#4583 Rapped Attention

Summary

TBTL: Too Beautiful To Live

Episode #4583: “Rapped Attention”
Release Date: October 24, 2025
Hosts: Luke Burbank and Andrew Walsh

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Brief Overview

On this Friday episode of TBTL, Luke and Andrew usher in the rainy season with trademark banter, discussing Seattle weather moans, umbrella logistics, and weekend plans. The duo delves into everything from local standup comedy guests and karaoke bar politics to internet trends (Blue Sky vs. Twitter), pet costume contests, sports gambling scandals, and the Louvre heist—plus riffing on mob name generators and the etiquette of online avatars. The signature blend of relatable personal narrative, pop culture, and playful comedy is on full display.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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Musical Cold Open: The “Round Ball Rock” Sketch

• (00:01–01:40)
  • A playful, fictional scene featuring “John Tesh” performing the iconic NBA theme “Round Ball Rock,” riffed by Luke and Andrew in character.
  • Light-hearted, sets a goofy, Friday energy.

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Weather, Adult Dilemmas, & Studio Conditions

• (02:16–12:06)
  • Luke laments the onset of dark, rainy weather in the Pacific Northwest, recounting the 4am stress of battening down deck furniture (“Being a grown up means waking up at 4am because the wind is howling and just thinking, ‘God, why didn’t I take the deck furniture in yesterday?’” — Luke, 02:52).
  • Andrew shares his struggle with darkness in the studio—extra ring lights required—and the challenge of connecting on video calls when houses look crypt-like.
  • Extended riffing about needing three umbrellas to manage life between house and studio.
  • The joys and woes of fall, including the little routines that come with rainy seasons.

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Weekend Plans: Pet Costume Contest & Pub Life

• (12:08–22:36)
  • Luke is emceeing a pet costume contest at his partner’s brother’s iconic karaoke bar in Portland. He recounts last year missing out on a Kieran Culkin interview for NPR, only to see Culkin win an Oscar.
  • Andrew and Luke riff about Portland bars, Amendment-themed bar names, karaoke night politics, and generational divides in song choice (“25 year olds…not particularly interested in 49 year old Luke Burbank’s take on the next great karaoke jam” — Luke, 21:20).
  • Plans for this year’s costumes: Becca and Luke going as French characters (“…just an excuse to put a beret on the dog. Gigi.” — Luke, 19:05).
  • Discussion about the potential structure and fairness of pet contests, originality, and participation.

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Pet Ownership: To Adopt or Not to Adopt?

• (23:14–27:38)
  • Andrew and Genevieve’s contemplation of getting a dog—considerations of responsibility, lifestyle, and the perils of falling for adoption photos (“…it’s a dangerous game when you start looking into doggies’ eyes.” — Andrew, 24:43).
  • Debating the merits and challenges of puppies vs. older dogs, and integrating with their cat, Bingo.
  • Luke relays his own canine experiences and the emotional cuteness vs. practical work of raising puppies.

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Discussion Tangents: The Superman/Clark Kent Metanarrative

• (28:02–34:52)
  • Playful discussion about how journalists like Clark Kent would fare in a real newsroom, managing Superman double-duty, and confusion over classic Superman actors (Margot Kidder, Christopher Reeve).
  • Correction section: Luke’s basketball player name mix-up revealed by a listener (Anthony Edwards aka “Ant Man” not the actor Anthony Edwards from “ER”, 35:20).

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Sports Betting & Scandals: Prop Bets and Poker Rings

• (36:33–44:41)
  • Luke breaks down recent sports gambling scandals, focusing on allegations of NBA prop bet manipulation and illegal poker rings involving high-profile figures like Chauncey Billups.
  • Discussion of how prop bets create easier openings for cheating compared to point-shaving.
  • Technological means of poker cheating: X-ray glasses, “chip readers,” and rigged shufflers (“…these games sound so incredibly rigged. It’s wild.” — Luke, 41:45).
  • Comedy riff on organized crime nicknames: “Flappy,” “Black Rob,” “The Wrestler,” “Juice,” and “Albanian Bruce” (42:22).
  • Segue into using a mob name generator for themselves (starts ~58:30).

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Social Media: Twitter vs. Blue Sky

• (50:00–57:45)
  • Luke’s return to Blue Sky for Mariners content during MLB playoffs, spurred by data suggesting Blue Sky has “10x higher engagement” on sports posts versus Twitter (now X).
  • Deliberation over the source and implications of this trend.
  • Critical discussion about avatar etiquette: Should white users have avatars of Black athletes/celebrities? (“…maybe as whites we should just not use…photos of other people as our avatars anyway.” — Andrew, 56:18).
  • Luke relates concerns about people using race-mismatched emoji tones for humor—both agree it’s problematic.

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The Louvre Heist: Fact, Fiction, and a Viral Mystery Man

• (66:34–76:33)
  • Luke summarizes the recent real-life Louvre jewel heist: criminals dressed as workers, using a cherry picker to access the building, then chainsaws to break open cases—“broad daylight while the museum was open” (67:24).
  • Focus on the viral photo of a sharply dressed, fedora-wearing young man at the scene—sparking speculation he’s either an old-school detective or possibly an AI image (“He looks, quote, too good to be real” — Luke reading NYT, 73:07).
  • Internet reactions range from roasting to conspiracy to admiration.
  • Confirmation via the press photographer: He’s a real person, not AI, just an ordinary passerby—a contrast to the police that set off the meme.

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Listener & Community Shout-Outs

• (44:43–50:00)
  • Thanking show donors, riffing on their potential mob-names and regional quirks.
  • Recap of cherished block party/second line wedding experience in New Orleans (46:10).
  • Dog birthday talk (“Rudy turned 82 in dog years!” — 49:01).

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Emails & Voicemails

• (77:02–80:44)
  • Listener “Chris Hayes” (yes, that Chris Hayes) calls in to clarify local transit pronunciation, inspired by a soul Coughing music tangent.
  • Luke hypes Hayes’ own podcast episode on “The War on Cars”—an urbanism movement to reduce auto dominance in US cities, and extols the peace and neighborliness of car-free spaces: “the only thing that makes it a block party is getting the cars off the street”.

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Urban Planning Tangent — “War on Cars”

• (80:44–86:14)
  • Andrew and Luke discuss Seattle’s “safe streets” initiatives, road diets, and the joy of pedestrianized neighborhoods (“…the only thing that’s happened to make it a block party is cars can’t drive on your street” — Luke, 80:24).
  • Luke: “Where do Americans go on vacation? Disneyland, where there’s no cars!”

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World Series/Mariners Blues & Football Fan Trolling

• (86:14–91:58)
  • The two analyze the psychology of sports fandom post-season: Should Mariners fans root for the Blue Jays (Canada) or bask in nostalgia if the Dodgers crush them (“…makes me feel less sad about the Mariners not going…” — Luke, 89:00).
  • Andrew’s only twinge of vengeance: a notorious Toronto “troll” fan’s taunts after Mariners loss.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Umbrella Logistics:
  “I need three umbrellas and a sack of grain—and a scorpion.”
  — Luke (11:47)

• Pet Adoption Dilemma:
  “It’s a dangerous game when you start looking into doggies’ eyes.”
  — Andrew (24:43)

• Avatar Appropriation:
  “I think that white people shouldn’t use avatars of famous Black people.”
  — Andrew (54:47)

• On AI and the Dapper Detective:
  “He looks quote, too good to be real, like the star of an old black and white Hollywood film.”
  — Luke, quoting the NYT (73:07)

• On Block Parties & Cars:
  “The only thing that turns it into a block party is getting the cars off the street.”
  — Luke (80:24)

• Mob Name Generator:
  (Running joke as the hosts generate their own: “Luke Eggman Burbank” and “Andrew Grim Reaper Walsh”) (65:54, 59:08)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:01–01:40 → Cold open “Round Ball Rock” parody
• 02:16–12:06 → Rainy season, adulting & umbrellas
• 12:08–22:36 → Pet costume contest & karaoke bar tales
• 23:14–27:38 → Should Andrew & Genevieve get a dog?
• 28:02–34:52 → Clark Kent/Superman newsroom banter, basketball name mix-up
• 36:33–44:41 → NBA gambling scandal & illegal poker games, mob names
• 44:43–50:00 → Donor thanks, New Orleans wedding story
• 50:00–57:45 → Twitter/X vs. Blue Sky sports community, avatar etiquette
• 66:34–76:33 → Louvre jewel heist & viral “detective” meme
• 77:02–80:44 → Listener calls (Chris Hayes); “War on Cars” podcast plug
• 80:44–86:14 → Safe streets and anti-car urban planning
• 86:14–91:58 → Blue Jays vs. Dodgers, Mariners fandom, Toronto troll fan

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Tone & Style

• Laid-back, playful, and affectionate; packed with tangents, pop culture references, and gentle teasing both between the hosts and directed at themselves.
• Language is casual, warm, and ribbing, with nerdy wordplay and affectionate self-deprecation.

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If you missed this episode, you missed:

• Plans for Portland pet costume glory, and the agony of misplacing an umbrella.
• A live demonstration of the “mob nickname generator.”
• A meditation on the evolution of sports scandal in the age of betting apps.
• Why you probably shouldn't have a Julio Rodriguez avatar if you’re a white Mariners fan.
• Hot takes on AI, baseball trolls, and karaoke generational warfare.
• And yes—what exactly to call DeKalb County and why soul Coughing is still a banger.

Closing Motto:
“No mountain too tall… and good luck to all.” (93:11)

Transcript

[A]

Excuse me, Mr. Lavender.

[B]

John Tesh is here.

[A]

Oh, great.

[B]

Send him in. Okay. Knock, knock. There he is. Mr. Entertainment Tonight. How you guys doing? Hello, everyone. This is my brother right here, Dave Tesh. Pleasure. Pleasure.

[A]

I did not know that you had a brother.

[B]

Oh, yeah. You know, he's not just my brother.

[A]

He's.

[B]

He's also the genius in the family. Meanwhile, I'm blushing. Okay, well, let's see what we got for you. We've written a song that we like to call Round Ball Rock. Now, it started as one of David's poems here, but. But then it just grew into something bigger than both of us could ever imagine. It's me on keys and Dave singing. Can you believe this is our job?

[A]

All right, fire away.

[B]

All right. Ready to do this? Yes, I am. All right.

[A]

2, 3, 4.

[B]

Ba, ba ba ba ba, basketball. Gimme, gimme, gimme the ball because I'm going to dunk it. Ba ba ba ba ba, basketball. Give me, give me, give me the ball because I'm gonna duck out. Whoo. All right, now that's how you do it, David. It's just getting hot. You are in such good voice today, buddy. Thank you, brother. Wow.

[A]

I mean, that was great, guys. But you know what I was wondering? Is there any way we can hear it again, but, you know, with the lyrics separated out?

[B]

Huh? Really? Okay. That's weird.

[A]

Are you okay with that?

[B]

If you are, I guess. Okay, yeah, sure.

[A]

We can do that.

[B]

All right, Here we go.

[A]

2, 3, 4.

[B]

Ba, ba ba ba ba, basketball. Okay, no, no, stop.

[A]

I'm sorry, guys. I'm sorry.

[B]

Stop that. I think we probably.

[A]

We weren't clear. We actually meant. Could we hear it with just the music? Right?

[B]

Oh, I defer to you My gut.

[A]

Is no.

[B]

TBTM Guess what day it is Guess what day it is It's Friday, Friday Gonna get down on Friday Everybody's looking forward to the weekend I saw a woman psychiatrist and she said it was ocd.

[A]

One cool dude.

[B]

And she understands the way I think right now and everything's cool, Everything's copacetic Everybody's happy. And I'm happy, too, sweetie. Have a good show. What you do is so important.

[A]

All right. Hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Friday edition of TBT all, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. It's the ship that made the Kessel.

[B]

Run in less than 12 parsecs.

[A]

My name's Luke Furbank. I am your host.

[B]

You're like the Daniel Day Lewis of.

[A]

Only doing one thing. Coming to you from The Madrona Hill studio perched high above the mighty Columbia, where, boy, it is dark.

[B]

Stay in my house if you're dark sided.

[A]

And of course, very, very wet. Didn't know you like to get wet though. The atmospheric river has arrived and had to do something very sad today. I had to batten down the hatches. I had to. Being a grown up means waking up at 4am because the wind is howling and just thinking, God, why didn't I take the deck furniture in yesterday? Why didn't I check the weather and then get all that stuff taken care of? Because it's time to now put that away for the rest of the season. What makes people all over America break.

[B]

Down and cry like this?

[A]

It's all right though. We're gonna get through it together. My friends. Here on episode 4583 in a collector series, let the fun begin. Two stories about the Internet. One, a mysterious young man whose photo near the Louvre has people wondering, is he a detective trying to solve the robbery? Is he part of the heist? Or is he AI? And then another Internet story. It's called the Internet and it's a.

[B]

Fresh new way to check out sites.

[A]

Like buy clothing and surf music. Is Blue sky the new Blue Sky? I don't know. We'll talk about that. Oh, and we're going to talk to this guy. He's the longest running co bro of the show. 2 Bros. Maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships. He's Andrew Welsh and he's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

[B]

Good morning, Luke. How you doing?

[A]

I am well, other than making peace with the fact that we are getting into the bad weather portion of our lives for the next many months, I'm doing really well on this Friday morning. How are you?

[B]

I am good. I wanted to ask you a question. Yeah, I was gonna do it before the show, but we'll do it now. Are you familiar with a comedian here in Seattle named Phil Burton?

[A]

Does not ring a bell.

[B]

I only ask because you're a little bit more tapped into that. Especially since you're booking folks for LiveWIRE and comedians, musicians, if I understand it correctly, your show has a theme and then you invite a bunch of musicians, poets, writers to explore variations on that theme.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Is that what LifeWire is all about? That's what I thought.

[A]

That's what we've been. Each week on our show, we pick a theme.

[B]

I know. I messed that up too. Anyway, I was on KUOW's podcast, their weekly kind of Friday roundup. It's called Seattle now. I always have to think about that. It's not Seattle today. Right. It's Seattle now.

[A]

I think it's.

[B]

And Seattle Lookout. It's Seattle.

[A]

Look out, look out, look out, it's Seattle. What's that.

[B]

What's that song from the 60s where they say, look out, look out, look out, look out.

[A]

That's.

[B]

It's about a leader of the pack. The leader of the pack, yes.

[A]

I felt so helpless. What could I do?

[B]

Oh, that's got to be Phil Spector, right? Speaking of Phil, it's gotta be, boy, that big old.

[A]

That big sound of those, like. I don't know, is that like a timpani or a big. That kind of wall and sound?

[B]

Yes. It's also, though, very sparse in places, which gives it that really spooky feeling, kind of. I remember as a kid being just wrapped by that song. I don't know if I use that word right, but, you know, it doesn't.

[A]

Look like it had. I don't think Phil Spector had anything to do with it.

[B]

Okay. But anyway. Well, back to philosopher. I don't have a real power out for this. I was just curious if you were familiar with him, because we had a lot of fun recording that podcast yester. It's. You know, usually it's kind of a news roundup, but we didn't really get into any kind of serious news at all. And he was a really funny guy and laughed really hard. I don't know how much. I don't know how much they're gonna leave in. I think, like, we record for like 40 minutes and they cut it down to like 20ish or something. So a lot of it. So I don't know if my crack cocaine joke is gonna make it in there. I hope it does, but I certainly. I'm not even joking. I hope it makes it in there. But it was one of the. I'm not joking, I said, but I guess.

[A]

Could you give us a little preview?

[B]

I feel like that would kind of ruin the joke. It wasn't something I planned on saying. Somebody asked me something and my response was crack cocaine. And we all laughed, but we all laughed in a way that I thought, you're cutting this out. I know you're not letting me make this joke, but maybe they will. I don't know. We'll find out. But anyway, it was a really good time. I'm not trying to overly promote it, but yeah, that was. We record yesterday and then it posts today that Seattle now podcast. And I'm Just, I'm a fan of. I'm a fan of Phil, so.

[A]

Phil, excellent. Well, thank you for putting him on our radar, because you're right. We. We do live wire in the Pacific Northwest, and we can always use more talented folks from the area. Speaking of which, we'll be at Benaroya Hall. I think it's December 5th. I think we'll be there on the 5th. I can't tell you exactly who's on the show. Probably Phil Burton.

[B]

Probably everybody.

[A]

Come on out.

[B]

I have not. I have not seen Phil Burton perform. So, you know, you still want to do your vetting, obviously.

[A]

I don't know. Vetting cup.

[B]

That sounds like.

[A]

Are you excited for the vetting?

[B]

I am excited for the vetting cup, absolutely.

[A]

Was it super windy at your house overnight, or is that just down here, high above the mighty Columbia?

[B]

Not that I noticed. I am dealing with the darkness today. As you mentioned, it's rainy and very dark outside my window. I. I even noticed when I turned on all my lights in this room because we do. We do put video cameras on us for this recording, even though we don't post the whole show online as video. So I have a couple of ring lights in here and stuff. And in the summertime, they don't have to work that hard, but I can really feel them working today. It was really dark when I came in here. We were talking about studio was. It looked like you were joining me from the crypt. When I dialed up, that was. It didn't look bad, by the way. It looked really cool.

[A]

Dark in here because I'm just sitting inside of a rain cloud. I'm also. I think my house is maybe at, I want to say, like 500ft of elevation. I'm not sure how high off of the river I am, but I think sometimes it's even more pronounced here because I'm kind of closer to the. Where the clouds are. And so it just gets. I get really, really kind of socked in. And yeah, I really did this at about 4, I had my bedroom window kind of open to get a little fresh air with Terry Gross. And I'm Dave Davies in for Terry Gross.

[B]

Oh, is that the show where you create a theme? What is the verb?

[A]

He doesn't come to them. Each week on our show, we pick a theme. This week's theme, Dave Davies filling in for me. And I just heard this. Just the wind just, like, shrieking. And again, I think some of that is because it's pronounced up here where I am, because I'm on kind of on the edge of this hill. There are some houses near me, but not in the way your neighborhood is set up where you've kind of got the protection. Although you guys are on a corner as well. Don't Dox Andrew and Genevieve and Bingo, please. But like there's just some. My house is kind of very exposed to the elements and all I could think when. So I basically didn't get any good sleep after 4am because the wind was howling and all I could think of. I could just picture the cushions on my outdoor deck chairs just tumbling down the hill and into the mighty Columbia. And it was literally all I could think about. But I also didn't want to get out of bed and deal with it. So instead I just stayed in bed worried about it fitfully like sleeping non sleeping. Just imagining all of the different outdoor furniture that I should have taken in a couple of weeks ago. But you know, we kept getting these nice days and I just kept not. You know that is a big changing of the seasons around here for me is like getting all of that stuff off of the deck. And I've got some other stuff set up kind of on a patio out here. I've got like an umbrella, you know, one of those kind of, you know that goes in the middle of a table to have a little nice lunch in the shade.

[B]

The whole point of those is that the wind catches them and blows them down the street or down the beach. Right. You have to block them. Yes.

[A]

And I had one. I had kind of an expensive one that I bought a couple of years ago that was closed. Right. The umbrella was not open and it was so windy that it opened the umbrella and Mary Poppins out of it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. And so I got a new umbrella. But I'm not taking that chance. Mama didn't raise no fool.

[B]

Can I make a recommendation for the new umbrella? I don't know how you plan on storing it but get yourself like a little, little carry on size bag and it looks like it won't hold the full umbrella. But just take the umbrella and just put it down there pole first and just start feeding it in the bag. My guess is the whole thing will end up fitting right in there. It's not going to look like it's going to fit. I bet you it will. Just give it a shot. Okay.

[A]

Speaking of umbrellas, I. We also are now at the place in the season where I have to use an umbrella to go between my house and the Madrona Hill studio. And I have a system. I have. I have an umbrella in each place. I have an umbrella here and I have umbrella down in the house. And they are hanging by the respective doors. And when I. It's like that, you know, crossing guard thing where you get to an intersection, it's got a flag you can take because it's not that far between my house and the studio. But it's far enough that when it is absolutely just pouring rain like it was this morning, it's actually a significant amount of rain that gets on me between the house and the studio.

[B]

I'm not joking. I think you need three umbrellas. We've talked about this before. Because there could be a chance.

[A]

And I need one sack. I need a sack of grains. Three umbrellas and a scorpion.

[B]

Yeah, I think that. Yeah, because you're gonna end up with two umbrellas in one place on a day where the rain has paused. And then you're gonna be.

[A]

Right, that's the danger.

[B]

Yeah, you need three.

[A]

Is a changing weather pattern. But other than that, I'm. Like I said, I'm doing pretty well today. Hey, do you have any big weekend plans?

[B]

Big weekend. The biggest one I've ever had. Big weekend. Well, I believe my weekend already began. And it began with me feeling insecure about using the word wrapped before I said that song had me rapped as a child, the leader of the pact. And then I got insecure about it and so I wrapped it up.

[A]

Attention R A P T. I just.

[B]

Wasn'T sure if I used it properly, like kind of with the proper syntax. So I looked it up and the good news is, yes, I did use it correctly. But check this out. The automatic dictionary dot com. You know the. The. The definition that pops up immediately when you Google it. Yeah, it uses my name in the example. It freaked me out, Luke. It feels like it's spooking season, like you like to say. So when you look it up, it says rapt adjective. Completely fascinated by one. By what one is seeing or hearing. And that's exactly what I was talking about. But then it says as an example, wrapped. Andrew looked at her. Wrapped.

[A]

That's. That's eerie.

[B]

Creeped me out a little bit. I. There's no way. It's like my computer knows my name. Right.

[A]

Well, let me say it.

[B]

No, you look up a definition and see if it puts your name in it.

[A]

Okay, let's see. What's another Skurrilous?

[B]

Okay, so do you want me to.

[A]

The things you're about to hear about me next week, Andrew, I would like to get ahead of them. And say those are scurrilous.

[B]

So it sounds like you do have big weekend plans, which we'll get to in a moment. Let's see. The example here is a scurrilous attack on his integrity. It just says his, not Luke's integrity or Andrew's integrity. So that's an example. This weekend.

[A]

Is it me, or are these pronunciations getting kind of sexual?

[B]

Oh, listen to this.

[A]

Listen to this little breathy read of scurrilous. Scurrilous. I feel like there's a little extra. There's a little extra something on that for a word, like scurrilous. I feel like they were giving a little extra sauce.

[B]

Interesting. Maybe it just has to do with your mood, Luke. I'm not exactly sure. I wasn't.

[A]

I am. My big weekend plans are. I am gonna help emcee a pet costume contest, if you want to know how my career is going to.

[B]

Did you do that last year? I did, yeah.

[A]

It's actually becca's Brother's Bar, 21st Avenue in Portland. And. And I did it last year, actually. You know what's funny? I think last year I did it instead of doing that profile of Kieran Culkin.

[B]

Oh, yeah, that's right.

[A]

I had been traveling a ton, and I was like, I'm gonna have some boundaries, and I'm gonna actually. And they were like, well, could you come out on Saturday and interview this guy? And I was like, no, I'm emceeing a pet costume contest. And then, of course, it was like, he ends up winning the Oscar. And it was like, well, that probably would have been a good story for me.

[B]

And even without the Oscar, you loved that movie that it was for. You hadn't seen it.

[A]

A real pain.

[B]

A real pain. Yeah. Hey, I have a quick question for you before we get into the details of the pet contest. You said this is at a bar that's on 21st.

[A]

Yeah, 21st Avenue in Portland.

[B]

See, that would have been perfect. Do we know Beck? I know you know it, but do we say Becca's brother's name?

[A]

Sure we can. His name is Scott.

[B]

So that would have been perfect. It could have been Scott's 21st amendment, because the 21st amendment. Didn't that repeal prohibition?

[A]

Does it go that high?

[B]

I think that's one that repealed prohibition. Right. So that was. That's why it would be perfect, because you mentioned you used to go to a bar called Jackie's Fifth Amendment. Yes. Which is. That's. Don't incriminate yourself, I think. Or like it's not saying don't incriminate yourself and say you don't have to.

[A]

Yeah. Fifth Amendment is pleading the fifth right.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Which is still the right to not have an unreasonable search and seizure.

[B]

Probably.

[A]

Is that the fourth?

[B]

Don't quiz me, but that sounds right.

[A]

I don't hear much about the second.

[B]

I don't know what. I think that's freedom of speech. I think, I think the second amendment is you have the right to let your freak flag fly.

[A]

Now that's an amendment I can get behind.

[B]

Oh, absolutely. Anyway, it would be interesting if he changed it to Scott's. Is it Scott's 21st amendment? Just throw that out.

[A]

21St amendment. We'll see if he wants to. I mean, I think what happened was when he bought the bar, I think it was already called that 21st Avenue. And so he then. I think they were sticking with it for sort of consistency.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

But what they had, what they've turned it into is, well, it's a beloved neighborhood bar. And it is also, I mean, the irony of me being now kind of in the family of someone who owns what is without a doubt the karaoke bar in Portland, like it's legend. Like it constantly, every year it wins the like, you know, Willamette Weeks best of karaoke bars. Which is funny because if you could have told 25 year old Luke that I was going to be basically related to someone who's running and that I have done karaoke there two times and probably never will again because first of all, it's always a tremendous weight because it's so popular. Also guess what, Andrew, Guess what? The who. The Clientele is there, 25 year olds. And guess what? They're not particularly interested in 49 year old Luke Burbank's take on the next great karaoke jam. Yeah, like it's, it's like I don't under. I'm. I find it interesting when I'm there to see what songs light up the room because they're rarely the songs that I would expect. There's kind of a mix of songs that I think of as relatively current that are total nostalgia plays for these 25 year olds.

[B]

Right. Yeah.

[A]

You know, and then, and then new songs that maybe I don't like. Of course, Mr. Bright side, always coming out of my cage and I'm feeling just fine or whatever that guy says. But yeah, like I, I think, I think my, my swan song there was when Scott and I did an Indigo Girl song and I think it was closer to fine and this is before the Barbie movie. Kind of like sort of sort of, you know, put that song back in the pop culture. I find it so interesting that, like, I have a whole theory about how that Closer to Fine got into the Barbie movie, and it's just because of Greta Gerwig's lived experience. Like, I totally see Greta Gerwig being a person of the age where her liberal parents were probably playing the Indigo Girls in the Volvo. And so it became part of the soundtrack of her life, much in the way that the soundtrack of my daughter Addie's life. And then, you know, many years go by, and then when she's looking for a song to put in her movie, she goes with the Indigo Girls. And then all these people are, like, kind of finding out about that music. But Scott and I did the Indigo Girls, and it went poorly. And we also cut to the front of the line because he owns the bar, which is a tremendously bad look.

[B]

Well, wait till I get down there and do Leader of the Pack. And they're gonna be hanging on my. They're gonna be wrapped. They will be.

[A]

So Andrew had the crowd wrapped.

[B]

In fact, maybe I will. Maybe I'll rap Leader of the pack, kind of give my own spin up.

[A]

Look out, look out, look out, look out.

[B]

That's right. Same lyrics. Just a little bit more tuned on it. I love it.

[A]

Stank on it, my friend.

[B]

Yes, indeed.

[A]

Yes. So here's what we're dressing up as. So last year, we dressed up as Ben and Jerry. I was Benjamin Franklin. I just reused my Ben Franklin costume from the Philadelphia show. And Becca was Jerry Blank from Strangers with Candy. I was very proud of the creativity of that costume pairing. And I think this year, we're just going as, like, French something. And it's just an excuse to put, like, a beret on the dog. Gigi. It's really just because the dog is a. Is a standard poodle, which has strong kind of French vibrations, and it's just an excuse to make the dog look cute. And then I think Becca's gonna be kind of a, you know, some sort of cute French appearing person. And I'm gonna be like. I'm kind of gonna go French mod guy from the 60s. So, like, kind of too small black suit, partially smoked cigarette, thin black tie, and a kind of devil may care attitude.

[B]

I don't want to. This is risky business for me, and I don't want to get into.

[A]

Are you going as Tom Cruise from Risky Business?

[B]

Yes. I don't want to get into oversized.

[A]

Collar Shirt, no pants, Ray bans your.

[B]

Love life or whatever. But have you considered asking Becca if she wants to dress up like the person who says skirless, scurrilous. Oh, with that.

[A]

Yeah, I'll ask help in any way that did something.

[B]

Are you comfortable asking for something like that?

[A]

I'm very comfortable asking for what I need.

[B]

Good. You're a modern man.

[A]

I am an absolutely modern man.

[B]

Anyway, so tell me more about these dogs. I don't remember too much about. I'm sorry, did you. Is it dogs only or is it pets? Is it all pets?

[A]

You know, I think you could bring it's pets, but I think it ends up being mostly dogs. Just, you know, think about the other pets that you. I'm trying to remember last year if there were other. If there were non dogs there. I don't know. Think so. I mean, again, I think it's open to cats and guinea pigs and the like, but it ends up mostly being dogs that are very adorable. I'm actually glad I'm not judging it because I actually don't want that kind of pressure. I don't want the smoke.

[B]

You did do that last year though. Did you now?

[A]

I think I emceed it last year. I don't think I've ever. I don't think I've ever judged it. And so basically my job is to tap dance as people are walking their dog in kind of a loop so that everybody can. And then the judges are there carefully scoring. And it's interesting. They take it pretty seriously, the judges do, which I kind of like.

[B]

Yeah. And they're just judging the costumes, not the dog's behavior. This isn't a dog show situation.

[A]

No, it's not a dog show. It is purely. And I think it might have to do actually with the dog and the humans costumes. Oh, I think it has to do with the pack. It's a package deal. Maybe. I don't know.

[B]

That's interesting.

[A]

It was a whole entire year ago that I did this. How can I be expected to remember any of it?

[B]

Interesting. And do you have. Now I'm putting you on the spot after what you just said, but do you have any recollection of who might have won last year or rose to the top of the top of the class? I'm wondering if it's. If they. I wonder if the. If they tend to lean hoards, big dogs winning most of the time, or small dogs.

[A]

I don't think that it has to do with the size. I think it's, you know, I Think it's, it's, it's just based on, I don't know, whatever the judges, whatever impresses the judges about the, about the probably originality. I hope originality matters. And then, you know, the other thing we're going to do on this, it's.

[B]

All about who you sniff. Really though, Luke.

[A]

And then over here you've got nepotism. There's somebody, I forget where that's from. There's somebody describes him as like all about. It's all about who knows who. And then over here you've got nepotism. It might be from one of those Christopher Guest type of films. Sunday, we're going to Halloween Pops at the symphony. It's going to be. We're going to see some orchestral production of scary songs.

[B]

Interesting. You're doing a lot of front loading of your Halloween festivities because of course, Halloween itself falls on Friday next week. Are you doing anything? Are we doing anything on tbtl? Halloween related?

[A]

I hope so. I thought I heard you were running a pet dress up costume contest at your house.

[B]

It's a way to try to dog nap all of the neighborhood dogs so that I can have that validation every time I come home. Just have a hundred dollars check in.

[A]

With your neighbors on that.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. By the way, I saw one of my neighbors yesterday and she thanked us for watching the dogs and we had a very quick but very sweet interaction. And I was totally reminded of why I like those guys. And so that was kind of interesting.

[A]

Okay, so beef squashed.

[B]

Yeah. We didn't like really chat about anything substantial. I just said, you know, we mentioned how much love their dogs and that we're now thinking, you know, Genevieve's been, you know, like going through looking at a lot of dog pictures. It's tough because we don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We, you know, we have a trip planned in March. We definitely don't want to adopt a dog before that. If we even do definitely want to adopt a dog. Which is still a conversation, but once you get to the phase, you definitely.

[A]

Want to adopt it.

[B]

Well, the one thing is, Veeves and I met for like sort of a happy hour drink the other night. And I almost like, I had this nagging sort of feeling. And I was gonna turn to her and be like, well, we should get back. And I was like, oh, we don't have to. We're not responsible for dogs right now. And I had this moment of. And I can't explain to you how fleeting this whole emotional journey was. It was a split Second. But for a second, I was like, oh, we gotta get. Oh, we don't have to get back. Cause Bingo's fine. You know what I mean? We'll give Bingo some kibble when we get home. And it was a sense of freedom that I mentioned to Genevieve. She's like, yeah, that's just something that we definitely want to talk about. So we're leaning. I think we're leaning towards it. And once you start looking at photos on your phone and Genevieve's been like, kind of like using all the searches to like, filter what we need, which is, you know, not a super new puppy. A dog that has a proven track record with cats. It's a weird way of putting it. Sounds like a tire company. We have a proven track record with cats. But honestly, like, the thing is. And I told Viz, this is a dangerous game. She's like, well, we gotta start having the conversations early. And I said, I know, but it's also a dangerous game when you start looking into doggies eyes. And you're looking. Because then you're just like, oh, well, yes, we have to adopt every dog you showed me tonight so far. And we'll figure it out later.

[A]

I mean, couple things. One, just remember when you get your dog and when your dog is, you know, growed up, or maybe you'll get a dog that's already growed up or whatever, you will likely hit a point where you can still live your life and have fun and the dog will be fine. Like, I think this. I mean, you know, this. I'm not telling you anything, but the circumstances under which you were there was intense dog responsibility the last week for you. And the good news is, I think that there's a world where you and Genevieve can have an awesome dog you love and also an awesome drink that you love.

[B]

Yeah. And also, it's not like I don't. It's not like, you know, of all the people in the world to say, I don't want it to interfere with my lifestyle. It's like, pretty galling because I'm the person who says, I don't even get out all that much anyway. So, I mean, obviously, you know what.

[A]

I don't like about that? This is another excuse for you to not do stuff.

[B]

Right. But I built it. But anyway. But there is just still sort of. I mean, everybody knows that the responsibility of taking care of a dog is more than a cat. A cat is going to be more independent and you can. Is easier to feed. You have to get home to take them out. Like there's no, there's no doubt. There's no arguing that. And so it's a little bit more responsibility. But we are looking at, we're looking at dogs who, I don't think we want to adopt anything. Any dog that's probably younger than a year old. We want a little bit of maturity there. And again, some opportunity to know that the dog had or, well, that was the original plan going into this. But then thinking, like a more mature dog that already has some experience with cats. But then Genevieve's doing some more reading and saying, actually maybe if you integrate a puppy and a cat together early on, that is actually maybe the best way to do it. But then, then you're training a puppy, and training puppies is hard. So fun is so hard.

[A]

So fun.

[B]

Yeah. So we'll see.

[A]

I mean, I have to say, like, like, I don't know. I mean, let's see. So Flea was a puppy, Momo was not a puppy, and then Rudy was a puppy. So I guess I've had experience with two puppies. And I mean, I don't know, maybe I just got lucky with those two dogs when they were younger, but I don't remember it being like a living nightmare at all. I mean, obviously there's, it's time intensive and there's some accidents and things like that, but I, I, I, the cuteness factor, I mean, that, just that, that you, you want to hang out with them all the time because they're so stinking cute.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. So, yeah, I somehow, I don't know how this happened, but, like, I was looking at one of my local newspapers out here the other day, and I, I got Zergnet into, like, a dog adoption thing. I'm not trying to get a dog. I'm not actively looking, but it was just one of those things where some really buff dogs.

[B]

Look at this. Where's this buff dog gone today?

[A]

It was like, it was weird. It was like a really old dog, but he was buff and hot. You know that guy I'm talking about really hot old buff guy. Right. It's like, what is this even a freaking ad for?

[B]

Yeah. What isn't an ad?

[A]

I don't know, because I don't dare click on it, but it's like, I see that guy a lot.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But, you know, it's one of those things where in the weird digital world that we live in, I'm scrolling around the daily News or whatever, which, again, is so funny. It's such a general name for the newspaper of Longview, Washington, but anyways. But I end up on. Somehow it's like, oh, this is a dog that's up for adoption. And, of course, it was a very cute dog, and I somehow clicked on it. And then I'm holding off a sneeze, by the way, which is why I'm.

[B]

I have an observation I can throw out here if you want to kind of take some time to breathe through your nose and get a sneeze going. I was going to say that. I did.

[A]

I just got it out.

[B]

Oh, you got it out. Well, I will finish this thought. I'll make it quick. The. The Daily News makes me think that any reporter who works there. Luke. Might also be a superhero in disguise. Just so you know.

[A]

Right. Totally. Sounds like. Like a. I guess it's a real newspaper. Right? Because the Daily Planet is a real paper, but it is staffed by at least one superhero.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And we know a very grumpy boss.

[B]

I mean, there might be a whole nother perspective, like, that might be a whole bunch of superheroes working there. We only know the one story.

[A]

Also, think about being one of the other employees of the Daily Planet, and you're like, we are really, honestly picking up a lot of slack for Clark.

[B]

Oh, I thought you were gonna say we're really leaning into this one Superman story. Like, it is a phenomenon and it's worth covering. But, like, there's so much stuff going on in City Hall. There's, like, some important stuff going on. And all front page every day is, superman does this, Superman does that.

[A]

I was thinking more like, it's like, we need, like.

[B]

Okay. Oh, shit.

[A]

Okay. Superman is fighting Lex Luthor again. Clark. Where's Clark? He's supposed to be covering this. Is he at lunch? He's gone again. And then it's like, Lois Lane or whomever else. It's like, just think about the experience of working with Clark Kent and how disappointing that would be at a certain point, how often he's missing.

[B]

But you know that he's going to come back with the story at the end anyway. With the quotes from Superman, though.

[A]

So, like, does he do that, though?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I think that he's got access to that part of Superman because I remember in one of the movies, and it's a. It's a. It's one of the rough movies. It might be like, Superman 4 or something like that. Oh, I'm going to mess this up. I know it's part of the Marvel Universe, John, but by the way, I.

[A]

Was wrong about the basketball player. His name is. I Don't know.

[B]

I don't know you. I saw a correction from John on some basketball stuff today. I didn't understand any of it and I didn't know what it referred to. You don't care to find out? I do not care to find out. But I do believe that there's like this. There's this conversation between Lois, Lyn and Clark. Just like in a private moment, Superman and Lois. I'm pretty sure this is the. This is Margot Kidder and. Oh.

[A]

Oh. So, okay, see, OG Yeah.

[B]

Why can't I think of Superman's name? Christopher. Christopher Reeve. Weird that I had Margot Kidder dialed up, but not Christopher Reeve. Honestly, what is going on there? But anyway, they're in a. You know, they're in like her apartment or something and she's like, boy, you know, you always get all these quotes. Or she was somehow criticizing him. She knew that he was Superman at this point and she said, well, then let me interview Superman right now. And so he, still looking like Clark Kent, sits down for an interview, but then it gets a little hot under the collar. Honestly, she keeps pushing him on these things and kind of. Is this a. I think it's from the OG series, but I could be misremembering that. But anyway, so I do think there's this understanding that Clark Kent is not only kind of disappearing on the scene when all the action is going down, but I think at the end of the day he's coming back with a lot of quotes and stuff from Superman because he's like the source. Or Superman is good at least. Well, that's the source.

[A]

Then that actually justifies kind of his, you know, the fact that he's. Exactly. That he's generally missing in action. But as long as he's coming back with the quotes, then I'm into that. Anyway, I'm on the Daily News and then I'm on this buff dog website.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. And then like, don't even. What I would say is, if you're not. If you're not at a place in your life where you want to adopt a dog, do not under any circumstances click on anything related to dog adoption. Because I went down. And by the way, these dogs were in like New Jersey. New Jersey. Like, because of the weirdness of how the Internet works, like, it wasn't they.

[B]

All cigars for some reason? All the dogs were half a cigar. Trying to make it look fake.

[A]

That's just a melding of various cigar related humor. That's the driving crooner meets a dog. From New Jersey meets.

[B]

I can't find a way to monetize.

[A]

It's simply too good. But like, so maybe the first dog was local, but then it suddenly I'm looking at like, I'm looking at dogs that are from New Jersey and other Texas and I'm. And I'm literally thinking like, well, could I fly there and fly the dog back? And then I'm like, this just makes no sense. But I'm like, but what if I lose all my jobs? Then I don't have anything to do.

[B]

I could do this.

[A]

Like, I go completely crazy sometimes where I'm like, like I'm. I'm not making concrete plans, but I'm thinking about ways in which I could maybe personally escort one of these dogs back from across the country.

[B]

Are you now getting a lot of like puppy related ads across all of your platforms now, like algorithm?

[A]

No, surprisingly, it hasn't happened yet. From that, what I am getting is a lot of boot related content on my Instagram because I'm trying to kind of expand my footwear.

[B]

Luke, I have made the big. I was making fun of John for criticizing me for always messing up the DC Marvel thing. And I just made.

[A]

Do you owe our.

[B]

It not only was it not, was it not. It was not an OG movie. It was literally the latest Superman movie. David, I was like, why was I watching Superman 4 recently? Because I do. I remember I was watching Parts of Superman 4 A couple of thumbs ago when we were in your neck of the woods. And I thought that I saw this scene from a classic movie. It is definitely not Margot Kidder, I'll tell you that much right now. This is the latest Superman movie that I would quoting as being from the rough Superman 4. I have very mixed feelings, by the way, about the latest Superman movie. We don't have to get into it.

[A]

Really.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You were excited about it because you're a big. Is it James Gunn?

[B]

And I wouldn't say I'm a big James Gunn fan, but there were things that I had seen that I really liked and I trust him to take over like a superhero franchise, you know, because otherwise I'd have no interest in a Superman movie. And I thought it was. I thought it was okay, but missed the mark on a lot of things too.

[A]

But. And also it clearly made an impression on you.

[B]

Yeah, right. I just love that I got shir. I like saying. Listen, I think I know what I'm talking about here. It was Superman 4 and I saw it in 1983. No, I saw it like two months ago and it was none of the people I said.

[A]

I just want to say that I. Yesterday, speaking of corrections from our good friend and colleague John Sklaroff, I was mistaken about the Timberwolves player who was beating the. The Portland Trailblazers on our home court and like celebrating at the end in this very triumphant way. That player is actually named Anthony Edwards, aka Ant Man. I think they should call him Dr. Green. I think that would be a sick name because that's the name.

[B]

Is that er.

[A]

Yes, that's Anthony Edwards of ER. I think his name is Dr. Green.

[B]

Basically called him Goose.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. There you go. Even better, they should call him Goose. I mean, Greed. The fact that we're not talking about the fact that he has the same name as Dr. Greed, aka I like.

[B]

Dr. Green better because it's more obscure like most. And they're people would kind of get Goose.

[A]

But I love that they're extremely different fellers in the world, let's just say. But hey, speaking of, speaking of that whole basketball kind of, I guess you could say, scandal, alleged scandal that's going on, that's really, really. That story has really become kind of the dominant news story of this week. And it's weird because it's like on the one hand you've got, you know, Cash Patel, noted podcaster and chief of the FBI, who I have very little faith in the things that he brings to the table and the investigations that he's heading and the priorities of the current version of the FBI. But also the story is quite intriguing. What I'm really kind of getting into right now is just the nicknames involved. In particular, the Chauncey Billups side of this whole thing.

[B]

So that's the poker scandal, right?

[A]

That's the poker scandal, which for people that aren't up to speed on this, there's sort of2. There's two scandals that are happening. One of them is a player named Terry Rozier, who I think was on the Heat at the time, or I can't remember what team he was on, but basically the allegation is that he told his friends to bet on the under. In other words, to bet on him having less statistics like less points scored, etc. Than he normally would. And then in the game that he told them to do that, he took himself out complaining of foot pain because there are all these prop bets not to get too into the weeds on the gambling. But the big issue, the thing that, the reason I've always thought that sports gambling is actually a harder thing, like by that, I mean the idea of fixing like a basketball game or a football game game. Point shaving, they used to call it. The reason that I've always thought that actually that was tougher than people thought and wasn't a huge threat was because it's actually kind of hard for one person to affect the point spread unless they happen to be in on the thing and they're like at the free throw line at late in the game and it's hovering around where the line is, and then they miss on purpose. Like a lot has to kind of break right for one player to be able to personally change the point, you know, the outcome of the game. So that's why I was always like, I just don't see that happening unless you got the whole team on board. And they were like doing some Globetrotter where they're all like, you know, somebody brings a bowl of like a bucket of popcorn, but. Or water, but then they throw it. It's confetti.

[B]

Why is that music playing?

[A]

Exactly. Sweet Georgia Brown is playing some middle.

[B]

Of a Heat game.

[A]

But the thing is, you've got all these things called prop bets. And the prop bets are where it gets crazy because one player, I mean, one of the prop bets is, how many points is this player going to get in this quarter? Yeah, that's a prop bet. Well, that's very, very easy for one player to impact, as is the allegation against this Terry Rossier guy. And like, I mean, the one thing I'll say is like, and this is something I think a lot of people are probably saying online, like, how unshocked are we that the fact that sports gambling has absolutely taken over all of the sports in terms of the broadcast rights to the sports, all of the ads that play when we were watching, when the Mariners were in the alcs, literally, like Fox. Oh, by the way, I absolutely detest FS1, as a baseball broadcast entity. Two things. One, the fact that they literally, like, here's the parlay. Did you notice that, like the TV broadcast would start with their branded. Whatever it was, FanDuel or one of those. Those betting sites, like the announcers are saying, here's the. Three, here's the parlay for today. Like the announcers.

[B]

No, I did not see that. I didn't watch much of the pre games. I saw a couple of, like the, you know, them. Each person making their picks or whatever, but I didn't see that branded content.

[A]

The other thing I hated was how. How subtle they made the strike zone box.

[B]

Yes, thank You. I thought because so much confusion. I thought maybe it was because I was using some extra legal feeds that maybe it was bad.

[A]

That's a decision that they made. And the pro. And so then, remember I told you I was watching some of the games on hbo, like the Dodgers, brewers games. Those ones had the normal strike box. Yeah. An illuminated white rectangle box that's very easy to see when the ball makes contact or not. FS1 decided to go with the like less is more approach and didn't play it either.

[B]

The way like root sports will be like, look at, you know, you can see like, well, this was called a strike. And then do like an approach, a 3D graphic of exactly where the ball landed. They were, they were never showing it. They were never going back and showing whether or not it was a good.

[A]

Super frustrating. But again, the idea that like sports, you know, betting websites have absolutely taken over the funding of all of these. Again, it's the media side of it, but every single ad seems like it's for betting. And then they've just, it's just so integrated. And then it's like, are we shocked that we're starting to get stories like this about Terry Rogier? But on the other side, you've got Chauncey Billups, the Portland Trailblazers head coach, who is alleged to have been part of this. These poker games that were going on in various places where. It's also funny to me that like, you know, Chauncey Billups was a great. He's a Hall of Fame basketball player for the Detroit Pistons. He's a, you know, like, he's a, you know, I guess you could say he was a great NBA player. Player. But he doesn't seem like the kind of guy that if I'm like some, if I'm some rich dude who wants to donk off my money, as we would say at the poker table. I don't feel like Chauncey Billups is such a draw for me because the, the allegation is that you had these games that were set up, these illegal poker games that were run by like the Bonanno crime family and the Genoveses and all these like old school names from like the mafia times. They were running these poker games that were illegal that were set up for these people to lose, these regular people that had a bunch of money to lose. And the attraction, they were called the face cards, were the Chauncey Billupses of the world who were then paid out later. Have you heard about some of the technology that they allege, just glancingly.

[B]

I was gonna ask you about it. I heard something about, like, maybe cameras underneath an X ray table or something. Or spyglasses. I don't, But I don't know.

[A]

X ray glasses. Something called a chip reader. Something that could read the cards. A. A particular shuffler that could shuffle the cards so that a particular player in a particular position would get better cards, and then the other people get worse cards. Like, wow, these games. If, if these allegations are true. These games sound so incredibly rigged. It's wild.

[B]

The most concerning thing, and I don't know if this is true or not, or if you saw it in what you were reading, but according to Cash Patel, apparently somebody wrote antifa on some of the poker chips.

[A]

Yes, that's definitely something that they're looking into. And very strongly.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So what I was struck by. I'm trying to find the exact. The list of some of these names, but the. Some of the guys that were alleged to be part of this from the kind of. From the organized crime side of it, they all just have great. Like, I'm trying. Where's this list? I had it somewhere. Oh, here we go. So the guys that were alleged to have been from the. From the organized crime side running these various games was a guy whose name was Flappy, Government name Amar Awada. There was a guy called Black Rob, real name Robert Stroud.

[B]

Sleepy is sleepy.

[A]

On the list, there was a guy, my favorite. There was a guy named the Wrestler. Oh, who's Matthew Dadino? There was a guy named Juice. That's Thomas Gallardo. And my favorite guy, there was a guy named Albanian Bruce. Or alternately, Big Bruce.

[B]

Oh, man, that's your old baby.

[A]

There's another guy. There was another guy named Fat Nick. I'm just like, come on. Right out of Central mob casting, a Fat Nick has got this under control.

[B]

I like that. What my name be? Did you say there's somebody named Flappy.

[A]

Come up with our mob names at some point?

[B]

Did we use one of those online? We did. We used an online mob name generator or something along those lines.

[A]

I mean, I feel like I could be Albanian Luke.

[B]

I know. You certainly could be.

[A]

I'm kind of mad that Bruce already took that. Bruce already stepped on my name, Albanian Luke. But anyway, you, baby. All right, let's thank some of our donors today. These folks have not been caught up in an illegal poker scheme that, you know. I mean, I, I, you're right.

[B]

Where do you think this money comes from?

[A]

I'm telling. Well, not from those games. They were rigged.

[B]

Well, that's why you said they haven't been caught. You haven't said. You didn't say they haven't been involved with. I guess that's what I'm. That's what I'm saying. These folks should be running.

[A]

If these people had been involved with those games, they would have been. Been fleeced, and they would have no money to donate to tbtl. That's my true.

[B]

Those games. I like to think these folks have their own game set up, and they're racing in.

[A]

They're running their own Pokemon teams.

[B]

That's my accusation against Heather Row.

[A]

Huh? Well, you know what? It's a Robin Hood situation. They call her Heather. Robin Hood Row. She steals from the rich and then donates to tbtl. Heather is in Sellin's Grove, Pennsylvania.

[B]

Thanks, Heather.

[A]

It's our friend Leanne Gast checking in from Phoenix, Arizona.

[B]

Nice look.

[A]

What's the weather in Phoenix?

[B]

Ugh. I bet you it's nicer feelings. I wonder what Leanne's nickname is when she's using those. That X ray, poker table, cheating, shuffle machine.

[A]

Romanian. They call her Romanian. Leanne.

[B]

Leanne the Romanian guest.

[A]

Whether. Hey, you know what I'm thinking, Andrew?

[B]

By the way, it's.

[A]

It's gonna be high of 84 today in Phoenix, Arizona.

[B]

Sounds nice.

[A]

We need to organize another spring training trip, I think.

[B]

Oh, that would be great. And now is actually, no joke, the right time to start thinking about it, because spring training always really sneaks up on me. And if we want to do a TBTL trip, by the way, we did book our tickets. We. Genevieve booked our tickets. I am going to Vegas to celebrate our 25th anniversary in January. I'll get you those states.

[A]

Nice. Thanks. Ali Port in New Orleans, Louisiana. Have you ever been to New Orleans, Louisiana?

[B]

I have. My friend Shay lives there, and I went to her wedding, and we were. We're all marched down the street.

[A]

Oh, you did one of those, like.

[B]

A second line after the wedding that. The second line for you started in.

[A]

The wedding that might. That might cause you to feel a certain amount of angst.

[B]

No, it was great. I had. I got myself a nice white suit for the occasion. I felt it was very. It was a very incredibly joyful. It really was.

[A]

That's awesome.

[B]

Sounds corny to say that, but it was just like nothing I'd ever been a part of before. And, like, literally, you were upstairs in this nice kind of classic space. I think it was above a museum, maybe even this ballroom or something. And then. And then Everybody's dancing, and I think there's a DJ or whatever, but then the band shows up and, like, starts playing just like, kind of. I think they might just. They start playing downstairs, and suddenly they're upstairs, and everybody just starts dancing. And then, like, almost organically, just sort of get into a line, and you don't even real realize what's happening. The next thing you know, you're just, like, through the streets of New Orleans.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

Your whole wedding, it was. It was incredible. Yeah.

[A]

Sad they're not together anymore. What a time.

[B]

Ally, I don't know if you ever plan on getting married or renewing your vows or anything along those lines, but if you want to invite me and Genevieve, you know how to get a hold of me.

[A]

Yes. Amy Mazzoni is in Mill Creek, Washington.

[B]

Hey, thank you, Amy.

[A]

Thank you, Amy. Appreciate you. Oh, no, Andrew, let me see. Let me get the Blue in the Face soundtrack. What did this. I want to agonizingly. I want to agonizingly play some soul coughing music to try to figure out how to pronounce part of the last name of our next donor. Who is Sarah Longino, DeKalb or DeKalb? DeKalb.

[B]

This is so ironic because we had a listener that we were thanking who was in Decatur, Georgia. We didn't even have to say DeKalb, but we were talking about Decatur, Georgia, and somehow that led to a conversation about DeKalb County. Maybe Decatur's in DeKalb, I don't know. But then you said there's a subway stop that you think is called DeKalb, that's in New York. And we say DeKalb. I'm sorry, you know me.

[A]

Based on the way that that guy sings it in that one song.

[B]

And then. Let me see here.

[A]

This.

[B]

Is this the appropriate time to play this? I think it is. I had a. We got a voicemail from television's Chris Hayes all about the cab and a call, but I had it on my desktop. I can't think.

[A]

I know about this.

[B]

I'll play it for you later on in the show so we don't have to interrupt things here.

[A]

All right, well, thank you, Sarah Longino, DeKalb.

[B]

That's so ironic.

[A]

I love it in Moxie, Washington.

[B]

Moxie. Nice. All right, well, thank you very much.

[A]

And then also thanks, of course, to Lloyd Christensen.

[B]

Hey, Lloyd. Lloyd.

[A]

That's right. Lloyd is in Bellingham. In Bellingham, Washington. The Bay City.

[B]

Nice.

[A]

I love that place. I gotta get. I gotta. I gotta get back up. By the way, Rudy turned 82 in dog years.

[B]

Oh. I was trying to figure out what Rudy.

[A]

I gotta get back to Bellingham and maybe say Howdy Doody to. To. To Rudy the dog. Rudy is 80s.

[B]

So what I do, I got like.

[A]

A text from Carrie, said, guess who turned 82? And I was like, oh, Oh, I didn't think your dad was that old. It's like a picture of Rudy.

[B]

So is that 82 divided by seven? Well, yeah. Well, then. So Rudy turned 11.7 years old.

[A]

Well, yeah, Maybe we were rounding up or down. I don't think we're celebrating 11.7. I think 11. So what?

[B]

Maybe.

[A]

Maybe whatever that. So maybe not quite 82.

[B]

I see. Oh, I see what I. Yeah. Because okay. If seven, you would. Okay, yes. Well, wouldn't.

[A]

So whatever that adds up to.

[B]

Yeah, okay.

[A]

But yeah, I got to get back to Bellingham is the point. Because I love that city and I love all of our donors. Thank you so much for making TBTL possible on this rainy, gloomy Friday. You're putting. You're lighting a warm, cozy fire in my heart by continuing to support tbtl. So thank you so much.

[B]

Hello and welcome to Top Story.

[A]

I've noticed, Andrew, that I have started going on to Blue sky again, which is, I guess, a little bit surprising to me because when, you know, when Twitter and then X or whatever they're calling it these days kind of took a heel turn, I got off of Twitter, but I was always looking for something to fill the Twitter shaped hole in my life. And I feel like I thought it was gonna maybe be threads.

[B]

Oh, yeah, that thing that was an Instagram thing or a meta thing or whatever.

[A]

And. And then, you know, that didn't really take. And then I thought it was going to be Blue sky and I kind of got on Blue sky and a bunch of people got on Blue Sky. But then I just sort of didn't. I found. I didn't find myself going there as often. I know that you kind of stayed with it.

[B]

Yeah, I got on Blue Sky a long time ago. You actually mocked me for it. And now here you are.

[A]

Well, so I sort of just forgot about it a bit. And then I kind of did a little bit, I think, of what you did, which was like when the Mariners. Basically when the Mariners, you know, post season stuff was happening, I was really. I was hungry. I was hungry for, like, Mariners content. And I also wanted to, like, go. I wanted to interact with Mariners fans who maybe I didn't even know. And let's be honest, I was over posting in the kreminals text chain and I needed somewhere else to go with my feelings. And so I started going back on Blue sky and I found it very kind of, it was scratching that itch for me me of just like kind of what I used to get a little bit from Twitter from just this community of people. I'm trying to find. By the way, I'm stalling because I'm trying to find this data point that Mina Kimes posted about interaction on Blue sky relating to sports. Sports posts.

[B]

I saw these stats going around. I wasn't sure who, where the source was though, so I wasn't sure how much trust to put in them. But about interaction, like comparing like in the world of sports, interaction amongst tweets versus interaction among Blue sky posts.

[A]

And I'm trying to get back to this post. But the thing is, Andrew, I don't know if you are aware of this. Nobody posts more than Mina Kimes. Yes, I do know I am. I mean it is, it's breathtaking. Just the sheer output. So it's making it impossible for me to actually go and find this, this, find this, this little data point. But the, the takeaway from it was it would appear anyway, again, I don't have the source material but I trust Mina to, to be linking to, you know, reliable data. Basically what it seemed like was that there are sports posts on Blue sky are getting a lot more interaction than, than sports posts on Twitter. And I just kind of wondered if, if, if like there is some sort of shift that's happening, if maybe just for sports stuff at least Blue sky is actually becoming the place to hang out because you know, Twitter is pretty toxic and is pretty right wing now and stuff. And so I don't know, have you seen any evidence of that? Do you feel like, I mean, you're not on. Oh, here we go. This was, this is the post from somebody named Harry on Blue Sky. This guy might actually, I think he's from the Blue sky team. So take this a little bit with a grain of salt because this is kind of like, like Blue sky hyping itself up, right? But here's what this person who works for Blue sky said. A note for sports. Blue sky's engagement rate was 10x higher than X's across a sampling of identical posts made on both platforms. For what it's worth, we see a similar trend across all communities, not just sports. Real people, real conversations. Now again, that's Blue sky trying to, you know, hype itself up. But I wonder if this, this if this indicates something. In other words, I think what they're saying is if you post the same post on Blue sky and on X, you're getting more interaction on Blue Sky.

[B]

That's what they're saying. Yeah. Which is interesting. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I definitely am involved with, like, a small cadre of Mariners fans on Blue sky, and there's a lot of interaction. Like, there are people who. I have no idea what they even look like because they're using, I don't know, Julio Rodriguez as an avatar or something. Actually, I have a. Wow, this is taking us into a weird place. I actually have a somewhat tricky topic that I think I might want to ask you about. This is one that I think I wanted to maybe ask you off air, but I'll ask you on air. This is for real. I want to be very careful the way I say this. I think that white people. And I'm totally. By the way, I'm totally ready. I'm totally ready to be talked out of this opinion. Okay. But I think that white people shouldn't use avatars of famous black people.

[A]

I couldn't agree more, because a lot.

[B]

Of people do that. There's a fella that I follow, and I know that his avatar is sort of almost a psychedelic photoshopped, but it is a photo of Julio Rodriguez's face. But when I'm scrolling quickly, I've always. I've just don't. I'm not, like, separating it out and there's small icons or whatever. And you're. The point is, you're supposed to recognize, oh, that's Marshawn Lynch. Like, I'm not. I don't think this person looks like Marshawn lynch or whatever. But in your head, when you're just like kind of a casual contact of somebody for a long time, you think that. And for me, I'm thinking I'm not going to use his name. But there's somebody that I have always thought of. I have associated this name as a Seattle sports fan that in my head, I always thought was a man of color. And then the other day I saw him, he was on some. Actually, even though he's a Mariners fan, I think he was invited to be on some Toronto talk radio show that they released the video of. And I saw that he was white. And I'm like, well, of course I know that he wasn't Julio Rodriguez. Like, I know that's just his avatar, but I was really surprised to see that he was a white man. And again, not that it matters. I don't engage with him in conversations about race. Like, it's just baseball talk. It doesn't matter. But when I suddenly had this realization, oh, this guy's a white guy, it just sort of like, I don't know. I found it somewhat disorienting. I'm just like, maybe as whites we should just not use. I mean, maybe we should all not use photos of other people as our avatars anyway. But I know that that's a pretty common thing to do.

[A]

I would just for myself, I would not use an avatar of anybody who is non white for myself. And I'll take it to another level. There's somebody who I know who I'm very close to and an appreciator of this person, but he oftentimes is a white person and will use in the, like, emoji. Like, if it's like I say, oh, we're going to do this, and then like, we're going to. I'll meet at this time. This person will throw up like a peace sign in a black hand or a thumbs up, you know, because they have a different skin tone.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

In the emojis. And this person who's white will use like, I guess what you would say would be black or African American emojis to represent themselves or their feedback on things.

[B]

I feel like that's weird.

[A]

I don't think we should do that either.

[B]

I wonder what the thought process is behind that.

[A]

I think that they think they're being kind of sort of funny, edgy. I mean, this is a person.

[B]

It's not solidarity. Sorry to interrupt you.

[A]

Well, I mean, I don't think that this person is. Is working against the interests of people of color. But this is a person who's like a hip hop fan and kind of like, I think this person who is white perceives themself to be somewhat, you know, kind of like integrated into spaces and music and things that are like, you know, can be sort of black coded at times. Like, I think it's kind of a. Like, I don't. I mean, listen, we haven't. I haven't interrogated it with them, but every time I see it, I die inside a little bit.

[B]

Yeah. You know what I was thinking? Let's turn this back on me. You were setting this up and you were saying there is somebody.

[A]

Why is Morgan Freeman your icon on Blue Sky? I think that's weird.

[B]

I'll change it to Dave Chappelle.

[A]

Truly was a Blue sky post.

[B]

I'll change mine to Dave Chappelle. Are you cool with that. One of these days you're going to set something like that up where you say, I'm not going to use their name, but there's somebody that I interact with a lot, a white guy, and he does a thing and I'm going to be listening. I'm going to realize, this is me. You're talking about me.

[A]

Where'd he go? I don't want to give too much away, but this is a person. He's a white guy. He used to co host this show.

[B]

Called the Andrew Walsh Show.

[A]

He used to go to this show, tbtl. And that's how you'll find out that you don't work here anymore.

[B]

I like the idea of saying I'm not gonna use his name, but he used to host a show called the Andrew Walsh show on Cairo Radio. By the way, it's because I don't know if you. I don't think you were trying to finish a thought. So I'm gonna go on a new agenda. Not in any particularly important way, but I ended up filling out a little survey, a little one of those little online silly [e-mail] glad that's.org to find out what my. It's a non profit, what my. My mob name would be. And they gave me Andrew Grim Reaper Walsh says you are the mob.

[A]

You have to sign up. Do I have to sign up if I want to get my mob name?

[B]

No, but here, can I give you the quiz? Can we just do this? Are you interested in this? All right, mob name generator, choose a gender. Male, female, or neutral. Mail.

[A]

I'll go mail, please.

[B]

Yep. Pick a region. You have several choices here. Los Angeles, West Coast, Las Vegas, Midwest. We're talking KC, St. Louis, Chicago, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Detroit. The south, like Florida, Texas, Louisiana or the Northeast. Your New York, New Jersey, Boston, Philly.

[A]

Pittsburgh, which is three new. I want to go with the. I want to go with the classic. I'm going northeast.

[B]

Northeast, Okay. I went with west coast. Just so you know. Number three, what side are you on? Number one, I'm on the right side of the law side of truth. Number two, I tried to be on the right side, but we all have our weaknesses. Or three, the law has never done nothing good for me. I'm a wise guy through and through.

[A]

Which one did you go with?

[B]

I think I might have gone with the second one. I don't remember.

[A]

I tried.

[B]

No, I think I went. I think I went full crime, actually.

[A]

I tried to do. I tried to do right. But Andrew, it's hard when you were raised. When you were raised in a Bronx tale like I was.

[B]

That's right. So I'm gonna give you the middle one. Then you try to be on the right side. But we all have our way to.

[A]

I'm trying here.

[B]

Oh, this is fun. Now. This is. You have a lot of choices on this. Pick wisely. What racket are you involved in?

[A]

Okay, the numbers game.

[B]

Money laundering.

[A]

No, that's too murder. Too high level. No schmurder for me.

[B]

Murder, mukduck. No kidding. Bribery, robbery. Casino skimming.

[A]

Okay, that one got some promise.

[B]

Bootlegging. Who, me or I uphold the law no matter what. They're giving you a chance to be a cop in. This is what's.

[A]

I think bootlegging, I guess. Bootlegging or casino skimming. Let's go with casino skin.

[B]

It does seem kind of on brand for you. Casino skimming. And it is fun. Now number five, what's your role in all of this? Are you a capo? My soldiers do what I tell them.

[A]

Capo di tutti.

[B]

Now, I can never pronounce this word. I've heard a million times in TV shows and movies. Consigliere.

[A]

Oh, yeah, that's a way. Consiglieri. Consiliary.

[B]

Consiliary. I think Conceal area.

[A]

I think you actually said it right.

[B]

Okay. That means I'm the boss's top advisor. I'm a mob wife. I know what's going on, but I'm not going to get involved.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Corrupt politics.

[A]

I've always wanted to whisper you're the king into my husband's ear while he's sitting down.

[B]

You're come. You come up behind him and with two hands on his mob wife style.

[A]

Mrs. River style.

[B]

You're a. You're a corrupt politician. What's wrong with accepting a little something if they offer?

[A]

But here's the thing. Can I be a casino skimmer and a corrupt politician?

[B]

That's what I don't get it. I do feel like this kind of works against itself. You're a clean cop. If someone so much as whispers bribe around me, they're in the slammer. You're a soldier. I do what's asked of me. That's all. You're a boss. Everyone listens to me. Or else. Or finally, let's just say I know some people who know some people. Okay. Okay.

[A]

I'm probably just a soldier. I don't want a lot of like, I can't be the consil Consiglieri because that's management.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You Grew up. You got to manage up to the tuto di capo. You got to manage down to the soldiers. You're stuck in the middle. I don't want that headache.

[B]

That's the whole thing. You got to manage up. All right. It's called managing up, Tony.

[A]

Godfather. Godfather. Not to be a nudge, but we're still waiting on your Thrive report.

[B]

It's a 360 review this time. Yeah. All right. Pick it. We're getting a roll to make it.

[A]

A better work environment for all of us. Godfather.

[B]

Pick your favorite era. Prohibition, modern era, Rat pack era, swinging 60s. But what's the difference between Rat Pack era and Swinging Six? And the disco era?

[A]

No way. Too much blow in the disc. Too much. Too much. Davey Kleinfeld. It's funny. I've cited, I think, two different Sean Penn characters because he's the one that gets whispered. You're the king in Mystic River. Right. And he's Davey Kleinfeld in Carlito's Way, which is like disco era organized crime.

[B]

I've never seen. Or. No, I did see. Are you saying Mystic River? Well, mystic river, not Mystic River. That's the same author. What was the movie you were Lehane. Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

Well, mystic river is a movie where she says, you're the king, I think to Sean Penn. Right.

[B]

So mystic river has. Oh, I'm getting. I get that confused with another Lehane movie. That's the one that does have the mob storyline in it. Okay. It's been a long time.

[A]

Well, kind of a. Mystic river is weird. It's like. It's kind of a lot going on.

[B]

Right.

[A]

But there is a kind of. Isn't Sean Penn kind of organized crime guy in that movie?

[B]

Yes. I'm confused. I'm totally. I don't remember much about Mystic River. I'm totally confusing it with a later Lehane movie about a mental asylum. That I am.

[A]

Oh, sure. Is that Shutter Island?

[B]

Yes. I'm getting those. Totally confused. I don't remember about Mystic River. Do you know that Genevieve and I summered with Dennis Lehane at his. Very fancy. It must have been. It must have been on the coast of Massachusetts or something. His summer. His huge summer cabin.

[A]

How did you know him?

[B]

A family connection, I think he was friends with Genevieve's young uncle, I believe. I think they went to school together or something. And then. I don't even think her uncle. I think her uncle showed up later on in the weekend. But we. We just showed up. We're just like. We're so and so's niece did you, like, hang out?

[A]

Did you, like, sit on the veranda with him? Or was he off in a room somewhere writing? You're the king.

[B]

Yeah, no, we all. We all hung out. It was him and a bunch of his, like, kind of, you know, kind of just like, chill friends. I think some of them maybe were a little bit artsy. Some of them were just like Joe Blows, like me. And we all just hung out. It was like your perfect summer, you know, on the. On the shore. It was a summer on the shore. It was just a weekend, but it was kind of a magical memory. Sure, sure.

[A]

Yeah, Absolutely. I didn't know that about you. You can still surprise me all these years later.

[B]

Anyway, so you got to pick your area here. Prohibition.

[A]

I want. I'm going to go with Rat Pack.

[B]

Just go Rat Pack again, though, it wasn't the rat pack. The 60s. I don't quite get what. Separating.

[A]

I'm going to go Rat Pack.

[B]

Okay. And then I'm entering your first and last name. And what is the last four of your social. No, just joking. Okay, here it is. Occupation, boss, Crime. You name it, I've probably done it. Your idol, Lucky Luciano. Am I saying that right? Luciano. Luciano. Yeah. Let's see here. Your name is. Oh, my God. This is so much better than mine. What was I, the Grim Reaper? Screw that. You are Luke Eggman Burbank.

[A]

That's what I say when I kill people.

[B]

The last thing you hear before you die is you see Cuckoo. Wow. Luke the Eggman. They're not saying the Eggman. They're just saying Luke Eggman. But I kind of like Luke the Eggman Burbank as well, if you want to throw an article in there.

[A]

Huh. I wonder what I did to get that title. I'm always frying eggs.

[B]

Yeah. Can I tell you a little bit about yourself? You're a dangerous man with a business to run. You know who will follow you until the end. And you know who to cut loose when they no longer serve a purpose for you. You're tough.

[A]

That's when I'm frying eggs.

[B]

That's when you're frying. Exactly. You're tough and respected in the business, Luke. So, anyway, I start treating you with a little bit more respect.

[A]

Speaking of pretty organized crime, have you been following any of this Louvre heist?

[B]

Yes. Did you see that video yesterday of, like. What we have learned is you put on a. You put on one of those bright yellow vests, and anybody will get in a cherry pick.

[A]

Anything.

[B]

Nobody will stop you or ask you Anything?

[A]

Yeah, it's a crazy story where this, this gang of criminals got one of those, those like powered kind of ladder, cherry picker things and elevated themselves up to one of the windows of the Louvre and then cut their way through one of the windows into the Louvre and then had these chainsaws. And then we're just like marauding around, chainsawing into these, these glass cases or these cases that had this like, you know, I think it's like $100 million worth of jewels.

[B]

They used chainsaws. And this was in broad daylight while the museum was open, Right?

[A]

Right, yeah. I mean, I think that they just, their plan was to get in, take what they wanted, assume that the security wouldn't mess with them, and then just get out. And it appears to have worked so far. It sounds like they found some DNA. Like, I, I feel like they're going to catch these guys because there was too many of them. They're running a moke. Like where the. There's too many, like there's too many people that have to keep their story straight. Like if you catch one of them, I have a feeling you're going to catch all of them. And again, it sounds like they found some like DNA and stuff because again, you just gotta, I don't know exactly how many, maybe four people or something, but they're running around, they're sweating, they're wielding chainsaws at least if that video that I saw is actually true and not some kind of a. AI creation. But there's this other subplot to it that I started seeing on TikTok the other day, which is this incredibly dapper, like, I don't know, teenager. I sent you the link, Andrew. If you click on that New York Times story, you'll see the photograph of. You've got these three French police. This is obviously in the aftermath of the heist. And then you've got this. I'm gonna say kid and I say that, you know, with affection. This guy looks like he might be 17 or 18 and he is dressed. Wait, what are you looking at this?

[B]

He's like cosplaying as a detective from the 1940s.

[A]

He looks at. Great. He's got a fedora. Would you call that a fedora?

[B]

Yeah, that's a fedora.

[A]

It's like he's got a fedora, but he's pulling it off. This is the first time someone's pulled off a fedora in the last 20 years. He's got a suit on, a nice tie, he's got a vest. He's holding a handsome umbrella. He's a very handsome young man. And he just looks. He looks like he's right out of a movie or something.

[B]

Yeah, but in a way that, like. No, I've not read the story yet, but, like, it's not like he's got. It's not like he's got a little bit of. Oh, yeah. His style is a little bit reminiscent of that. My initial reaction of just seeing this. This photo and how he's styled annoys me. Like, he's literally. He's literally cosplaying. Like, he looks like he's like, oh, it's Halloween. I'm gonna dress up like somebody from the Untouchables, and I'm gonna, like, dress.

[A]

Up like a famous baby carriage scene, Right?

[B]

Exactly. He's got a baby carriage.

[A]

Like, what's under a baby carriage going downstairs backwards.

[B]

Don't you find this deeply unseri at me, Louis, for a job that she did?

[A]

I like it. I think 19 year olds can figure out who they are in the world. It doesn't bother me in the way it sounds like it kind of bothers you, but you're right, it is a lot. It's a very affected, like, it's clear that he's a young person who has decided, like, this is my thing, is that I'm gonna be very, very dressed up in a way that's kind of anachronistic. It's not from our time period. Here's the headline, the first graph from the New York Times. This is. This is Alicia Haridasani Gupta writing in the New York Times. It was in nearly every way an ordinary photo distributed by the Associated Press to media outlets. It showed three policemen leaning against a silver car parked in the courtyard of the Louvre Museum in Paris just hours after a brazen theft. But then there was the dapper man standing jauntily on the right side of the photo. The officers, the AP caption said said were there to block the entrance to the museum. But the man dressed in a buttoned up vest, a trench coat and a fedora, who seemed to be surveilling the seed, was more than enough reason for the Internet to pounce. So basically, the Internet has gone in one of a couple of directions. One who was kind of roasting this guy, somebody wrote, a woman named Melissa Chen wrote on X, you're never going to crack this case with a detective who wears an actual fedora unironically. That's been viewed more than 5 million times. Melissa said, to solve this we need an unshaven, overweight, washed out detective who's in the middle of a divorce. A functioning alcoholic who the rest of the department hates, has a half eaten.

[B]

Sandwich and constant indigestion. Yes, like he's.

[A]

He's more Pepto Bismol than man.

[B]

Obviously I'm talking about Lieutenant Eckhart. I just realized from the original lieutenant, think about the future. Is that what he says? Is that what Jack Napier says to Eckhart? Hey, Eckhart, think about the future. Don't worry about it.

[A]

I'm on my own two face.

[B]

I'm on my. I'm on. This is. This is from the latest Batman movie which I just saw starring Margot Kidder and it's got Margo Kidder in it. Luke, I am dreading putting this show out because for five minutes people are gonna not realize that I eventually realized my mistake, that I was describing the late latest Superman, not Superman 4 from 1985 or whenever that came out.

[A]

So then the second wave of the Internet and speculating on this young man who, who is sort of impossibly put together, you might say, is that he was AI So because the. The rather quickly I'm again reading from this Times piece, the conversation shifted. This sharp dressed man, some social media users surmised, wasn't real real. It was an image of a French detective generated with artificial intelligence. The assumption that it was AI felt plausible because there is something about the image that Matt Grow, a professor at Northwestern University whose research focuses on AI Said seems off. It was perhaps because the man was so incredibly well dressed and so anachronistic compared with the rest of the people around him. His fedora is tilted just so. His skin looks flawless. He looks quote, too good to be real, Mr. Gross said, like the star of an old black and white Hollywood film. The photographer who took the photo, however, confirmed that the man was in fact real and he was merely a passerby unconnected to the investigation. So that was an AP photographer named Tebo Camu who said, I don't know him. I don't know if he is French, maybe a tourist, maybe he's English. That's from the photographer who took.

[B]

Maybe he's English. Why not?

[A]

All indications seems to be that he is a real person and not AI but we don't know anything else about him. The photographer who took the picture. And by the way, they point out in the article that the photographer's instincts were right. The photographer says that they took the picture because they found this guy in this getup to be such a contrast with the kind of modern day police staff. And then this photographer also took a picture which they put in the Times, which I kind of love this actually, actually of just kind of like a, a sort of a more I guess you could say 20, 25 looking woman who's in like a ball cap and she's walking past these same detectives. And the New York Times points out that this picture got absolutely no heat.

[B]

Ah, right.

[A]

So the photographer's instincts of going like, oh, I want to like juxtapose this kid who looks like he walked out of some other time period and these policemen, and then you put that up against just like a normal person and these policemen and that story is going, that photograph's going nowhere. So, so, so they were right. This was, that photo was quite arresting for people, as it were.

[B]

And here's the deal. When I got a little itchy about this, when I first saw it, I didn't know the story and I thought we were taking this person seriously in some way. Like this person was actually connected to the story in some way. That this person actually. So this is just a person who is, who dresses this way and, and happened to be caught on camera. Like this person is probably not somebody that I'm, I'm going to be hanging out with, but this isn't somebody that central to this investigation, which I thought it was at first. I thought this was some. Look at me, Louie, who was actually connected to the story. Not a passerby, a detective who dresses like I really did.

[A]

A child.

[B]

You had mentioned that he was 19. And I think I didn't hear that or something.

[A]

I don't know that he's 19. I'm guessing he's 19.

[B]

Yeah. So anyway, so I thought this was somebody we have to take seriously. No, this is a passerby who's into Dress him up. Okay, fine. Anybody can be in to dress him up. Do it to it, my dude. Dudes.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I'm kind of surprised that we haven't, that the Internet hasn't figured out actually who this person is because it doesn't seem to take the Internet very long to figure these things out. But again, my, it's my prediction that they will catch the people who robbed the Louvre because I think again, there's too many of them. Although they do think that the jewels are gone because if you steal like by the way, they were in the same part of the Louvre where the Mona Lisa is. I'm sure it's way hard to steal the Mona Lisa. And also what's the point of stealing the Mona Lisa? You cannot sell it.

[B]

Yeah, well, can you sell these jewels? I thought I'd seen the headline that says it's going to be impossible to fence these things.

[A]

Oh really? I thought I saw a different competing story that basically said, oh, they'll just take the, they'll just pop all the diamonds out and pop all the jewels out. So it's, it's a kind of a bummer because they, according to what I saw, this is something they can move because all they do, I mean these are precious, precious gems and, and precious stones that if you just take them out of their settings that they're in, they just have, they have value as just like raw diamonds.

[B]

And, and, and, and if you have somebody who's not super scrupulous, you can get rid of those raw materials. They could obviously be traced back, but if, if somebody doesn't want to trace them back, you can move them pretty easily.

[A]

Yeah, because like what can, who would buy the Mona Lisa? Because then they couldn't ever display it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So the value of that is pretty limited. Whereas these, somebody could just take this, a hu. That's off of some like tiara and just make it a huge ass diamond that's on a ring somewhere. So just as a, as a raw material, this is again, what like one guy being interviewed by CNN was saying, so who knows? Last question for you, my friend, before we maybe wrap things up on this. Oh, wait, you wanted to play a voicemail from television's Chris Hayes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Why don't we do that first? Because I'm intrigued. First of all, let me, please, let me activate the official sound effect for this kind of thing.

[B]

Here I go once again with the email. Every week I hope that it's from a female.

[A]

Hold on. That just happened somewhere in the way back of my computer. It's still playing Godfather.

[B]

Oh, that was the Godfather, right?

[A]

I can't find it because I X'd out of Spotify, Andrew. But it must be one of those things where it like, it doesn't let, it doesn't take that as a no. You know what I mean?

[B]

Who was it? Was it Sam Haggerty or Slam Swaggerty Swaggerty who used to play the Godfather thing?

[A]

That's a name I haven't heard in a long time. I do. I think it was Sam Haggerty whose waffle music was the Godfather.

[B]

And it was so arresting because just not used. You don't have to pay attention to all the walk up music when you're at a ball game, it's just like. I don't know, it's like kind of thumping in the background. You don't really pay attention. But then when it suddenly is just like, there's no bass and there's no drums, there's just these eerie strings that come in as number zero slam Swaggerty walks to the plate. Now, is he still playing baseball?

[A]

I missed somewhere.

[B]

Him, man, he was fun. I don't.

[A]

Fleet.

[B]

Oh, really? He was fleet of foot. He was a fun kid.

[A]

He was fun, but he was unserious. That's the thing.

[B]

You think he was unserious?

[A]

He was no Leo Rivas.

[B]

Yeah, right, exactly. Okay, so we already played. We're already in the V mails.

[A]

We.

[B]

You played the music?

[A]

We played enough of the music augmented with some Godfather.

[B]

Right? And then this is a voicemail we got from Chris last night.

[A]

Hey, dummies, it's Chris Hayes. I wanted to let you know that Luke is correct. It is Dekalb county in Georgia and is just called Street. That is one of the stops on my daily commute. And I also gotta say, wow, did soul coughing take me back.

[B]

It has been a while since I heard that. Oh, me too, brother.

[A]

Love it. Hey, by the way, speaking of. I guess you could say mass transit and things like that. Chris's episode of why is this Happening this week is excellent. He's interviewing the co authors of a book about. Oh, man, this is so up your alley. And Andrew, they. They. I think they run a blog and now they've written a book that's basically so they sort of tongue in cheek, they've named it the War on Cars, but they are. It's Sarah Goodyear and I forget the name of the other guy. But basically, like, they write about and. And work on projects that would reduce cars, not take cars down to zero, but as they say, put cars kind of in their place in cities. Which is a very Andrew kind of way of thinking. It was an excellent episode and it really had. It really had me thinking as well, because I'm much more car are. I'm pro. Like, one of the things that they talk about is this whole idea that, like, America's love Americans love their cars. Do you know that started as like. That was propaganda from some sort of like, automobile concern. And I believe it was like Groucho Marx would say, like, Americans love their cars. Like, that was like. That was a thing that was sort of like astroturfed into, you know, into the. Like, Americans didn't love Their cars. When cars first started, you had very rich people who had their cars. And then you had a lot of other people who were used to playing in the streets who were terrified of these cars that would go tearing around. And then Chris made a very good point in the show that why is a block party? This is something. When I used to live in Brooklyn, I loved this. You know, there'd be a night in the summer where there'd be block parties and the whole neighborhood would come alive. And the only thing that's happened to make it a block party is cars can't drive on your street. That's all you need for it to become a block party is, hey, we got the cars off of the street and now kids are literally free friggin hopscotching and playing basketball and stuff. So anyway, it's a. It's a really. It's a really interesting episode and I would highly recommend everyone check it out.

[B]

There are some streets in Seattle, I think this started during the pandemic, where they essentially have closed streets to car traffic. They don't really enforce it because there are still homes on those streets and the people who live there can still drive to their driveways, which means. And sometimes these things are. They're all over kind of where I live. These like little side streets.

[A]

There's a Sherman name, right? For some of the.

[B]

Yeah. And so they. They kind of. What they've done is they've just made it difficult to drive on them. Like a lot of speed bumps, a lot of those things that come in off of the curbs so that you, you know, you can't just fly down these streets, basically. And they're trying to make it so that like, I think they call them safe streets or something like that. So kids can kind of have the perpetual. My God, man. Was that one on purpose? No.

[A]

I don't know where the Godfather.

[B]

I don't know where the Godfather is. That sounds like a problem. Anyway. Yeah, so I kind of like that. I don't know if that. That's not the road diet thing, which is another term that's thrown around here, but I use those streets a lot. Not in my car. I mean, actually sometimes I really do have to cut across one. But you just drive very, very slowly. And you know, again, I'm not abusing that them. But when I go on my long.

[A]

Walks, if they're not.

[B]

If it's.

[A]

If it's lightly enforced, if you are allowed to drive down the street because you live on it. And if.

[B]

Is there a Sign that says lots of signs. And like I said those and they say what? I don't know, that just basically say. They will actually say like street closed to like non local traffic or something like that. And then a lot of speed bumps and then a lot of like, I don't know what they call them, but they're. They're the. They take the curbs and they kind of build them out into the street. So at places it's just like you'd have to kind of crawl through. You know, only one car could pass. You know, it's just like. There's just like all these sort of obstacles that they build that make it not a place that you would go flying by if you're trying. I think especially streets that, you know, probably have a lot of families living on them, but also are between two main. Like, you know, you know, where I live, Luke, there's all these main through ways, but people are trying to avoid those. So they'll go screaming down a side street like the, the ones we live on. And you know, that's. That's a problem. And so they. They've done this and it's really cool. I really, I really appreciate it. And I also appreciate the fact that like, if you are in your car and the Google map is saying, well, you got to get to this grocery store which is one block away, and this is the only way to get there. You can still use them, but just be very cautious, you know, and they're not. They're not throwing the cuffs on you. Genevieve said she saw a fella standing up against a wall in the U District yesterday. We met up at the U District and on her walk to come get me, she said she saw a fellow who was just leaning up against the wall with his dog, and cops came up to him and just handcuffed. Handcuffed him, handcuffed him, handcuffed him. And he must have been. They must have been looking for him. In other words, they weren't just like, he wasn't like loitering or something like that. You know, it wasn't like, oh, get away from this wall. He must have, you know, been accused of doing something that Genevieve did not see at some point. And then they found him, but it was kind of like he was very concerned, like, well, what happens to my dog now? And then later on when we were walking, we saw them again. They were still putting him in the car or something. And I saw that his dog was tied up to a. To like a signpost while they were arresting Him. And Genevieve said that the cops. Cops. And by the way, she said she didn't see anything untoward by the cops or anything that's overly aggressive. You know, you never know. But she said that, you know, he was being arrested, but it was this whole thing about, like, well, what about the dog? And it sounds like the police were trying to calm them down, saying, like, we. We're gonna, you know, take care of the dog or fine. Which. I know that is not something that ever occurred to me before, that sometimes. You're right. Yeah. And, you know, I suggested getting those tiny little, you know, little doggy handcuffs just so that the dog didn't feel left out.

[A]

And that gets pretty expensive.

[B]

And then it's like the difference between handcuffs and shackles. And then it just gets dark. The whole thing gets dark.

[A]

The last thing I'll say about this, the war on cars thing that I'm going to start using, if I'm talking about this with people that are not very open to the idea of maybe reducing the amount of time we spend in our cars and the amount of cars and places cars can go, is where do Americans go on vacation? They go to Disney, Disneyland, where there's no cars. Like, if you think about a fun, relaxing place to be for people, a place you. You really want to be, you're thinking generally of a place where there's not a bunch of cars.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You're thinking of Disneyland, or you're thinking of maybe the beach, or you're just thinking of these spaces.

[B]

Or Europe, where they don't. Or Europe, those. Those huge plazas and places that.

[A]

Right. Although I feel like if I'm talking to, like, my Amaga friend, I feel like that was. The one thing that I would say is that that was baked into this conversation was the people, the, you know, the folks that are advocating for less car usage. We're saying, like, if we look at all the places that we really love, and I'm thinking, well, yeah, but you got to figure out a different place than Amsterdam to convince the people in Cowlitz County.

[B]

Right? Yeah.

[A]

If you're thinking about the places we love. Yes, it is Amsterdam.

[B]

Yeah, we.

[A]

We being you guys and me.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like, roll down to Long. Roll down to the Home Depot at Longview and ask how many people venerate Amsterdam.

[B]

Yeah. Have the Daily News do a survey.

[A]

Tdn, baby.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

All right. Well, I didn't get to ask you my question about Toronto and the Blue Jays.

[B]

You did wind up to ask me questions really fast. Did you hear Linda give an Early Power out below you. I just pulled a Luke. You're playing the Godfather music. I had a little quiet Linda saying power out underneath you. Sorry about that.

[A]

We are, in the words of Spiritualized, we are currently floating in space. I don't know if I've ever been talking post Power Out.

[B]

Are you a big fan of that record? That's something my friends loved in college, and I'm just sort of. This fall, I started listening to it a lot. I had not listened. I love.

[A]

I love that record. It's a. It's very kind of, you know, vibey. I know that we have decided that we want the Blue Jays to win because then there will be no White House team. White House visit.

[B]

Although there might not be a White House by that point either, so.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. But. But also, the Dodgers have just outspent everybody. It doesn't feel very sporting. So those are strong reasons maybe to root for the Blue Jays, but is there. Here's what I'm struggling with. If the Blue Jays go, I guess actually the Dodgers have to go to Toronto, right? Blue Jays have the better record of the home team. But if the Dodgers sweep into the Johnson center and they just pummel The Blue Jays 10, nothing. Doesn't that actually make us relieved as Mariners fans that we didn't have to run into that buzz saw that is The Dodgers, like, on some level, like if the Blue Jays beat the Dodgers, some part of me is in a slight amount of pain because it meant the Dodgers were actually beatable and the Mariners could have beat them. Whereas if. If the Blue Jays get absolutely torched in four games, that on some level makes me feel less. Less sad about the Mariners not going to the World Series. I know this isn't science. I'm just. It's something that is playing through in my mind or playing out in my mind.

[B]

I. I mean, I. I do have the. I. I kind of can't follow all that logic there. I do have, you know, as I've mentioned many times in the weekly up to this. This feeling that whoever made it to the World Series was going to go up against a buzzsaw and likely get swept or at least, you know, five games or something, whether it was Detroit or Seattle or Toronto. So I follow that logic. But no, there's no part of me. I'm not going to watch the games. I'll be honest with you. I probably won't. If I'm in a place. Like if I, If Eve and I go out and we find ourselves at a bar and the Games are on. Like, I'll, I'll, I'll, you know, I won't avert my eyes or whatever, but I'm not. Like, I don't think it's going to cause tons of anger in me to see, you know, Vladdy potentially hit a home run. Whereas there are other teams that, like, if they had just beat us, just to see them do well would cause so much consternation inside me. I am, I just, I am fully, solidly rooting for the Blue Jays, but also so kind of not planning on watching it.

[A]

I think that's where I'm at. I think I'm, I think I'm generally, I tip towards probably Blue Jays, but also if The Dodgers win 10, nothing, I'll feel some kind of weird sense of relief about that. Like, well, that wasn't the Mariners.

[B]

And the people who celebrated your loss don't get to celebrate. Especially that troll guy. We didn't talk about this. Like, I was so in a good place even after the heartbreaking loss on Monday, except for that troll guy. And I don't know how much you were following this.

[A]

You didn't even notice I knew about this.

[B]

But you know the guy who showed up with a butt plug picture on his shirt with Cal Raleigh's number on it. But then he, this was earlier on in the series and he must be some rich guy who can afford those seats directly behind home plate. And he can there the Rogers center or the Johnson center, as you for some reason call it. And it was ended up being funny because he put that on as a troll. Like, oh, I'm we're going to plug up the dumper. Which is just such a gross thing anyway. But then of course, he's caught on camera and it goes viral when he's wearing that shirt. And Cal Raleigh just nails home run just like right out of the park. And he starts to clap because he thinks it's going to be a strike. And it's like, he couldn't look more a fool. Well, he disappears in the narrative for several games and then just appears for game seven. Him and somebody have white. It was after the home run, though. He doesn't even don these shirts that are like very visible until like Julio's down to like two strikes. He's like, now I'm comfortable. And he and his friend put on these white shirts. One that says Ciao Seattle, and the other one says Mariners. Lol. Lol. Just like these white shirts with big black letters. But like, the absolute wussy troll didn't Wear those the whole game until they were down to like two hours, possibly two strike. Like, he is such. He is the. And it was the only thing that kind of made me feel like, God, I would love. I would love those fans to really take it in the teeth. But I will say that I have heard a rumor that even, like, Toronto fans are like, this guy doesn't. This is not. Please do not judge us by this piece of trash. Like, he's gross.

[A]

Yeah, I tend to think that probably. And also the thing with the Dodgers is it's a little bit like the Yankees, too, that I'm sure that you can find hundreds and thousands of Dodger fans who are like, that's just. It was just a famous team to root for, which, you know, I always get a little bit prickly about anyway. Whereas I'm guessing that the Blue Jays fans are probably Canadian and probably, you know, kind of come by it, I guess, in my mind, more honesty or honestly. Because I'm the person who gets to decide whose fandom is come by honestly and whose fandom is not. I am officially the arbiter of that.

[B]

Yes. Right. Yeah.

[A]

So anyway, a guy who is dying to go get some more of this veggie lasagna that I made last night, I've been in a real cozy mood. I've been. I've been running a fire all day at my house. I made veggie lasagna yesterday. Today I might make some soup tonight.

[B]

Soup, Soup, soup.

[A]

Big nothing beats soup or whatever my mom says.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

All right. Thank you for spending this week with us. Of course, we are at the end of this broadcast week, but we're gonna be back here on Monday with more imaginary radio, so please tune in for that. By the way, if you. If you get the newsletter, today's this week's hey Dummies video will be me actually drinking the water in the. My house, the well water that my dad has described as gross. So if you don't get the newsletter, maybe subscribe right now. How do people subscribe to the newsletter?

[B]

Go to tbtl.net and click on the tab that says newsletter. You can subscribe there. And also, I just want to say, while I am very embarrassed about some of the mistakes I made talking about comic book movies today, I do talk a lot about some scenes in Lord of the Rings in this newsletter, and I get all the details incredibly right. Almost too right. So if you need to reset, if you need to relax a little bit, if you're into Lord of the Rings stuff and you're like, well, I'm worried Andrew's gonna get some of the details wrong. Don't worry about it. Read the email. You will see that I did a lot of fact checking.

[A]

Yes. So it's gonna be a great newsletter this week. Please do subscribe, read it, watch it, all of that. And meet us right back here on Monday for more imaginary radio. In the meantime, have a great, great weekend. Take care of yourselves, stay dry, and please remember, no mountain too tall.

[B]

And good luck to all. Power out.