The Morning Stream - TMS 3019: Cursed Bread

Episode Date: June 4, 2026

The Nicholas of Time. The Massive Weight of Unbearable Talent? It Goes From Zero to SIX! Bob's Your Mummy. Isn't there some kind of tree that grows in a Maple Grove? Ice Cream Prejudice. Cake Mix. Tall Feet. It's not the man-spider we expect, but the man-spider we need. The Bernthal Bears. I really like Creemeeeeeeeeees! Horde Flavored. Kroger by day, King-Super by night. Maple ain't Simple. Social Lube with Wendi and more on this episode of The Morning Stream. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Do you know what an SC paddle pirate is? It's a kind and generous human who supports the TMS Patreon at the grade A plus level. Be awesome like them at patreon.com slash TMS. Coming up on the morning stream, the Nicholas of Time. The massive weight of unbearable talent? It goes from zero to six. Bob's your mummy. Isn't there some kind of tree that grows in a maple grove?

Ice cream prejudice. Cake mix. Tall feet. It's not the man spider we expect, but the man's spider we expect. but the manned spider we need. The burnfall bears. I really like creamies. Horde flavored.

Kroger by day, king super by night. Maple ain't simple. Social lube with Wendy and more on this episode of the Morning Stream. He is a young creature. His mind is free from your stupid emotions and fears. Just look at him. He looks like cardboard in the rain. The Morning Stream, Funny Shoes.

Hello, everybody, and welcome to TMS. This is the morning stream for June 4th, 2000 and 26. I'm Scott Johnson. That's Brian. Hi, Brian. Hello. Oh, my gosh. It's getting so close to my time to go from this wonderful place.

I do love Vermont. It's very nice. Got a Vermont countdown to Brian leaving is, what, a day and a half now you got left? A day and a half? Yeah, Saturday after. So I guess two days, two full days, really, if you start from now. But no, Tina arrives. She's actually at the airport in Denver right now, getting ready to fly out here.

And I'm just so excited. It's been two weeks. And all I can say is, man, the dishes are piling up, the laundry is piling up. The trash is overflowing out of the bins and stuff. So it's going to be so nice to see her. Oh, it would be great to have her there to just tidy it up a little. Make everything good again. Yeah.

No, dude, two weeks away from your soulmate is not a fun thing regardless of the reason. No. I don't love it. I don't love doing that. No, it's been a long time since we did that. She, in her current job, Kent doesn't have to go anywhere. That's the kind of the reason that she had to stay in Denver while I came out here. But in her prior, like when she was an investigator, there were times that she'd have to go to, like, Boston for a month, where she was there for four weeks.

And that's. that is a long time. That was a tough thing to go through. You're a good lone wolf though. This is one of the things I like about Brian is he I think it's partly because all those newspaper trips and just in general you're a chill on your own. It comes natural to you.

You just can do it. It's fine. You love the social. You've got plenty of battery. The social battery is strong with Brian. But if he's like, hey, I got to wand it around Vegas for three days by myself and be at the pool and do what. You can totally do that.

I can totally do it. And I've done it so many times. There's so many times I took like solo trips to California, solo trips to Vegas and just said, you know what? I'm going out there for, you know, a few days and I'll be back. And there's always people out there, right? If I go to California, I can go see my family out there

or Tad pollutants who live out there. Sure. Cheesy G. Gary, you know, everybody out there. If I go to Vegas, I can hang out with the same. sex merry folks or Mitzula and that sort of thing. Here, I mean, we've got Mac Addict. Oh, I had drinks with one of the neighbors yesterday. Oh, yeah.

We talked to you. We were going to do that. How did that go? I was going to do that. It went very well. They made me a delicious maple Manhattan. I swear to God, maple, they almost have maple syrup coming out of faucets. It's basically, you know.

A maple, is that a common drink and it's just really good there because of all the syrup availability? I mean, Manhattan's are, Manhattan seems like they're making a comeback. It's kind of like an old fashion, but you use, oh, what is the stuff? Vermuth. Oh, okay. But not the really dry, clear remove that you would use for a martini. It's a, what do they call it?

Is it a dark vermouth, a red vermouth? Anyway, it's a sweet vermouth. That's what is, sweet vermouth. And you do that with bourbon or typically rye is your Manhattan alcohol. maple doesn't fit into the equation anywhere usually but it's but it does use simple sugar and that's kind of like Vermonters pretty much replace anything that's got simple sugar or simple syrup getting all these things wrong it's like I'm not a drinker um replace anything that's got simple syrup they just replace it with uh uh maple syrup and I'm fine with it yeah who cares yeah that sounds

great that's like maple old fashion been making a couple of those for myself since I've been here and straight from maple out of the grove, the grove I'm looking at right now. What's growing in that grove, by the way? Paper trees. Oh, just maple trees? Yeah, maple trees.

They aren't like a, I don't know. Is that their big word I'm looking for? Export. Not export, but their big agricultural contribution is maple. That's it? Or did they think so? I mean, I've seen a lot of farms, driven by a lot of farms that

with other things growing dairy. There's a huge dairy. I guess you hear about that, right? Vermont dairy, Vermont, cream, Vermont, that sort of thing. Lots of dairy. Ice cream. Supposed to be the best in the world, that kind of stuff. It's so good.

Oh my God. And they've got a thing here called a creamy. C-R-E-M-E. And what it is, we have those that is from the store, but that's not what you're talking about. Yeah, because you can get these like, they're basically just cream sickles.

And they're called Creamies, but they're super storebought. Like, they're nothing fancy. What are these? These are soft serve, this is soft serve maple ice cream. Oh my gosh. And again, back to the maple syrup.

But there's a place. Basically, when I leave here, 500 feet down to the road and then take that road down to the first major road past all the residential. It's like it's 10 minutes before I'm at quote unquote civilization. The first place that I come to is Palmer Lake Farms, which is a dairy farm. And they, for nine months out of the year, sell creamies. And it's like this incredibly rich, delicious maple ice cream. And they always have other flavors that pair with it.

So yesterday, I've had way too many of these, clearly. yesterday I had one that was Maple and Butterscotch What a freaking amazing combination that was I mean that sounds great on paper But I'll bet it's insane in real life Holy crap It's insane.

Maple and peach Two or three days ago I've been going every day But I've been going At least every other day That sounds like just the right amount to me Yeah exactly Bobby says not a fan of soft serve

Bobby We're going to have a discussion I understand that you know I love soft serve It's my favorite form of ice cream. Oh, really? More than the scoops. Yeah, I think so.

I mean, it depends. You give me the choice and I'll always take a scoop. You'll take a scoop. Yeah. It really depends on where we're at. If it's a place that's like making their own ice cream and they, you know, like you're saying, the authentic Vermont experience or anywhere else where it's like that, there's a place in Beaver, or not Beaver, wherever it is, Utah somewhere.

Anyway, we pass when we come back and forth from Vegas. And they have a whole dairy farm there and then a big front end store and all the best ice cream in the world. And there I will go scoop 100% of the time. In fact, I don't even think the offer soft serve. But if we're somewhere and you're like, hey, they got one of them Dole Whip style soft serve unit deals, I'll go, I'll do that. Or I'm a huge fan. This was a Bliscon thing. Every year, it would be Nicole, Tom, Tristan, and I would have ice cream social in the middle of the afternoon. And we'd meet at the flavor burst ice cream stand in the middle of BlizzCon, in the middle of the show floor. And like, oh, should we get in line and play some Diablo?

No, can. We've got ice cream social in like 10 minutes. We won't have time. Way more important. It was way more important. I don't know what they, it's soft serve with these little ribbons of flavor like a slurpy syrup that they mix in with the ice cream. But it's not fully mixed. So you get some bites or some licks that are super flavorful.

and then other ones that are lighter, and then other ones, you just get the vanilla from the soft serve. It's stupid good. Yeah, they were really good. If I remember, right, they had them all,

the coloring match, like, here's the Alliance, blue and the red horde and all that. Yeah, yeah. And you could even get multiple combinations so you could say, give me one with cherry banana and a horde. Yeah, give me some horde.

Can I have some horde? That'd be great. It's like their coffee shop on campus, very similar stuff. In fact, it's an actual Starbucks. But it's all Blizzard themed drinks. Is it really? Oh, that's great.

It's pretty cool in there. That whole cafeteria thing is really neat. Do they charge you 10 pelts? I wish. You can have this venty camel macchiato, but you must bring me 10 pelts first. Look for my wife. My wife has been missing.

I'm Mancric, just so you know. Now go find her. Okay, so a couple things. Oh, how was cake? We haven't had a chance to ask, the band Cake. Let's go right from ice cream to cake. Yeah.

It was a good show. Yeah. Man, here's the thing about cake. From album number one, from maybe fashion nugget, I think was their first one with, how do you support your rock and roll lifestyle? All the way till their most recent release, here's a band that has never needed to evolve. They established a sound with their bass, their, um, Their loose, loosely tuned guitar, their trumpet, and their vibraslap.

Oh, yeah. And the guy still sounds exactly the same. I can't remember his name. McCrae? Tom McCray? No. What is it? Something.

Ah, can't remember the lead. Headliner of cake. Headliner of cake. There you go. Your main ingredient of cake. Flower. Yeah, flour. His name is flower.

Flower. Anyway, great show. Mac addict, so I, the doors opened at 6.30. I like had to do some, oh, I actually drove to the T-Mobile store to get a blanket, but I didn't need it because I had, I found a lawn chair in the garage. Like, this is a field, a field concert. And so I found a lawn chair, took that. I got to the thing just as doors open. So it parked and got into the thing, got some decent seats, saved a bunch for Nate and his friends.

And then I get a text from me. Yeah, we're still getting Indian food. I'm like, oh, no worries. I got space. He's like, oh, dude, we didn't even bring, we don't have blankets. We don't have lawn chairs. We're probably just going to go right up close to the stage. And I'm like, oh, totally cool with that.

Kind of on that same, same. thing that allows me to just hang out here for two weeks alone without any problem. Going and sing a concert, just relaxing in a lawn chair and just, you know, hands behind my head. I'm totally fine with that. Just letting the music wash over me. That's way more cool than going. I mean, look, I get, we did this for Deadmouth. I get going up to the front.

I get the fun of it. I get the feeling of it. But I, speaking of social batteries, that one's, what do you call it when your battery doesn't take a full charge anymore. It's like, it's depleted. It's depleted or you're, you,

you, overcharged it or whatever. Yeah. Well, the cells won't hold a, mine only holds about a quarter of what it used to for a concert.

Before you get to irritated and like, had enough. Yeah, why is that guy touching me? This other dude won't stop talking. Like,

I'm out of here. Why is the person singing louder than the guy on the stage behind me? Yeah. And that battery was, bam, when I was it,

18, 19, oh, that battery dude. Oh, totally fine. Like, you know, Chris Brown and I went to Red Rocks to see Elvis Costello and the police. And the first thing he did is we had our reserve seats. Or no, we had general admission, which was where we got was right in front of, right behind the reserved section. First thing he says is, let's go down to the front. Like, oh, really? Okay, those are all reserved seats. All right. And we get like second row. And we're just sitting there watching the show. And, uh, do you ever get kicked or booted or nothing? I'll get there. I'll get there. So we get up to the front and we're watching. Elvis Costello's opening for the police. And so we're watching Elvis and it's just like great. And then this couple comes up and says, oh, I'm sorry.

I think you guys are in our seats. And we're like, oh, no problem. And he's like, oh, don't worry about it. You know, don't rush. I'm like, oh, cool. So we sat there and continued to watch the song. And he said, oh, I mean, get up. Just you don't have to, you don't have to rush.

Oh, that's great. Take your time. No, that's not what we mean. Exactly. You don't have to run, but you do have to get up. That's funny, man. So we started making our way back to where we were. And as we're doing that, Elvis brings Sting out on stage, and they do Allison as a duet.

And it's like, oh, man, I wish we could have stayed up there for that. Yeah. That would have been, that's the, that's what I wanted to hear. I wish they would have been serious about their, don't, don't worry. You don't have to go fast. Totally, exactly. Like, can we buy you a beer that you go and get and then come back and take your seats? Yeah, how about that?

Could we pay for you to have a beer somewhere else? Isn't that just like the baseline behavioral expectation at this point? I mean, why not? I would think so. Yeah. Then the actual police came. No, that's not true. Exactly.

But it was a, it was a great show. and big thanks again to to Mac addict to Nate for setting me up with those tickets. Thanks, Nate. You're awesome. He is awesome. Better Nate than ever. Getting out of there, though, was a pain in the butt. It was like...

Always is. I hate that shit. Yeah, because it's, you know, again, parking in a field and where they pull you in and have you park on the grass next to everybody else. And then everybody's backing out and trying to get out the same time. And there's just a big long line. I look over to the left and it's like, well, there's a wide opening for me,

just to go right to the exit and there's nobody there. So hell yeah, I did that. I went over there and got good torque on those electrics, man. I totally did, yeah. Yeah, that's the thing I like most about those. Yeah, I'm loving this EV, man. The speed, zero to six or whatever it is, or zero to 60? 60.

Yeah, let's open zero. It goes from zero to six miles an hour in 12 minutes. Yeah, that's not what you want. Downhill. But even like the least. for the lowest end, like, you know, just commuter car version. They have amazing torque. I love that.

Well, that's great. I'm glad cake went better. And it also sounds like you had a little bit better practice ride. That makes me happy. How'd that go? Oh, I did. Yeah. Yeah, did the ride again yesterday?

I went ahead and just rented a bike. Since we didn't have TMS, basically as soon as I was done with Daily Music Headlines, went into town, got another bike, did that same ride. and had a great time. This time I had a, I picked up an energy waffle. It looks like a little miniature stoop waffle. Guess what flavor it was, Scott? I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to really go out on a limb here.

Hold on. And I'm going to say it was maple flavor. Wow. How did you know? What? How can it be? Yeah. But pick that up, did that at the very, at the turnaround. So went all the way down the causeway to the bike ferry, which again only runs on weekends.

Had my waffle came back. No headwind. Got back. Did the whole ride in 22 miles in like an hour and a half. And did not have to ride around Burlington looking for the return place. So no lost in the neighborhoods. Had some sustenance with you. Everything's good.

So, abstinence didn't pass out. Well done, well done. Yeah. That's good. I'm very happy to hear that. Do you feel the, here's the ultimate question.

Yeah. Yeah. How do we put this? How ready do I feel for the actual ride? Yeah, how prepared do you now feel? Do you feel any more prepared than you did before you got? I feel more prepared. And I'm glad that I've been doing the Peloton here.

I've been doing the bike rentals. I, for sure, will ride at the MS-150. I may, just because I've got a little bit more prep to do for Nurtacular, well, a lot more prep to do for Nurtacular, as well as a long drive to Nurtacular and days at Nurtacular at a ride back. Yeah. I may do one of the shorter courses, but I will absolutely ride in Logan, Utah, in two weeks. Yeah.

That's how it's going to go, everybody. Yeah. Wow. Three weeks. Yep. We're not supposed to talk about time, though. Remember, we're on the moratorium of no time? I opted out.

I told that to Jerry. Yeah, we're not going to talk about what happens one week from today. One week from today, I know. I will say, you know what, yesterday getting back from the bike ride, I was able to get all the final questions written for the final countdown stuff. A lot of people, if you haven't seen Frog Pants All Stars before, there's going to be some staples in there. There's always a game of movie poster taboo where the captains blindfolded and the other three players have to give one word clues each without discussing what they're going to say to, lead that person to get there, that poster, like you did with 310 to human, get that uproarcy applause.

Yeah, love that one. There will be name that nerd where you're given a topic that has multiple answers and you've got a bid on who can give the most answers. And then every round ends with the final countdown, which is 10 questions that will just give somebody a chance to retake the lead or lose it completely. And that's a buzzer round. And so it's going to be a matter of like who's got the fastest fingers to be able to get those questions in and get those answers in. Give you guys a fun.

This is a 2017 throwback. That's John Jagger wearing one of the masks to hide his face. So he wasn't a captain though, right? So that must have been a lot of that mask. It's a really good question. I don't know how we did that. What was his deal? That might have been feeling Funko pops trying to identify.

the character, the funco pop character. Oh. So he's got something in his hand, probably. Probably in his other hand, probably. Not his wiener. Yeah, I'd forgotten that both Bo and John have played this before. They have. They were there in 2017.

This will be their first time doing it again. And they're the first time on my team. Yeah. And I'm terrified. We're going to just tank, I feel like. I don't know. Wendy's going to save you because she's, she's the secret weapon that the other teams don't know you have.

Yeah, she is. She's very smart. Didn't know you have. Her pop culture knowledge is a little lacking, but that doesn't mean that there aren't question, you know, Brian's already said, we've got a lot of diversity in these questions. Yeah, and I feel, you know, I've been looking at the teams, obviously. And I feel very good about my spreading out of the, the, wheelhouses. So, you know, you may have a lot of video game power on your team. But another team

has Carter and another team has TV's Travis and another team has Bobby and stuff like that. So it's, so, you know, there's, and movies spread all across the board. I mean, Wicked Kitten, TV's Travis, Red Fraggle. Um, uh, there's a, there's a lot of movie knowledge spread across the teams as well. It feels, you know, it feels, uh, I think even Wendy's got a good, good handle on the movie stuff. She'll be good on that. She does, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's going to be great.

But we're not talking about dates. We're not talking about times. Not talking about dates. Nope. Not saying about seven days away from now. I mean, I did do, you won't be able to read this. I'll still move it as if they could. But this is my, these are my notes last night.

I stayed up kind of late, just writing down what I kind of want to make sure to cover them in the opening ceremonies. It's two pages of this. And now today I try to make sense of my notes, read words that are hard to read. My handwriting sucks ass. Sucks a ass. Oh, mine too. So bad. I don't know what happened as a kid.

I took all the classes. I did the cursive. I did all that. That's back when it was required. I did all of it. And there was a time when it was pretty readable. But then I learned how to type. And then it all changed.

It all changed. Yeah. Typing. I mean. Uh, auto correct. All that stuff suffered like made the rest of our, our stuff suffered. Yeah, but I've been trying to write more like my hand just because as a like an exercise of like, don't lose that. Have a little of that before you die. Yeah. Exactly. Uh, guys, we're going to do a quick news story. Wendy should be here right about the time we finish it. And, uh, yes,

she's back today. No, uh, no, no, no big Wendy hold of today. No conferences, uh, she's got to be part of. No, she's been very busy, but I think we're clear today. So here we go. Let's give it a shot. Today's news is brought to you by. Core has plans for Summer Games Fest tomorrow. And here's Scott with more. Well, I'm sure planned Nertacular at the perfect time. Kind of forgot about all the E3 replacement stuff that we cover in June.

Yeah, the state of play. Yeah, which we did yesterday. Two days ago. Two days ago. You're right. It's all blurring together. We had a great time on there And Sony showed off a bunch of stuff

So Friday is Summer Games Fest Which is the big stage thing Jeff Keely's joint And when all the big announcements happen And we're going to be watching that live And doing full co-coverage of the thing As well as commentary and all of that That is going to be this week's big blowout

And that starts tomorrow at If I can find the timestamp There it is 2 p.m. Mountain Times when that starts So 1 p.m. for you, West Coast Folks, East Coast what is that, four? Yeah. So we're going to be there until they're done, is the plan.

And maybe even the Microsoft stuff on Sunday, but we don't know when that is for sure when we're trying to work it out. I'm not going to let it interfere with the film sac. So it sort of depends on that. And then there's potentially a Nintendo direct next week. Next week, I think Tuesday. Right?

I think that's right. Yeah. We'll see. Yeah. That's getting pretty close to go time. But maybe. You know, I don't know. I just forgot all the shit happens in June.

I screwed that up in my head. Yeah, an Apple thing probably. Yeah. That one is, but that way you guys wouldn't do that for, uh, no, not for core. But it's definitely a thing we kind of talk about all around everything, right? Yeah. Yeah.

The WWDC, I guess. Yeah. And so who knows? We'll see how it all lands. But anyway, check us out tomorrow. That's why there's no core today. But there will be a big chunk tomorrow. So watch for that.

All right. Yesterday is history today, Brian. I'm going to play the thing. Yesterday is history today. It's appropriate for this story. Scientists studying Oat-Zot-Z-O-Z, the ice man. Otzi? Outsi.

It's got the omelots, so. Got to be Outsi. Outsi. It's probably somebody's going to say, no, you pronounce it like, E, with your tongue kind of twisted into weird shape. Hey, dipshit, you say it like this. Right. You let us know, Bob.

Let's see. a naturally preserved human mummy who died roughly 5,300 years ago, has been identified or they have identified yeast living on and within his remains, still living. Okay. He's got yeast in there. Yeast. He's got a yeast.

It's a ice man with a yeast infection. And here's where it gets real gross. They even used it to bake sourdough bread. They made a loaf of bread from this guy's yeast. Oh. Yeah. I don't know if I'd have to do. on that, but whatever. The discovery sheds new light on the microbial communities associated with

ancient human remains and could reshape how scientists think about long-term preservation. Gross. Why is the first thing that somebody thinks about to do with a naturally preserved mummy from over 5,000 years ago, the first thing said, we could probably use that to make some bread. Y'all want some bread? I'm acting like the scientists, sir. Yeah, a bunch of yokels. the Ozarks or something. Yeah. Hey, I got an idea. Y'all wants a bread like that.

Right. Is there anything else maybe? I don't know. Like see, ooh, what kind of, uh, uh, litig in his teeth? What kind of diet did he have? And, uh, is he an unfrozen caveman lawyer who fell into the ice? Never know. Never know what these guys, right?

I mean, okay. I'll, I'll make an admission. Yeah. If somebody had access to this bread. Sure. And we're able to. send us a fresh piece slice of it i would try it on the show this is a safe thing this is the safe thing because you know there is no chance that uh that this bread is up for up for grabs for people

although it seems like you know it's yeast so they could they could preserve the yeast separately right they could they could grow more of this like basically it's like a sourdose starter and you could keep sloughing off children of the sourdose starter that's what i don't know if i told you this So what's what we did. This is going to sound wrong if I don't explain it right. When my mother-in-law passed away, we made sourdough starter from her yeast. Now, let me back it up.

It's not her yeast. We got her from the yeast that she was using for her own. For her own loaves of bread that she was making all the time. She made two, three loaves every week. And so she had this very robust, not even starter, just robust, whatever, yeast farm. or sourdough farm. And so we took that and Kim's sister Julie knows how to take

a sourdough bread starter or any form of that and put it into a powder form so that it can be packaged in little packets. So what we did is at the funeral, you could walk up and there are pictures of her and the video running and all the stuff you do in the foyer for the funeral home.

And then there's a big basket full of these little individual packets and it says this is the this is sourdose. starter from Francis's, you know, sourdough bread, whatever, please take one. So people took those home and in theory are making her bread. It is just add water kind of thing to reactivate them. Yeah.

Yeah. And it's supposed to, I don't know if it's freeze dried or how she did it. Julie's the brain on this one. I have no idea. Yeah, apparently. That's really cool. And she makes, Julie is like a wizard in the kitchen with the bread. Really?

Just with the bread. I don't know what's going on. Like her dad's been struggling to reproduce the bread and make it look as good as the purely departed. I could make some great stuff with the discards, the sourdough discards. My sourdough loaves always came out way too dense. They just did not rise like they needed to, you know, needed to. You get that interior that feels like almost like cement paste kind of like.

Yeah, right, right. Yeah, I hate when that happens. I mean, I'm the worst. None of them worked for me. Kim made plenty of good bread. Carter does a great job. I don't have the touch, whatever that touch is. neither is Kim's dad apparently.

So now he goes to Julie's house and she takes the exact same stuff and makes the most amazing bread out of it. I imagine, yeah, that's funny. So all I'm saying is if anybody out there in the scientific community, Bob, you got any connections or anything with all around science?

Reach out. Get us to just a smidge into that bread. Yeah, I don't know from me either because here's the thing. It's old yeast or, you know, it's ancient yeast, but it's also fresh flour, fresh water, fresh, you know. Right.

It's all the other things that you're making the bread with are going to be new fresh ingredients. Yeah. And yeast on its own is gross no matter where it's been growing. Yeah. It's all gross. Right. The yeast that, you know, the yeast that we've been using for some things has probably been around a long time too, maybe not 5,000 years, but.

Some of it hundreds, you know? Certainly, yes. Yeah, I've had bread. A lot of people brought up, like, that why didn't they do beer? It does surprise me because usually, remember there was a thing where they found some decaying thing in the bottom of the ocean. Oh, yeah. And they use the yeast in that to brew beer. That's right.

It's a funny. I'm surprised they didn't do that with a mummy. This mummy remains. If we end up getting to it, the second story is literally about a similar thing. It's funny. You said that. Oh, gosh. Really?

Yeah. It's about a dude. Well, I'll tell you, I'll just go ahead and read it. I'm going to skip down to this one. Yeah. Oh, damn it, Wendy just entered. All right. I'll just tell you real quick.

We can do it. I'll give you a hint and then we'll come back to it next week. But this guy thought, everybody thought he was an alcoholic. He seemed drunk constantly. He never drank and no one believed him. Yeah. Even his doctors were like, that's bullshit. Took years to get this rare illness.

I noticed basically this guy naturally bruise alcohol in his gut. He ferments. Yeah. So he, he, and he gets, and it makes him drunk. But he's not intaking anything. It's just he'll have a nice meal. And two hours later is like, I'm feeling a little tipsy because his body produces the stuff.

Wow. I know. Isn't that crazy? I guess I did just tell the story. You didn't tell you. That's all right. That's interesting. Yeah, I found that fascinating.

But anyway, let us now turn our attention toward this. Something wrong, Batman. Has anybody seen Wendy? Oh, I have. But not that long ago, but I guess I'll see her soon. It's Wendy on the phone, though. Hi, Wendy. How are you?

Hey, look who it is, everybody. It's my sister Wendy. She is an actual therapist. Health people with their real problems all the time. Comes here on Thursdays to help you with yours. Although it's been like three weeks. We've missed you. We have.

Is everyone okay? Yeah. I mean, how is your, you had all sorts of stuff. You had conferences. You had graduations. You had stuff. Yeah. So Abe graduated from college.

And that was very fun. And then he's immediately, whoa, he's immediately moving. to grad school in Pittsburgh. So we went to Pittsburgh to check out the University of Pittsburgh. It is the cute. Has anyone, raise your hands, been there?

Never been. It is a big of Pittsburgh, but I don't remember about never, never tour the campus. Well, it's not even the campus. I know, I mean, the whole city is. Oh, the city is like the cutest. I don't know. Wow. I think of Pittsburgh and cute is not the first.

Now, let's be clear. adjectives I'd use to describe it. Perfect 75 degrees. Everything was green. There were no students because it was the end of May. Oh, sure. Yeah. So it was super cute and quaint.

Anyway, we went down to Falling Waters, which is frankly, which writes one of the houses. Yeah, that really cool one. Yeah. Oh, so cool. And toward that, it was amazing. It was literally just lovely and pretty and beautiful. Did you go any, did you end up in any ERs to see if it's like the pit?

No, but. Where we were staying is really close to where all the med students stay and where that is like based in the, because it's a learning hospital, right? Right. And it's all based on that place. They film it in Hawaii, I think. Oh, really? But, yeah, because there's always, people are always pointing out when they do an exterior shot, there'll be a palm tree where there shouldn't be. Somebody in post forgot to like mask that out or whatever.

But yeah, it's supposed to be there. And it's supposed to be, it's supposed to be authentically. set there too. Like it feels like you're in Pittsburgh. And I hear this from people who live in Pittsburgh that they do a really good job of that, except for the occasional tree. But then also half the actors are British,

and they are very authentic, you know? Like, the pit's awesome. Freaking... It's so good. And it, you know, we kept looking around thinking we'd see some sign of, you know, acknowledgement and there's none. But it is... I just loved it. I thought it was a really fun town. And anyway,

it's really excited. But I have to tell you if you ever get a chance to go, even if you don't like baseball, you should go to a Pirates game. Because A, I've never seen a view like that from a stadium. Like every seat is good. We had terrible seats, you guys. Like, you know, we bought them five minutes before the game and with a student discount. So it was like the top of the top and it's as good as any seat I've had anywhere. It was so fun.

Wow. Is that a new stadium? Old stadium or how long is that pirate stadium? It's PNC. No, it's not old. PNC is the stadium name. And the river is right there. So if somebody hit a home run,

and went right in the river, it was awesome. Nice. It was really fun. So that's where I was. Can I just say I'm tired? Yeah, I bet you are. You've had a lot going on, dude. I know.

I can tell that you've been very busy. And so we are honored you could take some time out today. Oh, yes. You're right. I'm to honor you with my time. You all get to see her soon if you're coming to Salt Lake. And those who aren't watched the stream, Wendy will be heavily involved.

That's right. She's the sleeper agent for your team. That's right. We're going to show a picture of the Queen of Diamonds and all of a sudden she's going to like flip into Manchurian candidate mode. I might know one or two things. This is going to be so good. Yeah, that's going to be great.

Well, today we got a message from somebody. We're going to read and get through it. It's from an anonymous listener who wrote this, Dear Wendy and the Boys. I like being the Boys. It's fun. The Boys. Yeah.

I've seen this a lot lately. Anyway, it says, I have been listening to the morning stream for years and love the advice. You all three have given to us all. I have been struggling to make friends as an adult, especially after a divorce. I'm a guy in my mid-40s in the Midwest. Skoll Vikings.

What does that mean? Does that mean go? What does that mean? It's like it's a cheers. Yeah, it's like a toast. Oh, okay. School! Put it between your cheek and gum is what I thought that was.

Obviously, I'm a nerd and a surf, I suffer stereotypically. Wait, hold on. you're a nerd. What are you saying about listeners? Obviously, I listened to you guys so it must be a nerd. Yeah, what the hell, man? I'm just kidding. That's fine. We all feel the same way. I am a nerd and suffer stereotypically from some social anxiety. My therapist and I came up with the idea of business cards, something to give out as an icebreaker. They would all include my name and email and have something different for various interactions. One set of cards would be for potential friendships. Another set would be to ask someone out for a date, possibly a

another would be just to brighten someone's day. I like that one. I have been having a hard time coming up with a line or two for each set. I would love to hear some suggestions and feedback. Thanks to you all. Now, before we get to the suggestions, Wendy, I just have a kind of an arcing question about, or is it arching, whatever? Over- overarching?

A general question for you. Sure. I've full porkie-pigged that one all the way to the end. I believe it, yeah. Is this a, is this a, is this? this is a good idea to do this? Or is this weird? Like if you walk up to somebody and give him a card to ask him on a date, that seems unusual. I'm not saying it's weird, but you know. Yeah. I mean, if it's out of the blue, you're going to get an interesting reaction. I mean, I feel like,

like if you're, you know, sitting there talking with somebody and you don't have the nerve to ask him for, ask him out on a date, but you've been communicating and talking and stuff, then you pull out a card and it says, want to go grab coffee and didn't joke, like in some sort of joking way. It's, yeah, I'm curious. Yeah. So where do you land on that part before we give them suggestions? Sure. That's a great question.

I'm going to return it with a question. If somebody handed you a card and asked you to be a friend that way or asked you on a date that way, how do you think you'd react? Oh, that's a great. See, the juxtaposition of receiving it really makes you think. Turn it around on us. Yeah, I like it. No, this is good because I'm, let me put myself in, like, college age. Let's say I'm Abe.

I'm Abe. and I'm in my new Pittsburgh graduate school program, and a very pretty girl comes up to me after, I don't know, whatever class and says, here. She hands me a card. And I walk away with that card and I read it. I think I'd be charmed by that. Now.

Yeah, I think so. It really depends on what it says on that. Yeah, hot girl. Okay. Right. She's really smart on you. And that's my point is like I'm trying to look at that. bias, right? Because what if this person is like a one-eyed single nostril, you know?

Single nostrils. Whatever. One of their arms looks weird. They're one foot's taller than the other. Whatever. Things are just like kind of you notice them because it's off the pattern. No judgment, but you just like, oh, geez. And then they give me that card. I think my reaction would be different. I think that's human bias as a play, right? That's what I would do. I would go, ugh. And then I would have a story to tell and I'd show all my friends and whatever. And I might even go out with them. because they were friendly and nice or whatever. But I would react differently if it was a very pretty girl in class versus maybe a less so.

Or a dude gave it to me thinking I was gay and I'm not or something like that. Would you think a really pretty girl giving you a card? You don't think that's weird? I think it's different, but I wouldn't. I would think it's weird because if she's a really pretty girl, she probably has never needed to give a card to anyone in her entire. Well, probably. But let's just assume it's her cute way of doing it.

it. Sure. Why, this is a whole other question that I should write in as a person and ask this question. Why in my head is that so much of an easier yes and that's great than the other scenarios? I don't know. Have you not heard of the Halo effect? Have we not discussed how easy life is for pretty people? No, I haven't heard the Halo effect before.

Tell us, give us a- It's been very easy for me. What is the halo effect? Brian, tell us what it's like to be a hot. It's great. People just give you stuff all the time. You know, I never have to pay for a tank of gas. I just drive up and somebody's, oh, let me get that for you.

Oh, that's wonderful. How do I get on the halo effect? It's incredibly cheap to be famous as well, right? You people will stuff constantly. You're never paying for a meal, right? Right. Or whatever. Present company very much excluded from this, by the way.

Yeah. There is a level of fame. Yes. That we do. We don't have. No. Yeah. Our internet fame is very different and also there are levels to that as well.

Yes. And I can promise you knowing what's coming next week, ain't nothing free. Anyway, go ahead. Somebody needs to comp scones lunch. Okay, so here's the halo. I did not see this turning in this direction, so I'm not super prepared with my stats. But for the most part, you find endless amounts of studies that just show the biases towards someone's symmetrical face, right?

Like they're pretty, you know, and so they're going to get. more attention or excuses or let off easier or you name it life is just easier which is why they have like worst personalities usually yeah because you don't have to develop any skill right and here's here's what i'm hearing with this therapist okay i'm hearing the therapist saying we're going to try lots of things right and this may be somebody who's like yeah cards are awesome like i've always collected cards or like you know, a challenge coin. We have this in, you know, human nature and then kind of specifically nerd culture. I think it maybe goes a little further, right?

And so they're working together on like, how can we build connection? And here's just a thing to try. I don't think this is not written in a book somewhere as like, this is the go-to way to make friends and influence. No, I'm sure it's not. Yeah. But it might be like, you know, they have a sense of where our email is at and are like, okay, here's a good first step because it's going to, you know, maybe break the ice. Give it a try.

I would argue you're both of your points is most people would find that odd to have someone hand them a card. Odd no matter what also. Yeah, I think that's, I should have said that to start with. You don't hand cards out at all anymore as well, right? Yeah, you do if somebody says, hey, how do I get a hold of you? Oh, hang on. I have a card.

Like, that's fine. Right. And even then you're like, you have a card? Wow. Yeah. But I think, you know, is it possible that the therapist that recommended this has kind of like this not ulterior motive, but knows that in doing this, in handing somebody a card, it actually might, the conversation might then switch to, let's talk about this card, and that might open

them up to talking about, you know, going on a date or going, being friends or going, seeing a movie with somebody, as opposed to like, you know, check this box if you'd like to see a movie and return this by self-address stamped envelope to this address. It's more like, so I'm, you know, socially awkward, here's a card. I'm trying this out. Oh, well, it's really funny. It's cute. Oh, well, let's, you know, let's have these cards worked.

And it just opens up a line of conversation. Is he that it worked before? Right. Yeah, I mean, it would be my first question. And that opens up conversation then between the person that they're giving the card to and them deflecting the, want to be friends, want to go out on a date. And it moves it off of that, that touchier subject.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that sound like that's a very, that's a very socially mature thing to be able to do to say, I'm, I'm socially awkward. I kind of just do this. But like you said, Brian, that breaks a lot of ice? Tons of ice. But isn't that a sign that you don't actually need to be doing that? Do you know what I mean? But the therapist might think, you know, if I give him these cards to use as a crutch, he'll realize that he doesn't need them. Kind of thing.

Maybe that is the idea. Yeah. So what do you say, Wendy? Okay, I'm going to just tell you a therapist secret real quick, okay? Nobody listened to this. Oh, boy. All right. Oh, boy.

All right. We make up stuff sometimes. It has zero research backed. No one's ever tried it before. It pops in your head and you're like, you know what? I don't know how else to help you with this thing. What if we tried this, right? And so my guess is the first attempts and I feel like we're talking about the emailer

and one shed of two. emailer, but, you know, there may be this like, okay, social interactions are hard for you. The real question I want to know is why? Do we have some neurodiversity going on? Because that is a very common place to experience hard to read somebody's facial cues, hard to know when to say a thing. If you think about the nuance of human communication and then having that truncated to just very linear or logical or like the way someone with say autism or sometimes ADHD will communicate you really it's very different patterns than you have with someone who is like hey what's going on and reading the room and like saying this next thing go to small talk you know so brian you gave

the example of someone like like scott said the skills that you would then have to use to manage the awkwardness of the car yeah if it's potentially awkward would it defray but it defrayed but it defrayed flex like it yeah good yeah and it's very possible that's what the therapist thought i was just gonna guess that the therapist probably was thinking okay we've tried a couple different things it's not working what if we try this thing and any and it sounds from the email he lit up right like he's like yeah excited about it which is and so that is that is where my secret about therapist is that we are going to move to where you are willing to try a thing and we have to sort of see that you're even like it's clicking for you.

So I'm just going to say there's not a research paper on hand-on-out cards as a social. That's fair point. I mean, there probably wasn't a research paper on, you know, immersion therapy before somebody said, you know what? And instead of you being afraid of this thing, I'm going to make you experience more of it. Usually these are accidental discoveries, by the way. Like, oh, if I found a shark tank, then, oh, turns out that will actually help me overcome my fear of sharks or something.

I think even the process that he's going through now with coming up with what phrases he wants on the cards is a potential. He's kind of getting practice in, oh, what are the small talk things to say? You know, instead of as he's writing these, he's like, oh, I could totally say that to a person instead of just having it on this card. Okay, I'll keep that one for my for my small talk repertoire. And then, but I'll put this on the card and whatever. And it's, you know, I think this is, the therapist might really be on to something here with just the ulterior motive of. Right. Exactly.

Yeah. In this process, he's going to develop some skills and not even realize it. And he's willing to do this. And that's often when you're working with someone, just what are they willing to do that's outside of the repetitive patterns that keep them in the same place, right? So my guess is they've already explored ways that it has not worked for him to engage and interact. And he lives somewhere in the Midwest. If it's specifically Minnesota, I could tell you right now, like there's a lot of socially sort of off people that you might straight up give a card to and they would love. So I'm not convinced it's not a good idea at all.

I'm just saying there's people who with like you and Scott and I would probably be like, what are we doing with the card? And then also like we would do the social magic to make that work out. But that would be you doing the work necessarily if someone just hands you a card and says nothing. Right? Yeah. But there's something about, okay, maybe this is just on my mind. But you know, is it wonderful attorney Wu?

What's the TV show? I don't know. It's a K-drama. Oh. It's a K-jrama. drama about she is an autistic lawyer and she's...

I've never heard of this. It's so adorable. Here's what I love about K-drama. It's just as anyone needs a mental health tip and you still want to watch some TV but you need to feel good. Get yourself a K-drama because number one, you can't do anything else.

You have to read the, unless you speak Korean, of course. But you just have to read, you have to read it. And it is so earnest and wholesome and innocent and it's called extraordinary There we go. Extraged an attorney woo. The best one to start, if you want to start your K-Drama series or life, is the one where they, this, she, it's called crash landing on you or into you.

And she accidentally takes the parachute and it lands her in North Korea. Oh, shoot. It is so dumb and cute and so, like, sweet. I'm telling you, there's nothing more wholesome. And here's what happens is you have to read. And I've noticed this. Like I can't even fold laundry and do this, right? Which is unheard of in my life.

And so I'm like just reading and get absorbed in it. And I feel better after guys. This isn't like a dopamine high by any means. It isn't even like whatever. But okay, my point is in this show, she is, she has very odd mannerisms. The way she speaks. She's very blunt. Like all of the characteristics of having autism.

So basically is it like monk kind of, that sort of idea? Kind of, but way more direct and accurate, and then it's Korean, so it's extra fun. Anyway, but so she gets in front of the court, and she is odd acting, you know, all this sort of strange behaviors coming out of her. The whole courtroom's like, what is happening? And she does this preamble where she explains it, and she explains why she's talking the way she is and how she moves and how that might feel uncomfortable to them, but that she loves the law and that she really wants to help.

And she's like a genius, obviously, right? She's like a whatever. Anyway, so it is just like a really great scene that I feel like sometimes that is the key. And that is what these cards kind of feel like to me a little bit of like, hey, I'm letting you know this is hard for me. And I would love to connect. But I don't know how to do that quite with words. So the therapist is being creative and saying, okay, let's try this thing. You got excited about it.

And then it's like, all right, let's hand this out. the emailer's question is a good one, which is like, hey, do you guys have ideas of what I would write? But none of us, I think, are going to say, oh, write this because that's going to be the magic. It's not. No. It's more this authenticity that, of course, I saw in this show last night. So that's why it's all my mind of just like, like, you know, socializing is weird. Here's this card that, like, it would be so fun to hang out.

Like, you could have a few words that would kind of explain it. and then you have this card and you should just try it. Getting excited that this is the end all be all of how to make friends, maybe tamped down that excitement and, you know, some reasonableness because a lot of people might find that odd and not know how to connect. And then others would just think it's great. And then others,

it will be neutral. That's just going to be true of all of our social interactions. Yeah, whether it's on a card or verbal or whatever. Yeah. I don't know the dating thing. I can't see that working unless you are, at a convention where everyone's just like you.

It's got to kind of be, it can't be, you know, right to date. It's got to be something like, redeem this. Here's something definitely not to put on one of these cards. Do not listen to the X-7. Exactly. But redeem this card for one free latte with me or something like that. Obviously bad. But, but, you know, that step of like getting them, just getting the conversation started, do you, I would, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, but I would kind of shy away from putting on the card the reason for the card. Like I wouldn't put, you know, I have some social anxiety, have a hard time speaking to people. I would avoid putting that on the card and let that be the thing when somebody says, oh, what's this? And then that is your kind of, you know, that, that is, you know, that is, you.

your get your get the reason for the card kind of out there as a an opener to the conversation of why you've got the car unless you can't feel like you're frozen and you can't say that at all sure sure right that may be a factor so so one thing that you know I don't know if if the email has got some family around or or anyone he could practice some of this with because Brian, your point of immersion therapy or exposure therapy is a really good one, is actually getting some real-time practice in handing the card out and having someone, you know, that you love and knows you, you know, react honestly and like kind of help guide you do that, right? I mean, if you are at, I know this for a fact.

I know I have clients in the Midwest who love board games and will go to a, you know, a gaming house, whatever, where you play games, and you meet up with random people and play. A gaming house. Anyway, go ahead. That's what you guys call it. It's a hot house. It sounds like you might need some cards, Wendy. And you stand around, they stand around and do not know how to jump in or engage.

They don't know how to do it. And the human hierarchy that somehow exists all the way from middle school forever, the cool kids are playing at that table. And like, you know, whatever is happening and you're getting nervous. and you're overthinking it. You know, I'm going to tell you right now, there are 20 other people in the room who are you? Yeah.

And you're in the exact same boat. Give the person the card who is acting awkward. Do not give the person the car to the cool kid who you're like, I should be friends with. Just trust me on that. There is a bunch of people who are sitting around feeling like they maybe don't fit in. And, you know, Nerdtacular is a great place to practice this for people who are coming. If you're nervous,

if you're having any social anxiety. First of all, we know Brian, Scott, and Wendy never shut up. And so you could easily come talk to us. Yeah. I'll drag Misha there. She's incredible. Get Misha to talk to you. Oh, yeah.

It's more, uh, come listen to us because we won't let you get a word in as well, enjoy. But we will do this social. I made a term up a long time ago as a joke and it's really a gross word, but like social lubricating. Yeah. Um, but just like absolutely there are people that that's kind of natural for them. It's easy for them to do. So yeah, you can find those people and talk to them.

But there's a whole bunch in the middle who aren't going to help you out very well. And then there's a bunch of people who feel very similar to you are very nervous. Would freaking love to get your card. Right. So practice and talking this through with your therapist about where I can start. So we're not just walking into like a target and hand in a card out, right? You want to feel successful. So, you know, piecemeal this or step by step so that it can feel. you know, more successful. There are things like, I've talked about this on the show before, but like BFF, where you are actually looking for a friendship and you're matching with people and practicing that way, talking to somebody. Any gathering where, I mean, I just, I live in the

weird, if he's in Minnesota, you should have told me, but I don't know, maybe he's just saying scold because he can't help it. But this, there is no other city on planet Earth that has as many odd gatherings is this place. I am telling you there is a thing for everyone. So, for example, Saturday, and I think I told you about this last year, and we're going to make it this year is the Great Pencil Sharper. Oh, yeah, we did. We talked about it. We came up as a story on the show first, right? And then we were like, hey, Wendy, tell us about this pencil. And you're like, we're going. We're going to go see the Great Pencil sharpened. And then there is 10 million other gatherings that are specific to so many niches. And anyone who's ever thought of anything has a party and has

a place to go and a place to, you know, do the thing. So I would keep the card in context of where you want to meet the people you want to spend time with because they like the stuff you like. So, you know, making it so successful in baby steps rather than I just now have a bunch of cards I'm going to hand out. Because that plan, I'm not sure that's his plan, but that plan alone is going to backfire and discourage you pretty quickly because people, this isn't something that happens. very common. No, people don't do this. They don't walk up maybe a card, but. And what we don't want is you're taking a risk socially and having it rejected, right? So that's my risk I see with the cards is just that we're not going to have a small enough step of success before we get to. I just took all my courage, handed a card over, and the person thought that was ridiculous. Which is why a hot girl

can hand out a card all day long. Because the halo effect. Of course. Yeah. No, that's a, that's, I'm glad it has a name because I've never known

what to call that, but I can call it a halo effect now. Well, it's just like everything works for them because they're hot. And also there's, there's just beauty bias. I mean, there's a bunch of other terms and tons of research on it.

Like, it's wild. Sentences handed down, you know, leniency for any criminal behavior. Like, you got a pretty face. You are,

Al Capone is not right. But somebody. Al Capone is not right. If he walks in the room with a bat, careful, you might be after that. There's a difference. You have a bat or a symmetrical phase, one of the two things. If you play too much halo, you also have a halo effect. That's a very different problem.

Wendy, I found a pronunciation for that extraordinary attorney Wu show, but in the Korean version of the title. Can I play that for you real quick? All right, here you should be right here. Come on, why isn't it playing it spinning? Hold on. Isang Han Bion Hosa, Wu Yang Wu. There you go. That's the whole thing. Lou Young Wu.

Let me just tell you this. And Scott, you may enjoy just a few minutes of a K-drama too because it just sounds so familiar, right? Like just hearing Korean is so familiar. And so it's really fun to hear that. And everyone's why I'm like, I think I'm understand. And I'm not. Who am my kidding? But it is, it is, there is something healing about a K-drama.

Ask around anyone you, you will find people who absolutely love it. The other thing I hear all the time, my neighbor yesterday, we're both wheat in our gardens, we both have headphones in. I'm listening to some very devastating book about Ireland in 1970. And she is listening to, she goes, I said, oh, what do you listen to you? She's like, uh, fairy porn. Fairy porn. So I'm telling you right now, go ask the ladies in your life and you will find at least one

who is down the deepest fairy porn rabbit hole. You'll get her. So trust me, half of the chat knows exactly what. what I'm talking about. Oh, more, probably more than, well, I don't know. What do they call it? Romanticy. I hear about that a lot.

Oh, Romanticy, sure. It's a whole subgenre. Her book is like the gateway drug and then I think it's Thorne, Crown of Thorns or something. Anyway, and then it goes from there. Anyway, she's like, I am on book. She named it like 420. I know. And she's like, I'm just not sick of it yet.

Yeah. Well, I'm sick of Ireland in 1971. Taylor, Taylor keeps trying to get me to read Crown of Thuron. Thorne. She goes, Dad, I know it's like this subgenre thing you don't really think you're going to like. But I promise you, it's so cool. The fantasy stuff's so cool. And you love fantasy, right? Lord of the Rings, and the bed. I'm like, yeah. And she's like, all right, so give it a shot. I gave that one a shot. I couldn't do it.

Yeah. Yeah, that's very important. It's just too much, man. It's like, you know. They get, we all get our own thing, right? Whatever you want. Do whatever you're right. Yeah, this is not judgment by any stretch. Not at all. Sure. But it was fun to learn that every time I see my neighbor, I know now what she's listening to. It makes me laugh. There are people, if I told them to sit down and read God Emperor of Dune,

they're going to laugh at me. There's no way they're going to like that stuff. Amen. Which is our point to this guy, right? Like, you're in the Midwest. This is the mecca of nerddom. You got to just embrace that everyone in that room is also socially a little bit anxious. And like, find yourself in those spaces. I promise you, you will meet people who will think that card is awesome. And you will, you know, you'll have more. Like going where you fit is such a powerful way to feel like you belong.

And if you felt like you haven't belonged and you've had bad social experiences, is because it was the stupid jock in your school. So I went through Elliot, or sorry, Pete's eighth grade yearbook. And I pointed out, he goes, okay, who do you think is popular? I picked every single kid. And he's like, how do you know this? I'm like, because of their faces. Yeah, it's a halo effect.

electrical faces. They have clearly skin care that the other kids don't have. They have, you can tell they have money. Like, I know, I know a popular kid as far as I can throw him. And then he's like, so pick kids that you think nobody likes. And I could pick a few. And I was wrong about a bunch of them. And you know why? Because there isn't actually a look. I mean, there's a few that you could tell like, oh, someone might make fun of that or whatever. But he's like, oh, no, he's the nicest guy. Everyone loves him. I'm like, good. That's what I want to hear. So I can pick out every. Everyone is popular because they have to look the same. Yeah. Also, it does not last. That stuff, the people that match that in my high school turned out to be puds, all of them. I know. It's literally 100% backfires. Trust me, do not, you don't want to peek and you don't, but there is a tendency to follow an alpha or have this, you know, you're in a group, especially middle school.

Are we kidding? And so, so that feeling of like, I need to, I don't know, find your people is all I'm saying. find your people and practice, practice, practice. That is going to be key to, you know, the cards are only an instrument to the end goal, which is you want to be connecting. So the only way to connect is to actually eventually communicate and, you know, find ways to connect about, right? Yeah, find a place that's safe for the neurodivergent for the. Yeah.

Yeah, people get it. Like, you know, a thing that might be happening next week. That's a very safe place for the neurodivergent. And beyond. That's great. One final question, then we'll let you go, Wendy. This is unrelated, but it kind of goes back to your extraordinary attorney woo thing. When you and I were growing up and we were very young, we had these three, eventually three adopted Korean siblings.

And it was this cultural mix of us and these adopted kids. And there were no other families around us kind of like that. And it made us automatically weirdly diverse where we grew up and everything. Can you believe the dominance now? of these cultural aspects. Koreans are killing it. K-dramas, K-pop, Korean cosmetics are a force to be reckoned with unto themselves.

It's absolutely crazy. And so, you know, their GDP, like some huge percentage is just K-pop. Yeah, it's crazy. I look back at like when high school and I'm thinking, everybody thought Matt was an alien. Now it's like. Now they wish they had his skin.

Yeah, now they all wish they had Matt's skin. Well, maybe not mats, but Misha's maybe. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and you have this thing where like when you stop oppressing a people, it's just what? It's crazy what can happen. Yeah, they really come out of their shell. Yeah, we just needed. I don't think the North is paying attention. But anyway, pay. This has been good. Wendy, it's always good to talk to you. I think the next time we probably talk vocally. It will be physically here. Yeah, it'll be in person. We look forward to that. Everybody come and get to meet Wendy. She's not shy about that. She will not. Not at all. I have so much. I have a backpack of social lubricants. Not disgusting. And I'm like a ghostbuster. Yeah. Is that what the ghost busters? I think they pull the ghost in. I think it's the other way around.

Yeah, exactly. And my friend, I said it to her. You know, it's like, it's like when you, a Johnson where we can't say the right word. I was just trying to compliment her. And like, she's so good at social situations. It's so fun to have her there because I don't have to worry about it. And I said, it's like you have a backpack of. social lubricant. And now that's, I think, normal people say that and they don't. So I apologize, world, for that. It's a Johnson thing and I understand it and we were both born with it or raised with it or wherever the hell it came from.

Maybe it was the Koreans. Oh, no, full circle. No, I don't think so. But also, I have to say something real quick. I have a fun surprise for you. I'm very excited. Also, I'm going to bring some donuts, but I don't know who I should give the donuts to. Well, definitely give one to me.

If you're bringing them, if you're mark one of them right now. The tradition is usually the TMS live thing will have some sort of, you know, weird stuff. So we could probably do that. That's Friday morning. The opening deal. But Tom can have my climato. Yeah. Tom can then kiss your forehead or whatever he did last time.

Right. Remember that? Yes. Yes. Okay. So I'll bring some donuts to that. But then I have a fun surprise. You guys are.

I have no idea what you're bringing. Okay. I know. You really don't. I'm scared. It would be great. So please tune in or come and talk to us. Yes.

We're live streaming all of it. But if you're there, even better. We can't wait to see you all. Wendy, have a fantastic week, and we'll see you in an Earth week. Bye now. All right. That does bring up a very important question, Scott. What's that?

Speaking of social lubricant, is alcohol allowed in the ballroom? It is if you bought it in there with the bar that's in there. There's a bar. There will be a bar in there. There will be a cash bar in there. And it can go anywhere within that space. And it's very large. It's where all this stuff is happening.

And that includes the game room. all that if they want. The Utah law is you can't, unlike Vegas, we can just go outside and walk around the street with your big leg full of drink or whatever. Yeah. This one, the rule is you can't take it out

to, you know, on streets. They can leave the premises. Whatever the premises is. Which is the case for 49 of the other states. Yeah, it's normal stuff, right? I mean, I guess New Orleans has that too. You can walk around outside with it. It's normal stuff.

but in this case, they don't even, they don't even want you to take it to, like, the lobby or any of that. They want you to keep it in the thing. And that's some of that might be policy, but I think most of it's just Utah law. You just got to, you know, drink where you get it kind of thing. Yeah. Cool.

Well, good. Yeah, long gone of the days of the private club membership thing, which was the stupidest thing. Because on the radio, they'd have, all the ads would have to say at the end, blah, blah, blah, blah. There's a private club. Which was confusing anyway, because it's not really a private club. Yeah.

But then when you'd go there, you'd say, oh, are you guys drinking? Yeah. All right. Here's a little card to sign. You sign this. You're part of the club. Come in. It was so dumb.

So performative. Exactly. So stupid. To this day, I don't get it. But whatever. And I don't drink. I don't even care. That's just dumb.

Anyway. Yeah. And a reminder, glad you brought that up. Because Wednesday, the day before, which a lot of people will be here. No kids, but 21 and elders are going to want to do the smoke monster stuff. Mitsuo has done a big plan for that. I just, oh, look at these. forwarded to me so I would bring them for him, but he sent me a few of these.

These are cigar. Oh, look at that. That little ashtrays. Ashtrays. You put your dong on the. What do you call it? Keep it away from the lid end. You basically park your stogie right there.

Yep, you put it right there. And a few of those. Plus, he sent a butane tank. And today some kind of lighters are showing up. So he's prepped. He's prepped, man. Super prep. Yeah, usually this stuff is, you know, at home for him in Vegas.

But now he's got to like get it out to the place. Wow. I think the snowbird stuff he used to travel in bags and it caused some issues or something. He could correct me on that, but I think that's no. Because he would fly as opposed to just driving to, yeah. Yeah, I'm pretty sure he float. Well, maybe he did drive one of those years. I don't know.

I know that he drove the year that he brought me Zimas. Oh, maybe that. Because he was able to get Zimas in Vegas. And I couldn't get him in Denver. And he brought Zimas to Snowbird for me. He still get Zimas? There's still a thing. No, I don't think so.

No. Okay. Unfortunately. I thought Zenas were still. No. What's that the ones that people made fun of? Like, they're not really. White Claw or not smear enough ice.

Yeah, like that. Yeah. Okay. Now, what was great about Zima is on its own, well, fine. You know, okay. As a mixer with gin or vodka or any other alcohol, way, way better. Oh, really? I figured you liked him just for that, but the mixers

No, no, absolutely is a mixer. It's probably why they quit selling them because people weren't using them right or something. I don't know. Anyway, check that out. That's up on the Frog Pants, Discord. FrogPants.com will get you to the Discord if you haven't been there before.

It's super easy to get in there if you're not already part of it. And all the details are pinned in the Nerdtacular 2026 group. That's for next week, next Wednesday. Cool. That is going to do it for today's show. Frogpants.com slash TMS. Again, GameFest coverage tomorrow on core. FilmSack this weekend.

We're doing sneakers. I'm very excited. I'm sure you are. I've watched half of it. I was starting to fall asleep last night as I was watching it. Not because it's boring, but because still not used to the time. Sure.

Got to be alert. God, I forgot how much I love this movie. Sneakers is one of my favorite movies, and I love everybody in it, in particular. The character of mother, That is what established my, my unending love for all things. Acroid. Accroid.

Yeah. It's this kind of character that I just absolutely love. It's kind of grosser adjacent from Gross Point Blank. I love his acting. It totally is. There's, you know, your Blues Brothers, you're, you know, your Juliet Jake, your Ghostbusters character, very, very much a, you. you could draw a line from his S&L stuff right to those.

These other things feel so much different. His mother, his grosser, that sort of thing. So much different from his S&L stuff. His, I forgot the character name, but in Driving Miss Daisy, he plays Daisy's son. He's fantastic in that. He's great, yeah. He's just great. So we're going to watch that in a very young River Phoenix before he died.

Sydney Poitier. How do you get that guy to do any of this? I don't understand. Right, exactly. John Dunbar lady. That's her. Dunaway calls her John Dunbar lady. That's all I can think of, whatever he says it.

You know, the president of Battlestar Galactic is a rack-tag survivor group, you know? Exactly. Anyway, it's going to be great. Bring your... Very handsome Redford. Oh, that's right. Let's not forget our main star of the thing, Robert Redford. It's going to be great, and it's the only movie I ever felt like that did technology right, especially for the era it's set in.

It's very, very good. And Stratharine's amazing as the blind hacker guy. Oh, he's really good. Yeah, Whistler. Oh, man, you guys don't even know what you're in for. Sneakers. Prime, I believe, is where it's showing. Amazon Prime.

Yep. This is one, I think, is just going to be a great episode. So please tune in to that. No TMS Friday. Brian will be traveling. I may stream a game or something in the morning. I don't know. We'll see how I'm feeling.

Technically, I won't be traveling. I will be hanging out with Tina because I don't travel back until Friday. Oh, that's Saturday. That's right. So it's more that Tina's now here and I want a full day with her to go do fun stuff. Absolutely should. Have you decided to, for or against the filing cabinet deal?

I'm going to let her decide, but there's a thing that I do want to check out. Apparently, this guy lost a zoning in Cambridge, which isn't too far, like 40 minutes north of me, northeast of me. There is this guy who didn't get a zoning thing from the city board to be able to build something, but he happens to live right across the street from City Hall.

So at the top of this flagpole, he apparently built, hand carved out of wood, double bird, flipping off city hall on his property. I hope you go. I hope you see it. I'm so going, absolutely going. I'm sure there's some picture somewhere, but I'd rather see yours. That'd be great. Yeah. That'd be great.

That's right. Stick it to the man. Double burn him. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So I'm looking forward to that, but that's why there's no me tomorrow. So we'll see how I'm feeling, but if I'm okay, I'll stream something.

We'll give somebody, we'll give you guys something. And then the rest of the things you need, you can find at frogpants.com slash schedule. All shows are scheduled there. All things coming up, all our stuff. And next week's a little bit of a whack ado, but you know why. And we'll have the full, of course, the Nurtacular stream schedule is the same as what's actually happening there. So all of those shows that you see will be streamed live with maybe one or two exceptions. Oh yeah, we can't do the karaoke one because of music.

Of course. Of course. Right. But for the rest of it, all day, all the time. Oh, that's going to be great. Yeah, we'll see if the AV people we have to go through to do our AV continue to nickel and dime meat. That'll be great if they did. Of course.

Kevin's probably laughing to me right now in the chat. He knows how this is going. Sure. That's going to do it. Let's play a song for these people. Brian, what do we got? Yeah, this one's going out to David Taylor, Zytam. He mentioned it earlier this week.

Like, hey, you're going to get to my request? Yes, we are. And it is going to be today. He says, hello, Skaja Kwada and Bidwill. I don't know what these are references to. Goodwill? No, maybe not. I don't know.

Bidwill. Yeah, Scajaquata and bidwill. Sounds like almost locations, like city, city play on name cities. Yes. Maybe. Yeah, I don't know. He says, this is David.

I'm Zytam in the chat. On June 1st, I turn 60. Scott, can I get a version of happy birthday used to place for us? play for us olds. Every year I look forward to the AV Club covers, and when Guar is in the list, it's a plus. Can I hear Guar's cover of Pink Pony Club? All right, we're going to find that birthday clip.

I think he means the Miyagi one, right? Happy birthday. Is this it? Happy birthday. No, that's that guy, not him. You know what, though? That's what you're going to get, because I love it so much. I'm going to do it again.

Happy birthday to you. There you go, buddy. Oh, that's year. That's maybe a decade old, that thing. Oh, my gosh. Wow. Anyway, happy birthday, man. It looks like it's a 13-mile waterway in Erie County, New York.

This, well, Scegechata, so, or Scejakwara. Like a Native American name for the river or something like that? Yeah. Yeah. Man, we screwed those people over. Holy shit. Yeah. I think it's funny.

I think it's funny how bad. It's not funny. Not funny, funny. But it's funny how bad we screwed an entire nation of indigenous people over, but then decided to keep a bunch of names of shit. You know? Yeah. Like, we'll call it Utah after the Utes.

Yeah. No offense, get the F out. But we're going to. This is us making good. See, look, we named a place after you that we kicked out. Now everybody into the thing and go beyond the reservations, but stay out of our way. But isn't that nice we did that?

Exactly. Such pricks on a national level anyway. Totally, totally pressed. Anyway, so that's all right. Here it is. There's a cover of Chaparone's Pink Pony Club covered by Gwar. All the crazy visions of being in LA. I heard that there's a special place where boys and girls can all be queens every single day.

I'm having wicked dreams of leaving Tennessee. Here's Santa Monica. I swear it. I still love you in Tennessee. Always on my mind. Yeah, you southern draw the fow. Thanks for listening. The Frog Pants Network lives at FrogPants.com.

You're on my fingers out.