Lovett or Leave It - What if it’s David Morse AGAIN?

Episode Date: June 5, 2021

Aliens in the sky, zombies in the Senate. Comedian Pat Regan joins to break down the week’s news. Science writer George Zaidan on sunscreen - what we know and what we don’t. Plus we cover this UFO news with a real life alien. Huge get. (Thanks to Danielle Perez.)For a closed-captioned version of this episode, please visit crooked.com/lovettorleaveit. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

Welcome to Love It or Leave It, Vaxxed to the Future. fully covered face trying to save the human race you get plunged second dose plunge plunge so fellas yeah fellas yeah does your partner wear a mask hell yeah tell them to take it take it take the fucking vax baby got vax that song it was a song it's technically a song was by gabe gabe just gabe if you want to make a vax to the future theme Future theme, please send it to us at leaveitatcrooked.com. Before we get to the show, this month, Love It or Leave It is included in Amazon Music's Pride Collection, along with Keep It and a ton of other amazing LGBTQ podcasts. To check them out, head over to Amazon Music to listen for free. On the show this week, we pay tribute to Naomi Osaka with a game about the dumb questions athletes are forced to answer. And I talked to science writer George Zidane about sunscreen.

And I was really interested in this topic because there's been a lot of confusing information about sunscreen, what we know, what we don't know. And it was such a good conversation. I'm so glad we had it as we head into summer. So check that out. he is a stand-up the host of the seek treatment podcast a writer on the very funny hacks on hbo max please welcome pat regan pat's good to see you thanks for being here thank you so much for having me you know i was watching some clips before i came on and i have to say i really love your couch oh thank you i really like it i really appreciate that so i just wanted to say that like up top um because i don't want there to be any questions about where I stand. I appreciate that.

No problem. You don't want to have that sitting out there as an unknown. No, no. When you feel a certain way, when you feel something, you have to let the person know because we never know in this life how long we have. And that's actually tattooed on my pubic mound. Just kidding. I'm just kidding about that. It's not. It my pubic mound. Just kidding. I'm just kidding about that. It's not.

It's higher than that. Just slightly higher than that. Just very slightly. Let's get into it. What a week. During an appearance at a QAnon convention over Memorial Day weekend, a QAnon convention, just a thing we say now. That's just something that happened.

A QAnon convention. Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was asked why a Myanmar style coup can't happen in the U.S. And he said this. No reason. I mean, it should happen. No reason. That's right. Flynn later denied advocating for a violent overthrow of the government in spite of the video footage.

So it's just like a classic he said, he said situation. He did say it on video and we all saw it. And then he said, I didn't say it. And so that's sort of the controversy. And there's just no way to resolve it. Totally. He says he didn't say it. He said it. They have equal weight because they're, they're equally credible people, you know? Totally, totally. And they're definitely, there's some contradiction there, I think. I'm not sure that both those things could be true. I'm obsessed with QAnon. I tried to watch the QAnon doc, but it got almost a little bit too confusing for me.

And I had to like, I'm going to go back into it. Do you know what it is? The QAnon doc? I do. I do. I'm a little bit worried that you're, are you sure it's the QAnon doc about QAnon or are you entering and joining QAnon? Just be careful.

Yeah, totally. Totally. It is the QAnon? Just be careful. Yeah, totally, totally. It is the QAnon doc. But that being said, I think there's a lot of fucked up shit going on in our government. And I believe everything that I read. Cool, cool, cool, cool. In response to voter suppression efforts across the country and the fact that coup talk is a bit more prevalent than you'd want it to be,

really like your coup talk to be zero close to it. On Tuesday, President Joe Biden announced that he was asking Vice President Kamala Harris to lead the administration's efforts to protect voting rights. This is a very flattering way of saying, Kamala, I need you to dig through Joe Manchin's trash and find some blackmail stuff. Just anything we can use. All right. Definitely.

It definitely is feels like one of those things that's like when you're like at your day job when your boss is like so I have an amazing honor for you which is that you're going to be doing a lot more work moving forward and you will be still getting the same amount of money that you got before you had to do you know I mean it's like an extra an extra task is never an honor in my experience. Well as a rule if something is described as an honor, the honor is the payment, right? Like totally, you know, it's like this is a real prestigious award. Is there a cash prize? No, no. That's why it's prestigious. Totally, totally. Of course,

passing any meaningful legislation to protect our democracy will be difficult so long as the filibuster is in place. Enter Arizona Senator and reality denier Kyrsten Sinema. She went to Texas, where they just tried to restrict the right to vote, to stand next to John Cornyn, who voted against the Insurrection Commission, to say this. The reality is, is that when you have a system that's not working effectively, and I would think that most would agree that the Senate's not a particularly well oiled machine, right? The way to fix that is to change your behavior. Not to eliminate the rules or change the rules, but to change your behavior. The person saying this is a lawmaker.

Literally, the job is changing rules. Like, that's what you do. There are rules, and you're like, we should change some of these to make the system work better. Also, in a sport, like the sports we have now, the rules don't change very, very often. But that's because for a long time, they would try stuff out. And when the rules stopped working, they did change the rules. They add the odd rules all the time. I don't know them because I don't know the sports. But I do imagine that like, they didn't always have three strikes and nine innings that probably moved around a fair amount, I would assume.

Totally. I think they definitely experimented with eight strikes. And they were like, you know what? This is too long. Baseball is boring enough as it is. I mean, three strikes already, the games are very long. And I think that they even could go down to two, I think. Not to be a cinema.

You're being such a cinema right now. I know. I never wanted to come. Not to be a cinema. You're being such a cinema right now. I know. I never wanted to come on here and be a cinema, but I'm being a cinema towards you and towards your audience. I didn't even fully get what she meant. What is she saying?

She's saying that we don't need to change laws, we need to change behaviors. It's very patronizing and stupid, which is, I think, a vicious combination. Totally. That's like, you can be patron patronizing but you better be pretty smart or you can say something dumb in

like a really sweet way totally totally you can't be both you just can't be both and like you can't have it all can kirsten cinema have it all, I mean, you know, sometimes if something's not working, you don't want to change the rules. You want to say, are we doing something that's wrong? And I agree. Like, actually, it would be nice if the Republicans changed their behavior. But one thing I've learned from being a person on planet Earth for, lo, these many years, not that many years, like just the right amount of years.

Totally. People actually think it's fewer years than it is which is cool that's great i that used to happen to me but it doesn't anymore but i'm ultimately okay with it no i i think the key right i'm slowly right the goal is not to look like you have few years it's to really embrace that however many years you have is a greater number of years you know i recently got crow's feet and i have to say i'm like really feeling in my power around it I think it's cool that this was a dependent clause, but I got stuck on feeling old and lost complete control of the show. Totally. But the point I was making, I believe, was that like they're not going to change their behavior because you asked them. You have to change their incentives. And right now their

incentives are to block everything. One way to stop them from blocking everything, to actually make the Senate more functional and bipartisan, is remove their ability to stop everything. If they can't stop everything, they'll have to work on something. Because if you know that you can stop every bill, there's no incentive to participate. But if you know that some of these things are going to get through the machine, all of a sudden you're like, hey, I'm a Republican. I have an idea. What if we drilled just like one extra oil well? Totally. And we'll be like, okay, sure.

You know, bipartisanship. In other legislative news, President Biden has offered Republicans a new even lower figure for his infrastructure bill at $1 trillion. His original plan was $2 trillion. He later lowered it to $1.7 trillion. Republicans are expected to make a counteroffer,

endless negotiations until after the midterms. That's their retort. That's their riposte to do nothing. How accepted and commonplace filibustering is so LOL to me. It's all of our jobs to actually do a little bit of work, but we're all going to agree that we just aren't. We're going to do anything we can

to keep any work from happening for as long as possible. It's like so crazy to me. Yeah, it's a real shitty system. We probably should change the fucking rules, Kirsten. Meanwhile, former President Trump has decided to shutter his live journal after just 29 days, just

before the end of the free trial, which I think was pretty smart. His son, Donald Trump Jr., is now selling personalized videos of himself on Cameo with a rate of $525 for a standard video and $787 for a video delivered in 24 hours or less. Exciting. Oh, my God. I actually, you know, I briefly was on Cameo and I have to say it's so stressful. So I had to get off of it for my own mental health because you wake up and you're like, oh my God, do I have any due today?

And so I hope he's doing well with that. I love that they're embracing kind of like OnlyFans culture. You know what I mean? Like not exactly OnlyFans, but the surrounding entities. Yeah. I mean, look, people are making fun of Don Jr., but he is saving up to buy a Cameo from his dad. Like that's the goal, to get enough money to get one.

Is Trump on cameo? No, he is not on cameo. And the truth is, that's not what Don Jr. is doing. It's actually because safari companies charge a lot of money if you want to throw a grenade at a hippo. They really, that's sort of what he's trying to save up to. It's a real expensive boutique offering. And that's what sucks is like we have to get more access

into that community of people who throw grenades at rhinos because you shouldn't have to be rich. You shouldn't have to be charging for cameos if you just want to explore that passion. I think that's exactly right. Like somewhere out there, there's a kid who didn't have the same opportunities that Don Jr. does, right? Who didn't grow up in a palace in the sky. And that kid wants to grow up and throw a grenade at a hippo. And that's their

dream. That's their vision. That's been the picture on their mood board from the time that they were little. And they'll never get to. They'll never get to. They'll never get to. And that is not right. It's not right. It's not right. Meanwhile, RNC chair Ronna Romney McDaniel threatened to boycott the next presidential debates unless significant changes are made. My only reaction to this is like, 2024? Like you are blasting through that to do list. Like good for you. That's amazing. I am not that far ahead. You're thinking about 2024. That's cool. I have a paralysis around next week.

I can't make any new plans because I haven't written anything down on my calendar. So I have no idea what's going to be a conflict. So I laud that. I laud that. I celebrate it. I think, wow, that person knows how to use Google Calendar in a way that I don't.

One thing I like to do on Google Calendar is make really, really long-term bets and put them deep, deep within the calendar to discover years later. Like what kind of bets? They're so embarrassing, but I'll tell you. One of them was, I bet George W. Bush's reputation is not improved 20 years after he leaves office. Oh, so they're just bets against yourself. Well, no, who is that bet with? I don't remember.

I think it's, honestly, I have to go back in because it's literally now 15 years old and then it'll pop up and it'll say, you owe Samir $20. And it's like, all right, I'm okay with that. I have a disease where for some reason I can't figure out Google Calendar. Like I don't understand. I know it's, I'm sure that that. I have a disease where for some reason I can't figure out Google Calendar. Like I don't understand.

I know it's, I'm sure that it's easy. And for some reason I go to my like, what feels like the answer to me is like to go to CVS and buy like a day planner. Like, like the really organized girls had in middle school. And it feels like if I can just like write in that with colored pens, it feels like that will solve everything but I stop after like two days of course of course you do I mean I I have the same I had the same impulse I had the same desire the problem is um it's still you holding that planner you know yeah it's not one of those organized kids with the planner it's still you and so like the planner doesn't make you a planner with the planner, it's still you. And so like, the planner doesn't make you a planner. Totally. The planner helps you if you're a planner. It's like the container store. You know,

you don't totally I walked through that store back when we did that sort of thing. And I would just imagine a better life where like, I knew where things were. And that was cool. That's a cool way to live. I think I bought this printer and I thought I would be a really different person afterwards, and I have to tell you the rules of time and space when you have a printer almost identical to before you have one, and that's been a shocking revelation. Let me throw this at you. Let me throw this at you.

How many times in your life have you thought that stamps would change how good of a person you were? That's it. I just think stamps is the one thing holding me back. If I had stamps, I'm sending thank you notes. Totally. I've never struggled with that. I've never even considered that option.

That's how lofty it seems to me. But I do have that with like nice pens. Like I just think if I can get nice enough pens and enough nice enough pens, at that point I will be journaling nonstop. I will be writing a novel. I will be making to do lists. And it's actually honestly torn apart my relationship to the point where like, when we if I'm with my same sex sexual partner, and we walk by a pen section of a store, I like have a really strong urge to get as many as possible. And he knows that I am. And he'll be like, you can't, please don't get pens today. And we've had huge fights in Target

about putting pens back because we have too many. And I get ink everywhere. What did I do this year? Nothing. I did very little. Made great content. Made great content. I mean, it feels like you're having a lot of very

savvy political views that's something to me that's aspirational it feels like if i could read a newspaper an actual hard newspaper every morning while drinking coffee but the kind of coffee where it's like well coffee but also a glass of orange juice like then i would really know what was up you know what i mean then i would really step into my power. Yeah, that's a cool way to start the day, I imagine. I don't know, but it seems really amazing. Totally. Get the paper, sit down, read the paper,

not feel like doing that is failing to do the things you were already behind on, you know? But it feels like if you told me you were someone who did that, I would not even blink. I would be like, yeah, of course. Thank you. Of course. Thank you so much. No problem.

Also this week, the American West is on track for one of the worst droughts in centuries, with 60% of the area facing extreme drought conditions. This is also known as perfect gender reveal weather. Very exciting. Oh my God. exciting oh my god john hinkley jr who spent 35 years in a psychiatric hospital after his failed assassination attempt against president ronald reagan in 1981 is now posting love songs on his youtube channel jodie foster responded getting warmer so i don't know about either these jokes here's the next one and we can decide after

I don't know whether I need to just create ironic distance or actually cut it from the show here we go here's the problem Pat you show up to a John Hinckley concert and he starts playing the new stuff and you're out there shouting play the hits

shoot Reagan I don't know I'm not sure i like that one i like that one i want everyone listening to know that obviously reagan's already dead right it's no there's just a joke it's just a joke totally i mean and i think like bringing away i think what you're doing is you're bringing awareness to his death in a way that's we can't erase it we have to speak about it every day to look at it we have to look at it we have to use our platforms to direct attention towards the fact that reagan died one time he did die and then he there was a failed

attempt and that happened and that happened it was at the it was at the it was at the hilton one thing that i didn't understand until i moved to D.C. is everyone called it the Hinkley Hilton. Oh, that's kind of cute. I couldn't believe it. Like, what? We're calling it the Hinkley Hilton? Okay. I'm the kind of person that would love,

I think it's so silly like how real superstitions get where it's like if someone gets murdered in a house, then the house is like worth less money. It's like, that seems so childish to me. It's like, you're not going to get murdered. What are the chances that you're going to get murdered in the same house like worth less money. It's like, that seems so childish to me. It's like, you're not going to get murdered. What are the chances that you're going to get murdered in the same house someone else did? Probably even less.

You know what I mean? If anything, it should cost more because you probably, there probably won't be another murder in it. You know what I mean? That's a really, really good point. That's a really good point. Like what exactly are you worried about

that like there's an evil spirit in the house that causes murders? Grow up. I say grow up. Grow up. Grow up. We say grow up to that. Yeah.

But my view is that this is, buying a haunted house is very similar to me to going to Chipotle when they were having their troubles, which is no line, sometimes free burritos. Pretty cool. Pretty cool. Wait, I didn't know that Chipotle had that. Well, they went through that period where there had been a few E. coli or other kind of issues. Oh, right, right, right. free burritos pretty cool pretty cool wait i didn't know that chipotle had that well they went through that period where there had been a few e coli or other oh right right right and at that time they closed and when they reopened people weren't walking in they weren't totally

but i was yeah i would have i would i'm very um you know i'm always down to sort of take a chance you know what i mean well it seems like you may have and not known it and like you walked into an empty chipotle and they were like welcome what are you doing here you're? Well, it seems like you may have not known it, and you walked into an empty Chipotle, and they were like, welcome, what are you doing here? You're like, I love it here. I was like, why wouldn't I be here? And they're like, no reason. And when you said Hilton, it made me think of the fact that this isn't news, and this isn't politics by any means,

but Kathy Hilton finally has joined the cast of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, and she's already breathing so much life into the franchise that it's like just going so well and I'm just so happy for her. I'm really glad you brought that up because there's something I've been wanting to try out which is I think we need to start calling Glenn Greenwald

the Real Housewife of Substack because he's a messy bitch and he lives for drama and I think that that's important to get into the world. I think that you should do Totally. And I think that that's important to get into the world. I think that you should do that. But then I think that we need to find four to six other housewives of Substack. And as someone who has written four, everyone say it with me, four entries on a Substack,

I am willing to be part of the cast of the Real Housewives of Substack. Wow. Already? By the way? Yeah. I'm in. This is already a great show. Totally. Totally.

We're going to Brazil. On Moses Lake in Washington State, a boat filled with people harassing another boat for displaying gay pride flags burst into flames, forcing the people they harassed to rescue them. Those bigots almost became lake bottoms. Whoa. You see? i see that yes i almost i don't okay so i'm of like a million different minds it this year pride feels exceptionally um almost like controversial within queer spaces where it's like i don't like i think that everyone's so upset that browns are in pride now and that brands have like rainbow stuff that everyone's so upset that brands are in pride now and that brands have rainbow stuff. Everyone's like, this is not pride.

And that, and brands, how dare they? And I'm sure, I hate brands. But also, there's so many front-facing videos of comedians doing impressions of brands, being like, I love gay, that now I'm starting to feel almost oppressed by that. You know what I mean? You're now anti-anti-brand. I'm anti-anti-pride. So that's really kind of subversive. And not a lot of people are talking about that yet.

And I want it known that I'm the first person who ever said it on a podcast. Noted. But I also agree that like people who are on a boat with a pride flag, like, yeah, they are annoying. We have to be honest about that. Like we have to be honest about that like we have to be honest about prides about that too i totally get the other boat like i guess i'm just really seeing all sides on this issue now the actual situation is actually something i fantasize about all the time because not this specific thing but i um you know i'm a runner and i ran

in high school and college. Thank you. And so whenever you're running, there's always people who scream at you from their car, like trying to scare you. It's a strange thing that happens actually a lot. And so I always have this vision of like them screaming at me or something or like making fun of me and then crashing. And then I have to keep running by their car. And I'm like, I actually help them. I like pull them out and I call I I'm like where's your phone and I call and I save their lives and they're actually we're all kind of interviewed later and they're asking what how they got into an accident and they look at me because they're like they don't want to tell you know Ellen or

whoever that um they actually were screaming and in story, maybe they were like homophobic slurs at me. And I, in the last minute slide in and I'm like, it was an icy road or so I make it so they don't even have to tell it. Wow. And then they learned a little something. Yes. Yes.

But then like later it kind of comes out, but not, I didn't want it to, but it does come out what really happened. And yeah, you want a perfectly satisfying story in which you did the right thing, but the world knows the truth. Totally.

Like I've tried so hard not to let it get out, but everyone found out that I'm actually incredible. Yeah. It's like, and he tried to protect those people. Like what a person. Yeah. Yeah. What a person.

And you're like, I'm not talking about this. I've said what I wanted to say about it. Yeah. And my only thing I'll say about those people is I forgive them 1000%. That's what I'm desperate for. I hope that happens one day. Fingers crossed. My version of that is that when I was a kid, I had this fantasy that I'd be at some kind

of a concert, and then the drummer would get sick, and the lead singer would be like, is anyone out there a drummer? And I'd raise my hand, and then I'd be in the band. That was my version of that. Totally. Never happened. It's still not band. That was my version of that. Totally. Never happened. It still not happened. That shit never happens.

I have this fantasy too. One time I was with my friend and she had rented a car to go on a trip and it was a Chevy Traverse. And I remember getting in it and thinking like, wow, this is like a nice car. And my parents, they kind of need a car right now. And I had this fantasy. I'm one of six kids. I had this fantasy. I'm one of six kids. I had this fantasy where I make it huge.

I'm a huge, huge comic. And I have millions and millions. I have an immoral amount of money. And so I'm like, that's it. I'm going to go ahead and give mom and dad a Chevy Traverse. And so I'm sitting there with all five of my siblings. And I'm like, OK, so guys, I got mom and dad a Chevy Traverse. No one be weird.

You could say it's from all of us. They're like, I just had a great year. So don't be weird about it. You can Venmo me a couple of bucks if you want, but literally it's not a big deal. And they're all kind of like, okay, cool. Yeah, thanks. Let's just say it's from all of us.

And so I kind of give my parents a Chevy Traverse, but that hasn't happened yet either. In fantasy does the same thing happen which is though you try to stop your parents from finding out they also find out that you are solely responsible for the chevy traverse my parents definitely like they know you know what i mean like we all are sad but it's known it's known we're all kind of doing a performance you know what i mean i get that yeah i think that's really cool. I want that for you. Yeah, thank you.

And I want you to be a drummer. Thank you. Thank you. No problem. Look, was I in the NASA All-County Jazz Band? Sure I was. Just something I'm throwing out there, just throwing it into the universe. NASA Long Island?

Mm-hmm. I'm Suffolk. I grew up in Suffolk. Okay. Okay. Siasa. Siasa. Oh, wow. Northport. Northport northport okay northport okay yeah

how do you feel about the jean smart renaissance because i fucking love it i love it too i love it too i didn't have a firm firm firm relationship with her before watchman like that kind of felt like i remembered her when I watched, when I saw her in Watchmen, I remembered her as being the president's wife in season one of 24. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And so that,

I didn't have like this strong visceral, but I've been loving. No designing women? No designing women in there? I'm sure, I'm sure that I would love a show called Designing Mormon, but I just, it never,

and I, and I used to always watch like Nick at Nighty type stuff, but like I never saw it for whatever reason, but I just never, and I used to always watch Nick at Nighty type stuff, but I never saw it for whatever reason. But I'm loving her in Mayor, obviously, and I wrote on Hacks, which has been really fun, and she kills it in that.

So I'm like all, I'm 1000% here for it. Pat Regan, this was so much fun. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. When we come back, we'll play a game about the craziest questions asked at sports press conferences, which I knew nothing about and I found very interesting. Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up.

And we're back. Ah, tennis. If being versed was a sport. If you're looking to kill a few hours while you slowly give yourself whiplash, boy, do we have the game for you. This week, Naomi Osaka, the biracial Japanese-American 23-year-old all-star, said au revoir to the French Open after her refusal to do press resulted in a fine and a threat from the four Grand Slams to bar her from future tournaments

if she refused to face the international sports media. Osaka cited her mental health, but are the questions from the sports press really that bad? What could they possibly ask that could rub a global superstar the wrong way? We'll tell you in a game we like to call Naomi, oh my, I hate talking to you. Naomi, I'm going to try again. Leave this in, I don't care.

Naomi, me, oh my. Naomi, me, oh my. Naomi, oh my, I hate talking to you people Here to endure the game and this intro We have Sabrina Hi Sabrina Hi John, that was a lot It sure was

Now thank you for being here You are here because you are a sports writer You are a sports expert You also went toe to toe On a little quiz show called Jeopardy With our producer, Brian Semel. Famously, you wiped the floor with him. They said defeat, and Sabrina said, who is Brian Semel? That's how much of a route it was. Please edit out my various attempts at

that joke. But you can leave in me saying that I took various attempts at the joke. I'm going to see how long I can do this before Brian turns his camera on to end this. All right, we're going to move forward. Sabrina, here's how it works. I'm going to play you a clip of a wild question posed to an athlete. You will have to guess the athlete. Bonus points if you can remember their response, not verbatim, just ballpark sports. Sabrina, do you have any other recollections of the time you defeated Brian Semel in the Game of Jeopardy? I mean, just that we were trucked by the other guy who ended up in the Tournament of Champions. Good for him. Fuck that guy.

Fuck that guy. All right, Sabrina, are you ready? Let's do this. Trucked. Trucked on Jeopardy. Let's roll the first clip. So what type of parental role has he played for you and your teammates, Devon? Who was that clip asked of?

Kyrie Irving. Correct. Now, what was Kyrie Irving's response? I have a father. His name is Dedrick Irving. Yes. You got it. Hey, I've heard that.

People don't say Kyrie Irving. They just say Kyrie, right? That's correct. Yes. Okay. So we both got it right in a sense. Two for two. Next clip.

Normally you smile when you win. You come here, you laugh. What happens tonight? Normally you smile when you win. What's wrong? Who was told to smile? I'm going to guess a woman. Yes, of course. Serena Williams? You got it. It was Serena Williams. And here was her response. It's 11.30.

I don't, to be perfectly honest with you, I don't want to be here. I just want to be in bed right now and have to wake up early to practice. And I don't want to answer any of these questions. And you guys keep asking me the same questions, so you're not making it super enjoyable. Nice, Serena. Nice. Next clip, who was asked this question? you're getting a lot of fans here a lot of them are male and they want to know if you could date anyone in the world of sport of movies

i'm sorry they asked me to say this who would you date oh i don't i really before you answer i really hate the creation of the distance inside of it oh they told me to ask because as she's asking the question she's like oh I hate what I've been they made me do that like yeah okay who was asked that question can I get a sport um I wish that you could but unfortunately I don't know wait I'm gonna google what sport it is oh it's tennis it Oh, it's tennis. It's tennis. It's tennis.

Listen, I'm out of my depth. All right. You're a sports writer. I am not. All right. The sport was tennis. The sport was tennis. OK.

This could go in a lot of directions. I'm not even sure if she's asking woman or man. Sloane Stevens. Incorrect. The answer is Eugenie Bouchard. Okay. And her answer was Justin Bieber. I don't know. Good French Canadian connection there. Next question. Yeah, sure. Sure. Next question. That question was, what kind of Instagram photos

are you planning to take while you're here? Naomi Osaka? Correct. And what was Naomi's answer? Oh, that's a tricky one. I have no idea. It's great. It's great. Do we have the clip? I'm not really sure yet. Maybe in front of a convenience store or something. I love that answer. I love that answer. I don't know. Convenience store? What a perfect answer. I don't know. It's a convenience store. What a perfect answer. Like, I don't give a shit about this.

Next clip, Sabrina. Will the Clippers be back here Sunday playing the game seven? Chris Paul. Chris Paul, yes. Now, what was Chris Paul's answer? I'm assuming he said, what kind of question is that? You got it. Let's hear his response.

What? You're feeling about, you know, your level of confidence that you'll be back here again. What do you think? I'm on the team. What do you want me to say? Nah, it's over. That's what you want to hear? Yes.

Come on, man. You've been doing this long enough. What an annoying question. What an annoying question. You know, I would say what I've learned in just hearing some of these questions is like how much in common it has with sports reporting and political reporting have a lot in common. But even in political reporting, you don't hear somebody say like, so you're going to lose, huh? Like every that's a little more like, are you worried about how you're doing kind of a deal? Sabrina, next clip.

Who dealt with this interaction? Congratulations. Congratulations. I lost. You lost? Yes. Oh, okay. So what happened out there?

Who was asked that question? Who was offered congratulations for a match they, in fact, lost? It once again sounds like a tennis player. It is a tennis player. The photos on the internet are of a person playing tennis. Good to know. Good to know. I don't know.

Nadal? It was not. It was Nicholas Mahut. Oh, Mahut. Do you know him? Mahut. Yeah, of course. Nicholas Mahut.

It was Nicholas Mahut. Was it after the ridiculous 70 game fifth set? I'll have to put that in the comments because I don't fucking know. Oh, sorry. Next clip. The first person to come out of the closet in the NFL, do you think it'll be a white player or a black player? So the question was, the first person to come out of the closet in the NFL, do you think it'll be a white player or a black player?

I fucking love that. That is an incredible question. Somebody was asked, do you think it'll be a white player or a black player? Yes. Guess the race of the first NFL player to come out of the closet. Sabrina, who was asked that question? Tom Brady. What was their response?

It was not Tom Brady, though I would love him to have been asked that. I'm actually very interested to see what his face does when he's asked that question. But it was not. It was Adrian Peterson, and this was his response. Could be Hispanic.

Okay. Could be Asian. You never know. It could be Hispanic, could be Asian. You never know. Good point, Adrian. Good point, Adrian. Good point, Adrian. This is our final clip.

And I love this question. The question does reveal who is asked. Your job is to tell us how he responded. Let's roll the clip. Shaq, let's just say that a snake bit your mom right up here, right in the chest area. Would you be willing to suck the venom out to win the title? How is that possible? How is that question possible in the chest area would you be willing to suck the venom out to win the title how is that possible how is that question possible in the world how do you raise your hand at your job and and as Shaq Shaq Shaquille O'Neal I remember Orlando Magic and then some other teams actually correct remember the Orlando Magic they had Magic? They had the pinstripes.

I remember those pinstripes. I like those. What did Shaq say in response to this wild question? Really? No, predicting what Shaq is ever going to say. I'd do anything for a ring. Actually, incorrect. It turns out he won't do anything for a ring.

Here's what he said. No, but I will with your wife. Inside of the metaphor, it doesn't make a lot of sense. But we applaud Shaq for quickly coming up with no, but your wife. It's you didn't need something. It's a solid retort. Don't you think? I think it's very well done.

Really impressed. Really impressed. Sabrina, you did incredibly well in this game. You've won the game. Thank you so much for being here. incredibly well in this game. You've won the game. Thank you so much for being here. I'm sorry that both you and Brian Semel did get trucked by someone who went on to the Tournament of Champions. That's a tough break. Okay, but it got me on Love It or Leave It, so what are you gonna do?

It did. You know, that's, look, they say Jeopardy is a real launching ground for Love It or Leave It contestants, you know? Good to hear. a real launching ground for Love It or Leave It contestants, you know? Good to hear. Thanks, Sabrina. When we come back, I talk to George Zaidan about sunscreen and how much we know and don't know about how it works, which is really interesting.

Don't go anywhere. This is Love It or Leave It, and there's more on the way. And we're back. He is a science communicator, host, and producer. Please welcome George Zaidan. George, thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. So I'm really glad you're here. This is a topic that's been on my mind. America is reopening, and the idea that we can gather and spend time with friends outside this summer is the light at the end of a very long tunnel. Yes.

of a very long tunnel. But that light is a big nuclear fire in the sky that does cause cancer. And so the reason I wanted to talk to you is there was this piece in Outside magazine a couple of years ago that basically said, sunscreen is margarine. That it's something that seems like science has created to overcome nature.

And that when you actually dig into it, like, wait, hold on a second. Nature is smarter and more complicated than we realize. Then there's a bunch of people pushing back and saying, that's basically anti-vaxxer stuff for sunscreen. I don't want to be a sunscreen anti-vaxxer. So you have thought about this and done a lot of work to try to understand the science here about what we know and don't know about sunscreen. So sunscreen, what is it and what does it do? Okay, so sunscreen is usually one or a mix of many active ingredients. ingredients, and the whole point of it is to try and protect you to some degree from the sun's ultraviolet light, which, as you said, we know causes skin cancer, right? The thing is, you know,

no sunscreen is going to be a perfect shield, and that raises this million-dollar question, which is, does sunscreen reduce your risk of skin cancer? And the best available evidence that we have today suggests that, yeah, probably does reduce your risk of certain types of skin cancer. But, and I'm going to say the word but like a thousand times today, the best available evidence is one randomized controlled trial. It was conducted more than 20 years ago with SPF 16 sunscreen that's fairly different than what is on the market today in the U.S. And the study was conducted in Australia where the sun is trying to kill you all the time. So all that is to say, you know, the best evidence we have today, you know, it's a randomized control trial. That's good. But it would be great to have

multiple randomized control trials with modern sunscreens in places where the sun isn't trying to kill you every single day. So we get a fuller understanding of how good sunscreen is at protecting you from skin cancer. We know that the sun can give you skin cancer and there's multiple kinds of skin cancer. And it seems like, and tell me if this is wrong, that there's some evidence that sunburns are especially dangerous, right? That like sunburns represent a kind of damage that's more likely to lead to cancer. Is that right? So there has been a lot of work on the link between sunburn and skin cancer. And some people would say exactly what you just said, that it represents the kind of damage that is visible and hurts and your body is punishing you for getting too much sun exposure. And some people

say that it's actually not the sunburn that directly causes skin cancer. It's just a marker of a massive solar overdose. And there's something else going on that's actually causing the skin cancer. It's very clear that too much sun causes skin cancer. It's less clear what too much sun actually means. Does it mean a little bit over the ideal amount every single day for decades? Does it mean massive concentrated doses when you're at the beach without an umbrella? Does it mean massive concentrated doses when you're a kid? Like those details are still not fully understood. One of the arguments

in this piece that was questioning sunscreen is, you know, human beings have been around for a long time and we have these signaling methods, right? and if you get a little bit of sun regularly you get a tan if you get the same amount of sun very quickly you get a sunburn and we know that some regular exposure to the sun does good things for us right vitamin d is what people talk about though there are some dissensus about that but we do know that there is some evidence that exposure to sun reduces depression reduces other health conditions right like may help with, you know, the functioning of your, of your heart, there's diabetes links and all of these things. So how do you factor that in that like some sun exposure seems to be good?

Right. So the vitamin D thing is an especially fascinating puzzle because, you know, it is true. Our bodies photosynthesize vitamin D just like plants photosynthesize sugar. And it's also true that low vitamin D levels are linked to a lot of bad stuff, heart disease, cancer, et cetera. So doctors thought, okay, well, we're recommending that people wear all this sunscreen, but that seems to be resulting in lower vitamin D levels. So we should supplement people. We should put people on oral vitamin D. I don't know about you, but like in high school, I was put on a thousand units of vitamin D a week. I've never gotten the amount of D that I wanted. Sorry. I'm really sorry. This is a good conversation. No, no. No, no, no. We were

having a good conversation, and I did that. I apologize. Continue. I'd like to give more D than I do. Is that? No, just keep going. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for where I led us. Oh, man. So it turns out when you give people D, it does not actually take care of all the bad stuff that we thought it would. Some scientists are saying exactly what you're saying. Like, maybe the sun exposure itself is what's good, and it has nothing to do with vitamin D. And so really what we need to do is recommend that people spend the right amount of time in the sun. For every single one of those scientists, you will find like six dermatologists who will have a heart attack and say, you need to wear sunscreen every single day of your life. You know, I think the debate's not settled yet. And I would not be surprised if the answer

depended on where you live. Like, if you live in Australia, your risk of getting skin cancer sometime in your life is 600% as high as if you live in England. Now, you know, England is like the sky is woven of mist and despair. So it's not like there's a lot of sun. But still, that is a massive difference. And so, you know, I think that particular debate is not settled yet. Yeah. One other piece of this too, is around the color of your skin and that, that a lot of these tests are done on white skin, like SPF testing, as you pointed out in your book is done on, on white skin. And there's some evidence that because skin with more melanin, darker toned skin takes more sunlight to get the positive effects of sun, we're actually giving people really bad advice by telling them to basically prevent their body from doing some of these

natural processes that even that scientists recognize in some small amount is good. Yeah, I can't put a number on it, but the vast majority of research on skin cancer, sunscreen, all of that stuff is done not just on white people, but like on super white people, right? Like very, very white people. And there's no good excuse for that other than convenience. Like SPF testing is done by giving pasty white people sunburns. So, you know, it's just convenient to give someone a sunburn for whom it's easy to get a sunburn and it's easy to measure a sunburn.

But we need to do more to understand how sunscreen works on people with darker skin tones. Well, what the skin cancer risk is on people with darker skin tones. I mean, we understand some of this. So people with darker skin do tend to get fewer sunburns and have a lower incidence of skin cancer, but the keyword there is fewer and lower. It doesn't mean zero. And that's kind of resulted in this misconception that if you have darker skin, you're fine to just do whatever you want and like not worry about it. And that could make you miss an early diagnosis

of skin cancer, which could be a real problem. There are also multiple kinds of skin cancer and melanoma runs in my family. And so I worry about this. So there's melanoma, which is deadly and incredibly dangerous form of cancer. There's then basal cell carcinoma and there's squamous cell carcinoma. Do we know how the risk of sun exposure shakes out among those cancers? Does the sun tend to increase your risk of some more than others?

We have some observational evidence, and then we've got a little piece of evidence from the randomized control trial. I'll start with the observational evidence. So the basal cell and the squamous cell, which are the non-melanoma skin cancers, they occur most frequently on your head, on your neck, and they're more common in people who work outdoors than people who work indoors. What that maybe suggests, not definitive, is that maybe, you know, chronic levels of sun exposure just kind of above the right amount leads to squamous cell or basal cell carcinomas. Melanomas, on the other hand, are much more rare, but they are much more frequently found on your trunk or your thorax or whatever and your legs and your back. And they are also

much more common among office workers, like people who work inside than people who work outside. The theory is, oh, well, those types of people tend to like go on vacation to the beach and roast themselves two or three days a year. And so that kind of sun exposure is more likely to result in melanoma. There's, again, like these are observational studies. They're not randomized. We know so little. I know.

What the hell? It's wild. They're like, is there any other kind of treatment that is recommended so unanimously? I feel like Joe Rogan now. That's what I feel like right now. I feel like if you're a dermatologist listening to this and you want to yell at me, I welcome it. I would like to learn more from your perspective. But there was that famous commencement that begins with wear sunscreen, this universal, unequivocal piece of advice. And yet you're like,

oh, there was a study in Australia and we checked the backs of desk workers once and like, it's wild. How is this possible? How is this possible? We don't know the dangers of going outside. You know, I don't know. And some people would say

we don't know the benefits of going outside either, right? So I think the recommendation comes really because skin cancer is the most common cancer in the US. Melanoma is relatively rare, but the other two, there's millions of cases every year. And so dermatologists think, okay, listen, we understand the chemistry of how sunscreen works really well. We know what's going on on a molecular level. It's absorbing UV light. So listen, better safe than sorry, might as well wear sunscreen. But listen, I would love to see a large randomized controlled trial here in the US with modern SPF 30 sunscreen to resolve some of these outstanding issues that we've been sitting on for 20 years. I think it's actually shocking how little we know. Yeah.

I mean, on the one hand, science progresses slowly. It takes a while. This 20-year-old trial, like, the reason it took 20 years is because you have to wait a long time for melanomas to pop up in people, right? Yeah. But then on the other hand, like, why didn't we start another trial 10 years ago? Well, maybe five years ago. Like, when we got the results of this one and it was less than, like, ironclad, why didn't we start up another trial? Right? You know, millions of cases a year, you know, this stuff is sold in

every single drug store and grocery store on the planet, basically. Why don't we have more than just one large randomized controlled trial? I don't get it. Like there were more people enrolled in the Pfizer COVID trial than there were in this sunscreen trial. And like, I'm all for COVID trials. Like we need that. That's great. It's amazing that we got 44,000 people, you know, enrolled in that trial and the results are incredible. But like, if we can do it for the COVID vaccine, we can do it for sunscreen. Right. Given that the sun kills a lot of people every year too. There's an epidemic of melanoma and deadly skin cancers every single year. Yep. One other point that you make in your writings about this is one potential issue is that sunscreen by preventing sunburns prevents you from getting the little alert from your

body that's like, hey, you go inside, you've been out here too long. And so like there's just so many different cross effects here that we don't totally understand. How did your behavior change after you started learning about this? Yeah. So there's three things I do that I did not used to do or vice versa. The first is, I do not use sunscreen to overdose on the sun. So I don't purposely put on a bunch of sunscreen, reapply it multiple times, and then go and roast myself on the beach. Like that, I think there's no world in which that is not bad for you. I think of sunscreen as something I'm going to wear if I need to be in the sun

anyway, not something that helps me get more sun. The second thing I do is I bought a pair of sunglasses. I mean, UV light into your eyes is not great either. So other types of protection, sunglasses, hats, clothes, burkinis, you know, whatever, pick your poison. And then the really surprising thing I learned about sunscreen is that everybody applies it wrong. So if you've made it through those two things and you get to the point where you really want to put sunscreen on, most people will rub it into their skin like moisturizer, right? At that point, it is below your, you know, a few layers of skin cells. It's like you take your umbrella and you put it down on the

ground and then step inside it and expect it to protect you from rain. That is not how you're supposed to use sunscreen. What you're supposed to do is gently rub it on your skin and then step away and wait 15 minutes for it to dry and bind to your skin, to the top layer of your skin. Oh, that sucks. That just sucks. No. My answer, no. And then what about the spray? I don't go for the goopy stuff. I love those sprays. They've upsold me on the spray. Yeah. So I'm not sure about the sprays. I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, if you're going to spray it on yourself, then the temptation to rub it in is less there, right? So maybe that's a good thing. But then on the other hand, the amount of sunscreen that they use to calculate the SPF is two milligrams per square centimeter of your skin, which just to translate that is a fuck ton, right? It's a lot.

And it feels like you are smothered in butter if you put that amount of sunscreen on your skin. So when I'm spraying myself with the spray, I'm like, there's no way this is enough, you know? So I don't know what to think about the sprays. Yeah, but it does work, right? Like that's the one thing. Like I know that if I put on a bunch of SPF 30 spray, it'll prevent a sunburn. It'll prevent a sunburn. Do you actually know? Like, have you ever tried spraying half your body and leaving the other half unsprayed? Because that's really the only way to know for sure. Um, no. Fair enough.

I've never done a controlled experiment on my, on my corpus. This is, this is not, this is not where I, I, no. But I will say that I have from time to time done what you correctly say we shouldn't do, which is this is the tool by which I do the roasting. So like I know here's what I know for sure. I know that if I don't put on sunscreen and I go out in the sun for hours, I will be fucked up. Yeah. And I know that I've done that having applied sunscreen several times and I'm not. Yeah.

But actually, what do you think about this? Let me throw something else at not. Yeah. But but actually, what do you think about this? Let me throw something else at you. Sure. A long time ago, I received a piece of just conventional wisdom, that basically, the length of your shadow, that when your shadow is longer than you are, that means the sun is at a less than 45 degree angle. And the rays are much less harmful. And so my general philosophy has tried to be, I really don't like using sunscreen. And so what I try to do is like, if I'm going to go in the sun and get a little bit of sun exposure from like, you know, more than just walking to my car or a lunch outside, but like be in the sun, I try to do it basically like, you know, before 1030 after 230 in that range. Where's your head

at on that? So that's a classic dermatologist recommendation. And I think it makes sense. I mean, the UV index, which is to say the damagingness of the sun's UV rays is at its peak in the middle of the day. So I have no objection whatsoever to you staying out of the sun in the middle. And that's probably how our ancestors hunted, right? We hunted in the evening, very early in the morning, and we spent the middle of the day like lazing around in caves. Yeah, it was a cool time. Any final thoughts for people listening and who are actually a little bit like horrified by what is their view that this is anti-sunscreen propaganda?

You know, even in that piece in Outside that was the most anti-sunscreen, it's like dermatologists say use it. They are worried about your skin and they are worried about you getting skin cancer. These are the doctors and they say, slather it on, protect yourself. It's tough. Like I don't think there is a simple answer yet. If you've got a family history of skin cancer, if you are very, very light skinned, I have no problem with using sunscreen as one tool in your protect yourself from the sun arsenal. Where I really have an issue with it is what we were talking about before, like don't abuse it to get a bigger dose of sun exposure. To me, that seems like the biggest danger to avoid. And other than that,

like if you, because look, you're going to forget to, you're never going to be perfect. You're not going to apply it every single day. You're going to forget. It seems to me that like in winter, you don't really need to apply it because the sun, you know, the forget. It seems to me that like in winter, you don't really need to apply it because the sun, you know, the sun's UV rays aren't as strong. So like you're going to have imperfect sunscreen application. Maybe you'll end up with like 40% of days where you apply sunscreen. And so, you know, that's hedging your bets basically until we get that big randomized controlled trial. All right. Thank you so much to George Zaidan for being here. His book, which you should check out is called Ingredients,

The Strange Chemistry of What We Put In Us and On Us. And thank you so much to George for being here. When we come back, it says here we're joined by an alien from outer space. That's surprising. And we're back. In 2017, the New York Times released military videos of UFOs. Two years later, the Navy admitted they were legit. Fast forward to December 2020, a sneaky little stipulation crept its way into the $2.3 billion relief package. The Department of Defense and the

Director of National Intelligence had six months to deliver an unclassified report to Congress about UFOs. The report is due this month. Former Navy pilot, Lieutenant Ryan Graves, told 60 Minutes that training pilots saw unidentified aerial phenomena every day for at least a couple of years off the Eastern seaboard, and that we're happy to just ignore the fact that these are out there watching us every day.

And then this week, former President Barack Obama fanned the flames of speculation when he told the Late Late Show that what is true, and I'm actually being serious here, is there's footage and records of objects in the skies that we don't know exactly what they are. Here to address these reports of unidentified aerial phenomena, zooming to us from Saturn's rings, we have an alien. Thank you for being here, alien. Hey, thanks for having me. Happy Pride. Oh my God. Fun coinkydink. Get this. It's actually our pride too.

Wait a second. Wait a second. It's pride on your planet? That is a coincidence. Oh yeah, honey. A few hundred years ago on our planet, a group of radical men and us started questioning our ancient mating ritual of decapitation of the male it was very controversial but as we say on blurgo love without decapitation is love fascinating look you know i'm all for equal rights but between you and me and my spaceship how am i supposed to finish without ripping a man's head off? Yeah, obviously I wouldn't say that back home, you know, cause I get canceled. We have that too. I'm sorry. Wait a second. Wait a second. You have cancel culture. Oh yeah. If you question the queen's orthodoxy,

you get canceled, which means you can't be on social media. Totally sucks. And the queen kills you and everyone who knows your name. Wow. Ours is not real. Yours is real. Ours is kind of a... Anyway, let's move on. Topic in hand. What brings you to our planet of Earth?

Oh, we've never been to Earth. And honestly, not sure if we'll stop by. Your moon sucks. Okay, that hurts. We like our moon. It was hard to go. Anyway, but we all have this evidence. We've seen it now of your ships darting around. Okay, yeah, not us. We don't dart around. Traveling in space is expensive and dangerous. When we travel, we do it with great care. Okay, we pick a destination and we get to it.

Okay, this is the problem with you humans. You don't know how much fuel takes to move between stars. Like, you just don't. You're such cute little water-based morons. Well, then if you're not doing it, what is it? The fuck should I know? You thought tic-tac-shaped things flying to the ocean, right? Well, maybe go look in the damn ocean. I mean, it's probably down there laughing at you vicious skin dummies

crashing your cars into each other. I mean, seriously though, you should check out the ocean sometime. There's lots of cool stuff down there. If I was going to visit your planet, I wouldn't even bother with the gaseous part. All right, look, you keep insulting us, but humans aren't so bad, okay? We cracked general relativity. That's pretty good. Oh, honey, that's adorable. We teach general relativity to our little babies. All you know is that there's something you see that you don't understand. Okay. And you, your first instinct is to say aliens. Gosh, you're lucky you humans are just so darn cute because you are so, so stupid. You evolved to find meaning in your world and ascribe agency to the phenomenon in it.

That's useful when you're trying to escape a tiger. It's less so when you're trying to understand lightning. But it really seems, it really seems like- It just seems, it really seems. It just seems, it really seems. You know what you are? You're a dog barking at a trash can blown over by the wind. You're so skittish. You see a light and assume it's a warning. It's a failure of imagination, frankly, and a mistake you've made over and over again. Don't assume that because you can't explain it, you can't explain it. We will visit you when we are good and ready.

And honey, you right now, not ready. But when we do, I'll rip your fucking head off. Oh, got flirtatious. I don't mind. I don't mind. And Alien, everybody, thanks for being here. Bye. Thanks for having me.

Happy Pride. Kristen Sienema is one of us. Oh, good. Yeah, I know. Bye. Thanks for having me. Happy Pride. Kristen Sienema is one of us. Oh, okay. Yeah, I know. I totally think they bought it. Stupid morons. All right. An alien, everybody.

That was fun. Yay. Okay. Are you guys good with it? Yes. Okay. I know. I'm like, what? What a way to start the day, you know? It's a great way to start the day. okay I know you're like what

what a way to start the day it's a great way to start the day this was very fun honestly leave this part in too have a good weekend Danielle have a good weekend bye thank you so much to our alien Danielle Perez what a delight

when we come back we'll end on a high note. And we're back because we all need it. Here it is. The high note. Hi, I love it. My name's Ryan.

I'm from Minnesota and my high note this week is the fact that I'm celebrating my first Pride Month as an openly gay man. It's been a long time coming. The last year has been a journey,

but I appreciate all my friends and family who've been really supportive and people like you who I can look up to as someone who has done well in the LGBTQ community. And I just want to say thank you for that. Thanks. Hi, Lovett.

My name is Lisa, and I'm in Dallas, Texas, and I'm calling with my high note from the week. My daughter graduated high school over the weekend, and something really exciting happened. The valedictorian threw out her original speech, pulled another one out of her shirt when she got to the podium, and she gave a speech in protest of Governor Abbott's heartbeat bill that was signed recently here in Texas. And this was incredibly brave and courageous of that girl, particularly here. And it just gives me a lot of hope for the next generation. So that's definitely a high note. Thanks. Bye-bye.

Hi, love it. My name is Sarah from Boston, Massachusetts. And after a very long year, I got to travel with my family to see two of my relatives who turned 100 years old over the course of last year. And we didn't get to celebrate that milestone with them. So it was really nice to see them in Omaha and celebrate with them. One of my relatives was a pilot who flew in World War II. And both of them, of course, lived through the Depression. And so it was really great to see them at the end of this dark time after they've seen so much in their life. So anyway, it was a really great thing after a really dark year.

Thanks so much for all you do. Bye-bye. Hey, 11. This is Jake from San Francisco. And my high note this week is that my wife, Keith, and I are celebrating our 14th wedding anniversary. We originally met at Starbucks. I was working there as a barista to put myself through college, and she would go in every day to study for law school. And after years of making her coffee, I finally worked up the nerve to ask her out. And, you know, to this day, I still make her coffee every morning.

And on weekends, we, you know, spend a morning curled up on the couch listening to your show. her coffee every morning. And on weekends, we, you know, spend a morning curled up on the couch listening to your show. And so this weekend, as we're enjoying our latest episode of your show with a cappuccino in hand and nursing a champagne hangover from the night before, I just want to say that not only is she the high note this week, she's my high note every week and the brightest light of my life. Thanks for everything. I love it. This is Emily calling from the Bay Area with my high note for the week. Last fall, my husband and I lost a pregnancy at eight weeks and we were both devastated. The physical pain was terrible for about a week.

The emotional trauma hung over us for a few months. But week before last, we both got to go to my OB for being vaccinated and hear the heartbeat of the baby that I'm now 14 weeks pregnant with. We know that nothing is guaranteed, but so far everything is looking good and we're really, really excited to welcome our baby into a largely post-COVID world in early December. Thanks so much for everything you do. These high notes make me cry happy tears every single week. Thanks to everybody who called in. If you want to leave us a message about something that gave you hope, please call us at 213-262-4427. Thank you to Pat Regan, George Zaidan, and to our alien Danielle Perez and everybody who called in. There are 521 days until the 2022 midterm elections. Have a great weekend.

Love It or Leave It is a Crooked Media production. It is written and produced by me, John Lovett, and Lee Eisenberg. Jocelyn Kaufman, Poulavi Gunalan, and Peter Miller are our writers. Our associate producer is Brian Semel. Bill Lance is our editor, and Kyle Seglin is our sound engineer. Our theme song is written and performed by Sure Sure. Thanks to our designers, Jesse McClain and Jamie Skeel for creating and running all of our visuals, which you can't see because this is a podcast.

And to our digital producers, Nar Melkonian, Milo Kim, Mia Kelman, and Matt DeGroot for filming and editing video each week so you can.