Two In The Think Tank - 505 - "THE STAPLER"

Episode Date: December 23, 2025

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Bumdhiti, boom chatee, boom, boomtzee, boom, zi, boom, zi, boom, zi, boom, zi, jay, Merry Christmas. Hello and welcome to Toin the Thingtank, the show, where we come up with five sketch ideas. Sketch ideas. Merry Christmas. Yes, Merry Christmas. Christmas episode, isn't it, Andy? It's a very Christmas episode. Hello and welcome to a Holly. jolly think tank

yeah absolutely deck the nothing but a mouse is stirring up the ideas in our minds not a not a concept

was stirring except for a mouse stirring up the concept of a mouth physically stirring something um dust

dust that was this dust Dust is a sketch idea Welcome Andy, that's the most German I've ever heard you speak Ah well that's good That's good to know that the other German

I've been speaking has been unheard by you Yeah You know it's great The idea of like doing an ad And then but that nobody sees Oh the best Then you get like a few grand for just like a couple of days work or whatever. That is God showing his hand. That is him. That is Jesus walking amongst us

bestowing his blessings in his mysterious ways. Well, now that you're in the field, Andy, Andy, now that you're in the field, would you say that people who work in casting in ads, they might be gods? We discuss it in the field, in the paddock of advertising. We discuss it often. um and how they are godlike how we are godlike yes how we oh so okay so you you guys you think that everybody in advertising might be gods yeah of course and when they give somebody an ad like do you think that the whole purpose of it is to reward sort of actors who have been begging for work and you know to the to the lords of this universe yeah and the whole facade of sort of showing people's products off to the masses, that's just a cover

for giving actors who can't get into big films and great roles a few grand here and there so that they don't die and their dream stays alive. Alistick capitalism doesn't need marketing. Products don't need marketing, advertising to convince people to buy them. All products are speak for themselves. They sell themselves. Every single product that exists needs to exist, and people need to own it. The idea that you would need to convince people to buy things is insane. We've created this entire, yes. Does marketing just allow the products to speak faster for themselves or louder?

No, again, it's only to give struggling actors a glimmer of hope. This whole edifice, adifice, if you will, of advertising. Adifice. Is an artifice. The guy from the, to kill a mockingbird? Yes. Adifice Finch? Um, is, uh, yep.

Indeed. So, um, there's, there's almost nothing more to say. Um, but that's not going to stop me. Do you, go on? Alistin, I think that there's a sketch idea in this? Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay.

We keep it. secret it's like it's like somebody who's been in a coma for 50 years we keep it secret from actors and i shouldn't be revealing this but oh my gosh thank you and this actually could be really good for the podcast giving away insider secrets this is there's no bigger secret than this that we don't tell actors this it's like somebody who's been in a coma for 50 years and we pretend that it's still the past okay we this will be like when bourdain when bourdain went on He wrote Kitchen Confidential. And then he went on Oprah and talked about all the butter.

If you go to a nice restaurant, you probably end up eating a whole stick of butter. Can you reveal to the people the secrets of how much butter you guys use in advertising? It's, you know the ad? I can't believe it's not butter. Yeah. It was butter the whole time. Okay. That, I mean, isn't that the greatest?

That's why it was so hard to believe. Yes, exactly. we were like how we go to conceal the fact we in the advertising industry we actually all got together to work on this one it was in all hands and we it's like we came out of the trenches as like a Christmas Day armistice we all came out of the advertising trenches and we all came out of the advertising trenches and we worked together in one enormous writer's room all the big all the big competing advertising firms came out of the trenches They put down there I guess their They're cocaine

Their bumps of cocaine We put them down into a big pile I'm talking through it I'm recording a podcast with Alistair So can you run back to Mummy So that I can do the podcast Thank you Run

Run Run Run run Remy run That was Wally Oh, you know what? I forgot that Wallie was the youngest one. Yes. Yeah, no, but I did know it was the smallest. I just forgot that, you know, I'm so sorry.

No, no, no, no. But it was, yeah, it truly was a beautiful thing because it was such a, it was like the Manhattan Project or something, you know, something that we all knew that we had to work on. How do we sell this butter and say it's not? Oh, yeah. And convince people that it's not butter. And we figured out, lie.

Lie. Lie. Somebody, we actually, we all lay in a big pool together and joined our brains, connected our brains together. And then spoke with one voice. And we said, lie. That was the word that we said. And the rest is a herster. Isn't it amazing?

Like, you know, I know it's a long time ago to talk about I can't believe it's not butter. But just the idea of a marketing campaign that is like, this tastes good, right? But actually, you'll realize it's actually a much worse product. Yeah. Why did they do that? I guess at the time people thought margarine was better for you, I think. I think that's it. Yeah, I don't know if we're still, I think we're, I mean, there's still margarine in the aisles, we're still working that line.

We're still, you know, I mean, maybe we're trading off some kind of residual, um, delusion that, um, this is super processed, weird, worse tasting, butter substitute. I mean, you know, I guess there's also, there's also vegans, there's always vegans. But nobody's market to the vegans. Nobody's saying this is vegan. You know, there's no big ad campaigns going, like, we are kind to animals. You don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, a, a woke margarine. Margarine's never playing to the, to the gallery. And nobody ever puts a cow on a vegan product when really they should, you know, like if the cow was going to endorse anything, it would be.

Yeah. Marjoring. Instead, it's all over the, you know, It's all over there, our packets of sausages and our bottles of milk. Do you think they should put dead cows on a packet of sausages? Put dead cows, skeletal cows. What about this? You put a cow on the cover of a margarine packet.

And then underneath it, there's probably like, you know, like one of those beautiful ribbons or kind of like places where you can write something. And in the writing, it says, our tractor accidentally hit this cow. we were mowing the fields of the canola that we used to make this. Yeah. And this is in honour of her old, old sugar. Old blue eyes. After the villain in no country for old men.

Um, Anton Schu. Somebody of it. Anton Sugar. all right um have we written in that down any such ideas uh yeah i've sort of look i've been writing this whole time true purpose of advertising and i wrote down i can't believe it's not butter all hands on deck yeah i'm not a hundred percent sure about that but they should make but they you know they're all we're all about making um all the movies

now are about products have you noticed that they're all about like um uh uh uh uh uh uh Barbie, Barbie, Ferrari, you know, that kind of stuff. Ferrari, um, everything all at once. Everything all at once. All of those things, a lot of them are products. Yes. And time is money, and money's kind of a product of an economy. I agree.

GDP. Yeah. There should be ads for money. You know, like, oh, that's a good thing. Yeah, an ad for money. Oh. hungry thirsty

Why not try money Money With money You could get things To quench both of those urges I mean How many urges

Can you quote Almost that's what those fucking MasterCard Is it MasterCard For there's some things Money can't buy For everything else There's MasterCard

Which by the way Why are we advertising mastercard it's either like you get a master card or you get a visa and no one ever thinks about it right you just get whatever you the bank gives you nobody's ever been like oh i want a master card i don't want a visa yeah you actually have to would have to push really hard to try to like shift to it you'd have like move banks yeah and they're like god damn it like that is but and is there any difference i don't think there is i think there is i think once you got a duopoly I don't think it's

You know And then I guess then there's those ones where they're like You know when you're buying something either on Amazon Or like a plane ticket or something like that And they're like Buy my plane My airlines master card Yeah

You guys got your own master card And I was like I don't know if I want to put my Like I'm not even collecting any points But like do I want to put all my points in one basket Do I only want to be collecting flying points Instead, I'll collect none, thank you very much Yeah I'd rather nothing

But don't you kind of feel with the points thing That you're giving something away You must be giving something away Absolutely There's no way they're just giving you these points Yeah, why are you giving me these points What's the real damn here Yeah

But do you think people are going on flights You know like even this frequent flyer stuff Do you think people are going on flights because they're like, I just need a few more points. I will say my parents used to get lots of points and they would use them to get flights. So it does happen. It has happened, it does happen.

But like on a credit card or with an airline? I think they got it on their credit card. Yeah. And I'm not going to tell you how, because it might have been illegal. But... But they had a way of getting a lot of points. let's just say they were self-employed and they got a lot of points wink wink wink okay okay and let's not say they're full names okay wink and wink

so we'll just know them as wink and wink and mrs wink left eye wink and right eye wink um alistair uh can i tell you something that is right up there with one of the greatest things you can experience in life okay it's when you smash the screen of your phone right you really smash it and you look at that screen and you go oh god i wish i was dead my life should be over now right sure there's no way back from this and then you remember you've got a glass screen protector on your phone and you peel off that smashed protector and there's a beautiful untouched virgin screen underneath it's as close as you get in the and now you're You've taken the wrapper off of it.

Ooh, yeah. Now you can, but now you can really feel it when you run your finger on it. Oh, yes. And it's, I realized, because this happened to me yesterday, I realized this is as close as you get to like when you have a dream where you do something despicable, like you commit a murder.

And then you wake up and you peel off that layer of unreality. and you see an unblemished criminal record before you when you awake. There's no better feeling that and the phone thing. You know what I think is weird? Is that like when something bad happens, I think that there's a part of you that always expects that this is going to be able to just go away because every other time in your life most like bad things, have kind of been a dream or like

or you have been like you know and then it's gone away and then your brain is like oh this is actually not going away but it keeps feeling like it will yeah yeah and then and then sometimes you go into the dream world like for example

yeah when my grandfather passed away very sad and then I would have dreams where we were chatting right and hanging out and then you wake up and it's the exact opposite of everything I just described. You're like, oh no, he's not actually alive.

Yeah. But you got to hang out with him, which is almost no different, right? Yeah. Yeah. Totally. It was great. I had a really good time. Because like in your dream, in your brain, the whole world that you experience is inside

your brain. It's the whole fucking world, man. Yeah, I mean, it's just a model. You're only living in the model. Mm-hmm. you never actually get to see the real one so you actually never got to see your grandfather you only got to see the model of him

what if we just discovered that all of reality was an ad you know like it's not a simulation it's an ad and what would it be an ad for okay but like do we need to at first figure out how would we figure out like okay wait I know there's a lot of questions here

how would we how is the person in this scenario discovering that it is an ad I guess they notice a lot of product placement I mean yeah I guess am I for one ad Truman show but for all of reality and then is that no longer not interesting but who's it advertising it too that's I mean it's a good point okay so what if what if advertising has developed to the point where we don't just have ad breaks for TV shows, we can have an ad break for all of reality, right? Which presumably you will be able to have. Once everyone has a chip in their brain, right, you'll be able to be like, oh,

it's an ad break now, right? And then everybody goes into just an ad break, okay? So whatever you're doing, if you're out playing soccer in the field, it cuts to ads, everybody falls on the ground, sort of just lies there twitching while ads play for everybody simultaneously. It would be a bit like siesta in Spain. Exactly right, yeah. Is that what they do? They're in the middle of a soccer game. They fall to the ground, twitching.

Everybody lay down. Yeah, it's like 2 p.m. or whatever like that. Everybody lays down. see us then they have a little 15 minute now and uh okay and then and then rain you spring you spring back up or whatever but maybe that's what is happening you know maybe um you know ad breaks just get longer right so maybe the last four billion years of life on earth have been just an ad break um in the minds of

I don't know, like an amoeba or something like that. So we're in the dream of an amoeba where there's an ad break that's been going for four billion years like a single amoeba? Could be a single amoeba. And what were they advertising to this amoeba? Maybe sunlight.

You know, you think, like, what are amoebas drawn towards sunlight? They might... And how does the sun do? it, advertising by putting out feelers. Exactly. People, you know, amoebas aren't just drawn to sunlight. They have to be convinced by marketing, the greatest force in the universe.

Maybe it's gravity, you know. We were talking about gravity, Alistair, you and I. Yeah, you know. We don't accept the, you know, a lot of the metaphors that are used to explain gravity, the rubber sheet. That's right. You know, the distortions on the rubber sheet. sheet. Well, the dissociating in the rubber sheet are caused by gravity. So that can't be used to

explain gravity. Maybe gravity is just marketing, right? Convincing objects to go towards a large, towards a mass. They're just... And how does it and how does it distribute that that message

through a particle? A particle. Known as the gravitron. It's just, and it goes to the thing and it says you like gravity? Well, you should come and get some. Come over here. Gravity is going to be good for you.

I mean, it is genuinely quite a good product, you know, like gravity where if you, you know, if like it wasn't here, we would all drift off. Sort of, I guess, be stuck on, yeah, drift off. And I think that would be lonely. And do you think, I don't know, we'd still like be creatures, right? Like we would still have our atoms stay together. Well, it depends. It depends if there had never been gravity, because I think if there had never been,

been gravity. Probably all mass in the universe would have just expanded into nothingness from the Big Bang almost instantly. But then there might not have been a Big Bang, you see. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I don't know if gravity caused the Big Bang. But, I mean, we have to assume.

Well, you don't know what caused the Big Bang. No. I don't think anybody has a clue what caused the Big Bang, right? Yeah. So let's not go. I was like, well, I don't think gravity calls the Big Bang. No, that's absolutely not what I said. It may have played a part of it.

That's not what I said. I said, we don't know if gravity calls the Big Bang. I was agreeing with you, Alistair. Oh, yeah. I mean, it was agreeing in a very kind of. A quivocal kind of way. Yeah. No, maybe I wasn't agreeing with you, Alistair.

I can't remember what I was saying. That's okay. I might have been disagreeing with you. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I guess the ad break thing might work if scientists had discovered, you know, that they could get some kind of information from what they've discovered now is other universes. And therefore, they can emit information that goes to other universes, right? and then they are trying to communicate with, you know, all the planets on the other universe and then let them know about us and our great products.

Gravity. And which may lead to ultra, you know, advanced civilizations going from their universe to our universe and then earning money on our planet and hopefully spending that money in their new, found home, Earth. Yes. I think you know capitalism is the great good

the one true good like the product capitalism no no you say good goods and services no I'm saying it is it is

what I'm saying in a way it is God and I'm saying that if we're able to share it with other universes that will ultimately be our greatest achievement and by now For some reason, if there was any version of this as a TV show that we created, do you think we could call it gods and services?

Lord, it's really good. Yes. Yes. I'll just write down the title. Gods and services. I mean, what a beautiful, beautiful phrase. I think... What was the other...

Oh, yeah, you were... It was you guys, all the people in advertising were gone. That's what we were saying. Yeah. Is there, um, was there an Australian TV show about a bunch of gods living in a sharehouse? Or was that something that, yeah. Are you thinking of the one with the vampires that lived in the house? No, no, no, no, no, no.

I, I'll tell you what I think it was. I think, oh my God. Is my computer just restarting for no reason? Oh, no. It's still going. Yes. I think it was that when Stephanie Brocci, friend of the show, was working with that group Vigilantelope,

I think they were in talks with somebody at the ABC who really did want them to make a TV show that was God's living in a sharehouse, possibly. Okay. They were really excited about that idea. Yeah, like the ABC were? Yeah. I don't think the group wanted to make it, though.

Wow. But let's just say if the agency is listening, if they still want to make that, they're still nurturing that idea. Alistair and I will do it. We will do it. And if you didn't like what you heard up until this moment now in the episode, we don't have to use any of those ideas.

We never would. We never would. No. unless you love them yeah but honestly we just do your ideas you know we'll do your ideas you just tell us what you what you think is funny and we do that you know yeah and we'll just have our name on it we will yeah we don't have to though we don't have to have our names on it you we can put your names on it we can put your name on it we can change our names to your names if you want if that's what you want and if you want to pull our skin off our bodies and wear our skin and and and sort of

squelch around on screen flapping our lifeless gums up and down you know while our skinless bodies ride in agony in a basement at Ultimo that's okay

you could do that but our yeah but our skins will look you know like not in agony what's the opposite of agony not agony not agony

and and I just want to to say, we agree with all the decisions the ABC has made recently. We think the Antoinette Latouf thing, where you, like, threw away millions of dollars for no reason, was really good. We agree both with firing her and then choosing to defend that in court for no reason and bring you shame on the whole organisation. We think that's good. And all the stuff to do with it.

Israel and sort of, you know, I'm ever using the word atrocity or genocide or anything. The way you equivocate, allow me to be the first to say, I love it. And be proud, very proud. Allow me to be unequivocal in saying, the way you equivocate makes me rock hard. Oh, well, Andy, I think we've got this job. this is amazing just the idea of like of like people coming to you from tv and being like we've got this idea would you like to make it and you go no you know it's that it's that mistake of the early days oh I mean you know like I mean look it might not be it

the thing is that this whole thing might not be might not be what happened at all yeah oh yeah I'm picturing some... I do know other people who have said no to think things. I think being in that mind, like that state of mind where you're like, there'll be other opportunities and I will create my own opportunities. Like that.

And then not realizing they were in the opportunity dead zone. Yes. Where there's not much going on. Ah, the opportunity dead zone. What is the... What is the Stephen King movie The Dead Zone? Yeah, I've got no idea. Okay.

I thought you were about to riff on it. It could be set in, I was just thinking about the Twilight Zone. I was thinking if there was a way that I could shift what we were riffing about into a sort of a Twilight Zone discussion, but it was a, the Twilight Zone was instead some sort of opportunity dead zone. And instead of, say, entering. into a deal with the devil as you might

in an episode of the Twilight Zone. Instead you turn down a deal with the ABC. That's all. It's all. It's not much. It's good too. It's not much. It's not much. It's not much.

I mean, I could picture a character. It's an artist. It's a guy who does a drawing like this, right? And he does a drawing it's a really good drawing all right and and then this uh his friend shows it to their friend who's like a you know a person from a gallery or whatever and they're like we would like to enter this into a competition and he says no like that and then they they on the on the down low

enter it anyway and it wins and then he rejects the prize yeah and then he He gets, but then he gets, because of the publicity from that, he gets offered to do a huge mural on the side of Parliament House. And then he says, no. And then, while he's sleeping, they drag his limp body and they flap him around in front of the wall with paintbrushes stuck to his hands. And it wins a Nobel Prize for painting. and then he says no I don't want it like that

and then they take the million dollars he's old prize and they do buy lottery tickets and every one of them wins no but wait just listen to this idea

so he does he does the he does the you know he doesn't do the mural and then he uh you know he he gets offered a bunch of other stuff

and he says no to that and then he kind of gets older and then they uh They do a big documentary about him, about how, you know, he made this amazing drawing and, you know, I love this a drawing, by the way. I'm trying to imagine how good this drawing could be.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then eventually he dies. Oh, no. And he's one of the most successful artists. He has an amazing strike rate. Mm. One beloved painting for, you know, for, and then, but a very high integrity where he is,

integrity was so hard, he wouldn't even make a second drawing. Isn't it interesting that drawings aren't really ever up there with the best art? It's all fucking paintings, isn't it? You've got to do it with paint or people don't care. Why are drawings not up there with paintings? Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, Andy, really, like, everything is like the system. that they're stuck in all the stuff that we consider to be the best i think in many ways at some point were just the most popular there's a lot of things that are just the most popular and like you know like mona lisa you know i guess it did make it to the lube so it was pretty good already but nobody had a clue about it until it got stolen yeah and then they were like And then it became, and now it's like everybody wants to see it because it's famous for being popular. Famous for being popular.

How many people do you think have seen that the Monolith, like, have gone to see the Monolese and have been like, incredible. Yeah, changed my life. Like, wow. Yeah. I'd never seen a picture that good before. It made me realize what was possible. I guess I didn't know people could draw I could paint a woman like that

Front on like that That's incredible Not that much emotion She's so front on in that painting I'm not to say I don't love it I don't I don't love it I don't think of it Yeah you prefer a side on

You're like a side on or maybe like Yeah How would you improve the Mona Lisa How would I improve the Montalisa, great question. Yeah, I would put her a little bit side on, I think. Yeah. Where were her eyes looking at the camera?

Maybe her eyes rolled back into her head. Oh, yeah. I mean, already, actually, I'm finding that better. What's she doing with her hands still sort of folded like that? Finger guts. Duguts. Okay, yeah, yeah. What's she wearing?

I'm with stupid T-shirt. How about this? There's a painting. The Bona Lisa. how do you feel like Okay So she has a boner Maybe

Yeah Maybe she does Or Let's see The boner Is there anything Or maybe one of the other meanings of boner

No I think I think it is the one you thinking of Just trying to one Because I love a bit I'd also like it to be subtle. So I'm just wondering if there's any way.

Yeah. Anyway, for that to not be the case. No, all right. And then the last 15 minutes of the episode was just Andy. Try to paint his way back out of the Bonalisa-shaped corner. Out of saying Bono-Lisa. Um, Alistair, I reckon we got five sketchy ideas written down. I mean, I'm not going to be.

I'm not sure we do, Andy. I actually don't think we do. You're kidding. Hey? Well, because I haven't written anything since God's and Services, because we kind of just went into serious talk. Ah. But it was such fun, serious talk.

I assumed that it was dripping with chichiteers. I guess I guess I did say the guy with the one who just did the one drawing I don't know if it's a sketch I still can't get to the bottom and why this fucking drawings aren't considered able to be up there with paintings

you know is it because pencils is it because pencils are too easy because you can't do as many different effects with pencils I guess you can do lots of different sort of stuff with paint brushes

You can do sort of lumpy or like... Yeah. Streaky. Yeah. But then some of the most expensive paintings are done, not with paintbrushes at all, but like with a pallet knife or something. Yeah. I mean, that's still paint, though. It is still paint.

Maybe if people learned how to draw with a pallet knife. Mm. Yeah. You know, just get chunks, break up the chunks, put them under the knife, push down hard. With the little chugs of pencil. Is that what you're thinking? Yeah. And then drag. Yeah.

Yeah. I think let's try and do it. Let's try and elevate drawing to the heights. You know, let's think about using the side of the pencil somehow. I think they do that already. I think that's a big part of like char holes and stuff, which is drawing. Using the side of the pencil, you're right. Yeah.

Like I think if you open to like maybe the first two pages of any art, book. The first thing they show you is materials and then they show you that you can use them on their side. I'd never got that far in. I always just get to the contents page and give up. They rarely use the paintbrush on the side though. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. Oh, I mean, we were here trying to revolutionize drawing. But now we've still, we've just elevated painting even more, putting it still further ahead by using the side of the paint. brush the side of the handle like that and you know what the crazy crazy thing is about the side of a paint brush is that it's covered in paint the paintbrush has been painted itself it is often the

case yes and so of the lot of the you know wood pencils and things like that i think you know if you maybe this is why the pencils are down low they don't even have the confidence in them in themselves to to to have their own material on themselves all over themselves they They painted that. They're getting cucked. They're getting cucked by paint on the outside of a wood pencil. Yeah. And I want to say to them, believe in yourself.

I could do a little painting. Maybe I'll do a little painting on a pencil. That'd be good. That'd be... Do a little painting on a pencil? Yeah, on the side there. This is to try to elevate pencils and drawing. No, I've given up on that.

That great and funny idea. Try to elevate drawing. But, Andy, I think it's just, I think, I think it's also just, it's just like, you know, like it's essentially being bigots towards types of art that some are considered high art, some are considered low art. Yeah. But also, it's probably just more difficult to make a paint, a pencil, a drawing kind of look more professional and worthy of it. appearing on your wall.

Because, you know, the average person does have some pencils at their disposal, but oil paint, you got to go to a specialist shop to get, you know? I suppose really the only way that you can elevate it is just by starting to pay heaps of money for it. You know, it comes back to what you said that it is just like popularity. And if we just started paying hundreds of millions of dollars for, like when Damien Hurst made that skull covered in diamonds and then it was bought for a hundred million dollars right and it turned out it was bought by a consortium of investors I think of which Damien

Hurst was one of them so he's at the point where his art consists of overvaluing his own art like that's part of the process it's just convicted yeah yeah to spend all this fucking money on this thing and uh that yeah you know if that's if we really I really wanted to do that for drawings. That's what we'd have to do. Hmm. What about an artist whose art is to find some of the most wealthy artists in the world and staple their butt cheeks together?

I have stapled the butt cheeks of some of the world's most famous artists. Now, you're stapling their butt cheeks. to a different artist or just stapling over there, the crack of that one artist. Yeah, right. Butt shut. Staple your butt shut. I mean, I guess for Damien Hearst, it would be,

because these days he just kind of mass produces so much crap, that maybe for him it would be a, you know, a comment on trying to stop the flow of shit. Yeah. Oh, that's actually really, really profound. Maybe too profound. Maybe it's too obvious. you know yeah do you think maybe i could i could work with um the lady who you know you think i could get the lady who makes you know who made the the sky whale yeah yeah patricia

patricia patcinini something like that yeah and uh she makes those kind of like ultra realistic things and she could make me a nude a nude a nude damien hearse laying on his front yeah and then we could staple its its butt cheeks together yeah i think i think i think That would be a great work. I think you need to do two next to each other, right? One with the butt cheeks stapled shut and one with them sort of held open like the eyeballs in a clockwork orange, right? And you sell both of those things. Maybe it's part of the same work or you sell them separately.

And I think now we're really, because by putting them both next to each other, we've created an ambiguity. And that's what makes them really interesting art-wise. But what's, like, what do you see when you look at the, the butthole that's been open wide? Yeah, whatever you want to see. I mean, it's the in the eye of the beholder, yeah. I'm not going to tell you what to see. I know, but, I don't think the hole is open wide. I think the cheeks, I think the cheeks are just spread.

So you've got to clear view of the butthole. But you don't look into that. You are going to tell us what we see. I just thought if it was the butthole, then at least there's a possibility. It's either that there's light inside and then you see the inside of the anal canal. Yeah. Or there's a darkness within. I think the darkness within it.

I think the darkness within it. I think you're right. I think it should be a darkness. You know, yeah. Maybe up there, up in there somewhere is like a single gem or jewels so that like if the right light shines in in the right way and maybe it does this once in the solstice, you know, once a year maybe you're lying it up with the and then it gleams out with um you know a bit of sparkling uh um yeah yeah yeah you know a little bit of sparkling a little bit of sparkling a little bit of sparkling but the one with the butt closed you you don't ever get that and now i i really think I really think now we are, I know, pure art.

We've done it, Alastair. And isn't that great that like stapling, you know, now we've turned stapling into an art form, normally stapling is something where you would just, you would use to hold sheets of paper together, other scraps. Where you used to hold your art together. Now it is the... Beautiful artworks, your beautiful paintings.

Andy, let's go to three words from a listener. Today's listener is William Moy William Moy. Is William Moy a new name? Moy. Yes. William Moy is a new name, Andy. Very well-boy.

Is that our moi-boy here? Moy-boino. Thank you, William. William moino is moi-boino. Andy, William has sent in three words from a listener. I assume that listener is him.

And would you like to try to guess what the first word that William has submitted is? I absolutely would adore that. And it's going to start with the letter L, and it is lengthwise. Oh, you would have been closer if you would have said laximalist, because the first word is maximalist. The second word, Andy. Okay, so what's something? What is maximalist?

Where does that, is that an art? I mean, we're in an art territory again. Maximilist. Cheesel. Cheesel? Oh, close, Andy. Because they're light cheesels, but this is ghost. A maximalist ghost.

Expulsion. No, no, not that. It's maximalist. I was just picturing what a maximalist ghost expulsion one of you, for some reason. I just assumed it was a cum. Oh. And, no, it's frequency, Andy, maximalist ghost frequency. Maximilist ghost frequency.

Whoa! Yeah, I mean, there's not really a theme, I don't think, with these words. Do you detect a theme? Do you, any hints there? Andy, you know what? I like when there's no hints. That's my favorite thing. Yeah.

You know, because I think that, you know, I want you to get these, you know, if I want you to guess one, I want you to guess it purely, not because there was a hint. Yeah, I think that's true, yes. I want you to get a pure guess right. Yeah, from the, from the full subset of every word in the English language. Yeah. Just hit that bull's eye. Yeah, I mean, there is a, I think it's true, though, that like, even within, um,

the full subset, I don't think people are truly guessing, suggesting words from the broad range of what's possible within those millions of words, English language. You know, I think it's still a pretty limited. Is that a critique of the listeners? I mean, they could be using more words. I think, I don't think it's a critique. I think it's a valid analysis.

I think it's an interesting observation from me. I don't know, Andy. I mean, I think within the palette of three words that people have been able to submit. I mean, there's only so many words they can submit. Three. Yeah, that's true. They can only go so wide. Yeah.

Now, let's think about... What does maximalist mean? That means, like, when you go, like, when you choose to live or select things at... I mean, I guess a maximalist ghost would be just one that's like basically human, right? Just on the edge of being completely, truly alive and material and can probably open and closed doors and be seen. Yeah, okay. I can do almost everything that a person can do, can get a job, can go to work, can love. and be loved can age

can they age probably age yeah you know like what is the one thing that they can't do this ghost um like it feels like if they're a maximalist ghost they need to

but they're not fully mortal you know they need to be like one thing they can't do oh wow oh wow boo

boo so they can say it with a range of different emotion it's easily misinterpreted as a sort of a brain injury but actually he's he's he's actually all he's actually the most ghost you can be into before you are human even when I'm with my boo that's a maximalist ghost I'm friends with it you know I'm crazy yeah that's that's beautiful yeah do you think they go to a do you think they go to a doctor to like to have their brain uh injury analyzed and it they discover that they actually are a ghost is that is it a diagnosis like d i e agnosis die agnosis

You know because he had actually died Or 30 years earlier When he hit his head And he started saying boo I guess it really is Just a brain injury Because it was The brain was injured enough

To no longer be alive Yeah you are dead But his ghost was so strong That he stayed alive But could only say boo I mean, I feel like they would have picked this up straight away I feel like Maybe there's just one word he can't say

I think you remake the sixth sense But the only word that Bruce Willis could say is boo And look, if you're looking for a guy who has had a brain injury And probably can only say boo at this point Nick Bruce Willis is probably your guy. Not to make light of his condition. But you don't want to make dark either. No.

No. Guy who almost died. Booze, Boose. Booze. No, he did die. I don't think he almost died. I think he did die. Right?

And did die. did die. I just can't erase that first sentence. Mm. No. And it became so much ghost. Mm-hmm. So much ghost.

Much ghost. Um, I feel like there's a, there's a, there's a bit more twisting that could be done. I feel like this is on the verge of being very funny. But maybe we've made it, made him too serious. Bruce Willis. Uh. Whatever, like, okay, but, you know, maybe, I think the idea of a ghost who's not, not ghostly enough, who still has responsibilities, you know, like, I guess he's, is, is it that his unfinished business is just to, to live his life, um, yeah, you know, does he still have to pay taxes?

Be good if you didn't, you know, I think, because he's not. Alive. Not alive, right? And I think, I mean, what would that do to society if ghosts were still out there sort of earning money? I guess they'd hoard wealth. They'd probably become the, you know, the 0.01% or whatever would be all ghosts. Yeah. I still think that, you know, from when people do the maths about, you know, they're saying like, you know,

even if you'd made $10,000 a day for, from the time of ancient Egypt, you still wouldn't have the amount of money that Elon Musk had I think that we could we'd probably be surrounded by maybe some ghosts that had been deeply caught in extreme poverty forever

yeah yeah that's true really pissed off homeless people like nothing to even haunt I mean yeah that's interesting if ghosts are everywhere I mean, if ghosts are everywhere, they're fully visible.

They just can't affect the world in any way, right? Maybe they can still yell and scream. We all see them. They're all running around, right? They're trying to get us to do stuff. They're all like getting, oh, you've got to investigate my murder or whatever. Every dead person stays around as a ghost,

except for their physical form, basically, and they can't physically do anything. And we've just got to deal with this like plague of ghosts, just getting up in our business, screaming, yelling. You know, I guess they could maybe still do some kind of work, but not any physical work. Maybe they could operate voice-activated things. Maybe they could do call center work or something like that if they want.

Oh, that's cool. But like what would be to what end? Because they can't buy anything. think oh like you know they can't have physical possessions really well they can yeah i mean they can move them around they can't move them around you're right oh man there'd be a big business in robbing ghost's houses yeah but then they would probably come to your house and just haunt you in the night and say shit and stuff like that yeah andy we should go to the ABC say oh we got this great idea for your your god's sharehouse thing where there's

bloody ghosts as well, but they're part of the economy. Yeah. I mean, there is a TV show called Ghosts on right now, but this is going to be very different because the ghosts are part of the economy. Yeah, there's a Canadian version and an American version of that show, I think. Yeah, yeah, well, it was originally a British show, so there's a British version as well. Yeah. But don't worry, they'll make the other ones a bit more fun.

Yeah. Well, don't worry, you don't have to watch that one now. No, no. I have other versions. Finally, other versions, good versions. Andy? We did it. We did it.

I don't know if I made it the most joyful Christmas episode it ever could have been. No, honestly, you did great. What happened was, at one point in the podcast, I just got extremely hungry. And for the last 15 minutes, all I can think about is how hungry I am. Yeah, right. I mean, you can always say, can I pause for a second and then go and do that. But we can always do that next time. Instead, I'd just ruin the show. No, no, it's okay.

These recordings will only last forever, Andy. Yeah, yeah, like a ghost. Like a ghost, Andy. Only this is a voice. We can only operate things through our voices in this, and through the medium of whatever. I got to go. I got to go to a show. Andy, in a pleasure.

And a joy. A festive joy. I'll read us through the sketch ideas, yes. We have the true purpose of advertising is to give a few grand to actors to keep their dreams alive. And I think maybe everybody in advertising are gods. We've got, I can't believe it's not butter. It was an all hands-on-deck situation for the advertising industry. Their secret was they lied.

It was butter. We've got the Fullist Society ad break. and that's when everybody has chips in their thing and they all fall to the ground and they convulse, I imagine. And then we've got gods and services, which I think might play into some other thing we mentioned. Pep talk to pencils to try and elevate drawing.

And so we're talking to them about how they need to believe in themselves and maybe have some drawings on the outside of themselves rather than paint. We're getting our asses kicked by paint. Um, we got art where you staple Damien Hearst's butt cheeks together. That's really good. That's a, yeah. It's my favorite bit.

It's a show. We've got the you died guy. Uh, no, they've got the guy who died. Hmm. Uh, and, and became so much ghost that he was basically alive. Yeah. Um, we've got, uh, and then we've got ghost plague with the ghost economy. Ghost play with the ghost economy

They can't touch things though You can rob them But they can come and haunt you And well done Well done Happy Christmas Andy thank you Andy happy Christmas to you

And a happy Christmas year Ching ching ching chinka ching ching ching chitong ching chitong chong chong chong chong chung dong dong dong dong dong Dongong don't go chung Everybody's gathered under the Christmas tree Andy, I feel like it was, that was good. I think so too. I had a great time.

It was a good episode. Thank you, Andrew. I think you had a really good episode as well. And we love you. Oh, oh, you, bye. And Christmas, bye. And Christmas, bye-bye.