Bouilla-biased

Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

This week, Boolea biased.

Daryl brings the case against her husband, Adam.

Daryl loves soup, but she can't cook it at home because Adam hates it.

She misses soup.

She'll tell anyone who will listen.

Adam says he wants her to stop talking about soup in public.

It makes him feel bad.

Daryl just wants more soup in her life.

Who's right, who's wrong?

Only one can decide.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman enters the courtroom and presents an obscure cultural reference.

Old-fashioned vegetable made with beef stock.

Scotch broth, a hearty soup, one of the manhandlers.

Chicken dumplings.

Hot dog bean.

Tender beans and little Frankfurter slices.

Oyster stew.

Vegetarian vegetable, the alphabet soup.

New England clam chowder.

tomato beef noodle,

golden mushroom, rich in sliced mushrooms, cheddar cheese, great as a sauce, too.

Bailiff Jesse Thorne, please swear the litigants in.

Daryl, Adam, please rise and raise your right hands.

Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

So help you, God or whatever.

Yes.

I do.

Do you swear to abide by Judge John Hodgman's ruling, despite the fact that he only eats solid foods?

Yes.

I do.

I don't think that's true.

Judge Hodgman, you may proceed.

I'm sure you like soup as much as the next guy.

Just like the dead Kennedys said, soup is good food to me, but not to Adam.

Adam and Daryl, you may be seated for an immediate summary judgment in one of your favors.

And by the way, you may be seated in the comfortable chairs of Technica House, our recording partner in New York City.

Hi, Jacob, who's our engineer there.

Nice to be back with you virtually again.

But now it comes down to Daryl and Adam.

Can either of you two name the piece of obscure culture that I referenced as I entered the courtroom?

Let's see, Daryl.

Let's start with you.

It sounded like a delicious list of soups.

It was not a list of soups.

That's right, Daryl.

You win the case.

Goodbye.

Let me look.

You two met in like a trivia club, right?

Yeah, it was an online Zoom.

Oh, we're going to get to your whole life story, Adam, in a second.

Sounds good.

Point is, this is a trivia question.

Oh, yes.

I did recite 10 delicious sounding soups, including hot dog and bean, not a sandwich, a soup.

What do these 10 soups have in common?

Is my question to you.

Adam, I'm going to ask you now and give Daryl a chance to think about it.

I'm going to guess that it's like the...

Do you want to hear them again?

Sure.

Okay.

Old-fashioned vegetable, scotch broth, a hearty soup, chicken and dumplings, hot dog, bean, oyster stew, cheddar cheese, also as good as a sauce, golden mushroom, tomato beef, noodle o's, New England clam cheddar, vegetarian vegetable.

And I forgot to mention that scotch broth, a hearty soup, is labeled one of the manhandlers.

Don't know what that means.

But I gave you a big hint, by the way, there, Adam.

Give you a big hint.

And you too, Daryl, because you're going to get another chance.

Well, it flew right by me.

I think I'll guess that it's a...

It's like the opening day slate for Campbell's soup.

That was like

what they decided to offer on the first day of offering Campbell's soup.

The original 10 Campbell's soups.

Is that what you're guessing?

Sure.

All right.

I'll put that in the guest book.

When you said opening day, it was just baseball opening day.

I assumed that you meant that every year on baseball's opening day, Campbell's Soup offered a baseball-themed lineup of soups.

Yeah, it's like the puppy Super Bowl, except the

baseball soup, Super Bowl.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Their peanuts and cracker jack soup was not developed until a couple of years later, right?

Yeah, exactly.

Jesse Thorne, going up when you were seeing the Giants play, your favorite day to go was soup day, right?

Everyone got a can of soup.

Yeah,

big trouble when the Phillies had soup day.

It does remind me of, I did a tour of baseball stadiums, and one of the things I did was I wanted to try signature food at each ballpark.

And I'm struggling to think if any ballpark had a soup.

It's not something you want to bring into the stands.

I feel like a hot, brothy liquid is not something you want to be holding above another person's shoulders and neck when a flyball comes your way.

Boy.

That was always the joke about Candlestick Park, right?

That, you know, at other stadiums, they'd throw a full bottle of liquor at you.

And at Candlestick, it would be half empty because they would have had to drink most of it to stay warm.

Pretty good, Adam, but stop stalling.

Daryl, Adam Adam guessed the original 10 Campbell soups.

Now, I'm going to say something.

Adam got the hint because I did mention on Scotch Broth, the hearty soup, it says on the label, one of the manhandlers.

So he knew that there was a label involved.

So he's close.

But let me ask you this question.

Does Daryl smoke cigars?

Not currently.

Not currently.

Right.

No.

So he is close, but no cigar.

Oh, there you go.

I

win again.

Oh, boy.

Anyway, before I retire for terrible joke making, Daryl, what's your final guess so that we can move on to this?

I truly don't know, but I do see that.

These soups have something in common.

He is not correct.

It is not the opening day

roster of Campbell's soups.

Can I give you a hint?

Please.

So, Campbell's soup.

was introduced in 1869, or at least Campbell's started as a company then.

These soups were offered to the public in the year 1969, 100 years later.

So not opening day by any stretch of the imagination.

1969 Campbell's soup.

Hmm.

What could the connection be, Daryl?

Are these the 100th anniversary Campbell's soups?

All guesses are wrong.

The people of Pittsburgh are crying today because you did not realize that these were the 10 cans of Campbell's soup that were painted and then silkscreened as part of Andy Warhol's Campbell's Soup 2 collection of prints.

I was thinking about Andy Warhol and I thought I should not say anything about Andy Warhol.

Why?

Because it was too obvious or because you hate winning.

I definitely thought it was too obvious.

I thought it was too obvious.

So the 1969 collection of silkscreens, Campbell's Soup 2, was a sequel to You Guessed It Campbell's Soup 1, which Andy Warhol made in 1968.

But even that was a sequel to his original 32 Campbell Soup cans that he released and completely transformed his career in American art in 1961 and 62.

So there you go.

I like these cans.

The reason I picked Campbell's Soup 2 is because it had the weirdest ones, including hot dog bean.

And the manhandler.

The manhandler, a scotch broth.

I guess Campbell's had a line of pre-chunky soups for very masculine eaters, I guess.

I don't know what it was.

Anyway, we're going to hear the case.

Who brings this case to the courtroom?

Daryl?

I believe I do.

Daryl, you love soup.

What are your top three soups?

Oh, boy.

I think my top really enjoy tomato soup.

Sure.

Like a roasted, hearty tomato soup is wonderful.

Oh, no.

Sorry, you're wrong.

Campbell's tomato soup is the only tomato soup.

She makes her own.

Well, I used to.

That's one of the soups that has been banned.

Yeah, no.

Homemade tomato soup is really good, too.

I apologize.

Go on.

I like Trader Joe's tomato soup.

Sorry, I don't mean to throw a spanner into the works there, but

never tried it.

Okay, tomato soup is number one.

I also am a big fan of...

a white bean escrowl soup that you serve with like a crusty French bread

with some garlic on it.

It's delicious.

Yeah.

And then, gosh, there are so many soups to choose from.

I think, just off the top of my head, you know,

isn't Sophie's choice, Daryl.

Just pick a soup that you like.

It's not locking you into anything here.

My mom makes a chicken soup, which is very dill heavy, which I really enjoy.

Mom's dilly chicken.

So, of these three, Adam, mom's dilly chicken, extra thick white bean and escarole, or homemade tomato puree, which of these is most most disgusting to you?

I have to go with the chicken.

I'm a vegetarian, so

I'm not a big fan of the meat, the meat aspect of that one.

You're not, you're not, but you're a big fan of your mother-in-law, I trust.

Oh, yeah, she's great.

Okay, terrific.

But you do hate soup.

Yes.

Tell me all about it.

Why do you hate soup so much?

Is it because it's gross to you or what's going on?

It's really, it's hard for me to describe, but I find that it doesn't leave me very satisfied.

It's not filling.

Yeah, it's, you know, it's nice.

It's like warm.

It's a good sensation.

So I like, you know, I'm not asking you to make the argument for soup.

Everyone knows why soup is good food.

Why do you hate it?

It's like a real chore to eat.

It's just so much like volume of stuff to eat and like volume of liquid to consume that it just really, really grates after a while.

I'm just

a chore to eat.

Yeah, it's a spoon to mouth and bowl and spoon to mouth.

You just got to keep going on it.

It's like you're working on a project.

Yeah.

It's like

you're digging a ditch of stew.

Yeah, exactly.

And it just keeps filling in.

I 100% assume this would be a textural issue.

The fact that it is

an issue with chore foods

is really throwing me for a loop here.

Honestly, Jesse, I think this is the first time I have heard this argument.

So I'm also, my loop has also been thrown.

Has Daryl ever made a different argument or is this just a new side of your husband that you're seeing for the very first time?

He has made other arguments against soup.

Like what?

For sure.

That it's not filling.

That one I've heard before.

It's not.

You also have told me that you don't think that it is a meal, that you don't think it is real food,

that the flavors are not as flavorful as solid food, which that one I don't understand at all.

That feels like...

Yeah, I don't understand that.

I mean, it could be watery or mushy.

Exactly.

It's very, it's watered down, quite literally.

When was the first time you realized, oh, I'm not going to ever eat another soup again, even if it does hurt my wife's feelings?

Like, were you a kid?

No, it's,

I can't really remember.

It's kind of a later in life that I've taken a stand against.

How old are you?

How old?

31.

31.

Okay.

So

more recently that I've taken a stand against it.

What are you going to say?

25?

Ballpark?

Earlier or later than 25?

Around then.

Okay, around 25.

I got it on the nose.

How long have you had that beard?

People who are watching on the YouTube channel, Judge John Hodgman Pod, will notice that Adam has a beard and also that Adam and Daryl are very adorably holding hands and have been this entire time,

which I applaud.

You cannot because you're holding hands, but I applaud it.

How long have you had that beard?

Does that play into your superversion?

I definitely stopped shaving during the pandemic.

So a couple of years ago,

stopped trimming and shaving and just letting it go.

I'll get it cut back occasionally to get the split ends off and things.

So was it, did you start getting soup in your mustache?

And you're like, this is kind of gross.

Because it, I mean, I'll tell you something.

As somebody who now has a mustache and a beard, arguably, the soup is a challenging food for me, even though I love it.

It is a challenge.

Is that part of what's going on?

No, it doesn't really bother me.

I eat like runny eggs all the time and get egg in my face.

I did not need to hear that.

Not a fan of runny eggs?

I am.

I just don't want to hear you talking about it.

Now that I've got my, not only your beard in my mind, but in my eyes, it's just not what I want to envision at the moment.

No offense.

What's your favorite food?

What's your most filling, ideal food?

Oh, gosh.

And this is a Sophie's choice situation.

Yeah, this definitely is.

You choose it, and this is what you eat for the rest of your life.

Right, of course.

That's That's the

surdling that my wife.

No, you don't.

You're

a vegetarian.

Macaroni and cheese?

Macaroni and cheese.

I'm a big fan of like a

rice bowl, a lot of variety, a lot of

different textures,

some good spicy sauce on there.

I love anything that's spicy, really.

For sure, you were going to go with giant soft pretzel.

Oh, I do love giant soft pretzel, but that's not a meal.

That's like a great snack.

You ever have one of those giant soft pretzels where they bring it to your table on a hook?

Oh, yeah.

I just like that.

That's too showy.

No, I've never had that.

I have had this.

Where are you getting pretzel on a hook, Jesse?

Sometimes you go to, you're at like whatever, a beer garden or something like that, and you order the giant soft pretzel with a cheesy dip, and then they bring it to you on a hook, like on a stand on the table.

It's hanging from a hook, like the like the sides of beef that Rocky fights.

You're listening to Judge John Hodgman.

I'm Bailiff Jesse Thorne.

Of course, the Judge John Hodgman podcast, always brought to you by you, the members of maximumfun.org.

Thanks to everybody who's gone to maximumfun.org slash join.

And you can join them by going to maximumfun.org slash join.

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Let them know Jesse and John sent you.

Daryl, Adam tried to give the game away earlier.

Why don't you go ahead and tell us how the two of you met?

We met at a Zoom trivia night at the very beginning of the pandemic.

I think it was the first weekend of lockdown.

A couple of my friends, my close friends, were working.

You were married and you met on Zoom?

We did.

We met at a trivia night hosted by mutual friends.

So we like to say, depending on who you're talking to,

we met at a party hosted by mutual friends.

We also met online.

Both of those things are true.

Daryl, when did you learn?

So you met five years ago.

You got married how long ago, Daryl?

Year and a half ago.

Congratulations.

And when did you learn that your beloved Adam hates soup?

I only learned about this about,

I'm going to say October of last year.

Well, okay.

Recently.

It was very recently.

And it was a bit of a surprise because we had been eating soup.

And in fact, when Adam first met my parents, one of the things he did to show them, you know, how wonderful he is is he cooked ramen for them.

Ramen is one of the, Adam's not a, he's a great cook, but he doesn't cook very much.

I do most of the cooking, almost all the cooking in our house.

But one of the things that he specializes in is ramen.

And we're talking about more than just putting a packet into two cups of water.

Yeah.

Oh, he makes an amazing homemade vegetarian, I think it's vegan

ramen with dried mushrooms and fresh mushrooms and takes like a whole day.

It's great.

Your hypocrisy knows no brown boundaries.

No, no, no basically.

Yeah.

So you can see why I was very surprised to learn last year that he hated soup and didn't want me to make it anymore and didn't want me to tell anybody about it.

Jesse Thorne, I would say that ramen is one of the most famous soups.

Would you agree or disagree?

Yeah, that's got to be a top 10 soup worldwide.

Yeah, totally.

So you two are telling me that you're a a married heterosexual couple where

the wife does most of the cooking, but the husband does some really complicated cooking that takes all day every once in a while.

It makes a huge mess.

Yeah.

It makes an enormous mess everywhere.

You know, I presume that only the fact you're a vegetarian keeps you from having an over-elaborate smoker set up.

And living in New York City, too.

But we, we knew some people, one of her coworkers was big into smoking and lived in Brooklyn.

We were always like, I've always been like, how did he manage that?

Don't worry, Jesse.

He has an elaborate espresso machine set up with all the different fiddly bits to make coffee.

Oh, Mr.

Fiddlybits himself is in the house.

There's truly nothing that a husband whose wife does most of the cooking loves more than spending 36 hours smoking a brisket.

You're making all this ramen.

What is going on?

What kind of

manipulator are you?

One year into your wedding, you're making soup for your, for your in-laws.

And then, as soon as you hit that anniversary, you're like, well, I got you trapped.

Now it's time for me to show my true colors.

No more soup.

And I would like you to be a trad wife.

Start churning butter.

Turn this liquid into solid so it'll be more filling.

Yeah.

You know, what happened?

What was the, what, what, what was the switch that flipped at that moment?

Really, the inciting incident was

we had gone out a couple of times that that week seeing different people going out for her aunt's birthday or going to have dinner with some friends.

And it had come up at every one of these outings that

Daryl really missed baking soup.

And then the conversation would turn from Daryl saying, oh, I miss making soup.

And I'm like, well, why don't you make soup?

Oh, Adam hates it.

Then they turn to B and be like, Adam, why are you a terrible person?

But also, then it would turn into them just kind of naming soups in my direction.

We'd sort of, the conversation would move on and, you know, we'd be talking about something else.

And then, you know, someone from the peanut gallery would be like, chili?

Well, wow,

chili.

You just stepped on a third rail there.

Chili isn't a soup, though.

Yeah, that's not a soup.

That's a stew.

That's not a soup.

That's a stew.

That was the first case that Judge John Hodgman ever heard.

There you go.

And like, I really, I was really like, I don't want to, like, I would rather talk about the weather.

I don't talk about anything other than you quizzing me about soups.

And you kind of skipped a step there, too, because you went right to the fact that you were getting annoyed because all the people in your life were quizzing you about soups.

But you never told us when you told your wife, stop making soup.

I'm never going to eat it.

Oh, see, I've never told her that.

Daryl, then why are we even here?

So it sounds like you're willing to eat all the soups.

I grant you permission to stop holding hands if you need to.

This is a frustrating part of this conversation for

because what has happened is

so we went out this sort of

soup weekend where people were naming too many soups at Adam and he didn't enjoy it.

And we got a record show we were calling that soup weekend from now on.

Oh noted.

Soup weekend.

Okay.

So you went out.

You went out, turned into a whole soup weekend.

Adam felt was quizzed on all the soups that he didn't like.

As he, he will, he will characterize it as he doesn't, people were naming soups in his direction, which he doesn't enjoy.

And he got home and he was frustrated, like visibly very frustrated.

And he's usually a pretty calm, you know, he's a pretty even-keeled guy.

And he said, can you please stop talking about soup?

I don't enjoy it.

And

that led to a conversation about how, well, I really missed soup because I couldn't make it anymore.

And he said, well, I haven't said you can't make soup anymore.

I said, well, but you won't eat any of the soup that I make.

And so I can't cook at home for us because you won't eat it.

He doesn't want it.

There is a tacit ban on soups in the house, not an explicit ban.

And I recognize this is a personal

preference.

This is a reflection of my sort of the way that I treat food and eat, but I like to cook for

everyone who will be eating.

You know, I didn't grow up, I grew up in a house where, you know, my, my, primarily my mom, but also my dad did a lot of cooking and we cook family meals.

And whatever the person who was cooking cooked was what we ate as a family.

We didn't have separate meals, you know, that were cooked for different people.

And so if I know that if I cook soup and Adam isn't going to eat it and he's going to eat something else, then I'm just not going to cook it because it's not a family meal.

If you cook soup, what is Adam going to do?

Go make a sandwich for himself?

I'll probably, I think that what happened in the past is I'd be like, oh, could I have some of the non-soup leftovers from yesterday?

And you don't, you specifically say, can you go and get me other food

instead of getting your own food?

No, I'll get it.

I'll eat it up.

I'll do all that.

No problem.

You're just saying, so that's not, that's not an order to your wife.

Please go get something else to eat.

That is, do you mind if I go and eat something else?

Because I'm not going to eat any of your disgusting soup.

I'm tired of it.

I'm a grown-up.

I'm 31 years old.

I don't like eating it.

And I don't like being made to feel like a freak by your family.

Yeah, true.

Is that how you feel when,

I mean, this is as much about banning soup talk as it is about making soup.

So when

Daryl's family and your mutual friends start,

how do you call it, naming soups in your direction?

Why does that make you uncomfortable?

I just find it very frustrating.

It happened also when we were planning the wedding that we ended up just having the same conversations like over and over.

Like we would see different people.

Yeah, yeah, you're telling me about events that happened, but you're not telling me how it made you feel.

I mean, I do want to know what soup, what soups you served at your wedding.

I presume that it was a soup buffet.

There was a soup actually at our wedding.

Really?

Italian wedding soup?

No, what was it?

I forget.

It was a Jamaican jerk

chicken.

No, not chicken.

Jamaican jerk spiced

stew, I think it was called, but it was, it was a soup.

It was a, but it was a vegetarian.

Yes, it was delicious.

It was, in fact, the only thing from our tasting, and we had a great cater, but it was the only thing that from our tasting that we both said, no matter what else we have, we have to have this at our wedding.

It was.

And, oh, you agreed to a Jamaican jerk spiced stew?

Yeah, it was nice.

And you weren't just tricking your then-fiancé.

No, no.

You weren't just hiding your true colors until you got her locked down with with a ring on her finger.

And then you're like, nah, never again.

Yeah,

I did love that soup.

It was good.

Okay.

So we were getting, though, into your feelings.

Yeah, just having this same conversation over and over just makes me feel very frustrated.

And like,

I don't know, like I'm not actually connecting with my friends and family that I'm just sort of regurgitating.

happenstance and facts to them.

Well, I mean,

when you're presented with a sort of interrogation of soup after soup after soup, I think, I mean, I would feel

that the implication is they're saying, what's wrong with you?

Oh, yeah.

Do you feel picked on?

A little like, I don't know, othered, a little like, well, how could you possibly, you know,

feel this way?

Yeah.

But what about Minestrone?

Yeah, but what about?

What about consume?

What about Philadelphia pepper pot soup?

Never had that one.

Daryl, you say that you miss soup.

Do you ever just say, F.

It, I'm a whole human being in my own right.

I'm just going to go make some soup and enjoy it.

I don't care anymore.

There are certain soups that I have figured out that I can make for one, for myself.

And as I mentioned before, I really do prefer eating as a family.

But there are some times when we're not eating together, you know, either Adam's out of the house or sometimes on the weekends, rather than have a more,

say, formal dinner or formal lunch.

We'll have leftovers.

And so I have have some soups that I can put together just for me, you know.

So, I'm having a one-person soup.

But I think for me, it's more that

I want to be able to try these new recipes.

I mean, one thing that I have enjoyed is that since we got together, as I said, I used to make a lot of the same recipes on repeat.

And Adam really likes variety, so he's really pushed me to be more creative in our recipes.

And so, I now try all kinds of different recipes.

We probably do one or two new recipes a week.

And there's a spring bean soup recipe that I would love to try.

And I feel like it is not unreasonable.

I'm not asking him to necessarily eat again soups that he has previously rejected.

So he doesn't want the soup all piece due.

He doesn't have to eat that again.

But I think rejecting the soups out of hand before we've even tried them once seems hasty.

And that's what's going on?

Yeah, I don't make them because he says that he won't, you know, what you say is they're not.

What does he say?

You can make that, honey, but I ain't gonna eat it.

No, I say that's not my favorite.

It's like my

very white way of trying to attenuate criticism.

When you talk about sitting down to family dinner, you're talking about the family of the two of you.

Correct.

The dog does beg, but.

And Adam, what did you not like about

the

vegetable soup with the pea in it?

Oh, the Provençal pesto?

It just fell in the chore soup category for me.

I don't, what are you talking about?

Bowl to mouth.

Yeah, what are you talking about?

Do you prefer to eat with your hands?

I do enjoy eating with my hands.

Yeah, I'll pick a finger food.

What about a sandwich?

Love a sandwich.

Great.

You know, one of the reasons that we know that a hot dog is not a sandwich is that you would never cut it in half and serve it with a cup of soup.

Oh, yeah.

Soup and half a sandwich is a a well-known thing.

Soup and half a hot dog,

well,

you couldn't even have a lot of things.

Cause it is a little language.

Yeah, right, exactly.

That would be a disaster.

So I have a question, Daryl.

Why don't you serve your soups with a sandwich on the side?

One of my soups in heavy rotation was grilled cheese and tomato.

A classic combination.

Homemade tomato soup, and I would make homemade grilled cheese.

And that has also been canceled.

Okay.

I promised myself I wouldn't other other you, Adam, but that is a classic combo.

You don't like grilled cheese and you don't like grilled cheese and tomato soup?

Yeah, it's a,

it's not my favorite.

I can know if you can tell, but Adam grew up in what he calls a low feedback environment.

I don't know what that means.

Adam, can you tell me?

Just a...

Environment that nobody really talks to each other about things.

People don't,

you know, discuss the feelings they're having.

You just have the feelings and push them inside and then keep pushing more feelings on top.

And then one day you die.

Sounds like fun.

It is.

Great fun.

The goal, John, is to

die before the feelings explode.

Exactly.

So the sooner you die or the better you push the feelings, the more successful you are in life.

Right, right.

And it sounds like Jesse is familiar with this style.

I don't know anything about how you were raised, but I was not raised in that style of household.

And so it was a learning process for me to, it took a while for me to realize that when my husband says it's not my favorite, what he really means is, don't ever do that again.

I hate it.

When you say it's not my favorite, does that mean don't ever do that again, Adam?

It covers a lot of

ground, honestly.

Like it definitely, I don't think it means every time, don't do this again, but it does range from never do this again to like, and that really wasn't my favorite, but it was fine, and I'll eat it again.

Because what Daryl is suggesting is that perhaps your feelings are more strong than your expression of your feelings.

Would you say that that's true?

Yeah, I think downplaying the feelings is part of the whole deal.

Do you think you understand your feelings about soup?

Probably not.

Okay, I appreciate your honesty there.

Because the reasons that you present are all very rational.

It's not filling.

Obviously, it's not filling.

It's not a main course.

Soup is

not a main course.

Rarely is it a main course.

Let me put it that way.

It's not filling.

It's a chore to eat.

These all sound very rational, but you're behaving as though this is a deeper aversion, it seems to me.

Does that mean anything to you?

Does that resonate with you at all?

Yeah, there's definitely something more there that I have not unpacked.

In this low-feedback environment that you grew up in, was was it also a low-soup environment?

I'd say so, yeah.

No chili, as we said before, but also no, no green chili stews or anything.

It was a very occasional meal growing up.

Did you have rules in your house about finishing your food?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

For example.

My parents coined a term called a clean plate ranger.

Sure.

I think I was.

Oh, they're the ones who made that up?

Oh, no.

I don't know.

Did they, is that not specific to us?

I had no idea.

No, it's a well-known term.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

I think you need to have a long conversation with your parents about how they would gaslit you into believing that that was their invention.

If you were not a clean plate ranger, what would happen?

I think dessert was the main carrot,

so to speak.

Yeah.

And I presume they only gave you carrots for dessert, too.

Yeah.

Do you think that that played a role in any in your formation of your taste and your dislike for soup?

Yeah, it's a good insight.

Like, I think, you know, if I was done with soup and there was still some soup left at the bottom of the bowl, that would disqualify me for my ranger status.

One of the things I'm circling around is this idea that soup isn't filling enough.

It's not satisfying.

You need a full, nourishing meal is what I'm hearing.

And I think that's a totally, I recognize it's totally arbitrary about like what counts as filling.

I was trying to think, like, does chewing factor into it for me?

Like the lack of chewing in a soup?

We're not developing an app here.

We're not, you know what I mean?

We're not, we're not troubleshooting.

You know what the issue is.

It's inside of you.

Or in the case of soup, not inside of you.

You refuse to let it inside of you, or you, or you would prefer not to.

It's not your favorite.

I get it.

Adam, if Daryl held your hand, hypothetically speaking.

Hypothetically.

Right.

And then looked in your eyes and said, it's okay for you to not finish this soup.

Do you think that that would be meaningful to you?

Yeah, I think that would help.

Daryl, you want to give it a try?

It's okay

if you don't finish your soup.

I will finish your soup.

Okay, now it's getting a little spicy.

Daryl,

you're suing for two things.

One,

you want to make soup and you want

in a perfect world,

in the dream scenario, the anti-nightmare scenario.

You want Adam to enjoy it.

But barring that, you just want to be able to talk about soup again.

You feel like there's a gag order on soup talk.

Absolutely.

I am the one who brought this case, but I do want to state for the record that the way that this came about was we had the soup weekend.

It was uncomfortable.

And then

I think we were listening to an episode of the podcast where there was a call for cases.

And Adam said, well, if you care about this so much, like

submit the case.

I said, no, I'm not going to do that.

I'm not going to do it.

And then he kind of needled me and dared me to do it and said, well, you know, do it, coward, if you want to.

He didn't say that.

No, I did, actually.

I literally said, do it, coward.

No.

And I'm worried that.

Because I could tell it was bothering her that, you know, it was, that this was

a rift in our relationship.

But I do want to, so I did want to clarify for the record.

I am the one who, who is suing, but he is the one who encouraged us to bring the case up.

I'm also very worried that this is coming off like you're horribly controlling, which is not true.

Adam is one of the most empathetic, wonderful men.

This is such a small dispute in our otherwise wonderful married life.

There are just certain topics that he doesn't want his wife talking about in public.

And so I'm conscious.

Why would that be a red flag?

But there are certain ways in which our spouses are cowards.

Yeah.

And so, Your Honor, I want to answer the question that you asked, which is sort of what relief that I'm seeking here.

And that is, I think what I, I cannot compel him to enjoy the soup.

I understand that people like what what they like and i don't even want to compel him to eat soups that he has already said that he doesn't want to eat even though you know grilled cheese and tomato soup might be the best combo uh in the world what i would like is for him to in good faith try a limited number of soups we can limit it to you say two new soups a month recipes you know i cook i said to do most of the cooking and we probably do maybe four recipes a week so that's only like every other week.

We try a new soup.

And if he doesn't like it, he never has to eat it again, but he has to, in good faith, try it and then

give his,

give a genuine opinion about whether he likes it or not.

Or, so that's option A.

If he is unwilling to do that, then he has to lift the NDA because it is very stressful to me now when we go out and the topic of soup comes up.

I immediately, I get nervous.

Like, oh my God,

is the soup issue going to come up?

Am I going to say something wrong?

What if I'm going to follow you for the rest of your lives?

Because everyone's going to listen to this podcast.

You're going to share this with your, with your, your families and your friends, and all they're going to want to do now is talk about soup.

Right.

Well, that's.

But if it weren't for this, I don't see how it would ever come up again.

I can't tell you.

This is the first conversation I've had about soup in years.

And I love thinking and talking about food.

But could you imagine if you were out at, you know, you're out in public or you're at a restaurant and the topic of soup comes up and the first thing you think is, oh no, what?

I better keep my mouth shut because my husband might get upset.

What happens at a restaurant when they're serving soup?

Are you not allowed to order it, Daryl?

You're allowed to order it.

I get worried.

I mean, the reason this came up originally was because we were, during soup weekend, we were at a restaurant and my dad ordered, my dad is also a fan of soup.

I think I probably inherited.

my love of soup from him and he ordered a soup.

It was a white bean, Tuscan white bean style soup.

And I was so excited because I hadn't had soup in a while.

And I said, oh, can I, can we share?

We share a lot of meat.

When we eat out, we often will split things.

Can we share that?

And he said, oh, yeah, of course.

You know, this is great.

I said, yeah, I'm really excited.

He was like, why are you so excited about the soup?

And then, of course, it snowballed from there.

You explained that soup is not served in your house.

Correct.

And then he was aghast because he, but you love soup.

Why aren't you making it?

And then it turns into a whole thing.

So, you know, I can order it, but, you know, I have have to be very careful about how I talk about soup in public, lest it lead to soups being named in Adam's general direction.

How would you feel if I lifted the ban on talking about soup, whether that's explicit or tacit?

But I also issued an order to your family and friends to not bother Adam about it.

I think that would be fine.

I mean,

I'm sensitive to the fact that it's not always clear what is bothering him.

And I think sometimes people are genuinely surprised at how uncomfortable it makes him when they are talking about soup.

I think a lot of people don't think of soup as a controversial topic.

And so when they say to you, oh, well, what about a corn chowder?

That's a hearty soup.

It doesn't immediately register with them.

Oh, this is something that's going to make him upset.

So I certainly want people to take your feelings into account, but I think there's also a level of self-policing that's going on that is uncomfortable.

When and how did you explicitly ask for the ban?

This was after soup weekend.

Yeah, this was the paint the picture for me.

The nadir of soup weekend for me was a

got in the car after going to this Italian restaurant and

Daryl and her dad having a nice white bean soup and then devolving into a named a named soup conversation.

And I asked like, hey, could could you not bring up soup because it feels like every time we've gone out the past couple of days that soup has come up and then it's just turned into this like nonsense conversation that i really really hate it's interesting that you say nonsense conversation as opposed to saying it just makes me uncomfortable yeah there's something there for me about like it's this like feels like this useless conversation that like we're not you know if even if we were talking about the weather we could at least be like

you know, telling each other new information or something, but there's like none of this is like new information or interesting in any way to me.

Can I share something?

I don't want to answer for you, but I think

you are generally uncomfortable in conversations that you perceive as not having a purpose.

And that is something that has been very interesting to observe because I.

find that I'm often in situations where people are talking a lot, but not saying very much.

And it doesn't really bother me.

Um, but since I've been with Adam, I've noticed that that's something that does seem to bother you, particularly when you feel like there is a problem to be solved and the conversation is not moving towards a resolution of that problem.

That really does seem to be something that makes you uncomfortable.

Do you agree with that, Adam?

Yeah, that's uh, that's a good insight.

Huh.

So, Adam, if I were to rule in Daryl's favor and I were to rule

soup talk is back on the menu,

how would that make you feel?

Apprehensive about

any and all conversation.

Apprehensive about any and all conversation.

Is this a purposeful conversation?

Or am

I

a time waster?

We're working towards resolving this.

Okay, good.

Good, good, good.

Okay.

I just have a couple more questions for you, Adam.

Oxtail soup?

Vegetarian soup.

Asparagus soup?

Mock turtle soup?

Printanier soup?

That's a chicken consomme that turns into jelly overnight.

I suppose that wouldn't be for you.

What about celery soup?

Yes or no?

Well, no, obviously.

It's soup.

But

I guess I could try it.

What kind of soup is that, anyways?

Is it like frothy?

Is it?

It's a manhandler.

No, this is a poster of the 21 soups that were available from Campbell's soup in 1933.

I just wanted to see if there were any soups on there that would

catch your eye.

Adam, aside from soups, how do you feel about Daryl's cooking?

Is there anything else going on that you'd like me to address?

No, it's wonderful.

What's the favorite thing that she cooks for you?

Your favorite thing that she cooks for you?

I'll let you circle around that for a second and ask you this.

Do you consider

food

to fall into the same categories as conversation, i.e.,

food has value when it is purposeful and nourishing, but it has no value otherwise?

In other words, soup is like idle chatter.

It's not doing the job that food needs to do.

You see what I mean?

Yeah, it's an interesting comparison.

I don't know that I feel that way.

I think I

love the taste of food and love the

act of eating.

You do enjoy food.

Yeah, and the communal aspect of it.

Okay.

All right.

So that's not all just a waste of time.

No, no.

That's all just like

cultural smog that gets in the way of the caloric purpose of food, right?

No,

very much not that way for me.

Right.

So let me see here.

You love a giant pretzel, whether or not it's hanging off a hook.

You like sandwiches.

And we were trying to get back around to something that Daryl makes that you like.

The thing that's coming to mind is one of her go-to recipes.

One of the first things she ever cooked for me was

these Beyond Meat meatballs and just

homemade tomato sauce with some meatballs.

Got a lot of parsley in them.

Some dairy-free parmesan.

Just a great recipe.

She crisps up the meatballs a bit so they're not too chewy, but not too, like,

yeah, not too just like falling apart.

Sometimes they do fall apart, and then you have like bolognese, but the flavor is all there.

It's great.

Yeah, it's really, really, really right on the bubble there.

Between meatballs and sauce and a meatball soup, I understand.

Oh, yeah.

Especially if the meatballs don't want to hold together that day.

Think so?

Yeah.

Oh, boy, are they good?

Is cereal a soup?

Oh, boy.

I would go with no, but

if I have any milk in there, it's an extremely light amount of milk.

You just don't like liquids.

Yeah.

Except espresso, I guess.

Except water.

And water.

Love water.

Big water drinker.

You know what a vanilla latte is, right?

I've heard of it, yes.

Yeah, it's a three-bean soup.

Yeah.

Think it over.

I'll be back in a moment with my verdict.

I've heard everything I need to in order to make my decision.

I'll be back in a moment with my verdict.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

Daryl, how are you feeling about your chances right now?

I have no idea, but I do think this has been a productive discussion.

So

thank you for having us.

Adam,

how are you feeling?

I don't think my chances of keeping the soup NDA are good.

I think

Though I agree that this has

been a lovely conversation and very productive.

And

I don't think it was, I forget how the judge put it, conversational

weather talk.

Well, we'll see what Judge John Hodgman has to say about this when we come back in just a moment.

You know, we've been doing my brother, my brother, me for 15 years.

And

maybe you stopped listening for a while.

Maybe you never listened.

And you're probably assuming three white guys talking for 15 years.

I know where this has ended up.

But no, no, you would be wrong.

We're as shocked as you are that we have not fallen into some sort of horrific scandal or just turned into a big crypto thing.

Yeah, you don't even really know how crypto works.

The only NFTs I'm into are naughty, funny things, which is what we talk about on my brother, my brother, and me.

We serve it up every Monday for you if you're listening.

And if not, we just leave it out back and goes rotten.

So check it out on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.

All right, we're over 70 episodes into our show, Let's Learn Everything.

So let's do a quick progress check.

Have we learned about quantum physics?

Yes, episode 59.

We haven't learned about the history of gossip yet, have we?

Yes, we have.

Same episode, actually.

Have we talked to Tom Scott about his love of roller coasters?

Episode 64.

So how close are we to learning everything?

Bad news.

We still haven't learned everything yet.

Oh, we're ruined.

No, no, no.

It's good news as well.

There is still a lot to learn.

Woo!

I'm Dr.

Ella Hubber.

I'm regular Tom Long.

I'm Caroline Roper.

And on Let's Learn Everything, we learn about science and a bit of everything else too.

And although we haven't learned everything yet, I've got a pretty good feeling about this next episode.

Join us every other Thursday on Maximum Fun.

Judge John Hodgman, we're taking a quick break from the show.

Can I tell you about a couple of people who have been on and are about to be on Bullseye with Jesse Thorne?

I would love to hear it.

I love a sneak preview of Bullseye with Jesse Thorne.

This is, of course, my public radio interview program.

I had a great conversation with Christina Hendrix, who folks might know from, among other things, Mad Men.

That's one of those people, this also happened with Antonio Banderas, where when you're sitting like four feet from them, it's hard to form words.

Yeah, yeah.

So, so incredibly captivating.

as a person, actor, and presence.

I also had an interview last week with Bruce Valanche, the legendary

comedy writer who wrote on 25 straight Oscars, I think.

He wrote this book that was about the worst things he ever wrote on.

So if you want to hear Bruce Valanch talking about writing jokes for the Star Wars holiday special,

great news.

How did I not know that Valanch worked on the notoriously terrible Star Wars holiday special?

So weird.

It's fascinating.

That's great.

I need to go listen to that conversation right away.

Where could I hear it again?

That's on NPR's Bullseye with Jesse Thorne.

He also talks about Paul Lynn's Halloween special.

The premise of which was, because they had to come up, they're like, well, what's our take on the Halloween for Paul Lind?

It's basically just Paul Lind hates children.

That's perfect.

It's great.

Paul Lynn sings songs on it.

I've seen it.

It's amazing.

Seriously, folks, go listen to Bullseye with Jesse Thorne.

He is among the best conversationalists in the biz.

You know it already.

Go and enjoy those conversations.

And hey, by the way, look, you may not know that Janet Varney and I started a little side project to a little podcast on maximum fun called e pluribus motto.

If you've already listened, great.

But if you haven't, this is just a fun conversation that Janet and I have about all of the state mottos, slogans, mascots,

songs, beverages, mammals, you name it.

We talk about it.

If you like trivia, this is as trivial as it gets.

ePleuribus Moto is the name of the podcast.

The first season is available right now in its entirety at maximumfund.org.

We will soon start recording the second season.

So please let us know your favorite state cryptids.

That's right.

I'm talking about...

uh bigfoots and lake monsters in your state write to us always at emailpluribus motto at maximumfun.org uh you can listen to that also at Maximum Fund and get that email address again because I'm not going to repeat it.

Okay, I will.

Email Ploribus Mato at maximumfund.org.

It's an email address that bears repeating.

Let's get back to the case.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman re-enters the courtroom and presents his verdict.

My first job in New York City was working at a literary agency, and I was working as an assistant to a literary agent named Susan Ginsburg, who is still there and still the best.

The agency was owned

and I believe he still has a stake in it by a fellow named Al Zuckerman, an incredible guy.

He was Ken Follett's literary agent.

He started the agency.

Really interesting person and somebody who, I believe he's now finally retired, but he worked all the time.

In fact, one time he had a small surgical procedure.

And

he walked home from the hospital that day and wanted to get to work in the afternoon.

And because his assistant was on vacation, it was my job to walk his mail

over to his house where he was working from that afternoon.

And he invited me to lunch.

So this is my

luncheon with the big boss.

It was a formal luncheon, much like you and Daryl have, Adam, routinely.

It was in the dining room.

And he had brought back...

some food.

I think he had stopped off at Citarella and brought back some food for a lunch.

And he and I were not vegetarians.

He got a seafood salad, you know what I mean?

Like marinated octopus, which I know that was a weird thing to offer to somebody.

I didn't like that very much, but I ate it out of politeness, you know.

And there was soup, too.

And I don't remember what soup we were served.

It was probably a minestrone, right?

And

we were talking and he was trying to get a sense of,

you know, what I was, what was going on in my life and my career and what my plans were.

And yeah, he and his then wife had a little dog that was kind of running around the table.

It was cute, it was a nice afternoon, it was whatever.

But I was on my

best behavior, and I was also quite nervous too, because this is the big boss, this isn't my boss, this is the big boss, the owner of the company, etc.

And

as we got to the end of lunch, and I was sitting there with my more or less empty bowl in front of me,

Al

said, What?

You're not going to lick the bowl?

And I said,

no, I think I'm fine.

Thank you very much.

And he said, oh, no, no, I was talking to the dog.

And

what I didn't realize is that he had gotten to the point where he was done with his soup and had a little leftover.

And rather it be a crisis in his life, he put it on the floor.

But then he noticed that the dog wasn't licking the bowl.

And so he said, Are you not going to lick the bowl to the dog?

But I thought he was treating me like a dog.

It was a funny miscommunication, but it reminded me something of something which I think is important to remember from time to time, which is that soup is good food, but it's also disgusting.

And sometimes a dog won't eat it.

Sometimes a dog won't even lick that bowl.

Because it really is right in that liminal space between delicious and disgusting.

I was sure when we were coming into this

that, Adam, you were going to have an issue with the fact that soup has a texture that is not for everybody and that depending on its, you know, its thickness and its colloidalism and

its hardiness, it's, you know, there's a brand of soup made by Campbell's soup called Chunky.

It's called Chunky.

It's on the label.

It's disgusting.

Soup at any moment, if you look at the wrong way, all of a sudden you realize, oh, that thin soup is just saliva, or that thick soup is just snot.

And then you're done.

You're done with soup.

You don't want to lick the bowl.

The dog got grossed out, and so did I.

But that's not what you're bringing to this formal luncheon table, Adam.

What you're bringing is a more complex set of preferences that are entirely yours and entirely within your right to maintain.

I think that it might be worth exploring a little further

why you have these preferences and what it may or may not have to do with the culture of the family table in your growing up or whatever.

I think that it's something that

you're still,

it seems to me, working towards articulating even to yourself.

And I think it might be worth the effort to talk it through a little bit with your family or with a therapist or with anyone in your life to try to get a little bit more to the heart of it.

You might find some insight there.

And I also take your hand, Adam, and look you in the eye and say, it's okay to not finish that soup.

And indeed, you've got a solution, which you mentioned earlier, a soup disposal process called the dog.

Al Zuckerman's a fan of it.

I am too.

You are absolutely within your rights to say it's not my favorite.

It's a very polite way of saying,

no, thank you.

For reasons that I can't articulate, I don't want to eat it.

And that's fine.

And I would say this,

that now that you are married and clearly happily married, and

you're both wonderful people,

I mean, you used to throw a saxophone up in the air.

What verve and delight you bring to life?

What obvious care and emotional care?

you take for your wife and enjoyment you get from her company and vice versa, I believe, based on the hour or so I've spoken to you through a postage stamp of a screen, I can diagnose remotely your marriage is good.

But

one of the things that you have not yet learned about marriage, only being a year and a half in, is that

particularly if you have no children, you can eat whatever you want.

I mean, now that

our children are grown up and out of the house, my wife is a whole human being on our own right, in her own right, and I

only maybe twice a week eat the same thing.

And instead, it's like, well, I'm going to have this.

And I'm going, I don't care.

I'm going to have this.

It's a delight.

I mean, if you want a formal luncheon Hodgman marriage style, you don't meet at the end of a long table.

You do it Grey Poupon mustard style.

You just drive up next to each other in your respective

old-timey limousines and you eat whatever you want.

What I'm saying is that,

Daryl, you should make the soups you want to make.

You know, I understand that

the life pattern that you were instructed to adhere to, Adam, was to

force your feelings down, much like you were making a pate instead of a soup.

You know, just layers and layers of closely, and then put a brick on top of it.

and hope you die before you have to express any of those feelings.

If that's how you were raised,

I mean, in real life, you know, Darrell, you were raised in a different way, which is to share a lot of food and take a lot of value in sharing that food.

But this is not a value that Adam shares.

He does, you know, he will, he has said that he will try some soups,

but for the most part, he doesn't want to eat them.

And that may just be something that you have to accept, but that means in no way should you stop expressing yourself and enjoying the making of soup.

And if he doesn't want to eat it, that's fine too.

Like, Adam, you're holding Daryl's hand right now.

I want you to look her in the eye and say,

it's fine if you make soup that I don't eat.

Maybe it's fine if you make soup that I don't eat.

Whoa.

I didn't say you should call her baby.

That was hot.

Okay.

That added an extra spice to it.

I like it.

Some of that New Mexico chili went in there.

What I would recommend, right, if it is the case that you're cooking, and it sounds like you're doing most of the cooking, Daryl, because you enjoy it.

It's an expression of yourself.

I understand that you would love to share what you're exploring with your husband.

But if he doesn't like it, he doesn't like it.

He does seem like he's willing to try it.

And he did say there is no ban on cooking the soup.

So you should take him up on that.

Just go ahead and make it.

My wife, who is a whole human being in her own right, I mean, one of the great things about soup, even though it is disgusting a lot of the time, sometimes it's really delicious.

And one of its pros is that it freezes typically very well.

And my wife, who is a whole human being in her own right, has this product, I think, and I'm going to buzz market, I don't care, called Soup Cubes.

It's extra large

like ice ice cube dispense, silicone ice cube dispenser, so that you can portion out soup and freeze it and just have soup whenever you feel like it.

So the wastefulness issue goes away.

And I will say this as well.

You can make as much soup as you like.

Adam doesn't have to eat it.

You can talk about soup as much as you want.

You can talk about soup with your family as much as you want.

Until and in such time that Adam acknowledges that soup makes him gag, there shall be no gag order because there's no reason, there is no compelling reason for it unless it's actively nauseating him to hear about the soup.

However,

That does not mean that it is fair for your family, even if they are on Adam's side, to interrogate him about soup types.

It is now known that Adam doesn't like soup and he doesn't love talking about it.

So if the conversation of soup comes up, it is perfectly reasonable for him to be excused from it.

And as his spouse, you have to defend him.

If it is getting too hot,

you need to say, hey, cool your soup, everybody.

We're not talking about, Adam's not talking about soup today.

Soup is not on this conversational menu for Adam.

Let's move along to something else.

That doesn't mean that you are barred from talking about soup, or that Adam, Adam, that doesn't mean that

you're allowed to shut down the whole conversation.

You can excuse yourself from it and sit there quietly and think about the weather.

Because you can, you are, you are an adult and you can handle

the intrusion of some of the things that you don't love in order to enjoy the company of the person you very much do love.

But it is not okay for you to be soup-shamed.

I understand exactly why people want to ask you about soup because the thing is, lots of us have completely non-productive conversations about food all the time.

Some of us have just brains that are wired to talk and think about food all the time.

It has real benefits, it has real downsides, but that is just how

we do it.

But in many ways, I envy you thinking purely calorically, what is the most filling thing I can have?

And I would say the only other ruling that I would make is that when you're making soups and experimenting with soups, and you can do them whenever you want, I don't want to be like only twice a month or whatever.

Soup should not be shamed, nor should Adam.

But if you're serving soup, you got to offer a sandwich.

You got to, it's just not, it just doesn't feel like enough food to him.

And it's just not his preferred food mechanism, or at least a soft pretzel on a hook, something, something other than soup as an alternative.

So that way Adam's not insulting you by going like, well, I'm not going to eat that.

I'm going to go get something else from the fridge.

And if he eats something different that is not what you've prepared, or I should say, let me put it this way.

If you make the soup and he decides not to eat it and he decides to eat something else that you've prepared or that you've agreed upon, that's fine.

You can eat different different things.

It is not a comment.

You know,

your culture, the way you were raised, your table, your family table culture is different from Adam's, and that's okay.

And if he's not eating exactly the same thing, it's not a slight upon you.

It truly is, for whatever reason, I still think we don't know, not his favorite.

Okay, so that's my ruling.

Basically, I'm ruling in your favor, Daryl.

Make soup, talk about soup, but keep Adam's peccadillos in your mind.

And you go ahead and make that corn potato chowder.

It's not my favorite, but go ahead and make it.

This is the sound of a gavel.

Judge John Hodgman rules that is all.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

Adam, how do you feel about this decision?

Hopeful.

I think it's

going to be interesting, but I'm

willing to try the soups and I'm willing to try

conversing about them.

We should get you a feelings press

to turn your feelings into pate.

Oh, yeah.

Daryl, how are you feeling?

This is great.

I'm excited to make soups.

I'm excited to

talk about soups without the weight of judgment.

And I'm excited.

I mean, I'm looking forward to

helping my husband in public when people name soups in your general direction because i i feel deputized now to make sure that you're not uncomfortable in those conversations daryl and adam thank you so much for joining us on the judge john hodgman podcast thank you for having us thank you so much pleasure if you want you can stop holding hands now

it makes it makes me feel less nervous

Another Judge John Hodgman case is in the books.

We'll have swift Justice in just a moment.

First, our thanks to Mr.

DuckOne for naming this week's episode Boolea Biased.

We are on Reddit at Reddit.com slash r slash maximum fun, where we take title suggestions.

Evidence and photos from the show are on our Instagram account.

That's at judgejohnhodgman.

We are also on TikTok and YouTube at judgejohnhodgman pod.

Follow and subscribe to see our episodes and video-only content.

Speaking of users of the internet, I want to thank internet user TheFuzz33, who went over to Apple Podcast to leave some very nice words and a rating that amounts to not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars.

Thank you, TheFuzz33.

The Fuzz33 wrote smart, funny, creative, wise.

JJ Hoe has given me many lines to use in the classroom to help guide more children toward pro-social behavior.

I presume.

that one of the lines we've offered you, the Fuzz.33, is shut your piehole.

Yeah.

Or maybe something else.

I won't put your ashes in the toilet.

Yeah, exactly.

But in any case, thank you, the Fuzz33.

And if you, that's right, you are listening to us on Apple Podcasts right now.

Why don't you go and give us a review and a five-star rating if we've, if we've merited it, you can also rate us at Pocketcasts and you can leave a comment on YouTube if you're watching the episode there.

All of these ratings and comments really do help listeners find the show.

Judge John Hodgman was created by Jesse Thorne and John Hodgman.

This episode engineered by Jacob Derwin at Technica House in New York City.

Thank you, Jacob.

Our social media manager is Dan Telford.

The podcast is edited by A.J.

McKeon.

Our video editor is Daniel Speer.

Our producer is Jennifer Marmer.

Now, Judge Hodgman, you ready for Swift Justice?

I'm ready.

End of an afternoon asks this on the Maximum Fund subreddit.

Is a door on or off when it's closed?

My husband and I can't agree.

This started when I sleepily asked him, can you turn on the door?

Well, the correct phrasing is, can you Spider-Man turn off the dark?

But I'm trying to think in sort of Logie Twilight Sleep Awakeness talk,

turn on the door would mean

close the door to me.

This is not normal conversation.

This is obviously dream logic, but I have to say I would interpret that as please close the door rather than open the door, turn on the door.

And that is my Swift Justice.

And I will brook no dissent.

I would love to hear from you, though.

I'd love to hear some disputes about video games.

We're looking for disputes surrounding video games.

It's been too long since we've had a Mario Kart dispute.

Does your sibling have to be player one and you'd like a turn as player one sometime?

Is your sim peeing on the floor even though you built them a bathroom?

Did your mom babysit your Tamagotchi and forget to feed it?

Tell me about all of your video game beefs and disputes.

The way to submit them is at maximumfund.org slash JJHO.

There's a simple form there, it'll take you seconds to fill out.

And of course, we only ever want to hear about your video game disputes from now on, right, Jesse?

We'll take disputes of any kind at maximumfund.org/slash JJHO.

No dispute is too big or too small.

We'll talk to you next time on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

Bye.

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