Podcast: The Ride - P:TR Post Office (April 2026)

Episode Date: April 24, 2026

Today we answer your questions, along with some functional updates! Hope you like functional updates! "Alf's Music Career" episode is up at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/PodcastTheRide⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠FOLLOW PODCAST: THE RIDE:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/PodcastTheRide⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/podcasttheride⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠BUY PODCAST: THE RIDE MERCH:⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.teepublic.com/stores/podcast-the-ride⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠PODCAST THE RIDE IS A FOREVER DOG PODCAST⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://foreverdogpodcasts.com/podcasts/podcast-the-ride⁠ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Forever Welcome to the famously best kind of podcast The Ride. You know, the ones that are short and full of explanations and apologies. I'm Scott Gardner. There's Jason Sheridan. Hi. Yeah, it's one of those. It's becoming an increasingly common genre of the show, unfortunately.

Yeah, between last year and this year. Yes, yeah. Which I'll address here a little bit. Mike Carlson is not joining us today. Mike has been dealing with some difficult stuff. in the recent past, and I am not referring to his dislike of the Muppet Rock and Roller Coaster set list. However true, that may be. That is not the thing I'm referring to today.

Mike does have a lot on his plate right now, and I will leave it to him to address that someday or not address it, however he sees fit. But everything going on just kind of blew up our plans, and, you know, we're trying to keep the quality decently high here and not just throw up whatever. So long story short, it seems like the best move is going to be for us to. to take a little hiatus on the main feed. We aren't sure how long yet that's going to be. It might be short.

It might be longer. I don't know. But we want to leave it open-ended and flexible, and we will aim to return as soon as we can. Now, the good news is the episodes will keep coming on the second gate and on Club 3, which is, of course, the main way to support our show, and that is at patreon.com slash podcast The Ride. So if you're missing us, go poking around over there.

You know, hey, go digging in the archives for something you've, you've, you've, never heard before. I believe there are... Do you know the episode count now, Jason? Do we... If you had to guess, what's... How much is on the... How much is on the Patreon? On the Patreon, it's got to be a few hundred at this point, minimum, right? A few hundred, if not thousand. Yeah. I might guess...

I'm just here, I'm just going to... I'm just going to throw a dart at it. I think there are 8,000 and four episodes on the Patreon. So, you know, poker, there's probably something there you haven't heard if you're missing us on here. And also new episodes will be coming there. You know, hey, thank you listeners for your patience with us. As I said, there's been a bunch of these kinds of things lately. It's been kind of a wild time in podcast, The Ride World.

I would say we've been working behind the scenes a lot of irons in the fire in terms of discussions and stuff for all researching and making notes on. Let there be no question. The research fort is up and running. I mean, I'm not going to say 24-7, but like, do you keep office hours? Do you keep kind of like professor office hours in the research part? Oh, God. Yeah.

You know, my wife can stop by when, you know, there's listed hours, you know. Sure, sure, sure, yeah. You know, she's got a knock. And she's got to knock loud because it is made of pillows. Yeah, it is a pillow. You have to make sure that it's not a dull knock. But, you know, she's adapted. You know, we all have to adapt.

to things, and certainly I have. And yeah, but she's getting pretty good at the pillow knock. Without being too loud, without being too soft, without causing the entire thing to collapse. It's a delicate thing. Not as good as our friendly mail carrier. Now, there are pros at knocking and, you know, dropping mail packages and parcels and what happened.

Yes, indeed. Well, hey, what a perfect segue from friendly mail carrier. to what we are doing here because we thought, you know, instead of just coming on and saying, hey, we're not going to be on the main feed for a little bit. Let's see if we could send at least a little bit of fun your way. And thank you to the folks over on the Patreon on the second gate and Club Three who sent us a bunch of questions targeted specifically to Jason and to myself. So let's open up the podcast, The Ride, post office and answer a couple of things. I'm going to go straight to one because it's and it is addressed to me, but part of it's addressed to Jason and it's topical.

So it seems like maybe a good place to start. This is from Tommy Lips, who has a little profile pick of Smart One, the beloved Epcot Robot. So I really like that. Thank you, Tommy Lips. Here's Tommy Lips's question. Scott, what are your thoughts on the Mets playing Kokomo on the day Brian Wilson died as a tribute? This has cursed them as they are 47 to 70 since that day, one of the worst records in the league. So, yeah, Ian Rickabani is the first person who messaged me about this, and now I've seen that this is a news story that is out there.

The Kokomo curse. I was unfamiliar with this, but apparently, yes, after Brian Wilson sadly passed away last summer, the Mets played Beach Boys songs throughout the game. And one of those supposedly was Kokomo. Now, if you're in the know, as am I and as I have forced some of you, the listener, to be, then you know that Kokomo is the most famous Beach Boys song that Brian Wilson had nothing to do with. So this is an extremely odd choice to play in the wake of his demise. And I guess it has led to some bad stuff for the Mets, although I believe they won last night as we record this. so that record is improving just barely, fractionally.

But have you caught this story, Jason? Do you believe in the Kokomo curse? I think it's probably, there's some validity there, but also I don't think the Mets need any help stepping on Rakes. I don't think the Mets famously, you know, lot of losing streaks. And, you know, I, uh, the Phillies are right there with them this season. Uh, I was, I meant to text Ian Rickabani because I got the, uh, Ian Rickabonnie X, Lehigh

Valley Iron Pigs, the Phillies, um, AAA affiliate. Uh, he did a hat collaboration with them. And the Iron Pigs have a better record than the, uh, Phillies. this season. Then the major league Phillies. Then the major league team. Yeah.

So I was going to ask him to do a collaboration with the Phillies, please. We need any bit of luck we can take because now the season's starting to get underway

and people are starting to get injured on top of not playing offense or defense particularly well. So. Oh, geez.

I'm sorry to hear that. Well, have they, Have there been any issues of the Phillies playing wrongly attributed music of pop or musical icons? Is this, or is the Phillies mess their own mess? Well, I'll tell you this. There was a big thing a few years ago where their like celebration song that would play in the dugout was dancing on my own. But they wouldn't play the Robin one.

They would play the Kalem Skilom. Scott one. And what is the Kalim Scott one? I know only of the Robin one. What, there is no, he doesn't get to have a one. What is that one? So I think he, um, I, it is a cover. I believe it's popular and I believe he was a winner of the voice or American Idol.

I see. So is it the Kalem curse? Do you think you're, are you following, are you falling victim to the Kalem curse? I mean, look, they. They either, I forget whether they lost the playoffs or they lost the World Series a few years ago and they said no more of that song. Then they brought it back and I feel like they were swimming with weights on by not doing the Robin version. Calam Scott came to fame on Britain's got talent doing the cover of dancing on my own, which then became a single. Got it.

Got it. You know, the British music charts, it's like another planet. and you dig into them too much. Yes, yeah. And what are they doing playing British music to begin with? Come on. This is Philadelphia, the birthplace of America. Is that accurate?

I know the bell is there. Yeah, the bell and Independence Hall, and it's where the declaration was signed. Hey, there you go. All right, birthplace then. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why are we ceding land back to the Brits with this not great cover?

I mean, I guess Robin herself is not a man. American, but... Yeah, don't worry about. Yeah, no, that doesn't fit cleanly into that binary. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No rivalry there. I forget where she's from. Anyway, as for the Kokomo curse, I don't know.

I've also read that nobody can find documentation that they actually did play Kokomo. So this might be a made-up thing entirely. I mean, I think it's, I think to call it a curse is kind of a, you know, glass half-empty thing. I mean, because you have to look at who actually wrote Kokomo, and one of the writers of that is Terry Melcher. And Terry Melcher lived a long. and fruitful life despite Charles Manson trying to murder him. So he went on. Kokomo was one of his rewards, you know, for evading death, although others were not so

lucky as he went looking for Terry Milcher. But I still think that if you could view Kokomo as a transcendent thing, given how things worked out for Mr. Milcher. And maybe the Mets can rise above and come back from the grave, much as a, you know, Terry Melcher did. That's how I choose to look at it. Yeah. Hopefully. You got any questions, Jason? No, I just was trying to remember. There's another funny, there's like a reverse curse, like a rallying thing with the Pittsburgh Pirates this season with the phrase,

Raise the Cone, which I believe came from the apparel company fanatics who does all the MLB stuff. They were selling misprinted shirts. It should be raised the colors. Because Pittsburgh pirates, pirates raise the colors, you know, raise the flag. Kind of thing.

And then the city just ran with it and people were stealing traffic cones and bringing them to games. And there was like a guy always behind a home plate with a big cone. And the city had to put out a press release saying,

saying please stop stealing cones, stealing traffic codes. There's a cone shortage due to, wow. Yes. So that's kind of the fun. That's like a fun, that's a good curse. You know, they come. Just came out of nowhere? That was just a strange misprint wrong word?

It seems like I saw a little YouTube short saying that. And baseball has a lot of things where it's like, yeah, you can't. It's same with professional. wrestling where it's like, eh, you can't pinpoint exactly where the fans started saying it and the company adopted and blah, blah, blah. Okay, well, do you want to raise the cone on another question? I do.

Chelsea G. asked, who's the most obscure walk-around character you've encountered in the parks slash who do you wish would be a walk-around character? I will say it's always fun to see walk around country bears. There was a time when Mike and I were down at the park and like all the Robin Hood characters were back in what would become Galaxy's Edge, back in the Petting Zoo area. And so we had Robin Hood, we had Little John, we had the Sheriff of Nottingham.

and Mike had like a shirt with a target on it, like a, from a popular Hawkeye comic, and Robin Hood really started pointing it at it and miming a bow and arrow. And like, they were all going nuts. They were having so much fun with it. So that was pretty good. Most obscure character to me was a trip to Universal with my son a couple years ago. where there was just a big little bird around. And I think other people were seeing this big little bird.

And I guess that's just obscure to me because maybe other people would know what this was. But I really was like, what's this bird about? And it's a bird from migration, which is from an illumination movie from 2023. And I've never looked into what bird that was. I'm going to see if I can figure that out really. It's like a little one. He's like a little cute guy. Gwen Mallard is the name of that character, voiced by Trezi Gazzal.

Not sure who that is and not sure what it is. I know that my son was happy to meet Gwen Mallard either way. And so Gwen Mallard, I guess, is my answer for most obscure. Jason, I left out, this is very rude to you and to Tommy Lips, who asked the first question about the Kokomo curse. because there was one, it felt like a little bone throw to you at the end of the question, which was Jason thoughts on luncheables. Oh, you know what? I did see that, and I totally forgot.

Okay, here's my thing. I did eat luncheables as a kid. Obviously, it was very exciting the luncheables innovation of the little pepperoni pizzas, the little flat bread that you would put cold sauce and cheese and pepperoni on. That was a very special lunch. And I was so excited when those were, we would have those. There was a different brand that had like a little mini cold pizza in it that I remember eating once. And it was probably one of the worst school lunches I ever ate.

And like, I love my trash, but I like luncheables. I know Jane still, like, every now and then as a snack, we'll buy the cheese pizza ones. I think it's very funny looking back because my mom really upsold that. She really was like, well, it, I, luncheables were on sales. So we got pizza luncheables this week. and pizza luncheables are still, I would say, under $3. So often $2 or $1.50 on a big sale. So looking back, I'm like, how much did they cost in 1997?

Yeah, and how much of a sale, yeah, if you're in the sub-2-dollar range, then a sale is getting you a dime off potentially? Yeah, yeah. But I'm like, wait, how much did they cost it 30 years ago? And how much were the sales back then? Because I'm like, this is like nothing. This is barely food. But you feel like you're getting, you know, like one of those cheese slivers for free.

Like a single one of them is like technically a bargain. Sure. We were a big cheese and crackers house growing up of like, there's, oh, we haven't heard one of those in a while. I haven't heard one of those in a while. Just of like, I want a snack. I'm not hungry enough for full meat. I guess I'll just have cheese and crackers or like summer sausage, you know. If Mike was here, the next 35 minutes would be about that you just said summer sausage.

My leanings are a little bit different. and I'm not going to just grill about summer sausage, unless that's what you want, unless you were craving a full summer sausage takeover at this moment. I think I've said my piece. I think I've said my piece for now. Great. Have you found yourself recently,

is there such a thing as protein luncheables, and have you been eating that for nutrition? No, we've tried protein on crustables, which is just a slightly bigger uncrustable, and it's a little too much jelly. It's a little too much of everything. But protein jelly, which is good. You want your protein jelly, don't you?

Scott, I think they just made the diameter of the uncrustable a little bigger, and there's a bit more peanut butter. There's no secrets to this one. The rest isn't the protein comes from the peanut butter. There is not extra protein injected into the other components. or put into the 35 ingredients of said uncrestibles. Scott, I really did mean, I, next time you guys are over here,

you can sample it if you dare. But I was like, oh, I've got to see what they think of these. Because I do have a bag of blue flame tockies in the house. Because I've just seen them so much in stores. And I finally pulled the trigger and bought one. And I'm like, you know what? I don't know that this is very good. No.

What does Blue Flame imply? What kind of flavor territory are we in? It's just really, Tockeys are like really spicy, like, unpleasantly spicy. And so I, I, that was a sale where it was $2 instead of $274, you know. And I was just like, you know what? You're playing your mom's game. I am playing my mom's game. The apple doesn't, the slightly discounted apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

Yeah. I'm just gambling a little because I'm like, are they too hot? Are they good? Like blue snack treats? Like it's like things I always see around. I'm like, maybe I should try weight monster. There's a lot of people post a lot of videos and pictures. that white monster energy drink online.

And I'm like, what's going on over there? At the factory of it? At the, within the can. I'm like, what color profile? I mean, it's just caffeine. It's caffeine in Elfini or in like Guarana, whatever. It's the same shit as Red Bull, basically. But it's a lot bigger.

So, I don't know. You got to have a little fun. Protein? You know. Oh, I don't know if there's protein monster yet. Protein white monster. Something to investigate. I tossed that out as like a mini question, but then it got a full-sized answer.

So I think that, therefore, you are owed the next question. So I will, I will. Oh. Tommy Lips. Tommy Lips is two for two. He got a lot of, a big percentage of this episode. This is directed at me. Yeah, Mike's hard stuff has gotten.

It's gotten us too far away from the important thing. My heart stuff. Let's sign a spotlight on the other. Let's sign a spotlight. Yeah, I've certainly had my very share of stuff in a while. Dystopica asks. For Jason, how has your enjoyment of theme parks changed since you started to have mobility slash health issues?

Are there certain rides slash attractions you prefer more now. Great question. It is certainly, I certainly have to do a lot more planning. I have family coming out, and like, so I, coming out to visit and we're going to the parks.

And so a little bit of, like, work is involved of, like, making sure. I mean, I usually have a wheelchair and my cane at the parks. A neurologist, See, I said I was going to Orlando once to a neurologist, and they asked me, like, oh, don't roller coasters make you dizzy? And I'm like, I assure you, roller coasters are the one thing that don't make me to dis.

Like, it's one. Well, that's nice. Hey, that's good. They're nice. So I'm not terribly worried about that. I'm curious what this, you know, after Universal, I had that death on Stardust Racers. They're like, oh, well, we, you know, you need to, there's a new policy where you'll have to get to the ride, in the ride vehicle unassisted.

And I truly don't know what that entails. Like, is a 20-year-old going to make me walk 10 feet to ride? Like, awkward. That's an awkward thing. That's an awkward scenario. I think, you quickly realize how many ride vehicles are. below like your waist level so need an extra second to like step in for stuff or i got the experience of being the one to pause the haunted so i could get it a doom buggy at the other gate so um and

all the cast members and team members i've been very accommodating team parks are very accessible uh you know for the most part i don't know if I've noticed like a ride or attraction that I necessarily prefer but I'll tell you this with a wheelchair uh I can't say I'm as much of a fan as I used to be of the design element of cobblestones because I think being in a wheelchair and being pushed over cobblestones is more nauseating than most theme park rides So, you know, I noticed, you know what I notice you don't go on as much is the ride the wheelchair? Because you sort of don't, it's redundant. You don't need the experience.

I kind of don't need it. No, no. I'm not doing the Mac and me throw a ride, you know. That's a good idea, though. That is a good idea. If something could give you that launch, I don't know exactly how to simulate it. It'd have to be a dual vehicle where the, and we're talking about the, you know, the famous scene from the McDonald's,

partially promoting film Mac and Me that Paul Rudd plays every time he's on one of Conan shows where a kid is out of control on a hill in a wheelchair and then just goes flying off a cliff at the end. And so you would have to like, it's like the chair would have to be not the vehicle, right? And there would have to actually be something like lifting you up out of, it would have to be sort of a false vehicle situation.

Right. Yeah, yeah, false. I'll say this. I appreciate just being in and around theme parks and like clocking design elements like more, especially seeing it from another angle. Though from crowds, in a wheelchair with theme park crowds, is also a little nauseating because you're at like belly button height.

And that's a little strange. Doesn't happen so much on the ECVs, you know. Well, and I hate to say it. I mean, belly button height is different, but it's not far from fart height, which I hope is not something that you've encountered. No, I have not. I'm ever vigilant of it. If you feel like you're next to one that's about to rupture, you turn a different direction.

I'm pretty good at going, hey, let's hold up a second. Or like, let's go down this way, not that way. Let's create a little lag. Let's make some space. Here's one from this is from Wave Sona, aka Spuds McKenzie. Mike, I have a copy of Madam's book, Madam, my misbegotten memoirs, as told to Whalen Flowers. At the risk of Scott throwing it in the fire, would you like me to send it to you? And Wave Sona, you know what, that's nice.

But since Mike's not here right now, I don't want to bother him. So actually, feel free to just send it to me. Just send it my way. It's going to be fine. So just send it to Scott Gardner. Kara Scott Gardner, but at the address, you can reach me at 780 Flower Street, Glendale, California, 9-1-201. And if you put that into Google Maps, I mean, you might see that that is the site of the Glendale household hazardous waste disposal center. But don't worry about that.

It's a multi-use. There's offices there, too, and I've been using it as an office, just kind of a way to get off the grid and, you know, just have some creative space, you know, non-nextollies. you know, you got to go to a coffee shop and everybody's writing their screenplay and I just wanted a different vibe. So I took out an office at the hazardous waste disposal center in which place I will intercept the book and treasure it and not put it in

with the hazardous waste. It will be passed along to Mike. And I don't like you accusing me of otherwise Wavesana, frankly. I look forward to giving it to him. Scott will be handling it just to be safe. because it's probably older in the full hazmat suits that they use at that facility. Yeah, it's just because I don't, yeah, I look, I don't know where you got the copy for,

unless you have been reading it, Waveson, unless you have been reading it on the regular, you know, every three months or so, which might be the case. Other than that, it might, otherwise it might be collecting some dust. And I'm just trying to keep it safe for everybody, including Mike. I hate to say it in case Mike listens, but I, uh, I would. was just watching like whatever YouTube has like TV and movies uh for free and we have the YouTube premium so there's no ads on it and it popped up a HR puff and stuff popped up and I was like I've never sat down and watched the full first episode of this and um to watch it like

it like in order I'm not sure a lot of people have I don't know that a lot of people at I got a lot You know what, season one of Puffin' stuff is really, I mean, it gets really good at two, but. I watched the first one, you know, I had to, I had to see what Witchie Poo was all about, you know. And then it suggested me Lidsville, the one Mike likes, which involves a town of sentient hats. And Charles Nelson Riley is Merlo, the evil magician. and after about 10, 15 minutes, Jane was like, hey, I don't ask this a lot, but I really want you to turn this off right now.

Well, Jane is completely correct. That should be anyone's assessment of the show, Lidsville, or frankly, any of those shows. That said RIP Sidcroft. Oh, yeah. I don't. I wish no ill. Will on Sid Croyo. I hope that he is resting in peace. He at the ripe old age of 96,

why Citus Yolus, his real name. Do you know that? And the other one, Marty Croft, is Mashapopoulos Yolus. I didn't know those were gnom de plumes, you know. No, no. But we know them as Sid and Marty Croft. They are now, they are now both gone, but they have left behind a vast array of extremely unpleasant work. And that will be their extremely unpleasant legacy. Uh, yeah. I, I have to, um,

Jane is friends with the guy who's one of the heads of like puppetry at Universal Hollywood. And one of his first jobs was doing puppets stuff at the sit in Marty Croft indoor theme park. And I, we were visiting him while we were at his apartment. And he had the framed like map and stuff. And I,

I have to be. the only person who ever walked in to his lovely apartment and went, hey, is that the Cid and Martin Crosk Park in Atlanta? So I have a lot more questions for him about the Cidmore. Well, keep in mind, though, there's a lot of, there's a lot of puppeteers going into that apartment. The puppeteers might know. That is true. Yeah, there is a community of, like, pro-level puppeteers in Los Angeles. And I hope Mike gets to be part of that community as soon as possible. Yeah. I know that's, that's, that's, that's, The podcast game has been a long haul in order to eventually make it in with a big puppet.

Yeah. Dean Cooley asks, what screen-based attraction would you like to be released on physical media? Like how Shrek 3D was released on DVD. I mean, for me, it's Back to the Future of the Ride. There was a Back to the Future DVD that included a version of Back to the Future of the Ride. But in order to replicate the experience, they put a bunch of it. a gunk in they put like all of the everything the console it's in front of you

with biff and everything and it kind of blocked the screen and the resolution was weird but it's a it's a tough thing because that's a really specific format of that ride so the only answer is there has to be like a DVD that presents it in multiple formats and that gives you also

second screen materials or like basically what it should be is that I should be able to watch the fact of the future of the ride on a big screen and then they should should send me a private link digitally where I could pull up on my phone and sync up what Doc Brown and Biff are doing on their, on the little console, or it shows the flex capacitor or whatever you want to do. But that, that I think is what, that, that I think is the, that that has to be the future, is multi-format, like, which way do you want it? Because they're, they're, they're also

weird and wonky. But that's, that's number one for me. I mean, if truly they aren't going to put Muppet Vision anywhere, but in some of those stupid goggles or whatever. I mean, I think, like, a real kind of release strategy would be nice. You know, something people use, because I'd like to see Muppet Vision in, you know, crystal clear quality again. But, Jason, what do you go to? You know, I was going to say, like, a high-resolution Blu-ray copy of the Amazing Adventures is Spider-Man.

That also, you know, there's a lot of physical sets and elements, too. So I would have to agree with toggling, like, are you in the viewpoint? Is it the master footage? Is there one where you get the sets and the explosion simulated on your TV? but yeah, I would want to tell it on and off. What did you mean about the Muppets and the goggles? I think they said that they are putting out Muppet Vision 3D for posterity on one of the weird, like, meta-goggle kind of formats. And I don't remember which one, so apologies.

But I guess so that you can like be in the environment and look around and see Sweedoms and Stadler and Waldorf. but I don't know what I want though I don't really want an environment recreated I want to see just what was on the screen really nicely restored I just want a good transfer of what was on the screen I don't want like hokey

here's what it was like to be in the room I want like just give me what was on the damn screen that's my little picky thing about the screen based directions yeah I was I was at an Apple store to replace my phone battery and I saw someone fiddling with the Applevision Pro, and I was like, oh, I haven't seen one of those in years.

Like the headset, the cable, and the hard drive you put in your pocket, and I was like, oh boy, that's a weird, I forgot about that. I got played Matt Epidogga, Ather Campbell, Matt Apodaga, Nick Wire reviewed games on it. And I think it was kind of novel. but I don't know that it was super lasting. You know, it wasn't like, oh, I got a jack. I got a jack-in every day to my Applevision.

You got a free jack-in to your, yeah, to the virtual world and your Applevision. By the way, another one of these things, if Mike was here, I suspect that he would have a lot of follow-up questions about your battery, about the process of getting a new battery, which place you went,

which parking lot you parked in, what you could be doing to extend your battery life. But again, I'm not Mike, and that's not how I would apply. I just want to represent what I'm sure his point of view would be. That was very respectful, and thank you for suggesting that. I'm just leaving space for him. The answer is the Americana, and I was getting the warnings that the battery capacity was low, and I had the Apple care for, you know, that renews it every month, so it was all free.

Okay, great, great. And I can really feel the like eight follow-up questions, but I don't naturally have those, so therefore I will turn to the listeners questions. And this actually kind of, you know, this is a question I'd say about the situation we find ourselves in without Mike. This is from Ben. Mike often seems like the glue that holds the trio together, that he connects to enough of Scott or Jason's fringe interests, which make the odd guy out squirm. This is very astute, I agree. Scott and Jason, what do the two of you have in common independent of Mike? Are there any topics you'd both love to discuss that Mike would grown at?

And I think that's right. That's one thing that I've noticed about Mike is that like, I mean, look, I think I've professed to other things that I am nerdy about on the show. There are a few of them. But, you know, theme parks is the main one. I'm not as encycloped. It's kind of, it's theme parks and its session musicians and specific, and the beach. boys. But that's kind of what I got as far as encyclopedic knowledge. I do notice that Mike has managed to make room for like 35 areas of expertise and that like he chose theme parks as the one to do a

podcast about, but I think he could very easily do 34 others. Do you agree with that, Jason? I would agree with that. I think I think you and I and us with him too, like, like some nerdy comedy like going back in the history of like sketch comedy or TV and film and it's like who wrote this who was really

Yeah we know a lot of Yeah who wrote everything And yeah I think we all dabble a little at that But it's not a thing that leaves Mike out And the only thing that I What occurred to me as far as that that second question,

are there any topics you'd both love to discuss that Mike would groan at? The only one, what occurs to me is if we, you and I declared that we are doing the podcast, the right episode, sex, because this seems like the thing that you and I are the most comfortable with

that our third co-host is not. Now that said, that doesn't mean that I'm necessarily dying to do the episode sex because with apologies to you, Jason, there are still, there have been many moments where I have found myself uncomfortable with things that you are saying.

Why last week on the show used the phrase nerve endings in a way that has scarred me to this day. It's been many days since. And I still, I don't know, like fucking, like you could say big old cock and I'm fine. But nerve endings, given the context, any listeners who didn't hear it, I'm not going to repeat the context. But nerve endings really shocked me to the core. So maybe, I don't know, maybe I actually do go closer to. Mike than I think. Look, I've had to learn a lot

about the functions of the human body the last few years, and every now and then, you do stumble upon a fun thing, you know, so. I have follow-up questions, but I don't want to, I don't really want to ask them, and I don't want the listener to have to,

you're going to have to DM, Jason, for further, to connect the dots between what do you mean about nerve endings? I mean, I have some idea, but I don't, I don't, I don't want to have some idea, you know? Yeah, I mean, it's as simple as like the literal brain-body connection where it's like, well, I'm trying to move this and it's not moving.

And, you know, you just kind of got to adapt to that in all aspects of your life. He-ha. You know. It's an interesting area to be lascivious about. You're carving out territory, new territory with this. I think the more interesting thing is you don't realize until you do physical therapy or occupational therapy or rehab kind of stuff. You don't realize how many muscles you can like just walking around or doing basic activities. Like, oh, I never really strengthened that.

I just kind of did it on autopilot. it. You have to consciously think about everything. You have to consciously, and that drains energy. I mean, that was a thing I guess I missed in the theme parks. It's like, oh, I either have all the energy or none of the energy. So, yeah, some nerve endings. It's not just lascivious.

Okay, few. I am trying to think, I've known Mike for a long time. We've talked about anything and everything under the sun. I'm trying to think of anything that would make him grown unless I'm actively trying to make and go, ugh, you know. Do you don't think I've named it, though? I mean, it's a dicey. I think that or is crippling fear of getting eight hours of sleep at night. Which thus, you're saying fear of.

You're saying he does not get eight hours of sleep and it has something to do with anxiety? It can be anything can prevent sleep. It can be diet, water, caffeine, or something too late in the day, you know. So it can be anything and everything that can affect sleep. Sure, sure. We did it. There was a second gate that we have done that's in the can, and this was one we did without you, Jason. I had so many more questions about his feelings about April O'Neill, and April O'Neill being like his mom's friend.

I feel like I got to do like the full deep dive and it was fascinating and I hope you enjoy hearing it and I hope it provokes more questions for you to ask because you're not allowed to be attracted to April O'Neal because she's your mom's friend. To me is one of the most fascinating enigmas of a sentence and thought said on the show said by any human, I think. So just because we discussed it without you, I hope that you want to further that line of questioning in the future. I'll investigate. I'll investigate. I have been rewatching one of my favorite cartoons for exactly. I think it ran for like a year and a half, two years, but there's only like 13 episodes of The Toxic Crusaders, which is a real odd. I think I mostly liked it because the toys were really detailed. I really liked the toys. And then watching the show, I'm like, oh, Lloyd Caulf. is making these cartoon characters tell Borshbel jokes.

And one of the bad guys is basically doing cartoon Garfield, like, yeah, that'll work, you know, kind of stuff. But Tox's girlfriend, Yvonne, is a pretty lady, so I'm wondering if first grade me had a crush on Yavon. Yeah, one, I would be curious about Mike's rules about. about what types of people and at what age it is acceptable to be attracted to Toxie's girlfriend, Yvonne. Or his mother, his mom's in the show, too. She starts selling vacuum cleaners, second episode. Tyler Adams says, Universal Japan is a new show where the Blues brothers team up with Cookie Monster and Grover.

All of them wear the hats slash glasses and do the same. routine. Does this mean we finally have confirmation that Grover and or Cookie Monster did hard time in a correctional facility? I believe the four of them met in Joliet, but perhaps Sesame Street has its own prison. Food for thought, I don't speak Japanese, so maybe they address it in the show. How about that? Scott, your favorites? My favorites, yeah. I mean, here's the, there's the logical. error with that any blues brother needs to have been in prison is that in blues brothers 2000 there is a child and while the child i believe is in some kind of orphanage that is scarcely a prison so i believe that the policies have changed since blues brothers 79 or whenever that was 80 uh in the subsequent years um you know much like jett i anyone can be a blues brother so i don't think that uh cookie monster

Grover had to do any shanking or get in any violent prison brawls. I think they're there for the music and for the hat wearing. That is a really strange IP collision, though. They don't live in the same family and world to me. The Blues Brothers and the creations of the children's television workshop. This makes no sense. Look, I'm just happy Grover is getting some shine. I feel like Elmo overshadowed him.

But for those of us who grew up, in the late 80s, I mean, Grover was, he was the prize, you know, he was the star. Super Grover, monster at the end of the book, like, you know. Oh, yeah, that's still in the kid rotation for me. There's, and you know what, there's subsequently, there's another, it might be called another monster at the end of the book, but there's a, there is a follow-up in which Elmo is included, and it is not nearly as satisfying. I'm not anti- Elmo in general, but just with that particular book, the,

Grover solo one is much cleaner and a classic and one that really gets kids going because they're part of the story. Look, Grover, I don't mean to be controversial. Elmo, Grover should have had Elmo's career, you know. Carly Ray Japson should have had Taylor Swiss career. Grover should have Elmo's career. Amen. Hey, that's my favorite thing. I'm a big Carly head. That's, that's my favorite thing that's been said on the show in a while. And I Yeah, I don't understand. I frankly don't understand. I think, you know, actually I do have a theory about it,

which is that Carly Ray's music is fantastic, but I've seen her live and she may, there's maybe not a lot of ideas, like big theatrical ideas, the types that, that you're, that your tailors and your chapel Rones, uh, okay. Sobrainer, uh, seemed like a hell of a Coachella set, uh,

and live experience. And, uh, maybe, maybe Carly was not bursting at the seams with live ideas. and that might have hurt the Enterprise. That said, it doesn't hurt the records, which are great records. And I agree with your Grover analogy. You know, I don't mean to put that on her. She's a mom now. I hope she's happy and she makes great music.

And I hope she makes more great music. I'm going to go into a musical question. This is from Aaron Block. What is the worst concert you've ever been to? And do you think Mike has a worst concert or is any concert by D. default at least good because it involves live music. I think that's a correct assessment, I think, of Mike's sensibility. I don't know.

Maybe you would even know of one that he did not enjoy himself at. But yeah, it seems like from what he has communicated, that Mike, as long, if there are live instruments on the stage, if it even is a stage, if there are instruments within 50 feet, I do think Mike is happy. I, oh, do you have a counter to this, though? Oh, no, I, yeah. I agree with you. I think I like to be at the movies,

and I think Mike gets the same charge just by being at a concert. I think so. I think by any concert, this seems like the deal. And, you know what, to be so open, to be so unc cynical. But I do have opinions on this. I have an answer of worst concert, but it's like such a given that it would be a worst concert. This is like a you know what you're getting into when you buy a ticket to the concert.

So it almost feels like a cheat to say, This one, I'm going to table that and say, as far as like a disappointment from what I thought I was getting, I sadly have to say that what jumps out at me is when the cars reunited in 2011. I really love the cars, and I was so psyched that they were back. And unfortunately, I saw them at the Palladium, eventual site of the Shrek rave. And I have to say, it was so flat and they were so unengaging and just kind of like workman-like doing what they do. And maybe that is the reputation of the cars at the time, although I've seen live videos of the cars that are pretty fucking dazzling. And my theory is that Benjamin Orr, who I believe was the, how was he the bass player or was that Rick? I'm not sure.

Benjamin Orr saying some of the big cars hits. And it's now my theory that he was kind of like the sex appeal and what like brought it to life live. But anyway, I was reminded of this that like I think Jimmy Parto mentioned it on a podcast somewhere. I forget. And the same concert, and he had the same feelings, like being so hyped to see the cars. And then they kind of just, like, stared at the ground, and it was a bummer. As far as true worst, the answer for sure is Corey Feldman and the Angels, who I may have talked about this on the show before.

So forgive me if this is a repeat. But there were so many facets of it that were really fascinating. It was at this strange, now defunct venue in Pasadena that clearly used to be a Gelson's. Because I remember there was some corner that we turned. It still had the word meats really big up on the wall. And there were so many odd things about it. I remember that he was walking around on the tables, like right in front of us. But the tables were just, like, folding tables.

They were, like, really wobbly. And I was really worried that Corey Thulman was going to slip and hurt himself. Because with every step, it just, like, oh, you could feel that wobbly. These were not, like, permanent wood tables. And I don't think he knew that. And he was, we were right there because there was not a massively attended concert, if you can imagine. So I was prepared, and I have a video just of Corey Feldman's foot, just as close to me as the microphone is right now. Not because I was trying to lick it.

Let's not be weird. That's just where his foot happened to be. But I was prepared to, like, grab his ankle if I had to, to support and save his life. But there are a few things about it. that are very memorable. One was that there was a saxophone player and that whenever it went to him and everybody, all eyes were on him,

I just would look at his shirt and see that his parking validation ticket was sticking out of his front pocket. Like, not to say that you could, I mean, you got to put it somewhere. But I mostly... You can't lose it. You don't want to lose it. That's true.

Although with the back and forth action of saxophone playing, I'd be worried, more worried that it would pop out of the front. But that seems like a bad spot to me. And it kind of ruins the rock star illusion when you realize the guy's going to have to get validated and leave at the end of the night. But the other one was that there was a song where he did a long, very serious tribute

to his sadly deceased friend and guy he's forever associated with Corey Haim. And it was just like a long, extremely sincere set up to a song about my brother and my brother forever, Corey, and everything that Corey meant to him. him and so all right and let's hit it and the whole show was synced up to videos so when he said let's hit it after the long tribute to his past friend it went straight to extremely close up footage of the twin towers burning and and this is clearly not the right video because then he was like

instantly he's just like nope not that no wait skip don't and and then you're just flipping through every other one of the videos because whoever was doing the videos was not coached on what's on what trip. Because it wasn't in the order of the set list. And eventually they found the one that was nice pictures of the Corrie's together. And then later there was a song about like all the strife in the world. And that had 9-11 in it. And it made sense.

But boy, oh, he was so fucked. Oh, man. He could not. He's pouring his heart out about his friend and then straight to. Oh, my God. That's the worst thing I've ever seen happen in a concert. That's for sure. Do you have a thought on this one, Jason?

I don't know. I was trying to think back, and it's always been, like, circumstantial. Like, it wasn't the band itself. It was just, like, oh, it was a free, free concerts at the, you know, on the waterfront in Philadelphia. And it's, oh, cool, MAPS era, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's, like, 95 degrees out. and my college roommate dragged us into the pit and it's like, I'm soaking wet at the end of the concert

because of my sweat and everyone else's sweat. But it's not the AAS fault is what you're saying. That's not a bad show on their park. No, it's not. No, they were like in their prime practically. And wasn't Phantom Planet's fault either the weeks before when I saw that show? It was just a horribly muggy summer. or like the guy who like

tripped and like landed and it clearly like broke his nose outside of the will turn one time before I saw the new pornographers. Like that... You were just haunted that a guy hurt himself so badly? Yeah, just haunted this teen who seemed a little buzzed or stoned

like just ate it outside of the concert he was excited for. Like, oh, that sucks, man. Oh, shit. The bands themselves have not fallen on their face, not in the way that Corey Feldman did metaphorically. Christian Swanson asked, if you got to assign slash force Mike

to perform a role in any park for a day, i.e. tram tour guide, jungle cruise skipper, Tune-town grass cleaner, what would it be? I don't know. I think he'd be like a pig and shit. Kind of anything?

I think he would do anything. I mean, he is a naturally great work ethic. Maybe cleaning bathrooms. Like, custodial, maybe. But, like, again, just to keep him humble, you know? Keep him humble. Remind him what real work is. Yeah, I guess that'd be pretty mean if we forced him to, like,

you can't go 10 feet from the bathroom. You can take a break to. sweep outside the bathroom, but you're mostly spraying, you know, toilets and stuff. I legitimately wanted him to audition to be Jeff Goldblum in the, or Ian Malcolm, rather, in the, like, recent immersive Jurassic Park experience. I thought he might have been able to pull that off. I could see it being in his lexicon of like a character that he couldn't have it. but I don't remember if I mentioned it or pushed it, and maybe I should have,

because maybe now he could be at a job that he's in love with. That's true. Do you think he'd be comfortable unbuttoning his shirt that much? Ooh, that's kind of the biggest risk. Yeah, yeah. He would have to, like, during the interview, he'd have to say, sorry, I don't do nudity. And they'd say, no, it's fine.

You just unbuttoned a shirt an extra button. And he's like, yes, nudity. I, because you know that walk around malco, you know, they're going to probably have been an all black with a leather jacket for some of an hour, but then they're definitely going to wheel him out on a cot, like leaning with a shirt on button. I mean, you got to see both. I don't, yeah, I don't know his comfort with the pose. That would be the biggest.

I think if he's expressing theories and comically quipping about big piles of shit, I think, maybe he's okay. But could he be sensual Malcolm that I don't know? Well, could he pull off the clammy two-handed handshake that we received when we saw him noodling on a piano at a jazz show once? I don't know. I don't know if Mike could, you know, I know he takes care of his skin and moisturizes, but, you know, who knows?

Yeah, not sure what's going on with the hand. I haven't shaken Mike's hand since meeting him, so. Yeah, I mean, we can. do our usual pre-show long handshake prolonged eye contact saying I believe in you which we need

we need that moral boost every time we do it because the nerves are rattled let me tell you every single time the nerves are rattled and you also insist after live shows on doing your bravery save the podcast

yeah yeah yeah uh huh uh huh yeah just giving you long looking at us with the long look in the eyes. And you won't let us leave the bell. You won't let us go out front or to our cars without it. You stay here. You stay here.

This has not been six straight minutes of eye contact. You don't leave in five minutes 40. Scott, let's make it quick. I got a lot of peanut M&M bags to find it the green food. I got to loot this place. I should probably do a funny one, but I can't resist one where I have genuine recommendations. It is this.

Corey Hosh, playing directly to Scott here. Your recent tangent on Pablo Cruz, must have been Discovery Island, made me curious about who some of your favorite underrated yacht rock or yacht rock adjacent musicians are. Alternatively, who are some people in the subgenre you can never get into? Thanks for Yacht by Skiot, which is a playlist I made on Spotify. There's artists, I guess, who are, like, flatter to me than others, but I like the entire thing.

It's a genre where you know what you're getting for the most part, and there's nothing that it's all so chill, and the musicianship is so high, so nothing's like repellent to me. As far as, I just really want to shout this one out. If you are of the, if you look at Yacht Rock and you think like,

that's old and cheesy and these guys, these bands with their hats, their captain's hats, if you think it sucks from afar, I would encourage you to listen to an album, I think is extremely agreeable and lovable. an album called Two Eyes by Brenda Russell. This is from 1983, and it is, it's just, it shows you like how subtle and musically dexterous and catchy and sincere and heartfelt.

If you want to call it Yacht Rock, I think you can, but it's sort of like R&B, too. Whatever it is, this is such a lovely album and she's just such an incredible talent. Michael McDonald wrote a song on there, David Foster, Stevie Wonder plays Armonicana song. Look up a song called Hello People, which I think is pure magic. I would not describe a lot of songs that way. There are no jokes in this. I am just talking about this music that I'm very passionate about. And I would also recommend these albums, Pages from 1981.

It's a band that soon after morphed into the band, Mr. Mr. And then an album called An Eye by Burn and Barnes, also from 1981. 1984, wonderful year. Lots of wonderful music in that genre. Check those out if you're yacht curious. Jason, do you have a funny one? Because that wasn't. Uh, Brandt asks, Mike has previously mentioned that one of his life goals would be to smoke a cigarette on Pirates of the Caribbean.

What are some other bucketless cigarette locations in theme park slash attractions? Right. Have we answered this before? This feels like extremely like we've done this on a mailbag. But if we have a new answer. It's very possible. I would want to see, well, Huna Mansion's an easy one. There's so much fog and darkness and stuff, you know, in that ride.

I think you'd get away with it. The little red dot might be trouble, you know. You would have to hold it like they held cigarettes on the front in World War I, so snipers wouldn't get sold. You'd have to cover it. I think I would like the challenge. of doing Dr. Doom's Fearfall and lighting up a cigarette when the Doom spiel starts at the beginning of it and see if I could keep it in my mouth, solely holding it with, like, lips.

Yeah, without hand-axis. Not biting the filter, yeah. See how strong those lips are. See how good those nerve endings are. See how good. See how good. I don't think I would be able to hold it, and I would open. the rush of wind would blow the flame out because I'd be worrying about it the rest of the day. Sure, sure. You know what? I'm not doing cigarette. I'm doing a big old stogie, and I'm doing it on Pinocchio's daring journey,

because I want to be able to gloat that I had a big cigar, and nothing happened to me, unlike those foolish children who get turned into donkeys. I would laugh at each and every one of them. Yes, yeah. I'm part of it, and I win. I win this ride, damn it. I got one more I'll throw out. This is from Griffin. Can't tell if Newman. With the rumor of Zootopia taking over the land for Avatar, what franchise, if any, would you be okay? Taking over the area in DCA over Avatar? Answer, none. Follow-up statement. I don't believe this rumor for one fucking second. This has been the subject of a lot of chatting. on our various text threads. I think this rumor is hollow. I think the proof is extremely slim. Like, what is it?

There was, like, one guy says, I think, you know, if I was the CEO, I would put in Zootopia. Kay, you're not. You're not. So, that's not proof that they're thinking about doing this. Oh, there's a water table. So what if fucking, they can build a new water table. This thing is ridiculous. I am fired up.

I am saving my people. I'm standing up for the Navi. I don't want another trackless. I don't want it. Like, we're just going to have our third trackless, right? That's fine. You know, do it somewhere. And look, I'm fine with Avatar going elsewhere.

It doesn't have to be in that spot. It's not like that spot is perfect. But I'm afraid that if they don't do it because of fucking articles, we don't do this thing that would be extremely cool, then I'm worried that they're not ever going to do it. So I am anti. I'm standing my ground. And I think that the proof.

is flimsy, and Avatar is going nowhere. We are standing proud at Home Tree, damn it. Standing firm because this family is a fortress. This family is a fortress, and I'd love to throw in a line from the third one. Sully's stick together, and then there's another one, too. Sully's, there's a couple of unmemorable things that the Sully's say about themselves. But all of those, I think all of those. I want this ride, God damn it.

Yeah, I don't, I also am wondering, because I feel like I've heard in the past about international parks getting exclusivity for attractions or lands for a certain number of years. I'm wondering if they would even, if they would have to break that or if Zootopia is even under that. I'd be worried about that, yeah.

I think without looking it up, we should assume that that is what's going on. I think that exclusivity clause, with Shanghai is ironclad, and we better not. Hey, we could start an international incident. We could be at war with China if we say that we're going to steal their precious and perfect Zootopia hot pursuit ride. So let's just not even dip into those waters. Let's dip into a water table and build a kick-ass Shanghai Pirates-esque ride based on an incredible film avatar the way of water.

Let's stick to the plan, shall we? I think so. Yeah. And on that angry note, I just caught one more question for Thomas Monaghan. Tell me about the best party you ever went to. Well, answers the same as worst concert you ever went to. Corey Feldman and the Angels. Worst concert, best party.

I will always treasure my party with the Angels. Corey Feldman and the Angels in an abandoned grocery store. It's certainly something. Dream blunt rotation. And I think with that, you survived. Podcast the Ride. So as I said, for the near future, if you want to keep hearing Podcast The Ride, for three bonus episodes every month, check out Podcast The Ride the second gate or get one more bonus episode on our VIP Tier Club three, all of that at patreon.com slash podcast The Ride. We will be there.

We are hoping to be back on the main feed with Mike as soon as we can. But you know what? In the meantime, send some love to Mike because he deserves it. And, you know, life is fragile and it's never too late to tell a podcast host how hip and youthful he appears. This has been a Forever Dog production. Executive produced by Mike Carlson, Jason Sheridan, Scott Gairdner, Brett Boehm, Joe Silio, and Alex Ramsey. For more original podcasts, please visit Forever Dog Podcasts.com and subscribe to our shows on Apple Podcasts. podcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keep up with the latest Forever Dog news by

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