Wonderful! - Wonderful! 317: Boats Aren't Real

Episode Date: March 20, 2024

Griffin's favorite hero of the sportball season! Rachel's favorite educational living situations! Music: “Money Won’t Pay” by bo en and Augustus – https://open.spotify.com/album/7n6zRzTrGPIHt0kRvmWoya Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness: https://www.ffbww.org/

["The Wicked Man's Theme Song"] Hi, this is Rachel McElroy. Hi, this is Griffin McElroy. And this is wonderful. ["The Wicked Man's Theme Song"] That's the car. This is Griffin McElroy. And this is wonderful. Vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom. That's the car. Yeah.

Sorry, you're in a car listening to this and Rachel and I are. And this is car talk. This is car talk. Carburetors, spark plugs. Yes. Wind shield. Fluid.

This is, we're in a car and we're like driving, it's like a Max Fun Drive thing. Like when you're driving. Transmission, did we say transmission? We didn't, but I'm so glad. Thank you. The fans always get mad at us. I got one in.

When we forget transmission. It's the Max Fun Drive. If you're new to the show, every year, once a year, we come to you, hat in hand and open guitar case on the floor. Yeah. Busking, busking for you all day on the streets, asking for your support.

We are a pledge supported show, as is the whole of the Max Fund Network, and we have been proud to be members of this network for, well, I mean, for my brother, my brother, I mean, this is our 14th year doing this, which is absolutely wild. And obviously this is not our first time at the rodeo either.

We are so excited. We've been preparing for this drive for a long time. We've got some exciting stuff for you, but brass tacks, oh, there is a helicopter going overhead. I thought we could get some nice bird foley, but I forgot that Joe Biden likes to just buzz our house every 10 minutes or so. And we know it's him, cause he leans out the side

and says, hey Griffin, Rachel. Yeah, he shouts at us like that. Should we close the door, do you think? It smells so good outside. People don't tell you that about cherry blossoms, they look great, they smell so good. I can't smell anything. Oh yeah.

The allergy situation is always challenging for us in this house. It's not ideal. But, but, but. The spirit of Max Fund Drive. It's getting us all through. Will give me the power I need. Yes, so if you go to maximumfund.org slash join,

you're gonna get a list of shows and you get to pick the ones that you listen to, the ones that you want your contribution to go to in a very direct way. At just five bucks a month, you get access to hundreds of hours of bonus content. Yeah, it says over 600 hours. Yes, from all the shows throughout all of history, right?

It is so much stuff. Here at Wonderful, we have a lot of things. I believe, was it last year that we did Dharma and Greg Watch? Yeah, I think so. We've done a series where you played Animal Crossing and talked about it, Stardew Valley and talked about it. Yeah, I made my own D&D character.

Rachel made her own D&D character for a bonus episode. It's all really, really good stuff. Do you wanna tell them, this is huge. This is maybe the thing I'm most excited for in the whole drive. Do you wanna tell folks what we did for our bonus episode this year? Well, our listeners that are here for the right reasons

will know that we used to do a show called Rose Buddies, where we talked about The Bachelor and Bachelorette and other reality dating competition shows. This year for the pledge drive, we have watched the first five episodes of this current season of The Bachelor and We recapped them. Yes in one episode it was in our old old fashion old-style I don't think we missed it. I did feel like going back to your high school or maybe even middle school exactly

Wow, the doors are so small. Like everything looks familiar, but I feel so much bigger. There is a fair number of things that have changed. And part of the reason we decided to do it is that this season got a pretty good bachelor. Yeah, great bachelor, great. And we enjoyed watching it and talking about it.

Yes, we missed it a lot. The sentiment by the end of the episode was like, oh boy, it's like, comfy things. Griffin even tracked down our old theme song. Yes, which is so awful, but. So yeah, if you miss Rose Buddies, that's our Boko for this year, and you can enjoy that and all the other bonus content

at maximumfun.org slash join at just five bucks a month. We have other levels too that we're gonna talk about, but seriously, Rachel and I are able to do this show and prioritize it in the way that we have and keep it going for as long as we have because of the support that you have shown us year in, year out. And we are incredibly grateful to you for that.

We've mentioned this on some other shows, the podcast advertising market has bottomed out in a lot of ways, it hasn't done so great. We have weeks on this show where we just don't have anything. And so more than ever, we are relying on listeners to help us keep this thing afloat and growing. And you can do that by going to maximumfund.org slash join. If you're sitting at a screen now

and you're thinking about it and you're able, do it now before you let it slip because we only do this for a couple of weeks and then we're back on our grind. So we sure do appreciate you. Do you have a small wonder? I can go first. Yeah, please do.

Last night I went to a concert like a cool guy. Oh, you did. Like a cool adult man, I went to a concert. It was Hannah Diamond's recent, the talking point here on Wonderful, who performed at the Atlantis, which is part of the 930 club sort of venue complex. And it was a great show.

Met a couple of fans who were there, which is always very, very exciting and just had a great show. Met a couple of fans who were there, which is always very, very exciting and just had a great time. Just a trip in the light, fantastic. Drink two beers. I drink two beers. I feel like absolute dog shit this morning. That's all it takes.

Two beers will kill me. But yeah, it was a really good time, a really good show. It's like the second concert I've been to in like three months, which is fucking huge for me. That is huge. Yeah. Yeah. Do you got one? I do.

This was almost my sole topic. Oh shit. And then I decided, it's the max fun drive, I probably shouldn't make this a large wonder. So small wonder, the fact that kids like knocking over towers. Knocking over towers is huge for kids. I, sometimes at the end of the day, It's like knocking over towers. Knocking over towers is huge for kids. Sometimes at the end of the day, I know that our children have more energy

and we've talked about a lot of the ways that we engage them. But yesterday I realized that if I just made a big tower that both boys would be excited about knocking it over. Yes. And that, I mean, what is great about that, I mean, obviously it's a pain to restack, but they will do it for a while.

Yeah. And it's easy and I love that they love it. And sometimes it falls over on them and it's like soft block, so it doesn't hurt, but it's like fun, it's like kind of fun. Sometimes it knocks everything off of a table. Yeah. But again, easy activity.

Easy activity for kids. And they always love it. They love this stuff. I go first this week. Okay. I am going to talk about a hockey thing. And I know that there's probably a group of, or a portion of our audience who,

when they hear us talk about a hockey thing, their eyes glaze over. Should we say what hockey is? So ice, it's like ice, fast, shoot, there's scoring and hitting, there's so much hitting. Let's say basketball. Yes. The ball was only by the feet.

So small. And they used the sticks. So slippery. And the hoop was on the ground. And hitting is great. And somebody always guarded the hoop. Yes. And then, yeah, that's about all you need to know.

Not much jumping. No, not jumping, skating. Skating, though, for sure. I am gonna talk about something that I think has crossover appeal. I think it's an amazing story about the internet and kind of bullying and the triumph of the human spirit. I wanna talk about John Scott,

the unlikely hero of the 2015-2016 season NHL All-Star Game. I'm pretty sure this is a story that you are familiar with or at least you will be once I start going into it. Yeah, it doesn't ring a bell right away. I did not long ago talk about the whole All-Star phenomenon. You talked about the All-Star Phenomenon. But I do not remember this.

You talked about the skills competition. This was like the year before, I feel like you and I started watching every blues game. Yeah. But we were watching some of them, and so I remember hearing about it back when it happened. Radiolab did a really incredible episode about John Scott called The Punchline.

That came out in 2019, which if you find this interesting, they go into much, much, much more detail about it. So here's the setup. It's the 2015-2016 season, and the NHL decides to change the format for the All-Star Game, which they do basically every season. The All-Star Game is kind of a joke.

It's kind of like no one really takes it particularly seriously, which is pretty much the case for every sport. Like the All-Star game is just kind of a... Yeah, I mean, the goal is to not play too hard because you don't want to get injured. Exactly, right? So the NHL changes the format.

They decide that they're going to do three on three hockey between four teams for each of the four divisions, the Pacific, Atlantic, Metropolitan, and the other one that I can't remember. I think Eastern, this one. Eastern, yeah. They also make the somewhat ill-advised decision to allow fans to vote for the captains of each of the four teams,

which is not also completely unheard of, but restricting it to just be the captains of the four teams, which is not also completely unheard of, but restricting it to just be the captains of the teams. Between those two changes, diehard hockey fans, it caught their ire. There was a podcast, and a pundit, who goes by the name Puck Daddy, whose name I don't know for real,

but Puck Daddy shall be his moniker moving forward. It was on this podcast where he was discussing these changes with someone else, and he had this idea. What if everyone voted in a player who had no business being there to embarrass the league, right, to embarrass the league for making this decision. This is like when everybody gets to name like a bridge and they give it a silly name.

This is Boaty McBoatface like, exactly. It's exactly that, except for boats aren't real. Well, okay, boats are not. Wait, hold on. This is a big position that I'm taking. Boats are not, there's no. Science is still unsure if boats are real. Boats aren't people.

People are people, right? And so like Boaty McBoatface isn't like, aw, they picked a weird name for me, right? All the other boats are gonna make fun of me. Right, so on this podcast, Puck Daddy, and I guess the co-host on the show, they were trying to figure out who would be a good person to put up,

and who they settled on as the unanimous choice was an enforcer for the Arizona Coyotes, just an infamous, just tough guy. In hockey, they are sometimes referred to as goons, a goon named John Scott. John Scott, big, big, big fella, very pugnacious, was responsible for a few line brawls that made headlines, but not a great player.

In the 2015-2016 season, he had a total of 11 points, which is not very good. That's a combination of assists and goals. Yeah, I was gonna say, points in hockey aren't just goals. It's just like, if you happen to be on the ice when a goal is scored, you will get points. You will get a point usually, yes. So like, it's a joke, right?

Like, what if we did this? What if we got this enforcer in there as the captain of one of these All-Star teams to embarrass the league and to kind of like push back against this system that people were kind of annoyed with, right? This gag got some traction, got a lot of traction. A lot of people start to vote for John Scott

to be the captain. He played for the Arizona Coyotes, and so for the Pacific League, people wanted him to be the captain. It started to get so much traction that the NHL and like the Coyotes management told John, like you need to put out a statement telling people not to do this.

And so like he had mixed feelings about it. He was going through some sort of like intense family stuff. His wife was nine months pregnant with twins. They already have two kids. Like he had a lot of stuff and he was towards the end of his career, right? He was getting up there in age and not like a superstar. And so like, you know, things were tough for John.

He kind of wanted to do it, right? He put out statements later saying like, I think it is cool and important to represent a certain type of player who I am, which is kind of a fossil at this point. Like there aren't a lot of people. The, the, the, uh, salary cap for teams is so tight now that you don't really have space for just like a fighting dude, right? And so like his role is disappearing and he thought, hey, it's kind of cool

for me to represent that in the All-Star game. But he did, he put out a statement saying like, you know, I am flattered and I am humbled, but please just like vote for my teammates, don't vote for me. And people did not listen to him and kept on voting for him and he won the vote. He was named the captain for the Pacific division

and he would lead up this team for this three on three tournament. In January, before the game, he was traded to the Montreal Canadians who immediately put him in their minor league team, in their development team. And in so doing, they made John Scott ineligible to play in the All-Star game.

You can't play in the All-Star game if you're not in the NHL. Yeah, of course. And folks went batshit. People got really, really angry. Partially because like, I mean, mostly they were accusing the League of sort of like conspiratorially like moving this dude so that he could not embarrass the League

in the All-Star game. But in so doing, also like kind of destroying this man's like career and sort of life because now he's like, hey babe, I know that you are pregnant with twins at nine months, but I have to move to fucking Newfoundland on the other side of the continent. And it'll be a couple months until I see you again. So all of a sudden, like there's a lot of anger

going around, the fans are angry at the league, the like long time pundits are angry at the fans for bullying this dude with this vote that he probably shouldn't have been winning in the first place as a joke against the league. And because of that now he has been demoted and sent across the country and all of this bad stuff. There are a lot of bad vibes going around,

but the fans didn't relent. And eventually, like the NHL had no choice but to let him back in. So they eventually, a few days after the trade and the demotion, they announced that he would be able to keep his position, he would be able to stay as the captain for the Pacific division in the All-Star game, okay? All-Star game rolls around.

Everyone expects him to kind of embarrass himself, right? He asks the coach, like, just sit me on the bench. Like, if you put me in, just like put me in for a little bit, that's fine. He does not start the game as the captain, which is wild. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 26 seconds into the game, they get scored on.

They're down one nothing. So the coach is like, okay, now I'm gonna put you in. They put John Scott in and he goes fucking ape. Really quickly, he has this like beautiful open net like chance and shoots and misses, but gets this freak bounce off the goalie to get it in. And the crowd loses their mind standing ovation. Like everybody's screaming, chanting his name.

The energy of this game is so good, partially because it's like three on three all-star game hockey. It is essentially the same vibe as like just a pickup game of basketball, of just like folks kind of goofing around a little bit, but he scores and people lose their mind. At one point, he fucking lays out Patrick Kane,

delivers this gnarly hit on Patrick Kane, who I believe was an All-Star for the Blackhawks at that point, just like lays him out, which doesn't happen at the All-Star game. No one hits at the All-Star game, so like people are cheering, losing their mind. After that happens, Patrick Kane gets up and drops his gloves and they have a fake mock fight,

just kind of laughing and just kind of shadow boxing around each other. And everybody's cracking up, laughing, losing their mind. Towards the end of the game, they're up by one, he scores again. Two goals in this otherwise pretty short three-on- three hockey game. I just got goosebumps.

I know and the crowd just like loses it. Like it is, I've never heard anything like it. Oh I love that. Going back and watching this game. Rudy, Rudy. Huge Rudy guys. So they win, the Pacific team moves on to the finals, which they eventually won.

They won the whole thing. John Scott's team wins the whole tournament, winning a million dollar check for them to split amongst themselves, which is huge. That's not it though. They also do an MVP vote. At the end of the game, they put names up on the Jumbotron and everyone can text in their votes

or tweet in their votes for who should win. They put a list of names up on the Jumbotron, John Scott's not on there. And people start losing it. Just like booing and screaming and chanting John Scott's name. So everybody starts texting in, write in votes for John Scott.

Players on other teams start tweeting, MVP John Scott, got to be. Official Twitter accounts for other teams are like, yeah, we gotta give this one to John Scott. So fucking everyone comes together. The push for John Scott is so instantaneous and overwhelming that he wins the MVP prize, which I believe it was sponsored by Honda.

So he does win a new car for his efforts. And like, it really is Rudy level. Like his team skates onto the ice, lifts them up on his shoulders, which takes some doing because he's a giant. His wife comes out onto the ice. They have like this beautiful kiss as like the crowd is just cheering.

Delivers her baby. Delivers her twin babies right there. And it is just this incredible moment for everyone involved, right? It has to be, I mean, it's obviously the greatest imaginable sporting moment for John Scott, right, like as John Scott, you were there and that's exciting for you.

The people who voted in John Scott, I imagine there was a long period of time where they get worried like, oh shit, did we ruin this guy's life? And you know, was this joke that we were doing, which was supposed to be at the expense of the NHL, is it actually going to be at the expense of this dude, of this actual person who's gonna get out on the ice

and embarrass himself and have like a horrible time, probably at the end of his career? Like, are we going to make this man a laughing stock? No, he kicks ass and plays all-star hockey in a way that no one really had up to that point. And then he became a property brother. And then he became a property, the secret fourth property brother.

No, he actually, that December, he retires. He retired from hockey. Yeah, of course. Because what the fuck else could you possibly do? And he's like written books about it and he's done like a couple podcasts about it. And like I said, Radiolab did this whole episode on him. I was not familiar with this story.

I remembered hearing about it because I remembered, I think it came around around the same time as Boaty McBoatface. And so it started this whole conversation about like, when you give the internet this much power over an actual person's kind of like destiny, that is never a recipe for success. And I would say nine times out of 10,

yeah, that's probably true. 99 times out of 100, yeah, that's probably true. But this one time, this one time, this one dude who was not a superstar, like put on a fucking superstar performance with his back up against the wall. And I encourage you to like watch clips from this game because he has a huge smile on his face the whole time.

And with each goal, just like, he is like so emotional. Everyone is so emotional. It is an incredible story that I can't believe hasn't been made into like several Disney movies at this point. But it is hockey, I guess, at the end of the day. No one really watches it, but you should watch this one because it's a great story.

Hey, let's talk about the drive. Let's dip in here for a minute. We have some other levels that if you decide to support us at, you can get some awesome gifts. We talked about it, five bucks a month, you can get the bonus content, there's just over 600 hours of stuff there for you. At $10 a month, you're gonna get the bonus content,

you're gonna get a Letterpress Max Fund membership card, and your choice of one of 40 enamel pins from each of the shows on the network. The pin for wonderful is so, so, so good. These were designed by Maret Bondarou, and do you wanna tell them, do you remember what the wonderful pin is? I do.

So it is actually a little kind of cartoon of me and Griffin, but it is in the style of Stardew Valley. Yeah, so you look like Stardew Valley characters. You could have that as a pin on your shit. And can I say something? Yeah. Let's say you and your partner both have brown hair and the male has glasses.

Guess what? This could be a pin of you two. Now it's you. Now it's you guys. Now it's you. At $20 a month, you get all that stuff we've already talked about. There's also your choice of a fancy Max Fun

Rock and Chip Bucket Hat, or a Games on the Go Kit, which is a bandana that you can turn into a chess board. I love this. This has such beachy vibes, you know? It has huge beachy vibes. And then at $35 a month, if you wanna go that far for us, first of all,

holy shit, thank you. Yeah, it's incredible. Second of all, you can get the maximum bag. This is the biggest bag I've ever seen in my entire life. It's a tote bag. Yeah. But it's a tote. I could fit in this bag.

This is a, this is, if John Scott had a tote bag, it would be this tote bag. It's 27 by 35 inches. It is absolutely outrageously exorbitantly large. Listen, you know, we get messages from people like, hey, sorry, I can only chip in five bucks a month this year. That's amazing. That is huge.

Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. Like the content is free. And that's a big point of pride, I think, for all of us. There's no paywall. You can listen to this. Anybody can listen to this. But obviously that's not a sustainable business model for us as people.

No, no, not at all. So we are really grateful for those of you that recognize like this is important. I have the extra funds. I'm gonna contribute because I want this to continue to be free for other people. Yeah, so if you go to maximumfund.org slash join again you pick the shows that you directly want to support with your membership, you pick

the donation level that works for you, if you're a new member you can come in at whatever level you want, you can upgrade your membership if you're already you know say you're a five bucks a month member and you want to bump it up to ten you can do that and you'll get all the rewards for $10 and below. Or if you don't wanna jump all the way up to another membership level, you can just boost it. Maybe kick it up a couple bucks or so.

You can gift memberships. You can also, new this year, you can pay up front, right? So that $5 membership level, you can pay for the whole year if you don't wanna worry about a recurring charge. I totally understand that and that's an option too. All of that's over at maximumfund.org slash join. We really do, we could use the help this year. I try not to be quite as like a hat in hand about it,

but there are certain parts of this whole industry that are not doing good at all. And so we have definitely felt the squeeze over the past couple of years or so. And I just ask if this show and the stuff that we make, if you get some enjoyment out of it, if it means something to you, you can keep it going. You can support it in an incredibly direct way,

support us in an incredibly direct way by going to maximumfund.org slash join and choosing the membership level that fits into your life. And we appreciate you more than we could ever, ever say. So thank you all so, so much. Thank you. Do you wanna do your? Yes.

Okay, my topic this week. Yes. Is gonna be a little unfamiliar to you. Okay. But I think it is widespread enough that you will be able to participate. Okay, my topic this week is gonna be a little unfamiliar to you, but I think it is widespread enough that you will be able to participate. Okay, cool. I mean, I made you listen to talk about, me talk about so many Japanese role-playing games.

You are owed like 20 of these. But everybody's talking about Japanese role-playing games. So it's like, now I can talk to somebody at the grocery store, somebody at the gas station. The cashier is like, did you check out Final Fantasy 16? And I'll be like, no, but I have enough information about it that I could say something.

Yeah. I'm talking about the college dormitory. Okay. If you say so, my man, if you insist. I never had a great dorm. I never lived in a dorm. But you went to some.

I went to dorms, yes. I visited dorms and it was never like an amazing experience. Yeah, I mean, kind of gross. Objectively kind of gross for a lot of reasons. Yeah. But I will say as a college freshman, huge for me. Yeah, I bet. I will say as a college freshman, huge for me. Yeah, I bet. And then I actually, I believe when I was there,

Mizzou only required your first year to be in the dorms. A lot of people did two years and then pretty much after that everybody was gone. Okay. But it was huge for me because I don't think I was fully prepared for that first year. I went to a huge state school.

And it was obviously my first time kind of living as a quote unquote adult. And it gave me an opportunity to meet people and to have proximity to all of my classes. Some of which I literally would leave my dorm room five minutes before the class started. That was always the sense I got from dorm. I feel like I always knew, I never lived in the dorms

and so when I would show up to class and people would be in their pajamas, basically I would be like, oh, okay. I was jealous of that for sure. Cause I had to get in a car and drive for like eight minutes. I will talk specifically about like a pivotal moment for me in dorm living. But I wanted to kind of talk about how they became

a lot of what people associate with the dorm. Okay. When I talk about like kind of a typical dorm, I'm talking about like a high rise building. I'm talking about like multi-story, long hallways, multiple rooms, sometimes like a one or two bathrooms per floor, sometimes like the suite style bathroom, usually like cement block, no carpeting, that kind of dorm.

Right. And a lot of that came about because at the end of World War II. Whoa, not expecting that. The GI Bill was started. So what happened was while World War II was still going on, Department of Labor estimated that when the war ended, 15 million men and women who had been serving

would be unemployed, which obviously would lead to a huge, like epic depression that the country was not prepared for. Just widespread unemployment. And so a White House agency that studied post-war manpower needs as early as 1942, recommended a series of programs for education and training. So the GI Bill was federal aid to help veterans

adjust to civilian life in the areas of hospitalization for veterans, in the areas of hospitalization, so they could purchase homes and businesses, and especially education. This act provided tuition, subsistence, books and supplies, equipment, and counseling service for veterans to continue their education. This act provided tuition, subsistence, books and supplies, equipment, and counseling service for veterans to continue their education. So fucking wild.

Yeah. That was a thing. Yeah. That they could do, that the government could do, that could functionally create and provide. This was Franklin Roosevelt in 1944. And obviously, this was enormous. Just the thought of that happening at a level that could provide material sort of change and support to that many people is like, truly astonishing. Yeah, given the landscape of

today. I know it's hard to imagine anything like that now. So the GI Bill resulted in a near doubling of the number of college students in the decade after 1945. Wild. It is estimated that within the following seven years, approximately eight million veterans received educational benefits,

and approximately 2.3 million attend colleges and universities so Housing became an issue. Yes had to fundamentally change There was not enough space for all of these new college students, which led to the growth of the modernist high rises That I am talking about. Yeah high-rise dormitories also appeared outside of urban areas such as the Morrill and Lincoln Towers at Ohio State, which were completed in 1965 and had room for more than 3,800 students.

Lord. So at the time, super lean housing, we're talking about communal bathrooms and showers shared by 20 to 30 students. Yowza! Not really a lot in terms of comfort. I mean, there would maybe be like a common area, but now you're seeing more like high-end style dormitories.

Yeah. You know, like we're talking a swimming pool, we're talking on top of retail establishments. When I was in the dorm, my first dorm did not have wireless internet. And this was in the age of like Napster, you know, LimeWire, like everybody's trying to download songs and it would take me hours, literally.

Now I will say my second year I moved to a different dorm which did have the wireless internet. Or I guess it wasn't even wireless internet, right? It was, what was it? Was it called? I don't even remember. Where you like, you plugged in. Ethernet connection.

Ethernet, that's what I'm thinking of. See, this is how long it's been. You're such a Gen Z that like this old stuff doesn't even ring a bell. I know. So I will say that there are benefits. There's a lot of reasons that universities ask that their first year students live on campus.

First it like eliminates some of the things that if you were living independently, you would have to deal with, like monthly bills, releases, in some cases, purchasing your own food. A lot of these dormitories have like dining hall kind of situation. Also you have residential staff, which can help connect you to what you need while you're there.

So this is what was a big deal for me, my freshman years when I met my friend Nicole, what I told you about. She was the RA on my floor. And I decided to live in an all female dorm my freshman year. I don't really recall why. But it was difficult for me to kind of make friends.

But Nicole liked posters, music. It was just very clear. We had a lot of similar interests. She like poked her head in because I was like reading a book that she had wanted to read. You both loved posters. You both loved music.

Here's the thing though. She also loved Rushmore. She also loved Christopher Guest. She was a huge radio head fan. That's all you need. Those three things tell me everything I need to know about her. She took the same art history class

that I was taking. Beautiful. She worked at a movie theater and so she just, she was very cool and honestly was maybe one of the only friends I made in that dorm that year. Sure. And at the end of my senior year, I went to her wedding and I still keep in touch with her.

And my freshman year was rough. I mean, in a lot of ways, I had one very unfortunate roommate my first semester who basically forced me out of our room. And again, did not make a lot of friends in that dorm. So having access to her, like it was huge for me. Also in a dorm freshman year, they have what is called living learning communities.

I was part of what they call the freshman interest group. Mine was women in leadership. Awesome. Which again, I thought this is gonna be great. I'm gonna meet a lot of other powerful women looking to take over the world. That was not my experience, unfortunately. But I will say that there is research to say

that living, learning community participants were up to three times more likely than other campus residents to meet with faculty, attend class, see an advisor. It's just, it's access to resources. It's the motivation to kind of stay enrolled. Yeah. It's an accountability thing, it sounds like, right?

Yeah, and it's also like a shopping mall of friends in a way. Like I personally did not have a great experience with my roommate, but I will say my sophomore year when I moved to a different dorm, it was just kind of incredible to me that there was like seven floors of people who were all approximately my age,

all enrolled at the same university. It's kind of incredible to think about as an adult now. The opposite of our sort of social experience. People talk about how hard it is to make friends as an adult, and it is because in a lot of ways, you do not have regular access to people who have a similar interest and a similar age to you. We don't live in a building with 3,600 other adults.

No, and yes, I am grateful for that. Yes. But it has made it more difficult to form adult relationships. Yeah, for sure. So yeah, I mean, again, a lot of problems with dorm living. I would not do it again as an adult, but I'm glad that I did it.

And it's kind of an interesting phenomenon in a lot of ways, like a rite of passage for a lot of people who go to school. I feel like I missed out on a certain chapter of, certainly the college experience by not living in a dorm. Whenever I would visit dorms, I would always think like, I used the bathroom once at one friend's dorm. I was like, no fucking way, dude. I remember when we moved into the dorm,

we got like a little list of things to buy, one of which was a shower caddy, which I didn't even know what it was. I remember like trying to figure out like, well, why would you need a shower caddy? Why would you need a bathrobe? And the idea was that you were gonna walk from your room down to this communal shower,

so you needed to carry all your shampoo and stuff and you needed to cover your body. It was fascinating. I also bought a trunk, which was a thing, again, I think was like a holdover from years. World War II? Yeah, so I remember like trying to figure out where does one buy a trunk and why exactly do I need a trunk?

Yeah. Later realized could have just had a big suitcase, but trunk- It's great. Seemed like a thing. A little treasure chest. Yeah. Speaking of treasure chest.

We're gonna talk one last time about the drive for this week. MaximumFun.org slash join is the link. I mean, we've told you everything that there is kinda to say about it, but we really could use your support this year as the market shifts away from advertising and podcasts, we really, really could use your help.

If you can go to that link and kick in just five bucks a month. Do you wanna talk about any of the other fun stuff that you did with your brothers and or dad? Sure, so on MbemBem, we had an episode that got way out of control where we invented a nine level rave that took place in the basement of a container store

called Plato's Rave. So we did, on Mubim Bam for the bonus episode, we made a one-shot role-playing game out of Plato's Rave. And then for Adventure Zone, me, Justin, and Travis all simultaneously DM'd that experience for our dad who had no idea what the fuck we were talking about the whole time, which was a true delight. We also have like, you know, streams and stuff

that we've been getting ready for the drive, to be doing some DJ sets, Infuser, which I'm very excited about. We have grown dramatically over, especially the last few years, we've been able to hire people like Rachel, our editor on this and all of our shows. Griffin used to stay up until like midnight,

one in the morning sometimes, just scrambling to get everything edited. Yes. And now he doesn't have to do that, which is great because we have two kids and we're hardly sleeping already. Yes, exactly. But we've been able to do more video stuff

because we hired a video editor and producer and more live stream stuff. We have been able to do more stuff and make our work a bigger part of our lives and that is only because of the support that we've gotten in Max Fund Drives Past. Oh my gosh, and touring too.

And touring also. Not to forget touring, you guys tour so much more than you used to. We do tour, well, yes, we do tour so much more. Things have- In the early years. Things have slowed down, I would say in- There was, there were some unexpected circumstances that maybe changed that a little.

Post COVID, like our touring just hasn't gotten back up to what it was, which is honestly another kind of financial consideration that is weighing heavy on us. So again, maximumfund.org slash join, you pick the shows you wanna support and that support goes, I mean, a long, long, long, long way. I cannot stress enough that if you like the stuff we make and the community we attempt to kind of cultivate,

you are the sole kind of engine behind that with your support in the Max Fund Drive. So please consider going to maximumfund.org slash join, help us out, get some great rewards, get a bunch of bonus content, and feel great about the fact that you are helping put this stuff and stuff like it out into the world, because that is exactly what you are doing.

Thank you so much. Thank you to Bowen and Augustus for these for our theme song, Money Won't Pay. You'll find a link to that in the episode description. And of course, as always, thank you to Maximum Fund for having us on the network. That's it. We'll be back next week.

Apologies for missing last week. I know that's not a great look. Before the drive kicks off, we were- A lot of stuff going on. A lot of pretty heavy shit happening. Yeah, and we all thank our look community just for being so supportive. Yes. It means everything. Yes, thank you so much. And we'll be our community just for being so supportive.

Yes. It means everything. Yes, thank you so much. And we'll be back next week. So till then. What we always say. What we always say. Have a great summer.

Love you like a sister. I signed you for your crack. Are you a crack? I'm all ready, working on things. I'm all ready, working on things. I'm all ready.