233: Starting From Scratch

Summary

This American Life: Episode 233 — "Starting From Scratch"

Date: August 31, 2025
Host: Ira Glass

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Overview

In this rerun episode of "This American Life," Ira Glass and the team explore what it feels like to start your life over—from the comic to the existential. Across three acts, the stories focus on individuals at turning points: a New Yorker with reality TV déjà vu, a failed but visionary "Puppy Channel" entrepreneur, and a Las Vegas limo-driving gambler who builds (and loses) fortunes daily. The final act revisits the ultimate fresh start—the world’s first people—in a reimagined, darkly comic take on Adam and Eve.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

Prologue: Jorge’s Apartment Makes National TV

[00:13–06:44]

• Theme: The jarring experience of seeing your fresh start evaluated—and rejected by millions—via national TV.
• Story: Jorge, newly moved to NYC and excited for his clean slate, sees his exact apartment featured (and derided) on "The Bachelorette." Trista, the bachelorette, disparages the state of the apartment, leading to the contestant's rejection, which Jorge takes as a personal blow.
• Insight: Life’s big resets are extremely vulnerable—new environments can amplify feelings of exposure, and when judgment comes from unexpected places, it stings.
• Notable Quotes:
  • "I have to find out why he feels like he can live in an apartment like this." – Trista, The Bachelorette (relayed by Jorge) [04:06]
  • "National television came into his apartment and then kicked him off the island by proxy. He was like collateral damage to a reality show." – Ira Glass [05:45]
• Memorable Moment: The word “squalid” repeated in the New York Post’s article, which Jorge reads with equal parts horror and black humor.

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Act One: Puppy Love — The Business Model

[09:07–24:27]

• Theme: Reinventing yourself midlife with a wild idea, and the fine line between visionary and deluded.
• Story: After selling his longtime business, Dan Fitzsimmons sees a gap in television programming during a spell of enforced inactivity (the OJ Simpson trial and a back surgery). His idea: "The Puppy Channel"—24/7 footage of adorable puppies with no hosts, no dialogue, just cuteness and music.
• Key Steps:
  • Produces a pilot ("Puppies, Puppies, Puppies…”), conducts focus groups, pitches cable execs (even Ted Turner).
  • Faces constant skepticism: "You're maybe not gonna give [satellite capacity] up for puppies." – Dan Fitzsimmons [20:57]
  • Attends cable conventions (with his wife Carol in a dog costume, immortalized in Fortune magazine).
  • Media finds the idea charming; actual buyers do not.
  • The project ultimately fails—but as daughter Molly notes, internet demand for puppy videos decades later (on YouTube, Animal Planet, etc.) vindicate his vision.
• Insight: Sometimes being ahead of your time just means you’ll fail in the present. True reinvention risks ridicule and disappointment.
• Notable Quotes:
  • "Having a human being in the picture talking … struck me as against the concept originally of just having a quiet place on television." – Dan Fitzsimmons [22:05]
• Memorable Moment: The family cheers on a tiny puppy finally making its way off a couch: “We all find ourselves talking to the TV. Come on. You can do it.” [16:56]

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Act Two: Making Money the Old Fashioned Way

[25:19–43:32]

• Theme: The high-wire act of starting from zero—every single day. The compulsive, creative, and precarious nature of some people’s “resets.”
• Story: Joe (no last name), a Las Vegas limo driver and gambler, turns a $32 float into (sometimes) thousands daily through hustles: airport runs, casino commissions, side gigs selling comped hotel rooms, gambling on blackjack. His thrilling (and reckless) approach to money is legendary—and exhausting.
• Reveals:
  • Joe’s background includes a squandered fortune inherited at 50 and a checkered relationship with casinos (he’s banned from many for being "too lucky").
  • His daughter describes a childhood of constant instability—huge winnings, searching for quarters, moving between extremes.
  • Despite winning big, Joe always returns to the zero point, driven by adrenaline and possibly an addiction to the rush of starting over.
  • Family relations are complicated: his daughter can never quite explain to school friends what he does; his aunt and uncle (a billionaire, board member at the Met) occasionally bail him out.
• Empathy and Judgment:
  • The act closes with Joe’s dry self-awareness and pride in "going out with $32, coming home with $2,000"—knowing he’ll lose it eventually, but for today that's a win.
• Notable Quotes:
  • "One day I could have a million dollars, the next day I'd be broke. But I love it. I love the action. I love the adrenaline." – Joe [27:41]
  • "He’s an opportunist. If there’s an opportunity for him to work the odds or make a dollar, he’ll make 10." – Casino manager George [30:14]
  • "Even when things are really bad, he can always find a way out of it...There's always a way. And he can just laugh about it." – Joe’s daughter [39:00]

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Act Three: The First Starting From Scratch (Adam and Eve Retold by Jonathan Goldstein)

[45:51–60:23]

• Theme: Creation as ultimate reset—loneliness, confusion, accidental beauty and mayhem at the world’s first beginning.
• Style: Wry, modern retelling of Genesis, full of deadpan humor and existential asides.
• Summary:
  • Adam, newly created, is a dope; Eve, astute and restless, quickly becomes bored and then fixated on the forbidden Tree of Knowledge.
  • The snake, pictured as a resentful failed favorite, plots Adam’s downfall, while Eve and he exchange philosophical banter.
  • The infamous bite brings not only shame but a burst of sensory clarity and emotional intensity.
  • After the fall, Adam becomes nostalgic, telling grandchildren tales of Eden’s impossible sunsets and “eating God.”
• Insight: Every new beginning is, by definition, strange and lonely. The quest for knowledge (and companionship) is what makes us human, even if it complicates paradise.
• Notable Passages:
  • "Adam was close to the animals and spent all day talking to them. Except for God, Eve had no one." – Jonathan Goldstein [46:32]
  • "It was on such an occasion that she met the snake ... she realized in a flash the world was anywhere from 60 to 80% oilier than she would have ever imagined." – Jonathan Goldstein [52:42]
  • "When you ate the fruit in Eden, it was like eating God, and God was delicious. When you wanted him, you just grabbed him. Now when he ate fruit, he could only taste what was not there." – Jonathan Goldstein [59:11]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Jorge’s TV Apartment: [00:13–06:44]
• Act 1: The Puppy Channel: [09:07–24:27]
• Act 2: Joe’s Limo/Gambling Life: [25:19–43:32]
• Act 3: Adam and Eve Retold: [45:51–60:23]

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Memorable Moments & Quotes

• On total vulnerability:
  "I never wanted America to judge me and tell me my apartment sucked." – Jorge [06:01]
• On the Puppy Channel as TV’s antidote:
  "One person my father talked to characterized the Puppy Channel as the antidote to television. ... But implicit in this notion is that regular TV is something you need a refuge from. That's a tough sell to the people who make it." – Molly Fitzsimmons [22:35]
• On making and remaking a fortune:
  "If Joe just worked 5 days a week making 2000 and never lost it back. That'd be a half million dollars a year." – Mary Beth Kirchner [43:11]
• On nostalgia for beginnings:
  "This sunset isn’t bad, but the sunsets in Eden, they burned your nose hairs. They made your ears bleed. ... When you ate the fruit in Eden, it was like eating God, and God was delicious. ... Now when he ate fruit, he could only taste what was not there." – Jonathan Goldstein (Adam’s monologue) [59:11]

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Tone and Language

The stories balance comedy, pathos, and wonder, often with a dry, self-deprecating wit. Interviews and narration capture the mix of hopefulness and insecurity that comes with starting from scratch—layered with philosophical and emotional insight.

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Summary

"Starting From Scratch" explores the messy beauty of making a new start, in apartments, business ventures, or even human existence itself. Whether sabotaged by reality TV, dismissed by cable execs, or risking all on a single draw of the cards, these stories show beginnings are raw, electric, and infinitely human.

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For more, listen free at thisamericanlife.org.

Transcript

[Ira Glass]

This message comes from Capital One. Banking with Capital One helps you keep more money in your wallet with no fees or minimums on checking accounts and no overdraft fees. Just ask the Capital One bank guy.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

It's pretty much all he talks about.

[Ira Glass]

In a good way. Capital One, what's in your wallet. Terms apply. See capital1.com bank capital1NA member, FDIC. Things are just starting to look up for Jorge when the thing with the TV happened. He'd just moved to a new town, started his life over, found some work, got a place. Years of searching around and vagueness were ending.

[Jorge]

It's going well. Like the way that I'm procrastinating now is by doing work. You know, I'm coming into my own. Like, I feel good, I'm paying bills relatively on time.

[Ira Glass]

He'd moved to New York City, which was scary, and lucked into an apartment that real New Yorkers told him was a find. A little studio in the East Village. One room, good location, cheap. And then one night he's sitting at his table watching the Bachelorette on tv and it's the episode where the Bachelorette has whittled it down to four guys that she's gonna pick one from eventually. And she's in New York City visiting one of the potentials and you know.

[Jorge]

She goes out to dinner with his, with his family and they're, you know, they eat and you know, they've got the shifty eyed sister and you know, like everybody's family acts the exact same way, you know, Right. And then, and then they get in the limousine and they decide to go back to his apartment. Now, like now I'm, now I'm on, I'm on the edge of my seat because, you know, I just moved, I moved to New York. Like it's an enormous city and I would be so excited if I could recognize this street. I would be so excited. It would just make me so happy. And so I'm totally excited. So they get out of the limo and he hugs her in the street and they pan and they show a building, they show an awning. And it's my awning.

[Ira Glass]

It's your building.

[Jorge]

It's my building. It's the awning to my building. It says the address, it says the street. It's, you know, it's possibly the only place in New York I actually know. You know what I mean? And then the, and then he opens the door and she comes in and it's my lobby. You know, there's my lobby, there's the row of mailboxes, you know, And I'm just like. I'm out of my chair and I can't talk. I'm like, you know, like, pointing at the tv, like.

[Ira Glass]

And if it were me, I would think, like, are they here right now? Like, in the building?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

You.

[Jorge]

You're too smart. I mean, I was, you know, I was. I couldn't think. I was just like, you know, it was. You know what I mean? I was just like. It was. You know, I was just flabbergast. It just couldn't be happening, you know?

[Ira Glass]

He watches them take the elevator up to the fourth floor. Jorge lives on the fifth. They walk down the hall to a door, and then Jorge realizes something else.

[Jorge]

You know, he doesn't just live in the city as me. He doesn't live on the same street as me. He doesn't just live in the same building as me. He basically lives in my apartment. He lives in the exact same apartment. It's the exact same layout.

[Ira Glass]

So wait a second. So the camera goes inside this apartment and you see your apartment?

[Jorge]

Basically a much better version of my apartment. His is much better. The walls are whiter. The place is cleaner. The furniture is nicer. He has a half wall. He's got a half wall.

[Ira Glass]

A half wall with them brick, glass walls.

[Jorge]

It's like drywall, you know, but it seems like it has some sort of countertop kind of thing on it.

[Ira Glass]

And at that moment, Jorge gets this flash. He is not really doing all that well. His apartment is a kind of dump compared to this guy who's on tv. Plus, he's watching Trista Wren, the bachelorette on tv, looking uncomfortable in his apartment on national tv. In fact, she bails on the guy.

[Jorge]

She leaves the apartment and they cut to like that head on interview, you know? And she's looking into the camera and she says, I've dated guys with really bad apartments before. I can't judge him on that. I have to find out why he feels like he can live in an apartment like this.

[Ira Glass]

She ditched him because of the apartment?

[Jorge]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Ira Glass]

Wait, he lost out on the bachelorette because of the apartment?

[Jorge]

Oh, yeah, and it was your apartment, but better.

[Ira Glass]

Over the next few days, it all sort of goes to hell for Jorge. He's depressed. His new life does not seem so shiny. His New York friends console him. Look, they say the bachelorette had never seen a New York apartment before. She does not know how people here live. This means nothing. Which happens for a while until one day, Jorge picks up the New York Post, and right There is an article about his neighbor Todman, the guy from the bachelorette, getting busted for cocaine.

[Jorge]

Third paragraph. Todman's fate on the bachelorette was sealed the moment Ren set foot in his squalid avenue, a studio apartment. Do you understand the weight of that squalid, squalid avenue, A studio apartment.

[Ira Glass]

So this isn't just like people from outside New York.

[Jorge]

This is the New York Post. Nobody knows New York apartments like the New York Post. These guys have been in the most squalid New York City apartments. It's squalid, you know, it's squalid. Squalid. Squalid. You know, there's not that many definitions for squalid. There's not many ways to look at the word squalid and think, hmm, maybe they mean kind of hip, you know?

[Ira Glass]

Somehow, without ever meaning to, Jorge had the experience that a person would have if he actually went onto one of the reality shows and then got booted off the show. National television came into his apartment and then kicked him off the island by proxy. He was like collateral damage to a reality show.

[Jorge]

You know, I never. I didn't want to be. I didn't want to America to judge. Judge me and tell me my apartment sucked. You know, I didn't want. I didn't want that. But at that moment when I was, you know, when. When they came into my building and they. They opened that door and it was my apartment, I thought I was, you know, I thought that I was hot. I thought that it was, you know. Yeah, that's. You know, and then all of a sudden, it's like, you know.

[Ira Glass]

What was it? Boo.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Boo. Boo.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Boo.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Boo.

[Jorge]

You lose, you lose.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

You lose.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

You lose.

[Jorge]

You know.

[Ira Glass]

Jorge says that if he hadn't just moved to New York City, if he hadn't just started this whole life, it would not have been the kick in the stomach that it was. Which brings us to today's radio program from WBEZ Chicago, it's this American Life. I'm Ira Glass. Today on our show, Starting from Scratch, stories of people in that period of their lives when everything is up for grabs. They're starting over. Everything is tenuous. Act one, puppy love, the business model. Act two, making money the old fashioned way. In that act, the story of a man, a limo driver, in fact, who begins each day from scratch with just a few bucks and bills it to hundreds, thousands or tens of thousands by the end of the day. Act three, the first Starting from Scratch. In that act, Jonathan Goldstein revisits a possibly familiar tale of a man, a woman, a garden and a snake. Stay with us. Support for this American life and the following message come from AT&T. There's nothing like knowing someone's in your corner, especially when it really counts, like when your neighbor shovels your driveway after a snowstorm or your friend saves you the last slice of pizza. Staying connected matters. That's why AT&T has connectivity you can depend on, although proactively make it right. That's the AT&T guarantee. Terms and conditions apply. Visit att.com guarantee for details. This message comes from Capital One. Banking with Capital One helps you keep more money in your wallet with no fees or minimums on checking accounts and no overdraft fees. Just ask the Capital One bank guy.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

It's pretty much all he talks about.

[Ira Glass]

In a good way. Capital One what's in your Wallet? Terms apply. SeeCapital1.com Bank Capital One NA member FDIC.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It'S rare to find a podcast that can actually change your life, but when.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

The show's called Life Kit, that's kind of the whole point point.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I'm Marielle Segarra.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Three times a week on the Life Kit podcast, we guide you through a topic we could all use help with, from personal development to healthy living to.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Managing your dinero with takeaways so you can start living what you learn right away. Escucha El lifekit Podcast from npr.

[Ira Glass]

This is American Life. I'm Ira Glass. Today's show is a rerun. Act one Puppy Love the Business Model okay, you know there are mom and pop grocery stores, mom and pop newspapers. But could you throw everything away, change your life, start your life over and create a mom and pop cable network. Molly Fitzsimmons own father tried, and she has the answer.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Some people's fathers quit their jobs and become teachers. Some maybe retire early and start a new hobby like model building. My father, after turning over the reins of the business he'd owned and operated for 25 years, started a cable channel from scratch. It was February 1995, and he was looking for something new to do, but he didn't know what. Then came the OJ Trial. He just had back surgery, and the day they sent him home for bed rest happened to be the day that the trial began. During the long breaks in the action, he would flip through the channels.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

There was so much downtime in the trial. I had a chance to see everything that was on television all day long for weeks.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

You mean you just surfed around while.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

The slow points in the trial were most of the day. And I spent the time surfing around daytime television and seeing what it was.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

What it was was mostly soap operas, talk shows, reruns, game shows, things that my father had no interest in. My father is a problem solver, and this was a problem.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

So I thought something else is necessary. There's a need for a parking place on television. If you don't want to watch something is there. You could have the TV set on and it'd be playing something that didn't bother you and would hold the place until your favorite show or what you chose to watch.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

For my father, like, for a lot of people, simply turning off the television isn't an option. So he's stuck flipping through a bunch of shows that he hates, waiting for the OJ Trial to come back on when a little light bulb goes off in his head.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

I recalled my wife and I walking to lunch on a Friday in downtown Cleveland, walking into a building where the Animal Protective League had puppies up for adoption. And the crowd of people standing around these puppies included men in three piece suits and women in fancy outfits and shoppers, moms with kids in strollers, the UPS man. And they stood together, smiling and chuckling and even sometimes addressing one another in the middle of a big city building, all because they were puppies. The puppies made them feel better. So my thought jumped to if television needs some other kind of programming, what would be wrong with one channel out of the hundreds that there are that showed nothing but puppies all day, all night, every day? The initial idea was all puppies, all the time. You turn to the Puppy Channel and you would see 24 hours a day, seven days a week, footage of puppies fooling around like puppies do, acting the natural comedians and cuties that they are, with no people, no talk, accompanied only by relaxing instrumental music would be the Puppy Channel concept.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

What are you looking for here?

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

I'm looking for Ted Turner's letter where he very nicely refused me in writing this time.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

My father's home office in Clearwater, Florida is all decked out with family photos, artifacts from his years in the ad business, and an entire wall of file cabinets which housed the complete Puppy Channel archive. What's up?

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

This is a demo that is on the way to being the pilot show.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

He shows me a banker's box filled with videotapes and pulls out the one hour pilot he made early on in the Puppy Channel development. It's professionally packaged. There's a close up of a puppy on the COVID with the word woof and two exclamation points.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Okay.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

So it's a really.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's a cute cover.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Let's put it in. When's the last time you watched this?

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

I think it's been years since I watched this. Puppies, Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Puppies.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

You may recognize this voice. It's my dad. He also wrote the lyrics.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Puppies, Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

Puppies.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies. Puppies, Puppies, Puppies.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

The scene fades up to a family of old English sheepdog puppies playing and barking in a wood paneled suburban den somewhere with mellow guitar music in the background. After a couple of minutes, a scene changes to a corgi puppy running in circles on the snow covered lawn. Soon, border collies are fighting over a sock on somebody's linoleum kitchen floor. It's exactly what you'd expect from my dad's description of the Puppy Channel. And what's so surprising is that it really is nothing more than that. Throughout the hour long pilot, puppies waddle around and sniff things. Puppies wrestle and nuzzle each other adorably. It's a soft focus world of indescribable cuteness. Occasionally, my dad's singing interrupts a relaxing instrumental soundtrack. Wait, this is your voice, right?

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Puppies are everywhere. Puppies go anywhere. Watch the Puppy Channel now for puppies on tv.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

That's like the.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

That's the third Puppy Channel theme.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Aw, look at that one with the big ears flopping up in the air. At some point, while we're watching, my dad's wife Carol, who's been listening quietly to our conversation from the other side of the room, comes over and starts cooing at the television. Carol went with my father on most of the Puppy Channel shoots and actually had the idea for what became the big climactic final scene of the pilot.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Here's a scene of all 10 of the dogs on a sofa and how they get off. Some of them are vigorous in getting off. Some of them are a little reluctant.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

This was your idea, Carol.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I thought it would be cute.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

It's not just cute, it's also suspenseful. Most of the puppies immediately jump or tumble off the couch onto the carpeted floor. But a couple of them stay up there looking sort of confused. It's a pretty long sequence. I glance around the room during it and realize that all of us are smiling and we're watching with rapt attention to see if the two cowardly puppies will ever find their way down off the couch. One of the two finally does, leaving only one puppy left. And to give you an idea of the drama of the moment, let me put it this way. We all find ourselves talking to the tv. Come on. You can do it.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Come on.

[Ira Glass]

You can do it.

[Joe's Daughter]

Come on.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

No.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Wrong way.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Finally, after a good three or four minutes, the last puppy, sort of half jumps, half falls off the couch, and all of us cheerful.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Yes, success.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Nice. Nice move into slo mo there. The whole time my dad was doing the Puppy Channel, I could never decide if I thought the idea was genius or totally insane. And the thing that made it seem super smart was the same thing that made it seem kind of crazy. Crazy. Namely, puppies. Suddenly, my businessman dad was talking so much and so fervently about puppies, it was kind of weird. And my question was always, how would the Puppy Channel possibly make any money? When I asked my father this question, he was so convincing that I started to wonder why it's not on television right now. Here's how it would work. There'd be fees from cable operators, and there'd be product placements and sponsorships. You'd see a bunch of puppies tearing into a bag of Puppy Chow, for example, or a scroll across the bottom of the screen saying, this hour of the Puppy Channel, brought to you by Milkbone in focus groups. It did well. 37% preferred it to TBS, 41% to CNBC. And remember, my dad didn't need a huge audience to succeed.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

At the time we created the Puppy Channel, television channels with the tiniest little sliver of audience were worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Court Television sold one third of its stock for $100 million, which presumably means the thing was worth $300 million. And their primetime ratings was 1/10 of 1% of the TV audience at that time, based on our research, that even though the Puppy Channel would appeal to a very small segment of people, that segment would be big enough to make it a success.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

But even a small cable channel was a huge venture compared to anything my father had done before. By his reckoning, he needed to raise $17 million to get on the air. Or he needed a big cable company to buy his idea. And so he and Carol started hustling. And after 25 years of being at the center of their own small, familiar world, they suddenly found themselves in middle age, on the fringes of a much larger and stranger one, there were cable conventions.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

We had a little tiny booth way.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

In the corner and we had a.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Million people coming around wanting to get our video.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

And what was your role there?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Dog.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

What?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I dressed as a dog and painted my nose black. Yeah. And couldn't get this black out of.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

The pores of my nose for days.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Whose idea was it for you to.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Wear a dog suit? I think it was. I think it was your father's. Of course it was your father's.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Would I have voluntarily done that?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I don't know. These are the things you do for love.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Fortune magazine published a photo of Carol in her dog suit. The media loved the Puppy Channel. There was an article about it on the COVID of the Hollywood Reporter. There were favorable blurbs in Entertainment Weekly, in USA Today. Everybody loved it. Everybody except the ones who at this stage mattered most. People like Ted Turner, Barry Diller and Rupert Murdoch all got the Puppy Channel pitch, but my father couldn't make the sale.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

One of the TV professionals that we talked to was talking about the amount of space on a satellite. They call it bandwidth today that it takes to have a commercial TV network shown. He said something like, you'd ask us to give up six mega schlocks of kubishnap to put just puppies on there. And the answer is yes. But if you are the guy who owns the six mega goops of Schlagendachs, you're maybe not gonna give it up for puppies.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

But why? I mean, so he just. He doesn't like puppies or.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

It's a foreign concept to want to go way far off the beaten path. The Puppy Channel is way off the beaten path. It has no people, it has no talk.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Usually when you describe this, you do mention that there would be no talk. And that seems to be a big part of what you liked about the idea. Why do you think that is? Why were you so interested in a channel where nobody talked?

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

Having a human being in the picture talking about what the puppies were doing or talking about something struck me as against the concept originally of just having a quiet place on television that was all relaxing, all comfort, all easy and pleasure giving in a very, very low key way.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

One person my father talked to characterized the Puppy Channel as the antidote to television. And in the end, I think that's probably why it never worked out. My dad hadn't just imagined a new cable network. He'd imagined a new way to think about what television can be. What you'd get from watching the Puppy Channel would be very different. Than what you get watching the Food Network or QVC or Law and Order for that matter. In his business plan, along with all the spreadsheets and financial outlines under the section titled Vision, it says only to make television more helpful and under mission to help people relax and feel better. My father conceived of the Puppy Channel as a refuge from regular tv. But implicit in this notion is the idea that regular TV is something you need a refuge from. And that's a tough sell to the people who make it. After five years of hard work, my father decided to pull the plug. I'm just going to put it out there and say, I think the world wasn't ready for the Puppy Channel.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

If there were a thousand television channels, the Puppy Channel might be in there. If there were 600 television channels regularly being sent out by the satellites, the Puppy Channel might be there. There's a number where the Puppy Channel fits in. We just don't know what that number is.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

When we find out what that number is, I'll be there with my dad and we'll be singing this song. Take us out, Dad.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

I love the little puppies Pretty little puppies I love the little puppies on the Puppy Channel Every little pup on.

[Ira Glass]

TV Molly Fitzsimmons and her dad. Since we first broadcast this story all the way back in 2003, we have obviously seen the incredible demand for cute puppy videos. On YouTube, there's the Puppy Bowl. On Animal Planet, there's DogTV, a channel intended to be watched by dogs. Molly's dad, Dan Vitsimmons, died in 2016, but obviously was far ahead of his time. Molly says that he delighted in the fact that his idea, a cozy corner of the world for watching puppies caught in the act of being cute, flourished in all these other forms. Act 2 Making money the old fashioned way. Well, now we bring you the story of somebody who starts from scratch every single day with next to nothing and tries to build it up to something. Mary Beth Kirchner tells the story.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Every day, Joe plays this game. He starts with enough small bills to make change. Lots of fives and ones. Then the clock starts. It's 1:30 in the morning.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I go out with almost nothing in my pocket in the morning. Sometimes I end up with thousands. Sometimes I end up broke at the end of the day.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

So how much do you have in your pocket today?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I got $32 in my pocket today. By 6:00', clock, I should have at least a couple hundred dollars and, you know, take it from there.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

By 6:00am he meets Joe, who doesn't want me to use his last name. Drives a super stretch limousine in Las Vegas. Joe says he prefers starting in the middle of the night. He doesn't like crowds or traffic. Here's how his game works. By driving his limo to and from the airport mostly, Joe slowly earns enough. A few hundred dollars to play blackjack in the casino. And then pretty much the sky's the limit.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Sometimes I end up with 10 grand. You know, one time I started out with, like, 32 bucks or $33.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Like today?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Like today. And I wound up with $84,000 at the Gold Coast.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

84,000.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

$84,000.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

How do you turn 32?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I try and build it up to, like, 1,000, and then I play with a thousand. I build it up to 3. 4, and then you get on a run.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe's a bit of a legend in Las Vegas gambling circles. I'd heard about him from a pawnbroker south of the Strip who said Joe is a regular customer who came every month for. For about a year. Among the stories he told me, which led me to Joe, that he'd never worked a day in his life. That he lived only on a trust fund until he was 50, controlled by his father, who despised his love of gambling. On his 50th birthday, the legend went. Joe inherited 6 million. He instantly spent the first million on a house. The remaining five he gambled away. It took him five hours. Joe says, not true. But based on the truth, he did inherit millions of dollars from his family and did lose a big piece of it gambling. But over years, not hours.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

People tell me, oh, look at the kind of life you lead. You know? I mean, one day I could have a million dollars. The next day I'd be broke. But I love it. I love the action. I love the adrenaline. I get an adrenaline rush from it.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

One day you have a million dollars, and the next day you're broke. Is that an exaggeration or really?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

It's not an exaggeration. I mean, I had days where I went in and I won. Like, at the horseshoe, I won $680,000. I started the day out with, like, 50 bucks in my pocket. And I went out and I bought two homes with some of the money, and I ended up losing the other money. Then I needed money, so I borrowed on the houses, and then I lost the houses. I couldn't pay. I go up and down. It's like a roller coaster. But I really enjoy doing it. I think without it, I'll just wilt away and die. See this is one of the hotels the Barbie coast won't let me in. If I go in there and sit down for two minutes, they'll tell me to get up and leave.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe has a long history of winning big in the casinos. So much so, and this is clearly true, about a dozen of them in Las Vegas have kicked him out. He says most of them think he cheats. Nobody could be that lucky. They say among the places where he's still allowed to play, none wanted their names mentioned or would allow me to record in their casinos today. So we were limited to taping outdoors, where most of Joe's game happens anyway.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Sometimes you stand here for like half hour and nobody will, you know, but nobody will come out. But as soon as they come out, take a cab. I approach them, you know, first stop.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

His favorite nameless hotel and casino where the doorman lets him approach potential customers from the circular driveway out front. Joe tips the doorman for each ride he gets, so he gives Joe first dibs on every person who walks out the door.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

You guys need a cab? 15 bucks.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

With the approval of the doorman, lots of people say yes.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Isn't this a lot nicer than a cab?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Say it's 2am with our first $15 coming in. Joe says he started waking up at these hours when he worked in New York operating vending machines and coffee carts. Gambling in Atlantic City on the weekends there too. He says most of the casinos kicked him out by the time he came to Vegas 14 years ago. He says he was ready to retire, but he gambled full time for the first eight years he was here.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Well, he's not a dishonest man, by no means, but, you know, he's an opportunist. He's the type of guy, if there's an opportunity for him to, you know, to work the odds or make a dollar, you know, he'll make 10. He's one of them guys.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

George, please don't mention my full name either, or where I work. Is a casino manager in one of the few places where Joe now plays. We met in an empty hotel ballroom far from the casino floor.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

They think he counts cards. He doesn't. He's very good at knowing when the decks goes cold, when there's not a chance of winning. If I were to own a casino and have a thousand Joes walking around in my casino, I'd be out of business in short order.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Well, maybe not. Joe walks away with his winnings, but then he always comes back for more play. And that combination, George says, does to Joe, what it does to everyone.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I see the numbers. There's not a player in this place, like any casino I've ever been in, that has won more than they lost.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Never.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I'd say never when you see the cumulative numbers.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

And that's one reason why Joe is driving a limo.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

These guys are going on a strip club. That would be great. That's 100 bucks.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

5Am and we've got $180.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Where you guys going to?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe has his eye on a group of guys who've clearly been out on the town for most of the night. Joe's hoping these four are looking to go to a strip club because he gets a kickback of $20 a person.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Are you guys having fun? You want the radio on? Radio is optional. It's more money. I got anything you want, as long as you got money.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe tells me he also takes guys to the brothels a half hour drive from Las Vegas and collects even more.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

We take people out there and we usually get 30. Now for the holidays, they're doing 40% of what the person spends. If a person spends $1,000, we get $400 kickback for bringing them out there.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

What do you mean for the holidays.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Till December, they're doing like a special. Instead of 30%, they're giving us another 10%. I have pictures of everything in my trunk. I have a menu also, you know, they have a menu of all the stuff you can do there.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

As we drive, the stories keep coming. There was the day Joe won big at the racetrack and flew to London on the Concorde just for dinner or the two day stretch he was playing 20,000 a hand at the Hilton and walked away with over a million dollars. These kinds of stories can't be confirmed, but I wanted to believe them. So he offers to show me what's in his trunk.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

See, this is about a half a million dollars in markers right here.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe hands me a 3 inch stack of receipts from casinos all over town totaling about a half million dollars. Evidence, he says he wants me to see that these can't all be lies. And what are those? 20,000?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Yeah, they loan you 20,000 to sit and play with.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Ah.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

You know, if you lose, you got 30 days to pay it back.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

These are 20,000. 20,000?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Yeah, they're all, they're all like 25,000. What's this? This is my uncle in Forbes magazine. He made like close to a billion dollars.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

He's your uncle?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Yeah, that's my uncle.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

Billionaire.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Yeah.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Later, when I look into it, that story checks Out. As does the one about his aunt who Joe says sits on the board of the Metropolitan Opera in New York. He says she's the one who bails him out when he gets over his head in debt. Joe admits he's the black sheep in the family. How much do they give you?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

$41.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's 7:30am and we're up to $350 from the run to the strip club and five trips to the airport.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

We just keep going around and around.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

There's a brief lull. Joe says it's time to go into the casino.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I'm gonna go play a little blackjack. The only thing is, I don't know if they're gonna let you.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

The casino won't let me record his play, of course, but I watch.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I'm gonna play with a hundred dollars. Now.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

I know.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Hang on, you're playing on.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I'm making 50 or $60 in like 15 minutes or less.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe sits in front of a woman dealer with an empty table. And he's got that look, almost like a drinker who bellies up to a bar every night, like he belongs there. He signals the woman for cards and chips and quick shortcut hand signals. Each hand takes less than a minute. He plays a few and easily wins his $60 in 10 minutes or less. Before I know it, we're out again. 8am was $410. He says it's getting to be peak time for airport runs.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

See, now it gets busy, you know, so I don't have a chance to really go in and gamble because I'm, you know. As long as I keep the cash coming in. If it's low, I supplement it with gambling. If it's not, I just, you know.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

You wouldn't rather be gambling?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I'd rather be working.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Really?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Yeah.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

What happened to your feeling about the gambling? I mean, you gamble. You did nothing but gambling.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Just do it, you know, because I'm so hyper, I have to have something to do. You know, I used to sit like I was at the Flamingo one time, and I had about $40,000 in chips in front of me. And I was playing. I was playing like $2,000 a hand. And I told the doorman, if you get a good ride, like to golf course, come and get me, you know. So, like, for $75. Anyway, he came up to the table and he told me I got a ride for $75. And people in the pit, they all think I'm nuts, you know, I just stopped, I left, took my money and I Ran down to take the guy for $75. And here I am playing two grand a hand. You know, I try and separate the two. One has nothing to do with the other.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

You know, I don't understand that.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I know nobody does, but that's how I am, you know?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

But do you understand that?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I don't, you know, I just. Gambling, to me, is gambling. Work is work, you know.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

10Am and we've got $650. We've had three more airport runs, and the last customer just gave him a $25 tip.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Only in America.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

But Joe says today his game is subdued compared to the past. At age 54, he's had some heart trouble, and that's changed the stakes. A year ago, his daughter was home from college and noticed he didn't look well and called for an ambulance. Joe was having a heart attack.

[Joe's Daughter]

It was pretty scary, and I think he might have been in a casino. But I'm not here.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I guess that's enough to really get your heart rate up.

[Joe's Daughter]

Yeah. If you ask me, I think he probably was, but he never told me for sure.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe's daughter knew what she was doing. She's studying to be a doctor in medical school in the Middle East. I talked with her via her cell phone while she was working at a hospital in some remote spot in Israel. She asked that I not use her name, not even her first name. What did you tell your friends your.

[Joe's Daughter]

Dad did now or when I was growing up? Because now even I don't. Only a few people in my class really know of my good friends even.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

What did you tell them then?

[Joe's Daughter]

Then I would say, well, he's not really doing anything now, but he had real estate in New York. And sometimes I just make things up. I'd say, he's a chef. But it was always funny because I was running joke between me and my dad. But when I was growing up, I just couldn't tell people because nobody else had a dad like that. And so I felt like they would either not believe me or I would sound ridiculous and they just wouldn't understand. But he had never had a problem with me saying to anyone what he does or that he gambles.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

When Joe moved to Las Vegas, his daughter was just entering high school. He raised her practically as a single parent, starting from the time she was born when his ex wife had a breakdown. It wasn't until they moved to Las Vegas that she says she really understood just how much her father gambled.

[Joe's Daughter]

I guess what always blew me away in the beginning is we would Walk in. And everybody would know him. And they would know me too, because he would talk about me. And I would say to him, how do these people know you? I was amazed by that. And they would joke with him and they'd say, are you back again? And they'd say, well, what do you need today? Because he would go in sometimes and he'd say, I need a pool today.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

How much money does it take to build a pool?

[Joe's Daughter]

$20,000. I don't remember how.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

How long did that take?

[Joe's Daughter]

Literally 10 minutes, maybe 1, 2, 3. And that was it.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

But as much as she knows her dad's wins, she remembers the times when they were broke, really broke.

[Joe's Daughter]

We would have to search for quarters on the floor. And my uncle, which is really funny to buy a hamburger or something like.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

That, searched for quarters on the floor in your uncle's house?

[Joe's Daughter]

Yeah, he would search. We would pick them up, and I would go and get a hamburger. But that was in the very beginning. I mean, even when things are really bad, he can always find a way out of it. And even I would be amazed because I would say to him, there's no way. How are you going to do that? And he'd say, don't worry. We'll find a way. And there's always a way. And he can just laugh about it.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Which airline you going to?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Southwest.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Southwest.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's noon, and Joe has $1,100. The limo business has been steady for hours. It's a good time for business. But Joe wants to take a break to call his daughter.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I talk to her like five times a day.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's late night in Israel. He just wants to hear about her day.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Hi, honey, it's me. I just called to say hi.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

So what's happened since your daughter is gone?

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Well, that's when I started to work. I never worked while she was here. This, like, fills my void, maybe in a way. I just think about it, but I miss. I miss her so much when I see her. It's like. It's the greatest feeling in the world. We're at the airport now. This is zero level. I'm gonna go upstairs and see how busy it is. People are looking for rooms.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's 1:30pm and we're up to $1,300. We've just dropped off yet another ride at the airport. And for a little variety, Joe says he's going to show me how he also sells hotel rooms. These are hotel rooms the casinos give him for free because he gambles so much.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I gotta make it seem Like I'm just, you know, walking casual.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe's carefully checking out a middle aged couple in shorts and tennis shoes. Just as he's about to approach them, we're interrupted.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

Hi, this is Joe. Oh, how you doing, Dave? What's up?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

A lucrative job has come up. He says some high roller wants to charter his limo for three hours.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

For three hours? Did you tell him it's 75 an hour though?

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Joe says these guys are seldom big tippers, but it's worth the gamble. This customer, a handsome mid-30s Middle Easterner, says, no recording, please. So Joe tells me to take a break and he'll catch up with me when he's done.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

He says my family lost their homes when the Jews took over Israel.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

It's 5pm and I have no idea how much money Joe has. When we reconnect, he looks exhausted, but hyped up. Since I left him, he's finished with the charter, been to the casino to gamble, where he won 5, $500. But there's more he's anxious to tell me about how he's ended the day. Tell me this again. So this guy, at the end of the day, you thought this was going.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

To be the end of the day? I just asked him, I asked him, just. I said to him, where are you from? So he says, lebanon. I said, oh. I said, I speak Arabic, you know. I said, I was born in Baghdad. I was really born in Baghdad, Iraq.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

What Joe didn't tell the guy is that he's Jewish.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

I said, are you Most? He says, yeah. I says, yeah. I said, I said, oh, those Jews. I said, what they're doing is terrible, you know, to the Palestinian. And then he just. They know, his adrenaline just started going, you know, and he just. So, yeah, he wanted to go out with me tonight. He wanted to hire the car for five hours tonight. And I said, no. I said, I'm too tired. I said, so he says, well, I'll call you tomorrow.

[Ira Glass]

I said, fine.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

You know, he's like, buddy, buddy. But if he gave me 500 bucks, I said, all right. See, that's what I call it. A perfect day. You go out with like 32 bucks, you go home with two grand.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

As we take off, Joe's still hanging on to today's winnings in a wad of bills, folded up like it's a double cheeseburger in one of his hands on the steering wheel.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

$230 he gave me as a tip, which is not fair.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

But think of it, if Joe just worked 5 days a week making 2000 and never lost it back. That'd be a half million dollars a year.

[Joe (Limo Driver)]

It's a wonderful country.

[Ira Glass]

Mary Beth Kirchner. She's now a fellow at Stanford's Distinguished Careers Institute. Coming up, when the creator of the Universe starts from scratch. That's in a minute from Chicago Bubbog Radio. When our program continues, support for this American Life and the following message come from at&t. Whether you're calling your parents to say Happy Anniversary or checking in with your kids before bedtime, staying connected matters. That's why AT&T has connectivity you can depend on, or they'll proactively make it right. That's the AT&T guarantee. Terms and conditions apply. Visit att.com guarantee for details. Support for this American Life comes from BetterHelp. With the information overload about mental health and wellness, it can feel like there's advice for everything. But how do you know what actually works for you? BetterHelp therapists have a 4.9 rating from 1.7 million client reviews, so you're in good hands with their licensed therapists who can help you figure out what's best for you. Visit betterhelp.comtal for 10% off your first month. Support for this American Life comes from Squarespace, their AI enhanced website builder. Blueprint AI can create a fully custom website in just a few steps, using basic information about your industry goals and personality to generate premium quality content and personalized design recommendations. And get paid on time with branded invoices and online payments. Plus, streamline your workflow with built in appointment scheduling and email marketing tools. Head to squarespace.comamerican for 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. This is American Life. I'm Ira Glass. Each week in our program, of course, we choose a theme and bring you a variety of different kinds of stories on that theme. Today's program is a rerun Starting from Scratch stories of people starting over with all the vulnerability and rawness that comes with starting from nothing. We've arrived at Act 3, the first starting from scratch. Well before there was money or gambling or TV or puppies or even the idea of before there was this story about when everything started from scratch. Here's Jonathan Goldstein.

[Jonathan Goldstein]

In the beginning, when Adam was first created, he spent whole days rubbing his face in the grass. He picked his ear until it bled, tried to fit his fist in his mouth and yanked out tufts of his own hair. At one point he tried to pinch his own eyes out in order to examine them. And God had to step in looking down At Adam, God must have felt a bit weird about the whole thing. It must have been something like eating at a cafeteria table all by yourself when a stranger suddenly sits down opposite you, you. But it's a stranger who you have created, and he is eating a macaroni salad that you have also created, and you have been sitting at the table all by yourself for over a hundred billion years, and yet still you have nothing to talk about. It was pitiful the way Adam looked up into the sky and squinted. Before he created Adam, God must have been lonely. Now he was still lonely, and so was Adam. Then came Eve. Since the Garden of Eden was the very first village, and since every village needs a mayor as well as a village idiot, it broke down in this Eve, mayor, Adam, village idiot. And that is the way it was from the very beginning. Sometimes when Adam would start to speak, Eve would get all hopeful that he was about to impart something important and smart. But he would only say stuff like, little things are really great because you could put them in your hand as well as in your mouth. Eve would ponder how one minute she was not there or anywhere, and now she was. Adam would ponder nothing. In her dreams, Eve danced in the tops of trees. Her beautiful thoughts flew out of her ears and lit up the sky like fireflies. And there were all kinds of people to talk to and hug. And then she would hear snoring. She would wake up and there would be Adam, his yokel face pressed right against hers, his dog food breath blowing right up her nostrils. Eve stared up at the sky. Adam draped his arm across her chest and brought his knee up onto her stomach. God, watching in heaven, feared for Adam's broken heart, as though the whole universe depended on it. Adam was close to the animals and spent all day talking to them. Except for God, Eve had no one. She would complain to the Lord any chance she got. Adam is a nimrod, she would say, and the Lord would remain silent. God was the best and all that, and she loved the hell out of him. But when it came to trash talk, he was of no use. Adam was constantly trying to impress her. Look what I have made, he said one bright morning, his hands cupped together. Eve looked into his hands. She pulled away and shrieked. Adam was holding giraffe feces. I've sculpted it, said Adam. It is for the Lord. He opened his hands wide to reveal to her a tiny little giraffe with a crooked neck. On some days, Adam galloped about, exploring. His hair was wiry, and when it got sweaty, it hung down in his eyes. Adam was cute this way. On one such day, he saw a snake. Adam made the snake's acquaintance by accidentally stepping on his back. Wow, that's smart, said the snake through gritted teeth. Their eyes locked, and in that very moment, the snake concluded that indeed Adam was a lummox and that as king of the earth, his reign would very soon end. There was a new sheriff in town, and it was he. It was no longer the story of Adam, but the story of the snake. He could tell all of this just by simply looking into his idiot eyes. I've seen you around with another one like you, he said to Adam. But instead of the dead, legless snake between the legs, she has chaos there. That's Eve, said Adam, all animated. I named her that myself. God made her from out of my rib. He showed the snake the scar on his side. The snake looked at Adam in silence. The idea of Adam, Adam the schlemiel, Adam the fool being God's favorite, was enough to give the snake a migraine. You aren't at all like I imagined, the snake said. I thought you'd be closer to the ground, more pliant, greener. I tried to explain to God that to make you balanced up on your hind legs was architecturally unsound. I don't know why I bother. Adam sat and listened wide eyed. Eve hadn't the patience to sit and chat like this. So when the snake suggested they get into the habit of meeting every once in a while to talk, Adam was very excited to do so. As they lazed on their backs, staring up at the sky, the snake would brag about how he was older than the whole world and that he used to pal around with God in the dark back before Creation. He said that in the darkness it was a truer, freer time, that in the darkness was the good old days. He told Adam that back in the very beginning he had all kinds of thoughts on how to make the Garden of Eden a better place, but that God was just too stubborn to listen to reason. Make the earth out of sugar, I told him. Instead of stingers, give bees lips they can kiss you with. Adam didn't always agree with the snake. In fact, a lot of what the snake said went straight over his head. But there was still something about him that made him get into a very particular mood. He made the world feel bigger. Sometimes, when Adam was with Eve, sitting there in icy silence, he would think to himself, I sure could go for a good dose of snake. You would think that after all the time they spent together, the snake would finally find it within himself to start liking Adam just a little bit. But instead he only grew to hate him more. He took to comforting himself with thoughts of Adam's wife, Eve. From what he heard from Adam, she was hot and smart. Often he would imagine running into her and the instant synergy they would have. Adam neglected to tell me how leggy you are, he would say, wrapping himself around her calf. The snake had no idea what he looked like. He was hairless, buck toothed, four inches tall, and he spoke with a lisp. Adam had the IQ of a coconut husk, but he was still human. The snake, in his arrogance, was unable to grasp this. And so he daydreamed. Sometimes I'd think you were watching me, the snake imagined saying to Eve. Because I felt like there were ribbons wrapped around me. Ribbons made of raw pork intestines. I would turn around to catch you sneaking a peek at me from behind a tree, but all I'd see were the hedgehogs which mocked me. Come, my dear. Let us eat from the Tree of Knowledge. On Eve's very first day, Adam had explained to her the rules of the garden, just the way God had explained them to him. He had lifted his head up and had made his back stiff. He had spoken the way a radio broadcaster from the 1940s would. Another kind of woman, someone softer than Eve, might have found this charming. He explained that except for the Tree of Knowledge, every tree in the garden was theirs to eat from. I am a fan of the pear, adam said. It is not unlike an apple whose head craves God. Tell me more about this Tree of Knowledge, said Eve. She enjoyed the sound of it. The Tree of Knowledge. It sounded very poetic. There's not much to tell, said Adam. If we eat from it, we will die. From then on, Eve talked about the Tree of Knowledge all the time. It was Tree of Knowledge this and Tree of Knowledge that. It's like it wasn't a tree at all, but a movie star. Sometimes she would just stand by the tree and stare at it. It was on such an occasion that she met the snake. When Eve first caught sight of him, she brought her hand to her mouth and gasped. She had seen some repulsive animals in her day. A booby that percolated her vomit to just beneath her tonsils, a dingo that instilled in her a sublime sense of nature's cruelty, and a death watch beetle that filled her with existential dread. But still, there was something about the snake that made her realize in a flash that the world was anywhere from 60 to 80% oilier than she would have ever imagined. Hi, said the snake, in the mood for some Fruit of Knowledge. It's fruity. We were told not to eat from that tree or else we would die, said Eve.

[Jorge]

Die?

[Jonathan Goldstein]

What an ignorant thing to say, said the snake, all chewing on a blade of grass in the side of his mouth. If there is an escape hatch from paradise, then it isn't really paradise, is it? The snake made interesting points that appealed to Eve. He could see he was making an impression. All I'm saying is to give it a try. Many things will be made immediately clear to you once you partake. I could talk about it all day and you still won't get it. You have a right to at least try it, right? I'm not saying go out and eat an entire fruit. Have a nibble. A nibble isn't really eating, is it? Eve found arguing semantics exhilarating. She looked at the tree. The way the sun shined through its leaves was beautiful. Everything seemed to point to nibble the fruit. Then the snake said, think about it. Does God want companions who can think for themselves? Or does he want a bunch of lackeys and yes, men? Wouldn't God want a few surprises? It would seem to me that God's telling you not to eat the fruit was just a test to see if you could think for yourselves, to see if you could exist as equals to God. The day you taste the fruit is the day God will no longer be lonely. At least give it a lick. Eve looked at the fruit. Then she looked at the snake. Then slowly she parted her lips and pushed out her tongue, all wet and warm and uncertain. She ran its tip along the smooth flesh of the fruit. The snake smiled. Has anyone died? He asked. Now take a tiny little nibble. Just a speck. Just a. See? The fruit was squishy and tart. She smushed it around in her mouth. She squinted her eyes. It was a bit like trying on new glasses. It was a bit like an amyl nitrate popper. It was a bit like a big wet kiss on the lips, right at first when you weren't sure if you wanted to be kissed or not. She felt a thousand little feet kicking at her uterus. The idea of her own nudity as well as Adam's had always felt more like a Nordic co ed health spa thing. Now with the Fruit of Knowledge, it felt more like a Rio de Janeiro carnival thing. Her breasts felt like water balloons filled with blueberry jam and birds. Her nipples were like lit matchsticks her thighs, the way they swished against each other, were like scissors cutting through velour. With her lips still glistening in Tree of Knowledge fruit juice, she ran off to find Adam. The snake watched her as he chewed on his slimy blade of grass, and as she receded into the distance, he thought something along the lines of, now that's what I'm talking about. Kiss me, Adam, said Eve. Taste my lips. Adam, like any lummox truly worth his salt, could smell the minutest trace of knowledge coming his way, and thus he knew how to avoid it like the plague. But yet there was also Eve had never sought him out in the middle of the day before just to kiss him. It felt like a very lucky thing when he took her in his arms. He told her that he loved her with his whole, entire heart. He closed his eyes tightly and brought his lips to hers. Then he squinted. Then it started to rain, and Eve began to cry. During the darkest days ahead, with the fratricides and whatnot, Adam would often think back to his brief time in Eden. As he became an old man, he would talk about the garden more and more. A couple of times he had even tried to find his way back there, but he very soon became lost. He didn't try too hard anyway. He didn't want to bother God any more than he already had. When Adam met someone that he really liked, he would say, I so wish you could have been there. It didn't seem fair to him that he was the one that got to be in Eden. This sunset isn't bad, he'd say, but the sun sets in Eden, they burned your nose hairs. They made your ears bleed. He couldn't even explain it right. When you ate the fruit in Eden, it was like eating God, he would say, and God was delicious. When you wanted him, you just grabbed him. Now when he ate fruit, he can only taste what was not there. But it wasn't all bad. After Eden, Eve became much gentler with Adam. After getting them both cast out, she decided to try as hard as she could to give Adam her love. She knew it was the very least she could do. She sometimes even wondered if that was why God had sent the snake to her in the first place. Adam would tell his grandkids, his great grandkids and his great, great grandkids, about how he and Nana Eve had spent their early days in a beautiful garden, naked and frolicking, and the kids would say, ew. The children would swarm into the house like a carpet of ants. The youngest ones would head straight for Adam. Lifting his shirt to examine his belly for the umpteenth time, they smoothed their hands across his flesh and marveled. Where's Grandpa's belly button? They all asked. He stared at the children. They were all his children. And as they slid their little hands across his blank stomach, he wondered what it was like to be a kid.

[Ira Glass]

Jonathan Goldstein this story appears in his book where he rewrites Bible stories called Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bible. His podcast heavyweight is going to be returning this fall for a ninth season now with Pushkin Industries. They already have some new episodes in the fall. You can find them wherever you get your podcasts World program is produced today by Wendy Dooren myself with Alex Blumberg, Diane Cook, David Kestenbaum and Starleigh Kine. Production help for today's show from Todd Baughman, Jane Marie, Aaron Scott, Alvin Melloth and Ari Saperstein. Mixing help today from Kathryn Raymondo. Our technical director for the show is Matt Tierney. Help on today's rerun from Suzanne Gabber and Stone Nelson. Special thanks today to Mr. George Lara. Thanks also to Kevin Scully, Dave Dalstro and Tony Mancini. Some of the funding for Mary Beth Kirchner's story about the gambler came from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's radio fund, back when such a thing existed. Our website thisamericanlife.org where you can listen to any of our over 850 shows for absolutely free. This American Life is distributed by prx, the Public Radio Exchange. Thanks as always to our program's co founder, Mr. Tory Malatea, who I have to say got all angry this week when I told him we were going to be putting a story about puppies onto the public radio satellite.

[Dan Fitzsimmons]

You'd ask us to give up six mega schlocks of gooba schnapp to put just puppies on there?

[Ira Glass]

Well, yeah. I'm Ira Glass. Back next week with more stories of this American Life. Next week on the podcast of this American Life, when Angela's family goes on vacation, her dad plans everything. One year the plan went awry.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

I don't think I was particularly traumatized.

[Ira Glass]

Wow, you went like you got hit by lightning.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

Like lightning's not personal.

[Molly Fitzsimmons]

The lightning wasn't like, Angela, you're ugly. The lightning was just doing its thing.

[Ira Glass]

When nature, fate or the federal government mess with your plans, that's next week on the podcast or on your local public radio station. Support for this American Life comes from Charles Schwab with their original podcast Choiceology, hosted by Katie Milkman, an award winning behavioral scientist and author of the best selling book how to Change Choiceology is a show about the psychology and economics behind people's decisions. Hear true stories from Nobel laureates, historians, authors, athletes and more about why people do the things they do. Download the latest episode and [e-mail] podcast or wherever you listen.

[Mary Beth Kirchner]

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