Free & Easy w/ Flatulence - Episode 28

Summary

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Episode Overview

Title: Free & Easy w/ Flatulence - Episode 28
Podcast: The Musers The Podcast
Hosts: George Dunham, Craig "Junior" Miller, Gordon Keith
Date: January 21, 2026

Main Theme:
This episode is a quintessential Musers journey through embarrassing moments—childhood, adult, on-air, and especially those involving youthful flatulence. The trio reflects on personal cringe stories, the scarring power of adolescent humiliation, and the male compulsion toward lowbrow humor, all sprinkled with their signature wit and warmth. Along the way, the guys also examine generational differences about cell phones, navigating youth sports, and the value (or not) of learning to laugh at mistakes.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Listener Mail & The Cell Phone Dilemma (00:52–05:56)

• Doug’s Letter:
  Listener Doug responds to last week’s parenting episode with a story about banning cell phones on a spring break service trip. Unexpectedly, the parents revolted more than the teens.

  • “The real revolt was with the parents who protested…” – George (01:16)
  • Discussion: Parents are as addicted (or more) to instantaneous contact as their kids.
  • Fear-based parenting: Gordon observes, “We’re always worried about that 0.1% occurrence…and let that dominate the rest of our 99.999%.” (03:29)
  • Relief after device detox: “They always grumble about giving up their cell phones for something and then they’re happy they did.” – Gordon (03:46)

• When Should Kids Get Phones?

  • Reference to the book The Anxious Generation: 14–16 is the suggested age for a smartphone, with “a flip phone” or limited device as a compromise. (05:05–05:50)

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2. Embarrassing Youth Stories & Social Survival (05:59–25:11)

a. George’s Eighth Grade Haircut Trauma (05:59–12:33)

• New kid, bad haircut by dad, note from the prettiest girl (“I know who cuts your hair”), instant mortification.
  • “I realized she was laughing…and the three girls behind her were laughing.” – George (09:15)
  • Led to independent haircuts, part-time job, and a social scar remembered vividly decades later.
  • “I was the new boy in school…Everybody knew exactly who you were. I was bad haircut guy.” (12:09)

b. Gordon’s Tormenting Pants Incident (12:33–14:09)

• Humiliated for wearing striped jeans on first day of 7th grade, nickname from “Stymie.”
  • “That was so psychologically scarring, it changed the trajectory of my life.” – Gordon (13:29)

c. Craig’s Cleat and Basketball Bloopers (14:18–18:49)

• Mocked for black cleats (“Honus Wagner!”); blue cleats = “clown shoes”; worst football player with the best number.
• Basketball blunders: wrong uniform at the game, and a massive turnover in front of 10,000 at OU halftime.
  • “I bounce it right off my foot. Out of bounds, turnover. And then I think he took me out of the game.” – Craig (18:41)

d. Gordon’s T-Ball Catastrophe & Football Misunderstanding (18:53–22:23)

• Ran to third base after batting left-handed for the first time.
  • “I hit the ball and I ran to third.” – Gordon (20:10)
• Thought he “made quarterback,” but misunderstood “cornerback.”
  • “So, I told everyone that quarterback thing…Then I have to play cornerback.” (22:15)

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3. Youth Sports, Emotional Scars, and Parental Pressures (23:00–25:30)

• “We put our kids in really tough positions by making them play youth sports. Sometimes it’s important to us, not to them.” – George (23:00)
• Age to start organized sports? Eight, not four or five, say the Musers.
• Are embarrassing youth sports moments universal, or are the Musers just sensitive?
  • “My guess is it’s very common—except in the uber elite athletes. For the rest...we all had scarring moments.” – Craig (24:57)

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4. Freshman Flatulence: The Legendary Fart Tape (28:17–34:32)

• Dorm Life Rebellion:

  • “Flatulence was a big part of our daily lives when we were freshmen.” – George (28:17)
  • Created a communal “fart tape” using a stereo and a microphone in the dorm. Tapes were then played at parties as gag gifts.
    • “At the end of the semester, we had like a five minute long tape of nothing but farts.” – Craig (29:13)
    • “The tape became legendary...we’d give it to our friends.” – George (29:57)
  • Gender Split: guys howl with laughter, girls are appalled at parties.

• All-time Embarrassing Flatulence:

  • George accidentally unleashes a legendary fart on a girl’s dorm room floor in front of both her and Craig—“I forgot where I was!” (32:11–33:35)
  • “Yeah, I'm ruined in this dorm now because this girl's gonna tell the story—yeah, that's the guy that came bursting in, ripped one, and then ran away.” – George (33:35)

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5. Adult Flatulence Mishaps: When Grownups Fail (34:32–39:19)

• Politeness vs. Disaster: George tries (and fails) to blame the dog. Craig tries to cover when a card-grader friend may have heard his accidental emission.
• “It slipped out, total accident…and I paused, and I looked at him.” – Craig (35:31)
• Text message confession aftermath (37:14–37:39)
• The hosts debate if passing gas around significant others is ever okay (“church and state!”).

Memorable Flatulence Quotes:

• “I think you ought to create one of these moments—before our next podcast.” – George to Gordon (39:35)
• “On my deathbed, that's going to be one of the memories that flashes through my head…” – George (40:09)

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6. On-Air & Professional Embarrassment (43:49–56:53)

a. George’s 9/11 On-Air Disaster (43:49–49:42)

• During a national moment of silence commemorating 9/11 victims, George accidentally cuts it short to take calls—live, on air.
  • “Please join us in silence as we remember those innocent Americans... Paul in KTCK, Dallas Fort Worth…” (46:32)
  • “I thought the moment of silence was between the ID and when he came on and started talking again.” – George (46:46)
  • “I did not mean to do that… I wanted to bury myself in a hole.” – George (47:31)

b. Craig’s Broadcasting Blunder: The Wrong Scout (49:45–52:11)

• Halftime of a TCU basketball game: interviews a man he believes to be Al Bianchi—turns out to be Scotty Sterling.
  • “His eyes get real big, and he looks at me and says, ‘I’m not Al Bianchi. I’m Scotty Sterling from the Sacramento Kings.’” – Craig (51:39)
  • “He took off his headset and just threw it down and walked off.”

c. Gordon’s Celebrity Interview Flubs (52:23–56:21)

• Misidentifies Marisa Miller’s husband during Super Bowl coverage; asks Ahmad Rashad about his ex-wife without realizing the divorce; inadvertently asks a grieving celebrity about a deceased child.
  • “I barely know who half these people are. I count on you guys feeding me questions in my ear.” – Gordon (54:39)
  • “There are little ones that probably didn't come across as real embarrassing or cringy when they happened, but I remember internally cringing a lot.” – Gordon (55:01)
• Nervous blunder with Steven Spielberg: “I realized, what a stupid question that is… He made a whole movie to answer that question.” – Gordon (56:08)

d. Miscellaneous Public Speaking & Emceeing Failures (57:29–61:30)

• Craig: May have botched Kenneth Cooper’s name at a public event and made a joke that flopped.
• George & Craig: Died in front of a stone-faced PGA audience with their impersonations.
  • “No one smiled, no one laughed… seemed like we were up there for an hour.” – George (60:48)
• Musers agree: bombing on stage or mic scars are as vivid as kid trauma.

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• On cell phones & parental fear:
  • “We’re always worried about that 0.1% occurrence of anything, and then we let that dominate the rest of our time.” – Gordon (03:29)
• On universal shame:
  • “You take things on like, okay, yeah, life's over. If I could go back and talk to my 8th grade self…don't worry about it.” – George (10:50)
• On the necessity of uniforms:
  • “That’s why school uniforms are a good idea. Everybody looks exactly the same for the most part.” – Craig (14:16)
• Timelessness of fart humor:
  • “I don’t know what’s wrong with us as guys, why we think that’s so funny. It just is.” – George (36:36)
• On getting over embarrassment:
  • “I think as you get older, you handle embarrassment better…we can move on. We can have another day tomorrow.” – George (56:53)
• Final wisdom:
  • “It’s not as bad as you think, but it can also be extremely traumatic and scarring…and it will stay with you until you take your last breath.” – Craig (62:02–62:08)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Letter of the Week/Cell Phones: 00:52–05:56
• Junior High & Embarrassing Adolescence: 05:59–12:33
• Youth Sports Failures: 12:33–25:11
• The Fart Tape & Dorm Flatulence: 28:17–34:32
• Adult Flatulence Missteps: 34:32–41:07
• On-Air Embarrassments (9/11 story): 43:49–49:42
• Professional Broadcasting & Public Speaking Fails: 49:45–61:30
• Reflecting on Embarrassment & Life Lessons: 61:30–62:08

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Episode Takeaways

• Embarrassing moments are inevitable and formative: Sometimes you’ll never really get over them—but neither will anyone else listening share any less.
• Flatulence never gets old for some: No matter the social setting or age, for the Musers and their ilk, this will always be comedy gold.
• It’s okay to cringe at yourself—just don’t let it stop you. The Musers’ stories are universal in their awkwardness and ultimately liberating in their vulnerability.

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For more cringe, wisdom, or to share your own story:
Write to themuserspodmail.com

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The Musers The Podcast: Still the best place in DFW to commiserate, commiserate, and, uh, pass a little gas.

Transcript

[Gordon]

Booties, booties, booties.

[George]

Shut up.

[Gordon]

Trapped gas.

[Craig]

Stop.

[George]

Make it stop. Okay, here we go.

[Gordon]

The Musers, the podcast. Episode 28. Free and Easy with flatulence.

[George]

It is the Musers the Podcast. And this is episode 28. I'm George.

[Craig]

I'm Craig.

[Gordon]

Gordon. Gordon. Where's Gordon at?

[George]

Where's Gordon at? Your three friends who put together this little podcast? We've done radio together for like 85 years and we've been doing this podcast for several months. And we've had a good time doing it.

[Gordon]

Kick ass.

[George]

And we've heard from a lot of people who have enjoyed the podcast, which brings us to our letter of the week. Fanfare. Oh, yeah, total fanfare. And this is from Doug, who said he enjoyed our last podcast about parenting. He's been listening to us on radio since the aughts. And when we were talking about being a parent, the topic of cell phones came up. Devices that kids are addicted to, as we like to say. And he has an interesting story that a couple years ago he was leading a spring break trip, high school students. And the goal of this trip was to go into an area of need and serve the local outreach ministries. They're going to do cleaning and repairing, all sorts of things like that. And he thought to get his kids engaged, he would say, no cell phones, leave them at home. And he expected a revolt. And he got a little bit of pushback from the kids, but he said the real revolt was with the parents who protested. He said. So many parents were eager to tell me how much they disagreed with this policy, even after I assured them that they would have the phone number of every adult chaperone that was on the trip. Most parents disagreed in a civil way, but a few presented their arguments in a way that was downright hurtful, as he said. So the trip went great and the kids got a lot out of it. It was a transformative trip. But it was very eye opening to him that the pushback came from the parents. So he said adults are just as addicted, if not more addicted to cell phones. And in the case of parent and child, it's the parent that thinks, oh yeah, I've always got to be in touch with them. I always have to know where they are. This was a place that was eight hours away and I tried to put myself in that position. And I hope I wouldn't have been one of those parents, but I kind of understand that if they're going eight hours away, I guess I would want to have that immediate contact.

[Gordon]

Yeah, it's the but that's born out of fear, of course.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Which is similar to what we were talking about with the, you know, the kid runs the scam on the parent. When you want to get a cell phone, you always do them. What about there's a school shooting? You know, that's, that's the whole reason.

[George]

Or just if you have to get.

[Gordon]

A hold of you, you have to. But at the same time, like there's not going to be a school shooting out here on this trip. So.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Or some catastrophe like that. We're always worried about that 0.1% occurrence of anything. And then we'll let that dominate the rest of our 99.999% of our time when that occurred. It doesn't occur. But then it affects our lives if we always have cell phones. I've also found and heard stories, read stories, and even heard stories from actual young people who talk about how it's kind of a relief. They always grumble about giving up their cell phones for something and then they always are happy that they did for some event and just not have that option.

[Craig]

And in the case that Doug lays out, if something bad were to happen, the parents would still be notified. It just wouldn't be by the kids. It would be by the chaperones, the leaders of this trip. They'd still get notified. Yeah.

[George]

And man, back when we would take field trips, if it was a one day field trip or if it was a camp for a week, we didn't have cell phones to contact our parents daily or text them. Yeah. It was just that. Yeah, I'll see you next Saturday when you come pick me up. We had a lot of reaction to the parenting episode and about cell phones. That did make me think afterwards, what is the age? It's different. Different for everybody. But I asked that question a long time ago when my kids were young. When do you get your kid a cell phone? I still don't know what the answer is. It's different for all sorts of different families, but I don't know. 8, 9, 12. Wait till they're in high school. I have no idea.

[Craig]

You know, in that book, the Anxious Generation that I referenced in that episode, the author thinks the proper age is around 14 or 16. He says 12 is about the absolute earliest any kid should have a cell phone. But before that, certainly. And really before about 16, they just can't handle it.

[George]

Yeah, I think that's a pretty good age.

[Craig]

They can't handle the social media on the cell phone. You know, you can give him his Idea is to give him a phone that only makes calls to certain numbers or emergency calls. They can have a phone. He says just give him an old flip phone. Just nothing with any kind of apps on it or Instagram or Facebook. The stuff that leads to anxiety and mental issues.

[George]

Then you'll get the pushback. One of the real cell phones. Get back to me when you get the latest iPhone.

[Gordon]

This one's BS old man.

[George]

All right. Well, this week we thought we would talk about our most embarrassing moments. That moment where you just want to dig a hole and bury yourself or somehow push a button and just escape wherever it is you are. And we all have several of them. One of them happened to me while we were on the air. We'll get to that one here in a little bit. But I think my most embarrassing moment, even though more people heard the one that was live on radio, it was when I was in eighth grade. And I think we've mentioned this on the pod before, that junior high is the worst time in your life, isn't it? It's just you're awkward. You're not sure if you. Are you a kid? Are you. You know, are you a teenager just yet? You're a tween ager. And it's just the way.

[Gordon]

Why did God invent junior high school?

[Craig]

I don't know.

[George]

Just to punish kids. And you just fel. Like, you never really. At least I did. You never really fit in. To magnify that, if you moved to a new school, which I did, from seventh to eighth grade.

[Gordon]

Between seventh and eighth, you moved or.

[George]

Yes, Right before the start of my 8th grade year in August. We moved to Texas. Back to Texas.

[Gordon]

And I moved to Texas right before my seventh grade year.

[George]

Okay.

[Craig]

Both tough.

[George]

So I was excited about coming back to Texas. I was really excited about that. We're in a really cool area of the state in central Texas, the hill country. I love that area. But I had to now start over in 8th grade where you didn't know anybody. And this is a couple of months in the school. So I knew a couple of kids, but didn't know any girls. I didn't have. Do you guys have courage to talk to girls when you're in eighth grade? I never knew.

[Craig]

Sure. No way.

[George]

No, man, I didn't.

[Gordon]

I had a lot of. It seems like I've always kind of been more friends with girls than guys. Although I had a lot of guy friends in junior high, but, yeah, my first best friend when I was a little kid was a girl. And. And then yeah. Throughout elementary school, I would always have girls that were friends.

[George]

I was always scared to death of them, especially at a new school. And didn't take long to realize who the prettiest girl was in eighth grade, and she happened to sit right behind me in English.

[Gordon]

And you had a bathroom accident.

[George]

No, it wasn't that. It was worse than that. I would have taken bathroom over this.

[Gordon]

Worse than that.

[George]

I think it was as far as on the embarrassment meter, because she tapped me on my shoulder and she handed me a note, and I thought, okay, this is. We are finally going places here at this new school. A girl is reaching out to me. And the note read, and really cute handwriting. I don't know why girls always had better handwriting. I know who cuts your hair. And I thought, maybe she digs it. So I didn't want to write back. I just kind of turned around and I realized she was laughing. And I said, well, my dad does.

[Gordon]

Well, first of all, you should have changed that answer.

[George]

Well, that was the truth. My dad cut my hair.

[Gordon]

Never tell a girl the truth.

[George]

So as I turn around, I notice she's laughing and the three girls behind her are laughing. Yeah. And I think my face turned eight shades of red. And I just said, well, yeah, my dad does. And so.

[Gordon]

So if y' all need. And then haircuts, you call.

[George]

And she's. And then they've had more comments like, well, you may tell him to, you know, cut it even around the ears. And, man, I think later that day, I went into the, you know, the boys room, looked in the mirror, went, oh, my gosh. Yeah, look at that.

[Craig]

Look at that.

[George]

Looks terrible.

[Craig]

What kind of haircut was.

[George]

Was straight across the front. You know, it was really bad.

[Craig]

Bowl cut, kind of.

[George]

Kind of bowlish. And then he did do a weird thing around the ear that it went, like, way back towards the back of my head, and it just. Yeah, it was terrible. And I never really thought much about it as a haircut. You know, it was cheap. And. And then it just.

[Craig]

Then you didn't want to go to school the next few days, I'm sure. No, you knew. Everybody be laughing.

[George]

Yeah. You know, and. Yeah, I had to take several more hair comments. But it's funny how it changes behavior because I never let my dad cut my hair again. Right. And I started. And he always said, well, then you need to start paying for your own haircuts. And I started hi in eighth grade. And I. I don't think it motivated me, but I started getting a. You know, that's When I got my part time job at the golf course and started making my own money so I'd have my mom cart me into town and I'd get a haircut and.

[Craig]

You knew you had no shot at that girl. No, I was done.

[George]

I was ruined. I was absolutely ruined. And I just moved there. And yeah, you take things on like, okay, yeah, life's over. If I could go back and talk to my 8th grade self and. Man, don't worry about it.

[Gordon]

Your 8th grade self would not listen to a word you would say. There's nothing. He'd see you, this old guy coming in here.

[George]

I'd first apologize. I'm sorry this is what happens to you. But look, you're gonna have to. First of all, I need to apologize.

[Gordon]

For letting you get like this.

[George]

Sorry about that part of it. But you're gonna have a great life and you're gonna meet a lot of interesting people. You're gonna have a wonderful wife and kids. Why don't you leave, old man? It's gonna go well beyond the best looking girl in eighth grade and. But yeah, I just wanted to crawl in a hole and absolutely die of embarrassment.

[Craig]

Terrible.

[Gordon]

Have you ever thought of contacting her and telling her that story and showing.

[Craig]

Her your new updated haircut?

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Impress her with your new.

[George]

No, I never have. And.

[Gordon]

Yeah, you still remember her name and everything?

[George]

Yeah, I thought about saying it, but then.

[Gordon]

Well, don't say it.

[George]

Yeah, her first name was Wanda.

[Craig]

Seriously? That's an odd name.

[George]

Very unusual. Yeah.

[Gordon]

Wanda. Make fun of you, Wanda?

[George]

She wanted to make fun of me.

[Craig]

It wasn't Wanda Sykes, was it?

[George]

No, it wasn't. But. Oh, yeah. And you never want to be the. The topic of the joke, you know, that's going around the classroom and I, And I just assume that she told every other girl because I was the new boy in school. As a small school. So everybody knew exactly who you were. And yeah, I was bad haircut guy, I guess for the rest. Rest of the school year.

[Gordon]

Did you ever have any other conversations with her or ever get over that?

[George]

Yeah, she eventually like, you know, by the time we were freshmen, I was still probably afraid of her because she was the best looking girl in our class. Not say hi to her. And she was not like a mean girl or anything, but. Yeah. Isn't that weird? I mean, that was a million years ago, but I can remember that like it was yesterday. It was stupid junior high.

[Gordon]

Who cares? I think we've all got those. I've told my story many times here. I Think several times on this podcast about that dude who made fun of my pants. First day of seventh grade.

[George]

Now, what kind of pants were they again? They were forgotten.

[Gordon]

They were like jeans, but they had these little stripes that went down them. And this guy made fun of them in PE class. His name was Stymie.

[Craig]

What?

[George]

That was his real name?

[Gordon]

No, that was his nickname.

[Craig]

Little Rascal.

[George]

That was a Little Rascal character.

[Gordon]

But, yeah, that was so psychologically scarring to me that it, I think, changed the trajectory of my life. That one day, that stupid comment, him and his buddies were laughing at these pants. And I was so excited about these pants because my mom and I went shopping for this new school year at this new school that she swore to me she had all the advertisement brochures of how you're going to make new friends. Life's going to be great, and it's going to go well. And don't you worry about this new school. And I got my ass handed to me on the first day. Never trust a word that woman says again.

[George]

It did make you want to go down that avenue of just being. Let me just blend in here. Yes.

[Gordon]

I wanted to wear camo to school for the rest of the world.

[George]

Let me have the right haircut. Let me have white pants and everything like that, just so no one calls me out on it.

[Craig]

That's why school uniforms are a good idea.

[George]

Yes. Everybody looks exactly the same for the most. Most of yours.

[Craig]

Yep. Yeah. The only time I got embarrassed when it came to attire was one year, my baseball team. My mom took me to get some baseball cleats before the season started. And that's back when everybody wore white cleats, except maybe the Cincinnati Reds, but everybody else wore white cleats. Well, the only cleats we could afford were black cleats, so we bought those even though I wanted the white ones. And the next day, baseball practice, I wore the black cleats. And everybody called me Honus Wagner because I looked like a player from the 1910s, and I was so cruel.

[George]

We're not laughing at you. We're laughing at whoever came up with kind of a genius joke.

[Gordon]

We're laughing at them for making that joke.

[Craig]

Everybody else had white cleats, I had black cleats, and I was Honus Wagner.

[George]

Boy, that is a funny one on teams. I think I've told you this before. So the year before, when I was in seventh grade, we were living in Chicago, outside of Chicago, same thing. You had to get cleats for football. It's my first year to play football. And, yeah, there were most, I think, were black cleats. I think there may have been some white. But for whatever reason, maybe because I was a Cowboy fan, there were blue cleats, and that's what I went with. So first day of practice, there I am in my blue cleats, and I was assigned the number 32. And, man, they were called clown shoes.

[Gordon]

Oh, wow.

[George]

Hey, look, OJ's on the team. And that was at a different connotation back then. OJ was just a. He was the greatest running back of our time back then, that's all.

[Gordon]

So they weren't saying that because they thought you look like you would decapitate two people?

[George]

Correct. No, it wasn't.

[Craig]

32 wearing 32.

[George]

32. And I remember several guys who played youth football. I swam before I played football. So they were, you know, experienced players. They were veterans. I was without question, one of, if not the worst player on the team. I remember one of them saying, why do we give our best number to our worst player?

[Craig]

Terrible.

[George]

You know, that's a good question.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

You know. All right, all right, we can talk.

[George]

About it, Andy, where any has been blue cleats. And, of course, more laughter as you're tying them and failed smile. About to go out to practice and just get annihilated by guys who are bigger than you. And, yeah, junior high. So much fun.

[Craig]

This is jogging my memory of two more embarrassing moments with Little League sports. This is grade school basketball. And one time. So at St. Charles, my grade school in Oklahoma City, growing up, we had blue uniforms and white uniforms. One year, we actually had two uniforms, and the coach would tell us which uniform to wear for each game. So that Sunday, we had a game at a local high school, and I show up with my white uniform, and everybody else has blue. So I had. They didn't have any other blue uniforms, so I had to wear the white uniform. And when I checked into the game, everyone in the stand started laughing because I'm the only one on my team with the white uniform. Everybody else is wearing blue. And then another time, St. Charles basketball. This is probably sixth grade, and it was a big deal back then. Local high schools. I'm sorry, local grade schools got to play at halftime of college games.

[George]

Dang.

[Craig]

So at the Myriad, the big arena downtown Oklahoma City, there was an OU basketball game. They were playing somebody. And at halftime, my grade school was playing Christ the King, another grade school. And I didn't start. I was a bench warmer. But when Luig Andra Our coach, may he rest in peace, indeed put me in. And the first play and here we're in front of. You know, it wasn't full, but there were probably 10,000 fans and all the kids from school were there and everybody. It was the talk of the school all week.

[George]

Sure.

[Craig]

God, you guys get to play at the Myriad at halftime. And so everybody was there. I finally get in the game and it's our ball. We're going to inbound. Pass comes into me, I turn to dribble it up court and I bounce it right off my foot. Out of bounds, turnover. And then I think he took me out of the game.

[George]

One minute, one turnover.

[Craig]

Humiliated in front of 10,000 people and all the girls at school who were there. Terrible.

[Gordon]

See, I have some sports ones too.

[George]

Did you run the wrong way?

[Gordon]

Yeah, that was in T ball. I was on a T ball team. You'd have local businesses that sponsored the T ball teams. I was on o' Neal electric, electrician, who paid for our uniforms. And they were the cheapest uniforms of the iron on block lettering and like.

[Craig]

Chico's bail bonds uniforms.

[George]

It was just.

[Gordon]

It was bad. But yeah, my coach, T ball coach found out. You know, we started practicing and all this. And I was batting, you know, and I bat right handed because that's the way I saw my dad and my brother do it. So I thought that's the only option you had. You just batted from that side of the plate and. And then. But my coach found out that I was left handed about halfway through the season. He goes, oh, man, you're lefty. Okay, well, we got a lefty now. Like that really matters in T ball.

[George]

You know, we got a lefty.

[Gordon]

Yeah, like the pitcher, which is just the stand. I don't understand the matchup you got here, coach, but. But yeah, he goes, no, you need to be batting left handed. And so, yeah, I batted left handed for this game halfway through the season, and I hit the ball and I ran to third.

[Craig]

I didn't know when you were hitting right handed, you ran to first, though.

[Gordon]

Yes, I hit right.

[George]

But you thought by turning and I ran to first.

[Gordon]

But yeah, just the orientation of it confused me. And I was used to hitting the ball and then running, you know, that direction, away from my stance.

[George]

I think that's the mark of a genius, actually, by doing that.

[Gordon]

Thank you for saying that.

[George]

Yes, yes.

[Gordon]

And everyone's yelling at me. So I'm thinking, man, this ball is going a long way. They're cheering me because I'm just going to keep Running. But of course I find out they were yelling at me because I'm running the wrong direction. Everyone in the stands was laughing and it was funny to everyone. And I was so embarrassed.

[George]

And you were what, five or six?

[Gordon]

I was probably, yeah, about. It's probably about six. I think somewhere six or seven is horrible.

[George]

Horrible.

[Gordon]

And then another stupid sports from that. See, this is why I hate sports.

[George]

That's when you swore off on sports.

[Gordon]

After T ball was in elementary school, when we had a football team. Our school had the football team in elementary. And so I think everyone kind of got on the team at first. And the coach assigned roles to you based on basically looking at you and watching you all run around for one day. And all of a sudden he picks positions for people. And I was so excited because I was going to get to be quarterback.

[Craig]

Wow.

[Gordon]

I was going to be one of the quarterbacks for the team.

[George]

So it's big.

[Gordon]

The whole week, you know, leading up to this, we, we like had our tryouts or the initial thing and then like the next week was when practice is going to start. So I had a whole week of telling all the girls in school, yeah, I'm quarterback, you know.

[George]

Oh, really?

[Gordon]

Yeah, Quarterback.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

It's a big deal. Big deal. Because I knew this was going to launch my popularity career.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

So I'd already made out my five year plans, my ten year plans, you know, my popularity trajectory and how this is going to lead me to ultimately become an Instagram influencer. And so I told everyone that quarterback thing. And then the next week when practices start, he calls for the offense. Okay, offense, get out on field and calls the positions. You need to line up. So I go and I'm up under center. What are you doing? What do you mean?

[George]

Starting quarterback?

[Gordon]

Quarterback, cornerback. Cornerback. Have you ever heard of that? I never heard of the position of cornerback. And that's what he had told me and I misunderstood him and I told all those people that.

[Craig]

Terrible. Yes.

[George]

Man, no wonder you hate sports so much.

[Gordon]

Yeah. Sports is one of the worst deals that we've ever had. It harms way too many people. And I used to. I remember in. Even in T ball being out in the outfield praying the ball didn't come to me. I did not want that to happen.

[George]

Yeah. I always felt that coaching little League, I didn't want moments like that for my players, you know, and that was. That was always a struggle too, because I didn't necessarily want to put the kid who was very unsure of himself at shortstop.

[Craig]

Right.

[George]

I was afraid he's going to get eaten up by a hard grounder. But at the same time, I wanted to play everyone, you know, at different positions and would try to work him up to that. But, yeah, it's a lot of. I told you guys. My, my first swim meet. Do we put our kids in really tough positions by making them play youth sports? I think sometimes we do because it's important to us. And we're up there yelling and going crazy as parents, and they're trying to figure out, okay, which way do I go, which way do I run the bases, which basket do I go to? It's got to be.

[Craig]

It's part of the overwhelming process, though. It's part of growing.

[Gordon]

But what is it.

[George]

But what is it Preparing you for? 6, though? Yeah. And at 5 and 6, I just think, yeah, they're probably better off just playing in the driveway with the neighborhood kids than. I think we start too young. I really do.

[Craig]

What age should we start?

[George]

Maybe eight instead of five or six or even four. You know, there's soccer teams starting at three and four and it's just chaos. And I don't know what anybody's getting out of that. And I think it's in the spirit of, well, you know, they're making friends and. But I think for the dad, it's, we're going to make a superstar out of him. That's a topic for another day. But it does make me think that, yeah, we've put a lot of heat on our kids sometimes.

[Gordon]

So we all three had scarring incidents from youth sports. So is that just unusual that just we happen to have the three people out of the hundred who have the scar? No, I think everyone's are. Most people have like, oh, no, I did youth sports. I absolutely loved it. And yeah, I messed up, but it, it was, it never bothered me. Like, are other people just not as sensitive emotionally as the three of us? And we're just the three Ps?

[Craig]

My guess is it's very common. Except in the uber elite athletes. I bet they never had any scarring moments because they just dominated. And yeah, they were the toast of the team, whatever team they were on. But for the other 98% of us, I bet we all had scarring moments.

[George]

Yeah, that for those who weren't ahead of their own age group, athletically, we all had our dribble it off your foot or wear blue cleats or run the wrong way in a T ball game.

[Gordon]

I get so many headaches every month.

[George]

It could be chronic migraine, 15 or more headache days a month, each lasting four hours or more.

[Gordon]

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[George]

Ask your doctor, visit botoxchronicmigraine.com or call 1-844botox to learn more. Football playoffs are here, and underdog is the best place to get in on all the gridiron action. Playing on underdog is easy. Just pick your favorite players and if they'll go higher or lower on stats like touchdowns, rushing yards, receptions and more. Get them right and you could win up to 5,000 times your cash. Last week I took higher on Josh Allen's passing yards and I won big. Let's do it again this week. So what are you waiting for? Download the app today and use the promo code musers to score $75 in bonus entries when you play your first $5. That's promo code MUSERS. Underdog make picks win money must be 18 or older, 19 or older in Alabama and Nebraska, 19 or older in Colorado for some games, 21 or older in Arizona, Massachusetts and Virginia and present in a state where underdog fantasy operates. Terms apply. See assets.underdogfantasy.com web playandgettermsdfs.HTML for offer. Not valid in Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Ohio or Pennsylvania. Concerned with your play? Call 1-800- gambler or visit www.ncpgambling.org. in New York, call the 24.7hope line at 1-877-8-HOPE NY or text hopeny or 67369. Okay, fast forward to when we were freshmen, when Craig and I were freshmen at North Texas, and we talked about that in one of our early episodes, just about the nonsense that we were a part of every day the fact that intramural sports and making the other person laugh was more important than the economics test that you were about to take the next day. And I'm not proud to say this, but flatulence was a big part of our daily lives when we were freshmen.

[Gordon]

Why was there such an emphasis on that?

[George]

It was just a guaranteed laugh. And again, you're looking for the most laughs in a day. So it could be a prank, throwing a water balloon at someone. It could be ripping one and maybe recording it to go on the very now famous fart tape that we had.

[Craig]

We had a stereo in George's dorm room. It was our roommate Skip stereo, and it was always set on record. Pause. And there was a microphone attached. And whenever anybody had a fart, they would run into the room, I got one, and Skip, since it's his stereo, he had the worst job. He would run over, grab the microphone and hold it up to the person's rear end and then release the pause button and the person would rip one into the microphone. So at the end of the semester, we had like a five minute long tape of nothing but farts.

[George]

With the idea that we would again make the entire floor laugh by some night cranking that up as loud as we could.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[George]

And a stereo that had it was half mine, half skips. It was huge. And we had four speakers and we would rattle the dorm room with five minutes of farts.

[Gordon]

Why? Why is that such an accomplishment?

[George]

Can you imagine hearing that and think.

[Gordon]

How would that be?

[George]

Where is that coming from?

[Gordon]

What's putting the cherry on top of your life?

[George]

I don't know.

[Craig]

It seemed like a major accomplishment at the time. And I don't know why.

[George]

I don't know why either.

[Gordon]

And please tell me what biohazard team came in and took that mic away at the end of the semester and disposed.

[George]

Oh, no, whatever happened to that microphone?

[Gordon]

Yeah, what cave did they have to bury that in? Up under a mountain.

[George]

That tape became legendary. And when we started working at the campus station, we made copies of it and would give it to our friends. And yeah, it was huge.

[Gordon]

Wait, it was like a housewarming gift.

[George]

That you would give to people sometimes. It was to Alvin.

[Craig]

It was a birthday gift for Alvin and he loved it. He put it in his car and had it in his cassette console for years. He drove around with us.

[George]

He loved it so much that we went to his party for his birthday and we presented him with that tape. And everyone was dancing, having a good time. They had loud music. They took the music off to play the tape. It was such a dichotomy. All the. All the guys in there were bent over with their hands on their knees laughing, and all the girls were just like, ew, what are we listening to? And finally they got the music back going. So that was our mentality when we were freshmen. So we were trying to talk this girl into playing a prank with us. And Craig went up to her room. That was the other thing wild about our dorm. It was. It was mixed. I mean, you would have a floor of girls and you have a floor of guys. And it was co ed. And so we were on the second floor and the floor above us was girls.

[Craig]

It was great.

[George]

Yeah, it was pretty great. And our idea was we were going to talk this girl into really being into a friend of ours.

[Gordon]

See, this is cruel sounding to me right now.

[George]

I don't have to bore you with the details.

[Gordon]

So she was gonna fake liking a.

[Craig]

Guy, right, to lure him to a place where we would prank him.

[George]

Well, we would prank him. So we needed her as terrible. So as Craig is explaining this to her, he was by himself. I don't know why I didn't go up there initially with.

[Gordon]

You go to her dorm room. Right, her dorm room.

[George]

It's tile floor. That's. That's a real key. It's tile floor, low ceiling. And Craig is talking to this girl and he's explaining it, and I'm late to get up there, and he's already explaining the prank. And I go in there. He's about halfway through the setup, you know, and I'm kind of listening. And just because out of habit.

[Gordon]

Did you feel it building?

[George]

I felt. I felt it building. And I let fly with. Still to this day, the loudest. The loudest and longest fart that I've ever. I did it with the sole purpose of making him laugh. And then I realized. I looked up and I realized where I was. And she's.

[Gordon]

And she's sitting right there.

[George]

She's sitting two feet away from me.

[Gordon]

And looked at me and your ass has exploded.

[George]

And I ran out of the room and I said, I forgot where I was.

[Gordon]

And he left me there.

[Craig]

He runs out. So he was so used to being so relaxed with his flatulence around me and our friends, that he was just around me and just thought, hey, I'm gonna make him laugh. And can you imagine what I was thinking and what she was thinking? We're sitting here having a conversation, and this guy just rips this incredibly loud fart.

[George]

We didn't get it recorded. But it was forever recorded in her brain. Yeah. What was she thinking? Some moron runs in and just kind.

[Gordon]

Of stands every two seconds kind of fidgeting around. Sounds like a master sedon deflating.

[George]

Hikes up a leg and lets fly.

[Craig]

And then I have to perform cleanup duty after he runs out of the room.

[Gordon]

He's been having a lot of fun.

[Craig]

I'm sorry about that.

[George]

He's not right in the head.

[Craig]

Can you please still help us with this prank? I think she did.

[George]

Yeah, she did. She went through with the prank. But then I thought, man, I'm ruined in this dorm now because this girl's gonna tell the story. Yeah, that's the guy that came bursting, ripped one, and then ran away and said, I forgot where I didn't.

[Gordon]

You have one that happened to you one time? You stuck your rear out the back door to obscure it from your wife.

[George]

Yeah, well, some friends of ours were walking down the alley as it reverberated off the wooden fence back and forth. I had one.

[Gordon]

You went and stuck your rear out the back door.

[George]

Well, isn't that polite to the household? And that's what I've always thought. And while we were very free and easy about our flatulence, I don't think guys and girls should ever mix that. Like, guys should not do that kind of humor around their moms or their sister or their girlfriend or wife or anything.

[Craig]

Dorm mate.

[George]

Yeah.

[Craig]

Should not have done that around a girl in the dorm.

[Gordon]

No, Lots of people that disagree with you on that. They say that that brings a couple closer together.

[George]

Oh, no, no, no. You got to keep those things separated. It's kind of like church and state.

[Craig]

I agree.

[George]

Keep those things separated. For sure.

[Craig]

I had one of those moments. And this is somewhat recently, a couple of years ago. And you know our friend Mike, who works at Heritage Auctions, he was coming to my house a couple of times to grade some of my baseball cards, and there was a basketball card that I got, and I was going to have them put it up for auction for me. So he came by to get that card. It was one evening after work. He stopped by at my house, and I bring the card to him, and we're standing there at the front door, and we're talking about it. It's a Zion Williamson card. He said, yeah, I think this is a good time to sell, because, you know, Zion's got an injury history. He may not be this great player down the road, so let's get what we can. And I said, yeah, I think so too. And then I just let a fart out.

[Gordon]

Huh?

[Craig]

And it slipped out on total accident. And I paused, and I looked at him.

[Gordon]

Mike just said, looking at you while holding the cart, going, okay, I don't understand that reaction.

[Craig]

And I pause, and I look at his face for some reaction, and I didn't see any. So I kept talking about Zion Williamson. And then he said, okay, well, I'll let you know how it goes with the auction. Closes the door, and I lock it behind him. And then I'm thinking, he had to.

[George]

Have heard that maybe he didn't.

[Gordon]

He was being polite and pretending like he didn't.

[Craig]

So a couple of days later, it was bothering me so much that I texted him. I said, hey, listen.

[Gordon]

Oh, you didn't bring it up?

[Craig]

I did. What the fuck?

[George]

Text?

[Gordon]

Hey, I just want to tell you.

[George]

Man.

[Craig]

I said I let one out accidentally while we were talking. Did you hear that? And he said he never heard it.

[George]

Did you hear that?

[Gordon]

He's being polite.

[Craig]

I think he was being polite.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And if it was loud enough, I mean, you. You knew that he heard it at the time, didn't you?

[Craig]

I was 99% sure that he heard it, yes. Yeah.

[George]

And I don't know what's wrong with us as guys, why we think that's so funny. It just is. And I wish we would grow out of it, but, man, if someone did that in third grade when the class was quiet, it was funny then. I'm sorry.

[Gordon]

See, I don't remember kids doing that in class.

[George]

Oh, I do. It was very rare. But, like, the guy who would. That I've told you about through the years, who would call out wiener. He'd just go, wiener. And get sent to the principal's office. He would do that just to crack everybody up.

[Craig]

All right, here's the text I sent to Mike.

[Gordon]

Oh, no, you found it.

[Craig]

So I'm sitting here laughing with my wife, telling her that as I was saying goodbye to you, I accidentally farted. If you indeed heard it, I'd like to apologize. If you didn't hear it, then I'm just kidding. It never happened. And he responded with ten cry face emojis. Laugh face emojis. Did not hear it, but now I'm cracking up.

[George]

Okay, see, he thought it was funny.

[Gordon]

So, wait, you told your wife that story?

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

See, isn't that a violation of Georgia's rule about church state?

[George]

Yeah, but I think you can talk about it.

[Craig]

You just can't do it in front of her.

[George]

Yeah, I think there is a Difference of that? Cause I think I've told you my wife this story.

[Gordon]

See, I don't think. I don't think you even need to talk about it.

[George]

I think that's fine, too, if you want to. Just. Full lockdown, so you never have that conversation.

[Gordon]

Full lockdown, yes.

[Craig]

Do you guys remember the story 20 years ago when I was out on a date with a girl?

[George]

Yes. This is amazing.

[Craig]

We were at Snuffers in Dallas. It's a local burger joint, and they've got.

[Gordon]

I don't think they want their business mentioned here in this story, but.

[Craig]

Okay, well, they've got these old wooden booths, and we were sitting at a booth, and it's loud in there, and the smell of hamburgers is overwhelming. So I thought that I could let a test balloon out because I had some gas. So I cut this fart, and I'm thinking I got away with it. And after a couple seconds, she goes, what was that? And I said, what do you mean? And she goes, I felt the bench vibrate. She had her foot up. Across.

[Gordon]

Across onto your bench.

[Craig]

Onto my bench. And she felt the vibration of my far.

[Gordon]

She felt the explosion. Her Richter scale went off.

[George]

Seismograph kind of went up just a little bit. 4.3.

[Craig]

And I think I had to come clean. I can't. I don't think I made up an excuse. Like, I don't know. It must have been a truck.

[Gordon]

What are you talking about? I don't know what you're talking about.

[George]

Yeah, a truck just passed by, but.

[Craig]

I got busted there.

[George]

You've never had a moment like that with your own flashlight?

[Gordon]

Never. That's just. No, it seems like that's easily controllable as a human. Adult human.

[Craig]

So the older you get.

[George]

Oh, no, just wait, buddy.

[Gordon]

Oh.

[George]

And that's why I think you ought to. Before we do our next podcast, you ought to create one of these moments.

[Gordon]

No, those aren't the kind of special moments you want to create.

[George]

No, they're not. But, yeah, just like the. The haircut comment. I remember that night in the dorm with that terrible, terrible incident. Like it was yesterday. I think on my deathbed, that's going to be one of the memories that flashes through my head when you let.

[Gordon]

Your own Nagasaki loose in her dorm room.

[Craig]

We need to track down that girl and see if she remembers it. Certainly she does.

[George]

She has to.

[Gordon]

Do you remember her name?

[Craig]

I don't.

[George]

No, I don't. We could probably track that down.

[Gordon]

We need to get her and Wanda on.

[George]

One of our friends probably Remembers her name. And you know what? I think I did go back and apologize to her because I said, I know that looked really bad.

[Gordon]

And I wrote an apology.

[Craig]

I know that smelled really bad.

[George]

I'm really sorry. That's one of the worst things anyone could ever do is run into your dorm room and do that. And I'm very, very sorry.

[Gordon]

Well, you had another incident, now that I'm thinking about it. What was the incident? When you're. You thought you were home alone and you felt that you were safe and you were totally at ease, and you felt like you wanted to. Yes, you wanted to release. And then at that time, you hear the garage door opening.

[George]

It was when we had a basset hound who was very foul. His name was Bo Jackson, and he was very foul. He would let fly all the time. And, yeah, sometimes we would blame it on the dog. And here I was in the den watching tv, thinking, yeah, there's no one home. Just me and the dog.

[Gordon]

Totally same.

[George]

So, yeah, there may have been an explosion. And, yeah, then I heard the garage door coming in. My wife's coming home. Meantime, the dog is nowhere to be seen. Bo, get in there.

[Gordon]

Come on.

[George]

Screaming for the dog to get in there. So he moves really slow. You know, he can. He's got those little legs. He's going from the other side of the house, like, come on, come on.

[Gordon]

Come on, come on. The camera keeps cutting to the garage door opening and her car coming in there.

[George]

I'm thinking about locking the door. You know, I'm waving him around third.

[Gordon]

You're shoving a bookshelf up against the door to keep her from coming in the house.

[George]

But, yeah, And I think I got away with that one fine. It was just like, hey, what's going. Oh, nothing, nothing.

[Gordon]

Boy having some issues and everything. I've just been watching him because he looks like he's sick.

[George]

He's kind of messed up. But, yeah, we're just watching Gillig. I love you.

[Gordon]

What are you doing? How'd the shopping go? Everything okay?

[George]

Yeah. And I glossed right over it because, again, those things should not be talked about between life.

[Gordon]

I was just thinking, maybe you should buy some more china. We need more china.

[Craig]

That's weird.

[Gordon]

That was the exact opposite opinion you had last week. Really? No, but I thought about it some, and you were exactly right.

[George]

Anyway, just thinking. Just kind of thinking out loud.

[Gordon]

A lot of the stuff you say is right, honey. Shopping is hard. Right? But I found a better way. Stitch fix online.

[Craig]

Personal styling makes it easy. I just give my stylist my size.

[Gordon]

Style and budget preferences. I order boxes when I want and how I want, no subscription required. And he sends just for me, pieces, plus outfit recommendations and styling tips. I keep what works and send back the rest.

[Craig]

It's so easy.

[Gordon]

Make style easy. Get started [e-mail] Spotify. That's stitchfix.com Spotify.

[Craig]

It's back. Hey, it's Dan Bongino. I've got some big news for you. Starting February 2nd, the show is back. That's right, the Dan Bongino show is relaunching and we're going bigger than ever. Join me live on rumble.com Monday through Friday, 10am to noon Eastern. We'll cover the stories that matter, cut through all the garbage and get to the truth. Can't catch it live. No problem. Grab the audio wherever you get your podcast. Podcasts. Remember February 2nd, the return to the Dan Bongino Show. Don't miss it.

[George]

Well, one of the times that we were on the air doing our radio show, it was just an awful day. It's kind of an awkward transition to go from that to 9 11.

[Gordon]

Yeah. Maybe you didn't think this out.

[George]

We were live on the air, but.

[Craig]

We have some professional embarrassing moments as well.

[George]

Yes, yes. This leads us to a professional story. I'm supposed to be a professional broadcaster.

[Gordon]

Segue assist to Craig on that.

[George]

Yes. Very good, Craig. So a week after the the tragedy of 9 11, there was a nationwide moment of silence and it was to coincide either when the first plane hit or the second. I think it was the first plane hit. And every radio station, TV as well. Right. It's just supposed to be a broadcast everywhere. We're supposed to have a moment of silence. And I've tried to explain this to you guys through the years because just like we just had an awkward transition, we were thinking, how do you do a moment of silence on radio and.

[Gordon]

Then start your show up again?

[George]

Go back to your show. So we did all agree, this is the way I remember it, that to make it less awkward whenever the moment was done and we played a little outro to it that had, you know, an announcer's voice saying, you know, the following has been a moment of silence, you know, blah, blah, blah, brought to you by sponsored. The ticket.

[Gordon]

So we had it sponsored.

[George]

I've had it sponsored. We did all agree, did we not, that we would just go to the phones.

[Gordon]

Yeah. We would go straight to calls after the voiceover announcer ended the moment of silence and bookended it.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

For us.

[George]

And for whatever reason, I was designated as the person who would talk first. Right. That's the way I remember it. So as we took this moment of silence, I guess I just zoned out, and maybe I do remember closing my eyes, trying to be a part of the moment of silence. And when I heard the announcer's voice stop, I thought that was the announcement that was to play after the moment of silence. So I totally got lost with where we were, and unfortunately, I started going to a call right in the middle of what was supposed to be a national moment of silence. Please join us in silence as we remember those innocent Americans lost in this unconscionable, cowardly act of terrorism on our nation. Paul in ktck, Dallas Fort Worth, ktdk. Sherman, Dennis. I'm very sorry about that. I wasn't. I wasn't paying attention. I'm very sorry.

[Gordon]

This is supposed to be the moment of silence. Now then.

[Craig]

All right, let's do the moment of silence. Okay. Here's one thing before we move on and take calls on this.

[George]

Time out. I thought the moment of silence was between the ID and when he came on and started talking again. That's the moment of silence, isn't it? It was a little longer than what you left there.

[Craig]

No, the moment of silence was.

[George]

You're not the first one to be confused.

[Gordon]

You want to do over.

[Craig]

You want to do a do over. He talked in the moment of silence, right?

[George]

Yeah. So you have to stop. First time, five seconds. Sorry.

[Craig]

All right, one more. One more thing to wrap that up.

[George]

There'd be a more awkward thing to play.

[Gordon]

That was.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Oh, all right.

[Craig]

We are not doing the emergency break of the week this week, but if we were doing it, I'm sure that.

[Gordon]

Would be a candidate.

[George]

Okay.

[Craig]

See, all of a sudden, say this.

[George]

All of a sudden, I'm back in eighth grade and everyone's laughing at me again. I did not mean to do that. I swear to you. And then once that happened, I thought, I'm going to get fired. Could you show any more disrespect? Because then we started kind of laughing about it, and I wasn't trying to make a joke or anything. And again, I wanted to just bury myself in a hole.

[Gordon]

Speaking of buried, they were still digging people out.

[George]

Okay. Words, bad phrase. I just wanted to get away. Totally. I wanted to be off the air and not.

[Gordon]

You're the only person in America talking at that moment.

[George]

I know.

[Craig]

Yeah. I think.

[Gordon]

And you want to chit chat someone on the phone. That's what you Want to do.

[George]

The idea was, you're making it worse.

[Craig]

To play the announcers intro, then 10 seconds of the nation being silent, then play the outro.

[Gordon]

Right.

[George]

But you know, we never went over the time period that we would go. Was it 10 seconds?

[Gordon]

No, I think it was. I want to say it was a full minute, like thing.

[George]

Was it a minute?

[Craig]

Yeah, it may. I don't think it was a minute. Was it.

[Gordon]

There was some national guideline that everyone was going by the same thing and we were all going to be like silent for maybe it was. I can't remember how long it was.

[Craig]

It was longer than the half second.

[George]

1.3 seconds that I gave it. Yeah.

[Gordon]

Before he started taking calls.

[George]

Boy. And you guys too, immediately just started laughing.

[Gordon]

No, we handled it well.

[George]

He already awarded me in the emergency break of the week.

[Gordon]

Now, what is that?

[George]

Have one. That was something we still do in our show for awkward moments during broadcast time. But. Oh, yeah, I still. I mean, we've heard that now, I don't know, 500 times. And people laugh about it now. But I do remember that day just feeling so small and thinking, that's the dumbest thing that anyone has ever done in broadcasting. Has to be. Has to be.

[Craig]

Well, it was an accident. You zoned out.

[George]

Yeah, I wasn't trying to be cute or.

[Gordon]

I think you were. No, I think. I think it. You were like, 9, 11 is not that big a deal. Come on, let's do sports talk. That's what you had said off the air. So I just thought maybe that was.

[George]

What you were thinking. Oh, I did not say that off the air.

[Craig]

I had a very embarrassing professional moment as well. This was way back in the day at our radio station, the Ticket, when we carried TCU basketball games. And I did the games with Chuck Cooperstein, longtime play by play guy in the Dallas Fort Worth area. He was doing the play by play, I was doing the color commentary. And I was responsible for interviewing halftime guests. So each game at the arena, I had to look around for someone to talk to at halftime. That would be mildly interesting. Have them on for five minutes. I couldn't find anybody that night. And I turned to Chuck during a timeout and I said, I'm having problems thinking of somebody. I don't see anybody here that we haven't already talked to. And he goes, hey, right down there at the end of the scores table is Al Bianchi, the legendary scout from the Phoenix Suns. He's here scouting Kurt Thomas. Talk to him. Great. Next time out. I walk down to the end of the table. And I said, hey, Al, Craig Miller from the TCU Radio Network, do you mind if I talk to you at halftime? He said, what? I said, would you do our halftime show? Yeah, yeah, fine. I'll be down there at halftime. I said, okay, we're right here at the other end of the table. Halftime comes. Chuck leaves to the break room. Al Bianchi comes over, sits down, puts on a headset. I said, hey, I really appreciate you doing this. He said, no problem. So we're going to talk about Kurt Thomas and whoever else you're scouting. Okay? Fine. Come back from break. Welcome back to Daniel Meyer Coliseum. Craig Miller here at halftime. TCU leads Baylor 42 to 41. And joining me courtside is the super scout for the Phoenix Suns, the great Al Bianchi. Thanks for the time. And his eyes get real big and he looks at me and he says, I'm not Al Bianchi. I'm Scotty Sterling from the Sacramento Kings.

[George]

Son of a guy.

[Gordon]

But if you were Al Bianchi, what would you say?

[Craig]

And I just got this. This pit in my stomach. And I was like, oh, well, thanks for joining us. What do you think of Kurt Thomas? And he so reluctantly did the next five minutes.

[Gordon]

Yeah. Because he's been interviewed by an idiot.

[Craig]

And then at the end, I said, thanks to Scotty Sterling from the Sacramento Kings. And before I could get to the break, he took off his headset and just threw it down and walked off. I didn't even get a chance to apologize to him. I felt so tiny. Like you felt during the.

[George]

There's no recovery.

[Craig]

There's no recovery. You just feel like such an imbecile. And then when Chuck came back, I said, that wasn't Al Bianchi. That was Scotty Sterling. He goes, oh, okay. Like he didn't care.

[Gordon]

No big deal to me.

[George]

I don't care. Get some right, you get some wrong.

[Craig]

That's by far my most embarrassing professional moment.

[George]

See, I don't know if Gordo's had too many broadcasting embarrassing moments just because. You just write it off, though. Yeah. You know, it's just being funny.

[Gordon]

Well, I'm just shameless. I just. You can't be shamed.

[George]

What's the big deal?

[Gordon]

I suck and I know it. So when I mess up, no big deal.

[George]

When we were at the super bowl, who did? He read the wiki bio of somebody and talked about her ex husband when her real husband was singing.

[Craig]

That was Marissa Miller, Sports Illustrated model. I think that was her name.

[Gordon]

Yeah, she was standing there with a guy and I just assumed that that was her husband. And I was reading about her husband and everything. So I asked a question about him. She goes that. That you're talking about my ex husband. He is.

[Craig]

And her PR person behind is waving you off.

[Gordon]

Waving me off. And that was real uncomfortable. Oh, and it's, you know, it seemed like, man, I may not be remembering this correctly. Seemed like there was someone I was interviewing once who had just had a baby and I'd read, you know, they'd had a baby and I asked about the baby and I had not read follow up stories that the.

[George]

Oh no.

[Gordon]

There had been a passing and I was unaware.

[George]

Oh, gosh.

[Craig]

How did they react?

[Gordon]

Not good. Craig wasn't a laugh riot, I'll tell you that. There was a time I asked Ahmad Rashad about his ex wife and wasn't aware that he was no longer married to Phylicia Rashad.

[George]

Yeah, we had to inform you that through his silence to your.

[Gordon]

How's Felicia doing? Doing well. I hear she's doing well. I mean, he was nice about it, you know, glossed over it. I hear she's doing well.

[Craig]

So do those moments embarrass you or are you so out there that they don't even phase you?

[Gordon]

Okay, let's see. There's always a criticism nestled within this question. Well, those don't faze because I know that they're, they're funny moments. You know, it's awkwardness that's also funny.

[George]

Yeah, but you're right there in front of that person, though, and you're just trying to dig your way out.

[Gordon]

I know.

[George]

Oh, man, I'm so sorry.

[Gordon]

It doesn't. That does. Yes. And you do feel the nervousness of it.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And I certainly didn't intend that with Ahmad Rashad that time. I mean, I barely know who half these people are. I count on you guys feeding me questions in my ear.

[George]

That probably doesn't help either, that we're feeding questions and. Yeah, but we didn't ask you to ask that question about how his ex wife was doing.

[Gordon]

And there are little ones that probably didn't come across as real embarrassing or cringy when they happened, but I remember internally cringing a lot. I remember when I first. This is when I first started doing tv and one of the first interviews that I was doing was with Steven Spielberg, which is. He was huge in our childhood. I mean, still is huge. He's culturally one of the biggest names you can get. And so I'm interviewing and of Course, I'm very nervous about it. And I remember asking a question. It was a question that I thought about the night before, and I was going to ask him. I think it was for Saving Private Ryan. And I asked him a question. Your movie brings up this issue of is. Is one man's life worth the life of all these others that it took to get him this information? And as I'm asking that question, right after I finish asking, I go, I realized what a stupid question that is. He made a whole movie to answer that question, to give his point of view of this. And now I'm asking him, hey, so tell me, what's the real answer?

[George]

Did he say, watch the movie?

[Gordon]

He was kind and basically said, you know, well, I made the movie to explore that.

[George]

Oh.

[Gordon]

Oh, yeah.

[George]

I didn't think about that. Yeah.

[Gordon]

But. But I mean, other than that, other things.

[Craig]

And I just.

[Gordon]

The reason that moment stayed with me is just. I felt so stupid. Like, how did I not realize that when I. In this intervening 24 hours, I've been thinking about that?

[Craig]

Right.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

You know, how did that not dawn on me? And it just took me by surprise right here in the middle of this interview, and it's right at the beginning of my. My celebrity interviewing career. And I go, you know, you just feel like, okay, I'm just clearly not qualified to do this. Can't do it if something like that doesn't occur to me. You know, I just can't do this job. So I beat myself up over that.

[George]

Yeah, I think as you get older, you handle embarrassment better. You know, you can reason with yourself and think, okay, we can move on. We can have another day tomorrow. That one, that broadcast one wasn't that long ago, but that was still 25 years ago, I guess. And I would say I wouldn't be as embarrassed about that now as I was then. Just because, I don't know, you just figure, okay, it happens. You know, you say dumb things. You say things without thinking. You do things without thinking sometimes. And, yeah, then you're left there so.

[Craig]

Mortified, you know, I had one that has haunted me forever, but I'm not 100% sure that I did something wrong. And maybe somebody listening to this was at this event that night, and they can confirm this or tell me I didn't do anything wrong. But this is 25 years ago, maybe even 30 years ago. I was asked to emcee a dinner honoring Kenneth Cooper from the Cooper Aerobics center, the father of aerobics. And he was receiving some award friends of ours at a local shoe store were putting it on. They asked me to. To him see it. So I thought about how I was going to introduce doctor. I think he's a doctor. How I was going to introduce Dr. Cooper. And so I wrote something down, and then, you know, father of aerobics, blah, blah, blah. And I had a little cheat sheet there. And then I got to the line that I was most proud of, and I said, so after filling out his bio, I said, and ladies and gentlemen, run for your life. Because he's big into getting people to run.

[George]

Yeah.

[Craig]

But as I was introducing him, I thought it was funny to tell everyone to run for your life, because here he comes. And then a name came out of my mouth, and to this day.

[Gordon]

You called him a name after I'm only 50.

[Craig]

50. That the name that came out of my mouth was Kenneth Cooper.

[Gordon]

Oh, no.

[Craig]

I think I may have said Kevin Cooper. I think I may have said a name that wasn't even close. But I remember the reaction from everybody. I didn't get the laugh on the run for your life comment.

[Gordon]

And that threw you off and got you nervous. Yes.

[Craig]

And so then I don't know what name came out of my mouth. And I remember everyone was just Katie Cooper kind of confused. And he came up and I shook his hand, and he just kind of gave me a weird look. And everybody was weird to me for the rest of the evening.

[Gordon]

Yeah, I've had a few of those MC gigs, too.

[Craig]

But nobody said, hey, you messed up his name. Or his name's Kenneth Cooper, not Kevin Cooper, or whatever you said. And afterwards, the people who asked me to do it said, thanks for doing this, but they weren't real warm about it.

[Gordon]

Right?

[Craig]

Yes. But to this day, it's haunted me because I don't know if I got his name right or wrong.

[George]

Boy, that's a good one. The public speaking emcee. We get asked to emcee things. And yeah, the joke that doesn't go over. That's a rare double. A joke that doesn't go over well. And then maybe a mispronounced name of the guy who's being honored. Yeah.

[Gordon]

You had one job to introduce that guy.

[Craig]

Right. And I think I'm pretty sure I screwed it up, but it was never confirmed.

[George]

It's like that time Craig and I were asked to emcee an awards banquet for a golf tournament. And they said they listened to our show and they said, hey, do some of the jokes. Do some of the impersonations that you do on Your radio show. So we went out and apparently everybody who played in the tournament that day had never heard a radio show because we went into some of the impersonations we did. I think Craig did Barry Switzer. I maybe did a real short Jimmy Johnson or something. And one of the guys who was there was at the time PGA Tour player Lanny Watkins, who never cracked a smile. And we were supposed to go, hey, get up there and just make all these people laugh.

[Craig]

Nobody in the room ever cracked a smile.

[George]

No one smiled, no one laughed. And I think it seemed like we were up there for an hour. I feel it's probably five minutes tape of this. Oh, man.

[Craig]

I think I went home and drank a 12 pack. It was so awful.

[George]

It was bad.

[Gordon]

I've had those too. I mean, I've. Good friend of mine asked me to emcee something. Same deal. You know, I just go up there and do your practicing jobs. Great. And everything is great. And nothing went over. It was painful, stem to stern. And then at the end, having to see your friend. Hey, man, I just wanted to say I'm sorry about that.

[George]

So sorry about everything.

[Gordon]

No, it was fine. And then they don't take my calls anymore.

[George]

It was fine. Yeah, that's never a good review. It was fine. All right, well, stop embarrassing yourselves out there. And if you do, it's not that big a deal, is it? Not whether you're in eighth grade or you're talking to a group of people in your 50s. It's. It's not as bad as you think.

[Gordon]

I look back at about half of my life and still cringe at it. Like, I still.

[George]

I have a lot of cringe.

[Gordon]

I'll be reminded of something I did and just go, oh, man.

[Craig]

Yeah.

[George]

I know.

[Craig]

I think the lesson is it's not as bad as you think, but it can also be extremely traumatic and scarring.

[George]

Yeah. And it will stay with you until you take your last breath. Yeah. So.

[Gordon]

But other than that.

[George]

Other than that.

[Gordon]

Other than that, it's not that big a deal.

[George]

If you have some of those moments or you want to ask us or tell us about something else, you can email [e-mail] oh, I'd love to hear.

[Gordon]

Some cringy stories from.

[George]

Oh, yeah, Embarrassing moments. Cringy moments. That'd be great. Thanks again to Peter Welton for producing this fine production of the Musers, the.

[Gordon]

Podcast I'm gonna run to third base now.

[George]

Be the first time, if by chance.

[Gordon]

You happen to be the girl in.

[George]

College that George Farted on.

[Gordon]

Or maybe you were at that event that Junior was emceeing and you'd like to share your version of those events.

[George]

We'd love to hear from you.

[Gordon]

You can email [e-mail] and yes, bits are very much accepted. Thanks for following subscribing the Muser's Pod is a Tired head production.

[George]

The United States Soccer Federation presents the U.S. soccer Podcast. My name is My name is David Goss and I'm joined by my co host Megan Klinenberg.

[Craig]

Everything up until this point has been an outside look at the World cup.

[Gordon]

And now we're giving people an inside look. It is just total pressure cooker.

[George]

Watching flags come out of little plastic balls is like the epitome of everything that I love. And the World cup is everything.

[Craig]

It's why I became a soccer fan.

[Gordon]

The U.S. soccer Podcast follow and listen on your favorite platform.