Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! - WWDTM: Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone

Episode Date: December 21, 2024

This week, Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone join Dulcé Sloan, Hari Kondabolu, and Roy Blount Jr. to talk about their new podcast Hildy the BarbackLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Support for this podcast and the following message comes from Autograph Collection Hotels with over 300 independent hotels around the world, each exactly like nothing else. Autograph Collection is part of the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio of hotel brands. Find the unforgettable at autographcollection.com. From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is, wait, wait, don't tell me, the NPR News Quiz. Forget your silver bells, I'm your silver fox. Bill Curtis, and here's your host at the Studebaker Theater at the Fine Arts Building in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Segal.

Thank you, Bill. Thanks, everybody. Great to see you. We do have a great show for you today. Later on, we're going to be talking to Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone, part of a pantheon of Hollywood power couples like Bogie and Bacall, Ben Angelo, Leonardo DiCaprio, and a series of women who cannot legally rent a car. You can play our games alone or as part of a power couple.

We don't care. The number to call is 1-888-WAITWAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Let's welcome our first listener contestant. Hi, you are on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, this is Melanie Morgan from McKinney, Texas. start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you.

Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going to start with you. Melanie, I'm going have the two lowest paying jobs in the legal profession. Congratulations.

I teach family law and mediation. Wow. Well, welcome to the show, Melanie. It's a pleasure to have you. Let me introduce you to our panel this week. First up, a comedian and correspondent for The Daily Show who will be performing standup at the Philadelphia Punchline on December 27th and 28th. It's Dulce Sloan.

Hello. Hi, Dulce Sloan. Hello! Hi Dulce. Nice to meet you. And he's a comedian whose new special, Vacation Baby, is available on Hulu and YouTube. It's Hari Kandabolu. Hello. Hi Hari.

And he's a writer and humorist whose delightful substack is, Take Another Little Piece of My Heart Now. It's Roy Blunt Jr. Hey, how you doing? Welcome. whose delightful substack is, take another little piece of my heart now, it's Roy Blunt Jr. Yeah. Hey, how you doing? Welcome. So, Melanie, welcome to our show. You're gonna play Who's Bill this time.

Bill Curtis is gonna read you three quotations from this week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain just two of them, you'll win our prize. Any voice from our show you might choose on your voicemail. Are you ready to play? I hope so. I've been avoiding the news since the election.

Really? Yeah. Interesting way to break your fast. to play? I hope so. I've been avoiding the news since the election. Really? Interesting way to break your fast, call into a news quest. It's broadcast nationally. All right. Now your first quote comes from Senator Chuck Schumer. What the heck is going on? Senator Schumer was one of many people asking that question about what mysterious things in the sky over New Jersey. Oh, the drones. The drones for weeks now. People in New Jersey have been seeing what they say are car-sized drones, sometimes by the dozens floating in the sky, and people want answers. And after many, many demands, finally President Biden said, quote, there's nothing nefarious, apparently.

Hey, quick thought, if you're trying to calm people down, don't use the word apparently. As a New Yorker, I find it hilarious and very cute that New Jersey thinks that aliens and the government are interested in its matters. Like the idea that they think they're that worthy of attention from outer space or the Major League Baseball is not interested in New Jersey, the NBA is not interested in New Jersey,

the Jets and Giants play in New Jersey but they don't even want to be associated with them and you're telling me aliens and the government are putting their arms out there. Maybe the aliens have a particular interest in New Jersey, maybe like for, for respiration, instead of oxygen, they breathe hair gel. I believe that there is a tour that you can take to all the houses and sites of the Sopranos. Yes, you can, if there was that. If I were an alien being, I would want to check that out first.

Are these aliens? Do aliens have drones? I thought they had spaceships. Well, you never know. I mean, maybe they have drones. Maybe they disguise the spaceships as drones. Maybe we think they're drones, but they're really spaceships. Who knows?

This is too long for us to not know. Yeah, well, that's the thing. But no, because we would have shot these down by now. I don't, as an American, I know we shoot first, ask questions, never. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, as an American, I know we shoot first, ask questions never. Now, what happens is, is like people saying, well, there are all these drones and the government says, no, there aren't.

We've looked, they're all perfectly reasonable explanations for all of it. And the whole thing might be this kind of mass hysteria. This is all true. A Pennsylvania state senator tweeted a photo of what he said was a drone that had been shot down. See? It was a Thai fighter from Star Wars. And the former governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan, posted a footage of drones that he said were floating above his house for hours.

And again, true, it was the Constellation Orion. Okay, fine. Well, I flew here on one, but maybe that was the constellation Orion. Okay, fine. I flew here on one, but maybe that was just a plane. Yeah, I know. You never know. Yeah. All right, Melanie, here is your next quote. Let's look back at some delicious memories. That was a message that appeared on people's Starbucks app. Starbucks is one of many companies copying Spotify wrapped this month and offering users what?

Like a summary of everything they've done all year? Exactly right, a year in review, right? Everybody's doing their own version of Spotify rap. So for example, we mentioned Starbucks tells you what you bought, what your favorite drinks were. The Washington Post has a summary of all the articles you read that year. Strava, of course Washington Post has a summary of all the articles you read that year Strava of course gives you a summary of all the exercise you did and I personally loved Boeing's flights you survived 2024.

No one asked for this. Like, no, like, there's an expression like, you know, if you feel like you're about to die like I saw my life flash before my eyes. Yes. When did that become a good thing? Right. Nobody wants this information. Yes.

Also, it's just like Target shouldn't do this. Like Target, the Target store? No, because then you can look at all the times you went to Target and was like, I just need toilet paper. And then you spent $200. Right. You know who actually did this? Tinder.

Tinder. Oh, that's awesome. Offered their users an end of the year swipe report because what everybody wants as a Christmas present is a statistical breakdown of all the people who rejected you. So your top genre was unavailable guys with glasses. That's why I got rid of date naps, because every time I would open it, I'd be like,

man, a whole city doesn't want to sleep with me. Let me put my phone down. See, the whole point of these summaries is they give you the illusion of having accomplished something with your time, right? You're still just like, you know, the same old drudge you were January 1st. But look at all the songs you listen to.

I know I listen to Megan Thee Stallion the whole time. I don't need nobody to tell me that. There you are. Melanie, your last quote today is actually a punchline to a joke that was written out in a New York Times op-ed this week. All I can tell you is that it's the pope who is driving him. Who told this joke, among a few others about the Pope? Oh, the Pope.

Yes, the Pope. What? Of course it was the Pope, or as he would say, is the me Catholic? Pope Francis wrote an op-ed in Tuesday's New York Times entitled There is Faith in Humor in which he went on to basically tell a bunch of jokes. Great. Another old white guy in comedy. How many pulps does it take to do something?

There you go. Now, he says that what this is about is like how humor is important in coping with life's travails. It's a part of faith that we should embrace humor, right? But what's going on is that pretty late in life, the pope obviously wants to start doing standup. Which is fine, but it will be shocking when he starts his sets with,

so I've been dating again. And he'll do crowd work, like, oh, what do you do for a living, yes, and what are your sins? I mean, it's hard when Betty White has raised the bar so high for elderly people in comedy. That's true. And then you got, like, it's honestly, if it wasn't the Pope, would they let him write a thing about comedy? It was good.

That was the major point of the article. It's nice to laugh, which I think in the 1400s would have been groundbreaking. Right, exactly. Well, he's really interested in comedy, as you may have heard Jim Gaffigan talking about on our show a few weeks ago. He invited a whole bunch of comedians and humorists to the Vatican to meet them. Not me! Well. Are you Catholic?

No. Oh, okay. Oh, you had to be Catholic. Apparently. Well, most of these comics are heathens. That's true. Is the Pope Catholic? Shut up!

Ha ha ha! Bill, how did Melanie do in our quiz? She deserves a win, so we're gonna call her a winner. Good job. Yay, Melanie! Thank you. Congratulations, Melanie. Bye bye. Yay, Melanie! Thank you. Congratulations, Melanie. Bye-bye.

Right now, panel, it is time for you to answer some questions about the week's news. Dulce, question for you. Dulce, there's been another breakthrough in pickles. Now, the hot new online trend in pickles is to cover pickles with what? Let's see. Okay, so you could say that one they're doing is a fruit roll-up, rolled into heen. Then you could do it with chamoy or you could put a little glitter in it. Glitter, you got it.

Yes, you knew all of them. You want glitter. TikTok has come up with yet another way to torture a pickle so far as you, I think we're trying to tell us. That was, I love torturing a pickle. Go ahead. You did. Yeah. So far, the TikTokers have wrapped pickles in fried cheese. They've stuffed them with Taki chips, and now they're dumping edible glitter into pickle jars to

make a treat called a Glickle. Oh. Is the glitter edible? Yeah. They make edible glitter. They do? Yeah. Where you been? Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha.

Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Now, does glitter pickle sound like the name of an all-male strip club in Reno? Yes, of course it does.

Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. And Glickles apparently are perfect for people who like sparkly things and literally have nothing else to eat. See, I feel like you're judging, Peter.

I am. For why? Glitter pickles? That ain't none of your business. I guess you're right. If people want to eat their pickles with glitter, it's a free country. It's a vegetable. Right. Have you eaten glitter pickles or glitter?

No, I'm a grown up. Coming up, our panelists go adventuring in our bluff the listener game called one triple-a wait wait to play we'll be back in a minute with more wait wait don't tell me from NPR. Hey it's Peter Sagal the year is almost over and now is the time when NPR and I come to you hat in hand and ask for your support. Now interestingly, the idiom hat in hand does not refer to say a street performer walking around holding out his hat for people to put in money. I always thought it was. No, it is actually referring to an old tradition when knights would remove their helmets and show humility.

So it's really more about my attitude of supplication than it is about asking for money, even though of course I'm going to be asking for money. Now if you heard that and you said to yourself, wow, that's fascinating. I was also under that misapprehension as to the idioms meaning then you, my friend, are one of us. That means you enjoy our show where we do trivia and jokes for smart people, dumb jokes for smart people to be sure, where we give you a break from the week's news, where we make your breakfast on the weekend with your family, or your walk with your dog, or other interminable tasks, bearable with our goofy, dumb, but we always think, smart humor.

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I'm Bill Curtis. We are playing this week with Hari Kandabolu, Dulce Sloan, and Roy Blunt Jr. And here again is your host at the Studenbaker Theater in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Sagal. Thank you, everybody. Thank you so much. Right now it is time for the Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Bluff the Listener game. Call 1-888-WAITWAIT to play our game on the air.

You can always check out the pinned post on our Instagram page, at Wait, Wait, NPR. The information you need is there. Hi, you're on WaitWait, don't tell me. Hi, this is Kelly Cullen from Pittsburgh. Hey, I love Pittsburgh, one of my favorite places. What do you do there? Well, for the next two weeks, I'm going to spend as much time as I can with my family,

including my son, who's home from college in London. That's great. I have to ask, only because it's so typical, did he come back from college in London. That's great. I have to ask, only because it's so typical, did he come back from college in London with a pretentious British accent? Yes, he won't stop telling me how brilliant I am, and I will take it every day of the week. Yeah.

That's great. Well, welcome to our show, Kelly. You're going to play the game in which you have to tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Kelly's topic? Yep, me too. R-E-I. There's so much you can to tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Kelly's topic? Get me to R-E-I. There's so much you can do in the great outdoors. You can kayak, rock climb, get malaria.

Our panel is going to tell you about a whole new kind of outdoor activity that's becoming popular. Pick the one who's telling the truth, and you'll win the weight waiter of your choice in your voicemail. You ready to go? I am ready. Well, let's do it then.

Let's hear first from Dulce Sloan. In today's installment of Hey, Get Off My Lawn, the growing phenomenon of urban wandering. Based on the British tradition of wandering through fields in the countryside called rambling, Americans have started taking back their environment by walking aimlessly through businesses and people's yards. Rambling in the UK is protected by the Right to Rome law, allowing enthusiasts to access publicly and privately owned land because of centuries old footpaths

that predate modern property lines. Urban wandering on the other hand is a bunch of white people trespassing through a neighborhood they don't live in by jumping fences, walking through rose bushes, and then descending upon a Starbucks. The leader of the Wandering Society of Eagle, Colorado stated, it's all right, so enjoy the world we live in.

Property lines are fictional, nature is real. And so was the trespassing citation her group received after trudging through a gated community. Urban wandering in which people just barge their way through whatever they want because I guess they can. Your next word from the wild comes from Roy Blunt Jr. Adventure catting it's called and it's a full blown trend complete with special cat harnesses and social media feeds.

People are taking their cats hiking, paddle boarding, and mountain climbing as if they were dogs or people, anything but cats. One adventure catter told NPR, quote, taking them on adventures is such a good bonding activity. I wouldn't want to leave them at home. The cat had no comment. It breaks the stereotype of cats, we're told. Well, I guess it does.

Our cat, Jimmy, is adventurous all right when it comes to climbing way up behind a motel room sink or yowling with wildlife at 2 a.m. But can I see him swinging along a Sylvan hiking trail with us, much less paddle boarding and all the other distinctly non-feline sports that adventure cats, we are told, get up to? What I can see is Jimmy taking one look at the little Nike snowshoes somebody got him and laughing his little ass off. Adventure catting, the new trend of taking your cat with you when you go out into the

great outdoors. Your last inside scoop from the outside comes from Harikanda Bholu. Golf, some would call it a pastime, others a lifestyle, and if you're under 30, boring. Very, very boring. In response to golf's declining popularity with young people, some country clubs have introduced a new variation of the game called Combat Golf. A golfer tees off and then has a two-minute head start before the other members of the foursome give chase. The three attackers are allowed to do anything they like to hinder the golfer tees off and then has a two-minute head start before the other members of the foursome give chase. The three attackers are allowed to do anything they like to hinder the golfer outside of

injury, at least intentionally, wink, wink. The inventor of combat golf goes by the name of Payne Stewart. Payne spelled P-A-I-N. He says, quote, my daddy loved golf more than he loved me. When it was his weekend to have me, he made me caddy for him. Oh the destruction I imagined causing with his golf clubs. Who knew my revenge fantasy would turn into a legitimate team sport. All right, so here are your choices. One of these things is going on somewhere outside.

Is it from Dulce Sloan Urban Wandering where people just sort of wander through people's property and yards just because, you know, it's there? From Roy Blunt Jr. Adventure Catting where people are doing the typical outdoor things, hiking, paddle boarding, but bringing their cats. Or from Hari Kandabolu Combat Golf, a new variation on the ancient Scottish game in which you can try to keep your opponent from hitting the ball by hitting him first. Which of these is the real story of a new outdoor activity? Well, although I love the UK tie-in, and I am a dog person, I'm going to go with Roy's

story about adventure catting. Adventure catting, all right. That is your choice. You believe Roy's telling the truth. Well, here is someone who has first-hand experience with this particular activity. I think we were doing adventure catting before adventure catting was a thing.

That was Nicole Alcane talking to Oregon Public Broadcasting about her experience adventure catting. Funny, they never get the cats on tape talking about it. Congratulations Kelly you got it right you earned a point for Roy you have won our prize the voice of your choice in your voicemail. Thank you so much for playing and enjoy the holidays with your son home from England. Take care. Thanks. Bye bye. And now the game we call not my job. Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone have been married for 19 years, and in that time they have written, produced, directed, and or starred in six

films together, including The Boss and Thunder Force, and that is apart from the other movies Melissa has starred in like Bridesmaids and Can You Ever Forgive Me? And yes, also they produced two children. Their latest project is a podcast called Hildy, the Barback, and the Lake of Fire. Melissa and Ben, welcome to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Thank you. Thank you. So let me start here. I always wonder this. You guys have been at the height of Hollywood fame and power. You have your own production company. Melissa, you've been nominated for two different Oscars. Why throw that all away to do a podcast?

Well, it was Ben's idea. I mean, Ben, as a child, when I was like, God knows what I was doing, would just constantly read all of The Lord of the Rings. So this is very much in his DNA. It's kind of a middle earth comedy. And then, well, you explain it. It's out of your brain. Well, other people like Melissa were probably dating. I was and reading these books. And so a friend of ours, Steve Mallory, who co-created the podcast with us So a friend of ours, Steve Mallory, who co-created the podcast with us, came to me with this idea of just doing a sort of, you know, that style, fantasy style of a podcast. Because one thing about these worlds is that women are very rarely featured.

So we wanted to do a show where men mess everything up and funny women have to come to the rescue. Yes, of course. We read this that when you perform this thing, this fantasy thing, you're wearing costumes even though no one can see you. Is that true? I would wear a costume to brush my teeth, so if you put me in the Middle Ages, I'm gonna have some kind of armor and helmet on No matter what cuz you know there that means I'm definitely not a nerd. That's true Definitely do we read that you have a remarkable collection of costumes and wigs in your home. Is that the case? Yeah, I thought everybody had that Like our Christmas parties are costume parties that have nothing to do with Christmas. So do the costume parties have a theme that's a non-Christmas theme?

Yes. I mean, it comes, like we did, what was the Christmas, a Christmas flock of seagulls, so it was 80s hair bands, but with a kiss of Christmas. And then we did Hollywood Bears and what was that one called? We did, we did a- Hollywood Bears and Other Woodland Creatures. Woodland Creatures. Right.

So you could come as a Hollywood Bear, which is a super cute gay hunky guy from West Hollywood, or a squirrel. Right. I read, by the way, and by the way, I read a lot of this in an incredibly elaborate People Magazine chronology of your entire relationship, which I guess is a cool thing to have out there in the world.

Does that exist? It does. It does. It starts when you were both teenagers in Illinois, and it extends to the present day. And one of the things it mentions is that you both of you once went to an Oscar after party wearing velour tracksuits and people got mad. Yeah I think I flipped off a lot because everybody so many people change and they're in yet another kind of beautiful but maybe not the most comfortable thing or someone's in like another pair of high heels and then Ben

and I came in in tracksuits and like you know, shell toe Adidas shoes and people were, can I can I, I don't know if I can throw fingers, I'll keep it clean, but literally you just see people that you hadn't met yet but I was like oh I can't wait to meet that person and they were just like, really? But I do it again now I feel like I cracked the code. Sure. Speaking of that timeline of your relationship, you guys met as teenagers here in Illinois, right?

You both grew up here. Yeah, so I'm from Carbondale, Illinois, where SIU is. Yes. Hey. All right. And I remember I was sort of like, so this is the 80s and I had like the swooped haircut and the earring and a clockwork orange t-shirt and you know, that vibe.

And a lot of my friends all had that sort of similar vibe. And we saw these people walk across the strip, we call it down there. And they looked, you know, very goth and very cool. And I remember one of my friends going, I wish my mom would let me dress like that. And it was Melissa. It was Melissa. It was Melissa.

And it was probably, I probably had a full length cape on and God knows what else. And it was probably like in Southern Illinois, like 98 degrees pure humidity. And I'm sure it was like a real clam bake going on. Right. Moving on, the People Magazine Timeline of the Marriage of Ben and Melissa, you saw each other, or at least Ben, you saw Melissa, but you actually met doing like an improv comedy group in LA, famously, the Groundlings. Do you remember, Melissa, if like what caught your attention about Ben?

I actually do. The first class we had, when we, he, we all had to do like quick monologues and everyone was so loud and we were all trying so hard to be funny, but it was just loud and crazy and obnoxious. And then Ben got up there and was super quiet, super creepy. He was a prison inmate and he was welcoming his new cellmate and he's like, I just think we're going to get along so well. And it was so quiet that I was like, and for some reason, when I say it out loud, I realize I'm like, boy, this guy's super creepy. Maybe I'll get

to marry him. Yeah. Well, Melissa and Ben, it is a real pleasure to talk to you, and we have invited you here to play a game we're calling... Melissa and Ben Meet Melissa and Doug. Melissa and Doug. Since you're parents, you might know that that is the company founded in 1988 by Melissa and Doug Bernstein to sell traditional wooden toys. We're gonna ask you three questions about this company

and its products. Answer two of them correctly, you'll win our prize, one of our listeners, the voice of whomever they like from our show. Bill, who are Melissa and Ben playing for? Jeff Spray of Anderson, South Carolina. All right, here's your first question. Although they eventually became very famous and successful for their wooden puzzles and play sets, their first big product, Melissa and Doug, was what? A, a half-hour long VHS videotape that encouraged kids to make friends by playing the kazoo. B, a blank block of wood and a chisel sold with the name Imagination Playset.

Or C, a quote, anti-war toy that was a flower you could stick in the barrel of other kids' toy guns. I want all three of these to be real. I think maybe it's the A? A? I would say A too. Oh, that was very collaborative. Yes. A, you're right. It is A. The video is called You on Kazoo. It did not sell well,

so they moved on to actually making toys, but you can see it online because it went viral in the 2000s, and it is terrible. Here's your next question. In 2023, Melissa and Doug sold their company to a billion dollar toy conglomerate called Spin Masters. But even that giant company had humble beginnings. What was Spin Masters' very first toy? A, a box of cereal rebranded as a food fight kit. B, a short yo-yo called

Yo that all with a string so short it just dangled. Or C, Earth Buddies, which was a nylon sock stuffed with sawdust and grass seeds? I find myself drawn to see. Yeah, me too. You're both drawn to see and you're both correct. It was really successful. They sold thousands of them and went on to great things. All right, here's your last question. These days their most popular products, Melissa and Doug, include play sets that allow kids to pretend they're doing adult things, including a get-well-doctor activity center that is so realistic it even includes what? A, a real working x-ray machine, B, a credit card swiper for when your insurance doesn't cover the visit, or

see an exam table with stirrups. What? Inclusive? It is, yes, very much so. I want it to be C, but I think it's B. What do you think? I think maybe A, but now it's going to be B, because I did it. I'm wrong.

I'm going to say C. We're parting ways. All right. This is fascinating. I think it's an amazing glimpse into your working process. So Ben, you're picking A, which was the real working X-ray machine. Melissa, you're picking C, the exam paper. No, I'm going to switch.

I'm switching to C. You're switching to C. Oh, wow. All right. Now we see how the movie gets made. All right. So you're both choosing. Ben, you're following Melissa's lead and going to see the exam table with stirrups.

It was actually B, the credit card swiper. You got me out of it. The detailed medical play set is supposed to quote, ease kids' fears of doctors' visits, unquote, including the part where the insurance company refuses to cover the visit, I guess. Bill, how did Melissa and Ben do in our quiz? Well, they did great.

Two out of three means you're a winner here. Congratulations! Thanks, Bill! You've won. You can now change into your track suits to be comfortable at the after party. You've won. You can now change into your track suits to be comfortable at the after party. We don't mind. Ben Falcone and Melissa McCarthy are the husband and wife duo behind Lemonada's hit podcast

Hildy the Barback on the Lake of Fire. You can listen to all of season one, wherever you might get your podcasts. Melissa and Ben, thank you so much for joining us. And wait, wait, Don't Tell Me. We'd really like to meet you. Take care. Thank you. Bye-bye.

Bye, you guys. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Bye. In just a minute, Bill offers a delicious beauty tip that will give you that medium rear look in our Listener Limit Challenge. Call 1-888-WAITWAIT for Jonas in the Air. We'll be back in a minute with more of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR. In college, Mustafa Suleiman started a helpline for young British Muslims. People were just looking to find support in a language that made sense to them. Today, he's CEO of Microsoft AI, where he's building digital helpers.

Think of me as your superpower in your pocket. Building the future of AI. That's on the TED Radio Hour podcast from NPR. What happens to democracy when one political party has near complete power? That's the question at the heart of Supermajority, the series The New Yorker just named one of the 10 best podcasts of 2024. Listen and hear what all the hype is about. It's season 19 of NPR's Embedded Podcast. This message comes from the Kresge Foundation. Established 100 years ago, the Kresge Foundation works to expand equity and opportunity in cities across America.

A century of impact, a future of opportunity. More at kresge.org. A century of impact, a future of opportunity. More at Kresge.org. ["The New York Times"] From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz. I'm Bill Curtis. We are playing this week with Roy Blount Jr., Hari Tandabolu, and Dulce Sloan.

And here again is our host at the Student Maker Theater in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Sagal. Thank you, Bill. Thanks so much, everybody. In just a minute, Bill wants you to simply have a wonderful Christmas rhyme. Oh, and our listener, Limerick Challenge, if you'd like to play, give us a call at 1-888-wait-wait that's 1-888-9248-924. But first it is time for a game we call Doctors Thought. The news was filled recently with stories about doctors thinking they had the diagnosis right only for it to turn out to be something else.

So we're going to ask you to fill in the blank rapid fire style on some of these headlines about what Doctors Thought. Get yours right you get a point. So what we'll do is we'll just ask you to take your best guess as what the blank is. Here we go, first one's for you, Hari. Fill in the blank on this headline from the Telegraph newspaper.

Doctors thought I blanked a koala. I birthed a koala. No, it was doctors thought I got chlamydia from a koala. No. They have it. I thought they got vaccinated. Didn't they come up with a vaccine for that? They did, but the koalas, they still got it. Turns out that this particular patient just had pneumonia.

Apparently, as you indicate, chlamydia is very common in koalas. It's really easy to catch it from them. That's at least that's what that koala told me when she turned me down for a date. I'll say full in the blank on this headline from the Washington Post, doctors thought she had a deadly disease, but she was just allergic to blank. Talking to men. No. The real headline was doctors thought she had a deadly disease, but she was just allergic

to her own tattoo. Roy, fill in the blank on this headline from the Telegraph, doctors thought she was pregnant with twins, but it was blank. It was very small triplets. No. You went the other way. The real headline was the doctors thought she was pregnant with twins, but it was just one giant baby.

Thank you for playing Doctor's Thought, because remember malpractice makes mal-perfect. Ah. And now some questions about the rest of the week's news. Roy, this week a new study found that what has five times as many germs as toilet seats? It's a food thing. It's not a food thing.

Not a food thing. It's a thing that a lot of people have in their homes on a seasonal basis, and this is the season. Christmas tree. Christmas tree, and this is the season. Christmas tree. Christmas tree, something on your Christmas tree. Oh, well, a little bulb. Yeah, Christmas ornaments.

Ornaments. Yeah. It's the most filthy time of the year. Because they are handled so often and never washed, Christmas ornaments can be one of the germiest things in your house. So for a safer holiday, you can either disinfect the decorations as you put them on the tree, or go the easy route and start putting all your presents underneath the toilet bowl. But they're not handled that often. They're only handled once a year.

It's true, but then you never clean them. So over years, you know, all that grime and hand stuff gets all over them. So there's a whole civilization growing on the ornaments over the course of a year? Yes, exactly. Wow. Where's this Pixar movie? Hurry, a group of entrepreneurs in Russia is offering to take some of the work out of the holiday season, offering what for sale to anyone who wants it on the internet for up to $50 a pair. That means there's two of them.

There's two of them. Okay. Shoes. No. Shoes. Hands. Feet. They represent hands and arms.

They're hands and arms for a specific purpose. This sounds gross. I'll give you a hint. Some of them come in a package deal with a carrot and a corn comp pipe. Oh, a Frosty the Snowman kit. Well, I'll give it to you. Snowman hands. That is sticks. What? What? They're selling snowman hands. Russian online marketplaces are flooded with ads for artisanally

plucked natural snowman arms with prices ranging from about five dollars and basically those are just sticks to fifty dollars for well those are also just sticks the ad for the $50 pair reads we have a super offer new shiny creative hands for your snowman your snowman will become a star and your neighbors will definitely envy you one quote Is this for other Russians? Presumably, yes. They're going to get killed. How are they going to get killed?

Because they're going to realize I can go outside and get sticks. Well, no, no, they won't, because the last thing you want to do is cross Russian arms dealers. Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!

Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!

Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. You can catch us most weeks at the Studio Baker Theater in Chicago and come see us on the road.

Check back in the new year for upcoming road shows near you. For tickets and information, go to nprpresents.org. And you can also check out our sister podcast, How to Do Everything. This week, Mike and Ian make me taste some new eggnog recipes, and I barely escaped with my life. Hi, you were on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me. Hi Peter, this is Becky from Madison, Wisconsin. Oh Madison is great, a beautiful and cultured town. I love it there. What do you do for fun? For fun I guess I jigsaw puzzle and read and go hiking and walk around the lakes.

Oh yeah yeah they have those there. Does she take her cat? Do you take your cat when you hike around the lakes? I wish I think that will be a goal in the New Year. Sure absolutely for you if not the cat. Well welcome to the show Becky. Bill Curtis is going to perform for you three news related limericks with the last word or phrase missing from each. If you can fill in that last word or phrase correctly and two of the limericks, you will be a winner. You ready to go?

I'm ready. Here's your first limerick. Brushing Fido's a bit of a slug, but as pet owner, I go whole hog. First I taught him to sit, now I use him to knit. I spun yarn with the hair from my... Dog? Yes! From your dog. Dog fur knitting is back, baby. According to a new op-ed after its initial heyday in the 90s, people are once again collecting their dog's hair, spinning it into yarn, and knitting it into disgusting

little sweaters. Why stop there? Why not collect all your dog's drool and throw it in your brita? People advocating for dog hair garments argue it's warmer than sheep's wool, and also animal shelters just don't have any sheep. You can also collect all the material you need by sitting on any dog owner's couch. Wait, this was a trend in the past?

This was a trend in the 90s and it's come back, making sweaters out of your dog hair. You take the dog hair, you collect it, brush it out, whatever. You have to spin it into yarn and then you knit a sweater. And nobody will know that you're wearing clothing made out of dog fur unless of course you wear it in the rain. Y'all wear it. You mean to tell me there's people in here that act like that they wouldn't wear a dog hair? Too good for your own dog? Here is your next limerick. Hot men aren't hard edged or feudal, and rodent dudes pack your caboodle. A modern cute gent, eh?

He's barely al dente. He is skinny and limp like a... Noodle. Yes, noodle. Move over, rat boys. The new Hollywood heartthrob archetype is noodle boys Actually stay there rat boys a lot of you are the same people we're talking about these floppy haired wispy armed Hollywood stars like timothy chalamet and

Finn wolfhard who I refuse to believe is not a character from the Flintstones According to the New York Times our pop culture fixation has moved away from men who look like they spend hours in the gym to men who look like they've just coughed up blood into a handkerchief. I don't like this man. I don't like this man. I've never liked this man. Which man? A wisp of a man.

A wisp of a fellow. Girl, I don't want no man who's going to fall through a crack in the floor. I'm a whole woman. Wait, so the rap boy craze, who was in that? The rap boy, that was last summer. Last summer, we were told that all the guys were into rap boys, who were these sort of vaguely, feral, or I guess, looking guys. So, Timothy Shalimeck. Yeah, basically, whatever Timothy Shalimeck looks like now, that's the trend, here is your last limerick From this tallow my skin gets relief

But the internet's giving me grief the fat from a cow makes a wrinkle-free brow So I'm rubbing my face with some B According to the New York Times more and more people are turning to beef tallow. That's beef fat. It's a cheap and natural alternative to commercial skin care products. So stop shopping for skin care at Sephora. Start shopping at the dumpster behind a Ruth's Crits steakhouse. Users claim slathering pure beef fat on their faces makes their skin look nourished and

gives them that fresh off the grill glow. So it's dog hair and beef tallow. Basically yeah. So basically we're just England in the 1500s. Bill, how did Becky do in our quiz? She is a champion. Becky, good job. Congratulations Becky, well done.

You still cheer for Becky? It's okay. Yeah, we cheer for Becky. Congratulations and thanks so much for playing. Thank you, this was fun. Bye bye. Congratulations, Becky. Well done. We still cheer for Becky? Is this okay? We'll cheer for Becky. Congratulations. Thanks so much for playing. Thank you. This was fun.

Bye-bye. On the Embedded podcast from NPR, what is it like to live under years of state surveillance? So many people have fear of losing their families. For years, the Chinese government has been detaining hundreds of thousands of ethnic Uyghurs. This is the story of one family torn apart. Listen to The Black Gate on the Embedded podcast from NPR. All episodes are available now. Since the beginning of women's sports, there's been a struggle to define who qualifies for

the women's category. Tested, from NPR's Embedded podcast and CBC, takes you inside that struggle. Listen to Tested, the series that was named one of the 10 best podcasts of 2024 by Apple, Vulture, and the New York Times. It's season 20 of NPR's embedded podcast. Now it is time for our final game, Lightning Fill in the Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many Fill in the Blank questions as they can. Each correct answer now worth two points. Bill, can you give us the scores? Dulce and Roy each have two, and Hari has three. All right. So, why don't we do this? Since Dulce and Roy are in second place, Dulce, I will start with you. You ready to play? Because you were eager to go? Here we go,

Dulce, you're up first. The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill in the blank. On Monday, doctors in Louisiana confirmed the first severe human case of blank flu in the U.S. Bird? Yes. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case that could effectively ban social media app Blank. Tic-Tac! Right. This week, the Biden administration sent new pollution goals to help combat Blank.

Climate change. Right. On Thursday, the Teamsters launched the largest ever strike against online shopping giant Blank. Amazon. Right. This week, a man in Singapore who drove directly into a guarded military camp said he did it launched the largest ever strike against online shopping giant blank. Amazon. Right. This week a man in Singapore who drove directly into a guarded military camp said he did it because he wanted to blank. Get ****. No. He just wanted to see, he said, how security would react. On Wednesday the CDC confirmed that US blank had risen to 78.4 years.

Average age? Life expectancy. Life expectancy, right. According to a new study, moderate blanking may be healthier than teetotaling. What? Oh, drinking. Right. 80 people got food poisoning at an LA Times event celebrating blank.

Food! Good enough, they got food poisoning at an event celebrating the best restaurants in LA. A norovirus outbreak linked to oysters poisoned 80 people who paid $159 to get into a celebration of the finest cuisine in the city with the people who paid 350159 to get into a celebration of the finest cuisine in the city, with the people who paid $350 for VIP tickets getting VIP very important vomiting. Yeah. Well, oysters are worth it.

Are they? Yeah. Bill, how did Dulce do in our quiz? Dulce got seven right for 14 more points, a total of 16. Dulsey has the lead. All right. All right, Roy. You're up next.

Fill in the blank. On Wednesday, a House panel voted to release the ethics report on blank. Matt Gaetz. Matt Gaetz. Matt Gaetz. That's right. On Monday, Olaf Schultz, the Chancellor of Blank, lost a no-confidence vote. Sweden.

No, Germany. Germany. This week, the Federal Reserve cut blanks by a quarter point. We got the air destroyer. Right. On Wednesday the FAA reported that over 100 blanks had been hit by laser pointers this month. Planes. Right, airplanes.

This week a woman in California sued her parents because she claimed they gave her blank. Chlamydia. No. They gave her all of their ugliest jeans. On Monday, U.S. entomologists confirmed that the invasive blank hornet threat had been eliminated. The bandit hornet, the outlaw hornet, the illegal hornet, the— You're so close. No, it's the murder hornet.

Murder hornet. This week, a criminal in Massachusetts was caught by police after he got stuck trying to blank. Get through a miserable round of questioning. Whoa. No, he was caught while trying to escape down a family's chimney. After evading police by jumping from roof to roof, the man made a huge mistake when he got stuck trying to escape down a chimney. There's the nice list and there's the naughty list, but it's so rare we get somebody on Santa's stay in your lane list

Bill how did Roy do in our quiz three right six more points total of eight for Roy all right How many then? Does Hari need to win? Seven to win. All right, here we go. Hari, this is for the game. On Thursday, Luigi Mangione agreed to be extradited to Blank for his trial. New York. Right.

On Wednesday, OpenAI announced that you can now use a 1-800 number to call Blank. Dominoes. Nicole, chat GPT. This week, NASA confirmed that the two astronauts stuck on the Blank will be there until late March. Spaceship. Right. Well, Space Station on Wednesday. Taylor Swift threw a huge party to celebrate the end of her blank tour. Aeros tour. Right. This week a report revealed that the owner of the New York Jets scuttled a trade for star receiver Jerry Judy because blank.

Um, slept with his wife. No, because his player rating in the Madden video game was too low. In a possible link to climate change, researchers warned that some blanks had become carnivores. Herbivores. No, squirrels. A squeamish man whose wife was in the bathroom sick with food poisoning was able to comfort her and keep his distance by blanking. Hiding under the bed.

No, he comforted her from a safe distance by rubbing her back with a Swiffer mop. While his wife cradled the toilet, the husband was hiding in the hallway and rubbing her back from about four feet away with her Swiffer. It was a gesture just around the corner from Sweet. It was so nice, he also sent the Roomba in when he had to step away so there was somebody there at least to repeatedly bump her. Bill did Harry do well enough to win? No.

We got three right, six more points, nine is the total, but guess who won? Mose! Mose! Coming up, our panelists predict what would be the best Christmas present of the year, but first let me tell you that. Wait, wait, don't tell me. It's a production of NPR and WBEZ Chicago in association with Urgent Haircut Productions, Doug Berman, Benevolent Overlord.

Philip Godekir writes our Limericks, our public address announcer is Paul Friedman. Our tour manager is Shana Donald. Thanks to the staff and crew at the Studer Baker Theater, BJ, leader and composer, our theme, our program is produced by Jennifer Mills, Miles Grumboss, and Lillian King. Special thanks this week to Vinnie Thomas and Monica Hickey. Santa's Little Helper is Peter Gwyn. Emma Choi is our Vibe Curator, technical director from Lorna White. Our CFO is Colin Miller.

Our production manager is Robert Newhouse. Our senior producer is Ian Chilock. And the executive producer of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me is Michael Danforth. Now panel, what would be the best present received this year? Hari Kandabolu. The Earth is one year closer to getting these pesky humans out of here. Roy Blunt Jr. Jimmy Carter will get Heaven with a high five from Abe Lincoln. And Dulce Sloan.

Mr. Scrooge is going to wake up on Christmas morning and save TikTok. Well, if any of that happens we're gonna ask you about it right here on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Thank you Bill Curtis, thanks also to Roy Blunt Jr., Dulcé Sloan, and Harry Thunderbulu. Thanks to all of you for listening. Thanks to our fabulous audience here at the Student Baker Theatre. Happy Holidays from everybody here. I'm Peter Segel. We'll see you next week. This is NPR. Donald Trump promised to change Washington, DC, a place where there's an old saying that personnel is policy. That's why we have created a new podcast called Trump's Terms, where you can

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