The Morning Stream - TMS 3073: Dolly Bots Roll Out

Episode Date: September 24, 2026

Is Barry Gonna Try To Smuggle Grapes?? Captain Ibbott: The Printer Soldier. Mosquitos and Russian Hookers. People like 'em long. Airport Malaria Phenomenon. Nerd Culture Indoctrination. Bend over and show 'em the star. Sticky Outy Wings. I don't like DEEEEEEEEEET! Not my circus, not my monkeys. Crappy Three-Way Deal. Maybe I don't understand malaria. Pepper Spray Flavored Popcorn. Of Courst. I'm Right and You're Wrong with Wendi and more on this episode of The Morning Stream.VIDEO: https://youtu.be/cXdORy-5pLc Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Barry Manilow may have sung, I write the songs, his signature hit, but he didn't write it. It was actually written by Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys. Hmm, anyway, make the whole world sing by supporting TMS today at patreon.com slash TMS. Coming up on the morning stream, is Barry going to try to smuggle grapes? Captain Ibbett, the printer soldier. Mosquitoes and Russian hookers. People like them long. Airport malaria phenomenon.

Nerd culture indoctrination. Bend over and show them the star. Sticky outy wings. I don't like deed. Not my circus, not my monkeys. Crappy three-way deal. Maybe I don't understand malaria. Pepper spray flavored popcorn.

Of course. I'm right, and you're wrong with Wendy. And more on this episode of The Morning Stream. You can look, but don't touch. You may just get hurt. Electric's your friend. You must stay alert. Electric and water should never mix.

Strange objects and socket. We'll put you at risk I guess you could say I'm an Oreo cookie freak And I don't know how to ride a horse The Morning Stream Still looking there are a lot Oh my gosh I'm only halfway through

I'm not going all the way down Yes I am Hello and welcome to TMS This is the morning stream for Thursday September 24th, 2006 I'm Scott Johnson. That's Brian Abbott. Hi, Brian Nibb. Hello. As you can see at home, we've already talked about this in the pre-show, but Brian is very Captain America today.

TMS Assemble. Yeah. I like this one, though. Is this the first movie World War II business, or is this the later deal? I think it's later because it has an Avengers logo on the arm. Oh, okay. I think this is, I don't know, you know, with the red stripes on the arm and stuff, but the best two outfits are in my opinion in the movies anyway because lots of cool stuff in the comics but yeah

the best in the movies are uh winter soldier is my favorite that's the costume that kind of defines it from then on for sure and then I really liked the World War II business in the first one really like that old school thing yeah I'll tell you the one I hate and which would burn in a giant eternal fire and it's that Avengers one he wore the bright blue bullshit that was terrible again you know that was that was him just waking up from the ice and didn't have a thing to wear. Yep.

That is basically what it was. Yeah, there's also the one that I really like that just has the, that's all Navy with just the star on it. Mm. Without the red stripes. Is that a end game Infinity War era thing? I want to say, ooh. Good question. When he was rebelling against the, the, the government.

Oh, this is a great little copy image. I'll put it in our TMS Discord thing here. This is a great little montage of all of his different uniforms. I mean, the blue ones are really just pajamas. They really are, yeah. Freaking terrible. Yeah, I'd say this is the closest one. It's that middle one that I really liked.

And I think that might also be, that might be Civil War. Civil War, I think is... Or is that Winter Soldier. Winter Soldier, I think, is the one next to the ugly one. Okay. I think, because that would have been the next movie day who was in, right? Yeah, if this is chronological, which I guess it probably is.

Yeah. So you had your old school, like, pulled the chair up and talk to the people one. And where the, you know, it's sewn together, basically. This is his USO, like basically traveling with the USO, that very first one there on the left. And the second one is, I'm going to take that Jeep and go rescue the howling commandos. Yep. Third is my favorite of that era. I love that third one.

Yeah. That World War II one is great. Yeah. And then we get Avengers goofy. Then the Avengers is the center or fourth one. Terrible. So that probably is Winter Soldier is the fifth. And then Civil War.

Yeah. So let's see here. This one is one. One of these is Ultron. Maybe that one's a. Oh. Well, now, uh... We all forget Ultron sometimes.

I mean, I, I just watched it. What was his, uh... I don't remember at all. Form an Ultron. Plus, this doesn't have his long hair, no helmet, uh, end game look, so... Right. Well, no, end game, he put the helmet back on, but in...

He put the helmet back on, but when you first see him in Scotland, he's not wearing the helmet. Yeah. In Infinity War, he's running around basically without it. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. I'm confused about that. the last three.

Oh, yeah. Somebody says Ultron is probably the one with the trees in the background, so second to last. That might be at the... Okay. Either Socovia or that first, that first attack in there.

And I think probably with regard to what I'm wearing, I'd say it's kind of a mix of the last three with this... Yeah. A little combo. Your star is bigger, though. Yeah, baby.

Yeah, wait, look the size of Brian's star. It's a big ass star. You think that star's big. is moon. Oh, yeah. Didn't they used to say that when you were kids? You'd moon people, but if you starred people, it was, you were doing the front zone. Wasn't that the deal?

I never heard that, really? Yeah, there was something with that when we were younger. I would think that if you show them the moon, you're just showing them butt cheeks, but if you show them the star, you're spreading them, you're bending over and spreading them. Yeah, that sounds way more like what it should have been, but I, for whatever reason, I think my friends all would say it, and they meant, you know, wieners out is what I think they meant.

Yeah, you've seen the bullets. Let me show you the asterisk. Ew. I don't like that. Nasty. Anyway, hey, so that's awesome. Oh, here we go. Here's a better, you know what, just to put another pin on this. Copy, image, paste. This is a much better. It's that middle one, I think that. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that's the. It's a dark star, but it's cool. It is exactly. Yeah. Yeah, I like that a lot. I do wish they had. He's not chronological, though. No, this one definitely isn't. No.

Because you've got... Pretty sure third in is... Yeah. Third and from the right is another... Oh, that one over there on the right? Yeah, I don't know what that one's from. What is that from? Hold on.

I don't know. With the weird gray... Yeah. Oh, yeah. The gray stripe that pulls down and then the lighter blue... I don't know where that's from. Here's another image. Here's a better image of it.

I don't know where that comes from. Weird. Okay. Oh, yeah. Is this Ultron? Oh, could be. Oh, dude, I don't know. Or is that a World War II thing? Because that's the letters and everything. I want to be the World War II one. Yeah, but that would definitely has airbrushed abs. Look at it. Oh, yeah. No doubt. No doubt. So a little bit of airbrush.

Not that Chris Evans even needs it, but. No, exactly. All right. That is a field uniform. This is Recognize the value in the imagery of his USO costume and its ability To allow him to lead Rogers submits ideas for the design of his field uniform to Howard Stark Stark makes Rogers uniform with carbon polymer blah blah blah blah so this is This is still the first Avenger it looks like Okay yeah that looks like World War II plus those of jeeps he's standing in front of

Yeah That all looks old school I think that's the one I actually like but I didn't know what was like full on a pair of jeans basically Look at those things. I know, they really are. Just put on his 501s, man. Zipper and everything. The dark one with the star in front of it is Winter Soldier, the one that doesn't have the red and white stripes. The gray one also that you just showed is also from Winter Soldier.

It is the uniform he steals from the Smithsonian Institute. So it is his old World War II uniform, but he grabs that. Right. Okay. I forgot he did that. Yep. The one with the trees in the background, Indeed is Age of Ultron. Infinity War is his dark star, no helmet-looking thing.

It's how you always know when it's Ultron is if there's trees. Yeah, exactly. My memory of that movie is so many trees. So many trees. In the beginning when they're in the chasing down, Strucker. Here you go. This is the end game promotional, you know, form photo and this is the one that has

the Avengers logo on the shoulder piece and Oh yeah there we go. Ooh, I like that. Yeah. That one's cool. A mix of modern and old. Yep, exactly.

And I'm glad none of them, they never tried to stick. And a big star. I think that might be the big star. Yeah, that might be the big star. That's got the brown shoulders, the Avengers logo on the side.

Yeah. I think that's what you're wearing. Kind of the fish scale looking stuff. Yep. I'm glad they never tried to put sticky outies on the wings I mean they did the beginning yeah

and it looked like ass I hated it looked like ass yes it was silly it's the kind of thing you can get away with in a comic book and it just doesn't work in live action well and they the best way to do it was for you know his traveling USO thing

yeah and they made it even look like little hand sewn little puffy yes exactly and it's uh I guess to you know Because his head is the American Eagle, I guess. Yep. That's right.

He's our American Eagle. He's our American Eagle. Well, all righty. That's awesome. Hey, I got a request for the listenership. Sure. If anyone out there is like one of these big markdown nerds, and you'll know what I mean when I say that,

if you use apps where you're doing a lot of like note taking, project planning, that kind of thing, but you're using markdown apps like Obsidian or there's others. Obsidian is the big one, though. Big open source one that everybody uses. Curious if any of you, A, are those people. And B, if you have any, like, best practices tips, because it's very easy I've noticed to go in there and go, well, I'm just going to over-organize everything.

And I think maybe that's wrongheaded when the whole point of the markdown stuff is the quick search, the fast linking, the idea map you can create. You basically create a neural network eventually. of your ideas, your thoughts, your stuff, the things you've written. And they can all kind of link together and all this. There's a whole thing. There's a whole vibe with the community who uses this thing. And I'm just curious what best practices are. So if any of you out there have any good ideas, will you ping me on Discord or an email or something and just share your stuff? Just tell me

here's how I started. And I, in this, that way, it didn't become unwieldy or I didn't regret doing this or that. Because my tendency is to go, I'm going, I'm going to make a folder for everything and treat it like a computer and go, here's my folder for all the card games I'm working on. Here's my folder for all my comic ideas. And here's my folder for TMS and so on. Yeah. I started doing that and I went, I don't think this is right. So anyway, curious what people do.

I'm trying to get into that world. That markdown stuff's interesting to me. So let me know. Send me a message. Totally unfamiliar with it. But sounds cool. Denver Tadpole meetup. Coming up.

Coming up. Decided we nailed it down, October 10th, while Barry. here. We're going to do the Denver Tadpool meetup and we're going to go to this place called Acridge Cidery. It's a stem cider place. I should give you a link, man. This place, you put it on screen. I'll give you a link.

Here you go. Just the drone video that these guys have for their hero image. Oh, didn't you show this? We've shown this on the show before. I talked about how much I want to go to there.

That's right. And I still have not gone to there, amazingly enough. But you're now going to go to there. I am going to finally go to there. So, if you are Denver Tadpooler or in the area or you're coming here, I know that John and Angela and Burb are coming to the Casa Benita thing on Thursday night, let me know, please. In the Discord, I've created a new channel called Denver Meetup, or not created, I've just resurfaced a Denver meetup thing under...

It's at the very bottom under meetups. Nice. And there's one for Denver Meetups. Please respond to me there because I need to make a reservation for this place. And the sooner the better and no shows cost $10. But I think it's only if nobody shows up. I think if we say there's 10 of us and only eight of us show up, I don't get charged $20.

I think it just... Oh, I see. Yeah. Okay. I get charged $100 if I reserve a table. for 10 of us and nobody shows up. Well, that place looks awesome. I love this fly-through. I know. It's going to be great.

And what we'll do, we'll get a table inside just in case the weather's sketchy, but we can always move outside later on, but I'll bring some games, tabletop, things that you can play easily on a food table while you're drinking cider and chatting and that sort of thing.

Sounds fantastic. I won't bring Marvel United where we have to have the mat and all the little mini figs and all the cards and all that stuff. It'll be easy stuff. So is this somewhere in the discord or anywhere that people can express their interest and all that? It is in the frogpants meetups channel and a frogpants meetups channel called Denver Meetups. Oh, you said all this while I was watching that video, didn't I? I was mesmerized, man. That's all right. Maslow's 30, you got to say things two and a half times. I saw I kept, I kept being overfocused on that freaking dog in that lady's lab because I'm like,

I'll bet that dog hates a freaking fly over. The drone flying right over its head. Yeah, probably. Yeah, not a fan, those dogs. Yeah. Well, that's awesome. Go check it out. Get in there and express your interest in coming.

The question is, can Barry drink cider, or will he smuggle wine into the cider to drink wine while we all drink cider? I think he'd probably try the cider at least, but he'll try to get wine in there. He's going to try to get wine in there. Yeah, he always does. This is his thing This is his obsession It's his job now I mean copperwood

Copperwood dot wine Is his new site Yeah Check it out Go check it out you guys I've never met anybody Who likes wine the way he likes it No

And if you're gonna get certified As Somalia You better You better like wine Yeah get in there All right guys Time for some news And I say to that

Why not It's the news And it's brought to you by Brought to you by Coverville going to take place right after TMS today at Twitch.tv. slash Coverville. Tributes today.

So we have the tribute for Dolly Parton, but that same week that Dolly died, so did Tim Curry. Is that right? Yeah, I think so. And because there was so much Dolly music to play, I did not do a true Tim Curry set. Of course, you know,

covers of things that he did for the Rocky Har Picture Show and Ferengali also covers by him. He's done a lot of great stuff. Covers for Chad Gilbert of Newfound Gloub. Lori, another band that's done a ton of covers, and Duncan Sheik, probably best known for a song called Barely Breathing in the 90s. Yeah. 90s, early 90s. Yeah.

I didn't know that was him. I am barely breathing and I can't find the air. Yeah. Kind of feels sad to sing that now. Yeah. And you're six feet under trying to breathe. Yeah. Yeah, that was hell of a week.

Yeah, Dali, him, and the voice of Optimus Prime all dying the same thing. Yes. Colin, yeah. That was a crappy three-way deal. That was. Probably not the best way to describe it. No, but thank you for that visual. Sure, why not?

Eat or eat or eat. Roll out. Roll out. Dolly bots, transform. Let's get in. Duncan Sheik was last week, Dr. Calum, but Tim Curry was the week of Dolly. Yeah, there you go.

Let's get into this woman here who paid 120 grand to have a baby for video game billionaire who has over 100 kids. He obviously does this a lot. Okay. A woman in California revealed she was paid $120,000 to carry a baby that ended up being a Chinese video game billionaire's kid, a guy that goes to buy the name of Jubeau, I think is how you'd say that with the X in front. Jubeau, I think. Wow. So she's not a wife. She's just DLC. She's DLC. She's downloadable content and expensive. I guess the baby's more downloadable content. Yeah, that's true.

that is true. He subbed out this particular content. Let's put it that way. A woman from California revealed she was paid that money. There was plenty of reasons why people choose to go down the surrogate route. When it comes to having a child, on the flip side, surrogates can off to make some money from deciding to carry a child for nine months, provided they are not just helping out a friend.

However, you might not find out who the babies intended for. In the case of a woman in California, turns out it was this dude. Speaking of CBS, she, uh, who, let's see, the woman who's only been named only as Judy. It's not a real name, Brian. She's protecting her identity. Judy, Judy, Judy, I've got your baby. Uh, see, has her own seven-year-old child. After she spotted the ad for 120K, she decides she could help, uh, her find a home for her family.

So she's like, all right, I don't do this. Why not? Use this to help buy a house. Why not? Yeah. Uh, so she, she was wary by, or she said she was wary by the fact that the surrogacy agency, Patriot Conceptions. I don't like that. No, I don't like that at all. No.

I think the term patriot has just been used as a weapon for such a long time, well, for the last couple of years so much that it's like, it's now a, it now feels like a derogatory term. Yeah, it's a pejorative. I don't like it. Yeah, exactly. People say, yeah. Thanks a lot, Jesse Plemons. Who's the real patriot around here?

I'm like, freaking quit saying that word unless you're talking about football. What kind of patriot are you? I think he said American, but yeah, same time. Oh, did he have but he said Patriot? Let's find out. I have it right here. Okay. Do I?

Well, you've got a recording, so I trust your... What kind of American are you? Yeah, it's American. There you go, American. That's even getting to be a pejorative. It is. It is, yeah. Yeah.

I'm afraid of America. I love that song. I did too. Let's see. Let's see. Okay, so here it is. The Chinese billionaire behind the Guangzhou Duoy Network.

which was created a whole host of mobile games, or a big mobile game maker. He had downplay claims that he fathered over 300 children, but revealed that he has more than 100. So she could either choose view ads or have child. Yeah. Or the best value, $99. Right, exactly.

I still, I've never met a person who did that, who actually did the $100 mobile app option. No, oh gosh. Like, I've done plenty of things where it's like, oh, okay, 99 cents or, I did, you know, and the one that was, it was difficult, but I've been enjoying the game enough to where I decided to do it, is that, that dice game with the skull. Oh, yeah, the five bucks you get out of the ads.

Calm, Calma, or something like that, or whatever it's called. I like when they let you pay out of ads. Oh, for sure. I'm happily to support those guys. For sure. Yeah, it goes to the developers and all that sort of thing. And I like just barreling through that game. I made it through 25, 25.

Oh, nice. Yes. I haven't even done that yet. Nice job. I know I could see that from the game center. I'm not very good, apparently. How does, what happens then? Is it a game over at that point?

He just says, he says, congratulations, I will let you live. Don't spoil it. Don't waste it. Okay. And then I immediately got back in and only got to level four. Oh, so they'd let you relatter the whole thing. Yeah, I mean, you just start back over at the beginning with no power-ups or anything. Got it.

I thought maybe did get a, did get a bunch of wardrobe stuff. and now my skeleton guy looks like a pirate. Just give you guys an actual name of this thing. Yeah. It's very good. Where is it? I can pull it up too. I thought I had it handy here.

It is from Pepperbox Studios and the game is called Dice of Calma. That's it. Dice of Calma. K-A-L-M-A. I knew it had dice in the name. Why is mine only let me search for it? Weird. It's like hidden or something.

Yeah, you recommended that to me and it's quite good. It pulled me away from Dungeon Clawler, which I'm also really liking, but... Yeah, they're both good. They both have just enough luck in them and just enough little skill add-ons to make them interesting. For sure.

It's like, it is very much like the dice version of Balachro, though. Yeah, very much. You're really just creating, what's the word, synergies between... Yes. Cards, or in this case, dice, and then perks and... Right, exactly. and still like, oh, I'm going to beef up my full house benefits,

or I'm going to beef up my four of a kind, kind of like you do with Bellatro as well. Yeah, yeah, that's cool. It's a good game. You guys should check it out if you are into the mobile scene. Yes. So with this guy, keep looking through the article, it does not say whether or not she is now,

like, does she have to fully raise this child to adulthood? Or they don't get into it. I don't know what the deal. maybe let's see let me dig down deeper let's see the presenter with documents intended father was this dude

um because 120,000 dollars it costs way more than that to raise a kid these days yeah it does well yeah especially till her 18

yeah the question is if she was just for the nine months and then hand the kid over she added that she doesn't understand quote the motive unquote behind so many children it's going to be hard for the child

it's just a really crappy thing to be a part of, she says. Yeah. I guess if it's surrogacy as opposed to, you know, surrogacy implies once the baby is done breastfeeding and all that sort of thing, it's turned over to the dude. It says here at the bottom, the Chinese billionaire has previously said in an interview that he wanted to have at least

20 or so U.S.-born children with one of them, eventually taking over his business. Boy, you're thinking you're just getting better odds by having... That's it. What is people with too much money? Musk does a bit of this too. It's not hundreds. But he does this thing where he's got, he's got like 18 kids or something.

Something like that. Yeah. And it's with 100 people and he doesn't hardly talk to any of them and he's not really a good father in any way. What is the point of this? Is this just like a, you're so certain that you are that cool. that you've got to make sure you leave your seed, man. Yeah.

And the other question is, will, does the, anything happen to the deal if it's a girl? Because knowing the, you know, knowing some of the, the Chinese beliefs and stuff, or not beliefs, but. Just cultural stuff. Cultural stuff. Yeah. Yeah, that's definitely got, that's definitely a knock on with that. Maybe that's it.

He's like, if I have 100, at least 50, it'll be boys. I'm good. Yeah, there you go. I don't like it. These guys need to knock it off. Take your billions and quit being weird. Exactly. Freaking weirdos.

Help a third world country and then you can kind of, you know, celebrate all the kids that you just helped. Yeah, yeah. There you go. No, see, Meg, I wasn't trying to do direct math. He says 18 kids with 100 people. The math is not working out there. No, I know. Elon's got like a million baby mamas.

See, that's the wrong number. Yeah, you just went the wrong direction. Yeah, I'm just exaggerating. So that's how that works. A third person has died after a mosquito was reportedly trapped on a plane into Germany in a airport malaria phenomenon. Oh, my God. Jesus. This is gnarly.

Third person dies after the mosquito was reportedly trapped on a plane in Germany. Three people have died from the malaria. They said the thing twice. Why did that happen? All right. Several people were rushed to a hospital amid a rare outbreak of the topical disease following flights to Frankfurt. This according to the sun. It was unclear where the flights were or had departed from.

The third person, a resident of Schwanheim. Schwanheim? I think that's right. Yeah. Oh, for sure. That feels like one of the easiest ones that we've had to pronounce. Yeah, it's not bad. In a long time.

Just north of the airport died recently. In August, the airport worker also died from the disease. Neither had traveled to a malaria endemic region. The Lufanza Airbus A320. Oh, that's the airline that in Goodfellas they steal from, or they, they did a heist from. Lufthansa. Yeah, the Louvtonza heist. And that was the one that got him, it got Robert De Nier all paranoid and started, started clipping everybody.

Because he thought everybody was going to tell on him. Oh, it's time to watch that movie again. You need to watch it again, too. Yeah. Anyway, it sits on a remote stand at the Frankfurt Airport in Kleisterbach or Kerstro. So close. Kilsterbach Frankfort am main

he is Let's see Anyway the idea is this thing got in there The mosquito had malaria It gave it to everybody he bit Just stopped It just went to town And all the passengers

Had a little buffet Yeah I thought Okay I could be Maybe I don't understand malaria Like it's mostly eradicated In most of the world How do you

So if one mosquito With malaria Gets on a plane anywhere in the world and go somewhere like here to the states, that means we now have a malaria problem. We're not inoculated against malaria. We're not vaccinated against it, right? We're not vaccinated against it, no.

Okay, so that seems dumb to me that we would, that just that could have, that seems, I don't know why that seems crazy to me. I mean, this, you know, this mosquito could have easily traveled to the United States from, from Germany and, and then had fun in one of the airports or something, right? Like it, you know.

Yeah. But then it's, I guess it stops at those people. It's not like, because it's not spread by, it's only spread by mosquitoes. It's not spread from person to person. I think that's right. Yeah. I am no entomologist. I am no master of bugs.

But I can tell you that I think that's true. Spread when an infected mosquito bites of human, releasing parasites that travel to the liver before maturing and invading red blood cells. It's awful sounding. Yeah. Do not want. Yeah. Do not want it.

Was Bill Gates on that flight. Yeah. Yeah. Didn't he do that, though, at a TED conference? He opened a jar full of malaria flies or something. So it was something like that? What was that? Someone in the chat remind me what that was.

That sounds familiar. All I can think of is the fake Oprah. You get a bee. You get, really. It gets bees. I love that bean. that's the best of the you get a free car meme or whatever. Yes, for sure.

Bees. So wait a minute. Well, does anyone remember? Maybe it was just mosquitoes, but they didn't have anything, but everybody there freaked out because he was talking about malaria.

So he's talking about, so it's Bill Gates. He's up on thing, I love Russian hookers, whatever he's doing. And then he opens a jar and goes, so malaria, this and that, and we've eradicated,

bab, bab, bab. And then he opens the jar and says, like these. And he lets him out. And the crowd kind of, of loses it. And then he had to explain, no, these were just regular mosquitoes, but I still was a bad choice. Which is still, it's a bad choice because I don't like mosquitoes either.

I don't, you know, I don't like mosquito bites. They itch, they're pain in the butt. It's, it's, you know. Yeah. Why do that? Yeah. There it is. Captain Kippur found it.

During a 2009 TED Talk, he opened a jar of mosquitoes and let him fly around at a TED Talk. She's saying malaria. You can't see it. Malaria spread by mosquitoes. I brought some. I'll let them roam around, he says. I love Russian hookers, he finished with. Isn't that his whole thing in the Epstein files?

He's got like Russian hooker connection. Really? Okay. That one I have not, that's one part of this I have not kept up on, apparently. Yeah. And also, just, you know, these people on the flight, some types of malaria parasites can lie dormant in your body for up to a year. So, yeah. So some of you on that flight without,

symptoms. Don't think you're out of the woods yet. I wonder if you can head it off. Like, get in and... Oh, yeah, right. Like, uh, sure. I don't know if, I don't know how that works. You know, if this is only, if that's, hmm. Yeah, don't drink Diet, uh, trying to stop it. That, that, that, do that, the bad, bad idea. No, already not supposed to spray it on yourself. Don't eat it. I know. Right. Deet, Dete was bad. Deet's bad. You want to spray it on your clothing, but not on your, not directly on your skin.

That's right. I did plenty of DET when I was a kid because they didn't know yet. Yeah, they didn't know. Didn't understand. Do you think we're going to have Dete-related stuff later in life or no? I think one day the doctor would be like, hey, you did too much DET when you were tired. You did too much Dete. Yeah.

Yeah. I hope not. Well, then we'll get the class action lawsuit commercials. Oh, yeah. Were you affected by Dete in the 70s? Did your mom go to town with a can of off? Yeah. I hope it doesn't turn out that way.

I hope not too. I don't know how it shows up or what the, I could probably dig into it. But yeah, when we were kids and if you went to like when I would go to scout camp, they'd cover you in Diet. And then when I was, I don't know, late teens, they came out and said, oh, Diet. It's like worse than an asbestos.

Don't spray deed on your kids. And I went, you've been spraying it on me for a decade. Yeah. And now you're telling me it's bad. Great. Thanks. Thanks for figuring this out. And how do we feel about eggs right now?

Are eggs good? Are they bad? Where are we? with the eggs. I don't know, but I still have a couple eggs almost every, almost every day. I think right now they're in the good column. They're in the good, because you know, you get your protein and, yeah. It's good protein, too.

It is good protein. But someone will turn around a couple years ago, oh, we found out that the level of corrosive artery bullshit in eggs. It's okay as long as you don't eat the yolk. Yep. Here's another story about a man arrested. for pepper spraying a moviegoer. Okay. It says Arvada, Colorado.

Yeah, I was going to say, this is not me. Huh, weird. All right. Just kidding. It's Burbank. Police say a Los Angeles man was arrested after allegedly pay. Pepper spraying another moviegoer who was using his cell phone during a film at a Burbank theater.

Justified. Yeah, worth the jail time. Get in there. Do your time. Officers from the Burbank Police Department. said it was an AMC 16 theater at about 5.30 p.m. It says, investigators said the subject,

34-year-old Matthew Ware, became upset with another patron who was using a cell phone in the movie and sprayed him right in the eyes. The witnesses who were there said the mayhem happened at about 40 minutes into the film. And that movie was Paw Patrol. Yep. There you go.

That'd be amazing. There's like a little kids movie. The poor kids, yeah, like the overspray gets on kids. It's horrible. I would love that. Anyway, he's in trouble. he's going to go I guess the guy yelled it out

Oh behind him Oh behind him eh Yeah so it wasn't like So he was in a row behind him And the bright light from the phone And instead of like saying Hey turn that thing off Or could do you mind you know

That's really bright At least turn the brightness all the way down Or keep it close to your chest or something Yeah Just decided Spraying the guy Yeah he yells out in the theater by the way Quote

And a guy yells out I just got pepper sprayed This guy just pepper Sprayed me! I wish I was there. I don't want to be pepper spray, but I don't want to be there. Anyway, fun stuff. Yeah.

That's a little, I mean, you don't, you don't take pepper spray to a movie unless you are planning on using it, right? Like he, it's almost like he was looking for a reason to use it. Yeah, the buried headline here is, why are you taking pepper spray to a movie theater? Unless you are sure you're going to get no altercation. Well, that's all. like I do. Yeah, dude, like that. Or just spit cherry seeds. There you go.

During the previews, you make a bunch of spit wads, and then you fire them off. Yeah, you just got to prepare a little bit. It's not that hard. Hey, guess what, everybody, it's time for us to put our news hats off and instead exchange them for this hat right here. Something wrong, Batman. Has anybody seen Wendy?

I hope so. She's right here, I think. Hi, Wendy. Hello. Hi. Hi. How are you? Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. How's life? Do you always do the news right before me? Usually.

Yeah, sometimes we have other, we have something that goes long in the top, so we'll skip news, but usually news before you, yeah. We like to soften them up, you know, before you. Are you okay with that? Yeah, you're all right with that? Yeah, I guess. Well, the news we do is not serious. We don't do, we don't do serious news.

We don't do that in mind. I was noticing. Yeah, we do a lot of like, oh, some guy ate four turkeys and then ran naked through the park or whatever. That's that kind of stuff. Nothing. Yeah, really important stuff. We try to...

A hard-hitting journalism that TMS is known for. We don't want to talk about how the United States is suddenly decided the free press is no longer free. That kind of thing. We don't want to do that. Exactly. Because what good would it do. Yeah, we'll keep it up. Keep the stories.

We will. To my sister, Wendy, she is, of course, a therapist... Of course, a therapist and a helper of real people with their mental health. And she comes on the show on Thursdays and helps you with yours. And we didn't have a show. show last week, so we've missed you terribly. So now you have to do two. Yeah, you're doing two today.

Actually, you were doing kind of just a long one. So it's a meaty one. This is a meaty one. This is very good. Yeah, a lot of setup. A lot of setup on this one. So let's get to it. This is from an anonymous listener, although it sounds like somebody who probably talked to Wendy at Nerdtacular based on what they say here. But anyway, hello, since Therapy Thursday missed an email, I have something for Wendy. I think they meant to miss a show.

Well, no, a couple back, Wendy had to make up a topic as we'd have an email or whatever. Oh, right, right, right. Not make it up, you know what I mean, address one. Yeah, we made it up. Wendy's always making crap up. Please keep me anonymous. Wendy might vaguely recall a quick chat at Nurtacular. Background.

Parents divorced when I was 13 or 14 after living hundreds of miles apart. As the eldest, I became the other parent to my younger brothers, four and eight years younger. Amidst heavy conservative religious topics, right before my 21st birthday, as I finished college, mom and the brothers moved near me. Mom had a fatal heart attack. After tracking down dad, I became my younger brother's guardian with dad's blessing, and we lived together until the middle brother turned 18. Ten years ago, middle brother demanded a, quote, family meeting and ordered no contact

because he feared my liberal views were indoctrinating his son. My only crime was an annual sleepover involving video games, comic books, and park trips. I complied to keep the peace, though it crushed me. me as a childless aunt and they, sorry, and later they moved three hours away without telling me directly. Last year, dad arranged a family weekend due to failing health. It was my first time seeing my now 17 year old nephew in 10 years. Oh, wow, he's seven and then that's a long time. We bonded instantly over a board game conversation proving he was, uh, still had his old comics and didn't hate me. Proving he still had his old comics didn't hate me. Yeah, that's right. Last April, dad passed

way middle brother called me our first direct talk in a decade and acted as if nothing it had ever happened. We've been walking on eggshells, never discussing the past. In August during a family board game weekend, Middle Brother casually dropped that his cardiologist said he may need to go to the heart transplant list or get on the list. Ironically, about 20 years ago, I was diagnosed with a heart condition, which led to Middle Brother getting tested and diagnosed with a related hereditary condition. It might have been what took their mom. For now, my, for my conundrum, in early October, Middle Brother is in town for a medical stress test and youngest brother is planning a family dinner, assuming middle brother and I are getting along so well. I just want to move forward without rehashing the past, but I'm worried I'm just sweeping things under the rug.

I just want to text him without feeling like I'm walking on eggshells. As a bright spot, nephew and I are right as rain, texting about attack on Titan and Jiu-Jitsu Kaysen, I think. Carter knows this. And he wants me to take him to a con, says Anonymous. So some real mix of happy reunions and weirdness in this one. Yeah. And grudges or just uncomfortable, unresolved feelings. Maybe the brothers lightening up because gas prices went up.

Maybe that's going on. Maybe that's it. That'll do. Because look, when pedophilia and rape isn't enough, you go to gas prices. That's what gets you. It's got to affect you directly. Sure, sure, sure. So where do you want to go with this one?

Yeah, wow. This is just a lot. First of all, I mean, you have kind of the right thing is being done, right? Like you're connecting with the kid, you're respecting your brother's wishes, right? You're not indoctrinating anyone. Good job. I mean, maybe in nerd culture you're indoctrating someone. But, you know, like you're following somebody's wishes.

I think, you know, as right as we could all feel about whatever position we're in or, you know, this is everyone feeling that, by the way. Everyone on any side of any coin is convinced they're correct because as a human being, your natural tendency is to perceive attack and then defend yourself, right? And so the best way to defend ourselves is this internal sort of schema we have that is like, well, I'm right and they're wrong. They're all bad. I'm all good. there is something about survival and tribalism that is just really naturally occurring in how our brains work, right? And so what's tricky is that, you know, you're going to feel innocent. This person's feeling like maybe you're not.

But also, can we just roll the tape back to the fact that y'all have had a really tricky growing up situation? Right? So a lot of, you know, first of all, you're the eldest and eldest daughter. That's what I'm getting here, right? Meaning you're basically have been parentified, your parents' divorce, and, you know, you lose your mom, and you have like this role that you were trained to do very young. And that's hard. And we've talked about this on the show before when people have parents who did not do a great job. job of protecting kids from adult stuff, right? And that's one of the challenging things about

divorce is divorce introduces all the adult world. You know, it kind of comes crashing in on a kid, especially if they had no clue it was coming. But most kids have a sense. There's a vibe. They wonder if they could do anything differently. If I'd clean my room, maybe this wouldn't have happened. You know, there's a lot of self-blame and self-referential stuff that happens. But there is just a absolute invasion of adult level problems onto a child. So let's say everything was hunky dory till that moment, that still was a big burden placed on kids, right? And so that's why when, you know, it's notable when someone comes in and with their family history that there was a divorce. And even if parents do it perfectly, a kid is going to have their own sort of

understanding or take on that. And it's important because what was the takeaway. So that's what I would be interested to find out from this person. Like, what was the takeaway? And it sounds like they did not want children. That was one of the takeaways. They had enough responsibility, but they feel this very motherly feeling towards a nephew and politics has gotten in the way of a family, just familying. But I would argue there would be something else if it wasn't this. I mean, you know, I don't know if you guys know that families have always been dysfunctional, but they have. And so prior to being maybe so split politically, it would have been along religious lines. It would have been along, you know, you decide to leave the town we have always lived in or whatever the thing could be.

There's, I mean, real quick, everyone name two famous books about families that don't get along. Go. Oh, gosh. All of them. Christmas with the cranks. Exactly. That's all we need. There are probably, there are probably so many, right?

I mean, let's start with Shakespeare. Oh, yeah, there you go. First time it was written. Yeah, probably it's one of the most common thing. Oh my gosh, I just- Romeo and Juliet, of course. All of Game of Thrones is a giant family fight. 100%.

100%. So, and it's because it's special. I think it's, is it the beginning of Anna Karen and then, am I getting it wrong? But Tolstoy says, all happy families are the same. No, so all happy families are different, but every, every unhappy. family is the same. Am I kidding backwards? Anyway, either way, they are very predictable in some of the dynamics.

It's gone throughout history. It's been written about a million times. So nobody's special is what I'm getting at. And the dynamic that you have in each of your own families is the uniqueness to it is just maybe the times things happen, the personalities, right? You're trying to patch together a weird looking quilt and it's hard. And not everyone has the skills and not everyone has the maturity. But if the parents don't start with the maturity and sort of creating that healthy culture,

it tends to then bleed into whatever the kids then do. So you have a bunch of adults who get to make their own choices, but all seem to be having a real health scare going on with hearts. That's scary, right? So the question is, am I sweeping things under the rug or do I just, you know, get this over with, do we just, what do we do? Or do I walk on eggshells? So I would really wonder, are you walking on eggshells? Can you not be yourself? And if you can be yourself, and I don't mean your political self, because there is a time and a place where if you want to just never

have a relationship with someone, then you're going to just keep trying to convince them that you're right the way you think about things. And man, have we proved this out that no amount of logic and showing somebody research or whatever does anything other than get them in defensive mode. And maybe there are a few people out there who've been able to be swayed either way by loved ones. But usually it's just a doubling down and we can't be together and a lot of boundaries and a lot of no contact. That's been the way a lot of people have handled it. So if, so that's what I would ask. Like, are you actually walking on eggshells if you are just being your cool self hanging out with the kid, you know, are you trying to,

mother everybody, that would be my second thing I would really look at is like as the oldest trained parent in disguise, are you able to let go of that role and, you know, allow everyone to do and live the way they want? And that's, that's hard too, or believe you know better or, you know, because everyone kind of does the oldest child parentified thing a little differently. But so really take a look at yourself. Like, what are you doing that is made? maybe I'm still trying to parent when it is not your job. I have a few clients. I'm always like, okay, what's your lane?

Okay, get back in your lane. Like, where's your lane? This is not your lane. You cannot parent. I don't care if you're 50 and you're parenting your 80-year-old parent, you can't do it. You have a different dynamic that we got to work through, but you can never actually have the power that you think you, that you need to have, make something healthy because it is a parent's job. that's really hard to come to grips with. And yet to really ask yourself, and here's where a lot of people can find peace when they get in

their lane and they mind their own. I had one client say, I'm just minding my own bobber. Like a fishing reference. I like it. Fishing reference. Just mind your own bobbler. Can really go a long way. But also you're notice I'm saying be yourself and also don't be a bossy parent, right?

You're like, whoa. Because those aren't, that's two little jobs in your life. being yourself and loving what you love and caring about your family is a thing you can do. You know, tingling your bobbler and other people's bobbers is a choice. Right. Attempting choice because, remember, you were trained. I don't know. I mean, I played softball for a long time.

So if anyone throws any object at me, I will catch it with my left hand. Wow. Just I'm not right. Reflexes. Yeah. It is frightening. I've saved many faces with this ability. The face you save may be your own.

Exactly. That's very true. Or I'll just naturally like block something with my left hand. And I am super right dominant. So it doesn't make any logical sense other than years and years of training that when something's flying at you, you use your left hand. And so I can't help that. Like it's just going to happen. And sometimes it's to my advantage.

Sometimes I'm like, I don't know, swatting someone's drink out of their mouth. I don't know what I'm doing. But I'm not causing major damage. But you have to realize, like, the naturalness doesn't mean the rightness. It just means training, right? Yeah. And so to kind of really go deep with yourself here are you are, you know, can you, can you not parent or try to fix the feelings? Because that's often the job that's given to an oldest child is to feel like they have to fix the feelings in the family.

And so I hear this like, let's do a dinner. we're getting along so well, you know, do we have to rehash the past? And you can decide how, if you want to do that or not, if you don't want to rehash the past, you can say that. You can say, I don't, I don't want to rehash the past because if you have felt successful doing that before, write down your secret and tell us. Because so often, the only time of people can really go through the past and do it well and heal from it is when somebody's changed. right? When someone's had a real wake-up call or there's humility and we're not attacking and being defensive. More than that, it's going to be a fight. I mean, I work with couples who love

each other so much. And when we rehash a fight, they had Tuesday. They can't see it clearly. So it's really hard to do this. But what you can do is decide, you know, where are your boundaries, what are your lines, what do you need and what you don't need? And, you know, if you're feel like this brother's ready for a good chat, then okay, go for it. But that is tricky. And you don't, are you ready to hear everything they think of you? Because that's what that means. Yeah. And you have to be humble enough to hear it and take it in. So some families just can do it. Don't, it's not going to ever work. So maybe you just know that. And so is that sweeping everything under the rug, I guess, but also if you're consciously choosing to not have the conflict because it's

not winnable for either party for everyone, right? Then that's a different thing than, you know, just avoidance. And I'm one of those people. Like, I'm a closure person. I can't, like, if I have an argument with somebody, I feel like I need to smooth it over, get things dealt with and be able to move on. But there are people in my life, crazy neighbor, who, being one of them, who can can get in a big old fight argument thing and then an hour later it is like nothing happened and uh the you know it feels like that might even be the case with um with middle brother is that he's a like explode feel better exactly he's he's already he's already dealt with it or closed in his mind he doesn't need the close yeah the only difference is how long right like it took

a decade for him to talk a decade for him yeah yeah but sometimes i wonder when you When I first read that, my first thought was, well, maybe he's had some changes of feelings in his life, but he's just too proud to discuss the changes. And so he just wants to go straight to we're good. Yeah. That can be jarring. Let's skip over the mea culpa and you're right to, yeah. Yeah. That can seem jarring.

It might seem easy, but I think it can really throw you, you know. Yeah. Well, and you're both bringing up a very good point. Everybody's got a style. And it's a collaboration of life, training, personality, just sort of idiosyncrasy, right? Like we all kind of need a different thing. And so when you have, I think of the research on couples is really probably applicable here in the 90s. They took all these couples over a weekend and hooked them up to EEG machines and EKG machines and sweat monitoring and stress testing and all this.

And they just let them live in like a condo wired up or whatever for a weekend. And they monitor just their interactions, what they did, what worked, what didn't. And we have, you know, it's as close as we've gotten to, you know, having measurable ways to sort of frame what one person in a partnership does versus another. And what we found is that, you know, one person in the partnership will have their heart rate go down. and like they're more comfortable in the argument than they are if they have to walk away from the argument. Weird. And then they always partner up with someone who's the opposite,

which is they're really uncomfortable in the argument. And when they go away, their heart rate and they calm down. And so if you think of this in terms of thinking patterns, right? I overthink when I'm not engaged in an argument, I'm going to have my heart racing over here in the corner telling myself stories, right? And so when we are actually talking, it feels like solving and even if it's arguing and it's not great, there's still something feels more comfortable there versus the other who is like, I am flooded, I am so angry, I don't,

I can't think straight, I can't talk during this. So I need a minute to think it through, to relax. And so half of my job with couples is to get them to understand that they have different styles and to coordinate rules and plans so that when they do come together, it's effective. So siblings, coworkers, neighbors, whatever, everyone has got their own different proclivities here. And not all of us are the same, but we're trying to communicate. So sometimes it's being aware, like Scott, you're saying, what if this is just really, I mean, he doesn't have the skill set to talk about the feelings and the nuance. And there's a few clues in the text that that's probably really true.

And so having compassion towards him would look. like maybe not needing, you know, like forcing an apology for closure's sake. But you may also be like Brian and need some closure. So how do you get those needs met? And this is often why people just don't. They, and they end up just taking time apart because they cannot figure this sort of math out. But when someone has done their work, and that's why you always know when someone's done therapy, because they'll have a sense of themselves, they'll be like, I know I need this. I know I need to go to sleep by 10. If I don't, you know, there's nothing good comes from it.

And the rest of us can suspect those things about ourselves. Like, wow, I went really badly. But someone who really will look at their internal workings and figure out why and when and what works best for them can then do that in a relationship and say, this works best for me. I know that. And I have this tendency. I mean, feel someone's telling you, I have a tendency to overshare. And you're like, oh, good. Now I know how to think about this.

Or I've worked with someone before. Like as soon as she said to me, I have some autism tendencies. I was like, oh, this explains why you're doing A, B, and C. And now I can see it so differently than why did I think you were like hated me and wanted me fired? And it wasn't that at all. And it was just the way that was coming across. And so that self-awareness, holy cow, that goes so far. but you can't force anyone to have self-awareness, right?

It feels like it's a lot easier, though, to say, I tend to overshare versus I tend to hold a grudge until we get things resolved after an argument. Yeah, true. That's a hard opening line. It's a hard icebreaker. Nice to meet you. Yeah, and you are going to be seen.

And then you also tend to overshare. Obviously, right? Versus like I'm in a relationship with someone or a friendship is building. And, you know, I remember meeting some friends a long time ago. And the guy in the couple, I love the wife. She was so cool. And the guy in the couple goes, hey, real quick, something you need to know about me.

I know you just met me. But I literally like no one when I meet them. And we were like, what? And he goes, I have the most broken first impression. I don't know why. So if I seem weird, I get over it. And we were laughing like it was kind of jokey about it. And then as we got to know them later, right?

We really became very, very good friends. He was just like, see, I knew it. I thought you guys were kind of annoying at first. So that's interesting to know that much about yourself to know that you. Yeah. Like it's almost a weird thing to admit, but you know what your pattern is. I don't like you at first, but I'm going to warm up to you and then we're all going to be friends. So just know that going in.

That is a wild bit of self-awareness. It is. And it's very true. He says his entire life. It's like clockwork. He knows exactly. And that way he doesn't just think he doesn't like anyone. He knows that he's got to just chill out for a little while.

And then as he gets to know someone, that door opens. It's a hilarious. Oh, Larry Davidism is what it's called. I looked it up. Oh, there we go. Oh, nice. Yeah. Okay.

See? There we go. It's actually a term. Sounds right. Because Larry Dave does that all day. Now, so everyone has their own thing like this. And so that's what I would suggest the emailer does. It's like, take a look at yours.

What is your tendency here? and sometimes, you know, you have to really back up and look at it. It's really nice to have somebody walk it through with you. Like, what is your habits? What do you tend to do in this situation or not? You know, and once you start having some insight about yourself, you recognize, okay, if I need everyone to be happy and go lucky and that helps lower my anxiety, I'm going to spend my life trying to make people happy and then being miserable because

that's not how it works, right? So even just the acknowledgement of a tendency goes a long way for us to take it slightly less seriously or need it. Like people will say, I have a perfectionist tendency. And I have found anyone who can say that out loud is not a true, full-blown perfectionist in the moment. They can, they've just told everyone, I have a reason. I'm like this, guys. Like, I'm telling you, so I don't have to make myself be perfect. And it works.

So something to be just curious about for them to think about as they're interacting with their brothers and, you know, the nephew and just, what is my deal? And can I keep my deal a little bit out of this dynamic? That is the only power you have, friend. The reason I'm focused on you is because we cannot fix the brother. No. Brother has to do all of this on his own. And if there's an opening because he's had a softening and is wanting to, great. Take the window when it opens.

But, you know, controlling yourself, which it sounds like they have done for the most part. Yeah. It's hard. It's hard because there's elephants in the room and it's hard to ignore them. Yeah. And nobody loves that. And you really care about this kid. And this kid has been used as like a pawn and that's garbage.

And so now this kid's almost an adult. You can have a separate relationship probably. Right? So it's a little different than when they're just little guys. And this is why freaking kids shouldn't ever be in the middle of stuff. But they always are. Because they don't have power. Yeah. Yeah.

And when they're little, you know, there's a blissful time there where they don't really know what's going on. But they're going to start knowing pretty quick. No, they know about four and five is when we start to kick it up. I've learned like you talked earlier about this like tendency to if you've been trained to do it, this tendency to mother. or, you know, want to interject and help in that way. And it's not like even a bad instinct. It's just misplaced because, you know, it's not your job anymore or whatever. Or in that context, it's not your job.

But this will come up with my kids, kids sometimes where I'll feel that tug of, oh, let me jump in and take care of that. Or let me tell them that they shouldn't be that close to the water or whatever it is. And I have to remind myself that is, that used to. be your job. That's not your job now. Yeah. Stay in your lane. Your job is to spoil them and give them way too much candy and all the things that you do. And that's it. Like you, you be there. You love them. You do all those things. And then whatever, if your kids need more than that, great, you talk to your kids and you find out what they need. But, but you have to,

you have to like constantly remind Kim, Kim especially, because she's very good at that stuff, very good at like intuiting what a kid needs and why are they crying and their appropriate response to a kid who's mad or whatever she's good at that stuff so she it's really hard for her to to stop and go wait a minute not my job anymore anymore anymore you know so we talk about this a lot actually and it's I think that's also key is if you can talk to somebody about it yeah absolutely then you're I would love to challenge everyone because I think this is so universal. I can't do this. But if I went through all of my clients for this week, I could tell you for every single

one of them how they are out of their lane. And that's because it's all human beings. It's not just my clients. Because in some form, you know, I think it's the old Stephen Coveyism, right, which is your circle of concern is, is. much bigger than your circle of influence. You can't actually make an impact on some things you're worried about, right? And when they're kids, kids particularly siblings, family, like, they're just closer to you and you need more from them. And you want sometimes imaginary things from them that we

wouldn't ask of a stranger, right? But somebody close to us, we're worried or we need something. And so those are bigger sometimes than our actual ability to affect it, to have any power over it, to change it. So that's why I'm always like, what's your lane? You're not the parent. You might have to say it like, Scott, you were kind of referencing, like almost reminding yourself like, not my job, not my job, not my job. What's the thing that was done for a while? Everyone was like, not my circus, not my monkeys.

Oh, yeah. It's very helpful. I've never heard that. Yeah, not my circus, not my monkeys. Well, like chaos is around or like, you know, like grandparents to grandchildren. It is, they're not your monkeys. They're your monkeys. They're lucky to come visit, to have monkeys visit your house, right?

And so it's a constant reminder. We have just a need to sort of control things to have an outcome that is desirable to us. But most of the time, we don't have any power to do any of that. And so, yes. So maybe figure out what's your lane, emailer, figure out how to stay in that lane. and appreciate all the good stuff that you have going on and, you know, come in with a loving mindset. And when this brother says something about gas prices, you keep your mouth shut.

Like, you do not take the bait. That is one of the hardest things to do when we disagree on different things. And life is sort of running all of us over to, you will hear people say stuff or throw out or whatever. and it's so tempting to take the bait. And I've learned very recently, my in-laws were in town, that when my mother throws out a nice, meaty fish with a bobber and bait on it to try to catch me, it's not on purpose.

Girlfriend can't help it. That's just the way her mind works. And the best thing you can do, this is so funny, because Adam did it first, and then we just did it all weekend, which is you have to take one giant deep breath. And then count to like five and she'll drop it or change the subject or we'll

move on. And it worked breathlessly. So wait, you created like awkward pause basically? You created a vacuum. Yeah. And allowed it to be there. And that wasn't awkward by the way. It's only a weird perception you think it will be.

Because I think she just was talking to hear herself or whatever. She just threw out whatever. And normally I'm like, I got to defend this entire concept. Yeah. I'm not just like, no, I don't. I freaking don't. Get back in my lane. It was so much more peaceful because I just didn't.

Another term people will use is gray rocking. Have you ever heard of this? No. Where you just act like a gray rock. Oh. They're a rock. You're a rock. Everything's a rock.

It has no response, right? And especially with people who are very driven to get reactions, right? They're trying to go to you. They want you to fight. So you just act like it's a gray rock. And I had a few clients introduce this to me. And I'm like, I don't know how healthy that sounds. And then I realized like, oh, when you're talking to like a full real narcissist, it is very healthy.

It's like a survival strategy that is you and you're just kind of picture a gray rock and you just breathe and you're like, oh. And you don't have to answer. You know how many awkward people there are in the world that don't respond right correctly timing wise? Just you're one of them now. Yeah. Just be them for that. Be them in that moment. Sure.

Yeah. This says a lot, given our Johnson propensity for filling the space with sound. Yeah. And thinking, oh, I got to make sure you are comfortable. Yeah. And so I'm doing that. And I'm like, no, I don't have to make sure anyone's comfortable. Yeah, you really don't.

50, baby. Yeah. It is. I absolutely part of this is I get way easier for me to do this stuff now. I just don't care. It's not that I don't care. It's just that I don't know. I'm all out of poops.

I got no poops to give. Well, I know I've said this before and sorry to be so cynical, but we are just bags of meat and our personalities are hormones. And the hormones really, when they're working like they do in youth, you do care about what other people think because you're in the stage of creating the safety and the connection and the mating and all the things that get you safety in life, right? And then when those hormones start to go, you're like, it's fine, just bury me now. Just whatever. We start to be that, you know, the scene in, have you guys seen Norsemen? Yeah, I love that movie. When they tell the guy tells him to all jump off and the cliff, the old guy is just so it doesn't make the community hard.

Yeah. That was how they got rid of them. And they were like, what if we just disappear? Yeah. I love that. I feel like that director is obsessed with that concept because he did the same thing in midsummer. The old people in midsummer had to jump off a cliff. And it was some ancient Norse.

Yeah. deal. Like it's a thing. Oh, halla. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Well, this is awesome. I know that you are in the thick of the happiness deal. That started on the 13th. How are things going? Anything anyone should do that missed. Are people happy yet? Yeah, are they happy? People are trying. And we're all really trying to be happy. Yeah, it's going great. It's been really fun. We have, yeah, we've had some really good live groups. And one of the funny things is for some reason, the website when it recorded the video,

because they can watch the live lab if they miss it. It did this freaky Halloween thing where it recorded four breakout groups. So 16 people all talking at once. And the camera showed us all. So it looked like absolute chaos. And we're all just talking and then laughing is the creepiest thing. Each of you and your own groups are only. hearing each other in each individual breakart group.

And it didn't happen live. It happened in the recording. So when people have watched it, they were like, oh, no, what is happening? And it just made me laugh. So I fixed the problem, so we don't have that fun again. But it was very Halloween. Like, is this a nightmare for anyone with tinnitus? Tinitus.

Sinitis. Sinitis. They're both. I feel like the Brits say tinnitus. Either or either is okay. Exactly. Root. She begins her commercials with, is it tenetis or tinnitus, either or either is acceptable.

Nice. Nice. I like that. We need somebody like that here locally. That's cool. I like that. We do. So, real quick. It's going great. But what's fun is, we've sort of touched on it in the happiness class is I'm going to do a webinar, but we call it different things now. A lesson online live. Anyway, on inner critic. stuff and just sort of how to deal with some of the voices in your head that are rude to you. And that's just going to be a one-off thing for everybody. So I'll let you know when that's coming out. But that'll be sometime in probably October. Nice. Or early November.

Coming up fast. More than sooner than you think, everybody. Awesome stuff. And listener, let us know how things go. We'd love to hear your follow-up. Wendy, have a fantastic week. We'll see you next time. Bye.

See ya. Me. All right. She's out. It's going to do it for the show, everybody. good news tomorrow we're doing play date pretty sure we're going to go like a quick drawful warmup okay and then nothing but trivia murder party three murder party three yeah you've tested it's all working okay it ran i haven't played it though so i've known nothing about any of the new game play

mechanics other than i just had to make sure it ran yeah good um so we're we're good to go that'll be nine o'clock tomorrow uh we'll run till 11 so the good two hours please come everyone's welcome uh patrons get first dibs on slots in the game but sometimes we open that up and we do rotate people around. So, you know the drill. Come check it out. It'll also be live on YouTube and Twitch.

So be there or B-square. Today at 1 p.m. We have an episode of Core, myself, John and Boe. And Coverville before that, noon, right? Yes. Or right after? Right after this.

Okay. We'll raid over there right after we're done. And Brian will be doing Coverville. So lots of room. Sorry, I said one. It's 12 for Core now. I still say one. Exactly.

I know. It's been 12 for months. That's why I do Coverville early. Well, actually, I started doing Coverville early before you guys moved Core up to noon, but still, I'm done by the time Core starts. Yeah, that's the idea. That's the important thing. You get some sweet music content. You roll right into what we're doing, and then you go to bed, really.

Newfound Glory and Tim Curry from Rocky Horror Picture Show and Fern Gully. Yeah. It's all exciting. Duncan Sheik, barely breathing. Yeah. It's unfortunate. unfortunate title now. Unfortunately, yeah, exactly.

It's all good though. Anyway, check all that out. That's coming up next. And then what else? FilmSack this weekend, other cool stuff. So check it all out at frogpants.com slash schedule. If you are curious about what's coming up. Thanks to everybody who's been putting up cool drawings on my drawings.com.

I noticed one today that really jumped out at me. I'd like to share it real fast. Let's see it. It's this thing right here. Oh, did I not get his name? Oh, that's great. I love that one. That is fantastic.

God, great use of color. in that too. I agree. Some recent funny ones here. I think this is you and me. I'm not sure. I don't know. Might be? Oh. I mean, it says TMS, so I assume it's supposed to be us. It's good that somebody finally captured that ponytail of mine. Yeah, that's a, he's always hiding it back there. You can't quite say it. Always hiding it back there. So that's good. This guy that did this cool image is cruddlefish salad.

Oh, cruddlefish. Yeah. Yeah, it's really good. God, really good. Yeah, super impressed. Anyway, you guys have been cranking these out. They've been awesome. A lot of goofy stuff that makes me laugh. It's a big anima. Looks like Beau Schwartz right there. Oh, yeah.

Maybe. Or is that me? Maybe. That might be an attempt at me. Actually, yeah, with the stuff in the background, I think it is supposed to be you. All this shiz. Yeah. So anyway, it's been fun to watch these.

Please keep them coming. Go to MyDrawings.com. And, oh, I added navigation at the top. There's a hint of the daily doodle coming. soon but that'll oh good like a prompt yeah yeah prompt deal that's not there yet but it will be and what else did i change i did something else for mobile i don't remember oh the canvas is larger so it's like 77% bigger so you have a bigger space to work in which means nice tighter drawings when they get uploaded so anyway i need to do some drawings in there since my original ones got uh

yoinked but that's all right they kind of sucked so uh i found it was cached on my ipad so i screen grabbed I screamed grabbed all those just in case I wanted them. I don't really even have a way

to put them up. I can't really upload them because they're just code. They're JSON file code. So they're not

really image files. Anyway, that is it for the show. Thank you all for listening. Brian, let's play a song and take him out.

Yes. This one goes out to Gaggagoo Glitch who writes, Good Morning, Scott and Brian. Glitch again using punctuation this time,

exclamation point. Thank you for that. No, last time I requested the Primus and Puddles version of Holy Diver, which follows the more classic sound, just so you know with Primus. Now, new business. My wife is having a birthday, and of course I have to request a song to praise her and all that is glorious about her, but that would take too long. I love her and all that she is.

P.S. Yes, I'm from Iowa. Forever her idiot out wandering around. That's the Iowa thing. Gagoo Glitch. Nice. This is. Sorry.

That's all right. You can show that anytime you want. It's so good. This is a cover of the Doobie Brothers. What a Fool Believes. I'm just going to make sure that that is what I put in the thing for today. Yes. Yes.

There it is. Yeah. Okay. This is by James Eringer from an album called Euringer from 2018. It's going to be one of the more different versions of What a Fool believes. But fantastic, nonetheless. Here is James Eringer. I know just where to stick it.