#4771 Is There A Mrs. Dave?

Summary

TBTL #4771: Is There A Mrs. Dave?

Date: July 15, 2026
Hosts: Luke Burbank and Andrew Walsh
Theme: Frog-catching escapades, animal encounters, listener calls, and TBTL-a-Thon antics live from Valley City, Ohio.

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Episode Overview

This episode finds the TBTL crew in Valley City, Ohio, in the midst of TBTL-a-Thon 17. Luke, Andrew, and the team recount their late-night adventure catching frogs for the upcoming Valley City Frog Jump contest, discuss raccoon and badger run-ins, grapple with animal nomenclature, and field listener calls about small animal encounters. The show is a lively blend of animal-themed storytelling, community interaction, and the classic TBTL goofball charm—all while actively fundraising to support the program.

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Frog-Wrangling Adventures (00:00–07:00, 25:00–45:00)

• Setting the Scene: Andrew and guest "Dave (frog wrangler)" drive out to a friend's pond to catch frogs for the Valley City Frog Jump. Dave outlines his flashlight-and-net technique for stunning and grabbing frogs, debunking frog-capturing myths with self-effacing humor.

  “You shine a flashlight at them, they freeze for a second, and then you bend over and pick them up. Or you use a net.”
  — Dave, 00:26

  “He would get in a little inner tube and get into the pond and come at them from the middle… He would catch five frogs to my one, so I wouldn’t call him on it too often.”
  — Dave, 00:46

• Execution of the Plan: The hosts, with help from Dave and local farm kids, attempt to catch frogs at night, only to discover it’s much harder than expected. Flashlights only briefly freeze frogs, and farm frogs are especially skittish.

  “I was struck by actually how challenging the catching of the frogs turned out to be.”
  — Luke, 26:53

• Bug Battle: Luke goes full Tom Sawyer (barefeet, pants rolled up), later regretting it as he’s bitten by swarms of insects.

  “All that did was expose my ankles and feet and shins to the most bug bites I’ve ever had in my life.”
  — Luke, 27:43

  • Listener Simeon (Amphibiton) Voicemail offers post hoc advice: wear long sleeves, pants, bug net, and treat clothes with permethrin (28:37).

• Other Farm Animals: While frog catching, Andrew is unnerved by large 4H pigs and their sharp teeth.

  “She says, just be careful. They bite, and they have really sharp teeth.”
  — Andrew, 35:58

• Outcomes: They catch three frogs and prepare them for a week of pampered “frog-jump athlete” life—under the vigilant care and periodic wellness checks by Dave, the frog catcher.

  • The frogs are kept in a custom box, half land, half water, with mealworms for meals and rocks for perching.

  “We do have these three frogs who are … very chill. They look very chill.”
  — Luke, 37:27

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Animal Intruders at the Airbnb (06:00–12:00)

• The Raccoon Saga: Andrew describes a raccoon burglarizing their garbage cans, shutting the lid afterwards (“let gravity do the job”) and generally becoming a feared backyard presence.

  “I watched it stick its head in there…then close the lid, let gravity do the job…then it skittered off to the corner.”
  — Andrew, 07:00

• Additional Wildlife: Luke jogs past a “less-scary wolverine” (i.e., badger). Jokes about animal interactions ensue.

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Listener Calls: Animal Stories & Animal Nomenclature (11:02–24:00)

• Prompt: Listeners are invited to share small animal encounters—pets, rescues, or critter stories.

Jake in Chicago (12:31)

• Opossum vs. Possum: Tells a story about pandemic backyard hangs interrupted by an opossum.

  • Group discusses the difference between “possum” (Australia/NZ/China) and “opossum” (North America). Bob Vila’s website is re-confirmed as the source (15:01).

  “Opossums are exclusively found in North America, whereas possums are native to Australia, New Zealand and China.”
  — Jake, 15:01

• Notable Quote:
  “You have a lifetime percentage of Nick’s donations. So it’s a pyramid scheme. Nick is in your downline.”
  — Luke, 20:35

• Job Interview Update: Jake asks the community to cross fingers for his upcoming job interview at a "large beverage concern." Hosts send off “computer, make Jake have the best interview” vibes (20:13).

Animal Nomenclature & Benefits

• Debunking possum rumors, its gardening usefulness, and defending the “cute” opossum.

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The Saga of the Tech Box (21:30–25:00)

• The Mangled Box: Andrew’s box of equipment for the Athon arrives days late, mangled but with contents mostly intact. Debates whether to file a claim with the post office, and jokes about creating TikTok content with their “destroyed” tech package for added drama.

  “It is blown out. Two sides totally gone. But all of the contents... are still in there.”
  — Andrew, 22:29

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Naming the Frogs (38:10–41:03)

• Listener-Suggested Names: "Erling Hopland," "Jackie Drop Jump," "Mr. Frog Dabolina," "Leap Day William," "Dua Leaper," "Spark Plug," "Mr. Ribbitz," "Pre Frogtane" and others are floated and laughed over.

• Final Decision: In homage to Ohio’s many Daves, all three frogs are named "Dave".

  “That’s right. All three frogs are named Dave.”
  — Luke, 40:35

  "It pumps some much needed Dave names into the local economy here in Valley City."
  — Luke, 40:39

• Frog Welfare: Dave (human) will monitor the frogs’ wellbeing; lethargic frogs will be swapped out before the event.

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Valley City Frog Jump Contest Strategy (41:03–48:00)

• Discussion of the Frog Competition:

  • Details about “flight” rounds, how people can rent frogs, and the local families (the “boys”) who supply huge numbers of frogs, including some "super-sized" compared to TBTL's farm frogs.
  • Andrew and Dave privately confer and tentatively select "Big Dave" as their jumping champion.

• Concerns: The possibility their frogs may be outsized by hatchery frogs, but listeners and the team stress “it’s not all about size—sometimes it’s spirit.”

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Frog Cam Goes Live! (46:07–52:00)

• Frog Cam Launch: TBTL launches a 24/7 YouTube "Frog Cam" at tbtl.net, showing the three Daves in their terrarium.

  “Nobody knows where the Dave cam is, so I need to set this up for folks…”
  — Andrew, 46:07

  • Listeners can watch and chat around the clock; the frogs' quirks and camera shyness quickly become apparent.

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Name That Frog Emotion Game (68:46–79:56)

• Luke’s Frog Emotion Sound Game: Luke plays a set of frog “emotional” sound effects (made by humans), and challenges Andrew and John to guess their moods (angry, flirty, surprised, grumpy, happy, etc.).

  “Now, what do we think is going on with this frog? What is happening with that frog, John?”
  — Luke, 74:19

  “That is a horny frog. That frog is amorous on main, as I like to say.”
  — Andrew, 73:31

  • The absurdity of cartoon frog sound labeling leads to much laughter.

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Listener Call: Cheryl in Corvallis (82:23–91:40)

• Traveling with a Pet Rat: Cheryl shares the story of sneaking her beloved shoulder-riding pet rat "Templeton" onto an Amtrak train, giving him water from an ice cube, and their cross-country adventure.

  “He would sit on my shoulder while I was doing my household chores...his little ropey tail wrapped around my neck, hanging on.”
  — Cheryl, 84:07

  • The group reflects on the unfair stigma of rats as pets.
  • Cheryl confesses to leaning into the running joke about the missing TBTL van magnets from their visit to her home.

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Fundraising Updates and Donor Gifts (53:44–67:59)

• AThon Details:

  • The TBTL community is lauded as the heart of the show. The donations keep TBTL running and unique.

  • This year’s donor gifts include:

    • TBTL Content Delivery Magnet
    • Weekly Video Episode for Donors
    • TBTL Trading Cards (randomized packs or full set, depending on donor level)
    • TBTL Frog Jump Champion T-Shirt (90s-inspired, Ohio/Valley City motif, with frog art)
    • Dazzling Donor messages (on-air shoutouts).

  • Friendly reminders:

    • Any donation is appreciated.
    • Cancel anytime, no guilt or apology required.

  “If you’ve been listening for years and ever thought about donating, this would be a great year, even at $5 a month. Enough of those really does add up.”
  — Luke, 67:48

  “We're a community. We really appreciate that it's you guys who are keeping us on the air...But the worst outcome is that we have anybody listening who is feeling guilt or stress about this. That ain't how it works.”
  — Andrew, 65:18

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Additional Memorable Moments

• The Running TBTL Joke: Everything, be it groceries, animals, or people in Valley City, is named Dave.
• Tech Fails: Hardware drama as Andrew’s missing and battered "box o’ gear" is chronicled.
• Animal Welfare: Repeated emphasis on frog care, respect for the animals, and planning not to disrupt their “circadian rhythms.”
• Ohio City Praise: The group sings the praises of their walkable, vibrant Airbnb neighborhood and notes the body wash's honest multi-use labeling.
• Community Vibes: The show doubles down on the importance of inclusive, welcoming community—especially for listeners at varying donation abilities.

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Notable Quotes & Moments with Timestamps

• "This is the show that just might be too beautiful to live."
  — Luke Burbank, 02:25

• “You shine a flashlight at them, they freeze for a second, and then you bend over and pick them up. Or you use a net.”
  — Dave (frog wrangler), 00:26

• "If you see them in your neighborhood...they're a benefit to have where you are."
  — John, 14:26 (re: opossums)

• “All three frogs are named Dave.”
  — Luke, 40:35

• "Computer, make Jake have the best interview of all time tomorrow."
  — Luke, 20:13

• "We were frog catching last night. You had the raccoon. This morning on my little jog, I encountered a full-on badger."
  — Luke, 08:23

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Key Segments & Timestamps

| Segment | Timestamp | |------------------------------------|---------------| | Opening: Frog Hunt with Dave | 00:00–07:00 | | Airbnb Animal Intruders Raccoon | 06:01–12:00 | | Listener calls: Opossum, Job Hunt | 12:31–21:30 | | Mangled Box Tech Saga | 21:30–25:00 | | Frog Box / Frog Cam Launch | 25:01–52:00 | | Naming Frogs & Dave theme | 38:10–41:03 | | Frog Jump Contest Details | 41:03–48:00 | | Name That Frog’s Emotion Game | 68:46–79:56 | | Listener: Pet Rat Train Ride | 82:23–91:40 | | Fundraising, Donor Gifts | 53:44–67:59 |

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Tone & Style

As always, the show is self-aware, affectionate, and full of impromptu song, affectionate ribbing, and loving nods to the TBTL “tens” community. Luke and Andrew are both irreverent and earnest, making special effort to include long-time running jokes, callbacks, and audience participation.

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Recap / Useful for New Listeners

If you didn't hear this episode:

• You missed a hilarious and heartfelt froggy field report, community animal stories, tech misadventures, and the launch of the official TBTL Frog Cam for the Frog Jump.
• Listeners became part of the show via calls and chats—especially around the theme of quirky small animal encounters.
• The Daves (both frog and human) were the unofficial mascots of the episode.
• Throughout, the episode doubled as both a regular show and a TBTL-a-Thon check-in, with prizes, gifts, and appeals for donations—always with sincere gratitude and no guilt.

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"No mountain too tall, and good luck to all!" — TBTL sign off

Transcript

[Andrew Walsh]

All right, so just to set this up, where are we headed now?

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

We are going to. There's a friend of mine, has a real nice pond. It's up on his property. It's loaded with frogs. It's a nice place because you could drive right up to it. It's not like a lot of the ponds we go to. You have to trek a bit to get to it. This thing, you just drive right up to the edge and go grab you a frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

What is the process for getting a frog?

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

It's pretty simple. You take a flashlight. That's why we're going. At night, it gets dark. The frogs will sit out along the water or in the water a little shallow, whatever else. But you shine a flashlight at them, they freeze for a second, and then you bend over and pick them up. Or you use a net.

[Andrew Walsh]

So we will be using a net. Yeah, I have.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

I have three nets. And it's funny too. Now, I don't know if this is true or not. A buddy of mine contends that a frog faces the shoreline. Why does it face the shoreline? Well, it faces the shoreline because that's where predators come from. So he would get in a little inner tube and get into the pond and come at them from the middle of the pond, thinking that they're looking out. I think that's a lot of hogwash, but it sounds good. So I say it's a lot of hogwash. But in the same breath, he would catch five frogs to my one, so I wouldn't call him on it too often.

[Luke Burbank]

Tbtl. We can get money from selling oil, gold, and the crystals. That's a very good idea. I saw that in a movie I watched.

[Andrew Walsh]

What movie was that? The Muppet.

[Luke Burbank]

You know, these two are good. Very tough to do a morning show, this chit chatty kind of thing. But these two have an intellect behind whatever it is they're doing. I'm not very good with chitchat. I like a structured communication.

[Andrew Walsh]

I like a hard out.

[Luke Burbank]

You know, chit chat, chit chat, chit chit.

[Andrew Walsh]

Where are we going right now?

[Luke Burbank]

Stay patient, people. Stay patient. This is gonna be worth it, I promise.

[Cheryl]

Maybe not maybe, but it's worth it to me.

[Luke Burbank]

All right. Hello, good morning, and welcome, everyone, to a Wednesday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. Please don't be mean to Cleveland. My name is Luke Burbank.

[Andrew Walsh]

I'm your host.

[Cheryl]

Oh, hey, y' all said my name.

[Luke Burbank]

Coming to you once again from beautiful but very warm Valley City, Ohio.

[Andrew Walsh]

Be Careful though, it's spicy.

[Luke Burbank]

Nestled in the Greater Liverpool Township, here we are once again, day three of TBTL Athon 17, jumping for joy. We are here raising money for the program, keeping the program going, and also entering a frog in the Valley City frog jump contest on Sunday. And we moved a little bit closer to that last night when we went out and we did some frog capture on a farm late at night. They never touched anything in their lives. Let them touch those things for once. We'll give you a full update on how all of that went. And also we will activate the frog cam here on episode 4771 in a collector series, Let the fun begin. Also, we'll be taking your phone calls because we're streaming live right now all over the world on YouTube by way of tbtl.net, and you can call us at 206-414-TBTL, 206-4414TBTL, let me introduce my friend, Andrew Walsh, by the way, longest running cobra of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ships.

[Andrew Walsh]

Is it too early to get a fish sandwich?

[Luke Burbank]

He's asking about the fish sandwich because he got ever so late of a start this morning. We saved him a couple of fish sandwiches and here he is again. He's Andrew Walsh. He's joining me right now. Good morning, my friend.

[Andrew Walsh]

Good afternoon, my frog brother.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, it is where we are technically the afternoon. I was quite surprised this morning. You seemed actually very poised, very together when I saw you as we were getting ready to head off to the broadcast center here at the Liverpool Township Community Center. But I learned that you had only recently awoken.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, we got it. We were out late last night looking for these frogs. Catching frogs. Catching some feelings for some frogs. I would say too. More on that later, but we didn't even get out to the pond until like 9:30 or something, something like that. We spent some time out there, we met some pigs and by the time we. And then we came back here to do some technical stuff we'll tell you about in a little bit. And then by the time we got back to the Airbnb, it was after 11, right? Yeah, but I was still all wound up. So I had a couple of Miller lights, played some pool in the garage.

[Luke Burbank]

It's interesting to see Andy Times unfold in front of our very eyes in real time. When we had booked the Airbnb, the ad for the Airbnb, all the photos, it showed a pool table, but there is not a pool table anywhere inside the house or in the basement. And last night we got home, and again, we got some frogs. We set up. And by we, I mean Andrew, you set up the frog cam and got it all working, which we're gonna. We're gonna go live here in a few minutes. With that, we got back home, and you even said, you go. I've got all this kind of, like, energy right now. Where's that pool table?

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, I felt like I was babbling, by the way. I didn't even know there was a pool table until we got to Cleveland. John said something about a pool table in a garage, but sort of forgot about it. And then last night, I was like, you know, I could use some unwinding. I'm not a big pool guy, by the way. I'd be clear about that. But, you know. You know, I played darts in the basement a lot. Just some sort of, like, I'm gonna put on. I put on some Tom weights, had myself some Miller Light, and just, like, hit some pool balls around a table. Was not very good. Made frenemies with a giant raccoon.

[Luke Burbank]

That's what I wanted to ask you about. You. You said that we have an enormous raccoon.

[Andrew Walsh]

Enormous.

[Luke Burbank]

In the backyard of the Airbnb, who is learning it has become sentient.

[Andrew Walsh]

And now I'm. Did I close. The bathroom window does not have a screen. And right now, I guess raccoons are not going to be coming in the house during the day, right?

[Luke Burbank]

I don't think that's their move.

[Andrew Walsh]

But because we're not heading back to the Airbnb until late tonight, we think I closed the bathroom window.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't think you did, because I think that's the bathroom that you've been showering in. Are you airing it out?

[Andrew Walsh]

And it's ground floor. And so when I get out of the shower, it's really steamy in there. So I cracked the window a little bit and thought, it's the exact level the raccoon. Because I watched this raccoon. Actually, I didn't watch it get established, but I heard. I'm in the. In the garage, and I hear some clanking. And I look over. There's two, you know, garbage bins right outside of our house leaning up against the back of the house. And one of them is slightly shorter than the other. One's for trash, one's for recycling, I assume. I don't know which is which, but I look over and there's this huge raccoon, and it somehow has opened the lid of the larger Thing, like.

[Luke Burbank]

And it's putting a bag of dog poop in. Yes, the garbage can, which is one of the number one things that ticks you off.

[Andrew Walsh]

And so I wrote to the hoa. No, the thing I want to make very clear here is the garbage bins are not, like, overflowing. You know what I mean? The lids aren't like, cracked open because there's too much garbage in there. It's very tidy back there, it looks like. I mean, I didn't even open them. But it's weird. Usually the first thing I do when I get to an Airbnb is sort of like, check out the garbage situation. But I saw that somehow this raccoon with its little raccoon hands somehow stood on one of these things, opened this heavy lid of the bigger bin. Picture like the biggest recycling bin at your house. Opened it. I watched it stick its head in there. And I start saying, no, no, but it doesn't care. It's not well trained. And then it comes out with some sort of rag or paper towel, something that must have smelled like food. And I watch it methodically take this thing, then close the lid, let gravity do the job. Gravity. And jump down. And then it skittered off to the corner, and then it went over. It kind of went by this fence that separates our house from the neighbors. Later on, I even thought, I'm like, ooh, I hope that doesn't come in the garage. Because I'd be cornered and scared. And then I'm playing pool about, I don't know, 10 minutes later, I look over, the raccoon is creeping up on me, heading towards the garage. And you know what I did? I hissed at it. And it worked.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Wow.

[Luke Burbank]

We were having all kinds of animal experiences here. We were frog catching last night. You had the raccoon. This morning on my little jog, I encountered a full on badger.

[Andrew Walsh]

Really?

[Luke Burbank]

Which I took a photo of.

[Andrew Walsh]

I'm trying to think if I could picture a badger.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, he looked like a less scary Wolverine, so I took that to mean badger. He didn't seem aggressive. He didn't have claws. He bore almost no resemblance to Hugh Jackman. Oh, hey, speaking of Marvel characters. Hey, look who else we have here. He's half bear, he's half man. He's all John Sklaroff. He's TBTL employee numero uno.

[Jake]

I am doing my job here.

[Luke Burbank]

Welcome to the program, sir.

[John]

Hey, should I drive back to the Airbnb? Because this is the first I'm hearing about a raccoon potentially running rampant through our house.

[Luke Burbank]

The problem is that window. If he climbs into that. Don't panic. If he climbs into that window, into what we're calling Andrew's bathroom. Yeah, I do think the door was also open to the rest of the house.

[Andrew Walsh]

That's what I'm worried about.

[Luke Burbank]

So he's got pretty much full run

[Andrew Walsh]

of the place every morning. I've made a point of closing that window.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, well then.

[Andrew Walsh]

But I don't know that I did today because as you said, I was discombobulated. This all started with me. I overslept. Today. I forgot to. I probably didn't go to bed until 3 o'. Clock. And I want to make it clear, like, I wasn't up, like, getting wild and out. Yeah, Wild and out. I talked to Genevieve for a while.

[Luke Burbank]

You were down there on Scooters, which is the new. What's the name of the. Jessica was telling us about Hooples? No, no. The club that's been. That's been brought back to life and is now having all the shooters. Shooters. You weren't down in the classic Shooters.

[Andrew Walsh]

It was a chill night, but I didn't. I even got some work done. You guys went to bed. I edited some tape, some of that. You got to hear one of the Daves at the beginning.

[Luke Burbank]

I want to talk more about that tape in a minute, please.

[Andrew Walsh]

And so I was editing that and, you know, I was getting work. It wasn't like we were out, like crazy wilding out. But then I. But, you know, I just got home late, so I didn't fall asleep, I know, until about 3 o' clock in the morning. But we don't have to wake up super early to do this gig since we're on east coast time. And I woke up this morning, I'm kind of like, you know, a little logie. Like, I should check my clock. But I'm like, yeah, but the alarm hasn't gone off yet. So I know it's before 8:30. Like, just rest your eyes a little bit more. And then at a certain point I'm like, it is funny that that alarm has not gone off yet. Again. Set for 8:30. I roll over, grab my phone. It's 10:30 in the damn morning. We're supposed to leave at 11.

[John]

So what. What percentage. What are the chances that we get home and the raccoon's eating some of our pretzels and hummus?

[Luke Burbank]

I think it'd have a hard time getting into the pretzel case. Although if it was able to open the garbage, it knocks it to the

[Andrew Walsh]

ground that lids popped out.

[Luke Burbank]

That's how I've been getting into it. By the way, Andrew, here's a picture of my badger, I believe from my run today.

[Andrew Walsh]

All right. It'd be funny to use a photo of a badger on a day that we adopt frogs.

[Luke Burbank]

I know the thing I was going to ask before I sort of prematurely brought you onto the program, Andrew, I hadn't played your sound effect was I was giving out the phone number 206414TBTL. But I was reflecting on something that happened yesterday, which was we had a call from a listener in Kentucky, Dana, who was saying she was telling a story about being on a date with a guy who used to work at the Pizza Hut when she was a kid. It was a riveting call. It was fascinating. And we were all thinking, should we start focusing the phone call? Should we put out a topic? Should there be something, I don't know, pet related? Like small animal related? We've got, you know, we got. We were out catching frogs last night. If you have a story about like a small animal that you've had in your life, like, I had a gerbil named Harvey that I brought home from like, I don't know if it was third grade. It was that thing where I think at the end of the year the teacher was like, anybody want this gerbil? I brought it home. So let's try to. Let's try this. And this is. We didn't work this out pre show.

[Andrew Walsh]

We already have a caller on the line. I hope the caller can hear us now. Caller, be ready with a story about a little animal that you've had adopted it.

[Luke Burbank]

Some kind of little animal named Fluffy. Some kind of animal maybe that you adopted or that your friend did or I don't know, a run in with a raccoon. We're looking for animal based conversation today on the phone lines. 206414TBTL. Should we jump on that first call? Should we just get going early? All right. Hello. You're on Calling all pets.

[John]

Who's this?

[Jake]

So I explained. Oh, sorry. That this is Jake in Chicago.

[Luke Burbank]

Hey, Jake, the perfect daddy. How are you, buddy?

[Andrew Walsh]

Daddy.

[Jake]

Yes, sir. Doing all right. So on the topic of unexpected potentially illegal pets.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes, Perfect.

[Jake]

When during COVID If you all recall, there was a time when everybody's like, well, we can at least hang out in the backyard.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes.

[Jake]

So a bunch of us got together. I was visiting friends up in Michigan and a bunch of us got together and hung out on the back Porch of somebody's home. And a couple hours in, we look up and on the wooden fence is just an opossum with its eyes wide open, staring at us like, why are you guys in my house? And we're all like, very, very sorry, sir. I did not know you lived here, Jake.

[Luke Burbank]

That's interesting. You went with opossum. That must be a Michigan thing. I feel like there's, it's. I'm not saying it's incorrect. I came, you know, up in the west where it was possum country. But you came from opossum country.

[Jake]

You know what? I will tell you, I did second guess myself before saying I'm not.

[Andrew Walsh]

Listen, they're both right. I'm pretty sure.

[Luke Burbank]

I don't think you're wrong. It's just always interesting to me where we get the possum and where we get the opossum.

[Jake]

I don't know what the difference is, but somebody once told me there is a difference.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Really?

[Andrew Walsh]

I thought there was no difference.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Well, the.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh yeah, well, yeah, we call them Valley City. You just call them sums here.

[Luke Burbank]

Uh huh.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

The.

[Luke Burbank]

The thing about the opossum or the possum is they've really. Due to their inability to cross the road, literally, I feel like. And the fact that they do have a kind of a terrifying rat tail and a kind of a scary rat face at times, they have gotten, I think, kind of a bad rap. But if you've ever seen opossum mommy with the opossum babies, that is, that'll melt your heart right on the spot. I think the possums are pretty cute, actually.

[John]

They are. Also, I recently learned this. They're really good at like, getting rid of like, animals or like small critters or bugs that are bad for your garden. So they're actually like a benefit to have where you are. If you see them in your neighborhood, like, obviously stay clear of them. But they're, they're. They're good for everyone.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, we love the possums. We stand the possums around here. Jake, what else other than small animal talk? Anything else you wanted to throw our way here on this Wednesday morning?

[Jake]

I did want to update you on the difference between opossums and possums.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh my God.

[Luke Burbank]

You're both the cause and the solution to all of our problems today.

[Jake]

That's me. Opossums are exclusively found in North America, whereas possums are native to Australia, New Zealand and China.

[Luke Burbank]

Everything here in opossum. And I've been so. I've been saying the Wrong thing.

[Jake]

Opossums is playing dead. Opossums do not.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh. Oh, possum, where art thou?

[Andrew Walsh]

Where are you getting this information?

[Luke Burbank]

AI Overview.

[Jake]

That's what A man called Bob Villa has a website.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, babe, his name is Bob Villa. Is it this old homes guy?

[Jake]

This old house tried true trustworthy home advice.

[Luke Burbank]

That's Bob Villa.

[Jake]

Bob Villa, Yeah. He was the first guy who came up when I said possum versus opossum.

[Luke Burbank]

I can't believe we're turning to Bob Villa for our possum.

[Andrew Walsh]

We need some on this, I think.

[Jake]

Well, to be fair. To be fair, I shouldn't note. This article was written by Danielle Fallon o'. Leary.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay. Right under the. Under this old house like, website. Right. The. The blog. The web blog for this old house.

[Jake]

It looks like it. Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

That is. That is a show. I'm not sure if they're still putting that on public television. I would assume so.

[Andrew Walsh]

Was that public?

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, I didn't remember that. It was. I didn't. For some reason, I did not think it was public. Oh, interesting.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, I. I'm, you know, the older I get, the more wrong I am on everything, but my memory is that. Yeah, it was a. It was a public television show.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay. Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

Which is why I kind of had, you know.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Folks see, they're always working. They seem like they were always working on a Victorian somewhere, you know, like in the Northeast somewhere.

[Andrew Walsh]

Could you see yourself sort of like, getting down with that now? Like old reruns of that from the 80s, like, as a way of, like. Because you actually very much are like. You're living the life of, like, home renovation and all that stuff. So you'd find it interesting on that level. But it'll also sort of have that. Bob. Sort of just comfort to it.

[Luke Burbank]

Exactly. I actually, you know, where I find myself interacting with their content is if I'm trying to figure out how to do something on my house, and I go on YouTube and I'm like, how do you do this kind of a thing? It will be one of the videos that comes up, and it's the gold standard, really.

[Andrew Walsh]

That's great.

[Luke Burbank]

It's gonna be the absolute way you should do it. The video will be easily 40 to 50 minutes longer than it needs to be. So the way that the YouTube home improvement videos are now is a lot of them, they don't even have any talking. They're just music, and they're super compressed. It's got some weird rights free music playing where it's just showing you exactly the thing you want, this old house is more like, I'm here with Mary. She's been living in Sutterberry for the last 30 years and she needs this baluster replaced. And then it's like a very. Like again, folksy. Yeah, but what they're. The actual craftsmanship of what they're doing is definitely the gold standard of things. Nice, Jake. Anything else that you want to share today?

[Jake]

Well, I have been without a job for about a year now, and I have a job interview tomorrow that's pretty promising.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, tell me about it.

[Jake]

If I could get every 10 to cross their fingers for me tomorrow, I.

[Luke Burbank]

Would it be a jinx if you gave us any of the broad strokes about what kind of job it might be?

[Jake]

That's funny you ask. I. Because I in the past have talked smack about the CEOs of my previous companies and then promptly got fired afterwards.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, well, don't do that.

[Jake]

They were related.

[Luke Burbank]

Don't do that.

[Jake]

But I will tell you.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay.

[Jake]

It's a. I will say it's a large beverage concern in downtown Chicago.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, all right. Is it. Do you. Do they even do in person interviews anymore or is this all on Zoom these days?

[Jake]

This is my third interview. The first one was over the phone.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Jake]

The second one was over Zoom for about two minutes until the guy's video got too choppy and then he just called me on the phone. And then this third interview is going to be in person and two hours long, apparently.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Whoa.

[Jake]

Talking to four different people.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. That's good though.

[Jake]

Very thorough.

[Andrew Walsh]

And that's pretty far into the. I mean, honestly, when I was interviewing for jobs and kind of going through that tiered process too. This was before Zoom, but very similar. Phone, phoner. And then they bring you in. Sometimes those could even be all day events. You're going around, you're meeting all the different people or what have you. Two hours. Knowing that it's kind of like limited to two hours, I think is good. You can always see. You can always see sort of the end of it. Can you tell us anything about what kind of work it is?

[Jake]

Like administrative assistance thing.

[Luke Burbank]

Nice.

[Andrew Walsh]

Good, good. I'm very excited for you.

[Cheryl]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

We're going to be sending you incredibly positive energy starting now. Computer, computer. Make Jake have the best. There's this guy on TikTok that I love. He just walks up to people in the streets of New York and he goes, computer, make these people horny and gay. Computer firewalls down. Make these people have the best Fashion Day. Of their entire life. Computer. And everyone now knows who this guy is. So right when he'll just get up to particularly young people, he'll just go computer. They'll go your computer guy.

[Andrew Walsh]

Like so excited.

[Luke Burbank]

Computer firewalls down at the major beverage concern make Jake have the best interview of all time tomorrow.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes, thank you.

[Jake]

All right, buddy. We're looking for start. I can finally start donating to tbt.

[Luke Burbank]

Listen, my friend, our friend, our friend, you have done much for the show. So you, you, you do whatever is right for you. And, and you are always, you're always loved and appreciated around here.

[John]

I also count half of Nick's donation as yours, Jake, because you got him.

[Luke Burbank]

Fair point.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes, fair point.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes. You have a life. You have a lifetime percentage of Nick's donations. So it's a pyramid scheme. Nick is in your downline.

[Jake]

Yeah, right.

[Andrew Walsh]

Sincerely, man. Good luck tomorrow. We will be thinking.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, we're sending you good energy, Jake. Okay, buddy.

[Jake]

All right. Thank you all.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, dude, knock him dead. Yeah, let's. By the way, you heard what Jake did there. Great pivot love that was calling up to talk job interviews and beverage concerns pivoted to opossums. So yeah, if you have a story about a run in with an animal. An animal. Like maybe you found a bird in your backyard that was injured and you nursed it back to health. Posted on TikTok and played let the bodies hit the floor as the music underneath the video. Whatever, just tell us about it. 206414tbtl 2064148285 all right, do we start with the box update or the frog update?

[Andrew Walsh]

Andrew, do we have a box update? I mean I guess we have the box in our box. We have the box now. Yeah, yeah, we. So yesterday on the show we were talking about this box of technology that I shipped out here to Ohio to help us do this thon that got lost in the mail. It finally arrived several days late and kind of useless for our concerns at my parents house. What was it? It was two nights ago. We got a text message from my dad saying I hope this doesn't make things worse. With a photo of a box that was absolutely destroyed. Brutalized. Like I don't even understand how a box could be so brutalized in the United States postal system. But yesterday we need needed some tech out of that box for Frog Cam. More on that in a second. So we, we swung by my parents house very very briefly. Yesterday my dad gave me this box. I did accuse him of damaging the Box for dramatic purposes. He denies it.

[Luke Burbank]

Honestly, not the worst idea from Bob Walsh.

[Andrew Walsh]

I mean honestly, he's a content creator.

[Luke Burbank]

Guy gets it.

[Andrew Walsh]

He gets it. And it is. It is blown out. Two sides totally gone. But all of the contents, including the Hackis Sackis.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes.

[Andrew Walsh]

Are still in there.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, we've got the hacky sacks. Those were in there. They are. They're safe. They were not damaged. They're currently in the back of our rental car.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yep.

[Luke Burbank]

But yeah, which puts us in a weird spot because first of all, the delay in the shipping of the package was what made it eventually unuseful to us, not useful for us. Which equipment got here too late. You had to buy other stuff. You had to bring things. Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

Now we did get it yesterday because I said we wanted it for frog camp, but we already bought other equipment that like I have. I bought a new webcam that is still in the box over there. John lugged his really old imac here that we were going to use for the.

[Luke Burbank]

And it's a desktop. That's the crazy. It's that kind where the back of it's clear. So you can't hide contraband in there.

[Andrew Walsh]

Exactly. But we. So I was like, well, it'll be just easier to use the stuff that I'm familiar with. So we swung by my parents house. But essentially we replaced all the stuff we needed in this box for this thon. So we're, you know, so shipping costs to get it out here plus the replacement parts. We're already well into this financially.

[Luke Burbank]

But the thing is now what exactly is our.

[Andrew Walsh]

What's our complaint?

[Luke Burbank]

USPS is that you mailed the box too late and the box was destroyed. Although the contents were actually weirdly fine.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

I feel like this is clouding. I'm not saying we made a mistake. We needed that computer, we need Frogcam to work. But I feel like our. What we needed to. Our best case would have been to show up at the post office with the box all busted up with the stuff inside of it.

[Andrew Walsh]

I took a lot more photos. My dad sent me some. I just could be. AI took video of the thing.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay.

[Andrew Walsh]

So of course I. You can see that I have seven fingers on my hand while I'm spinning.

[Luke Burbank]

You're holding a newspaper which clearly proves that you are alive.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Right.

[Andrew Walsh]

But the headline says something about Superman.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

So that's the kind of. That's where things get a little bit fun.

[Luke Burbank]

I'm wondering like where we're at with it. I think we should still call your guy in what Was he in Westlake?

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, we call them.

[Luke Burbank]

We need to see if Kevin and Westlake can get us, I don't know, some relief. We need to at least be able to ship this back for free. At a minimum.

[Andrew Walsh]

I need to be. I need to feel seen and heard, if nothing else.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes. So that's the latest on the box. Now the latest on another box, which is a clear plastic box with many, many air holes cut into it that has water. It has some nice rocks to climb up on. It's got all kinds of mealworms and mealworms.

[Andrew Walsh]

I was trying to remember what the food is. Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

And it's got not one, not two, but three very, very handsome frogs sitting in there right now. Frogs that we went out.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, John. I was just pointing out of excitement, you don't have to go live quite yet. But we might be getting there.

[Luke Burbank]

Because what happened was last night, at about, I don't know, nine or so, when it was getting dark, we met up with our friend Dave, who is one of the many Daves that have helped us out here in Valley City.

[Andrew Walsh]

These are the Daves.

[Luke Burbank]

I know these are the Daves. That's my best Natalie Merchant impression. One of the many Daves in our life here in Valley City. Came and met us at a barbecue joint and then led us out to a farm. You heard the tape at the beginning. That was Andrew riding along with Dave. Dave R in his truck out to this farm where there was all kinds of livestock and crops and things, but also a big pond full of frogs. Where we got out there and we had this special net that Dave has modified for catching the frogs. We had flashlights so as to stun the frogs. And by that, I mean just sort of get them to where they're kind of compliant. They're not jumping around. I will tell you this. I didn't see any evidence that the flashlights work. I was shining that flashlight at any frog we saw, and they seemed perfectly happy to jump away from us.

[Andrew Walsh]

Well, he did say, this is where I was wrong. My whole life, I heard that the flashlights freeze the frogs. So I assume it just froze the frogs as long as you kept the light on them. But Dave said it freezes them for a second and then they go.

[Luke Burbank]

The problem is, you see the frog, they're over. They're 20ft away on the shore of the pond. You hit them with the light. If they're frozen for a second, you're still 30 seconds away from getting to them. So I was struck by actually how challenging the catching of the frogs turned out to be. Now Dave was also telling us that these are farm frogs. They're skittish. He thinks that the golf course frogs.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. Because they're used to people and noise and balls splashing in the water.

[Luke Burbank]

So these. We had a. Which by the way that could really help us out though that these, these frogs that we have, these three frogs are. Yeah, they're from. They're from a farm pond. So they're strong, they're corn fed, they've been raised. Right.

[Andrew Walsh]

They're not these with values.

[Luke Burbank]

Exactly. They're not these liberal woke. Big, big city golf course frogs that'll

[Andrew Walsh]

just not sipping their lattes.

[Luke Burbank]

Precisely.

[Andrew Walsh]

Queen Anne Hill like.

[Luke Burbank]

No, we've got some real, real salt of the earth, real hoppers on our hands. The other thing I was struck by when we.

[Andrew Walsh]

Edward Hopper would have been a good name for the frogs.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, Edward Hopper. It's not too late. We have not officially as far as the listeners though locked in on a name yet. But let's be honest, we're leaning in a direction. Let's see. I also made the very questionable decision when we got there to the pond to immediately take my shoes and socks off and roll up my pants. And then all that did was expose my ankles and feet and shins to the most bug bites I've ever had in my life. It was actually. Andrew, do you have that voicemail clanking around? I think our friend Simeon, our kind of resident frog expert, had called in with some advice about frog catching.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, you want to take a list

[Luke Burbank]

which we listened to on the ride home from frog catching. It would have been better information for me to get before the frog catching.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes. So here we go. Here we do have a caller on hold. I think I can mute them and bring up my computer here.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Hey there, it's listener Simeon. I'm calling myself the Amphibiton. Hey, it's the Amphibiton. I gave you my nickname. Calling you, giving you some tips about proper dressing for frog hunting. I hear you guys talking about shoes and long pants and so on. Yeah, definitely have some good water shoes. Definitely wear long, like long sleeves, long pants. Have a bug net. Have a head net. Always over. Prepare for bugs. Because if you're under prepared, you're gonna have a bad time.

[Luke Burbank]

Like they could fall off at any moment.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Get some something with permethrin. If you go and look in, in the bug spray aisle, you're going to see stuff with deet. You're going to see the organic stuff of Eucalyptus or whatever. And then you're going to see something with permethrin. Get something with permethrin and spray that all on your socks and your pant legs and the shoes that you're going well. Okay, so this is like. If you're going to be waiting, try not to spray it on your water shoes because it's not really nice, especially when it's fresh to get into water supply.

[Jake]

But you can use that for.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

For treating your clothes. Mm, I don't know. Just follow the instructions.

[Jake]

Google it.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

That'll be easier. I guess Google won't call you and give themselves a nickname on the listener line, but. Well, yeah, there's anti tick options.

[Luke Burbank]

Not as of yet. Power up.

[Andrew Walsh]

All right, great.

[Luke Burbank]

That's our amphibiton.

[Andrew Walsh]

Sounded like a somewhat defeated power out. Did you notice that there was great.

[Luke Burbank]

Simeon, the amphibiton. I have great news. We did not get any permethrin in the water. In the water. Because we did not know that was a thing until we were driving home from the frog hunt.

[Andrew Walsh]

And no, I didn't have permission to use Promethean.

[Luke Burbank]

I was wandering around you.

[Andrew Walsh]

Thank you, John.

[Luke Burbank]

Get Promethean in certain states in the U.S. i. I was walking around the pond again with just for. No, I wasn't going in the water. We were not even really going into the mud. We were. Dave had thought of everything. We were standing on the grassy shore or above the shore with the net so that he could flop the net over these frogs. So at no time did I need to be barefoot or have my pants rolled up. And all it meant was that I was just being absolutely devoured by the very bugs that listener Simeon mentioned.

[Andrew Walsh]

I do feel like adventures like this, you begin. From a sartorial standpoint, though, that is kind of your move. Like, how should I. If I want to look the part, what should I be doing here? And you wanted to look like Tom Sawyer.

[Luke Burbank]

I kind of did.

[John]

Also, big shout out to Gordon, the farm kid who was there who's helping us with the light. He was also helping Dave go and net the frogs, too.

[Andrew Walsh]

He's really the one who him. And I mean, not to blow up our spot, but like, they caught the frogs for us. Did you catch the frog?

[John]

God, no. I shined a flashlight.

[Luke Burbank]

Dave was the one operating the net.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

So all we were doing was he

[Andrew Walsh]

had a bunch of nets, but none of us grabbed it. He went to hand me a net, and I said, no, I can't. I'm holding the microphone.

[John]

I was carrying the box.

[Luke Burbank]

I thought that was interesting, Andrew, because he tried to hand you the net and you said, oh, no, no, I need. I have the microphone holder. Which was true. But the net would have meant that you didn't actually have to put your hand on a frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, that's true. But I don't know. I don't know. I thought I wanted sound of us out there. And also just like, I just sort of figured there were. There were a bunch of us. There was Mike, whose farm it was his kids or grandkids, I don't know the relationship, but some four H K,

[Luke Burbank]

Savannah, Cheyenne, and then Gordon and they

[Andrew Walsh]

had like pigs on the farm as a, you know, decent working. Decent sized working farm.

[Luke Burbank]

First 11 year old I've met named Gordon.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes, Gordon. I kept calling him Jordan and I was wrong.

[Luke Burbank]

I assume Gordon is a name that they bestow upon you at the age of 39, you have a totally different name. And then at 39 they change your name to Gordon.

[Andrew Walsh]

I see Gordy. I could see a young Gordy, maybe. But anyway, yeah, so there was a big crew of us and Dave really took the lead and.

[Cheryl]

Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

And I wasn't like jumping to the front of the line to take part, so we noticed. And you were sort of waiting for.

[Luke Burbank]

I only did one loop. I did one loop in my bare feet and my exposed.

[Andrew Walsh]

And you didn't have a net, did you?

[Luke Burbank]

I did not, no. Dave was the net guy.

[Andrew Walsh]

You had a flashlight.

[Luke Burbank]

I had a flashlight. And then after our first loop, we got our first frog, which I thought was like the goal. We're gonna get a frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

And then Dave said, what, do you want to get another? And then I just handed the flashlight to John.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. And you went inside the car.

[Luke Burbank]

That is not true. I also was on Instagra. I wanted to see how my Facebook running posts were doing at the Stens page. No. I got into the truck to kind of dry, slash, tick, check my feet and ankles, to put my socks back on and get kind of dressed. And then they were already the far side of the pond again. And what I realized was, oh, my gosh, it really is a cloud of insects out there. An absolute cloud of insects. And you had already given up on the audio recording of it. So you and I just kind of just sort of milled about. We sort of loitered by the truck waiting for John and the rest of the crew to come back with three. Well, now at this point, two additional enormous frogs.

[Andrew Walsh]

I was surprised too. I was like, okay, we got our frog we're good. But then Dave was like, all right, you said that. He said, you want more? I don't even remember that conversation. I think he was just like, I think once it's like me and Miller Lights, like, once Dave is in like frog grabbing mode, you know, one is not just gonna do it. So he. So he just kind of started circling the pond again. So I went around, I was taking some photos. I was enjoy being on a farm at night. I hadn't done that.

[Luke Burbank]

You were having a dangerous run in with pigs.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, my goodness. So one of these kiddos, who's really awesome, by the way, she has these

[Luke Burbank]

pigs and it's 4h, they're raising them for 4h.

[Andrew Walsh]

How many pigs were there? I'm going to say maybe were there six. Six pigs and big, big pigs. Right. And some of them were hers. Some of them were the other girls. I don't know if they're sisters or whatever.

[Luke Burbank]

I think there's one for each girl. And then. And the girl who does 4H is going to take it to the Medina County Fair. County fair.

[Andrew Walsh]

That was the fair that I would go to. I asked them when the derby is. That's on Friday, the last night of the fair, if I understand it correctly. I don't know if you guys are able to extend our Airbnb for that,

[Luke Burbank]

but by an additional week, maybe month.

[Andrew Walsh]

It doesn't matter.

[Luke Burbank]

Demo Derby.

[Andrew Walsh]

What part of demo derby don't you understand? Oh, all of it. But anyway, this is a true story. This seemed like it was literally a scene out of the Pink Panther Returns. So there's your dog bites.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Exactly.

[Andrew Walsh]

You know the scene I'm talking about, there's these pigs and they're large. And I have not been around a pig in a long time, and I tend to just be scared of things.

[Luke Burbank]

These are big, large. You aren't being like just a scaredy cat.

[Andrew Walsh]

These are not spider pig anymore. He's Harry Plopper. So I, I, but I noticed the girls are petting the pigs over the fence, and the pigs are sticking their snout sort of through the fence towards me. So I'm letting him, like, smell me a little bit, smell my hand. And, But I, I kind of want to pet the pig. So I think I pet one of them maybe, you know, just on their back very briefly. But I, I kind of wanted permission, so I turned to the, the, you know, the, the girl who's maybe, I don't 12 or something like that. And I said, is it okay to pet them? Like, is it all right. And she's like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I reach over the fence, and I pet him more. I pet this pig more. And then as I'm petting the pig, she says, just be careful. They bite, and they have really sharp teeth.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

What.

[Andrew Walsh]

What did you think I was asking for was. I wasn't asking if the pigs wanted me to do it. I was asking. Asking if your pig bites.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes.

[Andrew Walsh]

And she says,

[Luke Burbank]

yeah, that's info.

[Andrew Walsh]

The fact that I'm here today with

[Luke Burbank]

two hands, much like the permethrone, that's information we could have used before the event.

[Andrew Walsh]

It was so funny.

[John]

In his defense, he sent that voicemail in before we were out.

[Luke Burbank]

No, I'm blaming Andrew for that one. That's not on our amphibiton. But it was a successful mission in that we do have these three frogs who are. I'm looking at them right now, and I'm gonna be honest with you. They look very chill. Yeah, they are in. And again, Dave, our friend who's our frog wrangler, it was very touching. And we all commented on this last night, I think, to each other and maybe even to Dave a little bit. But, like, for somebody who goes out there and catches frogs for this frog jump on Sunday, he also really wants the frogs to be doing okay. He was saying, we're gonna make sure we want to handle them minimally. We've got them in this special box that he built that's got, like, a kind of a lid on top of it where you can slide and you can create this opening to put the frogs in, and then you can close it very easily. There's a bunch of air holes. And he also said, we're going to put about an inch of water in so that the frogs can be. If they would like to be in water, they can. If they don't, we've also put two rocks, like, pretty sizable rocks in there so they can climb up. In fact, right now, we've got. One of the frogs is in the water chilling. The other is. Is up on a big rock. And the third one is maybe hiding.

[Andrew Walsh]

The other one is hiding. The one is always hiding behind that big rock. Unfortunately, like, I think he's camera shy.

[Luke Burbank]

It's. You know, it takes all kinds. And we've got. We've got a shy frog, probably a frog that's very, like. Maybe even like a. What was it? The WB frog. But his real name is like, J. It's like Michigan J. Frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, that's close.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, we got a. Hello, my baby. Hello, my darling frog. We got one that's kind of in the middle and then one that's sort of hiding from the camera. But we've got these three frogs now. And of course, we have been in the lead up to this talking about what will we name our frog. But now we have three frogs. And John, what were some of the frog suggested frog names that we were working with that we liked?

[John]

Yeah. So my favorite one was Erling Hopland, in honor of the big Norwegian who

[Luke Burbank]

coincidentally brought a taxidermied raccoon back to Norway from America. There's a picture of him getting off the private flight for the Norwegian national team. And he's just holding. He's got his bag and he's holding a taxidermied raccoon that I think is peering into like an absolute. Like an absolute vodka bottle or something.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Really? Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

Just as an aside.

[John]

Well, happy America. Like that's his thing he's coming back with. Right. We, of course, a big fan favorite. Jackie Drop Jump.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, that's a good one.

[John]

One we really love from Cheryl Corvallis. Mr. Frog. Dabolina.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

Famous Beatles song.

[Jake]

Lisa.

[John]

At least Leap Day William.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, Leap Day William.

[John]

Dua Leaper.

[Luke Burbank]

By the way, I think he's maybe holding a tequila bottle. Take a look. Get some eyes on that.

[Andrew Walsh]

I didn't see this flash by my social media.

[Luke Burbank]

Raccoon is holding a sauza bottle for some reason.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, that's how he's gonna remember the

[John]

U.S. could that be the show pick?

[Andrew Walsh]

No, I have photos of frogs.

[John]

Oh, that's more appropriate. What else do we have? There's a few other going spark plug, Mr. Ribbitz, and then one I also really love. Not your Becca. Different Becca. Luke. Since in Pre Frogtane.

[Luke Burbank]

Pre Frogtane is really good. Those are all solid names.

[John]

Really good names.

[Luke Burbank]

We should maybe we see what the frogs think. Let's. We actually have a microphone. We got the camera that Andrew set up. Then we got a microphone in there with our three frogs just to see what their energy is and to see. What do you guys think of those suggested names? Any of those resonate? Any of those feel like they make sense for you? Oh, God. They're doing this classic. We get it, guys. It's a little on brand. Then there's the guy hiding behind the rock who doesn't talk a lot, but when he does, it's annoying. Yeah, we don't like that guy very much. So we have been thinking. We've been in quiet meditation and reflection on the topic of what we are going to name our frog now that we have three frogs and we thought we were gonna have one frog, and we've decided to name our frogs in honor of the part of the world we're in, and because there's not enough of them, our frogs are named Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

Dave.

[Luke Burbank]

Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

Dave.

[Luke Burbank]

Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

Dave.

[Luke Burbank]

Dave. That's right. All three frogs are named Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

That's right.

[Luke Burbank]

It makes it easier. It pumps some much needed Dave names into the local economy here in Valley City. Another thing that Dave, the frog catcher mentioned was he is going to come in and he's going to be checking on our frogs throughout the week. And if any of them seem a bit listless, a bit lethargic, we will take them and we will return them to their pond and we will maybe grab a different frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes, exactly. I love. Dave is sincerely looking out for the care of these frogs. It's funny. Dave is. He's both very sincere about the care of the frogs, but also tries to sort of, I don't know, like, kind of cut that with a little bit of humor. Like I was asking him, I'm like, well, what about their sort of circadian rhythms? We have to worry about lighting or whatever. And he's like, no, they're frogs. They have tiny brains. But also he's the one who's saying, hey, listen, I'm gonna come in here and check on them every day, and if they do start to look a little listless, we will take them back outside, get them into a pond as soon as possible, bring another frog in that I'm assuming we'll name Dave, probably. And so. Yeah, and so we're definitely looking out for these guys.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, we have their peace of mind. I mean, I was very last night annoyingly worried about their circadian rhythms. We did not want to leave the lights on in here because we're gonna have frog cam, which will be going 24 hours a day. But we're trying to figure out how could. How can we make it so that the frogs, you could see them on camera at night, but that they're not having their sleep cycle ruined? They're not used to fluorescent light. They're used to being outside. The sun comes up, the sun goes down. This is the bio rhythms of their day, and we don't want to mess with that.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

So we're being very, very careful with our Daves. And we may. These may be the Daves that we have all the way through Sunday. We may trade them out for other Daves. And I Guess we also have to figure out at some point which one. Which Dave we want to enter in the competition.

[Andrew Walsh]

Assuming that these are the Daves that last with us for the full week and that we're not taking any back out to the pond. I think we've identified it. Me and Dave had a little confab without you guys. A little sidebar.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, Dave, the Dave are Human Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

Me and one. Me and one of the human Daves had a conversation about the frog Daves. And there's one frog in there that is larger than the others, and that would definitely and significantly so.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, Big Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

Big Dave. Yeah, I'm talking about big Dave. Big Dave, ironically, is the small.

[John]

Can I raise a concern about Sunday Big one?

[Luke Burbank]

We call tiny.

[John]

A real concern I have about Sunday is we went out to the pond last night. It was great. We hung out with human Dave. It was a real fun time. And we brought back our three Daves here. Human Dave was mentioning that they get a bunch of the frogs for the jump from a hatchery. And you said they're three to four times the size of our frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Wait, I didn't realize that they get a bunch hatchery. I didn't know that he did.

[John]

Are we getting kind of screwed?

[Luke Burbank]

I'm not sure. By the way, it's not all about size.

[John]

I think it is with this.

[Luke Burbank]

Is it?

[John]

I think with that.

[Luke Burbank]

I mean, that's the bigger spirit. But they have to move. A larger frog has to move more frog weight as well.

[John]

So I think actually Simeon noted, you want to be strong. Excuse me? Our amphibitan mentioned you want them to be big and strong like, but not. I don't know the exact word he used. I'm gonna say frumpy, but that's not the word.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, last night, Dave, Human Dave kept saying, oh, they got some real pigs. And he didn't mean pigs, meant frogs. Yeah, he was using the term pig as a way of describing a super large fry, which was confusing to me

[Andrew Walsh]

because I was being attacked by pigs. There's apparently a frog.

[Luke Burbank]

There's an apparently a family in the area, and I believe they're called the Bacco family, the Braco family.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, the boys.

[Luke Burbank]

This is up the boys. This is a multi generation frog capture operation where they go out, they get a bunch of frogs they bring. Because this is how the frog jump works. First of all, it sells out immediately, I've been told. So people just show up on Sunday. Some of them, in fact, many of them have brought their own frogs to enter in the frog jump. There are also people that show up sans frog without frog to our non French speakers. And those people can rent a frog. You can basically for. I think it's $7. So it's $8 to enter the frog jump. It's $7 if you're gonna, if you're gonna rent a frog, you can rent a frog from them that have been captured by these people that do this as a volunteer thing. And then you can enter that as your frog jump. If you win your round, it's called a flight, then you get a little trophy and you move on to the next one. And then you go on to face all the other winners of the other rounds. But yeah, there are a lot of frogs that are brought in for this. And it's a fair question. I don't know how our frogs compare to the other frogs.

[Andrew Walsh]

I don't know. And you started to talk about this and I don't know. I asked Dave if he's been human, if he's been watching any of these broadcasts, and I think he said no. He didn't apologize for it either. But I don't know if he might be checking in today because of our adventures last night. Dave, if you happen to be in the building and are watching this, can you come in here? What were the. He was talking about the brackish boys or something like that?

[Luke Burbank]

Well, no, that's. That's the family.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, but he called them the boys. But he said they're my age.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay. Yeah, that's right.

[Luke Burbank]

That was why it was confused.

[Andrew Walsh]

He said, I call them the boys, but I think they're in their 60s.

[Luke Burbank]

I think it's them, maybe their children who are grown and then their grandchildren. It's a whole opera. He said they bring in something like, what is it, 70 frogs characters.

[Andrew Walsh]

They dress in capes sometimes. I don't know.

[Luke Burbank]

I met a frog in a cape one year, which didn't seem to help.

[Andrew Walsh]

Dave, if you are, if you are in the building, come in here and explain this to us.

[Luke Burbank]

So that's, that's where we stand. Should we all this talk about our frogs, about our Dave's. Should we go live with the cam?

[Andrew Walsh]

Nobody knows where the Dave cam is, so I need to set this up for folks. If you are interested in watching our frogs live, especially now as we open up the live stream for the very first time, just Simply go to tbtl.net,

[Luke Burbank]

go over there, John.

[Andrew Walsh]

You'll see two videos right at the top of tbtl.net. one of them is streaming us live right now. But you've probably already found that if you can hear me right now. The other YouTube video, that one is TBTL Frogcam, and it's labeled as such. So go to tbtl.net if you want to see us open up the frog cam, go live for the very first time. Dave, Dave.

[Jake]

Dave.

[Luke Burbank]

Dave's are live.

[Andrew Walsh]

I'm watching it. It's happening. Dave are live.

[Luke Burbank]

There they are.

[Andrew Walsh]

Pretty good shot of. I think that's big Dave there on the rock. That's close.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, so the small one on the rock.

[John]

Great job setting that up, Andrew. Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

Unfortunately, there is the. The third guy is camera shy, clearly hiding behind that rock. But that's okay.

[Luke Burbank]

That might be his process. That might be how he gets psyched. The big competition. I mean, that's a dark horse kind of candidate. But like, you get the kind of quiet, camera shy.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Frog that you don't know a lot about, but who might just have, like the, you know, the heart of a champion.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, there you go. You're also seeing a little behind the scenes. You can sort of see the. The other tripod in the background there. If you want to see how the. How the froggage is made.

[Luke Burbank]

We're pulling. We're not making any froggage. I want to be really clear about that. If. Yeah, if. If you want to check out our Daves. They are live. Tbtl.net and you can see them. And again, we are going to be. We'll be monitoring them, we'll be feeding them. We'll be making sure they're doing okay. And then I guess on Sunday we'll be seeing how they do. I also, it's. I maybe because we're kind of like filming this for cbs. I don't know. Are we going out as a threesome to exhort our frog to jump its furthest? What's our team strategy? Because we're supposed to. And you guys have seen pictures, right? It's like, it's a big. It looks like a big target on the ground and you're standing in the middle of it, I believe.

[Andrew Walsh]

Parachute. I believe.

[Luke Burbank]

And it's got, you know, got a circle in the middle and then it's circles ringing out. Because I think it's like, how far did your frog leap? You see people out there down on their hands and knees, kind of trying to encourage the frog or whatever. Are we. It's gonna be the three of us right out there.

[Andrew Walsh]

I mean, that was the original plan, I guess. There are supposedly Rules where it's supposed to be one person. But Dave specifically said we're here for a time. Human Dave was saying not a long time. But he said that if a couple of kids show up and they want to do it together. Great. Do it together. We're not going to be sticklers for the rules. We're just here to have a good time so all three of us could do it. That's fine. I'm going to be honest about something here. I've been telling you guys, I don't want to. I kind of don't want to touch the frogs. I've been saying that for weeks now.

[Cheryl]

And.

[Andrew Walsh]

And I love our frogs.

[Luke Burbank]

I would die for our frogs.

[Andrew Walsh]

I'm already attached to them. I would die for each one of those Daves. I would die for the human Daves too.

[Luke Burbank]

Lucy, who you don't even remember your actual pets back home. That's how locked in.

[Andrew Walsh]

We have a froggy playdate later on today with some more neighborhood frogs. But I will say I took some photos of you holding the frog yesterday, Luke. I'm gonna maybe make that the show pick. I saw everybody kinda. Not everybody was handling it, but those who were capturing the frogs and then handling it, I thought, yeah, I can't do that.

[Jake]

Ah.

[Luke Burbank]

So I can't do that.

[Andrew Walsh]

And even when I look into the frog to our little frog terrarium over there and I look at them, they. They kind of give me. I don't want to. Yeah, I don't. Not a bad feeling. Not a bad feeling. But I am glad that there is a barrier between us. And I don't know why.

[Luke Burbank]

Huh.

[Andrew Walsh]

Love from a distance. I did.

[Luke Burbank]

I did pick up one of our frogs last night. Very gently. It was kind of slimy, but not that bad actually. And so if we need to. If the frog needs to be carried on Sunday, I'm happy to do that. I don't know how that works exactly. Like if we bring the terrarium out and then just put them down or if we. How far, you know, between the terrarium and the. And the starting line. We're going to be. But I'm happy to handle the frog. I feel comfortable. I did it last night. It went okay.

[Andrew Walsh]

Are you going to get one of those Bjorns? Can we get a frog Bjorn for you so you can wear. Swaddle it.

[Luke Burbank]

I'll definitely. I'm going to definitely swaddle it on

[Andrew Walsh]

the front of your.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Well, that's.

[Luke Burbank]

I mean I'm going to be here tonight doing that just so we bond and so we're, you know, we're in alignment on things.

[John]

I also, I did not handle one last night. But if you need to hand it to someone for a moment, Luke, I would not be uncomfortable.

[Luke Burbank]

In fact, you were trying to impress the farm kids by talking about your childhood in the Catskills chasing tadpoles.

[John]

I'm a suburban kid and I pretend to know about nature. And I was like, yeah, we used to try to get salamanders and tadpoles because I didn't want the 12 year olds to think I wasn't cool or I felt uncomfortable on the farm.

[Andrew Walsh]

I love that. One of the kids said she sort of had a moment where I didn't see what was happening, but I heard a little commotion and then raucous laughter from one corner of the pond at one point. And it turns out the story was she wanted to get in on the frog catching action. But also, like me, was a little squeamish. She's like, I didn't want to touch the frog. So she had on like kind of a classic, you know, mesh back baseball cap, like trucker style cap. So she took off her hat and was trying to catch a frog using her hat, but then somehow I think slipped and like fell in the mud. And then everybody apparently was laughing at her. And it's like, is there any more classic Americana than this kid trying to catch a frog in her head?

[Luke Burbank]

No. And then falling down and then. And by the way, laughing herself and then her friend or sister or whatever laughing with her. They were having a. I mean, again, give them a couple of slingshots.

[Andrew Walsh]

It was so fun last time.

[Luke Burbank]

Their back pocket.

[Andrew Walsh]

I really love those kids.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, it was, it was right out of Americana Central casting. So that is, that's the latest on our frogs. We have our Daves. Like I said, we'll be watching them and we'll make the decision as to which Dave to enter in the contest as we get closer to Sunday. But you can go to tbtl.net right now and check in on them live, see how they're doing, all of that stuff.

[Andrew Walsh]

Let me say one more thing too, because the frog cam, there's a link to it. Like I said, it's [e-mail], but when you click on that, it can take you straight through to the YouTube page for the frog cam. And of course, just like this, you can chat in there too. And since it's a 24 hour frog cam, if you guys wake up at midnight tonight and you're like, you know, What I want to see if there's anything doing on the frog cam. Maybe I got some other tens who are peeping right now. You guys can have. You guys can just chat whenever you want. 24. 7. You now have an open 24. 7 chat line with the TBTL community.

[Luke Burbank]

Amazing. And that community is something that we talk about a lot. Thank you for being a 10, because here we are in Valley City, Ohio, with three frogs in Andrew's old elementary school. And you would think that that would mean that we, the three of us and the frogs, we are the centerpiece of the show. And in fact, in fact, the reason this show exists, and what's interesting about it is all the people that are watching us right now and listening to this in the coming days, it's you, the tens of listeners. Like the way that you show up for each other, the way that you like to chat in the middle of the night via the frog cam, the way that you have, again, taken care of each other when folks needed a helping hand or some encouragement or you name it. The community of TBTL listeners is the real secret sauce of this whole thing and the kind of inexplicable part. And so we are taking that week that we do each year to remind folks in that community that this can only happen through donations and your support. And we've got a lot of folks who've been supporting us over the years who are continuing to do that, and we are incredibly grateful. Also some new folks signing up as well. John, what are we offering people as our thank you gifts this year?

[John]

Yeah, we really haven't talked a ton about them. You know, we brought it up on Monday, but. But first of all, anyone who donates at any level, if you're giving 5 bucks a month or 100 bucks a month or whatever it is, or your firstborn child, we actually don't have an

[Luke Burbank]

intake for that, so.

[John]

Oh, right. That there's a whole thing with, like, the government.

[Luke Burbank]

Cbs, I believe. Cps.

[John]

Cp. Oh, cps.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

The one Barry Weiss is not running currently.

[John]

That's that we know that's more appropriate. So everyone who donates gets two things, actually. One, you get physical. A magnet, which is a replica of the pie cart delivery magnet or the contest delivery.

[Luke Burbank]

Have I told you? Content delivery.

[John]

Content delivery.

[Luke Burbank]

That's what we had. The. We had the van, the delica. We were driving around to people's driveways because this was during the pandemic, and we were delivering the podcast to them by doing the podcast in their front yard or driveway. And we had these magnets that said podcast delivery service or something. And. And they're actually kind of cool, you know, that I think the people at the Fast sign in Portland, in Slabtown, I don't know if they're listening, but we're definitely back on their radar now because we were trying to find where is the file, the digital file of this magnet or, you know, these big magnets that we had.

[John]

Because it's a specific font. Really?

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, it's kind of. It's sort of almost like. It's almost like what they thought the future was gonna look like in the 80s or something.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, I love it. Yeah. It looks sort of like. Reminds me of sort of Futurama delivery font.

[Luke Burbank]

Sort of.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

And so we couldn't find the art for it. And so I called up the Fast Signs where we got the magnets made years ago. They were so helpful. And the guy was like, oh, Luke Burbank, okay. And he's like, finds the thing, finds the file, sends it to me, still had all of the information years later. It was like, incredible. I just got an email from them today going like, hey, make sure to keep Fast Signs. Because I was explaining to the guy on the phone, I was like, I know, we. He goes. He goes, does it say podcast delivery? And I was like, it does, actually. Cause we do a podcast. And I was giving him the story on how we were driving the podcast around to people back then. I think he was 5% intrigued. So anyway, they sent us the file. We're making the magnets. But I think that now I don't know if they're listening, but I think that they're aware that we are a podcast and they are interested in staying in business with us.

[Andrew Walsh]

They could be watching right now. They could be listening. Hi, Fast Signs, with all due respect

[John]

to Walter Bernburg, are Fast Signs, are

[Luke Burbank]

they now our official sign maker for certain things? There were certain things. And the thing. It's a. You know, we have a lot of sign needs for a variety of different things. By the way, for a podcast, we oddly shout out to Gary at Fast Signs. I got the email, bro, for something like that, something quick and dirty. Fast Signs is your place. You want something sandblasted, John, you want something gold leafed? Walt's your guy.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

You want marine lettering?

[Andrew Walsh]

Sure, I do want marine lettering.

[Luke Burbank]

Do you need some van? Some, you know, some lettering on your van? Are you a major grocery concern that would like people driving on the freeway to know how much further to get to your Safeway? Walt's your guy.

[Andrew Walsh]

What if I'm a minor grocery concern?

[Luke Burbank]

That's a fast sign thing.

[Andrew Walsh]

That's a fast sign thing. Okay, sounds good. We have a minor grocery concern in our neighborhood and I'm loving it. And the grocery store is called Dave's.

[Luke Burbank]

Exactly. Dave. That is funny. I did not even think about the grocery store. At some point. I do want to talk on air. This is not the time because we are. We're talking about the thon and what people can get. But I do want to talk about that Dave's. And I am the whole self checkout situation. I don't know if you've run through that yet, Andrew. If you had the same issues that I did.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, I did not run into the same issues.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay.

[John]

I did run to the same issue. Luke and I have the same feelings.

[Luke Burbank]

We'll get back to that in a moment. In the meantime, you can, if you donate at any level, you'll get one of these handsome magnets.

[John]

A handsome magnet. Plus you get something that we're doing for the first time. A weekly video version of an episode of tbtl. So the way that works is Monday through Friday, the boys here will do the regular show and one of those episodes. We're not saying it's a specific one from each week, but one of those episodes will be emailed to you in video form.

[Luke Burbank]

Whichever one my skin has cleared up the most for will be the one we will use. Maybe you're watching us right now on YouTube and you're just like, look at those guys. I could look at them once a week for up to one and a half hours.

[John]

Even.

[Andrew Walsh]

Even tens can tolerate.

[Luke Burbank]

That's right. Coming your way this year. That's right. The video version of one of the episodes from the week.

[John]

So we're really excited about that. That's a cool new project that we'll do. So that's. Everyone gets that. Then if you go to the $10 a month level, you get that stuff. Plus you get a pack. A 10 pack of the TBTL trading cards. The inside baseball trading cards that we're super excited about.

[Andrew Walsh]

Very excited about.

[John]

You can see some samples. If you go to tbt, there's some samples. We don't want to give it. As you mentioned, Andrew the other day, we. We don't want to give them all away because we want the surprise. You get. You get your pack and we want you to be excited with.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. Or let them make it very clear. They're randomized packs. We have a set of 30 cards. But if you just get one pack of these. There will be 10 in there, but you don't know which 10 you're getting. So you're going to have that opening, that unboxing experience.

[John]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

And. Yeah. And if you want to get all of the cards, all 30, then what would people do?

[John]

That is at the $25 level. Month.

[Luke Burbank]

Sw. Yeah.

[John]

So you get those plus and then the middle between those two, at 15, you get a pack of 10 plus you get the on air daily donor.

[Luke Burbank]

Thanks from users.

[John]

Oh, get that as well.

[Luke Burbank]

I will say that the photo we're [e-mail] from the playing cards, the trading cards, I should say we've got one of me and one of Andrew. I look a little bit like if Gavin Newsom went feral. It's like Gavin Newsom has a scandal, he leaves politics, and we find him living in a cabin somewhere. It's a little. It's still Newsom.

[Andrew Walsh]

Is it the one with you in bubbles? Is that what we're looking at?

[Luke Burbank]

No, I'm smiling at a. I don't.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, the one that. That's the on air. Thanks. Little art, that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's nice.

[Luke Burbank]

It's good. I'll take it. I've been called a teemu. Gavin Newsom before, and I'll really. Yeah, I was. I was somewhere in a suit and someone said you look a little like. A little bit like Gavin Newsom, which I took as a high compliment.

[John]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay.

[John]

So then that's 1525 gets you the thing on your thanks. Plus the entire collection of cards, all 30 cards. And then if you bump up to the 35 level month, you get all that, plus you get the frog jump champion, which may or may not be presumptuous that we're gonna be champions.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, it is presumptuous, but it's also accurate. No, it's all about confidence.

[John]

It's all about confidence. So you get the awesome shirt that was designed by our friend.

[Luke Burbank]

It's. If I can, just for people that aren't looking at it right now, it's somehow like sort of 90s in the best way. Like with the way that the graphics are. It's. It's a really lovely green color. It says tbtl. It's got. I believe the state of Ohio is represented there. So it's TBTL over the state of Ohio. It says frog jump championship. And then we've got one of the Daves jumping on the T shirt.

[John]

Frog Dave, not human Dave. Although we get human Dave on there, too.

[Luke Burbank]

I think it's, it's right at the absolute maximum busyness I think throwing a human Dave on there at this point.

[Andrew Walsh]

Human Dave leaping like that frog.

[Luke Burbank]

So yeah, the T shirt is. People are already getting really excited about the T shirt this year. And unlike the hot dog shirt, it will not in any way look weird.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Depending on whatever's going on with you. So it's a great shirt. People are going to be excited for that.

[John]

So we're really excited for that. And then level after, that's the dazzling donors to get all the thank you gifts. Plus you get your personalized message on air which may or may not be feel like homework. You're not obligated to do it, but we'd love to.

[Luke Burbank]

You got a business and you're looking to promote it. It's a great tax write off. You can absolutely turn. We're not a 501C3.

[John]

I'd say talk to your accountant. We can't definitively talk about this right off.

[Luke Burbank]

I would say don't talk to your accountant. I would say just trust it. I'd say go with the flow. What I would say is we are not a non profit. We are not a 501C3. But if you have a business expense for your business, I guess work that out with your accountant and your God or your frog. Here's what I would say. They're defunding the IRS left and right. If there's a time to risk it, it's right now. And that's something John told me to say right before the show. John specifically asked me to frame it that way.

[Andrew Walsh]

I told you about my buddy John. We worked at a telemarketing firm together, right? And Town and Country, it was called ebs. Well, I probably should. It was called ebsco. I want to say ebsco Telemarketing Services. And we did call on behalf of all kinds of magazines to get people to renew their subscriptions. But in many cases those subscriptions were, were very long expired. It'd be like, oh yeah, Town and Country magazine. I subscribed to it five years ago, forgot about it. But now it's 1995 or whatever and I'm getting this phone call from Kent, Ohio, right? And somebody's saying, hey, would you like to renew your Field and Stream? You're like, I don't even remember I had a Field and Stream. But then you talk them into like renewing it anyway. That was my job. Get people to sign up. But then we had a confirmation part where people had to call Back, which is, this is good, right? Legally you had to call, call back and say, hey, you received a phone call from us yesterday. You said that you did want to sign up for this. We want to confirm that this is all legit so that like somebody like me isn't just signing somebody up and then, and then, and then they change their mind or they maybe I didn't follow the rules or whatever. So my friend was in the confirmation business, his name was John. He would call up, he's making the final thing, he's getting the financial information, he's closing the deal, he's confirming the deal and everything. But then sometimes he would just tell them if they were a little bit on the fence, he was just kind of like, well just confirm it now and then just cancel it right away. You'll still get a magazine and they won't even charge your card. He's giving them ideas about how to scam basically the company he's working for.

[Luke Burbank]

That's actually a perfect segue into something that I wanted to talk about which

[John]

is are you scamming tbt?

[Luke Burbank]

No, but we have, you know, folks who support TBTL can do it in a number of different ways. A lot of people go on like a monthly donation where you know you're donating X number of dollars a month, whatever feels right to you. Other folks will just give a kind of a one time lump sum donation. And one thing that we've noticed is that you know, as sort of based on previous thons, the one time donations, that kind of, you know, that group of folks, let's just say those donations as of it's Wednesday were, let's say it's lagging a little bit behind some of the other years. And we were kind of wondering why that is. And it's like, well, I know why it is. It's because the economy is kind of unknown thing right now. Some people are doing great, others aren't. Some people are doing great, but wonder if they will. And maybe the idea of kind of signing on for an entire year right now could be a little daunting to someone. So if you would rather just jump in on a monthly donation and then just if it doesn't work for you, stop doing the monthly donation. We won't even bill you for Town and Country or Field and Stream. Like if you're somebody who's been figuratively just writing us a check in years past for the whole year. And that's something that just kind of maybe something you're a little stuck on because it feels like a chunk of money just kick in a monthly something and then as soon as that doesn't feel right to you, stop kicking in the monthly something.

[Andrew Walsh]

Exactly. And listen, everybody is on their own financial journey, right? And so here we are asking you, asking maybe some people to maybe give a little bit more if you like the gifts or whatever. But now I'm going to do something, what is called an anti fundraising message, which is why they don't let me work in public radio anymore. But I also.

[Luke Burbank]

John, we need you to leave for this part.

[Andrew Walsh]

We hit on this a little bit yesterday too, which is like this is tbtl. We're a community. We really appreciate the fact that it's you guys who are keeping, keeping us on the air, on the Internet, keeping this whole community together, keeping the Dave's fed. So what I would rather have. I do not want anybody giving more than they are comfortable with. Like if you feel a little bit uncomfortable about it and be like, I just can't, I just can't. But I really want to support the boys. You are supporting the boys. You have supported the boys and you will support the boys again. And we really appreciate it. But the worst outcome is that we have anybody listening who is feeling guilt or stress about this. That ain't how it works. We have some folks who can give more than others and that's what it's all about. And that's what community is about. And we see people, their situations change, their donation levels change. Sometimes you just have to bow out altogether. Maybe you don't have a job right now. And so we are looking for people who are in good positions to maybe help out the people who aren't and to help out us. And we really appreciate that.

[Luke Burbank]

Maybe you're gonna get a job tomorrow at a large beverage concern, right? Immediately start donating. I mean I just.

[Andrew Walsh]

Exactly. Maybe.

[John]

And I will stress as somebody who's also an anxious person myself, Andrew, like I. The amount of emails I get just throughout the year, if somebody be like, hey, I gotta pause my gift or reduce my monthly gift that, you know, this situation changed and the amount of apologies that come with that, like you guys, it's obviously like the support of the tens makes this possible. And we really couldn't do the show without the community support. But on the individual level, like nobody needs to feel bad if they, if they can't give or if, if it's not. Whatever it is, whoever your personal situation is, we're just grateful you're there watching or listening to the show and and for those who can give, please make a gift. You know, that kind of thing.

[Andrew Walsh]

This is tbtl.

[Jake]

Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

You should feel bad about the things I'm saying.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah.

[Andrew Walsh]

And not your donation level. It is built. This is the model.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes, absolutely.

[John]

Absolutely.

[Luke Burbank]

But if you are, let me just say the last thing before we jump to our top story before we do a little, kind of one other quick

[John]

little thing, but go on, please.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, well, why don't you do that?

[John]

There was a question about the magnets came up in the chat. They're three by five magnets.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[John]

So that was if that impacts your

[Luke Burbank]

decision to donate 3 foot by 5 foot.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yes.

[Luke Burbank]

You're gonna need 3 yards by 5 yards. So this is for people with industrial refrigerators. If you're working in an institution somewhere, this is the perfect magnet for your fridge.

[John]

Thank you for clarifying.

[Luke Burbank]

I was just gonna say another thing is if you're somebody who has been kind of listening to the show for years and years and you have been considering donating, just jump in at five bucks a month or something, you know, if you haven't ever done it before, again, because of all the previous things, which is that maybe this will offset somebody else who's not able to do it. And also, you can cancel at any time and you don't have to send John an apology email. So if you've been on the fence,

[Andrew Walsh]

you don't have to send your field instructions, magazines back to us if you can.

[Luke Burbank]

No, honestly, at this point you can keep them. We don't have anything to do with them. So, yeah, like, if you, if you've kind of been like, maybe I'll help out one year, this would be a good year is what I'm saying. Because of all of the unknowns out there, this might be the year for you to jump in even at whatever, you know, a one time $5 gift. Enough of those really does sort of add up. So again, thank you to everybody who's gotten us this far and who is making TBTL happen all these 4771 episodes into this, this.

[Andrew Walsh]

Hello and welcome to Top Story.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, at the beginning of this week, I knew we were going to be talking about frogs because we're here at the Valley City Frog Jump. And I knew we were going to be getting a frog that we were going to enter in the contest. And so I needed to grab some audio, frog related audio. And I was going on the Internet looking for frog sound effects. And what I found was ultimately I went with like, this is a frog jumping From a Hanna Barbera cartoon.

[Jake]

Perfect.

[Luke Burbank]

Because an actual sound of a frog or anybody else jumping it doesn't sound like this. This is, I believe, from some other cartoon. Those are cartoon frogs. These are also. These are more like animatronic

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

whines.

[Luke Burbank]

I ended up on this website where two. To me, it's pretty clear that a person. I don't even think this is a computer generated thing. I think somebody who was probably just creating an entire large library of sound effects decided to try to make a bunch of frog sound effects. But this doesn't sound like someone went out in the field simian style and recorded frogs. This sounds like a person in their house was making frog sounds. But what I found interesting about this particular trove of sound effects was there. And I need you guys to.

[John]

So.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay, good.

[Luke Burbank]

In the interest of fairness, because I have the screen right in front of me, they have attributed emotional states to these ribbits.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

To these frog sounds.

[Andrew Walsh]

But you think these are not real frogs. This is somebody imitating.

[Luke Burbank]

I think it's somebody imitating a frog

[Andrew Walsh]

at various levels of imitating a frog

[Luke Burbank]

in some kind of an emotional moment. You know, like, for instance, this isn't in here, but like it could be like cartoon, comma, animal, comma frog comma, hungry.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, okay, okay.

[Luke Burbank]

So like, these are. This person has. Has attributed a sort of an emotional state.

[John]

Is that an Eastern European accent? If they're Hungarian, no, that's Hungary.

[Luke Burbank]

So here we go. All right, that's minus one for John, which is also a plus one for Andrew.

[Andrew Walsh]

So we call a zero sum game.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, here we go. I'm going to play you. Here's what I'm going to play you. A sound effect.

[Andrew Walsh]

My eyes are closed.

[Luke Burbank]

Good. It's for concentrate. The listeners are. Don't. If you're driving, don't close your eyes. But if you're home, if you're watching us on a big screen tv, which that is never not mind blowing to me, I forget that that's a technology that occurs. And then whenever the thon goes on, people. And you know, tonight, by the way, we're doing the zoom.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, yeah. Sign [e-mail] if you haven't yet. You want to join us tonight, 8:00pm Eastern, absolutely free on Instagram.

[John]

Your setup, if you're watching this, I

[Luke Burbank]

am always so surprised when I see that people have us on a television. It kind of makes me feel like we're sort of famous, at least in that home environment.

[Andrew Walsh]

So it must be weird for you to be on tv.

[Luke Burbank]

I'm going to. I guess you could say, ironically, no one sends me pictures of them watching me on Sunday morning. They do send me pictures of watching.

[Andrew Walsh]

They're still getting their film developed.

[Luke Burbank]

So this is. I'm gonna play this sound effect. It's gonna be frog. And I would like you to try to guess what the emotional state of the frog is at as assigned by whoever made this@ epidemicsound.com.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

oh, God.

[Luke Burbank]

Epidemicsound.com so here we go.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

Shonda, Tori, Beagle, Bagel, Boggle. I'm playing it. This. Who knows? This could be what Sean's doing in his off time. Here we go. I'm playing it again. This is a frog. What do we think? What is going on with this frog? Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay, I have a guess. Okay, I think this is a frog that is maybe protecting its territory.

[John]

Yeah, I was gonna say a frog under duress.

[Luke Burbank]

I need more specifics because I thought I was protecting his territory. And under duress are not emotional states.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, okay.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, I think just think about emotional states.

[Andrew Walsh]

Defensive, scared.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, Both wrong. Well, both wrong. It is angry. This is angry frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Now listen to what I went to first.

[Luke Burbank]

Now listen. So that's what I'm saying. Just like. Just come up with.

[John]

Okay, like.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, so this is

[Andrew Walsh]

angry. He's angry because we're in his territory. I'm getting. I'm taking the point there.

[Luke Burbank]

That's a minus one for Andrew and a plus one for John, which brings them both to zero.

[John]

Thank you.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Thank you.

[Andrew Walsh]

How does John get a plus one on that?

[Luke Burbank]

You know what? I rule with? An iron whim. Okay, so that was angry frog. Now I'm going to play you another one. What do you think this frog is feeling? Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit. That is a horny frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

That frog is amorous on main, as I like to say.

[Luke Burbank]

Do you agree, John?

[Jake]

That's exactly.

[Luke Burbank]

That is a flirty frog. You both get two points, which means it's two to two. That is two points.

[Andrew Walsh]

Look at the Daves. They're getting excited over there.

[John]

Oh, keep in your pants.

[Jake]

Whoa.

[Andrew Walsh]

One of them is looking right at you.

[Luke Burbank]

Literally. One of the Daves has has oriented himself towards where we are broadcasting upon hearing this rabbit. Rabbit.

[John]

Which is especially weird because there's no audio being pumped into the room. So how is Dave. Can you hear that?

[Luke Burbank]

Senses rabbit. Okay.

[Andrew Walsh]

It's nice to have a pet that actually wants to be involved in the podcast.

[John]

For sure.

[Luke Burbank]

I know.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Change.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, here we go. You're right. That was Flirty.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, it was flirty.

[Luke Burbank]

Frog. Now, what do we think is going on with this frog? What is happening with that frog, John?

[John]

They are confused. That's.

[Andrew Walsh]

I need to hear it again.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Here we go.

[Luke Burbank]

Play one more time.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, it does. It's. It's inquisitive. It's asking a question. I don't want to take what just is saying, but imagine. I think that they're. They're. I do think they're. You said confused, right? Yeah, I'm trying not to just steal your thoughts. Not confused.

[Luke Burbank]

It's a. It's a.

[Andrew Walsh]

It's inquisitive. It's more like curious. Curious.

[Luke Burbank]

This is gonna get away. Imagine it was this frog's birthday and it thought it was not having a birthday party.

[Andrew Walsh]

It's surprised.

[Luke Burbank]

Surprised. Surprise. You would be depressed. You would be depressed if we made you have a birthday party. This is surprised. Frog. Rabbit.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Rabbit.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

Rabbit.

[John]

Yeah. Okay.

[Andrew Walsh]

Rabbit.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Rabbit.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, moving on. No point.

[Andrew Walsh]

Somebody was.

[John]

This game is great.

[Andrew Walsh]

You told me about this game a couple of days ago, but I thought it was like somebody in the field collected frog sounds. I didn't realize it was Sean Dore in his kitchen.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes. And, like, I don't think this person even understands how funny this is. They were just trying to give you the full range of frog ribbits you might need. But then they decided to try to do an impression of a frog that's having a very human kind of experience, which cracked me up. Okay, here's another one. What do you think is going on with this frog?

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, no.

[John]

Yeah. That's concerning.

[Andrew Walsh]

That frog's depressed. It's sad.

[John]

I'll just try to give a different answer, but I kind of agree. I'd say that frog is feeling a sense of loss. Feeling.

[Luke Burbank]

It's less. It's less. Well, here's the thing. What this emotion is or what this kind of way of being is can be an outgrowth of maybe feeling sad or depressed. But it's not that it's sad. I mean, one of the things that my therapists have said over the years is that we tend to convert fear and sadness into something else because we

[John]

eating too many fig Newtons in the

[Luke Burbank]

middle of the night sometimes that. But because it's less scary to be kind of a little this than to be actually the sadness that you might be feeling.

[John]

Angry.

[Luke Burbank]

Yes. But, like, what is angry, but you just didn't have enough coffee yet.

[Andrew Walsh]

What is angry but you turn down the anger. Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

And turn it into more just kind of like not Loving life and let's malaise. I mean, don't talk to me until I've had my coffee. You are in the morning. You could be a little. Not you, but a person could be a little grumpy.

[John]

Thank you for all the hints.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, it was a dwarf. That's not Sneezy.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

That's not.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah, okay.

[Luke Burbank]

Grumpy.

[Andrew Walsh]

Grumpy.

[Luke Burbank]

Do we hear it?

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. Yeah.

[John]

I think some of the other ones

[Andrew Walsh]

are better, but he's trying to be short.

[Luke Burbank]

I feel like he's trying to be. Kind of like he's doing that grumpy thing where he's just like. What's going on? Nothing. It's fine here.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

It's fine.

[Luke Burbank]

I'm fine. Except you keep asking me why I'm fine.

[Andrew Walsh]

It's Monday. It's Monday morning. We just got to the office. Exactly Monday morning after a holiday weekend. It was a long weekend. Weekend. And I just say, hey, Dave, how was your weekend? Okay, maybe we don't have to have this conversation right now, Dave. I'm sorry. I'll catch you after lunch.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay, let's see here. Here's another one now. Well, actually, I'm just going to tell you this one because you've already just guessed this on the previous one. This is allegedly a sad frog.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

Okay.

[Luke Burbank]

But I'm. What I'm going to be curious to hear is how that's different than a grumpy frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay. Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

So let's hear sad frog. Cartoon animal. Frog. Sad rabbit. Rabbit.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh. Oh, I knew it was gonna make me sad. My little buddy. Oh, it's all right.

[John]

Poor Dave.

[Andrew Walsh]

You can talk to us about anything.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, okay. We'll get the nose up on. Well, I'll. I'll throw this one at you. I also feel like it's unfair to ask you to guess at this because, you know. You know, how do you guess at something that has no characteristic? This is described as neutral.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, okay.

[Luke Burbank]

This is a cartoon animal. Frog. Neutral. This is a neutral frog. Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit.

[Andrew Walsh]

This is a frog being a frog.

[Luke Burbank]

I guess that's just regular frog. No emotion.

[John]

Neutral in the sense that's in between the sad and the horny.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

I don't know.

[Luke Burbank]

To me, this frog also sounds like it's being kind of withholding.

[Andrew Walsh]

Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit, rabbit. Fine. Yeah. How was your day? Fine.

[Luke Burbank]

I mean, neutral. Listen, as we all know, there is a version of neutral that still lets you know that they're kind of mad.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah.

[Luke Burbank]

I feel like that's the kind of neutral it is.

[John]

Then let's passive aggressive.

[Luke Burbank]

Let's round things out with. Let's. Let's round things out with a frog who's feeling a certain kind of way. I'm going to play the sound effect for you. Let's see if we can guess what this.

[Andrew Walsh]

Rabbit.

[Luke Burbank]

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit, rabbit. That is the sound of a what? Frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Hungry.

[Luke Burbank]

Hungry is not on the list.

[Andrew Walsh]

No. Hangry.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, it's hangry.

[Andrew Walsh]

Should have had a Snickers. Oh, turns out.

[John]

Oh, what?

[Luke Burbank]

That wasn't Danny DeVito back there.

[Jake]

Rabbit. Rabbit.

[Luke Burbank]

Worried is in the words. In the immortal words of Pharrell Williams. Happy. No, this is a happy frog.

[Andrew Walsh]

Just doing its own thing.

[Luke Burbank]

A happy frog.

[John]

I think.

[Luke Burbank]

I think the hit, of course, of the whole contest was rabbit.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. Oh, yeah. You gotta save that forever. That has the cannon, my friend.

[Luke Burbank]

Do those legs go all the way down?

[John]

Oh, no.

[Luke Burbank]

Rabbit. Is there a Mrs. Dave?

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, my goodness. Well, that's gonna get us the explicit label, won't it?

[Luke Burbank]

That's how you play. Name that frog's emotions. Thanks, guys. Playing along.

[Andrew Walsh]

I love that.

[Luke Burbank]

A couple of, let's see, quick things before we wrap things up today. Some thoughts on Ohio City, which I've been enjoying the living tweedle out of.

[Andrew Walsh]

Me too. I told you guys. I mean, as far as, like walkability and vibrance, this is literally one of the best air and B Airbnb situations I think we've ever had on one of these fonts. I'm loving it.

[Luke Burbank]

I love our Airbnb. Honestly. It's an older house, but I think they've done a really nice job of kind of remodeling it and appointing it so it's got lots of comfy places to sit. I think our bedrooms are all sort of nice and working out.

[Andrew Walsh]

I also love got a pet raccoon.

[Luke Burbank]

There's a pool table. I love that. I don't know what's going on in your guys showers, but the shower that I've been using, I love that they have a body wash that has the radical honesty to call itself what it is. Have you guys noticed the thing?

[Andrew Walsh]

I does it all because it's always

[Luke Burbank]

been the same thing. You've always been here. This farce, this game we play where you have three bottles in the shower of the hotel or whatever, and they all appear to be, well, at least two of the three. The conditioner is noticeably different. The shampoo and the body wash are the same thing. And we've been bamboozled into treating them like they're different. Things, and they're not. And this is just. It says. You know what this is? It's a big old jug of soapy stuff.

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. It's gonna suds.

[Luke Burbank]

It says it's a shampoo, it's a body wash, and it's a bubble bath.

[Jake]

Yep.

[Luke Burbank]

And I just. I just appreciate that. Every time I use it, I just feel like I'm living a life of radical truth.

[John]

So you didn't bring your own soap or.

[Andrew Walsh]

I always travel my own bar soap.

[Luke Burbank]

I stopped doing that a long time ago. And I don't know why. Because, you know, I might find myself at an Airbnb that doesn't have the stuff. But because I'm mostly in hotels, I guess I've just, like, lost that tendency.

[Andrew Walsh]

I'm mad at myself for not bringing. Because I like bar soap. I don't really like body wash every time. No, no, thank you. I appreciate that, though. That's sweet. Also, I was just reminded by somebody on the chat that we have had a caller on hold for over an hour now.

[Luke Burbank]

All right, fine.

[Andrew Walsh]

You know what? At some point, let's bring.

[Luke Burbank]

Let's bring them on. I'll give you more of my Ohio City thoughts.

[John]

I have an idea of who it is based on the comments.

[Andrew Walsh]

Okay.

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

Sorry.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh, hi. You are on tbtl.

[Cheryl]

Ahoy hoy, business boys. It's your friend Cheryl and Corvallis.

[Luke Burbank]

Hi, Cheryl. How are you?

[Cheryl]

Hey. I'm honestly doing great. I got some great news while I was on hold with you guys.

[Luke Burbank]

Well, that's.

[Jake]

What?

[Listener Simeon (Amphibiton)]

That's.

[Cheryl]

I can't actually.

[Luke Burbank]

That's your reward for staying on hold for an hour?

[Cheryl]

Yeah, I can't actually share it because I have to let the people know who it's regarding, but I feel like it was tbtl, you know, good luck to all vibes that made it happen while I was on hold.

[Luke Burbank]

Hopefully that was part of why you got the good news. And hopefully for our friend Jake, a similar thing will happen tomorrow. Yeah, I know you don't want to talk about it, but do have to ask you, Cheryl, I don't know if you can hear that down the line. That was a Budweiser joke. Okay, so you got some good news while on hold. Do you have any small or large animal memories or thoughts that you could share with us here on this Wednesday? Since that's the theme, the late breaking theme of the calls.

[Cheryl]

Yeah, well, I was remembering when you mentioned, you know, small animals I had. And I don't know how you all feel about this, especially Luke, who and John who, you know, have New York connections or have lived in New York. But I used to have a pet rat.

[Andrew Walsh]

Oh, really?

[Luke Burbank]

I have heard from people, one friend in particular who had pet rats, that they are the best pets. She absolutely loved these little rats and their personalities. What was your experience, Cheryl?

[Cheryl]

Well, my rat was a big, gray rat, and he. His name was Templeton, like the rat in Charlotte's Web was.

[Luke Burbank]

He was that voiced by Charles Nelson Riley.

[Cheryl]

I don't know.

[Luke Burbank]

I'll look it up while you're talking. Please keep going.

[Cheryl]

Yeah. Okay. And. Sorry. Just so you know, the line kind of cuts in and out a little bit, so I have to. I have to kind of fight to. To understand you. But the. The great thing about him was that he would sit on my shoulder while I was doing my household chores. So, like, I'd be vacuuming, and he'd just be riding on my shoulder with his little ropey tail wrapped around my neck, hanging on.

[Andrew Walsh]

It's very sweet.

[Cheryl]

And I actually took him. So the. The. The specific story that I really remembered about him was at about 18 and a half, I moved from Oregon, where I grew up in Portland area, to Texarkana, Texas, for a little while. And because I was poor, I took the Amtrak all the way from Portland down to LA and then from LA over to Texarkana, and I sneaked. Templeton. Sneaked, Snuck. What's the past tense? I sneaked my rat. I snuck my rat onto the train with me.

[Andrew Walsh]

Under your hat?

[Cheryl]

No, he was in my backpack. He was in his little. He was in his little, like, one of those little containers that, like, sometimes kids put bugs in them. Unfortunately, I had to keep it small so that I could hide him. But I would get ice cubes from the dining car, and I would take him into the bathroom of the train car, and I would open the thing and let him out, and I would hold an ice cube in my hand to melt water so he could get water, you know, lick water off my thumb.

[Luke Burbank]

Did Templeton. So Templeton made the journey and was okay. And then Templeton lived in Texarkana with you?

[Cheryl]

Yes, and then he drove back to Oregon with me in my. What Was that? A 1986 Buick Skyhawk.

[Luke Burbank]

And so it sounds like Templeton had a pretty long life for. For a rat.

[Cheryl]

Yeah, he did. And he was.

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

He.

[Cheryl]

I won't bring it down, but he did have a. He did have a very long life, and I. I still miss him, so. But he was a fun travel companion.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, that's. Again, you know, we rats are so stigmatized, you know, because of Norwegian rats and the kind of like, you know, rats running around New York City and how we think about them. But like again, people I know that have had pet rats really love them and talk about what interesting great personalities they actually have. I found some audio of Templeton from Charlotte's Web. It was not Charles Nelson Riley. It was Paul Lynn. Which if you know, you know, I was mixing up my kind of fabulous guys from that era who were on Hollywood Squares and we're kind of living, let's just say, an open secret. Paul Lynn, Everything well ripened, seasoned with the passage of time and the heat of the day. Oh, it was rich, my friends, rich. You ought to be a. That was Templeton describing some smorgasbord that

[Dave (frog wrangler)]

he had had to. Oh my God.

[Luke Burbank]

Gosh, to somebody.

[Andrew Walsh]

I never heard Paul.

[Cheryl]

I remember that audio.

[Luke Burbank]

I. Yeah, yeah. Paul Lind was. I'm trying to remember what else he was in. He just was always. He was. Was he in I Dream of Genie maybe?

[Andrew Walsh]

Was he like the. Oh, Bewitched, it looks like here. Okay. Yes, yes, yes.

[Cheryl]

There you go.

[Luke Burbank]

So Cheryl, you were waiting a whole hour. Was there anything else you wanted to talk about here on this middle this, this Wednesday of the Thon?

[Cheryl]

I mean I'm just so excited for this particular thon and I am really excited about. I know we're getting a little ahead of myself here, but the 5,000th show looming on the horizon.

[Luke Burbank]

Yeah, we are too. We just have to figure out what our plan is for that. But it's very much happening and it's going to be a big, probably the biggest to do that we've to done. You know, at this point, I mean

[Andrew Walsh]

we've celebrated each thousand mark. Right.

[Luke Burbank]

But 5,000 is maybe shouldn't even be legal for now. It still is. So yeah, we're gonna do a big, big old thing for that. And we'll look very much forward, Cheryl, to seeing you there. How's the family? How are the kiddos?

[Cheryl]

Everybody's great. Everybody's doing well and healthy. Julian just turned 15 as you heard on the Blurs days. And Irene is 13 now.

[Luke Burbank]

Oh my goodness.

[Cheryl]

So two teenagers in the house. It's. It's definitely an adventure.

[Luke Burbank]

So it's a probably a low stress time.

[Cheryl]

I was going to throw one more thing in. I feel like you guys are like low key trolling me a little with the magnet.

[Andrew Walsh]

Well, listen, I wasn't going to bring it up. I have a great joke. I was going to say, hey, Cheryl, you can get one of these magnets and add it to your collection. But I didn't want to bring it up because I thought it was a sensitive subject with you.

[Luke Burbank]

Cheryl, let me give you a little more info on this, which is. And even the listeners who maybe weren't tracking these things as closely. So when we, we drove our van down to do our little road trip to deliver the podcast, we stopped at your house in Corvallis. And that was our first stop. And somehow when we came out from the hotel the next morning, I think, was that when we realized, at some point we realized that our magnets were no longer on our van. And we like to make these jokes about somebody in Corvallis took them or whatever. And then at some point it became the main thing we always said when we mentioned you, which was not fair to you or your lovely family. And so then we backed off of that. But here's the problem. Our friend Lindy west recently drove across the country in a van that she rented with magnets on the side of it. Because she asked me about, didn't you do magnets one time? And I told her how to do it. I said, but be really careful because they will blow off of the van. She got a big magnet with her book logo on the side, put it on her sprinter van, she drove around the country. She said that when she ordered the magnets from the magnet place, she said, do I need to be worried about this blowing off the vehicle? They said, we've never in our 30 years heard about a magnet blowing off a vehicle. She arrived at the end of a cross country road trip with the magnets fully intact, which really undermines the theory that our magnets blew off of the

[Andrew Walsh]

car, but we did not have a flat surface the whole way. I'll always come back to this. The van. We have somebody unearthed photos of the van with the magnets still on there. And there was this divot in the side of the van, maybe the size of a silver dollar or something, that went across. And I do believe that if a magnet is going to withstand that speed, it needs to be flush the whole way. We had an air tunnel right down the middle of these magnets that I'm quite convinced would have ripped it away.

[Luke Burbank]

I mean, maybe I was convinced as well that they blew off. And then this, and this is just as of this summer, this breaking news from our friend L. But all that is to say, Cheryl, we don't think that you had anything to do with it. And so we've been trying to not just always make that the reference. Because, of course, that's probably annoying to you.

[Cheryl]

You know, at this point, it's kind of. It's the shtick. So I figured I'd just lean into it.

[Andrew Walsh]

Well.

[Cheryl]

And honestly, I'm. I'm looking forward to having that in my collection of magnets on the refrigerator, but not. But they're all travel magnets. I can send you a picture just to prove it.

[Luke Burbank]

Okay.

[Andrew Walsh]

We're like, that close to admission for a second there.

[Luke Burbank]

No. Cheryl, thank you, as always for all you do for the show and can't wait to see you for the 5,000th. All right.

[Cheryl]

Okay. Sounds great, guys. Have a great time.

[Andrew Walsh]

Thanks, Cheryl, for everything.

[Luke Burbank]

Bye.

[Andrew Walsh]

Bye.

[Luke Burbank]

What do you think? Should we. Okay, last. Let me do my last Ohio City thought. And then should we? Do we?

[Andrew Walsh]

Yeah. I gotta be honest with you about. I got into about 45 minutes ago. I got into sort of a critical state.

[Luke Burbank]

I see you kind of.

[Andrew Walsh]

I have been drinking. I got a late start today, as we mentioned. So then I guzzled a coffee, and then I got a big thing of water, and then I started drinking my Dairyman's iced tea. Definitely helping.

[Luke Burbank]

He's about at his limit.

[Andrew Walsh]

And I got to say, the fact that I have not left, I have been.

[Luke Burbank]

You got up to leave a minute ago, and I thought you were going to the bathroom. You were going to fix the frog cam.

[Andrew Walsh]

Nothing was wrong with it. I just want to check something. But I. But I have been thinking, like, if we do get a phone call, maybe I could leave during the phone call because I am at his limit.

[Luke Burbank]

I know a guy. All right, well, you know what? That's as good a sign as any that we should probably wrap things up today. I've got more Ohio City thoughts, but we can bring those to the table tomorrow.

[Andrew Walsh]

Sounds good.

[Luke Burbank]

Let's go ahead and call it for this Wednesday show again with a quick reminder. TBTL.net, you can go there. You can click on the Donate now button. You can help support the show. You can help us get to episode 10,000, which is the goal.

[Andrew Walsh]

And you can join us tonight for a special Zoom meetup. Go to tbtl.net for details.

[John]

That's free whether you donate or not.

[Luke Burbank]

Absolutely free. But you do need to make a reservation so that we can send you the link to it. So we'll see, hopefully, a bunch of you tonight on zoom. And to everybody else who's listening, thank you so much for being part of tbtl. We'll be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for all of you. In the meantime, have a great week, Wednesday. Take care of yourselves, and please remember, no mountain too tall.

[Andrew Walsh]

And good luck to all. Power out.