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This is me, Craig Ferguson. I'm inviting you to come and see my brand new comedy hour. Well, it's actually, it's about an hour and a half and I don't have an opener because these guys cost money. But what I'm saying is I'll be on stage for a while. Anyway, come and see me live on the Pants on Fire tour in your region. Tickets are on sale now and we'll be adding more as the Tour continues throughout 2025 and beyond. For a full list of dates, go to thecraigfergusonshow.com See you on the road, my dears. Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Joy Podcast. My name is Craig Ferguson. I am your host today for the Joy Podcast, which I have to say is a rather exciting one for me today. Now listen, if you've been following this podcast at all, first of all, no refunds and my apologies. And secondly, you'll know that this podcast started, it's called Joy. And it started as me talking to people about what brings them joy in their life. And I found that quite interesting. And I still do find it quite interesting and I like to do it. But as the podcast went on, and I only started it like a couple of years ago, I found it more and more difficult to schedule guests into the podcast and make sure that I could have a conversation with them. So then I started doing it on the Zoom because I was, you know, in lots of different places. I was in London. Well, you know, where different places are. I was in London and New York and Los Angeles and Arizona and Mexico, and I wasn't in Mexico, but I could be. Anyway, look, the thing is, it was too difficult for me to schedule one on one conversations with people in the way that I like to do it. So then I started doing them on the Zoom. And whilst it's okay on the Zoom, I feel like, here's what I feel, and this is me blowing my own trumpet a little bit. But I feel like if I do a Zoom podcast sort of interview, I'm as good as anyone else. But I feel like if I do an in person interview, I'm a little better than most. And I feel like that's what I've decided to do. Unless I can do it in person, I won't do it on the Zoom. And what I have enjoyed doing is doing this podcast where I just do your tweets and emails. You send me in the tweets and emails like we used to do on the late night show. You send me in a question and I answer your question. I believe it's called an ask me anything on the Reddits or the Face Tubes and what is it they call it, you time. I don't know. But whatever it is Reddit, it's like ask me anything. But you can ask me anything here on this podcast. And that brings me joy. So it still fits in under the umbrella of joy. So I will still continue to do interviews when I can schedule people and be in the same town. And I'm going to be in Los Angeles quite soon, so I think I'll be able to do a couple there because I have some people there that I like and I want to talk to. And then I'm in New York quite a lot and it's possible to do it there, and I'll do it anywhere I am. But here's the upshot of what happened today. So I'm doing it with you guys today because I'm at home for the first time in ages. I've been away traveling, and now I'm at home. And because I'm at home and I moved house, I don't know if you guys have been following me on the, I don't know, Internet, but. Or just following me. Just follow me down the street. But I moved house about a year or 18 months ago. And any of you who have moved house before know, especially if you're a bit older like me, I think I maybe get some gray hair. If you're a bit older like me, you've accumulated a lot of stuff, and it takes a lot of time to unpack all that stuff. And I've been unpacking and unpacking. So I've been home. This is the exciting part. I've been home for a little bit the last few days, and I unpacked a few more boxes, and one of the boxes I unpacked was very exciting for me because I've been looking for this for a while and people still talk about it and you guess what it is, and it's not. No, it's not that. It's this guy. Yeah, look at that. Now, this is the. This is not the actual cup that I used to use on late night, because I don't know where that is. I think that must be another box. This is the backup traveling cup, because the other cup had someone drew up caulking balls underneath it. And I don't know who it was. I really don't know who it was. I don't think it was me, but it might have been. Anyway, someone drew A rude thing underneath it. We had to censor it. And the one that I used to use later had a broken fang and then it had a gold cap put in. So that's somewhere in all the boxes. I'm still working through boxes. I have storage units. But I feel like we're getting into the more authentically me. I feel like I'm more myself. Do you know what I'm saying? I feel like I'm more in my vein of what I do when I've got this guy. It's like, hey, everybody. So what do you think, Jeff? He's not here. Actually. He is here. He is here. You probably should tell anyone this. He is here. He's in my garage and he's turned off. But someday in the future, not soon, because I got a lot of stuff to do, but one day in the future, we'll turn him on and we'll get him going. We'll fire up the old Jeffrey Peterson. I've still got the old Secretariat. I've got two Secretariats, actually. The pantomime horse, not a real horse, a bit of a spoiler. The pantomime horse, Secretariat. There was two of them and I've got both of them here as well. You want to know another thing? There were two Jeff Petersons. The traveling Jeff Peterson and the studio Jeff Peterson. People are shocked when they hear that. But if you look at the old late night shows when we did the like when we were in Paris or we were in Scotland, if you check out Jeff Peterson carefully in these old shows, you'll find out it's the traveling Jeff Peterson. You know why? Different voltages. Plus, you don't want to travel with a robot skeleton and get stopped at the airport. TSA go crazy. Well, all right. So this is then, to all intents and purposes, my friend, one of the Joy podcasts. When I said friend, I meant you personally. My friends, this is one of the Joy podcasts where we do the tweets and emails and you've been sending them in, which I'm delighted by. So let me just start with this one. This is from Laurie B. I'm looking down here because this is where my computer is. It's not like I'm. Laurie B. Is not down there. I'm like, hello, Laurie. Hello. I have a question. Yes, Laurie, ask it. All right, here it is. Do you drive? You know, it's a computer. It's a computer. Do you drive in both America and Scotland? If so, how do you possibly do it? I'm going to be traveling To Scotland. And I can't imagine driving on the left side of the road. Well, let me tell you this. It's very simple because I do drive in both America and Scotland. And what you do is this. When you get to the country, you're going, and I presume you have a rental car. I would assume you would get a rental car. You keep the steering wheel to the center of the road, right? So where the line is, that's the nearest with it. So if the steering wheel is near the center of the road, then you're driving on the right side. Also, a good tip is to look where the other cars are driving. If, for example, they're driving down one side, they would follow those guys because they probably live there. And I would. I would do that. Now, I will say one thing to you about driving in Scotland. This is very important. When you drive, particularly in the north of Scotland, look out for sheep, because they often drive on the wrong side of the road. They don't care. Also, the sheep don't drive in Scotland. They are driven. They're VIPs. They usually sit in the back of a limousine enjoying. Just enjoying the ride. Just enjoying the ride, man. But sheep, a lot of times when you're driving up in the north of Scotland, the sheep will just wander onto the road. Just wander on there. You got to look out for them. Because if you accidentally kill a sheep In Scotland, it's 20 years in prison. Then that's not true. But if it is, that would be bad. But it's not. But if it is, which it isn't. But if it was true, which it will be. Because people always say, there's no smoke without fire. Do you know, this is an interesting thing. I noticed that about the Internet or facetime facetune. If rumors start on the Internet, people say even if they know it's crap, they'll say, there's no smoke without fire. And I like, well, there is actually smoke without fire. In fact, anyone who has worked in show business for more than maybe 10 minutes knows that it's mostly smoke and no fire. The analogy that's used or the description that's used of show businesses is all smoke and mirrors. So it's not there's no smoke without fire. There's no smoke without mirrors is what you should probably say. And smoke and mirrors, they say that because that's how they used to get these old effects and the old Hollywood music. Not Hollywood, the old vaudeville music halls and, you know, the old magicians, the Houdinis and stuff that would smoke and mirrors and they would create illusions. And I think that for me, the idea of there's no smoke without fire is yet another misdirect by the Illuminati on the Internet that are trying to make you believe things that are not true. Oh, my God. I've got Internet crazy. Oh, God. Hang on, let me calm down a bit. Snake water, the greatest water of all. Try snake water. What do you think, Jeff? Ah, I miss that guy. But you know what? He's in my garage waiting for a time when his country needs him. Like King Arthur. Anyway, I hope that answers your question about which side of the street do you drive on in Scotland. It's the side that the sheep are not on and the people are driving on. This is from Katrina. Again, this is a computer. Not actually Katrina from Boca Raton, Florida. Because of course, Boca Raton is not right here. If I was in Boca Raton, it'd be sunnier and there'd be lots of old people wearing Tommy Bahama shirts and I'd be one of them. Katrina from Boca Raton. Floss says Craig. Do you have a special item that you travel with that makes life on the road more enjoyable, such as bespoke velvety pajamas or an opera Viking hat? That's a very good question. I wouldn't travel without an opera Viking hat because that's. I'm a hand luggage queen. I like to only have hand luggage. I'm one of these people that like. I'll cram everything into such a small space that if I have to unzip my hand luggage, bang. I haven't quite got to the vacuum packing my clothes yet, but I would do that. I like that when people suck all their clothes right down to little tiny amounts. And that's something in the future for me anyway. What I think is that I travel with. What do I travel with? Well, I usually. I usually tend to be a bit ocd. I like to wear lucky underpants and they're usually blue. That's. I don't know where I picked that up, actually. But I do like to wear lucky blue underpants when I'm traveling to avoid trouble. The truth is, I don't know that that kind of thing works, but snake water, America's first quack shark. So, no, I don't really travel with anything. I travel with Tomas, who is my tour manager, and he's a 6 foot 5 Czech gentleman. He's quite lucky to travel with him. I think there's plenty of people, like, I'd like to travel with him, I think you know what I'm saying. But that's not the relationship that Tomas and I have. Anyway. All right, this is from Kathy Roser from Salina, Kansas or Salina, Kansas. I think it's Salina. I can't remember. Again, Salina, Kansas is not down there. This is just a computer that I've received an email from Kathy Roser in Salina or Salina, Kansas. Insert the correct name of the word here, Kansas. See that little cut in my hand there? That's moving a box. That was moving the box that this was in. Actually. If you could back in time and see any concert or festival, who would you see? Back in time and see any concert or festival? I think what I'd like to do, you know, my initial answer would be maybe go and see the. The Damned playing in London in 1976. Would it be 76 or 77? I don't know. But then I think to myself, well, I would have liked that then because I'd be like spitty, you know, all that kind of stuff. And I would be young and like all that noise and spitting. But now I'm in my 60s and I like things quiet with a lot less spitting. I'm actually moving from my spitting years into my drooling years. So it's all, you know, saliva based really. But what I'm saying is no spitting concerts, more drooling concerts. So I think if I was going to go back in time now, like at the age I am going back in time but remaining the age I am, then I'd quite like to go back in time and see somebody like Bobby Darren or Sinatra or something like that, you know what I mean? But in their prime, you know, where a lot of. Where everyone was sitting down but then everyone would be smoking. Let me tell you something, by the way. I stopped drinking nearly 34 years ago and I stopped smoking when I was about five years sober. So 29 years, I guess almost 29 years since I smoked cigarettes. And I will be honest with you, if they didn't give you cancer, which sadly they do, but if they didn't, I would smoke cigarettes. I loved them and I enjoyed them. The drinking, it was, I mean, it really messed up my life. But smoking, I kind of liked it. Apart from the, this is going to kill me. And I look forward to people on the Internet telling me that smoking isn't bad for you. Because I'm sure that's a thing now as well, that, oh no, smoking is not bad for you. It's actually Good for you. If you smoke the right way. By the way, the vape thing. Don't even get me started on that. You didn't. You did. You asked me. What? You asked me if I went back in time, which concert would to go to. And I think I would like to go to something or maybe even further back. Maybe like Rimsky Korsakov's premiere of the Scheherazade or something like that. That'd be pretty good, wouldn't it? Anyway, it's not possible to go back in time, apparently. I know this is the Internet and everything is possible, but I don't think it is possible to go back in time. I think time travel, you can go forward. I think that's the current thought in physics that you can go forward in time by folding or through the wormhole or going down another planet or something. I don't know. I watched. What was that movie where Matthew McConaughey went. It was a long movie as well. I felt like I was traveling in time in that movie when he was. Yeah. Anyway, I don't want to be mean about the movie. It's a good movie. It just. It was long. It was long. It was a long movie. This is from Margo Lane or from Margot. Who lives in Lane? I don't know. Or lives in that. Lane. Margo Lane from Elk, California. Or maybe it's from an Elk who's trying to remain anonymous. Because if you're an Elk and you can type and do emails, you probably want to keep that quiet or sooner or later they'll be having you on TV and speaking from experience. That's not always great. So Margo Lane from Elk, California said, what is your favorite Strangler song and why? I don't know. The Stranglers. If you're not familiar with the Stranglers, you can Google them. They were a very popular band during the punk rock. I think they're still around. I remember them at the time. They had a drummer and Hugh Cornwall was their singer. And their drummer was a gentleman by the name of Jet Black. I don't know if that was his real name. I suspect not, but his name was Jet Black and everyone had punk names back in the day. You know, Dave Spit, Tommy Poo, all that kind of stuff. I don't think there was a Tommy Poo. I wish. I wish I'd called myself Tommy Poo. You know what? From now on, guys, because I know you will now that I've said don't call me Tommy Poo, you'll call Me, Tommy Poo, even more so. Look, call me Tommy Poo if you like, but that's not my name. Anyway, Jet Black was the drummer with the Stranglers. And I remember we were all. Oh, and their bass player was a French guy called Jean Jacques Bernel. And he was the one that everybody thought was cool because he's French and he played the bass like this. He could do that thing with the bass. I believe they called it the walking bass. I call it the finger surprise bass, but that's. You probably shouldn't call it that. So it's the walking bass. I think that's. Or maybe that's the walking bass, I don't know. Anyway, Jean Jacques Brunel or Brunel, or I think maybe that was Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who was an engineer in Victorian Britain who was very clever, but nothing to do with the Stragglers. Anyway, the Stranglers had a drummer called Jet Black and Jet Black was older. I remember him being older. We all thought, man, he's really old. Because he was. I remember he was. He was 46. We were like, 46. How does a person get to be 46? I'm 63, you know. Anyway, Snake Water, America's thirst quencher. Anyway, Jay Black was a drummer on the Stragglers and we thought it was really old. But my favorite Stranglers song, I think at the time it was Heroes, but not the David Bowie heroes. It was another one, no More Heroes, that they may have been called, I think it was that I saw the Stranglers ones at Glasgow Apollo, which was a big theater in Glasgow, and I went to see the Stranglers one night and they were kind of. They sort of invited the audience. It was a big thing then to like stage invasiony type things. So the audience kind of stage invaded at the Stranglers concert and then they had to make an announcement because some of the audience, not all of the audience obviously, but some of the audience that had invaded to the stage the stole all the microphones, which wasn't really in the spirit of the evening and certainly affected the performance. Anyway, favorite Strangler song, no More Heroes, I think. I don't know, I haven't listened to them in years. They haven't stayed with me as a band. Maybe I shouldn't. That's one of the great things about the Internet is not only is everything true, but you can look up old music that you haven't listened to in years and listen to it. So I might look up the Stranglers Anyway, this is from Joanne in Richmond, Virginia. It's a very simple question from Joanne. Joanne isn't here, by the way. If you're just joining me. Joanne isn't here. It's not like Joanne is here. It's just a computer with stuff on it. Joanne said, how do you take your coffee? Cream, sugar, black? Black. Take my coffee black. I have to limit myself with coffee as well. Now, I have two cups of coffee in the morning, and that's usually it, unless I have a show. Then I have a cup of coffee before the show because I feel coffee kind of keeps me going. But my real love, my beverage of choice these days, Steak water. America's thirst quencher. When you worked hard and driven your truck, drink a little snake water, you won't give a. All right, this is from Katie from Bentonville, Virginia. I don't know if that's anywhere near Richmond, Virginia. I wonder if Joanne and Katie know each. Other. I mean, I don't suppose everyone in Virginia knows each other, but it's possible. Katie from Bentonville, Virginia, says, what is your persuasion? And that's her word, not mine. What is your persuasion on the Loch Ness Monster? Asking for a friend. Well, one, I wonder if our friend is Joanne from Richmond. That would be amazing. Like Joanne said, I'm asking about coffee, but I'm not going to ask about the Loch Ness Monster because I feel that it's too personal to ask a Scottish person. And Katie's like, no, I'll ask. So Katie says, what is your persuasion on the Loch Nest monster? Do you mean opinion or what do I believe? Or persuasion? Should I. Or maybe I'm not. I'm not trying to persuade you that there is a Loch Ness monster, But I will say this. These things don't happen by accident. Don't even know what I'm saying. The Loch Ness Monster definitely, definitely is one. Its name is Nessie. And when you're in Scotland, if you see the Loch Ness Monster, drive on the other side of the street. The thing to do is, if you see the Loch Ness monster, drive on the other side of the street. And that is the correct, as they call it in Britain, highway code. That's the highway code. Seal Loch Ness monster, give way and drive around. I'm tearing through these questions today, tearing through them. And you know what? I put it down to Snake water, America's favorite. All right, this is from Sartak Nig. I feel like I may be butchering the pronunciation of Sartac's name. It might be Sarthak Nagi. I don't know. But anyway, Sartak says, what is the. I apologize, by the way, Zartak. Unless I got it right, in which case, all good. What is the secret to your silver foxy hair? Time, time, my friend. If you want silver hair, just keep going. Genetics. Sunlight. Lemon juice. Lemon juice. And of course, I think we know by now on this episode of the podcast what we're talking about. Lemon juice. And that's right. Snake. Say it with me. Snake water. All right, this is from Ryan Smith. All right? And I think I'll probably have to zip it after this. I don't want to drink too much snake water. Which for those of you who are worried about what is in the. Snake water. Water from a snake cup. Oh, it is. Stop it. Pretty. Ryan Smith says. Are there any quotes or sayings from people you admired growing up, a philosopher, a writer or historical figure that really stuck with you or shaped your outlook on life? Gosh, Brian. Too many to mention. Too many to mention. Everything that I have learned, I kind of. Well, I've learned because I can read. And so I read a lot. I still read a lot. I'm kind of rolling around. For a while there, I was rolling around in the great American writer Gauravidal, because I like his historical fiction. That's where he's at. His best. Historical fiction, really accurate historical fiction, they're really good. But writers, philosophers, of course, from Descartes to Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, I don't know, Kierkegaard, of course, who doesn't love a Danish Christian existentialist? I'll tell you who. Quite a lot of people. But I do, I like a bit of Danish Christian existentialism. I'll tell you what I have been looking at recently, and I look forward to your outrage, but I've been rolling around a little bit in the sayings of the desert fathers and mothers. The desert fathers and mothers were in about the second or third century A.D. there was a group of people, it was in northern Egypt, and people would go out into the desert. I think the first one was St. Anthony, who became a Catholic saint. He wasn't at the time. At the time, he was just Anthony. He was just, hey, Anthony, what you doing? And he's like, I'm living in a cave here for 30 years on my own. So I can think. Well, at first, he lived in a haunted fort. This is an amazing story, by the way. You should look this up. He lived in a fort and was haunted by demons. And he was There for ages and then he had to move. Not because of the demons though. He was like, you know. Anyway, the idea this was pre church Christianity. They were aesthetics. There were people who felt like, you know, no eating and living a very hard life was a way to emulate. They felt what Jesus had done when he went to the desert, it was a way to get closer. I don't know if I buy that, but I mean a lot of people do believe it and anyway, so I look forward to your. Oh, Craig, how dare you. But anyway, I'm interested in a lot of people who did that. There's a couple of very interesting sort of theology philosophers. The gentleman, he wasn't really a desert father, but he was an early pre church Christian guy called Origen, Origen of Alexandria. He was an early theologian, gave birth to a lot. He was actually excommunicated by the church about 300 years after he died. He upset somebody, clearly after he died. But people try to figure stuff out, whether they be in that area or whether they be in the Enlightenment period. Certainly the philosophy that gave birth really to the. In many ways I feel the United States of America is the child of the Enlightenment, child of the Scottish Enlightenment, really, to be honest. But maybe I'm wandering into dangerous political territory here. But isn't everything dangerous political territory even by saying the word America? Unless you're saying steak water, America's thirst quencher. Anyway, what I'm saying is they ask us the question, is there any quotes or stuff like that? There's too many. If I single one out, it feels like, you know, there's too many different walks of life. People who are, you know, theologians, people who are atheists, people who are. Who have very. Christopher Hitchens, I am fascinated by his work as well. A fabulously interesting guy. I don't have to agree with someone to find them interesting or even inspirational, if you know, or thoughtful. Do you know what I mean? I feel like there's a lot of. Right now, unless you agree with me, then we can't get along. I'm like, well, it's not very interesting, is it? But anyway, who am I to say? But I will say this, it changes when people say, is there one particular quote? I think the answer is actually no, because I don't have anything I can put on a towel or a little plaque or I guess I have some tattoos which contain quotes which are meaningless. And there are affirmations and prayers and pithy quotes that I like. But I think it's a little like music, language, do you know what I mean? Like prose. Sometimes I'm in the mood for Schubert and sometimes I'm in the mood for Slayer. You know, are they, you know, are you not allowed to have both? Can we have, can we have both? Can, can you have, can you have all of the music? Can you have all of the language? Can you have all of the thought? Can you, can you listen to everything? Can you get something from all of that stuff? Well, yes, you can, but you gotta have this stuff. Snake Water, America's Starsqueer. So, anyway, that'll do it for now, everyone. This has been my joy to talk to you. I'm sorry if I didn't get to your. There's a lot of questions here. So I'll do another one of these podcasts next week because I'll be here. Oh, it'll be Thanksgiving next week, so I'll do some Thanksgiving stuff. We used to do that when I was doing the late night show. When we would pre record shows, we would try and make them topical, but some days there weren't really things to talk about. And then one day we came across, I can't remember what day it is, but Latvian Independence Day. And then it became a thing for us. We did a logo thing and a little C. And we. Every year we celebrated Latvian Independence Day. So if by any chance today is Latvian Independence Day and isn't every day, in a way Latvian Independence Day, then happy Latvian Independence Day, everybody, and enjoy your Snake water, America's thirst quencher. I'll see you next week on the Joy podcast. God bless you all. Sa.