Speaker 1: Hi. I'm Vanessa Beyer and this is my brother Jonah.
Speaker 2: We're two siblings who love to talk about our childhood
Speaker 2: and nostalgia and how it shaped us into the people
Speaker 2: we are.
Speaker 3: Today, who are pretty excited about our guests today because
Speaker 3: Senior's two thousand.
Speaker 2: Rule, welcome to how did we get weird?
Speaker 1: Jonah?
Speaker 3: Because we went to high school with our guests today
Speaker 3: and middle school in all school with our guests today,
Speaker 3: I thought we could talk about something from when we
Speaker 3: were little that used to happen that was absolutely humiliating,
Speaker 3: which was when the moms would come into the classroom
Speaker 3: and check everybody for lice.
Speaker 1: Do you remember that, Jonah?
Speaker 2: I do remember that. I wonder if that still happens.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: That you would come in, you have to sit down.
Speaker 2: They'd have those little.
Speaker 1: Like like popsicle sticks almost.
Speaker 2: Yeah, popsicle sticks, and they kind of would just go
Speaker 2: through your hair and I think it was like kids moms, right,
Speaker 2: I don't think. Yeah, And they would look for lice,
Speaker 2: I guess, and if you had him, you'd get sent home.
Speaker 3: If you had him, you'd get like sent I think,
Speaker 3: to the nurse's office. It never I never had, but
Speaker 3: it was such a. It was such a nightmare moment
Speaker 3: because if someone got sent out of the room, it
Speaker 3: was like shaming them. It was like, yeah, they've got lice,
Speaker 3: they're unhygienic, and.
Speaker 2: It doesn't seem very scientific the way they're doing it either.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and also I think had we been like a
Speaker 3: few years older when they were doing it, it would
Speaker 3: have been like so humiliating. At least we were like
Speaker 3: young enough that maybe we didn't get as embarrassed as
Speaker 3: if we were, but it was still anyway, I think
Speaker 3: we should want to introduce our guests because I'm really
Speaker 3: curious if he remembers this.
Speaker 1: I'm sure he does. He has an amazing memory, and
Speaker 1: what his thoughts are.
Speaker 2: Let's yeah, let's do it. Do you want to give
Speaker 2: a little intro?
Speaker 3: Yes, our guest today is a senior writer at Rolling
Speaker 3: Stone who writes about music, movies, and television and runs
Speaker 3: the Unknown Legends and King for a Day Interview franchises.
Speaker 3: He is also the author of the New York Times
Speaker 3: best selling book The Office, the until story of the
Speaker 3: greatest sitcom of the two thousands. He's also my friend
Speaker 3: growing up and the person I go to with every
Speaker 3: question about our high school.
Speaker 1: Please welcome Andy Green.
Speaker 4: Ye, guys, I'm told the big here, So thanks for
Speaker 4: having me.
Speaker 3: Thanks so much for being here. Now, Andy, do you
Speaker 3: remember life tests.
Speaker 5: I have vivid memories of the PTA moms. They would
Speaker 5: enter our classroom and we line up by the sink.
Speaker 4: We go one by one. We'd put our head down,
Speaker 4: they would go.
Speaker 5: They would use chopsticks in our hair slowly and go
Speaker 5: through everything. And I would just pray, please don't have
Speaker 5: me be the dirty kid who sent to the office.
Speaker 5: It would be so humiliated. And you have to leave
Speaker 5: the room with lice. It was like a scarlet letter
Speaker 5: or something that you had to wear. Yes, I never
Speaker 5: had it, but my sister had it once and they
Speaker 5: called me home.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So I got called on the PA down.
Speaker 5: To the nurse's office and I'm like what I do
Speaker 5: And they go, you have to go home because your
Speaker 5: sister has lice.
Speaker 4: I'm like, I don't have lice.
Speaker 5: So I had to go home and I might have
Speaker 5: my hair washed and the stain with this gross crap
Speaker 5: and everything. It was just mortifying.
Speaker 2: Oh man, Yeah, I don't think I don't think we
Speaker 2: ever got it, Vanessa.
Speaker 1: I don't think we ever got it.
Speaker 3: Either because I don't remember, but I but I remember
Speaker 3: that was the thing, right, was like if you had it,
Speaker 3: you had to use this like really strong shampoo.
Speaker 5: It was ransom crap that I hated. I was like
Speaker 5: six or something, but I still remember this. I have
Speaker 5: stronger memories of the spine checkshich the same pta moms. Yeah,
Speaker 5: they come in and do you would be in the gym,
Speaker 5: locker room or the corner of the classroom. You would
Speaker 5: put your shirt up to your shoulders. You would bend
Speaker 5: over and the moms like traced your spine with her
Speaker 5: finger or something. It was completely insane because they weren't doctors.
Speaker 1: Right to see if you had scoliosis.
Speaker 2: Right, Yes, yes, yes, I don't remember that. I remember.
Speaker 2: Do you remember in Jim there was a thing where
Speaker 2: like it was like almost like a stretching competition, whereas
Speaker 2: like they'd put blocks up and if you could reach
Speaker 2: your to it was like some kind of international like
Speaker 2: test or something.
Speaker 3: Yes, are you talking about the like universal Yeah, where
Speaker 3: there was like thirteen challenges.
Speaker 1: The only Nathan Canner did all of them.
Speaker 4: It was j Justfathan Canner who could do anything.
Speaker 5: Yeah, she was amazing.
Speaker 3: What was it called it was called like the it
Speaker 3: was called like the National There was like throwing a
Speaker 3: basketball at a wall and oh yeah, oh yeah our
Speaker 3: producer Olivia the Presidential Fitness Test.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was very stressful when you're throwing that basketball
Speaker 5: against the wall on have a stopwatch.
Speaker 3: I'm like, yeah, yeah, to throw a basketball against a
Speaker 3: wall and catch it and then you have to jump
Speaker 3: with both feet over a stick or like over sort
Speaker 3: of like a low balance beam. And I remember watching
Speaker 3: Delia Wheat do it and she was like incredible at it,
Speaker 3: and I tried to do it.
Speaker 1: I got over like twice in a minute.
Speaker 4: I couldn't do shit.
Speaker 5: But they kept the records that were from past years
Speaker 5: even and it was just Nathan Canner down the line
Speaker 5: for everything.
Speaker 3: I remember like Nathan Canner being in the gym in
Speaker 3: like seventh grade and accepting an award because it was
Speaker 3: like he was the only one.
Speaker 1: Because it was sort of weird.
Speaker 3: It's like if this is the residential fitness as, like
Speaker 3: why is it so hard?
Speaker 2: Like why it shouldn't be because all the presidents are
Speaker 2: like eighty year old guys.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, that George H. W.
Speaker 5: Bush he could throw ballie, he gets the wall one
Speaker 5: hundred times in a row.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: What's funny is the kids counted. So I remember Rob Frice,
Speaker 5: he won by some huge number and he whispered to me,
Speaker 5: I think they counted way.
Speaker 4: Wrong, you know, So it was not right. It was
Speaker 4: not enforced very well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like this pta mom thing. It's like you
Speaker 2: got to have the right systems in place.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was, yes, exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Also was one of the challenges also to do an
Speaker 3: obstacle course or was the obstacle course separate?
Speaker 5: That was different, and that was freaking crazy because.
Speaker 4: It was you.
Speaker 5: It was you and your switch class would both be
Speaker 5: in the gym and you'd sit there for the whole
Speaker 5: gym class and have like two minutes on your own
Speaker 5: as so as the whole is like sixty kids. They'd
Speaker 5: watched you do this thing and I was slow. I
Speaker 5: could get over the wall or anything, you know, And
Speaker 5: it was like girls who I crushes on everything were
Speaker 5: watching me just like run into a wall over and
Speaker 5: over again. I'm trying I go through like that weird
Speaker 5: tunnel thing. It was just humiliating.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so like, why did they set up an
Speaker 3: obstacle course for us in the gym, like just let
Speaker 3: us live our lives.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and our friend Matt Nef is a gym teacher now,
Speaker 5: and he told me, yes, he is just awesome. And
Speaker 5: he told me that looking back on that, it breaks
Speaker 5: every single rule that they're taught in school about about
Speaker 5: how to do gym class because there's no activity for
Speaker 5: most kids, it's just sitting there for the whole class base.
Speaker 3: Right, Yes, does he play battleball with his students, because
Speaker 3: that's the one thing that I really am still mad about.
Speaker 5: I think they've kind of killed battle qualified. Yes, it
Speaker 5: was ridiculous. Yeah, it was petrifying to just stand there
Speaker 5: as balls are just being shucked at your face and everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like the super bad kids were just like so
Speaker 3: violent about it.
Speaker 4: They were going nuts.
Speaker 5: Yeah, hide him back by the by those rustling mats
Speaker 5: that they rolled up and just cower and fear.
Speaker 1: Same.
Speaker 3: I was always like the last person because I last
Speaker 3: persons standy because I was hiding.
Speaker 2: Yes, Andy, I had a couple and I don't want
Speaker 2: to change a tone of this podcast because to this,
Speaker 2: but I had a couple kind of music questions for you.
Speaker 2: Sure if that's okay, because we both you know, I
Speaker 2: was in music at our alternative press. We both have
Speaker 2: kind of been editors. I know, you know, I've written
Speaker 2: for Corey and bred to other people at Rolling Stone,
Speaker 2: and so we don't know each other.
Speaker 3: We went we went to the same school, two years.
Speaker 2: Apart, two years apart. You have a good memory. I
Speaker 2: have a terrible memory.
Speaker 3: Do you remember, wait, really quickly, Andy, do you remember
Speaker 3: Jonah floating down the hallway in such big jinkos that
Speaker 3: you couldn't even see his feet move?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: He don't.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we had like parallel existence. But but you know
Speaker 2: what's interesting is like, you know, I read Rolling Stone
Speaker 2: and every time I read, you know, I know Corey
Speaker 2: does a lot of the Metallica stuff, which is like incredible.
Speaker 2: But also whenever I read a story that I'm like, oh,
Speaker 2: this is a story I would be interested in writing,
Speaker 2: it's it's almost always something you wrote. And the two
Speaker 2: that really stand out to me are the feature about
Speaker 2: Live and the mc mars Montley crue one Yes, And
Speaker 2: I'm just wondering, like what it was like kind of writing.
Speaker 2: I know they're very different stories, but to me, like
Speaker 2: it got so deep into Live and the lawsuit and
Speaker 2: it was so complicated and or if you could just
Speaker 2: talk about that a little bit.
Speaker 1: Wait, is this about the band throwing?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Got it?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 2: And that's kind of a nostalgic band, both of those bands,
Speaker 2: So I wonder if you could just talk about those
Speaker 2: a little because you wrote these trouble stories.
Speaker 5: Yeah, for Live, it was kind of crazy. I have
Speaker 5: an interview franchise that Fanessa match called King for Day
Speaker 5: where I interview replacements, singers and rock bands. So people
Speaker 5: that sang for Journey or Yes or Genesis and were
Speaker 5: fired later, you know, it's always a great story. Now,
Speaker 5: speaking to the guy who sang for Live about six
Speaker 5: years ago, he was just there briefly and he was like,
Speaker 5: shit has gone insane. It in Live right now. It's
Speaker 5: like had fired the whole band. They're suing each other.
Speaker 5: It's gone fucking bonkers. So I'm like, so I did
Speaker 5: some research. I saw that it's just complete madness. That
Speaker 5: the band that they fired at the same state one point,
Speaker 5: and then he came back and then fired them, and
Speaker 5: it's all so if you saw Live six years ago
Speaker 5: and you see them now, it's completely different people up
Speaker 5: on the stage. That So I was fascinated. So I
Speaker 5: emailed all the guys. I'm like, hey, I love to
Speaker 5: do a feature. I'm live.
Speaker 4: And it was just the guitarist who got back to me.
Speaker 5: So he goes, He goes, dude, if you come to Pennsylvania,
Speaker 5: I will spend the day with you. I will tell
Speaker 5: you everything. So I went great.
Speaker 4: I took the train out there, and he told me
Speaker 4: this wild story about this alleged con artist that entered
Speaker 4: their world and he allegedly stole all of their money.
Speaker 5: And there's a million lawsuits and they hate each other,
Speaker 5: and the drummer's gone QAnon and none of them are speaking,
Speaker 5: and they're all suing each other. And this alleged con
Speaker 5: artist guy, he was under house arrest for sexual assault
Speaker 5: against one of their employees. And and so I just
Speaker 5: went in deep and I talked to all of them
Speaker 5: who I could. I spoke to the guy who was
Speaker 5: under house arrest, I spoke to the drummer who's very trumpy,
Speaker 5: and wrote just this wild story of how this nineties
Speaker 5: band just devolved into absolute chaos. And in all my
Speaker 5: years of rolling style, I've never talked to people who
Speaker 5: have such hatred for each other. Yeah, like this raw, burning,
Speaker 5: obsessive hatred of each other. Oh yeah, I was sad.
Speaker 2: Well, it's like it's interesting because I read my kind
Speaker 2: of guilty pleasures reading this website Blabbermouth, which is yeah,
Speaker 2: of course, and it's like incredible, how many of these
Speaker 2: guys now in their like fifties and sixties are just
Speaker 2: all fighting, all seeing each other, all in like nineteen
Speaker 2: different bands, fighting for the name. It's like, what, well,
Speaker 2: how many people are even interested in this in the
Speaker 2: first place.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it fascinates me that the band rat or something,
Speaker 5: that they're all fighting for crumbs. They're all fighting for
Speaker 5: the right like to play at these tiny bars and
Speaker 5: make virtually not enough money to pay like their gas
Speaker 5: on their hotel. It's this faded spotlight they're all clinging
Speaker 5: to as hard as they can, and they just hate
Speaker 5: each other.
Speaker 4: And I'm fascinated. There's people like Simon and Garfunkle and
Speaker 4: Pink Floyd that they're in their eighties now and the
Speaker 4: hatred of each other is had never been worse.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so yeah, speak of that. What was it
Speaker 2: like going to Mick Mars's house, because like that is
Speaker 2: such an and you were kind of the exclusive person
Speaker 2: writing about this.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, that was intense. He lives in like this
Speaker 5: gothic just castle in the suburbs of Tennessee, and in
Speaker 5: my mind I view him as like this vampire or
Speaker 5: something who is He's the guitarist and Moley crue that
Speaker 5: they spot got it.
Speaker 2: Got it okay, And it's kind of a contentious. They're
Speaker 2: suing each other now yeah yeah, okay, okay.
Speaker 5: And he's this wicked spying disease. His whole body is
Speaker 5: like a question mark. He's all hunched over.
Speaker 4: It was fun though. He was super funny, he was
Speaker 4: super warm. We'd spent two days talking.
Speaker 5: Then I had Mickey six on the phone, who was
Speaker 5: not too happy with me or Mick or this article happening.
Speaker 4: It was very awkward, but it was the same thing of.
Speaker 5: Just lawsuits and just rage at each other, just absolutely
Speaker 5: hating each other.
Speaker 2: Was SA, What kind of music were you into like
Speaker 2: when we were in like high school, middle school, were
Speaker 2: you into like alternative music or what was your kind
Speaker 2: of pride?
Speaker 5: I was in the classic Rocke It was all like
Speaker 5: ninety eight to five. It was just tattooed in my brain.
Speaker 5: I grew up on all that stuff on Cleveland Radio.
Speaker 5: I was in the Prague guy like Genesis, but then
Speaker 5: I got way into Bob dyl and Bruce Springsteen and
Speaker 5: like and like Neil Young and dress all that stuff.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And one of our first concerts both of us was
Speaker 2: Phil Collins Genesis.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, I love Genesis. I have since
Speaker 5: the fifth grade. When We Can't Dance came out, I
Speaker 5: saw Steve Hackett play Foxtrat about five days and go
Speaker 5: straight through. It was awesome.
Speaker 2: Wow. Yeah. I went with Jason Williger's parents to see
Speaker 2: him on there we Can't Dance tour.
Speaker 5: Oh wow, was at Cleveland Stadium and that was in
Speaker 5: ninety two and the pouring rain right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was and that my actually my first concert
Speaker 2: was Phil Collins solo on the Butt Seriously Tour.
Speaker 5: Wow, it's going way back that that's like nineteen ninety.
Speaker 2: It was like ninety ninety. It was my first. I
Speaker 2: was like, you know, eleven years old or something, but yeah,
Speaker 2: I saw those. Those are my first two shows. And
Speaker 2: then my third was Guns N' Roses Illusion to Our
Speaker 2: at Richfield Colseum with.
Speaker 5: Our mom, with my mind, with your mom.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah and skid Row.
Speaker 5: Wow, wow did you wear a kilt?
Speaker 2: It was you know, I think he was wearing Remember
Speaker 2: he would wear that nine in snail shirt, that white
Speaker 2: one with like the big red he I think he
Speaker 2: was wearing that shirt. I remember.
Speaker 4: That's awesome. I'm very I'm very jealous that.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Yeah, you saw those shows. I would have killed
Speaker 5: it seen any of that stuff.
Speaker 1: Well, it sounds like you're making up for it now.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, I see.
Speaker 3: How can I ask what? I just want to ask
Speaker 3: about something that came up earlier? What is Blabbermouth? Is
Speaker 3: it like a gossip site for rock bands?
Speaker 2: It's kind of like it's like kind of the opposite
Speaker 2: of Rolling Stone. I would say it's like basically, if
Speaker 2: someone gets like, uh, if and Andy you explained, I mean,
Speaker 2: I can explain if I'm curious your take on it.
Speaker 5: It's a heavy metal and hard rocking news site that
Speaker 5: pretends as if Vince Neil's solo work is still really
Speaker 5: interesting and recovering. And so every time the bassist in
Speaker 5: La Guns is on a podcast, they transcribe like the
Speaker 5: choice bits of it and they band they posted.
Speaker 4: They do no interviews of their own.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but basically the fact that we've mentioned Motley Crue
Speaker 2: with Andy on this podcast could be seven articles on
Speaker 2: blackermos because they basically just take quotes from podcasts and
Speaker 2: just like make them into nineteen articles.
Speaker 5: And every time that Vince Neil plays a solo show
Speaker 5: at the casino in like the Keepsie, they post the
Speaker 5: audience video and it's the same songs he always does. Now,
Speaker 5: there's no news value, what subverge, Like watch Vince Neil
Speaker 5: send girls girls Girls at a casino.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it is daily. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: Rob Zombie says new record is going to be pretty good,
Speaker 2: and it's like a quote.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's the worst quotes and the same twelve acts
Speaker 5: over and over and over again. Yes, Oh I go
Speaker 5: there every day about five times.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know. Me and I have a friend, my
Speaker 2: friend Brian, We just send stuff back and forth because
Speaker 2: it's just it's so and it's also like the the
Speaker 2: source material they're using. It's like James's rock blog, you know,
Speaker 2: it's like the most obscure YouTube channels and stuff. Like
Speaker 2: it's so funny.
Speaker 5: I always think it's so easy, you know, to get
Speaker 5: d Snyder on the phone for a interview.
Speaker 4: Just do your own interviews, right right.
Speaker 2: That was our question too. We were like, do you
Speaker 2: think any of people say no, to things like based
Speaker 2: on what they're doing, Like do you think I was like, eh.
Speaker 4: No, I think these guys say yes to everything.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Okay, Now speaking of saying yes, Andy, what a
Speaker 3: great segue. You just got married in our hometown of Cleveland,
Speaker 3: and yes, first of all, congratulations.
Speaker 2: Congratulations life, Thank you very much, thank you.
Speaker 3: Was there anything super nostalgic or like high school that
Speaker 3: happened while during your nuptials or during that visit to Cleveland?
Speaker 5: It was weird to be in Cleveland and have a
Speaker 5: few high school friends there. Our friend Dan Jacobson, he
Speaker 5: was the officiator of the wedding, yes, which was incredible.
Speaker 4: I love Dan to death.
Speaker 1: He's so funny. I bet he was so great. He's
Speaker 1: so great.
Speaker 5: I didn't know what to expect exactly, and was standing
Speaker 5: there in front of one hundred and fifty people.
Speaker 1: And was it a lander Haven executive suites.
Speaker 5: No, we did tour lander Haven as a possibility. It
Speaker 5: felt very bar Mitzvah.
Speaker 1: It felt very say that's where Jonas bar Mitzville luncheon?
Speaker 1: Was there?
Speaker 2: Great lunch?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was at Hillbrook.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, great, very.
Speaker 5: It's very non Jewish there, but that's okay. You know
Speaker 5: we took over.
Speaker 3: Did anyone have their bar? Is that where John Falcon
Speaker 3: Mike Wasserman had.
Speaker 5: Their Oh I remember their co bar mitzvah. I don't
Speaker 5: remember that was. I know Dan and Scott promutters that
Speaker 5: they were at Worldly Ball, which was the best armitzvah.
Speaker 3: Awesome.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, that was always the best.
Speaker 1: So mine was the best.
Speaker 5: Yes, I have no doubt. Yes, I had mine. It
Speaker 5: was at Lake Forest and it was the first one
Speaker 5: of the year, basically because I'm so old. Whoa, Yeah,
Speaker 5: I guess that. Joel shrellows it was the week before,
Speaker 5: but mine was the second.
Speaker 2: Yes, got it. When's your birthday?
Speaker 4: It's in June of eighty one.
Speaker 5: So I was on the cusp of the two grades,
Speaker 5: and my parents decided that I was very little at
Speaker 5: an extra year of preschool would be fine for me,
Speaker 5: got it?
Speaker 4: So I drove first. I was from Midsford First.
Speaker 5: Everything first.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Jony, you're similar to September twenty seventh, you were.
Speaker 2: I was September, so I was old for my grade.
Speaker 2: I was on the older side. Yeah, so I was
Speaker 2: yeah tough first. Yeah, which is good, A good spot
Speaker 2: to be in to.
Speaker 4: Like drive to school. The first day of tenth grade
Speaker 4: was awesome.
Speaker 5: All these people that I talked to in like six
Speaker 5: years that were like, hey, and yea, I will, I
Speaker 5: would love a ride home today.
Speaker 4: You know it really oughtn't It was was very good
Speaker 4: for me.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, same here, same here.
Speaker 3: I was probably driving to school because Jonah was older.
Speaker 3: So probably the first day of tenth grade, Jonah, you
Speaker 3: would have been a senior. You would have been blasting
Speaker 3: no effects and getting me to school about ten minutes late.
Speaker 2: Little late. Yeah, it wasn't real priority for me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, can you do well?
Speaker 3: On that note, We're going to take a quick commercial break,
Speaker 3: but we'll be right back with our friend Andy Green,
Speaker 3: and we're back. Well, Andy, we're already getting into so
Speaker 3: much nostalgic stuff, and we asked you for a topic
Speaker 3: for today, and you gave us.
Speaker 2: Like seventeen incredible topics. Yes, thank you, So we're going
Speaker 2: to have to have you back on the podcast. But
Speaker 2: the one that really resonated that I don't think we
Speaker 2: talked about is keyboarding class. Yes, and I'm wonder if
Speaker 2: you could just talk about that. Little Me explained it
Speaker 2: to be like anyone under thirty or thirty five. They
Speaker 2: have no idea what we're talking about.
Speaker 1: For anyone over sixty five.
Speaker 5: It's where they taught you how to type, which was
Speaker 5: an important skill, and you didn't start until sixth grade.
Speaker 5: So I had this vivid memory of being his fifth
Speaker 5: grade walking down the hallway. I was going to art
Speaker 5: class and I looked in this room. It's a whole room.
Speaker 5: It was full of actual typewriters at that point, which
Speaker 5: we didn't have, but our fifth grade, the sixth graders were,
Speaker 5: We're on these all they were on these.
Speaker 4: It was it was these.
Speaker 5: Modern typewriters that were quase electric but were like they
Speaker 5: looked like typewriters. And I'm walking past and the teacher
Speaker 5: it was it was like mister Abins, right right, mister
Speaker 5: Edwards grade Yeah that was fifth grade, Yeah, who was
Speaker 5: my advisory teacher. But so I'm walking past and there's
Speaker 5: this big mustachio guy in there that's like ce B
Speaker 5: A R E space And I was like, holy shit,
Speaker 5: sixth grade's gonna suck.
Speaker 4: What the fuck is that was? It's petrified me.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And by the time we got there, they had
Speaker 5: updated to computers that had a floppy disc.
Speaker 4: It was much more modern.
Speaker 5: They call it typewriters in the side room that were
Speaker 5: piled up to the ceiling, and they taught us the
Speaker 5: home keys and on the whole deal. You know, it
Speaker 5: was sort of intimidating.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, so here's here's what happened. I'm two years
Speaker 2: older than both of you, so I was two grades ahead.
Speaker 2: And here's what happened. We started in fifth grade. So
Speaker 2: we took keyboarding in fifth grade, okay, and they changed it.
Speaker 2: They said, no, now you need to take in sixth grade.
Speaker 2: So we took in sixth grade. Then they said no,
Speaker 2: we're changing it to seventh grade. So my class took
Speaker 2: it keyboarding three years in a row.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Wow, And to this day it's the most valuable skill
Speaker 2: I've probably learned it in my whole school experience. I'm
Speaker 2: such a good typist. I got asdfjklsum here. I'm just
Speaker 2: for transcribing interviews. I mean, it's it's funny.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: We would do like all the games like words per
Speaker 2: minute accuracy. We had like a white out key on
Speaker 2: those typewriters if you made a mistake. But that we
Speaker 2: had to keep doing this class with mister Edwards over
Speaker 2: and over every year.
Speaker 1: So your seventh grade year, was it on a computer or.
Speaker 2: I think at one point, yeah, it was on those
Speaker 2: typewriters because I remember we had it.
Speaker 1: Like I said, they were like word processors, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was a key where if you made a mistake,
Speaker 2: there was like almost like a little thing that would
Speaker 2: click up with it.
Speaker 1: Oh, so it was like a typewriter.
Speaker 2: But then later we had more like almost word processors
Speaker 2: where it felt like there were like almost video games
Speaker 2: where it's like it would time you and then everyone
Speaker 2: would try to type as fast as possible. But also
Speaker 2: you had to maintain a level of accuracy.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, now I remember, well, I remember the ASDF
Speaker 3: some like that, going through those keys, and once in
Speaker 3: a while mister Edwards like I remember like on the
Speaker 3: first day of keyboarding or one of the early days,
Speaker 3: he had us write out like ass or something like
Speaker 3: he had us write like a swear word to like
Speaker 3: be funny, and it really worked. Like it was like
Speaker 3: we were like this is this guy is fantastic. I
Speaker 3: feel like some of his popular like I feel like
Speaker 3: it was harder. I guess, like my opinion of him,
Speaker 3: you know, probably a good person, but as this signments
Speaker 3: would get harder. The class became less fun, like sometimes
Speaker 3: you'd have to type out so much stuff in one
Speaker 3: day in a way that was like, why are we
Speaker 3: like filing these briefs?
Speaker 1: Were like kids.
Speaker 5: In By seventh grade it became secretarial teaching. It really
Speaker 5: taught us how to be a full on secretary. He
Speaker 5: gave us these documents to type out in full and
Speaker 5: we have to format the margins, change the fonts, do
Speaker 5: all of this bullshit, and it got very tedious, and
Speaker 5: I did something I'm not proud of.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Andy, if you don't mind telling this story, end up.
Speaker 2: But I still.
Speaker 5: Confess to something. I'm not a cheater. I went through
Speaker 5: school with honor. In Latin class, I had my I
Speaker 5: had my textbook cloths as I was doing all of
Speaker 5: the quizzes and everything. But seventh grade I had a
Speaker 5: moral failing of I got very sick of having to
Speaker 5: type out all these elaborate things. And they had these
Speaker 5: cases by our computers at that had and there were
Speaker 5: floppy discs and like all of them of our other kids,
Speaker 5: and they were all labeled for other classes. And I
Speaker 5: saw a kung was written on a disc that was
Speaker 5: over my head and I was like, that's James Kung's disc.
Speaker 5: I guarantee you that his work is perfect. It's absolutely perfect.
Speaker 5: So when he wasn't looking the teacher, I put it in.
Speaker 5: I opened up the assignment that he did he did
Speaker 5: that morning. I hit select all copy and put it
Speaker 5: in mine, hit paste and was done for the day.
Speaker 5: I told my friends about this, and they were like,
Speaker 5: cung me. You know, you know I would be cunned.
Speaker 5: So I would sit down and when he would look away,
Speaker 5: I would, I would con my entire row. I would just.
Speaker 4: Put their discs in one second. I would.
Speaker 5: I would control the and we'd all get cunned. And
Speaker 5: we were high five at lunch. We would we were
Speaker 5: going straight eight pluses. We're doing no work. It was
Speaker 5: super easy. And then one day we came in and he.
Speaker 4: Was like, can I see you guys?
Speaker 5: This was a teacher. I'm like, oh fuck. And he
Speaker 5: had circled the same mistake on all three of ours.
Speaker 5: It was like two spaces and two capitalizations that were
Speaker 5: all in a row. And I was like, what and
Speaker 5: he goes, and he goes, the odds of three of
Speaker 5: you you would have the same mistake on one in
Speaker 5: a million. I'm like, that's funny. I don't know what
Speaker 5: it happened. And he's like, it's obvious you two were
Speaker 5: just helping each other. I go, I go, I go,
Speaker 5: how's it even possible we were typing it? And he goes, look,
Speaker 5: I know what happened to you guys that you're working together.
Speaker 5: And I'm like, I don't underneath, I don't understand how
Speaker 5: I played dumb. I pretended I didn't even know how
Speaker 5: that was possible. I think he wound up. We had
Speaker 5: to stare down from it. It was very tense. Whoa
Speaker 5: And I think he gave us like a D minus
Speaker 5: on the assignment as a compromise of sorts, and we
Speaker 5: dodged a bullet and he never even realized that it
Speaker 5: was James Kung's disk.
Speaker 1: Wow, he never put that together.
Speaker 4: And ever put together. It was a different class.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because to.
Speaker 3: Say that you were working together, it's like, that's not
Speaker 3: what happened. Like that would be actually not that big
Speaker 3: of a deal if you were like, here's how you
Speaker 3: type this part.
Speaker 1: Like the point is like you didn't type anything.
Speaker 4: No, I didn't do jack shit. Well, I felt bad
Speaker 4: about it.
Speaker 5: I'm happy James didn't care in trouble because James didn't
Speaker 5: do it dance.
Speaker 3: Do you think that James knew that that happened? Do
Speaker 3: you think he knew you used his disk?
Speaker 5: I think he had no clue into this day. I'm
Speaker 5: sure he has no clue. James, if you're lifting this,
Speaker 5: sorry about that.
Speaker 3: Well, as Jonah pointed, Jonah asked, is this the same
Speaker 3: James Kung who opted to not sign the pledge to
Speaker 3: not smoke in fourth grade? Yes, because, as you know, Andy,
Speaker 3: we were part of the smoke free class of two
Speaker 3: thousand and we were asked in fourth grade to sign
Speaker 3: this thing that said we would never smoke, and I
Speaker 3: signed it and I stuck to it. And I still
Speaker 3: have never smoked and smoked a cigarette because I signed
Speaker 3: a waiver and I don't want to, you know.
Speaker 1: But James stood up in our class.
Speaker 3: I've told this story on here before and said that
Speaker 3: when he's in college he might want to experiment with cigarette,
Speaker 3: which is he's.
Speaker 1: The smartest kid in the world.
Speaker 5: And yeah, yeah, And James was so smart that in
Speaker 5: middle school, a small bus it would come to the
Speaker 5: school in the middle of the day take him to
Speaker 5: the high school. From high school, math classes because he
Speaker 5: was that smart.
Speaker 1: Wow, he was so smart.
Speaker 3: We could do a whole episode about James Kung.
Speaker 1: I mean he's yeah, I just said.
Speaker 5: One more just storygo Chans Kong, that Dan Jacobson. He
Speaker 5: goes to Brown and he meets these friends in his
Speaker 5: hallway and there from Sacramento, which is where James moved
Speaker 5: in the middle of high school. Right.
Speaker 1: He looked at what grade was James in when he moved.
Speaker 1: It was sad when he least like tenth or something.
Speaker 1: I think, okay, okay.
Speaker 5: And so they're talking about the smartest kid in their
Speaker 5: high school that they said that. They go, wow, and
Speaker 5: this kid James Kong with a freaking genius at my
Speaker 5: high school in Sacramento.
Speaker 4: It was the same James Kung.
Speaker 2: Yeah, incredibly God. Well, I want to, you know, speaking
Speaker 2: of mister Edwards, I don't know if you remember this
Speaker 2: Andy so So. Yeah, guy hit a big mustache. He
Speaker 2: seemed like he was like fifty years old. He was
Speaker 2: probably twenty five. Like when you're that young, everyone every
Speaker 2: adult seems so old.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: But he I think got married to another teacher at
Speaker 2: our school, like an art teacher. And I remember actually
Speaker 2: feeling sort of like betrayed by because I think there
Speaker 2: were rumors about it, and then I remember they got married,
Speaker 2: and I was sort of like, well, why didn't he
Speaker 2: just tell us what was going on? That's also like, well,
Speaker 2: why would he tell a bunch of thirteen year old
Speaker 2: kids about his personal life?
Speaker 5: Of course not Yeah, no, And we saw it happening
Speaker 5: because her art room was right across the hall. It
Speaker 5: wasn't Miss Dewey, it was Missotastic or something.
Speaker 1: Yes, I think you're right. I think you're right.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I hope they're very happy. I'm I'm glad that he
Speaker 3: and Missotastic found love. Not the only well, Andy, I
Speaker 3: want to let you say, what were you gonna add?
Speaker 3: Because this is what I was gonna say, is not
Speaker 3: the only couple that got together in Brady Middle School.
Speaker 1: And deceived us?
Speaker 3: Because Okay, I just want to I want to say
Speaker 3: we went on this trip in like sixth grade where
Speaker 3: we went and we were Jonah, I don't know if
Speaker 3: you guys did this too, but we went and we
Speaker 3: we went to learn about the environment by saying it
Speaker 3: like a sewer, Andy, do you know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 3: Where we stayed a few nights at like this like Concerva.
Speaker 5: H Yeah, it was Hiram House camp for older grades.
Speaker 5: And our grade was the first grade to go to
Speaker 5: the Cayahaga Valley C HC A some long acronym where
Speaker 5: we lived there for two nights.
Speaker 1: Sixth grade, right, it was sixth grade.
Speaker 5: Because seventh grade was the Columbus trip in eighth grade
Speaker 5: was DC.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we went to high my grade went. We went
Speaker 2: to him.
Speaker 1: We went to hire Up. Okay, we went to this
Speaker 1: place that was like a little further out.
Speaker 5: Okay, yes, it was by it was by the Ritual Coliseum.
Speaker 5: And we were there three full days.
Speaker 4: I mean I was. I was next mister Turpak and
Speaker 4: a bunk bad was very awkward.
Speaker 1: It was, Yeah, it was really weird.
Speaker 3: And we stayed in these rooms with bunk beds, and
Speaker 3: every room had like maybe ten students or so, I
Speaker 3: don't I don't even know how many, and maybe more
Speaker 3: than that, and one teacher. And I remember the teacher
Speaker 3: in our They didn't put me with like a lot
Speaker 3: of my friends.
Speaker 1: I do remember that.
Speaker 3: I remember being like basically the person that I feel
Speaker 3: the closest to in this room is the teacher, which
Speaker 3: was Miss Merchant, and so we had like we had
Speaker 3: like sort of a night of like girl talk one night,
Speaker 3: like very very like mild girl talk with her, and
Speaker 3: it was like you can ask everyone. It felt like
Speaker 3: very unthreatening. As I'm saying it, it seems more it
Speaker 3: seems more like scandalous than it was. But I remember
Speaker 3: we asked her, like, what's going on with you and
Speaker 3: mister Apple, who was the gym teacher, And this is.
Speaker 1: What she said to us.
Speaker 3: Okay, she fully lied in our faces, which, by the way,
Speaker 3: I love miss Merchant.
Speaker 1: She can do no wrong, but this was wrong. She said.
Speaker 3: Mister Apple and I are kind of the old only
Speaker 3: teachers at Brady Middle School who are the same around
Speaker 3: the same age. So we just really hit it off,
Speaker 3: like we just really get along because we're kind of
Speaker 3: like from the same generation, and we just like, you know,
Speaker 3: we just like talking.
Speaker 1: We're just friends. Cut to.
Speaker 3: Like two years later and they're like getting married and
Speaker 3: she's having a baby. I think I can't remember if
Speaker 3: they had a baby, but they were fully in a
Speaker 3: relationship and she just lied to us. And I remember
Speaker 3: when I found out they were getting married, I was like,
Speaker 3: this is fucked up.
Speaker 4: That's a big betrayal.
Speaker 5: I remember Andy Vermilion saying to me one day, he goes, Dude,
Speaker 5: I went to dinner last night. I was at Jimmy
Speaker 5: Dodono's and at the next table was mister Apple and
Speaker 5: Miss Merchant. I was like, no shit, God, yeah, spotted
Speaker 5: it at Jimmy do Donno's.
Speaker 2: Wow, Wow, Wow, scandalous.
Speaker 1: This is unbelievable.
Speaker 2: And the one thing other thing that you put a
Speaker 2: note about was your diet in high school, which I
Speaker 2: really want to dig into because I think we had
Speaker 2: kind of some similar eating habits. How would you kind
Speaker 2: of describe what you were eating during this period of
Speaker 2: your life.
Speaker 5: It was every single thing I ate from the moment
Speaker 5: I went to bed the moment that I mean for
Speaker 5: that was from the moment I woke rough the moment
Speaker 5: went to bed with sugar based I'd wake up and
Speaker 5: have cappin crunch cereal or like cookie crisp. My lunch
Speaker 5: was just peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and doritos and
Speaker 5: ho hos occasionally I'd have that my my my lunch
Speaker 5: at school was a cinnamon raisin and frosting bread from
Speaker 5: Gales with cream cheese in the center. Which is just cake.
Speaker 5: It's cake for lunch. And I didn't even think of that.
Speaker 5: And then I'd go, yeah, I got go home. We'd
Speaker 5: get Chinese food. I'd get sweet and sour chicken with
Speaker 5: extra sweet and sour sauce, fried rice and like walnut
Speaker 5: prawns coated like a white sugar sauce. And then I
Speaker 5: would then we'd like go to Dragons or something. I'd
Speaker 5: get like a giant Sunday And that was every day
Speaker 5: for years, and I weighed two pounds and then made
Speaker 5: of apple cider and apple juice. I would just mainline
Speaker 5: it all day long, and I never I didn't I
Speaker 5: thought sugar was just in like candy bars. I didn't
Speaker 5: realize that I was happy, like a thousand grams a day.
Speaker 2: Of sugar, I know.
Speaker 5: And it's leat addict.
Speaker 2: And it's also like because back then it was so different.
Speaker 2: It was even probably the peanut butter we were eating
Speaker 2: wasn't didn't even have peanuts, and it it was just
Speaker 2: like sugar flavored like peanuts.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was everything that our moms that they would
Speaker 5: pack us peanut butter and jelly sandwiches just every day,
Speaker 5: and they didn't think that there's no nutrition in this whatsoever.
Speaker 4: Were just white bread and sugar.
Speaker 3: I mean, I will say if you try like Jiff
Speaker 3: peanut butter now or peter Pan peanut butter, which was
Speaker 3: our dad's favorite now that like grocery stores often have
Speaker 3: like organic peanut butter or even just regular peanut butter,
Speaker 3: is just peanuts. And if you try Jiff or any
Speaker 3: of those peanut butters now, you're like, oh, this is
Speaker 3: a dessert, Like this.
Speaker 5: Isn't Yeah, no, it's frosting. And then the first when
Speaker 5: we when we toured Brady Middle School in fourth grade
Speaker 5: and we get into the to the big lunch room,
Speaker 5: I'm like, what is that machine over there by the
Speaker 5: pretzel rods? And they were like, that's a slushubby machine. Yeah,
Speaker 5: slush puppies. And I'm like, you can get slush puppies
Speaker 5: in school. So every day I had like four of them,
Speaker 5: and I didn't know it was basically poison. I mean,
Speaker 5: it was just the most disgusting, sugary, syrupy crap that Monkeny.
Speaker 4: It didn't occur to me.
Speaker 2: They had that little snack bar area like kind of
Speaker 2: and I'd go, You'd be like, I get my lunch.
Speaker 2: I got my girl cheese and I'm gonna like grab
Speaker 2: a couple of zebra cakes like a teenage Nija turtle
Speaker 2: custard bie. Maybe it's slushy. I mean, it's so funny
Speaker 2: to think about it.
Speaker 1: Jonah also had like a real issue.
Speaker 3: Jonah sort of discovered at Brady Middle School cafeteria, like
Speaker 3: what was important to him, and he like learned, how okay.
Speaker 2: This is going to set the tone for my entire
Speaker 2: adult life. You remember we had a certain day of
Speaker 2: the week. We had Domino's pizza Fridays, right, Fridays, okay,
Speaker 2: And I remember it was a dollar fifty slice. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so it's a dollar fifty a slice of Dominoes. And
Speaker 2: I remember going up to a teacher and being like,
Speaker 2: this is too expensive. I was like, a pizza is
Speaker 2: like six dollars. You're charging a dollar fifty is like
Speaker 2: the pizza. And I remember them saying some the effect
Speaker 2: of like Joan, if you think it's too expensive, don't
Speaker 2: buy it. But I remember being like feeling like it
Speaker 2: was this injustice.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it was expensive.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Now you go to like a fancy pizza placer
Speaker 2: paying thirty bucks for like a twelve inch pie, right,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm sure a dollar fifty. I mean, don't
Speaker 2: get me started, but but yeah, I remember having this
Speaker 2: kind of visceral attitude, being like this seems like a
Speaker 2: total ripoff.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and every fourth Friday it would be Mexican Pizza Day.
Speaker 2: Oh I don't remember that. That sounds good though.
Speaker 1: And was that something that was made in the cafeteria
Speaker 1: or that was big?
Speaker 5: So yeah, yeah, it was may there. It was like
Speaker 5: a circle.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well the other real big lunch issue was like,
Speaker 2: remember we were not supposed to leave campus for lunch
Speaker 2: in high school. In high school, even if you had
Speaker 2: a car, And I remember like sneaking out to go
Speaker 2: to like McDonald's or Burger King and there was someone
Speaker 2: monitoring it, and it was like this whole huge ordeal. Wow,
Speaker 2: did you guys ever sneak out to get lunch Burger King?
Speaker 5: Now?
Speaker 1: Try?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you could do it. It was risky. It
Speaker 2: was risky.
Speaker 3: Joanah was taking a lot of risks between between between
Speaker 3: sneaking out to go like a block away to go
Speaker 3: to McDonald's and uh putting. We've talked about this so
Speaker 3: many times, but Andy Joan also had a book scam
Speaker 3: at where he helped contribute to.
Speaker 2: That demys of Borders. I would, yeah, really quickly, yeah,
Speaker 2: I would. I would me and my friend would go
Speaker 2: to Walden Books. We'd buy a bunch of books on clearance.
Speaker 2: Then we'd take them to Borders, say we got these gifts,
Speaker 2: return them no receipt and they would give you the
Speaker 2: full credit and we would buy CDs. So we'd spend
Speaker 2: like shit twenty dollars on hardcover books and then we
Speaker 2: would get like two hundred dollars in credit of Borders
Speaker 2: to buy like like bel and Sebastian import CDs or
Speaker 2: like whatever.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was a pretty good They caught on eventually,
Speaker 2: but yeah, and Dan Patton used to get get deep
Speaker 2: into this awesome and I was using a fake ID
Speaker 2: and then I got busted because my friend's sister was
Speaker 2: working the counter and she was like, why are you
Speaker 2: using a fake ID to return books? And so being
Speaker 2: that age, I just said, hold on, I forgot something
Speaker 2: in the car and just left nice. So that's how
Speaker 2: you dealt with things. And that's so funny because I
Speaker 2: feel like that's so much how I dealt with things
Speaker 2: at that age. If something was stressful, I didn't know
Speaker 2: how to react. I would just be like, I'm just
Speaker 2: gonna leave.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, Yeah that was kind of your.
Speaker 2: It's kind of my move, kind of your mo. Yeah.
Speaker 2: You don't get a lot of resolution though, Yeah, you gotta.
Speaker 2: Then he called me. Then I had to deal with it,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, your friend called you and was like, why
Speaker 1: were you using a fake ID?
Speaker 3: And why did you just run away from my sister
Speaker 3: at Borders?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Very weird.
Speaker 3: Now, okay, I just want to revisit something really quickly.
Speaker 3: So you two never cross paths, and I.
Speaker 2: Don't think so. I mean, you know, Andy, I was
Speaker 2: like playing in bands a lot, like in high school.
Speaker 2: I was playing like like Euclid Tavern or the grog
Speaker 2: Shop or like I was really involved in like punk
Speaker 2: and hardcore and that kind of play. You know that stuff.
Speaker 2: But it sounds like you weren't really as into that
Speaker 2: type of stuff.
Speaker 5: I was going to the Odion back then and seeing
Speaker 5: I was seeing Gensis Chibute bands. Okay, well you know
Speaker 5: I was seeing stuff like that. I was in a
Speaker 5: weird circle back then. Yeah I had I didn't go
Speaker 5: with the grog Shop then, or I ain't that stuff
Speaker 5: in that era that was more college. I discovered like
Speaker 5: different music.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, the Odeon. I would definitely go to the odio.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: It was kind of interesting because I had a guitar
Speaker 2: teacher in Solin, and he kind of would take me
Speaker 2: out with his band and so like we would they
Speaker 2: would play gigs at like Peabody's Cafe or like the
Speaker 2: Odeon or all these So I saw a lot of
Speaker 2: these places when I was like fifteen sixteen, so that
Speaker 2: kind of exposed me to a lot of that stuff.
Speaker 5: I remember being in like eighth ninth grade, some bolder
Speaker 5: kids they played they played Pink Floyd's Money or something
Speaker 5: at a big assembly and they.
Speaker 4: Look really cold to me. I guess it wasn't you,
Speaker 4: though I don't remember.
Speaker 2: I almost got the Orange Talent Show in high school
Speaker 2: shut down permanently, according to mister Hegner.
Speaker 3: Because the Brady Brady Talent Show. Was it Brady Town Show?
Speaker 3: Well that was mister Hegner, was Brady.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, maybe it was seventh grade, seventh or eighth grade,
Speaker 2: I think it was. It was at the high school.
Speaker 2: Maybe it wasn't a high school. Okay, you had to
Speaker 2: rehearse to be in it. It was like this whole
Speaker 2: big thing. I got rehearsed with some guy. Anyways, my
Speaker 2: band played and we were like a punk band and
Speaker 2: like our singer tried to get a mosh bit started
Speaker 2: and like spit on the audience or something, and like
Speaker 2: mister Hegner freaked out and was like, no, kids from
Speaker 2: other schools can can be in the talent show because
Speaker 2: it was a bunch of kids from like Shaker and
Speaker 2: other schools I was friends with. I was just like
Speaker 2: a lot of kids from other schools at that point
Speaker 2: in my life. And it was so funny because he
Speaker 2: was like, we're gonna never have a talent show again,
Speaker 2: and he thought this would be a punishment. Me and
Speaker 2: my friends were like, this is so cool. We shut
Speaker 2: down the whole town show like we thought it was awesome.
Speaker 2: It was so it was like the opposite reaction. They wanted, wow,
Speaker 2: that's great. Really we did that. Yeah, we played that,
Speaker 2: But yeah, I guess, I guess we weren't really crossing
Speaker 2: over in the music. I was also a couple years older,
Speaker 2: so you know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I didn't interact much with the with the ninety
Speaker 5: eight kids.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, ninety eight for life. Well two
Speaker 3: thousand were, yeah, of.
Speaker 5: Course, or like zero zero, which was on our jackets,
Speaker 5: and that really caused a ruckus back in the day,
Speaker 5: right right.
Speaker 3: Right, And by the way, when I was introducing you,
Speaker 3: I said, seniors two thousand rule. Do you remember this
Speaker 3: sort of controversy about the two thousands? Andy and I
Speaker 3: both graduated in the year two thousand and do you
Speaker 3: remember there were like T shirts that like the popular
Speaker 3: girls made that said two thousand on them, but like
Speaker 3: not everyone got one, and then the school made a
Speaker 3: rule that everyone had to get one.
Speaker 1: Remembering the story so poorly.
Speaker 5: I remember first day of senior year that was walking
Speaker 5: in a bunch of people. They were wearing senior shirts
Speaker 5: and I was like, I'm not a shirt. But it
Speaker 5: didn't eve occur to me or possibly be getting along,
Speaker 5: you know. So yeah, I don't call that.
Speaker 3: I just remember everyone saying seniors two thousand rules, and
Speaker 3: it's something that I still say to a lot of
Speaker 3: people when I see them from our.
Speaker 2: High school, right y two k remember that remember that
Speaker 2: one Oh wow theaters?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, that was people didn't know what was going
Speaker 3: to happen, you.
Speaker 5: Know, Yeah, and it was nothing, Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was nothing. It was absolutely nothing.
Speaker 3: We're going to take a quick commercial break and then
Speaker 3: be back with our friend Andy.
Speaker 2: Green, and we're back Andy. Before we get into this game.
Speaker 2: There is one more topic that you sent them. I
Speaker 2: just wanted to touch on, and it was essentially this
Speaker 2: idea that Beverly Hills and I too and Oh set
Speaker 2: some kind of realistic expectations about high school would be
Speaker 2: what it would be like.
Speaker 5: Yes, I watched a lot of that show in the
Speaker 5: first two seasons because my sister is five years older,
Speaker 5: so I was pretty young. I was nine ten years
Speaker 5: old watching this show and high school it kind of
Speaker 5: scared me. It was this big brick building and the
Speaker 5: kids there were so old booking. It's just I couldn't
Speaker 5: imagine being in those hallways. It just petrified me that
Speaker 5: I'm watching this show where everybody is like a model
Speaker 5: and like thirty one years old in dealing with cults
Speaker 5: and rape, and a kid dies when he's a gunnadad
Speaker 5: he start drowing on his finger. Yeah, and everything was
Speaker 5: so dramatic. And then prom came and you had to
Speaker 5: like wear a tux and look like Luke Perry, and
Speaker 5: it was just I would sit there on the couch
Speaker 5: just being like, oh my god, I'm scared for middle school,
Speaker 5: but this shit, Oh my fucking god, I don't know
Speaker 5: how I'm going to do any of this. Yes, I know,
Speaker 5: and I you know, I didn't think that in the
Speaker 5: summers I would like work out like a surf club
Speaker 5: or anything.
Speaker 4: But I definitely thought it would.
Speaker 5: Be more sophisticated and more and more weighty issues were
Speaker 5: going to be dealt with on a weekly basis than
Speaker 5: actually happened when I got there, and now was like
Speaker 5: much older, whereas it was much more like freaks and
Speaker 5: geeks than actually, I don't do it. Oh, and it
Speaker 5: actually happened.
Speaker 1: Yes, it was interesting.
Speaker 3: I remember, I still remember, and I think it was
Speaker 3: because we were having rehearsal for Stage Crafters, which was
Speaker 3: our after school theater program or something, and we were
Speaker 3: rehearsing at the high school. And I remember the same
Speaker 3: thing about the high school being like, as like a
Speaker 3: nine or ten year old, it was like, this school
Speaker 3: is so enormous, It is so scary. How does anyone
Speaker 3: know where they're going at any time? It's just like
Speaker 3: it was like it felt like it was like an
Speaker 3: amphitheater or something like it felt like it was just like, yeah.
Speaker 2: Well in your defense, in both your defense, you know,
Speaker 2: it was eighth through twelfth grade, so you do have
Speaker 2: like thirteen year olds and like eighteen year olds, and
Speaker 2: that's a pretty big gap.
Speaker 3: Also, we only had like two hundred people in a grade,
Speaker 3: so it wasn't like it was like, true, that's enormous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I'm saying the age difference was big. The
Speaker 2: age that big.
Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 5: And we go there to swim when we were at
Speaker 5: Brady and it was scary enough that you had to
Speaker 5: like a little locker room about a bathing suit and
Speaker 5: go do laps and everything.
Speaker 4: It was petrifying.
Speaker 5: And then to walk through those halls and had wet
Speaker 5: hair and he's so little, and it was just like,
Speaker 5: oh my god.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. Do you remember that we had a
Speaker 2: day when you were at Brady where you went to
Speaker 2: visit the high school and like you'd meet high school kids.
Speaker 2: And I remember I was wearing a mega death shirt
Speaker 2: and like I was just a little kid. I was
Speaker 2: like in seventh grade, and I remember like these guys
Speaker 2: being like, oh, this guy's like into you know. It's
Speaker 2: like but I remember it was so scary, like you're
Speaker 2: dealing with the other you have to go visit the classrooms,
Speaker 2: and all these kids are kind of like feeling I
Speaker 2: don't know, I remember like feeling out. The vibe was
Speaker 2: really I remember wearing the shirt and having being so
Speaker 2: scared talking these high schoolkids seemed so old.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I remember there was a bomb threat or something and
Speaker 3: we had to go to the high school and they
Speaker 3: served us lunch in the cafeteria and they gave us
Speaker 3: all free like chicken nuggets. This is what I remember
Speaker 3: about it. And I remember being like, this is awesome.
Speaker 5: It was the best day ever. I love bomb scared day. Yeah,
Speaker 5: that we were in the theater for hours, just like fuck.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was great.
Speaker 3: Also, speaking of the theater in the high school, Andy
Speaker 3: and I had sort of an infamous grade in that
Speaker 3: we couldn't have people come speak to us at assemblies.
Speaker 1: Is that what it was?
Speaker 3: Because we were so rude and we would talk through
Speaker 3: what was the rule.
Speaker 5: We were We were so rowdy and such little assholes,
Speaker 5: and anybody would come in, there'd be a voice in
Speaker 5: the back of the theater like paint us.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 5: We just couldn't be trusted to deal with anybody. We
Speaker 5: were like in a tooriously bad grade.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so they were like, like, you don't get
Speaker 3: assemblies anymore, Like these are a privilege.
Speaker 1: And you don't get them anymore. And because our grade
Speaker 1: would just like yell and talk, it's like.
Speaker 2: The Talent Show. So yeah, we didn't want it. Anyways,
Speaker 2: you're taking away something. Yeah, the moon wants maybe give
Speaker 2: us some privileges we're interested in. Okay, right, all right,
Speaker 2: So let's get into this game, Andy. This game is
Speaker 2: called change dot.
Speaker 4: Door Change Door.
Speaker 2: Otherwise known as you know, let's make fun of people
Speaker 2: who don't know how to use change dot org. So
Speaker 2: in this game, we're going to bring up three different
Speaker 2: somewhat nostalgic things people are trying to bring back on
Speaker 2: change dot org, and we'll each vote for our favorite.
Speaker 2: Great So, this first one is called change Cookie cris
Speaker 2: back to its original flavor. This is thirty three signatures.
Speaker 2: It's made out to General Mills. It's kind of long,
Speaker 2: but I'll really little. It says, years before the age
Speaker 2: of forgetfulness, a sweet treat of undeniable grandeur existed. It
Speaker 2: was a taste of joy and a magical concoction of
Speaker 2: cookie and milk. Flavor. This was the original eighties and
Speaker 2: nineties experience, you know this cookie crisp. Sometimes in the
Speaker 2: two thousand, General Mills decided their indoctrination vis a vis
Speaker 2: the dog mascot have been significantly enacted. Now the celia
Speaker 2: must change its flavor to that of a vaguely depressing
Speaker 2: chocolate whisper on top of whole grain deliberately made to
Speaker 2: sound like corn and bed dog food. Anyways, this person's
Speaker 2: basically saying they change the recipe of cookie crisp in
Speaker 2: the early two thousands, and it's not as good and
Speaker 2: it's not as cookie tasting. Do you have any thoughts
Speaker 2: on this?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think it's a good plan. If you buy
Speaker 5: cookie crisp, you know what you're getting. Yeah, you're getting
Speaker 5: just an injection of sugar, like straight into your spine basically,
Speaker 5: So why water it down? I fully agree it should
Speaker 5: go back to like the previous version.
Speaker 2: Okay, fair enough, finesse you my thoughts on this.
Speaker 3: Yes, I do think it's interesting that they changed it.
Speaker 3: I agree with Andy. I think this is you know,
Speaker 3: sometimes I get annoyed with the people writing these petitions
Speaker 3: because I think they get like a little self serious
Speaker 3: and you know.
Speaker 2: They using some three silver words in this. It's a
Speaker 2: lot for a cookieeshist.
Speaker 1: So we treat of undeniable ander existed. It's like, we
Speaker 1: got it.
Speaker 3: But right, I do think there is a point that
Speaker 3: like that Andy made, which is that if you're buying
Speaker 3: cookie crisp, you know what you're you know what you're buying,
Speaker 3: and it just doesn't I don't know why they're kind
Speaker 3: of watering it down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Jonah, what about you?
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know, I can put aside my my
Speaker 2: issues with the CEO of General knows Jeff Hammeronning. Oh yeah, Jonah,
Speaker 2: He's been someone who I've had a lot of issues
Speaker 2: with over the years. But I will say I'm going
Speaker 2: to take Jeff's side on this one only because Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's like I feel like it's like it's just going
Speaker 2: to be unhealthy. Like it's probably like maybe slightly less unhealthy,
Speaker 2: but it doesn't taste good. Like if this is an
Speaker 2: indulgent thing, just make it what it is. Like I
Speaker 2: feel like trying to make stuff that's really bad for
Speaker 2: you and then being like it's a little lower calorie.
Speaker 2: It's like, what's the point at this, you know? So
Speaker 2: to me, it seems a little silly. Go back to
Speaker 2: the original one. At least you know what you're getting. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And as you want to get into the next petition.
Speaker 3: The next one is called bring back the old TGIF
Speaker 3: to ABC. So obviously already probably piquking a lot of
Speaker 3: our interests. So this was a petition that this woman
Speaker 3: made to ABC. It has twenty four signatures, so it's
Speaker 3: getting there.
Speaker 1: It's getting there, And she.
Speaker 3: Wrote, I am starting this petition because at a time
Speaker 3: like this in the world, I feel as if people
Speaker 3: need to be reminded of nostalgia and happy times. Okay,
Speaker 3: listener podcast, ma'am. The nineties was such a fun and
Speaker 3: laid back generation to be a kid. At times like these,
Speaker 3: I think we need a break from the news and
Speaker 3: TGF was a happy time for many.
Speaker 1: I am urging ABC to bring.
Speaker 3: Back the old TGIF blocks from years ago and put
Speaker 3: them on Friday nights. Everyone seems to be staying home nowadays,
Speaker 3: and it would be a perfect throwback to a simpler time.
Speaker 3: I'm talking all the old classics like Family Matters, Perfect Strangers,
Speaker 3: Full House, Stup By Step, Boy Meets World, et cetera.
Speaker 3: Every week could be dedicated to different shows so that
Speaker 3: we get a variety. It would also be neat to
Speaker 3: be able to see the TGF hosting parts that were
Speaker 3: made so famous. It would take us all back in
Speaker 3: time to happiness. I understand that these shows are on Hulu,
Speaker 3: but why not bring it to a universal network scene
Speaker 3: by all, so that it's free to all who want
Speaker 3: to watch. Kind of like a nod to the past.
Speaker 3: Please help me out and sign this position and bring
Speaker 3: back happier times. Okay, what do we think, Andy?
Speaker 5: I don't think it makes sense to show TV shows
Speaker 5: that every thirty years ago on a network to the
Speaker 5: whole country. I do agree that some reboots would be
Speaker 5: in order. I would love more perfect Strangers. They're both alive,
Speaker 5: they're both willing, and with Susanne Summer's tragic death this
Speaker 5: past week, I think step by step would be tough
Speaker 5: to pull off.
Speaker 3: But I think what this person is saying actually is
Speaker 3: I think this person is saying.
Speaker 5: He show the old ones.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she just wants to show the old ones.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, Well that's crazy. I mean, you can watch
Speaker 5: those on hulugain them from thirty years ago, but they
Speaker 5: could revive family matters that they're all around and the
Speaker 5: story needs to be finished. I've given a much thought
Speaker 5: A bowl can happen. It's a frequent topic when I
Speaker 5: talk with Daniel, our mutual friend, and it has to happen.
Speaker 5: They did Full House, It's it's the next in line.
Speaker 3: I feel like right, And actually, Carl Winslow is showing
Speaker 3: up in a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: He's in that commercial recently.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he isn't Diehard.
Speaker 5: And the show ended he's In't Yeah, and in Diehard
Speaker 5: too in a brief cameo. And I think in Turner
Speaker 5: and Hooge that he's always a cop. He was he
Speaker 5: was born to be a cop. Yeah. But the show
Speaker 5: ended with Steve and Laura finally dating, but it just ended.
Speaker 5: They didn't get married, they didn't have kids.
Speaker 3: We need to say, yeah, yeah, I think we need
Speaker 3: to see what happened. Okay, so you're so you're not
Speaker 3: for this petition, but you're for a version of this petition,
Speaker 3: which is to just bring back family matters.
Speaker 1: Yes, Okay, Jonah, what about you?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you know these shows were good, but yeah,
Speaker 2: kind of to Andy's point, you can still watch them.
Speaker 2: I think these reboots can be tricky. I had COVID
Speaker 2: last week, so I was watching a lot of stuff.
Speaker 2: One of the things I watched was the Fraser reboot.
Speaker 2: It's rough stuff. I mean, it's like it's rough. And
Speaker 2: I know one of your topics was Quantum Leap that
Speaker 2: obviously got gotta reboot. I don't know what your thoughts were.
Speaker 5: Bullshit, it's a bullshit readbook because there's no Vacula. If
Speaker 5: there's no Scott Bakula, it's not quindently fuck this new version.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, so, like I said, yeah, it's tough to do.
Speaker 2: I think these shows, I do think there is something
Speaker 2: nice about like sitting down and having a block of
Speaker 2: shows you look forward to all week. But again, I
Speaker 2: think it's kids today are going to see these shows
Speaker 2: as so dated and adults like we just kind of
Speaker 2: have stuff to do. It's hard. So I think it's
Speaker 2: kind of unrealistic. But I can appreciate the sentiment from
Speaker 2: a nostalgic point of view.
Speaker 1: Vanessa, what about you, Well, yes, I appreciate it too.
Speaker 3: You know, I think this idea to this person is
Speaker 3: better in theory than in practice. I will say, I
Speaker 3: don't know. A few months ago, I was watching TV
Speaker 3: and I was on some weird Network and they were
Speaker 3: showing reruns of step by Step and it's pretty low
Speaker 3: like I'm and i'm I think like Family Matters is
Speaker 3: genuinely a better show than step by Step. And that
Speaker 3: is no burn to to Suzanne Summer's.
Speaker 2: It's okay, no no one affiliated with step by Step.
Speaker 2: He was listening to this podcast.
Speaker 3: I don't know, but I but I so, I think
Speaker 3: there's I don't mean to group them all as like
Speaker 3: being one level of funny, but I do think like
Speaker 3: some of that stuff, it seems like a better idea
Speaker 3: than it is now. I just also have to tell
Speaker 3: a story really quickly, which is that I was recently
Speaker 3: at our friend Jamie's wedding Jonah, and one of Jamie's
Speaker 3: friends was there and she was like, this is my
Speaker 3: husband Rider and I was like, oh my god. And
Speaker 3: it was Rider Strong otherwise always Sean from Boy Meets World.
Speaker 3: And it was like, yeah, I know his name is Ryder.
Speaker 3: You don't have to introduce me to him. Which it
Speaker 3: was nice of this woman to introduce me to her husband.
Speaker 3: She was actually Alex. She was really cool, but it
Speaker 3: was so crazy because I was like, what the hell
Speaker 3: is going on?
Speaker 1: Like I knew I was going to a wedding.
Speaker 3: I didn't know I was going to like a place
Speaker 3: where i'd get to meet Ryder Strong.
Speaker 2: Right yeah, wow, Yeah, So incredible congratulations of Jamien Phil
Speaker 2: on their wedding.
Speaker 3: Yes, and not to make it about myself, what a
Speaker 3: cool thing to get to do, to meet rider Strong
Speaker 3: at their wedding.
Speaker 1: Happy. The coolest thing was that, you know, getting married. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I.
Speaker 3: Would say, I would say that I'm not as for this.
Speaker 3: I appreciate this person sentiment, but as I said earlier
Speaker 3: before I got sort of went on a tangent. I
Speaker 3: recently watched a few episodes of Step by Step, and
Speaker 3: I just don't know that these shows are gonna are
Speaker 3: gonna have the same effect however, many years later, especially
Speaker 3: the original versions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, fair enough, And I think we talked about this
Speaker 2: a little bit when we had mind Bialgone, because I
Speaker 2: think Blossom was part of.
Speaker 1: That yes, which I do think they should reboot.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2: Okay, So this last one is called bring back nineties
Speaker 2: hot topic, and this one has thirty one signatures. A
Speaker 2: lot of people miss the old hot topic. The current
Speaker 2: hot topic is boring, not as unique it used to be.
Speaker 2: An easy access place for any form of the alternative
Speaker 2: community to shop in person. It consisted of trip NYC,
Speaker 2: pants platforms, good quality chains, all band shirts, et cetera.
Speaker 2: Now Hot Topic really has que clothes to buy, and
Speaker 2: it's band shirts are now mostly people like the Weekend,
Speaker 2: Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande, et cetera. I want to bring
Speaker 2: back at least a little bit of its former era back. So, Andy,
Speaker 2: what do you think about the nineties Hot Topic reboot?
Speaker 5: I mean, I think a lot of people they want
Speaker 5: the world to be the same world that it was
Speaker 5: back when they were fifteen.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and things change.
Speaker 5: That the emo scene is not around much, you know,
Speaker 5: it's very different that Billie Eilish is for the current kids.
Speaker 5: And I think times change and it's right for Hot
Speaker 5: Topic to change with the times.
Speaker 2: Okay, fair enough. Yeah, this was a tough one for me.
Speaker 2: I actually I don't know if you remember this site.
Speaker 2: There was this site Hot Topic Grand called Shotgound. Okay,
Speaker 2: so they had almost had like it was like it's
Speaker 2: sold stuff. It was an offshoot of Hot Topic was
Speaker 2: like editorial. So I do like interviews and stuff, and
Speaker 2: so actually, at one point I went to hot Topics headquarters,
Speaker 2: which was in like, oh, Studio City or something, and
Speaker 2: it was it's so funny. My editor was this guy Randy,
Speaker 2: who's a great guy still write for sometimes. And I
Speaker 2: remember walking into this huge building and like this woe
Speaker 2: in front ofs had like really tall like stripes socks
Speaker 2: and I was like, all right, this is like the
Speaker 2: Hot Topic. And each boardroom had like a different theme
Speaker 2: because we got a tour and they were like this, Oh,
Speaker 2: this boardroom is like the surgeon room, and so it's
Speaker 2: like a feel table with like weird like stuff like
Speaker 2: and like the CEO the company was there and she
Speaker 2: was on like like some kind of treadmill desk with
Speaker 2: like a walking desk with like a tr and they
Speaker 2: had like seven of these super big and it was
Speaker 2: a huge warehouse. I think they like ship stuff out
Speaker 2: of there. And yeah, I mean I never really went
Speaker 2: to Hot Topic. I worked at this record store and
Speaker 2: mentor Ultrasound Music, which is like a punk and hardcore
Speaker 2: store and metal and so Hot Topic always seemed like
Speaker 2: a little kind of too corporate for me, but I did.
Speaker 2: I was into a lot of the stuff they sold,
Speaker 2: probably especially the vinyl, So I think it's cool to
Speaker 2: have that stuff. I do think this stuff kind of
Speaker 2: still does exist, like if you go, you know, I
Speaker 2: was actually recently at Newberry Comics and they had they
Speaker 2: had a ton of vinyl in Boston. Actually ran into
Speaker 2: my friend Mike from All American Rejects there. He was
Speaker 2: vinyl shopping too, and it's like, yes, so there are
Speaker 2: stores that still sell this. But yeah, to your point, Andy,
Speaker 2: you got to sell the stuff that's kind of relevant
Speaker 2: to what's happening now. And I'm sure Andy, you personally
Speaker 2: get a lot of this at Rolling Stone, where people
Speaker 2: are like why aren't you covering this like foreigners not
Speaker 2: in the rock hall, or like you know, why aren't
Speaker 2: you covering this thing? And it's like right, cause, like
Speaker 2: this is not the stuff like we need to sell ads,
Speaker 2: like we need to write about stuff like people care
Speaker 2: about more.
Speaker 5: Yes, it's a frequent topic around here that no matter
Speaker 5: what we do, that we anger so many people.
Speaker 2: Yes, Yes, And I think also like the baggage of
Speaker 2: it being Rolling Stone and having that like legitimacy and
Speaker 2: that history. It's like, well, you wrote about this band
Speaker 2: sixty years ago. I don't understand where you're not writing
Speaker 2: about it now.
Speaker 5: Yeah. Yeah, they gets so mad if we cover young
Speaker 5: acts and the kids are annoyed if it's old stuff.
Speaker 4: You just you can't win.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can't win. So yeah, so I like I
Speaker 2: like the fact that there's a store at the mall, yeah,
Speaker 2: where you could get like you know whatever, like like
Speaker 2: a Pennywise CD, and you know that that's in the
Speaker 2: mainstream culture in some way. But I think you can
Speaker 2: find all that stuff now if you look for it.
Speaker 2: And yeah, it's like these stores are just have to
Speaker 2: keep the lights on. So yeah, yeah, yeah, good, it's
Speaker 2: like this other one. Good thought, but I'm not sure
Speaker 2: it works in execution. Vanessa, what do you think in
Speaker 2: hot time?
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, I got a little I looked
Speaker 3: up Shotgound. It was an online music downlin site, retail store,
Speaker 3: and social networking platform launched by hot Topic in two
Speaker 3: thousand and eight. Yeah, now it was only around for
Speaker 3: a few years. It closed down in twenty eleven. So yeah,
Speaker 3: you got to visit those Shotgound offices in their peak
Speaker 3: but very short era that they were happening.
Speaker 1: But I agree with both of you.
Speaker 3: I think you know, hot topic has to First of all,
Speaker 3: it really made me laugh when this person said good
Speaker 3: quality chains.
Speaker 1: I'm implying.
Speaker 3: They're implying they still sell chains, but they're not good quality.
Speaker 1: God.
Speaker 3: You know that just made me remember too, Jonah. Remember
Speaker 3: you would walk around with a chain on your wallet.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know where I got it. Ryan Newman's
Speaker 2: dad owned like an Ace hardware, and we'd go to
Speaker 2: the hardware store and pick out little chains and put
Speaker 2: on my wallet around my neck or you had to
Speaker 2: go to the hardware. We didn't have hot topic, we'd
Speaker 2: go to the hardware store. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: It was seventh grade when the chain wallet's hit and
Speaker 5: they were everywhere, and I was like I was. I
Speaker 5: was like, man, I am not cool enough to carry
Speaker 5: this off. I just can't do it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, let me tell you the problem with the chain
Speaker 2: wall especially, I would get the really thick ones. You'd
Speaker 2: sit on a bench or something that had grus and
Speaker 2: then the chain would get stuck in between like the slats,
Speaker 2: and then you couldn't stand up and you'd be pulling
Speaker 2: on it. And it was a lot of where.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it seems like you're kind of dudgeable out there, Andy,
Speaker 3: but I could.
Speaker 5: See yeah, like like for Carson Bassett, it worked perfectly
Speaker 5: for Michael Wasserman. It was Yeah, it was like born
Speaker 5: with him. It was it was so natural.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, not for me.
Speaker 5: I need to try.
Speaker 2: Yeah, not for everyone. So, Vanessa, so you're kind of thinking.
Speaker 1: I agree with both of you.
Speaker 3: I think doing the old Hot Topic it just feels
Speaker 3: like easy for this person to say, who doesn't own
Speaker 3: the business and have to make money for it. So
Speaker 3: I don't really agree with this petition, even though I
Speaker 3: appreciate the of course, you know, of course, I completely
Speaker 3: understand the nostalgia of it and wanting to wanting to
Speaker 3: revisit those times. But it's almost like you'd have to
Speaker 3: have a different store that sold that kind of stuff
Speaker 3: and maybe call it something like the original Hot Topic
Speaker 3: and then just expect to, you know, whoever starts it
Speaker 3: to just throw money out the window.
Speaker 2: So yes, so that's a fair point. So Andy, if
Speaker 2: you had to sign one of these petitions and just
Speaker 2: bringing them back a cookie Chris to its original flavor,
Speaker 2: bring back the old TJF to ABC, or bring back
Speaker 2: nineties Hot Topic? Which one of these would you sign?
Speaker 2: You don't actually have to sign any of them.
Speaker 1: Can send you the links if you want to I.
Speaker 5: Would definitely go with the cereal. I can go on
Speaker 5: Hulu and watch old sitcoms. I don't really need hot
Speaker 5: topic to be like it used to be, but I
Speaker 5: could use some old school Cookie Chris for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but Asa, what about you?
Speaker 1: I'm in agreement with Andy.
Speaker 3: I like the idea of bringing back the old TGIF,
Speaker 3: but I actually think it would be so disorienting to
Speaker 3: on Friday night turn on ABC and just see those
Speaker 3: especially this person also said they'd want to have the
Speaker 3: old interstitial like host things.
Speaker 1: It would just be like, what the hell is happening
Speaker 1: right now?
Speaker 3: And as Andy said, you can go you know, you
Speaker 3: can watch those shows on other networks now, so the repeats,
Speaker 3: So I would say Cookie Crisp.
Speaker 1: That would be my vote.
Speaker 2: What about you, Jonah, I'm gonna I'm going to go
Speaker 2: nineties hot topic. I know it's not really possible, but
Speaker 2: you know, like, you know, we talked a lot on
Speaker 2: this podcast about Record rev in Cleveland shutting down all
Speaker 2: these stores, and so it's like, yeah, such a bummer,
Speaker 2: And so I think having a store like that would
Speaker 2: be cool. You know, you know, would I go there
Speaker 2: a lot and buy stuff? Probably not? But I think
Speaker 2: in theory and nineties hot topics like selling this like
Speaker 2: alternative stuff would be a cool store, you know, as
Speaker 2: long as I don't have to be involved in funding it. Right,
Speaker 2: So right, that's where I'm going and shout out, you know.
Speaker 2: And I was an employee shotgun, so I got got
Speaker 2: to give them some props. Yeah, so yeah, So I
Speaker 2: think we're pretty much in agreement two to one, but
Speaker 2: not to.
Speaker 1: One, but I think we're all sort of on the
Speaker 1: same page, you know.
Speaker 2: Yes, So Andy, do you have anything to promote or
Speaker 2: where can people learn more about your writing or anything
Speaker 2: like that?
Speaker 5: Yeah, they could just go on the Rolling Song website
Speaker 5: and my author page is there, and I can say
Speaker 5: and see my articles Ice lest Stones last night at
Speaker 5: a small club and I dis reviewed that. So that's
Speaker 5: the newest start. That's the newest article.
Speaker 2: Wow, how was I read? I read? It was really small, right,
Speaker 2: it was.
Speaker 4: Five hundred people.
Speaker 5: I was right by Daniel Craig and Chris Rock and
Speaker 5: I almost Costello. I was right in front. It was
Speaker 5: just mind blowing cool. They played seven songs. They played
Speaker 5: four new ones and three old ones and I get
Speaker 5: to touch mixed foot the entire time. And it was
Speaker 5: like just absurdly cool.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, my god, that's so amazing.
Speaker 3: We did this sketch on SNL once where when Nick
Speaker 3: was I guess he was the host, yeah, and which
Speaker 3: was crazy. And we did this karaoke sketch where Fred
Speaker 3: did his impression of him and and I was played
Speaker 3: his wife, Mick Jagger's wife, and Seth wrote the sketch
Speaker 3: and he was like, and Mick Jagger kept being like
Speaker 3: that guy doesn't really sound like Mick Jagger, and I
Speaker 3: kept being like, yes he does.
Speaker 1: Kevin, shut up.
Speaker 3: Mick Jagger wanted his name to be Kevin, by the way,
Speaker 3: and Seth was like, I remember we were rehearsing it.
Speaker 3: Seth was like, you need to yell at him more
Speaker 3: like you need to yell at Mick Moore. And I
Speaker 3: was like, okay, So I had to be like I
Speaker 3: had to be like, shut up, Kevin, he does sound
Speaker 3: like to Mick Jagger, the shut out he does sound
Speaker 3: like Mick Jagger, You're stupid. Like it was so fun
Speaker 3: and it was so crazy to be like to be like,
Speaker 3: yell at Mick Jagger more about how he doesn't know
Speaker 3: what Mick Jagger sounds like.
Speaker 5: Wow, that'sble.
Speaker 1: It was really it was so crazy, It was really fun.
Speaker 1: So that was so much fun.
Speaker 3: Andy, thank you so much for joining us and everybody
Speaker 3: for listening.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this was so OBVI.
Speaker 3: We have to have you back on Andy because the
Speaker 3: topics that we didn't even scratch the surface of the
Speaker 3: incredible topics we give that you gave us.
Speaker 1: But to everyone who's listening, if you if you.
Speaker 3: Like this, please subscribe to the podcast and keep an
Speaker 3: eye out for next week's episode of How Did We
Speaker 3: Get Weird, where we will discuss more stories from our
Speaker 3: childhood and cultural touchstones like keyboarding class.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Andy, this was so great.
Speaker 4: Of court was so much fun, So thanks to you
Speaker 4: both