Santa & the Tim Biakabutuka Jersey - Episode 25

Summary

The Musers The Podcast

Episode 25: Santa & the Tim Biakabutuka Jersey
Release Date: December 17, 2025
Hosts: George Dunham, Craig “Junior” Miller (Bob), Gordon Keith

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Main Theme

The Musers, three legendary Dallas-Fort Worth radio personalities, gather for a festive holiday special focused on their most memorable Christmas stories, the joys and trials of childhood wishes, the quirks of family celebrations, and that magical (or occasionally disappointing) moment when dreams meet reality under the tree. With classic Musers banter and introspective tangents, the trio taps into nostalgia and humor, reflecting on what makes the holiday season meaningful.

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Table of Contents

1. Opening Banter & Holiday Movie Talk (00:28–01:46)
2. Letter of the Week and Podcast Therapy (02:00–04:57)
3. Why Podcasting Feels Different & Lowering Walls (04:57–06:17)
4. George’s Three-Generations Christmas Story (06:17–16:14)
5. Craig’s Magical Christmas in Colorado (17:50–26:46)
6. Gordon’s Putt Puttmobile—Longing & Childhood Disappointment (26:46–34:53)
7. The Santa Question: Magic, Skepticism, and Kid Logic (39:40–47:06)
8. Holiday Traditions: Desserts & Christmas Dinners (48:04–50:25)
9. How Families Do Presents—Chaos, Rituals, and Gift Wrapping (50:30–53:44)
10. Childhood Gifts: The Ones That Got Away (53:44–57:19)
11. Closing Wishes & Holiday Sign-Offs (57:19–end)

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1. Opening Banter & Holiday Movie Talk (00:28–01:46)

• The group kicks off with playful ribbing about Christmas dinner traditions—Denny’s is jokingly cited as a family staple.
• Spirited defense of Home Alone as a top holiday film, and a tangent about tensest movie scenes—Joe Pesci’s famous “funny how?” scene in Goodfellas and the firecracker scene from Boogie Nights receive mention.
• Quick detour: The tension of the Russian roulette scene in The Deer Hunter.

“Joe Pesci is so great. I love Joe Pesci and Home Alone. Again, another vote for Home Alone. As we talk about great holiday movies.”
—George (01:16)

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2. Letter of the Week and Podcast Therapy (02:00–04:57)

• George reads a heartfelt fan email from Philip: listeners appreciate the authenticity and vulnerability of the podcast, especially around hard moments and loss.
• The Musers reflect on how the podcast feels more therapeutic than their morning radio show, with more freedom for candid, emotional conversation.
• Gordon muses about the “walls being down,” and jokingly attributes their candor to recording shirtless.

“At least for me, it has been very therapeutic at points… I think I need to go into some therapy. I think in some ways this has been very therapeutic for me.”
—George (03:17)

“Yeah, we're saving you money, Giorgio… Don't have to go to therapy.”
—Gordon (03:42)

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3. Why Podcasting Feels Different & Lowering Walls (04:57–06:17)

• They discuss why the podcast format allows more vulnerability: slower, longer form, less time-pressure than radio.
• The comfort of the podcast setting (“shirtless” aside) leads them to deeper places than timed broadcast segments.
• The group reiterates their enjoyment of the format and the opportunity to speak freely.

“Maybe we just think about it too much on radio. That's okay. We've got this much time and we got to get to the good stuff.”
—George (04:17)

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4. George’s Three-Generations Christmas Story (06:17–16:14)

• George shares an emotional story from the mid-’90s when his young son wanted a real NFL ball and a kicking tee.
• In last-minute Christmas Eve panic, he discovers the kicking tee is missing; suspects it was accidentally thrown out.
• George retrieves his own childhood tee from his parents’ house at 1 am, enlisting his father to clean and “restore” it for his son.
• The experience of three generations coming together to save Christmas was profoundly meaningful.
• Afterward, he sits in silence on the porch—“five most peaceful moments of my life”—a powerful moment he’s tried and failed to recapture since.

“My dad was a former marine. If he would have you, you would have gotten cast.”
—George (10:55)

“I just sat out on a front porch, and I sat down on the stoop, and I just sat there for 15 minutes looking at the lights and just enjoying quiet. And I've tried to duplicate that since, and I have not had them… almost what has been 30 years, I've not had another experience like that.”
—George (13:22)

“And you had the three generations of men involved... that’s so alpha and omega.”
—Gordon (14:01)

• The story ends with laughter about how kids sometimes react less than rapturously to homemade or “used” gifts—with George’s son giving the “game-used” tee a quizzical look.
• Gordon shares a related anecdote about playing with a boxed football all December, ruining both the surprise and the box.

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5. Craig’s (Bob’s) Magical Christmas in Colorado (17:50–26:46)

• Bob recalls his parents moving to Evergreen, Colorado, and spending his first Christmas in the snowy mountains as a college student.
• The drive up I-70, town square with a frozen lake and skating, and shopping with his sister in a snowy, idyllic setting made it feel like living in a movie.
• Christmas Eve traditions: nice dinner out, gift opening, midnight mass—all surrounded by snow and “movie set” atmosphere.
• Bob ties this to his ongoing love affair with mountain Christmases and how setting informs his own family’s traditions.
• George and Gordon riff on the romanticization of “white Christmases” by Texans, the desire for postcard-perfect celebrations, and the perennial grass-is-greener mentality.
• The group jokes about odd “summery” Christmases (like those in Honolulu), and Gordon reminisces about miraculous snowy holiday trips to places like Bruges and New York.

“That just always stuck out to me as the most magical Christmas ever. The first one in the snow… from that moment on, I wanted every Christmas to be like that for the rest of my life.”
—Bob (21:54)

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6. Gordon’s Putt Puttmobile—Longing & Childhood Disappointment (26:46–34:53)

• Gordon describes his intense childhood longing for a pedal car (“Putt Puttmobile”) found in the Sears catalog—he cut out its picture and kept it in a pipe tobacco tin, staring at it daily.
• Christmas morning joy: Santa delivers the pedal car, which becomes his most treasured possession… until it’s destroyed by his older brother and friends, who race it downhill and break the wheels off.
• He movingly describes visiting its “skeleton” in the basement after the family moves; many years later he searches online for the rare toy but never finds another.
• The crew riffs on childhood obsessions, pedal-car mechanics, and the sensory nostalgia of pipe tobacco and old basements.

“That picture from the catalog had turned to tissue paper... so soft and feather light because of all the wear from the pennies that had been shaken around it.”
—Gordon (32:49)

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7. The Santa Question: Magic, Skepticism, and Kid Logic (39:40–47:06)

• Bob tells of the Christmas he decided, with scientific rigor, to test the Easter Bunny and Santa myth: he marked a carrot with a green X, only to find it relocated to the crisper drawer by morning.
• The group discusses the moment kids start questioning Santa, with stories ranging from helpful local Santas who read a kid’s mind (with help from the radio show) to complicated parental ethics around “perpetuating the magic.”
• Gordon exposes his childhood heartbreak and trust issues when his mother insisted Santa was real—prompting a spirited debate about when parents should “be honest” about the myth.
• Musers trade personal anecdotes about the age they stopped believing and how families handled “the truth.”

“That was smart of him to do that, because I had the traumatic experience...I experienced that as a betrayal.”
—Gordon (46:38)

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8. Holiday Traditions: Desserts & Christmas Dinners (48:04–50:25)

• The group compares Christmas desserts: pumpkin pie, chocolate pie, banana pudding, gingerbread cookies (with George touting his mom’s unbeatable recipe).
• The Christmas dinner lineup mirrors Thanksgiving: breakfast casseroles (assembled and refrigerated the night before), with some discussion of changing up the standard menu.
• Bob notes the tradition of tamales at Christmas in New Mexico.

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9. How Families Do Presents—Chaos, Rituals, and Gift Wrapping (50:30–53:44)

• Debated present-opening rituals:
  • One-at-a-time (with everyone watching) versus everyone tearing in together (total chaos).
  • Rotating “Santa” (the present distributor), youngest starts, trash-bag management.
  • “Brothers’ Christmas Eve” for sibling gift exchanges, with in-box practical jokes for extra mystique.
• Dads and gift wrapping:
  • Bob’s dad: methodical, careful, always guessed “slippers,” never tore wrapping paper; “ooh, I wonder what this is?”
  • George brags about his own expert-level gift-wrapping skills.
  • Gordon and Bob admit they’re hopeless at wrapping.

“That's one of the few things I'm really good at. I can drive a boat, I can back a trailer, and I can wrap a gift.”
—George (53:00)

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10. Childhood Gifts: The Ones That Got Away (53:44–57:19)

• George’s white whale: four years of asking for “electric football” (the classic vibrating metal field game); Santa’s “helper” (his dad) considered it junk and never delivered—until George’s wife surprised him with one as an adult.
• Bob’s heartbreak: yearned for a real Cowboys uniform, got a generic “Hutch” brand Packers-style set (“the worst number you could possibly get as a kid: 66”).
• Gordon boasts of finally getting a Dolphins uniform, only to outgrow it—teasing about being the only fully suited-up kid tackling others in the yard.

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11. Closing Wishes & Holiday Sign-Offs (57:19–end)

• The Musers offer cheerful holiday wishes to listeners, sprinkling in light jabs about “Happy Christmas” vs. “Merry Christmas,” and referencing Paul McCartney’s preference.
• Tease for next week’s “Best of” episode as a sharable holiday audio gift.

“We all hope that everyone has a Merry Christmas, happy holiday, a happy New Year… Thanks to our producer Peter Welton for putting up with this once again.”
—George (57:19)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On capturing the magic of Christmas:

“I can still, I can put myself in that place… just hearing that silence for 15 minutes or so.”
—George (14:46)

On wanting what you can’t have:

“That was my penny collection… I would take this picture out… and just stare at it and dream of all the exotic locations I was going to go to in this pedal car.”
—Gordon (29:45)

On the myth of Santa:

“I got my 4 year old sister to the side and I said, I don't think there's anything to this Easter bunny thing or Santa Claus thing… we put it at the table for the Easter Bunny… and I pulled out a carrot and it had the X on the side of it.”
—Bob (40:24)

On family ritual and chaos:

“I know several families though that… on Christmas morning, it's okay, go. And everybody unwraps at the same time. That seems like chaos to me.”
—Bob (51:26)

On finally getting your wish:

“When I was, I guess, around 30 or 35, my wife got me electric football… And as I bring it up 56 years later, I eventually got over it.”
—George (54:12)

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Tone and Style

Warm, nostalgic, and peppered with dry, sometimes absurdist humor. The Musers’ legendary chemistry shines in affectionate teasing, wistful memories, and unsparing self-deprecation—creating a rich, relatable, and highly entertaining portrait of family, holiday tradition, and the small, poignant moments that stick with us for life.

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For longtime Musers fans and newcomers alike, this holiday episode is a cozy, laughter-filled journey into the heart of what makes Christmas memories endure.

Transcript

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[Bob]

What do you guys do for Christmas dinner usually? Is there a staple or do you mix it up?

[Gordon]

Oh, yeah. Same Christmas dinner every year. Denny's.

[George]

Not a bad option.

[Podcast Intro Announcer]

It's the Musers, the podcast, episode 25. Santa and the Tim Bianca Batuca jersey.

[George]

It's the Musers, the podcast holiday edition. I'm George. I'm Craig.

[Gordon]

I'm Gordon.

[George]

What's so funny?

[Gordon]

I don't know. You crack me up, okay. You're just funny, you know, just the.

[George]

Way you say, thank you, Gordon. Like, funny how? I don't know.

[Gordon]

Just the way you tell stories and stuff. It's just funny.

[George]

I'm funny.

[Gordon]

Is that not the greatest scene in cinematic history?

[George]

It's a good one.

[Bob]

It's the tensest.

[Gordon]

God, it was so tense the first time I watched that.

[George]

Joe Pesci is so great. I love Joe Pesci and Home Alone. Again, another vote for Home Alone. As we talk about great holiday movies.

[Bob]

It'S either the tenses scene or it's the firecracker scene in Boogie Nights.

[Gordon]

Yeah, it's great.

[Bob]

One of those is the tensest scene in movie history.

[George]

Yeah, no doubt.

[Gordon]

Scenes like that I've never seen. Is it Deer Hunter? That has the Russian roulette?

[Bob]

Yeah, that's really.

[George]

That's tense, too.

[Bob]

Oh, my God, that's so tense.

[George]

You need to watch that. Really?

[Gordon]

Yeah.

[Bob]

You love that.

[George]

And I think it holds up.

[Bob]

Really?

[Gordon]

What's it about?

[George]

I think so.

[Gordon]

Is that with John Void in it?

[Bob]

Yep. And a very young Meryl Streep.

[George]

Yeah, it's good. I haven't seen it a long time, but it's good. Yes. This is episode 25. As we are to the holiday season, we talked some Thanksgiving a few weeks back. We talked about the hardest things we've done on our last episode. And I've got an email here. Let's go ahead and call this our letter of the week, shall we? From Philip, who says about our podcast that every episode is amazing, and he feels confident saying that all listeners have been through something that was so difficult to do or deal with, that the three of you are just men living your lives. And we all get to be a part of that with you through the podcast as a listener. And when you've lived through a rough time or lost a close person, you get and need to talk about it. The musers, the podcast is allowing this to happen at a level that helps us, the listener, to benefit even more.

[Gordon]

I think you need readers.

[George]

Yeah, it's really small print.

[Gordon]

I hate that when you get an email that has such tiny print.

[George]

It's really small. Anyway, Philip says please add this email to the pile. That helps the good guys keep doing good guy stuff. Well, that's really nice.

[Gordon]

Way too sweet.

[George]

And I think it helps us too. I do think that one thing about this podcast, we do have more time to talk about different subjects. Some happy, some not. And at least for me, it has been some very therapeutic at points because I. I mentioned I think I need to go into some therapy. I think in some ways this has been very therapeutic for me to talk about some difficult things.

[Gordon]

Yeah, we're saving you money, Giorgio by Thank you podcast. Thank you. Don't have to go to therapy.

[George]

Trust me, this time of year I need to save money.

[Bob]

So why do you guys think that it is so much easier to talk about these kind of things on this podcast as opposed to our radio show?

[Gordon]

Because we're dumb.

[George]

I don't know. It's. As we've said before, it's more on the record.

[Bob]

Right.

[George]

These are. We can. By the way, you should go back and revisit some of our episodes over the last six months if you haven't done so.

[Gordon]

A whole library of incredible library of talk.

[George]

I don't know, I do feel like somehow walls are lowered just a little bit and I don't know, maybe we just think about it too much on radio. That's okay. We've got this much time and we got to get to the good stuff.

[Gordon]

As I told you. I think it's because we do the podcast shirtless. I think that puts us at ease. We're in a casual setting.

[Bob]

Is it because it's more long form? And so we end up getting to these places that radio doesn't allow us to get.

[Gordon]

Yeah.

[Bob]

Because it takes a while to kind of get to a vulnerable place or an emotional place.

[George]

And I think you're right about that.

[Bob]

And with radio you have 10 minute segments and we never really can get there.

[George]

Yeah, I think you're right.

[Bob]

Sometimes we do, but it's harder.

[George]

Yeah, absolutely. Well, it's been fun doing the musers, the podcast and this holiday season we thought we would tell a few holiday stories from our lives. And I can start. I've told this one on the air on our radio show at some point, I think only once or so, maybe twice over the last 30 some odd years. But I think it's interesting in that the night of Christmas Eve as a kid, that was such a magical day and night. The day before Christmas, the night before Christmas, I don't know if you're six or seven, you can't go to sleep at night. You're just thinking about what's going to happen the next day and whatever gift it is that you really wanted as a kid, are you going to receive that under the tree? It was such a. Just a. Awesome time. And as a father, when I started watching young kids go through the experience that I went through, I remember one Christmas in particular, this was 90s, mid-90s, about the time that our radio show started. And I only had two kids at the time, a seven year old and a three year old. And one of them wanted a real football. By real I meant official NFL. Did you guys ever get one of those as a kid, the official NFL football?

[Gordon]

I got some Kmart Terry Bradshaw football. So that's okay.

[George]

One year I got an official NFL ball and I just. To this day I think it's the greatest gift that I ever got on Christmas morning. I just thought that was so incredible, the smell of it, the, the leather smell and it.

[Gordon]

Was it a K ball or was it a real.

[George]

It was just a real ball. Said National Football League Pete Roselle's signature on it. The NFL crest was on it. Just golly.

[Bob]

That wasn't the Duke, was it?

[Gordon]

No, that was a popular one.

[Bob]

Was the Duke at one time the official ball.

[George]

That's what it was called. And then I think for a while, like right now may say the Duke on it. I'm not sure.

[Bob]

Yeah, I want to say they brought that back.

[George]

Yeah, I think they brought it back for nostalgic reasons. This did not say the Duke on it, but it was, it was real to the point where if we were going to play football, we were not going to use this ball, if we were going to play street ball. Just because I did not want to mess up my official NFL ball. It was awesome.

[Gordon]

So you got that when you were how old?

[George]

I was in fourth grade. So what is that? Nine? Something like that.

[Gordon]

Nine.

[George]

So with a seven year old, I think I told him that story. So he put it on his list and he wanted an official NFL ball. And he wanted a kicking tee, which we've talked about this before. Doesn't a kicking tee seem like maybe some sort of gift that you really shouldn't be able to buy because it's so official? It's a game piece that, you know, they'll only have in the NFL or college football. And in case we have some, some young listeners, this was one of those years where sometimes Santa needs help and he needs help from parents. And so that's what we were doing this Christmas. We were helping out and we, we thought, we told Santa in, in some correspondence that we had with him that we would take care of the kicking tea and the football.

[Gordon]

How did you correspond with Santa? We wrote letters, snail mail. Yeah, okay, so you said he this done early st.

[George]

He could take care of just about everything on the list except for could we help him out with the kicking tee and the official football. And we wrote back, said sure Santa, no problem. So we would keep some of these gifts in our closet and they were supposed to be very well hid. Do you guys creep by the way as kids to go into your parents closet? What's up?

[Bob]

Of course.

[George]

Sure, I guess I did too. But I'm telling you, they were really good at it. I never found anything. So if they were Santa's helpers at some point, I never found it. And I never really looked that hard too as I got older. I just didn't want to, you know, ruin the surprise. So anyway, it's Christmas Eve, it's late, the kids are finally to bed, 11 o', clock, midnight or so. And again there's seven and three. So the Mrs. Starts going through the gifts that are in the closet and she said I can't find the kicking tea. I said what do you mean I can't find it? And you know, we have sacks in there of gifts and it's very possible that it got put in a sack and then thrown away as we're getting ready for Christmas. And I mean panic, panic because that's really his top two gifts. Football and a kicking tee. And again helping out Santa. I put a lot of work in getting the official ball, looking for just that right tee. And I think it was semi official. I don't think it was the kind they use in the NFL. But it was pretty cool. Could not find it. I said what are we going to do?

[Gordon]

So by what time at night?

[George]

Well, by now it's after midnight, it's about 12:30. And this is back when my parents were still here. They would have been in their late 60s, early 70s. And I said, you're not going to believe this, but I don't want to scare my parents and just show up at their house. They lived about 20 minutes away. And I said, but I still have my old kicking tea at my parents house. I think it's in pretty good shape. Maybe we could spray it with something to make it look new. And it sounded like a good idea as any, so. So I wouldn't scare my parents. I called my dad and I told him the story and I said, I think I had the kicking tea there. Would you mind if I came over and we just tried to make it look better? He said, yeah, sure, come on over. So I got over there about one o' clock in the morning. Sure enough, we found the tea in my old dresser and we called him.

[Gordon]

In the middle of the night.

[Bob]

Yes, that probably scared him.

[George]

It did, yeah. Something wrong? No, it's fine, dad, it's. You don't find a kicking teeth.

[Gordon]

You don't think you could have ninja'd in there, like lowered yourself from the ceiling like Tom Cruise and then got in the kicking tee and got out without waking them.

[George]

My dad was a former marine.

[Gordon]

If he would have you, you would have gotten cast.

[George]

Yeah, he would have taken care of business the old fashioned way. So he didn't really have a workshop, but he had an area where he did have a workbench and he had, you know, some tools. And he said, you know, I think I have some sort of like a finish, like a shellac we could put on that and make it look new. And we cleaned it, my dad brushed it and just an old orange tee had three prongs on it. It wasn't that great a tee, but it was still in decent shape even though at that time it was probably 20, 25 years old. And so we got it looking great and my dad sprayed it and I'll be danged if it didn't look pretty new. And so I went home and you know, hero got home about 2 o' clock in the morning and again, that was a, that was a Christmas. We had to actually help Santa put a few gifts under the Christmas tree, knowing that he was going to come later and finish it out.

[Gordon]

I think you guys were Santa. That's what I think what we were.

[George]

Saying as helpers is all we were doing. So we took care of it and. But before I went to bed, I went out front. This was before at least I had a timer for the Christmas lights and I was gonna unplug the Christmas lights. For little decorations out front that me and the boys.

[Gordon]

Santa's landing lights. Why are you unplugging them?

[George]

Yeah, I didn't even think about that. I probably should have left them on. And usually on Christmas Eve, I think you do leave them on all night.

[Gordon]

Yes. That's what you're supposed to do.

[George]

Well, for some reason, I went out to unplug the lights, and I'm glad I did. It was the strangest spiritual experience. I went out and we lived near the airport at the time, near Dallas Fort Worth Airport. And you could always hear planes going by. But for whatever reason, I didn't hear any planes. There was no wind, and everyone else still had their Christmas lights going. Of course, here I am about to unplug ours. But I just sat there and for about five minutes, it was just, I think, the five most peaceful moments of my life.

[Bob]

Interesting.

[George]

It was just really quiet and gone through this thing, you know, with my dad. And thinking back to when I got my first football and I just sat on the front. It probably looked pretty weird, like, oh, they've had a domestic. Right. Right. Episode.

[Gordon]

And he's sitting on his porch with his shot.

[George]

He's got to cool off a little bit out front. But I just sat out on a front porch, and I sat down on the stoop, and I just sat there for 15 minutes looking at the lights and just enjoying quiet. And I've tried to duplicate that since, and I have not had them. I've had a few moments like that where it was quiet or maybe I'm watching a show late at night in a choir, singing and, you know, looking at lights. And it's similar. But I'm telling you, almost what has been 30 years, I've not had another experience like that. Well, and you never forget that Christmas. It was so. It was so cool. And the.

[Gordon]

And you had the three generations of men involved in the story, which makes it all. You know, that's so alpha and omega to.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Have your dad helping you fix up your childhood tea in order to give to your son.

[Bob]

Yeah. Right.

[George]

And that's the night.

[Gordon]

In the middle of the night. Yeah.

[George]

And it really was a quiet night right before Christmas. And the next day, he was so pumped up about his new football, and the tea passed. I remember him kind of picking it up and going, huh. Okay. It's just. I don't think he said, it's just game used. There was a bit of a pause looking at the tea, like, don't make teas like this anymore, son.

[Bob]

Actually, this was used in Super Bowl 5.

[George]

I probably should have said it may have passed. But yeah, I'll never forget that Christmas. And it was more than 30 years ago. And I can still, I can put my, myself in that place. Being on the front porch and just hearing that silence for 15 minutes or so.

[Gordon]

It's so funny because my brother actually got a football. He wanted an official football one time when we were kids and. And so my grandmother gave it to him and she just wrapped it. They used to come in these boxes that the front of the football was exposed in the box, right?

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And so she just wrapped that whole thing. And so for the month of December, because we would go and spend it in at my grandmother's house in Mississippi whenever we got off school, we spent all Christmas vacation there. And for that last half of December, we played with that football in the front yard still in its box. She used to get so mad at.

[Bob]

Us because we'd ruined.

[Gordon]

The surprise was ruined. We knew he was getting the football.

[Bob]

That's funny.

[Gordon]

And we would throw it and do pass patterns, everything, and then throw the gift through the air.

[George]

But you had the respect to leave it in the box. Yes, respected that Christmas.

[Gordon]

But we didn't watch the bow fly off of it as I'm running a post route.

[George]

That's so wrong. I knew you would wind up your mom, but your grandmother too, oh my gosh, she fell victim to that.

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[George]

All right, what do you guys remember? What's the, what's a Christmas story that you remember?

[Bob]

Well, I remember my my favorite Christmas was 1985, I think this was and we were in school in Denton at North Texas, Georgia. That November my parents took me out to dinner. They were in Dallas and they said, we are moving to Colorado. Dad got a job up there in Denver and I said, wow, that's great. We can come visit you. And because I spent very little time in Colorado, only I'd been there one time and that was eighth grade summer camp, Circle K Ranch with the sexually advanced kids from Azel.

[Gordon]

Story for another time.

[Bob]

Yes. So Colorado seemed like this incredible wonderland to me. So I was all for them moving. Even though they were moving far from me. I thought what a great place to go visit.

[George]

This is a beautiful town. But probably still is.

[Bob]

Yeah. So they, they, while my dad worked in Denver, they lived in Evergreen, Colorado, which was up in the foothills and it was, you know, maybe a 25 minute drive from downtown Denver. So that Christmas I remember you remember our friend Barb? The Barb?

[George]

Oh yeah.

[Bob]

Her parents lived in Aurora, Colorado, suburb of Denver. So she asked for a ride home for Christmas, knowing I was going to Colorado. So we drove that. Yeah, that famous drive that I've done a million times up 287 through Wichita Falls and Amarillo and this time up to Denver. And this is December 20th or something and I drop her at her parents in Aurora and then I head up to where my parents lived in Evergreen and it was nighttime by then and I just didn't really kind of knew what to expect. But I had not really been to the Rocky Mountains as an adult, so I didn't fully know. And as I'm driving up I 70 you get higher and higher in elevation and all of a sudden everything around me is white but it's being lit up by the moonlight and I'm like, wow, this is amazing. And I'm seeing all these foothills that kind of turn into bigger mountains and the ground Is covered in snow, and the trees are covered in snow. All these tall ponderosa pines. And then to get to their house, you had to get off and take this little side highway, go down into the town of Evergreen. And when I got down into the town, the town square is right by. Or the main street is right by the big town lake, which was frozen over with ice skaters on it and a huge pine tree decorated with Christmas lights.

[George]

It's like you're on a movie set.

[Bob]

It was like a movie set. And I was like, this is the greatest thing. I can't believe how Christmasy this is. Drove up to their house, and then the next day, my sister and I went Christmas shopping down on the Evergreen main street. Just few little shops, you know, nothing big. Small town back then. And it started snowing on us.

[George]

Oh, man.

[Bob]

And it's snowing in this quaint little mountain town. And I'm looking at these ice skaters in this Christmas tree, and I've got a bag of gifts and shopping. And I just thought, this is the greatest Christmas ever. And that Christmas Eve, the next day or two days later, when it was Christmas Eve, I. We went out to dinner as a family. This place that my dad would always take us those years that we were up there called Tivoli Deer. And it was a nice restaurant. We didn't eat out at a lot of really, really nice places growing up, but this was one that we always would. So we'd do that, and then we would go home and unwrap some gifts, and then we would go to midnight mass. And so we had all of that surrounded by snow and Christmas lights. And that just always stuck out to me as the most magical Christmas ever. The first one in the snow. I think we may have had a white Christmas or two in Oklahoma City, but this was in the mountains and the snow and midnight mass and fireplaces, and it just seemed like from that moment on, I wanted every Christmas to be like that for the rest of my life.

[George]

I was going to say, do you think that's why you are more of a mountain guy than ocean and. And why that you have been spending Christmas up in the mountains for a while?

[Bob]

Yeah. Now I take my family to New Mexico and spend Christmas in the mountains there. And. Yeah. And I love the beach. I love the ocean, too. Really love it. But I. I'm more of a mountain man, as you guys can tell. I look like a mountain.

[George]

Total mountain man.

[Bob]

But I do love the mountains. They're just more atmosphere in the mountains, I think.

[George]

Yeah.

[Bob]

The beach is more relaxed, but the mountains are just more beautiful. And especially at Christmas time.

[George]

There is something about those who live in our area, the Southwest, in our case, the state of Texas. Am I wrong? That a lot of us dream about that type of Christmas? That. Because we're thinking about doing that next year. Going to some mountain with all of our, you know, all the kids, all the grandkids and going. And I won't ski, but they will. And just taking that in. My white Christmases in Minnesota and Chicago, I can barely remember them. I just. That sounds very romantic and just magical to me to do that.

[Bob]

Yes, it is. And I think you're right. It's like being on a movie set. Because all the Christmas movies over the year, it's always a white Christmas. It's always in some beautiful setting with lots of big trees.

[George]

Yeah.

[Bob]

So I think we do kind of crave that. I was always kind of weirded out watching the Christmas parade or the New Year's parade, whichever. It was from Honolulu and it was 85.

[George]

Does it look like Christmas?

[Bob]

And everybody's in shorts and I'm thinking that's not Christmas.

[George]

How about some fake snow?

[Gordon]

Something, you know, Because a lot of our vacation time always happens obviously between Christmas and New Year's, and so we travel a lot during that time. And. Yeah, some of the prettiest Christmas towns. I remember I went to Bruges, Belgium, one time.

[George]

Wow.

[Gordon]

It was so. It was like walking into a movie because it was. It was all decorated up for Christmas and people skating on frozen pond there. And. And it was. It was just so storybook to me. And just getting a street waffle and eating that, and the steam's coming off the waffle and the snow is coming down and those really large but very light flakes, you know, that just is so. Like confetti from heaven.

[Bob]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

So beautiful. Christmas in New York is also another really magical town. If you ever been up there in the holiday season, do you think folks.

[George]

In Colorado or Utah or New Mexico, do you think they take it for granted? Or do you think they look forward to it every year?

[Gordon]

Are they human?

[George]

This is what our. Yeah, you're probably right. You eventually get snow. What's the big deal?

[Gordon]

Eventually get beaten by anything that you have to go through, through over and over again.

[George]

They have to shovel it day after day. So it's just like, yeah, I can.

[Gordon]

They're all tuning into the Honolulu Christmas Parade, looking on.

[Bob]

I think the people in New Mexico, at least, since we've spent a lot of recent Christmases up there. I think they really embrace it. They never seem to get tired of it. There's so many, even more than Colorado and Utah. So many specific New Mexican traditions for Christmas and they seem to just dive into it and it's like their best time of the year.

[George]

Yeah. They tell the story that when I was 4, I think it was, and we came down to Texas to visit my grandparents and we lived in Minnesota and every day you just wore big rubber boots. And that's what I had. And I would not take them off day to day because I would kept. I kept telling my grandparents it might Snow Anytime it's 60 degrees, you know, and see. And that was cool for me. When I was living in the north, against my will that we moved away from the state of Texas. I always got a big thrill out of visiting Texas because to me that was amazing. Wait, we can wear short sleeve shirts at 72 and it's January 2nd. This is amazing. I can't wait to move back to Texas. So it's. Yeah, it's probably wherever you are, you think the other place is exactly. More magical.

[Bob]

Yeah.

[George]

I've experienced both. But there is something. If you can go to a place where it's snowing at Christmas time, that's pretty awesome.

[Bob]

Yeah. Last year when we were in New Mexico for Christmas, I kept telling our daughter, we're going to have snow at Christmas. It's going to be great. And we got up there and it was bone dry and there was, there was no snow in the forecast. And she kept asking for it, asking for it. And guess what happened on Christmas Day?

[Gordon]

It snowed finally. And Christmas Santa came through and it.

[Bob]

Wasn'T even in the forecast. But it was that afternoon. I looked outside, I was like, oh my God, it's snowing. See, Daddy told you we were going to get snow at Christmas. And she was so happy. And we got enough where we could go out and build a little bitty snowman. Sure. She loved it.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

All right. Story of longing. This is probably the thing I've wanted the most in my entire life. Happened when I was three years old.

[George]

See, I can barely remember three.

[Gordon]

And for Christmas, I wanted this little pedal car called a Putt. Puttmobile.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

My automotive obsession started when I was really young.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And it started with this particular thing. I saw this in. It was either the Sears or the Pennies catalog. Sears actually used to be a very big corporation in this world of ours.

[George]

You're right. The Sears catalog. When it came out, that Sears wish.

[Gordon]

Book that Would come out for Christmas or something.

[George]

Or October. Yeah.

[Gordon]

And as a kid, you spent that whole season of September to December looking through and memorizing that Sears wish book and picking out the stuff that you wanted. And in one of those catalogs I found this pedal car. It was called a Putt Putt mobile. It was a blue car and it had like a red vinyl top on it that was just kind of a canopy that went over it.

[George]

So you had the Fred Flintstone it or were there actual pedals that you would.

[Gordon]

Actual U shaped pedals in there that you stick your feet up on top of that inside the U and then put pressure on the bottom of the U and pedal back and forth. You know, alternating feet.

[Bob]

Like a paddle boat.

[Gordon]

Yeah.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

Well, no, not pedaling around, but pedaling, Shuffling back and forth. These two U things that would rotate on a center crank.

[George]

Okay.

[Bob]

Interesting.

[Gordon]

Very, very odd. But, but I wanted this thing. And I don't know, it's the first time I remember fixating on something so strongly. And I cut that picture out of the catalog and I stored it in this Sir Walter Raleigh pipe tobacco can that my granddad had given me because he smoked a pipe. And Sir Walter Raleigh was what he. The tobacco he used. And I love the smell of that tobacco. Oh, I would always go in there and open up his can of tobacco and just take hits and hits off of that thing.

[George]

Pipe tobacco, cigars both smell amazing.

[Gordon]

Cigars smell gross. Pipes smell great. What? Cigars, they. They stink.

[George]

You're insane brain.

[Bob]

They smell good before they're lit. Once they're lit, they stink.

[George]

Overwhelm you. Yeah. But just the smell of that tobacco is. Hey.

[Gordon]

And there's nothing better than the smell of a freshly lit cigarette. I love that initial hit of the cigarette, particularly when it's mixed with the Zippo lighter smell. It's a bad.

[George]

No, those had smells.

[Gordon]

Yes. And I actually prefer cars that have been smoked in too.

[George]

Oh, so you wanted a little car and cigarettes when you were. Is that what you're saying? Cigarettes.

[Gordon]

That's bonus content.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

But I. So I wanted this car. Cut out the picture and I kept it in the sir Walter Raleigh 10. This. And it had pennies in it too. I had probably about a quarter of the way filled with pennies. That was my penny collection.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

And I would take this picture out all the. Every day, multiple times a day. I would take that picture out and just stare at it and dream of all the exotic locations I was going to go to in this pedal car.

[George]

With that Kind of locomotion. You could go anywhere.

[Gordon]

It was my ticket to Honolulu Christmas parade. I somehow was going to pedal out there.

[George]

No doubt.

[Gordon]

It was going to be awesome. I wanted that thing so much. And all I thought about all day, all day I would think about this car and have to look at it. Take the picture out, look at it. And. And then finally Christmas came and there walked out. We did this thing. Santa would leave unwrapped gifts. When I found out that Santa wrapped gifts at other people's homes, we were always unwrapped too.

[Bob]

We were always unwrapped.

[Gordon]

Yeah, there you go. You don't need any protection from Santa's gifts. You go unwrapped. They're supposed raw dogging it.

[Bob]

They're supposed to set apart from the normal gifts. These are Santa.

[George]

Yeah. He just dropped them by.

[Gordon]

He pulls them straight out of that big sack.

[Bob]

Right.

[Gordon]

And they're unwrapped.

[George]

He doesn't have time to wr.

[Gordon]

No. Because he's got a lot of homes to service.

[George]

Right.

[Gordon]

He's got a large. He's a. He's a regional manager of a very large region. So go out and there's that pedal car. And I love that thing. And I probably put more miles on that car than I have any car since that stupid pedal car.

[George]

How long did you ride it till you're seven?

[Gordon]

I wrote it for at least a year and a half or so.

[George]

Then you got served by somebody in the neighborhood. Don't tell me no.

[Gordon]

Older brother and his friends who did not fit inside that car. They had to ride with their legs splitting out the sides of it because it had. You had to climb into it. It had little doors, you know, that were fixed. You can't open them up. And. And so him and his buddies from the neighborhood, they got in it. We lived on a very steep and very long driveway that went down to the road and on the other side of the road was a ditch. And so my brother and his buddies. I can laugh about it now, but it was trauma at the time. They would go bombing down our driveway in my little pedal car. They had to keep their. Even if their feet were able to be inside the car, they had to keep them clear because those U shaped pedals would have turned into a shredder like a combine plate that's churning inside that vehicle.

[George]

Are the wheels shimmying?

[Gordon]

It was horrible. So they would have to go down the driveway and their whole challenge was they would have to get to the end of the driveway. And it was basically almost A one lane road, so it was not very wide. And they would have to cut so hard to try to make it onto the road without sailing off into the ditch on the other side of the road. And that was their big challenge. And they spent a whole afternoon doing that until I come out there and see them doing it on their last run. And I watched the front right wheel shoot far out into the woods across our roadway, into that. Because they had ridden it so hard, they destroyed the wheels.

[Bob]

Not to mention a car could have been coming down the road.

[Gordon]

Yeah, we didn't get much traffic. We didn't get much traffic on that road.

[George]

You must have fallen apart.

[Gordon]

The destruction of my most cherished gift that I'd ever had that I kept inside that 10 looking at that picture until that picture from the catalog had turned to tissue paper. It was so soft and feather light because of all the wear from the pennies that had been shaken around it. It was great. And I love that. And that thing. When we moved away from that house when I was six years old, the remnants of that pedal car were left in the basement where I would go and visit it at least a couple times a week. I would open the door to that creepy half basement that was up under this house. Because the house was built on a hill. So there was an access point where they had built the house out of the. Onto the hill where you go under the house.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And up under there. I still remember that damp, musky Rudy smell that it had in there. And I would look in the corner where the skeleton of my pedal car was laying up against the wall.

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I beckon you.

[George]

Did your dad ever say he was going to fix it? I get around to fixing that for you?

[Gordon]

No, there was no fixing it.

[George]

That's so sad.

[Gordon]

I know.

[George]

And then you just took it to the dump one day.

[Gordon]

No, we stayed up under that house. We moved away from that house. That pedal car was still in the basement.

[George]

Maybe.

[Gordon]

There were several years ago where I looked online to see if I could buy one of those pedal cars from the. From way back then for how many decades ago, that exact model. And they only made it for, I think, one or one and a half seasons. One and a half years?

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

And. And I did find one, but at the time I was like, no, I'm gonna be frugal. And it disappeared off ebay. And I haven't seen one since.

[Bob]

Well, if you had found it, can you imagine adult Gordo trying to fit into that thing?

[George]

Knees up past his ears.

[Gordon]

Oh, gosh, that That I should get that thing and. And put it up in my garage where I do all my automotive work. Because that is the original car that I was obsessed with.

[George]

That. That's what got you going on right after.

[Gordon]

That obsession with that car was. I used to dream about having a. My kindergarten. Kindergarten teacher gave me a ride home one day from school. I can't remember what happened. My mom couldn't come pick me up, so she agreed to give me a ride home. And I was so in love with her.

[George]

How could you be in love? Oh, kindergarten.

[Bob]

Oh, my gosh.

[Gordon]

I had the biggest crush on my kindergarten teacher.

[George]

You were girl crazy at a young age.

[Gordon]

I was. I was. I loved women. Everything about women. I thought it was magical.

[Bob]

Did you try to kiss her?

[George]

The.

[Gordon]

No, I didn't try to kiss her. I didn't know from any of that kind of stuff. I just knew that I. I loved her. That's all I knew.

[George]

No doubt.

[Gordon]

And she gave me a ride home in her silver Mercury Cougar with red velvet interior.

[George]

Oh, yeah.

[Gordon]

With the split armrest. And I remember it had two armrests for each side. And I thought that was the most armrest back then I'd ever seen in my life. And so I would go to bed at night dreaming of getting a miniature version of her Mercury Cougar.

[George]

Get in the backseat.

[Gordon]

What? What's wrong with you?

[Bob]

Get that cougar in the backseat of.

[George]

Your miniature Cougar in the Cougar.

[Gordon]

But, yeah, I used to dream of that and everything. Asked Santa for that, and he never showed up with the miniature Cougar because that one I wanted to work. I wanted to have an actual.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Internal combustion engine in it and. And everything. Just.

[George]

Your brother and his no good friends would have wrecked that.

[Gordon]

Yeah, they would have.

[George]

They would have gotten bored one day and done it in.

[Bob]

But you got one of your car dreams fulfilled.

[Gordon]

Yes.

[Bob]

And around that same age, I had a very similar request. And this started me questioning Santa.

[Gordon]

Oh, never.

[Bob]

Because I was about.

[Gordon]

Plug your ears, kids.

[Bob]

I was a little older than three. I was probably five. And my favorite TV show was Adam 12 with Martin Milner and Ken Reed.

[Gordon]

That show's forever old.

[Bob]

I love that.

[Gordon]

Came out before tv.

[Bob]

It was a police show, two LA Cops. And I was obsessed with. I actually met them at a car dealership in Oklahoma City. They were signing autographs and I was too scared when I went up there to talk to him. My dad took me up there.

[George]

What do you say to them?

[Gordon]

Because guys were beaten.

[George]

Oh, my God.

[Gordon]

Car dealership in Oklahoma.

[Bob]

But I couldn't believe they were in front of me. And I got their autographs. I still have those to this day. Had an Adam 12 lunchbox. So at Christmas, my parents told me, you can ask for anything from Santa. And I was like, anything?

[George]

He'll do it.

[Bob]

They said, anything. He builds everything at his workshop. Oh, okay. Well, wow. This is awesome. So I wrote him a letter, and I included drawings of what I wanted. And I wanted a miniature Adam 12 patrol car. And I didn't care how it worked. Pedal gas, it didn't matter to me. I just wanted it.

[George]

Okay.

[Bob]

And I drew a picture of it with the lights and. And then I also wanted the kind of police uniform that they wore, the LAPD back then, in the 70s.

[George]

And I drew.

[Gordon]

I drew yourself up for all kinds of failures.

[George]

Movie quality here.

[Bob]

Yes. Well, I was told, santa can make anything and will bring you anything.

[George]

And others.

[Bob]

So put that letter in the mail to Santa. And for the next two or three weeks, I'm thinking, this is going to be the greatest Christmas ever. I'm getting this stuff, and I'm going to be just like Officer Pete Malloy. And then Christmas morning comes, and I get up at 5am and I run out there, and none of that is anywhere to be found.

[Gordon]

There's some pajamas and some Tinker Toys.

[Bob]

Yeah. And I was so crushed.

[George]

Oh, man.

[Bob]

And I remember asking my parents, why didn't Santa bring this? And they said something like, well, maybe he had trouble making that, or he couldn't get the parts or he was really busy, or they had some excuse.

[Gordon]

Our dad didn't get his Christmas bonus.

[Bob]

Yeah.

[George]

Got a ham instead.

[Bob]

And at that moment, I started questioning Santa, because at the same time, I was starting to notice, well, there's a Santa at this mall, but we saw one at the grocery store yesterday, and they don't look anything alike. Helpers. And then there's one on tv. But they weren't. We weren't told they were helpers. We were told, this is Santa. You're sitting on Santa's lap. Tell him what you want for Christmas. So all of that didn't make sense to me. Plus, what didn't make sense to me was he goes to every kid's house around the world in one night.

[George]

Yep.

[Gordon]

Well, it depends on the religion.

[George]

With some help.

[Bob]

That doesn't make any sense.

[Gordon]

He discriminates against some religions, I think.

[George]

Right.

[Bob]

That doesn't make any sense to me. So that next Easter, when we put out a carrot and some milk and Cookies for the Easter Bunny.

[Gordon]

Yeah, which is springtime Santa.

[George]

I like this story so much.

[Bob]

I got my 4 year old sister to the side and I said, I don't think there's anything to this Easter bunny thing or Santa Claus thing here, let's do this. And I took a. I remember it was a green magic marker and I put a little X on the side of the carrot and we put it at the table for the Easter Bunny to come and feast on. And then we went to bed and we woke up and our Easter baskets were full of candy and Easter eggs and the carrot was gone and the cookie had a bite taken out of it. And I tapped my sister on the shoulder, I said, come here. And we went over to the refrigerator and opened the crisper drawer and I pulled out a carrot and it had the X on the side of it.

[Gordon]

I said, look, no Easter Bunny thought.

[George]

Put it back in there so you can have it.

[Bob]

I said, no, that was. This whole thing. It's a fraud. It's. There's nothing to it. We're being sold a bill of good man.

[George]

That's so funny, because, you know, when my oldest, that same one who wanted the football and the kicking tea started to have some doubts, started to ask some pretty tough questions, I don't know if you guys remember this, but we had a Santa Claus in our neighborhood, I don't know, about six blocks away. And he would set up every Christmas out on his front lawn. He had a real beard. He was just great with kids. And he happened to listen to our radio show. And I. And I think I said one day, yeah, my older one's starting to get to the point where he's not so sure. And this guy listened to the station so much that he knew my son was a Carolina Panthers fan. And I saw him at church or I saw him around town and he said, well, what else does he want for Christmas? And I told him. So we took the kids by there and I think by this time it may have been that same Christmas. Seven, eight, something like that. And he sat on Santa's lap and before he could say anything. So you're a Carolina Panthers fan, huh?

[Gordon]

Santa could do the mind reading trick.

[George]

And my son just kind of sat up.

[Gordon]

Mentalist.

[George]

Really straight.

[Bob]

Yes.

[George]

What do you want? A jersey? A Tim Bianca Batuca jersey?

[Gordon]

I'm sensing Tim Bianca Batuka.

[George]

Yes. And it just. And we left and. Okay, so is this a bad parent that I.

[Gordon]

It's just manipulated?

[George]

And on the way home he said, that is the real thing. Why do you hate that we kept the magic alive?

[Gordon]

And, oh, it's you're keeping.

[George]

There's a lesson there to always believe. Don't doubt.

[Gordon]

No, you don't always believe something.

[George]

Pessimist. Pessimist.

[Gordon]

That is not true. That is not true. And going to extensive lengths to try to make a kid believe in something that.

[George]

Look at extensive links. He went and put an X on a carrot. I'm surprised he didn't do dental records on the cookie bites.

[Gordon]

That was smart of him.

[George]

That was smart of him to do that.

[Gordon]

Because I had the traumatic experience of going to my mom when all the other kids were saying, you know, hey, you know what the truth is on this?

[George]

And why do my kids always want.

[Gordon]

To and talk about that? And I said, this is what the kids are saying. What is the truth? Tell me the truth. And she did what you would do, which is, no Santa is real and you die.

[George]

Okay? My mom or me? I never said that. My mom would always say to me, well, what do you believe?

[Gordon]

Yeah, right. I think that's much better to do than this. We're gonna go to any lengths to keep this kid believing something we know, that we're lying to him.

[George]

Instead of wanting to put my parents up on some sort of child abuse charge or something. When I found out, to me it went, oh, my gosh. All this time, it's been my parents.

[Gordon]

Who care, not me. It was them lying to me. When I asked them directly about it, when I said, just give it to me straight up. I want to hear the truth.

[George]

That's what happens when you're horny for your teacher in kindergarten. Then by the time, how are you.

[Gordon]

Roping that story into this?

[George]

Then you have a big problem with.

[Gordon]

The truth when they ask directly. The best thing you can do for your kid is to be honest with them. You want them to trust you, right? You need to be a source of honest information.

[George]

The way my mom did it, she said, well, what do you believe?

[Gordon]

Right? And you said, well, I believe this. And should she correct you, then my.

[George]

Mom never did look at me. Turned out great.

[Gordon]

No, you're still perpetuating the lie.

[George]

It's not a lie.

[Gordon]

Others even roping in neighbors with some creepy guy who has a Santa beard all year round.

[George]

You're like a JFK conspiracy theorist. You just have to prove something. Don't try to prove it.

[Gordon]

I have a question for.

[George]

Enjoy the spirit of Christmas.

[Gordon]

Your son, he didn't think it was weird. He has a neighbor that looks exactly like the Santa and He's appearing in front of that neighbor's house.

[George]

You know, when you're seven or so, you don't put all the that together. You just think, okay, well, I guess Santa came to visit Coppel, Texas for weird. A couple of weeks.

[Gordon]

That's just weird.

[Bob]

I'm looking here it says the average kid stops believing in Santa around age 8.

[George]

Yeah.

[Bob]

Though some start to question it as early as 4. That was me. And others hold on until 10 or 11.

[George]

What's.

[Bob]

What's the oldest kid that you ever knew believe that was me.

[Gordon]

I think my voice had already changed when I was still on the recess playground saying, hey, guys, listen.

[George]

Swear it's real.

[Gordon]

I got it from a good source. My mom swears to me.

[George]

He's taking a drag from a cigarette. Look, man, just be cool. And Santa bring you great gifts.

[Gordon]

Yeah. And I'll tell you. I'll tell you. We'll go visit Santa and I got my license coming next week, so we'll go visit them all. Santa, and he'll tell you the truth.

[George]

I. I may be one of those who believe till about 9 or 10.

[Bob]

Really?

[George]

That there may be something to it.

[Bob]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Yeah.

[George]

And I think there is something to it. What?

[Gordon]

Okay, what is there to it?

[George]

A dad driving over to his dad's house at 12:30 at night.

[Gordon]

Then why not go with that story?

[George]

Beautiful thing. Yes. Still a beautiful.

[Gordon]

Then why didn't you tell that story?

[George]

Because he will experience that for himself someday and he'll go, okay, that's the magic of Christmas that my dad was talking about and my grandmother.

[Gordon]

I think at the first sign of questioning, you should be honest with your kid. Levels of honesty based on their age, obviously, but never double down and swear and do like my mom did. I crossed my heart. I would never lie to you, I swear. Don't ever.

[George]

See, I've always doubted that story that your mom said, Son, this is the truth. What I speak to you right now.

[Gordon]

She didn't.

[George]

I bet she did say something like, well, what do you believe?

[Gordon]

No, she didn't do that much.

[George]

That was some helpers. And she would just do the.

[Gordon]

No, Santa's real. How do you think that the Christmas gifts show up and all this? She would. She would not do the hedging language that she should have done. And I experienced that as a betrayal.

[George]

It is like holding a press conference. As a parent, what do you want to admit to?

[Gordon]

Right.

[George]

I'm not going to comment on that at this time.

[Gordon]

We're going to leave that alone for right now. Well, has he traveled to every single house?

[George]

I'm not going to answer that.

[Gordon]

Any other questions that are not in my department?

[George]

Any other kids have any other questions in here besides that?

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[George]

Okay, real quick, what is your what's the dessert at Christmas time? As I'm sure Gordon's about the bag on what we eat for Christmas.

[Gordon]

What do you mean at Christmas time? And desserts, I just do them all year round.

[George]

What is the dessert at Christmas time that you look forward to?

[Gordon]

I think it's the same as Thanksgiving. Pumpkin pie is very common. Chocolate pie is very common. And banana pudding.

[George]

Okay. Oh, yeah. Banana pudding is pretty strong.

[Bob]

Boy, I don't associate Christmas with dessert. I do Thanksgiving, but I don't think we have a go to Christmas dessert.

[George]

It's the only time we had them during the year. And I still ask for them every year. And it doesn't always happen. Sometimes I make them gingerbread cookies with my mom's recipe. I'll put it up against any cookie in the world.

[Gordon]

Why don't you put up a recipe? I want to fix these gingerbread cookies and try them for myself.

[George]

I'll send it to you.

[Gordon]

Okay.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

All right. I'll take that challenge.

[George]

But you're going to bag on it. You're going to come back and go, eh, I don't know.

[Gordon]

Well, if it's not that great, it's not that great.

[George]

I think you'll. Yeah, you'll think it's great. And then that was a great memory, too, of, you know, decorating the gingerbread, the gingerbread men and putting those little.

[Gordon]

BBs on his eyes and stuff?

[George]

Yeah, BBs and biting into that and.

[Gordon]

Have to head to the dentist the next day.

[Bob]

What do you guys do for Christmas dinner usually? Is there a staple or do you mix it up?

[Gordon]

Yeah, same Christmas dinner every year. Denny's not a bad option.

[George]

We've talked about doing that this year because this is the off year. Thanksgiving we were on for our kids coming back. Christmas were off. So we're gonna go see them, like, a day or two after Christmas. So I threw out that idea. Hey, we're gonna be just us. Maybe. Maybe Denny's. What's wrong with that? We have a breakfast casserole that my wife makes every year.

[Bob]

Okay.

[George]

That's really, really good.

[Gordon]

Yeah, we got that going, too.

[George]

Yeah.

[Gordon]

Sausage in it and stuff.

[George]

Yeah. Oh, man. Leave it out. You refrigerate it overnight?

[Gordon]

Yeah. What's with that?

[George]

Same thing. I don't know.

[Gordon]

You have to do that. Magic makes it better somehow, putting it in the fridge overnight.

[George]

But the meal is very similar to Thanksgiving, which I'm open for change there. We just kind of go the same route.

[Bob]

We change it up. Talking about all those Christmas traditions they have in New Mexico. Tamales on Christmas Day are a big tradition there.

[George]

Okay.

[Gordon]

I thought it was New Year's.

[Bob]

It's Christmas. Yeah.

[Gordon]

Love tamales.

[Bob]

I have a question. How do you guys do your presents on Christmas morning? Well, number one, do you do them on Christmas morning or some people do them Christmas Eve. But how do you like. We always unwrapped one at a time where each person was on center stage for that little two or three minutes, and they got to unwrap and then the next person. And you have somebody in the family playing Santa Claus that hands presents to everybody. Is that how most people do it?

[Gordon]

Somebody else has to man the trash bag.

[George]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's a rotating thing. Usually the youngest starts it off. We always let our boys open. Did you have the one on Christmas Eve? You ever have that?

[Bob]

Yeah, we did that.

[George]

And that became Brothers Christmas. When they would start exchanging their gifts to each other. That was always on Christmas Eve. And they still do that. Brothers Christmas. They always go to great lengths to put, like, a car battery inside the box just to make the other one guess what it is. And goofy stuff like that. Yeah.

[Bob]

I know several families though that. But on Christmas morning, it's okay, go. And everybody unwraps at the same time.

[George]

Same time.

[Bob]

Yeah. That seems like chaos to me.

[Gordon]

Yeah, that's insanity.

[Bob]

And you can't see what other people are getting because you're too busy opening your own presents.

[Gordon]

Yeah, but as a kid, wouldn't you love that?

[Bob]

Yes.

[Gordon]

You know, that's the worst when you're a kid, having to sit around watching grandpa try to struggle to open something that someone's over packaged and over wrapped for him.

[Bob]

And I told this story on our radio show a couple of days ago, but my dad would always unwrap presents the exact same way. He would pick it up. He would make every single turn this big production. He would pick it up and he'd go, ooh, I wonder what this is? And he would shake it. And then he would always guess slippers.

[George]

And bust out laughing.

[Bob]

And then he would unwrap it without tearing the paper because he would say, this paper is so beautiful. And so he would just try to untape it and then unfold the paper. We never wanted to tear into it. And then he would just get the box and shake it again. And then he would just barely open the lid and look in there. And then he'd look at everybody and go, oh, every single gift.

[George]

Everyone, Every time.

[Gordon]

Yeah.

[George]

I've probably thrown out a lot of dad jokes over the years. I think mine's always been bowling ball. Huh? Bowling ball. Yeah, maybe. I don't know.

[Gordon]

Can you guys wrap a gift?

[Bob]

No. My dad was the best at it.

[Gordon]

I can wrap.

[Bob]

My dad could rap like the department stores wrap, and I couldn't. I did not inherit that from him. My corners are terrible.

[George]

No, me too. I'm. That's one of the few things I'm really good at. I can drive a boat, I can back a trailer, and I can wrap a gift. Wow. I wrap all of our presents at Christmas time.

[Gordon]

Wait.

[George]

I'm so darn good at it.

[Gordon]

You do?

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Yeah.

[Gordon]

You are the house gift wrapper.

[George]

Yes. My wife will tell you. Yes.

[Gordon]

Dang.

[George]

Yeah. Wow.

[Gordon]

I suck at it.

[George]

Yeah. The big thing is measure before. Make sure you have, you know, straight lines. And.

[Gordon]

And you can do the scissor thing where you don't even have to use the scissors. You just absolutely go straight up.

[Bob]

That's cool.

[George]

That's the way to do it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm really good at it. Did you ever. One more thing. Did you ever really wish for something like Gordo with the car or whatever was on your list and not get it?

[Bob]

My police car.

[George]

Police car. Yeah. That's the other one I was trying to think of is the Atom 12. I wanted electric football. And for those who don't know what that is, it's the buzzing metal field that was what, about 4ft long by 2ft long, maybe something like that. Had fake stands, had plastic players, and it would vibrate and the players would move. And it was a big thing in the 70s.

[Bob]

Huge.

[George]

I'm going to say four straight years. I asked for electric football.

[Gordon]

You got shut out every year.

[George]

Only because one of Santa's helpers, my dad, had bought that for my older brothers and he had classified it as a piece of junk that it wouldn't work.

[Bob]

He was kind of right about it.

[George]

He was kind of right, but, okay, I wanted to experience that. All my friends had it. And yeah, for four straight years. And eventually I got over it. And as I bring it up 56 years later, I eventually got over it. But when I was, I guess, around 30 or 35, my wife got me electric football. Yeah. And my boys were little and we played it and it was. They liked it. They. Some days they would play electric football instead of Techno Bowl.

[Bob]

I had one as a kid. I loved it. Yeah, I got it one Christmas. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. And it came with the Cowboys and Broncos because they were the super bowl team.

[George]

Yeah, that's awesome.

[Bob]

The only time, other than my Adam12 request that I was really disappointed was back to the Sears catalog. I was going through there and I saw a real Cowboys uniform, helmet, jersey, everything. And I asked for that. But instead, Santa brought me a generic Hutch jersey. And it was basically a Packers jersey. It was a yellow helmet, but it didn't have the packers logo. Terribly outdated. White face mask. Not like a real NFL face mask. And then a green. What was a Packers jersey, but it was generic and it said 66. It was the worst number you could possibly kid as a kid.

[George]

Okay. That was Ray Nitschke, though.

[Gordon]

So.

[Bob]

Okay, maybe.

[George]

Maybe that's a tip of the cap to Ray Nitschke.

[Bob]

But all of the Hutch jerseys were 66. No matter what color they came in, it was just generic. So I was really disappointed there. Again, I was like, well, I thought I could get anything. And I'd seen they make these. This Santa.

[Gordon]

Why do parents think that attention to detail is just not needed? I know they just feel like if they get within the general category of something, then this will suffice.

[Bob]

Yeah, I was pretty let down. I put it on, but I looked real spare.

[Gordon]

When I was 6, I got my NFL full NFL real one.

[George]

Did you get Roger? No. Did you get.

[Gordon]

It was once again kind of a discount bin looking thing that showed up But I loved it because it was Dolphins. I just wanted a Miami Dolphins.

[George]

You like the Dolphins uniform?

[Gordon]

Yes. I love the colors. I love. I like the jumping dolphin wearing the helmet. I loved all that.

[George]

That was great.

[Gordon]

And I got that when I was six years old. Man, I was so ready for the NFL.

[George]

Why didn't any of us make it to the NFL? We had all this, I don't know. We had Hutch jersey, of course, it.

[Gordon]

Was very unstable because we go out to play football in the front yard on Christmas day and I'm the only one that's fully suited out.

[George]

Probably felt really cool.

[Bob]

Weird.

[George]

As a six year old, you probably felt like you were. Yeah, whoever.

[Gordon]

And that was when you could still go head to head when you're making a tackle. So I took advantage of that because I'm the only one with the helmet.

[George]

Yeah, you were knocking a few kids out.

[Gordon]

I was headhunting.

[George]

Well, that's being a coward if you headhunt. We all know that and we all hope that everyone has a Merry Christmas, happy holiday, a happy New Year. I won't see you guys for a couple of weeks, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Bob]

Merry Christmas, guys.

[George]

Happy Christmas to you.

[Gordon]

Happy Christmas. That's unstable.

[George]

That's what Paul McCartney always said.

[Gordon]

So I thought that's wrong. It's Merry Christmas the way that Joseph and Jesus said.

[George]

That's the way first.

[Gordon]

Yeah, very first Christmas because of Mary.

[George]

Absolutely. All right, well, thanks to our producer Peter Welton for putting up with this once again. And we'll talk to you next week. Best of right.

[Bob]

Yes, I believe we're going to do that.

[Gordon]

I'm excited about this. Yes, I've heard it and it is, it's good.

[Bob]

Highlights from our first what now seven.

[George]

Months podcast, Something like that. All right, that's next on the Musers, the podcast Horny.

[Podcast Intro Announcer]

Yes. As promoted by George. The goal of next week is to give to you an audio gift you can give somebody else to help introduce them to the Musers or reintroduce them to the Musers. So be on the lookout for that next Wednesday. George and Bob will continue to do Cowboys weekly editions while they're on vacation. So those will continue to drop on Thursdays. Happy, happy holidays, everybody. We really do appreciate you listening to the Musers the podcast. A tired head production.

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The United States Soccer Federation presents the U.S. soccer Podcast.

[George]

This is the show where we bring you in depth interviews with U.S. soccer stars.

[Gordon]

This time, Sam Coffey.

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The World cup is in two years.

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Is it time yet?

[George]

Like, can we get back in into camp. Tim Ream. We're going to continue to show other countries we're not going to be pushed around. And Jedi Robinson every time you come back and you put the jersey on, it means more and more each time. So we'll be back here with all the best stories.

[Gordon]

The U.S. soccer Podcast.

[George]

We've got a lot to talk about. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.