Reply All - #84 Past, Present, Future 2

Episode Date: December 22, 2016

This week, updates on some of the stories we’ve done over the past year, some bonuses and surprises, some breakbeats, a motorcycle ride, and we take a glimpse into the future. Check out the amazing 2016 Reply All poster by Matt Lubchansky! The Episodes #56 Zardulu #64-67 On the Inside Parts I-IV #53 In the Desert #68 Vampire Rules #57 Milk Wanted #47 Quit Already! Lightning Round #76 Lost in a Cab #83 Voyage Into Pizzagate #60 A Simple Plan #61 Baby King #69 Disappeared #78 Very Quickly to the Drill Further Reading Illustrator Matt Lubchansky’s website is OVER HERE Singer/songwriter Matt Farley can be found on his website or on Spotify. Our theme song is by the Mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder. Our ad music is by Build Buildings. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Okay, so Alex. Yes. We do this thing on the podcast, which is that we talk to people and we get them to tell us stories. And we talk to them oftentimes when something's happening in their lives, it's like completely unusual that will never happen again. And we talk to them and at some point their story ends and we move on and that is generally speaking it. And if you think about it, it's kind of weird. It's super weird. It's like, tell me about this.

Tell me about that. Oh, my God, thank you so much. Goodbye. Yeah. I actually do feel very weird about it often. Me too. But our normal curiosity as human beings sometimes gets the better of us.

It happens once a year. And it starts with our anthem by Matt Farley. Through the winter and the spring and the summer and the fall, so much good stuff happened on reply. Now it's time to look back, check in and get a few updates. So we are here.

We are at our past, present, future episode. We're going to look at the past, find what's going on in the present, and eventually look at what the future holds. It is, I guess, now officially, an annual tradition. Yeah, and it's dope. I love it. And there's someone here to help us with the updates episode. Hey, guys. This is Damiano Marquetti, reply all producer.

Very smiley today. He's just silently smiling. He's like sort of hugging himself with excitement. Are you feeling nervous? I wasn't until you guys started to point out every move that I was making. You walk into this room, you get noticed real hard. Welcome to the hot seat, bud. Welcome to the hot seat.

It feels very hot. Okay, so from your position in the hot seat, you are going to guide us through this day of time travel. Yes, exactly. So where are we going? So today we are updating six episodes, and there's going to be some exciting bonuses along the way. I actually know about one of these exciting bonuses, which is that we asked Matt Loopchance, our favorite artists, to make a Reply All 2016 poster. And so he did this, like, enormous, colorful poster with all these different characters

from stories we did this year. It is awesome. If you want to buy it, or even if you just want to see it, you should go see it. It's at Replyall.com. We have a few for sale, but it's going to sell out. So if you want one, just go get it. And before we start the episode, I just have one disclaimer, which is that if you haven't heard any of the stories that we are updating,

you are going to want to go back and listen to them. Otherwise, this episode will be very confusing. to you and why would you even listen to it. So, uh, go listen to those and then come back. Uh, all right, Damiano, what do we got? Okay. First up, episode 56. Uh, so, PJ? Yes. A couple weeks ago on a dark and stormy night. Really? Truly a dark and stormy night. Yeah. I received a visitor at the Gimlet offices. Okay. A picture was taken. Okay. Oh my God. God. Zardulu.

Wow, in the flesh. Yeah. So episode 56 was about this anonymous masked woman who goes by the name Zardulu. And she does these elaborate public hoaxes, I guess. The most famous example of something she has taken credit for was there was this very popular viral video called Pizza Rat in the fall of 2015, which was a rat that was dragging a slice of pizza down a flight of subway steps. she later claimed responsibility for having organized the entire thing. She said she trained the rat. She like, yeah, she's, yes.

PJ is skeptical of her. I'm a Zardulu skeptic. Because any time something weird happens, in theory, she can say that she orchestrated it, and it's very hard to disprove. And I am a Zardulu fanatic. And for the original episode, she wouldn't talk to us. I tried a number of ways to lure her.

actually talking to us. Yes. But after the... But since then, you guys have become internet buddies. Yeah, after the episode came out, Zardulu got in touch with me on Twitter, in my Twitter DMs. And basically, we've been in contact off and on ever since.

This weirdest buddy comedy. I know. And it's like, she goes back and forth between sort of being like, yeah, this is what my day was like, and like, The power of mythology will be unveiled to you. It's like a bit of that.

It's a bit of both. Okay. So I asked her to come in to do an interview. And she agreed. And she texted me to tell me she was outside. And I opened the door. And I, like, look to my left. And then I looked to my right.

And standing right in front of me was a person wearing a death mask with a billy goat beard. Oh, my God. And a cloak and a turban. And it literally, it seriously made me jump. Well, yeah. So, Zardulu did the entire interview without ever taking off the mask. and one of the conditions of doing this interview is that we mask her voice.

So instead of hearing Zardulu's voice, you're going to hear the voice of 12-year-old Owen Clowny, the son of our friend and former colleague Peter Clowny, instead of Zardulhu. But I can tell you what it's like to talk to Zardulu. Okay. It is weird. She speaks in these very halting short sentences.

It kind of feels like every sentence is being read off of a fortune cookie. So I begged her, I was like, can I please just play like a snippet, just like a sentence in your actual voice? And she said, okay. So what you're going to hear is a sentence of Zardulu, but then for the rest of the conversation, her voice is going to transform into the voice of a 12-year-old boy. Okay. This is going to be so much fun. I am so excited. I can...

You legitimately scare the crap out of me when you walk. when you walked up. Oh, well, I don't mean to cause fear. But I figured this might be more what you're looking for than my normal hideous visit. How would you describe the mask? What is it made of? Dreams? What's any mask made of? It's what you want people to see instead of seeing you. This one happens to be wire.

Is it uncomfortable? You get used to it. What was the most normal thing she did in front of you? I could see her blinking behind her mask. That's pretty normal. Did she have weird eyes? I couldn't tell because there were fake dead, wide open eyes in front of them on the mask.

But you were to see like a little eyelash or whatever? So what was she able to tell you? So I asked her like why she was willing to talk to us now. She was like, well, I wanted to talk in defense of the kind of fake news that I create. Because what I create is fake news. Right. But the fake news that I create is not the sort of nasty, politically deceptive stuff that's out there right now. What I produce is pearls of merriment for the world to enjoy.

I don't think anyone who saw pizza rat was going to incorporate that into their down-ticket vote. But of course, I can't be sure. And the thing that I didn't realize and was explained to me during the course of our interview is that she is not just working in New York City. It is worldwide. doing stuff all over the world. So what's like an international Zardulhu heist?

So she is very cagey about what she has and hasn't done. Right. Obviously. Kind of source of her power. What she was willing to tell me were a couple of things that she did that didn't play. Like, they didn't get picked up by the news. They weren't

like... Like she made like a dead big foot and dropped it off and nobody saw it. These were much more subtle than that. Like what? She was like very fascinated by like the white and black black splatches and bird poop? Who hasn't been fascinated by that? So she decided to make something out of it.

I studied the contents, the composition. I collected the appropriate materials, including white acrylic paint to keep it simple. And I created a work of art out of what appeared to be bird poop. I created the image of Donald Trump on a car. I stood back and waited, and indeed people noticed. And indeed, people took photos. When you say you made the head of Donald Trump I like this

Was it like a silhouette What was it was it Did it have like features? How did it look? Well at the time I set it up It had features But I fear that by the time anyone noticed It had run together more

Right That's the difficulty when you're working in the bird poop medium Or faux bird poop If I'm being totally honest I think real bird poop Has much better staying power Huh. I guess that's something that you learn.

On the job. I think what I like about that, it's not even like, oh, great critique on a trip or whatever. It's just like it's so much work for such a subtle miniature. Right. Like you really need someone to get on their hands and ease and stare at bird poop for anyone to ever know that you've done this careful thing. Well, the deal is that a lot of times she will have like a collaborator who will be the person who notices it. And then that collaborator will shop it to the news.

So she had somebody who was like emailing news being like, look at this bird poop I saw it. And people were like, yeah, we've got stuff today. Basically. And then the other thing that she was attempting to do that she didn't pull off is that she... Are you familiar with the rapper Belly? No. He's a rapper.

He's a songwriter. He's written songs for Beyonce. He's like a friend of The Weekend. Okay. He and Zardulu collaborated on a project. What's the project? The premise of the project was Zardulu made a sort of like animatronic fake chicken.

Uh-huh. A chicken smoking marijuana. I had taxiderminated chicken and drawing inspiration from one of my favorite pieces of machinery. The lit reindeer that raisin lower their heads for Christmas, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I set the chicken up basically like that. We went out to Sacramento, California, where there happened to be a large number of wild chickens, went to the side of the road, drew some wild chickens near, which is not too difficult.

And I placed my chicken among the others, put a roach in its mouth, and lit it up. And Belly's role was to say that he had been walking through his roach, and a chicken picked it up and got lit. So it would be like the next day,

it'd be like, TMZ, like rapper Belly throws one chicken smokes it. Yes. That's great. But I guess that belly got cold feet on the project.

So like she ended up having to abandon it, but she showed me some pictures of the chicken. They're really spectacular. And so she actually told me during the course of that interview, that she had performed illusions over the course of the year

that I had seen. But not known about. But not known about. Wait, so she's done things like literally to you in the world? Yes. Like what? She wouldn't tell me. I'm not sure I believe this.

I know. I knew you wouldn't. If she was on cable news, her Kiron would be like, no did liar and fabulous. And she's saying something that's completely unprovable and like there isn't even circumstantial evidence for. I know. But I think that's sort of her.

power is that everything could, she could be responsible for everything. She could be responsible for nothing. Yeah, I know. So I asked Zardulu, like, what's in store, like, what do you have in store for us for the future? Okay, so here's what I know. Your operation is global. You are working on dozens of illusions at a time. Eric Earwood, who appeared on our original episode, described a person who was, like, poised to reshape the world in a beautiful and exciting new way. Is that something that we can expect? Should we, like, live in anticipation of new delights all the time? Why would you live in anticipation when you can have a hand in its creation? Are you imploring all of our listeners to Becomes our due lists?

I'm imploring all of your listeners. Our listeners, if I may be so bold. You may. To not take for granted that someone else is going to make the magic happen for you. You know we are perhaps not at a turning point, but we're at a point where we could turn toward the better. So we did the interview. She was very kind, pretty coy. And then I walked her to the door,

just to remind you, she's still wearing her death mask. Yeah. Right before she leaves the building, she says, Alex, she hands me a piece of paper. And then she walks away. What was the piece of paper? It was folded up. I opened it and written on it was

nothing is as it seems. She's good, man. Since we broadcast our story, we heard from a cell of junior high school Zardulu adherence. Confidential to the Zardulists at Centennial Middle School in Provo, Utah, the strength of the pack is the rat.

The strength of the rat is the pack. So next up, our friend Breakmaster Cylinder, who produces a lot of the music for our show, We asked them to send us an update, and this is what we got. Be up on a mountain. Harvesting Beats to play on your show. So far from my home. Can't talk long because this area is heavily guarded.

Harvesting be. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Master Sondor. Very mysterious. Oh, hey, PJ. Yes. Did you know that we have an update from Smeagel? Smeagel.

Yeah, you know, Ghalm from Lord of the Rings? This is a cool joke I had a very good year this year Aside from filthy habits Is this your comedy bang bang Audition Real? Fuck you, people Okay, what else have we got?

Shrithy Pinnam and Annie Hey guys Hi, welcome to the present All right, it's nice being inside this gift Do you have an update for it? Yeah, I do, about Paul Madras. Wait, did you say it's nice being inside this gift?

You mean in the sense that the present is a gift? It was such a bad joke that I was happy you didn't even notice it. It was terrible. It was terrible. I didn't get it until PJ just explained it. It sounds like a password that a spy would say on a bench. I thought you were calling this episode a gift and I was like, well, that's really sweet of you. It was a multi-layered bad dress.

Okay. So yeah, I have an update about the on the inside story that I worked on. specifically an update about Paul Madraski's case. Okay. All right? So the smallest, quickest version of the summary of that story was it's about a guy in prison who has a blog who says that he's innocent of this crime that he's in prison for. So the big update is that if you remember in the story, his co-defendant was a man named Bob Farachi. There's a scene in the story where I am in a car with Bob asking him questions.

And Bob, you know, he was tried alongside Paul, but he was acquitted, right? Right. There was a patch of blood found in his car at the time of his arrest. Bob's car. In Bob's car, exactly. They tested it, but they didn't find anything. Like, this was back in the 90s, and so the technology just wasn't there. Paul's lawyers have managed to find this sample of carpet, and they're getting it tested.

It's in a lab right now. And if the DNA results come back and say that this is the blood of the victim, then there could be grounds for Paul to get a new trial. This is what happened with An Anan Sayad in the serial case. Exactly. It's like if you get it, they vacate the conviction. They're like, we are starting from scratch, basically. Exactly. Yeah.

Wow. Yeah. exciting. Thanks, Ruthie. Will you keep a surprise of what happens

on the show? I promise, Alex. Okay. Hello. For all producer Fia Benin. Hi, Fia.

Hi. So, we are going to do a speed round where you guys compete. One of you will exit the winner of this

competition. Is that true? I think so. Huh. I'm going to judge you guys. One of you is going to be the winner, and it's going to be who I think wins. So are you putting a minute on the clock?

Yes, I have my cell phone right here. I'm going to put 60 seconds. PJ's going first. Ready? Mm-hmm. On your mark. Get set. PJ begin.

Okay. Remember I got scammed by the fake Delta Airlines thing? Yes. Turns out they are suing a bunch of those people for trademark infringement. They're, like, actually solving the problem. Good for them. Pizza Gate, which we talked about just a couple episodes ago, has now, embroiled Linda Tripp, the woman who tipped off the Monica Lewinsky scandal, because of codes

that are embedded in her Christmas Chotchky website. And they want John and Tony Podesta investigated for the disappearance of a child named Madeline McCann about a decade ago. Wait, but they think Linda Tripp's part of it. Hey, this is the 60 seconds. You got to keep going. Okay. You remember that guy Matt who was trying to get service with Verizon. He wanted Verizon Fios and it was really hard. We did a big story about why it was really hard. Yes. Still doesn't have Verizon Fios. Animation Factory, the website that had a bunch of animated gifts, briefly became very popular again

when a frog on a unicycle gift became the basis for a meme called Dat Boy this summer. It was huge. I went to the latex ball. It was super fun. I just wore jeans in a button-up shirt. Everybody was really nice to me.

And I saw incredible, beautiful stuff. Google has a pilot program in San Diego that is going to require both plumbers and locksmiths to give them additional information before they can advertise with Google AdWords. Time. No! No!

Who won? Fia? I mean, you both fulfilled the requirements. Let's do it again next year. Good answer. Thanks for having me. Coming up after the break, we visit possibly the most haunted place in America. Next up, episode 53.

In the desert, right? Yeah. It was a story about some people who started getting knocked on their door from folks who were saying that they had stolen their cell phones. and it started happening over and over again, and no one could really figure out why everybody's lost phone pointed to this particular residence. Right. So basically, all these people who used By My Phone were being sent to Mike and Christina's house.

Here's a clip from the story. It's just one of the more upsetting encounters they ended up having. So I had fallen asleep on the couch watching Star Trek Voyager. As Christina will tell you, I fall asleep to Star Trek on the reg from TNG to Deep Space 9 and Now Voyager. Anyway, so I'd fallen asleep on the couch, woke up immediately, and ding, dong, ding, ding, ding, dong. And someone's pounding on the door. I go to open the door. We had like two, three dudes standing up on the little stoop, and then another dude behind them who had, like, his hands in his jacket, which I was like, oh. Mike was worried the guy might have a gun.

And as soon as I opened the door, you know, just immediately, they started yelling in my face. Where is he? Where is he? Where is he? Where is he? Our friends here. Where is he? Okay, so I went down to Atlanta to figure out why this was happening. And we just really didn't know. Like, it was something to do with Wi-Fi, maybe. Like, I didn't know what. And what I remember is that this was not something, this was a little over your head technically,

so you brought in a ringer? Yeah, I brought in Dave Maynard. He's a technical wizard. So what is this? This is a software-defined radio. And what's this? This is a spectrum analyzer. So basically, Dave was able to figure out that,

The problem had to do with IP addresses, like there are these database companies that keep track of everybody's IP addresses. And the companies are supposed to know like your IP address corresponds to this spot on a map to anywhere you live. But what was happening is sometimes they would have an IP address

but they wouldn't know where on the map to put it. And so they'd just pick like a random location nearby. And that random location for many of these IP addresses just happen to be these people's house? Yes. And so we'd originally, I originally found this story because one of our friends slash peers, Cashmere Hill, who reports on technology for fusion, she had learned about this problem and was trying to solve it. Right.

And so after we reported our little chunk of the story, Kashmir kept reporting the story with Dave. And so a week ago, I gave her a call to get the latest update. Can you hear me now? Hello? I can hear you. Can you hear me? I can hear you. Where are you? Well, right now I'm trying to make my way back to a quieter spot. But I'm in Golden Gate Park. Like actively in the park?

I'm actively in the park walking around, trying to encourage my baby to come out. How close are you to baby coming out time? My due date is tomorrow. Wow. Yeah. Okay, so Kashmir says when she and Dave started looking at this, Dave's reasoning was basically,

if we know that we have this one house in this one place that's having this problem, that means there's probably all these other houses that are also having it, that just haven't, you know, like, talked to a reporter and turned into a national news story. Right. So they looked into it.

And what they were able to learn is that as bad as Mike and Christina have this problem, there are tons of people who have it way worse than them in America. Basically, if you take the top thousand places in America where people get erroneously sent because of IP glitches,

Mike and Christina's house is like 800-something out of a thousand. And at the top of the list, a defecation in the middle of Kansas that had 660 million IP addresses associated with it. And they had it really bad. They had people showing up to their house looking for identity thieves

and scammers and spammers and child pornographers, crazy things. Why? Like, why was that happening? What had happened was that all these IP addresses were IP addresses, the company that wrote this database, Max Mind, they didn't know exactly where the IP addresses were.

They only knew that they were in the U.S. And so they said, okay, well, when they're in the U.S., we'll just map them to a default location in the middle of the country. And that happened to be the front yard of this farmhouse. And it's like, you know, the people live there, like live there to get away from everything. If farmhouse has been in the woman who owns it, it's been in her family for over 100 years, you know, it's like completely in the middle of nowhere. And yet it became kind of the center of the American internet. So knowing that they are the worst off, but also knowing now, you know, like who's responsible, like, is there any sign that this could lead to things getting better? Yeah. So, you know, I contacted the company,

Max Mind, and I said, hey, I have, I have some questions for you. Like, you have 600, 160 million IP addresses associated with this house. Could you tell me why? And, you know, number two, did you realize this is causing huge problems for the people who live there? And the founder of the company is like, oh, my gosh, like, I had no idea. Like, what should we do? You might want to change it somewhere else.

And so, you know, he got back to me and was like, hey, we moved it to a lake. Do you think that's a good solution? And I was like, when did I become the Internet? infrastructure expert. So Alex, yeah? Kashmir told me that the company, Maxmined, they did change the default location away from the farmhouse.

They've chosen a new location where something like 600 million lost IP addresses are all going to point. Do you want to see that location? Of course I do. Okay, here's a video. Here we go. So it's called Cheney Reservoir

right outside Wichita. Cashmere says it's nice. Lots of people go fishing. fishing and boating. This is a video of a guy just catching a fish there. A five-pound fish, apparently. I can't tell that they've buried 600 million cell phones at the bottom of that lake. It is weird that, like, I don't know.

It's just weird that there's... It's like seeing a cursed place, even though it's... Do you know what I mean? Right. Like any moment, you expect some kind of great cybernetic hands to reach out of the water and pull that guy in. And just like grab the fishing kid and pull him in. Yeah. Anyway, that's the lake.

And now, vampire rules. Okay. Um, too-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Okay, Alex, you remember our episode, Vampire Rules? Yes. Okay, so a lot happened in that episode. But the thing that is important to remember right now is that you and I got into an argument. Yes, we did.

Basically, the argument was, if you're allowed into someone's house, if someone willingly let you in their home, what are you allowed to do if you're alone in their home? Like, what is fair? Right. And I said that the sort of outer limits of it were, like, playing their Nintendo, and you were, like, dress up in all their clothes and pretend to be them for a week. That is not what I said. But I did endorse, like, a line of being more comfortable generally with snooping, basically.

Like, like, I believe that vampire rules apply. Like, the same way that a vampire is only allowed into your home if you invite them over the threshold, but once you invite them in, they're allowed to kill you. I believe that once you're in somebody's house and you've been invited in, you're allowed to snoop a little bit. Right. Okay. So, listener wrote in and they were like, just so you know, there's another person. Kind of somebody that a lot of people consider an ethical person who also abides by mine, PJ's view of vampire rules.

Okay. His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, Alex. What are you talking about? I'll tell you what I'm talking about. The Dalai Lama wrote a book. It was a book that was like, etiquette when you're staying at another person's home. Basically.

Hold on. Okay, here it is. So he's making this point about whether rich people are happier than poor people. And he writes, I remember well on occasion on one of my early trips to the West. I was a guest of a very wealthy family

who lived in a large, well-appointed house. A guest, Alex. Everyone was very charming and polite. There were servants to cater to ones every need. And I began to think that here perhaps was proof positive that wealth could be a source of happiness. My host definitely had an air of relaxed confidence. But when I saw in the bathroom, through a cupboard door which was slightly open, an array of tranquilizers and sleeping pills, I was reminded forcefully that there's often a big gap

between outward appearances and inner reality. The point being, the Dalai Lama snooped in somebody's medicine cabinet. Okay, I'm with two minds on this one. I'd like to hear both. I'd like to hear both of them. On the one hand, it's like if your significant other leaves their Facebook up and there's like a chat window open and you walk by it and you see a word that's like a fair. Yeah, you see a word that's like a fair or trist. It's like kind of fair to be like, okay, I noticed that. And he noticed something that was like a cupboard that was cracked open a little bit. It doesn't say that he cracked the thing open and took an inventory of all of this person's tranquilizers and sedatives. And on the other hand, I mean, I don't, this is not a thing that I particularly want to

say because this is a lot of people's spiritual leader, but I think that's a little creepy. Well, I don't think it's creepy because I think you can do this stuff, but also recognizing that His Holiness of Dalai Lama is a lot of people's spiritual leader. I do not believe him that it was slightly ajar and he just happened to peer through it. Like, I think he looked through their medicine cabinet. I think that even like the way he writes it, it feels like maybe I'm imagining this, but like, I feel like I can hear a big wink throughout this paragraph. Slightly ajar. Look, I get it.

People are curious. Even His Holiness, the Dalai Lama. Okay? I take your point. My personal opinion is that it's just not great. You shouldn't do it. I think it's cool that you've found someone so eminent to feel holier than thou about. I'm glad you feel holier than the Dalai Lama.

I hope it's worth it to you. Oh, boy. I feel like this was just an elaborately. laid trap that I just stepped right into. You mean the last two minutes or this entire show? The last two minutes. Well, then you're not on to me yet. Okay.

What's next? Can we move on from this and never look back, please? Yes, never look back. Okay, episode 57, Milk Wanted. Hey, Fia Bannon. Hey. Hi. Hi.

How's it going? Good. How are you? Chilling. Cool. Chilling. Hmm. Oh, my God.

Fuck. What? Why? every you you evaluate everything I say you have see you have this idea that like somewhere along the line you became like the official

Alex Goldman like the equivalent of a food taster but you're like a word taster and you have to like hear every one of my words and be like doesn't taste great I don't know if I call it a word taster I'm sorry Fia's here.

I'm here. This is not what I came for. Do you have an update? I do. What's your update? Okay, so remember early in the year, I did an episode about breast milk and how there are families that are like really, really desperate for rest milk and they're trying to buy it or find ways to get it for their children. And then there are other people who are overproducing it. And usually when there's like a demand and a supply, there's a place online where it's like really easy to go. get the thing. Yes. And how breast milk, like, there isn't somewhere really easy to do that. Yes, I do

remember this. Yes. And one of the solutions for that was places called milk banks where people could donate their milk and then you could buy it or your insurance might cover it, but it's like really expensive and a hard way to get it still. Uh-huh. And at the time, there were only a couple that were open, right? Yeah. At the time, there were less than 20 milk banks in all of North America and. And there is none in New York. Right. But since I reported that piece, actually, New York now has a milk bank. Cool. Yeah. So in September, the New York Milk Bank opened, and they say they're doing really well.

The demand has been really high. A lot of people are donating. It's like off to the races immediately successful. But one of the things about their system is that they have depots, milk depots. There's like over 20 of them in the state, and you can drop off your milk there if you're a mom who's overproducing. And they'll take it from those depots, bring it to the main location, pasteurized. it and then redistribute it. Huh.

So, over the weekend, I went to one of the depots. And what I haven't told you that is crazy about the New York Milkbank system is that they are partnering with a motorcycle club. What? Yeah. So this motorcycle club is going to the depots, picking up the milk, and then driving it, or biking it, to the. the main milk bank. So, like, they are the messengers. And the logic behind it is, like, they can

move through traffic gradually and they can park outside of places easily. Oh, God. I used to commute around New York on a Fespa. It was like, it's like having a cheat code. So it's a women's motorcycle club here in New York. This is the coolest thing. They're the coolest people. Okay. What are they called. They're the Sirens Motorcycle Club of New York City. Damn. And over the weekend when I was at that depot, I met three of the Sirens.

The first one was Molly. She is a pledge in the motorcycle club. She is a welder. She wears beautiful red lipstick. I work in a metal shop and I'm the only woman at work. So like all the men, they were unfamiliar

with milk banking. Then there is AJ. who, before she found the sirens, she was riding on Long Island with a group of New York cops. Well, I started riding when I was 18 because my boyfriend had a bike. And I got on the back of his bike and I rode a couple times. I thought, why am I riding on his bike? So I got my own bike and I've been riding ever since.

She's a lawyer. She has five children. She's amazing. That is so cool. And then the last one is a founding member. Her name is Cheryl. She's very petite and blonde. and just has like absolutely no fear.

You know those people who lean over all the way and they drag their knee on the ground and then they drag their knee the other way? I do that and I have a bike just to do that on. Oh, that is scary. It's really fun. We have such different definitions of fun, you and me. So I was there on a Saturday,

the Friday night before a hospital in the Bronx had run out of breast milk. And so they did an emergency breast milk run from upstate to that location on Friday night, and they could do it, like, so fast. They sound great. They're like a pack of benevolent badasses. Exactly.

Okay. Knowing that you have a deep phobia of motorcycles. Right. Did you ride? So here's what happened when I asked. So I have one more question that you should say no to, which is just whether one of you would be willing to bike me around the block once. I'd be happy, too, but you sound terrible.

I know. I am. It's like riding a bicycle. It is? Yeah, it's not that scary. Once you're on it and get used to the idea. I actually love bicycles. There it goes.

Oh, man. Yeah. Oh, man. That's me getting on. Okay. Oh, man. Oh, man. I was that?

Yeah. I just heard a gas. I just heard a gasp. This is all me squealing. I am squealing for the entire time around the block. And just to clarify why this tape sounds absolutely so terrible is like I'm grabbing onto Cheryl for Dear Life. My microphone is inside my jacket.

And all I'm trying to do is not fall off the back of the motorcycle. And that's my whole update. That's a good update. Thank you. I think every year you end up doing something dangerous on the show fearfully. It's a good question

whether acid or motorcycles is more dangerous. Motorcycles. It's increasing. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thanks for you.

Bye. All right. So we are at the final part of the show. The part of the show where we talk about the future. Obviously, a lot of people are not feeling great

about whatever's going to happen next year. But we wanted to know what people are looking forward to, what people feel optimistic about. And so we gave out our phone number again, and we asked people to call in, and we asked them to tell us,

what are you looking forward to in 2017? We sat down Friday afternoon to take calls. The phone system immediately broke. We came back Monday afternoon and took more phone calls in the studio, and here's what we heard. Here they come. The calls are pouring in.

There it is. Hello. Hey, this is Joe from Wisconsin. Hey, Joe. Please tell us what you're looking forward to in 2017. People were excited because their horses were about to have foals. It's a lot cleaner, I guess, than when a human's born.

But they're very, very gangly. They're all legs. They were excited because they thought their kids might finally start eating their school lunches. My daughter goes to a Jewish preschool. And the only thing she likes is sausage. They were excited because they were going to turn 25 on the day of a solar eclipse. The path of the shadow of the eclipse passes right over my parents home, like where I grew up. Whoa. Oh, that's dope.

That's dope. I know it's so dope. I'm going to get superpowers. That's what I'm banking on. Overwhelmingly, what we heard is that this year sucked, but that people are looking forward to a chance to try again. We wanted to just play one of the calls we got in its entirety. This is Alex and PJ. God, no way.

Way. Am I really talking to you guys? It's really happening. Who are we talking to? Well, this is Susan. Hi, Susan. Brackney from Bloom. Indiana and home of Indiana University and really crappy winter weather.

2016 was easily the worst year of my life. And I am ready for 2017. And you wanted to know what I'm excited or looking forward to? Yes. So how to say this? I have three dear friends who have a. soap company. Each of them are Muslim Americans, and I'm kind of scared for them in this age of Trump and all that.

And I'm doing my very best to help them. And one of the things that we have just started to do and will have a hard launch in 2017 is design my silk.com. It is the world's first and only online soap market. making studio. I like this. So you get to choose the ingredients and stuff? You choose the ingredients.

And the thing is that they've invented this special way of making soap that not even like Proctor and Gamble knows how to do. What's the special way of making soap? Well, it's a little bit of secret. But I'll tell you, they call it the volcano method. We usually charge people money to do ads on the show. But this feels good to me. This feels okay.

I'm very happy to support. this volcanic secret soap technology. It sounds really intense. The volcano method. These guys, they just broke the mold. It makes me cry when I think about. I'm just very proud to know them. How do you know them?

My parents are customers there, and they were always buying their soap and giving me their soap to kind of cheer me up. Because like I said, I had a really bad year. Why was your year so bad? I got a divorce. Oh, I'm sorry. And I found myself living in a 133 square foot airstream trailer.

And I have rheumatoid arthritis. So those things all happened in the same year. And those things are not designed for wintertime. Let me tell you. Oh, no. That is a bad year. That is like a year to box up and put away. how come you're so proud of these soap guys like what what about them makes you so proud

well they've been at this for four years they have this one soap for poison ivy and they actually one of them got poison ivy on purpose to test us no one to make sure it works like they don't want to put out shit and they they only want to put out the best stuff and and And their profit margin is terrible, and they're barely getting by. And I just, I love them. I just want them to be okay. And are they like, is it like when I feel this way sometimes, like, when you hang out with people who love a thing, is it like all they'll talk about is soap all the time forever?

Oh, the goddamn time. It's all they talk about. What is soap talk like? Well, like, they'll argue about which base is better, how to make something something thudsier. Anthony made one called Anthony Spice, and he's like really super proud of it. I'm curious. I feel like a lot of people, if they'd had such a bad year, they would probably just be like, all I want is for better things to happen for me next year. But all you want is for better things to happen to your friends with the soap company next year. Pretty. I love coming here.

I'm in their little factory right now, and it smells so good. Just being in here. makes me feel better with all these smells and they're just such nice people. They're like the opposite of the person I was with for the last 10 years. It was a very abusive relationship and these guys have like they bought me a little heater for my trailer and they, one of them made me an eye doctor appointment today because he knows I really need to get my eyes with that and they've just been looking out for me and they're just the sweetest people ever. just makes me want to cry. I just want them to be okay. Oh, I'm glad you found a good place. So anyway. Yeah, but anyway, people should go design their own soaps. Yeah, just design my soap.

Okay. All right. Thanks so much for calling. Thank you. And that is all. Bye. There's actually, there's one more person who I talked to who I wanted to tell you about. Somebody who is really looking forward to hearing from this year. All right. Who is it? This is a story that we actually officially officially, broadcast at the end of 2015, but whatever. Okay, lay it on me. You remember the story quit already? Yes. It was about a very kind woman named Lucia, who was a grandmother who lived in Guatemala,

and had so much disgust at the sort of corruption of the political system. she started a Facebook event that basically was like, let's go protest at the presidential palace. Yeah, although it wasn't even an event. It was actually just a Facebook post. I asked her to read it to me back then. Yeah, you get me one bit. I'll search it.

Yeah. This is an invitation abierta to have expressed their intention to vote null in the next elections. I asked Lucia to translate her note in real time for me, and she gave it a shot. If ever in Guatemala needed that everyone go out to the streets for the return of the millions that they have stolen, it is now. I wrote that like I was Yoda.

So Lucia posts this Facebook event. Doesn't imagine that anything is really going to come of it. And one thing leads to another. and it balloons into a protest that is so huge that it results in the president of Guatemala stepping down. Basically, yeah. This is what Lucia said about it when we first talked. For the very first time in my life,

finally, justice had been served. Did that ever seem possible? No, actually, it didn't. That's why I was so happy. every single one of the Congress that word that they have the Congress and had to make the decision voted yes. So I caught up with her over Skype last week

and found out about what is going on in Guatemala and what is going on with Lucia. What do you want to hear about first? I am very interested in how Lucia is doing because it was hard not to really love her based on your interview with her. So she is now working. working for this political nonprofit called Citizens Action.

They're basically the Guatemalan chapter of Transparency International. So she's doing, she's fighting corruption in a like organized way. And she's there. Wow. Yeah. And she's their chief financial officer slash administrator. So she's like doing the day job she used to do, which she's really good at. But she's doing it in the service of the like large scale political change that she thinks is important.

So she's happy. That's amazing. Yeah. God, the paths that lives take, it's so wild. Yeah. Are you just sitting there like contemplating the fullness of the universe? Kind of. I'm a little overwhelmed. It's just like, hey, I'm going to post this thing.

Fifteen of my friends are going to show up at it. And then now it's like her life, it's changed her life. Her life is completely different. And it's totally informed by this one tiny, seemingly insignificant action. Yeah. All right. Now do you want to feel bad? Well, no, but I mean, in order to encapsulate the fullness of the story, yes. So here's what happened. One of the questions was just like, who's going to be president of Guatemala now?

And what happened was that there was an election. And this guy ran, whose name was Jimmy Morales. Mm-hmm. He was a guy who had almost no political experience whatsoever. He was actually famous as kind of like a buffoonish TV personality. Are you trying to set this up to sound very familiar to me? I don't know why it would. He ran against a former First Lady who had a lot of political experience, but who was seen as part of the corrupt establishment.

Get out of here. Yeah. And he won. And he's been. a kind of absentee president. He's actually not in the country very much, but he's like impulsive. He just like starts fights with other countries

for no reason. He's super right wing and he's backed by the military. And so under him, progress has slowed in places and reversed in others. How does she feel about that? She was like, yes, our president sucks. But politics isn't just about the president.

Like, the person who is the president of Congress this year was kind of, His nickname was Cabraloka. Cabraloka. It's a wild, not wild, crazy. Crazy ram, cabra loca. And what does it mean that he's a crazy ram? Like, he published all the names of the people that work in Congress with the salaries that they receive.

Yes. Because it's public information and everybody was asking. And it turned out that we had like janitors that were earning as much as a CEO in a company. And Lucia had a bunch of other examples of places where there were signs of progress happening in Guatemala, even if they weren't coming from the president. Like, for instance, there was a big crackdown this year on citizens who made illegal political donations, which in the past was something like everybody got away with. And there were actual arrests. Like Lucia knew somebody who was arrested, and she felt bad for them because they were. They were one of the first people to get in trouble for something that everybody used to do and not get in trouble for her.

But she looks at something like that and she's like, things are changing, even if they're not changing very quickly all the time. Right. And that sort of made me realize, like, I think why I had wanted to check back in with Lucia in the first place, which really was I wanted to know how she continues to be hopeful, despite the fact that progress in Guatemala is not always a straight line. I think a thing that I hadn't known when we talked that I know now is like, I don't know how this is a, this is dumb. But like to care about your country to like really care, like to pay attention and to think you can affect it. Like to care about your country the way you care about your family or your neighborhood, it really hurts. Like it hurts all the time because it's this like massive boat and you can barely move it. Like even with a lot of people, you just nudge it.

I don't know how you did it. Like, I don't know how you continue to care because it actually really hurts. How? You know, when I was really young, perhaps when I was even a teenager, I don't know. I always thought that civilizations on Star Trek and all these sci-fi movies were, really possible where humanity was joined together and blah, blah. Yeah. And again, focusing on the small things, you know,

focusing on the one guy that works for years on end on the seti institution, searching for intelligent life outside the planet. And I think, oh, these people that really care, you know, and we have that little flame of hope for human agenda. I'm surprised that your example is a person who's hoping that the aliens come save us. Yeah, but you know. There are some really good people in the world doing things that nobody else noticed, and that gives me hope every day.

She's the best. I know. She's actually just the best. Yeah. For me, like, the fact that she exists is like, the thing that steady guys' existence makes her feel, I feel because of her. Have a great afternoon and thousands of kisses.

Thank you, Lucia. Have a great afternoon. Thousands of kisses. Bye. Okay, bye. That's it for us. That's it for this year. Just a reminder, if you want to see our year-end poster, and believe me, you do want to see our year-end poster, the URL, again, is replyall.com. And thank you to everybody who listened to this year, everybody who wrote in or called us or browbeat their friends into checking out our weird podcast. Thank you even to the people who keep sending us emails saying we say like too much.

We will see all of you in January. Reply-all is hosted by PJ Vote and me, Alex Goldman. We were produced by Shruthy Penaminani, Fia Benin, Chloe Prasinos, and Damiano Marquen. Our executive producer is Tim Howard. Production assistance from Thane Faye, and we were mixed by David Herman. Special thanks this week to Adam Quinn, Felix Biederman, Virgil Texas, Karen Duffin, Felina Rakowski-Galliger, and Stephanie Fu. Matt Lieber is launching your sled off a killer jump.

Our theme song is by the Mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder, our ad music, is by Build Build Buildings, and our logo is by Matt Lubchanski. You can find more episodes of the show at iTunes.com slash Replyall or wherever else you get your podcasts. Our website is Replyall.soy. We're going to be taking a couple weeks off for the holidays, so our next episode will be on January 11th. Thanks for listening. We'll see you in a couple weeks. No ketchup. Okay.

Do you still make those tiny pies? What about that?