Family Trips with the Meyers Brothers - WILL FORTE Missed Out on Hawaii for a Jigsaw Puzzle
Episode Date: January 9, 2024Seth and Josh’s good buddy Will Forte joins the pod! They talk about Will’s trip to the Galápagos Islands when he was younger, missing the ferry to Catalina Island while his family sailed on, and... what he did on one vacation to Hawaii that had nothing to do with exploring the island. Go to usbank.com/altitudego to learn more about how you can earn 20,000 bonus points, worth $200, if you spend $1,000 in the first 90 days of opening your account. Live every day your way, with the Altitude Go Card Limited time offer. The creditor and issuer of this card is U.S. Bank National Association, pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. Some restrictions may apply. Find your new favorite fits and get 15% off @marinelayer with our exclusive link -> marinelayer.com/TRIPS. #marinelayerpod Thanks to BetterHelp for sponsoring this episode. Visit BetterHelp.com/trips today to get 10% off your first month.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Hi, Pashi.
Hi, Suvi.
Guess what I did with my kids last night?
What?
We went to the circus.
Oh, wow.
I haven't been to a circus in forever.
I hadn't been to a circus in forever either.
And because of that, I was not excited about going to the circus.
Oh, I think, yeah.
I'm going to take a moment to talk about this on my show tonight.
The circus was so good.
That's great.
We had the best
time at the circus. I can't even tell you. I think we all lived through a dark age as human beings,
which is when we're seven years old, we think jugglers are the coolest thing in the world.
And then we depart from that knowledge. And we spend, you know, for me, 40 plus years trying to find something
better. And then you're with a seven-year-old like I was last night watching a juggler and
it's the best, it's literally the best thing in the world. Yeah. It's fun. It's magic. It's magic.
Yeah. How good of a juggler are you? Three balls for five tosses. Yeah. Yeah. What about you?
Or five tosses.
Yeah.
What about you?
Three balls for probably like, I can get into a rhythm.
I feel like I can picture you juggling and there's always a great deal of anxiety.
I think your face gets pretty tight pretty fast.
Yeah, my face gets away.
This guy, by the way.
So this was also, this is a German outfit.
I think it's the Roncalli Circus out of Hamburg. The Big Apple Circus is a german outfit i think it's the ron colley circus out of hamburg the big apple circus is a uh yeah so it's the big apple circus is where they host it okay but i did some reading and i
guess this is the first year where they brought in this german troop all right great you didn't
were you doing some reading at the circus no i wasn't i mean i was looking at my phone a lot
of the same thing but that was just to follow football scores and stuff.
Okay.
Yeah, I don't want to be like I was never looking at my phone,
but I was looking at my phone less than I do at other things.
Well, that's something.
That's saying something.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, baby steps.
Baby steps.
And this guy, he was juggling ping pong balls with just his mouth.
Oh, yeah. So picture this. Spit out a ping pong ball, spit out a ping pong ball, spit out a ping pong balls with just his mouth. Oh, yeah. So picture this.
Spit out a ping pong ball, spit out a ping pong ball, spit out a ping pong ball.
Catch, spit, catch.
I think spit probably isn't what they choose as the term, but my God.
And it was real early was the juggler and the kids. It's a great opener because the kids had a real, what is going on here?
Yeah.
Another thing that you will probably enjoy.
No animals. Wow. I do enjoy that. I thing that you will probably enjoy. No animals.
Wow.
I do enjoy that.
I appreciate that more than I enjoy that.
Well, first of all, let me say,
that's great for animals.
I am fully supportive of the fact
that there are no animals at the circus, right?
We all know now.
The truth is out.
Not as good of a gig.
Not as good of a gig as we maybe thought
as kids in the 70s.
Yeah, no.
I think a lion would rather not be in a circus if given the choice.
No animal, if given the choice, would opt for the circus.
There's probably some weird animal out there that's like, I love the circus.
Yeah, maybe like a fat seal.
Yeah.
It's like, they got buckets of fish.
I'd never catch them on my own.
Do a little clapping.
Clap, clap, fish, fish.
You guys, you suckers, go back to the ocean if you love it so much.
Anyway, here's the thing.
I thought it was good.
There were no animals at the circus because of the animals.
Here's why it's good.
It doesn't stink.
I walked in ready for that circus smell.
Right.
That I remember from my youth. There for that circus smell. Right. That I remember from my youth.
There's no circus smell.
It's just normal, the way a tent's supposed to smell.
I would say it smelled like mostly the magic of a circus.
I would say 70% magic of circus, 15% farts, 15% COVID.
Big Apple Circus, everyone.
It was the best. Feats of strength.
Also, we were with Agnes, my niece.
She loves seeing a lady
in a pretty dress. So many pretty dresses.
I bet. Yeah.
It was a wonderful, perfect run list.
There was a 15-minute intermission.
And this was late for us.
We didn't get home until 7.
And it was a 15-minute intermission.
We said, do you want to go home? And it had been an hour. And Ash said, I never't get home until 7. And it was 15-minute intermission. We said, do you guys want to go home?
And it had been an hour.
And Ash said, I never want it to be over.
Kids want the circus.
How long was the whole circus, top to bottom?
I mean, 2.15.
Wow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's as long as Ferrari.
Yeah.
And I will say Axl was a little bit bummed that we weren't at Ferrari.
Well, yeah.
It wasn't out at the time of this recording.
Not out.
Speaking of, you're going to have mom and dad are going to visit you for a week.
And I heard you talk to mom and dad about, this is what a good son Josh is.
He's planning ahead, or maybe not what a good son you are.
Maybe it's just you know how prepared you have to be for their questions.
Yeah.
Of what are they going to do next.
And so you actually have looked ahead to release dates of movies.
Yeah.
Because you want them to have options.
It was Boys in the Boat or Ferrari on Christmas Day.
We've gone with Ferrari.
I've had some people tell me like, oh, I don't know.
I'm not hearing good things.
And I'm like, it's not out.
Who are you not hearing good things from?
But that's friends who are like, it's playing at festivals, man.
Oh, yeah.
You don't need friends like that.
Probably guess who that was.
It's one of the downsides of your life in LA is that you have people who have heard bad things about movies that haven't even come out yet.
I know.
So, yeah.
So I got us some nice tickets, good seats.
Yeah.
Christmas Day.
We've got a dinner reservation right afterwards, sort of a lunch dinner that little hour.
We're going to see Home Alone at the Walt Disney Concert Hall with the L.A. Philharmonic.
I think that this might be the year we introduce the boys to Home Alone.
I hadn't seen Home Alone since we were kids.
Yeah.
And maybe three years ago watched it.
But you didn't even see it when you were a kid.
It didn't come out when you were kids.
You were already a teenager.
Well, that's what I mean then.
Okay.
I hadn't seen it since it had come out.
Yeah.
And watched it three years ago, and it's so good.
See, I feel like we have this very small window.
The boys don't love live action stuff yet.
Uh-huh.
I don't want them to get in their head.
Alexi last year tried to sell them on Elf,
and they just didn't like Elf.
They weren't ready for it.
Oh, yeah.
And now they don't
want to watch Elf.
So I don't want to start
Home Alone
and have it go badly.
So it's a real
whites of their eyes situation.
Yeah.
But I'm very excited.
I would love for them
to love it.
Yeah, I'm excited too.
It's the same way like
years and years ago
I remember
we were somewhere
I want to say mom and dad
was there
and Baby's Day
Out was on TV. What's Baby's Day Out? Wasn't it like a Joe, Joe Mantegna? Am I getting that name
wrong? No, that's right. And there's a movie where like, there's a baby that just gets out on the
loose and Joe Mantegna has to like- Find the baby? I think he's a criminal and something. And it like, it just made us laugh so hard.
And I'm,
I'm hoping to get those laughs out of,
uh,
out of dad.
I don't know.
I'm a dad.
Yeah.
We should also know,
you know,
we did our,
our special episode with mom and dad and we did it before a Steelers game.
And it was a really fun episode,
but I think it's safe to say now we completely jinxed the Steelers season.
It has maybe been the worst three game run of my entire life and and we were flying high and it's been real
bad i haven't talked to mom and dad this weekend and i because i'm just not ready yet yeah well
i mean i don't know why you would talk Steelers with them right now.
Yeah. Yeah, it would be like
calling me to ask how it's going
with Pickles, my dog. Pickles, your dog.
Your dog that died a year and a half ago.
That tells you. We're having a real Pickles
season. Yeah. The Pittsburgh
Steelers.
That would be funny, though. I mean, I'm going to start checking in
on Pickles.
I mean, I love him. Still love him. Still love be funny, though. I mean, I'm going to start checking in on Pickles. I mean, I love them. Still love
them. Still love them, of course.
I still love the Steelers. It should be noted.
Yeah, exactly. It's never going to change.
That's never going to change. But yeah, we wish
different circumstances. Say lovey.
Different circumstances. Have I said how great the circus
was? Yeah, you did.
Okay, good. Hey, I want
to mention something, Josh. Because one of the nice things about that episode with Mom and Dad is we had great questions from the listeners. Yeah, you did. call in with your sibling travel stories. That would be a lot of fun for us to hear. So if you
got a good travel story, it doesn't have to be tied to any place or any time of year, but call
in and leave it for us at www.speakpipe.com slash family trips pod. I wonder what the percentage of
these sibling stories will be saying how sweet your sibling was when you were traveling and what the percentage will be of really running them down.
But again, I think that one of the cores we've been trying to get to with this podcast, if you were still close enough with your sibling to run them down on a public podcast, I think that shows a level of closeness.
I wonder if you have one of these with you and Mackenzie.
I think this might be the most Alexi and I are in agreement on a person,
is how much she and I both love Will Forte.
Yeah, I don't know who it would be for us.
It's really nice, because when he comes up,
I know that we're not going to have a difference of opinion.
Yeah.
And let me tell you something, in case you haven't picked up on this.
My marriage is built on differences of opinion.
It's the core undergirding of every day.
So it's nice.
Sometimes I bring up Forte just so that we can have that one thing we agree on.
He's the best person.
He's the funniest person.
Now, in recent years,
he's a great husband and father. Started later than me. I'm always happy when someone starts
later than me because I started pretty late, but he's crushing it. And I love talking to him.
Yeah. What a treat.
You know what? Let's listen to him. But you know who should listen to first?
Tweety.
Jeff Tweety. Enjoy! Well, hello, hello, hello
That's one of my favorite voices in all the world
My wife just did a last minute cover up
If you can see right where my finger's pointing
There is a picture that she had to cover up her nipple
Oh, because she's breastfeeding or she's laying with a baby Yes, yes Where my finger's pointing, there is a picture that she had to cover up her nipple.
Oh, because she's breastfeeding or she's laying with a baby.
Yes.
Yeah. Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We didn't realize that we had sent that around to our entire family and her nipple was exposed.
Well.
Seth, we might have talked about this on your show.
Yeah, I think we did.
I mean, I feel like more often than not, one of the topics we talk about is how you sent an appropriate,
oh, he's wearing his late name Seth Meyers shirt.
You often send inappropriate photos to people.
Oh, yeah.
On purpose?
It's one of the joys of life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
My mom, for my 40th birthday, sent me a picture of me with a horrible diaper rash in the card.
It was like taped it to the card.
And so I got a real kick out of it.
I sent it around, but the person who most hated it was Andy Samberg.
And so I kept finding ways to lure him in and say,
oh, you got to see this picture of, you know, this ski trip or whatever.
Nobody loves ski trip pics like Samberg.
It made the rounds and all anybody for a week at SNL talked about how it was the worst photo they'd ever seen.
And I managed not to see it and was very proud of that.
And then when Will had a baby, I said, oh my God, send me a picture.
And he sent me that picture.
So I did see it.
Speaking of baby, I have a little visitor who just woke up from her nap.
Oh, look at this.
Hi, Cecilia.
Hi.
Say hi.
Uh-huh.
Yeah.
That's a microphone.
That's a microphone.
Now, Forte, you have two little baby girls.
I do.
Girl, Dad.
You are Orville Willis Forte IV.
So the chain has ended.
There's no Orville Willis Forte V unless you So the chain has ended. There's no Orville Willis Forte the fifth unless
you and Olivia keep trying. Yeah. And that's not out of the cards. That's true. That's not out of
the cards. And if we had, I mean, I feel like if we had a third, it would be another little girl,
which would be awesome. Obviously, if we had a boy, we probably would choose to not break the
chain and name him Orville Willis Forte V. But I mean, if it was a girl, Orville Willis Forte V,
that's, you know, that's not unheard of for a woman, right?
Yeah. And then I feel like maybe she's like Orvie or something, right?
Orva?
I think there's Orva.
Orva?
Yeah.
Yeah. It'd be fine. I mean, and you don't go by Orville.
I don't. In fact, none of the Orvilles go by Orville. It's Buster was the first one.
Junie was junior. My dad was Rebel. Wow. Yeah. So I'm the only person who even came close because
I used the Willis part. Yeah. Why was your dad called Rebel? Who started calling him Rebel?
Was it based on behavior? Well, he's from your neck of the woods. Well, he's from Massachusetts, but his father was
stationed in New Orleans in the war. So he was a Yankee down in Rebel territory. So as a joke,
they called him Rebel. I see.
Yeah, it stuck.
I want to ask about the trips you took when you were a kid, but my kids were very lucky this
summer because you took a trip to where they were. And so Ash and Axel and Addie, to a lesser degree, got to see Uncle Will up close and personal.
Oh, yeah.
And Kristen Wiig was with us.
And I want you to explain to Josh what you and Kristen Wiig tried to do.
You said to me, we have planned a bit during karaoke night.
We want you to introduce the two of us for this bit we are doing.
And then we were all sitting around the fire before karaoke, and you said to me,
we just need like five minutes to get ready for the bit.
And you and Kristen disappeared for 90 minutes.
And then you finally came down with the dumbest wigs I've ever seen.
And what were the names of the characters?
I completely forget.
Do you remember?
I do remember that both of their first names were Katrine.
Oh.
Wait, the...
God, what was our last name?
I could probably find it.
The goofballs?
It was something like the goofballs or the Katrine and Katrine.
Was this a bit for the children?
No, no, no.
Years ago, we used to plan out stuff.
We would go out and we would go to Tom and Joanne's place.
Those are my in-laws.
Tom and Joanne are my in-laws.
Yeah.
By the way, that's the Beatles photo that Tom gave me right there.
And I talked to Tom this morning.
He said to say hello.
You talked to my father-in-law this morning?
Yeah.
Why?
I don't know.
I owed him a call and I was thinking about him this morning. Buddy. I chat with your father-in-law. I love him.
This is not helpful for me. Oh, sorry. I hate him. He's a horrible guy. No, I like that you like him.
It just makes me like, I'm not the most connected person to him from the 2009 SNL cast is a problem.
Well, this makes it sound like I call him every week.
Obviously, I was thinking about him because I was coming on with you guys.
Okay.
And then I realized, oh, I'm going to call anyway.
So, yeah.
Because we have a huge Beatles connection because, you know,
when we were just with you on this trip, we had a karaoke night.
And then everyone took off and went to bed.
And your father-in-law and I sang Beatles songs for like an extra two hours.
Yeah.
And had a fantastic time.
And now there's that new Beatles song where you chat about the new Beatles song.
Yeah.
That's what I asked him about.
And he's still, the jury is still out with him.
I love it.
I love that new Beatles song.
Gotcha.
Have you listened to it?
Do you like it?
I haven't listened to it yet.
But I will say that there are a million funny things about the way Will Forte sings karaoke.
The funniest thing about the way my father-in-law sings karaoke is if you start playing any
Beatles song, he will say, I love this song.
He's just so earnest about the fact that he loves a Beatles song.
Without irony.
It's hard to go wrong with the Beatles, so I don't blame him for that.
I'm realizing that we went very far off track from this Wig story.
The two of you stood up on stage.
You stood on a back porch while we were doing karaoke and bombed for 20 minutes.
Oh, yeah.
Just bombed.
We got a couple laughs in there, but it was spread out over a very long period
of time.
Well, Wig had contacted me like two months before.
She said, we gotta just do a dumb bit.
And so she had bought the wigs and the costumes and we kept sneaking away and writing this.
We thought it was going to kill.
We had so much fun writing it.
And it was even worth the bombing just to get to spend that amount of time together.
Because, you know, we don't get to see each other as much as we would like.
Yeah.
I remember one of those karaoke nights.
Kristen was like, hey, do you want to sing Leather and Lace?
And I was like, sure.
And we did.
And everyone seemed to like it.
And there was no prep.
And there was no bits.
And it was just easy.
You can just get
in there sometimes well i should note that forte and wig then sang the shallows and gender swap
the roles and if you don't know this this is for our listeners if you don't know this about will
beautiful singing voice also one of of America's greatest screamers.
And... I'm on the...
I'm off in deep end
Watchers on Turban
I'll never be in the ground
Sudeikis, if he hears this, he's going to be very upset
because I would be cheating on him with Wig
because he usually does the Bradley Cooper part.
Gotcha.
I'm going to interject
here. Getting real SNL
heavy. Yes, that's true.
Josh likes to try to keep us on a family
trip. That's true. You guys want to have an SNL podcast?
Go for it.
So there I was
hanging out with Alex Borstein.
Oh no, it's a Mad TV story.
Okay, so we can talk about Mad TV.
And Wilmer Valderrama.
Oh, yeah, let's talk about him.
All right.
Great guy.
Forte, you're growing up, your sister Michelle, older than you.
Two years older.
Two years older.
And you guys are super close?
We're very close.
As kids, you were close?
Yeah, we were close as kids.
She would, you know, kick me in the balls like the normal amount of times that an older sister would kick her younger.
Well, probably a little bit more, but I was a very forgiving brother.
I was a very saintly brother.
Also, you kind of are someone I've known to maybe run your balls through the danger zone a bit more.
Maybe even enjoy some of the kicking.
And you're in Northern California.
So what were the Forte family trips?
The Forte family trips, I mean, admittedly, we were very blessed.
We had parents who liked to travel, had the means to travel.
So we would usually, our main trips were going up to Tahoe all the time because my dad was
a huge ski fanatic.
But that, I almost don't even count that because we just went up all the time. So we were stuck in a car for three and a half hours, pretty much every weekend.
Friday night, you would leave Friday night to go up there?
Yeah, we'd leave right after school, get up there and come back Sunday afternoon.
And did you look forward to the ski trips?
Oh yeah, we would love them. My dad was very smart about it. He knew that my mom was not a
huge fan of skiing. I mean, she's not not a fan of skiing. She was just kind of somewhere in the
middle, but not a let's go every weekend skier. My dad, at a certain point, decided to get my
sister and I on the ski team at Squaw Valley, or Palisades now, which was an ingenious move because
every weekend he would just say,
oh, Patty, I don't want to ski.
I got to get the kids up there for a ski team.
So that was on us.
Would she stay behind or would she come with?
No, she would come.
She would come.
Gotcha.
And would she ski or would she read a book in the lodge?
A mixture of both.
She would get out and ski. I mean,
my dad is a fantastic skier. He's 80 and he still skis. We go on this trip every year. It's a place called Bald Face. And you go, you take a helicopter up into this lodge. It's up in Eastern British
Columbia. And then every morning from this lodge, you take snow cats up to all these fresh powder runs. And he's still, wow, like doing these very tough powder runs.
I mean, it's even hard for me getting into the snowmobile.
So the fact that he can do all that stuff, he's pretty amazing.
I should be so lucky.
He seems like the kind of guy who would be able today to beat your friend's arm wrestling.
No, not on that
because he's like if you see him he's just got this special skiing gear okay got you see him
get up from a couch you're like oh this guy's 150 years old and he gets on a pair of skis and he's
like 30 oh that's interesting so i could crush him in arm wrestling. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Seth loves arm wrestling.
Oh, yeah.
I like arm wrestling old days.
I don't think I've ever arm wrestled my dad.
I must have back in the day.
Yeah.
You kind of have to.
I should start arm wrestling my kids now because you have to give them a memory of when you were strong.
Even though I'm only strong relative to them, I feel like I'm wasting the years where I'm taking advantage of that.
There's that really special moment when your kids kind of pass you by.
I remember when I could beat my dad in some kind of physical contest.
It was a big moment.
It was very exciting, but then it was also kind of sad
because you're like, oh, my dad's not infallible.
And he cried a lot when you beat him?
Yeah, he's a big crier.
Rude. Yeah, it's not infallible. And he cried a lot when you beat him? Yeah, he's a big crier. The rude.
Yeah, so back to the trips.
I think the big first trip that we went on,
we would go on little ski trips here and there.
But the big trip was there was a family trip.
My dad's brother organized this trip to the Galapagos Islands.
Wow.
And this was 1980.
We were 10 years old.
I was 10 and my sister was 12.
And this was just amazing.
We had never been anywhere out of the country
and to go to this place,
that's just a crazy, amazing trip.
And it's also for my parents.
They feel good about it because it's very educational
and we get to learn all about Darwin
and all these animals.
So it was awesome.
Although my main takeaway was there was a bird called a booby.
There were a bunch of, you know, the blue-footed boobies and the red-footed boobies.
And I got to bring a shirt home that said, I love boobies.
And I tried to wear it to school once.
And my parents let me wear it to school.
And then they made me take it off and switch shirts.
That does not surprise me that a 10-year-old Will Forte
would just be over the moon about a bird called the boobies.
I mean, isn't that every 10-year-old boy, though,
would be excited about them?
I would be pretty excited.
Isn't most of society pretty happy that there's a bird called a boobie?
I mean, it's just fun.
It's just fun, right?
Seth, I know you play
New York Times Spelling Bee. I do. Josh, do you
do that also? I don't. I do the
wordle, but I don't do Spelling Bee. Spelling Bee,
if you type in boob, it comes
up. If you type in booby, it
does not. Yeah. You know, I think
about the blue-footed booby
all the time. It's like, it is a...
You're just saying from an ornithologist
perspective, you feel as though it's very cruel to leave it out like it is a you're just saying from an ornithologist perspective you feel as
though it's very cruel to leave it out yeah thank you for ornithologically yes yeah they're changing
a lot of birds names right now because they were named after people who have problematic or like
racist or some some kind of you know problematic. But I feel like the booby should maybe be elevated at this point.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Remember the green-clawed peen?
They changed the name of that?
No, I don't know.
Yeah.
And then the long-dong sparrow.
Just banging into things as it flew by.
I remember that.
You have to see this painting.
Yorma and John Solomon got this for me.
Can you see that up there?
Were they SNL writers and performers?
They're on the film MacGruber.
They both worked on the film MacGruber.
Okay.
Independent of that.
Okay, so what is it?
It's a painting.
I think he got it done in Vietnam.
Sure.
Can you see it?
I'm not sure if I can see it.
Kind of.
Someone has a very long neck.
That's my wife's face and my face.
They had it like painted into this thing.
It's like an Elizabethan photo of us.
Well, it's just, it's a podcast.
So the more we talk about things that people can see, the worse it is.
Then why are we recording this?
Why am I looking at your faces?
So, because I want to see your beautiful face.
Oh.
And by the way, on your Instagram,
I love watching all the clips from these.
Good. There you go.
I just saw the Nick Offerman clip.
I didn't even have the sound on,
and I just loved him.
I could just imagine what he was saying.
God, I love him.
He has a very fun face to watch.
How do you get to Galapagos
from Northern California? Do you remember as a 10-year-old? Well, first of all, you
call the travel agent. You got to tell them the dates that you want to select.
You pack your bags. So you do bring suitcases.
You do bring suitcases. We were trying to bring duffel bags back in the day. Well,
I was, duffel bags were so big in the seventies. No, you take a, I don't remember if we flew
straight to Bogota, but we definitely stopped through Bogota and then flew into Quito. And
then we stayed a couple of days in Quito. This was a really fun memory. We stayed in this kind
of fancy Ecuadorian hotel in Quito. And the kids all, once we landed, we went down to the pool.
And my cousin, who's maybe a year older than me, he's probably 11 at the time,
he goes down to the pool and just has a complete brain fart and takes his shorts down.
He forgets that his swimsuit is not underneath his shorts.
But he's right in front of the dining area.
So he just completely flashes his old penis and balls to the entire restaurant
and quickly goes, ah!
How old was he?
He was 11.
Wow.
That kind of is a scarring thing for an 11-year-old.
Yeah.
Again, you saw my boys this summer.
Certainly Axel, who's five.
I mean, it's hard not to see his penis and balls.
I saw it a lot.
I wasn't looking for it.
It found me.
Yeah, no, it was very hard to miss at this point.
Whereas it's funny because Ash is seven
and Ash has now passed the threshold to like shame.
Not shame, but he just knows
that it's not for everybody to see.
Yeah. Oh, your kids are so cute. They were such a delight. That was really fun.
Forte made the mistake of telling the kids, why did you say you were going to send them a present?
I can't remember why. You like rewarded them for something.
I think Alexi said something about maybe if you go to bed tonight, maybe we'll do something for
you. I forget what it was.
And I said, yeah, I'll do.
Sounds like my wife to get something that she wants from the children.
And in return, you give them a gift.
That was so fun.
That was just a magical weekend.
It was very nice.
The boys after you left asked, like, you pulled out of the driveway.
And they said, when are Will's gifts getting here?
And so we had to check the mailbox.
I thought you were going to say, when are they coming back?
Oh, no.
The minute you left, it was just, where are these gifts? I feel like the minute I show up, they always want to know if I've brought them something.
And then I need to be like, well, pump the brakes.
Yeah, I got something and you're going to get it later.
We do so much, you know, preparing them.
Like, just remember, like, they're coming to visit.
They haven't seen you for a while.
Say hello.
Say you miss them.
And you just watch.
They're like, uh-huh, uh-huh.
All they want to know is what did you do.
Where's those presents?
Where's that?
Hey, we're going to take a quick break and hear from some of our sponsors.
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What's that?
It's called the Engineered Stripe Sleeve Tee.
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You know this about me.
Yeah.
I've done some work on myself,
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because it makes me feel as though there's something this about me. Yeah. I've done some work on myself, and I feel like I love a stripe because it makes me feel as though
there's something athletic about me
that is not internally true to my actual physique.
An outside stripe, more like a sports car, if you will.
Yeah, I mean, I've said it before, I'll say it again.
I'm a sucker for a marine layer T-shirt.
They're so soft.
But I feel like right now,
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So you get down to the Galapagos.
How long is that whole trip?
It must have been like 10 days.
We spent a little time in Quito and then we went to Rio Bamba and went to this big market. And then we took a train from
there, I think, to Guayaquil, which is a coastal city from what I remember. And then you take the
boat over to the Galapagos and you're just out in the boat for, you're just staying on the boat the
whole time and going to different islands. You sleep on the boat?
You sleep on the boat. Yeah.
Do you like sleeping on a boat?
Do you have fond memories?
I'm okay with it.
I don't get seasick.
I'm lucky in that way.
Some of my cousins were having a rough time.
Yeah.
It's so funny because all the stuff I remember
is all stuff a 10-year-old would remember.
Like, I remember the boobies thing, and I remember...
The boobies?
You remember your cousin showing his genitals? Yes, and then anotherobies thing. And I remember... The boobies. You remember your cousin showing his genitals.
Yes.
And then another genital thing.
There was this guy, Rui.
He wore these short shorts and no underwear.
And he would always be on the boat with his leg up.
So it was like, those were my memories.
Oh, I do remember seeing some turtles swimming with sharks, iguanas.
The iguanas were a little bit of a letdown, I got to say,
because beforehand my parents were showing me pictures of the stuff we were going to see.
And in the books, I thought the iguanas were like the size of, you know, a St. Bernard.
Right, like full dinosaurs.
And then they're just like regular, like pet store lizards.
Yeah, so I was probably a little asshole, you know.
Yeah, that's great.
Can we get back on the boat?
And Rui was one of the guides.
Sure, sure, Rui was.
Yeah, yeah, very handsome.
He was handsome.
When someone does that,
they must know that they're sort of flashing you in a way.
And it's almost like something that you can't not look at.
I think so.
It's like a dare to sort of like look up somebody's shorts
when they're squatting down on a boat.
And I'm going to take that dare every time.
Well, yeah, you got to.
Right?
I wonder if they, yeah.
Yeah.
Hard not to.
It's hard not to.
Yeah.
I hope you're comfortable telling this story
because I've heard it from other people
and I think we talked about it this summer.
Okay.
I'm going to count this as a family trip. This is years ago. You are going to Catalina
Island with a girlfriend at the time. Okay. Colin Jost, I believe. Okay. John Solomon. Yes.
Your mother, I believe. John Solomon says, say hello. Also, I just talked to him. My mother,
yes. And you get to the boat. I've never gone to Catalina Island, but you get to the boat. That's a ferry, correct?
Yeah.
And you are currently starring and creating the show Last Man on Earth,
and you have a script for it due, and everybody gets on the ferry but you.
Okay.
And you sit in the parking lot, and you work on the script
and waiting for the next ferry.
You make your mom and your girlfriend go to Catalina Island without you.
Did I?
I don't remember that.
You were so focused on that script.
But I mean, it certainly is possible.
First of all, in fairness to me, you know, when you got a deadline, you got a deadline.
Yes.
And I am blessed to have a bunch of people in my life who are fantastic and fun to hang
out with.
So having to go on a boat ride to
Catalina with my mom is a treat. Yeah, Patti Forte is a real laser-focused good time.
And this girlfriend, Celia, this was Celia, and she was super wonderful also. So everyone's a
winner. They don't have to hang out with me for the boat ride. You heard me talking?
All these years later, I thought maybe your perspective on this would be apologetic.
But it seems like...
No, do you know what?
This makes me feel really good because it means that Jost really wanted me on the boat.
He wanted to talk to me.
So that makes me feel better.
That's so funny.
I don't...
God, it's so crazy the things that you remember and the things that your mind
lets go. I remember that trip just a little bit. I don't remember anything about that part of it,
but I remember my mom falling asleep on the way back and just taking all kinds of video of mom.
That's kind of it.
Wait, you take video of her sleeping?
Or the stuff that I remember, just all the 10-year-old boy stuff.
And I can't remember.
I meet somebody, and I try very hard to remember their name now, and I can't at all.
Yet, if I saw somebody from elementary school who walked by me, somehow the name comes up.
It's like, wait a second, are you Van Sy?
I just did a charity event in my hometown. And backstage, a woman walked over.
And I was like, we went to middle school together.
And we totally did.
Oh, yeah.
It's so weird.
There was this really amazing show that we just did.
What is it?
The MPTF?
Is that what it's called?
Yeah.
The Motion Picture Television Fund.
So there was this show that we did where you find out the show you're doing a couple days before we found out it was a chorus line.
And so then you have like two days to learn the entire choreography and script of a chorus line.
And you don't find out till the day before what your actual character is.
It was this amazing time.
Wig did it too.
And On a Gas Tire and just all these amazing people, Jim rash and nap facts and just ton
of groundlings.
And Kristen bell was the lone non-groundling who did it.
And afterwards I'm in the lobby and this woman came up who I knew from years ago, but I,
you know, I couldn't remember was this elementary school or junior high or high school?
And I still don't know.
It was, actually, I did figure it out.
It was college.
But it's just crazy how it all just becomes a little soup in there.
You mentioned John Solomon, who is your longtime writing partner.
And he's also friends with Colin Jost.
One of my favorite things that ever happened to Solomon is he was on vacation with Jost.
He's probably, what, 15, 12, maybe 10, 15 years older than Jost.
Does that sound about right?
Somewhere in there.
How old is Jost now?
I'm not quite sure.
But he's in probably 40?
Yeah.
Solomon's 53.
All right.
So it's that.
So think about it.
It's probably in the 10 to 15 range.
Anyway, they were walking down the beach together.
They were surfing.
They were on a surfing vacation.
And they started talking to some people.
And one of the people said, it's so nice to see a father and son on vacation together.
And real burn on Solomon.
A huge burn.
And then do you know what happened a second time on that trip?
Somebody else came up and said it.
Yeah, two different people.
I think this is more about how good Jost looks than how old Solomon looks.
But here's my favorite part about it, is John said, and Colin had a beard.
Yeah, John's like a very handsome.
But then here's the final burn is Jost and I just did an event together in Boston.
And I'm talking to a woman and Jost is standing next
to me talking to somebody else. And she goes, so you have, I go, I have three kids, two boys
and a girl. And she points to Jost and goes, and this is your oldest? Wow. So it happened to me
too. So bummed. Oh my God. I mean, you know, my wife got me a sweatshirt. She had one made that says,
Dad or Grandpa?
And I'm telling you,
most everybody goes with Grandpa for sure.
All right, I'm going to just keep trying to get you
to tell stories about trips that I've heard about you.
Okay, okay.
I have a couple other trips that I've sing've singled out i just want to ask this one
and then we'll get back to what you've planned to tell us but you uh you are a very detail-oriented
guy if you have a task in front of you it is often hard for you to move on to the next thing yes
tell us about the jigsaw puzzle a friend made you that you then spent an entire week in hawaii staying
inside to complete okay um i guess i should tell you the run-up to it so please i had a friend and
i will not say her name is this woman we have a a friend who's a doctor and so anytime any of us
have any kind of problems um we'll call this guy up and say what is going on.
Yeah, any kind of medical problem.
Before we call our own doctor, we just call to see if we even need to call our doctor.
And he's awesome.
And for her, she had some kind of lumpy thing in an area of her butt, which she wasn't sure what it was. So she sent him a picture
and then she, at some point we were having dinner and she said, she told me that story and I said,
oh my God. And she showed me the picture. And so I said, to make you feel better, I'll send a
picture of my butt to Brian, or maybe it was just a joke. So anyway, I outed him. His first name is Brian, but there are a lot of doctors named Brian.
He's a great doctor. Anyway, so we send him this picture of my butt. So months go by and we took
this big friendship trip to Hawaii. Solomon was there too. And she surprised me. She had the picture that I had taken of my
butt turned into a thousand piece jigsaw puzzle or 500. I'm not sure which one, but it's just like,
it was crazy. And it's just all the butt. And it was the hardest jigsaw puzzle of all time. Because it's mostly just like pasty white pieces where you don't, you know, you don't, you just can't figure out where.
Because you have the crack, which, and then a little shading on the outside or, you know, where the tan line turns.
But other than that, it's just like all white, you know.
Who took the picture, may I ask, of your butt? She must have, or maybe I did. I don't
remember. I'm proud of the picture. It's like, yeah, it was a good butt pic. Good looking butt.
I feel like that, you know, but it's more medical than sexual, right? Like this is not something,
this isn't a turn on picture. This doesn't sound like a picture. Definitely not a turn on. Yeah.
Is it true that when given a task like completing a jigsaw
puzzle of your own butt like you did forego being outside oh yeah we're in this beautiful this was
when uh i was doing last man on earth so we would reward ourselves at the end of the season and just
splurge on this beautiful cabin in hanalei beach um It was actually right next door to the place where they filmed
The Descendants. So it's just, you're in this beautiful house with this big stretch of grass
that leads right to the beach. And it was fantastic. We jam a bunch of friends in there.
So I have all this beauty at my fingertips and I just am laser focused on staring at my own butt
at my fingertips, and I just am laser focused on staring at my own butt just like the whole time.
And I never finished it. I never finished it. Really? It was an impossible task. I think that shows growth for you, Forte, that you managed to not finish it. The kind of jigsaw puzzling that I
do, people just have to, when I go to the restroom, they just have to destroy it and put it in the box. And that's the only way to get me off it. Yeah, I remember a
New Year's trip that my old girlfriend, I went to the bathroom and she's just like,
we've got to destroy this. And I even still wanted to keep going.
I do really like a jigsaw puzzle on a vacation. If you've rented a house or something like that,
to just lay it out on the dining room table, because very often at those you don't actually like use like the big dining room table.
But to get up in the morning and have your coffee and sit around, I find that jigsaw puzzles are great for conversation.
And then if you do make progress and eventually finish it, it's very satisfying.
It's a really good like Thanksgiving and holiday season thing.
It's really fun.
Because the way most people do it, it's fun and you're chatting.
And I'm the guy who's like, I've got to race to get the section finished.
Yeah.
And it's also, I think, the other difference between you and most people
is they're not doing one of their own butt.
I bet there are more butt puzzlers than you think.
And now, is that the term? It is butt puzzlers? That is what they're called? Yeah. Yeah.
And now we're going to take a quick break to hear from one of our sponsors.
This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Hey, Pashi. Yeah, Sufi. You know, a lot of people,
this is the time of year, New Year's, take stock of yourself, decide what you want to change,
what you want to work on.
Do you have any big plans?
Yeah.
I mean, I feel like you and I both have this thing where if we encounter like a loaf of bread and some great dip,
we're probably going to go through the entire loaf of bread and the entire thing of dip.
Yeah.
Are you going to try to stop doing that?
I want to stop doing that.
You know what?
I would say a good resolution for me.
I do not order cheese anywhere. I don't order dairy. If there's a cheese plate at a party, I'm going to be there the whole
night. Yeah. So I'd love to maybe try to wean myself off an entire cheese plate. Not only
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All right, so what other trips do you have to tell us about?
Well, okay, let's see. Again, I need to preface this by saying I am the luckiest person in the
world to have gotten to go on these trips, but I went on a trip to Italy and Croatia. Well,
at the time it was Yugoslavia. It was, this was back in the mid to late eighties and just,
the time it was Yugoslavia. This was back in the mid to late 80s. And my parents somehow let me and my, there were two families that were going and the oldest son who was one year older than me,
when we were probably like 18 and 17, they'd let us get your rail passes and go cruise around for
like two weeks before we met up with them at the Spanish Steps in Rome.
And basically, this is before cell phones.
And we just got to do whatever we wanted to.
And they said, as long as we met up with them at one o'clock on the Friday,
whatever it was at the Spanish Steps.
And it's like, oh my God, I would never let my kids do that.
That's so great that they did.
But we just had this magical time all over
the place. I'm sorry, it was you and your sister were traveling? She wasn't there. It was just me
and this buddy. And then we met up with my sister in Rome. And then we had like a Italy-centric,
ended it in Croatia for a couple of days in Dubrovnik. But the early part was just us.
We would know, we'd say like, okay, we're in Spain, we want to go to Paris.
And then we'd look at the train route and we'd write down a bunch of the names of the cities
along the route that we were heading up and we'd throw them in a hat, crumple them up and we'd pick
it out. And that would be the place we'd stop. And we got so lucky. I remember, I don't remember
where this was, but one of those stops was Avignon. And it just happened to be the day that they were having this yearly festival.
And we just got really lucky with all that stuff.
Did you go to the bridge?
The bridge.
I don't.
We.
Monsieur Le Pont d'Avignon.
Yeah, probably.
L'on y danse, l'on y danse.
You've been.
Monsieur Le Pont d'Avignon, l'on y danse, l'on y danse.
Monsieur Le Pont d'Avignon, l'on y danse en tout en rond. Are you sure it's real or just a song thing?
I don't know.
Gary, Indiana, Gary, Indiana.
I know Gary, Indiana is real.
One of the things that we did, this is crazy.
We were in Paris and we had been there for a couple of days and we loved it.
But we also felt like we should move on and a couple of days and we loved it, but we also felt
like we should move on and see these other things that we've never seen. We were torn. Like, do we
stay another day in Paris or do we leave? While we're kind of discussing this, this wonderful guy,
Mike Snell, we noticed that there was this dude down below our hotel. We're looking out the window
and he was just picking his nose and wiping it on the windshield of this car. And it was pretty funny.
And then we, we looked at it for a while and then we,
we kept discussing like 20 minutes later, we looked down,
the guy is still picking his nose and wiping.
And we don't know if it's his car or if it's like,
he's got an ax to grind with the owner of the car. And he's, it's,
it's like, he's got this endless supply of boogers.
And he just keeps going and going. And so we finally, my buddy takes a shower. He gets out.
He's still going. So we said, okay, here's the deal. We're going to go get some breakfast.
If this guy is still there picking his nose and putting on the car, when we get back, we are
leaving. And if he's gone, we're staying on the car. When we get back, we are leaving.
And if he's gone, we're staying here in Paris.
Because I think secretly we wanted to stay in Paris for another day.
Yeah.
And we thought, there's no way this guy will still be there.
Sure enough, we have a breakfast.
We come back and the guy is still there.
We took a bunch of pictures of him in the background. We were pretending to take pictures of the hotel sign.
But I'll always remember, he looked very French. Do you still have those pictures? I still have the pictures. Yeah.
Any other highlights on that sort of two-hour cruise around with your buddy?
So once we did meet up with my parents, we went to Positano, which is about the most beautiful
place on earth. We've been to Positano with our parents. Yeah parents yeah oh really yeah it's did you stay at
we rented a uh an apartment yeah yeah we stayed at the fancy hotel by the way i you know as i tell
this story i do realize how fortunate i was to get this opportunity i mean it's like you know
not everybody gets to do these things we were very very lucky that our parents did this for us. So, but anyway, there was one night that I say that as I'm about to be an
asshole who takes it for granted. We there's one night we're in Positano, you know, we're there for
two nights probably. And then, but there is this well-known incredibly fancy restaurant that I
didn't really give a shit about because I'm 17 at the time or whatever.
So this is with that other family. I come down, I'm dressed, the very rare occurrence of me
tucking in my shirt, I have my shirt tucked in, I'm wearing a belt. That was unheard of back in
the day. So I come down, my mom says, oh, Willie, you look very nice. You look so nice. I'm like, thank you.
And then the two boys from the other family, the one that I had been traveling with for two weeks and his younger brother, Jeff, they come in.
And their mom, Linda, says, oh, you guys look good, but you have to go shave.
And then my mom says, oh, yeah, Will, you have to go shave.
And I'm like, oh, no, no, no, no, no.
You already said I look great.
So I am not shaving.
Thank you, but nice try.
And she said, no, no, no, no.
And then she dug in hard and we both, we had a dig in contest.
And so it finally became this thing where she said, you're shaving or you're not coming to this restaurant.
And I said, I don't fucking care about the restaurant.
I'll stay here.
And so they all go to this restaurant.
I stay and have, well, it was probably whatever it was, was delicious.
Everything in Italy is delicious, but it was certainly not like whatever the most amazing
restaurant. They came back and I think they felt
guilty, but even with not trying to lord it over me, because they felt bad that I hadn't gone,
they were like, this was the best place I've ever gone. And I regret that to this day,
but I also kind of harbor resentment towards my mom. It's like, she did say I looked great.
kind of harbor resentment towards my mom.
It's like, she did say I looked great.
And by the way, I'm 17.
You know, it's like these tiny little hairs that nobody can see.
It was just like her making a power play.
Yeah.
Or also her just being influenced
by the other family on the trip.
She didn't believe in her own parenting.
She couldn't have faith in herself.
I want to go back to you saying you would never let your kids do that because I feel the same way.
And I feel like we have to shake free of that, Will, because I'm so jealous I didn't do one of those Eurorail trips.
Josh and I lived in Amsterdam after college, and that was an adventure in its own right.
But it was after college, and I didn't move around as much as I should have. But thinking back,
if I was with a buddy, 18 years old, on a train around Europe, I so wish I'd done that. So we
have to make sure that we allow our kids to do those things. Oh yeah. I mean, that's, you know,
I'm sure that I'll loosen up the reins. It's just so tough, you know, and kids are about to be three
and one just turned one. Well, not now. Don't let them do it now. No, I know. But it's just so hard to put your head in the space of like, oh, one day they'll be
driving cars.
I mean, getting a driver's license terrifies me.
All of this.
Staying in hostels.
Yeah, staying in hostels.
Yeah.
Yes.
Did you stay in any hostels on that trip?
Me and Mike Snell decided it.
Yes, we stayed.
That's all we did. There was one time we went to Siena and there was a hotel that was under construction.
And somehow my buddy got us this huge room for super cheap just because he talked his way in.
I forget how it happened, but every other place was like dirt cheap.
Yeah, so fun.
I've only stayed in a hostel one night in my life. I've stayed in like hotels, but, but I liked it. I liked it as a thing.
Where was the hostel? In Panama city. Oh, really? I've never been. In old town. I was with like,
with a big group who was on a trip for a new year's and we stayed on the sandblast islands,
which are these little like postage stamp sized islands. And we had one
night after we got back to Panama city and people were staying in like a fancy hotel. And I was like,
I want to stay downtown, but it was like one of those bunk rooms where you just, you know,
throw your suitcase on a bed and that's your bed. And then if you want to go out, you just leave
everything there and you just hope no one's going to root through it.
And I'm sure there must be some, you know, code of ethics that goes along with people that stay in hostels.
But also, I feel like hostels are open to people who maybe don't abide by that code of ethics.
Yeah, there are people who go like, oh, I know these people believe in this code of ethics and all this stuff.
But would you meet people at hostels?
Like I would imagine hanging out in the common areas or did you make friends along the way as you sort of traveled with your buddy?
Yeah.
I mean, we had some people that we kept in touch with and we'd say, oh, we're going here, but why don't we meet up in this area?
But it's so funny that I forget all that stuff. And then I was just looking through the pictures
a couple months ago and I'm like, oh, that's right. This dude was all over our trip and I
had forgotten all about him. Yeah. I mean, it's so fun because everybody who's staying at hostels,
there are so many people just traveling on their own, which I have so much respect for.
I never did that where I went out and just went out completely on my own.
I was always with usually one other person or more.
But what a badass thing to do, to just go out on your own and commit to, oh, I'm just
going to go wherever and have to put myself out there and meet new people.
And it's easier than you think it would be.
But you're taking that first step is the hardest part, right?
Sure, yeah.
I'm hoping one of the upsides of having New York City kids is that they will be less,
I don't know.
I think I would have been so afraid as a suburban kid to just give myself over to European travel.
Oh, yeah.
Maybe they'll be braver than I was.
Have they gone overseas?
I know you go to Amsterdam a bunch.
That's a special place to you.
Have you taken the kids there?
They haven't gone there, but we have taken them to, we took them to Italy, but Axel was
too little to, I don't think either of them.
And then the pandemic happened and now we have not gone overseas since.
But I think it's about time for them. And then the pandemic happened and now we have not gone overseas since. But I think it's about time for them. I think the thing that has been missing with our kids is just that they
haven't been excited about any of the big trips. You can like bring them, but I want them to be
excited for the two months leading up about the fact that they're going to Italy. You also want
them to remember it. I feel like I have friends who have traveled with little kids and then those
kids are now teenagers.
And you're like, hey, how was it going to Rome?
And they're like, I have no memory of it.
I see pictures.
But I guess in the moments, if the kids are enjoying it, then that's great.
It's myakalopikus.
I was 10 at the time, too.
If you go when you're even younger than that, yeah.
The other thing I want to stress is if the iguanas were that unimpressive when you were 10,
now that you're fully grown, imagine how shitty those iguanas are.
Yeah.
But also, you know, this is 43 years later, so they've probably fattened up and evolved. Big, long, cool beards.
Do the iguanas' moms make them shave before dinner?
That feels good.
So you drive to Lake Tahoe.
Did you do any other sort of Western United States road trips?
Did you do road trips?
It sounds like you were a flying family for the most part.
My mom's side of the family, they're big into hunting and fishing.
They live up in Seattle.
I'm actually going up there north bend for Thanksgiving. Although my house will have several policemen staying here in case anybody is hearing this and thinks that we're getting here.
Do you always have policemen stay when you travel?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's not Airbnb, but it's a different service where you can have police officers.
Or LAPD.
But they were big into hunting and fishing.
So we would every summer go up to this dude ranch in Montana.
And we did that probably from the time I was like 8 to 13 or 14.
Oh, it was so fun.
That family has seven kids.
And just getting that collection of kids together with me and my sister, it was
magic. I mean, a dude ranch is so fun for kids. You're riding horses twice a day and you're
going out and crapping around with a fishing rod. I sucked. I was so bad at fly fishing,
but it was fun to try to... Just that motion is very fun. Yeah, but it was
great. And now I think the place that we used to go, it was called the Boulder River Ranch. And I
feel like Tom Brokaw bought all that land. Do your Tom Brokaw, because it's so good.
See, I've always known for my Brokaw.
See? I've always known for my broken heart.
So I feel like this is a cheat, but it's one of my favorite stories.
And I think it fits.
Josh, you can decide after if you'll allow it.
Okay, I'm going to decide before that I'm going to allow it,
but I'm also deciding before that this doesn't fit.
I think it fits.
In family trips. Okay.
Because it's a trip that began my current family. Okay. Because it's a trip that began my current family.
Okay.
Will Forte and I were in Albuquerque, New Mexico,
filming MacGruber.
Wonderful film.
2009.
2009.
Alexi and I had been dating for about a year.
And Alexi is from New Mexico.
So Alexi and her sister Ariel came to visit us in New Mexico.
Therefore, it is a trip.
Josh, do you allow?
Okay.
Yeah.
All right.
Yeah.
And we're like family.
And you definitely are like family with your wife.
Yes.
Now, officially, legally.
So we go back to Alexi's parents' house, Tom and Joanne.
Will's best friend, Tom, and his wife, Joanne.
So we're driving in two separate cars.
I'm driving with Alexi, and Will is driving with Ariel,
my sister-in-law, and Ariel mentions to Will that Alexi and I have been dating for a year,
and I have not said I love you yet.
We get to the house, and the four of us get into the hot tub,
and Will, do you remember what you said to Ariel?
I do. I told
her that I loved her.
I told
her that I loved her.
Not just that.
You said Ariel I love you
and I don't know why
I would wait a day more.
When you know you know.
And I had no idea that they had had this conversation.
And it was, I was already in a hot tub,
and yet I feel like the temperature of the hot tub doubled.
I was so, I felt so much shame.
How long had you been together, by the way, at that point?
I'm sure I'm going to say a year,
and if Alexi was here, she would say it was like 19 months.
All right, so act two of this story is now I've said I love you.
She knows I love her.
But we've been together for five years.
And we are not engaged.
And I'm at an SNL after party.
Will has left SNL.
He comes to New York.
He comes to the after party.
He lives in LA, Josh.
So it's a trip.
He takes a trip to New York.
OK.
And he walks over to the table.
I'm sitting with Alexi, and I'm sitting with Ariel,
and you walk straight over to us,
and Will, do you remember what you did?
I proposed to Ariel.
I made sure that everyone knew
that it was pointed at you and Alexi.
Yeah, no.
But you took a knee at our table
and said,
Aria, will you marry me?
I would be a fool to wait a day longer.
I mean, again,
I feel like Alexi really...
It worked.
It worked.
Alexi really loves wig,
but I do still think
that you are her favorite
of anybody I've ever worked with
for those two moments.
Pretty good.
I love Alexi.
That was one of the funnest times
being back there with you guys this summer and spending that time for Wig's birthday.
It was great. There is one more thing. Please. For some reason, this registered. I went on a big
cruise with my family, my dad, my sister and her whole family. She's got two kids.
And then my dad's side of the family several of
his brothers and their kids and grandkids cruise from vancouver up to alaska it's delightful well
the the kid who's putting kid my age who's putting it together says i got us all these
drink coupons there's like a drink special where it's like 15 drinks for a day.
And I'm like, are you fucking kidding me?
Wow.
That's a waste of money.
15 drinks every day, every day.
We roared past that.
It was, I mean, you wake up and you're on a cruise.
So you wake up and you have a Bloody Mary for breakfast.
And then everyone's just sitting around after breakfast.
So maybe you get a second Bloody Mary.
And then you take a nap and you wake up and you go have a Bloody Mary.
And you have, you know, you're just sitting around.
So then it's like, okay, I'll have a little pre-lunch glass of wine.
And then you drink a glass of wine at lunch.
And then you're sitting around after, so you have another one.
So you're at like six or seven by the early afternoon.
But it's just, it was crazy.
We would hit 15 easily every day.
And I didn't think that was possible.
And it's a testament to the human spirit.
Wait, how old were you?
This was like five years ago.
Okay, gotcha.
All right.
Yeah, that's impressive.
This was pre, you know what?
Probably seven years ago.
Because Olivia, my wife, was not part of it.
So that sounds like the kind of drinking you can do in your mid-20s.
But yeah, sort of late 40s.
For some reason, nobody woke up with a hangover the next day.
Yeah, I guess when you hit a rhythm on a drinking vacation, it can just sort of, it all bleeds together.
So I guess the message to the kids listening is like, spread it out.
Yeah, spread it out.
Spread it out.
Yeah.
yeah the that cruise was one where we go to get on the cruise and they they they let us all know that there was a huge norovirus outbreak have you guys seen triangle of sadness yes i feel like our
boat was that boat you just get this picture that like people are shitting on the ceilings.
It is gnarly.
They've disinfected everything.
It's supposedly pretty crazy.
So they tell you there's been a norovirus outbreak,
but they still expect you to get on the boat?
Yes.
Yes. They say they make you fill out these forms,
and they give you a bunch of paperwork to explain what the norovirus is,
just because they want, you know, if you have any problem with it, you just don't get on the boat.
But we're like, we paid this money. And, but this was before COVID and it was every single time you
pushed on a door, there was hand sanitizer that you just, they, they said, just put hand sanitizer
on anytime you touch anything.
Yeah.
And then you probably also thought by drinking all this alcohol, I'm going to be killing.
Yeah, that was helping me.
That was my internal hand sanitizer, my gland sanitizer.
All right.
We got some questions here.
Will, you ready?
Yes.
You can only pick one of these. Is your ideal vacation relaxing, adventurous, or educational?
Educational. Nice. Lovely. I mean, there's a place for one of these. Is your ideal vacation relaxing, adventurous, or educational? Educational.
Nice.
Lovely.
I mean, there's a place for all of them.
Yeah.
What is your favorite means of transportation?
Train, plane, automobile, boat, bike, foot?
Boat.
Well, automobile.
Automobile.
The thing about the boat is you know you're going someplace that's kind of far away.
Like a car.
I drive to the store all the time.
There's something about saying boat that I'm like, oh, I know I'm like, you know, you're in some kind of islandy place, which feels real good.
I remembered a quick story about Will's car.
So I had a New Hampshire driver's license.
That's where Josh and I grew up in New Hampshire.
And all of a sudden, I can't find my driver's license.
Now, I'm living in New York at the time,
I'm working on SNL.
I don't really feel like I need a driver's license.
And I also want to keep my New Hampshire driver's license
just because I like having a New Hampshire driver's license,
but I wait too long.
And when I go back to New Hampshire,
after two years, you can't replace a lost driver's license.
So now I don't have a driver's license. And basically, when I meet Alexi, you can't replace a lost driver's license. So now I don't
have a driver's license. And basically, when I meet Alexi, I still don't have a driver's license,
which at this point is embarrassing. She lived in LA, I lived in New York. I would go out
to LA and she'd have to drive us everywhere, which was lame. Years later, I finally bite the bullet
and I go and I get myself a New York driver's license. I have to take a
driving test. I have to wait in line with a bunch of teenagers. I have to take a written test. I
have to go through everything. Two years after this, I get an envelope from Will Forte, who sends
me a letter and says, I found this while I was cleaning out my car, and it was my New Hampshire
driver's license. I had been in Forte's car exactly one time in my life.
It was a, what was the hybrid?
It was the...
A Honda Civic Hybrid.
I was looking up the picture of your license on here
and couldn't find it,
but I did find the picture of my diaper rash.
I don't think that's probably something that I should show.
After we get off, I'll show you, Josh.
Great.
I need you to see it.
Your car was so filthy.
I mean, that's the takeaway.
Your car was so filthy that it took 11 years
to find a license that I had dropped in the side door.
In fairness, you know how the backs of the seats
have those little slivery pockets sometimes?
This had just like that little thing where you could maybe fit a laptop in if you wanted to.
Yes, okay.
You're certainly not going to put a box of Kleenex in there.
Right.
This was stuffed down in the very bottom of that.
I don't know why you would have ever thought that was a good place to put your license.
Because I didn't put it there. I would have never gone that was a good place to put your license. Because I didn't put it there.
I would have never gone like, oh, here's Seth's license.
I'm going to put it in here to remember.
Put it in this slot I've never used once.
And by the way, my car was not pristine.
But I've seen worse cars.
And thank you.
I have not.
That was the worst one I've seen.
All right, Josh, go back to your questions.
If you could take a family vacation with any family,
they could be fictional, they could be real,
they could be alive, they could be dead.
Other than your own family,
what family would you like to take a vacation with?
You know what?
I would say this is a little bit of a cheat.
My Groundlings and SNL family. I'd allow it but josh has a real this chorus line thing no i'll allow this it was so magical it was just like for
days after we did the actual show i was like oh it makes you realize how how much you appreciate
these people and just to have that experience it was was kind of like what, what, what the, the Wigs birthday experience was like.
Yes.
You know, you're one of my favorite people.
She's one of my favorite people yet.
We hardly ever get a chance to see each other.
And if, if we do, it's for like a dinner.
Yeah.
And you're with a big group of people.
So we, you know, we get to talk a little bit, but like, that was just,
we were all together for like four days in a row.
It was just the best. So, so I just can't wait to have that experience again.
Good answer.
Very good. If you had to be stranded on a desert island with one member of your family,
who would it be?
One member of my family, my wife.
All right. Lovely.
I mean, my kids.
Lovely. Well, which one?
Oh man, it can only be one. All right. Lovely. I mean, my kids. Lovely. Well, which one? Oh man,
it can only be one. Only one of them. This is easy. It is my daughter, Cecilia,
because she can least fend for herself. She's the one-year-old. Okay. Alameda, California.
Is that your hometown, would you say? I was born in Oakland, California, which is in Alameda County,
but Costa County is where I grew up, Lafayette, Moraga, but it's close to Alameda. So, but what's your hometown? My hometown, I would say Lafayette, California.
Would you recommend Lafayette as a vacation destination?
No. Okay. I would recommend it as a place for people to live, but it's not a vacation destination.
Okay. Very good. And Seth has our last questions.
Will, have you been to the Grand Canyon?
Yes.
Recently, too.
Was it worth it?
Yes.
Doesn't seem like very resounding.
Well, I was thinking about the one time when I was probably 12 or 13, we took a family trip where we rafted down. I think the Southern part of this,
but this doesn't count as a family trip because there were only like 20
members of my family.
And,
uh,
so tell me,
tell me more about your butt puzzle.
That's the thing.
And we didn't do any puzzles of any family members body parts on that trip
so it doesn't doesn't register in my brain and then like just a couple years ago you know that
big walkway the the glass walkway that they built in a fully different area i did that and that was
that was uh i'm kind of scared of heights, so that was terrifying, but fun also.
Yeah, I love it.
Were you with Olivia?
No, this is right before Olivia.
Okay, gotcha.
This was... This is when you thought you were going to die alone
and you were going to jump off that bridge, right?
Exactly, I was alone.
The bridge tricked you.
The bridge tricked you.
You thought you were jumping, but it was glass.
Josh, do that Avignon Bridge song again.
C'est le pont d'Avignon, l'on y danse, l'on y danse.
C'est le pont d'Avignon, l'on y danse, tout en rond.
Will, do your song from Chorus Line.
One singular sensation, every little step she takes.
One thrilling combination, every move that she takes. One thrilling combination.
Every move that she makes.
One smile and suddenly nobody else will.
You know you'll never be lonely with you.
No.
One moment in her presence. That was great. Only with you know who won.
Moment in our presence.
That was great.
It was nice.
I tried to look at Josh's screen because he has chorus line lighting.
Oh.
And then hear you.
And it was wonderful.
I know you don't want this, but I just remembered my solo song.
Okay.
I'm watching Cisco pitter-pat.
Said I can do that Said I can do that.
I can do that.
Knew every step
right off the bat.
Said I can do that.
Yeah, I can do that.
I'm having such a hard time
on this show
remembering the words
to this song.
Now it's weeks later
and just everything's
right there.
You do have an ear
for musicals.
This summer, again, going back to karaoke, Will went inside later yeah and just everything's right there you do have an ear for musicals this summer again
going back to karaoke will went inside and learned a les mis song in about five minutes and then came
out and nailed it you've never seen les mis correct wow i don't think so i read the book
and uh you are the best javert i've ever seen am i allowed to say who i sang it with? Go for it. Jake Gyllenhaal.
Do one more,
one more time.
Do it,
Will.
Well,
I am,
I forget the words,
but I am Javert.
I'm six foot five.
No,
16,
nine,
14.
I forget.
I love you,
buddy.
I will never. I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never.
I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never. I will never.
I'm.
Oh, so beautiful.
I remember basically it was something like that.
Where is Josh when you need him?
All right.
I love you, buddy.
I love you.
This was really fun talking to you.
I love you very much.
And we will talk soon.
Love to your family, buddy.
Right back at you.
Bye. your family buddy right back at you well he has traveled to many ports of
call
girl i will go silent to gawk at boobies
and balls
in positano he did not want to shave
because his mommy Said he looked great
A puzzle of his blood
On a Hawaiian vacay
A puzzle of his blood
On a gorgeous getaway
A house right on the ocean
His friends in the tide But a puzzle of his blood was the thing that kept him inside.