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Mishke here, joining the GL world to pitch my new podcast, which now comes out twice a week, Wednesdays and Fridays. The show features an extraordinary array of exotic circus performers, forgotten Hollywood starlets, reclusive Fortune 500 CEOs, professional taxidermists. Oh, wait a minute. That's a different promo. Where's the promo for GL ers? Here it is. Let's try this again. Mishke here, pitching my new podcast. We're out of time. Could I do it again? Hi, everyone. Good to be with you again. I'm coming to you from the old outpost on the bleak, barren tarmac of University Avenue. Thanks for joining me. My name's Mishke. Shooby dooby doo I said shooby doobie dooby doo Shooby doobie doo I said shooby doo doo doo. It's good to do a show. There are worse ways one could spend some time, Huh? A lot worse ways than doing a show. Now, will this show be remembered years and years from now? No. No. Will it be remembered next week? Unlikely. That's not the point. The point is we have to do something with our time while we. While we breathe. What do you do with your time? I do these, what you call, shows. I'm going to do one now. Sometimes when I'm trying to figure out what to do with a show, I go to the news and I look to see what the news is saying. Headline drunk plane passenger problem getting worse and no one's doing anything about it. I didn't know that it's been a while since I've jumped on a plane, that the drunk plane passenger problem is getting worse and no one's doing anything about it. Do they kind of like it? Is that why they're not doing anything? Is it kind of funny flying with a bunch of drunk people? Maybe that's the thing. Morally, they feel they should do something, but it's a hoot, so what the hell. You hand me the drunk plane passenger problem and I'll fix it. Tell you what I'd do, and I'm not joking with you. I'd take the back third of the plane and I'd cage it off the same way in a cab. Sometimes you're caged off from the front. Certainly in a police car. You know that cage? I'd cage off the back third of the plane. Turn it into the equivalent of detox. Jail detox. Remember detox. You ever. Well, I don't want to make it sound like we've all been grabbed off the street and thrown into detox. But some of us have, you know, in our misspent youth. Might have happened once or twice. Come on, even Cool Hand Luke got arrested, didn't he? What was he doing? I don't know, but he was hammered. Playing around with the parking meters. I wasn't doing that. Anyway, back third of the plane is jail. Detox. The cell where you throw the drunks. You cage them in back there, the unruly ones, you push out a back door with a parachute. They land in some Ohio farm field. That trip down will sober them up. Oh yeah. A lot of flight attendants have been asking if they can bring back the old cheek slap. That cheek slap used to be common in the 50s and 60s. You know, when a guy. When a guy would get a little fresh. That's what they said the guys got back then, fresh. I never understood that. I used to be watching a movie as a boy and hear someone say, you're getting a little fresh. And I think, what the hell does that mean? A lot of times you'd see a woman slap a guy in a film. Sometimes you'd see a guy slap a woman. But the face slap was around back then, more so than today. Flight attendants would like to bring back the. The old cheek slap. The good old fashioned slap to the cheek. Passengers get fresh and one quick zinger upside the head, boom. That'll shut em down. We gotta do something about the drunk plane passenger problem. Drunk plane passenger problem. That's tough to say. That's kind of like saying Joe's crack cold stone crab claws. You ever had Joe's crack cold stone crab claws? Or that's like Orson Welles having to say in that commercial, it has a crisp crumb crust. Remember when he had to say that crisp crumb crust in that commercial for those fish sticks? Crisp crumb crust. Same with the ad for Joe's crack cold stone crab clause. Mm, drunk plane passenger problems. We gotta do something about it. Notice the Greyhound folks aren't bitching. They have the polite passengers on the greyhounds. They're just enjoying the countryside, moving past their windows, reading a pulp novel, Thinking about the gal that got away back in high school. The one who married Larry, the drywall guy. No, it's the plains where you gotta worry about the drunk passenger problems. That's when the hooch comes out. Maybe it's the altitude, maybe it's the attitude. You think to yourself, I get to fly through the air like a bird. Why not drink like a fish, act like a monkey, laugh like a hyena wish I could smoke like a chimney. But those days are over. It is amazing to me they still allow drinking in the friendly skies. I'm surprised that hasn't been shut down altogether. They must be making a lot of money off the booze. You can't drink in a taxi. Speaking of friendly skies, it's kind of astonishing what happens when you place friendly next to something. Did those skies ever sound safe? Once someone decided to call them friendly skies as opposed to the skies planes fall from when they crash. Somebody in a boardroom somewhere, some PR guy said I let's call them friendly skies. It'll make people feel better about flying. How can you crash when you're flying through friendly skies? Friendly is a great word. When I was a kid and Casper was called a friendly ghost, that really helped. That helped me out tremendously. No one ever called Lurch on the Addams Family friendly, and I ended up getting a Lurch complex. As a child with a Lurch phobia, I got scared of him to the point where I had to look away. When I was watching the Addams Family with my brothers, I had to look away whenever Lurch came on. That was not a friendly face. What if, like Casper the Friendly Ghost, Lurch had been called the friendly butler? I think that would have helped. Adding friendly to things helps. I got to thinking about the adjective friendly today, and I wondered what other words. It lightens up. It softens the way it does with Casper the Friendly Ghost. So I looked to see if there was any use of friendly with a word that is the opposite of friendly. Say, oh, I don't know, Nazi. In other words, was friendly Nazi a thing? I looked up friendly Nazi. I wanted to find out if there was a Nazi out there who wanted people to feel better about him or her. And did they place friendly next to Nazi? I thought that was possible. I could not find one example online. Not a single one. Not one example of Friendly Nazi. I thought for sure there had to be someone who had purchased the domain name friendlynazi.com Nope. That domain is available right now for just five bucks a year. That's what they're asking right now. If you want to go purchase friendlynazi.com go get it. I gotta tell you, folks, almost every single combination of words you can think of has been registered as a domain name. And yet no one has thought to register friendlynazi.com that's really difficult to believe. I would think there would be a band called Friendly Nazi by now. How did the punk movement miss that? Opportunity. I next looked up Friendly Neighborhood Nazi. That's also available as a domain name. Friendly neighborhoodnazi.com but it gets a tad more expensive. That's 1199 a year. That means they think more people are likely to buy friendly neighborhoodnazi.com thank you. Than friendlynazi.com. why would that be? Friendly Neighborhood Nazi is longer. You'd think a shorter domain name would be more appealing. They must think that warm Rockwellian neighborhood vibe is going to appeal to some Nazis someday. And they'll bite at the 1199 a year friendly neighborhood Nazi. Then I put in Happy Go Lucky Nazi. You can't find that either. If you want happy go lucky nazi.com it's available 6 bucks more a year than friendlynazi.com Happy go lucky Nazi. Strange, isn't it adorable. Nazi.com is available as is Nazi Toy store. And. And forgive me for this, but I did look this up. I don't know why Nazi diapers. I don't know why I put in Nazi diapers. Now that I think about it, I was imagining an ad for cute little Nazi diapers. Or an ad for diapers for aging old Nazi guys in assisted living facilities. You got those Nazi diapers on, Hans? Hell yeah, Bernard. I feel cradled in the arms of the entire Third Reich when I wear these things. Well, Hans, isn't your health care aide a Jewish woman? Yes, Carol is Jewish. And I've noticed I go a lot longer here without getting a fresh diaper change than the rest of the residents. Sometimes I can go three days, Carol just walking by the room, looking and smiling at me and moving on. Consider yourself lucky, Hans. Carol changes my diapers and just replaces them with the soiled diapers she's just taken from other residents. That level of cruelty seems absolutely unmatched. Well, hold on, Bernard. I actually think in the cruelty department, we're still holding the trophy there. By the way, Bernard, you don't smell so good. I'm gonna head back to my room and see if Carol is feeling compassionate today. I need a change. Friendly, soiled diapers are nothing but a curse. You don't need friend friendly diapers. You need a friendly nurse. In the long and fabled story of Spectacle Shop, there have been many wondrous moments. Prince buying glasses there, William Hurt buying glasses there, Bette Midler, the Coen brothers buying many pair of vintage eyewear for their period piece films. Pro athletes coming by, people stopping by who are performing concerts in town, people flying in from other states to get glasses at Spectacle Shop. Glasses they know they can't find anywhere else. But if you ask the folks at Spectacle Shop, they're most proud of winning virtually every media poll there has ever been for best eyewear shop in all of Minnesota, including winning the Star Tribune's poll. Every single time they have had a poll the last five years in a row, Spectacle Shop has taken the crown. Best eyewear shop in Minnesota. Remember them? There are four Twin Cities locations and they are simply the best.
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Did you know you can save up to 70% on the best brands just by shopping at from rebel.com we're talking about strollers, car seats, high chairs, espresso machines, cookware. Everything you need for way less. Here's how it works. Every single day, REBBL drops thousands of new products on the site for up to 70% off. It is a constant stream of endless deals from top brands like Uppababy, Nuna, Baby bjorn, Breville, Nespresso, KitchenAid, Le Creuset and more. But you have to act fast because every deal is one of a kind. So if you see something you love, make sure you add to cart fast. So stop paying full price when you don't have to. Whether it's baby gear, kitchen upgrades or a treasure for your home you didn't know you needed, Rebel has it for way less. Up to 70% less. Shop from rebel.com and save big.
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You walk into a place like Menards and maybe the size of it takes away its charm. It's a big chain store. The smaller hardware stores are so personable and friendly. They remind you of the old days. The problem is the small hardware stores have more restrictive hours. They don't have as many products, and what they do have are more expensive. So it's a quandary for you. Now take that comparison to the world of banks. Something different happens. You leave your big national bank and you switch to North American Banking Co. A community bank with six Twin Cities locations, and you get your small and friendly and warm banking experience but without losing anything. The big banks offer nothing that North American Banking Company doesn't offer. North American Banking Company isn't more expensive. It has every single feature the big guys have. It has every service. Plus they offer that personal touch that means it's easier for them to approve your loan because they don't have to check with the big guys across the country. You're local, they're local. They understand you and your life. You're their neighbor. It's easier for them to deal with you as a unique individual and not a data point On a spreadsheet. Yes. All the pluses with none of the negatives. North American Banking Company. What, pray tell, are you waiting for, people? North American Banking Company Member fdic. Equal Housing Lender. Back to this term friendly and what it does to words that it's placed beside. It's extraordinary to me that its number one use, and I've looked this up, the number one use of friendly is as a word to set beside the word reminder. That's the number one use in the English language for friendly. The number one use of friendly is using it in the phrase just a friendly reminder. That's the way friendly is employed most often in this world in the English language. Why do we need reminders to become friendly reminders? What are they before they're friendly reminders? You see, a ghost is scary before friendly is added. A Nazi is a disturbing, sick and twisted individual before friendly is added. A reminder, however, is just fine before it's made friendly. A reminder is kind of nice from the get go. Why do we need to make it friendly? It wasn't unfriendly. If we said to someone, hey, just a reminder, tomorrow's garbage day, would that person hearing it get angry? Would they get upset? Don't ever say that to me again. If you want to keep that pretty nose of yours nice and straight. Okay? Oh, I'm sorry. I meant to say, just a friendly reminder, tomorrow is garbage day. There you go. That's. That's kind of you. Thanks much. I had forgotten about garbage day. I appreciate the reminder. What are we afraid of with reminders? That we have to make them friendly or we could get into all sorts of trouble. Say you're having to remind a prisoner that tomorrow is his execution day. Say you're his attorney and you know his mind has been scattered of late. Do you say, hey, just a friendly reminder, tomorrow they fry you? I'm not certain that would help. That actually sounds worse to make it friendly. For me personally, the most troubling use of friendly has been when the military has had to inform parents that their son has died from friendly fire. Would you ever feel a little bit better knowing it was friendly? Or does that maybe make it a little worse, given that friends don't let friends get shot? At least that's what the bumper sticker says on my car. Friendly fire should never have been a term. Accidental would have made more sense. Accidental fire, when your car runs into another car, what is it called? An accident. Not a friendly crash. Friendly fire should never ever, ever have been a term because once you're saying friendly fire, you're opening the door to a Saturday morning kids cartoon. Jimmy the Friendly Bullet. Hi, I'm Jimmy the Friendly Bullet. Here I go, zooming through the friendly skies, ready to take out a friendly guy. Friendly fire shouldn't make you smile. It's like getting shot by Gomer Pyle. Tough to get mad at that mar. Sweetest jar head you've ever seen. He shoots and it's a rock. Well, I' n seen though. You're blown a two smithereens, by the way. Smithereens. Have you ever bothered to find out what the heck that is? What happened to him? He was blown to smithereens. Smithereens. What are those? You don't know? Smithereen, interestingly, is a word that comes from the Irish language, the Gaelic language, from the word smidgeni, meaning little bits. That's a Gaelic word. Smidgee ne, smithereens, Smidge eeny. Gaelic for little bits. We get a lot of words from the Irish. Did you know that Irish language has given us all sorts of words? Bog. We got that from them. Galore. Got that from them. When you say there are fireflies galore out here. Stole that word from the Irish slogan. Took that from the Irish whiskey. Took that word from the Irish, from their Gaelic word, which translated means water of life. Water of life. We get the word hubbub from the Irish slough clan. The word gimmick, the word hooligan. Thank the Irish for all of those. Thank you very much. Thanking you kindly. I spotted something on social media that disturbed me a little bit this week. It featured Madonna in a very unusual role for Madonna. She was offering. I can't say this with a straight face. She was offering her services as a spiritual teacher. She was offering her services helping you learn the Kabbalah, the esoteric mystical tradition within Judaism that explores the hidden spiritual dimensions of God and the universe and humanity's relationship with the divine. Madonna is offering her services for a fee to help you learn these teachings. So if you've always wanted to learn the esoteric mystical tradition known as Kabbalah, you can learn it with Madonna. You have to pay her. You have to send her some money. Madonna? Did I mention it was Madonna? What are you up to these days, Tim? Well, I'm exploring spiritual growth with Madonna. Madonna? Yeah. She's become a spiritual teacher in her old age. Well, Tim, there are all sorts of spiritual teachers out there. There are more now than ever. In fact, in all walks of spiritual life, there are people who have devoted their entire lives to spiritual practice, spiritual pursuits, spiritual teachings. There are enlightened mystics out there by the score. People with profound, deep spiritual insights and understandings. I know that, but I went with Madonna. Tim, what the hell were you thinking there? Well, with this spiritual stuff, I'm. I'm like a virgin. It's all new to me. So I don't feel I can start with the top spiritual leaders. I can't go right to Thi Nhat Hanh in Buddhism or Paramahansa Yogananda in Hindu, or Father Richard Rohr in the Christian contemplative tradition. I need to start out with something more accessible. So I'm going with Madonna. Did I mention I'm going with Madonna? Actually, she's my second guru. My first guru was Pee Wee Herman. He had a kid's way of talking about spirituality that I could understand on a six year old level with Madonna. I've kind of graduated to being more of a selfish teen in my spiritual questioning. When I get done with her, I'm going to study under Derek Jeter, the former New York Yankee, and I'm finally going to wrap up at the end of my life learning from Mel Brooks. Mel wrote a religious spiritual text that he called what the. Yeah, that's the title of it. What the. I think at the End of My Life, that'll probably be my main bible. What the. It's really, really good from everything I've read. He just asks questions Mel does. For instance, what the heck is up with death? That's one question he asks. What the heck is up with death? That's one sick invention. Death. Someone has some explaining to do there. Why'd they invent death? Mel has a point. I mean, is there anything more twisted than death? And it's not like it's rare. It's everywhere, man, everywhere. What gives? Someone had a little bit too much hooch when they created this world, huh? And they were a mean drunk. Death. I mean, death is just, you know what death is? Death is icky. Mel is a great spiritual teacher. I hear he's way, way better than Madonna. But again, he's not doing the Kabbalah. He's more into the whole. What the. You know, Picture yourself one day at the age of 67. You've worked hard your whole life. But here's the big question. Will you have enough to live the retirement you want to live? Most Americans vastly underestimate how much money they'll need. And when they find out it's so often too late. Health care costs, inflation, living longer than they thought they would. It all adds up. That's where Josh Arnold comes in. The difference he makes for people is often the difference between comfort and struggle. With over 40 years of experience, Josh Arnold has helped thousands and thousands of people transform their worry into confidence. He doesn't just manage money. He helps you build a roadmap to the retirement you deserve. He gives you 48 minutes on the phone for free. Take him up on it. 952-925-5608. Investment services offered by Josh Arnold Investment Consultant, LLC. A security and investment advisor. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. All investments involve risk. Tommy Mischke is a paid endorser. John Kennedy is president. Gas is 30 cents a gallon. And somewhere in Minnesota, a man opens a car lot. He doesn't know his grandson will stand in the same spot 60 years later. He doesn't know families will plan what he sells. First car at 16, minivan at 30, truck when the kids leave. No, he doesn't know all that. He just knows this. If you treat people right, they remember and they come back. That man was Red Leonard. He opened Fury Motors in 1963. And while we don't always remember the cars we buy, we remember the man who stayed open late because your work kept you working late. We remember the kid who grabbed a couple mementos from your trade in vehicle before you said goodbye to it because he knew those things mattered to you. Fury Motors has four dealerships now. They sell new Jeeps, Chryslers, Dodge, Fords, GMCs, Buicks and all makes and models of used cars. But walk into any Fury location and you'll feel that same thing people felt in 1963. Guys taking care of the customer with the idea that if they do it right, that person will be back. Fury Motors. I might start a religion. I don't know. I've been thinking about it. Just calling it Cosmos. What religion are you? Cosmos. Well, who's your guru? Mishki. Well, what's he say? Well, Mishki says that the space between galaxies is so vast that our brains can't really grasp it. The Milky Way, for instance, is about 100,000 light years wide. 100,000 light years wide. Now, the nearest major galaxy to the Milky way, Andromeda, is 2.5 million light years away. That means you could fit over 20 Milky Way sized galaxies in the gap between the Milky Way and our closest neighbor, Andromeda. And Andromeda is considered near. That's considered nearby compared to other galaxies in the very emptiest regions of the universe. Cosmic voids. Galaxies can be separated by hundreds of millions of light years. Remember, Andromeda is only 2.5 million light years away from the Milky Way. But there are galaxies that are hundreds of millions of light years apart. And in those gaps, you could fit thousands upon thousands of galaxies, and you'd still have mostly nothing in those gaps. Now, imagine being stuck there sometime. No nearby stars, no planets, no bright sky. The closest galaxy millions and millions of light years away in every direction. You could drift for millions of years, millions of years, and never pass a star, never pass a planet, never even pass a cloud of gas. Nothing. On average, that empty space contains one atom per cubic meter. That's less than the emptiest vacuum humans could ever create. The vast, vast majority of our incomprehensibly gigantic universe is trillions and billions and bazillions, quintillions, Godzillions of miles of nothingness. Empty space, nothing, nada, zip. More nothing than any nothing we could ever hope to create here on Earth. The ultimate nothing. For an almost infinite amount of space. Just nothing. An immeasurable void. At night, when I'm lying in bed, I like to imagine myself in that void. The only something in that endless field of nothing. I say out loud, anybody here? And of course, I hear nothing. Because I am alone. And I mean alone. More alone than anything has ever been alone in the history of alone and there. Alone by myself in that eternal ocean of nothing. Feeling an isolation impossible to imagine. A loneliness more profound than anyone could ever encounter anywhere else. Then and there, I picture myself saying, well, if ever there were a place to create an imaginary friend, this is it. And then and there, I create Fritz Cobdabbler. Fritz Andrew Cobdabbler. And he becomes a lifesaver. I say, fritz, thank God I was given an imagination. Where would I be without it? My lord, it's good to have you with me. And Fritz would be the first imaginary friend, the very first to ever wish he had never been born. Why the hell did you bring me here, Mishki? He would say, this is not a fun place. This is no place for anyone, even someone imaginary. This is hell, Mishka. You've brought me to hell. Wait, wait, wait. Fritz. Fritz. You do not know yet how much fun I can be. Hold on. And Fritz would say, do you know how much fun you would have to be for me to enjoy this eternal void? It would be a level of fun God would have trouble attaining. God would have trouble attaining that level of fun. And I would say, well, Fritz, Old boy, I have never thought about how much fun God could be. This is something I've never contemplated and this will give me something to pass the time and I need stuff to help me pass the time. When you think about an omniscient, omnipotent deity, you think about how everybody focuses on God being all loving, extraordinarily loving, compassionate. These people have these near death experiences and talk about this tremendous field of love, all encompassing love. They don't talk about the fun. I would think God would be fun. How come these people don't talk about attaining a level of such fun? There aren't words to describe it. Why don't we hear people say the first thing they noticed after moving through the tunnel and emerging into the wondrous loving light was how much fun God was? Wow. I mean, he's a riot. The level of fun was like. Well, it was like being 12 years old at the state fair, times a trillion. The most fun I've ever had. I didn't want to come back. I said, God, don't make me go back. This is fun. And God would say, I know I'm a fun guy. There's no one more fun. I am the summit of all fun. And I'd say, I know you are. That's why I want to stay here. You are world shaking, zany fun of an impossibly high order. Wow. I died and I saw a bright light and a tunnel. And when I emerged on the other side of that tunnel, I heard surprise. It was a party. And the best party I ever attended. I will tell you this. You think you've had fun. You don't know fun until you've discovered God created fun. He is the fun czar. He's the emperor of fun. It was fun in all directions. Endless, eternal fun. Fun without boundaries, without limits, beyond all the fun the world has ever produced combined. God in the end turned out to be a cosmic clown, if you will. A good natured, fun loving, zany, wacky goofball with a penchant for pull my finger humor that actually is pretty entertaining when it's coming from God. He is nuts. I am telling you, God is nuts in the best way. I've spent a lot of time the last couple of days thinking about fun. Are people having it out there? Is it fun being alive? Are you folks having fun? I went to a Reddit post today that stated the following. I think that having fun is the highest order of human experience. I have set my life goal to having as much fun as possible. I'M curious to know from others what's the most fun you've ever had? And one Reddit user after another answered the question. Here's just a sampling of what people answered when asked what's the most fun you've ever had? This person says I decided to fly out to Vancouver on a whim during the Olympics. Inspired by my spontaneity, a couple friends met up with me. We're all Latvian, so we caught a couple hockey games, got the entire stadiums cheering for our team. Then we met Wayne Gretzky. Then we pre gamed a Canada game, sitting on the ocean with a Heineken mini keg and a bald eagle landed right next to us. Then we got into an amazing bar for a Canada hockey game. There was a four hour line to get in, but we met some Latvian athletes and including a couple medal winners and they got us to the front of the line. I could go on, but this was the most fun I've ever had. Here's another person posting When I was a kid, we had the ultimate slumber party. 20 kids showed up. 4 kids brought over their N64s and hooked them up to multiple TVs. We had a battle royale of Goldeneye, Smash Bros and a bunch of other games. This night will be remembered as the greatest night of fun we ever had. Wow. There's a simple little thrill. A slumber party with video games. This guy says the most fun I ever had was a weekend in a five star hotel room with my girlfriend doing nothing but having sex and ordering room service. This guy writes. When I was eight I went on a cross country trip with my aunt, uncle, my older brother and three other cousins. My uncle had one of those big conversion vans. We towed a pop up camper with all of our bikes on top of it. We had a giant box of comic books in the van. For long stretches on the road, we stayed in campsites every night. We rode our bikes all over the campsites. We swam in rivers, had a snowball fight in the Rockies at 9,000ft in July. I was too young to know much about any of the places we were visiting. I just woke up each morning looking forward to something awesome. And something awesome always happened. Now there, there there is a beautiful, beautiful thing to be a child and to wake up every morning looking forward to something awesome and something awesome always happening right there is what life should be right there in a nutshell. You should wake up every day looking forward to something awesome and something awesome should then happen every day. There's the world I Want? Right there. Fun. Are you having fun? Is there fun still being had out there? Are people having the most fun they've ever had? Or can't that be grasped anymore? Are those days over? Was the most fun long ago? Or is the most fun still ahead? And do you have control of it? Back after these messages. The biggest problem with memory care facilities is staff. Turnover is often high. At a lot of these memory care centers, workers are in short supply, certainly good workers. How do you ensure you don't have high turnover? That the highest quality applicants come your way and that they stay well? You become the well Shire of Medina and Bloomington. The Wellshire doesn't even consider hiring anyone without medical training. Try finding that rule anywhere else. Number two, they provide an environment where staff is valued. Never overworked. They're cared for, they're appreciated. People who arrive at the Wellshire arrive there to work for life. They have found their home, their employment home. The Wellshire knew that they wanted to maintain impeccable standards. It was going to be hard to find workers unless they offered them a lot. So they offer them a lot. It's their way of winning the turnover game and of ensuring that people caring for your loved one are not second rate actors giving lip service to giving a damn, to caring, when mostly they're enjoying time on their phone while your loved one is shoved in front of a TV set. Don't accept that. Tour the well Shire of Bloomington and Medina. It's January 13th, 3:47am Sarah's awake because she can see her breath. Not outside. Inside, in her bedroom, she can see her breath. The furnace died sometime after midnight. And now the cold is doing what cold does. Here's what nobody tells you about a broken furnace in January. It's not about the temperature. It's about realizing how fragile everything is. How fast home becomes just a building. But here's something else nobody tells you at 4:15am when the truck from MSP pulls up and Tom, yes, Tom from Minneapolis St. Paul Plumbing, Heating and Air walks through that door. That's not just a repair that's about to happen. That's the moment the universe tilts back. That's when home becomes home again. At Minneapolis St. Paul Plumbing, heating and Air, they don't just fix furnaces. They bring back the safety of home, the comfort, the feeling of being sheltered. Minneapolis St. Paul Plumbing, heating and Air. That feeling of home. Well, let's go to the phones. I want to go to the phones. I'm going to spin the listener wheel. Find someone to call. I Want to make a call to a listener, find out what's going on in listener land? Let's see what happens when we spin the big wheel. Spin the big Wheel, Tommy.
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Okay, I'm spinning the big wheel, and.
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It'S landing on Joyce. All right, Joyce it is. Hello, Joyce.
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Tommy?
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Yeah, it's Mishke. All right.
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Oh, my gosh, I'm so glad to talk to you. I've been waiting forever for this phone call.
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Well, you are a rarity in this podcasting world of mine. You are female, and that is so unusual.
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I have been like a fan all the way back to the early days when you were just a guy that would call from a phone booth.
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It really is quite startling when you look at the list of people who have agreed to be called. When you look at the list, it's stunning how male dominated it is. Now, as a woman, could you maybe posit a third theory as to why that is? I mean, I don't think it means that I don't have any female listeners. I don't think my show is all that male. I think it's probably more male, but I think it's 60, 40, and yet I don't think the women are as interested in being randomly called. Now, why is that? I've never been a woman myself. Thought about it now and again, but it just looked like too damn much work. Well, what do you think it is?
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I don't know. I was. Well, I was hesitant to put my name on there. Okay, but then when you will put it out there? I think maybe the fourth time I've heard you say, I don't have a lot of women callers. I'm like, going, okay, I got to step up to the plate and do my part and take a phone call. Maybe we're just busy. There's just a lot to do. Maybe just listening to the radio and your podcast gives us background noise. To do something and then to actually take the phone call is taking time out of our day to.
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They're not up for a call unless the call is going to get something done, advance their day in some way, help them in some task. They don't want to waste their time with me.
- [42:13]
D
I've been a huge fan the whole time. Tommy, I'll tell you this one time you were on the air and you didn't say a word. You didn't. I remember we were calling in. My two boys were with us, and we were all laughing, going, we have got to get this guy to say something on the air. I Think the whole time you're on, you didn't say a single thing. And I'll never forget it.
- [42:33]
A
It probably is my most famous show, and more famous for the fact that nobody, but nobody out there has a tape of it. And there are people out there who have a tape of every one of my shows. I mean, you name it, they can find it out there. But that night, for some reason, no cassette tape players were used in the Twin Cities to record my show. Which makes it that crazy. Which makes it hard for some people to accept because they can't hold the proof of it. Did Mishke in fact go on the air for a two hour talk show and not say a word from the moment the show started until it ended?
- [43:12]
D
I'm a witness.
- [43:14]
A
Although it's a little bit like the cross that Jesus was on. Let me explain.
- [43:20]
D
Okay? Please do.
- [43:21]
A
If you go to Israel, you can buy a tiny little sliver of the cross Jesus died on. Someone figured out that if you add up all those little slivers, it adds up to about 2 trillion crosses. So someone's lying about that little sliver being from the cross. Now, why do I bring up that analogy? Because, well, I can't remember what the hell that had to do with anything. Hang on.
- [43:54]
D
Okay, I think I got it.
- [43:56]
A
I think I got it. A lot of. A lot of people say they heard that show. But if I add up all the people who say they heard that show, it's more listeners than I really ever had on the night show. I didn't have ratings that justified all those people claiming to have heard it. So a fraction of. A fraction of the Twin Cities heard that show, but everybody claims to have heard it that night. Oh, yeah, I was listening. I not only listened, I called up. Now, it's important to let people know that while I said nothing, it didn't stop me from pressing the button anytime a phone rang. I didn't say hello, but I did press the button. The ringing on their end stopped and they began to speak. There were words said on the air, I just didn't say any.
- [44:42]
D
Yeah, it was an awesome night. I loved it. And whether I'm a little sliver here, I know this is a part of my story because I listen to you every night. I remember that.
- [44:55]
A
I believe. And I believe one of those slivers is actually from the cross. There's gotta be one of those slivers that's real somewhere. Somewhere.
- [45:02]
D
You know what? Now I just want to tell you I'm happy I came across your podcast. Too. Because you were gone for a long time.
- [45:08]
A
Yeah. It's always a difficult thing for me to accept that I was gone. I didn't feel gone, but everybody tells me I was gone. From December of 2008 to February of 2025, people tell me I was gone. Now. I didn't feel gone. I felt like I did a lot of things. I went to City Pages and I did a podcast there every day for two hours. I went to WCCO every day there for two hours. And then I started the Roadshow. And I did those shows for 11 years.
- [45:37]
D
Yes. I found the Roadshow. And my favorite one was we went to the Haircutter. Oh, my word. I was just laughing from the story you were telling that woman.
- [45:48]
C
My kid's getting surgery locally here. That's what I'm down here for. He's got a very, very rare condition. Neurofolio streptococcal foliasis. His hair has live nerve endings in it. So to cut his hair is extremely painful. Most of us, while there are nerves within the skull, they're not in the hair fish follicles themselves. Not with this young man. Every strand of hair cut causes excruciating pain. His grandfather had it, I had it. I was treated. My father, his grandfather was not treated because they didn't have a treatment back then.
- [46:37]
A
Right.
- [46:38]
C
He went into the service in Vietnam, Marines, and they just took a clipper to his head, shaved his head, which they do in the Marines, killed him. Because you can't, with this disease, just shave a head. If one strand of hair, one strand being cut causes excruciating pain, you can imagine what shaving the head caused. I can't actually imagine that level of horror. And it was overwhelming, and it killed him.
- [47:09]
A
Now, now.
- [47:10]
C
By the time the late 70s came along, there was a treatment for me, and it's the same treatment my boy is getting.
- [47:17]
A
What is the treatment?
- [47:18]
C
They go inside and cut off the connections to the brain that experience that pain.
- [47:26]
D
Okay.
- [47:27]
C
So while those nerve endings are still alive, there's no pain because the brain is not receiving pain signals.
- [47:34]
A
Okay.
- [47:36]
C
It's about a 22 hour surgery.
- [47:38]
A
Oh, man.
- [47:43]
C
It's a crazy time for us to be away, too. There's a whole lot going on. I'm mayor of St. Paul. I don't know if you're familiar with St. Paul, Minnesota.
- [47:52]
A
I've heard of it.
- [47:53]
D
I've never been or anything.
- [47:54]
C
Well, I'm mayor.
- [47:55]
A
Okay. Awesome.
- [47:56]
C
And the old mayor lost his position because he was caught stealing bagpipes from the locker room of the Royal Order of Hibernians. And they had a special election and I was elected. I'm also lead guitar player for the Replacements. Are you familiar with that band?
- [48:16]
A
No.
- [48:17]
C
It was big in the 80s up there in Minneapolis. So I have to split my duties between lead guitar player for the record placements and mayor of St. Paul.
- [48:29]
A
Right.
- [48:29]
C
And then I've got this going on with the kid and the surgery. That's a whole lot to deal with.
- [48:35]
A
Oh, yeah, the tongue on your plate. Yeah.
- [48:38]
C
I have some politics in my blood. My mother was a mistress to Hubert Humphrey. Remember Humphrey?
- [48:46]
A
At all?
- [48:47]
D
It sounds familiar.
- [48:48]
C
Humphrey was a senator from Minnesota. And a lot of people think that I could be his son. Around the time that she was his mistress, she got pregnant and I was born.
- [49:00]
D
Okay.
- [49:01]
C
And he ended up going as far as vice president. He was vice president to Lyndon Johnson.
- [49:07]
A
Okay.
- [49:08]
C
So I have the politics in the blood. So it's not that strange to be mayor again. I was lead guitar player first, and I didn't seek this office. There was a special election, the band was popular.
- [49:20]
A
Boom.
- [49:21]
C
Next thing you know, I'm in. I was going to step aside because of the problem with the boy. When I was his age, haircuts were excruciatingly painful for me, too. Now, the hair follicles didn't bleed, but the pain, well, it felt like I should be bleeding. That's how painful haircuts were. Consequently, I rarely got them right. Just. Just to cut one strand was enough to make me wince and bend over. So you can imagine what cutting several or a full haircut would involve in the way of suffering. They say there are only 100 people in the United States with this out of 300 plus million.
- [50:02]
A
Oh, wow.
- [50:03]
C
You ever run into anybody with that?
- [50:06]
A
Not at all.
- [50:07]
D
First I've heard of it.
- [50:08]
A
Yeah.
- [50:13]
C
Do you have a small bag that you could scoop some of this hair into? I actually am able, because of my position, to auction some of it off for charity. And then I was recently in Independence, Missouri. Ran into a woman there who has a hair museum, and she asked me to drop by with some. Are you familiar with that?
- [50:38]
A
I'm not. How are you?
- [50:40]
C
I got a haircut four months ago. And with the hair trimmings from that haircut, I was able to raise over a hundred thousand dollars for the American Kidney Foundation.
- [50:51]
D
Four is a half inch. Six will leave you at three quarters. Do you want me to go any shorter than that?
- [50:58]
C
I think that's good on the sides.
- [51:00]
A
Clean up your neckline. Just A little bit. Alrighty.
- [51:03]
D
I'll stick some of that hair up for you.
- [51:04]
A
All right.
- [51:10]
C
Oh, that's nice.
- [51:11]
A
Yeah.
- [51:11]
C
That's gonna raise some money right there.
- [51:15]
A
Yeah.
- [51:16]
C
Shredder Cutworth, if you want to look up my name, Shredder Cutworth. And I've been able to auction off this here for about 20 years now.
- [51:27]
A
That's awesome.
- [51:28]
C
You should look up that hair museum in Independence, Missouri. And so I'm gonna send some of.
- [51:36]
A
This hair over to her, and then.
- [51:37]
C
The rest of it we'll raise some money for. There's a suburban dad's club. They're just kind of depressed suburban dads who have sort of lost any interest in living. And there's a fundraiser for them, and I'm going to use this hair for that.
- [51:52]
A
Oh, awesome.
- [51:53]
D
It's really cool.
- [51:54]
A
Yeah. Thanks a lot. You're very welcome. Okay. Bye. Bye now.
- [51:57]
D
Have a good weekend.
- [51:57]
A
Thank you. You too.
- [51:59]
D
This is the funniest thing I've ever heard. That was really a good one. Storytelling is a gift, and you. You definitely have that gift, Tommy.
- [52:07]
A
Thank you for saying that. I do want to say that that hairdresser deal is proof that those people cutting your hair are not listening to you, not caring what you're saying. You're the 15th person this particular day, and you can say whatever you want. And they'll nod and they'll go, mm. But they don't care. I mean, if you analyze what I was saying to this woman, it was absurd.
- [52:30]
D
It was hilarious. And I cannot believe she had never gone to the Hare Museum, which was right down the road.
- [52:36]
A
Yeah, the old hair museum in Missouri. Worth a visit?
- [52:39]
B
Yes.
- [52:40]
A
All right, well, listen, I want to thank you so much for putting your name on the list, for hanging out with me. It's been delightful. I hope other people.
- [52:48]
D
Oh, anytime, Tommy.
- [52:49]
A
I hope other women listening realize that this conversation just sounded relatively normal and nothing too weird about this.
- [52:57]
D
You're fun.
- [52:58]
A
You're fun.
- [52:59]
D
Don't be afraid. He's a lot of fun.
- [53:01]
A
Thanks, Joyce. Great talking to you, Tommy.
- [53:04]
D
Yeah. Have a great day.
- [53:05]
A
Thank you.
- [53:06]
D
Okay.
- [53:06]
A
Bye. Bye. If you'd like to get on the caller list, Simply text me 651-321-8949. 6513-218949. It's fun.