Listener Episode #7: Crab Beauty Pageants & Lower Deck Days

Summary

Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers: Listener Episode #7 – "Crab Beauty Pageants & Lower Deck Days"

In the seventh listener-focused installment of "Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers," hosts Seth and Josh Meyers delve into whimsical and nostalgic family adventures shared by their listeners. Released on October 1, 2024, this episode is a treasure trove of humorous anecdotes, heartfelt memories, and relatable family dynamics. Below is a comprehensive summary capturing the essence of the episode, enriched with notable quotes and timestamps for added depth.

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1. Host Banter and Personal Updates

The episode kicks off with Seth and Josh exchanging light-hearted banter about Seth's reclaimed "posh hat." Seth shares the amusing tale of how he lost and subsequently retrieved his uniquely colored hat, highlighting sibling interactions and the challenges of losing a cherished item.

• Seth (00:07): “I wore it to draft weekend, and everybody thought I had it made... But the cake shop doesn't make them anymore, so it's a one in a million at this point.”

Josh chimes in with playful remarks about the potential for an unboxing video, emphasizing the humorous side of their family life.

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2. Listener Story #1: Joe's Hermit Crab Adventure

The first listener story comes from Joe, who recounts a childhood trip to the Jersey Shore in 1986. Joe, the youngest of five siblings, shares his ambitious endeavor to win a hermit crab race with his two crabs, Spuds McKenzie and Checkers. The story intertwines competitive spirit with family dynamics, culminating in an unexpected twist during the event.

• Joe (09:10): “Checkers pulled out his big claw and pinched the big bully crab, freeing his little brother. Spuds then took off and booked it past all the other crabs... but Spuds ended up taking second.”

Seth and Josh respond with enthusiasm, commending Joe's storytelling and reflecting on the hilarity of sisters accidentally entering a crab beauty pageant.

• Josh (12:23): “I mean, that's like... it feels like a Mark Twain story. It's too strange and wonderful.”

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3. Listener Story #2: Cindy's California Road Trip Mishap

Next up is Cindy from Alberta, Canada, who nostalgically narrates a 1967 family road trip to California. Traveling in a station wagon with seven family members, Cindy details the chaos of managing luggage, shared sleeping arrangements, and a memorable incident involving a loose spare tire.

• Cindy (08:09): “We hit a bump or something. The spare tire bounced off the roof rack and went rolling down the side of the highway and then into the grassy median.”

The hosts engage with Cindy's story, offering humorous insights into handling spare tires and reminiscing about their own travel experiences.

• Seth (22:52): “If you've been raised on a farm, you've chased a tire.”

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4. Listener Story #3: Allison's Whale Watch Gone Awry

Allison shares her family's whale-watching trip in Massachusetts during the mid-1980s. Excitement quickly turns to disappointment and seasickness as the anticipated whale sightings fail to materialize, exacerbated by the temptation of special jelly donuts onboard.

• Allison (27:11): “As I hung over the rail... I saw those Cheerios from breakfast again. My mom and one of my sisters succumbed as well...”

Seth and Josh empathize with Allison's ordeal, drawing parallels with their own less-than-ideal wildlife encounters and poking fun at the reality versus expectation of such tours.

• Josh (31:56): “We went on a boat in Scotland... sure, maybe it was just.”

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5. Interactive Listener Engagement and Q&A

The episode transitions into an interactive segment where listeners like Larry and Kate pose questions to Seth and Josh. Larry inquires about the hosts' deep-seated pop culture obsessions, leading to a humorous exchange about Batman, "Battlestar Galactica," and Josh's limited knowledge of the TV show "Friends."

• Larry (39:28): “Is there something in pop culture that you feel like you have a really deep knowledge for?”

Seth discusses his enduring love for specific TV shows, while Josh humorously admits his lack of encyclopedic knowledge in certain areas, adding a layer of lighthearted self-deprecation.

• Seth (39:43): “Nobody bangs the drum harder for shows like Homicide, Life on the Streets, or Battlestar Galactica.”

Additionally, Hannah asks for advice on creating memorable family trips as a solo parent, to which Seth and Josh offer heartfelt and practical suggestions, emphasizing the importance of bonding and creating special moments.

• Hannah (45:02): “How can I create family trips for just me and my baby and still manage to create the adventures and exciting stories...?”

• Josh (46:05): “Find something that you love to do where your child will be able to sort of run around and play and where you can also be happy.”

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6. Humorous Recaps and Closing Remarks

As the episode wraps up, Sam provides a humorous recap of the shared stories, highlighting key moments like Joe's crab race showdown and Allison's tumultuous whale watch. The hosts close with laughter and warm thanks to their listeners, celebrating the diverse and entertaining family experiences that make each trip unforgettable.

• Sam (48:38): “Joe and his family took a trip to the Jersey shore... the minivan smelled like the sea for seven years.”

Seth and Josh reflect on the stories with amusement, reiterating their appreciation for the listeners' contributions and hinting at future adventures.

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Notable Quotes:

• Joe (12:20): “Well, the world can be brutally unfair. Second place ribbons are red. And that unless you're in Florida, a Miss Crustacean beauty pageant is probably about forcing a crab to wear a dress, not a person.”

• Cindy (22:22): “I want to see the Grand Canyon. Sorry, Seth. I just do.”

• Allison (30:54): “We couldn't believe our luck. Four hours on a whale watch tour. For sure we'd see whales.”

• Larry (39:28): “Is there something in pop culture that you feel like you have a really deep knowledge for?”

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Conclusion

"Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers" continues to excel in fostering a sense of community through shared stories and genuine interactions. In this episode, Seth and Josh not only entertain but also connect with their audience on a personal level, celebrating the joys and mishaps of family travel. Whether it's chasing a runaway tire, competing in crab races, or enduring a sea-sick whale watch, the Meyers Brothers showcase the unpredictable and endearing nature of family adventures.

For those who haven't tuned in yet, this episode offers a delightful glimpse into the myriad of ways families create lasting memories—sometimes perfectly planned, often hilariously spontaneous, but always cherished.

Transcript

[Seth]

Hi, Poshi.

[Josh]

Hi, Sufi.

[Seth]

How are you?

[Josh]

I'm good. How are you?

[Seth]

Good. I'm really good because I got my posh hat back.

[Josh]

Yeah. Explain, please.

[Seth]

Yeah. I was leaving Flagstaff wearing my posh hat, and I should note, so I have a posh hat. And the reason I have a posh hat, anyone who listens knows I call my brother posh. There was a cake shop in the West Village in New York City called the Posh Cake Shop. And I guess maybe a couple years ago, I was walking by and they had a bunch of hats. And I said, well, I'm gonna go in and buy a posh hat. And it's a purple hat with neon pink script that says Posh.

[Josh]

Mm.

[Seth]

And I love it. Get a lot of compliments on it. Not Alexi's favorite hat. Just on color. Just on color.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

She's not anti posh, but she doesn't love the.

[Josh]

You know. Yeah, fair enough.

[Seth]

And I wore it to draft weekend, and everybody thought I had it made, and everybody was really excited and wanted more. But the cake shop doesn't make them anymore, so it's a one in a million at this point. And I was in a car going from Flagstaff to the Phoenix airport. Got out, left my hat in the car, thought it was gone forever, and did some leg work, got in touch with the driver, got him to send me the hat.

[Josh]

Huge, huge news.

[Seth]

Huge victory.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

Can't tell you how happy Alexei was when she unboxed that hat.

[Josh]

It would have been a great unboxing video if you gave it to her and was like, I just want to film you. Because she would have been excited thinking, why are you filming me? And then the disappointment.

[Seth]

And the day before, I would have told her, hey, I lost that hat. And then. So then she would have also put her in a good mood that she would have thought the hat was gone.

[Josh]

Yeah. I went to sofi Stadium for my first time.

[Seth]

Wow. What'd you see at SoFi?

[Josh]

I saw green Day.

[Seth]

Oh, wow.

[Josh]

Who I don't think I've ever seen somehow. But, I mean, I've loved them forever, and. But I was, like, trying to figure out, is there a good way. Is there a good place to park where I'm not going to sort of get raked over the coals? Yeah. And there's this. There's this website or this app called Spot Angels, and I was like, there's this little neighborhood, and they say you can park anywhere up here. It's all, like, green. It's like, you can park for four days. And I went with my buddy Devin and I was like, do you mind maybe walking 20 minutes? And I think we're going to get out faster because we won't get buried in parking. And he's like, sure. So we pull into this little neighborhood, signs everywhere that say, no stadium parking. Tow away. You got to have this permit otherwise.

[Seth]

So the app has let you down immediately.

[Josh]

App really let me down. And then the next thing it said is, next best thing is parking at the Forum. And that's going to be 25 bucks. So I'm like, all right, we go, there's a left hand turn. It's like sofi and forum parking. We get in the lane for forum parking and then there's a sign that says forum parking. Sold out. You gotta have a pre printed pass.

[Seth]

Gotcha.

[Josh]

So I got. It's going bad, it's going bad. Then I get in the Sofi parking line and you're just sort of like, you're railroaded at this point. There's no getting out of it. There's like four lanes and you get up to pay the person. What do you think it costs to park at SoFi?

[Seth]

Well, if the form was 25 and SoFi is prohibitively expensive, I will say 2751.

[Josh]

$25.

[Seth]

Geez Louise.

[Josh]

And the woman with the little like, you know, machine to take my credit card, I was like, what? And she's like, it's not me. And I was like, oh, I know it's not you, but we had to do that. And then we had to walk all the way around Sofi because one of these gates were closed and. But man, Green Day is so good. They play dookie all the way through and then they play American Idiot all the way through. And I somehow I know American Idiot better than I know dookie all the way through as a top to bottom listen. And they're great. It was awesome. And caught the end of the pumpkins. We were sort of like a bit waylaid from all this.

[Seth]

Oh, the pumpkins open.

[Josh]

Yeah, pumpkins opened. Also there was a. We were in section B2 and in front of us was section A2. And there was this post during the pumpkins saying A2. But as I'm looking at the stage, I have to like lean to my left to see Billy Corgan. And I'm like, this is an obstructed view seat. Like, this is unacceptable. And I'm taking pictures. And between the two things, between the two shows, Devin has gotten food. He's now joined me I point this out to him. I'm like, this is gonna be a problem. I'm gonna be really angry about this. And I take a video and I have every intention in this moment of suing Ticketmaster. Yeah. Because this is an obstructed viewseat. This is a new thing.

[Seth]

Yeah. 100%. I'm looking forward to the. I think it's gonna be season two of Presumed Innocent. It's gonna be this trial.

[Josh]

Yeah. But I was fired up and I was.

[Seth]

Yeah. No, I've been with you during one of these firings.

[Josh]

Yeah. And it seemed like a slam dunk case to me. I was gonna be the dude that brought down Ticketmaster.

[Seth]

Can I predict what I think happened?

[Josh]

Sure.

[Seth]

It was just a guy dressed like a post and he moved close.

[Josh]

The post was on a little like, spinny thing. And right when the show started, they spun it and it dropped down to sort of a normal person's mid back height.

[Seth]

So it was just letting people know where the seats were.

[Josh]

Yes.

[Seth]

Ah, that's very novel. So a very high, well marked. This is section A2. But then when the show starts, they bring it down.

[Josh]

Yeah. Although I will say disrespect to the pumpkins to have it up during their set.

[Seth]

Oh, okay.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

If it was up during their set. I agree. That is disrespect.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

But maybe not enough to bring your full legal force down on Ticketmaster.

[Josh]

No.

[Seth]

I wish I was there to get a video of you watching how wrong you had been. And then I would have sent that to Ticketmaster. I'm like, if this guy ever shows up with a summons. Yeah. Something happened that I never care for. But I was only, I believe, only on the ground for 16 hours in Los Angeles. I did not see you. Oh, yeah.

[Josh]

I didn't even know you were coming to town.

[Seth]

Well, yeah, I had to come lose my Emmy, but landed and went straight to the hotel. Got straight. Got put on my tuxedo. I will say the win of the day. Steelers 2 0. So I'll take that.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And then went to the Emmys. A lovely time. Got to present with Bo and Yang and Kristen Wiig and Maya Rudolph, which was a delight, I hear.

[Josh]

Was super funny. I didn't.

[Seth]

Haven't seen it. It was a good bit.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And they're obviously the best. To be in that four shot is a honor and delight. Lost our Emmy totally fine. And then. Yeah. Got on a 6:00am flight home.

[Josh]

Wow.

[Seth]

And yeah. And a shout out to. Not the way George Miller wants you to watch It. But I had not seen Furiosa.

[Josh]

I still haven't either.

[Seth]

Oh, I mean, go see Furiosa. I mean, I know it's too late to see it in a theater, but at least watch it on a tv. I watched it over the course of two days on two different airlines, you know, loved it. And I love Fury Road, so I don't know why I waited so long for Furiosa, but. Great.

[Josh]

Yeah. Well, Mackenzie had a little bridal shower. A bunch of the people at the Barn had a sort of nice dinner night evening with her. Her sister was in town, so they went after that, and I was like, I'm going to watch this Napoleon. This Joaquin Phoenix Napoleon. And I went online because as soon as I pulled it up, it was like, do you want to watch the theatrical or you want to watch the director's cut? And I was like, I don't know. And all the sort of things said that the director's cut was better. So I did a three and a half hour.

[Seth]

Wow.

[Josh]

Napoleon. I loved it.

[Seth]

Great.

[Josh]

I love it.

[Seth]

All right, look at this. Now, this is a new segment where you just are getting loose wrecks from posh, and I just kind of. Loose wrecks. Hey, it's a listener episode. And since you've been listening to us just go on and on, we would like to listen to you. Oh, real quick. Somebody on Instagram said, I can't believe you got bullied out of doing my favorite part of the show. And I think that in this case, you're the bully. So we're gonna listen to our listeners. But first, why don't you listen to Jeff Tweedy?

[Sam]

Family trips with the Myers brothers. Family chips with the.

[Seth]

All right, so we've done this before. We're just gonna drop in a listener story, and let's all enjoy it together. First time Josh and I have heard it.

[Joe]

Hi, my name's Joe. I live in Playa del Rey, California, but grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia. I'm the youngest of five kids, one older brother, three older sisters. And our family trip every year was going to the Jersey shore for a week. A little backstory before the story. My mom signed us up for everything. Even if we didn't want to do it. She signed us up not because she was trying to live her life through us. To compensate for that time. She got the polio in the great Boston outbreak in the summer of 52. She just didn't want us to miss out on anything. This particular story took place in 1986. We were staying in Ocean City, New Jersey. I was very intent on buying a hermit crab that year and convinced my parents that I needed two of them. One small, little fast one that I named Spuds McKenzie after my favorite alcoholic dog, Spuds McKenzie, and a larger, lazier one named Checkers because he had a checkered shell. And at 7 years old, that shit made a lot of sense. Anyway, that summer, I saw a flyer for a hermit crab race on the boardwalk, and I was jazzed to the max. My mom glanced at the flyer, and what she saw was something called the Miss Crustacean Beauty Pageant. She, of course, then mentioned this to my sisters to get them to compete. They declined immediately, but my mom would not have it. Now, my grandmom was a seamstress, and I'm pretty sure she made their outfits by hand, which added to the pressure my mom was already putting on them. It was a full court press of Italian guilt, which I like to refer to as the gabagool. On the day of the big race and the pageant, my mom dragged my sisters in full makeup and handmade gowns to the boardwalk, where we soon found out that the Miss Crustacean Beauty Pageant was for hermit crabs, not human people. Now, of course, my sisters were completely embarrassed, but I was there to win a goddamn race, and I couldn't let anything break my focus. You might be wondering, how exactly does a hermit crab race work? Well, a bunch of nerds put their little crabs on a table inside of a plastic cage. Think of it like a tiny UFC octagon, but circular. And instead of two dudes in board shorts, it's a bunch of hermit crabs. Now, the idea is that they lift up this little crab prison, and the first one to crawl past the finish line wins. I should note the finish line is also a circle because hermit crabs have no spatial awareness. Okay, back to the race. There are probably 20 to 30 hermit crabs on this table, and they all look alike, but it doesn't matter. I'm a father. I know my children. On your marks, get set, go. The head nerd lifts up the cage. Spuds is immediately attacked by a larger hermit crab holding him back. Now, I know what I'm about to say will sound made up, but I swear on my seamstress grandmother this happened. Checkers pulled out his big claw and pinched the big bully crab, freeing his little brother. Spuds then took off and booked it past all the other crabs, reaching the finish line, in my opinion, first. But as you can imagine, there was no photo finish, so Spuds ended Up taking second. I learned some valuable lessons that day. The world can be brutally unfair. Second place ribbons are red. And that unless you're in Florida. A Miss Crustacean beauty pageant is probably about forcing a crab to wear a dress, not a person. Love the podcast, guys. Oh, and Josh, your songs at the end are fantastic. Please don't ever stop.

[Seth]

Thank you, Joe. What a story.

[Josh]

I mean, that's like. I don't know, you want that to be a short film or. It feels like a Mark Twain story. It's too strange and wonderful.

[Seth]

And I mean, three older sisters in homemade gowns accidentally showing up for a crab beauty pageant. Were. Then the only move is to say no. We know. We just dress up for crab races.

[Josh]

Like, if you garbage people like people used to.

[Seth]

Yeah, if you garbage people wanna show up in your flip flops and street clothes, fine. But this used to be an occasion.

[Josh]

Was there a race for hermit crabs as well as a beauty pageant for hermit crabs?

[Seth]

It is one of. This is one of those problems where you wish Joe was here in person. Because I do. I will say, as good as his story was, I do have some follow ups.

[Josh]

Yeah, but I mean, but that's.

[Seth]

That's great. Cause I was wondering. Oh, are all. Are all the crabs in the race gonna be dressed up in crazy costumes? But it turns out no.

[Josh]

Yeah, I'm gonna. You know, we haven't done this before. If Joe can just reach out and.

[Seth]

Joe let us know. Was there also. Was there also a hermit cab beauty contest? Who won that and how much? I also have a question. How much did you pay for the hermit crabs?

[Josh]

Yeah, don't you just find those?

[Seth]

Yeah, that's what I would have thought. If someone was like. I mean, like, if my kid was like, I really want a hermit crab, I'd be like, best of luck. I mean, I wouldn't say like, all right, let's head on down to the pet store. But I guess, you know, again, this is Jersey Shore. I bet there's a lot of people listening. Go to the Jersey shore. They're like, the first thing you do is bite a kid's crabs.

[Josh]

Then they're good for the whole summer.

[Seth]

That was before Tamagotchis. That's how you knew your kid could be a parent one day. Could you get the crabs through the summer?

[Josh]

Yeah. I mean, it must just be a similar thing to, like, goldfish. It's like, oh, yeah, these things are.

[Seth]

I'm very proud of checkers looking out for spuds. I did not think this kind of Crab would care for one another. You know why?

[Josh]

Why?

[Seth]

Because they're hermits, you know, kind of famously. Yeah, famously solitary.

[Josh]

Do you think maybe the race also in their head is like, I just gotta get away from all these other crabs.

[Seth]

Right.

[Josh]

Yeah, right.

[Seth]

You're right.

[Josh]

That's somewhere where I'm just like alone, where I can be with my thoughts. Yeah, yeah.

[Seth]

I'm gonna race to the aerie.

[Josh]

I've never been to like a small animal race. Like, I know they have like pig races sometimes. I've seen like videos of that. I want to say, like, these kinds of things happen. And these kinds of things, I think, always sound like great fun.

[Seth]

You know what? Martha's Vineyard does a crab race.

[Josh]

Oh, really?

[Seth]

Yeah. They do a crab race during fleet week. And it's. And that is a sort of big square. Think of like a big wooden pallet where there's like six rows and they put the crabs at the end of each. So each crab has their own individual chute to run across.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And I don't think they enjoy it based on their attitudes, but you know what? They're always so crabby. That was. I think I specifically. I apologize for everybody who heard that joke. That was specifically for our mom.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

You're like, he missed the mark on that one, Seth. I hit one exactly where I wanted to. Yeah.

[Josh]

Also as a real quick sort of family. Family trip. Our parents famously once went to Florida and they were looking for a restaurant to go to. And there's a restaurant called Krabby Bill's.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Josh]

And for whatever reason, mom didn't want to go there. And she took on a real childlike Persona and kept saying to him, I don't want to go to Krabby. Be that.

[Seth]

So now when somebody is being fussy in our house, they're being a Krabby Bill.

[Josh]

Yeah. By the way, Krabby Bills might be a fine, wonderful restaurant.

[Seth]

Might be a fine establishment also. I'm pretty confident when that happened with them. We were in our 20s, if not our 30s.

[Josh]

Oh, yeah.

[Seth]

That's a very late breaking story. We were not children and yet we still are. Like, she'll be like, ugh, your dad's being a real Crabby Bill.

[Josh]

Yep.

[Seth]

And by the way, my brother in law Zach, his parents, Bill and Kathy are fantastic. And my mom literally goes, oh, it's Crabby Bill. I'm like, you can't call him Crabby.

[Josh]

Bill just because his last name is.

[Seth]

Bill, not Krabby at all.

[Josh]

Yeah. Also it's his first name, but yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Seth]

And now we're going to take a quick break to hear from one of our sponsors. Family trips is supported by Airbnb. Hey, Baji.

[Josh]

Yes, Sufi?

[Seth]

You know we have an annual trip.

[Josh]

Yeah, we sure do. We get a couple regular trips. But which trip are you talking about?

[Seth]

I'm talking about the fact that you and I and 10 of our closest college friends get together every September for our fantasy football draft.

[Josh]

Such a trip.

[Seth]

And very little of the trip is about a fantasy football draft.

[Josh]

Yeah. I always feel a little nerdy saying that we're going on a fantasy football draft, but we're going to hang out with our buddies.

[Seth]

Yeah, that's why I say it's a fantasy friendship draft. Would that make it less nerdy or is that maybe worse?

[Josh]

No, I think it's charming. It's sweet.

[Seth]

So this year for our fantasy friendship draft, we have a fantasy location booked. And it's all thanks to Airbnb. We found a place that has enough space for all of us and enough bedrooms for all of us and has a lot of outdoor activities. A fire pit. There's a fire pit. Possum.

[Josh]

There's a fire pit. I want to say there's a volleyball court.

[Seth]

Yep.

[Josh]

There's a pickleball court. There's a lot.

[Seth]

It's driving distance to a hospital that a bunch of 50 year old guys are gonna have to go to when we blow our ACLs.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

But in general, it is so nice that it has all the things that we could not get with our group at a hotel.

[Josh]

Oh, absolutely not. Because what you want is you wanna be able to hang out together for as long as you can. And then if it's time to go to bed, you go to bed. But everyone else is sort of in the same place. And one thing that we're sort of focused on on trips like this is no new friends.

[Seth]

No new friends. We don't want to meet them, we don't want to make them. We're happy with who we are. And maybe you're someone who's thinking, you know what? My home could be a great get together for old friends who are not looking to meet new people. You've put a lot of time, effort and work into your home. And someone out there would probably love to experience it while they're traveling. And then they would rave about how it was the highlight of their trip. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how [e-mail] host here we go. All right, you guys, let's Hear our next story. Thank you, Joe.

[Josh]

Amazing Joe. Thank you.

[Cindy]

Hi, my name is Cindy from Airg, Alberta, Canada. I love the Family Trips podcast. There's just enough humor to delight me. And I love the glimpses into the lives of people that you kind of know from TV and movies. So, about Me I grew up on a mixed farm ranch in southern Alberta, number four of five kids. There were six years between the oldest and the youngest, and that's a story in itself. We were all toddlers together, teenagers together, got married within a few years of each other, had our kids close together. We're all grandparents now, and the next stage is coming. We did just one big family trip, all seven of us in a station wagon, to California in december nineteen nineteen sixty seven. This was before seat belts were required in cars, so we had a foam mattress behind the seats and one or two kids would hang out back there. Our luggage was all piled on the roof rack along with the spare tire. Think Beverly Hillbillies. A few stories about that trip. We didn't have a ton of money, or maybe my dad was cheap. So we'd pile into one motel room, kids sharing beds, and we'd use that foam mattress from the car for a couple of kids on the floor. When we were approaching la, I think we hit a bump or something. The spare tire bounced off the roof rack and went rolling down the side of the highway and then into the grassy median. Dad stopped the car and yelled at my two older brothers, who were, I think 11 and 12 at the time, to chase after the tire and bring it back. If you had tried to get that tire to roll, it probably would have gone 15, 20ft. But when you want it to stop, it just kept rolling and rolling. So here are these two little country boys running down the median of an LA freeway, desperate to grab the tire. The story ended happily with the tire retrieved back on the roof rack, and on we went. When my parents died a few years ago, we found all of Mum's travel journals. She'd log every penny we spent on those trips, driving from Canada to California, and returned. Total cost for gas was $113.51. It cost us $11.25 for Disneyland, plus souvenirs and food for a grand total of $20.08 for a family of seven. My husband and I are planning a road trip this winter. My hubby has finally been cleared to travel into the US and that's another story for another time. We're hoping to find a small motorhome, head to California across the Southern states to Florida and then back north to get home to western Canada. We'll be visiting some friends and family along the way and hoping to cross a few things off our bucket lists. For me, I want to see the Grand Canyon. Sorry, Seth. I just do.

[Josh]

That's all right. That's all right.

[Seth]

Look, I've been. Now I get it. I totally get it. I think what you and your husband should do, Cindy, is you should take a road trip. But you should try to only spend what you spent on your trip with seven people. So you can go from Alberta to a different part of Alberta. Once you hit, like $140, you have to turn around and go home.

[Josh]

Yeah. A tire, like a car tire. A spare tire. I feel like for. I mean, I don't know. I'm trying to get a good sense of. I don't have a good sense of what an 11 or a 12 year old is capable of. But I guess country boys in Alberta have probably been raised to be a little tough.

[Seth]

If you've been raised on a farm, you've chased a tire.

[Josh]

Yeah. Or you could like lift a tire. You've done some lifting.

[Seth]

Yeah, you could definitely lift.

[Josh]

But I just. I'm imagining two boys of that age like trucks. Yeah. We'd be like, dad, yeah, that tire's gone, man. Yeah, but like, it's over. If I had to lift a tire right now from my car, just, I guess you roll it back. But.

[Seth]

Oh, my God. It took you that long to come to the conclusion that you would roll a tire back. I think that's like. That would truly. The dumbest thing to see would be somebody walking down the side of a highway carrying a tire.

[Josh]

Well, it would be two people, Seth.

[Seth]

Yeah, it would be two people carrying a tire, which is maybe even more unwieldy. Have you ever switched to spare own?

[Josh]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Seth]

You know my spare tire story?

[Josh]

Yeah, I do. You want to tell the people?

[Seth]

I mean, I've told it before, but we. We got a flat tire before we have kids. I'm driving winter, freezing cold. We're outside a diner and Frisbee. Tiny Frisbee. Wearing a little sweater.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

Wearing a sweater vest.

[Josh]

Little Italian greyhounds.

[Seth]

And neither. We don't have service. We're not in the middle of nowhere, but we're just in a weird, like, no service spot.

[Josh]

Yeah. But it's nice though, that cars all have like a spare tire. And then like the tire iron in there.

[Seth]

It was all there.

[Josh]

Yeah. He got all the gear.

[Seth]

So you're all Set, by the way. Even Alexi knew that was not the right outcome. But she went inside and said, hey, can we use your phone to call aaa? And they were like, oh, what's the problem? She's like, oh, we got a flat tire. And then some guy sitting at the diner was like, you got a spare? And she's like, I'm pretty sure we got a spare. He goes, I'll go ahead and change it. And so he walked out and obviously he thought this was a damsel in distress. And instead he walked out and I was sitting in the driver's seat playing Scrabble on my iPad. And he was like, oh, hey. I'm like, hey. He goes, I'm gonna change the tire. I'm like, oh, great. And then he got the stuff out. And then he was like. Then he came back. He's like, you gotta get out of the car. I'm like, oh, okay.

[Josh]

There's a picture of you holding your seven pound dog.

[Seth]

We can't all be raised on farms in Alberta.

[Josh]

We were raised in New Hampshire, and Daddy taught me how to change a tire.

[Seth]

Well, yeah, he taught us how to change a tire. Use the F word in every single conjugate. Literally. Listen, dad, changing a tire was conjugating the F word.

[Josh]

Very Christmas story.

[Seth]

Oh, yeah.

[Josh]

I do love Cindy's plan. To sort of get an RV and drive and stop and see people is just. It's the best. When I drove cross country, I would stay with people and I would show up right around dinner time. I would be shown to a room where I would be a guest for a night. We would have dinner, and then I'd be tired from driving all day. We'd maybe like, you know, sit around, have a drink. I wouldn't want to drink too much because I'd be driving the next day.

[Seth]

And these were all strangers. And it was done at gunpoint.

[Josh]

No, these were. This was Denny, you're like, now we're.

[Seth]

Going to have a drink. This was Rob a couple games.

[Josh]

This was Rob Phantor's parents in Des Moines.

[Seth]

Sounds good.

[Josh]

This was my buddy Mark Cottrell, who was with his wife's family in San Jose.

[Seth]

Did you map it out? Did you sort of push pins on maps beforehand of, like, these were eminent hit.

[Josh]

That's really cool. And then in the morning, people were like, well, we have to go to work in the morning. And I was like, well, great. I have to drive to Iowa or I gotta get to northern Pennsylvania, so let's have some coffee. And then we'll be on our merry way, and it was just lovely. So I wish you guys a great trip and thanks for the story, Cindy.

[Seth]

Thank you, Cindy. I think we got one more story. Is that right, Sam?

[Josh]

Yep, that's right.

[Seth]

I want to get Sam in here.

[Josh]

You know, and that's my contribution. Yep.

[Seth]

We're just getting just enough Sam to whet people's interest and appetite.

[Josh]

Yeah, Sam's been called out.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Josh]

Previously. For not catching when we had. Was it siblings?

[Seth]

Siblings, yeah. People are really hard on Sam when it's obviously, you know, we've been here for every episode, too.

[Josh]

Well, they called us out and they called Sam out, which I think was a new thing for her. Yeah, it was. Yeah, yeah.

[Seth]

You know, I can handle it.

[Josh]

Keeps me on my toes.

[Seth]

Absolutely.

[Josh]

We don't blame you.

[Seth]

If you can't stand the heat, don't produce a podcast.

[Josh]

All right, here's our last story.

[Allison]

Hi, Seth and Josh. My name is Allison and my sisters Susan and Debbie, and I love your show. I was in Seth's class at Northwestern, but unfortunately I never met either of you while we were there. I live in Tampa now and my sisters live in D.C. and Chicago. We took many family road trips when we were kids, so here's a story about the first one we took. Our mom and dad grew up in Chicago and moved to La Crosse, Wisconsin for work. At the time of this story, in the mid-80s, I was 12, my middle sister was 9, and my youngest sister was 5. We'd never been anywhere but Wisconsin and Chicago. Our dad had a two day conference in Boston, so we drove in our family minivan all the way out to Massachusetts. The trip had the usual components of a Massachusetts tour. Plymouth Rock, the Freedom Trail, Cape Cod, et cetera. But as landlocked Midwesterners, the event we most looked forward to was a whale watch. To see real whales in real life. We had never been on a boat other than a canoe in the Mississippi river, so we were so excited about going out into the Atlantic Ocean. The morning of the trip, we were up early in anticipation, and we could hear the other hotel guests and workers in the hallways and outside as they called to each other. It looks like a lower deck day, we heard one person say. What could that mean? We thought maybe lots of whales we could see up close. We ate a small breakfast of Cheerios at the hotel and headed down to the dock. A cool breeze picked up and waves crashed against the pier. We smelled the salty sea air and we could not contain our excitement. We couldn't believe Our luck. Four hours on a whale watch tour. For sure we'd see whales. As the boat chugged away from the shore, my sisters and I ran from one side of the rail to the other to the bow, wind in our hair and faces, taking in all of the sights and sounds of the sea. It was just as we had imagined, and after about 45 minutes, we reached the spot where the captain thought we might see some whales. The boat bobbed in the rough seas as we waited. It pitched and rolled. An hour went by. The sun got higher, and it felt hot. We started to look at each other with every sideways motion of the boat feeling worse and worse. We were pale and sweaty as the boat heaved in the waves. No whales in sight. At that point, we had split up. My mom consoled my two younger sisters, and I had my head down on my dad's knees, struggling to keep it together. What time was it? Only two hours had gone by. We still had two hours left. Then the captain made an announcement that the ship's concession was serving their special jelly donuts, and people walked by eating them casually, like they were standing in line for their coffee at Dunkin. That was too much for me, and I found out what a lower deck day meant. As I hung over the rail with many other passengers, I saw those Cheerios from breakfast again. My mom and one of my sisters succumbed as well, my mom dramatically hanging onto my youngest sister's windbreaker to keep her from going over the side as she threw up. Eventually, some whales did show up, but no one cared anymore. We just needed to get back onto solid ground. A long hour later, the boat arrived back into port. We kissed the earth when we finally disembarked. And to add a final insult to injury, our minivan smelled like seawater for the next seven years that we headed to remind us daily of our infamous whale watch trip. Love the show.

[Seth]

Oh, my God. Thank you, Allison. Go Cats.

[Josh]

We'll start with.

[Seth]

I mean, we went whale watching as well, and it is not. I mean, I feel like my takeaway is. I remember dad kept saying what it was just a huge scam.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And I think I also gave myself my sense of whale watching would be the entire whale would come out of the water.

[Josh]

Right. You wanted a breach.

[Seth]

I'd been SeaWorld spoiled.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And instead, it's just sort of like the back of a whale that, like, goes under you.

[Josh]

And I suppose if it wants to tip you, maybe could tip you. But, yeah, those. We've been on those whale watches, and they are longer than they need to be.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Josh]

And also it's, you know, unless you're truly in some majestic place once you see a couple whales, that's kind of it.

[Seth]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've talked about the fact that we went on safari. The same is true of giraffes. The first giraffe you see is mind blowing.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

The fourth giraffe you see is now just like a deer. Like, that's the speed, you know, just. You know what I mean? Like again, if you saw a giraffe in New York City, it'd be fantastic. But like, if you see a giraffe where all the giraffes are, you just kind of get used to it. And I feel like the same is true of Wales. There was a real. Two summers ago, there were. Everybody wanted to see Wales. Um, my whole summer was like my father in law being like, they spotted whales.

[Josh]

Oh, yeah.

[Seth]

It was a lot of like taking a boat out and just like, just like sort of looking around for whales and being seasick.

[Josh]

Yeah. I remember we went out on the boat on Martha's Vineyard, ostensibly looking for whales, and we came across a pod of dolphins.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Josh]

And there were like hundreds of them. It was amazing. And your son Ash kept being like, I wanted to see whales. Yeah.

[Seth]

And dolphins are so much better than whales.

[Josh]

That was dragged. It was amazing. It was like, it was fascinating. It was so cool. You know, we cut the engine and you could just. We were surrounded. It was amazing. Were you on? I went on a boat in Scotland and I don't know if you were with me. Maybe it was just. No, definitely Mackenzie and I. But we had like taken some trip and it was like a dolphin sighting boat trip. And on the picture there were like, there was a boat moving with all these people leaning into the wind and all these dolphins out of the water with the same lean as the people. And you were like, oh, this is going to be amazing. And we saw zero. And they said, well, we will give you half off your next boat tour if you want to do it again.

[Seth]

And it was like, no, half off the next one.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

But then I will say, because we went on a boat in Loch Ness.

[Josh]

Yes.

[Seth]

And we did see the monster. So you've been. Yeah, we did not strike out that time.

[Josh]

Yeah, she's down there. Ol Nessie.

[Seth]

Since we're talking about whales, you know. And again, sometimes people will say, do you have a. What's your hidden talent? People ask me that during like a Q and A. And I always say, like, if I. Well, I'm not hiding anything. I'm doing four shows a week. Right. If I had one. You have a good answer, though. And since we're talking about whales, you and dad have this weird genetic inheritance where you can echolocate.

[Josh]

Well, we can. Like, it's more of a dolphin, but it's a dolphin Click.

[Seth]

All right, so Josh. Now this is. Josh is doing this with his mouth, and I can't do it. And it's been a great frustration to me. And the two of them, the way they explain it to me is. Just explain how you do it.

[Josh]

It's the inside. It's the side of my tongue on the upper part of my teeth. And I'm sort of inhaling, but slow. Not inhaling, just. It vibrates off the inside of my teeth, the side of my tongue. And I'm sure there are people out there that can do it, but it is one of those strange things that dad could do and I could just do. Yeah, I don't think we, like, worked on it.

[Seth]

No, I don't think you worked on it either. You worked on my last nerve. Was that our second. That was our last story.

[Josh]

That was our last story.

[Seth]

Great stories.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

Thank you, everybody.

[Josh]

Thank you. Allison.

[Seth]

Allison, Cindy, Joe.

[Josh]

Also tremendous. Their car smelled like seawater for seven years.

[Seth]

I will say I was not. Seven years was a very funny culmination of that sentence because I sort of thought weeks. Seven years is. I mean, I kind of feel like maybe you guys didn't, like, I don't know, desalinate well before you got back into the car?

[Josh]

Yeah. Is that just like a car from Wisconsin that's never seen the ocean? Has. Is porous in a way that can take on a seawater smell and never replace it with anything else.

[Seth]

My nightmare. And I like a point A to point B ferry ride. Sign me up. Yeah, we're gonna take a boat out for two hours, then we're gonna come two hours back. Sign me out. Just. I feel trapped, man.

[Josh]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I feel like you do that to a degree on the regular. Yeah.

[Seth]

Yeah, I do. I suffer quietly on the bow of the ship.

[Josh]

You're going.

[Seth]

The bow's the front. Posh. I love that.

[Josh]

You're going nowhere. Good way. There you go.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Josh]

And now we're going to take a quick break to hear from one of our sponsors.

[Seth]

Support comes from Deleteme. Hey, Pashi.

[Josh]

Yes, Sufi?

[Seth]

Have you or someone you know been a victim of identity theft? Harassed, stalked, doxxed. Has that happened to someone you know?

[Josh]

It hasn't happened to anyone. I know specifically, but anyone you hear about it happening to says it's maybe the worst thing that's ever happened to them.

[Seth]

I think it's a huge drag.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

When someone takes your identity because they almost never do something with your identity that you would like them to do. No one has ever, like, steals your identity and then go takes like tap lessons and then, you know, tap.

[Josh]

That would be amazing.

[Seth]

Yeah, that'd be amazing.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And you know what? But again, that's not what they're doing.

[Josh]

No.

[Seth]

And that's why I personally recommend use choose Delete Me. Deleteme is a subscription service that removes your personal info from hundreds of data brokers. These are the data brokers that are making a profit off your data. Your data is a commodity. Anyone on the web can buy your private details. And then that leads to the identity theft where people are all of a sudden using your information for nefarious means.

[Josh]

Shame on them.

[Seth]

So that's why sign up. Provide Deleteme with exactly what information you want deleted. And their experts take it from there. Take control of your data. Keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me now at a special discount for our listeners today. Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to JoinDelete Me.com Tripps and use promo code TRIPS at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is go to JoinDelete Me.Com Trips and enter code T R I P S at checkouts. That's JoinDelete Me.com TrippS code. Tell them poshy trips.

[Josh]

I really feel like you almost deleted me from that whole ad.

[Seth]

Yeah, I just, you know, sometimes I'm just rolling posh and you're just. You know what? You know what? You are expendable and an anchor.

[Sam]

Here we go.

[Seth]

All right, I think we have some cues that we're going to provide some A's to if you want to roll one of those. Sam.

[Larry]

Greetings from beautiful Cambria, California. Josh, come on up and visit. It's a short drive from la. My name is Larry. And hearing the discussion and the befuddlement that Seth had over Josh's blind spot about the show Friends, the now worldwide phenomenon that everyone seems to know about. I was just wondering for each of you, is there something in pop culture that you feel like you have a really deep knowledge for? What's the one thing maybe each of you would say in pop culture that you've had something almost bordering on obsession since you were maybe a kid or adolescent curious to know Love the podcast.

[Seth]

I mean, since a kid, I would say, you know, Batman. You know, I was like, I remember waiting to get the first ticket to the 1989 Batman movie.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

Which, by the way, looked like all the other tickets. Not the best use of my time.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

But then, you know, I would say that I. Nobody bangs the drum harder for shows like Homicide, Life on the Streets, or Battlestar Galactica. The new Battlestar Galactica. Those are things that I feel like maybe I have a more abiding love for than the normal human being.

[Josh]

Yeah. Baseball cards. I feel like you.

[Seth]

Yeah, that's. Yeah.

[Josh]

I mean, but then there are people that are so into baseball cards.

[Seth]

That's the problem with a lot of these get lapsed. Like, people are more into. Yeah.

[Josh]

Um. I don't know. I forget so much that I feel like.

[Seth]

Yeah, you really do that.

[Josh]

I can't.

[Seth]

It's interesting when I'm like, what is Josh's pop culture thing? I don't think you have one. I will say, because. But like, you, like, genre wise, I would say you love horror movies.

[Josh]

I do.

[Seth]

You love a good scare.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

But you're not. Yeah.

[Josh]

Yeah. But I don't. I don't know.

[Seth]

I would say, like, I love Seinfeld. But then, you know, Sal Gentile, one of our writers, knows Seinfeld such a, you know, granularly in a way that I don't. So.

[Josh]

Right. Yeah. I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of anything. I think.

[Seth]

Yeah. Again, you could just.

[Josh]

Me.

[Seth]

You were of adult age in the 90s. You can't name all six friends.

[Josh]

That's true. The other day, I was thinking about that again, and I was like, yeah, I can't do it. And I didn't want to look it up. Real quick. I just want to say to Larry, I've driven through Cambria, and it's beautiful. It's sort of this, you know, it's wine country. I sort of drove in off these sort of rolling California mountains down to the coast and was like, what is this town? And that was Cambria. I did not stop. I was on my way to Big Sur. But, man, it seems like a place that's worth stopping in.

[Seth]

All right, put that on your next family trips, everybody. Cambria.

[Josh]

Hi, guys. My name's Kate from Philadelphia. I was just wondering how you guys think your family dynamic would have changed having a sister. And if you had to have a sister, would you have preferred having an older sister, a sister in between you two, or a younger sister?

[Seth]

I mean, now, being in a situation where I have two boys that are the same distance apart as you and I and watching them with a little sister, I would love to have had a little sister.

[Josh]

Yeah, we talked about what it would have been like to have a little sister when we were kids. We talked about how we probably would have been a real pain in the ass to any dude that wanted to date her. But, yeah, I think that would have been really fun. Although also that older sister thing that we hear from so many of our guests and, you know, sort of having those early crushes based on friends of the older sister and trying to show off for her friends to be noticed, I feel like that is something that I would have been very into.

[Seth]

Yeah, I think reflected back on sadly, but very into at the time. Yeah, we had. A very hilarious thing is happening right now, which is Alexi, who has impeccable taste, impeccable style, and has friends with impeccable taste and impeccable style, has received all these, like, gorgeous hand me down dresses for Addie. And all Addie wants to do is wear pants and a T shirt. And today, Alexi, I just heard her saying, will you just please put on a pretty dress? And she's like, I want to wear pants like my boys. Like my boys. She calls her brothers the boys. And so it's so funny. Like, Alexi's like, I can't. I can't believe that. Because there's these two dumb boys. My daughter, and just the stupidest. She looks so funny to me. But it is. And it's. I mean, it's my dream come true that now Alexia has to deal with a stubborn woman. I'm like, oh, no. But it's the best.

[Josh]

Yeah. I have seen. I mean, there are some great pictures of Addie in adorable dresses. So they're out there. She'll put them on.

[Seth]

They're out there.

[Josh]

Yeah.

[Seth]

I also walked. I had to walk all three kids, plus cousin Agnes to school today. And Addie's in preschool. She's in a room called the Red Room. And Agnes started singing to her, Addie's in the red room. And then Addie heard it and started singing along, but she had misheard it and started singing, addie to the rescue. She heard red Room is rescue. And then the other boys. So I was like, just, I'm pushing Addy in a stroller. And then I got three kids on scooters next to her, and they're all screaming, addy to the rescue. And it was really good times.

[Josh]

Yeah. Great.

[Seth]

Yes. So I would have loved one.

[Josh]

Sure.

[Seth]

I mean, obviously, we ended up. It just, you know, the problem would have been, would she have wanted to be cut in on the podcast? You know.

[Josh]

Would she have had, you know. Yeah, she would have had good insights. She would have ripped us.

[Seth]

Yeah, no, that's a.

[Josh]

On the regular.

[Seth]

I would like a sister, but she's not allowed to rip us.

[Josh]

Can we have one of those, please?

[Seth]

All right, let's hear our next one.

[Hannah]

Hi, Josh and Seth. My name is Hannah. I'm from St. Louis, and my question for you guys is, I'm about to have a baby as a solo parent. How can I create family trips for just me and my baby and still manage to create the adventures and exciting stories that you guys hear about and tell yourself? How can I, as a solo parent, create that for my own child? Love the podcast. Love you guys. Thank you.

[Seth]

First of all, congratulations. Second of all, you are going to be fine, because you are going to love the company that baby so much that it will just be so natural to you where to go and what to do. And you can't possibly know what that is yet, but I'm almost jealous of how special it's gonna be in this chapter of your life where it's just the two of you doing all these things together.

[Josh]

My fiance, Mackenzie, her parents are divorced and divorced when she was pretty young, and she used to take trips with her mom, with just her mom. And they still talk about this place, Cook's cabins, which is in Cape Cod. And I think they're these sort of, like, you know, seaside weather beaten cottages. And they would get one of those for a week after Labor Day, which was like, a more affordable time of year. And there were these, like, sand dunes that you would hike down to the water, and they just sort of, like, hang. And it was this place that was like a little community because there were all these little houses so you'd get to know the people that were there for the same week or on the same weekend. And I think just like, yeah, going somewhere. Going somewhere that's fun. That, like, I feel like Mackenzie's mom, Linda, loved the beach and loved to lay out and kids, like, hanging on the beach. But find something that you love to do where your child will be able to sort of run around. If you're in St. Louis, I don't know how busy it is where you are, but a spot where kids can run around and play and where you can also be happy and, yeah, make those memories. That sounds exciting to me.

[Seth]

You're Gonna want to be with that baby and that baby's gonna want to be with you. And that's the most important part of any family trips.

[Josh]

So, yeah, two person family.

[Seth]

Congratulations again.

[Josh]

That's still a family.

[Seth]

Hey, thanks everybody. We really do love these episodes and we couldn't do it without you and that was just wonderful today.

[Josh]

Thanks, everybody.

[Seth]

Josh, do you wanna say that thing about how to. What the best way to move a wheel one more time just cause people forgot?

[Josh]

Yeah. You get. If you're 11, find a 12 year old, pick up the other.

[Seth]

It works at any age.

[Josh]

Okay. Yeah. But ideally though, that's the perfect age. And you pick up one side of it and then you have the other person pick up the other side and you carry it sort of like, I don't know, like you're moving a table.

[Seth]

Yeah. Just like a janky back and forth. Yeah, Shuffling, like real, like little shuffling steps.

[Josh]

Yeah, that's the best way.

[Seth]

All right, thanks everybody.

[Sam]

Joe and his family took a trip to the Jersey shore. Got himself a hermit crab or two sisters in a beauty contest. Was just four crabs, man, that's the best. But also there was a crab race and Joe was gonna win it. Spuds hit the circular track. Some dickhead crab tried to hold him back. Check hookers came to his rescue. Cause that's what bro crabs do. Cindy hails from Alberta. She's got lots of siblings. Road trip down to California. When they hit LA's smoggy air, they hit a bump and lost their spare. It hit the ground but didn't stop. Just kept on rolling. There were two Canadians running down the median. They got the tire and brought it back. Bradley didn't carry it back to that first vacation pageant just for crustaceans. Was there a coronation? I'd like more information. Allison hopped in the van and drove to Boston. She saw the Freedom Trail and Plymouth Rock. The whale watch sounded pretty fun. But after hours in the sun, the boat just rocked and rocked and rocked. And they got nauseous. Special donuts with jelly. Not so good for a queasy belly. The Cheerios that you once ate have suddenly become fish bait. Adding salt to injury. The minivan smelled like the sea. Eventually that smell would fade. After seven years.