Aiding in a Bed-in

Welcome to the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

I'm Baylor Jesse Thorne.

This week, Aiding in a Bed-Inn.

Anne brings the case against her husband, Pete.

They both love dressing up in costumes for their annual holiday card.

This year, Pete wants to recreate an iconic photograph of two famous musicians.

This would require Pete to pose in the nude.

Anne says, no, thank you.

For some reason, she doesn't want to send her mom a picture of her naked husband.

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.

All the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow.

Bailiff Jesse Thorne please swear them in.

Anne and Pete, 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.

Do you swear to abide by Judge John Hodgman's ruling, despite the fact that he's nude right now?

Yes.

Yes, I do.

You can only disprove that if you're watching the video, so you should check out the video.

I'm definitely nude under my robes.

Judge Hodgman, you may proceed.

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

Can either of you name the person who said the words that I quoted?

Word for word, no changes were made in this particular case, because I'm going to ask Ann first.

Go ahead, Ann.

I'm going to say noted, famous, former farmer, E.B.

White.

Noted, famous, former farmer, farmer only because he's dead, E.B.

White, Elwyn Brooks White

of New York and Maine.

All right, Pete, now's your big chance.

Do you want to hear the quote again?

Oh, no, that's fine.

Thank you.

I was

going to say Albert Einstein.

Albert Einstein.

All the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow.

Those are good guesses.

I like both of them a lot.

They're all of them wrong.

I was quoting the American painter Grant Wood,

who created a little painting called American Gothic, which if you don't know from your history class or your art history class, that's

the lady and the guy and the pitchfork in front of the house.

Everyone knows this picture.

And you do too, Ann and Pete, because you recreated it for one of your holiday cards, if I am reading my evidence correctly, we'll get to that in a minute.

American Gothic is the name of that painting.

Grant Wood, of course, was the founder and pioneer of the American school of painting called Regionalism, which took a lot of inspiration from the 15th century Dutch masters.

And I'm not talking about

the little cigars.

I'm talking about the painters.

And they stood in front of that house.

You've been to this house, right, Ann and Pete?

Yes.

What

they now call it the American Gothic House, previously known as the Dibble House in Elden, Iowa.

You made the pilgrimage, eh?

Yes.

And it's called American Gothic.

Well, there are a number of reasons that it's called American Gothic.

One of them is it's got that

big, fancy Gothic window that's pointed at the top.

You can see me making the shape on the YouTube if you go over there.

I'm not making a symbol of Illuminati.

Don't come at me.

But I'm trying to make the shape.

You know that shape of that window, Jesse?

Yes.

Is that a Gothic

style?

Yeah, the Gothic arch.

Grantwood thought that was pretty funny that there was such a fancy window in such a plain house, such a plain-seeming Iowa farmhouse, and decided to paint the two people that he thought might live in there.

And he chose as his models his own sister,

Nan Wood Graham, and his dentist, Dr.

Creeby.

And

they became

imprinted on the minds of Americans everywhere.

Now, I have to hear the case unless one of you knows the answer to this important Grant Wood trivia question.

I'm going to give you another chance, Ann and Pete.

And Jesse, you can guess too if you want.

Can you name either of the two plants that are visible in the background of American Gothic on the porch of the house?

They're two potted plants on the porch.

Ann or Pete, either of you have green thumbs?

No, no, no, very black thumb.

Jesse, you want to to jump in?

Marijuana and psilocybin.

That would be pretty amazing

and better than what I'm going to tell you, which is one of the plants is called mother-in-law tongue.

It's a kind of, it has a lot of different names.

I'm not going to, you can look it up.

Mother-in-law tongue.

And the other one is Beefsteak Begonia, which may be my nickname going forward.

But in the meantime, we've got to hear this case.

Who seeks justice in this court?

I do, Your Honor.

And I understand that you and your husband, Pete, have been making funny holiday cards for a long time,

including taking photos of yourselves in Eldon, Iowa, in front of the American Gothic House, recreating that famous photo, among others.

Tell me about

some of the previous holiday cards you put together.

There is a, in the evidence,

there is the year we really went all out and

were a Kiss album.

Right.

Merry Christmas that year.

We remodeled our kitchen one year and posed kind of Warden June Cleaver style with a beautiful fake, very expensive fake turkey coming out of our

turkey.

Should you need a fake turkey?

I

look, I mean, I want your investment to pay off.

Are you renting it out now?

Oh, yeah, we sure can.

You should start a poultry prop warehouse.

great idea what does a fake turkey cost compared to a standard turkey because what does a standard turkey cost for like a small one maybe 40

i think it was about 40 bucks for the for the turkey yeah oh yeah big foam turkey yeah big foam turkey And all of these photos, of course, are available on our Instagram account, Judge John Hodgman, also on our show page at maximumfun.org.

And you're probably, if you're watching us on YouTube, you you can see them right now this is a very funny photo of you and you pete dressed up as as norman rockwell style just marveling at this beautiful fake uh foam turkey in your oven and judge hodgman just for our litigants future reference is should you come on the judge john hodgman podcast and you have an enormous foam fake turkey do bring it to the studio we're gonna want to see it in the studio this is not a mistake i want repeated by future litigants i i I understand, Pete and Anne, how you made that mistake.

I'm not blaming you.

I'm just saying in future.

Ann and Pete, you have Riled, the bailiff, I'm afraid.

And I'm holding you in provisional contempt of court

until we see a photo of you with that foam turkey that maybe we can post later.

Merry Christmas.

Of course, you now.

You replicate the makeup of the band Kiss, the rock band Kiss.

Who's who in this photo?

There are four people here.

They're diagonally.

Two of them are me and two of them are Pete.

Oh, okay.

I got you.

So you are, so, and you are Paul Stanley and

I forget who the, was the cat in that one.

Yeah, cat guy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'll take your letters on that one.

And then you, um, uh, uh, Pete, are Ace Freely and

the bane of Terry Gross, Gene Simmons.

Yes.

Right.

Okay.

Very clever, very fun, very demure, Very mindful.

There's another photo of you two here about to fall off a cliff.

What is this photo?

In the Strato Bowl, South Dakota.

I've never heard of such a thing.

So the Strato Bowl is kind of where the space programs would have got it started.

They were launching people in balloons to the stratosphere back in, what, the 30s or something like that.

So I remember the famous National Geographic cover of the...

the balloon going down and they're trying to get out of the capsule underneath.

So that was launched from there.

Very cool.

And how did this tradition get started?

How long have you been married?

13 years?

Something like that.

Yeah.

So yeah, most years we do it.

Some years are better than others, but yeah.

What was one of the bad years?

Oh, gosh.

Probably down by the lake.

It was just kind of,

yeah, we're running out of time.

We got to do something.

So there's, we have a

pond near the house, and there's a

just a chair down there.

So we decided to just go down and sit by the lake.

So yeah, it was kind of.

so funny, no funny outfits, no concept, no nothing.

Just a portrait of two people in love sending their images to the people they care about.

Correct.

Stupid.

Oh, plus, a lake.

There was a lake, too.

Yeah, like, well, I'm, I'm getting more of a pond.

Pond, yeah, more pond vibes, you know.

Yeah.

That's that's there in Georgia.

You are in, you're, you folks are in Georgia.

Yes.

Correct.

So who, who normally comes up with the concepts?

Like, who's responsible for this pond debacle?

Debacle, I guess, is what I'm supposed to say.

It depends on a lot of years where we go on vacation.

And is there something there, like a great ball of twine?

Right.

And it's you coming up with the ideas, right?

Normally.

Well, I think I'm catching this vibes.

I don't know why.

Yep.

It's a 50-50.

50-50?

You might be visiting a great ball of twine or whatever.

It's easy for us to do it because of Pete's employer yeah.

That you refer to as beloved airline.

And so if there's an empty seat, we're on it.

Yep.

And away we go.

That's yep.

Pete,

you're an airline employee.

Yes.

We should explain that in John's book, Medallion Status, which is available now in bookstores everywhere,

he refers to

a certain airline as beloved airline.

And I think it's okay for us to say on the show that that's aero flot.

Spirit.

Yes.

Aero flot.

No, you work for a major airline that is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.

Everyone else can do their homework and figure it out because they're not giving us any money.

I'm not going to buzz market that airline.

I've devoted a whole book to them, basically.

And what did I get out of it?

Platinum medallion status.

No thanks.

Might as well throw me in the garbage.

Meanwhile, you, however, are an employee, so you get to hop on empty seats

and travel all over the world.

Are you a pilot or what do you do?

No, no, I'm in technical operations.

So

tech ops.

Yes, tech ops.

Yeah.

In the QC department.

Quality control?

Yes.

All right.

Controlling the quality of the tech ops?

To ensure that

the aircraft are correctly maintained.

Well, you know what?

I can't fault you there.

They seem to take off and land pretty good.

You're a wing counter.

One, two, one, two, one, two, one, two.

Exactly.

You got to count all the wings before you can let any of them them fly.

If you get an odd number, there's a problem.

And then you got to go back and figure out where it is.

Yeah.

Yep.

And if takeoffs don't equal landings, we're in trouble.

And if you get four, watch out.

There's a red baron in your midst.

Probably you got,

if a plane takes off and doesn't land, you probably have a Bermuda Triangle situation.

You ever have one of those?

Nope.

Not under your watch, Pete.

No.

And Anne,

you work for a university, correct?

I do, a large private university with an academic medical center, which you can also study up and find out which one that might be in Atlanta.

Yeah, look, no, we're not inviting anyone to stalk your adorable lives in Atlanta.

Hello, I'm your Judge John Hodgman.

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Okay, so let's get down to the meat of it here.

Specifically, Pete's meat.

Pete, this coming holiday season, we are in the thick of it as we record this, or some holiday season down the road, you would like to send out a holiday card recreating a famous image in popular culture, a famous photo.

What is the photo you would like to recreate?

It's the cover of Rolling Rolling Stone with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, where she's laid, they're out on the carpet with her hair all out and all that kind of stuff.

And then John is cuddled up next to her with nothing on.

John is wearing, John Lennon is wearing nothing and kissing her on the cheek.

Yes.

And she is clothed and kind of dealing with it.

And this

is kind of the look.

that Yoko Ono has on her face in this case.

And

this photo was taken by annie libovitz famously and uh you would like to recreate this photo and you would like to be in the nude is that right pete oh yeah no sure i'll be i'm i'm down with that so yeah let's rock yeah and you've been putting up with pete for a long time why

who lets rock says pete

pete you're out of control slow down you're rocking too hard

whoa why don't you want to lie down on the carpet fully closed and let Pete snuggle you while he is nude and have a photo taken from the top down?

Maybe you're going to get Annie Leibovitz to come and take it.

I don't know.

And then send that out to all your family.

What was your reaction when Pete first suggested this?

Absolutely not.

Absolutely not.

His parents are living.

My mother is living.

Yoko Ono is living and is my mother's age, interestingly.

He's got a child.

He has grandchildren and our friends.

And, you know, my boss is going to get this card.

Your boss is going to get this card.

I don't, I don't want any part of that.

Yeah.

How do you want any part of that?

How do you think?

I mean, okay, there's famously in the photo, you know, you're getting some side nude Lennon haunch,

but you're not, you're seeing side, side butt,

but nothing serious here.

Jesse, you looking at this photo?

I can see it here.

So what we see in this photo is

a pretty good illustration of John's receding hairline because he's seen in profile.

We see

this, by the way, not mine.

Yeah.

I'm not in this photo.

No.

And your hairline is vibrant.

It's doing what it's doing the best it can.

And we see a little bit of underarm, a lot of sideburn, and a little bit of thigh divot.

But we don't see any

butt crack, nipple, or intimate part.

Right.

it's uh it's it's a tasteful nude as dave hill would title his book of comedic essays tasteful nudes and i and have you ever seen uh pete in the nude before i have

don't don't you think he has a beautiful body absolutely but that's for my eyeballs not everyone's eyeballs pete if i said you had a beautiful body would you hold it against ants for all

absolutely

I was going to say,

Pete, if I asked you to take off your shirt for the video, would you do so?

Yeah, why not?

Yeah, don't do it.

Suddenly, this is turning into something a little darker than I meant it to be.

Modeling just sucks.

They made me take off my top.

So you mentioned that Pete has children and grandchildren.

This is a blended family situation, right?

Ann, these are not your children and grandchildren, biologically speaking.

He has a daughter, and we have together three grandchildren.

Well, of course.

Yeah, you're right.

What do they call, what do the grandchildren call you to?

Grandma and Nudie?

For a long time, the oldest is five.

So for a long time, I've been that girl.

That girl.

I've been trying that girl.

Were you that girl?

And I've been trying to get them to call me Gran so that they will one day learn the joy of the silent E, G R A N N E.

Gran instead of Anne.

Correct.

Right.

Add a gr in front of okay i like that that's cute

and i'm hoppy i'm hoppet so uh my hot peat i hope say so

well hot peat is like uh is some sort of dutch holiday character exactly so my my daughter named my dad uh hoppy h-o-p-p-y

and then when i came along i became hot pete hopete hop eat and bat girl

no sorry not bat girl that girl, like Marlo Thomas.

That girl.

Oh, that girl, like Marlo Thomas, the famous, the famous sitcom.

I got to tell you, Gran,

I wish it were Bat Girl.

Bat Girl, yeah.

But

Hop Eat and That Girl, even though it's not Bat Girl, that's pretty much the greatest grandma-grandpa names I've heard since I learned that Jonathan Colton's paternal grandparents were called Tuffy and BJ.

La la la la la la la la la la la.

Right?

Who's that girl?

Oh, you're Jesse Thorne.

What an old soul.

You actually remember the theme of that girl.

Incredible.

That's even Gwen Stefani.

Do you, this is an iconic image.

And do you think that people won't recognize the homage that you're that you are and Pete would be making, Hopi?

Oh, absolutely.

They're going to recognize it.

I mean, the five-year-old won't, but everybody's going to know.

You know, my mom will know.

His parents will know.

Yet that's a naked Pete.

It is.

It's Pete in the nude.

So

it's just the side of me.

It's not like

we're going full on here.

Yeah, yeah.

Everyone's seeing a new side of hot Pete for sure.

The hottest Pete of all.

There you go.

Find out how hot Pete's flank is.

Anne mentioned that

your parents are still alive.

Anne's mom is still alive.

Do I remember that correctly?

Yes.

Correct.

You don't feel any self-consciousness about showing your bare flank to your whole fam?

My mom's seen my butt before.

Well, that's true.

But how recently?

Well, okay, it's been a minute.

To my knowledge, my mother's never seen his butt.

It would be funny if you found out she's seen it plenty of times.

Not that I know of.

No, no, but I'm just saying maybe she put a camera in your house.

I don't know.

Look, I don't know your lives.

That's why I'm trying to figure this out.

When you think about your mom, Anne, opening this card and seeing you two together, what do you think her reaction would be?

Oh, she would absolutely hate it.

The kiss card was bad enough.

So, Anne, let's talk about this kiss card.

First of all, I mean, there's a lot of distance between the two of you on top of the cliff at the Stratobowl versus the wild theatricality of putting on full face makeup.

in two different configurations and compositing the photo together.

How did it evolve to get to be so complex?

Pete joined a local

studio,

photography studio.

He's a photographer, amateur photographer, and a good one,

and happened to join the studio.

And so the studio was available.

And we did a family Christmas card for his parents there and had all the family there.

And I thought, oh, we got this studio.

We've got a sink.

We've got, you know, let's just do this thing.

So we took it inside that year.

Yes, the kiss card reaction was bad enough that, you know, I think she hesitates to open our card every year.

But I think she would find a half-naked Pete or mostly naked Pete or a side Pete

pornography, you know.

Whoa, how

did your mom

express her dissatisfaction?

When was the kiss card, first of all?

Oh, I don't know, seven, eight years ago, maybe?

So how did she express her dissatisfaction upon?

Well, first of all, what is kiss?

That was lost on her entirely.

And then, you know, describing it's this band and, you know, they play this rock.

You know, if it's not classical music, it's not music to her.

So there was just a lot of, you know, it was just big thumbs down from her that year.

What are your ages, roughly speaking?

54.

Yep.

Yep.

I'm a little older.

Doesn't your mom understand that you want to rock and roll all night and party every day?

She does not.

When you go visit her at her house, still,

if dinner is over and she's off to watch Wheel of Fortune in Jeopardy and we want to go somewhere, you know, what are you doing?

It's what?

It's 6:30 at night.

It's almost bedtime.

You don't want to go out.

So, you know, she's set in her ways.

Bless her.

Bless her.

How did she feel about the two of you going to sock hops?

Rock and roll is music.

Yeah, Yeah, you ever tell her you're going out to the point to watch the submarine races?

Does she know you're married?

She does.

Yes.

Okay, that's good.

And how do you think Hop Pete's mom and dad are going to react?

Well, Hop Pete's dad, just to triangulate us more, is a retired Methodist minister.

Here we go.

So I don't think they're going to like it either.

I think they're probably a little more liberal about that sort of stuff than you think.

But by now, and surely, I mean, you know,

you are mature adults.

By now, they must know what you two are all about.

They've gotten your goofy cards in the past.

You've laid the groundwork for nudity, wouldn't you say?

Sure.

Absolutely.

I mean, you know,

I'm not,

you know, it's the Roman Catholic guilt.

It's the, I don't know what,

but I just don't feel comfortable with it.

I don't want it.

Pete, have you run this by your daughter or anyone else?

Has anyone else opposed to this?

I've mentioned it several times, and my sisters are all, oh, go for it, especially my middle sister.

She's a little wilder than the rest, but yeah, I don't, you know, my daughter hasn't

said anything negative about it.

Just, you know,

she may think that

we won't go through with it just because, but we'll see.

What is an example of your middle sister being wilder than the rest?

Well, you're aware of the

sort of the preacher's daughter and the kind of reputation that they tend to have.

Well, she was out to prove it.

That was kind of her thing.

Do any of your siblings or other family members make funny novelty cards like this?

No, just me.

Are you the wacky one?

I don't know.

I'm the oldest, so it's, it's, I don't know.

It's interesting.

You're the oldest.

Usually the oldest is the one who's trying to lock down family norms.

And it's usually the middle child or the baby who tries to get away with.

attention-getting stunts like this.

But in this case, you want to let it all hang out.

Absolutely.

Okay, easy does it.

If you're not going to get too excited, explain to me how you're going to do this photo shoot because

you don't have Annie Leibovitz there.

Exactly.

And I understand it's a Polaroid that she took.

I think she was standing on the sofa over them to take the picture.

So I've got a C-stand and a few things to mount the camera and run remotely.

So there's not going to be anybody else there with us.

And so we can do the overhead of as many shots as it takes to not show anything important.

How long do you think you're going to be down on the floor?

Hours and hours?

Oh, no, no, not hours and hours.

If it doesn't work fairly quickly within 30 or 40 minutes, then it's probably going to

try something else for that year.

Jesse Thorne, you know what the difference is between hiring a talented photographer, a legendarily talented photographer like Annie Levowitz, and setting up a C-stand is?

What's that?

Nothing of the same.

Yeah, same thing.

Yeah.

Basically, a photographer is just a tripod.

You need someone to hold the camera up.

And do you have anyone in your circle that's as horrified as you are by the prospect of getting

more Pete than they bargain for?

I am an only child, so there's no judging there.

I conferred everything I need to in order to make my decision.

Thank you very much.

Sorry, Pete.

You're used to it, right?

My coworkers love Pete, so they're all just going to get a kick out of it.

And I still don't want any part of it.

Is there anything else stopping you from participating in this scheme or is it just the nudity?

I just think there's so many other things we could do besides, I mean, you name it.

You know, we could do a Holland Oates album cover.

You know, we go back to album cover.

Excuse me.

Excuse me.

Excuse me.

And I have to hold you in contempt.

Not only did you fail to bring a foam turkey to the courtroom.

It's Daryl Hall and John Oates.

Pardon me.

You are absolutely correct, Your Honor.

I apologize.

They've never been billed otherwise.

Right.

So then if I were to say emphatically said to me.

If I were to say eurythmics, is it the eurythmics?

No, it's just eurythmics.

It's just eurythmics.

It's just talking heads.

It's just pixies.

We could go to Easter Island.

We could go anywhere and do anything, including the biggest ball of twine.

So you really want to do the biggest ball of twine.

Is that something that Pete nicks?

I actually do.

It's weird Alice.

it's it's a whole bunch of things i just think it's so dumb where is the biggest ball of twine these days and by the way if it's been there for a long time why hasn't someone made one bigger it's in minnesota i honestly don't know where in minnesota

i'm looking it up largest ball of twine world's largest ball of twine tourist attraction in what looks to me caulker city kansas I was going for the Weird Al reference, the biggest ball of twine in Minnesota.

Well, excuse me, the largest ball of sizzle twine built by a single person is in Darwin, Minnesota.

Okay.

2025 card.

Here comes.

In Kansas, they work together

on their twine balls.

Weird Al Yankovic indeed wrote a song in 1989, released it anyway, The Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota, based on Francis A.

Johnson's folly.

And if I were to find in your favor today and I was to nix the John and Yoko photo,

would this be the runner-up?

Would Pete have to get you some seats on a beloved airlines flight to MSP and

right before the holidays, get it out there?

Is this what you want to do?

Yeah, biggest ball of twine, but really just no

partial or full nudity of Pete or me in any holiday card.

Thank you.

Pete, why this photo?

Does it have a particular meaning to you?

It doesn't have a particular meaning.

It's one that everybody knows.

And that's kind of what I've gone for in some of the other cards:

it's an instantly recognizable image.

Well, I mean,

there are other iconic photos, even of

John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

Some of which are even more nude, frankly, but some of which are less nude.

I mean,

there's

the double happiness

album cover, which also features a kiss between them, which was in part, based on my research, the inspiration for Annie Libo that's taking this photo.

Why not do something something that's less nudie for

your beloved spouse?

Maybe, maybe someday when we're old and wrinkly.

Judge Hodman, did you see that Pete is a ham radio enthusiast?

Yes.

Okay.

Let's put whatever question I was about to ask into the garbage forever because I need to hear a little bit more about this.

Ham radio, amateur radio.

Yes.

An old-timey hobby insofar as we have cell phones now.

And anyway, we can connect connect with people all over the world in any way.

Tell us a little bit about ham radio, how you get into it, and what it is.

So, I started in ham radio back in 93.

So, I've been at it for a while.

I put it down for a little while and

then picked it back up.

And I went and actually, this last summer, upgraded my license.

So, there's three levels of license, and I'm in the middle.

And what that allows you to do is have more frequencies you can use.

What are the levels of license?

Silver medallion, platinum medallion, and diamond medallion?

Technician.

Yeah, technician general and extra.

So I'm general.

What I enjoy most about the hobby is the hardware.

Talking to people, okay, that's okay.

But

taking the equipment and making it work and actually making contacts all over the world from my little

office there in Atlanta.

So

that's the cool part about it.

And it's digital modes.

There's slow scan TV.

There's just the...

The spectrum is huge of what you can do.

Why would you say slow scan TV?

Like that's a sentence I've ever heard heard before in my life.

Oh, there's slow scan TV.

There's

microwave transmit.

Let me just ask you some basic questions for the few people in our audience who are not ham radio enthusiasts.

Okay.

What is your rig?

And what does it look like?

Yeah, we should explain.

Obviously, most of our audience are also dads from 1963.

Yeah, of course.

It's actually not too far from the truth.

I'm trying to build their own projection booths for stag films.

So I've got a

small mobile rig at the house and a couple of them, one for the high-frequency stuff for the

lower bands and one for the VHF and UHF, which are more local and then don't go quite as far.

What does it look like?

What does your broadcast machine look like?

Looks like a CB, honestly.

So it's quite small.

And there's a power supply under the desk and all that kind of stuff.

So

the antenna is the hardest part to figure out.

We are fairly restricted in what I can do outdoors.

So I'll put something up and play with it for a little while and then take it back down and put it away to keep the neighbors from yelling at me.

So for those of you who don't know, ham radio, amateur radio, also known as ham radio,

it's a radio

where you are able to talk to people all over the world, right?

Yes.

It's sort of like a terrible telephone.

Exactly.

But I don't have to rely on Mobile to use it.

And also, you don't know who you're calling, right?

You just sort of like go out there and go, this is Hot Pete broadcasting on blah, blah, blah.

Come back if you hear me.

And then all of a sudden, ham radio enthusiast Marlon Brando is talking to you from Tahiti.

Right.

Judge, this summer we visited Bletchley Park outside of London where the code breakers were.

Yeah, sure.

Beautiful place, beautiful grounds.

Alan Turing's stomping grounds.

It turned out most of our visit was talking to the guy who runs the Bletchley Park ham operator station.

It was a day.

I presume you're telling this story, Anne, because you just had the greatest time.

Ann is very, very kind to put up with my hobbies.

What other hobbies do you have?

Call it considerate.

SWAT cars, balsa wood gliders,

polishing roller skate keys.

Yes.

Photography, ham radio, trumpet,

banjo.

What else goes on?

Oh, cycling, bicycling.

Trumpet and banjo.

Huh, Pete.

Yeah.

Well, not at the same time, usually.

Get back to me when you can do them both at the same time.

And do you have any hobbies that Pete has to put up with?

My hobby was outside of the home and left with the pandemic, And that is I was a stage manager.

My talents are best served behind the curtain here in Atlanta for many, many years.

It was wake up, go to work, go to the theater, go to the bar, come home, go to sleep, rinse and repeat.

That is the show person lifestyle.

That's a young person's game.

I loved it.

I loved every second of it.

I loved all my casts.

I just...

you know, when pandemic came around, I was not in it for telling people after, you know, an hour 50, it was time to take a break from staring at the screen.

So surely you're not a young, you're not an old person, though.

You're young.

I mean, we're the same age.

You could go out and manage some stages now.

They're out there.

You could get back into the game if you wanted.

I could.

I did at the university where I work.

I enjoyed working with the students the most.

I could, but here's Pete to spend time with.

So why don't I do that?

That's right.

Watching him do all of his.

All right.

Let's get back to this case.

I apologize.

That was a very, very fun diversion.

But, Anne,

your justice is not being served here.

Have you considered taking this photo and sending it to a select group of people who will get it while sending a more traditional holiday card to your mom and the other sticks in mud

who don't appreciate Pete's nudity?

I mean, that is doable, clearly.

But, you know, for the amount of time, why make two cards?

Right.

And would the, would the work fall to you?

I mean, who prints out these cards and mails them?

Is that what you're doing or are you emailing them?

No, I print them.

I enjoy enjoy the whole process of taking the image and

editing and printing and folding and all that kind of fun stuff.

So, yeah.

Does this fold into your photography hobby or are you also a silkscreen printer?

No, it's photography.

It's a it's an inkjet printer.

So yeah.

Got it.

But nice papers and all that kind of stuff.

So you are the one who mails this stuff out, right?

So

it wouldn't be any extra work for you, Anne, if there were two different images.

You know, you could even do the same image, but Pete is wearing

clothes in one.

Yeah, or just

where Yoko Ono is, there's just nothing.

It's just the side of Pete.

The end.

Or he could wear what they call in Hollywood terms a privacy garment.

when shooting a nude scene.

He could be wearing a full body nude suit.

Would that be work?

What if you were wearing a skin-tone bodysuit that matched his skin tone?

I mean, why bother?

No, no, not no.

I guess what I'm asking is, is it just the idea of your mom and other folks seeing Pete in the nude that makes you uncomfortable?

Or is it even posing for the image itself that there's something about lying down on the floor with him?

No, no, I wouldn't mind the posing at all.

I mean, you know, you could do that later this afternoon if you wanted to.

It's the idea of, well, after the kiss card, for example, we've not gotten to that level of

great.

And I feel like with, if we were to do this card, there's no going back.

I mean, it would just be like, what are we going to do next?

What are we going to do next?

What are you afraid will happen next?

Well, I feel like the years that we have kind of like blame, it's just us looking at the ocean like a Cialis commercial.

Sorry, didn't mean to thus market.

It's just like it would, it would thud in comparison to this amazing thing.

You're afraid that this would, there would be escalation after this.

To what?

More nudity?

Not necessarily more nudity, but you know, then we'd actually start getting, instead of getting other people's holiday cards back, they'd just send us a note saying, next year, do this.

And

great.

Now we got to satisfy the masses.

Pete, what is your connection to John Lennon Yoko Ono?

Other than being very influential early in my high school career, I mean, 1980 when he was assassinated.

Oh, I thought you were saying, other than my influencing him.

No, no, no, no, no, no.

His influence, his influence.

Do you have a particular connection?

Pete is Chuck Berry.

I have no connection other than that, other than me.

You just like this photo.

I like that.

I do like the photo, yes.

And do you have a particular emotional connection to John Lennon and Yoko Ono, this photo, or is this sort of our research?

We weren't even Kiss fans.

It just happened to be, hey, that's a cool album cover.

Yeah, there are other album covers out there.

You mentioned that this is an iconic image.

There are many iconic images.

Why don't you go as the silver scarab busting out of a sphere in the cover of a journey album?

We could do it.

Yep.

We've also talked about Pretty in Pink.

Oh, that's right.

The Pretty in Pink on the glass tabletop.

16 Candles.

16 Candles.

Sorry, sorry.

with the glass tabletop.

Or

Gustav Klimps, the kiss.

Gustav Klimps, the kiss is a famous image that I'm looking up that is often cited as an influence upon this particular image of John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

Right.

There's two people.

It's a man and a woman embracing and kissing.

It's not the passion that bothers you, right, Ann?

Oh, no, no, not at all.

Not at all.

Or am I going to find that fabric, really, is the problem there.

Well, you do it all, do it all in CGI.

That's going to be another one of his hobbies.

Photoshop is my friend.

Yeah, that's right.

Photoshop is his friend, maybe his only friend if I rule in your favor.

And

do you have any ideas beyond this one, Pete, that you feel like if you get to do this nude shot,

then all bets are off and you've got some more ambitious things in mind?

Oh, there's always, you know, like you say, there's tons of altin covers.

I mean, you mentioned,

it was was the,

I'll make sure I get it right: Daryl Hall and John Oates album covers.

I've got a pen mustache.

There's oodles of stuff.

I mean, we

sit down and try to think up something every year, and some years it's like, oh, and then the time gets away from us, and it's like, yeah, too late now.

Which Daryl Hall and John Oates album are you?

It's the in the white t-shirts.

So it's just Devil.

Yeah.

I forget the name of the album.

Well, the essential Daryl Hall and John Oates has them wearing white t-shirts here.

I feel like there's a leather jacket one.

Maybe one of them has a leather jacket.

There are a lot of them.

What about H2O, where they're both really sweaty and they're like forehead to forehead?

Okay, yeah, we do that.

I do think that the, I think that the Daryl Hall and John Oates cover, the self-titled album, where they're like almost completely white, except for their really intense rouge.

Yeah, there's a glam rock element to the album, Daryl Hall and John Oates, for sure.

Let's just say the glam rock does not necessarily favor

John Oates'

look.

Not necessarily the most suitable for his aesthetic.

Pete, how will you feel if I rule in Anne's favor

and say you can't do it?

A little disappointed, because I think it would be a fun, a fun album to recreate or a fun image to recreate.

You know, it doesn't necessarily, like you say, have to go out to everybody, but you got a little disappointed, I think.

And if I were to rule in Pete's favor, but he could only send it to the people that you approve, the

more tolerant folks, and instead you were to send a more,

I don't know, traditional holiday card to your mom or whatever.

How would you feel about that?

I'm still not liking it.

Why?

Tell me why.

You know, it's not me being approved.

It's just, I don't want any picture of my husband's butt, part of it or another part of it, out in the world.

It could be used against him.

No, not even on blackmail for him.

No, it's not a retaliatory thing.

It's just,

why do you want to do that?

All right.

You know what?

I want Pete to answer that question.

Look him in the eyes again, Anne, and ask him.

Pete, why do you want to do that?

It's an iconic image I would love to recreate that everyone would know.

Everyone would would know what I'm parodying.

And you just don't care that it's your butt.

No, not at all.

Yeah, Pete, I don't buy this.

I'm sorry.

There are a lot of iconic images in the world that are worth creating.

And you're like, well, I like John Lennon.

It's fine.

And this is a well-known image.

So is the image of the service guy dipping and kissing his best girl in Times Square.

So's the image of the Phantom of the Opera or whatever.

Like, there are lots of them.

Why do you want to be nude?

It's the shock value of the card, I think, is what really kind of attracts me to it.

It's the open it up and go, oh, I can't believe they did that.

I forgot that

Pete places so much value on shock value, Jesse Thorne.

I forgot that Pete is basically the GG Allen of Beloved Airlines Tech Ops.

No bananas, please.

Can't believe.

I can't believe.

I mean, why shouldn't I?

Two guys in their 50s know who GG Allen is, but this

sweet ham radio operator is dropping GG Allen obscure cultural references right back at me.

Hey, if you're a young person listening to this, don't look this guy up

at all.

No,

holy moly.

Uh, all right.

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

Or I go get nude and lie on the floor of my chambers here and think this over for a minute.

I'll be back in a moment.

My verdict, please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

And how are you feeling about your chances?

I feel

I feel like, in fact, with the idea of two cards, it's like, oh, I'm losing now.

Pete, how do you feel?

I'm feeling pretty good at that.

I'm looking forward to getting everything set up and getting it going.

Yeah.

Well, we'll see what Judge Hodgman has to say about all 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 Lum.

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 Hodgman?

Yes, sir.

We've hit the deadline for Christmas shipping in the Max Fun store, but Hanukkah doesn't end until January.

So go get those Canadian House of Pizza and garbage t-shirts.

Yeah, that's the gelt you need.

Eight of them.

Get eight.

Get eight t-shirts.

For every night?

Each night that the oil lasted.

Whether it's Hanukkah or Saturnalia or Yule or New Year's Eve or anything that you honor and celebrate during this, the holiday season, it's still a good time to give a present, even if it's a little late.

And we've got lots of them over there at the Maximum Fun store at maxfundstore.com.

Our Canadian House of Pizza and Garbage t-shirts are out of the vault, first time available in many years, as well as beer and/or beverage koozies, non-alcoholic beer or other canned beverages.

We have Canadian House of Pizza and Garbage beverage koozies available as well, in both regular-sized cans and for the slim cans that are so popular these days, as well as weird mom t-shirts to to go along with our famous weird dad t-shirts.

And what's more, we've got shows coming up, right, Jesse?

We're headed up and down the West Coast, Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Sketchfast, and of course, LA, although the LA tickets are already sold out.

So go to maximumfund.org slash events for links to all of those shows and get those tickets now before your preferred destination sells out.

That's right.

And, you know, if you're looking for a last-minute Hanukkah gift, get some tickets to the big show and

put them in a little card and hand it to them and say, Happy Hanukkah from Judge John Hodgman and Jesse Thorne.

Should we get back to the case?

Let's do it.

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

Pete, and let me say, first of all, that you're both of you the most adorable Gigi Allen fans I've ever met

and intrinsically very adorable.

And I would be really remiss.

You know, I

people who are watching on the YouTube channel at Judge John Hodgman Pod over there on YouTube are probably mad at me because I haven't brought this up yet because they have seen what I have only just now seen now that I've focused, I've enlarged the image of you so that I can really take a good look at both of you before I pronounce sentence.

And only now do I realize that you're both wearing shirts with bananas on the shirts.

Can you tell me why you have dressed up alike in such a cutesy manner with bananas on your shirts?

We wanted to be cutesy for you.

And also, there was a

taping last year of a podcast on a different comedy network that we bought these shirts specifically for.

I see.

Well, you just lost your case, Anne, because you mentioned it in a minute.

Oh, no.

I figured it was going down south anyway.

Good luck to all bands.

Did you think it was going to go down south?

Do you think

I was going to endorse Pete's down south project here and that your case would go down south?

Yeah, I think you appreciate the shock value.

I do.

Well,

why don't you listen to my whole verdict then?

My favorite part of your adorableness today was when I asked, do you feel uncomfortable taking this photo for any reason?

And you're like, no, we could do it this afternoon.

I don't care.

I was like, that's right.

They can do it this afternoon.

For anybody who wants to know, that's what marriage is.

Marriage is the comfort of knowing that if you wanted to, later this afternoon, you could lie down on the floor with your loved one, and one of you can be nude, and you could recreate an iconic image just for funs.

And indeed, do you know what?

My preliminary ruling is: you're going to do that this afternoon.

You made your promise, you're going to do it.

You're going to lie down on the floor with your husband and let him kiss you on the cheek and

humiliate you by cuddling next to you in the nude.

The question now is, will a photo be taken?

I think that the photo should be taken

because obviously it's something that

Pete is really thinking a lot about for reasons that he has difficulty explaining on a podcast.

Maybe in the dead of night, he's able to

unburden himself and reveal his deepest uninhibited feelings.

But here right now,

all he can say is, this is an iconic image I'd like to recreate.

And I'm like, well, why not?

If you're comfortable enough with it, Anne, why not go ahead and take the photo?

And here's the reason for my ruling, which is no, you shouldn't.

And the reason being that, yes, this is an iconic photo.

Yes, there is.

nothing wrong with

the nude human body.

And there is nothing wrong with Pete's new human body.

And I think that if

your mom could handle Hop Pete and you, Gran as Kiss, she probably could handle this next thing.

But

one thing I didn't understand about this iconic photo that has not come up in our conversation is not only was it shot by Annie Leibovitz, but it was shot hours before John Lennon was assassinated.

That afternoon, she took that photo at the Dakota and left, and then he was assassinated.

And that's why that photo is so famous.

It's the last photo of them together, literally the day that he was killed.

And for that reason, I think that that's a bad vibe to send out in the world as a holiday card.

Makes it a little easier for me to make my ruling.

But I do think that that's not something that everyone would know because most people are like, holy moly.

They're going to be distracted by the beauty of Pete's alabaster flank and all of its glory.

But I think that that's the wrong thing to send out, I'm sorry to say.

Like, you know, the holiday time is about

trying to share

not only your nude self, but your hopes and dreams and thanks and gratitude for this year as we pass into the next year.

And

I just don't think that that's a good vibe to send out.

If you wanted to do double fantasy,

that image from the cover, it's not quite as famous,

but that is a wonderful wonderful celebration of love between John Lennon and Yoko Ono, two people who really loved each other.

But I think that this is not the one to send out as a holiday card.

You can take the photo.

Indeed, you could do it this afternoon.

And it has challenged you to it, frankly, Pete.

Go home and take this photo and then have it for yourself and maybe share it with some people that you care about down the road or whatever.

It would be a alarming thing to leave to your daughter as part of your legacy.

But it definitely is a reflection of you and your and your anything goesness as a couple, which is terrific.

But I don't think you should send it out as a holiday card.

I do think that you should either or at some point definitely go do the largest ball of twine created by one man in Minnesota.

And

maybe we can even send that holiday card to Weird Al Yankovic.

I've got his address

to honor the song that he wrote about that very ball of twine.

Anne,

my sympathies go to you from one only child to another.

I never intended to share my life and my decisions with anyone.

And then I accidentally fell in love with a person to whom I am married.

He is a whole human being in her own right.

And it has been a now 25-year period of intense discomfort and growth as I realize I have to take other people's thoughts and feelings into account.

I'm sorry to have to remind you of the fact that that is the choice you made too.

We both sold out our birthright as only children by sharing our lives with other people.

It is sometimes uncomfortable.

It is sometimes complicated.

Compromise is for other people with siblings.

But I think that you have benefited greatly from knowing each other and complimenting each other so well.

I'm sorry that this is not quite a match.

Why don't I take a screenshot of you both in your banana shirts?

And when I say three, two, one, both of you say, let's rock.

Three, two, one.

Let's rock.

Yeah, there you go.

There's your Christmas card right there.

How about that?

This is the sound of a gavel.

To show everything.

People are always looking at people like me, trying to see some secret.

Oh, what do they do?

What do they do?

Do they go to the bathroom?

Judge John Hodgman rules, that is all.

Please rise as Judge John Hodgman exits the courtroom.

And how do you feel right now?

I am shocked, actually, but looking forward to finding something else for the rest of our lives together each year for a card.

What's shocked you?

Shocked that I won.

Pete, how do you feel?

A little bit disappointed, but not that bad in that we, you know, we'll do the image, but I agree with the judge that it may not be the best idea for a holiday card.

Well, and Pete, thanks for joining us on the Judge John Hodgman podcast.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Another Judge John Hodgman case is in the books.

We'll have swift justice in just a moment.

But first, our thanks to Redditor Fortinbross III for naming this week's episode Aiding in a Bed Inn.

You can join the conversation on Reddit.

By the way, John, I just found out from a user on the the Maximum Fund subreddit that going to maximumfund.reddit.com no longer takes you to the maximum fund subreddit.

Oh, okay.

In fact, it doesn't work for it's not something special with maximum fund.

Just Reddit, I guess, decommissioned that referral thingy.

So now you've got to go to Reddit.com slash R slash Maximum Fund or search for Maximum Fund in your Reddit app or on Reddit or whatever.

Anyway, that's where we chat about every week's episode and ask for suggestions for titles.

It's great time over there in the Maximum Fun sub.

And by the way, I failed to mention it earlier.

Fortin Bross III was one of a couple of Smarty Pants over there who came up with some version of aiding in a bed in.

And the bed in is one of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's famous forms of protest.

They would lie in bed all day.

That's what that's a reference to.

But thanks to everybody who came up with that.

fun joke and you can go give them thanks right over there at the maximum fun subreddit reddit.com slash r slash maximum fun it's a a lot of fun over there you can find evidence from this week's show uh on the maximum fund website on the episode page for this episode as well as on our instagram account at judge john hodgman you can also find video from this show on youtube uh clips on instagram you can find clips on facebook you can search for judge john hodgman on tick tock follow us on tick tock we're putting fun stuff on on the tick tock there yeah and also i want to send a thanks out to Jonathan Arbogast

over on Apple Podcast for leaving us a really nice review and five stars.

Jonathan Arbogast says the Judge John Hodgman podcast is essential.

Wow.

Jimmy Vee once said that if you laugh, cry, and think, you've had a heck of the day with Judge John Hodgman.

I've had a heck of a Wednesday for many years now.

Thank you so much, Mr.

Arbogast.

If you're listening on Apple Podcasts, won't you consider leaving us a few words and maybe a number of stars?

Perhaps that number of stars would be five.

You can also rate and review us over on Pocketcast.

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All of these methods of watching us on social media, interacting with our content, spreading it around really helps new listeners find the show, and we really do appreciate it.

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

This episode engineered by Brookie Kuhn at Bravo Ocean Studios in Atlanta, Georgia.

Our social media manager is Natty Lopez.

The podcast is edited by A.J.

McKeon.

Our video producer is Daniel Speer.

Our producer is Jennifer Marmer, now Swift Justice, where we answer small disputes with quick judgment.

Balta nerdist on the maximum fund subreddit.

That's a classic Judge Sean Hodgman.

Listener on the Reddit, Balta Nerdist.

Balta nerdist.

Yeah, Balta nerdist always, always chiming in.

My friend Robbie gets annoyed when PhDs prefer to be called Dr.

so-and-so.

I think it's a matter of the social contract to call someone the thing they ask you to call them, even if you find it pretentious.

What do you say, Judge Hodgman?

I'm sorry, were you talking to me?

Yes, sir.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I think you called me Judge Hodgman, but I've changed my name.

I'm now Beefsteak Begonia.

So that's how I would like to be addressed from now on.

Apologies, double B.

Dr.

Beefsteak Begonia, to you?

Look, is is it a little pretentious?

Yes.

Is it decent to call people what they ask to be called?

Absolutely.

And by the way,

even though it is convention to refer to medical doctors as doctor and less conventional to refer to, say,

a doctor of musicology, call them doctor, just to name an area where you can get a PhD.

That doesn't mean that Dr.

Music did not do a lot of work to get that doctorate and deserves to be called doctor.

So, Robbie, why don't you just worry about your own stuff over there and call people what they want to be called?

Signed, Beefsteak Begonia.

Hey, we're getting ready to ring in a new year, and I want to hear disputes about new things.

Are you a New Yorker feeling conflicted about a move to New Jersey?

Did you get a new jumpsuit that you love, but your husband just does not understand it?

It's called fashion, and he's clearly never heard of it.

Did you follow through on your New Year's resolution and no one cares?

Let me know all of your new disputes, anything anything involving the word new

over at maximumfun.org/slash JJ H.

O.

That's maximumfund.org slash JJ H.

O.

It's a simple form where you send us your disputes, whether it's new things or old things.

Do we want to hear all of them or just some of them, Jesse?

All of them indeed at maximumfun.org/slash JJHO.

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

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