#4575 Paddington Myself On The Back

Summary

TBTL #4575: "Paddington Myself On The Back"

Podcast: Too Beautiful To Live
Date: October 14, 2025
Hosts: Luke Burbank & Andrew Walsh

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Episode Overview

In this lively Tuesday episode, Luke and Andrew dive into a mix of listener corrections, baseball superstitions, pop culture blind spots, and the blurry boundaries between Paddington Bear and Winnie the Pooh—both in the realm of sweater embroidery and international snack preferences. They muse about d'Angelo's musical legacy, recount their varying levels of emotional engagement with the Mariners post-season victory, and reflect on the fun, foibles, and fandoms of being a Seattle sports fan.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Gas Station Culture & Awkward Interactions

• [00:01] Andrew opens with an anecdote about a bizarre exchange at his neighborhood gas station regarding his birthday.
• Quote: “So you're telling me nothing. Is that why you're...I said three things and two of them don't apply to your daughter, who I've never met. What do you want me to say to that? Get her in here.” – Andrew ([00:15])

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2. Paddington Bear vs. Winnie the Pooh: Sweatergate

• [03:00] Listener Correction: After referencing a bear on Luke’s sweater as Paddington, dozens of listeners (including longtime friend Harriet) point out it’s actually Winnie the Pooh.
• [04:00] Discussing attributes:
  • Paddington: British, wears a rain slicker, loves marmalade
  • Pooh: Likes honey, known for being pants-less
• [05:43] Marmalade origins: Learn it's Scottish, not a product of British colonization as Luke mistakenly implied.
• Quote: “It does make me sad that when you Google Paddington Bear...all the initial responses are like the uncanny...computer generated Paddington Bear. Not the classic.” – Luke ([04:41])
• [07:21] Throwing Becca (Luke's partner) under the bus for not correcting him sooner.

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3. The Art and Responsibility of Alt Text

• [11:41] Andrew raises whether he should correct the alt text for the show photo to reflect the actual bear.
• [12:08] Luke notes, for listeners who use those descriptions: “...just know that description is incorrect and it is in fact Pooh Bear who is on the sweater.”

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4. Fun with Blind Musicians and Parental Conversations

• [12:47] Luke recounts playing Ray Charles on vinyl for his parents and being quizzed about which came first: Stevie Wonder or Ray Charles’s blindness.
• Quote: “Who did it first? Who had the idea to be blind first, Stevie Wonder or Ray Charles?” – Luke’s mom, paraphrased ([13:10])

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5. Remembering (and Admitting Ignorance About) d’Angelo

• [13:58] Andrew learns of d’Angelo’s passing and confesses he’s unfamiliar with much of the artist’s impact.
• [16:15] They discuss the iconic “Untitled (How Does It Feel)” video ("black Adonis," cornrows, shirtlessness, and the New York Times’ extremely NSFW description).
• Quote: “In the video, d’Angelo stood as a black Adonis in cornrows, apparently naked...” – Andrew (reading NYT, [17:00])
• Luke’s take: “That video…awakened feelings in a lot of people that they may have not known existed...not to minimize d’Angelo’s career, but you say d’Angelo to me, and I think, oh, that video.” ([15:04])

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6. Birthday Musings & Thanksgiving Scheduling

• [20:35] Andrew realizes his birthday will fall on Thanksgiving this year, sparking memories of childhood and the variable date logistics.
• Luke asks about the Walsh household’s birthday rituals, which are refreshingly low-key, except for a “very sexy dance” joke. ([22:19])

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7. Mariners Mania: Rituals, Superstitions, and Guilt

• [28:30] Andrew discusses feeling anxious and distracted during a day game, unsure how much of his anxiety is Mariners-related vs. life-in-general.
• [31:00+] Superstitions:
  • Both hosts detail their (often sweaty and inconvenient) ‘lucky’ clothing and rituals for watching games.
  • Luke: “Yesterday...about the sixth inning, I was absolutely baking between the sweater and the stove. But I could not change it because everything was going great.” ([55:05])
  • Andrew: Has specific “lucky” Mariners hats and worries about disrupting the team’s fortune with the wrong headgear or a borrowed FuboTV login.

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8. Mariners Playoff Performance & Toronto Rivalry

• [32:04] Playoff tension: Reflecting on the psychological cost of being two games up (not wanting to “jinx” it), historic collapses, and the emotional rollercoaster.
• [34:25+] Mantra:
  • Luke recites a calming text: “The Mariners are good at baseball. The Mariners do good baseball plays. The Mariners have good players.” ([34:00–34:25])
• [40:07] Toronto fans in Seattle: Why Jays fans flood T-Mobile Park and how their “authenticity” compares to Yankee fans who hail from Federal Way.
• Andrew: “It feels...it triggers something in me. It makes me feel owned in a way that maybe I felt owned a lot as a kid, you know, by, like, bullies or whatever. And it's so weird. It's like to feel bullied by Canadian baseball fans.” ([44:35])
• Luke: “I’ve had, you know, kind of yelling matches and things like that. And again, I blame Molson and probably Rainier. Me with the Rainier. Our Canadian fans with the Molson.” ([44:55])

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9. Musings on Superstitions and Sports Streaming

• [54:28+] Andrew recounts his misadventures with pirated baseball streams, using a friend's Fubo login, and blaming a Mariners loss on the switch.
• Quote: “But I don’t want to be the person who says, ‘I quit smoking’ and then bums cigarettes off of everyone...I don’t want to be the person with other people’s Fubo.” – Andrew ([58:36])
• Luke: “First of all, it’s called ‘My Stuff’…that’s the name for it in Fubo. Please use the proper language.” ([61:12])

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10. Mariners Theming & Local Nostalgia

• [45:59] The Westerlies Music: Luke shares a brass performance of the Mariners’ TV theme, marveling at how evocative the 90s-era intro remains.
• [48:48] Mariners–Blue Jays rivalry: Discussion of both teams being “brother” franchises (born the same year) and the mutual charm (but also rivalry) of the matchup.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “I'm not just trying to pat myself on the back, I'm not just trying to Paddington myself on the back here…” – Luke ([38:22])
• “Who did it first? Who had the idea to be blind first, Stevie Wonder or Ray Charles?” – Luke’s mom, paraphrased ([13:10])
• “It makes me feel owned in a way that maybe I felt owned a lot as a kid, you know, by, like, bullies or whatever. And it's so weird. It's like to feel bullied by Canadian baseball fans.” – Andrew ([44:35])
• “You were more of a...No, I don't think so.” – Luke, on Andrew’s worries about being a mooch for not subscribing to streaming services ([59:27])

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Segment Timestamps: Quick Reference

• Gas station birthday story: [00:01–01:23]
• Listener correction & 'Beargate': [03:00–08:05]
• Alt text dilemma: [11:41–12:08]
• Ray Charles/Stevie Wonder conversation: [12:47–13:31]
• d’Angelo tribute & video discussion: [13:58–18:16]
• Thanksgiving/birthday math and traditions: [20:35–24:26]
• Mariners playoff emotions/superstitions: [28:25–36:20, again at 54:28–56:26]
• Jays fans rivalries: [40:07–49:36]
• Streaming superstitions (Fubo): [54:28–63:38]
• Westerlies Mariners theme: [45:59–47:38]
• Donor thanks: [66:13–70:38]

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Tone, Style, and Listener Engagement

Throughout the show, the tone is warm, irreverent, and lightly self-deprecating, with Luke and Andrew bantering playfully about their own obsessions and foibles. Listener participation drives much of the content, with frequent email references, corrections, and shout-outs.

The hosts find humor in their quirks and engage honestly with their own cultural gaps and neuroses (especially related to baseball fandom). Even digressions (like secret streaming guilt and the intricacies of Mariner’s alt-text) become delightful detours.

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Final Notes

For TBTL regulars, this episode is classic: oddly comforting, funny, and full of the small-but-real stakes of daily life as filtered through baseball, nostalgia, and sweater misidentification. For the uninitiated, you’ll find a uniquely personal style of storytelling—a mix of friends-on-the-mic, listener-driven correction, and offbeat, self-aware humor.

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End of Summary

Transcript

[A]

I love a good gas station. There's a great gas station by my house. I'm in there all the time. I talk to the employees. They know me. This just happened. I was in there. I had a weird thing with the woman, the cashier. I bought a beer at the gas station and the cashier goes, when's your birthday, honey? And I said, November 13, 1991. And she goes, oh, my daughter is on the 1st, but, you know, different year. So you're telling me nothing. Is that why you're. I said three things and two of them don't apply to your daughter, who I've never met. What do you want me to say to that? Get her in here. Dude, I got. Are you kidding me? I gotta meet this girl. November. What? That's insane. Get her in here. To btm.

[B]

I consider myself to be an absolutely dead center, normal, average American. And it's romantic and it's full of.

[A]

These sort of situations, which turns out to be.

[B]

That's very interesting, very scary at times, but also a lot of romance and really well made. So I recommend good soundtrack. Good soundtrack is there, and I'm just.

[A]

Guessing here some kind of medication that.

[B]

You maybe need a lot of and.

[A]

Have taken none of or maybe too much of today.

[B]

Laughter a sure sign of a good time. Flashes of Quincy. Well, all right. Hello, good morning and welcome, everyone, to a Tuesday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live.

[A]

Carol, hold my calls.

[B]

My name's Luke Burbank. I am your host. Please clap. Coming to you from the Madrona Hill studio perched high above the mighty Columbia, where it is an absolutely spectacular Tuesday, the 14th of October.

[A]

Oh, ma pa.

[B]

It's just beautiful. I mean, just crystal blue skies, the cows are out in the river. And we are ready, my friends, for episode 4575 in a collector series.

[A]

Let the fun begin.

[B]

I know we talk about AI kind of a lot on this show these days, only because it's a big topic and sometimes I think the abilities of AI can be a bit overstated. But there is this new video program that basically generates AI video content that is shockingly, shockingly capable. And I think it's going to really revolutionize some stuff. Lying is like 95% of what I do and I can't see, see how that could be in a.

[A]

A good way.

[B]

Also, somebody stole a dinosaur in a bad way in the Palisades in California, but then they got the dinosaur back. And it's a cute story. We will talk about that. And we're going to talk to this guy. Longest running cobra of the show. Maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. Hello, lr.

[A]

Ooh.

[B]

He's Andrew Welsh and he's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

[A]

Good morning, Luke. We learned once again yesterday that sometimes making a little boo boo, making a little mistake on the show is one of the best ways to generate interaction with our listeners. Engagement. Engagement, indeed. Do you have any idea what I am going to correct the record on? We have heard from dozens, dozens of people on one specific little topic. Do you know what it is?

[B]

I believe it might be a bear.

[A]

Whoops. Go ahead. No, I'm giving you time.

[B]

Who had no idea what world it just stepped into.

[A]

That was it. That was it. Play. You know what? I'm gonna play it again, Luke. Give it the volume that it needs. A bear who had no idea what.

[B]

World had just stepped into.

[A]

There it is. We didn't know which. Which bears world we stepped into yesterday. Referring to your new cute sweater, I believe is a Paddington Bear.

[B]

My new cute, lucky sweater, by the way.

[A]

Lucky sweater. But actually it was Winnie the Pooh. As for the show pick, yesterday, I grabbed a screen cap of you wearing the shirt. And then when I was posting it to the website, I was typing in the. What do you call it, the alt data or whatever for people who are visually impaired. Yeah.

[B]

What's actually in the photo?

[A]

And as I'm describing, I'm just like, I guess that's Paddington. I didn't question it. I was just like. I remember saying to you, why. You know, why not the rain slicker? I always thought that's. That is the thing. I'm like, why did he disro from the rain slicker? No, no, this is famous. Naked on the bottom this time. Naked almost all the way through. Not Paddington, but Winnie the Pooh is on your shirt.

[B]

Yes. And they are very different bears. I'm looking now. It does make me sad that when you Google Paddington Bear or Paddington. Yeah, Paddington Bear. All of the visual, the initial sort of image responses are all the sort of like, uncanny. What would you call it? Like not animated, but like the almost like computer generated animated Paddington Bear.

[A]

Not the.

[B]

Not what I. Exactly. Not the classic. Yeah, Paddington Bear. But whatever newfangled business they've been. By the way, I'm sure These movies are 25 years old, but they feel newfangled to me because they're not the Paddington Bear that I grew up with. Famous lover of marmalade.

[A]

Paddington loves marmalade. Paddington loves marmalade. Or.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Okay. Winnie likes honey.

[B]

He loves honey.

[A]

I see. Interesting. You're right.

[B]

Oh.

[A]

Because one. And why would I go? I don't know. Why would I. Colonization.

[B]

Andrew, let's take it to the most.

[A]

I was going to say. Was he English? Paddington.

[B]

British.

[A]

Sounds very British.

[B]

Marmalade. Which I feel like is related to the colonization of India. But I could be wrong about that. But my gut says I've never been wrong about Paddington bear related topics.

[A]

Right. I know. That's what I like. I like the fact that we got some corrections on that.

[B]

And then I did so much harder.

[A]

I did zero more research. And now here I am trying to extend out the differences between these two bears. Now, here's one thing I'm going to say.

[B]

And it was popularized in Scotland.

[A]

Ah. Not England.

[B]

Has nothing to do with colonization.

[A]

Now this is going to be a somewhat controversial take on the topic, but have we ever seen these two. You know what? It's not a take. I'm just asking questions here. Luke, have we ever seen the two bears in the same room together? How do we know they're not the same?

[B]

One of them has glasses. That's what's always throwing me off. Very black glasses. Clark Kent.

[A]

That's right. And a little mustache. I never kind of recover from how.

[B]

Wrong I was about marmalade. That was. That was hurtful to the people of the United Kingdom, the people of Scotland, the people of Portugal. Portugal, where I'm now learning it apparently originated somehow.

[A]

India is also insulting.

[B]

I don't even know why India caught astray on this. The subcontinent. I apologize. In three, two, one.

[A]

All right.

[B]

Good morning. Hello, and welcome to a Tuesday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live.

[A]

Carol, hold my calls.

[B]

Just starting over.

[A]

I love it. I love it. Now, did you. Did you. So you sort of saw that after the show yesterday too. That was probably just a quick in. In the moment. In the moment. You said the wrong word. You weren't actually confusing them or.

[B]

I was totally confused.

[A]

You were confused.

[B]

Well, I hadn't given it any thought. I purchased Andrew. I purchased a sweater. It was cute with a naked animal on it.

[A]

Yes. You went to nakedanimals.com.

[B]

I actually think this might be on Becca because I wore this sweater.

[A]

Throw her.

[B]

Let's add Becca to the list of people who've been wronged by this episode.

[A]

Seven minutes in, Becca's over there eating her marmalade.

[B]

Exactly. Colonizer. And I feel like this weekend we discussed the bear on my sweater past this past weekend. And either I said Paddington and she didn't correct me, she might have said Paddington. Yeah, I'm pretty sure she said Paddington.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I just went with it.

[A]

I. You know what? I am totally on board with throwing her under the bus here.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

Because she can. Then I kind of signed. I kind of co. Signed it as well. When you said it. I co Signed it. But we as.

[B]

So you asked me who was the bear and I said Paddington.

[A]

Yes. Or I. Yeah, I think at one point I even stumbled and I couldn't think of his name for some. For some reason. By the way, I want to say one of the people who did reach out to me personally to set the record straight on that was our dear friend and celebrity journalist, Harriet Dellinger. Dellinger.

[B]

Oh, from Harriet's on the Move.

[A]

Yes, exactly. They're in Friendship, Wisconsin. Wait, is that the first time I've said her name out loud? Because it occurred to me I might be mispronouncing Harriet's last name, but we all know who Harriet is.

[B]

Wait a second, hold on. Harriet called in or emailed in to correct the record on my sweater.

[A]

Harriet wrote to me personally via email yesterday not long after the show posted, by the way. And the show was.

[B]

She didn't message APM where we still work. The fact Knower has logged on.

[A]

She listens to every show now. And every show was a 2 hour and 12 minute ordeal. Luke, where we.

[B]

I consider it a corker.

[A]

By the way, I will apologize to you and the audience sincerely here. Not joking. The day after the Mariners won two of the biggest games in their history, we should not have spent at least 15 minutes arguing about whether Dan Wilson is a good manager. I'm not saying it's not a conversation to have. Yesterday was not the day to have it. And I felt really bad the rest of the day about that conversation. First of all, my performance was terrible.

[B]

He's a good manager.

[A]

Now I don't. I still. Well, this is the beauty of me, Luke.

[B]

Because he told them, let's get 10 runs and they did. A bad manager would not have said let's get 10 runs.

[A]

Luke, you ignorant. I know I am a terrible debater. I still think I'm right, but I just. I am a terrible debater. And also like I made no good points. So I mostly mad at myself. But also it was just like. I just think everybody was like so excited to hear us just revel in the pure joy of this post season and everything that the baseball gods have given us and I include Dan Wilson as a baseball God. And then I just get in the. I just get in the trenches. And I'm just saying, well, you don't read Reddit or whatever I was saying.

[B]

That is not what you said.

[A]

But anyway, I feel bad about that. I apologize to you and the listeners. But Harriet did listen to the whole. Harriet listens to the entire show. She said came in hot, by the way. Wrote by the way. The email begins. By the way. I listened to the whole episode and the bear is in Paddington. It's Winnie the Pooh. Just saying Harriet. I get the scores every day. So Harriet is out there in friendship, by the way. Well, Adams county, right? Adams Friendship, we'll say, like hardcore. Rooting for the Mariners via the Scoreboard reports because of our love, like, Harriet has become a friend and a traveler of this podcast and I truly appreciate it.

[B]

Fellow traveler on the road to 5,000. Harriet, we love you and we appreciate you. And you're absolutely right. That bear that was not a clothed is not Paddington Bear. That is Winnie the Pooh. Although it's actually not. That's the thing. I don't think they have the rights to any of it. I think it's a Pooh like bear.

[A]

Well, that was the other thing that I was sort of thinking is, I'll bet you. Because you said you bought that on an Instagram store of some sort. The fact that I call it an Instagram Instagram store says that I should probably. My grandkids should probably take my phone away, by the way. But no, it's very.

[B]

It's always hard to have that conversation with grandpa that you can no longer be trusted with a phone.

[A]

Now, let me ask you this. Do I have to go on the website and find that photo and go into the alt data and change it for the folks who can't actually see it?

[B]

That's between you and our listeners who may be visually impaired.

[A]

Yeah, I feel like I'm lying to them, but I'm also sort of the.

[B]

Subject of which those folks are presumably now hearing this.

[A]

I'm hoping that.

[B]

And it's getting corrected. So if you're one of our listeners who utilizes that function on the website of the description of what's in the photos, just know that that description is incorrect and it is in fact Pooh Bear who is on the sweater. And speaking of folks who are visually impaired, did I mention to you the other day I did write about this on Instagram, that over the weekend I was using my. My record player. I was playing a record My mom and dad were over and I was playing a Ray Charles record and we were bopping and enjoying it and my mother took a moment to ask if I knew that Ray Charles was blind.

[A]

And did you?

[B]

I did.

[A]

Yeah. That's one of the.

[B]

And I.

[A]

If you dig deep in the Wikipedia page, you will learn that.

[B]

Uh huh. Yeah. I feel like it's in the top five known things about Ray Charles. And then she said, well, what about Stevie Wonder? I said, also blind. And then she said, amazingly, who did it first?

[A]

I don't understand the question.

[B]

Who had the idea to be blind first, Stevie Wonder or Ray Charles? I believe Ray Charles was older. So I guess in this construction, Ray Charles.

[A]

That is an interesting.

[B]

It wasn't. It was a truly. It was one of one. As far as conversations I've had with my mother and I've really had some over the years. Who did it first? Who wore it better?

[A]

That's what I was about to say. I'm not gonna riff on that anymore because I don't wanna be disrespectful.

[B]

We are in high spirits today because of our Seattle Mariners.

[A]

Correct? We are. I was gonna ask you a question before we got into the Seattle Mariners, if that's okay. But I worry a little bit about putting you on the spot here because today something just happened right before the show. Some sad news broke and it's a reminder of.

[B]

I don't think I know about this.

[A]

Well, you might just not expect me to bring it up. But it's just, it's a reminder of my just huge, just like gaping wide blind spots of pop culture. I just saw that d' Angelo passed away. I don't know. Oh, so you didn't know that this just kind of broke right before the show and there is. And I was reading a New York Times kind of initial O bit on him and I'm seeing this just absolute outpouring. Just an outpouring.

[B]

51.

[A]

Yes. Incredibly young. And also people just like now I'm seeing like sort of for the first time just like what a. How well respected and beloved a musician he was. And I gotta say, like, first of all, in the 90s, I was listening to music, but it was all my, like, if it wasn't old stuff, it was very alternative Y stuff. I was never a big RB person. And then I think his huge hit was in 2000 when I had basically totally opted out of pop culture. So I could just follow Ray Suarez and the Gang and Talk of the Nation, like, these are the big D'.

[B]

Angelo Head, by the way.

[A]

Big d' Angelo head. And so, like, I always had heard the name D', Angelo, and I knew, like, you know, kind of 90s, early 2000s R&B singer, but I was totally unaware of his impact on the culture. And it's pretty embarrassing. I'm bringing it up here, I guess, maybe as a certain kind of penance. But I was kind of curious if. If this was something that loomed larger in your life as somebody who is more into pop music, especially as somebody who does karaoke and stuff.

[B]

Well, I would never have tried to pull off a d' Angelo song at karaoke.

[A]

Yeah, maybe nobody should ever try that. That was. Maybe that was a wrong way for me to end that.

[B]

I do remember he put out this album, Brown Sugar, that was like a big hit. And here's the thing, and I don't want to objectify the guy in his passing, but the video from Brown Sugar, I believe, awakened feelings in a lot of people that they may have not known existed or it was a real coming of age moment because he is shirtless. He is absolutely about as attractive as a person could ever be on this planet. And that was. Again, I don't want to minimize d' Angelo's career, but you say d' Angelo to me, and I think, oh, that video.

[A]

Yes, that video.

[B]

Credibly hot video.

[A]

The song was untitled. Apparently that was the name of the song, of the song. And that was off of an album called Brown Sugar, I believe.

[B]

Yeah, and that's just like. I just like, again, I don't want to reduce his career down to that, but that's. He was. That was. Video is really something. And I believe the camera's kind of just doing this. Like, if I remember right, it's sort of 3:16 around him. It's very sort of spare. It's like, well, we don't need to add a lot to this because we got a shirtless d' Angelo and it's working here.

[A]

Can I. Do you want me to read to you the official New York Times description of that video?

[B]

Good. They mentioned it, so that's some cover.

[A]

Yeah. Well, I'm not trying to make you feel bad here, but they kind of mentioned that it was like, this is what most people sort of know him about or know about him, I should say. Or the first thing they think of is, like, so iconic and again, totally lost on me. I'm reading about this and people. And I'll read you the description. So I love hearing New York Times write about erotica and the way they describe it, but apparently it really. He kind of then slipped away out of pop culture for a long time after that. And he kind of didn't like the idea of being a sex symbol. I mean, I don't know why he chose that particular video then, but like apparently like it sort of. It set him off track for a while there, but here's how the New York Times describes it. Untitled, set to an erotically slow pace, also crossed over to the wider pop market, reaching number 10 in the Billboard's All Genre Hot 100 chart, thanks in no small part to its music video. In the video, d' Angelo stood as a black Adonis in cornrows, apparently naked. The video framed its lower edge just below its his waist except for a gold crucifix. The camera scanned d' Angelo's muscled, sweat drenched physique as he brought the song Luke to an orgasmic climax.

[B]

Ladies and gentlemen, here for me is leaving that. I'm leaving that completely in the clear. I need somebody to pull that audio.

[A]

I stumbled too much. I didn't do a good job on my dramatic reading. I'm ashamed.

[B]

No, that's. I mean that's very evocative, the writing of it. And yeah, I didn't realize. Now I'm kind of like also learning more about him. I didn't realize that he was reclusive or at least as described in some of his obits, that he sort of had stepped away from the spotlight and all that. But yeah, that said also, I just feel like 51 is not old. Andrew, I don't know if you know this. It's not old. And the older I get, the less old numbers like 51 become to me.

[A]

Yes, exactly. You. So I just realized, and I'm not saying this so that you can get me any gifts, although Luke, you know, it's on my wish list. You know it's on my Amazon wish list. It's that Jeff Bezos would go away.

[B]

Without his days on his island that is shaped like a human skull with Loren Sanchez and not bother us that.

[A]

Jeff Bezos would be forced to walk in someone else's shoes for a while.

[B]

But you know what Jeff Bezos ultimate punishment is? There are so many people who call him Bezos. I'm shocked at how many people think his name is Bezos Bead Zos. Be Zos.

[A]

Okay, gotcha. By the way, shout out to listener Gretchen, our friend and teacher in Tacoma who came up to Seattle this weekend and inherited all of the beads left over from our bracelet making party. Thank you, Gretchen. And thanks to everybody who reached out with both ideas of where to donate and folks who said I could use it as well. And Gretchen says there will be a great use for this in the classroom. So it's just so nice to know that those are going somewhere where they can be appreciated and used.

[B]

By the way, did you say this just so we don't get Paddingtoned again, that the d' Angelo song is Untitled? How does it feel? Were you saying that?

[A]

Oh, I didn't see that. I was just reading directly.

[B]

Yeah. How does it feel? I was remembering there was something else to that. And it's Untitled. Parenthetically, how does it feel?

[A]

Oh, sorry about that. I might have been reading. I was reading the Pooh. I read the New York Times. So it was second reference in the graph that I was. You know how the New York Times has very specific rules about first and second reference, Luke? It was referred to as Mr. Untitled. The second reference in what I was reading.

[B]

That's honorifics. Yes, the name for that style of writing.

[A]

I don't know why I was about to say this or how we got into it, but to finish my sentence, I just found out that my birthday is on Thanksgiving this year. A friend pointed that out to me.

[B]

I didn't even know that must happen. What, every 10 years? I mean, it must cycle into Thanksgiving and out of Thanksgiving.

[A]

This is how. This is. What a moron I am. Because I know that leap years mess around with this as well. But this came up on the show once a couple of years ago, and then Phyllis sent me. I can't remember if she figured it out herself or figured out using computers or AI or the Internet. But, like, it's not something simple. Like, well, every seven years, I would think there's seven days in a week. It would somehow sag in. You know, Thanksgiving is always the. What is it second to last Thursday or the last Thursday in November?

[B]

I think the last Thursday in November.

[A]

So you would think it would be on a more regular schedule. But anyway, it seems to vary greatly, maybe because of leap years or whatever, but there are clusters of years where it lands on Thanksgiving more often than not. I think I was saying when I was a kid, it seemed like it landed on Thanksgiving a lot more than it does as an adult. But it doesn't really affect my life too much. I don't plan on doing anything especially celebratory for my birthday, as usual, but it wasn't interesting thing to note. And I was just thinking about birthdays because you had mentioned that you're about to turn. Your next birthday will be turning to 50. Is that correct? And I'm about to turn 49 here in about a month.

[B]

Does Genevieve. I know you know you're not a. We know you're not a big birthday guy, but does Genevieve. What's the process? She says happy birthday and gives you a kiss on the forehead. And that's pretty much it. Like, how does it go in the household on your birthday?

[A]

It involves a very sexy dance. How much do you. How much do you.

[B]

What do you know about the d' Angelo video? Imagine a possibly nude Andrew.

[A]

I don't know how it goes. I don't know. I don't. Yeah, I mean. I mean, generally, Genevieve will always get me a gift. Certainly there will be a moment where we will sit down and I will open a gift. Last year, it was a. It was a cool T shirt and along with a gift card to a cool record shop that's in, I want to say, not Ballard, but in that area. And no, I don't know. I don't go in for cake or anything like that. I'm not a big cake guy. Sometimes if I'm feeling like I want to do something special, I will sometimes use my birthday just as an excuse to go spend too much money at like a nice steakhouse or something like that. Like, what's the nice steakhouse? You and I would go there sometimes with the Cairo sales department down in South.

[B]

Oh, Daniel's Broiler.

[A]

Yeah, like I remember, we would go to Daniel's Broiler. Maybe not even on my birthday did we go with Brock once. Maybe you did. I don't know. I don't know. I remember. I think I've told you this many times on the show. I remember I was working at Cairo Radio as a producer, as producing the show that you and Dave Ross hosted. They were just beginning to, like, slot me in. In some, like, fill in slots as a host here and there, which that was. I kind of. That. That just. I can't even remember the origin of that. I think I just started talking during your show or something. Or they paired me up with Curly one time as a producer, and he made me talk on the radio a lot. And then after that, they started slipping me into some like, some, you know, like late night time slots or whatever. But I remember sitting at Daniel's Broiler the sales folks wanted to take. I don't know. I think it was just you and me. Dave Ross might have been there. And then one of the salespeople said, we heard you're hosting the Ron and Don show later this week. And I said, what? Like, yeah, yeah. And I was like, are you kidding? I remember like, because that's a. That's drive time, right? And I did not consider that.

[B]

Must have felt very heady to you, the whole thing.

[A]

That is the perfect word to use. I wouldn't have thought of that. But yeah, I remember, like, just like being like I am and then like the rest of the evening. And I love a good, like, kind of steakhouse hang. Anyway. That's kind of a good vibe for me. And I just remember, like, yeah, heady is the perfect word. Sort of my head swimming the rest of the time, like, first of all being like, I gotta get to the station tomorrow and figure out. Because so far my program director hasn't told me this. Nobody's told me this. I need to verify this. And then also I need to start a worrying campaign.

[B]

Things are going to start happening to me now.

[A]

That's a good. That's a fond memory.

[B]

That was a really fun day, too. I remember that as well. So maybe you'll go. You'll go get a fancy steak or something. Well, not on your actual birthday.

[A]

Yeah, probably not. I'll probably. But if I do that, I might defer it. You know, sometimes it's just fun to go do that. So maybe sometime around my birthday, if I do. We haven't done that in a while.

[B]

And that's just steak deferred is a steak denied. Andrew, can you believe we ruined Canadian Thanksgiving?

[A]

I know. That was kind of a big thing.

[B]

Yesterday and I want to say shout out to our friends in Canada. I'm, of course, pretty excited about the Mariners winning, but I'm also sorry that we ruined your Thanksgiving. And I don't really mean that as a joke. Thanksgiving is kind of my high holiday, as people who listen know. I love Thanksgiving. And it was an. It was. I mean, there was a lot about that baseball game that was memorable for me, but I've never seen. I was saying this in the text chain there. I've never seen baseball announcers do their John Madden impression because I always associate John Madden with Thanksgiving Day football. And there was always this kind of quite upsetting turkey they would make that would have like nine legs on it. Because everybody who got like an. Like that, like, if you got a turkey leg, that was like, you know, John Madden was singling you out. Well, not singling you out, but was honoring your performance. But then there was, like, more people getting the award than there are legs on a turkey. So they started doing this real kind of Frankenstein's turkey kind of situation. But anyway, a lot of turkey talk yesterday on the baseball broadcast, which was weird.

[A]

Yeah, the game ended up being a bit of a blowout. It was a weird afternoon game, at least for us here in our time zone. So it sort of broke up the day in a kind of a strange way. Do watching the games like that during the day, does it have a very different effect on you? I had trouble. The last time we had a day game like that was the loss to the Tigers. And I told you that. I was sort of like, really? You know, that bummed me out for a while. This one was like kind of a blowout. This was a blowout in our favor, But I still had sort of trouble engaging with it. I can't explain it. I was watching. I was there watching, but I was so. I just had a lot of life. Stuff was coming in, like, kind of trying. The doctors trying to make appointments with me, which makes me sound sickly, but just like my chart is popping off for some reason. I've had this project that I've been dragging my feet on that I dedicated to yesterday to doing. And so I was kind of running in and out of my studio and trying to do that. And then, like, I don't know, I just sort of felt like. I feel like. I keep on saying this, but I felt like I. Maybe if that were a night game, I'd be jumping up and down and like, just screaming my head off at the number of runs that the Mariners produced. But instead I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is good. I got. I just felt very distracted the whole time.

[B]

It was sort of like you're checking a box. Like, okay, Mariners win. Good runs are being scored. Okay, check that box. And now what else? As opposed to it being the total centerpiece of the rest of the day, or I should say of the day itself.

[A]

Yeah, maybe. And I think I just. Well, now I'm just getting too personal. I think. I don't think I realized this until the end of the day yesterday when I started to, like, kind of. I think I had some generalized anxiety yesterday. Generally speaking, maybe it's because I felt bad for pooping all over the Mariners victories with a weird half baked argument.

[B]

Nobody except Harriet was listening to that.

[A]

Part of the show.

[B]

That's the good news.

[A]

I don't know what it was, but, like, it was just a kind of a combination of various things. And so I feel like, yeah, there Was just like some anxiety, generally speaking, and maybe some of it is about the game. I almost had a moment yesterday where I was kind of like, wait a second, whatever. I don't want to go down this road. But I was sort of like, wait, how much of my anxiety lately has been about baseball and how much of it has been about other things? And I'm putting it in a baseball looking package.

[B]

Sure. Yeah, I can totally understand that. Like just focusing it on the Mariners because that's something tangible. And. And then, of course, it's also just weird. It's enjoyable when they're winning, but it's also a strange experience for it to be the daytime and for it to be not stressful.

[A]

And Thanksgiving, like you said, it was such a weird. Thanks.

[B]

And it's Canadian. And John Schmaltz is eating a turkey breast.

[A]

Did you see him trying to hold.

[B]

What the hell is going on?

[A]

I didn't like it. I know what he was trying to do. At one point. He's trying to hold. He's like slices a piece of turkey. And that was turkey, right? It wasn't turkey.

[B]

It did make me hungry for turkey, by the way.

[A]

But did. He started like, he tried to hold the meat up to the camera like a slice of it, but then it was clear that he wasn't prepared for it and started falling apart on him. And it was. Did you see that? And he's like using his hands and fingers too much. I'm like, oh, that's. That's like.

[B]

Well, you had one of the announcers who was trying to show off his turkey breast cutting skills, and he kept talking about skin. Now everybody gets some skin. And I was like, okay, calm down.

[A]

I might have been a little distracted over that.

[B]

I was like. And so then. So the main announcer whose name eludes me the. And then John Schmaltz is like the color commentator guy, Longtime Atlanta Brave great, by the way. They are. I said this also on the text chain, but, man, is this broadcast crew better than the previous one, in my opinion. Like, I feel like John Schmaltz is insightful. It also helps that the Mariners won both games. And so I guess I haven't been like, you were talking about your maybe general generalized anxiety kind of trying to find a specific box to go into. The Mariners. My Mariner anxiety is always searching for something and someone to blame for how I'm feeling. And it becomes the announcers very quickly.

[A]

Uh huh. Interesting.

[B]

So maybe because the Mariners are winning, I then feel better about the announcing. But I do Think that they're a little better. But yeah, they were. They were. They were literally tap dancing. Like it was. The game was really not that close and they were going into like, oh, we're just filling time mode. And now I'm going to show off my turkey breast. Here's how you cut a turkey breast so that everybody gets some skin. It was like, I don't want to hear that from my baseball announcers.

[A]

Just a little bit. Somehow just felt a little graphic to you.

[B]

Yeah. I mean the idea that this guy has given this much thought to the skin distribution of his Thanksgiving dinner and that he grew up in a house where if you didn't get enough skin, you were getting left out of the process. Now let me ask you a baseball question. Let me. Let's get off of the topic of skin and onto the topic of baseball. Something that we have barely talked about so far in the last couple of weeks. You said yesterday that if the Mariners you would. You preferred that they win the game yesterday, that they are leading two games to zero over the Toronto Blue Jays. But you also said that that could also continue your anxiety because then it would make a the Mariners not winning this series more of a collapse as opposed to just a hard fought series that we weren't able to best the Blue Jays in. But like being up 20 now means the Mariners are presumed to be winning this series. The statistics are that when you go up 20 in one of these series, most of the time that team wins. Not all of the time, but a lot of the time. And so I'm wondering how you're feeling today because it's pretty exciting that they're up 2 0. But is it actually having the effect that you thought it might?

[A]

I think yeah. I remember saying that yesterday and also feeling like that was one where I was not articulating what I was saying. I think, okay, I will answer your question. But first let me kind of reset what I was saying yesterday. I think what I was trying to say is I won't. I have basically been not counting any chickens before they're hatched. And I was like kind of emotionally prepared, thinking we were not going to make it out of the Tiger series. And then we did and that was great. And then I was like, oh, well, the Blue Jays are definitely going to eat us up. And now obviously two games up, I no longer believe that it is a given that we are not going to win the series. I remember coming into the Blue Jays series and just sort of thinking, I just don't Want to be swept. I just want to show, you know, some. I want to show some that we can play good baseball and not. Not embarrass ourselves and not collapse in a way that will haunt us forever. Because I feel like the Mariners have had some pretty famous haunting losses in the postseason. And. And that's what I was trying to maybe articulate yesterday about where I was emotionally. But two games up now, obviously, we're not getting swept over there. Where. As you were. You kept saying during. Thank you. I appreciate. I. I'm a ball.

[B]

I actually hadn't thought of that. I hadn't thought of that. I'm not being sarcastic. I am not being.

[A]

What do you mean?

[B]

I mean, I just hadn't thought about the fact that we have officially avoided a sweep.

[A]

We have officially avoided a sweep. We've played some great ball. You know, there. I. I am very much in the mantra. Yeah, no, I was just about. I was gonna try to paraphrase that a moment ago. And what did you keep putting in the text chain yesterday?

[B]

Let me see if I can find the exact words. Cause I was proud of this. And I also feel like. And again, I'm just getting lucky here, but I feel like about the time that I put that into the text chain, things really started turning around for our beloved Mariners. For some reason, I cannot locate the criminals. This happens sometimes on my computer, but I can find it on my phone. I was saying basically, oh, I got.

[A]

It here a few days. Okay, good. Luke KE putting this in the text, I think, before the game, in the middle of the game. And then afterwards, it was maybe near.

[B]

The game when they came back and tied at 3.

[A]

3.

[B]

When, as they say, the brakes were beating the boys. That was when I needed to go. I needed to take my mind to a place of positivity. And by the way, this could have ended really badly if we just. If we gave up seven runs after this. But we didn't, thankfully.

[A]

And you. You were here. I'm quoting from your final repost of this yesterday. The Mariners are good at baseball. The Mariners do good baseball plays. The Mariners have good players. So in other words, when we were down by. Or maybe we weren't down.

[B]

Kind of terrifying, because it was like you're just waiting for the sleeping giant that is the Toronto Blue Jays. And it is this, like, absolutely geeked crowd. You're waiting for that to sort of, you know, rise up, and it's like, oh, my gosh. This home run by Julio. We're up three nothing. This is amazing. But I will tell you this. And this is where I guess I was. I was probably maybe channeling a little bit more of your thought process. Andrew, when we went up three nothing, no part of me felt good about that. I mean, that's not true. I was. I'd much rather we were ahead three nothing than losing three nothing. But no part of me thought, game over. I was like. My thought was, it's going to take, like, nine runs to win this game. And turns out it would have taken four runs. But just like, it was weird because we get that home run and like. Like, for some reason, my first thought wasn't like, oh, phew, we've got this game. It was like, okay, well, now we need to start piling on, because I know that there's going to be a moment where these folks are going to come rushing back. And of course, they did very quickly tie the game again.

[A]

Yeah, just like they got a home run on the very, very first pitch of game one. Like, that didn't give us a good feeling either. But you just never know what's going to happen. And that's where I am now, by the way. And I guess, apologies if I have been. If I'm coming off as a grumpus about these things. I'm just, like, trying to not get my expectations up too high. But this is fun. And also, I feel any. Literally anything could happen in baseball. Like, you think that we have the advantage because we're up by two games and now we're coming home and we have, like, everything looks good on paper. Our pitching staff is going to be pretty well rested as we get into this rotation here. The woo question remains a big question. Him.

[B]

Although maybe less so now. I mean, depending on how it goes.

[A]

Yeah, well, that's true, too. If we even see him, which is such an amazing thing to even contemplate if the Series doesn't go that long. But I am. Anything could happen. Anything could happen. The ball could totally bounce the other way for us. You never know. I think baseball is really weird, but that's why I love it. And I got to say, after yesterday's win, I'm just, like, very, very appreciative of where we are right now. And it is just. It is bananas to think that we're two games away from potentially going to the World Series.

[B]

I lived in New York City when the Boston Red Sox were down, I think, 30 in the series against the Yankees and came back to win four in a row. And I'm not a particular Boston Red Sox Fan. I'm also obviously not a big New York Yankees fan. And it was, it was absolutely exquisite for me to sit in these sports bars in New York City and watch the Yankees collapse from a 3, 0 lead in the, in the World Series. I think it was, wait, they couldn't.

[A]

Play in the World Series.

[B]

It would have been the ALCS. They had a 3, 0 lead and the Boston Red Sox, I believe came all the way back and ended up winning the Series. So anything can happen. And you're right, like it's weird because like you would think, Mr. Mantra, that's me, I'm talking about me here, would just be like, we got this. But, but now you're right. It's, it's strange because here's, for whatever reason, this is what always drives my sports beliefs is whatever everybody thinks is gonna happen is almost never the thing that happens. And so everybody thought in the first game, oh, the Mariners are gonna to play really poorly because they just came off this 15 inning game. Their flight was delayed and they got in. I love that too by the way. Like when pro athletes have to go through 1% of what we, the rest of the people do, it's like a call your congressman. Like every article was like, and their flight was. And their private plane was delayed. Oh man. And they had to sit in those oversized large seats playing bunko with each other for extra two hours. God, how will they survive this?

[A]

But anyway, by the way, they weren't saying that. I heard the players quoting that time and just being like, yeah, we're just chill. We were just at a. And so they weren't. Woe is mean. They actually described it very much as you described it. Like we're, I think I even heard Cal say, yeah, you know, we play cards.

[B]

Uh huh. Good for them. I like that kind of, that approach to these things, these hassles. But yeah, all of the baseball knowers were like, Bryce Miller has terrible stats against Willie. Kind of everyone this year. And the Mariners are on no rest and like, you know, they're just going to try to escape with one of the two games, but definitely they're going to lose this game. And that gave me this bizarre. I really did. I'm not just trying to like pat myself on the back, I'm not just trying to Paddington myself on the back here. But I did have a strange sense that the first game was going to go better for the Mariners than people expected, only based on the fact that usually when there is a conventional wisdom around something and everyone's like, well, it's just a given that it's crazy how often that doesn't end up happening, that thing. And now the conventional wisdom is, oh, the Mariners are arrested. They're going to send out, you know, arrested. Castillo, he's going to be home. There's going to be. They kept talking last night about like, you just can't understand how hungry this Mariner fan base is for getting to the World Series. And it's like, yes, that is true, but that has zero impact on the game.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

In fact, I think there's an argument that being the home team is more stressful in a way. You get to bat last, which helps, but you're like playing in front of your die hard supporters and the fact that they're screaming while you're hitting, like, hey, let's quiet it down a little bit, folks. Let's let our hitters concentrate, you know.

[A]

Yeah, well, it'll be, it'll be very interesting to see what the makeup of the crowd is going to be here at home too. Like, there is no.

[B]

How many Jays fans down.

[A]

I mean, I guess, and I know we kind of have this conversation a lot. Obviously, when the New York Yankees are in town, they have a national fan base, so they truly, you know, the Yankees fans truly take over the stadium. But the Blue Jays fans, I would say it's tied. I don't even know. I mean, the Blue Jays fans. During regular season games, if you are listening to a Mariners game here in Seattle on the radio, it. The crowd is so clearly rooting for the other team. It is disorienting because you realize how many little cues you get when you're listening on the radio and your mind might be on other things and you hear the crowd go wild. You're just like, wait a second.

[B]

The crack of the bat, the roar of the crowd.

[A]

Oh, you're familiar. Oh, you are. You're a baseball guy, too.

[B]

I'm a news radio guy.

[A]

Been watching a lot of news radio lately, by the way. Very comforting. Just good to see Joe Rogan in his prime. But anyway, it'll just be interesting to hear if Mariners fans, because you, you. There's no.

[B]

I think it'll be different because playoffs and I hope so. We've never had a home game against Toronto, you know, in the playoffs because when we played them before, we were all. It was all in. In Toronto. So my sense is, because it sells out so quickly because there's no, I mean, those regular season games, it's like there are typically going to be a fair amount of tickets that are available. And my sense is, well, here's what I can say. There were not very many Mariners fans in Toronto. I was, you know, kind of when they would do crowd shots, I was like, I mean, they found a few. And certainly by the end yesterday, it was the Mariners fans were sticking around, the Blue Jays fans were hitting the. Hitting the road. But. But my sense is, my guess is that there will not be. It's not going to be like a regular season game. There will be maybe some Toronto fans, but it's going to be overwhelmingly Mariners fans, which, honestly, I kind of like. I feel like that's how it should be. Like, I don't. I'm with you.

[A]

It's.

[B]

It's disorienting when we have these teams that come through. And again, I don't know why this matters. Here's what I will give the Blue Jays fans. I'm guessing that most of the Blue Jays fans that show up are, in fact, Canadian. They come by their Blue Jays honestly, as opposed to when the Yankees come through and you and I. There's nothing you and I love to do more from a moment of pure frustration and impotency than to say, like, oh, what part of New York are you from?

[A]

And they say Federal.

[B]

They say Federal way.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And then for some reason, that in my mind means they're not allowed to like the Yankees.

[A]

Right, Right. Exactly.

[B]

Makes me so, so mad. So I will give it. I will give it to the Blue Jays fans. I don't think you have a lot of Americans who just randomly latched onto the Blue Jays as the team. Although I did wear a Blue Jays hat in heavy rotation as a kid after I stole my Steven Wright valor and was awarded, I think, second or third place in the Snow King Stars of Tomorrow talent show. The. My prize was 150, and I didn't know what to spend that money on at that age. And so I went to the pro Image at Northgate Mall and I bought a bunch of fitted hats and I bought a Cleveland. Then they were called the Cleveland Indians hat with a regrettable.

[A]

You got the one with the logo on it. Yeah.

[B]

Oh, yeah. Well, because I was a big fan of the movie Major League.

[A]

Oh, yeah, right. And that logo is all over.

[B]

And I thought that logo, I mean, at the time, of course, I wasn't thinking about it in the broader sense. And I thought it was, in fact, very cool. I got that. I got a. There was one more. I feel like. And I don't even think I got a Mariner set. I think this was in the era when maybe we might have been getting into that S that I kind of like more now than at the time that it came out. And then. And then I got a. A Blue Jays hat because I thought it was a pretty cool looking hat.

[A]

It's a handsome hat.

[B]

I stand by that.

[A]

Is it the kind that they were wearing yesterday with, like, the white panels on the front and the blue panels and the logo? No. I mean, listen, that is a tight uniform. That's a tight logo. Those hats are beautiful. The thing is, like, my thing with the Blue Jays is like, I like, I really, really get too angry about them taking over our stadium. I will admit that. Like, I really hate it. It feels. It triggers something in me. It makes me feel owned in a way that maybe I felt owned a lot as a kid, you know, by like, bullies or whatever. And it's so weird. It's like to feel bullied by Canadian baseball fans, right? Like, whatever. They're cheering for their team.

[B]

Well, I'm told you some of the most tense interactions I've had at Mariners games have been with very drunk Blue Jays fans.

[A]

That is the reputation. I will say I haven't had any personally bad interactions other than just feeling like I'm, you know, a fish out of water in my own park. But you've had actual bad interactions with.

[B]

Oh, yeah, no, I've had. I've had, you know, kind of yelling matches and things like that. And again, I blame Molson and probably Rainier. Me with the Rainier. Our Canadian fans with the Molson. Can I play something for you real quick, Andrew? That just really made my morning. This is a band, a group out of Seattle. I believe they're called Westerlies Music. It's a four piece. It looks like a couple of trumpets and a couple of trombones and Take a listen to this. Perfection. Have you ever heard a more beautiful sound?

[A]

So crazy. He said, this is two Jacks and a Jill.

[B]

It's. They're out of Kansas City, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Key change. Another key change. That's Westerly's music playing the. I was. You know what? I forgot that that's still the theme song. When I put that. I put this, like, little video clip into the text chain recently. That was like, 90s. I was listed on TikTok as like, 90s Mariners, like, hype music. And I. And I was. I put it in there like, oh, what a flash. What a blast from the past. And I was like, wait, that's still what they Play.

[A]

It is. Yeah. So, yeah. I don't. Is it on TV?

[B]

It doesn't rain for 25 years, if not more.

[A]

Because I know I hear it on the radio. Right, Right. Yeah. But I didn't know. I couldn't quite remember if I heard it on a root sports, though. Yeah. Maybe I don't, like, kind of see the beginning of games on root sports so much. I didn't realize that. Yeah. Because that thing has been going around, that original image, that 90s imaging of, like, the compass spinning around.

[B]

Yes. And it's like the song is way too long. I mean, I guess it makes sense because it's for production. They just are like. Like, however long, you know, like Rick Riz or Aaron Goldsmith or whomever wants to talk with the music under him, we need to give them a long music bed. But because of that, it's got, like, a ripping guitar solo. It's got, like, again, multiple. It just keeps. The keys keep changing. It keeps ratcheting up. It's very long. That song, the one that I put.

[A]

In our text chain, it reminds me, actually going back to, like, kind of thinking about that. That 90s imagery is what I was starting to say before. I wanted to hear if you had gotten in any good fights with Blue Jays fans that you wanted to not physically open up about. But I will say that while I feel so much animosity because of that aspect of it and them also, their fan base, they're very proud of that. There was. People were saying in Toronto, or at least Toronto fans I saw online, kind of saying, oh, great, all of our games are home games this time because we take over. And there's just something about that that rubs me the wrong way. But if I can take a step back from that kind of particular phenomenon that goes on between our two teams right now, like, what a cool matchup this is, just based on two really cool teams, I think, both in their current state, but also just historically, the fact that they were both. It's brother versus brother right now. We were both born in the same year. Right. Like, this is. I mean, there's a lot of, like, really cool things to love, I think, actually, about the Blue Jays. And I think if things were different, I could totally see myself being a Blue Jays fan first and foremost. Because of those sweet ass hats.

[B]

Yeah, those are very, very sweet hats. And yes, you know, as I said yesterday, there was a time where the sort of nationalism of the game played a role in my mind, which is to say I thought America was pretty great. And of course, that has a lot to do with my experience. He said the day after Columbus Day. I've heard nothing has ever gone wrong in this country for anything. But, you know, I used to kind of have this weird. An element of the whole thing for me was like, we're the big brother. Canada is the little brother. And I don't know, I just was sort of pretty smug about everything. And I am no longer. I can no longer feel smug about. I mean, I probably never should have, but I certainly can't now. And I don't know why. That's part of. I feel like that's been. One of My burns on Canada has been completely eliminated, which is, hey, but we're a better country.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Again, it was never an accurate burn, but in my mind it existed. And now I don't even have that. And it's almost like Canada seems vastly superior to us. Maybe that's why the Mariners are finally prospering, because, you know, there's some kind of the. The universe craves balance. And with Canada being a manifestly better country than us, that means our baseball teams have to be manifestly better than theirs. There has to be a balancing out.

[A]

If I were.

[B]

Does that make any sense?

[A]

I. Yeah, I think. Well, that's kind of. That's science. Right. I mean, if I were at one of these games, because I'm assuming, you know, I brought this up yesterday, and I'm assuming that they still do the thing where they'll play both national anthems and. Because I saw some people saying, you Americans, don't, you know, fellow Americans, do not be booing during their anthem, which you sometimes.

[B]

We were saying that yesterday.

[A]

Yeah, and I kind of brought that up. But I'm just thinking now, if I were at the game, there's a better chance I would stand for their anthem than ours. Like, I don't. You know what I mean? Like, I definitely would not be standing for ours right now because I don't think that this is right. Thank you. Yes, I kneel for the cross. I stand for the anthem. Anyway, that's where I am. And now. And now. So today's Tuesday. We have all day tomorrow to talk about it. But what are your thoughts about Wednesday's game as far as your viewing experience? Not about predicting.

[B]

Well, it's at 4:00pm, which is better?

[A]

Oh, it's 4, not 5. Oh, I had that wrong.

[B]

I believe it's a 4:00pm because. And again, it takes very little for me to get on this hobby horse. But, like, I was looking.

[A]

It does say 5. By the way, it says 5. 508. I had never heard 4. I have 5 o' clock, game 3, 5:30, game 4, and then a 3 o' clock game 5 if necessary.

[B]

Are they staggering? So are we playing? This is crazy. I swear to God, I looked. I could go on Fubo. I could go on Fubo right now, Andrew. And double check this from this computer. I swear I was looking at the TV last night and they were showing when all the games are going to be on. And maybe that's Toronto two hours ahead of us. Maybe it was Toronto time. I don't know. Anyway, I swear to God, I saw that. Our games are. Each day our games are on before the Dodger brewers games is at least that much true. Like, are we always earlier than Dodgers and Brewers?

[A]

That I don't know. I'm not following. I mean, here. I mean, I could look it up. I'm not really following the schedule. I know that last night I was kind of just very mildly peeping the scoreboard for that Brewers Dodgers thing, but I haven't really been kind of locked into that. So.

[B]

That game had the craziest double play. Oh, okay. Well, let's see here.

[A]

So officially scored as a ground out, by the way. Did you know that?

[B]

I mean, just absolutely wild. A borderline grand slam that ends up actually being a. Like a home to third. Like out at home. Out at third double play. Your standard bases loaded double play. That hit the wall so weird.

[A]

I watch it like, I had to.

[B]

Watch it like five times to figure out what actually happened.

[A]

I only saw that on social media, like right after it happened. So I watch it a bunch there. But you know what the extent of it.

[B]

Okay, I am going to. I swear to God, Andrew, I know that this. Listen, I know that I'm wrong so much, but I don't. My lion eyes. I looked at the schedule that they put it on the television. I looked at it and I had feelings about it. And now the schedule I'm looking at is totally different. I may have just the deer outside. Hear me getting worked up. That's never a good sign.

[A]

A deer, did you say?

[B]

Yeah, there's two deer in the yard. And they. When I. When it gets loudly, it gets very loudly. And they stop chomping on the grass and they look up at me like, get a life, dude.

[A]

Okay, listen, I'll give you cover on that, Luke. They could have totally gotten it wrong on a chiron or something. Somebody fox put a chyron up. I don't know if you saw this. That was celebrating Cal Raleigh's first home run in the postseason a couple of days ago. Like, as if 2022 didn't exist. So I think they're. I think there's a lot of people are calling it, like, kind of disrespect of the broadcast, entire operation towards the Mariners. Like, people are hearing about them for the very first time, especially when compared to the teams like the Dodgers.

[B]

Well, I was going to go on my big old complaint about how the. The TV men decide that the Dodgers are the only team worth watching and they put them in the prime position. But I'm looking at the schedule and that's not the case. So I take it back because it is alternating. So Tomorrow we're at 5 o'. Clock.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And the Dodgers game is at 3 o'. Clock.

[A]

Can you do that? Then? Are you going to be at home watching at 5 o'?

[B]

Clock? I will be at home watching. I'll be wearing, famously, the Paddington sweater. And I'll be calling it that because that was good luck yesterday. And. And yeah, I'll be doing. Now. I kind of messed up yesterday because I added a new. A new luck to the thing that I now have to do.

[A]

A new look or. No, a new luck, Luc.

[B]

A new luck thing.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

But it also was a look thing. So I had the sweater on, right. Which is pretty warm. And I had to wear that the whole game. And then. But also it was. It was a tad bit chilly in the house. And so I put on this. I put on a fire in the. I have a pellet stove. And that thing starts. That thing really pumps out the heat. And by about the sixth inning, I was absolutely baking between the sweater and the stove. The fire in the stove. But I could not change it because everything was going great. And so I had to sit there sweltering like Australians at Christmas. Andrew.

[A]

What an interesting thing to drop in the middle of an otherwise normal conversation. I love it. I want to start using that. I'm sweating like an Australian at Christmas. Like.

[B]

And I was just like, ah, why did I choose. And you know what I have to do tomorrow? Same thing. Sweater on. Heat blasting from the fireplace for the entire movie. Because that. Or, excuse me, it's the movie that is the baseball game. Because that worked. And so that's what I'm stuck with. So I'll be. Yes, I'll be watching the game, I'll be blasting the fire, and I'll be wearing the sweater.

[A]

So this was something I was starting to tell you. I Think the other day regarding kind of our luck and how we're so superstitious about this. Even though you and I don't believe in anything magical, we do believe in our ability to disrupt a game by wearing the wrong Mariners hatred to the.

[B]

Outcome of this game, my friend.

[A]

Exactly. I actually was very happy that I have two Mariners hats that are currently in rotation and one is a little bit scrubbier than the other, or maybe grubbier is the word I'm looking for there. And. But I think I wore that for game one of the Tigers series. And so I thought it was lucky. But then the other day, I didn't realize I was wearing my other Mariners hat, but the Mariners still won, so I'm like, oh, good, I can wear my nice Mariner's hat out now. Like, it's absolutely ridiculous. It's like, oh, good. Either one of these hats will get us a win. This one, though, that's good.

[B]

You're expanding the luck universe.

[A]

It was good. It would be like if you accidentally were wearing a different shirt yesterday and the Mariner still won. That would give you the freedom to not necessarily have to wear the Paddington Pooh shirt. But here's one thing. So, you know, I've been watching these games, you know, when I'm watching them at home, I'm watching them on some sort of stream, some sort of like, you know, non official stream. Right. Some pirated stream. And that's gotten me, you know, for years now. I've been using various websites and stuff to do that, and it always moves around a little bit. Some government entity from some government will shut it down and then it'll pop up over here, whatever. But this year more than ever, it's been kind of moving around or like the main site will be down or what have you. And I'm getting all my days confused here, Luke. But basically it was the Wednesday game last week. That was what I call the sad game. Right. Where the Tigers ended up really owning us. We had a lead in that game. You might want to fact check me on this. I feel like we were up by three, maybe three nothing or something.

[B]

Three nothing. As I was arriving at my television shoot, the Mariners were winning three nothing. And the Detroit Tigers fans were booing their own team.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

I put my phone into my pocket and I thought, everything will be okay for the rest of my life. And that's starting in this moment.

[A]

That's why you can never go on a shoot during a Mariners game again, even regular, regular season. Yes, well, listen to this. So I was at home. That was a day game, and I got one of my streams up, and there were very few options. And this stream or the two streams I was trying to bounce between, bounce between. Each of them had its own issues. One would sort of temporarily freeze up every, like, every 30 seconds, and it would only freeze up for about a second, but it was really annoying and untenable. And then the other one would be fine for big chunks of time, but then totally crap the bed on me, and then I have to reset it. I'd miss. It was just really frustrating me. And I then remembered that a dear friend of ours, who will remain nameless for the sake of this conversation, I don't know why, but I'm going to you remind, keep his name anonymous, a few days prior, had said, you know what? I'm biting the bullet, and I'm going to buy FuboTV at least to watch this series, and then we'll see what goes on, you know, after that, or at least to watch this postseason and then maybe keep it later. And I even said, well, yeah, maybe we could even share that. Maybe we could. Maybe I could go havesies on you with you on this or, you know, kind of figure it out. And he's like, well, either way, here's. Here's my login and password. And he had texted it to me, and I had not used that because, I don't know, I got a weird thing about this. And you're probably going to feel galled by what I'm about to say because you used to drive my ass around all the time. But I'm somebody who doesn't like to drive that much. I like to take cars, public transport, I'm sorry, like to take lifts or public transportation or what have you. But I don't ever want my decision not to drive to be a burden on my friends. I feel like maybe back in the day, maybe I did lean on you more, but you were more of a.

[B]

No, I don't think so. So.

[A]

But, like, I really don't. I don't want to be the person who says, I quit smoking and then I'm bumming cigarettes off of everybody. It's a bit of an antiquated analogy in 2025, but I remember that phenomenon very well from my college days. I don't smoke, but then they smoke half your pack anyway. I don't want to be that kind of a person with other people's fubo, you know what I mean? Like, I'm the one who have decided I'm not buying Fubo or a cable package. So I will try to use these various streams, and if they crap out on me, that's kind of my problem. They usually do not. But on Wednesday of last week, this. While the mariners are up 3. Nothing. My streams keep going down. So I text my buddy. I'm like, hey, man, I'm about to log in. I'm going to use your Fubo right now. I'm letting you know because I want to make sure it doesn't disrupt your viewing experience. If anything happens. If I log in and you get booted off. Very small chance of that happening, but if so, I just want you to know that that's going on. Tell me to get off if that's the case. Also, thank you. You know, I just want to let you know I'm going to try this. Luke, I typed in a Fubo login. I typed in my friend's info. I was expecting some little bit more of a barrier. It worked so smoothly. This is on my laptop, which is plugged into the back of my computer there. I'm sorry. This is on my laptop, which is plugged into the back of the tv. I'm logged in right there. The very first thing to choose. I even set up a. I set up a profile for myself on his platform, and I called myself Andrew the Mooch. And I just.

[B]

Really. Leaving a toothbrush over there, aren't you?

[A]

Just to acknowledge. Well, I didn't want to mess up his algorithm. I didn't want to. If he had a bunch of silk things recommended to him or whatever it's called.

[B]

Andrew, first of all, it's called my stuff.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

That's the name for it in Fubo. Please use the proper language and actually, yeah, you know what? I would. It never even occur. I feel like a bad friend. Andrew, in all of this time, it never even occurred to me, oh, I could just share my. My Fubo login with you, which I would have.

[A]

Oh, yeah. No, no, no.

[B]

See, my stuff and my stuff is. It's all in with Chris Hayes. It's American Greed, narrated by Stacy Keach, produced by Bill Curtis.

[A]

And that's kind of a. That's kind of a. Is that a true crime thing? Sort of.

[B]

It's true crime, but it's true crime about financial crimes.

[A]

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

So it's a little bit less kind of, I don't know, grotesque than true crime about people who've lost their lives. But, yeah, you could. I didn't even didn't even occur to me. And also, I didn't realize you can set up multiple profiles.

[A]

Well, Doyle, when I logged in and just said, are you. Are you so and so, or do you want to set up your own? I was like, oh, I'll just set up my own. That way you can get. Anyway, it's no problem. But here's what happened, Luke. I logged in. It had. It was so seamless. It was so great. And I was like, oh, my God, this is amazing. And then, Luke, I swear to God, the first pitch I saw on that, I believe was a home run that put us up only by two. Am I misreme. I'm. I'm sorry. All the games are blending together, but I swear to God, the very first pitch I saw on FuboTV was, I believe, a scoring hit, which I think was a home run. No, no, no. For the Tigers. So. And we both.

[B]

Bad luck.

[A]

We immediately. We kept the lead, but it was cut into, I think, by one run there, because I think that inning was just like. They ended up tying it, I think, with three individual runs. I think that's how it went down. But I put it on. They scored once. Immediately, Luke. I mean, immediately I'm like, ruh, Roh. I text my buddy. I'm like, ruh, Ro. I don't know if I just messed up the vibe here. They score again. I think I texted him. I definitely thought, if they tie this up, I'm getting off of Fubo. They tied it up, and I got off of Fubo and I went back to the janky stream. And then it was so janky. And then that's when I was like, you know what? What? Then we just. The bottom fell out, and I'm like, I'm going to listen to the rest, like, the last two or three innings just on my. In my headphones. Anyway, I sort of gutted it out a little.

[B]

Have you been back on Fubo since?

[A]

I have not. I have not. And it's such a. It's such a tempting proposition.

[B]

I really want you to. I wish you would have tested the waters yesterday, because I think it would have been, you know.

[A]

Yeah, I could have tested it later.

[B]

That game for us, right? We were so. We were just winning by so much.

[A]

Like, yeah, that was Ferguson proof.

[B]

That was such a great joke. You had two.

[A]

I don't even remember what incredible jokes put in a position player. Thank you. I didn't think it was that celebratory.

[B]

That was one. And then the other was about our friend, the Stubbot and his prediction that Jorge Polanco would do well for the Mariners. Before I think we even got into the playoffs or very early on, our friend the Stubbot said, you know, because Polanco was a Minnesota Twin for a long time. And he said when Polanco gets hot, he's a guy that can actually win series for you. And boy, has that ever been prophetic. And Stu likes to bring that back up sometimes.

[A]

But then sometimes, every time Polanco does anything amazing, which is a lot these.

[B]

Days, it's all he knows. It's all he'll ever know. Andrew, but you. Because there's been so much blocking and talk of blocking people in the text chain after Stu was. Was rightfully celebrating his prediction about Polanco. You then said something to the effect of I've had Stu blocked. I'm not sure what has he been saying. And then what did you say that he said?

[A]

I think I just said I have Stu muted. But didn't he say that Polanco will be no good to us in the postseason or something along those lines? I don't know what it was. You know.

[B]

And then I just had a thought though.

[A]

Stu is the one who gave you that Polanco signed ball. Right. Which at first we thought was also signed by Stu. It's signed by Stu and Polanco.

[B]

I'm wondering two of my favorite baseball players.

[A]

If the Mariners is. If the Mariners go all the way. How many signatures can you fit on a baseball? Should all of the fun loving criminals sign that baseball? With the exception of John. Is John a Mariners fan? I don't know if John's a Mariners.

[B]

He's Ducks first Ducks baseball. Then he's a fan of his bizarre Madden players. And also whatever the baseball version is where he builds these players that have the proportions of total.

[A]

What's his name? Le Steroid. I think people are gonna know this from Tick Tock Steroid Clark. But anyway, we should all sign. I don't know how many signatures you can fit on a baseball. I love that we could all sign.

[B]

We can't do it until the the season's over because nothing, nothing can be done to that baseball that might change the the Soto Mojo. But once the season is over one way or the other, then a hundred percent we should all sign it. I love that and it will. That's a really good idea. I'll absolutely do it. I'm gonna take it on a tour. I'm gonna bring it to criminals home.

[A]

Can I drink out of it? Yes.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Thank you, baby.

[B]

All right, let's thank some donors. These folks are making TBTL possible. This is 100%.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

Listen. Supported podcasting. No donors, no podcast. And we are so grateful to get to do this for our job. And we're so grateful for folks like Reed Schumann, who's in Lafayette, Colorado.

[A]

Thank you, Reed. Appreciate you. Appreciate it. Also, I am feeling slightly less sheepish. I haven't. I gotta say, I have been apologizing a lot for all the baseball talk so far I haven't received. And this is not an invite to send them. I have not actually received any emails of complaint like sometimes we do in the past. In fact, I've only gotten emails of support from listeners who are saying, we're all in on this with you, and we really appreciate you going, you and Luke having all those conversations about your feelings about it. And we're along for the ride. So I appreciate that kind of support, too. And Reid offers both.

[B]

Thank you, Reed. Thanks to Rena Lopez, who's in McMinnville, Oregon. I know where that is now. Yeah, I didn't used to know where that is, and now I do know where that it is.

[A]

We're all growing. Thank you.

[B]

Yes, we are. We're growing. We're expanding our mental map of the Pacific Northwest, including Portland, Oregon. I have known where Portland is for a long time, and that's also where Lindsey Swanson is.

[A]

I'm sorry, I don't mean to sharpshoot. And I realize that that might be. I believe Portland is in Maine. Portland is in Portland.

[B]

Absolutely right.

[A]

I don't think it's in the Pacific Northwest at all.

[B]

I'd like to visit Portland, Maine, by the way. I hear it is absolutely beautiful. Have you been there? There?

[A]

You know, Luke, I feel like I must have. I've definitely been to Maine. I don't know for sure if I've been to Portland.

[B]

We know you're horny on Maine.

[A]

Did you see what I named the show that day?

[B]

Corny on Maine.

[A]

I got to say, I'm not fishing for compliments. I think that was better than anything I dropped in the text yesterday. I love Corny on Main as a showtime.

[B]

Ferguson as a position player. Was your. Your greatest contribution to the comedy landscape of all time. Thanks, Lindsay. Thanks also to Stacy Moliette, who's in Spanaway, Washington.

[A]

Okay, now I gotta say Spanaway. I love saying it, but I don't think I've been there.

[B]

I feel I could be wrong. I feel like Spanaway is on the road To Mount Rainier.

[A]

I feel like you go.

[B]

That's when I. I don't exactly have synesthesia, but when I think about Spanaway, I think about Mount Rainier.

[A]

Maybe I have been at least through there then, I think.

[B]

Because you've been to Mount Rainier.

[A]

Yes, I definitely visited. Kind of took a. Yeah, you're right. You know what Spanner Way is directly. And I mean Luke. Directly south of Tacoma.

[B]

Oh, okay. Well, then it's not the road to.

[A]

Wait. Yeah, I guess it's not the road to Mount Rainier. Yeah, I guess you would sort of. I don't know how you get to Mount Rainier, but it's definitely not. It's still north of Mount Rainier. So if you're going from Tacoma, you might go through Span. I don't know.

[B]

Possibly.

[A]

Who knows?

[B]

You know, Stacy knows, and she'll get to us on this. Thanks, Stacy. Thanks to Christine Zazula in Johnston, Rhode Island, Rhode Island.

[A]

Now, Rhode Island I don't think I've been to. Which is interesting, because I did spend all that time in New England, but for some reason, I don't think I made my way to Rhode island, another beautiful part of the country.

[B]

Yes, absolutely. That might be. Is that the only state I have not been to? It's possible that Rhode island is the only state I have not visited. I don't have any memory of doing a story there. I know that I've been to Maine because it's usually because I went there for cbs. I know I've been to Maine. I've been to Connecticut. I've been to Vermont.

[A]

Have you been to. Have you been to. I want to. Have you been to South Dakota? Oh, yes.

[B]

Many times I summer in South Dakota and North Dakota.

[A]

You've been to both?

[B]

Yes. In fact, I went for a jog once, and I ended up at the governor's mansion. And accidentally, because I was jogging around the state capitol there, I think I was jogging around in May, maybe Bismarck. And so, yes, because I was in Mandan, north or South Dakota, this is where I'm gonna be. I've been to both of the Dakotas, but I don't think I've been to Rhode Island. So, Christine, next time I'm there, I will look you up. Also thanks to Sumathi Raghavan in Seattle, Washington.

[A]

Now, you were supposed to give. And I don't know if this happened or not. Sumathi was supposed to give Genevieve, I believe, a tour of the Burke Museum, the kind of remodeled Burke muse. And I think she has a connection there. I don't remember it was. And I don't want to dox her too much either. But anyway, thanks for being a friend and a friend of the show.

[B]

Absolutely. Thank you to all of our donors for making TBTL possible. We could not do this without you. All right, Andrew, once again, as is our custom, we didn't get to any of the top stories, even though they are actually for once pretty good top stories. And I want to talk about them with you, but we're going to have to. Maybe we'll push those to tomorrow because the thing about tomorrow is there will not have been a baseball game yet. So we will not be reacting to a game that we saw a Mariners game. And I feel like we've been pretty today. We spend a fair amount of time on the, you know, what are we going to be doing when we watch the game tomorrow? So unless a different four piece horn group puts out a new version of the Mariners, you know, TV hype song, I don't think that we're probably going to need to talk about the Mariners too much tomorrow. So there we can bring up the top stories and get to them.

[A]

And if they do, the name of the band should be Horns on Main.

[B]

Horny on Maine.

[A]

That'd be a great.

[B]

Horns on Main is better.

[A]

You're right.

[B]

I don't know. Horny on Main just becomes the thing.

[A]

It does become the thing that they say.

[B]

But the Horns on Maine is better.

[A]

But if you were in sort of a second line group or something like that, you want to call yourself Horny on Main, that would be pretty great.

[B]

That would be pretty dope. Yeah. All right, thanks for listening everybody. We are going to be right back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for all of you. So please, please join us for that. In the meantime, have yourself a great Tuesday and be safe. Take care of yourselves as well. And please remember, no mountain too tall.

[A]

And good luck to all. Power out.