#4734 The Florida School For Unpayable Student Loan Debt And Interpretive Scarf Dancing

Summary

TBTL Episode #4734: The Florida School For Unpayable Student Loan Debt And Interpretive Scarf Dancing

Date: May 25, 2026
Hosts: Luke Burbank & Andrew Walsh

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Episode Overview

In this lively Memorial Day episode, Luke and Andrew commit to keeping it short (which, as always, means around 70 minutes). Despite battling allergies (Luke) and cracked thumbnails (Andrew), they lean hard into their signature blend of goofy banter and genuine conversation. Topics range from Little League triumphs and quirky commencement speakers to Colbert’s surprising post-Late Show turn on Michigan public access TV and a deep dive into Seattle’s public access television scene of the 1990s. The tone is indulgently nostalgic, a little playful, and—true to TBTL form—full of warm, meandering friendship.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Memorial Day Check-In & Personal Updates

• Allergies and Injuries: Luke’s battling allergies; Andrew laments painful hand cracks from too much dishwashing and puppy-related chores.
  • “Well, I’ve got allergies. Your thumb is about to fall off. And Memorial Day. So we're really playing hurt.” — Luke (04:45)
• A Sacred Covenant: They joke about their agreement to "keep it short" and Andrew teases a story about accidentally ending up at a death metal show—"maybe later in the week" (05:20).

2. The TBTL Junior Sluggers Little League Update

• Recap from Coach Ben: Luke delivers a play-by-play of the kids’ baseball game, featuring a dramatic win for the Jalapenos (aka TBTL Junior Sluggers): 19-2 over the Wilshire Riverside Knights.
  • Features detailed at-bats, including Crosby’s near-cycle (almost thwarted by a suspiciously well-placed tree branch—possibly an “ent” or Detlef Schrempf in disguise).
  • “Crosby probably would have hit a home run and completed the cycle if not for an errant tree branch hanging over right field...” — Luke (06:38)
• Creative Team Names: Praise for names like “Super Chill Ice Cream” and “Flying Chicken Nuggets," a refreshing change from the typical “fiercest animal” approach (10:26, 10:36).
• Season Success: Team has seven wins this season (up from two last season), and Andrew may attend the next game if he can talk Genevieve and Lucy (their dog) into the drive (14:05).

3. Commencement Speaker Disasters & AI

• Real-World Examples: Luke rails against out-of-touch commencement speakers who extol AI’s virtues to debt-burdened humanities graduates (15:16).
  • “It was like the Florida School for Unpayable Student Loan Debt and, you know, interpretive scarf dancing... talking about the AI revolution.” — Luke (16:04)
• Viral Booing: Eric Schmidt’s (former Google CEO) speech booed for condescending AI optimism; Andrew observes, “the condescending tone is the real viral story” (16:33).
• Memorable Anecdote: Luke recalls the notoriously bad graduation speech Richard Karn (Home Improvement) gave at a Seattle high school in 1994—an unprepared ramble so incoherent it became legend (17:48).

4. Early Days of the Internet

• Reminiscences: Luke and Andrew reflect on the infancy of the web—dial-up connections, waiting minutes for a Red Square webcam image to refresh, early chat rooms, and a more ephemeral, unrecorded era of life (22:00–24:00).
  • “There’s something that’s nice about it being a lived experience that will live in the heads of the people who were there.” — Luke (21:00)

5. Dazzling Donors

Thank yous and custom messages from supporters Sarah Hayward (Bainbridge Island, WA) and Ivan Vukovic (Amsterdam, NL):

• Sarah confesses sports talk is her ideal background noise for chores (27:57).
• Ivan takes the chance to thank Rachel, who got him hooked on TBTL before they started dating (30:04).

6. Stephen Colbert’s Post-Late Show Public Access Return

• Summary: After his final CBS show, Colbert immediately travels to Monroe, Michigan to appear on "Only in Monroe," the public-access show he visited before launching “The Late Show.”
• Andrew’s Deep Dive: Andrew, after multiple nudges from friends, watches and loves the special. He describes it as “the dream of the John Mulaney Show, only not live,” with real, awkward-yet-charming moments and a “Gen X, Wild Side of Letterman” vibe (35:48–44:00).
• Highlights:
  • Colbert interviews the show’s hosts (two earnest Midwestern women), loosens them up with local shots and helium balloons (for a “cancer journey” update with chipmunk voices), and closes with a therapeutic destruction of the set (38:11–41:35).
  • “I am so glad I was encouraged to watch this because I could have seen myself just being like, oh, yeah, I know about that thing, but never actually watched it.” — Andrew (41:22)
• Production Observations: Not low effort—behind the “earnest jankiness” were a lot of writers and serious production muscle (46:55).
  • “You start watching it… and you just hear some of the camera people chuckling. And it really is the best sound.” — Andrew (47:11)

7. The End of Monoculture & Public Access Nostalgia

• Monoculture Loss: Luke and Andrew muse over the death of appointment TV and the rise of niche content on social media/TikTok (42:00–44:50).
• Seattle Public Access Lore:
  • From “Goddess Kring” to “Tana and Brody” and the infamous “Mike Hunt Show,” they recall the wild, sometimes topless, public access scene in ‘90s Seattle.
  • Crowd-sourcing: “Did anyone see Brody Stevens’ [future comedian] show?” or the “Richard Karn graduation speech?”
• Public Access Shifts: Discussion of local access’s origins and its passing as YouTube and TikTok take over as digital Commons (60:00–65:00).

8. Show Wrap-Up

• Classic TBTL Closure:
  • “We did a tight 70 minute show.”
  • Toothbrush fails, allergy struggles, and pledges to deliver an even tighter episode “tomorrow.”

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Marijuana Dispensary Naming Bits:
  • Andrew: “The Dank Vinci Code… Toque Story… Turner and Hash… Stash That Thing You Do (Parentheses: Smoke Weed).” (00:00)
• On Lopsided Little League Wins:
  • Luke: “I did wake up in the middle of the night feeling a little guilty about this win.” (10:09)
• On AI Commencement Speeches:
  • Luke: “How could you be that out of it… extolling the virtues of AI while talking to a bunch of humans who just paid a ton to get educated?” (15:16)
• Historic Internet Moments:
  • Luke: “It was mind-blowing… in a mere 45 seconds, you could see a 4-minute-old photograph of Red Square!” (23:45)
• On Unrecorded Pre-Digital Life:
  • Andrew: “Sometimes…it’s kind of refreshing. I can’t find this speech because it was a moment… only those who were there remember.” (21:00)
• Colbert Public Access Show:
  • Andrew: “It was like the dream of the John Mulaney Show, only this wasn’t live…it hit all the right sentimental beats.” (35:48)
  • Luke: “He might be free to do way more interesting things now.” (44:02)
  • Andrew (quoting Colbert): “You could just laugh. It’s really okay.” (48:48)
  • Luke: “Why is the sound of unmiked people laughing… one of the greatest sounds in the world?” (49:23)
• Seattle Public Access Memory:
  • Luke: “There was this guy… the Reverend Bruce Howard… would sing, ‘Your brain’s with the King, and it’s such an awesome thing.’” (55:15)
• On the Future of Public Access:
  • Luke: “I guess YouTube is the new public access television, right?” (64:31)
  • Andrew: “You just have to find it. Like digging through your cassette drawer for the Grateful Dead…” (66:45)

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• Little League Update: 05:38–14:00
• Commencement/A.I. Discussion: 15:16–19:58
• Richard Karn Story: 17:24–21:00
• Early Internet Nostalgia: 22:00–24:00
• Dazzling Donors: 27:00–32:33
• Colbert’s Community Access Show: 32:37–49:00
• Monoculture & Public Access: 42:00–60:10
• Classic TBTL Riffing/Wind-down: 68:06–end

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Tone & Language

Playful, gently self-deprecating, and warmly nostalgic. Conversational and meandering, with just the right balance between genuine feelings and ironic detachment, in classic TBTL flavor.

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For the TBTL Missers

If you missed the episode:

• You'll get caught up on TBTL Junior Sluggers' glory, hear some epic commencement speech disasters, and receive a podcast friend’s pitch as to why Stephen Colbert's final act on public access is actually the kind of weird, beautiful moment the monoculture can no longer produce.
• Leave with a strange urge to search YouTube for old Seattle public access shows and perhaps a new appreciation for off-mic laughter.

Power out!

Transcript

[Andrew]

Back in 2018, the state of Michigan legalized recreational marijuana. And here in Monroe, a string of dispensaries off I75 has come to be known as the Green Mile. Though if I were naming a cannabis district after a Tom Hanks movie, I think I'd go with Forrest Hemp or the Dank Venci code. Or maybe Catch me if you cannabis or possibly Toque Story a weed of their own smoking Private Resin, Larry Kronik, Joe versus the vaporizer Burner and hooch Turner and hash. You've pot mail the munchie pit, a bluntiful day Indica neighborhood Stash that thing you do Parentheses smoke weed Grassed away the bong fire of the Vanities or just Cloud Atlas. Ever been to the Green Mile, Jack? I have not. You've not been there. But I like the for splash. You could do hash or stash.

That's kind of.

[Luke Burbank]

You have two choices. You could.

[Andrew]

Too late now, sadly, In January of 2019, you got to say these things earlier. Like saying that during rehearsal would have been better because then we could have had it, bruh. Okay. At this point, it just seems like criticism.

Tbtl.

[Luke Burbank]

How, sweetie, you got a little Mars cocktail in your beautiful gray dress there. Can we get that for free?

[Andrew]

What?

[Luke Burbank]

The Mars cocktail. Can we get one of those for free? Cause she spilled a little bit on her dress. Sure.

[Andrew]

Great.

[Luke Burbank]

Cause if you said no, I would have gone home and got on Yelp and said that I found a Lego

[Andrew]

head in my corner.

[Luke Burbank]

I've done that to a lot of places. It works. My hobbies include leaving mean, unsolicited comments

[Andrew]

on Internet videos and rushing to be the first one off the plane. Even if I'm in the back. The comedy factor speaks for itself. It's just painfully obvious. Yeah, yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

It's an unfulfilled prophecy. It just has to be played out.

[Andrew]

I tell you two. Go, go, 80s Reagan. Ots like us. We could rule this world.

[Luke Burbank]

All right. Hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Monday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. It is our turn. My name's Luke Burbank. I'm your host. I'm sorry, I'm tan.

[Andrew]

I like to be tan. It just feels good.

[Luke Burbank]

Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio, perched high above the mighty Columbia here on this Memorial Day. Yes, that's right, folks. We are bringing you a brand new episode. Even though it's a holiday, I'm not even supposed to be here today, and I'm battling through some serious allergies as well. Like majorly. So we may keep things on the shorter side today. I'm not sure. But I can tell you that it's going to be a fun time because we've made it to episode 4734 in a collector series. Let the fun begin. Oh, and we've got an update. Can you, can you verify, can you give me some 411 an update on the TBTL junior sluggers, kids and fantasy and how they're doing in the playoffs of the little league that they are in. We'll talk about that. We'll talk about Stephen Colbert's quick return to the television airwaves. Believe he was off the air less than 24 hours maybe. And we'll say hi to this guy. Longest running cobra of the show. Maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. He's asked that from now on, I guess we refer to him just as Targets.

[Andrew]

Targets.

[Luke Burbank]

So here he is. Targets. Targets is joining us. Good morning, my friend.

[Andrew]

Good morning, Luke. I gotta do. I gotta. I gotta think of a more permanent solution to these little cracks that keep on appearing around my thumb now sort of. I think it's.

[Luke Burbank]

Is it Digger the dermatophyte?

[Andrew]

No, it's kind of the opposite of that. It's not like something that is like kind of gross and growing in there.

[Luke Burbank]

Climber, the climatophyte.

[Andrew]

It's. That would be the opposite, wouldn't it? I kind of regret saying that now. No, I think it's because I'm washing my hands too much. I think what's going on here is I do a lot of dishes, but I do even more dishes these days. I feel like puppy related stuff. Cleaning out frozen yogurt things. I know you call it puppy ice cream. And also just washing my hands a lot because I think I'm picking up gross stuff a lot. And I think it's just drying the hell out of my hands. I got this cuticle butter from. What is it? Tom's? No, Burt's Bees that a listener recommended. And I like the way it smells, but it's not really doing much. And I gotta say it's getting so painful. I just got a tiny little split right, right to the right of my thumbnail and the skin there and everything I do just sort of hurts. It's just like one of those little irritants of life. I think it goes back to original sin somehow.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes.

[Andrew]

I think this has to do with the garden of Ed Serpent.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, I've got allergies Your thumb is about to fall off. And Memorial Day. So we're really playing hurt.

[Andrew]

Exactly. On this Monday, I'm withholding. I told you before the show, like, there are things I'm not talking about. I figured I could just. I could just kind of dispense of the cracked finger talk pretty quickly. But I'm not going to get into how I ended up at a death metal show on Saturday night accidentally. But maybe we can talk about that later in the week. I want to keep this a short Memorial Day week. And you and I entered into a covenant on Friday saying we're going to keep it short and so we. Sacred agreement, bond. Exactly.

[Luke Burbank]

So, yeah, we'll keep it. We'll. We'll try to keep it relatively tight today, which usually means we go about three hours or so.

[Andrew]

Three. Keep it under three. Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

But let me just give you a little update here.

[Andrew]

Nice.

[Luke Burbank]

On how your Jalapenos, also known as the TBT Junior Sluggers, did as they entered the playoffs last Thursday. This is from coach Ben. They were at Wilshire park, and apparently the sluggers decided. Andrew. Subtlety was overrated. Facing the Wilshire Riverside Knights, the Jalapenos put together one of their most complete games of the season. Big bats, sharp pitching, aggressive baserunning, an absolute lockdown defense. I see they took absolutely nothing away from yesterday's Seattle Mariners performance.

[Andrew]

Literally. In this case. I stand by it. Literally the opposite of the baseball that I experienced as a Mariners fan this weekend.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, indeed. Thank God the sluggers are finally getting it together as the Mariners are crumbling all around us. Coach Penn says let's not bury the lead. The final score. Andrew Jalapenos 19, Knights 2.

[Andrew]

Whoa. There was no mercy rule in.

[Luke Burbank]

Apparently not. Maybe not in the playoffs.

[Andrew]

It's.

[Luke Burbank]

Wow, survival of the fittest out there. The headliner of the night was Crosby, who drove in six runs on four hits. Crosby singled in the first, doubled in the second, singled again in the fourth, and then tripled in the fifth. He probably would have hit a home run and completed the cycle if not for an errant tree branch hanging over right field, which knocked down a hard hit. Fly ball. Let's get Portland Parks and Maintenance on the case, Andrew. We cannot have trees keeping Crosby from hitting for the cycle. One of the hardest things to do in baseball.

[Andrew]

Well, I'll tell you what. This is the first I'm hearing about this, but I already have a theory and I don't like it. I don't. Are we sure that's a tree? Are we sure that that tree is there at all times, or was that a coach for one of the other teams? The Knights maybe dressed up as a tree? What? Did it. Did it move at all? Did it look like an ent?

[Luke Burbank]

I was picturing an ENT when you said this. I said last week that the Wilshire Riverside night sounded like a fancy neighborhood to me. I don't know if it is or not. It just has that kind of high class ring to it. Could they be paying someone?

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

Could they have hired someone to pretend to be a tree to knock down Crosby's home run?

[Andrew]

You know who's in there? I'll bet. I bet you a million bucks. Was debt left. Shrimp.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, that would actually. That would check out. I did see a picture of him on an airplane. He could have been flying.

[Andrew]

He was flying. Did he. Did you see a tree outfit in the bag next? I didn't, but he could have checked that.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't know. The referee, the umpire, I should say, ruled it interference a la the Kingdome Rafters, circa 1995. Nice call, Ben. I don't know if you come by that honestly or if you looked that up because you know that we're Mariners fans, but yes, there was a whole issue. I believe it was speakers. The speakers in the Kingdome were a problem from time to time of foul balls would hit them or pop ups would hit them and then get redirected. Crosby was not alone. The Jalapeno bats were sizzling from the start. In the first inning, Amos kicked things off with a single. A triple, rather. Excuse me. Crosby brought him home, Armani followed with another RBI single and Ali smoked a double that brought in two more. Just like that, the Jalapenos were up big before some parents had even fully settled into their camp chairs. The second inning brought more fireworks. Amos singled in a run, Crosby doubled in two more. Nemo added an RBI single and another run came home on a steal of home. At this point, the Jalapenos were less baseball team and more highly organized. Spicy traffic jam. Then came the fifth when the Jalapenos poured on five more. Atlas worked a basis loaded walk. Amos doubled in two and Crosby followed with the aforementioned triple, bringing in two more runs and causing at least one coach to briefly consider whether this team had been replaced by professional stunt performers. On the mound, Zaya was excellent, starting the game and allowing just one hit and one run over two innings while striking out five and walking none. Crosby then came in for relief and was equally dominant, throwing two scoreless innings, allowing no hits and striking out six between the two of them. The Jalapenos pitching struck out 11 batters and walked nobody, which is the pitching equivalent of cleaning your room without being asked. That's impressive.

[Andrew]

The.

[Luke Burbank]

The no walks thing, because, again, at this age, it's, you know, control can be a problem, as we.

[Andrew]

At any.

[Luke Burbank]

As we notice.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

With many. Yeah. For the Mariners, depending on who's in there. Side note, I generally don't love lopsided outcomes. I've been on the losing side of these games plenty of times, and I know how they feel. However, we are now in tournament season, and the rules say any ties in pool play will be resolved by aggregate run differential.

[Andrew]

Aha.

[Luke Burbank]

There is some incentive to keep playing hard and keep scoring. That caveat notwithstanding, I did wake up in the middle of the night feeling a little guilty about this win.

[Andrew]

Aw.

[Luke Burbank]

The Jalapenos have another pool game on Wednesday against Wilshire Riverside. Super Chill Ice Cream.

[Andrew]

Super Chill Ice Cream is the name of the team.

[Luke Burbank]

It appears that they are the Wilshire Riverside. So another team from this league. And they are named Super Chill Ice Cream.

[Andrew]

The names are great this year across the board. Almost all of us.

[Luke Burbank]

Or like the flying chicken nuggets that we play them.

[Andrew]

I like. Yes. And I like that as a name. They feel more. Well, certainly more creative, but also they just feel more like. I don't know, like I'm kind of. I'm not a big fan of just like, let's try to think of the fiercest animal type of thing, you know?

[Luke Burbank]

No, I like names like Super Chill Ice Cream. To prepare for this matchup, the Junior Sluggers enjoyed a team outing to our neighborhood frozen yogurt shop. Picks attached. Coach Ben out. And Andrew. These picks are so great. I'm gonna. I'm gonna forward you them. I would. Maybe we can make this one the show pick. Today. One of the kids, one of the Junior Sluggers, is carrying the Parkside Jalapenos flag across the street. There's a stopwalk. These kids look like a combination of a major league ball team and the Beatles as they stride across the street being led by the triumphant Jalapenos victory banner. It is a hell of a picture.

[Andrew]

And this is the. This flag has the logo, right? The cartoon jalapeno. But then I believe in that logo. The pepper itself is holding a little pennant that says tbtl. So, like, that's. This is a little aggrandizing for us as well.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't think on this flag. They did that.

[Andrew]

What the hell? Wow. That went Fast. What kind of erasure is this?

[Luke Burbank]

Well, we have a pennant there. We have a. We have a, you know.

[Andrew]

Okay, yeah, a tbtl, whatever you call it.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah. Right. We do have a TBTL sign that is at the ballpark. So I just don't know this.

[Andrew]

No, but I mean, just think about it this way. They made a logo. They included TBTL in the logo. Then at some point, they decided to put this logo on a flag. And somebody, I don't know who it could be, but somebody made the decision to remove TBTL from the logo. And I'm just curious how that all went down.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, take it up with coach Ben on Wednesday. On Wednesday, Andrew, because I understand you're coming down for the game Wednesday night.

[Andrew]

Wednesday against the Super Chill Ice Cream. I don't. I'm looking at the calendar. Are you going? This is the last chance. Huh? Let me see.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, unless they win and then there'll be another chance. But I'm actually just very excited that the season got extended this far. And again, if you're scoring at home, if you're keeping track of previous seasons, I believe we had two wins last season and we have now gotten to seven wins this year, if I'm. If I'm keeping track of things correctly. So that is really impressive. Amazing stuff from the Jalapenos, great coaching by Ben and the other coaches and yeah, it's exciting again. With the Mariners just continuing to frustrate me. The Ascension, the rise of the TBTL junior sluggers has been a welcome relief this baseball season.

[Andrew]

Do you know, like, I'll just tell you what I'm trying to do here and you tell me the information I need. I was going to say to finish my thoughts, you know, exactly where they play. In other words, can I just Google maps this right now and see? Because I don't have anything on Wednesday. And I'm wondering, could me and Genevieve and a little dog named Lucy get in the car and head down? And I wanted to see what is it? But that's like a. Is it like a three hour drive or what?

He was a little dog named Snuggles.

You knew what I was doing.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, I mean, more than welcome. You could stop off here and, and, you know, have a popsicle or something on your way down. We're about three quarters of the way down to where the field would be, but I know Becca and I are going to go. So if you were, if you were

[Andrew]

up for it, if I just typed in Parkside Portland, would that get me there?

[Luke Burbank]

I don't think so. I'm going to coach text. I'm going to text Coach Ben. That is where I'm going to coach, text Ben. One of the two.

[Andrew]

I mean, I do think it probably rush hour Dr. Seattle down to Portland on a Wednesday might. It might be a bit much, but we'll see.

[Luke Burbank]

Or you could come early, early do the show here. I think Andrew came early to bring us this new printer. You could come down on the earlier side. We could do the show down here together. You'd beat the traffic and then. And then we could go watch the baseball game, something.

[Andrew]

Yeah, give me some details. I think, you know, we'll see. We'll see. It occurred to me that if I'm doing that, then Genevieve and Lucy, I kind of forget sometimes that Genevieve has a. You like a job with like a boss. And it's also busy season.

[Luke Burbank]

Wait, more important than this job.

[Andrew]

And it's her busy season. She's writing all kinds of speeches for people because it's graduation time and so that's what she'd do.

[Luke Burbank]

She's not having the AI do that for her.

[Andrew]

She is not yet, as far as I can tell. So anyway, she's going to, though, be writing some praise for AI into all of these graduation speeches because it seems like that is what's going over really well. Exactly. Especially when they're sort of talked down to in a condescending way.

[Luke Burbank]

How in the world could you be that out of it to be one of these, in this, you know, these commencement speakers, too many of them have been extolling the virtues of AI while talking to a bunch of humans who have just paid a crapload of money to get educated, to hopefully get jobs. It's just like the reading of the room or the lack thereof is absolutely stunning. The one that there was this like, it was like a real estate CEO in Florida who was like giving a speech to the, like, you know, the Florida School of Poetry or something. You know what I mean? It was like the most non. Like it was like the Florida School for Unpayable Student Loan Debt and, you know, interpretive scarf dancing or something. It was like the most, the people who the least want to hear about, I mean, about the AI Revolution. The other thing is, I feel like these commencement speakers are. They are, they're. They're thinking that their job is to sort of give some really useful advice to these kids or something. But I don't. I think your job is to inspire them.

[Andrew]

Right? Yeah. Right. I. That's a. What? That's really?

[Luke Burbank]

To go out there.

[Andrew]

Yeah, that's really well put the tone. And again, we're just seeing the sort of cherry picked ones that are going viral because you do have the. And also. So you and I had this conversation off the air already, right? Didn't we? Were we talking? I'm just a little bit worried.

[Luke Burbank]

Last Friday, I think we briefly. We were chatting off air.

[Andrew]

Off air. Okay. Yeah. Because who is the former Google guy who is giving his.

[Luke Burbank]

Not Larry, not. It was Eric Schmidt, maybe.

[Andrew]

Yes, yes, yes, Schmidt. Anyway, so he was the latest one to go viral because he's like giving a commencement speech somewhere and he's like, again, kind of, he's talking about AI and everybody's booing him. But at this point in the cycle, I think he was ready for the booze. I think he didn't seem as surprised. Or maybe I'm confusing that with another one that went viral. But yeah, it is kind of interesting how for me the story is, oh, all the kids who are graduating are booing AI. But what I'm really seeing is this condescending tone that a lot of these commencement speakers are taking with these students who are graduating. And I think you put it absolutely perfectly, Luke. And I'm so loathe to say that, but it should be inspiring, not condescending.

[Luke Burbank]

I've told this story before, but it wasn't my high school graduation. It was my buddy Dave was graduating from Roosevelt. I wonder if there are listeners out here, out there out somewhere who remember this maybe, who were Roosevelt Rough riders graduating in 1994. But the commencement speaker was the other guy from the show, Home Improvement. So not Tim Allen, the neighbor?

[Andrew]

Oh, no, no.

[Luke Burbank]

Richard Karn, Sure, Richard. Not the guy who looks over the fence, but the, the Tool Time assistant. Sure.

[Andrew]

He's the most likable part of that show, right?

[Luke Burbank]

I think he seemed likable on the show. I didn't watch a lot of, of that show, but, you know, it was obviously a big hit. And Richard Karn is from the Pacific Northwest. I think he's from somewhere in the, in the sort of, I don't know, state, the state of Washington. And so he was, you know, they tapped him to do the commencement speech for Roosevelt High School. And you know, I was myself a high school senior, pretty, pretty young at the time. I didn't have a lot of opinions on a lot of things, but even I was like unbelievably shocked by how bad the speech was. It was, it was, it was like someone. It was, it was like he Had Quantum leapt into Richard Carnes body? It was like Scott Bakula. Had Quantum leapt into the body of a guy who is about to say the first three words of a commencement speech and had absolutely zero preparation?

[Andrew]

Did it end with an oh boy?

[Luke Burbank]

It was totally crazy. It was incoherent. Like as. Again, as a 16 year old or 17 year old, however old I was at the time, I think I could have got up there and freelance. And I'm somebody who's on the record is having given one of.

[Andrew]

The.

[Luke Burbank]

Given one of the worst inspirational speeches of all time about being unreasonable during unreasonable times. So I know about bad speeches. I've given some and I swear to God I could have done better if you just said try to say something to high schoolers about like what a big deal it is to graduate and also going out into the wide world. He was. It was such a rambling disaster. I almost thought maybe it was some sort of a prank. I'm wondering if there was anyone out there who's listening who was at this same. Because I think I want to say it was at like Memorial Stadium or something. It was somewhere down in the Seattle center where, you know, the school would come for the big thing. And it was, it was a rambling mess.

[Andrew]

I'm looking for this. Let's see here. Could it have been. Well, let's see here. In 1995, UW magazine wrote Richard Karn finds his voice on home improvement. I'm wondering if it was this, would this have been a tie in. Would this have been around 95? I graduated high school in 95.

[Luke Burbank]

I think it was 94 because my buddy Dave and Joe and I, we were all the same graduating class. But you remember, Jesus Creek closed down when we were juniors. So we all spread, we all scattered to the wind. I went to Nathan Hale High School. I think, oh, you know, maybe it was Ingram. It might have been Ingram.

[Andrew]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

I can't remember if Dave went to Roosevelt or Ingram.

[Andrew]

If you Google Richard Card. Yeah, I'm gonna get rid of Roosevelt and just put in Richard Card, Seattle commencement speech. This is. How do you feel about this? So I'm not finding anything and I'm gonna stop because it's gonna distract me too much. But how do you feel about the fact that that is not available online because it was 95, you know, like within, you know, 10 years later? That would be infinitely findable. Right. And I'm not totally mad about the fact that I can't find this. Sometimes it's frustrating, sometimes it's when it was something that I worked on in my early radio days or something. And I would love some evidence of it or just like to, you know, feel some nostalgic feelings. But also sometimes you're kind of like, yeah, that's kind of refreshing. I can't find this speech because it was a moment. People maybe complained about it or maybe laughed about it a little bit, but only those who were there remember.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, there's something that's nice about it being a lived experience that will live in the heads of the people who are there. And that was a one time offer. Yeah. I think I come down on feeling okay about that just because it was a simpler time. I mean, I spend all this time complaining about the hold that my phone has on me and our digital lives and how encompassing those are at this point. And you know, we didn't have footage of it because our digital lives were not that encompassing. I'm trying to think was the Internet, the Internet had been invented or what? You know what? I know there had been around for a long time, but it was. But I don't feel like in 94 when I was graduating, I don't think we did certainly did not have the Internet at our house. I remember it being a big deal to go to college because there was going to be Internet at the University of Washington and I worked at the Visitor Information center and I think at the front desk. We had the highest speed Internet out there at the time, which meant I could print out various pictures of like Mickey Mouse, but made just out of like dollar signs and asterisks.

[Andrew]

Yeah, exactly.

[Luke Burbank]

I remember being in like chat groups. Like I think what were they? I mean they were like fans of. Maybe it was some sports ones. I think there was. Maybe I. Was I getting into Wilco yet? I think I was. I was on some music chat groups too that I'd sit there at my, at my post at the front desk of the University of the Visitor Information center and go on some chat rooms and talk about Wilco or something.

[Andrew]

Yeah, I remember my friend Ed Bristois was the first person to have Internet in his home. But I didn't really play with it once. I just remember going in and literally standing in his kitchen and looking at the computer one time like that's Internet, huh? And I think it might have been making that squealy modemy sound or something like that. I think his sister might have been using it. And that was my experience with the Internet. And then that would have been probably 94, 95, right before I went to college and then in college I definitely didn't have Internet in my, in my dorm or my studio apartment. We would go to the library and you would do your Internet in, in the library. So that kind of gives you a sense of where things were. And then by the, the end of my college career, more and more people, it was more normal to have Internet in your living space. I still did not, though I would not for a long time. It's weird how I love technology, but I'm so late to it. I.

[Luke Burbank]

When I was working at the Visitor Information center, there was a camera in Red Square. So there was, you know, and, and you could go on, and this was mind blowing. You could go on the, like Netscape probably and you could go to where the link was for the camera that was in Red Square and you could click on that link and In a mere 45 to 50 seconds, Andrew, you would be able to see, yes, a four minute old photograph of what was saying.

[Andrew]

Every four minutes it would refresh, slowly refresh it.

[Luke Burbank]

And it would, it was. But that just seemed impossible that I was like, I'm sitting at this desk. Red Square is like three blocks from here. And I'm looking at a camera, I'm looking through a camera at Red Square. I know what happened a mere four minutes ago.

[Andrew]

The weird thing is, is I wonder if that is still. Even though the technology and the delivery system changed. I'm wondering if that would have been the same actual camera that was focused on Red Square when I worked at kuow, which is of course, you know, off campus, but still affiliated with the University of Washington. And so I was working at KOW. What was that, 10, 15 years ago now? I don't like saying that, but it was a while ago. But in the main studio at KoW, like kind of the control room where every now and then a microphone would open to give the weather or a quick break. But other than that, it's more like where kind of the producers and stuff are while all the talk show people are kind of actually behind microphones in the studio next to it. And all that is to say in this control room area there was an old tube television that hung from the ceiling and had a camera focused on Red Square. But the camera was so old and so bad and something was wrong with it. And it really did like the whole, my memory of it is the whole thing was tinted red. Not out of any kind of like, oh, this is the Red Square camera. It was just so old and like foggy and it always Looked so ominous. And I think the idea was the person who was giving the weather could just kind of look up and say, like, oh, it's raining out there, or whatever. But I think it just looked like it was raining blood all the time. I think they've updated it now.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, I'm looking at it right now. The UW red square cam. And let me tell you, it doesn't take 45 seconds to refresh. It's just a live camera. Look. I can see there is a. I thought they were maybe working on the obelisk, but I'm guessing that actually what that is is maybe a bunch of flowers and things. There was a really sad story where a young woman was killed on the UW adjacent to the UW campus. And I'm guessing that there are a bunch of flowers at the foot of the obelisk, maybe in honor of her life. That's kind of a big guess by

[Andrew]

me, but, yeah, maybe. Yeah. Because it does look like. I'm looking at it, too. It does look like a memorial.

[Luke Burbank]

A memorial of one kind or another.

[Andrew]

Yeah. I also see. Wait a second. Is that. Is that Genevieve holding hands with a fellow on her lunch break? What is going on?

[Luke Burbank]

This is the worst way for you to find this out.

[Andrew]

I mean, is it?

[Luke Burbank]

What? Were you rooting for something less public?

[Andrew]

That's what I'm saying. I don't know. I can think of worse ways to find out.

[Luke Burbank]

We was hoping for some razzle dazzle. Razzle dazzle. That's right, man. Razzle dazzle.

[Andrew]

On your mark.

[Luke Burbank]

On your mark.

[Andrew]

Get set, get set now. Ready, Ready, Go.

[Luke Burbank]

Everybody rattle dazzle. All right, let's thank some dazzling donors. We do this show five days a week, even on the holidays, because people are donating money to make this our job. We work here, as does our friend John Skloroff, and these donations of dough are keeping the whole thing going, and they're. Today, we'd like to thank Sarah Hayward, who's on Bainbridge Island, Washington. I wonder if Sarah was at that commencement speech that Richard Karn gave. It's possible.

[Andrew]

Maybe Sarah get at us.

[Luke Burbank]

Can't rule it out. Sarah says, dear Biz boys, I finally know what to say in my Dazzler message this year. I absolutely love the idea of an hour for us and an hour for you. I just finished listening to episode 4686. It has Ashton Kutcher as the show pick. Would that have been, like, a punk'd thing? Maybe.

[Andrew]

Yes. Yes. Good. I was like, why would we do that. Why would I do that? Because sometimes I have to pick a photo and I'm like, I don't know. But yes, we were talking about punk'd a month or two ago.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, that 4600. Oh, yeah, that is recent. I thought we were already on a higher number than that. I was like, well, that was years ago. No, that was pretty recently. I don't give a bleep about sports. This is Sarah talking, not me. You know, I give a bleep. I give too much of a bleep, Andrew. I don't give a bleep about sports. And I don't mean the F word, just the S word. So maybe I'll just say it. I don't give a hoot nanny about sports.

[Andrew]

I love that.

[Luke Burbank]

But when you guys are doing a no point conversation or any other undeclared no point behavior, I leave the podcast running in my ear holes and I get shit done around my house. I get the kitchen picked up, I get the garbage out or a bed made. Sports is the absolute best background noise for me to get anything done. So just keep it up and live it up. What each and every one of you honeys do is so important. From our friend Sarah on Bainbridge. Ah, well, Sarah, thank you. What you're doing is so important here. And I kind of know that feeling. Like, I listen to a lot of podcasts and a lot of spoken word podcasts, and, like, sometimes I'm able to just, like, drift. If I know they're talking about something I don't really care about, then I can let my mind wander. There are other times where I'm, like, listening really hard because it's like Chris Hayes talking about AI with someone or some other kind of technical topic that I'm really trying to absorb. And then sometimes it's nice because I'll be listening to a show, I'll be listening, like, Pod Save, and then they'll do like, an interview with, like, an up and coming, like a person running for Congress somewhere. And then I'm like, okay, I can kind of turn my brain off.

[Andrew]

Yeah, but you don't turn off the podcast. Just sort of keep the. You like the patter?

[Luke Burbank]

I like the patter. As does Sarah. Sarah, thank you so much for being such an awesome supporter of the show for all these years. We really, really couldn't be here without you. Maestro.

[Andrew]

On your mark.

[Luke Burbank]

On your mark.

[Andrew]

Get set, get set now. Ready, ready, go.

[Luke Burbank]

Everybody rattle dazzle. It's the one, the only Ivan Vukovic over there in Amsterdam. The Netherlands.

[Andrew]

Nice. Ivan, by the way.

[Luke Burbank]

Second Netherlands. We've known Ivan for years and years, including when Ivan was living in the Seattle area.

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

Now, Ivan and his wife Rachel have been over there in the Netherlands quite some time.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

I think we had Marshall last week from the Netherlands.

[Andrew]

Oh, yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

So we've been very Netherlands heavy on the show of late. Ivan says, hey, dummies. I found myself creatively bankrupt when it came to brainstorming what to submit for my dazzling donor message this year, and I was close to foregoing it altogether. Suddenly I realized I've never used this opportunity to express some proper, heartfelt gratitude to my partner and TBTL progenitor, Rachel. If I knew that part of this story, Andrew, I had forgotten this. I know that you.

[Andrew]

I worked with Rachel at kow. We both were either volunteers or maybe, I don't know, it was just kind of an in between phase, I think, for both of our careers. And so I knew Rachel that way, but I. And then eventually, I mean, I think I knew Rachel before she and Ivan got together. I could be wrong about that, and that's their business. But my point of this is, I did not think that Rachel brought Ivan to the TBTL party. I thought he was a TBTL 10 and he sort of like bolstered the TBTL input in that relationship, but I guess not.

[Luke Burbank]

Sounds like we had it exactly backwards. So, Rachel, thank you, thank you, thank you. Many years ago, right before she and I started. Look at. It's all right here in the note. If we would allow our eyes to travel even one sentence ahead, we would know the answer to these things. Many years ago, right before she and I started dating, Rachel suggested I check out this podcast that she was obsessed with. Soon after, soon after, on a cross country flight, I was just sitting there on my ipod with a conversation between Luke and Jen about how the office wasn't really all that good anymore. But hey, this Parks and Rec show really seemed to be on an upward trajectory. It was hashtag content that spoke to my sensibilities.

[Andrew]

Hey, let me jump in here for one second because I just realized I was patting myself on the back too much there because I kind of realized as you were reading this, she was listening to tbt. Rachel was before I was ever a part of it. And I knew Rachel. So Rachel and I were probably hanging out at KoW and she was obsessed with your TBTL with Jen and Sean, and they would be years before I would join the gang.

[Luke Burbank]

And honestly, the fact that she met you first and was listening to the podcast if you were on it, I found surprising. This makes a lot more sense.

[Andrew]

And I believe she probably stopped listening about the time I joined the podcast. So, I mean, we've got Ivan locked in. All of this is making sense now. Thank goodness.

[Luke Burbank]

We've got Ivan locked in. Thank God. It was then, around late October 2009, that two of the longest relationships of my life began. Thank you, Rachel. Among the many things you've given me in this life, I'm glad you forced me to listen to your weird little podcast. Power out from Ivan. Well, Ivan, buddy, so nice to hear from you. I hope you and Rachel and everybody else are doing well there in the Netherlands. And thanks again.

[Andrew]

Hello and welcome. Welcome to Top Story.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, our Top story in a surprise, and I think an unannounced little surprise, Stephen Colbert, who, of course, had his last episode of the Late show with Stephen Colbert on last Thursday night on CBS Television then, in fact, I believe he made a joke during his final Late show appearance about how, you know, 11 years ago or something before he started doing the Late show, when he'd already been hired for the job, but it hadn't started yet. They had as kind of a bit. He had gone to this public access show in Michigan and in Marion, Michigan,

[Andrew]

maybe Monroe, only in Monroe.

[Luke Burbank]

Excuse me, only in Monroe, and had done, like, he had done a show on the local public access station, again, just kind of as a bit. And he said something about, like, how he'd probably be back there sooner, you know, sooner than later. And sure enough, was it Friday night.

[Andrew]

I think it was Friday. Because he makes a joke in it. He says something like, it's been 23 hours since I've been on. On television. It was about all I could take, right?

[Luke Burbank]

So he, the very next day, headed over to Michigan, to Monroe, Michigan, and did this talk show, or yeah, I guess you call it a talk show, with his musical director, Jack White, which is great. You've watched more of this than I have. What did you make of it?

[Andrew]

It was really special. My journey to this was I saw it all over my various timelines on Friday and Saturday, I think. And this is where I really appreciate friends. I'm not kidding. Sometimes you see something that is buzzy like this, and you're like, oh, yeah, I'll check that out. Yeah, I'll check it out. I'll check it out. And you kind of never do, but you need a little extra push from people, you know, Right. And so our buddy Hauser was texting me, hey, did you watch this? And I was like, no. You know, I keep seeing it in my timeline. He's like, I would recommend it. And then I had good intentions. I still didn't sit down to do it because again, even though this is kind of quirky and it's not like your typical late night programming, of course, I just don't sit down to watch. It was a full hour long episode without commercials and I just don't sit down to watch that. And then I saw our friend Anna on Sunday and she's like, have you watched this thing? It's so good. And I was like, no, but you're like the second friend who's really told me to do this. So I came home yesterday and watched it with Lucy and I am so glad I did. It's really hard to explain why this felt so special. But I didn't, you know, I told you I'd watched the monologue of his final late show. But I, you know, I wasn't super interested in watching the whole thing. I wasn't somebody who watched that show. But watching this was. First of all, he admitted to a little catharsis at the end of the show, a spoiler alert. They announced at the end of the show that this is the last time that this Community Access show is using the set. And he says, this is not a joke. They told me that we can destroy the set at the end of the show. And for reasons I can't quite explain, I feel like destroying something right now. So it actually, even though we talked about how uplifting and joyful his last episode on the network was, it was nice to see him at least acknowledge

[Luke Burbank]

the fact that go into a rage room.

[Andrew]

Just like, yeah, kind of. And it wasn't toxic or anything. Actually, the whole show I'll get. I'm kind of starting at the end, but it's just kind of where my brain went. But at the very end, they do kind of destroy the set a little bit. And then you see them throwing chairs and stuff into a dumpster. Like basically everybody who is part of the show of this, of this particular, you know, Community Access episode, they're all just standing in front of a burning dumpster and you're kind of like, okay, he's. This is him just being a little. This is like we got to see the CBS Colbert and maybe even the Colbert Report Colbert. But what we saw yesterday or this weekend was a little bit of the Strangers with Candy Colbert, a little bit of that Gen X Y guy who wanted to get a little. He wanted to put a Little bit of a dumpster fire out there. But here's how I would describe this, Luke. It was like the dream. I had texted somebody this, so I'm plagiarizing myself, but it was like, oh, it was like the dream of the John glaring yourself. The John Mulaney show that you and I are obsessed with. Only this wasn't live. It was like live to tape. I think this was shot very much like a late night show would be, but you could tell that there was some editing and stuff involved in the same way the Late show would be. And so because of that, you didn't have to just sit through some really painful, awkward stuff. But it also, there was no audience to laugh at his jokes. Like, it was just so great to see him be real, be funny, do several set pieces where he's actually, like, we heard at the beginning of the show, kind of sitting in a chair and doing jokes that were written out. But also he interviewed the two women who usually host the show. They came out and he had done this with them, I think 11 years ago as well. And it was really sweet and touching, but also awkward at times, but not like unwatchably awkward the way Mulaney would sometimes get. And again, I'm not using this to shit on Mulaney. I wish that show would come back. And I appreciate what he was trying to do. But he's interviewing these two women and they're just so Midwestern, middle aged women, maybe kind of retirement age or whatever. And like, one of them sometimes is trying to be a little bit funny, but the other one isn't. And then he immediately starts doing. I think he wanted to give a shout out to some local distillery. And so he pulls out. So that he pulls out shot glasses and they start drinking a little bit.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, I saw that clip.

[Andrew]

And it was like, good, because it loosened them up just a little bit. And you could just tell that, like, it was not too scripted, like, it was very well produced. There were. You could tell that a chair was in the right place before Jack White just came over. You know what I mean? It wasn't like all off the cuff. This was clearly something that was very produced, but in a community access studio. And when these two women were talking, one of them ended up talking about how she had thyroid cancer and was on the other side of it successfully now. But Cole, she said, you know, I talked all about this on my social media. You could just look it up. He's like, we did look it up and we're gonna play the video of you talking about this tough experience. And he found a video of her from 2017, when all of those filters were, like, on Instagram and Meta were such a big deal.

[Luke Burbank]

So you have a cat face or something.

[Andrew]

Basically, it was like that squished face with the really big eyes. And she's talk like this about. I know a lot of you have been having a lot of questions about where I am on my cancer journey. And it was like, just such a. And it was because she's all over Facebook. She's like the perfect demographic, Midwestern woman of that age who would be excited to play around with these filters, but doing it on Facebook, not TikTok or something, or even Instagram, you know? So they played a little bit of that. And then he said, so I want to now interview you some more about your cancer journey, but in that spirit. So they brought out a bunch of helium balloons, and he forced the guests to, like, suck in a bunch of helium. They run out of balloons at one point. So the producer just brings out the tank, and he's hitting the tank. And while you can sort of. I'll bet you they were ready to bring out the tank. I'll bet you, like, he was like, okay, I hope this happens. But also, you could tell they were getting loopy because they were really getting. I mean, I know helium doesn't make you high, but they were depriving themselves of oxygen. And, like, I really think you would have loved it. And then there's some really tender moments where the one woman is talking about her cancer journey, and then he turns to the other woman and says, well, what was it like for you? Her good friend, and she's talking about it. And then at one point, the woman who had. Had cancer is talking, and her friend just, like, instinctively reaches over. I don't know why this is such a small detail that got me, but she just puts her hand on her friend's thigh and is just sort of like, kind of just gently comforting her. And I don't even think she knew she was doing it, you know, and it just, like, spoke to, like. It was just. It hit all of the. Right. It was sentimental in ways that seemed very real and not, like, you know, like fabricated. But he's just so good at knowing how to get these moments out of people. And it was really, really. I thought it was really, really special. And exactly the kind of thing that I think sort of like pushes the buttons of what you were reminiscing about. Like, the Wild side of Letterman when he was a Kid throwing shit off the top of a TV studio. Like, it truly had that feeling to me. And the Jack White stuff, when they would turn to Jack White, it felt like watching Space Ghost coast to coast. I don't know how much you watched that. He was like crag over by his little audio thing. And as you heard in the intro tape, they had at times a little bit of a little tense relationship. Tense relationship. But obviously kind of like in a joke. But it seems so much like Space Ghost at times. I am so glad I was encouraged to watch this because I could have seen myself just being like, oh, yeah, I know about that thing, but never actually watched it.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, no, I'm glad that you watched it. And now I'll watch it in its entirety. It also raises the question, we were talking about this on Friday. It's obviously a bummer to me, it's a bummer that the Late show with Stephen Colbert is going away. And also I do kind of miss. It's funny. I was watching some. On some Tiktoks or whatever over the weekend and it was kind of like, who was it talking about the end of the monoculture? Oh, it was this guy named Guy Branham who's a comedian and writer.

[Andrew]

Yeah, friend of Lindy's. Right? Isn't he on the Friend of Lindy's

[Luke Burbank]

Livewire guest fairly recently. And a very smart individual, Guy Branham. I think he's won celebrity Jeopardy a couple of times.

[Andrew]

Oh, wow.

[Luke Burbank]

A very, a very, very thoughtful person and a very funny person. And he was talking about the monoculture. I think he was kind of. My sense was he was basically not that broken up that another, you know, white guy approaching 60 was not going to be, you know, sitting behind a desk talking to someone. And I can kind of see that take as well. Like I was saying on our show on Friday that there was something comfort to me, comforting to me about the monoculture. There's something about when something would happen on Carson or something or Letterman and there was a reasonable chance that other people would have. Would have seen it, would know about it the next day. It would be a conversation. I kind of liked that. But I said also, you know, we were playing that clip of the. The kid that I saw on TikTok who's talking about, you know, he's sending an anti bully message. And also how, like that's also content now and that's content that doesn't need to go through any of the, like, the filters of like how you get on the Late show with Stephen Colbert. How you get to be a comedian who performs on that show. So I sort of miss the monoculture. But I also like the fact that there are all kinds of ways we can be entertained and people can just get on their phone and record a funny video, and you and I can be cracked and can be sending each other additional videos of the guy over the weekend.

[Andrew]

Yeah. Punching metal. I. Or at least referencing punching metal. Yeah. And what I liked about this was, again, not that I was super invested in it. I don't want to make it sound like I was a super, you know, late night television watcher, you know, that I'm not. But there was something sad and angry making about how his show ended and how the show is ending and the legacy that is kind of dying with it. But what watching this made me feel yesterday. And by the way, I ended up watching it twice because Genevieve ended up coming home. And I'm like, just watch the beginning of this. And then we end up watching the whole thing again. It really felt like, oh, you know what? He might be free to do way more interesting things now.

[Luke Burbank]

That's where I was going with this.

[Andrew]

Oh, sorry to cut you off.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, no, no, please. I mean, exactly. Like, he doesn't make this if he's still doing CBS every night. And also, you know, this is probably more interesting to me than a typical episode of his show on cbs. Not that it wasn't a good show, but just, you know, there's a certain kind of, you know, a show like that the show he was doing is kind of an aircraft carrier. You know, it's a big thing. It's hard to turn it. It's like it's kind of got this momentum of its own comedically, et cetera. And, you know, the guests that are gonna go on there are gonna be pretty famous and they're gonna be prepped on what their stories are. It's just kind of a format thing. And so, yeah, like, the idea that this thing got created is kind of a hopeful sign. I mean, I hope to see more stuff of Stephen Colbert actually, again, ironically, maybe making stuff that I'm more inclined to watch than just a typical episode of the Late, Late Show.

[Andrew]

What I like is there's no audience here, right. And so. And he truly is the camera people

[Luke Burbank]

kind of laughing occasionally.

[Andrew]

Yes. Well, that's what I want to.

[Luke Burbank]

Tiny bit of mirth in the background of some of the clips.

[Andrew]

This is what I love. So he, you know, he's doing kind of a monologue at the beginning, but sitting in a Chair. I mean, it starts so funny because he's pretending to water a plant. I can't even explain to you why this is so funny, but he's watering the plant with like, kind of one of those old fashioned, almost spindly, like kind of metal water or flowering pots or watering cans or whatever, but with a really thin sort of spout on it. And then I'm sure there's nothing in it, but he's just like pretending to water this fake plant. And then when he's like, oh, hello. Just literally the way he sets it down, he doesn't set it on its bottom, he just sets it on this. And he's got a glass table in front of him. And you know that as a television professional, glass tables are not where it's at. Like, anything you set on them are going to make a lot of noise. And so he like clanks this watering can down on this thing. And I noticed throughout the. He had. I didn't even mention his other guest was Jeff Bridges. No, Jeff. Oh, good.

[Luke Burbank]

Dumb and dumber 1.

[Andrew]

Dumb and dumber guy. Yeah, exactly. Whatever.

[Luke Burbank]

Jeff Dumb and Dumber Guy.

[Andrew]

Jeff Dumb and Dumber Guy. And like, that was actually the worst part of it. I think he was trying too hard to be kind of funny or cool or something like that. But they made these gross sandwiches together that Jeff Dumb and Dumber Guy once made for himself.

[Luke Burbank]

Daniels.

[Andrew]

Jeff Daniels, exactly.

[Luke Burbank]

And I blame him for having a last name that's a first name.

[Andrew]

Yes, but we can't remember. Yeah, it's not on me at all.

[Luke Burbank]

No, don't have a last name that's too, too generic.

[Andrew]

Anyway, I'm sorry, I'm rambling. But, like, even during that, I could tell, like, Colbert was like, slamming the plates down. Like, I think he was like kind of leaning into what a bad idea it is to have a glass table on the set. But also what I noted is like, you could watch this and be like, oh, yeah, this is just like, oh, man, there's just like, this is just really low budget. And you could have the impression that it also was low effort. But I'm telling you, just knowing the tiniest bit about production, this was not low effort. You could just. First of all, he does, like a bunch of jokes, like, a lot of

[Luke Burbank]

jokes, but they're like, local, right?

[Andrew]

And they're all local because one of them is a catching up on what has happened in Monroe since the 11 years since he's been there. Another one is a community calendar that he does with Jeff Daniels. And you Know, like, some of them are actually written jokes that, you know, a team of people had to write the credits at the end.

[Luke Burbank]

That's what I was wondering about.

[Andrew]

Yeah, the credits at the end were super, super long. And I think it was his way of, first of all, like, thanking probably everybody he worked with at cbs. I think this was his way of subtly going out kind of the way he wanted to a little bit and giving some more credit in places. But you could just tell that, like, there were bits that really took some technical know how to end up having to do. But when you start watching it, you don't know what the vibe is going to be. And you just sort of hear the camera people chuckling. And it really is the camera people who work on that show for the cable access show.

[Luke Burbank]

I wondered about that. Do you think they used them or do you think they brought in.

[Andrew]

I think they really. For the camera, but I think that they brought in a whole bunch of people for support, for writing, for producing, but then they used, like, the main producer of that show. Her name was Genevieve. Coincidentally, I'm also in a relationship with a Genevieve, as some listeners may have tracked. But this young woman who I think also was on the show, and she was so funny because they had her coming out kind of doing funny things. It's hard to explain, but she wasn't an actor trying to be funny and pretending that it wasn't funny. But she also was sort of doing bits and just naturally laughing at the absurdity of the situation. Genevieve was an absolute delight, and her relationship with him got fraught at times, which was great. But to answer your question about the laughing, I have the perfect piece of tape that I wanted to play for you, and you set it up. At one point, he's sitting behind the desk. He's doing all of his material that is scripted material, and you can just hear people laughing a little bit. And he's like, I'm telling jokes. Just laugh.

January of 2019, Monroe residents hailed the reopening of northbound I75 after a truck that was carrying human waste lost its cargo on the roadway. Not the worst traffic incident in Michigan history, but easily number two since the last time I was here. You look like you're suppressing laughter. Like that sound you just made was like, I don't want to make any laugh sounds while he's telling jokes. You could just laugh. It's really okay.

We do not know who he's talking to there. It might be one of the women he's about to interview. It might Be a camera person. We don't get like a shot of behind the scenes.

[Luke Burbank]

Why is the sound of unmiked people laughing in the background of something. One of the greatest sounds in the world.

[Andrew]

Do you remember you and Jen, when I had the. The very first time you and I met in person and that I met Jen in person. Veebs and I had just moved to Seattle. I said, you know, I'd love to come by. You said, come by during tbtl. You're on the radio then at that point. And I remember I was such a public radio guy. You don't make noise in the studio when the mic is open. And I think it was between. I can't remember if you said this to me on the air or like during a commercial break, but you're like, you or Jen had to tell us, like, just laugh. We like the sound of people laughing at our jokes. It was almost exactly like this.

[Luke Burbank]

I love that effect, that. That show, the Soup.

[Andrew]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

They really perfected it, which is kind of lightly. Just the sound of like when. When you get a camera person or a producer or someone who's in the background when you actually get them laughing. Same thing sometimes on sports radio. What was I listening to recently? I was something I was enjoying and it was like you could tell that they had. Oh, actually it was a little show called the Howard Stern Show. Andrew. I don't know if you've heard of it, but, like, I think what it was Fred Norris, who's the sound effect guy. Sometimes he'll just have his mic open and then it'll just. When something particularly funny happens, you'll just hear him laughing off mic like he's genuinely getting cracked up by it. It's the greatest sound.

[Andrew]

Yeah, it is.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't know, it's. There's some evolutionary component to it. It's like a confirmation that what you're feeling is being felt by someone else or something, I guess.

[Andrew]

But not having the whole, like, studio crowd laugh.

[Luke Burbank]

Not a laugh track. Not the studio crowd being miked, by the way. That was. That was kind of interesting. When I was filming in la, I think maybe two trips ago, we were on the Warner Brothers lot. And because it was, you know, we're interviewing this guy, Chuck Lorre, and people that are associated with this thing that he's making for hbo. But because he's also got shows that are on CBS or on the. On. On the Warner Brothers lot. We were on the set of a sitcom, like an old school sitcom. I don't think I'd Ever actually been in one of those. On one of those sets before? I think I was on the. Maybe I was on the Young Sheldon or something, but, like, I don't think that had a laugh track or they had a live audience. This fully has, like, a bunch of risers with chairs on them where people are sitting to watch the performance of this, to laugh and have it be picked up on the recording. There was something so quaint about that. I didn't see that in action. It was. The set was empty for the day, but, like, I was just wandering around when they were resetting the lights, and I looked up and I was like, oh, my God, this is a real thing. Like, they bring in 100 people to sit and watch this thing get performed so that the people will laugh so they can get the recording of it.

[Andrew]

Which means they also probably have, like, a rest in peace. But Brody Stevens type who comes out, like, Brody Stevens was a comedian who was famous for, well, having some mental health issues and being very open about it and sort of turning that into a big part of his comedy as well. But also he worked and he would talk about, like, working his ass off all the time by, like, was it the Ellen DeGeneres show or something? He was known for being the guy who goes out before certain talk shows and warming up the crowd so they're ready to laugh when Tim the Tool Man Taylor comes out.

[Luke Burbank]

Speaking of public access, I've told this to you before, but when I was a kid, Brody Stevens had a public access show in Seattle with a guy named Tana, and it was called Tana and Brody. And it was deeply weird, and I loved it.

[Andrew]

I forgot that you had told. You had told me about that. Is Brody from here or. He must have been up here.

[Luke Burbank]

No, I think he was. He. He must have been. I don't know. That's not true. I think he was from Arizona.

[Andrew]

Oh, no, wait. No, no, because he. He would. Oh, he was always a baseball player, and he was always obsessed with his Valley phone. Oh, yeah, right. So I think maybe he grew up in the Valley, Right.

[Luke Burbank]

For some reason, he, for a period of time was in Seattle doing. And again, this is the show, Andrew, where I just consistently try to crowdsource things. Was anyone at a Richard Parr High school graduation speech and did anyone else see Tina and Brody on public access in Seattle? It was a truly crazy show. It was just like the two of them sitting at some desk or something. And he must have been in Seattle for some period of time doing that show. And as A kid. I was so inspired by it. I was like, wow, you can just. And then me and my buddy Peter, we took the classes so that we could have our own television show, our own public access show. But then we never did it because it was too much work.

[Andrew]

By the way, I'm just gonna give these details, not for the audience, but just to make you feel better. The reason you thought maybe Arizona is it says Stevens was born Steven Brody. He was born in Los Angeles to parents. His dad was a private investigator from Phoenix, and his family was originally from New Mexico and Arizona. So that's why you had that sort of Southwest connection, I think.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, if anybody else remembers. Oh, here we go. From Reddit. Not arguably the best public access show ever, I've considered. Let's see here. Oh, man, this is a rabbit hole. I could go way down. Andrew. I was really into public access when I was a kid, like, because they would have weird shows on there. They also had this woman named Shannon Cringan, who was the goddess Craig. She would do all kinds of very artsy things. She would paint her face. She would paint shoes. She would do these kinds of, like, exotic dances. She was sometimes topless, so.

[Andrew]

Oh, that's right. In Public Access, there was kind of no hold bar.

[Luke Burbank]

A young. Yes. There was a show called the Mike Hunt Show. The Mike Hunt show on Public Access that we would watch. We would watch Goddess Kring. We would watch Taino and Brody. So I'm looking at the subreddit or the Reddit for public access. 90s in Seattle, public access TV in the 90s, and somebody is referencing. Let's see.

[Andrew]

Well, you look and I also. Jump in, please. The first sentence under career on Wikipedia is he tried stand up in Los Angeles before moving to Seattle, where he began developing an act in addition to co creating and co starring a public access television show with. How do you say his name again?

[Luke Burbank]

I think it was.

[Andrew]

Was Tana, Tana Manu, called Tanu that garnered a cult following, a cult following called Luke.

[Luke Burbank]

Then they were referencing. There was this guy named the Reverend Bruce Howard. This guy, the Reverend Bruce Howard, was just such a weirdo. He would just stand there in a suit and he would just, like, say things into the camera. He sang a song that is still with me to this day 35 years later. Reverend Bruce Howard on Public Access. He was just singing the camera. Your brains with the king and it's such an awesome thing. Your brains with the king and it's such a lovely thing. He was just singing your brains with the King. And it's such a. And then he would add in a little detail, he would change it up. And to this day, I'll find myself walking around going, your brains with the King. And it's such an awesome thing. Just like, wow, this is a real trip down memory lane for me. 1990s Seattle Public Access TV. Okay. All that is to say, this Colbert thing sounds really cool. And I will watch that. And yes, I'm excited. I was wondering, like, who wrote it? Was it Colbert writers? Did he pay them? Did he have them steal time from cbs? They must have been working on this for a little while leading up to this.

[Andrew]

They must have. And I think it was a lot. I really do think it was a lot of people. And like, that's sort of the dichotomy in your head when you're watching it. It seems so low budget and it seems it does have a feeling of kind of like, well, okay, let's just try this thing. But you and I just know enough. And obviously you know more about television than I do. I'm not trying, but like, we know enough about like what you need just infrastructure wise to have in place if the conversation is going to go in this way. So you know that there was a lot of work, a lot of thought and a lot of work that went into this. He can't just do this every day because he's just like, it's not a throwaway project, you know what I mean? But it had the sort of the patina of that. And it was just, again, I hope I didn't like over sell it or give too much away, but I hope I didn't ruin it in any way, but I just really, really enjoyed it. And it was.

[Luke Burbank]

What?

[Andrew]

I can't explain it. It's kind of like what I needed to close that chapter, sort of.

[Luke Burbank]

Absolutely. No, I mean, it's honestly making me feel hopeful where I was feeling pretty sad about just the bad guys winning yet again at the end of last week. You know, I love that he went off and did this. Now, this is the last thing I'll say about this. Is it a Reddit or a subreddit? When I'm.

[Andrew]

It would be a R. Seattle. Yeah. So that's a Seattle subreddit, you would say.

[Luke Burbank]

And guess who started this post. Guess who posted this entire thing. The wild world of public access cable TV in Seattle in the 1990s. And then it's got a picture of Shannon Cringan and then who is commenting repeatedly throughout, kind of going back and forth with people and talking about these different shows, it.

[Andrew]

Could it be Chris Hay? Not Chris Hayes, Andy Haynes?

[Luke Burbank]

No, I'm trying to think of people Rossophonic.

[Andrew]

Oh, my goodness gracious.

[Luke Burbank]

It's our guy, Ross Reynolds.

[Andrew]

Ross. Is bowling a sport?

[Luke Burbank]

Yes. And then Ross is in the comments section mixing it up. But I need to know this for once and for all. If someone posts something on Reddit, that's called a subreddit, right?

[Andrew]

No, no, that's a post. A subreddit is the community. So the community is that R Seattle. That means that's the Seattle subreddit.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, that's the Seattle subreddit.

[Andrew]

And then he. That's what you would. And then Ross posted in the Seattle subreddit.

[Luke Burbank]

Got it. There was Bong Hit championships, apparently. I wonder if Seattle was overrepresented with kind of good, weird public access shows.

[Andrew]

I wonder if that was.

[Luke Burbank]

If that was pretty typical in any city in America that you went into or if. If Seattle was especially fertile for that kind of stuff.

[Andrew]

I wonder too. And we should probably wrap up the show. But there's so the idea of cable access, even though it's clearly still around. I mean, Colbert just did this thing. But like it really is of an era that is very specific. You can track it down. It was because of the introduction of cable and the idea of cable access. That was some sort of agreement between the private cable companies. Right. And the. And the communities that were laying cable for this private venture. I think that was part of the thing. Well, you have to allow some channels for the community. Right. Some nonprofit channels for the community. And that's why cable access started. And if you think about like the heyday of that, it would be the 90s. And Seattle was also like known as a very creative, you know, kind of off the wall place in the 90s. Like that seems not that like, obviously New York has a huge one. Right? That's Chris Gethard's thing. That was in New York City, but I think so.

[Luke Burbank]

Or maybe New Jersey.

[Andrew]

Was it okay, Jersey.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't. He's from Jersey. But I don't know if that show, if the studios were. If that was a New York public, New York public access or New Jersey public.

[Andrew]

But I could see, just to your point, I could really see Seattle being a place where your Brody Stevens end up, because Seattle's a cool place to be at that time. And you also have almost live, like, I don't know any other city that has sort of the whole thing.

[Luke Burbank]

It definitely inspired me and Peter to think like, yeah, we can. We could just make a comedy show. We could make a sketch based comedy show. We had to go take the classes. You have to sign up. And this was on Aurora Avenue, by the way, right by that Burger Master.

[Andrew]

Oh, yeah, right by.

[Luke Burbank]

And so we would. We went and we took the classes and we sat through the things that we were certified to, like operate the thing, whatever. And then we just never did a show because again, we were kids and it was the kind of thing that seemed cool until we realized, oh, this is actually gonna be a lot of work. I've told the story a million times, but the only time I made it on public access was this nutcase guy had heard me on KVI as the producer and call screener and he had. He. He was producing this conservative talk show on the local public access station called. I think it was called Seattle or Washington Conservative Live or something. But then he changed the name to. That's right.

[Andrew]

Oh, exclamation point. I gotta say that. Play on words. Not kvi, but what was the conservative station that was in the cluster that you and I worked for?

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, well, that was kvi. Oh, no. Ktt, where we work.

[Andrew]

Yeah, sorry, yeah, ktth. They had bumper stickers that even. I think I might even have one on my clipboard down here. Even me, I think I had a KTTH bumper sticker that says we're always right. Or something along the lines, which you gotta give them credit, right? Do you have to give him credit, Andrew?

[Luke Burbank]

Your hat says that conservatives weren't always right, but it should say you were always wrong.

[Andrew]

Pam Bondi write that for you? That's adorable.

[Luke Burbank]

One last thing that I'm just gonna throw out there on the subject of Seattle public access television. There was a guy named Richard Le. He's being listed here, who had the show. Kurt Cobain was murdered and he would just go around and like relentlessly bother Courtney Love or anyone who. He would always just be standing by like a hedge, like on the outskirts of maybe the property or something. He'd just be in these random places. And I mean, the funny part is there's probably a. There's probably a fairly substantial online community of conspiracy minded people who think that in fact, fact, maybe he was murdered at this point. But this guy was kind of ahead of the curve on it, but also really bad at spelling out the case, but doggedly obsessed with it. And he ran for like Seattle City Council or something. He ran for some public office where because of the equal time clause, I think I had to interview him for Kuow. Like, I was just the intern, but they were like, someone has to like, interview this guy because we're having on the legit candidates. So I have this vague memory, either I interviewed or I engineered it, of doing the interview with the guy whose entire platform he was probably running for mayor and his entire platform was Kurt Cobain was murdered.

[Andrew]

I think that I had. I know that you've mentioned this before, but I feel like I also heard about it maybe because. Does he figure prominently into the documentary that was made about.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes.

[Andrew]

You know, Kurt.

[Luke Burbank]

Kurt Cobain's death?

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, I think he. Because I forget then who made that doc.

[Andrew]

It was kind of trying to figure

[Luke Burbank]

out who's a well regarded filmmaker who kind of came in and put some oxygen into that story. That there was like some things about the death of Kurt Cobain that were. That were pretty unexplainable to the point where I think that the, like, the police. Didn't the Seattle police recently just have to say that, like, they had to announce they're not reopening the case or that they had reopened the case and decided that their initial read on the thing was correct or something? It was like recent news in the death of Kurt Cobain.

[Andrew]

I'm trying to figure out if even the documentary I'm talking about is Kurt and Courtney or Kurt Cobain Montage of Heck. I. I think it's Kurt and Courtney.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, you're right.

[Andrew]

I think Kurt and Courtney might have been the one that focused because that's 1998.

[Luke Burbank]

Was the filmmaker.

[Andrew]

Okay, yeah, that's Kurt and Courtney then. Yes. And then. And I think that that is the one that focuses on this guy. Because I think this is the documentary that's a little bit more unhinged. Right. And I think Montage of Heck might be more like kind of mainstream look at his life. I think I could be wrong.

[Luke Burbank]

I guess. YouTube is the new public access television. Right? If we're thinking about it that way, sort of. It's kind of made it. It's probably made it generally unnecessary. Because if I want to, I know we're wrapping the show up here, I promise. But if I want to. Let me just start this whole another media discussion. But like, I was just reading those comments about the different shows and thinking, like, did they even do public access tv? Well, obviously they do it. Colbert was on it. But I mean, like, what's the utility? Because you could go on YouTube as easily as you could go on that channel of your tv. And it's A much lower barrier to get your stuff on YouTube than to go and do the TV channel, I guess. So it's probably. And TikTok, I guess, you know, that

[Andrew]

was one other thing about this cable access show. This specific episode that I liked actually, even though it sounds like a pain in the ass, is it's on YouTube, right? And so I'm watching it. I have a smart TV, not to brag, E equals MC squared. And so I have YouTube as an app on my TV. The same way that I might turn on Pluto or Netflix or HBO or whatever, right? And so I go to find it and I realize, oh, I don't think there's like an official version of this on YouTube, like maybe only in Monroe or that cable network or whatever has its own YouTube page. But there does not seem to be a definitive copy of this. And in fact, the first one I was watching, whoever grabbed it, there was some Internet glitching going on. And I didn't realize until I was watching it again later with Genevieve that I found a cleaner copy sort of accidentally. And the fact that, oh, and by the way, I also saw people screen capping things on bluesky. The reason it's popping up all over the place is because CBS keeps on trying to take it down. Like CBS people. These videos keep disappearing of this cable access show. And then it'll say that a copyright because of property owned by cbs. And it's like the Late show with Stephen Colbert. Even though it's not the Late show with Stephen Colbert, I don't have any claim on it. I don't know if it's the robots that are automatically doing this, this. If it's because he does play a clip, but it would be totally public domain. He plays a clip of his own show, but within the context of him playing a clip of his old show, like he'd be allowed to do that, you know what I mean? Like you're allowed to play clips. So I don't know if it's an active effort on the part of some, you know, some management or something over at CBS or Paramount or whatever, or if it's just the computers getting confused. But because of. Partially because of that, to find this, you just have to find it. You have to go in kind of digging through YouTube to find a copy that you like of it. Like digging through your cassette drawer to find the Grateful Dead live in Toledo, 1972 or whatever. There's just like the non centralized nature of this was also something that sort of appealed to me.

[Luke Burbank]

It looks like according to the New York Post, CBS halts crackdown on Stephen Colbert's Only in Monroe public access show uploads after backlash.

[Andrew]

Okay, thank you for. Thank you for confirming that. Because I had only seen it like in a flash across my screen. So they really did make a concerted effort to try to pull this down. Can you, like. Well, on Friday, working for this company, I can't.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't know the kind of person that would. Honestly, on Friday, I was trying to. I was trying to. To grab a clip that I was of Colbert. I told you. I was trying to find this part after the first commercial break because I thought it was really lovely talking about the joy machine.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

And that didn't exist on the Internet anywhere for free. I was gonna have to sign up for Paramount plus to get it right. I was like, no, I'm not. I'm not signing up for Paramount plus to get this two minutes of tape.

[Andrew]

So anyway, having said that, you should know that. I do. We do for some reason have Paramount plus in this house. I say for some reason.

[Luke Burbank]

Get enough Landman.

[Andrew]

Right. No, you know what it is? I think, think it's because somebody in this house who isn't me or one of the pets has an addiction to Star Trek content. And I believe Paramount is.

[Luke Burbank]

Your place is where that lives. I see. All right, well, listen, we did it, Andrew. We did a show.

[Andrew]

We did a tight 70 minute show.

[Luke Burbank]

That's right. I gotta go take some allergy meds. And my eye, my eyes are so itchy. I want to like, scratch them, but I hear that's bad.

[Andrew]

Oh, yeah. Don't scratch your eyes. I'm allergy.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't. So have you seen these chompers? These. No. Toothbrush. My electric toothbrush just straight up broke on me on my last trip. I was. What do you mean? Well, it was one of those Instagram purchases. It's. I forget what it's called, but it's. It sits in this little case and supposedly this case is like red light. It's like. It's like radiating the thing in a certain way so that the bacteria won't grow. So that your travel toothbrush doesn't get. Get gross. That was how it was pitched to me. I don't know if that ever actually worked, but it just. The head just snapped right off as I was. As I was brushing the other.

[Andrew]

So that's.

[Luke Burbank]

I guess I'm done brushing my teeth now, I guess.

[Andrew]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, thanks for listening, everybody. We are going to be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for all of you. And it's not a holiday, so we're going to really try tomorrow.

[Andrew]

Let's do a half hour show tomorrow.

[Luke Burbank]

Just keep them guessing.

[Andrew]

Right.

[Luke Burbank]

In the meantime, everybody, have a great Memorial Day, have a great Monday, take care of yourself themselves, and please remember, no mountain too tall.

[Andrew]

And good luck to all. Power out.