Wonderful! - Wonderful! 313: Don't Tell Anyone About the Slots

Episode Date: February 14, 2024

Griffin's favorite game about games! Rachel's favorite big public art!Music: “Money Won’t Pay” by bo en and Augustus – https://open.spotify.com/album/7n6zRzTrGPIHt0kRvmWoyaThe Marsha P. Johnson Institute https://marshap.org/ MaxFunDrive ends on March 29, 2024! Support our show now by becoming a member at maximumfun.org/join.

Hi, this is Rachel McElroy. Hi, this is Griffin McElroy. And this is wonderful. Rachel met Scott Bakula. I feel like that's gonna be this if not the small wonder we never had like an umbrella wonder that sort of casts a shade over the whole of an episode before like a wonder for 2024 like an annual wonder even though it has just started yes it's not gonna get any better than that um this is a wonderful show we talk about things

that we like that's, that we're into. And Rachel met Scott Bakula. And so did I. But Rachel's really- It wasn't about you. It really wasn't about me. Immediately, they started talking about which St. Louis high schools they went to. And I was like, I'm going to take a backseat on this one. Yeah.

We have a friend that knows people in New York. It's joe biden no it's it's it's lynn he it's it's lynn he made the broadway connection his guardian angel lin-manuel miranda he notified us that scott bacula was to be in a musical uh and asked us if we would like to attend said musical this was several months in advance and And we, without any planning or coordination, said yes. Which a streak we continued until about three days before we were supposed to leave for the show. Yeah, we knew that it would have to be an overnight affair and we hadn't really worked out the logistics on that.

Sorry, when Rachel says an overnight affair, she means that the trip was to be overnight. There was no indecent proposal. No. So, yeah, so it came together. Tricky. It was basically like we got there at 4 p.m. and then left at like 7 a.m. the next day.

Yes. But we got to see the show. The show was amazing. The show is called The Connector. It runs through, I believe, March 4th. If you live in New York, get there. It kicks ass. It's so good.

I believe March 4th. If you live in New York, get there. It kicks ass. It's so good. It's the new, it's got music from the writer of the last five years and Parade. It's fucking great. It's about journalistic ethics at an independent magazine in like the late 1990s. Yeah. Extremely my shit.

And I have songs stuck in my head from it that I can't do anything about because it's new and it's not, there's no cast recording out there yet. So after the show, we got to hang around. I was told Scott Bakula would be arriving imminently. And so I met a lot of fans of the shows, which was very, very cool. cool what a big time moment for griffin to be talking to these like world-renowned actors and performers and to have individuals keep coming up to him mid-conversation and be like hey by the way griffin mcguire i'm a huge fan so a big big power play uh-huh yeah and then scott bacula came out walked directly over to us um i i provided some lubricant to the conversation right away by saying that I was from St. Louis and that I, in fact, grew up five minutes from where he did. Yeah.

And then we had a lot to talk about. Yep. And then we got to meet his wife, which was incredible. They had four children, so we got to talk a lot about that. Yeah. I think he spent maybe 10 or 15 minutes with us. Very generous. Just so friendly. Exactly what you want a Midwestern celebrity to be. Yeah. I think he spent maybe 10 or 15 minutes with us. Very generous.

Just so friendly. Exactly what you want a Midwestern celebrity to be. Nobody made any like Quantum Leap references or jokes. I did not reference Quantum Leap at all. Which was a huge victory, I think, for both of us. I approach interactions with famous people as an opportunity to not talk about the thing that probably everybody talks about yes that's great so i didn't reference a piece of work that he had done i'm more focused on the fact that we were from the same place and it was exciting to me to see somebody from my relatively small midwestern location uh make it big yeah in the world you

also weren't overly familiar which i think is the risk you run when you're like, I'm not going to talk to Scott Bakula about quantum leap. I mean, I did make it clear I knew exactly where he was from, which suggests- Not his address. No. You didn't dox Scott Bakula. But it does suggest a certain amount of research.

I mean, if you're from where you're from, and someone like Scott Bakula is where you're from, it's like me not knowing that Billy Crystal did like one semester at Marshall University. Which, by the way, he attended the show the next night. He did. So we missed a real opportunity, I guess. The stars really could have aligned on that. Boy, howdy.

So much I would have to talk to Billy Crystal about. Like that one semester he spent, I believe, at Marshall University. Oh, my gosh. And he would probably feel really uncomfortable because I don't know that he has a lot of recall from that time in his life, most likely. That's entirely possible. Yeah. It was a long time ago.

But yeah. Big pothead, Bill Crystal. William. William Crystal. William Crystal. But yeah, it was, I mean, it was everything I could have ever wanted it to be. I was in complete shock. Vibrating. Vibrating. Yeah. Really. Buzzing with excitement. Really, really amazed. could have ever wanted it to be um i was in complete shock vibrating yeah really buzzing

with excitement really really amazed just one of those things that you don't think about uh you know happening ever uh and then there he was yep and i'll say dot's home style pretzels we met dot yep and had all of uh her incredible no i mean just good incredibly outrageously zesty little pretzel rods i had some of them for lunch and i left the bag out did you see the bag for your boy i got in there and i had me some happy valentine's day valentine's day both of our breath is probably unfathomably foul right now because they are zesty. A lot of seasoning. A lot of seasoning.

An Edo's level of seasoning. We just had the original. I haven't tried all the varieties yet. Although the cinnamon sugar is very good. The cinnamon sugar is so good. Get those away from me. Can I tell you about my big wonder? Yes.

It's a show we're watching right now. And we've briefly discussed it, I believe, in the small wonder segment of this show. And I believe I also talked about it a bit on the besties. But it's time for us to dive in because I think we've spent enough time with The Devil's Plan. We haven't finished it yet, though. We have not finished it. And I will say it was treacherous researching this show without spoiling the season. Yeah, you didn't think about saving it?

Because from what I can tell, we haven't even gotten to the biggest thing yet. It's entirely possible. We're about seven episodes in, and it's already, I mean, something I can't stop thinking about. The Devil's Plan, if you haven't heard us talk about it on the show before, another fucking slam dunk reality competition show from Korea. Just amazing. Last year, it was all Physical 100 and siren survived the island and uh new world uh this year's treating us actually i think devil's plan actually came out last year too and we're late to it but uh it's treating us so so right

um so the devil's plan korean reality competition show in which 12 contestants live together in a like open air hotel slash like incredibly well furnished sort of prison sort of situation yeah it makes it there is a prison in the show that is not the main living area it's like a pretty decent like there's a lot of almost like office style cubicles that have beds in them. Yes. And then like a main area where they can all eat their meals and relax. And then they enter this big auditorium where they do their puzzles. They do their games and their puzzles and their machinations. Every sort of – so these 12 contestants live together. They have to do all these challenges in order to add money to sort of the prize pot, which the winner of the show will collect, and also avoid

getting eliminated. In each day of the game, there is a main match, which are usually incredibly complicated competitive tasks in which players can earn or lose pieces, which is the main currency of the show. Throughout the different challenges, sometimes you'll have an opportunity to spend those pieces to earn an advantage in whatever challenge that you are doing. And also, if you ever run out of pieces, you are kicked out of the game immediately. You are immediately eliminated. So doing these main matches, you can either win pieces if you do a very good job, or you can lose pieces leading to your elimination if you do a very bad job and we should say all the contestants are kind of known for being gamers right or at least have some celebrity status there's some level of select there's some actors in there there's um there's a guy named orbit who

as far as i can tell is a science youtuber um who is i guess fairly well known if he was on this show but yes it is there's like an idol performer yes there's an idol performer uh there's a the cast is fantastic um yeah i struggled at first to i mean this is true of every reality show to like remember who everybody was but i feel like by like the second task especially once they start to sort of team up and form these factions it gets a lot easier to sort of follow them and genuinely become quite invested in their plight as they try to survive this game. So you have the main match where you try to get pieces and try not to get eliminated. After the main match, the player with the lowest number of pieces and also a second player chosen by the player with the highest number of pieces go to prison. And this

is like a little room that you, you know, prison, it's like a little room they live in for the next 18 hours. Fairly spartan, but also sometimes there's a little room they live in for the next 18 hours um a fairly spartan but also sometimes there's a little puzzle in there that if you solve it you get it a piece yeah they get their meals on trays there's like no like natural light or like proper sink yes so but because two players get sent there at the same time usually some pretty decently tight bonds end up getting forged as you spend 18 hours in the same room as somebody. And then at the end of that, there is the prize match, which is usually cooperative. And in the prize match, players work together to complete these really difficult cerebral challenges to add money to the pot that the final winner of the show will ultimately take home.

Those challenges are pass-fail. You either succeed at the task altogether or no money gets added to the pot whatsoever. Complicating those games is the fact that sometimes you can also earn a piece or two doing those challenges, usually working against the sort of benefit of the group. So there is an element of teamwork, teamwork, teamwork, but also I'm down to one piece. And so I am going to kind of screw everybody over here a little bit. So there is some politics involved in that side of the show as well. That's sort of it for the main structure of the show what sets the devil's plan apart from i think any other show i've ever really seen before is just the bonkers game design element of it which

permeates just every single strata of of the show and i i will say this was a little bit of a turn off for me because usually when they introduce a game they will start to tell you the rules and you're like, okay, okay, okay. And then this, each game takes about five to seven minutes to reveal the full amount of rules. Yes. And I have a very difficult time keeping up. But once they actually start playing the game, it's like you can kind of figure out from the interactions like what is trying to happen. Yes. So even if you're like me and not somebody who can follow like 17 rules in any interaction,

like it's still very entertaining because you watch the people kind of figure it out in real time. Once the games get going, they are usually pretty easy to kind of follow. Between that, the rules explanation and the game happening, though, there's also almost always like an hour of prep time. And that hour of prep time is interesting because that's where they figure out the game. So to sort of set up what I mean, I'm going to explain maybe the easiest to understand of the main tasks that we've seen in the episodes we've watched so far. The challenges, like I said earlier, are so complicated and they challenge what I really like.

They challenge different parts of like mental ability. So there's like a memory challenge where they all have to just look at this huge picture with a bunch of stuff on it and then remember like what they saw in the picture. There's a lot of sort of deduction. There's like social engineering elements of it. So the easiest one that I can explain that we've seen so far is a game where players receive a number between one and 100. They keep it hidden from everybody else. They also, it is hidden from them. Nobody knows what their number is or what anybody else's numbers are. In order to deduce that, two players can team up to go into a booth and exchange a math ticket, basically, to find out the sum of what their two numbers are if they use

an addition ticket. Or if you use a multiplication ticket, it shows you what the last digit of the number is when you multiply them together. And then there's a division ticket and there's another ticket. So the game is using these tickets with other players and working sort of backwards from these different mathematical equations to figure out what your number is. If you can figure out what your number is, you get a bunch of points.

You also can get a point if you figure out another player's number. And if that happens, they lose a point. So now all of a sudden, it is a game about like working your way through all these like crazy mathematical possibilities, working with people that you trust, and also trying to figure out a way to work with someone you don't exactly trust so that you could maybe screw them over and get a point and win a bunch of pieces. Here's what rules, right? That sounded very complicated.

I understand that. There's a ton of time that they spend making sure that you understand like what the rules of the game are. And then in that intervening period where everybody kind of like figures the game out, the beauty of the show kind of comes together, which is that this is not a game people have played before. here's the list of strategies. Let's pick the one that's going to work for us. It is them reverse engineering the game. It is them solving a game that has never been played before. And so it rewards a level of just kind of like common gamesmanship that I never really seen tested on a reality show before. Well, and like the ability to pivot too. Because the games are so complicated,

you have to make certain assumptions. And a lot of times what'll trip players up is they'll think they've figured out a piece of it and they'll cling to that. And then at the last minute, they could find out like that was not an appropriate thing to cling to. Yes.

And like, can they still move to make a change or is it just too late? So there've been some like agonizing moments on the show where people are like, got it, figured it out. And then they'll get halfway through a challenge and be like, I'm fucked. Like I did not do this. I didn't do it right. Now I know what I should have done.

But that's the beauty of the fact that these are games that nobody's ever played before. And so like, you don't know what's going to work. You don't know what's going to be good. It's not just, you know, the usual stuff that games test of, you know, figuring out your opponent and getting lucky with a dice roll. It is like looking at the list of rules, which are always long, and trying to find the like hidden pathway through them that is going to lead you to victory. And that is, for me personally, incredibly satisfying to watch. I love watching people figure out games, right? Like, I feel this way about video games sometimes. Like,

I love when I figure a video game out, when it's like a new thing that I've never really tried, like, anything like that before. And that happens every single episode of that show. And that rules. And getting to see, like, people trot out these different things uh that they figure out that you know they uh underestimated themselves in what they thought they were capable of is also like hugely rewarding there have been a couple of genuinely like triumphant hero moments of somebody like realizing like oh shit like actually i'm really smart at this one thing and i i had no idea um there's also like a layer of mystery to the whole show too that I really appreciate. Like when you first, when the game starts, everybody gets one of these golden pieces,

but they're not told what they're for or what they do. They know they have to have pieces to stay in the game, but they don't know ultimately what the point will be of like the pieces themselves. So the first couple of games, like everybody's guessing like, well, maybe we should make sure that one person gets a lot of pieces and then they can spread it out and then maybe yeah spend that money to get people out of jail and it's like none of that is how it works and they're like giving pieces to other people is like a little thank you like they don't know they don't know what the fuck they're doing right that the pieces also somebody realizes that the pieces have different sort of slots on them which like sets them off on this spree of like what are the slots what does it mean don't tell anyone else about the

slots but watching that kind of start to come together which is about where we are in the show is also very very fucking cool yeah there's also like board games scattered all around the common area and people keep playing the board games like this is going to be relevant one of these days we're gonna have to play nine men's morris for something yeah we have not seen whether or not that pays off but it is hysterical watching people go like okay man we're gonna play connect for all night long so that when we inevitably have to play connect for against each other but they also just couldn't Um, it's, this is, it's a game about games that rewards sort of like game flexibility. And it's, it's just, it's just really, really good to see that. And it also has like a lot of those like basic reality show tropes of like, oh, this person's a threat.

We should probably get them out. Yeah. And this person we don't have to worry about, so let's keep them around. They're like not going to challenge us in any way. There's one player who sort of champions himself as the guardian of the weak players who have the few pieces. And so he arranges them all into a pretty big – he forms this big alliance that is like, I'm protecting all the weak players. Let's pick off everyone else. And it's like, well, hold on.

You have formed a very big alliance here. players let's pick off everyone else and it's like well hold on you have formed a very big alliance here but he's like we'll share all of our pieces and we'll have this this beautiful uh this beautiful dream of equality and i love he gets called out on that at some point because the person that calls him out is like so you're just getting rid of the strong players like protecting the weak is another way of saying getting rid of the strong players yeah but yeah and his his motivations are not like well hidden at all like it is very clearly like what this dude is doing um the casting is like great like there's a lot of genuinely funny moments on on the show uh because i imagine living with all of these people for a week and going through all these challenges genuinely does bring you fairly well like close together it is the type of the show that i wish i could like be a part of just making uh even if it is just i guess i just

want to be on the show because it is thrilling to like figure something out at home that you then like later see the contestants figure out like i feel like that moment can happen a lot while you're watching this uh the show is directed and produced by Jung Jong Young, who has had a few reality show hits, a couple of which have been mentioned to us as we went down our sort of spree last year. One is called The Great Escape and one is called The Genius, both of which sound sort of actually similar in structure to The Devil's Plan, which makes me want to check those out. But yeah, that's The Devil's Plan. Thank you to everybody who kept recommending that to us. I feel like we tried it and then bounced off the first episode, but I'm glad we gave it another shot because it is demanding television. You really have to give it your undivided attention while you're watching it.

But there is something about that that is really rewarding when it kind of pays off. So that's the devil's plan. I really, it is, it continues to be amazing to me. The crop of incredibly high production value, production quality,

like incredibly complicated reality competition shows that are coming out of South Korea is it is, it is wild to me. There is no way on earth. This show would ever get made here, here in the States. I simply do not think that they would,

they would spend as much money as this show demands, but I am glad that, Oh, it's on Netflix, by the way. I'm glad we're able to, to watch it. Can I steal your way?

Yes. My name's Doug Duguay and I'm here to talk about my podcast in the middle of the one you're listening to. It's called Valley Heat and it's about my neighborhood, the Burbank Rancho Equestrian District, the center of the world when it comes to foosball, frisbee golf, and high-speed freeway roller skating. And there's been a jaguar parked outside on my curb for 10 months. I have no idea who owns it. I have a feeling it's related to the drug drop that was happening in my garbage can a little over a year ago.

And if this has been a boring commercial, imagine 45 minutes of it. Okay, Valley Heat, it's on every month on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get podcasts. Check it out, but honestly, skip it. These are the Chronicles of the Rancho Equestrian District in Burbank, California. These are the events taking place in my house and around my house. Hello, sleepyheads. Sleeping with Celebrities is your podcast pillow pal. We talk to remarkable people about unremarkable topics, all to help you slow down your brain and drift off to sleep.

For instance, we have the remarkable Neil Gaiman. I'd always had a vague interest in live culture food preparation. interest in live culture, food preparation, sleeping with celebrities, hosted by me, John Moe, on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get your podcasts. Night night. What do you got? My thing this week is street art. Street art. Or like murals is basically what I'm speaking of. Oh, okay.

Yeah. There's a lot of art on streets. Sometimes, you know, people doodle stuff on chalk on the ground. Yeah. I'm not really going to be talking about like graffiti art as much as I'm going to be talking about like organized murals, like planned and sponsored in some way. Yeah. That's good to be specific because you could be talking about my street art,

the body motions. What's your tag? No, it's not like painting. It's like body stuff. Like I do body art out there with my body. Like with your body. Yeah, the way I move it and I stand cool. Have you seen those statues?

Like the people statues? Uh-huh. It's like that, but I don't get all dressed up do you have like a alter ego like is there a character name for this guy still man oh so you're just standing somewhere very still yeah yeah i'm doing it right now can you tell and it looked familiar to me because i've seen lots of videos of the still man. Have you? I thought like, oh, that guy's just standing there. I didn't realize. No, no, it's art.

Body art. Performance. Body street art from the still man. The piece I wanted to talk about is kind of my gateway is one that I happened upon when I was in Paris. Sorry. upon when i was in paris sorry the rachel made a face when she said that that was very like pursed lips like heard of it uh the experience is kind of like what i'm speaking of it's like when you're in a place that you don't know very well and you haven't done a lot of research and then you just happen upon this like incredible artwork yeah no it's the best incredible mural um the one that i

am referencing oh wow it's got kind of a banksy quality right well i don't know i don't know enough about banksy to be able to qualify that but this is a pretty huge photorealistic human face yeah i literally turned a corner and i was like oh such a giant cool um so this the artist's uh pseudonym is jeff aerosol which i love fucking great i mean it's french so it might be aerosol yeah it might be pronounced in a french way yeah thank you for not i took a stab at it but And it was actually, it was put up in 2011. And it is called either Chut. The French way of saying hush or be quiet is C-H-U-T-T, which is what it's called. Yeah, Chut.

And it is actually a self-portrait of the artist himself holding his finger to his lips. But it's gigantic. Is that what, like a three-story building? It's quite large. Yes. So it's gigantic. Is that what, like a three-story building? It's quite large. Yes. So it is 22 meters high. I have no, no idea what that means.

Is that 66 feet? I mean, I could Google. No, it's not worth it. 22 meters, two feet, is 72 feet.

All right. That was close. That's big. That's so much bigger than I thought it was. Wowzers, bowsers. It is made in four strips. So that's the stencil piece. Okay.

It's basically like plastered up there, but also involves 200 aerosol cans of paint. Damn, Jeff. Yeah. I mean, there's a reason they call him Jeff Aerosol.

Yeah. And so that's just kind of an example of that experience I had just kind of being like, I don't know this place. I'm by myself. Oh my God, what is that? It's kind of what I love about murals. Yeah, it's amazing. They're obviously, you know, if you think about like antiquity, you know, people have been painting on walls for a long time. I think one of the traditional mediums for painting in prehistoric days was walls,

which makes sense. But I wanted to talk about kind of like a more like modern take of like art as activism in a way. So a lot of where this starts, at least in like North America is after the Mexican Revolution. And it's like artists like Diego Rivera doing these like public pieces, kind of promoting the country's indigenous roots and political interests. And then the U.S., out of the Great Depression, the Works Progress Administration was launched in 1935. And artists were employed to paint public spaces and civic centers around the country wow yeah uh chicago um in 1967 there was a group of african-american artists uh that formed the organization for black american culture uh which did this uh big piece called the wall of

respect uh 43rd and langleyley Avenue which featured more than 50 portraits of influential African Americans including Malcolm X Muhammad Ali Aretha Franklin it was designed and painted in sections over the 20 by 60 foot wall Jesus Christ yeah it's a it's this right here you probably this part of Chicago I don't know that you'd ever been to I was trying to figure out I've seen that before yeah it's like south side of Chicago, I don't know that you'd ever been to. I was trying to figure out. I think I've seen that before. Yeah. It's like south side of Chicago. I was wondering like, is this, have I seen this before? But yeah, it's like south side of Chicago.

And then in Los Angeles in the 60s, murals became an important way for Chicano artists and activists to communicate values, affirm cultural identities. Artist Judy Baca is the artist that's often credited with igniting this LA community and mural movement. In 1970, she began working for the Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks while teaching art to at-risk youth in LA's predominantly Mexican East Side neighborhoods. I have never heard recreation and parks said in that order before that's true that really tripped me up i was like oh that's new wait a minute it tells you where the emphasis is you know sure fun like parks sure but recreation first hell yeah i mean it's one in

the same if i'm at a park i'm having a good time uh with the city support she launched la's first city-wide mural program which employed young artists uh in her mural cruise uh and they painted more than 400 community murals this this has also happened in san francisco there's different you know areas throughout the country that have done this kind of work of like, let's mobilize these artists and let's make our city interesting and also dedicate energy towards, you know, like the movement and what's important to us. And I just think that's really exciting and something that hopefully will continue. Did they take down the mural wall in Austin while we were still living? I feel like I remember hearing about that. Austin used to have this wall that was just like people would just come and, you know, make art on it.

And it was real big. They did. They were going to relocate it. Castle Hill? Was that what it was called? Maybe. Yes. I don't know. Yes. Graffiti Park at Castle Hill. Was that what it was called? Maybe. Yes. I don't know.

I only ever heard it called the mural wall. Yes, Graffiti Park at Castle Hill. I guess that's a different, not to split hairs. I mean, it's all art. But yeah, it's the same kind of thing of like this is a public space and we're letting artists come and do their work here publicly. Yeah. But yeah, it was dismantled.

Yeah. As I understand, it was relocated to another part of the city. A beautiful farm for mural walls upstate. No, I love mural. One of the great sort of experiences that I feel like I always have when we go on tour, particularly in L.A. I remember going to L.A. for like E3 and whenever we would go around the city just being kind of like amazed at all of the just gigantic works of art that were visible from so many street corners. That is always very, very exciting. So I will just briefly I mentioned Banksy earlier. I will just reference the kind of more modern movement, which includes like Keith

Herring and Banksy. Shepard Fairey. I don't know what that is. Okay. But it's more it's more stencil focused. It's, it's more mysterious. It's not like commissioned art uh but it is very recognizable shepherd fairy did the obey giant oh okay uh yeah and obviously like there there are there are challenges with this i know that there are artists that also uh decorate uh public spaces and are not celebrated for that. But I don't know. I think that this is something that has lasted for a long time and I think is super cool. I think objectively, as a just sort of outside observer,

it's always cool to just see art on the street, right? I think that having art be visible in common public places is like a good thing pretty pretty objectively speaking exactly there's a lot about kind of like the the modern urban landscape that is it's very easy to just kind of go about your day and not really pay attention to what you're seeing because it's just building upon building yeah and to have that experience is always really cool giant fucking 70 foot tall face just like oh there's art here yeah i don't know about scary street i don't know about jump scare street art like that 70 foot tall face i do not want to turn if i'm in paris i've never been if i'm in paris

i'm lost probably i don't want to turn a corner. Giant face there waiting for me. But all the other stuff can stay. It's just that one. I'll send a letter to my uncle in France. That's fair. To see if he can get it taken down. We have some submissions from our friends at home. Here's one from Alex who says,

my partner and I have been very into a YouTube slash Nebula show called Jet Lag. It features a primary cast of three with usually a guest and they turn very into a YouTube slash Nebula show called Jetlag. It features a primary cast of three with usually a guest and they turn travel into a game show. Each season the game is a little different but they do a good job of designing an interesting experience. They also do a good job of balancing production quality without feeling scripted and being conscientious travelers. We watched some of that. We did. We watched an episode of Connect Four across the United States where you had to go to a state's capital and do a task there to claim that state for your team. And the first team to get four states in a row wins.

And it was very, very entertaining. Our friend and MBM showrunner J.D. Amato turned us on to that one. And, yeah, it seems great. That's one that we have a subscription to that i think we'll probably dig back into once time permits uh here's one from allison who says my small wonder is the two dogs that hang out at my gym they're always on hand for belly rubs before and after class and especially love giving kisses when we're really sweaty perfect angels no i love that i've never heard of like gym dogs no i've heard of gym rats yeah

for sure you gotta look out the scourge you gotta look out for that you gotta watch out sometimes i'll get back from the gym and i'll dig around in my bag and there's a little hole in the bottom of it one of those stinking rats is chewed right in there to get at my my dots home style pretzels i always think of like bookstore cats you know and like uh bodega cats hospital turtles sure dr turtle of course turtle restaurant fish that one's real that is real although it's it's a dangerous thing to commit to if you're a restaurant because you really have to keep that tank up or else people are going to walk in and they're going to be like. Where were we?

It was our. Oh, it was when we went to Japan for our honeymoon and our last night in town. We didn't make a reservation and we were just wandering around and went into this place that someone was like on the street like, hey, come in here and eat. Which is never like a great like an amazing sort of start. We were like one of two tables that were occupied. And it was it was in kyoto uh i forget where we were but there was like a fish tank with just the gnarliest fish like just like they looked like they were a little mangled they looked like they were rescues rescue fish rescue fish they were not necessary they were not particularly appetizing no um and

then we and then we just sat there and then our food was delivered and we were like yes not very good not very good at all anyway thank you so much for listening thank you to bowen and augustus for the use of our theme song money won't pay you can find a link to that in the episode description uh we have a bunch of merch over at McElroyMerch.com. We've got the Sometimes It Rains in Trab Nation t-shirt. We've got a Fungalore poster for you up there. A bunch of stuff.

A bunch of stuff over at McElroyMerch.com. You can find our other shows at McElroy.family. Thanks to Maximum Fun for having us on the network. Go to MaximumFun.org. Check out all the great programming they've got over there. I think that's it. Happy Valentine's Day.

Yeah, happy Valentine's Day. To you, yours. We're recording this on Valentine's Day. It may not be up on Valentine's Day. Just pretend like we got it up on Valentine's Day. Just pretend we got it up on Valentine's Day. That's the card that you can get now. Just pretend we got it up on Valentine's Day.

You go to CVS right now. It's the most popular card. Can you do me a favor and just pretend like I got it up? Bye. Bye. Working on it. Money won't pay. Working on it. Money won't pay. Working on it. Money won't pay.

Working on it. Money won't pay. Working on it. Money won't pay. Maximum Fun. A worker-owned network of artist-owned shows. Supported directly by you.