#485: Westward Ho!

I swear to God, everything that we were going to tell you about this fucking tour guide is gospel.

Frank pussied out.

I feel like if society ended, I would have trouble bringing back a lot of technology, but I think I can make the whistle happen.

Tell him, Steve, Dave.

Hello, and welcome to this week's edition of Tell him Steve Dave.

Welcome back, everyone.

Welcome back, Walt.

Welcome back.

Welcome back, Q.

Hello, hi, hi.

After our hiatus.

Two weeks.

Hiatus.

That's probably the longest in some time.

Yeah, I would say so.

I mean, we take some holiday time off around the Christmas season, but I don't know if it's ever been two weeks, though.

Right.

People were clamoring.

They want us back.

Were they?

Yeah.

I would hope so, man.

I thought we'd see a little bit more unrest in the streets.

I was hoping for.

A few broken windows, a couple vandalized cop chips.

Just one car on fire?

Come on.

Come on, SmotFan.

Curator.

Oh, curator.

Get off your ass.

Sorry.

Start a fire.

This is exactly the sort of thing that ends up in a court transcript.

Please, no one started any trouble.

Well, now we're back, so there would be no point.

But it would be on the high tradition of doing everything ass backwards with telemstool station.

So, Walt.

Yeah.

Big old vacation.

Yeah, the longest vacation I've been on in,

possibly my whole life.

Maybe ever.

It was how many days?

From the 20.

From Father's Day until

two weeks later, so 14 days.

14 days.

So, yeah, it's a long time to max and relax.

That's a little maybe too long?

Yeah.

Well, don't worry, Q.

I wasn't max and relaxing.

I was driving like a madman, clenching the wheel as semis were on either side of me because I'm like, we're going to fucking die on this trip.

I know we are.

So you guys started out on Sunday, right?

Yeah, Father's Day.

Okay, so did I.

I stopped in Pittsburgh.

You guys, did you...

Did you go right to Columbus?

We went straight from Port Monmouth, straight on through to Columbus.

Got there in the wee hours of the morning.

So man drives 10 hours.

Or eight hours.

When's the last time you drove across country, Q?

Cross country?

Yeah.

I mean, I drove to Florida last year.

That was 16 hours in one shot.

Were you like, man, I'd like this, or were you like, I don't need to do this for quite some time?

I'd like it up to about 10 hours.

And

then I'd start being like, all right, I'll just stop.

And then the last three hours on that particular trip were, well, I came this fucking far, so let me just grind out these three hours and get to my parents' house type thing.

Do you ever get that pain in your back of your thigh?

That, you know, your leg that controls the

gas and the brake?

Yeah, oh, for sure.

What's that?

I don't know what that's called.

Your sciata?

Your sciatica?

I don't know.

I was after.

Oh, no.

Holy shit.

That's a true old person.

Yeah, and I was just just like, ooh, this is not good.

I'm having aches and pains on the drive up to the Grand Canyon.

Am I going to be able to get down to the bottom and back out again?

Right.

So, you guys, you and Frank Five, you ended up getting there

Sunday night,

whereas I wouldn't get there until Monday afternoon.

Let me, you know what?

We're going to have, we've got a special guest queue.

Oh, we do.

Yeah, we got Frank Five.

Hello,

Frank.

What's up, baby?

Hey, how's it going?

Pretty good.

Q, you can hear him?

Hey, yeah, I hear you.

How are you doing, Frank?

Oh, good, bro.

How are you?

Excellent.

Excellent.

I'm about to hear about your trip.

I'm very excited to hear this.

Yeah, well, definitely an interesting trip.

So far, we've gotten up to

you and Walt being in Columbus

in the morning of the 21st.

So you're looking for something to do, and you decided on the zoo?

Yeah, we went to to a zoo, and then we went to a whistle factory.

Oh, they're trying to forget about the whistle factory.

Yeah, we went to a whistle factory and we saw how whistles were made.

Why are you laughing?

A fucking whistle factory.

It's awesome.

It's like, is there a mystery as to how whistles are made?

It's like Willy Wonka's that's secretive.

Yeah, I mean, I feel like, I feel like if society ended, I would have trouble bringing back a lot of technology, but I think I can make the whistle happen.

I think the thing that was most interesting about the whistle factory was the fact that there were only five of us there, but the tour guide needed to have a wireless microphone that went through a loudspeaker that went through the entire factory as he told us how to make whistle.

How big was the factory?

It was about maybe

the size of the old stash, maybe.

Okay.

So not super big, not super small, but it was

America's

leading distributor or maker of whistles.

Was.

Well, it is.

It makes America's whistles, and they're very proud of it.

Oh, yeah.

It was an hour and a half of them telling us how they made whistles.

No.

yeah,

I love it.

You gotta love the passion, though.

Like, it's it's

oh, yeah, yeah, it's the people you want making America's whistles.

Now, Q, if you had to guess,

if you brought a whistle

last year, how long would it last you?

Is it a like a shitty plastic whistle or a good wood whistle?

It's a good, hefty, you know, whistle, like a police whistle.

I'm going to put it at decades, man.

I think that whistle lasts and lasts.

I don't think it'll ever go bad.

So I'm wondering

why there's such a need for so many whistles to be made.

These guys are pumping out millions of whistles a year.

And I'm like, who's buying all these whistles?

Right?

Because if you buy a whistle, it should be good for your lifetime.

Unless you lose it, it's not going to fucking decompose.

Well, that little cork wall is out of the dry rot.

They don't make them out of cork anymore.

Oh, what do they make make it out of?

It's something else that doesn't in a dry rot.

Oh, really?

It's proprietary.

You can't know about it, Brian.

As closely guarded as Apple Secrets.

What's that, Frank?

I said, see, Briar, you missed what the cork has made out of now.

You were with Mary Beth's parents when we were at the tour, right?

Yeah, when you guys were at the Whistle Factory, Mary Beth and I went and had lunch with her mom.

Then met with you guys later on.

But you went from the Whistle Factory to the zoo.

Columbus's zoo.

No, is it a good one?

As I recall, that's a great zoo, right?

Like, it's awesome.

Yeah, it was good.

Yeah, we saw some bears.

We saw some

sorts of wildlife.

Yeah, we fed the giraffe.

Yeah, we fed a giraffe.

You were on that wood platform above the giraffe cage?

Yeah, yeah.

I love that zoo.

Every time I have a show in town, there, I'll go there and feed them giraffes.

Yeah, are you able to be left alone or do you have to do a little private

before or after-hour zoo exercise?

I definitely go for the old white glove treatment.

You know?

You know, the old trade, like you'll give a zookeeper or two a ticket to the show that night, and they get you, you know, and return you can pet like a polo bear or something.

Do you even feed the giraffe out of your hand, or do you make one of the handlers just feed it for your pleasure?

For your pleasure.

Usually, you're well.

If I know I'm going to that zoo,

no, if I know I'm going to that zoo, I'll have Jiggy come and make him feed them

as I instruct.

So Jiggy will

hand Jiggy the leaf.

Jiggy will put it in his mouth or his butt cheek or something and lean over and the giraffe will come in and take it from him and I laugh and laugh.

So post-zoo, we meet up.

Yeah, we're going to get the caravan.

The final pieces of of our caravan are in place,

and we are ready to start the trip

officially now because everyone's in one location.

Everyone's under one roof, finally.

We had the walkie-talkies.

We were ready to go.

Yeah, those walkie-talkies.

We'll get to them later.

Why, what happened?

Night one in Columbus, Q, you know, since Mary Beth is from Ohio, she has favorite restaurants in certain parts of

state.

And she's really into this Mongolian restaurant in Columbus.

She's like, I want to go there for dinner.

I want to go there for dinner.

So I'm like, okay, you know, well, we can eat one meal apart.

I'm like,

the

opening ceremony dinner, though, I was like, it kind of sucks that we won't be with everybody, but this is where she wants to go.

What am I going to do?

Because he thinks that

not everybody in the party is going to want to go to a Mongolian restaurant.

Probably correctly.

Oh, you would have funky.

There's a hero in this story.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Some just wear a frown and sit in a Mongolian restaurant going, I'm not hitting this shit.

They just pout.

I was stunned because

I was like, they have certain things.

They have like chicken nuggets and shit, but I thought the smell would be too much for them.

Yeah.

You know, because they have a lot of fish, you know, like

seafood and shit and the smells of Chinese food.

You know, I know Gidden loves to eat outside when he eats shit.

Is it one of those like open pit...

Does he really?

There's like, was it one of those open pit places where they're like constantly throwing food on a giant grill in the middle of a

like you bring your uncooked food up?

Is it like that Mongolian place?

Okay.

Yeah, where we used to go, yeah.

There's always food cooking then.

Always.

Always.

A lot of aromas.

It's overwhelming to a superstar.

And now, now, like, you know, not only is Walt agreed to come to the restaurant, you know, we're sitting pretty far away from where they're cooking, but every single person at the table and everybody surrounding them has this Mongolian food.

So I got to say, I was duly impressed.

I sucked it up because I was like, I want to get this trip started on the right foot, and that does it.

We got to all be together and break bread at the same table because right now we're a clan.

Yeah, you're right.

Who knows what dangers we'll face after this, our maybe possibly our final dinner together on this planet.

Day two.

Day two.

What about the whistle factory put you in this frame of mind?

Take nothing for granted.

I learned that from the fucking guy with the whistles.

We got our picture taken by a big boot.

All right.

The LL Bean store.

I guess they have a giant boot out in front of it.

So that was the first for me, you know, being included in any photographs, you know, of the trip.

So we got.

Do you guys, can I just ask a, can I ask a question that's been on my mind?

Do you guys have a theme song or something for the trip?

Are you guys like hitting play at the same time on a song while you take off for the first time?

Is there anything like that set up?

That would have been cool, you know, like we started the trip off with like a like a pump-me-up song, like, you know,

tiger or something.

Yeah, and you guys could go back to it at different points when you're all flagging a little bit.

Oh, man.

I wish you had, yeah, I wish you had said that you were going to drive out.

That would have been a good idea.

Or just given us the idea before.

No, we didn't do that.

Okay.

Okay.

And

so this is the first I'm hanging out with Alicia in some time.

Yeah, my daughter, Alicia.

Yeah.

18 years old now.

Let me tell you, Walt undersells this kid.

How so?

Really?

What a fucking cool kid she was.

Mary Beth loved her.

Loved her.

Why would you think I would have a nerd?

I don't know.

Look at me.

All right.

I wasn't going to say it, but look at you.

How could I spawn anything less?

than fucking a 10 on a cool meter.

I mean, you did it.

You did it, man.

You accomplished it.

Later on, I'll tell you something Mary Beth said about her when it's more appropriate.

More appropriate time.

So we leave the next day and we're heading for Indianapolis.

Indiana.

Indiana.

We want to go to

the Mayberry Cafe.

Now, this is something you found, Frank?

I'm not sure.

I think I did.

I think I found it while we were driving, and all I had to do was say Mayberry Cafe, and Walt was all over the walkie-talkie.

Let's go there for lunch.

Oh, yeah, because I just fucking had sucked it up for at a Mongolian restaurant.

I was like, I'm old.

Yeah, I was like, we are definitely going to the Mayberry Cafe where they have burgers, fries, and nothing Chinese.

Right.

Good old American

fair.

Or whatever, Mongolian.

It's all the same to me.

Now, Kill,

I don't know how big of a fan you are of the Andy Griffith show, but

we're in this little town.

I think you know.

You're familiar with it, though, right?

Oh, yeah, I actually do think it's very funny.

But so there's a little cafe there that is,

I don't know why it's in Indiana because that's not even near where Mayberry actually is, which is by the Carolinas, where I was based, that town on anyway.

But this little cafe has adopted

everything about the show.

They have like an old police car in front of the cafe.

They have TVs all over the place showing the black and white episodes, none of that color shit.

Oh, nice.

Purity.

And it is like, it feels like you just stepped back into 1955, 56,

maybe 57, if you're lucky.

It was awesome.

I couldn't recommend it enough to people who may be traveling across country.

If you're in, I don't know what little town I was in, but look up Mayberry Cafe or Diner, whatever it is.

It was awesome.

Yeah, but before we got there, there was a Mayday call put out.

A 911.

Frank Five, what happened?

So we're driving to the Mayberry Cafe.

We're about about 10 miles i think from the cafe and all of a sudden my car um engine light comes on

and uh what happened was the something with a limited slip um uh

thing that goes on with the car um failed and because of that it would not allow me to drive more than 40 miles per hour uh in the vehicle

so just stay behind me i said you'll be fine

yeah i i think i could have even passed you.

So

I, you know, I tell, we pull over.

Walt is kind enough to take Mary with him to go to the Mayberry Cafe.

He was very excited about the Mayberry Cafe, so I didn't want to slow him down.

So I said, you guys go to the Mayberry Cafe.

I'm going to go to the Cadillac dealership and see if I can get this car.

fixed today while you guys are eating because it's you know it's the second day of the trip so off they all go now I'm sitting in a Cadillac dealership in the middle of this Indiana town they don't know if they're going to be able to get the car in they don't know what's going on with the car I might have to stay overnight all this stuff is going on I get a text message from Walt this cafe is awesome they got They got videos playing, they got t-shirts, they got all the food I like, and he's going on and on and on about how awesome this place is, forgetting that I am alone at a car dealership trying to get my car fixed begging me people to fix the car before we can uh proceed

double check okay yeah it's good okay sorry sorry Frank Brian was fixing something uh wow so Walt you you were that excited that you forgot that he was

well I didn't forget I was just he told me that he was going to go to a dealership and then he was going to have a loaner car.

He would get a loaner car and we would like, and while he was getting the car repaired, we could still do some sightseeing in Indiana, do some little, little things while the car is being repaired.

And he was going to come meet us at the diner.

So I assumed that, I mean, I didn't realize that he was

getting all fucking,

you know, weak at the knees because he had to sit at a fucking car repair shop.

I had no idea.

I know.

He was blowing up my phone, too.

He was like, come get me.

And he wouldn't come and get me either.

I texted Brian.

I'm like, where are you?

He goes, oh, I'm 10 minutes from the cafe.

I'm like, great, hey, can you just swing by?

I'm on this route.

Can you come and pick me up?

I'm only like 15 minutes from the place.

He's like, sorry, I can't.

Cars full.

Like, nope.

He couldn't pick me up either.

Now, I would have.

I was on a totally, like, for some reason, my GPS made me go a different way.

So I was like way out in the boonies.

And I'm like, there's no fucking way there's a car dealership out here.

In fact, it made me second guess if I went the right way.

But, Frank, you were how far away from the Mayberry Cafe?

I was probably about maybe six miles from it.

So it was too, I couldn't walk it.

No way.

So, but right.

So what I'm saying is, at worst, you would have arrived at the Mayberry Cafe and then having to drive an additional six miles in any direction to get Frank.

And you still said, no, you still were like, just

round trip.

It's 12 miles.

Hugh, did you forget I ate at the Mongolian restaurant the night before?

I'm done.

There's no more, like, I don't need to do anything anymore.

No, I agree with you.

But even, like, I'm just saying, there was a possibility that Mrs.

Five could have gotten in your car and driven to pick up her husband and then just drove it back.

Well, you would be wrong on that one because I don't think Mrs.

Five ever gets in the driver's seat.

No, no.

I can see how you were out of options to get them.

Yeah, I understand that.

In fairness to us.

I was on my own.

In fairness to us, Frank kept saying, I'll be there in 15 minutes.

And it's like 15 minutes came and went, then a half hour came.

I mean, it didn't matter because there was no tables anyway.

Oh, really?

So actually, Frank showed up, and it was almost like right then it was time to go in.

So it worked out.

Oh, shit.

Wait, it was a waiting list for the Mayberry Cafe in Ohio?

Oh, we waited over an hour and a half because they kept sitting all the locals.

They really have to do it.

Just like Mayberry would.

The real thing.

Apparently,

when Walt said to the host, we're from New Jersey, that didn't have any clout whatsoever in Indiana.

Oh, man.

You should have dropped.

That's like the heartland.

That's our

Impractical Joker's demographics.

You could have been like, hey, man, you ever watch Impractical Jokers?

If you said, yes, I could have FaceTimed in and been like, hey.

I wouldn't have picked up.

We'd look like assholes.

Or even better, like, I FaceTime it.

She's like, I don't give a fuck.

She said, this is the Mayberry Cafe, motherfucker.

But now, Frank finally gets there, and then Bry, of course,

is a little agitated that we haven't been sat yet.

Just a little.

So I'm telling him, like, hey, man, it's fucking Mayberry, man.

You don't come right in and we'll bluster in with like, like, hey, it's been too long.

What's going on?

So we went back in, and it turned out that the guy forgot about us,

which really didn't matter.

And it didn't matter to me at all.

I was like, hey, it happens.

And it turned out this guy loved me, right?

I mean, he couldn't keep his hands off me.

He was like, he's not even kidding around.

He was like rubbing his shoulders and massaging me.

Total stranger.

Yeah.

Just like, I was like, this is what it's like to live in the heartland, man.

Early massaging you.

They got up to that sort of shit in Mayberry.

Yeah, he was patting me on the back.

He was calling me like Jersey.

I love that, though.

Like, you know, I had a nickname already on the second day of the trip, Jersey.

That's what I want you guys to call me from now on, Jersey.

Jersey.

Name the state you're from, and that's your nickname.

Yeah, that's like World War II.

That dude did love you.

I think he loved us because we did.

Because when he told us, he literally admitted that, like, I've totally forgot about you guys.

We're even here.

And we were like, don't worry about it, man.

It's okay.

I think he was just like, he was like, oh, these guys are cool.

These guys are all right.

And he kind of took a shine to us and then really gave us a table right in like the best table in the house.

Yeah.

Far away from the toilets.

The unpleasantness.

But so Frank's car isn't done, even though we finished lunch and everything.

We're like, okay, what is there to do?

And

she recommended the Walmart.

Yeah, one girl recommended a Walmart.

Which to me didn't sound that bad.

Yeah, I was about to say.

It was a Target because we had just gone to Target the night before.

And we're like, we already went to Target.

Then the weirdest thing she said that our waitress said for things to do in town was, well, you can go start a fire in the field.

That's what me and my friends do.

Yeah, they go start fires in open fields.

And that's just something a bunch of strangers into town are going to take upon themselves.

Jersey, what are you doing out there?

But so then we have to find something to do.

And there's a,

it's called a they called it a flea market.

Would you call it a flea market?

I guess it did.

I would call it like an old-fashioned kind of indoor flea market

where

I just don't know how they do it.

I just don't know how they could stay open seven days a week from nine in the morning till six at night,

just selling stuff that like is like just useless junk.

Yeah, I mean, I have a lot of junk.

I have the answer for you.

I know how.

How?

Because the only other thing to do in that fucking town is light fires in the middle of a field or go to a target.

So, what on earth are they going to do besides that?

At least they get to talk to people there.

Yeah.

It was an eye-opener how

Middle America lives because it's different than how we live out here.

It's definitely more relaxed.

It's definitely more laid back.

You know, it's much like the TSD Town General Store because I think we have just as many sales as this flea market did on a Monday.

It's not going well.

Just a couple of droughts while I was gone.

I heard

there was a four-day drought of sales, which was broken by a bumper sticker, and then another two-day drought in between that.

We are so fucked.

So, yeah, now I know this is where I started to notice something was going on with Bry, though, when we were at the flea market, though, because he disappeared from the flea market.

You know, me and Frank are trying on hats.

We're like trying to make a go of it.

We're trying to have fun, even though we're in a shitty flea market.

We're still trying to have fun.

And Bry's gone.

M-I-A.

I'm out of here.

You're like, well, it's like he's back on the drugs.

Yay, it looked like he may have been.

Yeah, I felt like I may have been.

But I had taken a run out to get some cold medicine because when I was at the Mayberry Cafe, I started like my head started feeling woozy and shit.

I was like, well, I just don't feel right.

Like, I didn't feel sick, but I just didn't feel right.

So, we went to the flea market, and then I left the flea market for a little while, went down to a CVS, got some cold medicine and shit, some tissues, came back, and then from there we went to it was like outlet mall.

I guess it was just a waste mall.

It was an outlet, yeah, like an outlet like complex, like just filled with

your standard outlet stores, like Nike,

Gap, all that kind of like corporate, you know, right brand shit.

So

we split up.

Everybody's looking at different shit.

Me and Mary Beth went to Barnes and Noble because I'm like, I just want to sit down a little bit.

I just want to sit down.

And as I'm sitting there, more and more, I'm like, I don't think I could drive like another mile tonight.

Oh, we still got a lot of drive in front of us.

We got like six hours to make up because we're sitting in fucking Indiana, you know, like not making any headway.

So Frank's car got fixed.

You guys have to go to the next one.

No, not even yet.

Still not fixed.

Not yet.

Not yet.

Okay.

Okay.

But I'm sitting in Barnes and Noble and I'm like, maybe

I because

the goal was to get to where the next day

or that night.

Frankie, remember?

Let me see.

I think it was to get to St.

Louis area, right?

That's where it was.

St.

Louis, which was about three hours or so, maybe a little bit more.

And I said to the

what the hell?

Amber Alert.

Amber Alert.

Who cares about that?

I know.

Come on.

Kids come and go all the time.

This trip has hardened you.

I know he's not in my house.

So if he's not in my house, then I don't know where the fuck the kid is.

So

I say to those guys, I was like, I think what I'm going to do is get a room.

This is at four o'clock in the afternoon.

Yeah.

I'm going to get a room, and what I'll do is I'll get up real early tomorrow morning.

I got to sleep off whatever this I'll get up real early tomorrow morning so I get there by, you know, by like nine o'clock, and then we can take off.

You know, I'll drive in the morning.

That didn't happen.

They went on the St.

Louis.

And when did I tell you?

We woke up.

I woke up around six o'clock in the morning and I saw the text

that you were like,

it's not happening, guys.

Yeah, I'm like, I can't do it.

And this is, god damn it.

What is going on?

Oh, is it your phone?

Yeah.

Wow.

I mean, I hope that kid's okay.

And that night, I was like, I got to make a call here.

Like, if I feel this way,

this late,

am I going to be able to fucking drive?

Like, I can't drive like this.

And I was like, I had to make a call.

And I called it off.

I was like, I guess I can't go.

Because I'm like, I then stayed.

Okay, so we're in

Plainfield.

No, we're in Plainfield,

Indiana.

So I stayed there that night.

And then I was like, I can't even, I can't go anywhere.

Like, I can't, even to Columbus, I can't drive back to Columbus.

It's only three hours.

So I got the road for a second night.

You know, then it was just a series of like, we got to Columbus.

And then the next day we drove three hours, then the next day we drove three hours.

You know, it took us like probably as long as it took you guys to get the Grand Canyon, it took us to get back to fucking jersey.

Um, I mean, you want to talk about fucking deflated, something I've been looking forward to for ever since the second you texted me, you're like, Hey, this is what we're doing.

I was like, I'm in, yeah, yeah, you know, yeah, it sucked.

Yeah, I was shocked.

I was just like, Is this

like some sort of joke he's gonna pull and he's gonna pop up, pop up in the Grand Canyon and be there?

You guys thought I wasn't coming, huh?

Great joke.

I'm not sure if this will make you feel any better, Brian.

But there were many times throughout the trip that we both said we wished you were there.

There were certain instances, things that happened.

I mean, we want you, we wanted you there anyway, but there were certain times that things happened that we were like, oh my God, if Bridget was here, that would have been just great.

Getting hustled by homeless people.

Oh, yeah.

Waitresses.

It really, it sucked to have to turn around and go back.

And what I was saying earlier about Alicia was Mary Beth had some plan in her head where Alicia was going to drive my car and Mary Beth was going to be the passenger and I was going to drive with you guys for a while.

We were just going to mix it up Chinese fire drill style.

I was like, really?

So Alicia, you're going to put her on highways doing like 80s

around semis in your brand new car?

I mean, it's insured.

So if she if she wanted, if they were like, we want to do this, I would have been like, all right.

The only time Alicia drove was when there was like this

tiny ass little road that we were going to be on for over an hour.

There was no traffic anywhere.

I was like, yeah, you can drive now.

Because otherwise, I want to be able to sleep in the car.

So, like, if I'm all nervous and I'm all like, like, I'm not real comfortable, like, I can, like, or I can relax or I can go to sleep.

Like, if Deb's driving, it's okay.

But, like, Alicia's too new of a driver.

I could never fall asleep.

And I just wanted to sleep at times.

So, at that point, I was like, yeah, you can drive on this road because I knew it was so remote in the middle of fucking nowhere.

We let her drive, but yeah, definitely not on that fucking highway.

I would be white-knuckling it the whole time in the back seat.

Oh, if she wasn't there.

I'm talking about if I saw, if I knew she was in front of me, all that traffic and all that.

So, yeah, so that's kind of where I

fall from the story.

Jesus, man.

When you texted me, I was like, how the fuck?

In one way, I said, it's the most tell him Steve Dave thing possible.

I said to him, I was like, it just seems right for the podcast somehow.

As much as I would have rather you had made it and have all those stories, like, this is on brand.

It really is.

When you think about it.

The fucking wheels fall off almost right away.

Yeah, I mean, like, I told Frank, I was like, this is not going well.

I said, like, right out of the gate, man, like, your car's not working.

He's sick.

I go,

I had, like,

there was a shadow looming over us right out of the gate.

Did it clear up after the Johnson curse moved away from you?

It seemed like it was smooth sailing after that.

Yeah, it actually did.

You know,

it really was kind of like smooth sailing.

You know, no one got hurt.

No one got sick.

No, there was no real like.

No fights.

No snafus, no fights, no nothing.

It was just kind of like I said, like, just kind of smooth sailing, thankfully.

And yeah, it was

just just a decent time where where's the first place that you guys stopped like did you stop any any places between there and arches i hope we still we stopped in st.

Louis at

another flea market

we were gonna go we were gonna go to downtown st.

Louis

but we were but me me and Frank were in the in the flea market and the ladies were out in front of the flea market because they had had enough of it.

And they started talking to some locals,

and they told us that, like, you do not want to go into St.

Louis.

You will get shot.

Right, Frank?

Yeah.

Now, mind you, I was very excited.

We were going to go to this 50s diner soda shop and everything, and we were all ready to go.

And the guy says, you don't want to go around there.

It's dangerous.

It's going to be,

you know, you can get shot and this and that.

Walt looks at us and he goes, this is a message from above.

So we should just continue on going and skip this soda fountain.

Yeah, I said, This is God intervening right now.

And we better listen to God

or else we're going to regret this because this guy was like, I think, don't even think this, like, this guy could have been a ghost.

When we drove away, he could have just like dissipated in the wind and turned to dust.

Or he's like, he's like Ralph from like, go doomed.

You're all doomed to Friday the 13th.

Remember, Ralph?

Go doomed.

Yeah, crazy Ralph.

how uh my question is though how does a 50s style soda fountain survive in the middle of a hood of people getting shot and shit like who's going who's going there

now I didn't we didn't do any investigation to see if this old man I mean he had to be 102 if he was if he was if he was 100 I mean he he looked like shoe leather left out in the sun for you know his whole life and he you know he

But I just felt like it would be wise to heed his warning to not go into St.

Louis and, you know, go to this 50s soda jerk diner.

It's not enough.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Like, is it really like I like Coke right out of the can.

I don't need to have it on tap

and then get capped

for the fucking honor of going to the soda.

Yeah, for the trouble of going to the soda factory.

So you skipped the blocker.

Is this going to be a series of things you guys didn't go to because you were afraid?

Yeah,

you know how it is.

I talked all

bed for months leading up to this trip, how I would be fucking climbing out of the fucking Grand Canyon by just my fingernails and toenails.

It didn't happen.

It didn't happen that way.

Well, you made it to Arches, right?

Yeah, yeah, we made it to Arches.

Now, was it worth it?

Was it how you remembered it?

Yeah, remember Q,

that's a trip we did together.

I was very impressed with Arches when we went

so many years ago.

I thought it was more beautiful than the Grand Canyon.

Yeah.

I agree.

I do agree with that.

It's more breathtaking.

Yeah.

I can see that.

I mean, the Grand Canyon is a Grand Canyon, but yeah, I see what you mean.

And I took a page out of you and Bry.

I told them, Frank and my wife and my daughter, and this is five, we were going to eat at that restaurant you guys ate at at the top of the mountain.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Remember that?

Oh, shit.

I forgot all about that.

Remember, the waitress was there.

We're like, we're doing nothing with our lives.

Look at her.

She ate from somewhere.

Yeah.

That's right.

We were so impressed with that woman.

That's right.

Yeah, we ate at that restaurant, and

it was really nice.

You know, it was like we got there when it was turning dusk.

So the sky's all purpley and pink, and it turns to, you know, to pitch black, and the stars are out up there.

Yeah, it was really, really nice.

And then the next morning we did, got up early, got into arches for free.

Oh, that early.

That early.

Wow, that is early.

That's a coup, right?

And that's awesome.

Yeah.

When you get to fucking, you know, it's probably not cheap.

No, it ain't cheap to get into these

national parks.

Yeah.

So

if you go like on the off times, though, right?

Nobody's there because we got into the Grand Canyon for free the first time.

Yeah, because we got in so late.

First time?

Multiple trips to the Grand Canyon.

I wasn't aware of this.

Yeah, we spent two days in the Grand Canyon.

One day we got in for free, free, and then the next day we paid to the nose

twice.

Yeah, yeah.

So, you know what?

The thing with the Moab and the arches was,

I just couldn't believe

some of the

parents who allow children to take, to climb these rocks that if they slip, if there's one mishap,

You have a dead child in front of you.

Like, so much so that, like, I was feeling nauseous watching from afar these

10-year-olds climb these massive rocks to the tippy top with these amazing, like, like, degrees, like the angles that they were at.

Would like if there wasn't one slip, they're done.

And the kids are done.

Parents are just like, whatever.

Yeah, and the parents are just like,

and I'm just like, what are you doing?

Why are you laughing like that?

How could you watch that?

Like, it would be nauseating for me to sit there and have that kind of like anxiety to see if like if Alicia would make it back down from that rock, right?

Oh, yeah, like

I just don't know how this.

I guess there's some people you know who who do nature.

Like, I don't really do nature, and they have a different mindset.

You know, they're a little bit more carefree and not adventuresome.

Yeah, they're not as

safety conscious

as me.

They'd go to the 50-style diner in the hood.

Kids climb all over the counter.

Now, we forgot to mention just before the arches, even though we didn't go to the 50-style diner, we went to that city in Illinois, that Casey city, that everything there was big.

Oh, yeah.

The largest attractions, you remember that?

Yeah.

Largest rocking chair, largest, world's largest thermometer, all that kind of stuff.

Yeah, this town had bought in that if they built

giant props, kind of like the Fortress of Solitude level of lunacy, where like a chair the size of like a, of a, of a building,

that they would have, they would have to beat the tourisms, the tourists off with a stick, with a giant stick, with a giant ruler.

But that wasn't the case.

There was nobody there.

It was a fucking ghost town of giant props.

That sounds pretty fucking cool.

It is, but I don't know how these little towns are making it in 2021, man.

There is just like, they're close at like five o'clock.

Nothing's open, just nobody on the streets.

You think that there was still like we were still in lockdown in some of these towns we drove through.

That's where you stayed, or you just drove through there?

We just drove through there.

Okay.

Now, Grand Canyon, was it expensive to stay?

Like the rooms and stuff?

More so than the rest of the trip?

What would you say, Frank?

I'm sorry, I didn't hear him.

What did he say?

The expense of the rooms in the Grand Canyon as compared to the rest of the trip.

Moab was?

Yeah, Moab was, I would say, Moab was probably the most expensive room out of all the places we went to, except at the very, very end when we were in Texas.

But I don't think I, you know, what was expensive at the Grand Canyon was gasoline because they have a little Grand Canyon village down at the very bottom.

That's the only place you can get gas.

It's the only place you can get food.

And it was like four something a gallon, right?

Welcome to Biden's America, buddy.

Yeah.

Now, cute, have you been to the Grand Canyon without when we went, other than when we went together?

Yes, yeah, I went.

I had never been.

I had no idea there was a little town in Grand Canyon with like

a pizza parlor and a McDonald's and a Wendy's and a hotels and chocolate fractures.

Within the canyon?

Right around the rim.

Oh, around the rim, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I didn't know that.

It was like a little tourist attraction where they rape you.

You're here for everything that you got.

Everything.

How much is this?

How much did you get?

Yeah, gas, food, everything.

Like, it's the most expensive Wendy's in America.

The

lady at the window told us when we pulled up.

She, because she goes, How'd you like those prices?

This is the most expensive Wendy's in the country.

She works there.

Yeah, she works there.

She's almost gloating about it.

She knows you can't do it.

She's like, You don't like it?

Go eat sand, the motherfucker.

My God, were there any standout moments in Grand Canyon?

Oh, God.

Yeah, yeah, there were.

But before we get into the Grand Canyon, like I said,

I talked kind of a big game, right?

You would say, like, I was going to do this and I was going to do that.

And

in very hot temperatures, you said you were going to do it.

Yeah.

And so

leading.

Did you take your water pills?

I had a backpack.

I brought myself a backpack, like a real hiking backpack.

And I tried to break it.

like Giddam said, you got to break it in.

He goes, You just can't wear a new backpack while you're hiking.

He goes, and I was just like, You're full of shit.

What are you talking about?

Why would I need to break in a backpack?

And he goes, You'll see.

And motherfucker, my nipples.

I couldn't wear the backpack because it would rub on my nipples the wrong way.

So, so, like, right off the bat, I'm like, What the fuck?

I can't even wear the backpack where I'm going to keep all our water because it hurts my because it hurts my nipples.

You should have taped them up like Lady Gagar or something.

Two exes.

So, but leading up to that trip, for the weeks leading up to that, I was bombarded with messages from aunts to my personal email, KMUS2 at Gmail, with

absolutely very concerned, very nice,

some condescending pricks who are like,

let me know

when you're at the Grand Canyon so I can plan to come out and visit you at the hospital because I know that's where you're going to be if you attempt this.

Like that kind of tone, some of these emails were getting.

What an asshole, man.

So there, but there were some very

concerning emails I was getting from people who said they did this and that you're not going to be able to do this without taking precautions.

They said, if you don't have the proper shoes, you're going to lose toenails on this hike.

If you don't have a walking stick, you will be confronted with snakes.

And how are you going to to move them without a walking stick?

So, you better bring a walking stick.

How am I going to move them with a walking stick?

They were like,

Your brain's going to be scrambled within 10 seconds.

You don't use this elevation.

He goes, Please, I beg you, do not do this.

They put the fear of God in me so much that

we just stayed in the Grand Canyon fucking

little tourist city.

We didn't call.

We did the chocolate factory and we went to the pizza parlor.

You guys never hiked?

We did hike.

We didn't even go on pizza.

Oh, my God.

I was so terrified that we were going to die that I was like, I can't do it.

I just, I don't want to take these, everybody down there.

And then if we can't get out,

it's just not worth it.

Like, like I said, there was too many people warning me.

Like, there was just too many things.

I was like, God is speaking to me right now.

What about the donkeys, the burrows?

We didn't see anything like that.

We were at

the southern rim, and when we got there, there was no donkeys.

There was no glass bridge.

There was no donkeys at the Wendy's.

Oh, no, there were.

So we did the touristy thing in the afternoon.

We went to

the trails that the tourists do.

Like,

we stayed by the people who look like they, you know, they couldn't really do anything.

Like they couldn't hack it.

They're too old or too out of shape.

That's where I felt like that was our lane.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, you were with them, were you?

We took the handicapped trail that would take

the

lack of self-awareness.

Is fantastic.

Now, Frank, were you in agreement with this?

Were you like, oh, it was too dangerous?

He was not happy then.

But his wife was happy.

She was like, you can only go where Walt goes.

She goes.

Let me tell you, going to the Grand Canyon was like having three wives because

we were in Utah just before.

We're all mormons now and every time i walked even remotely close just to see what the the the grape canyon looked like all of them from 10 feet away were yelling to me to come back that i was too close to the edge i needed to come back out to the concree and look at it from there

But your wife was so concerned.

She was like filled with anxiety as you got too close to the edge, though.

Why would you want to do that to her?

She said to me, she goes, you can go wherever Walt goes, which was what she told me.

So that was what I saw at the Grand Canyon.

You drive 2,500 miles for Walt to be like, no.

But you said.

But when we got there, it was like, it was massive.

We never would have fucking made it down to the bottom.

There's not a chance on the planet we would have made it down to the bottom.

It was completely bigger than I remembered it.

Yeah, it was huge.

Huge.

There's no fucking

ended up walking to

the other side of the path, and I was just like, I'll go in the car and I'll wait for you guys in the parking lot.

So I just parked, I parked close to the path, waiting for them with the air conditioner running.

And I was watching TV.

He started to put on the office.

He's at the Grand Canyon and he's watching the office in his car.

Mary's like, did Walt say you could do that?

But what I wanted to do was I had saw the night before, I had saw

these really hyped up tours, that Jeep tours.

And I was like, let's do the Jeep tour.

It says that

they grant you access that most tourists will not gain.

You know, you're going to get more,

you're going to go areas where like, the normal tourists don't go on these Jeep tours because they're like off-road in,

and

it was expensive per person.

I think it was like $125,

right?

Yep.

Yep.

So

we tried to book these Jeep tours, and we couldn't book one.

They're all sold out

until finally we call the last tour, the Jeep tour place, and they say, yeah, they have enough spots free for us.

So we book it

for 5 o'clock or 6 o'clock in the evening, this tour to see the sun go down in the Grand Canyon.

And they talk about we're going to see wildlife that we've never seen before.

But granted, we had been there for 24 hours, so we had seen all the deer that they were, that that is at the Grand Canyon.

So we didn't actually see anything that we hadn't seen for free, you know, the night before.

But we got,

I swear to God, I'm not exaggerating, we got the most condescending,

fucking

irritating know-it-all.

And I fucking spend six hours a day with Giddam Steve Brady in a room just for us.

And I'm telling you, I know condescending and know-it-all.

And this fucking lady was brutal.

Really?

She was the Jeep driver?

She was the tour guide.

So yeah, tell them about it.

I mean, I can't even, I know you guys are going to think I'm exaggerating and this didn't happen or she didn't say this.

But I swear to God, everything that we were going to tell you about this fucking tour tour guide is gospel.

It was

shocking how poor she was.

We could start off by saying that it's safe to assume that everybody thinks Walt Flanagan is wonderful because this tour guide

did not like you.

She hated you.

She hated me because I had the fucking balls to question

some of her knowledge.

And then when she got, and when she annoyed me, I started to then just fucking outright mock her.

The woman you described as a smug asshole.

There was one point in the tour where they were bickering back and forth.

Yeah, it's true.

Over the year that drones were first brought into public use.

It's true.

Because everything that everything

that she brought up about showing us the Grand Canyon and

relaying knowledge, she relayed knowledge by asking us questions.

Like, does anybody know this?

Or does anybody know this?

Or does anybody know this?

It was like, it became too irritating to be constantly be like questioned about anything.

It's not a classroom.

Right.

It's like, if we fucking knew these questions, we wouldn't fucking be paying you through the nose.

To tell us the fucking answers.

Right.

And so, and when you said something, let's say you were wrong, and like, because she's not talking until somebody answers.

Someone throws out an answer, even if it's wrong.

So we would throw out an answer, and if it was wrong, she'd be like, before you could even finish the word, no.

Wrong.

And of course she's fucking, she had to let us know she was formerly a vegan.

Right off the bat.

I'm like, this isn't about you, bitch.

No one cares about, we're here to see the fucking hole in the fucking earth.

We don't care about your dietary needs or how you're so much better and superior to us us who consume fucking

homogenized or pasteurized food.

But I mean, if she's like, I'm formerly a vegan.

Yeah, but now she hunts her food and nothing goes to waste.

Oh, good for her.

Oh, my God.

She was so fucking pretentious.

It was fucking maddening.

Well, we kind of got off on the wrong foot with her

about 10 minutes into the tour through no fault of our own.

She dropped us off at some store and told us to go for a half hour go look our first fucking stop on the tour was a gift shop in a parking lot

where there's hundreds of thousands of people anyway so that's our first stop and she goes you have a half hour here

to just go like at a gift shop right

so obviously we don't have it there's not a half hour that we're going to spend in a gift shop so we just sat on the side of the rim You know, it was nice and cool.

And there was these squirrels everywhere that were almost like they would um they were so conditioned and trained to kind of like sit up on their hind legs and beg for food it's so cute and adorable like they look like little men walking for food if you give them food and they're very aggressive for the food but it's still cute as hell you know they look like they're walking on their back feet

and we're just sitting there and another tour guide

A nice guy, I thought, comes over and just starts a conversation with Frank.

About what, Frank?

What was it again?

Something about a car, right?

yeah i was wearing a delorean hat so we were talking about the car and then he started we started to ask him a couple questions about the grand canyon just because we're making what else we're going to talk about with this guy who won't leave us alone so obviously you know he we're talking about and we ask about what's the most dangerous animal and he goes oh it's the squirrels he goes they have bubonic plague

now granted we were just feeding these squirrels hours earlier in the day and i was telling frank don't feed that squirrel oh yeah.

Yeah, because I said, you don't know if it's going to scratch you or give you rabies.

And he wouldn't listen.

There's something else he didn't want me to do.

Stay away from the squirrel.

But I was right, though.

I was like,

they may have disease.

You don't know.

They're out in the daytime.

This is not normal behavior for a squirrel to be walking up to you that nonchalant and begging for food.

Right.

And getting aggressive if he doesn't get it.

Like, they went into his bag.

Really?

With their two hands, like little chimpanzees, like little primates.

So they're trying to get into his bag to take his chocolate bar.

Jesus.

So we're floored by that when he says they have bubonic plague and they're the most dangerous animals in the park.

And then we're talking about, you know, these kids who are like, who are just dangling their feet off a very precarious rock?

Like, if

they had fallen, they would have died.

So I was like,

why are you guys allowed this?

Like, why are the park rangers so like okay with people acting like fools just to get a like a selfie.

And he got like kind of a like, well, it's nature.

We're not supposed to be putting up higher walls.

This is what it's all about.

If you're too stupid, you know, it's your fault.

And I go, yeah, we just read a story about a kid who got blown off the rim.

Not doing anything wrong, a little four-year-old who got blown off the rim because of a high gust of wind.

And he's like, so?

The fucking railings taller, asshole.

Like, what, you're telling me it's okay for kids to come on vacation and get blown off the side of the rim?

I got to say, I kind of feel for him.

I felt the same way during that Amber alert.

I'm like, so?

So we're talking to him.

And like I said, I would have rather had this guy as our tour guide because he was still nice.

He goes, where's the beers?

Are we going to get beers later?

You know, and we went.

Was Q the tour guide?

Just some dude you met in a parking lot wants to go grab beers later.

Like, yeah, I'm a Ranger.

Why not?

But he had a personality at least.

And he wasn't like so condescending and pretentious as our tour guide was.

But then our tour guide fuck comes around the corner and she's like, hello, we're waiting for you.

Oh, my God.

She goes, what's going on?

They're early.

Yeah, like, we're like, oh, okay.

We didn't know we were back.

We thought we had more time.

And she's like, what's going on with that?

With that tour guide?

Why are you asking him so many questions?

Shut the fuck up.

No.

Oh, my God.

This is where we wished you were here because no one's going to believe us.

We said, she is so pissed off that we were talking to another tour guide.

Like we were cheating at her.

Yes.

So we thought she was teasing at first.

So we kind of rolled with it.

She's like, oh, you know, we were just talking about DeLoreans.

And he told us that the fucking squirrels have bubonic plague.

I was like, is that true?

And she's like, well, why don't you go back and ask him?

Oh,

my

I was stunned when she said that because I'm sitting right behind her in the Jeep.

And I looked at my friend and I'm like, is she like, is she serious or is she teasing us?

And she was not teasing us.

She was fucking livid that we were talking to another tour guide.

Dude, I was upset already that I wasn't able to go on the trip now.

Oh, my God.

It sounds awesome.

Oh, my God.

My daughter, I look at my daughter, and she does not want me to engage.

She's like, stop.

Stop talking to her.

You know,

it's like she doesn't find it amusing

that she's getting more irritated with me by the moment.

So we go to the next stop and she goes to another spot, which is fucking another parking lot, just another parking lot amongst the fucking 12 that we visited that night.

So we get out and she goes, you can go out here and get some good pictures.

There's some great scenery over here.

And she starts to talk about how the Grand Canyon had to ban drones

because of

the frequency that a drone is like controlled on will interfere with the helicopters' tours or rescues that they might have to perform.

And I thought that was interesting.

So I said, oh, wow.

I go, so was that something that was learned by accident?

That, like, you know, because when the drones came into popularity, I can't imagine that people just didn't come with them and were like, I'm going to get amazing footage here at the Grand Canyon with my drone.

And you guys learned the hard way or that, you know, you had to like squash this.

I said, so when was that?

I said, when was that implemented that they had to ban ban drones?

She goes, she goes, well, when were drones invented?

She goes,

so like in my face like that.

And I was like,

I don't know.

And she goes, the 80s.

And I go, and so it's the 80s.

She goes, like, like, like, she's right and turns away.

And I go, no, I don't think so.

I said,

I don't think a commercial drone was available to the average Joe consumer in the 80s.

I said, it would be much, much later than that.

Probably 20 years.

I said, I could, I can't imagine anyone having a drone in the 90s.

I said.

and she goes, I don't know.

And then, like, five minutes later, she comes back and she goes, she goes, drones were in the 80s.

She goes, I was a government contractor

and a former vegan.

I swear to God, she said that.

Like, she couldn't let it go that I questioned,

and I told her, like, there's no way that drones were around in the 80s.

I said, consumer models of drones, I mean, I can't say for a fact, but I feel like I'm 99.9% sure.

We would have seen them.

I wish you were there.

My daughter is just mortified.

It's like we're arguing about drones amongst all the tourists that

are on the

rim.

And then she says something that

I just had had enough.

She goes,

Do you know who has to get rescued more at the Grand Canyon?

Men or female?

Men or women.

And somebody says, men, and she goes, wrong.

it's it's women, she goes, You know, why?

And I said, Because I don't listen to the men.

I said, Oh, yes,

that is fucking perfect.

Oh, my God, she just didn't even look at me, she had sunglasses on, so I couldn't see how mad her eyes were, but she just was like, She was seething.

And I looked over at my daughter, like, laughing, like, huh?

That was a good one, right?

And she's just like, Will you just shut up?

And she goes, The reason that women need to be rescued more at the Grand Canyon is because men, what happens when men get tired?

What do they do?

And nobody knows.

That's what it is.

She says they will rest.

What will women do when we get tired?

Women, we will carry on.

We will persevere.

We will keep going.

And we will push ourselves to the point where, you know, where we push ourselves harder than the men.

because of

whatever.

I don't know what her reasoning was.

And that's why women have to get rescued more.

It's due to stupidity, that is what she's saying.

That's what she's saying.

And then she says something that just fucking makes me go,

she didn't just say that, did she?

She starts talking about,

well, who funds the parks and the national parks?

Who's in charge of the national parks in the government?

And, you know, questions that I'm like, who the fuck knows?

I don't know.

But she starts rattling off like, who's in charge of that?

The Department of

I don't know, Department of Nature.

I don't know what it was.

And people are just zoning out now because she just keeps asking us questions that nobody can answer.

And then if somebody says something, she's like, no.

But then she says something that just made me go, I can't believe she just said that.

She goes, now

BLM, she goes,

is

a political organization who does nothing.

Not really.

And I was just like,

what, what just happened here?

Like, like, she just fucking called out BLM

at the Grand Canyon, we're looking at fucking shrubs and berries.

And

she just says that out of nowhere.

Like her political feelings on BLM.

Unless BLM means something else at the Grand Canyon.

Well, there's the Bureau of Land Management.

Oh, okay.

Then that may be it then.

Because I was like, what the hell is she talking about?

Why is she bringing this up?

How does she know our political, how does she not know?

Like, why, why is she saying this?

Like, would she say this if there was people of color in our group?

Or would she call it by at least

the full name instead of an acronym?

Right.

Yeah, I think that's probably what she means.

She probably has personal experience with BLM and is unhappy with her.

Oh, but not the BLM that's in the news today.

No, no, the one that nobody knows about.

The one that she should have sort of specified, since everyone thinks BLM.

Okay, there, I was wrong on that one then.

But remember, before she even mentioned that, she was saying how she used to live on the southern border of the state.

Oh, yeah.

Yes, and she goes, I moved away because of everything that's happening down on the border.

She goes, it's just a mess.

Yeah, she kind of did bring her personal feelings into

the tour information.

I wonder who she voted for.

I didn't ask her.

Yeah, but she just had a distaste.

She was just kind of like

just

too pretentious and too

interested in kind of making us feel stupid.

She actually said at one point, where did you people go to school?

Oh, my God.

That's what she said.

Right, Frank?

Yes.

Where did you get your education at?

She goes.

So everybody's terrified to say the wrong answer because she's jumping down our throats.

She's just been like Harvard.

Frank here went to Yale.

We had a teacher and a professor in our group, and they were terrified to say anything because they were about to get their heads bitten off.

Yeah,

I kind of sidled up to the other group that was

on our bus afterwards.

Oh, you were distancing yourself from all of them.

Yeah,

everybody was.

Nobody wanted to sit next.

I'm with this family now.

Holy shit, man.

That's unbelievable.

But then she hits the balls.

The balls.

She brings us back to our car, you know, and she goes, I have a tip jar up here, and if you would, please leave me a great review.

I was just like, you got to be out of your mind.

I wasn't about to go leave her a bad review because I hate people who leave bad reviews.

I'm just not into doing that.

I have no idea what her day was like before she picked us up.

Maybe it was a bad, bad day.

Right, her muscrack got away when she was like, you know, I'm not, I don't want to judge her of one on a couple hours, so I'm not going to go and leave her a bad review.

But I sure as hell ain't giving you a fucking tip, though.

I paid $120 for that bullshit.

Right.

And if they had been

overly helpful and friendly and like, hey, yeah, like, you know, like, made it a fun experience, then, yeah, you might not feel bad, like, throwing a 10 or 20.

I want, like, I wish we could have just traded like families and gone on the tour guide with a guy who wanted to go get beers.

Yeah, he would have drank a beer.

I mean, I went to

fucking tried a Mongolian restaurant.

Maybe I was up for a beer.

Holy shit.

Wow.

So, the way back.

Well, then we went to Tombstone.

We saw

Tombstone.

Frank wanted to stop.

I love Tombstone.

You like Tombstone?

You've been there?

Tombstone.

Yeah.

I do.

It's a lot of fun.

Yeah.

Frank really wanted to do Tombstone, so we drove the...

How many hours was that from Grand Canyon, six?

Well, yeah, like six to eight, I think it was.

Everything at this point started to be like eight or nine hours away from each other.

Yeah.

Which makes it difficult to get there before anything closes because you've got to get up so early to get on the road if something closes six hours away.

Yeah.

Because if you start at 10, you get lunch, by the time you roll into town, it's already four o'clock then.

So, and you only have like a couple hours to do anything there.

Yeah, Tombstone's fun.

You know what?

It's not my thing.

I don't think it's a place.

I could see why a lot of people go there.

I could see why people have fun.

But I was kind of like,

I'm just not into Cowboys, I guess.

And you said Alicia's up for anything, right?

She's into the whistle factory.

She's into this shit.

Yeah, she's the kind of person that, like,

whatever you guys want to do, I'm up for it.

I'm not going to complain.

Until, you know, until we're in the car alone.

And then she tells me that

she's like, it's too hot.

What's with Frank?

Why do we have to go to Tombstone?

It's 118 degrees there.

Oh, was it?

Oh, God.

Yeah.

Oh, God.

We saw the whorehouse, though.

Oh, yeah.

That's good.

Yeah, the birdcage, wasn't it?

Yeah, the birdcage.

The birdcage?

I need to take.

Go ahead, I'm sorry.

No, did you take an old Western photo, like an old-timey Western photo with everybody in costume?

No,

we were just still suiting.

We were still fucking seething over

our tour,

our tour budget being fucking blasted by

the tour guide.

But we didn't do that.

But we took photos.

We took a lot of photos off of our phone.

We saw a reenactment of the big fight with Wyatt and

who are some of the other bigwigs in that?

James gang.

Yeah.

Yeah, Doc Holiday.

Doc Holiday.

Yeah.

And I got

the young guys that do that, and there are some older guys.

They deserve more recognition for doing that shit in fucking trench coats in 118-degree weather for a bunch of tourists every fucking day out in the sun.

Probably multiple times a day.

Oh, my God.

And they're like, they are so into it and they're so eager to talk about it.

It was,

yeah, that was impressive

for the actors who were in that.

I loved it.

I would actually love to go back there again.

Tombstone?

With the operating.

What else?

Yeah, I knew.

It's like one street.

We did it all.

You're not going back, Frank.

No.

We saw a knockdown drag out brawl in the streets of Phoenix.

But so, did you just feel like badass?

We felt badass in Tombstone.

Oh, I don't know if you can hear us.

Can you hear us?

You felt badass?

Yeah, I can hear you.

Can you hear me?

Oh, okay.

Yeah, I guess you could feel like a badass.

You can get caught up in that.

Like, yeah, I could be a gunslinger.

You kind of get caught up in that mentality until you're like, yeah, because it's all fucking play acting.

Could you ever imagine living in a fucking time where, like, if you fucking look at somebody the wrong way, they'll shoot you and just shoot you?

Yeah, I don't want to live in a world like that.

But we almost saw a world like that in Phoenix, Q.

We saw a big knockdown drag out brawl right on the streets of Phoenix when we're parked at a traffic light.

Really?

Yeah, some dude just beating the shit out of like three people.

One little man with a bald head just knocking people out.

Women.

Wow.

Knocking out women.

Knocking out women.

He didn't care.

He was hitting anybody.

And people sitting at a bus stop acting, oh, yeah, this is just a regular Monday in Phoenix.

They didn't even try to stop the brawl.

They did not care.

And you said that it happened too quick to bust out your iPhone and get a little World Star action, right?

I mean, I could have.

I was just in shock.

I just don't, I don't see that very often where you just see people just beating the shit out of each other.

And I didn't even think to pick up my phone and videotape it.

I saw a fight in Wildwood, same thing.

I'm just watching it.

And meanwhile, I look around, everybody has their phones out.

And I'm like, yeah, it just doesn't occur to me.

I'm just watching it.

I think it's funny.

My wife's going, why are they doing that?

Like,

let me go find out.

Hey, Baldy.

You know, what's funny about it is that before that, we're in Tombstone, and you feel like a badass, right?

And then you're you're you're in Phoenix and you're seeing this fight on the street and we're like, all right, roll the windows off.

Lock the doors and roll them off.

Yeah, reality hits you in the face when

you see it.

It's not a bunch of little 18-year-olds in play acting and trench coats.

It's a fucking muscular ass fucking five foot five dude with a bald head beating the shit out of five people.

You ain't going up to him and saying, hey, dude, what's going on?

Everything okay?

Like fueled by a mess.

And then where else did we go?

Oh, you guys went on a break and bad tour.

Yes.

Awesome.

It was awesome.

Yeah, we went to New Mexico, Q, and

they were doing tours of locations.

Locations, yeah.

What'd you see?

We saw everything.

We got lucky because when we called for the reservation, the RV was booked up.

But this other guy,

he used to, he runs a limousine company, and he used to actually bring the actors and the crew back and forth when the show was going on, you know, when it was being taped.

So he had a lot of insight and knowledge.

He had a lot of photos and stuff.

So we went with him, and it only ended up being the three of us, me, Mary, and Alicia.

And he took us to, we went to Walter White's house, we went to the laundry, we went to the car wash.

Every single day.

You went to restaurant.

Did you guys go to the restaurant too?

Oh, yeah, yeah.

We went to the, it was called Twisters, but it was the Chicken Brothers in the show.

Oh, God.

And the cool thing was, is that

he kind of knew everybody

on the tour.

And when we got in front of Walter White's house, it's very well known that the people who own the house hate the publicity that this show has generated.

And they will often, you know, scare people away.

They just sit there all day in their driveway, you know, telling people not to take pictures and this and that.

But because they knew our tour guide, we kind of got to hang out there and talk a little bit about what it was like when they were filming the show and everything.

So it was, it was really, really cool.

It was, it was nice.

I mean, that tells me

how, like, how up for anything Alicia is.

Yeah.

She went like

she just met Frank and Mary only a couple days earlier.

And like, you know, she's like totally, like, I couldn't do that as like an 18-year-old.

Right.

Like, I'm just going to go with like, you know, people I really don't know.

She's not like me, though.

Yeah, like your parents' friends.

She's got a personality, yeah.

Yeah, she's a cool kid.

But yeah, me and Deb, while they were, we searched for Sabaros because we were just like Jones in for like real pizza, like, or at least pizza that we recognized.

So we're like on the hunt for, like, you know, we're like crack addicts driving around Phoenix, like, hey, man, you where's the Sabaros at?

You're gonna start knocking women at this shit.

So we finally find a Savaros in this mall and I've never been in a mall like this, man.

I had, I just, it was just a culture shock.

We walk in and there's a lunchboard sign in front of the entrance to the mall that says, have you removed all your belongings?

Have you locked your doors?

We are not responsible for any theft.

And we're like, oof.

That's not like at our malls in Jersey.

And also, you're driving a car where you have all your shit in it.

Exactly.

All our luggage is in that car.

So we're like, uh-oh.

And then we go to the front door, the sliding doors that get in, and there's giant signs all over the front door.

No firearms are allowed in this establishment.

So we're like, oh, shit, you can carry it in this state, too?

We didn't realize it.

So we're like, well, it's 11 o'clock in the morning.

There's no way that there's going to be,

what are the chances that our car would get robbed?

We're like, you know, we're overthinking it.

We've been too safety cautious on this trip as it is.

Let's leave our doors unlocked.

That's our equivalent of fucking hanging our feet off the edge of a rock at the Grand Canyon.

But when we walked in, the fucking first steps into the

I know I shouldn't tell this story.

I know I shouldn't do this, but I should, I got to be honest.

I didn't even tell Frank.

So we're looking for, well, we walk in, we see a poster, too.

This is also something that was really fucked up, of this dog.

that says that like if you see this dog, don't approach it in the mall.

It detects firearms and it's working.

So, there's a dog that walks around the mall detecting firearms.

Right.

How fucking, how,

how many firearms come through that to try to get through that mall on a daily basis?

Do they got to hire a dog?

It's like, we got to get a dog.

It's just people won't listen.

The signs aren't working.

So, we go in, me and Deb go walk into the mall.

We're a little, you know, we're a little leery.

I mean, we're,

we're out of towners.

Let's just be honest, and we're old, too.

So, we don't know what's going on.

So, we're walking around.

We can't find a directory.

And we walk to one end of the mall, and there's no Sabbaros on that side.

We know there's Sabaros there.

And I noticed somebody's following us.

Oh, God.

I swear to God.

Well, I think he was following us.

So I say to Deva, I was like, let's just stop and go into this mall, to this store.

It was like a beanbag store or something.

I don't even know what it was, something we weren't even interested in.

And I said, I don't know.

I know this is going to sound crazy, but I think that guy was following us.

And she's like, he was not following us.

And then we walk out and he's sitting on the bench.

So I'm like, is this motherfucker following us?

But, you know, then he actually was waiting for his wife too, though.

Oh, really?

I turned out of us being a big pussy.

There's all those signs of firearms and everything.

I mean, there's a dog walking around.

Yeah, it's not like the mammoth moral.

Yeah, I know that I talked like I was going to fucking climb out of the Grand Canyon like some action hero.

Like I was going to hook up with some fucking young rock climbers.

They're going to call me Jersey.

They're going to see my raw talent as a rock climber and I was going to do all this shit.

But I mean, yeah, I'm just all fucking fucking hot air, man, because when push came the shove, I turned into a fucking 99-year-old woman.

Wow.

Aren't we all

later on that night, the 99-year-old woman and all of us came out?

This is a good one, too.

Tell us.

Yeah,

the diner.

So we were driving out of New Mexico, and it was really, really late before we got to our next location.

And we were starving.

And we couldn't find any place to eat.

So we ended up, Walt

message or says on the walkie-talkie, hey, listen, there's a diner up at this town straight ahead.

Why don't we stop at it?

And what time was it?

Like 11?

No, it was like 10.

10?

Yeah.

So it was, it was, the town was called Beline.

Never heard of it.

We go into the diner, and do you want to tell them a little bit about the atmosphere?

That warm welcome that we got?

Yeah, I mean,

it was chilly, to say the least.

Like, nobody wanted to wait on us.

And when the waitress finally came over,

I don't know if you know what this means, but like she had a tattoo of a black

teardrop.

I think it means she killed somebody.

Yeah, she killed someone in prison or something, right?

So she had one of those tattoos, and she was eyeing us up as her next fucking teardrop tattoo.

It looked like she was so angry.

She did everything we asked for.

We don't have that.

Yeah.

She looked like a tiger, like

trying to control herself, not to pounce and eat us right there, it felt like.

At this point did you start did you start to think like maybe it's us like the tour guy driver didn't like us now this lady doesn't like us i think we're lovable as fuck i don't understand why anybody would love us

it was the most unnerving thing the entire um diner was empty yeah there was only like maybe two other patrons there she came over and said what can i get you and she just stared at us like staring through you so we're like all right yeah four cokes and a water and she's just looking you.

Yeah, she doesn't say anything.

She just stares at you.

And then she started staring at Alicia.

Like, she wouldn't take her eyes off Alicia.

Really?

Was Alicia getting nervous?

Alicia was on her phone.

She didn't even notice.

And I was about to tell her, I was like, you know, I think you're going to get married in a second because that waitress over there is eyeing you up, and you may have to go live with her for us to get out of here.

The place was so bad, we got all of our food, but we had no.

so I said to the waitress, um, could I please have a fork?

And she looks at me, she goes over to the counter, she brings back one fork and hands it to me, and it's it, nobody else got any utensils.

Oh, it was

so uncomfortable.

And then tell them about when you looked up the town, what the town, what the town

has a rep for.

Oh, gosh.

Yeah, Mary has a habit of doing this.

So we're leaving and we're ready to get gas, and Mary starts hawking the horn while I'm filling up.

And she's like, we got to get out of here.

She's hawking it like

she saw a UFO

or a mad bull is about to gorge Frank.

And she's like, hurry, get to the car.

We got to get out of here.

We got to get out of here.

And I'm like, what's the matter?

And she goes, I just looked up the town.

She goes, it is the number one worst city as far as the crime index is concerned.

She goes, in the state.

She goes, it's in the top 10 as far as the country.

And I go, well, what do you mean?

She goes, I'll tell you this.

How much more clear could she make it?

All of a sudden, she's like, you know, she's like Oracle on the computer, you know?

She goes, I'll tell you this.

Bedsty in New York City is a 20 on the index of crime.

Bedsty?

Bedsty, right?

Kind of a nice neighborhood.

No, you said Brooklyn, I thought.

Yeah, Bed Sty's in Brooklyn.

Yeah, Bed Styes in Brooklyn.

It's kind of a nice neighborhood these days, but is it?

But I understand what you mean.

You know what?

I should have interrupted.

I don't know why I opened my stupid mouth.

Keep going, but

I'm just saying it's it bedstai was listed as a 20 on this index, and the town that we were in was listed as a one

and it goes from zero to a hundred.

So this is the same town that the waitress was in?

Yeah, yeah, okay, that makes sense.

Like there was it was two ladies running the joint, and um

they both

were some tough, tough ladies, tough-looking ladies that, like, yeah, would put the fear of God in you if we

if you had to fight them, you think you might lose?

You don't have any teardrops, no, like you don't see any teardrops except little ones coming out of these eyes

for making a horrible mistake,

but we got out of there alive, and um, and then our final stop on the way home was um Metropolis, Illinois, Q.

Oh, you saw the Superman statue?

We saw it, yeah.

how cool is it?

It's pretty fucking cool that, like, this little town with really nothing going on in it has been like, we're going to adopt Superman, and DC is like okay with it.

Like, DC didn't fucking squash it, which well, it was before DC was like a corporate thing like it is now.

Oh, is that why they're able to do this?

Because I'm like, how are they getting permission to do this without?

I think it was

kinder days, like, you know,

more groovy days.

I've never been there.

I've always, I do want to go.

I've seen pictures of this stuff.

What was it?

A Superman parade, Frank?

I'm sorry, you were breaking up.

Say it again.

What did we miss?

There was like a Superman event there that goes on every year, and we missed it by the

Super Celebration, and

we missed it last year, but this year I went onto the website when I bought that brick, and it's taking place in July 30th of this year.

Yeah, so they have this celebration where they say they get 15,000 people to come into town for this celebration.

And I'm talking like a town that is

maybe the size of the street that Bry lives on.

It was so super tiny.

And they have this massive Superman statue.

They have a Superman Museum, which I don't know.

I was impressed with it.

I don't know, Frank.

I was getting the vibes that you weren't as impressed with it as I was.

Well, for me, it was just so cluttered.

And I like things to kind of like be explained.

Like, if this is something, you know, like we had to look for a lot of the signs for things, like we would look into a cape.

I was like, all right, that's cool.

What is it?

You know, there was no sign saying that this was, you know, Christopher Reeves' cape or Dean Kane's cape.

And, you know, I had a hard time with that.

But I thought it was really cool.

Yeah, like, there must be over

$5 million worth of Superman memorabilia in this one little Superman museum in the middle of nowhere.

in Illinois.

I mean, it was, that's the road that I let Alicia drive on to get to that town.

It was like fucking Hazard County.

It was that small town vibe to it.

And there was another, there was a comic book store, a pretty big comic book store.

And then it was kind of half-assed the effort of the other stores to maintain the Superman vibe, which I think, man, why not embrace it?

Be

with everything.

Right, Superman hardware store.

You should have been like, this town should have just been super everything.

And they just kind of were like,

we're over it.

Right.

But I mean, what else do you got?

You really should embrace it.

You really, I mean,

one thing that I've noticed that, like, if I was a foreigner from another country and I did this trip, I would think Americans are obsessed with fucking fireworks.

You can't find a gas station

for hundreds of miles, but you could find every 10 miles a tent selling fireworks in the middle of nowhere.

It looks like a bomb went off.

Like a nuclear bomb destroyed a town, but yet that

tent is selling fireworks.

You don't think that it was because the 4th of July was coming?

Oh, you think it may have been that?

You know what?

Maybe.

But this was still June, though.

Yeah, maybe you're right.

I didn't even think of that.

I just thought that that was their, like, that's

their money out there because, I mean, these tents were huge, though.

I don't know if they were just set up for 4th of July.

I think they're up year-round.

Yeah.

But, like, also, there's a lot of underutilized land in America.

Like, there's way, way more land.

Like, we can let millions of people in if they want to come here.

And live in the middle of nowhere.

Yeah, but it's like, you just gotta, you gotta fucking inject some infrastructure into

these lands where there's nothing but like trees or sand and build up some cities because there's plenty of room that's not being used in this country.

Yeah, it's always good.

There was at one point where we drove from one state to another.

We drove 150 miles.

No other cars, no buildings, no people.

Wow.

It was just the road and two and the two of us in that.

That's what

that's a movie.

That's where you connect with the road, Q.

You know, you say like, the road's my mistress.

Yeah, yeah, sure.

You start to feel like it, and it's your mistress, and you can't stand her.

Yeah, you're like, I just want to drive.

I just want to stop driving.

When did you guys get to that point where you're like, I don't want to fucking drive anymore?

For me, yeah, I think it came on pretty early in the trip.

I was starting to get loopy from driving.

And, you know, even my wife was doing some of the driving.

Frank did all the driving on his end.

But he drives.

I mean, I don't know how the fuck he does it.

He watches TV while he drives.

I say that's not the safest way to drive.

That doesn't sound safe.

Sorry, I wasn't watching television.

I was listening to the TV.

Where was the screen aimed?

It was facing down.

There you go.

Now, I want to ask Frank, and I know it's hard to answer honestly, you know, on a podcast and everything, but my wife has asked repeatedly since the trip ended, how do you think it went?

How do you do you think they had a good time?

Do you think that, like, you know, they were sick of us?

Do you think this hurt your friendship with Frank, or do you think it strengthened your friendship with Frank?

And I'm like, how could it not be strengthened?

I was like, we didn't get into it.

And she's like, I don't know.

You just never know.

I don't know if they had enough of us of you constantly telling Frank he couldn't do something.

I think he likes that, I said.

He likes to be dominated.

I got to tell you, we had the best time.

I thoroughly enjoyed going on vacation with you.

I thought we had a ball.

I kept saying it.

Throughout the trip, I would say to you, how nice is it?

They said, you know, here we are.

We've been together 10 days, 11 days.

Nobody's gotten into an argument yet.

Nobody

seems to be sick of each other yet.

I mean, everybody's still getting along.

I mean, there was.

But we learn a lot about each other, though, when you spend that many days together, though.

You learn about things that you didn't know.

The real

human being.

And Frank's got a little bit of OCD.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I think we all.

I know I do, but like, Frank's got levels that I didn't even realize.

You know, he drives garbage around.

Garbage?

What?

Yeah, tell him.

Tell him.

For two decades, this man refuses to buy an extra garbage can for his house.

So he'll drive it miles miles to dump at somebody else's house.

You know what?

I knew that I knew that he did drive his garbage places.

I didn't know it was because of for want of a garbage can, though.

Can you explain that again?

Because even Debbie is just like, that makes no sense.

What are you talking about?

She was agreeing when I was telling the story.

But she says, like, I would, you know what?

I would make you get another job before I would fucking drive garbage around.

If we couldn't afford a second garbage can, you're getting another job if we could afford a second garbage can before I drive garbage around.

Now, very simply, where I live, garbage is privatized.

So in order for you to get your garbage picked up,

you have to pay a monthly fee for it.

Now, I don't remember what it was because when I looked it up 20 years ago when we first moved into the house, I remember it being fairly expensive per month.

However, I live close to the city lines, like within a mile.

My father lives within a mile in the city.

So I just drive my garbage to his house and I could just leave it there instead of having to pay monthly to have it taken away.

This has been going on for 20 years.

When you say fairly expensive,

like what about how much?

I don't know.

I think it was

no matter what I'm saying, let me get my balls broken.

I think it was probably like maybe 50 bucks a month.

That's all right.

So $50 a year, I thought he was going to say.

Yeah, but what about the gas?

And the stench of the garbage.

Time.

If it wasn't so close, I probably would, you know, cave and pay for the garbage.

But because it's just, I mean, literally, I could go drop it off of the house and come back to my house in a span of 10 minutes.

I mean, yeah, 50 a month.

Once a week.

Yeah, I mean, then they're like 600 a year.

It's like, if I just have to throw it.

Yeah, I could see it.

I could see it.

There's no way, Q, you're fucking driving garbage around before you go to the fucking set of IJ.

You're like, oh, I'm going to be a little late.

It's fucking Thursday.

It's garbage day.

There's no way.

I said I could see it.

Not that I would.

I need to save a prorated $12.50.

But I thought that said she did the same thing.

Who?

Your wife.

No, she's never driven garbage around.

I thought before the trip, she was collecting all the garbage from the house.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

I mean,

she's a

like a compulsive cleaner,

but she would, she, she would draw the line at being like, what?

I have to now fucking

buckle in my garbage

two times a week.

She just would draw it all.

She wouldn't do it.

No way.

But those are the little, those are the little quirks and things that, like, you know, that's the things that you connect with and bond with.

And like, you know, that's how you get closer as a friends, though.

By bringing it up and being like, what a weirdo.

But he's right.

I had a good time.

It was good.

And like I said, nobody got hurt.

Nobody,

you know,

God really looked down on us.

I mean, we're driving, you know, we saw accidents on the way down here.

So you're always in the back of your mind, like, you know, you're always taking your life in your hands when you do these things.

Yeah.

I mean,

devastating is like the loss of a loved one or something, but it was crushing that I couldn't continue on with you guys.

We were.

We were very, very disappointed.

I got you a couple silvenirs from the Breaking Bad store.

Look at this.

Oh, nice.

I got you some.

This is not real meth.

God damn it.

But

it's Breaking Bad Blue Sky Rock Candy.

Oh, nice.

Made to look like Blue Meth.

It was real stuff.

I go down to the bus stop and kick somebody's ass.

That was from New Mexico.

There's a store there that's a breaking bad

store.

But at Moab, I brought you something that has nothing to do with Moab, but I just thought it was so fucking badass.

This is a gear shift thing.

You put this on your gear shift.

How fucking badass is that?

It's a Frankenstein skull.

For that charge, that is cool.

That is cool.

This is the fucking dopest gear shifter that you could possibly have.

You are the Mac Daddy now of fucking Port Mama.

This, this is a.

Well, it's probably for a stick shift, right?

What's that?

That's probably for a stick shift, though.

You don't have a stick?

No.

Oh, you got a vagina.

You got a vagina car, yeah.

see it.

You told me that you're you.

You don't make it in a stick.

Your wife said you had to have a man's car, so I just assumed that was like you got a stick shift.

Yeah, no.

Then your wife saw you shiny.

She doesn't know what a man's car is.

I told her that's a man's car.

You're telling me that you don't have, you can't use that?

No, I could probably use it.

I could probably, I'll fit this on somehow.

Okay.

You watch.

You just jam it on.

You're like, ooh.

This is fucking cool, though.

Yeah, I would have bet the farm that you had a stick shift.

No.

That rattled in my head.

That fucking played with my head, man.

That played when you were like, I thought you were taking a subtle dig at me because you're like, my wife said, I need a man's car.

And I was like, oh, so the Prius is not a man's car.

No, no, not at all.

But she draws the line at this weird, like, the reason I got this one is because it has all-wheel drive.

Really, what I wanted to get was the bigger engine.

Right.

But it's not all-wheel drive.

So she's like, well, I don't want you to have that because of the snow in the winter.

But don't you need it, though?

All-wheel drive?

Yeah.

I mean, kind of, but you know, I mean, the other ones, they just have rear-wheel drive.

It would just skid all the way.

Louder engine.

Faster.

You don't need to go.

With soundballs either.

You can't go fast.

No?

No, you're not allowed to go fast anywhere like that.

I know how you feel, Frank.

Slow and steady.

This is very good.

Like I said, it has nothing to do with Moab, but I just fell in love with it when I saw it on display there, like in the glass case.

I was like,

if I had a stick shift, I would want this on my stick shift.

So I thought you would dig that.

Yeah, thank you.

Very cool.

No problem.

So what did you guys do?

I mean, did you, what did you do, Cube, while we were gone?

Did you do anything exciting?

I know Bry was sick for basically 10 days.

10 straight days.

Oh, God.

Yeah, that's horrible.

No, not really.

I went to a couple of Mets games because we were doing promotion.

The new season of IJ started.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, just doing some light promotion work.

Really fucking well.

I didn't do shit, man.

Mostly sat around this fucking joint hanging out.

Oh, yeah.

Well, I know that

you're going to pick up

some appearances on the Patreon.

You're going to be at the Picnic Olympics, I hear.

I'm going to be at the Picnic Olympics.

Did you announce the bowling?

We haven't announced the bowling episode, but Q is going to be

the Webster.

Remember that?

He was the Gretzky.

I think his name was Tom Webster in the 70s of bowling.

Okay.

I think, yeah, the Picnic Olympics has got a massive

attendance.

There's anybody who's anybody, except Ming, because he's on a con, but I think everybody who's anybody in the TSD universe is going to be playing at the Picnic Olympics.

Oh, awesome, man.

Like, Tim the record store clerk is coming.

That's a deep pull.

I can't wait.

Yeah, that is a deep pull.

Ladondondo, you got London.

Lodondo is coming.

Awesome.

Troy is coming.

Sunday Chest is coming, huh?

Maxwell.

No, he's in Tennessee.

Yeah, I didn't extend.

I didn't know if he would come for the Picnic Olympics.

I know how far it is from Nashville, New Jersey.

It ain't worth an hour and a half of kickball.

Some of the events, queue, kickball.

When's the last time you played kickball?

Oh, years ago, man.

That's cool.

What's your dominant foot?

A right.

Definitely righty.

We're looking at it.

I want to get some lefties on my team.

I mean, I just

pop it out into righty.

I mean, it's just a rubber ball.

I can kick it with my left foot if you want.

We got Extreme Bad Mitten with birdies the size of a snapple bottle.

Okay.

Yeah, so this is going to be a fun event.

It's called the end of the summer Olympics because it'll probably come out after it's all edited in August.

So if you're not on the Patreon, people, now is the time to join up.

Forget the real Olympics.

That's all fucking corporate bullshit.

And they're always arguing.

People are turning their back on the flag.

You don't have that kind of drama with us.

When we do our flag ceremony, there will be no fucking

controversy.

No dissension, Brooks.

Oh, no, no.

We are going to raise that flag.

Everybody salutes the four-colored demon flag.

Oh,

tell them, Steve Dave.

Well, I wish we could.

We do have sponsors.

There's something I need to get your guys' opinion on.

Oh, okay.

But first, I'll talk.

Frank, do you want to hang on or do you want to get going?

No, that's fine.

I'll sit and listen.

Okay.

First, we're going to talk about Raycon.

Q, you and I are going somewhere pretty soon.

Hopefully, I don't get sick.

So I'm bringing my Raycons with me for the plane ride.

So whether it's for work or play, a lot of us are going to be on the move again this summer.

So our advice to you is take your Raycons with you.

So whether you're listening to podcasts or rock and roll or road music, a pair of Raycon wireless earbuds in your ears can make all the difference.

You get crisp, powerful beats at half the price of other premium audio brands.

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They come in a range of cool colors with customizable gel tips included for a comfortable in-ear fit.

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The batteries, I love them.

I put them in my ears at nights because of the tinnitus, and I just listen all night long to like, you know, white noise or

what's it?

ASMR music sounds.

No, I haven't really gotten into that.

Oh, yeah, I'm big into the ASMR.

Are you?

Yeah.

I like razor, like buzzers.

Oh, yeah, you've mentioned that before.

Yeah, yeah,

I'll have to check that out.

ASMR.

So listen up: Raycon's offering 15% off all their products for our listeners, and all you have to do to get it is go to buyraycon.com slash T-E-S-D, where you'll get 15% off your entire Raycon order.

And it's such a good deal, you're going to want to grab a pair and a spare.

That's 15% off at buyraycon.com/slash T-E-S-D.

That's buyraycon.com slash T-E-S-D.

What else do I got?

We have,

before I get into this other thing, podcast awards.

We won?

We did not win.

Not yet.

Oh, it's just a matter of time.

Yeah,

we're in the categories People's Choice and in Comedy.

So if you go to podcastawards.com and vote for us, we would appreciate that.

We haven't won an award in some time.

I think we're due.

No.

Yeah.

Why haven't we won any awards in such a long time?

I don't know.

The last one we were up for was the Webbies, and they went real political with the winner.

I feel

what you're saying.

There's certain topics that you've got to address.

You got to play the game.

If you want to get the hardware, you got to play the game.

We're renegades, man.

We don't fucking play by those rules.

So, yeah, if you want to do that, go to podcastawards.com.

That would be great.

Yeah, please.

Oh, it would be so cool to be able to put some new plaques or trophies in the TSD general store.

That would be nice.

That would be really nice.

I mean,

you can vote multiple times, right?

Curator, come on, buddy.

What are you up to?

Stop fucking lighting fires and call us on fire and start fucking multiple, start

creating multiple email accounts so we can

so we can increase the numbers.

Yeah, invest in a spam bot or something.

We also have this week, we have Green Chef.

Green Chef, which is

the.

Oh, I got to tell you, man, eating on the road for that many days, it fucks me.

Oh, it's Frank.

We've got to.

Frank pussied out.

How so?

And this is the only thing I told him to do, he wouldn't do.

We stopped at one of those Armarillo,

eat the seven-pound steak in 30 minutes, and you get a t-shirt, and everything's free.

He pussied out?

He fucking was like, I'm going to do that.

I can do it.

I know I can do it.

We get there, and he fucking won't do it.

And I was like, come on, you can do it.

This fucking place will go crazy if you go up there.

It's 10.30 also in the morning now.

We got to stop it, too.

He was happy to get there at 10.30 in the morning.

He's going to eat a 10-pound steak.

But he told me he could do it.

And then he fucking, he wusses out.

I think he overestimates the excitement that was going to occur at a restaurant for somebody eating a steak.

The problem was that you had to eat everything.

So it was steak, it was shrimp, it was a salad, it was all that.

I know I could eat the steak, but I wasn't going to eat the shrimp because I don't like seafood.

Shrimp, I wasn't going to eat this,

yeah, and I wasn't going to eat the salad because I don't like salad.

So, it's going to be an automatic loss for me anyway.

So, why do I want to go up in the middle of the restaurant on top of a stage while everybody watches me knowing that I'm not going to win?

Because I told him why.

Because, okay, the clock starts.

The accolades is what you said.

The people carrying me out on this stage.

This place is packed at 10:30 in the morning.

I don't know what the fuck they're doing in Texas or if it's all tourists, but this place is jam-packed.

There is not a table to be found anywhere.

And I told him, if you go up there and you, like, you, like this little string bean goes up there, and then you fucking snarf down a 10-pound steak, and you still got time on the clock, and then everybody starts channing because they know you're going to do it because you only got a couple fries and a shrimp cocktail left.

And you grab that shrimp cocktail, and you just turn to the fucking, so everybody, and you're just like, and you just put it down, and you just can fucking go, and you walk away from it.

Everybody knows you could have did it and the place will fucking go crazy it'll erupt into a frenzy and they'll carry you out of here on their shoulders

fucking says no i'm not going to do that but then orders a 10 pound steak he did it anyway and ate it with and ate the 10 pound steak at the table and no one knew it though he did it in anonymity why frank

Because

I don't need it.

Just knowing that I could do it was enough.

Did you do it?

Yeah, he did it.

Every bit of it.

And then proceeded to drive seven hours on a fucking full of 10 pounds of steak.

Distended elegant steak.

Oh, my God.

Yeah, and that's the other thing, you know.

So I order the steak, and first Walt's really excited about it.

And then as I'm eating, he's like, I don't know.

You could be driving a long time.

He's undermining you.

Because I'm like,

there's no reason for you to do this now.

And then like, you don't need to finish it.

Just eat eat eight pounds of the fucking 10-pound steak.

There's no need to engorge yourself full of steak and fucking derail us when we're trying to get home now because we're almost home.

Now, all of a sudden, now you're going to fucking

safe Nelly the whole way there now.

You've been listening to me.

And now, all of a sudden, you're going rogue and you're going to eat 10 pounds of steak.

We're almost home.

That's a good point.

Yeah, like you don't know how it's going to treat me on the road.

And he's

not hearing it.

He fucking chows down that whole steak.

But then we saw my own voice.

A guy took the challenge as we were leaving.

And I told him this would happen.

His family is up

at the stage watching him.

His wife is screaming words of encouragement.

And I'm like, everybody's eyes are all over him.

You know, people are eating and still

engaged in this guy as he tries to break the record.

And I was like, that could have been you.

And you ate it for nothing.

You did it for no fucking steaks.

He paid for it.

Yeah, nice.

It's a nice wordplay.

Very nice.

But yeah, but though, eating on the road, though, for 12 days, I couldn't wait to get back to some Green Chef.

Yeah, I mean,

you didn't bring any with you, I guess.

You know what?

It was in between shipments.

Right, Green Chef and a hot plate.

Yeah, and plus, I didn't know if I could prepare in the hotel room, so I was like, I gotta eat Burger King.

I gotta eat McDonald's.

I don't want to.

You gotta.

I gotta.

Gotta pay $14 for a hamburger at Wendy's.

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Make leading a healthier lifestyle.

It makes leading a healthier lifestyle easier than ever with a satisfying home-cooked dinners with options that work around your lifestyle, not the other way around.

Real quick, how many times could you have eaten eaten at Denny's on the trip before you're like, I can't eat at Denny's no more?

Let's see, out of 14 days,

I'd say seven.

Oh, okay.

I could eat there half the year.

Yeah, we didn't hit seven.

We did about five.

Yeah.

Five Denny's.

Yeah, I don't mind Denny's.

Yeah, I think everybody else, besides me and Frank, were like, enough with the Denny's.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like green chef.

Except in a restaurant.

Let's see.

Everything is hand-picked, featuring organic veggies and high-quality proteins delivered to your door, pre-measured, and mostly prepped in an instant insulated packaging.

I like it.

It comes to the house.

Mary Beth makes it.

Then she likes it because it's in these little packages.

Everything's pre-measured.

She doesn't have to measure everything.

What's your

plan are you on?

I'm on the plant pedo.

Oh, the plant.

The pedo?

Paleo?

Yeah, paleo.

I'm on the paleo plant.

I think, I believe that we're on the paleo.

I believe so.

I mean, that's that's a pupedo.

No such plan exists for a green chef, but it's so delicious.

Oh, it's tasty.

I can't get enough of that plant.

I believe this is the sort of thing they don't want in the commercial, guys.

What I was saying, it's awesome.

Yeah, it is awesome.

It's delicious.

Yeah, between the jokes about fucking kids, you're saying how awesome it is.

So go to greenshef.com/slash TESD100 and use code TESD100 to get $100 off,

including free shipping.

You know, but the cue, I think the listeners appreciate that kind of like chicanery with the ads, and that's going to make them want to vote for us in droves.

So

I'm putting our potential award

above money in this ad.

I think the award is more important important than

Peto.

Yeah,

that is a foolish, foolish decision.

You can't pay your mortgage with

a trophy.

A trophy that you have to pay for, I think, right?

The trophy

pay for it.

I'm not sure if this is the same one.

It does sound familiar, though.

Like, don't you have to give a $300

check to them before they release the trophy if you win?

I don't know.

That does sound like a scam, though.

Yeah, yeah.

All right, we'll see.

I still would, you know what?

I'd write that check 100 times out of 100 times.

Yeah.

I want the trophy.

We deserve the trophy.

We need the trophy.

We earned it.

We earned it.

We earned it with laughs.

One more time, go to greenchef.com slash T-E-S-D and use code T-E-S D100 to get $100 off, including free shipping.

Green Chef, the number one meal kit for eating well.

I've always said free shipping is the what, Bri?

The lubricant.

The Spanish fly of retail.

It gets everybody's legs wide open, and they're like, I'm ready to order.

I'm ready to buy some merch and buy your product.

So I need your guys' opinion on something.

Very quickly, maybe.

Yep.

I sent you a text.

I didn't get it.

Okay.

You didn't get it?

No, I got a new phone.

I'm not getting texts.

You can look at it now, Q.

I'll show you, Walt.

All right.

Let me check this out.

Did you send it to Bry Q?

I mean, where it says Q and Bry?

Yeah.

Yeah, the last one I got was cool thanks.

Okay.

Wow, this is something.

Okay, right.

So, Frank, I'll explain this to you

since you can't see it.

And to Walt.

There is a picture.

I got a text from someone.

I'm not going to say who.

I just need to, I need some advice on, like, or some input on to, like, how do you deal with a text that comes to you like this?

Yeah, this is a weird, this is weird.

It's very weird, right?

It's a picture.

It was from Amazon, I guess.

It says new commercial, and I'll put this picture up on TSD Town Instagram.

New commercial penis waffle maker.

So it's a waffle maker.

Oh, Giddam showed me this.

Okay, then I guess we just gave away who sent it.

Yeah, Gidham showed me this.

Okay, but he was so fucking titillated by this.

But did he, when he sent it to you,

did he ask,

do Deb and Alicia like waffles?

Did he wrote that?

No, did he ask you that?

Oh, no, he just showed it to me.

But so he didn't ask, do Mary, Beth, and Sage like waffles?

Is that not?

That is weird.

That's really, yeah.

That's like, yeah, that's.

But you know what?

He did that to me, and he said, does Mary like waffles?

Yeah, that's...

It's weird that he's looping your wives into it, but the addition of Sage is really what threw me.

That's really what threw me.

Because

at first it was like, it was, I was like, wait, wait, what is this?

I didn't really even know what it was at first.

And I was like, okay.

And then I was like, sage?

And then I backed it up even more.

And I'm like, I love Getham.

He's a great friend.

But I'm like, I don't know if I want him saying that about my wife.

Yeah.

It's certainly not about my 15-year-old kid.

It's not even the funnier joke.

The funnier joke is like, hey, I found your waffle maker or something like that.

The implication that you yourself want the penis is the way to go with that one.

Because in reality, Mary Beth likes dick.

So

and waffles, probably.

And waffles.

But I'm just like, I'm not sure if I can do it.

I would have been here to confront him on that.

Yeah, I didn't know how to respond.

Yeah, he did not text that to me.

I didn't get it either.

He's smart enough not to text that to me and say that because I would have fucking exploded on it.

That's what I said to Mary Beth.

I was like, there's no fucking way if he sends this to Walt, he's including that.

There's just no way.

So what did you do?

He just said, did you see this?

And I was like, what?

And he turns his laptop to show me.

And he could tell by level of interest level was so, I was like, oh, yeah, whatever.

So he just dropped it immediately.

He was like, he wasn't.

Yeah.

I mean,

you must really love it, like you say, because

he sent it to, or at least showed it to

three out of the four people on the phone right now.

He really did send that to you, Frank?

Yes.

And he really wrote this, I like waffles?

Yes.

And, you know, it's funny is if if Joe Bryan just said about it being a dick, I didn't really realize.

I just went and looked at the text because I went into this whole thing of like, because it was like 400 bucks, right?

Or it was expensive.

Yeah, it's like really expensive.

It's like a $600 waffle maker.

Yeah, because all I did was reply and say,

no, for that price, she can keep eating agos.

And I just never thought of

what it was.

But yeah, that's not a bit of.

Yeah.

So now that you think about it, you're weirded out a little?

No, it doesn't, you know, I wouldn't expect anything other than that.

Yeah, like in him's defense, though, he is

he's, you know, he's on the spectrum.

The boy ain't right.

Yeah, he's on the spectrum.

So, like, sometimes what he thinks is

a sure-fired fucking firecracker of a joke.

Sometimes they're fucking dougs.

They fall flat.

Sometimes it's like, hey, does your 15-year-old daughter suck dick?

Well, not that I know.

Tell him, Steve.

Hey, it's Walt here.

And before we go, I just wanted to address

the aunts who are on the 60

and 100 tier who were sent out gifts in June and July for the Patreon who are internationally

members of the Patreon because we had some issues.

with packages coming back as I'm sure some of you international Patreon members are well aware of of and you've been patiently awaiting your gifts

and today with the help of the TSD town

resident genius we found out what I think the problem was

and get them yes what was that problem

well under the USPS guidelines for mailable items that are sent by air, you cannot have something that is too magnetic.

Otherwise it will affect the or affect the

compass that is inside the plane.

So, for safety's sake, so your plane doesn't end up in Australia when you're aiming for Hawaii, they limit the amount of magnetic material they load onto planes so it has to be shipped by ground only.

And that is the reason why

we believe the international packages kept coming back to my house was because there was a canvas poster with dowels that had magnetic connectors that kept the poster in place.

And we also have

versions of that poster that have dowels that are glued in place.

So I'm going to be sending the international Patreon members in the 1600 tier the wooden glue dowel version of that canvas poster.

And hopefully, those will now be on their way to their final destinations

in the coming days and weeks.

And hopefully, now people who who go out in August,

now it shouldn't be an issue moving forward.

We hope.

We hope that's the reason why

they came back twice, and it's very frustrating.

I don't know why the fuck the post office keeps this shit a secret.

Well,

it's intentional.

It's to keep them employed.

Because you bring it back, and then they have to figure out why the other person did

either that or it's like tit for tat.

Like, you know, one post office doesn't tell you, so the

other post office tells you an entirely different thing.

I really, really believe believe

the post office lives for moments like this.

Like they see something come in, they're like, oh, that little dial moved on the sensor, moved a smidgen.

Send it back.

Yep, send it back.

And don't tell them why it's sent back.

Make it a puzzle.

We're sending back how many was it?

14?

Yeah, easily more than that.

Okay, so they're sending back 14.

Don't put a single sticker on a single one of them and let him figure it out.

And then when he goes to his local post office, they're going to be like, oh, I don't know what it is.

Maybe it was this.

Yeah.

So again, I really, really appreciate it.

Nobody bitched.

Nobody complained.

And I really appreciate that.

And you guys have been awesome and very, very,

what's it called, patient with this.

And hopefully now that problem has been solved.

But before we go, Giddam, while I have you here,

you weren't at the recording of this episode that everybody just listened to.

No, no, I was not.

But I've heard some of what was discussed in this episode.

So it's tough going into this blind

based on what you've told me because you sometimes misremember things.

I leave out some details once in a while.

But

I'm going to tell you exactly what went down and you tell me if I'm wrong.

Okay.

You found on the internet a waffle maker that makes waffles in the shape of penises.

Wednesday night, I was at the bar and I was going.

Yes or no?

Yes.

Okay.

It was an ad.

It was an ad.

I didn't go searching for it.

It was an ad that appeared in my Instagram feed.

Okay.

So you found this waffle and

this delighted you.

And this

made you very titillated.

It was a commercial grade penis-shaped waffle maker.

And apparently it's a huge in Taiwan.

The Taiwanese love these penis waffles.

Okay.

So then you proceed to then send

texts to people in your circle.

Whom I thought would find it funny.

Yes.

Okay.

So

again, the question has to be asked.

You sent this text to Bry and said, hey, does Sage and Mary Beth like waffles?

Can you explain why you chose to include Sage, a 15-year-old teenager,

why you would say that?

Okay, now in my head, in my head, this is what I think Bry.

Even if, okay,

let's say,

she's still 15.

I didn't send it to her.

I sent it to Bry.

Yes.

And I thought, it seems like his sense of humor would be like,

hey, everybody, I made waffles.

And just to get their reaction,

it seemed like it was something that he would gather them around the table and present, you know, present that he made it at breakfast.

But you also said that you were drunk when you sent it.

I was drinking a little, yes.

But you sent this to a bunch of people.

Frank Five apparently got one.

And the same joke was made.

No, no.

I'm not saying joke.

No, no.

But you're like, does Mrs.

Five like waffles?

Yes.

Are you sending these like you can barely even push the send button because you're laughing so hard at this joke that you have?

In my head, yes, I'm laughing.

Because

I think everyone finds it as funny as I do.

Like that

there is such a demand for penis-shaped waffles that they make a specific machine to make penis-shaped waffles.

And a commercial grade.

It's like stainless steel.

It's meant to be in a kitchen.

So why do some people get the text and some don't?

Like I didn't get the text.

When I got back from my trip, it was like one of the first things you you did was show me this waffle maker on your laptop.

Yes, I did show it to you.

I didn't think that you would,

knowing how you, given the interactions I had with you while you were on your trip, I didn't think that you would find it as funny because you were a little stressed, even though you were on vacation.

So I figured once you got back, you know, it would be something that you would, I think, would enjoy.

I really didn't care, though, when you turned your

pan.

All right, so that's your defense because people, because I'm sure people are like, what the fuck?

Why would he say that?

So that's your defense that, well, Bry, that's the kind of humor Bry was in the house.

And again, she is a teenager, so, you know,

like I've seen, I've been at the bar and I've seen people having like bachelorette parties and just everything is penises, penises, penises.

No, no, no.

You don't think that's true.

You really don't, you just don't think you're, you just can't be like, yeah, I really just should have left her off that and just Mary Beth.

It's not even funny, but at least you just should have gone with Mary Beth and not.

In hindsight, yes.

like many things in hindsight yes

you live your life pretty much in hindsight don't you regretting yeah regretfully in hindsight yes wishing it was front sight

again into my to my defense this is a

defenceless I think it is

like I said I didn't send it to Sage I sent it to Bry who again has a warped sense of humor gotcha and the person who buys horror dolls for his child.

Now, Frank, did he even reply to that?

I don't remember.

That night ended for me, and I woke up on my futon.

All right.

So, all right.

Well, that's it for this episode.

I hope you guys enjoyed it.

And like I said, for those affected by the delay in the Patreon gifts, sit tight.

I think they're on their way finally.

All right.

And if not, I will not rest until these friggin' magnetic canvas posters and skateboard decks make their way to

all four corners of the planet.

I thought you were going to say to those who are affected by Gidham's decks,

waffles.