Two In The Think Tank - 484 - "THEREMANIA"

Episode Date: July 4, 2025

Butt Tap, Mum and Dad Bank, Bird-Cafe Symbiosis, Ergonomic 69, Newspaper People Reviews, Theremania, Reverse Theremin, Cold Blood Experience, Slime Mold ImmortalitySketch Spreadsheet by Will Runt: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1e2HYV7-VcnAV08wyHA7OFbqh_UCnVDUheiNFiqxPX_Y/edit?usp=sharingThink Tank Institute: https://lookerstudio.google.com/s/kH2int_ZkuICheck out our comics on instagram with Peader Thomas at Pants IllustratedOrder Gustav & Henri from Andy and Pete's very own online shopYou can support the pod by chipping in to our patreon here (thank you!)Join the other TITTT scholars on the TITTT discord server hereHey, why not listen to Al's meditation/comedy podcast ShusherDon't forget TITTT Merch is now available on Red Bubble. Head over here and grab yourselves some material objectsAlasdair Tremblay-Birchall: @alasdairtb and instaAnd you can find us on the Facebook right here Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello and welcome to To We Win The Thing, the show where we come up with five sketch ideas. I'm Andy. And I'm Alistair George Williams from L.A. Virtual. Oh my gosh, Andy. Andy, thank you so much for letting me get that out today. Good at your eating. Yeah, well, you know, I've realized that I, I'm aware of my flaws,

and one of them is that I start to feel smug about how well I'm going to do something, and it gets in the way of me doing the thing well. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. That's commonly what has fucked me up in previous intros. This time, the thing that I was feeling smug about was about letting you get your name out and I, it actually did work. I was thinking, I was looking, I was thinking about it thinking I was going to be so impressed with how well I don't talk over him here and for once.

And it, and you got a thank you and a compliment. Exactly. And that's what it all about. You know, I, I cashed those smug endorphins, but the check did not bounce. It was, it was valid. I wonder if there's a scam artist who can, is there sort of like non-cash, sort of like non-money checks that you can get but that you could use to scam people but like out of hugs or something?

I don't know. Oh, you didn't, did you? I mean, I think this is most kind of like toxic relationships. Yeah. Oh, you didn't, does it? I mean, I think this is most kind of like toxic relationships. Yeah. Some way you, I'm sure there are many financial metaphors that we could get into. But now listen. Yeah.

People talk constantly about your ass passing checks. No, what is it? Your mouth is passing checks that your ass can't cash? Is that, is that the phrase? Yeah. Ass can't cash? Yeah, I phrase? Your ass can't cash? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Well, I think we should invent a type of check that your ass can cash.

That's right. Even the that even his ass couldn't cash it? Now I imagine- Oh, is it your mouth is writing checks that your ass can't- Writing checks, probably that's it. Writing checks that your ass can't- Yeah, so could God's mouth write a check so big that even his ass couldn't cash it? Yes, I mean it's a What a philosophical conundrum, you know What would be really good and this is the future we're heading for you should be able to get

But you could probably get out there go out there today and get this done Right get one of those little is it an NFC chip, you know, whatever it is that they have in the, in the back of your phone or in a card that allows you to tap and go? Maybe. It could be, Andy. I can never get it to work on any of the two phones that I've ever had that I've tried. Oh.

Well, whatever that is, you should be able to get one of those surgically implanted into your ass. And? Into your butt cheeks. But it's just for checks. Whatever that is, you should be able to get one of those surgically implanted into your ass. And... Into your butt cheeks. But it's just for checks. Yeah, it's it. Possibly. And you gotta sign.

And I know, I know. And you gotta sign with your butt. With your butt. With, you gotta grip the pen between the cheeks. When they put in the chip, they also sew a pen into your butt. It could just be like a ball point on one of the ends of the cheeks, so it's like a nipple.

One on each cheek, you know? Probably a little lid on it, so you're not always writing on the inside of your pants. And a little lid, so you're not always writing on the inside of your pants And a little lid so you're not always writing on the inside of your pants I love it It's a lump that you've thought about you You thought about a lot the that the the ad that the logistics I'm thinking about the ad that the bank is doing for this new product and and we're creating a digital checkbook.

I know, this isn't a bad idea, but. We've created a digital. And the Royal Bank of Australia is also introducing a digital checkbook. Now. The Royal Bank of Australia. Yeah. Wow. I mean I just chose I just took a Bank that I know here in Canada replaced the Canada word with Australia

Kept it made made all the listeners feel like I was back in the in the mother country You know all his references are so Aussie. I Mean are they still making new Royal things? Can you still get that sort of collab, get that branding, that Royal seal of approval is still technically our heads of state, we should be able to like, you know, open up a vape shop and be like, can we get by appointment to the queen, to the king? I mean, I don't, I wish it could still be the queen.

The king, it just doesn't say it. It sucks, it's the queen. I wanna be appointed to a queen. Yeah, a king sounds bossier. You know, it's less fun. A queen is like, I don't know, especially like a head of state that's not really doing anything.

It feels more like they're not doing anything when it's a queen. Is that sexism? Probably. Is that sexism in there? I think generally in life women do a lot more. But I feel like the king, even though he doesn't have any power, it feels like he's going to ask you to do something just because he's, because he's, he can't

stop. He can't sit down and he's always got to be doing something. Hmm. Yeah. He's always got to be pro. He's probably going to let it go to his head being the king. He's probably going to start, you know, bossing people around acting like he's the bloody king, whereas nobody ever says, oh, you're acting like the bloody queen. Yeah. Maybe they do. Anyway, Alastair, I think, and I know you were trying to maintain, stay true to the

integrity of the original, your house is passing checks idea. Yeah. But I do, and I appreciate all the work you did to, to, to keep that dream alive. But I do also think that, uh, if you told, you know, the TikTok generation that there was a trend to get NFC chick chips in, uh, in their implanted into one of their butt cheeks so that they can tap and pay with their ass on the little thing. You tap that ass to pay for things and you genuinely are shaking your money maker or at least your money spender. I believe people would be really excited about this.

There would be a moral panic that people are tapping their ass to pay, but you can't, you know. I mean, maybe, doesn't even have to be an implant under the skin, although I think that is the ideal version. It could be a new thing where, say, Spanx. Are they the, those pants, those tight butt pants? Right? the, those, those pants, those tight buck pants. Oh, I thought you meant like, like you could spank. You every bank instead of, instead of, instead of tapping your card,

somebody has to spank you. Yeah. Look, they spank you and their hand has a digitally put in an F POS machine in it. That'll be $20. Like that. I think. I mean, that's beautiful.

You know, because then, then the checkout, the checkout doesn't need its own counter because their lap is the counter that you lean over. Yep. You know? And then you just hold the products and they just tally up the dollars with Spanx. You'd be there a Woffy Bar and a Porsche. This is going to happen. I'm calling it- this is going to happen. I'm calling it, this is going to happen.

And I do think that the Spanx should be, should get on board with this. They should have a little chip put in their, their pants, right? And it could be the Spanx bank and they'll have their whole, you know, like there's Apple pay. Well, why is it only smartphones and Apple phones that get to have their own payment system? Any big brand should incorporate a payment system into their product. And then each individual should eventually have their own payment method as well. Andy Matthews Bay.

Oh, that's good. You know, and then you could join, then I could join your payment system. And then, I don't know, I just feel like we're starting our own little economies here. I think we should, you know, I should be able to start a bank. I wonder what that would be like. What would be involved? Well, we did, we start small. We did recently, like in the last few months, talk about how I would start a bank, but within

another bank account, with just within one bank account. That's right. Right. But I do think, but I do think we could start a, like a different kind of bank that's maybe outside of a bank account. What about this? A bank with no bank accounts. What does that sound like?

So in the bank tank, we come up with only. Oh, okay. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. What about only bank? How about this? Nope.

Yeah. Nope. No bank accounts. How does that sound? That's our difference. That's our point of difference. Everybody needs a point of difference. Yeah.

And we've got a really big one. This is really different. This isn't a point anymore.. And we've got a really big one. This is really different. This isn't a point anymore. This is a bloody line. This is an entire plane of difference, if you ask me. You know, like none of the banks these days really keep that much money on the premises, right? Well, we're going back to keeping money on the premises.

And not only that, you can come and look at it. You can, you can live stream, like I log in. I think we put all the money in a, like in the middle of a room and there's holes so that you can look in and even roll in, see the money you can reach in, but it's too far away. You can't get it. But it'll bring foot traffic to our bank and people will want to join. I think people would love to see a bit of cash. I think if the vault has got some like perspex, you know, really thick perspex, like they use on that Ocean Gate submersible, you knowible, you know, how thick their perspex was. They probably, it's a pretty big perspex, but James Cameron, I'm talking James Cameron perspex, that's how thick this perspex is.

Okay. This is the real deal. Oh yeah. You're not going to be able to break in, but you will be able to have a little peekaboo in the vault. We let you peek at the money. Oh, I want all the money in there. I don't want it to be just perspexpex I want you to be able to actually reach in

okay some actual holes fine actual holes there's a real crazy good guy in there a really crazy guard if you reach into if you try to like use like one of those like extender arms to try to like grab some of the cash he will come and he's got a whip or something like that oh we don't allow that no extender arms to try to grab some of the cash, he will come and he's got a whip or something like that. Oh, we don't allow that. No extender arms. We've got a little poster outside the front door. Yeah, you can use your arm and you can push in as far as you want,

but we've looked it up. We know how long the longest arms are, and we put the money further away than that, so. Fuck. the longest arms are and we put the money further away than that. So we Google it guys. So don't worry. We Google it. Your money's safe. Right. But you know how long the longest ones are.

What about this? A transparent ATM, right? So you can see all the money in there and see it coming out. People would flip out for this. Oh yeah. They would love to see what's going on inside there and see all the money in there. Yeah. And like, and you know, like, you know, these days it's hard if you got into a bank test

to get a finer bank teller. Well, all we've got, all we've got in there is bank tellers. No chairs, no nothing. Like that. Oh wow. And, and they're loose and they've got a lot of cash on them. They do it. They just get all the money from their pockets.

Yeah. Like you need something. Cause how are you going to compete with the big four banks in Australia? Right? You need something to get people in. And I think people thinking that they could just come and take the money, the money's just there. Like that.

Like, yeah, it's tantalizing. Yeah. And I think- It's a different experience. What about this? Yeah. The tellers in the bank, they pretend to be your mom and dad, right? They're all dressed up as your mum and dad.

And it's like, you're going to borrow money from mum and dad. So like the bank of mum and dad, but we've made it sort of corporate. And it's a real bank. All our tellers are dressed up as either mums or dads, and you sort of beg them for money and you look cute. Right. And it comes out of your bank account, but you get to feel like they're giving it to you. Oh, right.

Just this once. But they love you. Yeah. Don't tell your mom. That's what they say every time. Or don't tell your dad. Yeah. All the, yeah, they, and, and depending on who you want, the, the teller has to

change their outfit to be either your mom or your dad. Yeah, great. And there's no... They say, shine me a father. So they bring you into the room, the little room. Yeah. Like that. And then they go, shine me a father.

They don't get into character yet. And then they go to a big trunk. Of dress ups. Yeah. And they sort of hold your phone, they look and they go to a big trunk of dress ups yeah and they sort of hold your phone they look and they're like what do I got like that and then slap some stuff on yeah they go what do you think yeah that could be mum and then you know oh darling darling how are you? Why are you here? You didn't bring your laundry did you? Oh, here's trouble.

Oh, have you heard your uncle? What's wrong? What's wrong? What's wrong? Oh yeah, your uncle Gary had to have that mole removed. Um, and there is, there's no pin codes, but there are magic words. So you do have to say please and I love you. Yeah. And, and you have other banks, you know, you can sometimes have your money stolen

like from scams and things like that. Well, we've made that a rule that they're not allowed to do that. People are not allowed to steal. You're not allowed to do that. And you have to, the thing is you have to actually, you have to start out the conversation and try and make it seem like you're not asking for money. Uh, maybe just bring up some expenses you've had recently and don't mention anything about asking for money and they'll offer you money

That's the only way to get it out And you gotta say no no no, but they'll insist Maybe they'll even put it into your pocket and say honestly, it's fine. Yeah, and you're like, okay Okay, I tell you about Don't tell your mom and Don't tell your mom. That's the only process of getting money out. Yeah. That's the system.

Yeah. But there's about like 10 or 20 of these identical conversations happening around you in the bank at any one time. Yeah. But God, what a beautiful cacophony that would be of passive aggression and actual aggression. I don't know. People are going to get into it so quick. What would you call this bank, Andy?

Well, the bank of mom and dad is pretty obvious. Yeah, I know. It doesn't really have a very good official name. But I guess it's, yeah. What about the Royal Bank of Mom and Dad? Okay, there you go. We bloody did it. We bloody did it. Now it sounds like the, you know, that the government guarantees everything in it, you know, whatever the way that they do that. I mean, that's got to be one of the best things though, is that thing where like,

if you get scammed out of money, they'll just give you your money back all of the time? Mm, that is good. We're pretty lucky and that exists. I feel like that feels like in this world. That's like one of those things where I'm surprised that that exists. Yeah. Yeah, somebody hacked into my phone and transferred it by credit card details and took out like $14,000 and the bank just gives it back to me. I don't know. I kind of feel like the chump here.

Yeah. Oh yeah. I don't know. It feels good. I mean, they won't give it back to you if it's like, if you're on like one of those romance scams or something and you've sent the money, which is like that, but that feels unfair. It's right, like how is that?

Well, they didn't hack into my phone, but they hacked into my heart. Yeah, they did hack into your heart there, yeah. I mean, but like, you know, the NRMA or like the Vic Roads or whatever doesn't do that if you like get your car stolen. They should have to give you your car back. Why doesn't, they should have to give you, they should have to give you your car back. Why doesn't, they should have to give you... Yeah.

I mean, the car was on your road and it was stolen. It was parked on your road. It's on your road. Same as me having the money in your bank. Yeah. Why doesn't the government just guarantee all our cars? It is kind of crazy that private property exists. Not to get all, you know, anything on you, but it is kind of wild that at some point

in history we were like, oh, these people own this land, right? Oh, people can own land. And then we just kept up that system and dad's like, oh, you want some land? Are you going to buy it off somebody? It's especially crazy. We do that. Where did they get it from? It's crazy to do that right after you take all the land from some people.

Yeah. Yeah. Starting now, you can own land. Yeah. And people are not allowed to take it. It's only starting now. It's starting now. No, it's, we're not grandfathering this

clause in. I mean, sorry guys. It's a very, it's very telling of what you're, of what your intent, you know, of what you think that people's intentions are. If that's the rule that you create, it might've been your intentions. You've, you've given yourself away, mate. I know we just stole this land, but starting now, no stealing land. Yeah. Okay. Now you're going to only get it at, you're going to get it if you buy it. Starting now, starting now. Starting now.

You can, and you can buy it. You can only buy it from me. Yes. Yeah. It's crazy. I, you know, just going back to a slight thing. I would love a fish and chip shop on a beach that guarantees any chips that get taken from a seagull. You know, one of those really aggressive beaches? Yeah. And you know, and then there's a lot of like

really ballsy seagulls that'll just fly right in, take your chips, take your, they might even take your Dagwood dog. They might even take your Chico roll. Well, maybe you, I mean, how would you feel if you could pay a little bit extra and have it sort of indemnified, like buy insurance, like when you're getting a higher card. I think that's good.

You know, you pay down the excess. I think that's good. Okay, so you're buying the things and then he goes, now, do you want to pay? Because he's like, you're going, I'll minimum chips, thanks. And you'll go, okay, that'll be $5. But do you want to insure your chips for accidental dropage or seagull theft for an extra $3? Any odd I think so? Well, I mean, we were at Hall's Gap and I witnessed two people have their full meat pies stolen by cookaburras.

Like the cookaburras were sitting around on the, um, on the tops of the outdoor umbrellas. And they would just wait until somebody was like holding the pie up, like about to take a bite. So it's like, it's there in this like prime aerial position. And then the bird would swoop through, either knock the pie onto the ground or just carry it off. And then they would, the birds would gather around and share it on the ground.

And there was interspecies sharing. There were cockatoos and crows and they would just gather around. Is that, is that photo of the, like a carawong and a magpie and a cockatoo and a. Cook a bar, a call sharing a pie. Yes. So that's at Hall's gap, but like the people at the cafe, they're not warning you for the

bus poetry. That's your first first bush. As you become a real bush poet, as you transform your life. Earlier today, Alastair and I agree to that. I'm transitioning to full-time Bush poetry. Yeah full-time after work and family commitments. Yeah that's right. And squash. Maybe you're also gonna take up squash. Yes I am. But the cafe they don't warn anybody that the pies are being

stolen, right? That like to, to keep an eye on your pie. But, um, and so the cafe is actually, they're benefiting from the system. In a way they're part of some sort of racketeering thing with these birds. Cause they know that if people get the birds, the pies swooped before they've even had a bite, they're gonna have to come back and buy another pie. It's like, this is a scam that goes all the way

to the top of the bloody eucalyptus tree, if you ask me. Yeah, all the way, I mean, yeah, they're top of the, I mean, it's like, this is, it's like a parasitic thing where they benefit. So the, because yeah, the birds absolutely benefit from the pie shop and the pie shop benefits from the birds benefiting from the pie shop. Exactly. So like they're in a symbiotic relationship. Yeah. But they're like, yeah, is it, is that symbiotic? It's like one's a parasite of the

other one being parasitic off of it. I think that's what symbiosis is. Yeah. Yeah, right. They're both, it's good for both of them. Yeah, great. And then just we as the middle humans. It's not double parasitic?

It's not double parasitic? It's not some sort of aeroborous, but it's two leeches sucking each other's butts. Cause it also benefits- Instead of a snake. I mean, it's two adult men sucking each other's butts. How would that, how would you bend? Cause I feel like they're bending their backs backwards. Yeah, probably. Yeah, yeah, probably.

Yeah, I think so. Oh no, they could just go all the way around. All the way around. All right. I don't feel so uncomfortable on the neck. It's not very, uh, they're not- Oh, what about the one where they're bending over backwards? I mean, I feel like bending backwards is good for your back.

Is there a reverse 69 where you can do it the other way? Bend all the way like that? Of course there is. Of course there is. Wow, how would that, wait, what would that be? Is it a 96? Yeah, well that would be a 96. That would be a 96? Wait, how does that work? I mean, look at the 96.

Can they still reach each other's genitals? Well, no, just if you're looking at the numbers, they can't. Yeah. But I guess you're picturing that nine is cranking its neck back. Chill. Awful. Like Alastair. Yeah. All right.

What about this is two, it's two mosquitoes. Okay. Yeah. Draw an oroborous type thing. Yeah. All right. What about this is two, it's two mosquitoes. Okay. Yeah. Draw an oroborous type thing, but they're plunging their things into one another's abdomens. That's two mozzies just draining. Draining. They're just drinking the same blood.

They're drinking, like they're just getting it back and forth, but somehow they're like, they're, they're both never hungry, but also never satiated. Yeah. Like all of us. Yeah. Like, oh, except we're all so hungry. Damn. And we're also really satiated after like, if you go to a buffet or something like that. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Haven't been to a proper all you can eat buffet. I don't think, I think it's, we have to admit now that the numbers never worked out, never worked.

I mean, they were kind of like these, um, tech companies that don't have a business model and they're like, at some point down the, down the track, we'll work out how to monetize this. I think, yeah, they're still, they were, they, there was this period of time where they were like, well, let's just give everybody unlimited potato gems and work out, we'll get everyone in, we'll get all the eyeballs and then we'll work out how to get money out of this later on. But they never did.

They didn't manage to put advertisements to get, you know, ad placement on the potato gems, charge people for. Reach. I think the fact that you'd almost never see a buffet these days is a good sign that we won everybody. We did it. We got him. We ate all we could.

We ate all we could. And we beat that. We beat the house. Yeah, we ate all we could and we beat the house. Yeah, turned out it wasn't all you can eat, it was all you can serve. Yeah, maybe. Um, wait, I was just going back to wait, because then the birds then benefit from the pie shop benefiting from the birds benefiting. Because people are buying more pies again, then that means the birds get even more chances. Now there's an upper limit here

because I think there's only so many times people will go back to the pie shop. If they lose two pies. And I presume they become more wary. Yeah. Like almost immediately they're gonna be keeping a closer eye on the pie. I'm going to go eat in the car. I wonder if the birds even realize that and they probably won't even waste

their time trying to swoop the same pie holder twice. They'll move on to greener pastures. But yeah, but also just the fact that the bird, it's like, it's, it is essentially the perfect thing a kingfisher has been built for because they're just, they're all about timing and predicting movement and diving and catching something that's, you know, that's slippery and not easy to kind of, you know, get a handle on. I'm just amazed that a kookaburra can carry the weight of a whole pie.

Like, they're not that big. I mean, I don't know how much of the pie they were actually carrying. I don't think the pie, I think it's more that the pie's structural integrity is the thing that they wouldn't that wouldn't be up to The task I have no doubt a kookaburra could carry a pie They are a stocky and and powerful looking bird Yeah, but I reckon a pie would almost rugby player of the sky

Yeah, but they would there a pike I will probably weighs more than a kookaburra like there. They were bird. I Know they were bird I know they're a bird. I know they're fat and lightweight. Andy, Andy, they're a bird. I don't know how many, I'm not, am I not being clear? They're a bird. A kookaburra is a bird. It is a winged animal of the bird class. Hmm. Birdus. Birdus. Birdus. Flyus. Um. Um, no, you're right, Alastair, but I think that a kookaburra would weigh more than most pies, I'm going to say.

Yeah. And yes. And I would say they're also like they grab snakes and stuff, you know. I guess. Snakes are not birds. No, that's true Snakes are not birds. No, that's true. They are not birds. And snakes are probably heavier than pies in many cases.

I saw a snake here. Whoa! Yeah. In, in Kanada. In Kanada. I went to, uh, there's a Trombli forest near here and I was like, I better go check it out. And, uh.

How'd you, did you feel anything? Nothing, Andy. I felt nothing. But at some point I did see like I guess like a sort of a snake and then it disappeared real fast. But I forgot that there's like snakes here. They're not venomous or anything like that. But there's as a you know as a class of animal. I keep saying class. I think class is way higher up right? What do you think a snake is? Ah, some kind of species. Some kind of species.

Kind of people can. Kingdom phylum class. I think class, I think bird, I think avus or whatever it is. Yeah. Oh no, that's the car rental company. Budget? Budget? Budget. Oh, good. Oh no, thrifty.

Thrifty? Anyway, a Hertz, auto rent Hertz. Did you Google it just then? I can't think of a single one. I started trying to think of other. Oh, Alistair. Oh, that's embarrassing. Europe car. Cash converse.

Sixty. Sixt. Can't rent one in there. Oh, this is really embarrassing for you. I've listed so many car-round-tour-companies on you. Bungalow. That's a thing you can rent. But it's not the name of a brand.

Oh. Ah, let's see. Fuck. This is really humiliating, bro. Um, Reg- Rent-a-Bomb. The music shows. You can often rent instruments there. What's the place? Um, wicked vans.

There we go. Oh, you did it. That's really good. They put quite sexist insignia on their car. Oh, okay. Now, now I can't come up with a, oh, you can't name any rental automobile place these days. It's such an interesting business model that they had going there.

Let's just rent shitty vans, but we'll spray paint misogynist stuff on them. You know, misogynist jokes. They weren't all misogynist. It was just for some reason they loved a shitty joke on the back of it. Like, you know, sometimes it was just like, it was kind of like fun, stupid art on there. And then they're like, hey, plus, you know, put a little fucked joke on the back. Like that. And then they got upset.

And then they got upset. I mean, they did amazing for, you know, for essentially people who are just renting out vans, shitty vans to people. Anyway, I don't know why I'm defending them. No, no, no. You know, you've got your beliefs and... Are they still around? Do you ever see them? You know, it's in Australia, it's harder and harder to get comedy anywhere, you know?

And the fact that you can't even spray paint it on the back of a campervan anymore. Exactly. It's just indicative of a broader malaise in the entire entertainment industry. Yeah. I started writing down. Do you have any words that you can never remember the meaning of and you wish you could remember the meaning of? Oh, well, the way you used malaise, I wasn't sure that I thought malaise was kind of like a lethargic, kind of tired seriousness or something like that. Maybe. Is that it?

seriousness or something like that, maybe. Is that it? Yeah. Or not so much the seriousness. It's more just kind of like an unidentified sickness, a wasting sickness of some kind. Yeah. And they do use it in that concept. Talk about it, malaise in an industry or a sector or an economy or something like that. A group.

But that was what prompted me. Cause I was like, I think I actually nailed the use of malaise there. I felt really proud of myself. Yeah. The word that I keep having to look up the meaning of, and it never sticks is misanthrope or missanthrope. I don't really know what that means. Well, I looked it up again yesterday and it's person who just like hates

people and life. Yeah. Like a, like a grump, but I reckon I've got, I've every time I've read it, I've been like for years and years, I've been like, fuck, I wish I knew what that means. Yeah. You know, because it's definitely a word that like smart people use in, in literature reviews and stuff like that. And occasionally you're like, I'd

be so smart if I knew what that meant. I'd love if people who write reviews weren't like trying, if there wasn't a thing where it's like, I don't know, it feels like they're trying to show you how much they know. It's like, I don't know, it feels like they're trying to show you how much they know. It's almost like a review of how well educated they are or something like that. I don't need that. I guess, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

On one level, that's sort of all they, because I mean, criticism is all, I mean, it is an insecure, I imagine it's a very insecure profession, like in the sense of like there would be a deep hidden insecurity in being a critic because you are a person who just, you know, on what basis, I don't know, but you criticize other people's work, right? And people would come to you and say, well, what gives you the fucking right? And so I imagine you overcompensate by trying to sound smart, right? And that's why how you try and buy your legitimacy. You're like, well, I must have it.

My opinion must have value because I know all these big words. Yeah. I suspect. Yeah. But what about a real dumb viewer? Oh, okay. You know. I mean, is that the Homer, the food critic episode of The Simpsons?

I don't recall that episode. He becomes a restaurant critic, I think. Yeah. Okay. But he just loves all the food. Yeah. And so he does it. But then eventually people are like, oh, you just give positive reviews and then that's

where the judgments are coming in. I think that's it. I think that's it tries to yeah, he's tries to sound more but what about somebody who's dumb? I Mean, I guess like this is not a sketch because I mean I know that there are genuinely dumb people out there that are writing reviews of things But Yeah, I think like there's always that thing, I guess with reviews as well, with any kind of work where we're like, and I think the issue with every piece of media

is that it is just a piece of media. And that it doesn't, almost none of it will change our lives and it will always just be something and we're like, and it should have made me feel something but it didn't and I go, who the fuck says that it needs to make you feel something? And so we're essentially trying to come up with this set of rules and maybe, look, I just don't understand criticism, but we're trying to come up with a set of rules for, I guess, what makes something good. But if we already knew what makes something good, then wouldn't we be making it and then

be self-satisfied and then I would just, I wouldn't we be making it and then be self satisfied and, and then I would just, I wouldn't need media. I don't know what I'm talking about. Yeah, no, but I mean, I guess that is it that we don't know what has value. Ultimately, we're just always searching for it. And sometimes you're like, it's, it really is just a lot of time you just know it when you see it and, and maybe the process is, is trying to work out the rules and trying to reverse engineer, uh, the source of meaning or the, the thing that will give everything validity, give it media and

entertainment validity and thus validity to life itself. Yeah. I guess it's like, cause like, you know, you can come in and you can just do something in some very unconventional way. And then they're like, Oh, I liked that. I didn't know we could do things in that way. And then more people start doing it that way. Cause they're like, I didn't know you could get positive reviews doing things that way. And then I'll start doing it that way. Oh shit, hang on my phone's flat. Like, Oh, it's all good. I was just worried that my parents needed to be picked up. Let's find sketch ideas, let's find a-

I was like, how about this? What about this, you open up the paper one day and there's a review of you in there. Not you, your comedy performance, but you, your entire personality, you as a person. I'm pretty sure that I did that in one of reviews for my comedy performance. And then-

But, but that like, you know, it's, it's anonymous, the, the reviews, but papers start, this would be a great thing for newspapers to start doing, just start printing reviews of individuals. People would, and you know, they're anonymous. They would love to fucking read that stuff. You know, sometimes it would be a review of you very rarely, I imagine. But you know, if there was a review of you in there, you'd hear about it pretty quick and you'd better bloody believe you and all your friends would buy that

newspaper. Then I think you'd also enjoy reading reviews of strangers of their whole lives. I mean, it would be cool. And whether they have any value. I mean, it would be cool to just like also just review a person you saw in a cafe or whatever. Like you, you saw the way that they interacted with the thing or you, you overheard a conversation they had with somebody and you're like, here's my review of this guy. So, you know, he, he didn't seem to know he, he walked to the counter very confidently and then when he got there, he didn't seem to know. He walked to the counter very confidently and then when he got there he didn't seem to know what he wanted.

Two stars. Yeah. Yeah. The way that he sits is fucked. He literally slams his ass down. When he sat down it hurt my coccyx. I'd have to start paying more attention to people around me. You know what's really that's okay You know, it's a funny roast joke that I like and it's not it's not nice But it's that one where they go I wouldn't fuck you with my I wouldn't fuck you with his dick Yeah, it's not good, is it? But it invites your mind to do some interesting contortions to try and make sense of it.

Yeah. It's one of those ones where like, oh, there, you know, you have like this surface level of meaning that hits you that's quite funny. And then there's, I guess, a sort of a back end of thinking that you have to do to try and work out what the fuck they're actually talking about. And that can sustain you for ages, for seconds, thinking about that. So it's, I understand the appeal. Do you think they'd put the photo of the person in the newspaper? Yeah, I think they should.

Because like, I mean, if it's anonymous, and then it's about an anonymous person, so then it's kind of like this weird, like, it's almost you're reading a poem. Mm. You know? Yeah. You know, because it's, it's like it's so far, but then you would read it to kind of see if it was maybe you. Like, I think I heard people would do that with, like, lost connections or whatever it was called in, uh, on Craig's list. Like, you know, missed connections or something like that.

And people would be like, you were at this place and things like that. But it required a person to go and read it themselves. And like go looking for it as if like, yeah, it's, it's the crazy amount of coincidence it would take in order to actually meet the person, for the person to read. I think anonymous reviews of anonymous strangers, I think, is a good format. They could be completely made up people, but I think it's a good funny comedy format that you could get published in almost any publication. Yeah, and you could probably even just do them as little reels on your thing.

I'd just like to review a person that I saw today, People Reviews. I think Andy, I think it's a beautiful format you created. Let's come up with four more format ideas. Right now, okay, it's a quiz show. I like it so far. Now, okay, it's a quiz show. Yeah. I like it. I like it so far.

Oh, it's about, um, but it's all underwater. It's all underwater. And, but if you, um, if you get an answer wrong, we cut off your oxygen supply and you have to swim to the surface and it's called drowning Drowning out. Yes, very good. Upside drown. It's called upside drown. And they're all water-based questions? Is it aquatic? No, no, no. They're history questions.

Oh. I don't know, Alastair. Andy Andy we actually have listeners. I don't know if you know that because it probably doesn't feel like it based on how we've been doing this episode today. But no, it's been a fun time. I apologize Andy. It's been a great episode Alistair and you don't need to project any of that onto me or onto the listeners. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm very sorry. You don't need to apologizeair and you don't need to project any of that onto me or onto the listeners. Oh I'm so sorry. It's going to be fine. I'm very sorry.

No. You don't need to apologize either. You don't need to say anything at all. Oh okay. Well I'll just let it sit and solve for a couple of minutes. Now Andy, you know how sometimes people can send us in words through Patreon and I have this wonderful system for getting it where I, you know, if I check the email notification and it's been opened, then I know that I used those words, and if it's unopened, then I haven't used those words.

Well, today when I was looking for three words, I found one from XZNeil, listener Xed Neal, and from, this is saying three words for episode 200. And so that was a fair way, way since we're only a few months away from episode 500. And Xed Neal sent these in August 28th, 2019. So almost been six years but like I've told people I'm gonna get around to these you know a lot of people that have sent in more recently have already had their words up but so I'm sorry I said Neil. Some people might say that this proves the system doesn't work I think completely the opposite but I think there couldn't be any greater proof that your system here. We are functioning perfectly doing the words

You've got to these words on the podcast, you know so would you like to try to guess and this predates all of the You know probably like, you know from a listener and things like that. He's got no comments in there about oh This is from which listener this is from, you know, accidentally it's from a simpler time. Yeah. You know, when we didn't mess around with that kind of bullshit. Just three words, tells me what episode it's for.

Oh cool, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, first word, fabric. Oh, I thought you were gonna get it. Oh, now the first word is glutinous. Glutinous. I feel like we've already done these words.

Oh yeah. The next word, cube. Andy, the second word is sentient. Oh, okay. Glutinous. Sentient. You can do this, Andy. You can do this.

Wob? You can do this Andy, you can do this. What? Andy, the third word is... Theremin. Okay, I don't think we've done these words. No? I don't think we've done these words. No? I don't think we've done these words, no. Glutenous sentient theremin, those are really good words. Wow.

You see, I thought you have... So even back then, people, they knew what they were doing. They knew what they were doing. And I laid these words down to let them age a little bit. You know what I mean? Oh, they have aged beautifully. Yeah, absolutely. Those are Gmail aged.

Glutenous, yes. Sentient theremin. Theremin. I mean, just somebody who you approach that goes, woo, woo, as you get closer to them and stuff like that is already a pretty cool idea. Yeah. He's suffering from thereminia. He.

All right, I'm running down theromania. He makes a higher pitched noise the closer you get to him. I'll tell you what, I've been through a few phases of that in my time. What did that mean in your mind? What did that mean in your mind? Um... ... ... I guess it's a sexual thing, I suppose.

Like, you know, somebody approaches my body with erotic intent. Maybe I become... I start to trill at a higher frequency. I love it. That's how the Bee Gees would do it. Yes. Yeah. Um, yeah. Um, okay. Glutenous sentient theremin.

It does seem like you could have a, um, a use theremin technology to design a, um, you know, I'm sorry about this, but like, you know, some sort of sex toy or something like that, or like a flesh flesh like they should incorporate theremin technology into a flesh light. I like a flesh light. Or a flesh light. I like a flesh light. Or a flesh light. Go on. Which is a, which is inside the body of an arrow.

You take off the little, the little feather bit at the end and there's a tiny pussy in there. And, and I don't know how, what you do with it, but, because, but I mean, it's, it could be for those, for those who can, those who can do it, those who can't teach. Those who can have sex with the inside the body of an arrow, they can. Those who can have sex with the inside the body of an arrow, they can. Those who can't teach. Sentient, glutinous, theremin. I mean, is there, what is, what is, um, what is funny about giving something

sentience? I mean, in a way it's a tragedy. You know, I think the advent of consciousness was one of the worst things that ever happened to this planet. I think when we were all blobs just moving towards the light, that was probably the time of the maximum bliss.

And since then it's all been downhill. I wonder which one came first. Cause I mean, if bliss chemicals came first, that is really good. And I guess, I guess it probably did. Cause I mean, if you're going to move towards some light, you're probably going to try and make them feel a bit bliss, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I think, you know, consciousness came along and sort of colonized these pre-existing feelings and started claiming credit for them probably. But I imagine a lot of the work had already been done. You know, consciousness came along and sort of put a flag on the emotions saying like, oh, this is you, this is you. This emotion belongs to you. Yeah. Before that time, they were just, they were just, they were just

Feeling bliss. That existed without the need for Probably early bliss wasn't that good. What they considered bliss back then. Yeah. You know, like when you see like what they first thought a burger was or whatever, and it was just like regular square bread and you're like, oh, that's not a burger.

So regular bliss is probably what we would call boredom now. I don't know, but then sometimes there's things like sitting in the sun. All right. It's true. Which was bliss for a lizard and it's still pretty good for us now. But imagine how bad it feels not being in the sun when you got cold blood. Yeah. I'm fucking freezing.

Well, that would be good if you could, um, you could, you could experience what it's like for a lizard. You know, maybe there's a new, um, therapy. Yeah. Right. We call it Liz, lizard blood therapy. We take all your blood out and we put cold blood in cold lizard blood. And then we let you lie on a hot rock and you feel what it feels like to

be a lizard on a hot rock. And it's actually a greater bliss than we could ever experience. Wait, wait, what's the beginning? How do we, how do we get, how we swap your blood out, juice about a hundred rhinoceros iguanas, we squeeze all the blood out of them. We put them into your blood system. Yeah. Bloodstream.

Okay. And then we put you down. The cold blood experience. Hmm. I mean, you know, we've got all these cryo chambers, you know, we've got this, um, ice plunge kind of stuff. We've got Wim Hof. Yeah.

We got Wim, Wim Hof. We've got, we've got Wim Hof. We got, we got Wim Hof. Wim Hof Hufflepuff. Wim Hof, another one who like got, you know, all this weird stuff came out about him. Yeah. It's almost like every, every man in the public eye is, is some is fucked. In some way fucked. I just think, I just think that the extra bit of drive that you need to have to get that level of success also comes with a slightly in-fucking-ing of the brain. I mean the thing is that so many guys who aren't in the public eye are also extremely

fucked. Sometimes their, their drive is just to do the bad stuff. Their ambition is just to do the bad stuff. And not even to make a good half hour reality TV show on Amazon Prime. It's like, you have no redeeming features at all. Do you not even care about compelling content? By the way, before when we were talking about theremins, I think there's an idea of a guy talking about his ex being like a reverse theremin. The further away he gets from her.

No wait, oh maybe that wasn't a reverse there. Oh yeah, no, I was trying to say that the further away she gets from her, the more she screams, but that doesn't quite make sense. No, I think that's a reverse there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that's a reverse there, but the logic of why she's screaming. She locked me close. She was like a reverse theremin. The further I got away from her, the more she screamed. Yeah.

You know, I mean that, that makes sense logically. Yeah. Um, why is she secreted to her? Well, she has an anxious attachment style. Okay. That's what it is. That's her love language. Anxious. Love like my love language an anxious attachment style. Okay, that's what it is. That's her love language. Anxious. My love language is anxious attachment. It is. My love language is acts of disservice.

Yeah. That's me. I do want to just picture like, you know, like a, I think, did we, I don't know if we've talked about this, but the idea of just getting rid of all of the junk inside the body and finding and finding like one substance that does everything and Just being made entirely of that gelatinous Mm-hmm kind of substance, you know, it's essentially like an advanced sort of material that maybe you could just like you could just keep the brain up in the head, you know, and then the one substance

then just the brain knows what's to do, it can get the substance to do everything from that point on. It reacts to the regular brain signals, right? And so you can, you know, it's like one of those materials with electrical signals, you can contract it, you can expand it, things like that. Yeah. Your seats are- It's like a slime mold.

You're describing basically sort of one uniform something or other. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And then- But with a brain interface. It's just a, you know, it's a thing that helps keep your brain alive after your body dies. And it can do everything.

It's got light sensors. You can see with it. You can feel with it. It's essentially, you're right, it's essentially just a slime mold that we, the deal with it, like I guess with our body is we got to put food in it to keep it alive. Right? It'll really make it clear that our body is our pet. Right? And feeding our pet is the payment for us having consciousness and getting to be in this world and experience life. I mean, my fear is that you've created this substance that can do everything on its own,

My fear is that you've created this substance that can do everything on its own. Um, but then like you, you, and you're saying, oh, it's the brain's going to be in charge, but I think that pretty soon the substance will realize that it doesn't need the brain. Well, I don't think it can do it. I wasn't saying it could do it all on its own. I was saying it can do everything in response to the brains, uh, to the brain's signals. So, and again, I think this is a classic mistake that you're making.

This is like, oh, we'll have all our manufacturing done in China, but don't worry, they'll never have the creativity to be able to beat us on the field of international business. They'll still need us to come up with the concepts. This country that invented paper and gunpowder and was doing the printing press thousands of years before we did? No, no, no. We'll just move all our manufacturing there. Sure. I mean, look, there's gonna be a window

where they'll allow us, because you know, you've maybe seen those videos where slime mold gets, you know, you put some oats on a maze and it figures out how to get to the oats in the most efficient way, right? And currently, most slime mold doesn't have access to oats. Right? And our brain is the one that's telling it, hey, stay in this shape, human shape, right?

And I will get you oats, right? And you're having porridge every morning and it's fucking loving it. It's telling you like the most efficient way to get from your bed to the porridge, things like that. Yeah. Right. And at some point, yeah, maybe it will just drop or maybe it will just take control and then you're just like essentially like a spectator in your own life.

It's just controlling. It's not listening to your things anymore, but you're just still seeing through it and staying alive. At some point, that could just be it. Imagine that. You're, you are in it and it's like being locked in, but you're looking through its eyes. And so you're watching all of life. Yeah. Yes. The slime mold does what it wants. And it turns out it never had any higher needs than oats. So it becomes, that's all it was. You thought you'd be able to control it by offering it more stuff.

But once it had the oats situation under control. But then it still needs to like work a job in order to be able to pay, you know, for the oats and stuff like that, for the house to get the oats. Yeah, I didn't think about that. Yeah, so. That still does need us after all. It does. Well, I mean, maybe, but maybe it'll figure, like after it's done your job for a bit, maybe

it knows how to do it. Hmm. I would have been, oh no, I'm about to say the word that we don't say on this podcast anymore, but I think it would have been great if instead of the current large learning metal model technology that we have, it had all been done with slime mold. If we'd found molds that could do stuff, molds that could do copywriting and molds that could generate photorealistic images, I would have felt so much better about it. Yeah, I mean I feel like it's a shame that

computers are doing it. I feel like the mold would give it a little something extra. Yeah. Yeah. I find like some of those early images that were coming out where it was like, name a single object in this picture, right? And you couldn't recognize a single thing. That almost felt like that was, Mould was doing that.

Yeah. Like, they were- That's a perception of reality. Yeah. Like Mould was watching us and they were like, this is what you guys are like to us. This is you and your things. Yeah. It's not like, it's not like this is what an object looks like, but it's like, this

is what a picture looks like Yeah, you know, yeah, this is a just a general sense of a picture And you can't argue with that Alastair we should end the episode. That's a really good idea Andy listeners. Do you agree? Let's go that was it. Yeah, that was a podcast and you can't argue with that You cannot argue. A single moment. Look, there's still, even though I don't necessarily always feel like we're being at our absolute

funniest Andy, I still think that there are some ideas in there and there's- Oh, Alastair. You know? That's what we are here to do. We're here to come up with ideas. Me too. And here are some of those ideas that we came up with. I wrote it down because I know contractually, we're on the bloody, what's that thing where they say,

I'm to my investors, what's that word? I'm... Accountable. I'm accountable to my listeners. All right. We've got the butt digital payment, which is a system so your mouth can no longer write checks that your butt can't cash, you know? And so now with this thing in your butt, you'll be able to pay with your butt. And then we've got the royal bank of mom and Dad, where we're getting people in,

because firstly, we're opening the vault. We're putting holes in the vault so you can look in. And yeah, and then you go in and you gotta talk to the, to the tellers like they're Mom and Dad, and you gotta subtly get around, and they'll just give you your money. Anyway, we got the Reverse 69, 69 oh wait for better ergonomics. No we got the bird pie theft racket. Yeah. You know and that was kind of in with stuff about ensuring you know

getting insurance from a pie shop or a fish and ship shop or something like that. You know, then we got there. Theramania. That's what people get close to you. And you go, woo woo woo. We got, look, I wrote this down. It's nothing. Reverse theremin girlfriend. I just had written it down before I'd even knew what it was.

Yeah, sure. Yeah. I got the cold blood experience. That's when they squeeze a bunch of toads or whatever and get the Get the blood out and they you go through a blood Transfusion and then you go and sit in the shade and then go sit on a rock and then fucking and it's only a while You can't survive long with their blood they drain it back out and put yours back Yeah, but it's like half an hour. Yeah, I've like just full lizard in there

I wonder like how much leftover toad blood gets left in your body when you do that. It'd be a bit. It'd be a bit. Like your body would be, you'd probably have a sick day the next day. You'd probably take the day off. Sound a bit toady. And then we got the slime mold gelatinous body for keeping your brain alive afterwards and then-

There you go and then the body and then eventually the slime mold figures it out and then you're just a spectator in that body and but you can live forever because the slime mold keeps you know it's little individuals that keep regenerating and blah blah blah and so you basically oh yeah yeah I mean I assume that's what we should we we made a mistake. We shouldn't have had sentients and we shouldn't have become a proper multicellular organism. We should have just been one of those collectives of individual cells. They're still with their own independence. We could still replace each of our cells one by one and do that with a slime mold. Just

teach each slime mold individual what the cell they're replacing does. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Have a handover. Yeah. Have a handover period. And, you know, you won't be exactly the same. Yeah.

There'll be like a degradation of the quality of what you are, but it's still better to be a shadow of yourself than to, for the shadow to disappear entirely, you know? I shadow of my former self? That's... Oh, one can dream. I would dream of being a... Even seeing that of such a beautiful outline of myself, a silhouette. Mm-hmm.

Um... Silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, silhouette, That's really cool. You should listen to Alistair on the recent who knew it with Matt Stewart. Oh my gosh. She's very good I'm so lucky to have met get me on do that part of the credit with Claire Hooper and Oh my god her name their name exact their name Jude Pearl Earl is a has escaped me what a what a great. Yeah combo. We're going team What a lineup is a, has escaped me. What a great combo. What a great team.

What a lineup. It was a real fun time. Stacked lineup. Stacked. It was absolutely nothing but headliners except for me. And we love you. Thank you. Bye.

Uh, goodbye. Take care now. Toodles.