Wonderful! - Wonderful! 81: Bug Man vs. Magic Guy

Episode Date: April 25, 2019

Griffin's favorite humble body of water! Rachel's favorite optical illusion fad! Griffin's favorite toilet hygiene friend! Rachel's favorite uplifting loneliness poem! Music: "Money Won't Pay" by bo en and Augustus - https://open.spotify.com/album/7n6zRzTrGPIHt0kRvmWoya MaxFunDrive ends on March 29, 2024! Support our show now by becoming a member at maximumfun.org/join.

Hi, this is Rachel McElroy. Hello, this is Griffin McElroy. And this is wonderful. Damn! I wish this was your podcast. Ooh. That's my first thing, and I wanted to bring it. It's the song, and I believe

it's called Damn. I think that the title of that song... In parentheses, I Wish I Were Your Lover? I don't even think it gets the parenthetical. I just think the name of that song is Damn! And it's from, you know, you don't need me to tell you who did that song i don't because the person or just all just band that sang that song is one that most people our age is familiar with

sophie b hawkins oh who did this is wonderful this is a show where we, it's a Sophie B. Hawkins fan cast where we talk about the song, Damn, I Wish I Was Your Lover, which is how the song starts. I'm looking at the Google, the lyrics and oh no, it's not. That's the first chorus. Anyway, on this show we talk about all the great hits of Sophie B. Hawkins as well as whatever else sort of floats across our field of vision uh there was the um uh og i wish i were your banker yeah and shoot i wish i was your buddy um shucks i wish that i worked at a deli counter there was fuck i wish i was your mortician which was that one wow that one only got some college radio play. See, I was trying to clean it up.

I know. But that one, she was going through a dark time. Do you have any small wonders? I do. Oh, okay. First, duh, Lizzo's album is out. I still haven't listened to it. This is not one of those albums where the singles are the best songs.

Oh, you're kidding me. I am not kidding you. Juice is not even the star of that album? I, so, oh my gosh. So there's Like a Girl, which I really like. It's kind of a lady anthem in the style of Beyonce. And then I like, oh, oh, it's something. Is it Damn it damn i wish i was your lover the cover that she did for that one i bet she would crush that song actually exactly how i feel is the name of the

song uh and it's very good uh i'm going to listen to it this week i will need some i will need some power to get me through friday oh were you just going to go ahead and start doing your first no i have one more thing i wanted to mention. Oh, what was it? There is a new special on Netflix called Call to Courage, which features Brene Brown. Oh. Who I am a big fan of. Who is that? Brene Brown has written several books. And she talks a lot about how you can't have courage without vulnerability. And so she sounds a little bit like a self-help guru, but I will tell you what.

She has a bachelor's, master's, and PhD in social work. And she comes from a very research-based place. And I find her stuff really compelling. It's not just that she has big teeth and can speak confidently into a microphone. No, no. Which is really all it takes for a lot of folks she's done a lot of a lot of research on vulnerability and shame and she talks a lot about how vulnerability is necessary to have courage in your life and i just find it very

useful and i would recommend it or superpowers if you had those you probably yeah i saw a vidra zen game and i can't talk about it because this is still going to go up before Embargo. But I liked it a lot. I don't even know if I can say that. I enjoyed it very much. Yeah, I went to an early screener, and that was fun. That's, I guess, one of my small wonders. It was a good flick.

Good way to wrap it all up. And also, touchscreens. They're pretty cool that they're where they are now, right? When I was a kid, I remember I like an early palm pilot thing that i like oh my gosh i remember the palm pilots and i was like in love with it because it was it was if memory serves it was kind of open source and so like i figured out how to download like these games that people made on them and it was like a really quality version of drug wars and stuff like that. And you had to like press it really hard with this little stylus.

How old were you when you got a Palm Pilot? I was in high school. Do you have a lot of meetings that you were responsible for? I forget the circumstances as to why I got a Palm Pilot. I'm pretty sure it didn't start out mine. I don't know if that means I stole or inherited it. Okay. But now they do everything.

I saw a thing. This isn't a touchscreen. This is my third small i saw i saw a thing this isn't a touch screen this is my third small wonder i saw this thing where people were shooting pool on a pool table but there was like an ar overlay on it there was like a projector overhead so that there was like a little circle around the cue ball and wherever your stick went in over that circle it would project a line straight forward that would bounce off of the borders of the table so it would show you literally exactly where your ball's gonna go. Whoa, that's some like minority report stuff.

Yeah, so I guess all my things together is just technology. Yeah. Who goes first this week? I have no idea. Ah, shoot. It's me. Oh, well, congratulations. My first, thank you for the prize.

My first thing is Crix. Let me do my, I gotta get the good accent stank on this one. Cricks. Did you grow up actually saying crick? I think it's interchangeable. No,

that's too much for me. Did you know people that say crick? Oh, absolutely. I think I get very, my hackles get up whenever anybody brings up certain like

Appalachian stereotypes. And I would say that saying the word crick is borderline on them. Yeah. But just like all Appalachian stereotypes, I don't think I necessarily fall prey into most of them, but I definitely know someone who falls prey into at least one of them. Yeah. And I want you to know that I do not associate any stereotypes with you in particular i just i get curious about the words people use in their regions crick felt too much like an

affectation to me but there were people who lived in huntington who could pull crick off i'm talking about creeks yes see that i'm familiar with yes creeks these little rivers are everywhere and i am just i'm all for them uh we now live in a house with a creek uh pretty close to it uh it's incredible this is like a childhood dream of mine to be this close to a creek we're pretty close to a creek when it's dry like nothing happens back there it's more of a ravine but then as soon as it starts raining uh it starts gushing and so i was actually preparing this segment with the windows of our living room open, just listening to this just natural white noise machine. Did you, one, write a poem about it that you're going to read right now?

I can just read my notes in the style of a poem. And two, is it on a monopoetic? Creek? No, the words in your poem. Did you use the sound of the creek to inspire the language you used in your poem? Did you do a lot of gurgle, gurgle, shush, shush, shush? No, but I did write the following. I'm in our living room right now with the window open as I prep this.

And it's just like this chill ass white noise machine and then hold on wait thank you for that um griffin is this your first poem that you've ever written uh it's my seventh one yeah so i did the other ones in school uh i just like when i was younger i will say this i didn't say the word creek, but I did have a lot of creek based activities that I could rely on, which is a lot of good creeks where you grew up. There were a lot of good creeks. There was one that sort of ran through my local park that we just kind of lived down the street from.

And usually like, you know, we'd be playing in the park or I'd be riding my bike. I would often ride my bike around the lake, a little track around the park. And when it got too hot, you just take off your socks, take off your shoes and do a little wading the water children. Oh yeah, wading in a creek. It feels very, I'm surprised that you're as for this as you are. I was kind of an outdoorsy kid.

It might be hard to believe, but it's true. It is very hard to believe. I have this, let me know if you've done this. You ever go crawdad hunting no i now see that's that's where i've got i never ate any of the crawdads that i caught as far as i can remember but i did go crawdad hunting how did you catch them you flip a rock over really quick and you try and grab them really fast no like a bear like a bear would do yeah sure i thought you meant like how you would grab a bear you flip the rock off its cave and you try and just grab them real fast um now boat races yes boat races creeks were made

for little leaf boat races there was a bridge that went over the creek at ridder park and we would just like toss some leaves off and just see which one did went under the bridge faster very good sport sport of kings you grew up in like a mark twain story i did there was also a big tree that fell down and it forded the creek the creek kids would use it as a bridge uh so much so that it almost became like codified like this is now a bridge uh but i think someone got hurt uh not not full-blown terabithia as far as i know but like it wasn't good so then they cut it out which was a shame so uh they're just like this nice little water feature and it's not like a big deal like a river it's not like it's it's like an unpretentious water body of water which

i appreciate it doesn't have to be anything that it's not it's like the above ground pool of rivers interesting thank you i guess an above ground pool is already its own kind of body of water but um so i was googling like what makes it what makes a creek a creek and technically all creeks are streams but not all streams are creeks wow i. That's interesting. Yes, I know. There's a whole taxonomy of it. It goes as such. The smallest kind of stream is a brook, right? A babbling brook.

So you don't have trickle? You don't have trickle in there? There's not a trickle, no. I don't think you would ever call it a trickle. Brooks are usually very shallow and they are usually fed by like a spring are usually very shallow and they are usually fed by like a spring uh rather than like being a uh having having a tributary uh of their own okay here is the here so creeks are like a little bit beefier um and they can also vary based on rainfall so the weird thing is it's all kind of just

calvin ball when it comes to creeks v rivers it's all kind of just basically it just says like there and there is no hard and fast rule for it but just like when a creek gets deep and long enough somebody looks at it and is like i actually think that's a river now but there's no so like who decided all this so it goes brook stream creek no a brook and a creek is a stream and technically i think a river is also a stream okay but so like i'm it just drives me wild i grew up next to four pole creek is what it was called why but it was pretty freaking deep when it like rained and flooded in huntington which it was known to do very very badly and destroy the city from time to time. I feel like if you could bring a watercraft or conduct transportation on something, it's a river.

Is that what your... But see, I don't... That's what my brain says. But this is what I'm saying. Four Pole Creek was very deep, and so when it rained a lot, it would get extremely full. Yeah, but could you put a boat on it? Easily, easily.

Yeah? Yeah. What kind of boat? How big is a boat? could you put a boat on it? Easily, easily. Yeah? Yeah. What kind of boat? How big is a boat? How big is a boat? Well, according to the dictionary, a boat is 10 feet. How big is the boat that you're putting on this body of water? I mean, it's got to be bigger than a kayak, right?

You want an engine on this thing? Yeah. I could probably get a sailboat on it. Huh. Yeah, it's a big creek. Right? So who decides that? Who decides that? Yeah. I could probably get a sailboat on it. Huh. Yeah, it's a big creek. Right? So who decides that?

Who decides that? I think it has to be a bigger boat that can get on there. Okay. See, I grew up in St. Louis, which is right on the Mississippi River. Oh, that river's big. That's a big old river. Yeah. I mean, I grew up on the Ohio. Nobody would call that a creek.

No, nobody would call the Ohio River a creek. Exactly. They would call it a creek no nobody would call the ohio river a creek exactly uh they would call it a sludge line of acid your dad really does he has like legitimate burns on his body from swimming in the ohio river i didn't my my dad is uh you know he's a very clumsy man and so i often see just like new wounds appear on him. And then I guess I had forgotten. I saw him while he was changing for a Taz live show. And I was like, holy shit. Cause he had like just these patches of body hair that were missing. I was like, what is it?

He's like, oh, that's from when I swam the Ohio river and I got acid burns on my body. Yeah. So anyway, uh, creeks are good. Creeks are great. They are the people's rivers. Uh, and I, I just think more rivers should be creeks and that's where I'm going to leave it.

What's your first thing? My first thing. Magic eye. This is going to be tough for me. I mean, it's going to be tough for all of us. I have never once in my life gotten a magic eye painting really never once in my life have i gotten one to work and it wasn't until i was in like college that i it dawned on me that it is probably because of my blind spot yeah i could never ever people would see it and be like oh

that's clearly a boat i'd be like what the fuck are you talking about and i tried everything like people like here's a life hack. It is very difficult for me. So the pro tip on Magic Eyes is that you're supposed to use what is called divergent viewing. What is this? That's where you go to the movie and you see the flick about the woman who defies the redhead woman from, oh my God, I couldn't remember a single actor's name. I just could, I can't think remember a single actor's name i just could i can't think of a single actor's name in the movie divergent that exists ever it's not keanu reeves okay holy shit wait keanu reeves is in divergent no i he's just a celebrity

that i was able to think of oh my god julianne moore maybe or kate winslet is in one of those magic eyes are good though divergent viewing now divergent viewing so instead of focusing your eyes which is everybody's inclination to do you look past it so you kind of have something in front of you and you act as if you are looking through it and past it but then you but then you can kind of like eyes are so weird right because if you they really do work like a camera lens where you can adjust focus like kind of like you you can control it and so like that's what you're supposed to do is like dial it in and out until you see the boat and i could never see the boat i know and it's hard for me honestly like you don't have to pity me.

You don't have to pity me. You have to practice a lot. It's not like one of those things you get good at right away. Okay. Here's the thing about Magikai. It was super huge in the 90s, so much so that there were three books released and they spent together a total of 73 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Oh my God.

I remember this as a kid. Like, I remember it being a thing. And it's so quaint now when I think about it, that the world was going crazy for these books and posters. Doesn't that seem like a simpler time? I like to think that Mr. Magic Eye, who invented it, Steve Magic Eye, Magic Eye. Do you want to play this game?

Because I have the info right here well i think he had this invention locked down bad in like 1950 and he was like no they're not ready for it yet i'm gonna wait until it's the most lucrative the most profitable and then in the early 90s everybody got dial up internet and he was like oh fuck if i don't get this out once everybody's on the internet nobody's gonna give a shit about magic eye they will download their own magic eye and be bored with it in a week so magic eye uh actually has a history and that history is auto stereograms which are um images that appear 3d through 2d patterns and this started as a random dot stereogram invented by a neuroscientist in 1959. And he did that to test people's ability to see depth in 2D form. which dots they thought were further away based on the placement.

So it was kind of like an optical illusion that he was kind of showing that people have the ability to see depth without actually having the depth. Yeah. And so this was in 1959. And then in 1979, Christopher Tyler created

the first black and white wallpaper auto stereograms with a computer. Wait, it's a wallpaper? Yeah, you know how magic eyes are like wallpaper, they repeat the same thing? Right, right, right. Okay, I thought you meant literal like putting it up on the walls of somebody. Can I just say though, having

a magic eye wallpaper in your room would be pretty cool. That would make you so ill it would make you very sick you know oh that's a way to update the yellow wallpaper are you familiar with that short story no uh it's i believe by charlotte perkins gilman and it's a short story about a woman who is kind of locked away in a room uh due to quote hysterical reasons and then she kind of has this whole hallucination where she's like in the wallpaper and it like represents her madness oh okay uh and but now if you had

the magic eye yeah that'd be for real i still don't see any fucking boat uh so it was in the early 90s 1991 when uh when a creator, Tom Betsy, worked with Tenyo, a Japanese company that sells magic supplies. So this started in Japan. The book was called Miro Miro Mega Yokenaro Magikai, which roughly translated is your eyesight gets better and better in a very short rate of time, Magikai. And the book became a bestseller over there and then it came to north america in 1993 it's nice not having to take responsibility as a nation for this one magic eye is neat but it almost i don't know i just assumed anything that burns as bright and fast as that is. No, that's a good point.

Yeah. That's a good point. I was talking to my coworker today about Ugg boots and how it was a trend that I could tell was kind of not going to last. Magic Eye, very similar. Yeah. So as you mentioned, Magic Eyes have been used by vision therapists to treat certain issues. Like if people are physically enabled to see a magic eye,

they could potentially go to their eye doctor and they could have issues as like binocular vision or accommodative disorders. So like people that have quote wall eyes or cross eyes or whatever also aren't able to see magic eyes. I think I'm not missing out on a on very much not really no especially by today's standards the vow that vr exists magic eye kind of seems unnecessary vr works for me vr works is it which i guess is just like it's just two

screens that are kind of well they did say that magic eye kind of operates on the same assumption that like uh 3d glasses operate on right that your your eyes can kind of do different things at the same time that you can unfocus your eyes and have them work kind of independently is kind of the same thing as like you know that i mean that's the that's the basis of pretty much all vr heads and a lot of VR technology, all the way down to the Google Cardboard thing, is essentially when you put on the Oculus Rift, the headset is producing two images.

So it's twice as hard to make games for because it has to literally run two sort of visual fields at the same time. And then it is when those two visual fields combine at an exact, very, very precise that you have to sort of dial in, uh,

like distance from each other is where you get the, the, the 3d effect. Also, uh, viewfinders. Oh yeah. Plastic viewfinders kind of same thing.

Do you think that if magic eye came out today and every time we say it, it does say, it sounds like we're saying magic guy. That's really cool too. You know who I love? Magic guy and that's really cool too you know who i love magic guy chris angel i don't know he's the one that does the tricks uh if magic i came out today do you think it would be like the dress the buzzfeed dress is it like a blue or because they're you know i'd pull it up on my phone and be like, some dipshit says there's a boat in these squiggles.

And then you'd be like, there is a boat in those squiggles. And then, you know, Twitter. That's kind of how all of these problems end, isn't it? Yeah, sort of. I don't know that there's room for Magic Eye anymore, unless they can somehow get it on your Apple Watch. But I'd need two apple watches no i don't think that's how that works hold them up to my eyes like i'm a bug man did i look cool right then when he's pretending to be a bug literally held both of his ribs up

to his eyes as if i couldn't imagine what that would look like if he didn't demonstrate it. Like a bug man. Like a bug man. It's me, the bug man, here to fight you, magic guy. Can we steal us away? Please. Can you read me this first Jumbotron? This first message is for Michael. It is from Sarah. Michael, happy fourth wedding anniversary.

I am so happy I got to spend another year gaming, parenting, and exploring life with you. Serenity and I are so lucky to have you in our lives. Here is to another forever and a year together. Also, thank you for being a good, good husband and putting up with my McElroy obsession. Love you lots, Sarah. Hell yeah, a couple gamers. I wish we were a couple gamers. Really?

The gamers that game together, game together. That is true. And I've always told you that. Now, if we were gaming together, we'd be gaming together. But you know what the problem is? What? We just like the different stuff. And I'm always wanting to play osmosis jones for

super nintendo and you always want to play earthworm jim for sega genesis oh my gosh that is so true do you want to hear the next message capulets and montagues just can't seem to can i read the next message oh sure this one's for eric and it's from bridget or brigitte i'm gonna go with brigitte because that's what it actually is. These are my vows. Hopefully I am playing this for 100 of our family and friends right now. Thank you for loving me and our sweet Alfredo

and watching Drag Race with us. I've loved you for six years and I'll love you forever. I've hidden some Girl Scout cookies somewhere in the apartment. If you can find them, you can have them. I guess I'm your wife now.

Those are pretty good vows. Really sort of gets across exactly what you need to know in this exact moment. And I like the little mystery of the Girl Scout cookies. And that's what I was talking about. These Girl Scout cookies, they have a shelf life. So get hunting. The Greatest Generation is a Star Trek podcast that de-stigmatizes the very idea of having a Star Trek podcast.

We're Ben and Adam, the hosts of The Greatest Generation, and the technology we've developed is that nobody knows what you're playing in your earbuds. You know, with legalization, it's easier than ever to find out what's in your buds. But we suggest that you legally find The Greatest Generation wherever you download your podcasts. We'll send it to you in a discreet, unmarked package that nobody has to know but us. That's The Greatest Generation, the Star Trek podcast that you didn't know you needed, yet makes you feel like you belong. Can I talk about my second thing?

Yes. It is, of course, a bidet. Oh, here it is. Oh, bidet. Here it is. Here we go. Here we go. We're going to get a little bit anatomical in this one. First of all, we should say that this is a lovely birthday gift from the very thoughtful Travis McElroy.

Oh, he's very much thinking about sort of our needs. And when Griffin says our. You used it and you came out of that bathroom hovering four inches off the ground. So I do not want to hear you say like, it's my thing. It's our thing. I also get down on this. I also want to say,

so it is a toilet attachment. Yeah. It's a toilet seat with a little robot inside it. Griffin installed himself. I did a good job. And he did a very good job. I cut my hand in four places. And there was a small flood.

There wasn't a flood. It was a little leak. Was it a creek or a stream? It was a brook. So yes, we have a bidet now. It's rad. It has all these different functions. You can adjust the water pressure of the spray,

the heat of the spray, the heat of the toilet seat. There's a massage function. The position of the spray. You're going to change the position of the spray. Freaking of course. Nobody's buttholes is the same. Everybody's, massage function the position of the spray you're gonna change the position the spray freaking of course nobody's buttholes is the same everybody's which is another way of saying everybody's buttholes is different um there's all kinds of bidets right we have the built-in toilet seat one which is the sort of more modern take but there's also the standalone sort of toilet-esque uh appliance that usually lives right next to the toilet. I have seen these,

never used one because it weirds me out. And then there are like shower heads that you can use in some places. Honestly, like bidet use differs wildly between like different countries and different sort of like religious practices. There are certain religions that take hygiene like very, very seriously. And so bidets, you will find like more of them in regions where that religion is more common. Also among like different age ranges,

bidets are becoming slightly more common among the elderly for various health reasons. But I had never used one until i went to japan and it really opened my eyes because they are very very common there uh pretty much you're not supposed to use it on your eyes uh are you sure oh no their bidet game is i'm sure we've talked about this but like their big bidet game was so on point because let's see we had a home away there in kyoto where it had like ground effects that shone into the bowl and also sound effects that it would like make running water so you could like i think you

would walk in and the lid would open the lid would open on its own it had a motion sensor and then there was like a perfume spray the host was really excited to show it to us like she knew that that was going to be a big feature. Yes, and it was. And it feels very good on your duff or whatever undertown parts that you're using to rinse up. And I didn't think I would appreciate it. First couple times I used it, I was like, hee hee hee, and I turned it off really quick. And then I was like, hey, it off really quick and then i was like hey i'm clean i'm refreshed it gets kind of uh humid in japan where i was walking around a lot and so i would just get a little spritz a little clean and then i was ready to go and having that available in my own home to fight off the fucking texas summer heat i am ready to beat the shit out of June, July, and August. It's going to be so good.

I am armed and ready. And bidets are good. Bidet is a French loan word. The etymology, I thought, was hysterically funny. It's the French word. Do you know what it means? Do you know what bidet means in French? We did not learn that in high school French.

It's pony. So in old French, bidet meant to trot so the etymology comes from the notion that one quote rides or straddles one of these standalone bidets much like a pony is written oh my gosh uh that is very very good for me so like nobody quite knows like a lot of rad things that we use these days. Nobody knows exactly who invented the bidet, but it is thought to have come from like French furniture makers from some time in the 1800s. What was the thing I recently talked about that I feel like we attributed to French furniture makers? I've never done bidets before, right? Oh, sectionals. I think I was talking about sectionals, yes. Leading the charge. There was a written reference to a bidet in uh italy in 1726

uh there is also historical evidence of bidets being used like among royal circles around that time period uh and also at that time it was traditionally kept in the bedroom gross gross gross gross gross you know what i'm thinking about is the kind of comedy of errors that would come from the bidet in the bathroom and then the bidet that you ride on out in the world, right? Yeah. If it comes from the word pony. Yeah. How do you differentiate when you're talking to your friends in France? Yeah.

You know? Well, I think it's probably rare for a person of a certain age to say the words, I'm going to go ride my pony, unless they are genuine. I think genuine is the only one that can say that out loud. If you're 10 and you say, I'm going to go ride my pony, I'm going to assume you're talking about the small horse.

That's fair. And not the appliance. Okay. So there was a book that was published in 2001 called the encyclopedia of birth control apparently uh during this time period where like uh bidets were starting to get get going uh in europe it was used for contraceptive purposes oh see yeah they used to they used to just think you could just just sort of goose it out you could just scoop it out and you'd be fine

out of there yeah that's nothing So plumbing got better The bidet moved into the bathroom Where it belongs Obviously John Harvey Kellogg Had to get a hand on the ball And he was like Oh let's talk about anal douching Let's talk all about anal douching

Gotta be clean everywhere They've talked about this fellow On Sawbones before Probably many many times So he came up with his own Sort of bidet style contraption, surprising nobody. I feel like when that hit the news, Kellogg, invent new bidet style nozzle contraption. I think that everybody's like, I thought he'd already done that. But I guess maybe I just had to assume.

Later in the 20th century, they became sort of more common household items, but it wasn't until the 1990s that the sort of built-in nozzle on the toilet seat sort of modern bidet that we own and we know it came from Japan, of course. That's where they got their, they entered the playing field

in the early 1990s with the built-in bidet. There were companies like Clean Sense, Galaxy, Infinity, Novita, and GoBidet. And they just changed the fucking game for all of us, for the rest of us. And this is a lot easier on your plumbing than those like flushable wipes and stuff that they sell now. So that's the thing. I was thinking that actually a bidet was a sort of luxury item that was actually pretty bad for your global footprint.

Yeah, because it seems like it would use more water. But actually it was found that you actually use way, way less toilet paper. And so it evens out and also almost kind of makes up for the fact that you are using slightly more water not a ton of water you're not even using as much as you do when you flush when you when you use a bidet unless you really want to get clean all up in there kellogg um but yeah what's great too is you can get rid

of your shower because why would you shower anymore if you have a bidet yes exactly exactly i love the bidet i've used it every day since i've gotten it if you are a bidet. You have a bidet. Yes, exactly. Exactly. I love the bidet. I've used it every day since I've gotten it. If you are grossed out by this segment because you've never used a bidet, I really don't think it has to be a thing. Griffin, are you inviting everybody to use our bathroom right now? No. Although you were very, we had to put it in our guest bathroom just for, there was the only place it would fit. And Rachel is very nervous about like- Because the first thing we're going to talk about with every single guest that comes into our house now is that bidet and we had a little easter get together and sure enough everybody wanted to talk about

the bidet which was flattering for me because they all wanted to talk about how well installed it was and then all of them were like oh i'm so nervous to use the bidet but then everybody came out like it was actually very good like i'm I'm glad I rode that pony. I'm glad I rode that particular pony. Bidets, they're amazing. What's your second thing? My second thing is a trip to the poetry corner. Yeah.

Hey, baby, I hear the poetry. Oh, no. Oh, no, Griffin. Just do it. You had it last week. No, just do it. I know, but I used it all up, didn't I? It was like, Griffin. Just do it. You had it last week. I know, but I did use it all up, didn't I?

It was like, there was like scrambled verse, I think was one of them. Toss verses? Just go ahead. I'm so sorry. The poet I am featuring this time is Mary Oliver. Do you like the faces I make at you when you say the names of poets at me and i pretend like can you describe the one i just made i always i always look at you to see if there's recognition and you always do this kind of face like i am explaining to you how batteries work yeah if you bring robert frost or ee cummings although that one's not going to play on radio i

feel like yeah and those are the only two emily dickinson she got some good ones you say this to me but we have brought so many poets and it troubles me that you can't william carlos williams Williams. Okay. William Henry Harrison. Yeah. William Smith. We talked about his poetry in our bonus episode. Yeah. Mary Oliver was born in 1935 in Cleveland, and she actually just passed away in January 2019. She was 83 when she passed. It was a long life.

she passed was a long life uh she was born in cleveland moved to massachusetts when she uh was older and published 15 collections of poetry damn that's a lot of poetry i know uh she is i've only published four what are the names of those collections well the first book was called just some of my new shit and it was cool it was cool like the cover book was called Just Some of My New Shit. And it was cool. It was cool. Like the cover art was very cool. It looked like graffiti. And you're like the Eminem of poetry in that you just introduced yourself. Well, I dialed it back in.

And the second one was Some Thoughts. And then the third book was More Deep Thoughts. And I worked with Jack Handy. You know I have a soft spot. Yeah. And the fourth one was untitled. It was just kind of like blue. And so people called it your blue album?

No. That's a Weezer thing. Oh, okay. Weezer stole it from me. I published these books in 1981. I get you and Weezer confused all the time. It's the glasses. It's the white guy with glasses.

Yeah. I look like a lot of white men with glasses. Did you know there's a Facebook group called Griffin McElroy is every white guy with glasses? Is there really? Okay. Every white guy with glasses is Griffin McElroy. Is it just screenshots of tweets that people send to me comparing me to?

I don't know. It's a private group. So I wasn't able to see what was in it. That's probably a blessing. Go with God. to i don't know it's a private group so i i wasn't able to see what was in it that's that's probably a blessing go with god griffin mackerey is every white guy with glasses facebook group uh so mary oliver is similar to the romantic poets in the kind of the era of wordsworth and keats who are poets i know them who poets that wrote about nature and kind of the majesty of nature. Yes. But then she also has this kind of solitude, loneliness, similar to Thoreau or Whitman, of kind of like, we are small in this environment, but also very American in its kind of spirit.

Okay. She said in an interview with NPR, poetry mustn't be fancy. I have the feeling that a lot of poets writing now, they sort of tap dance through it. I always feel that whatever isn't necessary should not be in the poem. Yeah. Well, I probably could have told you that. She won a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Award. And there's this great obituary, kind of not obituary, but, you know, tribute to her, uh, the month she passed in the New Yorker. And they talk about though her, her poems spoke to this kind of loneliness in the world. Uh, they were not poems about isolation though, but about pushing beyond quote emotional quarantine, even when you feel fear.

quote, emotional quarantine, even when you feel fear. Which I thought was kind of a beautiful way to put it. So I wanted to bring a poem that kind of represents that energy. And it's called When Death Comes. It's very positive. Okay. It's a very positive, affirmative poem. Cool.

When Death Comes. When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn, when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse to buy me and snaps the purse shut, when death comes like the measle pox, when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades, I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering, what's it going to be like that cottage of darkness? And therefore I look upon everything as a brotherhood and a sisterhood. And I look upon time as no more than an idea. And I consider eternity as another possibility. And I think of each life as a flower, as common as a field daisy

and a singular and each name, a comfortable music in the mouth Tending as all music does towards silence In each body a lion of courage and something precious to the earth When it's over, I want to say all my life. I was a bride married to amazement I was the bridegroom taking the world into my arms When it's over, I don't want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular and real. I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened or full of argument. I don't want to end up simply having visited this world. That's amazing.

Isn't that incredible? That's incredibly good. That's the best poem I've ever heard in my entire life. I don't think I'm joking when I say that. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. And it's like I told you, like it starts in this very dark place that a lot of poets go and then ends saying, you know, you have a lot of agency in this life.

Right. You know, and you're one of, you know, millions of people. But there's a tremendous opportunity to be an individual in that. That was a very good poem. Thank you for bringing that poem. You're welcome. It was delicious.

Good. A sumptuous poem. Mm. A honey-kissed... Uh-oh, Griffin's writing his eighth poem. A honey-kissed collection of words and dribbling juices punctuateuate do you want to know what our friends are talking about at home cats cat says something i find wonderful planetariums it's

relaxing the stars slash planets projected across the dome are beautiful tickets are generally affordable and usually you'll learn something new we should bring henry to a planetarium. He would love it. He loves rocket ship. Yeah. He do love that very much. They should call them space museums, though, because I get planetariums confused with plantariums. Oh, I know. That's not really anything.

Is a plantarium anything? I don't think so. I don't think they call them plantariums. I don't think so. Well, scrambled egg all over my face. Lauren says, my wonderful thing is when my favorite fruit comes back into season. I live for winter oranges. I'm counting down until summer tomatoes, and I have just eaten my first perfect spring

strawberry. Wow. Oh, man. I got to make a strawberry pie, though. I think here it's more of a summertime treat. Is it? Yeah. I don't think's more of a summertime treat. Is it? Yeah, I don't think the strawberries are going here yet. Huh, okay.

Well, I'll make sure to get on it. I've talked about Jim Spaghetti's strawberry pie, right? Yes. You have with me. I don't know if you have on the show. It's a very, very, they have like one week where the strawberries they grow are like peak,

and during that one week they sell strawberry pie and everybody like lines up around the block for it it's the best so here's one from becca who says my wonderful thing is the last perfect bite of a meal i'm talking specifically about when you notice when the best bite is on your plate for example the nacho with the best cheese topping chip ratio and you specifically save it so it's your last bite chef kiss oh i do this all the time i am very deliberate when i eat a meal of like portioning out my food across the plate yeah so that i am able to consistently get the best bite you know at the end i like when i've eaten

most of the stuff on the plate and there's nothing but just sort of scrapples and leavings and then i get a honk of bread and I can just scoop it all up. Oh. It's tempting to finish that bread before you finish your meal, but you gotta hold on to a little bit. You gotta save one

just juice spoon. Is it weird that my mouth watered when you said juice spoon? Yeah. Okay. Hey, thanks to Bowen and Augustus for the use of our mouth-watering theme song money won't pay

you can find a link to that in the episode description um and thank you to maximum fun for having us on the network go to maximum fun.org check out all the great shows there i want to give a shout out to mission to zix it is a very uh ambitious and very very very well produced and well-made uh space opera comedy improv show that is very fun he's been lucky to bring on a lot of really great shows dr game show too is a hell of a lot of fun uh yeah and then amy man and ted leo for the art of the process i know i still can't believe that we have our network has a show with them on it they're so talented okay so yeah that's all at maximumfund.org we have stuff at macFamily, including tickets to the live shows

for My Brother, My Brother and Me in the Adventure Zone that are still on sale in certain places. I think Northeastern regions, y'all slept on it and they're sold out, but they're in other places too. Macroy.Family is the link. And we have merch too, working on some new merch that we're very excited about.

Yeah, is there an update on that? None that we can share on the show right now, but hopefully soon we will have news. We usually drop them in monthly batches. Oh, okay. So maybe like June we'll probably have something out. Sounds good. Yeah.

Hey, what else do we need to say to our friends? Yeah, thank you for listening. And if you haven't already joined our little Facebook community, it's a great place for people to share their wonderful things each week. It's the best Facebook community. Yeah. Because you just get these little pop-ups on your feed like, hey, you know what's good? People specifically go there to share great things.

Yeah. You know what's good? The theme song to Crossfire. And that's just like on your Facebook feed. And you're like, hey, you know what? That is good. So yeah, that's the only good website. That's where I found out that Missy Elliott's new album is coming out soon.

It's a news source too. Yes. You can't beat it. So that's going to be it. I'm going to go downstairs. Okay. And I'm not going to give away what I'm going to go downstairs. Okay. And I don't want to, I'm not going to give away what I'm going to do. Watch Survivor?

It's going to come after. Let's just say, going to get that spray. Going to ride that pony. I'm going to jump on it. Was that whole bit too gross? I don't think so. I said anal douching a lot. You did say that a lot,

but you didn't describe it in detail, which I appreciated. I could. Please don't. Bye. Bye. Money won't pay. Working on pay. Money won't pay. Working on pay. Money won't pay.

Working on pay. Money won't pay. Working on pay. Money won't pay. Money won't pay. MaximumFun.org Comedy and culture. Artist owned. Listener supported. Hello, this is Amy Mann.

And I'm Ted Leo. And we have a podcast called The Art of Process. We've been lucky enough over the past year to talk to some of our friends and acquaintances from across the creative spectrum to find out how they actually work. And so I have to write material that makes sense and makes people laugh. I also have to think about what I'm saying to people. If I kick your ass, I'll make you famous. The fight to get LGBTQ representation in the show.

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