#4546 House Of Flies

Summary

TBTL #4546 House Of Flies – September 3, 2025

Main Theme/Purpose

In this episode, Luke Burbank and Andrew Walsh dive into a classic TBTL blend of everyday absurdities, comfort banter, and homegrown horror. The centerpiece is Andrew’s real-life “house of flies”—a grim saga of rodents, decomposition, and a biblical outbreak of flies in his basement. From pest control and the realities of homeownership to tangents about state fair food, credit card professions, and livestock ethics, the episode masterfully oscillates between comic misery, relatable minutiae, and cultural commentary.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Andrew’s Pestilence Saga: From Rodents To Flies

[03:52–21:39]

• Rodent/Horror Chronology: Andrew recaps discovering a foul smell in his basement, suspecting a dead critter in the wall. This led to pest control efforts and the unexpected twist—flies, not rodents, became the main issue.
• Cat as Pest Deterrent: Luke previously suggested using Andrew’s cat, Bingo, as a live deterrent. Andrew reports partial success, but the house is soon beset by swarms of flies.
• Fly Explosion: One day, Andrew finds 8-10 flies clustered at a window, realizing they must be emerging from somewhere near the baseboards, likely having hatched from eggs in the mystery carcass.
• Primitive Pest Control: Old-school flypaper strips are hung. Initially, nothing happens; by mid-morning, they are “shock-a-block” with flies. Andrew also vacuums live flies with a Dyson, but finds both methods disgusting.
• Gallows Humor: The graphic descriptions escalate, including Andrew tallying 30+ flies on a strip and getting “gaggy”—“It is such an awful thing to be dealing with. Genevieve and I will stand there... and say, ‘Genevieve, it's grim.’ And she says, ‘It is grim. It is very, very grim.’” ([18:22])
• Resolution and Coping: They believe the cycle is winding down, but describe the psychological aftereffects: “...even when you get them out of the car... that sense memory on your skin, it doesn’t go away.” ([38:53])

Memorable Quotes

• Andrew: “It just represents pestilence... I just keep on saying the word pestilence.” ([21:39])
• Luke: “Are you familiar with the Brad Pitt movie? 5. ...Are you familiar with the Morgan Freeman movie seven?” ([11:27])
• Andrew: “I cannot tell you how absolutely revolting... I’m almost getting gagged.” ([14:19])

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2. Reminiscing: Flies In The Outback

[34:08–39:14]

• Shared Trauma: Andrew relates the basement flies to a prior road trip with Luke through the Australian Outback, where gas stations required “biblical” fly-swatting strategies.
• Banter & Memory Gaps: Both recall tactics to keep car doors shut and fly windows down, but quibble over the accuracy of their memories.
• Sense Memory: Both note the “phantom” feeling of flies on the skin long after the event.

Notable Quote

• Luke: “...when you would step out of the car, 40 flies would land on you. It’s a very unpleasant experience.” ([38:53])

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3. State Fair Food & Ethics Of Livestock Eating

[43:44–77:22]

• Luke’s State Fair Observations: Luke details his visit to the Oregon State Fair, finds the fair’s food uninspiring, and rants about people eating generic chicken strips instead of state fair exclusives.
• Andrew’s Take: Defends people’s right to eat as they please, but prefers not to indulge in over-the-top fried fair food.
• Livestock Pavilion Dilemma: Both reflect on the paradox of celebrating the cuteness and intelligence of animals that are destined for slaughter and eating, musing on pig intelligence and the ethics of meat eating.
• Cultural Traditions: Andrew expresses distaste for cute animal mascots advertising their own meat—“I am really done with ads or signs... of the animal you’re about to eat dressed up like a chef.” ([76:55])

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4. Podcaster Not A Profession? Credit Card Applications & Odd Jobs

[55:28–68:29]

• The Alaska Airlines Atmos Card: Luke details signing up for a premium credit card, highlighting their “overly specific” occupational list—podcaster not included.
• Absurd Job List: The hosts laugh over obscure options such as “Cigarettes Distributor,” “Vending Machine Operator,” “Senior Political Figure,” and “Auctioneer,” questioning why “media” is missing.
• Meta Commentary: “Are there more gemologists than podcasters currently? One wonders.” (Luke, [03:00])

Notable Quotes

• Luke: “If you want to know my brand, Andrew, I’ve had multiple listeners say, hey, are you signing up for this?” ([55:56])
• Andrew: “Vending machine operator—not owner—even?” ([63:00])
• Luke: “I see some videos on TikTok and I wonder if maybe that could be my post-podcasting career—vending machine king.” ([63:14])

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5. Voyeurism Or Curiosity? Andrew’s Webcam Admission

[48:11–54:35]

• Subreddit Confession: Andrew admits he’s captivated by a subreddit featuring open, unsecured security cameras around the world—not in private spaces, but cornfields and beaches.
• Luke and Andrew debate whether this counts as “voyeurism,” agreeing on its curious, non-creepy nature.
• Andrew: “I do feel like it is voyeurism. And I will take the slings and arrows for that. ...But my guess is the idea of voyeurism is staring in on—does it always have to be people?” ([52:25])

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6. Email Corner: The Real Origin Of The Baby Carriage Scene

[77:54–85:44]

• Correction Time: Listener Elisa/Elyssa gently corrects last episode's assertion that The Untouchables originated the iconic “baby carriage on the stairs” sequence—it’s an homage to Battleship Potemkin (1925).
• Discussion on Early Cinema: This spins off into musings on silent film stunts (Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd) and the cinematic roots of slapstick and spectacle.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Andrew, feeling bugged out: “I am almost getting gagged now, just not for effect. I’m getting a little, like, my—the hair on my arms is standing up a bit.” ([14:19])
• On Bingo the Cat’s lackluster response: “It's time for him to earn his keep a little bit, you know?” ([31:08])
• Luke on the jobs list: “Cigarettes distributor, which by the way, I hope and pray cigarettes are a contracting industry in this country... seems more niche to me than us...working in the media.” ([62:07])
• Andrew on the flypaper: “Imagine, like going to wash your hands in the sink and having that hanging over your head. These just pieces of paper and I’m changing them out every day.” ([16:31])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Main rodent/fly saga: 03:52–21:39
• Outback fly reminiscence: 34:08–39:14
• Fly removal techniques: 14:19–18:22, 26:40–27:51
• House of Flies gallows humor: 18:22, 21:39, 76:55–77:22
• Credit card job rants: 55:28–68:29
• Voyeurism/camera confession: 48:11–54:35
• State Fair and animal ethics: 43:44–77:22
• Iconic film correction: 77:54–85:44

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The TBTL Vibe

The episode is classic TBTL: whimsical, gross, philosophical, and self-deprecating in equal measure. Luke and Andrew’s blend of curmudgeonly humor and genuine curiosity makes even fly infestations and state fair food debates sound compelling. If you crave a podcast that finds the comedy and humanity in everyday disasters and idle obsessions, this episode is peak TBTL.

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End Note: For all the pestilence, existential shrugs, and inside jokes (“No mountain too tall...”), House of Flies is a reminder that sometimes misery really does love company.

Transcript

[A]

You swear that the testimony you are about to give this committee is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth to help you God? I do. Please take a seat. Senator Evis, it's your time.

[B]

Gregory Hirsch, Executive assistant to Tom Wambsgands, correct?

[A]

Yes. Yes. If it is to be said. I'm sorry? If it is to be said, so it be. So it is.

[B]

Are you all right?

[A]

Yes. I merely wish to answer in the affirmative fashion.

[B]

You can speak to us normally.

[A]

Okay. No, thank you, sir. So I shall. Tbtl.

[B]

Can'T you say anything in a normal way?

[A]

The answer, sadly, is not yes. What I like to do is first lay down a kind of a syncopated beat that isn't so much about what it is altogether. It's more about the modulation and what it is once it starts. It's a little bit of a proof you have no reflexes, your blood tastes like root beer, and some of your bones appear to have vanished. He's a hot tomato. I don't know what a hot tomato is.

[B]

Whatever happened to that wonderful man who was in here last week wearing that funny looking turtleneck, singing that dumb song.

[A]

Wearing that smelly aftershave lotion? Whatever happened to him, he was too beautiful to live.

[B]

Well, all right. Hello, good morning and welcome, everyone, to a Wednesday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. We are living in the midst of a podcast boom. My name is Luke Burbank. I'm your host. I just want you to be normal. And clearly you're not. Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio perched high above the mighty Columbia, where and another lovely early September Labor Day week morning, which will turn into an afternoon, which will turn into an evening. I'm not sure if you understand how the cycles of the sun and the moon work, but we're having a nice one here today already.

[A]

Oh, Ma. Pa.

[B]

It's just beautiful. And I can tell this is going to be a nice episode. It's episode 4546 in a collector's series. Let the fun begin. I don't know if you've heard the ads. If you watch the Seattle Mariners baseball team, you've been inundated with all kinds of ads about this new credit card that the Alaska Airlines company is rolling out. And you know how I am. First of all, when just comes to new bright, shiny things and also stuff related to air travel on the airline that I use, you know that when they say we've got a fancy new credit card, that's probably overpriced and a. But it has some perks with it. I will start asking myself, should I go ahead and sign up for this credit card? Girl, don't do it. It's not worth it. And then you know, that I'll realize it's probably not actually a good value for my money. But then I'll keep reading about it, and then over the course of days, I'll talk myself into it.

[A]

I did it.

[B]

Well, I did. I signed up for the. The new Atmos credit card. I guess technically I already had one because my. I had a regular Alaska Airlines credit card, which I think is all now part of whatever this program is. But I signed up for the, like, elite level one. And what really struck me was the fact that they don't list podcasting as a job on there, which, like, to me, makes no sense. And they do list a lot of other weird jobs, which we'll talk about. Like, gemologist is on there. Are there more gemologists than podcasters currently? One wonders. Here's a guy who wonders about this day and night. The longest running cobra of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ship. Speaking of employment, I am doing my job here. He is doing his job here, right here, right now. He's Andrew Walsh, and he's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

[A]

Good morning, Luke. I learned a valuable lesson this weekend. Yeah, it's pronounced pestilence, not pestilence. I've been saying pestilence my entire life. Not unlike.

[B]

I would have said pestilence.

[A]

Would you?

[B]

Yeah, I don't know, but I would have. It would have sounded fine to me. Who corrected you on this?

[A]

Who do you think?

[B]

Well, and what was their rationale? What was this. What was this anonymous person's rationale? No, it seems like it's just a preference thing, don't you think?

[A]

I don't know. I looked it up later and it does seem like the dictionary or like whatever Google searches pestilence.

[B]

Well, pestilence.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And you were saying pestile.

[A]

I was saying pestilence. Like I say electrician or electric. No, I don't.

[B]

I would have allowed it. But that's because, you know, I care about you and I take feelings into.

[A]

Account, unlike some people, unfortunately. No, Genevieve did correct me on that.

[B]

Oh, you were talking about Genevieve? If that was rodent.

[A]

No, but she just said, I think it's pestilence. But the thing is, this is one of those things you don't want to learn. I was saying the word pestilence. Over and over and over, and I have been the past several days. I'm kind of surprised I didn't tell you about this yesterday, but I think part of me was I went into the whole ordeal on Monday's episode of Spotless, and I wasn't sure if it was a little bit played out or maybe I wanted people to have an opportunity to listen to my ears, but not to your ears.

[B]

Wait, may I ask.

[A]

You're not waiting. You're not hitting refresh on the Spotless feed every other Monday. That's the schedule that you follow.

[B]

Any kind of pestilence. Some people have called it a pestilence on the podcasting landscape. I think that's mean. I think that's unnecessary sex.

[A]

Pestilence is this.

[B]

But can I just ask, is this a continuation of the previous conversation from last week about the Cabinet of Wonders in your basement and the possibility of intrusion there?

[A]

I believe it is all evidence. So quick recap comes as bad news to me.

[B]

I thought I had solved the problem by recommending a.

[A]

No, I don't.

[B]

Feline intervention.

[A]

No, you don't know where this is going. I don't. I believe you were helpful, actually, in your suggestion. So really, really quick recap here. A few weeks ago, I noticed a pretty bad smell in the basement. I couldn't figure out where I was coming from. I thought maybe because it was. It was kind of coming from this area of the basement, but I couldn't quite pinpoint it. And I thought, well, we could have a dead critter in the wall. I've heard of this happening to people. Critters get in there, they die, and then you have a really bad smell for a while. And unless you go insane and start hammering your wall open with a hammer, which I've heard, pestilence, eventually, it's probably a small rodent and take care of itself. And it will probably just eventually dry up into a husk and rot and desiccate, and it'll desiccate and it'll be gone. But the thing that surprised me was I had this bad smell indicating death. This smell indicates death. Before I started to notice indications of possibly a live rodent as well. Because in this little closet slash shelf, cupboard area, we started to notice a little bit of what looked like maybe mouse scat or maybe even rat scat. Rat scat. I still don't really know what's going on with that. I cleaned it up a couple of times. Scatman's World. Your. Your idea was, hey, before you start bringing poison or traps into the situation to try and catch whatever this living creature is. Maybe just try putting bingo up in that area. It is kind of a cupboard area, this deep, deep storage area, but it has doors on it, so bingo isn't in that area much. And you said. And I did not realize this, but you said that it's not just that cats can act as mousers going around catching mice and rats, but also just their very presence, their very pheromones, their smell can just like, you know, kind of make. I had heard animals not want to.

[B]

Come around, but I didn't have. I mean, that's the kind of thing I had heard from someone. I don't know if I'd really tested it in my own life. And that could be, you know, more. More myth than. Than. Than science, but it sort of checks out to me.

[A]

Like, it's.

[B]

These animals have very, very, very heightened senses. It's how they stay alive. I'm talking about, like, the mice and things like that. That and their ability to drive a convertible the two ways. Yeah, A little motorcycle and a scarf.

[A]

Yeah, there's a scarf and those goggles. The goggles are what get you. Right. So anyway, I did do that a couple. So keep in mind there's kind of two things going on here. I thought it was weird that the smell of death would come before seeing evidence of a live creature. So it's still unclear exactly what's going on in the walls, but clearly something's going on. So I did a lot of mitigating for the smell that seems to have worked. I got a lot of baking soda and stuff. And then I did put Bingo.

[B]

One class of the mice has gone missing, but all the other classes are.

[A]

Yes, and all people want answers. I did put Bingo up there because he likes to crawl around up there given the opportunity. So I let him crawl around a little bit. Just basically I just said, bingo, get your stank up in there. Right. And he did that. And we have not seen evidence of any more turds or scat or whatever you want to call it. So me, you know, I'm still hopeful for that. It's unclear. You know, you never. You don't want to say, you know, mission accomplished or heck of a job brownie until you're sure that everything is really in order. But definitely a good sign. And then this actually goes back to, I believe, Thursday, or it must have been Friday of last week, because I would have told you on Friday show if it had happened earlier than that. But I am just sort of Noticing more flies than usual in the house. And I'm in my. And keep in mind, all of this stuff I'm talking about is in the basement now. There are some black flies flying around upstairs. It happens. It's summertime. Bingo's chasing him around.

[B]

Get out of here, you flies. That's. It's fly season.

[A]

Fly season.

[B]

It's making me crazy here at the Madrona Hill studio.

[A]

Well, my friend, you do not want to be in my house right now, because I am. The only windows, actual windows that you can open that let fresh air into this basement are in my studio. So it is. It is a basement. So not a lot of windows, as you might guess. But I do have, like, kind of, I don't know, windows that are about, I don't know, five and a half feet off the ground or something at kind of ground level. And so I keep those open, obviously, during the summer months, and they're open all the time. And I'm doing the show or something on Friday. Maybe I'm posting the show. I don't know what it is. I look, I got like, three or four flies in one window. And I look behind me, and I think I. You know, what happened was I noticed a few of them Thursday night, and I told these. I'm like, we might have a bit of a fly problem. And she's like, I don't think it's a fly problem. I've just seen a few, and it's probably fine. And then that was, I think, Friday morning. I think maybe Friday morning is the morning she goes downstairs and she's like, oh, my God. And in this area of the basement, where the smell no longer exists and we no longer see any evidence of a living creature, Pestilence flies. Luke flies. Yes. And the thing is, the reason I brought up my windows in my studio is throughout the day, they were gathering. You don't notice them. You don't see swarms of them. But then all of a sudden, you would look at one of the windows, the one right behind my head, Luke. And I would see eight to ten flies all buzzing, trying to get out the screen. I'm like, this is crazy.

[B]

Get out of here, you flies. We got three flies, five flies, Veeves.

[A]

And I realize what's going on here is. At first we think they're coming from the cabinet area, but they're not. They're coming from the ground. Chances are whatever I smelled died a few weeks ago is probably more at the baseboard level inside the wall. And flies are somehow. They must have laid eggs in that creature, my friend.

[B]

Are you familiar with the Brad Pitt movie? 5.

[A]

I'll raise you by 2.

[B]

Are you familiar with the Brad Pit movie? 6. With the Brad Pitt movie?

[A]

8. Oh, we were so close. I was so optimistic for that.

[B]

Are you familiar with the Brad Pitt. Are you familiar with the Morgan Freeman movie seven?

[A]

Yes, I am. I am familiar with Five Deadly Sins. Yes.

[B]

Whoa, dude, that's like out of a like David Fincher film. The Pestilence related to the smell of the thing you can't see that's no longer probably alive.

[A]

It is so bad. You. So what we've done is there's not a great modern solution for this. The solution is still something that I have been lucky enough to never need in my life, which is fly.

[B]

Harvey Keitel.

[A]

Yes. No. What do you call it? Flypaper. Those. You take a tube. They're. They're just like they were in the 60s. You pull them out and they're these strips of really sticky stuff. And we're hanging them from the ceiling right now.

[B]

So they're like an unfun Chinese yo, yo.

[A]

Oh my God. Dude, we are.

[B]

We're.

[A]

Now, as I talked to you on Wednesday, we believe we are past the worst of it, but still we will hang up these. Well, I haven't seen them yet, but we'll hang these things up and then the flies do not come out overnight. You'll hang them up these sticky papers and nothing will be there. But then by mid morning you start to see like there's one out there. I think it was last night. We had like 30 of them and some of them are still alive. On this paper we have two of them hanging, actually maybe three because I put one in the closet storage area. They were just coming and I think they were coming from the baseboard level because I kept finding them on this one wal. Like kind of coming up the wall. Not like ants, but they're slow too. So I've been vacuuming them up alive. Just like vacuuming them up if I can get to them before they can fly away. So my. My vacuum cleaner, one of those Dyson see through things. Looks like I've been vacuuming up raisins. It is so disgusting to look at. To look at these.

[B]

Are you familiar with the Gwyneth Paltrow Film 10 minus 3?

[A]

Yes, I am. What is in the.

[B]

They're crawling on the wall, dude.

[A]

They're crawling on the wall. And so we hung these strips up by the light bulb in this little kitchenette area that we have. Where they. And it has, like, they've. They've been kind of quarantined since we started doing this on Friday or Saturday or whatever it was. They stopped kind of coming into my office. They're not flying around the rest of the house. The tape is doing its job and collecting most of them. And I do believe. I'm guessing that when we dial up tomorrow, the situation might even. I don't want to count. Literally don't want to count my flies before they're hatched. But based on what we were seeing, it seems like the numbers are decreasing a little bit. But I cannot tell you how absolutely revolting. I'm almost getting gagged.

[B]

Gag now, just not for effect. I'm getting a little, like, my. The hair on my arms is standing up a bit.

[A]

I would show. I would take a photo of what is hanging in our basement right now and send it to you, but I really don't think you can handle that. I really don't. It is.

[B]

I think we've all seen Wicker Man.

[A]

It is. I haven't seen Wicker Man. Those are.

[B]

I think that's more beads.

[A]

Yes, beads. Okay.

[B]

I have. Andrew, I have so many questions.

[A]

Do you want a photo? I have some on my phone that are not super graphic because they're kind of.

[B]

Yeah. Or graphic. I'd listen.

[A]

I don't have any real graphic ones yet because I don't want to get too close to them. I've taken some of these things down and put in a plastic bag to throw it away. The fly paper. And it's still, like, buzzing and vibrating. It is.

[B]

So. Okay, first things first. The fly paper or fly tape or whatever you might call that. It works.

[A]

It works.

[B]

It's working. It's getting the flies to go to it, because I'm not. I haven't had any. Let's just say homicides in my house like you apparently have. Or maybe not homicides. Just, you know, a natural. Hopefully the coroner will rule a natural deaths of despair. Mice asides. Like, listen, Andrew, all mice aside. All mice asides aside. I haven't had anything like that, but I have sometimes. Whether it's because, you know, my piece of food got left out or whatever, or again, just this time of year. It's weird. There were not very many black flies hanging around in my chardonnay, as it were, until about, like, I don't know, two weeks ago. So I'm dealing with. I'm dealing with some of them. Not as many as you are, but I will have the Thought occasionally like I'm tired of chasing these things out here with a fly swatter or just waiting them. Waiting for their 24 hour life cycle to be over. And then what I will do is I will consider getting some of that fly fly paper, fly tape, whatever you call those things. But I've never actually hung one of those up. I didn't know if they actually worked or not. They actually work.

[A]

Yeah. Take a look at your kind of.

[B]

Satisfying a bunch of flies on there.

[A]

Gaggy though it is so upsetting and especially because it's an area. Now this is in our kitchenette area. Those photos I sent you are kitchen at upstairs. No, no, no. That's a full kitchen. This is just a little awful kitchenette area we have downstairs that we want to kind of like totally tear out and redo. It's by far the most kind of embarrassing in there.

[B]

I don't think it's awful.

[A]

The. The cupboards have. That was before water damage. Yeah. It's just like I'm looking at these photos. Those aren't even bro. What it looked like this morning was worse than that. That was early on in the process that I just sent you like and that's pretty disgusting. And like imagine like kind of going to wash your hands in the sink and having that hang over your head. These just pieces of paper and I'm changing them out every day. I'm going to do that after this episode. But it has been. And that was why active ingredient.

[B]

What is on here?

[A]

Well that's the thing. I. One of them is definitely says so we have two different brands. One of the. Which is like very old school in its packaging. I love the fact that it hasn't changed.

[B]

It comes with a. With a bottle of rye whiskey and a light bulb that buzzes intermittently here.

[A]

I'm going to send you a photo of just the packaging. I do think you'll love it. But. But anyway. And those specifically say no bait involved. It's like it's just sticky paper and you put it where the flies are going to gather by a light source. The other ones which I want to say are Black and Decker. But that's not a brand. What would be a brand like a common. Like believe it starts with word black. It's some sort of common household cleaner and poison whatever spray.

[B]

Well not Raid.

[A]

I don't. Well you know what? Maybe it is Raid and maybe the packaging is just black. It doesn't matter.

[B]

It has. I think Raid has like a black lightning bolt.

[A]

I think I'm thinking Of raid. Yeah. So then we bought some more modern ones that are raid. And those might. Those might have an attractive quality. I'm still not entirely sure. But we hang them up by this light source in the basement and that's where the flies are congregating anyway. So as they, as they fly towards the light, they get stuck on these things and again, like it's sort of satisfying to see them. Like I've, I've, I've. It's personal. Like I'm not joking. Like last night I was like kind of talking to the dead and dying flies on there a little bit like you little mothers like is. At first I'm like.

[B]

Cuz I. I thought maybe you were having empathy for them.

[A]

I was at one point. It is grim. That is the word. I keep on. I just keep on. Genevieve and I will stand there, I'll put one arm across her shoulder and we'll just stare at our fly trap and I'll say, genevieve, it's grim. And she says it is grim. It is very, very grim. It is such an. Aw. It's such an awful thing to be dealing with. Luckily, you know, it is. It has been contained to this area of the basement. If we catch them on the fly paper, like just now coming in here to my office, I did find two flies in one in each window. So I got rid of them with the vacuum. But it's mostly. They're not all. They're not all like flying and migrating towards this end of the basement the way they were before we realized truly what was going on. But it's really. It's turning my stomach to look up at these just. Just these pieces of tape that are just shock a block with just like what I think is not just like gross to see a dying creature, even if it is a little bug. But everything that they represent, these are bugs that have laid. They've come. They've come into this earth from eggs that were laid in the carcass of a dead animal. That is bent side scenario. Right? And then what do they do if they survive?

[B]

That's. I. Okay, so I'm sorry, I don't mean.

[A]

Oh, you didn't get the connection.

[B]

I. I thought I had the connection backwards. I thought that they were showing up because there was a rotting animal, but of course it's because they were inside.

[A]

A rotting something pro. And I don't know exactly what that is, but I assume that maybe there was a fly. You know, a single fly or a couple of flies are attracted to rotting flesh and then they'll lay their eggs in there. And then that's what happened. Is that from pavement?

[B]

No, it is. It's from. It's from the Yul Brenner song.

[A]

Oh, right, right.

[B]

Electronic carcass. So you think. Okay, so the, the working theory currently is that the thing that died and smelled very, very bad.

[A]

It.

[B]

It was probably. It's probably underneath your house or back in the wall. Maybe it got trapped in the wall.

[A]

Probably in. I'm guessing it's in the wall, but at ground level now, like a ground level of the. In other words, you. Not ground. We're in the basement. So I believe that it fell through the wall and is probably sitting at like the baseboard of my basement. Only inside the wall, but also in.

[B]

A place where flies could get access to it.

[A]

Yes. Well, clearly we have some kind of issue going on where animals can get inside of our walls.

[B]

So flies then got to the carcass, feasted on it, laid their eggs. Those eggs hatched. Those flies came out of the carcass and are now. But if you close the. Is the cabinet closed?

[A]

Yes, they're not cabinets.

[B]

And we put.

[A]

We put some. This is the big storage area where we first noticed the smell, sort of. And probably because that's also where there's a big hole in the wall where the animal could kind of come out and probably roam around the storage area. But yeah, we're keeping that closed. And so there are a few flies in there. And so maybe they're getting into there in some way. But the majority of them seem to be not coming in through through the closet or the cupboard, but instead down below because it's really noticeable and they seem small.

[B]

There's a hole down there too.

[A]

I mean, I don't see anything. But these are flies. They don't need a lot of space. Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

[B]

That is, to borrow a phrase, grim.

[A]

It is so awful. It's so macabre. And it's just. It just represents. I just keep on saying the word pestilence. It's just like.

[B]

So if you could have timed it with Halloween.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You might have.

[A]

Really, you know, Pestilence, you.

[B]

This could actually have been. You know, people go out to Home Depot, they pay good money for fake flies. You could add real flies.

[A]

Well, I'm saving these, I'm selling them.

[B]

And if you could find like a. Maybe a 40 foot tall guy and skin him, you could also gotten a free one of those giant skeletons that are all sold out everywhere.

[A]

I'm working on that. That one is Harder to effort.

[B]

I'll be honest with you.

[A]

Even just finding the victim has been tough, to be honest.

[B]

You'll, you'll. You'll know him when you see him. He'll be the person stalling, standing 14 head above every trust. Hashtag process. Yes, but I mean, I had the most minor version of this happen. Again, I can't overstate how minor my version of this was. But on the subject of the fact that there are more flies buzzing around right now in our home environment and that kind of weird thing where it's like I don't have. I don't feel a lot of empathy for flies. In fact, I really just don't. I don't feel empathy for them. I swat them with the fly swatter. I don't feel bad. I feel relief when they are not in my house. I do open the sliding glass door if they're buzzing around and flapping into the glass. I give them a chance. I give them one chance to straighten up and fly right, literally. And then if they don't, then I have no problem with killing them. That being said, I have these. I don't know if you and Veeves have these. I actually highly recommend them. They are a little like. I forget what the name of the product is, but what it is is something you plug into like an outlet, say like near your kitchen counter or above your kitchen counter. And it's a blue light, the kind that you know, we know bugs are attracted to. And then you slide this little paper card in that has. Stick' em on one side of it. Are you familiar with these at all? Have you seen these?

[A]

I don't know. That rings sort of a bell. And it's essentially what we're doing. We're just using light to attract them, to get them to stick to something sticky. We have, we also bought some clear see through things that you stick to windows because the flies will be attracted to the window and they'll stick to the window.

[B]

Well, this one is kind of nice because what it is is it's keeping that nasty business of bugs meeting their maker. It's kind of, it doesn't, it's discreet.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So all you see if you walk into the kitchen, all you see if you even look at it, is like a little thing that almost looks like a Glade renews it type of deal plugged in and then just like an innocuous little small paper square. Now the other side, that's friggin Gettysburg. Yeah, that's like, that's basically when we come back from the break in Gone with the Wind, that's mass destruction. That's just like every kind of bug that was in my kitchen that I didn't even know was there. Fruit fly, mosquito fly, they've all landed on that thing, gotten stuck there and they're moth and they're dead. And I will be honest with you, when I go over there and I, and I. So there's. You get like a whole stack of replacements and I replace it maybe once a week or something when I remember. And when I pull that thing off and I look at it and it's just like a bunch of bugs that are no longer alive and I throw it in the garbage can, it is so satisfying because it's like these were bugs that were in my house, in my kitchen, and now they, and now they can't hurt anyone. But yesterday there was a fly. He was in the kitchen, he was being annoying. And I watched him walking around on the backsplash tile in my kitchen. And I watched him walk over to the area where this faint blue light was sort of attracting him. And then I saw him fly onto the stick'. Em. I mean, I wasn't looking at it, but I was looking at the outside. I was looking at the non sticky part of the cart. So I watched him and then I thought, will he be strong enough? Because he was pretty big. And mostly what gets stuck on this are like fruit flies and gnats and things that are small. And then I was like, will he be strong enough to unstick himself and will he lose a leg in the process? And what kind of a death is this, as we've so long searched for as humans, A good death? Where does this rank on the kind of deaths you can have as a fly?

[A]

Is there dignity?

[B]

Is there death with dignity? And. And he landed on there and I was, I waited for a minute to see if he would be able to get off of there and I couldn't tell if I was rooting for him or not, to be totally honest with you. And then about a minute later, I looked over and sure enough, he had apparently gotten off there. He had all of his legs. He was now just walking around somewhere else on the thing. And then I was mad at him again.

[A]

Ew. Yeah. Oh God. But anyway, these things, once they get, I've, I, it's. It's really grim. I see them getting stuck on the paper. Like one little leg will get stuck on the paper and then there, then those. But they don't just die right away because being stuck doesn't kill you. They just stay on there until they don't have sustenance or whatever they need to live and so they die. They buzz and they just kind of like. It's really awful. The other thing I'm doing is, you know, I have, like I mentioned, I have one of those Dyson cordless vacuums. And so I put on just like, you know, I take off the main floor vacuuming do hickey and I put on just like the, the narrow little. I'm going to vacuum in a tiny space thing, you know. What's the word?

[B]

I love that thing, by the way.

[A]

Yeah, that's kind of the main. The go to attachment. Right. That's the word I was looking for. And remember when you had your Dyson and you thought you could run it on the highest speed at all times, but then it dies for like two minutes? Yeah, that's because that, that, that like super powered level isn't supposed to be used for sustainable. Yeah. Long periods.

[B]

It's like asking Scotty to give full thrust.

[A]

Yeah, you're giving it all Dyson. Yes, exactly. But I found the perfect use for it, which is. So usually you're just like in the middle sort of level of that Dyson. Well, I'm bumping it up to that top one and then I turn it on kind of far away from a fly. Let's say it's on a window or a screen. It's not on this. Not on the sticky paper. Once they're on the sticky paper, that's done. But I will move it slowly to the fly. And one thing I've realized is by the time the fly knows it should be scared of this thing, it's already caught in the tractor beam of suction. That's how. That's how. And so I watch it start to fly away. But the second the fly gives up its footing and tries to fly away, it's sucked right into the vacuum cleaner, which is also very grim and it's really gross when I go to clean the vacuum.

[B]

Is it?

[A]

That's the other thing possible.

[B]

Any of these flies are Jeff Goldblum.

[A]

That is a. That is a. Have you considered that's something to be worried about or the original.

[B]

Any of them yelled human fly here.

[A]

Human fly here.

[B]

Is one of them a lot larger than the other flies and is it constantly saying human fly here as it's stuck on the paper?

[A]

Very specific New York accent. Here's the last thing I'll say about this, which is like the, the grossest part is imagine you have this long piece of sticky, super, super sticky tape that is now hanging from your ceiling like I showed you in that photo. Luke, how do you get that down without like freaking yourself out and touching any of the flies? What I do is I take these bags. I buy these bags that are, I think three or four gallon plastic bags, and I use them as cat litter bags, scoop out the cat litter, dump them in there, tie them off, and throw them in the garbage. Right. I'm taking those, like, I guess they're the small size kitchen bags or whatever. I'm taking one of those and I am starting at the bottom of the sticky strip that's hanging from the ceiling. And I just try to not let the sticky strip touch any of the sides of the plastic bag as I move it closer and closer to the ceiling so that I can then, because this, it's connected to the ceiling with just a basic tack. These pieces of tape come with tacks. And then I gotta like, pull it down and then just try to. But by that point, these things are so sticky, it's not gonna just fall into the bag by gravity. It's like kind of the bag and the stickiness are all one now. And then I try get that out of the house as fast as humanly possible as I can still feel some buzzing in the bag. It is so awful, Luke. And it's been days of this. And again, these and I are pretty confident.

[B]

But you're not smelling anything anymore.

[A]

No, the smell went away at least two weeks before the flies came.

[B]

Huh. And so the. Basically the plan going forward is to just burn down. The house burned, obviously. And it just basically, like, just keep trapping and removing the flies and just watch the numbers and see if they go down. And if they're going down, then you'll just kind of R it out.

[A]

I think that's all we can do at this point. Like, if it seemed like it was something that, like, was not getting any better, obviously we would have to call somebody. But I do think that the only solution would be for somebody to be like, you know, time to cut into the walls and find this. It would be a pretty huge project. And I've talked to some other people who've lived through this. I mean, this is. It is literally a life cycle. So unless something goes bad and we have more creatures coming in, and of course, as things get colder outside, we got to keep an eye out for this stuff. But assuming that this was a. And I'm going to continue to put bingo up there. In fact, I'VE been having a lot of conversations. He does not seem to. He doesn't have the air of a mouser, and it's kind of bugging me a little bit. Like, he is now what.

[B]

What's the heir of a mouser?

[A]

He doesn't seem. Do you remember when you introduced me on the show yesterday, and you were really trying to will me into some energy? You were like, this guy is coming in full of energy on this Monday morning or day after Labor Day morning or whatever. Like, I want to see a little bit of that kind of get up and go from him. I want to see a little.

[B]

I feel like if there's one thing that cat has, it's get up.

[A]

And I know. And, like, he'll sometimes kind of. He'll kind of bird dog some of these flies. He doesn't kill the flies, but he'll sort of help kind of hound dog them for genes, kind of corner them. But now that is. It's one of those things, like, if you're a kid and you see your parents washing the car, you're like, I want to help wash the car. That's my invitation. The kid.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

No offense, kids. And then you do it. Then you get to an age maybe a year or two later, and your parents were like, great, your job is now to wash the car every Tuesday. You're like, what the f. I don't to want. It was just fun when I was just sort of, like, playing with the hose, and you guys were doing most of the work. I don't want to actually take on this responsibility. That's sort of what I'm getting from Bingo. Like, I feel like it's time for him to earn his keep a little bit, you know? Like, I know he's a cat. He can't go out and get a job. But, like, we're providing all of his food. We're providing a roof over his head, like, all of the comforts that you could ask for for a cat. And, like, I'm just saying, get your stank up there, buddy boy.

[B]

You guys take him on walks sometimes?

[A]

Genevieve takes him on walks a lot. Yeah.

[B]

Time out of Genevieve's schedule. This kit, this cat has quite the life, and I don't think it's asking too much for the cat to contribute a little bit.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

To the. To the. The sort of family situation. Well, Andrew, I am really sorry you're going through that. That is, I do feel like when there's, like, a fly or some kind of a little bug in Becca's house that or even when Bubbles was living here that Bubbles would become fascinated with. It felt like free childcare. Because Bubbles is like such a twitchy, active cat still. And like instead of me, like, you know, getting out the laser pointer or one of these other kind of distractions, like the whole thing with. If you have a cat and Bingo just seems like the perfect cat. Honestly, I'm very. I'm envious because Bingo just seems like to have a lot of energy but not to be like constantly like, I don't know.

[A]

He's not annoying. He doesn't.

[B]

He's not annoying and he's not like. But the thing with Bubbles is Bubbles is like a, is like a spring that's been wound up to its tightest setting and then just like put into an apartment or home environment.

[A]

Still bounce because it's been a while, still has that kitten energy.

[B]

She still has a space. She's still just like very energetic and getting into everything all the time and to the point where it's kind of. It's sort of cute sometimes, but it's annoying a lot of the time. And the whole thing with. That's why I had that like, you know, treadmill for her and everything. Like, it's like having a, like having a human child that's got maybe too much energy or a lot of energy. I would say when Bubbles would. Or when Bubbles does see, like there's a fly in the house and Bubbles is like on it, like tracking it and then like chasing it and then like jumping up to get it and everything. I'm just like, please fly, will you? You can live here now. Honestly, I'll feed you. Like, I would, I would happily let one fly live in the house if it would just keep Bubbles distracted. Slash engaged. Slash jumping and running around. Slash getting tuckered out.

[A]

Yeah, that'd be a pretty good somebody pointer that, that points itself.

[B]

A laser pointer. That is. Yeah, that is self directed.

[A]

So there's one other thing and I was telling Hannah this and actually I realize now that I have you on the line, I would like to reminisce about something with you. Although I'm wondering how well you remember.

[B]

This, but my guess is not well.

[A]

Well, I don't know. It was quite an adventure that you and I had. So I was trying to explain to Hannah the bad feeling that I'm getting from seeing all these flies. And sometimes like when I go like especially before we kind of of fully understood what was going on. And I like vacuum like five or six or seven flies right out of a wind. Like, they're all buzzing around my window. I'm like, what is going on in my office? Right. And I vacuum all up, but then they're gone, and I'm in the office by myself and there's no more flies. But I still. I feel like flies are on me. And I think about the time you and I drove up through Australia, and remember we had the agreement that you would stop at every single gas station, because if the next gas station was out in the outback, we might not make it through. We. I said, even if we're only a quarter of a tank down, we'll stop at every gas station. I think that's what caused us to do this. Do you remember way up in the outback, there was one spot that I think we knew in advance was known for being heavily flied. And we had to get. Was there also a tourist attraction there or was it just gas? I remember getting out and the whole area was like a movie. It was like the movie the Birds, only they were flies. It was literally biblical. And you remember we got back in the car eventually and we got all the flies out of the car, whatever stragglers were in there. But don't you remember, we were driving for a while after that, and we just kept feeling like there were just flies on us. It's such a bad feeling.

[B]

It's. I. Here's what I remember. It was as if the flies in Australia understood the boundary of the Northern Territory.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Which you wouldn't think they'd be. They'd be up on. Although I did watch a 60 Minutes with Anderson Cooper recently about this dog who is considered maybe the smartest dog in history. And it actually can infer things now. So maybe these animals are smarter than we. Than we realize. But it was like, we're driving along, driving along. We start out in the sort of south of Australia or wherever it was we were.

[A]

I guess.

[B]

Yeah, I would call it the south. And there weren't flies anywhere. It was lovely. And then I remember we were driving and there were some hitchhikes, hikers on the road, and we were getting close to the Northern Territory, and they had one of those, like. They were both wearing, like, a hat that had a black mesh, like you could call the mosquito net or a fly net. And I remember my thought, because this is how I view and interpret my world, which is why I am so much fun to be around. And people love me. Literally, my first thought was, like, all right, calm down with the mosquito net, you guys. I've Been outside. It's not that bad. What. I hadn't been outside the car in probably three hours, Andrew. And as we were traveling north, so what I did not realize until we got to like, whatever petrol station we were at and we opened the doors of the car and suddenly were set upon by black flies.

[A]

And wasn't it just like one place in particular? Not that every. Not. Not that there weren't flies up in Laramie and stuff too. But do you remember, like, wasn't like it concentrated at one specific spot on the map where it was specific, specifically biblical?

[B]

I. Here's what I remember. I remember it being really bad at a couple of gas stations. So that. And you're right, we did the show in Larima. We did it outside. We weren't being menaced by flies the whole time. So it was. I think it was a range of the Northern Territory. But what I. What I remember was after, like the first gas station where they were, there was a bunch of flies. I think we sort of developed a strategy and maybe it was only for the next two gas stations, but basically we got into this thing where it was like, okay, ready? Three, two, one. And we like throw the doors open just as wide as we have to jump out, slam the doors, run for the gas station. Do you remember that?

[A]

I don't. I only remember the one. And that's why I'm. But I'm not. I'm not disputing what you're saying. It's just kind of a bummer that my brain is. Is this soft. But I.

[B]

Only my memory of it is that we. We learned that like, wherever we were, the part of Australia we were in, that particular part, the flies were really bad. And so like, we developed a bit of a system. And then the other thing we would do is even with us doing that whole quick exit strategy, still a few would get in the car and then the move would be. We would drive and then we would put the windows down. We were driving fast and hope that.

[A]

They would go out. I vaguely remember that.

[B]

And then roll the windows back up on our. What was it? A Hyundai Tucson we had.

[A]

That's right. Yeah. We had the most Santa Fe, the most American sounding name for a car that we could get in Australia. And I'm pretty sure this was not. This was definitely not the, the. The. The specific fly stop I'm thinking about was not the same one as Splooch the Turtle, but I think they were starting to get in that. It's in that area. Yeah.

[B]

100 100. Those were. I think that was in the same like five gas station stops.

[A]

I think so. Maybe even the same day. Yeah.

[B]

But I also know what you're talking about with that feeling of like, even when you get them out of the car. Yes, because them hitting your skin. Like, like when you would step out of the car, 40 flies would land on you. It's a very unpleasant experience. And then that sense memory on your skin, it doesn't go away. Even if you're actually not being sort of beset by flies again.

[A]

Terrible.

[B]

Anyway, that concludes this ad for the Northern Territory of Australia Tourism Board.

[A]

Come visit us. Good day. Thank you, baby.

[B]

All right, let's thank some donors who are supporting TBTL. Did you know that this is 100% listener supported podcasting? We are not, in fact being supported by the Australian Northern Territory Tourism Board or the Flypaper association of America or even by the. Even by Crazy Mike's buzzing single bulb, light bulb. None of those big concerns have come in through with the money. No. It's folks like Kalina Fultz, Stuck of Bonnie Lake, Washington.

[A]

Hey. Hey. Thanks, Kalina.

[B]

Appreciate you, Kalina. Also appreciate Molly Price of Seattle, Washington.

[A]

Hey, Molly. I live in Seattle too. That's something I don't talk about much on the show, but it's true.

[B]

At some point we'll need some kind of an update on your whole neighborhood situation. But maybe, maybe today. We've already. Yeah, we've already spent enough time in your basement of horror.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I don't know if we need to go to your street of horror.

[A]

I get one. I get one epic saga a week. I think that's all the listeners can handle.

[B]

That's all Sarah Sambal can handle. It's all she's ever handled. It's all she's ever wanted. Andrew, they're in Tacoma, Washington.

[A]

Tacoma. Never got to my Rainiers game this year.

[B]

Thank you, Sarah. I wanted us to. I was. When I was at my sister Hannah's place, I was hanging out with David and Sam, who are not only my brothers, but they are members of the fun loving criminals. And I was floating this idea that we try to get the criminals together for a baseball game before the season is up, which I would love to do, except. And I don't want to ruin this. I mean, I would. I would recommend all of the criminals minus me do a fun thing. Literally, the only three days that I'm in the Pacific Northwest, that the Mariners are in the Pacific Northwest are the Rockies games.

[A]

Well, that's good, right? Because we would Want to see a win?

[B]

That would help. But also it's like a. It's like a Tuesday. You know, it's kind of like a Tuesday, Wednesday. Or maybe it's like a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. It's not even like a. A particularly fun night where everyone kind of let their hair down or. I don't dare. I'm not even in town. But even if I. I think we're. Andrew, I think we might be. Well, actually you're not. It's just me. I forgot you're not. Are you coming to the Twin Cities with me for Livewire on September 26th? You're invited.

[A]

No. Thank you. I appreciate that, but no, I don't want to come to that. Well, no, you mean just to hang out. That would be fun.

[B]

We'll go to.

[A]

I think that would be fun. I think I know the fair. It was a big thing. That was Minnesota State Fair almost said Wisconsin. What an insult. But is that wrapping up now? Was last week the big week, Labor Day?

[B]

Well, you know what? I don't want to. I don't want speak out of turn. Every time I say something without researching it, I'm wrong. And sometimes even when I'm researching it, I'm wrong. But I get the sense, I think in a lot of places Labor Day is kind of the wrap up.

[A]

Yep. Wrapped on Monday according. Well, at least according to the Google autocomplete. But yeah. Oh wait. Oh good. Look at that. Would you look at that?

[B]

I will.

[A]

The Google AI said it ended on Monday, September 1, but when you actually go to their website, it ends on September 7th. You know what? They're already advertising next year's. They're already advertising next year's Minnesota State Fair. Google AI is right. And the Minnesota State Fair's website is already updated to August 27th through Labor Day, September 7th, 2026. They are on their grind.

[B]

Seriously.

[A]

That is awesome.

[B]

I was watching so many videos that were everything my boyfriend ate at the Minnesota State Fair, which would just be this super cut of like a guy, usually a sort of A you know, 20 something kind of floppy haired guy, presumably the boyfriend of the woman making the video. Kind of just taking one bite of 8,000 different like you know, over the top state fair foods.

[A]

Uh huh.

[B]

Then Becca and I went to the Oregon State Fair in Salem the other day and walked around. First of all, no one has, no one has ever state fared less hard than I did.

[A]

I don't see you getting into like a lot of crazy greasy foods and stuff at the fair.

[B]

Well, but here's what I like to do. And this is something, by the way, that Holly Barnett, Reba in Lakewood, Ohio.

[A]

Hey, Holly.

[B]

Appreciates about my whole take on the world, as does Teresa Slusher or Slusher of Tumwater, Washington. And who could forget Andrew? And this is actually big. Margaret K. Is in Edinburgh, Scotland. You know, else is going to be in Edinburgh, might even be landing in Edinburgh as we're recording this. You my niece, Maddie.

[A]

Your niece.

[B]

That's where she's. She's going to. Margaret, look out for Maddie in Edinburgh, please, will ya?

[A]

Tell her to stay away from the fringes.

[B]

But the festival is fine. It's the fringes that you've got to really watch. This was my state of mind walking around the Oregon State Fair and you know, you, it's not that, it's not that like I'm not trying to act high and mighty like the foods. I have had one of those giant turkey legs before and it didn't taste very good to me because obviously like generally speaking with food making a giant amount of it is not going to make the food taste better. That's rarely the thing that makes something better is there's more of it.

[A]

I agree.

[B]

It's almost always the opposite, right? So like I just don't like those turkey legs because they don't like. I love some, a bite of turkey at Thanksgiving. I'm here for it. But that's not my favorite anyway. I'm not trying to act above it all, but this is the. Where I get really judgy at the state fair when people are eating food that is readily available in non state fair environments. So like we walked in, Becca and I walked in from whatever gate we came through and, and like you walk by, you know, animals and stuff, it's like the 4H beach barns or whatever, you know, pavilions. And you get like the very first thing was like a totally underwhelming snack shack that just had you know, your typical like it was just like corn dog kind of like very lousy looking cheeseburger, hot dog, chicken strips. And I just saw people just like going ham on these chicken strips. And I just thought like chicken strips exist everywhere in normal life. Every gas station you go into, every baseball game, you go like you need in my opinion if you go to the Oregon State Fair or the Minnesota State Fair, you need to go get the like deep fried whatever abomination you need to be eating things that you can only get at the state fair. That's the whole fun thing. Not just like, I'm gonna get something I could get at any arco. I could, could get any tomb gas could be handing me this in any gas station in America. That to me seems like a real missed opportunity.

[A]

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I'm a little bit for. People can do whatever the heck they want. In that case, I'm not send me one way or the other. But. And it also might just be that, you know, some people might be like, hey, I don't usually splurge on this kind of stuff, so I save it for the fair. Other people are just in the mood for what they're in the mood for. Like, because I. The reason, like, I'm not going to get on board with that. That other than just the main thing that I legit don't care is color.

[B]

Me unshocked that you're not getting on board with me shaming people about their fair food.

[A]

But it's just like, like, like you said, like, the idea of eating the crazy over the top stuff doesn't really hold a big appeal to me. You know what I mean? Like, so I don't want to go. Are you laughing?

[B]

If you're wondering what happened to Andrew's voice, there it was Bingo. Using him as a pommel horse.

[A]

Did you see that behind me?

[B]

It was actually mildly terrifying because I'm just looking at you and then there's this white figure. Literally rains down from the sky.

[A]

Keep going up.

[B]

Sorry.

[A]

He jumps up on this window ledge that's right behind me. And if I were standing, would be at about shoulder level and he'll go up there. And I was trying hard to keep him off my audio board. Usually he launches up there off my audio board, but then he mutes everything. And it was going to take us off the air, but usually he's up there and I forget that he's up there. And he'll be up there for a half hour. And then I just think I'm in the studio by myself, like playing a game or editing tape or something. And then out of the blue, something heavy just jumps on my shoulder for a second, then jumps down to the ground. And it scares the living hell out.

[B]

Of the second that your defenses are down.

[A]

Can I tell you what I'm doing right now, by the way? This is not about fair food, but I think you're going to find this interesting. And it's something I probably shouldn't have done. And this is something that I have been wanting to mention on TBT for a long time. But have purposely not mentioned because it makes me sound like a grade A creep. And I don't know how our listeners are going to react to this.

[B]

Okay, well, I'd like to honestly hand you the baton for a while on this. As the resident grade A creep, I would like. You could take the heat off of me for a minute. That'd be great.

[A]

So there is a subreddit, and again, I want to make it very, very clear here that I would not be admitting to this if there was anything like actually invasive going on or invading anybody's privacy. But there is a subreddit that is basically a bunch of security cams. Like, people will post like, oh, I get. I. Here's my understanding of it. If you set up a security somewhere, whether you're a municipality, a private business, or just even potentially a homeowner or property owner, there are things you got to do to lock it down. Right? And then there are people online who find all of the open links to cams that you can log into and watch security cams. Like, I could right now find a security cam probably in a lobby of a. Of a South Korean bank. Probably not North Korean, probably a South Korean bank. Right. And it's probably after hours, and there's not much to see there. Or it'll just be a street view in New York, maybe, and every now and then, you'll see somebody walk by or a lot of people walk by. It's just like, some of them are, like, very public. They're actually on people's YouTube pages because they're like, hey, we're a restaurant in Miami, and we have these great views, and some of them are advertised that way. Others are kind of like. It seems more like leaks. Sort of like, click on this. But the thing is, some of them are controllable. This is why I was. Why I had to interrupt myself just before the show. I was looking at this, and I saw that there was a new update, and there was one that says Hawaii beach cam or something. And I clicked on it, and it is the private security camera on somebody's house. But it's not pointing into their house. It's pointing out at the ocean. And it is a incredibly beautiful view. Incredibly beautiful view on a beautiful day in Hawaii. I don't know exactly where it is. And I put this up. I'm like, this will maybe be interesting just to, like, look at while I'm talking to you, but it's a controllable webcam where you can zoom in and out and pan from left to right, left to right. And it's actually. Most of them are very clunky. This one has a very easy interface. And I was just sitting here watching the default view of the ocean and the waves coming through, and somebody just logged in and is going crazy with the cam right now. They're swinging it back and forth. They're zooming in, zooming out. And it was very weird because I just had this on as a sort of a background image. But some other Internet freak like me just grabbed the controls of this thing and is doing some crazy zooming in and zooming, zooming out. It's just technology amazes me that I'm just sitting here in Seattle watching Hawaii and watching somebody in some other part of the world zoom in and out at like, oh, and now we're. Now there are some beachgoers out there, like, doing some windsurfing or. Not windsurfing. What do you call it? Wave surfing or whatever. Body surfing. This is crazy.

[B]

You could have been. If you had chosen to. You could have been futzing with this camera, too, but you weren't. You're just watching it.

[A]

Yeah, I could. I'm going. I could right now. This is a really good camera. This is. And it's.

[B]

And it's on someone's house.

[A]

It looks like it's on the back of somebody's house or a hotel or something like that, but it's not. But I want to be very clear, because if there. If I were not being honest about this, there's no way I would bring this up. None of these look into windows. None of these look into places where there is an expectation of privacy. They are all things that look out onto the world. Some of them are just like cornfields. Some of them are like rural roots in the middle of nowhere. I just like it because of the randomness of it. And this idea of, like, wow, I've just teleported someplace, right?

[B]

It's not. There's nothing. I guess you. Would you call this voyeurism? This is voyeurism.

[A]

It feels like voyeurism to me, which is why I felt bad bringing it up.

[B]

But what I mean is, does voyeurism necessarily mean looking at something that you're not supposed to look at? Or is it just looking at something that's unexpected to look at? Because you're. You're looking at something that's unexpected, that you could be looking at a cornfield in Iowa or that you could be looking at at the waves breaking in Maui or something. That's unexpected. So probably it's technically voyeurism, but if we use the term voyeurism, it always has a much more, like, kind of weird, creepy sort of connotation. Right. Which is obviously not what it is.

[A]

But I do feel like it is voyeurism. And I will take the slings and arrows for that. And because to me, and I have not looked this up, but my guess is the idea of voyeurism is staring in on. Does it always have to be people? Would it be voyeuristic? If you're saying that's what I'm wondering, yeah. It does feel like voyeurism is, like, looking at things that. Where people don't know you're looking at them or areas you're not going to.

[B]

Like the Merc manual on this. First of all, why is it that of all the things I put on the Internet, AI has nothing on voyeurism?

[A]

They're like. I don't even want to literally, like.

[B]

You know, it's not giving me that, like, AI answer to the question that we talk about so much on this show. The first question I get is from the Merc company, Like, I think, who make, you know, the drugs. It's the Merck manual. Voyeuristic disorder. It's their. It's their explanation. I get Wikipedia. It definitely looks, based on the first few responses, that voyeurism has a. Has a kind of a sexual component. Obviously not what's happening here.

[A]

No, no, but.

[B]

But I get the appeal of. I get the appeal of, like, again, a camera that is, again, looking into a public place where there is not an expectation of privacy. I. I like that idea, but people have. I mean, I like the idea. I can understand why that would be interesting. And for some reason, the cornfield.

[A]

Mm.

[B]

When you talk about the cornfield, that really, like, that piques my interest.

[A]

For some reason, four wheeler just went by on the beach, just zipped right across the screen.

[B]

But does this mean also that somebody has hacked into the WI fi of this hotel or house?

[A]

Literally don't know how people get access. I don't. I don't. I don't think it's a hacking in. Here's my understanding of it. And again, I'm sure that the more I talk about this, the more I try to justify it, the more I sound like a grade A freak and I should probably not be doing this, but whatever. Like, the subreddit is where this is there. I promise you, there is no, like, there's nobody like, hey, look at, look at this Gantele clad. I don't even know what it would be. But like it's just like the. I think that they just find open links and I don't know how you find them, where the directories are or what it is, but I don't think it's like a, hey, you had security here and somebody did a brute force attack to hack in. I think it's kind of like carelessness. Like, oh yeah, somebody left the permissions.

[B]

Off or on or whatever.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

I, I feel like, Andrew, we may be in the wrong industry with this podcasting thing. Are you with your amateur camera snooping and sleuthing because the job podcaster and the job accidentally left open camera looker at her.

[A]

Uhhuh.

[B]

Are not listed as possible jobs under the Alaska Airlines Atmos credit card options. When you apply for the card, which I recently did, do you feel like you have been fully and completely inundated with pitches for this card because of your Seattle Mariners fandom? I feel like they have taken over the Mariners experience between the backdrop of the, in whatever it is called, what's it called, T Mobile park, between the ads, the TV ads, it's. I feel like it's everywhere. Are you getting that same thing.

[A]

I was going to ask you about that because there are certain ads, even though I pay attention to ads for my podcast, there are certain ads that I kind of just don't. They just sort of wash over me and I kind of don't pay attention. Like car ads often will do that. And I don't know if I know specifically about the commercials you're talking about right now. It might just like a credit card ad related to an airline obviously is right up your alley, but I can't tell you how uninterested I am in that. So I wonder if that has something to do with that.

[B]

Well, it definitely. First of all, I have had multiple listeners email me about it and ask me if I've if you want to know my brand, Andrew. Yeah, I've had multiple listeners say, hey, are you signing up for this? It's also been almost exclusively the thing I've been discussing with our friend Broadcast Barry of the Broadcast Coffee and of many other things Empire, because he, like me, is a major miles Maxer and uses Alaska Airlines and everything. And basically this was such a big story, at least in my world and in the world of, I guess some people that it was. The Seattle Times wrote a whole article about it when it was announced, which to me is like when you get earned media like that, that that means it's sort of, at least to some people, kind of a big deal.

[A]

I did see that. I did see that. I think the article and.

[B]

Okay, so I don't want to turn this into an analysis of your motivations or whatever, but I guess my question to you is like, you know, there was all those cards that were the like for a while, I feel like there was a lot of conversation around the like Chase Sapphire card or whatever, these cards that you had to pay a service fee to even have. But then they got you all of these perks and you know, you could go in this airline lounge and you could do this and that. And there was like there, there was a. I felt like there was a lot of conversation even like the New York Times about if these, like if these high dollar credit cards were actually worth it or not. And I never signed up for them, but I was intrigued by the whole thing. Is that the kind of thing that. That doesn't like, do you. Do you think about or care about your credit card very much, the one that you use?

[A]

I think it's. Genevieve now has us both signed up for the same credit card, which she has stronger feelings about. So like when I, I didn't have a credit card for a long time, I was a debit only guy for a long time. So I was sort of scared of credit. I heard too many horror stories. You don't have to know my whole deal on this. But when I eventually got a credit card, I think it was maybe branded with association of my alma mater of Kent State or something like that.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

And I don't know, like, I just looked for a decent rate and I use it for a while. Then I don't know. Eventually, like when we bought this house, Genevieve became Costco crazy and is a huge Costco person now and signed us up for a family Costco credit card account, which I know that she's like earning points. We get the gas there. She's. And so I'm kind of just like, I just kind of do what I'm told on that one now, which is fine. And if it were me myself, I would have a very basic credit card that I pay off and probably would pay too high of an interest rate on because I just don't think about it that much.

[B]

Well, that's the thing. If you pay it off, you would have no interest rate.

[A]

Well, that's true.

[B]

I stand kind of where. But like, yeah, I mean, on it for the miles, you know, for the like, so I. I have the Alaska one already that I don't. I don't know if I. Maybe I pay $100 a year for it or something, but this new one is like $400 a year, which is not nothing. But for that, you get a hundred. First of all, if you sign up for. I'm not doing an ad for them, by the way. I think I told the people who were asking me if I was signing up for it. I was like, I don't actually know if I'm going to do this and I'm not recommending it. But, like, you know, you get a hundred thousand miles from them, which is, you know, you could. It's a couple of tickets somewhere. So that's. You kind of go, well, is that more than 500 or $400 or whatever.

[A]

Whatever.

[B]

You get, like passes to the lounge. There's a bunch of stuff that I don't even really understand about it that are like, these perks. I know. I don't think I'm putting Barry on blast. I know he said he thought it was a good idea.

[A]

He was.

[B]

For him, he was going to sign up for it. So I finally just decided I'm going to sign up for this thing because I do think actually that it would. I will get my money's worth on it. So then I have to apply for it, which is kind of interesting because I already have an Alaska Airlines whatever, whatever credit card. I just have the normal one. And now I'm going up to the fancy one, I guess. And they want you to select your occupation. And I'm a little surprised, Andrew, that podcaster isn't on here yet. I just think with the amount of podcasts that are out there, like, why is. And I'm looking at the actual list. I screenshotted this. Andrew, why is pawnbroker on here and not podcaster? It's in the P's.

[A]

And even.

[B]

Do you think there are more pawn brokers or podcasters in America?

[A]

And even if not podcaster, this is something that has bedeviled me because I've had to fill these types of things out before. If not for credit cards, something else. And. And for the longest time as a radio producer, and I understand radio producer is not something that maybe a lot of people have that very specific job, but I was always astounded that there wasn't just media, especially as more and more people sort of work in the media in some capacity. How is there not an overarching media that would cover whether you work in radio, tv, Podcasting, any of these things. I mean so many people work in media, but instead they have pawnbrokers.

[B]

Yeah, I understand the general ones. Yeah, media should be one. It's not on this list. I understand some of the general ones. Military enlisted is one of them.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Insurance agent is one of them. These make sense. These are broad categories. Engineer is one of them. But like, I don't know to me, let's see. I feel like, let me find one that jumped out at me. Cigarettes distributor seems specific.

[A]

Is that like, is that like a 1940s woman who's going around the bar like selling cigarettes out of a box?

[B]

Cigarettes. Candy cigarettes. Candy cigarettes distributor is his after CEO and before clergy slash pastor. That's where cigarettes distributor falls. Who is a cigarettes distributor at this point? I guess at that point you're a convenience store manager. But guess what's also on the list, Andrew? Convenience store manager.

[A]

Well, I guess I think cigarette distributor is probably somebody who drives to convenience. I have known people who've had jobs. In fact, I'm thinking about my buddy Scott from college. I think his first job out of college was like going around and providing stores like convenience stores with like, I don't know if it was Camel or Marlboro. Weirdly I don't think he smoked but his first and I think he was pre law or something. But to make ends meet, he was driving around where. What is the town that I think it was like South Bend. Is that where Notre Dame is? Yes, he was driving around South Bend, Indiana, I believe, like distributing cigarettes and cigarette related things to stores. So I guess Scott, I find it here.

[B]

I find it odd that that job, which still strikes me as fairly niche is on here and, and yet podcasting, slash media, just media. Somebody you work in the media at some, at some level you could be the receptionist at a TV station or something. Cigarette distributor, which by the way, I hope anyway, I hope and pray cigarettes a contracting industry in this country. The person who drives around making sure that the store has all of the Camel Bucks promotional koozies.

[A]

Yes, exactly, exactly.

[B]

Like the guy doing that. The person doing that seems more niche to me than us at this point. Working at the media in as much as we need do. That's an odd one that's on here. How about vending machine operator?

[A]

Operator. Not operator, not repair person. That I got to say the operator. Because like not owner even.

[B]

Aren't we the vending machine operator customers?

[A]

I was going to say we can all check that box if you've ever bought any of those Little Lance brand peanut butter crackers from a vending machine. You are a vending machine operator or.

[B]

A bag of Funyuns, as I am sometimes, you know, sort of tempted to do when I see that. Yeah, vending machine operator, not vending machine owner. Which, by the way, I see some videos on Tick Tock and I wonder if maybe that could be my post Podcasting career vending machine king. Just get a bunch of vending machines. You would love that job, by the way.

[A]

I would.

[B]

Have you watched any videos on that? Because it's a lot of puttering, really. It's a lot of showing up and replay, you know, refilling all of the different items in the vending machine from your own stash that you bought at Costco or whatever and then taking the quarters. And although a lot of it now is, you know, you can scan your card, but I feel like you would. I feel like you would. You would find it very satisfying, the process.

[A]

Yes. Also just like the stocking up on things and knowing, hey, we're running. Because I kind of do that with my volunteer gig quite a bit. I'm always like, hey, I got to keep an eye on this. Got to get more bowls, got to get more to go. Containers or bags or whatever. Like, I'm always, like, thinking ahead at, like, what is needed. I could see myself being God. Yeah. Vending vending machine king of North Seattle. Absolutely.

[B]

If they'll let you back in Shoreline after your incident. How about.

[A]

Oh, by the way, that's the thing that I wanted to share with you yesterday. I got a text message from listener Nigel, mayor of Kenmore, who said, I literally at some point this week have a meeting with like four other mayors, including the mayor of Shoreline and whatever else. Because we were talking about Shoreline, the.

[B]

Summit of the mayors of that. Of that area.

[A]

Yes, I said it's like the meeting of the five families, but I don't know if I should put it all on front street. But yeah, like, literally, we were joking. Like, oh, I wonder if he has mayoral meetings with the other kind of neighboring mayors. And he most certainly does and is engaging in one possibly as we speak.

[B]

Huh. Well, hopefully they'll let you back into trail. He'll be able to prevail upon the other mayors to repair your damaged reputation up north there. I already mentioned gem slash metal dealer, which again, seems a little bit on the specific side. Let's see. I almost went with musician, writer. Not because I'm a musician and not even really because I'm a writer, but because I Do sometimes have to write stuff. This is also where I get in my head. If I list myself as. Because this was an application, I'm applying for this credit card now. I'm telling them what my yearly income is. I'm assuming they can search my credit credit, But I'm telling them what my job is. And I do get worried that if I pick a job that sounds a little flighty. Musician. I feel like if I put in trap, it feels like it's a bit of a trap.

[A]

Because there would be too.

[B]

Honestly, I mean, seriously, like, maybe it's good it wasn't an option because, like, yeah, if I put in musician, writer, they're like, okay, musician, writer. Are you really paying your bills with your musician writing?

[A]

Yeah. Is there one that says between things or trying to find myself.

[B]

You know my favorite. My favorite joke about that about a sort of a resume, a resume gap. Some of this guy goes for an interview, and the. The. The people interviewing him for the job, they say, hey, we're gonna. We're gonna give you the job. We were very impressed by this. Five years that you list as being in at Yale. And he goes, oh, good, because I can really use this job.

[A]

Yes. I love that joke. I didn't know that I got it from you. I threw my favorite joke.

[B]

I might have gotten it from you. Be sending it back to you. That could be how these things work. There was another one. Oh, how about this? Senior political figure.

[A]

Senior political figure. Would Nigel be able to check that?

[B]

I mean, I. Absolutely. One time mayor of Ken.

[A]

Current. Current.

[B]

Current mayor of Kenmore.

[A]

Yeah, I believe so.

[B]

Current mayor. I'll just keep saying it higher and higher. The specificity of this stuff again is senior political figure. So what if you're a.

[A]

Too.

[B]

What if you're a. What if you're an, you know, a sort of. What would you call it? First year political figure or what if you're like senior political? Like, I just feel like these. These jobs are just kind of pulled out of the ether.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In a way.

[A]

Or a weird list. I feel like weird antiquated list that somebody used at some point and nobody wants to take the time to really do the work of recreating.

[B]

Just seems like some things like auctioneer is on here.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

I mean, the irony is I actually know a decent number of, like, professional auctioneers. Because when I would sort of emcee these events, which I kind of haven't done in a while, I wonder if I was bad at it. I wonder if the industry has the. The Auctioneer industry. The charity auction industry has turned its back onto old LB because I haven't been invited to do one of these in a while. Which honestly is kind of a relief.

[A]

Yeah. Because you can't say no to things but them not ask.

[B]

Probably that's the only way that I actually get a work life balance is people stop offering me the gigs and then I can't say yes to them and then I don't have to do them. I believe that's happening currently with a major software concern on the east side. I believe that they finally, after many years they may be going in another direction with how they teach their cyber security. And of course that's less income for me, but also a massive relief. It's, it's very, it's. I consider it to be gemology.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

I can no longer list gemology as one of my. Was one of my jobs. But yeah, the, the auctioneer thing is, is strange because I do actually know some people that make the sure m majority of their living through doing these charity auctions. But I also think they're on a list of about 20 people in America who can say unless you're talking about somebody in the Midwest who's handling livestock. Aqua auctions.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

How much? How much for this pig? That was what was kind of weird.

[A]

That's why you lost the auctioneering job in Wisconsin.

[B]

Well, the funny part is how much for this pig?

[A]

And then you just waited.

[B]

Yeah. Hey, anybody want to buy this pig?

[A]

Terrible. Worst auctioneer.

[B]

I actually, to be honest with you, maybe part of why people may have decided to stop hiring me is because I, I actually refused to do the auctioneer job.

[A]

Yeah. You would only emcee. Right. And then because I don't know how.

[B]

To do that and I don't want to be responsible for the actual specific amount of money that you don't blame you.

[A]

I do not believe that's the, that's.

[B]

This whole art and science of like sort of psychologically prevailing upon people to. And of course all this is going for a good cause. So it's not like it's, there's nothing sinister, but there's a whole thing to it that I just didn't want to be involved in. I didn't think I would be good at it and I didn't want the pressure. I just wanted to come out and like crack wise and introduce the next, you know, special speaker or something. But there are people that do both. There are people that can be the auctioneer and they can emcee and you can fold it all together. And I had no interest in doing any of that. So that could be. That could be part of. Now, speaking of livestock auctions and the like, when I was at the state fair, the Oregon State Fair, I thought it was interesting because, you know, me and all of my, like, weird animal shit with the. I both like am. I adore all these little goats and pigs and things that are in these, you know, sort of like, pavilions. And they're being raised by cute little 4H kids who I think probably really love these animals and are probably take good care of them. So I don't think these specific animals are having a bad life. But it causes me to reflect on what I sort of feel sad about the larger plight of food animals in this country, animals that we eat, et cetera. And as I'm, you know. And then some of the animals are for sale. And I don't think people are necessarily buying a pig purely as a. As a pet. They're probably someday that pig will meet the end of its life, maybe to become, you know, food for a family or whatever. And I want to say what I always say about this, a. I'm not strictly a vegetarian. I do eat meat occasionally. So I'm not trying to be on any kind of a soapbox about it. And also, I don't think there's something immoral about eating meat. I just personally would like for the suffering of animals to not be more than it needs to be, et cetera, et cetera. But there was this huge. On the side of, like, the pavilion for the 4H where they're raising these animals, again with the expectation, in fact, there's like a barbecue place next to the four Hill age. It's like, you real. You really get to see the beginning, middle, and end of this process. Right? You got the little cute piglets, then you got the mama pigs, and then you got the cooked pig over here.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Fine, Whatever. I appreciate the proximity. Honestly, I'd rather people can see the baby pig and think about the fact that that's the pork rib they're eating. Cool. Whatever. They have this huge, amazing sign on the side of the 4H Pavilion. That's a pig. The cutest piglet you've ever seen. And it's says, did you know piglets can learn tricks? Piglets are smarter than some dogs and can learn tricks faster than them. And I thought you're really. That's. I consider that to be an argument for us animal rights types. Like, the idea that you're, like, going, do you realize this thing that was also in the movie Babe, that is both adorable is also wicked smart.

[A]

Do you know that pigs do all their own stunts? No. I mean, that fact you said is literally why Genevieve stopped eating Porthos. She's like, they're incredible, incredibly smart. They're smarter than some dogs. And like, that was just a line in the sand for her. And she's like, you. She's not on her soapbox. She's not telling other people not to. I always am very impressed. I don't. It doesn't come up much, but if Genevieve and I, you know, me, I have very strict boundaries about the things that I don't want to eat. If I find it icky, like a cheese related thing or a mayonnaise, if somebody. A mayonnaise dish or something, a casserole containing that kind of stuff, like, I'll just be like, nope, I don't do that. Thank you very much, though. I appreciate it. Or I just ate. I'm not hungry, or whatever Genevieve is, as I kind of like, she will sort of like, quietly eat what is sort of given to her, even if it's sort of pork related. And in the back of my head, I'll be like, I don't think that that is probably what she wants right now, but she's just more of an adult than me. So I'm just saying that to say that she is not on a soapbox either. But that exact, that exact reasoning is exactly what I think led her to, like, what am I doing eating these guys?

[B]

I just thought it was funny that at the same place where you're celebrating essentially like far farming. And by that I also mean the, like the ra. The raising, and then the ultimate slaughter of these animals. Animals for eating that you're also celebrating how smart and cute the animal is. I would, I would feel like you'd want to keep that kind of far away from the barbecue stand.

[A]

Well, again, I do think, though, like.

[B]

I salute their honesty.

[A]

I do think that that kind of. In, you know, these kind of agricultural fairs, I do think that that is, that is a fair way that they do think in. In, like, places where you're raising animals and you, you love, like, you legit love them and you legit take care of them and then you legit kill them and you legit eat them. And it's not a moral quandary. And again, I kind of applaud that, that approach more than what I do, which is I just buy, you know, processed kielbasa from Hillshire Farm that is so far away from doing anything kind to an animal. You know what I mean? So, like, I'm with you.

[B]

Like, I think. I think particularly based on the level. The scale of the operation, I would totally agree that I think a lot of these people that are raising animals really, really love these animals and. And. And do want to take care of them. And, you know, like, I think that the. Whatever. I think that the. The issue becomes, like, I. So depending on the jogging route that I pick in the morning, if I. If I decide to go down towards town, you know, I run by this chicken processing plant, and they just have these. They pull the. You know, those trucks that have, like, 8 million cages on them, and it's got a bunch of chickens in them and stuff. I noticed the other day that I was jogging past it, and they. They pull them into this big bay. So it's. It's. It's outside still, but it's kind of covered. And it's got these huge fans blowing on the. The. The trucks. The back of the truck that has all the cages on with the chickens in it. And my first thought was, oh, that's really nice. They're, like, keeping the chickens cool. That's good. I'm glad that those chickens are not, you know, getting overheated. And then I realized, oh, of course they have to keep them alive. If they don't do that and it's a hot day, they'll die. And then if they die too early, you can't sell them. So you have to, like, make sure we got to keep them at least minimally alive in these cages long enough that we can then do the thing that we do to them or whatever. And I would say that, like, I have a. I have plenty of respect for. For. For people who are raising livestock and they're feeding that livestock and they're taking care of it, and then they also are responsible for maybe the end of that livestock's life. Like, I'm with you. Like, I don't have the patience for that or the whatever for that. If I did, though, and if somebody does that, I don't have a problem with that, personally. Like, I feel like, hey, same thing with hunting. I both am very turned off by the idea of hunting. For me, personally, like, I would never be able to point a gun at a deer and pull the trigger, personally. But if you're somebody who's eating deer meat and you went out and you chased the deer down and you shot it and then you processed it and then you ate it, that's real. That's much more circle of life than what. Whatever I'll be doing or whatever I was doing in my days of eating a lot more meat. And even now, it's like, I'm still not doing that. So I do have a kind of a weird, begrudging respect for people the closer they are to the experience of the whole thing.

[A]

The one thing that. And I'm sure I've said this on the show before, the one thing that gets kind of close to what you're talking about as far as kind of like, branding or. I don't know. This is going to sound like I'm being silly, but. And I sort of am. But it is a true feeling I have. I am really done with ads or signs, even though there's a long, cute tradition of showing the animal dressed up like a chef of the animal that you're about to eat. You know what I mean? Like, it's a big thing in Southern barbecue culture, I think, right, to have, like, a picture of a pig yet, you know, on your sign because that's your logo for your barbecue stand or whatever. Like, I don't. And maybe. Maybe I'm just fooling myself, but we just don't need to, like, personify them, Cutie. Like, it seems.

[B]

Well, that seems like making them dig.

[A]

Their own grave really does. And I know the animals don't know that. I know that there isn't a pig walking by as smart as they are and saying, hey, that's undignified for my brethren. But, like, I am over that. And I know that's been long parodied. It was parodied on SNL way back in the 1970s, I think about. Or no, no, that's the 1990s. The. The chicken mascot comes off its own head. But, like, I really am. I'm kind of like, I don't like that anymore. It's grim. Bring it back to that.

[B]

You've had enough. Yeah. You've had enough grim in your real life.

[A]

Yeah. In fact, into some flies. Speaking of. Speaking of auctioneers. One fly, two fly, three flies.

[B]

We got five flies. One fly, two fly. Do we still even have it? Let's see. Oh, this is. Get out of here, you flies. We got three flies. Five flies.

[A]

Yeah. So many flies. Here I go once again with the email. Every week. I hope that it's from a female. Oh, man. It's not from a female.

[B]

All right. An email or a V mail, sir, before we ski daddle.

[A]

Yeah, I got an email here, and I thought you would appreciate this because I believe yesterday's email gently corrected something.

[B]

That not gentle can never be gentle enough.

[A]

Gentle. This doesn't call me out specifically, but this is a correction on something that I said when we were talking about the Untouchables and we were talking about that. That famous baby carriage scene.

[B]

Yeah. That I had left loud in my own mind. Loud. Wrong.

[A]

Yeah. You had misremembered what happens in that scene. But I had said, based on my listening of a recap podcast, that this was the original scene of a sort of a baby carriage being let go at the wrong moment and it's on the loose during kind of an action scene of some sort. And I said that it was my understanding that the Untouchables did it first and then it was much parodied after that. Either I misheard what the hosts were saying on the podcast I was listening to, or they were just wrong because Alyssa said. Says here, Elisa, I think is how you pronounce this. Eli. Ssa. Elissa says, regarding the earlier discussion about the Untouchables and the scene with the stairway and the baby carriage, I realize that my brain holds a tiny, insignificant factoid related to this. This scene is an homage. Homage. Would you say homage there? The scene is an homage to the 1925 film Battleship Potomkin.

[B]

Potemkin.

[A]

Potemka. Sorry. Let's see here. The Odessa step scene is a classic. Apparently it has been mimicked and honored in several movies. The only one I knew off the top of my head was the Untouchables. But looking it up online, I see Hitchcock did it in Foreign Correspondent. There's a Godfather tribute to it. There's a scene in Brazil, Star Wars, Episode 3, Revenge of the Sith. Never seen that one. And Alyssa says. And that recent Dune movie that I haven't seen because it is, sadly, Stinger. Sting was in the original and can't match my adoration for David Lynch's super awesome version. Now that seems odd to me because I think David lynch didn't even like that version. Right. Like, he quit. Didn't he quit halfway through and they finished.

[B]

I know that it's considered to be kind of a. A bit of a mess of a movie. You know, there are the people like Elisa who apparently love it. But like I will tell you, I really enjoyed the. Is it Dennis Villeneuve? The. The Timmy. The Timmy Chalamet ones they put out? I thought those movies were very, very entertaining and watchable, for what it's worth.

[A]

Yeah, me too. I loved. I loved the remakes. And I, I love David lynch, but I find the original Dune almost impossible to get through because it seemed, I think they fired him or he quit or something. And then it was like kind of a patchwork of other things. The second half of the movie just zings by. It's almost like a bunch of like extra foot. Not extra, but like it's just like they just kind of rushed through the second half. Now I'm, I'm kind of being mean to Elissa here, but like I just, I. A little bit surprised that you hold that in such high regard. But having said that, I was wrong about the baby carriage.

[B]

Now Battleship Potemkin, I've never seen, I haven't seen the baby carriage scene, but I've always heard. I thought Potemkin, like a Potemkin Village, I thought was a reference to a sort of a. A kind of. Not a made up place, but almost like a. How would you describe it? Like, I always thought of Potemkin like, much like I think of the COVID of the VHS to License to Drive as being dangly. Something's dangling. I think of a Potemkin village as a sort of like a faux place where it's like, it looks like it's a real place, but it's actually all kind of like, you know, false buildings and like it's. There's no one really there. That's what.

[A]

You're absolutely right. In politics and economics, Potemkin Village is a construction whose purpose is to provide an external facade to a situation to make people believe that the situation is better than it actually really is.

[B]

So I wonder what Battleship Potemkin. I wonder if that, if that idea or concept shows up in Battleship Potemkin or if Battleship Potemkin was the beginning of like. I wonder if when you hear about Potemkin Village, if that's like a Battleship Potemkin or like a. You know what I mean, like that. I'd never seen that word outside of Potemkin Village until Elisa emailed in.

[A]

Yeah, and I'm one. I think it's Elissa. I'm sorry, I. I'm the one who kind of butchered. Oh, I'm watching this. By the way, what year did this come out? 1925.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

Lissa said that in their email. But yeah, I'm watching this scene now with this baby carriage. And let's see here. Oddly, Andrew Garcia is in this scene as well. I was surprised about that. But I do wonder if the movie and Genevieve would know this because I'm pretty sure she has Seen Battleship Potemkin, but I wonder if there is some sort of fakery going on to trick the enemy or something like that.

[B]

I'm just watching a clip of it now as well, and it's like, man, the 1919, 25. Like, I. I didn't even. I don't think I even fully knew they were making movies in 1925. There's this part where the Battleship Potemkin is sitting there parked, and then an entire building falls, but the window is the shape of a Battleship Potemkin and it lands all around it and the ship is unhurt. That was a. That was a Charlie Chaplin reference.

[A]

I did not, not get it. Sorry.

[B]

You know how, like, I feel like every 1920. If I think about a 1925 movie, I think of, like, Charlie Chaplin or somebody of that ilk, maybe Harold Lloyd or one of these. Buster Keaton is really who I'm thinking. I think of Buster Keaton standing and then this whole facade of a building falls on him, which would kill him because he's standing in the window section and the wind. And so he's fine. Which I believe that's the biopic that I would like to watch at some point. Point would be the Buster Keaton biopic. Because I see these old. Like, I see these clips on Tick Tock and other places of him doing his own stunts. Like, I know that that's a joke. You've even made that joke this episode. And I know that's something we always talk about with Tom Cruise. It's like, whatever, whatever.

[A]

But those guys did. And Lloyd famously did, right?

[B]

Harold Lloyd, you know, hanging on the clock. I think he was the hanging on the clock guy. And then like Buster Keaton, like these just crazy, like, unmoving trains and. And cars and like, again, that house falling thing is so real. Like, he would have died if he. If they. If the measurements, if the math and I guess the geometry of it was not on point. He's just dead. He just dies. And, like, it's crazy. The shit these guys would do for these. Sometimes these, like, silent films or whatever.

[A]

Well, isn't that. I mean, it's kind of an argument that the earliest days of cinema, like, in a certain way, like, we hold. We hold cinema up, or at least least, like people like me. Do you think about, like, the movies that are true classics or that you truly love, maybe even not classics, but maybe even underappreciated movies, but, like the true art of cinema. But when you actually think about the course of, you know, cinema history, it's been jackass since the beginning, right? Like it's been like crazy stunts. Like I think that a big part of that, those movies were that they were real. That like no, a man is hanging off a clock. Amanda taking off a clock.

[B]

Like you know, here's the subreddit. Damn, that's interesting. Which I was looking for Damn, I feel like a woman. But I ended up on Damn.

[A]

Oh, I was looking for Damn, I wish I were your lover.

[B]

Uhuh. The Sophie B. Hawkins subreddit. In 1928, Steamboat Bill Jr Buster Keaton performed one of the most dangerous stunts in film history. A two ton house wall collapsed around around him with an open window barely missing him. His crew had warned him, but Keaton insisted on doing it. Now this is the part where I don't think we needed this final line. And nailed it in one take. Well, obviously.

[A]

Yeah, right. That would be.

[B]

I think two takes would have been the end of Buster Keaton.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Nailed it in one take.

[A]

Well, yeah, if you don't nail it in the first take.

[B]

No.

[A]

The movie is probably not going to be released.

[B]

No. And we're probably. I don't even know if we remember the name Buster Keaton other than, than like some, you know, Hollywood trivia buff says oh, the name of a guy who died making a movie in 1920. Whatever.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Anyway, all right, well that was kind of a semi interesting end to the show.

[A]

That's from the semi interesting subreddit. Actually that is a sub. Actually there really is a subreddit called mildly interesting. Oh God.

[B]

One day we'll get there, Andrew. One day we'll, we'll rise to that level.

[A]

Working on it.

[B]

In the meantime, this is what we got. So we appreciate you listening. Hey, we're going to be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio, so please, if you can come on by. In the meantime, have a great Wednesday everybody. Take care of yourselves and please remember, no mountain too tall.

[A]

And good luck to all. Power out.