them started to sort of share their stories and some of them spoke with me, but there's still so many people who now are like, I'm just gonna not talk about that for the obvious reasons. And it was really eating away at them inside.

Yeah, there's something in the book, there's Abigail, who's the teen character. It's a little bit of fantasy for her. It's a lot of fantasy for her that she'll get to leave this world behind and just be a girl and be a woman. Yeah. Abigail starts transitioning when she's 16. And when you start transitioning that young, you know, you, you, you, you, quote unquote, pass very well. And so her idea is right now, I live in small town, South Dakota, Abigail, plus, uh, she lives in a town called Mitchell and she's like, I'm going to leave there. I'm going to go to Chicago or Minneapolis.

I'm going to change my name or my last name And I'm just going to live a life as this person and it's um It's a dream for her and I think the book is but that's like where you start her and if you know how character arcs work You know that she's going to like have that challenged across the course of the book But it is it is kind of like her idea of a thing to do. Yeah. Well, it's You know, there's the ways in which Characters discover that that's impossible, right? You can't, this is who you are, you can't run from who you are.

You can try though. You can try. I'm doing it right now. You're doing it right now. Amelia Perez tried to do that. But that is a little bit the story, that is a little bit what Amelia Perez is trying to do. Well, a movie we're not going to discuss.

And unless you'd like to. We can talk, Amelia, Let's do it. No. But a perfect film. As I've said on this stage, a perfect, flawless film. But what I was thinking about in reading it is that we spend so much time talking about trans tolerance and acceptance and fighting to a baseline of not being persecuted. But what was interesting in just reading this story, which has from the perspective of two different trans people, both immature in their own ways, but one further along on their trans journey, the other further along in life, say life's journey, and one of the characters

is a teacher who's older when they're accepting themselves as being trans, is you see kind of unacknowledged the beautiful aspects of being trans and the access it gives you to certain truths about gender that most people don't see. And I was wondering if you could talk about that. We're living in an era when transness is largely understood as, we've backslid to this point where it's understood as like a trick. You know Ace Ventura at the end when the character

is revealed to be a trans woman and everyone's like, she was really a man and everyone throws up and it was a trick. We're now back to that in this weird, sort of dark way. A lot of this, Tommy Tuberville, our, the world's smartest senator, was talking about how there's whole teams of boys dressed up as girls playing women's sports now,

and that's not happening, but it is like every single thing that people are talking about is like a bad Rodney Dangerfield movie from like 1998 and we're just stuck with it and I think that people don't sort of Fundamentally don't understand that like this is a joyful beautiful thing that is just a normal way of being a human and it's not something to be afraid of or something to feel is a of being a human and it's not something to be afraid of or something to feel is a trick or a fraud

that's being pulled on you. It's just a type of human being. And I'm hopeful that Tommy Tuberfill will read my book and get past the first page. We have other ways of fixing politics. Don't rely on that. I hope we have other plans. No, the whole plan is everyone reads my book

and that fixes America. One thing that made me think that's just about like kind of if we could get past, if we get past acceptance, which is obviously is a hard place to get to that we're not at. Erica, the teacher in the is just desperate for a female friend, just like a normal female friendship. And what I thought when I was reading this, like, you know, in the eyes of this character, she's desperate for a female friend because she's discovered she is trans. But you realize just like, my God, how many straight men would benefit from having a female friend.

And that these straight men and these straight women, cisgender in this world, are so hidden from each other. Yeah, there's a sense where Erica, who was living as a straight man, air quotes, for so much of her life, would start to be friends with a woman and then this wall would go up between them and would be like, this happened to me as well. It was, you know, it feels like there's a thing that's happening here that I'm not entirely sure what it is and I'm scared you're gonna make it weird, basically. And I would always be like, no, I don't wanna make it weird,

I just wanna be your best friend forever. I'm just gonna like lean in right here and let's hang out and go shopping together. And they'd be like, no, no, thank you. And then the second I came out, they were like, oh, that's what that was, okay. And then like that switch flipped and it didn't happen with every person I knew,

but I sort of did want to capture that experience of like being honest with yourself lets other people see you in a way that can let them accept you. Yeah, and just the other part of the two is just the, there's a scene where Erica is trying on a dress and is kind of overwhelmed by the experience and talking to her ex-wife. And the ex-wife is a bit like,

oh, you didn't like how you looked in a dress and it made you feel bad about yourself? Yeah. Yeah, that's us every day. And the kind of like, there's an, I am always, I've thought about this myself as somebody that has often struggled to know the difference between dysmorphia and dysphoria.

And that's something that this character grapples with a lot. I'm just curious, like, if you could just talk a little bit about that, because there's a way in which in that scene I thought it gets at something, again, that I think transness exposes, which is this trans character who is still presenting more as a man, wants to feel beautiful, looks at themselves, at herself, doesn't feel beautiful. And it's hard to tell where the gender dysphoria, the being in the wrong feeling as though you're in the wrong body,

ends and just the brutal experience of just being a woman begins. Yeah, I think if there's one thing I hope everyone in the world can relate to in this book, it's that having a body is weird and bad and we should not have to do it. I do think that part of why transness upsets some people so much is that it's like we are saying, having a body is weird and we can do something about that, and people are like, no, we are just here to suffer this body that we are put into. And I think, I do hope that like,

I don't, I want this book to sort of show people the ways in which living a life that's that's more honest and more open can be beneficial to you and to everyone around you even if there's pain and fear at the start and that applies to literally everybody on the planet right now. Right yeah and I think that's I do think that's part of what threatens people so much. And it does it on the axis of just having a body, but also just in, you know, Trump said this in his State of the Union,

and it's quite a trick that they're trying to pull. And I've heard some people on the right try to pull this, which is, you know, on the one hand, they have these incredibly rigid notions of what it means to be a man and what it means to be a woman. But then when all of a sudden someone says they're trans, they say, Oh, you're being convinced by the left that there's a wrong way to be a boy or a wrong way to be a girl. And actually you think that you're, you think that being trans means that actually you are,

you need to change your gender, but really we just need a more expansive definition of what this gender is. And those things don't, those are in contradiction obviously. But they're not wrong that what they're getting at, what their own internal contradictions can't resolve is transness does challenge some fundamental ideas about gender and it is an interplay of culture and biology.

Yeah, one thing I find, you know Pat Robertson, about gender and it is an interplay of culture and biology. Yeah, one thing I find, you know Pat Robertson, the 700 Club guy, a totally rancid, horrible human being. May his memory be a blessing. He, and right up until Obergefell, the marriage equality decision, was saying, well obviously trans people, gender dysphoria is real and we need to treat it

and the best way to treat it is transition. You can find clips of him saying this in early 2015. Obergefell comes out mid 2015, by the end of that year, he's flipped around and has been like, well, we have to get rid of trans people. It's that transparent how quickly they flipped the strategy as soon as marriage equality came through. It's a way to drive a wedge between trans people and all queer people to slowly start

wearing away at the broader acceptance of queerness. And it's really cynical. Yeah, I think because I'm in a relationship with a trans person and I still see myself as gay, but according to the Trump administration, I'm in a heterosexual relationship, but of course I'm not. I think we're both becoming straighter by the second because I'm married to a woman, but there are no lesbians on this show. So it's like I'm getting tugged in that direction.

Well, yeah, that's a good, but yeah, I mean, but according to this, according to the Trump administration, yeah, we're American is Apple. Fucking pie. Uh, this is what I wanted to ask you about. Uh, you were an essay of vanity fair. This is, let's come back to where we started explaining that the substance is a better trans film than Amelia Perez. This is true. Most, most films are better trans films than Amelia Perez.

I have to say, um, yeah, the substance, The Substance is a movie that is not unlike the novel Woodworking by Emily St. James, available at Crooked.com books, slash books. It is a book about when I first came out to myself and really started examining my gender, I had a 13 year old girl who'd been locked up in the back of my brain, because I was like, I'm not going to listen to you.

And she woke up and she was like, hey, let's go sleep over at our best friends. And then we're going to like prank call boys and it's going to be fun. And I was like, I am in my thirties and I have a job and a marriage. So we're not going to do that. And she was like, ah, it's no fun.

So I was like both the like rebellious teenage daughter and her mother at the same time. And the substance is kind of about that because it's about this woman who essentially gives birth to a much younger, hotter version of herself who's her but also not her. And that just captured something so fundamental to me about waking up one morning and being an adult

who nevertheless has this much younger person who's like trying to get your attention and Like having to like sort of synthesize those two things in the substance Those two things are synthesized very well. Nothing bad happens and there's not a giant monster that explodes in blood Yeah, that's also not I mean, that's a gay. I mean, I think there's a lot but nobody is a very gay It is a very you know, a lot of yeah gay guys go through a kind of a late adolescence. They go through kind of like they're, I mean, they go nuts in their twenties or whenever they come out because they like, I, you know, I missed the, I didn't go to my prom, you

know, I missed the whole, the kind of high school experience. You do actually see in the novel that like, Erica has some jealousy towards Abigail, who despite feeling put upon in all the ways she really is sort of struggling, does get a part of what every girl wants in high school that someone like Erica or a lot of queer people don't get. She gets to kiss the cute boy. You know, if Abigail's story is like,

if she isn't trans, it's just the punk girl who the jock falls in love with. And like that is the thing that Erica will, Erica's 35, she's not gonna get to have that. She's not gonna magically suddenly wake up and be 16 again. And that's good, I think that probably we shouldn't be 16 again, sounds not fun. But it is also very sad sometimes if you're queer

and have to like cope with the fact that you have only become yourself as an adult. Yeah, and it does terrify, I think, the right to imagine a world where those queer kids just get to be kids, you know, and they're wrong. Yeah. Emily, thank you so much. Everybody, please go to crooked.com slash books.

Pick up Woodworking. It's also available on an audiobook Wait before we get to our next segment Couple notes Trump's address to Congress was the longest in history But beneath the 100 minute spectacle was the same dangerous rhetoric and immigration crime and trans rights So what now in the latest episode of assembly required Stacy Abrams is joined by Jen Psaki host of MSNBC's inside of Jen Psaki To break it all down strategize about how Democrats and all of us can push back. Listen to Assembly Required Now. New episodes drop every Thursday wherever you get your podcast. Also, if you're in LA, come to 90C Typewriter next Thursday, March 13th to check out Love

It or Leave It live with special guests Tig Notaro and Stephanie Allen, get tickets at crooked.com slash events. We'll be right back. Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of love it or leave it coming up. Love it or leave it is brought to you by factor ready to optimize your nutrition this year. Factor has chef made gourmet meals that make eating well easy. They're dietician approved, ready to heat and eat in two minutes. So you can fuel right and feel great.

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And use code factor podcast to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. That's code factor podcast at factormeals.com slash factor podcast to get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box. And we're back. Please welcome back to the stage. It's Natalie Morales. Hello. Welcome Natalie. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm back. Great. Here we go. Emily, you wrote for the third season of Yellow Jackets. Yes. Currently airing on Showtime while Natalie, you directed the hilarious and politically timely 2021 comedy Plan B. I wanted to ask you both about writing for and about teen girls but I also really wanted to talk to you about cannibalism because Yellow Jackets and Santa Clarita Diet are about eating people. So it's time for segment we call to all the boys I ate before also known as 10 Things I Ate About You also known as Gossip Grill.

It's time for a rapid fire segment. Are you ready? Yes. First, did you get superlatives in your high school yearbook? No. Yes. I can't remember what it was. It was like, you know, most likely to do this shit probably, you know.

I think it was most likely to play a hyper religious lesbian cop on a show about a zombie. That's what I remember it being I was there All right Our plane crashes. Okay. Okay. I'm dead. Okay a Chef was also a passenger board the plane. She yes she also dead But she was carrying a suitcase full of delicious spices Would it be more wrong to use the spices when cooking my human flesh to make my flesh more palatable? Also dead. But she was carrying a suitcase full of delicious spices.

Would it be more wrong to use the spices when cooking my human flesh to make my flesh more palatable? Is it more immoral and wrong to make? To make you taste good? To make you delicious. No. No, we are gonna make you delicious, John.

I think it would only do you honor. Yeah. I think that's right. We talked about that. I think you taste good with a little coriander. I think just a smidgen talked about that. I think you taste good with a little coriander. Just a smidgen. If someone was going to eat me, I would want me to taste good.

Yeah. You see, there's something to be said for that understanding that this is an emergency and you're doing something out of desperate need to have the experience match it. Like have the aesthetics match the ethics. But you have time. Yeah. Well, sure, sure. It's not that kind of emergency. Hey, here's a question.

You know you're going to have, you crash. You know you're going to have to eat somebody. Nobody's coming. You're going to have to eat people. There just aren't enough pretzels. But there are pretzels, okay? You have like a bunch of bags of pretzels. Okay.

You will have to eat people. You know that. There's no getting out of that. You're stuck in this mountain. I don't know that I could, but sure. Do you finish the pretzels and then start on the people? Obviously. Or do you have, I just to make the whole experience a little better,

pretzels and human pretzels and human. No, because you don't know when you're going to get rescued and you hope that it's at the end of the pretzels inhuman, pretzels inhuman, pretzels inhuman. No, because you don't know when you're going to get rescued and you hope that it's at the end of the pretzels. Yeah. Because if you go pretzel human and then you get rescued and you had all these pretzels left over. If you hear helicopters you got to eat a lot of pretzels. Which high school fashion trend would you rather pluck your eyes from your skull than

see Jen Alpha revive again? Mine or Jenko's? No, I love Jenko's. I wore those all the time. I love them. Yes. The ones that they make now are not as good as the ones they made then.

I would wear those any second. Those kids look so cool. They're great. What a time. Were you going to give us an or which? Nah, it doesn't matter. All right. Let's see.

Oh, we don't get to answer that, just you? Well, I don't even, what did you want to say? You were asking the question, weren't you? I don't remember. Okay, all right, all right. Low-rise jeans is what I'll say. Low-rise jeans, you don't like low-rise jeans? No, that one-inch zipper can't do that anymore.

Do you think RFK Junior's meat would be better because he's free-range organic and unmedicated? No, it's full of worms. It is full of worms, yeah. That's correct. No. It's full of worms. It is full of worms, yeah. That's Greg. No. It's full of worms. Imagine if you had a cow and it moved like RFK's voice,

you'd be like, shoot that one. That one's not healthy to eat. If that cow was like, Mwah! You'd be like, that's not a good cow. Yeah, that's not a good cow. Yeah, that's a really important point. I'm a vegetarian, I don't eat animals, but yeah, no. That's all bad.

Let's play this way, if my plane crashed with RFK Jr. I wouldn't eat him, I'd be scared. That would be worse for me, I think, than eating shrubs. That's actually a good question actually. Would you eat someone you love to you know was healthier versus someone you hated who you think might have sicker meat? Did they die first or would I have to kill them? No, they're just dying.

You're not killing anybody. They're dead. They're dead. They're dead. They died in the crash. I think that I would eat the healthy person. Yeah. I don't want to get worms.

Yeah. I would eat the person person. I don't wanna get worms. That's the thing. I would eat the person also with a good butt. Something that looked tasty. Okay. Where do you think you'd start? Again, I don't eat meat, but. But in this case, you might have to. I don't know. Start with the quads, maybe.

No, the butt. I think we'd all start with the butt, right? You think the butt or the quads? Like the butt cheeks, obviously. Who's starting with the butt? Yeah. It's a plot cheeks, obviously. All right. Who's starting with the butt? Yeah. It's a podcast. It's a podcast.

Lots of people starting with the butt. Yeah. Who's starting with the quads? Quads. You got to applaud. It's a podcast. That's so tough. OK, so butt, quads, other part of the body.

What? Stomach? You're starting with the sweetbreads, you freaks? You're starting with the Oregon meat, are you insane? Yeah, that's nuts. It's, the answer, there is an answer to this and it's the butt. Yeah, butt cheeks.

You start, you start, I have, I work on a show, or I do research, you start with the butt. And how do you do research on this exactly? Well it seems the easiest also to to like just bite into, right? Sure. So part of the problem with cannibalism, if you really want to get into it, is that the human body doesn't really

have enough calories to keep you going, because it's already stuff that's in your body. So you're not really getting nutrients from it. So that's why often people who resort to cannibalism sort of slowly waste away. Now in the movies and on TV we exaggerate that because it's fun. But I mean it's fun to imagine eating people I guess. But like the-

It's a taboo. Yeah, exactly. But like the Donner Party or the Andy's Plain Crest Survivors, they were in very bad states of malnutrition. This is good to know. Not just because they had little tea but because they were actively eating things that were making them less healthy. Huh. Interesting. And also there's like like like

like Kreutzfeldt-Jacobs disease. I just mispronounced that. Oh, Kreutzfeldt-Jacobs disease? Yeah, it's a thing that can happen to your brain if you resort to cannibals. Human flesh. You know, I feel like there was a lot... Is there a Yakov in there? I don know, I feel like there was a lot. Or Yakov, is there a Yakov in there? I don't. I feel like there's a lot of cartoons when we were younger about cannibalism, people being cooked in a big soup pot.

Like that was like always a thing, that and quicksand, right? Yeah, quicksand and cannibalism, they loom large in the child's mind. Yeah, well, cannibalism for like purposes of ritual, religious ritual has like always existed. It's this idea that you die, you're playing crash and you're gonna survive by eating people that I should not say this because I write for me. Cannibalism for like purposes of ritual, religious ritual has like always existed. It's this idea that you die, you have a, you're playing crash and you're going to survive by eating people that I should not say this

because I write for Yellow Jackets and I want the show to continue running, but yeah. And, and it just led me to think about now that the FAA is basically volunteer based. Yeah. All right. So that was high school versus cannibalism, I guess. Sure. Sort of a loose show today. Any final thoughts in general? Alright, so that was High School Versus Cannibalism, I guess.

Sure. Sort of a loose show today. Any final thoughts in general? Buy my book. It's a good book. I'm just going to keep pushing the book. That's what I'm doing this week. Check out my dead friend Zoe with our live friend Natalie Morales. I'm alive and it's in it's in theaters and I think it's a really good and funny movie. Please watch it this is probably the last weekend it'll be in theaters because it's like a you know indie movie

with a two-week run so go see it. Get in there. Yeah. While the getting is good. What do you do instead? Sit on your couch at home, watch something on your phone while also watching on something on television. You're fucking up your whole life. Yes. It's slipping through your goddamn fingers. Every single one of you is wasting your lives. You're all wasting so much time. We're gonna look back and think, my God, what we gave to these conglomerates.

My God, we gave them our youth. My God, we gave them our attention for so many years until we figured out how to stop it by not having electricity anymore after the troubles, after the troubles in the late 2013s and the Sino-American War of 2042. After that we fixed it but until then we'll say we should have gone out and seen that movie, we should have read that book and if there's nothing else you take from that show that you heard then this one that's now. See the movie and read my book before you die. That's the message.

Emily St. James, Natalie Morales, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. That is our show. Thank you so much to our guests. I threw down the card that has the number of days until the midterms, so they're coming.

Have a great weekend. Isenberg, Kendra James is our executive producer, Bill McGrath is our producer, and Kennedy Hill is our associate producer. Hallie Kiefer is our head writer, Sarah Lazarus, Josson Kaufman, Peter Miller, Elaine Pierre, Will Miles, and Mahana Del Shiki are our writers. Evan Sutton is our editor, Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis provide audio support, Stephen Colon is our audio engineer, and Milo Kim is our videographer. Our theme song is written and performed by Shure Shure. Thanks to our designers, Sammy Kaderno-Rves, for creating and running all of our visuals, which you can't see because this is a podcast.

And to our digital producers, David Tolis, Claudia Shang, Mia Kelman, and Matt DeGroote for filming and editing videos each week so you can. And our productions app is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East. It's love it or leave it. Love it or leave it. It's love it or leave it.