Podcast Summary

Podcast: You Made It Weird with Pete Holmes
Episode: We Made It Weird #233
Release Date: November 21, 2025
Hosts: Pete Holmes & Valerie

Main Theme & Episode Overview

This episode is a classic “We Made It Weird” conversational ride with Pete Holmes and his wife/co-host Valerie. It’s built around their signature freewheeling banter, riffing on relationships, secret weirdness, travel mishaps, parental quirks, and deep-dive vulnerability. Listeners are treated to a lively mix of bits, tangents, and authentic relationship insights—plus behind-the-scenes peeks into their creative dynamic and some post-tour stories.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Show Format, Silliness, and Spiritual Bits

• Meta-commentary on Format:

  • Pete and Valerie experiment with the episode structure, openly discussing ad placement timings and giving listeners tips about where the actual show's content starts—playfully lamenting the influence of sponsorships.
  • [02:27] Pete: "At like 12 minutes in, I’m like, okay, we should do the ads. We don’t. There’s like a good 35 minutes of episode before the ads. If you’re an ad avoider, just know that."

• Opening Riffs and Burlesque Tangent:

  • The pair riff heavily on burlesque, nipple tassels, and the origins of pasties, with both playing with stereotypes and poking fun at male fascination with movement and body decorations.
  • [07:17] Pete: “The tassels are dripping with sexuality. Yeah, let’s get those on nipples.”
  • [08:14] Valerie: “Yeah. But the person that made the tassels, I’m gonna pitch...just thought they would hang. And then they were like, we don’t want this. And they gave them to Daphne. No. And she was like, wait a minute, Mr. P. And she starts spinning them.”

• Meta-Narrative and Surreal Juxtapositions:

  • They describe their own podcast structure as a blend of “bits, tits, and Z’s,” then as a chaotic Japanese knick-knack store, then shift into deeper relationship terrain.
  • [16:02] Pete: “Actually, I think what we are is a very authentic native peoples of any land. Like some sort of Afghan, like a blanket…People go, what is this? What is this? I’m cold. Then they look down. I’m not cold. I’m wrapped. And what? It looks like the flag of Argentina. That’s this podcast.”

2. Meditation, Sensitivity, and Self-Awareness

• Meditation, ‘Being,’ and Relaxing the Mind:

  • Pete briefly shares a spiritual meditation technique inspired by Rupert Spira: the importance of “relaxing back” into being, rather than striving.
  • [04:04] Pete: “Enlightenment belongs to the very late, the supremely lazy person for whom even blinking is too much trouble. And it’s like sinking into a bath. And you don’t have to look for your being. It’s already here.”

• Sensitivity, Photo Paper Analogy, and Social Fatigue:

  • They explore the challenges of being highly sensitive and absorbing other people’s energies. Pete sees himself as “photo paper” exposed to everything, and both explore how this fuels a need for boundaries and careful social interaction.
  • [21:10] Pete: “I’m not saying I have a photographic memory. I’m just saying if someone’s putting something on my photo paper and it’s starting to develop...”
  • [31:27] Pete: “He said the best artist is the most sensitive. I’m not saying I’m the best artist. I’m saying I’m the most sensitive.”

• Enneagram, Childhood Programming, and Empathy:

  • Valerie and Pete dig into personality types, the Enneagram, and family dynamics—especially the compulsion to “mirror” others, root out what they need, and anticipate.
  • [22:55] Valerie: “She doesn’t know how to find you, so then she doesn’t know how to mirror you, so then it’s like...you’re unpredictable.”
  • [26:15] Valerie: “One of my strengths that comes from a wound...is being able to suss out a person, figure out what the whole thing is and how to be what they need.”

3. Relationship Dynamics & Authentic Vulnerability

• Testing Each Other’s Weirdness:

  • They reflect on how early communications were about testing how much weirdness, confusion, and boundary-pushing the other person could tolerate.
  • [24:47] Pete: “I’m just constantly going around going, are you fun? Are you safe? Are you fun?...Can I be confusing? Will you allow it?”
  • [25:16] Valerie: “...that was probably the attraction, is that I was like, oh, I don’t know exactly how this person wants me to be.”

• Hypervigilance and Being Seen:

  • Pete admires Valerie’s ability to “mirror and love” at a micro-level, saying, “It takes a brain like mine to appreciate a face like yours” ([28:36]). They discuss the intense, sometimes exhausting effort to care for one another and be attuned.
  • [28:36] Pete: “The frame rate of your understanding and mirroring and loving is like...everybody’s at 24 frames a second, and you’re at...190 frames per second.”

• Letting Go of FOMO and Relationship Comfort:

  • They recount a missed New York theater show (“O Mary”), exploring how to handle disappointment, comfort each other, and avoid the urge to transfer bad feelings or guilt.
  • [42:26] Pete: “...when you’re hurt, even when you really love each other, there’s this impulse to hurt someone. And children do this too.”

4. Travel Stories: New York, Atlantic City, and Bad Car Rides

• New York as a Rejuvenation:

  • Valerie’s return to a kid-free New York is described as a “spiritual blood transfusion.” Pete jokes about her renewed energy, and they wax nostalgic about their “Crashing” show days and their love for the city’s chaos.
  • [38:55] Pete: “I took a thousand pictures of [Valerie] and her face...she was like the opposite of the painting in the attic. You kept getting younger.”

• New York vs. California “Sun and Vegetables” Bit:

  • They riff on the urban lifestyle’s nutritional and sunlight deficiencies, with Pete referencing a podcast about the health value of sunlight.
  • [49:07] Pete: “...you should get 20 minutes of sun every day, even if you’re wearing clothes...When I lived there, I think I had seven sun-free years and didn’t eat anything green.”

• Atlantic City: “Hell Together is Heaven”

  • They retell a harrowing travel story—comically traumatizing rides to and from Atlantic City, with drivers that inspired fear and motion sickness.
  • [52:13] Pete: “The punchline is: hell together is heaven. Because if I had been alone, it would have just been hell. Me, you, and Matt grabbing each other’s knees.”
  • [53:03] Pete: “I mean, it was insane. And he was driving—the first guy was driving like a cartoon. Like you know, in cartoons where they move the wheel. So we’re just fishtailing for three hours.”
  • [57:43] Pete, on handling bad drivers: “This is why I’m like, if anybody has a TikTok about what to do, how to consciously handle...I don’t even...you have to say, like, sir, this is like...Imagine what like, Shonda Rhimes would do...Love to know how Shonda handles that. This is not okay. Pull over."

• Future of Transportation:

  • Pete wishes for a world with regulated, AI-driven cars, quipping about a future where comedians are replaced with robots too.
  • [60:23] Pete: “I'll be on stage, and there’ll be a funnier robot that goes, ‘yeah, and bitches be like, why are my nipples with these curtains on them like the corners of Nana’s pillow?’ That’s—That’s enough, Chuckle Tron.”

5. Comedy Craft, Joke-Thieving, and the Generosity of Comedians

• Joke Credits, Collaboration & the Sklars:
  • Pete opens up about the under-discussed generosity among comedians: giving tags, lines, and jokes freely rather than hoarding material. Valerie and her brother have provided bits that Pete now uses on stage, and he highlights the Sklar Brothers for their prolific “tagging.”
  • [69:23] Pete: “Everyone know. I’m not saying this defensively. That was Valerie’s joke. As I always say, my talent is going, You said it, I wrote it down, I knew it was stage worthy.”
  • [72:42] Pete: “The Sklars are thanked in the special thanks of every special. Because they’ve always given me at least three or four lines. They’re overt about it...If you’re a comedian, you should be doing it. There’s nothing lost. It’s an abundance mentality.”

6. Notable Quotes & Fun Moments

On Tassels and Boobs:

• [07:17] Pete: "The tassels are dripping with sexuality. Yeah, let’s get those on nipples."
• [08:14] Valerie: "But the person that made the tassels...just thought they would hang. And then they were like, 'We don't want this.' ...And she starts spinning them."

On Relationship Testing:

• [24:47] Pete: “I’m just constantly going around going, are you fun? Are you safe?”

On High Sensitivity:

• [21:10] Pete: “I’m not saying I have a photographic memory. I’m just saying if someone’s putting something on my photo paper and it’s starting to develop...”

On Atlantic City Travel:

• [52:13] Pete: “Hell together is heaven. Because if I had been alone, it would have just been hell."

On Regret and Empathy in Relationships:

• [42:26] Pete: "When you’re hurt, even when you really love each other, there’s this impulse to hurt someone. And children do this too."

On Comedy Collaboration:

• [72:42] Pete: "If you’re a comedian, you should be doing it. There’s nothing lost. It’s an abundance mentality."

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [02:27] – Ad timing and show format meta-commentary
• [04:04] – Spiritual meditation tips (“relaxing back”)
• [07:17–12:26] – Burlesque, tassels, pasties riff
• [21:00] – “Photo paper” analogy for extreme sensitivity
• [24:47–26:33] – Testing and boundaries in early relationship
• [28:36] – Intuition, “high frame rate” of hypervigilance
• [38:55] – Valerie’s “spiritual transfusion” in NYC
• [49:07] – NYC vs. California, sunlight and nutrition riff
• [52:13] – Atlantic City, “hell together is heaven” travel nightmare
• [69:23] – Joke-sharing, comedy collaboration and the Sklars

Tone & Style

• Loose, playful, digressive: True to "We Made It Weird," the conversation is wide-ranging and unpredictable, with sustained bits and call-backs.
• Blunt, affectionate, candid: Pete and Valerie don’t shy from vulnerable insights or poking fun at each other's quirks.
• Irreverent and honest: Self-roasting, riffing on sexuality and bodily functions, and raw honesty about marriage and sensitivity—all done with warmth and affection.

For New Listeners

• This episode is more “bitty” and less structured, but if you stick with it, you’ll get unguarded insights into real partnership, sensitivity, comedy writing, and the strange joys/challenges of a comedian couple’s life.
• Pete and Valerie’s dynamic is both comedic and emotionally revealing—they model both goofiness and unfiltered vulnerability, making “weirdness” feel universal and relatable.

End note:
Skip to the [38:55] mark for NYC stories, the [52:13] mark for the Atlantic City adventure, or [69:23] for behind-the-curtain glimpses into joke-writing and comedy generosity. The whole episode, though, is peppered with quotable moments, layered affection, and memorable riffs.