WWDTM: Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone

This message comes from Amazon Pharmacy.

Ever looked a pharmacist in the eye and said, Hi, I'm here to pick up my cold sore prescription? Amazon Pharmacy delivers right to you, so you can get meds without your lip doing the talking. Amazon Pharmacy.
From NPR and WBEC Chicago, this is, wait, wait, don't tell me, the NPR News Quiz. Forget your silver bells, I'm your silver fox.
Bill Curtis, and here's your host at the Studebaker Theater at the Fine Arts Building in Chicago, Illinois, and Bacall, Ben and J-Lo, Leonardo DiCaprio, and a series of women who cannot legally rent a car.

You can play our games alone or as part of a power couple. We don't care.
The number to call

is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924.
Let's welcome our first listener contestant. Hi,

you are on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, this is Melanie Morgan from McKinney, Texas.

McKinney, Texas. I don't know

where that is. Can you tell me? It's a little north of Dallas.
A little north of Dallas. And what do you do there? I am a legal aid attorney and an adjunct professor at a community college.
All right. What do you teach there? Yeah, I say I have the two lowest paying jobs in the legal profession.
Congratulations. I teach family law and mediation.
Wow. Well, welcome to the show, Melanie.
It's a pleasure to have you. Let me introduce you to our panel this week.
First up, a comedian and correspondent for The Daily Show who will be performing stand-up at the Philadelphia Punchline on December 27th and 28th. It's Dulce Sloan.
Hello! Hi, Dulce. Nice to meet you.
And he's a comedian whose newest special, Vacation Baby, is available on Hulu and YouTube. It's Hari Kondabolu.
Hello! Hi, Hari. And he's a writer and humorist whose delightful substack is, take another little piece of my heart now.
It's Roy Blunt, Jr. Hey, how you doing? Welcome.
So, Melanie, welcome to our show. You're going to play Who's Bill this time.
Bill Curtis is going to read you three quotations from this week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain just two of them, you'll win our prize.
Any voice from our show you might choose on your voicemail. Are you ready to play? I hope so.
I've been avoiding the news since the election. Really? Interesting way to break your fast.
Call into a news quest. It's broadcast nationally.
All right. Now, your first quote comes from Senator Chuck Schumer.
What the heck is going on? Senator Schumer was one of many people asking that question about what mysterious things in the sky over New Jersey? Oh, the drones. The drones for weeks now.
People in New Jersey have been seeing what they say are car-sized drones, sometimes by the dozens floating in the sky, and people want answers. And after many, many demands, finally President Biden said, quote, there's nothing nefarious, apparently.
Hey, quick thought. If you're trying to calm people down, don't use the word apparently.
As a New Yorker, I find it hilarious and very cute that New Jersey thinks that aliens and the government are interested in its matters. Like the idea that they think they're that worthy of attention from outer space or the Major League Baseball is not interested in New Jersey.
The NBA is not interested in New Jersey. The Jets and Giants play in New Jersey, but they don't even want to be associated with them.
And you're telling me aliens and the government are putting drones out there. Maybe the aliens have a particular interest in New Jersey.
Maybe for respiration instead of oxygen oxygen they breathe hair gel. I believe that there is a tour that you can take to all the houses and sites of the Sopranos.
Yes you can. There is that.
If I were an alien being I would want to check that out first. Are these aliens, do aliens have drones? I thought they had spaceships.
Well you never know. I.
I mean, maybe they have drones. Maybe they disguise the spaceships as drones.
Maybe we think they're drones, but they're really spaceships. Who knows? This is too long for us to not know.
Yeah, well, that's the thing. But no, because we should have shot these down by now.
I don't, as an American, I know we shoot first, ask questions never. Now, what happens is, is like people saying, well, there are all these drones, and the government says, no, there aren't.
We've looked. They're all perfectly reasonable explanations for all of it.
And the whole thing might be this kind of mass hysteria. This is all true.
A Pennsylvania state senator tweeted a photo of what he said was a drone that had been shot down. See? It was a Thai fighter from Star Wars.
And the former governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan, posted a footage of drones that he said were floating above his house for hours. And again, true, it was the Constellation Orion.
Okay, fine. Well, I flew here on one,

but maybe that was just a plane.

Yeah, I know. You never know.

All right, Melanie, here is your

next quote.

Let's look back at some delicious

memories. That was a message

that appeared on People's Starbucks app.

Starbucks is one of many companies copying

Spotify Wrapped this month and offering

users what?

Like a summary of everything they've done all year? Exactly right. A year in review, right? Everybody's doing their own version of Spotify Wrapped.
So, for example, we mentioned Starbucks tells you what you bought, what your favorite drinks were. The Washington Post has a summary of all the articles you read that year.
Strava, of course, gives you a summary of all the exercise you did. And I personally loved Boeing's Flights You Survived 2024.
No one asked for this. There's an expression, if you feel like you're about to die, you're like, I saw my life flash before my eyes.
Yes. When did that become a good thing? Right.
Nobody wants this information. Yes.
Also, it's just like Target shouldn't do this. Like Target, the Target store.
No, because then you can look at all the times you went to Target and was like, I just need toilet paper. And then you spent $200.
Right. You know who actually did this? Tinder.
Tinder. Oh, that's awesome.
offered their users offered their users an end of the year swipe report because what everybody wants as a christmas present is a statistical breakdown of all the people who rejected you so uh your top genre was uh unavailable guys with glasses that's why i got rid of date naps because every time i would open it i'd be like, a whole city doesn't want to sleep with me. Let me put my phone down.
See, the whole point of these summaries is they give you the illusion of having accomplished something with your time, right? You're still just like, you know, then the same old drudge you were January 1st, but look at all the songs you listen to. I know I listened to Megan Thee Stallion the whole time.
I don't need nobody to tell me that. There you are.
Melanie, your last quote today is actually a punchline to a joke that was written out in a New York Times op-ed this week. All I can tell you is that it's the Pope who is driving him.
Who told this joke, among a few others, about the Pope? Oh, the Pope.

Yes, the Pope.

What?

Of course it was the Pope, or as he would say, is the me Catholic?

Pope Francis wrote an op-ed in Tuesday's New York Times entitled, There is Faith in Humor, in which he went on to basically tell a bunch of jokes.

Great.

Another old white guy in comedy.

How many popes does it take to do something? Now, he says that what this is about is like how humor is important in coping with life's travails. It's a part of faith that we should embrace humor, right? But what's going on is that pretty late in life, the Pope obviously wants to start doing stand-up.

Which is fine.

But it will be shocking when he starts his sets with,

so I've been dating again.

And he'll do crowd work.

Like, oh, what do you do for a living?

Yes, and what are your sins?

I mean, it's hard when Betty White has raised the bar so high

for elderly people in comedy. That's true.
And then you got... Like, it's honestly, if it wasn't the Pope, would they let him write a thing about comedy? It was good.
That was the major point of the article. It's nice to laugh, which I think in the 1400s would have been groundbreaking.
Right, exactly. Well, he's really interested in comedy,

as you may have heard Jim Gaffigan talking about

on our show a few weeks ago. He invited a

whole bunch of comedians and

humorists to the Vatican to meet

them. Not me! Well...

Are you Catholic? No.

Oh. Oh, you had to be

Catholic. Apparently.
Well, most of these comics

are heathens. That's true.

Is the Pope Catholic? Shut up! Bill, how did Melanie do in our quiz? She deserves a win, so we're going to call her a winner. Good job.
Yay, Melanie! Thank you. Congratulations, Melanie.
Bye-bye. Right now, panel, it is time for you to answer some questions about the week's news.
Dulce, question for you. Dulce, there's been another breakthrough in pickles.
Now the hot new online trend in pickles is to cover pickles with what? Let's see. Okay, so you could say that one they're doing is a fruit roll-up, rolled in tahini.
Then you could do it with chamoy, or you could put a little glitter in it. Glitter.
You got it. Yes.
You knew all of them, but you wanted glitter. TikTok has come up with yet another way to torture a pickle so far, as you, I think we're trying to tell us.
I love torturing a pickle. Go ahead.
You did. yeah.
So far, TikTokers have wrapped pickles and fried cheese. They've stuffed them with taki chips.
And now they're dumping edible glitter into pickle jars to make a treat called a glickle. Oh.
Glitter edible? Yeah, they make edible glitter. They make edible glitter.
Yeah. Where have you been? Now, does glitterle sound like the name of an all-male strip club in Reno? Yes, of course it does.
But that's beside the point. And Glickles apparently are perfect for people who like sparkly things and literally have nothing else to eat.
See, I feel like you're judging, Peter. I am.
For why? Glitter Pickles? That ain't none of your business. I guess you're right.
If people want to eat their pickles with glitter, it's a free country. It's a vegetable.
Right. Have you eaten glitter pickles or glitter? No, I'm a grown-up.
Coming up, our panelists go adventuring in our bluff listener game called 1. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT-TO-PLAY.
We'll be back in a minute with more of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR. Hey, it's Peter Sagal.
The year is almost over, and now is the time when NPR and I come to you hat in hand and ask for your support. Now, interestingly, the idiom hat in hand does not refer to, say, a street performer walking around holding out his hat for people to put in money.
I always thought it was. No, it is actually referring to an old tradition when knights would remove their helmets and show humility.
So it's really more about my attitude of supplication than it is about asking for money, even though, of course, I'm going to be asking for money. Now, if you heard that and you said to yourself, wow, that's fascinating.
I was also under that misapprehension as to the idioms meaning. Then you, my friend, are one of us.
That means you enjoy our show where we do trivia and jokes for smart people. Dumb jokes for smart people, to be sure.
where we give you a break from the week's news, where we make your breakfast on the weekend with your family, or your walk with your dog, or other interminable tasks, bearable with our goofy, dumb, but we always think smart humor. Now, if you heard me say that, and you said to yourself, well, I know that everybody knows that, then you are our ideal listener.
And you should donate even more. You know what you should do? If you're enjoying this little riff on idioms, you should join NPR Plus.
A small recurring donation gets you special perks for more than 25 NPR podcasts, like sponsor-free listening and bonus episodes, even discounted items from the NPR shop. It only takes a few minutes to sign up, and you can do it right now at plus.npr.org.
And if you've already donated to your local station or joined NPR Plus, that and I thank you. We will be waiting for your donation with Bated Breath.
And that's Bated, B-A-T-E-D, short for like a-baited, i.e. we're holding our breath.
But come on, you knew that. Support for this podcast and the following message come from Mint Mobile.
Tired of spending hundreds on your monthly wireless bill? Enter Mint Mobile. Mint has plans starting at 15 bucks a month with high-speed data and unlimited talk and text.
Shop plans at mintmobile.com slash wait. Upfront payment of $45 for three-month five-gigabyte plan required.
New customer offer for first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra.
See Mint Mobile for details. This message comes from Amazon.
Have you ever been so sick that even the thought of standing up to go to the doctor made you even more sick? Amazon One Medical has 24-7 virtual care, so you can get help while horizontal. And with Amazon Pharmacy, you can get medicine delivered fast right to your door.
You just have to make it to your door. Thanks to Amazon, health care just got less painful.
This message comes from Travel Nevada. Pop quiz.
Where can you find 60 million acres to discover? The Silver State, a place like no other. The desert has a way with words, ghost towns, saloons, and burrows

and herds. No bluffs or limericks, just wide open, wild, and terrific.
It's time to get a little out there, to the heart of Nevada, to be more specific. Plan your trip at www.travelnevada.com.

From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is, wait, wait, don't tell me, the NPR News Quiz.

I'm Bill Curtis.

We are playing this week with Hari Kondabolu, Dulce Sloan, and Roy Blunt, Jr.

And here again is your host at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago, Illinois, Peter Sego. Thank you, everybody.
Thank you so much. Right now it is time for the Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me Bluff, the listener game called 1-888-Wait-Wait to play our game on the air.
You can always check out the pinned post on our Instagram page, at Wait, Wait NPR. The information you need is there.
Hi, you're on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Hi, this is Kelly Cullen from Pittsburgh.
Hey, I love Pittsburgh, one of my favorite places. What do you do there? Well, for the next two weeks, I'm going to spend as much time as I can with my family, including my son, who's home from college in London.
That's great. I have to ask, only because it's so typical, did he come back from college in London with a pretentious British accent? Yes, he won't stop telling me how brilliant I am, and I will take it every day of the week.
Yeah, that's great. Well, welcome to our show, Kelly.
You're going to play the game in which you have to tell truth from fiction. Bill, what is Kelly's topic? Get me to REI.
There's so much you can do in the great outdoors. You can kayak, rock climb, get malaria.
Our panel is going to tell you about a whole new kind of outdoor activity that's becoming popular. Pick the one who's telling the truth and you'll win the wait waiter of your choice in your voicemail.
Are you ready to go? I am ready. Well, let's do it then.
Let's hear first from Dulce Sloan. In today's installment of Hey, Get Off My Lawn! The Growing Phenomenon of Urban Wandering.
Based on the British tradition of wandering through fields in the countryside called rambling, Americans have started taking back their environment by walking aimlessly through businesses and people's yards. Rambling in the UK is protected by the right to roam law, allowing enthusiasts to access publicly and privately owned land because of centuries old footpaths that predate modern property lines.
Urban wandering, on the other hand, is a bunch of white people trusting passing through a neighborhood they don't live in by jumping fences, walking through rose bushes, and then descending upon a Starbucks. The leader of the Wandering Society of Eagle, Colorado stated, it's all right to enjoy the world we live in.
Property lines are fictional. Nature is real.
And so was the trespassing citation her group received after trudging through a gated community. Urban wandering in which people just barge their way through whatever they want because I guess they can.
Your next word from the wild comes from Roy Blunt Jr. Adventure catting it's called and it's a full-blown trend complete with special cat harnesses and social media feeds.
People are taking their cats hiking, paddleboarding, and mountain climbing as if they were dogs or people, anything but cats. One adventure catter told NPR, quote, taking them on adventures is such a good bonding activity.
I wouldn't want to leave them at home. The cat had no comment.

It breaks the stereotype of cats, we are told. Well, I guess it does.
Our cat, Jimmy, is adventurous all right when it comes to climbing way up behind a motel room sink or yowling with wildlife at 2 a.m. but can I see him swinging along a Sylvan hiking trail with us? Much less paddle boarding and all the other distinctly non-feline sports that adventure cats, we are told, get up to.
What I can see is Jimmy taking one look at the little Nike snowshoes somebody got him and laughing his little ass off. Adventure catting, the new trend of taking your cat with you when you go out into the great outdoors.
Your last inside scoop from the outside comes from Harikandabolu. Golf, some would call it a pastime, others a lifestyle, and if you're under 30, boring.
Very, very boring. In response to golf's declining popularity with young people, some country clubs have introduced a new variation of the game called combat golf.
A golfer tees off and then has a two-minute head start before the other members of the foursome give chase. The three attackers are allowed to do anything they like to hinder the golfer outside of injury, at least intentionally, wink, wink.
The inventor of combat golf goes by the name of Payne Stewart. Payne spelled P-A-I-N.
He says, quote, My daddy loved golf more than he loved me. When it was his weekend to have me, he made me caddy for him.
Oh, the destruction I imagined causing with his golf clubs. Who knew my revenge fantasy would turn into a legitimate team sport? All right, so here are your choices.
One of these things is going on somewhere outside. Is it from Dulce Sloan Urban Wandering, where just sort of wander through people's property and yards just because, you know, it's there? From Roy Blunt Jr.
Adventure Catting where people are doing the typical outdoor things, hiking, paddleboarding, but bringing their cats? Or from Hari Kondabolu Combat Golf, a new variation on the ancient Scottish game in which you can try to keep your opponent from hitting the ball by hitting him first. Which of these is the real story of a new outdoor activity? Well, although I love the UK tie-in and I am a dog person, I'm going to go with Roy's story about adventure catting.
Adventure catting. All right, that is your choice.
You believe Roy's telling the truth. Well, here is someone who has first-hand experience with this particular activity.
I think we were doing adventure catting before adventure catting was a thing. That was Nicole Alcain talking to Oregon Public Broadcasting about her experience adventure catting.
Funny, they never get the cats on tape talking about it. Congratulations, Kelly, you got it right.
You're in a point for Roy. You have won our prize, the voice of your choice in your voicemail.
Thank you so much for playing. And enjoy the holidays with your son home from England.
Take care. Thanks.
Bye-bye. And now the game we call Not My Job.
Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone have been married for 19 years, and in that time, they have written, produced, directed, and or starred in six films together, including The Boss and Thunder Force, and that is apart from the other movies Melissa has starred in, like Bridesmaids and Can You Ever Forgive Me? And yes, also they produced two children. Their latest project is a podcast called Hildy the Barback and the Lake of Fire.

Melissa and Ben, welcome to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me.

Thank you. Thank you.
So let me start here. I always wonder this.
You guys have been at the

height of Hollywood fame and power. You have your own production company.
Melissa,

you've been nominated for two different Oscars. Why throw that all away to do a podcast? Well, it was Ben's idea.
I mean, Ben, as a child, when I was like, God knows what I was doing, would just constantly read all of The Lord of the Rings. So this is very much in his DNA.
It's kind of a middle earth comedyth comedy. And then, well, you explain it.
Yeah, well, other people like Melissa were probably dating. I was playing YouTube and reading these books.
And so a friend of ours, Steve Mallory, who co-created the podcast with us, came to me with this idea of just doing, you that style, fantasy style of a podcast because one thing about these worlds is that women are very rarely featured. So we wanted to do a show where men mess everything up and funny women have to come to the rescue.
Yes, of course. We read this that when when you perform this thing, this fantasy thing, you're wearing costumes, even though no one can see you.
Is that true? I would wear a costume to brush my teeth. So if you put me in the Middle Ages, I'm going to have some kind of armor and helmet on, no matter what.
So that means I'm definitely not a nerd. That's true.
Definitely. We read that you have a remarkable collection of costumes and wigs in your home.
Is that the case? Yeah, I thought everybody had that. I do.
Thank you. Thank you.
I was like, our Christmas parties are costume parties that have nothing to do with Christmas. So do the costume parties have a theme that's a non-Christmas theme? Yes.
I mean, it comes... We did...
What was the Christmas... A Christmas Flock of Seagulls.
So it was 80s hair bands, but with a kiss of Christmas. And then we did Hollywood Bears and...
What was that one called? Hollywood Bears and Other Woodland Creatures. Woodland Creatures.
So you could come as a Hollywood Bear, which is a super cute, gay, hunky guy from West Hollywood, or a squirrel. Right.
I read, by the way, and by the way, I read a lot of this in an incredibly elaborate People Magazine chronology of your entire relationship, which I guess is a cool thing to have out there in the world. Does that exist? It does.
It does. It starts when you were both teenagers in Illinois, and it extends to the present day.
And one of the things it mentions is that you, both of you, once went to an Oscar after party party wearing velour track suits and people got mad yeah i think i flipped off a lot because everybody so many people change and they're in yet another kind of beautiful but maybe not the most comfortable thing or someone's in like another pair of high heels and then ben and i came in in track suits and like you know shell toe adidas shoes and people were, can I, can I, I don't know if I can throw fingers. I'll keep it clean.
But literally you just see people that you hadn't met yet, but I was like, oh, I can't wait to meet that person. And they were just like, really, but I do it again.
Now I'm like, Oh, I felt like I cracked the code. Sure.
Speaking of that timeline of your relationship, you guys met as teenagers here in Illinois, right? You both grew up here. Yeah, so I'm from Carbondale, Illinois, where SIU is.
Yes. Hey, all right.
And I remember I was sort of like, you know, so this is the 80s, and I had like the swooped haircut and the earring and a clockwork orange t-shirt and, you know, that vibe. And a lot of my friends all had that sort of similar vibe.
And we saw these people walk across the strip, we call it, down there. And they looked, you know, very goth and very cool.
And I remember one of my friends going, I wish my mom would let me dress like that. And it was Melissa.
It was Melissa. And it was probably, I probably had a full-length cape on, and God knows what else.
And it was probably like in southern Illinois, like 98 degrees, pure humidity. And I'm sure it was like a real clam bait going on.
Moving on, the People Magazine timeline of the marriage of Ben and Melissa, you saw each other, or at least Ben you saw Melissa, but you actually met doing like an improv comedy group in LA, famously the Groundlings. Do you remember, Melissa, if like what caught your attention about ben i i actually do the the first class we had when we he we all had to do like quick monologues and everyone was so loud and we were all trying so hard to be funny but it was just loud and crazy obnoxious and then ben got up there and was super quiet super creepy he was a prison inmate he was welcoming his new cellmate, and he's like, I just think we're gonna get along so well.
And it was so quiet, and I was like, and for some reason, when I say it out loud, I realize I'm like, boy, this guy's super creepy. Maybe I'll get to marry him.
Yeah. Well, Melissa and Ben, it is a real pleasure to talk to you.
And we've invited you here to play a game we're calling... Melissa and Ben, meet Melissa and Doug.
Melissa and Doug. Since you're parents, you might know that that is the company founded in 1988 by Melissa and Doug Bernstein to sell traditional wooden toys.
We're going to ask you three questions

about this company and its products. Answer two of them correctly.
You'll win our prize, one of our listeners, the voice of whomever they like from our show. Bill, who are Melissa and Ben playing for? Jeff Spray of Anderson, South Carolina.
All right, here's your first question. Although they eventually became very famous and successful for their wooden puzzles and play sets, Their first big product, Melissa and Doug, was what?

A, a half-hour-long VA... became very famous and successful for their wooden puzzles and play sets.
Their first big product,

Melissa and Doug, was what? A, a half-hour long VHS videotape that encouraged kids to make friends by playing the kazoo. B, a blank block of wood and a chisel sold with the name Imagination Play Set.
or C, a quote, anti-war toy

that was a flower you could stick in the barrel of other kids toy guns I want all three of these to be real I think maybe it's the a I would say a too well that was very collaborative yes Yes, A. You're right.
It is A. The video is called You on Kazoo.
It did not sell well, so they moved on to actually making toys, but you can see it online because it went viral in the 2000s, and it is terrible. Here's your next question.
And In 2023, Melissa and Doug sold their company

to a billion-dollar toy conglomerate called Spin Masters, but even that giant company had humble beginnings. What was Spin Masters' very first toy? A, a box of cereal rebranded as a food fight kit.
B, a short yo-yo

called Yo, that all

with a string so short

it just

dangled.

Or C, Earth Buddies, which was

a nylon sock stuffed with sawdust

and grass seeds.

I find myself drawn to C.

Yeah, me too. You're both drawn to sea, and you're both correct.
It was really successful. They sold thousands of them and went on to great things.
All right, here's your last question. These days, their most popular products, Melissa and Doug, include play sets that allow kids to pretend they're doing adult things,

including a get-well-doctor activity center that is so realistic it even includes what?

A, a real working x-ray machine,

B, a credit card swiper for when your insurance doesn't cover the visit,

or C, an exam table with stirrups. What? Inclusive.
Inclusive. It is, yes.
Very much so. I want it to be C, but I think it's B.
What do you think? I think maybe A, but now it's going to be B, because I did it. I'm wrong.
I'm going to say C. We're parting ways.
All right. This is fascinating.
I think it's an amazing sort of glimpse into your working process. So, Ben, you're picking A, which was the real working x-ray machine.
Melissa, you're picking C, the exam. No, I'm going to switch.
I'm switching to C. You're switching to C.
Oh, wow. All right.
Now we see how the movie gets made. All right.

So you're both choosing.

Ben, you're following Melissa's lead and going to see the exam table with stirrups.

It was actually B, the credit card swiper.

You talked me out of it.

The detailed medical play set is supposed to, quote, ease kids' fears of doctor's visits, unquote, including the part where the insurance company refuses to cover the visit, I guess. Bill, how did Melissa and Ben do in our quiz? Well, they did great.
Two out of three means you're a winner here. Congratulations.
You've won. You can now change into your track suits to be comfortable at the after party.

We don't mind. Ben Falcone and Melissa McCarthy are the husband and wife duo behind Lemonada's hit podcast, Hilde the Barback on the Lake of Fire.
You can listen to all of season one,

wherever you might get your podcasts. Melissa and Ben, thank you so much for joining us.

I'm Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. We're going to be able to meet you.
Take care.

Thank you. Bye-bye.
Bye, you, Don't Tell Me. We're going to go like to meet you.
Take care. Thank you.

Bye-bye.

Bye, you guys.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

In just a minute, Bill offers a delicious beauty tip that will give you that medium-rare look

in our Listener Limerick Challenge.

Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to join us in the air.

We'll be back in a minute with more of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me from NPR. This message comes from Capital One.
With the Spark Cash Plus card from Capital One, you earn unlimited 2% cash back on every purchase and get big purchasing power so your business can spend more and earn more. Stephen, Brandon, and Bruno, the business owners of SandCloud, reinvested their 2% cash back to help build the company's retail presence.
Capital One. What's in your wallet? Find out more at CapitalOne.com slash SparkCashPlus.
Terms apply. This message comes from Amazon.
Have you ever gotten sick on a very expensive, very non-refundable family trip? Amazon One Medical has 24-7 virtual care, so you can get help no matter where you are. And with Amazon Pharmacy, your meds can get delivered right to your hotel

fast. It's kind of like the room service of medical care.
Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just

got less painful. Support for NPR and the following message come from American Jewish World Service,

committed to the fight for human rights, supporting advocates and grassroots organizations worldwide,

working towards democracy, equity, and justice at AJWS.org. From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR News Quiz.
I'm Bill Curtis. We are playing this week with Roy Blount Jr., Hariabolu and Dulce Sloan and here again is your host at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago, Illinois Peter Sago thank you Bill, thanks so much everybody in just a minute Bill wants you to simply have a wonderful Christmas rhyme aww, and our Listener Limerick Challenge if you'd like to play, give us a call at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT.
That's 1-888-924-8924. But first, it is time for a game we call Doctors Thought.
The news was filled recently with stories about doctors thinking they had the diagnosis right only for it to turn out to be something else. So we're going to ask you to fill in the blank, rapid fire style, on some of these headlines about what doctors thought.
Get yours right. You get a point.
So what we'll do is we'll just ask you to take your best guess as what the blank is. Here we go.
First one's for you, Hari. Fill in the blank on this headline from the Telegraph newspaper.
Doctors thought I blanked a koala. I birthed a koala.
No, it was doctors

thought I got chlamydia from a koala.

They have it.

I thought they got vaccinated.

Didn't they come up with a vaccine? They did, but the koalas

they still got it. Turns out that

this particular patient just had pneumonia. Apparently,

as you indicate, chlamydia is very

common in koalas. It's really easy to catch

it from them. At least that's what that

koala told me when she turned me down for a date. Dulce, full in the blank on this headline from

the Washington Post. Doctors thought she had a deadly disease, but she was just allergic to blank.

Talking to men. No.
The real headline was doctors thought she had a deadly disease,

but she was just allergic to her own tattoo. Roy, fill in the blank on this headline.
From the Telegraph, doctors thought she was pregnant with twins, but it was blank. It was very small triplets.
No. You went the other way.
The real headline was doctors thought she was pregnant with twins, but it was just one giant baby. Thank you for playing Doctor's Thought, because remember, malpractice makes malperfect.
And now some questions about the rest of the week's news. Roy, this week a new study found that what has five times as many germs as toilet seats? It's a food thing.
It's not a food thing. It's a thing that a lot of people have in their homes on a seasonal basis and this is the season.
Christmas tree. Christmas tree.
Something on your Christmas tree. Oh well a little ball.
Yeah Christmas ornaments. Ornaments.
Yeah. It's the most filthy time of the year because they are handled so often and never washed, Christmas ornaments

can be one of the germiest things in your house.

So for a safer holiday,

you can either disinfect the decorations

as you put them on the tree, or go the easy route

and start putting all your presents

underneath the toilet bowl.

But they're not handled that often.

They're only handled once a year.

It's true, but then you never clean them. So over years,

all that grime and hand

stuff gets all over them. So there's a whole

civilization growing on

I'm sorry. and they're only handled once a year.
It's true, but then you never clean them. So over years, all that grime and hand stuff gets all over them.
So there's a whole civilization growing on the ornaments over the course of a year? Yes, exactly. Wow.
Where's this Pixar movie? Hari, a group of entrepreneurs in Russia is offering to take some of the work out of the holiday season, offering what for sale to anyone who wants it on the internet for up to

$50 a pair?

That means there's two of them.

Shoes.

Hands. Feet.

Eyes.

They represent hands and arms.

They're hands and arms for a specific purpose.

This sounds gross.

I'll give you a hint. Some of them come in a package deal with a carrot and a corncob pipe.
Oh, a Frosty the Snowman kit. Well, I'll give it to you.
Snowman hands. That is sticks.
What? They're selling snowman hands. Russian online marketplaces are flooded with ads for artisanally plucked, natural snowman arms with prices ranging from about $5, and basically those are just sticks, to $50 for, well, those are also just sticks.
The ad for the $50 pair reads, we have a super offer, new, shiny, creative hands for your snowman. Your snowman will become a star and your neighbors will definitely envy you,

unquote.

Is this for other Russians?

Presumably, yes.

They're going to get killed.

How are they going to get killed?

Because they're going to realize

I can go outside and get sticks.

Well, no, no, they won't,

because the last thing you want to do

is cross Russian arms dealers.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Oh.
because the last thing you want to do is cross Russian arms dealers. Coming up, it's Lightning Fill in the Blank, but first it's the game where you have to listen for the rhyme.
If you'd like to play on air, call or leave a message at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924.
You can catch us most weeks at the Studebaker Theater in Chicago and come see us on the road. Check back in the new year for upcoming road shows near you.
For tickets and information, go to nprpresents.org. And you can also check out our sister podcast, How to Do Everything.
This week, Mike and Ian make me taste some new eggnog recipes, and I barely escape with my life. Hi, you're on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me.
Hi, Peter. This is Becky from Madison, Wisconsin.
Oh, Madison is great, a beautiful and cultured town. I love it there.
What do you do for fun? For fun, I guess I jigsaw puzzle and read and go hiking and walk around the lakes. Oh, yeah.
They have those there. Does she take her cat? Do you take your cat when you hike around the lakes? I wish.
I think that would be a goal in the new year. Sure, absolutely.
For you, if not the cat. Well, welcome to the show, Becky.
Bill Curtis is going to perform for you three news-related limericks with a last word or phrase missing from each. If you can fill in that last word or phrase correctly, in two of the limericks, you will be a winner.
You ready to go? I'm ready. Here's your first limerick.
Brushing Fido's a bit of a slug. But as pet owner, I go whole hog.
First, I taught him to sit. Now I use him to knit.
I spun yarn with the hair from my... Dog.
Yes! From your dog. Dog fur knitting is back, baby.
According to a new op-ed after its initial heyday in the 90s, people are once again collecting their dog's hair, spinning it into yarn, and knitting it into disgusting little sweaters. Why stop there, you know? Why not collect all your dog's drool and throw it in your Brita? People advocating for dog hair garments argue it's warmer than sheep's wool, and also, animal shelters just don't have any sheep.
You can also collect all the material you need by sitting on any dog owner's couch. Wait, this was a trend in the past? This is a trend in the 90s, and it's come back, making sweaters out of your dog hair.
You take the dog hair, you collect it, brush it out, whatever. You have to spin it into yarn, and then you knit a sweater.
And nobody will know

that you're wearing

clothing made out of dog fur

unless, of course, you wear it in the rain.

Y'all wear it?

You mean to tell me that there's people

in here that act like that they

wouldn't wear a dog hair?

Too good for your own dog?

Here is your next limerick.

Hot men aren't hard-edged or feudal,

and rodent dudes pack your caboodle.

A modern cute jette, he's barely al dente.

He is skinny and limp like a...

Noodle.

Yes, noodle. Move over, rat boys.
The new Hollywood heartthrob archetype is noodle boys. Actually, stay there, rat boys.
A lot of you are the same people. We're talking about these floppy-haired, wispy-armed Hollywood stars like Timothee Chalamet and Finn Wolfhard, who I refuse to believe is not a character from the Flintstones.
According to the New York Times, our pop culture fixation has moved away from men who look like they spend hours in the gym to men who look like they've just coughed up blood into a handkerchief. I don't like this man.
I don't like this man. I've never liked this man.
Which man? A wisp of a man. A wisp of a fellow.
Girl, I know when a man is going to fall through a crack in the floor.

I'm a whole woman.

Wait, so the rat boy craze.

Who was in that?

The rat boy, that was last summer.

Also Timothy Chalamet.

Last summer, we were told that all the guys were into rat boys who were these sort of vaguely feral, I guess, looking guys.

So Timothy Chalamet.

Yeah, basically, whatever Timothy Chalamet looks like now, that's the trend.

I can't wait until that boy hits puberty.

Here is your last limerick.

From this tallow, my skin gets relief.

But the internet's giving me grief.

The fat from a cow makes a wrinkle-free brow.

So I'm rubbing my face with some...

Beef? Beef, yes. According to the New York Times, more and more people are turning to beef tallow.
That's beef fat. It's a cheap and natural alternative to commercial skincare products.
So stop shopping for skincare at Sephora. Start shopping at the dumpster behind a Ruth's Critts steakhouse.
Users claim slathering pure beef fat on their faces makes their skin look nourished and gives them that fresh off the grill glow. So it's dog hair and beef tello.
Basically, yeah. So basically, we're just England in the 1500s.
Right. Bill, how did Becky do in our quiz? She is a champion.
Becky, good job. Congratulations, Becky.
Well done.

We still cheer for Becky. Is it okay?

We still cheer for Becky. Congratulations, and thanks so much for

playing. Thank you.
This was fun. Bye-bye.

This message comes from NPR sponsor

We'll see you next time. This message comes from NPR sponsor Viking, committed to exploring the world in comfort.
Journey through the heart of Europe on an elegant Viking longship with thoughtful service, destination-focused dining, and cultural enrichment on board and on shore. And every Viking voyage is all-inclusive with no children and no casinos.
Discover more at viking.com. This message comes from Capella University.
The right support can make a difference. That's why at Capella University, learning online doesn't mean learning alone.
You'll get support from people who care about your success and are there for you every step of the way.

Whether you're working on a bachelor's, master's, or doctoral degree, you can learn confidently knowing you'll get the dedicated help you need. A different future is closer than you think with

Capella University. Learn more at capella.edu.
This message comes from Warby Parker. What makes

a great pair of glasses? At Warby Parker, it's all the invisible extras, without the extra cost, like free adjustments for life. Find your pair at warbyparker.com or visit one of their hundreds of stores around the country.
Now it is time for our final game, Lightly Fill-in-the-Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill-in-the-blank questions as they can.
Each correct answer now worth two points. Bill, can you give us the scores? Dulce and Roy each have two, and Hari has three.
All right. So why don't we do this, since Dulce and Roy are in second place? Dulce, I will start with you.
You ready to play because you were eager to go? Here we go, Dulce. You're up first.
The clock will start when I begin your first question. Fill-in blank.
On Monday, doctors in Louisiana confirmed the first severe human case of blank flu in the U.S. Bird? Yes.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a case that could effectively ban social media app blank. Tick-tock! Right.
This week, the Biden administration sent new pollution goals to help combat blank. Climate change.
Right. On Thursday, the Teamsters launched the largest ever strike against online shopping giant blank.
Amazon. Right.
This week, a man in Singapore who drove directly into a guarded military camp said he did it because he wanted to blank. Get no.
He just wanted to see, he said, how security would react. On Wednesday, the CDC confirmed that U.S.
blank had risen to 78.4 years.

Average age?

Life expectancy.

Life expectancy, right.

According to a new study, moderate blanking may be healthier than teetotaling.

What?

Oh, drinking.

Right.

80 people got food poisoning at an LA Times event celebrating blank.

Food.

Good enough.

They got food poisoning at an event celebrating the best restaurants in LA.

A norovirus outbreak linked to oysters poisoned 80 people.

Who paid $159 to get into a celebration of the finest cuisine in the city, with the people who paid $350 for VIP tickets getting VIP, very important, vomiting. Yeah.
Yeah, well, oysters are worth it. Are they? Yeah.
Bill, how did Dulce do in our quiz? Dulce got seven right for 14 more points, a total of 16. Dulce has the lead.
All right. All right, Roy, you're up next, fill in the blank.
On Wednesday, a House panel voted to release the ethics report on blank. Matt Gaetz.
Matt Gaetz. That's right.
On Monday, Olaf Scholz, the chancellor of blank, lost a no-confidence vote. Sweden.

No, Germany. This week, the Federal Reserve cut blanks by a quarter point.

We got the interest rate.

Right. On Wednesday, the FAA reported that over 100 blanks have been hit by laser pointers this month.

Planes. Right, airplanes.
This week, a woman in California sued her parents because she claimed they gave her blank. Chlamydia.
No. They gave her all of their ugliest genes.
On Monday, U.S. entomologists confirmed that the invasive blank Hornet threat had been eliminated.
The bandit Hornet, the outlaw Hornet, the illegal Hornet, the... You're so close.
No, it's the murder hornet. Murder hornet.
This week, a criminal in Massachusetts was caught by police after he got stuck trying to blank. Get through a miserable round of questioning.
Whoa. No, he was caught while trying to escape down a family's chimney.
After evading police by jumping from roof to roof, the man made a huge mistake when he got stuck trying to escape down a chimney. There's the nice list and there's the naughty list, but it's so rare we get somebody on Santa's stay-in-your-lane list.
Bill, how did Roy do in our quiz? Three right, six more points, total of eight for Roy. All right.
How many, then, does Hari need to win? Seven to Roy. All right.
How many then does Hari need to win?

Seven to win.

All right.

Here we go, Hari.

This is for the game.

On Thursday, Luigi Mangione agreed to be extradited to blank for his trial.

New York.

Right.

On Wednesday, OpenAI announced that you can now use a 1-800 number to call blank.

Domino's.

You call chat GPT.

This week, NASA confirmed that the two astronauts stuck on the blank will be there until late March. Spaceship.
Right. Well, Space Station on Wednesday, Taylor Swift threw a huge party to celebrate the end of her blank tour.
Aeros tour. Right.
This week, a report revealed that the owner of the New York Jets scuttled a trade for star receiver Jerry Judy because blank. Slept with his wife.
No, because his player rating in the

Madden video game was too low.

In a possible

link to climate change, researchers warned

that some blanks had become carnivores.

Herbivores. No,

squirrels. A squeamish man whose wife

was in the bathroom sick with food poisoning

was able to comfort her and keep his distance by

blanking. Hiding under the bed.

No, he comforted her from a safe distance by rubbing her back with a Swiffer mop.

While his wife cradled the toilet, the husband was hiding in the hallway

and rubbing her back from about four feet away with their Swiffer.

It was a gesture just around the corner from Sweet.

It was so nice, he also sent the Roomba in when he had to step away,

so there was somebody there at least to

repeatedly bump her.

Bill, did Harry do well enough to win?

No.

He got three right. Six more

points. Nine is the total

but guess who won?

Nolte!

Coming up, our panelists

predict what would be the best Christmas present of the

year but first let me tell you that

Thank you. Don't say.
Don't say. Coming up, our panelists predict what would be the best Christmas present of the year.
But first, let me tell you that. Wait, wait, don't tell me.
It's a production of NPR and WBEZ, Chicago, in association with Urgent Haircut Productions, Doug Berman, Benevolent Overlord. Philip Godeker writes our limericks.
Our public address announcer is Paul Friedman. Our tour manager is Shana Donald.
Thanks to the staff and crew at the Studebaker Theatre. B.J.
Liederman Composer, our theme. Our program is produced by Jennifer Mills, Miles Grumbas and Lillian King.
Special thanks this week to Vinnie Thomas and Monica Hickey. Santa's little helper is Peter Gwynn.
Emma Choi is our vibe curator. Technical direction is from Lorna White.
Our CFO is Colin Miller. Our production manager is Robert Newhouse.
Our senior producer is Ian Schillock. And the executive producer of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me is Michael Danforth.
Now panel, what would be the best present received this year? Harikandabolu.

The earth is one year closer to getting these

pesky humans out of here.

Roy Blunt Jr.

Jimmy Carter will get

heaven with a high five

from Abe Lincoln.

And Dulce Sloan.

Mr. Scrooge is going to wake up on Christmas morning and save TikTok.
Well, if any of that happens, we're going to ask you about it right here on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Thank you, Bill Curtis.
Thanks also to Roy Blunt, Jr., Dulce Sloan, and Hurricane Dabulu. Thanks to all of you for listening.
Thanks to our fabulous audience here at the Studio Baker Theater. Happy holidays from everybody here.
I'm Peter Sagal. We'll see you next week.
Hey! This is NPR. This message comes from Bombas.
Nearly 30% of marathoners end their race blistered. Bombas running socks are strategically cushioned to help say bye to blisters.
Run to bombas.com slash NPR and use code NPR for 20% off your first purchase. This message comes from LinkedIn ads.
One of the hardest parts about B2B marketing is reaching the right audience. That's why you need LinkedIn ads.
You can target your buyers by job title, company, role, seniority, and skills. All the professionals you need to reach in one place.
To get a $100 credit on your next campaign so you can try it yourself, just go to linkedin.com slash results. That's linkedin.com slash results.

Terms and conditions apply.

Only on LinkedIn ads.

This message comes from the Nature Conservancy,

working together to create a future with a livable climate,

healthy communities, and thriving nature.

Explore ways to act during Earth Month and every month at nature.org slash NPR.