My Brother, My Brother And Me - MBMBaM 540: Bubblestar Metallica

Episode Date: December 21, 2020

It’s Candlenights, we think! We already did ONE Candlenights spectacular for you, but because y’all have been extra good this year, here’s another one! I mean, it’s maybe not “spectacular” as much as it is a regular episode without cussing, but still.Suggested talking points: Little Jumble, Dear Christmas, Salmon Blasters, Cooltown Texas, Haunted Slime Bag, Dikembe MutumbowlWays to support Black Lives Matter and find anti-racism resources: https://linktr.ee/blacklivesmatter

The McElroy brothers are not experts, and their advice should never be followed. Travis insists he's a sexpert, but if there's a degree on his wall, I haven't seen it. Also, this show isn't for kids, which I mentioned only so the babies out there will know how cool they are for listening. What's up, you cool baby? Hello everybody and welcome to my brother, my brother, and me in Advice Show for the Modern Era. I'm your oldest brother, Justin McElroy. Just hear those T-R-A-V-I-S bells. I'm your middle brother, Travis McElroy. I'm your sweet baby brother, Dash for the reindeer McElroy. Hold on, I'll be right back. What? I don't know, this is for the show or not. I don't know either.

I think you might have just flown off to take Santa and Ollie's crazy reindeer, but we're still making show. Yeah? Just fine without Griffin. Yeah, have you noticed? I think it flows better. I think the chemistry is there. The same show basically without Griffin. It feels like a lot of dead air is gone. This is all 100% usable content. Salvageable content. Well, you know what? I can go ahead and tell people this is our candle night special. Indeed it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're celebrating our fake holiday. Hey. Hey, Griff, you okay? Yeah, I've been waiting on a gift for Rachel that I would need to sign for, that I needed to intercept. Oh, is it from Santa? I tried to do that because I got

Sydney a rug to replace the rug that the cat pissed on, and there's just no, there was no cool way to do it because we're all, we're both at the house all the time. I got her like a nursery rocker too, and that one showed up in a big box from Wayfair that was like, hey, Rachel, here's your nursery rocker. Griffin got it for you. Merry Christmas. There was no- Carrie, Carrie, do it. I hope she's not a listener because this- This isn't the show. Oh, my mistake. Oh, how embarrassing. Justin and I thought it was the show this one. Yeah, the show was continuing. Some really choice, choice stuff. So this is candle lights. It is our- And I'm Griffin McRoy. Okay. Let's start. What

are you guys thinking about starting over? No, no. Are you kidding me? There's three minutes of quality stuff there. Well, I was going to say salvageable. Okay. Okay. This is exciting for so many reasons. One, it is our candle night's spectacular. Of course. That means no cursing in this one. Can we just, it's our second candle night's spectacular, really, if you think about it. Yes. The other one is a video that you can still watch if you go to bit.ly for its candle nights 2020. It's available until January 4th. It's a two hour long spectacular full of tons of great bits and skits and goofs and songs and dances and celebrity cameos and holiday

festivities and cocktails and it's kind of everything. And it's 5, it's 625 to get it and proceeds are going to Harmony house, which is a shelter for people experiencing homelessness in our area. So my area, I should say, although we still claim the boy. So please go do that if you have not already done it. You got until January 4th. Watch it. Okay. But that's just a video. This is still the podcast candle lights. This is the one that counts. This is the, no, they both count. No, this is the one, that one. This one counts less because it's free. Oh man. Yeah. It's not as valuable. This one's free. We're going to, we're going to not be using swear words. So if you want to gather your family around the radio, the Victoria,

we're just going to be doing a show without swears. Now, can we use alternate swears? Sorry, just like beans and butterscotch. You guys remember like frack, like from frack. H.E. double hockey six. Sorry, did you say bubble star? Bubble star. Bubble star galactica. Bubble star bubble star galactica. Bubble star bubble star metallica. Oh, frack, I miss bubble star metallica. But that we should, we also always mention this and it is a fact that just because it doesn't have bad words doesn't mean a lot of challenging ideas. Yeah. Oh boy. And just to reinforce that, I would like to start with an anecdote. Two nights ago, or two days ago, rather, I was in the shower getting rid of all my filth.

And my two year old, as she is want to do, just sort of barges in. And because she wanted me to do something, I don't know what it was, probably to do something to one of her dolls, like wrap it up in toilet paper or throw it into the toilet. So she can she not do that last for what I understand toddlers excel at throwing things into toilets. Yeah, but if I do it, she can't get in trouble. So she barges in. And you and I both know Cooper likes making people do things, but like she has her whims and she likes them to be acknowledged. So she barges in and while I'm mid-shower, I'm just wrapping up. Where are you at in this point? In the shower? Yeah, like what stage of the process? I'm ranced, I'm ready to go. The shower's over,

basically. And I she barges in and I am, of course, caught unawares. And I, you know, I rush to turn the water off so I can reach out and grab a towel. But in the way that little children are want to do, she has already taken notice of my privates and started scowling at them and pointing in a very angry way as if to say, what do you do with those? How dare you? You have those. And so I cover myself up and I go to see with the towel and I, before I could say anything, she points at my now covered crotch and says, daddy, I'm sorry about your little jumble. Oh, great. How would she know the worst imaginable thing to say? Every word of that is the sickest burn I've ever heard. I'm sorry is not what you want to hear

about your little, I don't know, jumble? Jumble suggests that there's things where they ought not be. Which from her perspective. Right. All right, fair. But she said sorry about your little jumble. And then she went on, she went on to inquire more and I said, no, it's 6.15 in the morning. I'm not doing this with you. We're not doing this. I'll put the doll in the toilet. You win, but we're not talking about my little jumble. Sorry about your little jumble. Real quick, I just wanted to say like, yet another, this is our, yet another interruption before the show can begin. Well, I just know like this year is pretty different for people. And this candle nights, people aren't traveling as much as that. Not so rough year, right? No,

it's been a rough year for everybody. And you know, people are like, what can we do at home? We had a lot of questions about what kind of traditions they could do at home. And so I thought maybe we could play along at home. All right. Oh my gosh. Dutch centercloth is believed to originate where? Norway. Where does he come from to come visit the Dutch? Heaven. Justin? Iceland. It is believed he comes from Spain and also believes that he travels with a group of elves who will take bad children back with them to Spain. Rad. Oh God, please, please, please get down to Barcelona. Please. Give me these. Yeah, wouldn't mind. Take me away. I've been really bad, Mr. Elf.

The first artificial Christmas tree developed in the 19th century in Germany was made from what material? As best as. Well, come on. Human hair. Cat hair. It was goose feathers. Died green, but you were in the right realm. Man. This is so festive. Associated British foods. Associated British foods did a study and found that the average American consumes how many calories on Christmas Day? I mean, am I trying to stay in Quito? Oh, because 3,500. I'm going to say 2,200. 7,000. Shut up. Now I mean, shut up. How do you get it? I mean, how much calories is in cinnamon rolls? Because I kind of just eat one of those every half hour. I mean, you get a pud.

Yeah, you get a pud. You get a little bit of pud. You need a green honey pud. It's a custard. Cream with the pud. I love a custard and cream with the pud. It's always your pud. Um, one more with, it's a two-parter. In 1950, the record holder for world's tallest cut Christmas tree was erected in the middle of Seattle. In feet, how tall was it? And for another point, adjusted for inflation, how much would the tree cost in the year 2020? I'm more interested in those uncut trees. You know how I do it. It's more natural if you know what I'm saying. I'll say, here's, and here's a problem that I feel like we are put up against from time and time on this show, which is my complete lack of sort of

spatial imagination. Because the first thing that came to mind, like I wanted to say like 1,500 feet, but then I was like, no, that would be 150 stories. Here I'm going to say, I'm going to say 225 feet. I'm going to say, I'm going to say 690 feet. Is that still a lot? It still feels like a lot. I'm going to give that point to Justin, because it was 221 feet. No, give the point to Justin. I was four feet off. Yeah, but you were crescin over here. Still wrong. If you kicked a field goal that was four feet to the left, the referee wouldn't be like, well, give it to you. What if it, but unless it was near the right post, in which case, well, yeah, it'd be even better. So the price in 2020 dollars.

When was the tree built? This was 1950. 1950? But we're adjusting for inflation now. I'm going to give it a rate of, which is pretty typical for home cut trees. Heard this on Planet Money. It's like 10 bucks per feet. So I'm going to put it at 2,210 dollars. I'm going to say 750,000 dollars. Wow. You were both wildly incorrect. It was 185,000 dollars. Wow. I mean, I got the right number of digits. It was like 19,000 dollars. Yeah. I say give that one to him so we can move on. Okay. It's tied. 1-1. All right. Okay. But that was the last one, right? Well, I guess the time breaker will be, who's been the best boy this year?

I mean, not me. I'm trying to get to Spain. I've been real dirty. That's true. All right. Justin Wins, because Justin was the best boy this year. This is an advice show. I burned down a Whole Foods. Stole a cab. Stole a cab. Did take a Uber, drove into the river, smashed it all up. The Uber drove into the river. After burning down the Whole Foods? Yeah. It was on my way back home. His car was in the Whole Foods. Yeah. He drove his car into the Whole Foods, burned the Whole Foods down, didn't have a ride out. It was embarrassing. We get off.

Call an Uber, took an Uber, drove it into the river. Well, I asked the driver to please drive it into the river and I was very convincing. Yeah. It was a fun day. I did want to. We didn't have a traditional candlelight's live show performance. We did have our Sawbones Christmas special. That's part of the video. But I did want to just tell you guys about a lifetime Christmas movie I watched last night, if I have a moment, because it was called Dear Christmas. And I thought it would really speak to you guys because it is about a podcaster.

Oh, all right. So they really got into our territory. Melissa John Hart is up in the mix. And she is the best podcaster. You know what I mean by that? How can you put? She has, her show is the number one podcast in America. Whoa. Wait, I want rating. Well, Trevor, that's never specified, but it's the number one. It's on the Ear Muffs Network. And it's the number one podcast in America, guys. And here's what it is. It's called Holiday Love. Oh, boy.

And in each episode of the number one podcast in America, she, it's called like Dear, and then inputs the holiday there. So it's like Dear Halloween. And then it's about like real love stories from that holiday, right? Oh, boy. Okay. Okay. But so this, so in this movie, Dear Christmas, she is doing, people keep asking, so what's the next episode about? She's like, well, Christmas. And in my head, I'm thinking this is the number one podcast. It's called Holiday Love. And you are just now hitting Christmas.

So it might have believed there's like a Dear Arbor Day. Me and him both love trees. And we were like, let's do it. I mean, it definitely means that roundabout, let's say March to like July. Real dry spell in there. Real stretching for material. I love my dad and he loves her dad. So whatever. We're in love. That's the whole bit. Okay. But the thing about this movie is that makes it really special. Besides the fact that her love interest played by Jason Priestley,

his name is, well, I should tell you first off, he's a volunteer firefighter and an amateur glassblower. And those two should cancel each other out by the way. And an accomplished baker. And at the firehouse, they make the best fried chicken in town. And also he hangs Christmas lights and decorations on the side. So this is a lot of side jobs that he does. And his name is Chris Massey. Oh boy. That rolls. People call it Mr. Christmas. Yeah.

But which would have been a better name for the movie than Dear Chris. It's a Melissa John Hart. And they should have just called the movie. Is that Jason Priestley? Is that Jason Priestley? I think it's Jason Priestley. He's 51 years old. He looks great. So, but okay. The weird thing about this.

Justin, what's his core job? He's a volunteer firefighter and amateur. He does all the side gigs to support his glassblowing, which is germane to what I'm about to talk to you about. Okay. The thing that is fascinating about this film is its relationship to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which is an interesting relationship. So he makes these little, he blows these little glass hearts and puts them up all around town.

And it's a way to thank our first responders, right? And his sister is an ICU nurse in New York, right? So it is happening. We can appreciate this, right? Right. I just want to say real quick, because I had a very loud sigh there. If you're trying to make a living as a glassblower, hanging up your product for free around town is not the way to do it.

I cut it. No, he does the other jobs to support the glassblowing. But he's doing it. Grasses? He is not attempting. It's art. It doesn't matter. Listen.

So the interesting thing about this is, so that is happening. But also in this film, in the first five minutes of this film, her boss at Ear Muffs is like, are you coming to the holiday party or not? And it's like, OK, so what? Sorry, we're having a holiday party? We're in the same universe, right? OK, that's fine. And then later in the movie, there is a ugly Christmas sweater party full of people,

but they're just on the outside of it doing something else. All right. Yeah. And they don't actually talk about they don't you don't see it. And then later, there's a fireman's ball that she shows up too late to. So it's just her and Jason Priestley. And that is the thing I wanted to talk to you about, really, is that this movie really is it was filmed during.

It's not just set in a world that is sort of doing the covid thing, but not really doing the covid thing. It's also filmed in a world that definitely does have the covid thing going on. As such, Jason Priestley, Melissa Joan Hart, Ed Bagley, Jr. as her dad, Faith Princess, her mom, two other her sister and her boss. End of cast in movie. There are six people in this movie, which you don't really notice until like they're having they're at like a restaurant.

And they're the only ones there because they can only get, I guess, enough covid tests for these two and nobody else. So every once in a while, you'll see someone 30 feet in the distance just sort of walking through the shot. But there are no extras. The people in the movie, zany neighbor, there's no waitress at the restaurant. They're like getting their own drinks. And it's this in the wild thing is she doesn't hate Christmas.

So if you know anything about these movies, that's the that's the thing that has to be overcome. They both like Christmas fine. So there's no movie either. I said, it's literally Melissa Joan Hart to Egg Bagley, Jr. just shouting about how much they love candy kids. It's like waiting for a good tow. It's madness.

Justin, is it possible that there's a deeper underlying thing going on here in which the six of them are not just the only people in this movie, but in this movie, the only people left on earth? Well, no, because there is a brother. The sister, her job is that she's pregnant. The other job she has is her husband got stuck in traffic or something. So he hasn't been able to come to where she's about to have a baby. She does eventually have a baby and it is 100 percent a plastic doll

that is completely obviously a plastic doll. And it really ratchets up the full blown panic attack that this film is where they're just passing around this beautiful plastic baby and making Google eyes at it. But she he makes it just in time. But he doesn't talk because I guess maybe it's particles, maybe it's somebody just not wanting to give him his aftercard because I'm pretty sure he's the cinematographer. I was looking at pictures trying to figure it out.

I'm pretty sure the cinematographer doesn't say anything when he finally makes it. They don't say anything to his plastic baby. Just falls asleep and he's asleep on the couch. He stumbles in with suitcases, lays him down, lays on the couch, guys asleep for the rest of the film does awesome. Can I ask you guys something that's really twisted my noodle? Sure. Yeah, sure.

And it's something I've never thought about before, but only now this movie is making me question. Do volunteer firefighters get paid? I think they're just in it. I think they're just in it for the love of the game. Travis, they just hate fire so much. They hate firemen or anything else. It just seems like a really hard job to do.

For sure. For no money. So it's fighting the Joker, but you don't hear Batman complaining. That's true. Does that for free? Batman doesn't get paid? We're not cutting Batman a check, no. Somebody should.

You think Commissioner Gordon's got him on the payroll? That would sort of go against the whole thing, huh? No, I just assumed it was the mayor. He gets advertisements. That's why he has endorsements. Yeah, he's got on his cape. He's got the thing for razor keyboards and a lot of gaming chairs. A lot of gamer fuel.

A lot of gamer fuel. Do we want to try and sneak in a quick question before the break or? Just one quick, yeah. One quick question. I bought my little brother his favorite candy online as a stocking stuffer, but accidentally made it a bulk order. I now have enough boxes of Swedish fish to open my own old-timey candy shop, and I can't decide what's the best way to give Miss Candy candy.

If there was a candy shop in my town that only sold Swedish fish, I'd be so gized about that. Yeah, they have lots of different colors and shapes and sizes now. Anyway, should I stuff his stocking to the brim, wrap them all up in a giant box, trim the tree with them? Any ideas are appreciated. Happy candle nights. Candy conundrum in California.

And what can I just say? What a lovely problem to have. Yeah. Too many Swedish fish. Oh, now I gotta need to Google shelf life of Swedish fish. Oh, forever. There's, yeah, they keep, man, this astronaut thing. And I think they get better, honestly.

Oh, sure. Less fresh. When they get that crust on it, like you got a kind of... A little bit of a kite in it. Yeah, I like that. I like that. They do not spoil easily, yeah, absolutely. Okay.

The problem is box candy. Candy in boxes is not great stocking stuff for material. You know what I mean? Because it's not an efficient use of stocking space. You gotta have a candy that can get down in the toes, fam. So you're gonna... That's why the chocolate orange is such a classic. Perfect.

Perfect. It's perfect. By the way, weirdly sold out everywhere. Chocolate orange? Cannot find a chocolate. Cannot get a beat. I think I'm, folks, I may have to go to Cracker Barrel. And I don't want to.

I made a promise. And I keep my promises. But, Swedish Fish, you're gonna have to grip it, rip it, and tip it into the stocking so that it's just loose fishies in there. Here's what you could do. I think this would be fun. And this is a legit suggestion.

I want to preface that because sometimes it's hard to tell. Every day, slap a stamp and an address on one of those boxes, drop it in the mail. And eventually, what will happen is every day, your brother will receive one box of Swedish Fish in the mail. So good. That's so good. Better yet, when you're putting in the address,

put mine in maybe sometimes. Oh, that's fun. Here's an idea. Maybe your brother, you start doing this, and then he starts not thanking you or stops thanking you as a normal person would say it. And when he gets sort of like that to teach him a lesson, send it to me because I will enjoy it quite a bit.

I won't thank you like your brother does, but I will still eat it, and you'll know that. The problem with Travis' idea is... Oh, please. There's a small one, but is that... Let's say 12 packages, right? That's probably what we're talking about here. I'm looking at the bulk assortments on Amazon.

It looks like 12 packages. So you get 12. He gets a fresh, delicious pack of Swedish Fish, maybe once per week. And then wait 13, his mouth starts watering. Oh, yeah. Cherry, yellow. And then he opens it, and the bag's not there.

And then he has to start wondering, like, what did I... What I did wrong. Why did I have been enjoying every delicious fish? I was a good boy this week. I want my kid there. I shared him. I think that's best case scenario, Justin, because worst case scenario is,

then he gets that Swedish Fish hunger. And he's out there, you know, like ripping up mailboxes, trying to find where his Swedish Fish went, and it just becomes a real mess. You got to prank him, you know, until the madness passes. Or you could get some more. Or you could just get some more. I guess keep buying them.

I just feel like if you do this for 12 weeks, then you have to do it for at least like the rest of the year. Or it's like six... Like when you have to pick the duration of a gift subscription, which is always the worst, it's like, I thought you might want this for three months, and then not want it again. Yeah, so that's what I went with.

I might suggest though, again, just to circle back to sending me some of your great candy, that I think eating 12 boxes of Swedish Fish would make your brother pretty sick, even if spaced out over a long period of time. You're going to gum up. You're going to gum up the works so hard in there that he will become more gummy than man at that point.

Then alternate between Swedish Fish and Metamucil. Okay, just to clear out... Just to make room for more Swedish Fish. Just to keep the aisles clear, you know? Maybe you dust the Swedish Fish like with Metamucil, like it's the acid powder that they put on sour patch kids. There you go. Oh, what does Swedish Fish like to swim in?

Oh, that's a big drink of Metamucil, my friend. Yeah, and it'll treat your body like one of those tubes that they blast the salmon out of. I have always... I have very little interest in marine life. I have always wanted to blast one of those salmon cannons. Yeah, you've seen those. It's like, oh, we'll help you get up this waterfall salmon.

Here's your salmon blaster. And it's like, well, first of all, that's cheating. But also, it looks like a lot of fun. And I would love to just like really launch these boys. Now I just want to go down a deep rabbit hole of YouTube, watching videos of that. Of salmon blasters? Yeah, let's do that.

We'll do that together while Justin does the ads by himself. OK. Oh, fantastic. Oh, let's go to the money zone. I googled salmon blasters. Oh, boy. That's not anything. It does kind of sound like a new, like,

appetizer TGI Fridays. Yeah. Listen, this is perfect. If you are planning on mailing any of your siblings a piecemeal bulk order of Swedish fish, there is only one place that is going to let you do that from the comfort of your own home. And that's stamps.com.

Last minute holiday gifts or holiday gifts that will go throughout January and February and some of March that are fish shaped and cherry flavored. Well, the post office is a little busy. And, you know, with the ongoing unpleasantness, maybe not the best place to go hang out. But you can do all the post office stuff from your house. Stamps.com brings the services of the US Postal Service

and UPS right to your computer wherever you are. You can send out invoices to big warehouses, send out lots of packages every day or maybe smaller operations that's more focused on transporting Swedish fish around this great country. Stamps.com can handle it all with ease. And with Stamps.com, you get five cents off every first class stamp. You can't beat that.

They got deals on pretty mail and UPS shipping rates as well. Skip the post office and go to Stamps.com instead. There's no risk. And with our promo code, my brother, you get a special offer that includes a four week trial plus free postage and a digital schedule. There's no long term commitments or contracts. Just go to Stamps.com, click on the microphone

at the top of the homepage and type in my brother. That's Stamps.com promo code, my brother. Stamps.com, never go to the post office again. We'll know. We'll know if you do. We'll know. They track your phone. To celebrate the holidays, you guys, I have a new invention. Okay. What's that? I call it Red Apron.

And with Red Apron, you get a, it's kind of a loose, really thin material plastic bag full of just a random assortment of ingredients that don't really go together. No clear instruction. There's like snippets of instructions that I've included in there. And, oh, and I should be clear.

All the food is room temperature or worse. Okay. And you get that at random times, there's really no way to predict when it will come, what will be in it. Sometimes you'll get two boxes on the same day and then not get another box for the next month and a half. Right. But you'll still get charged. Let's be clear, you'll still get charged at regular intervals.

And it's just kind of my, if, you know, it's a dinner innovation, as I like to call it, a denervation. What do you think? I'm sorry, y'all. I just, I've been watching this salmon cannon video for the last like four minutes and it's entrancing. Can you imagine if a big giant man picked up your body and shoved it into a white tube?

And then all of a sudden you were in Illinois and you were like, uh, thanks giant, giant human like being. Well, then let's put it this way. Blue apron is like a salmon cannon for ingredients to your door. Exactly. Including, but not limited to. Salmon. Salmon.

Yeah. You got, you blasted a bunch of salmon out of can. Maybe you want a nice little capersauce with this. Yep. They blast that too. A little bit of jasperin. Yeah. It's a series of, series of salmon tubes that run all over this beautiful country of ours

and you get it and you make a tasty home cooked meal. And they're, they're, they're really good. And they come with super clear recipes that are easy to follow. And yeah, they also have meal prep options now, which allows you to cook one time and get eight servings of food that can all be prepared in under two hours using one streamlined set of steps. That sounds pretty, pretty convenient if you ask me.

Don't miss out on all that blue apron has to offer this season. See what's on this week's menu and get $30 off across your first two deliveries when you visit blueapron.com slash my brother. That's blueapron.com slash my brother. Okay. Here's my new invention. Blue apron. Never go to the post office again. Here's my new invention.

It's a salmon cannon. Yeah. That as the salmon passes through the cannon, it gets slowly roasted until it arrives at your door fully cooked and seasoned. Yeah. And then it lands right in your ears. And you're like, I cannot hear my music with these.

And someone's like, why are you putting cooked salmon in there? You should be using Raycon. Okay. I mean, I guess that's not really great for my pitch for Shark Tank, Justin, but I guess. No. Okay. Well, Raycon, if you want to get a gift, and for somebody that's hard to shop for,

there's one that so many people would love to have and use. And they're wireless earbuds. And Raycon makes a great pair. I've got a pair that I use. They are my like around the house. The kids are maybe still asleep. I don't want to pop into podcasts or music. Or the kids are talking about your jumble.

Okay. They fit my wife's weird, shameful ears, which is a real feather in their proverbial cap. They're great earbuds and you're not going to. It's comparable quality to what you get from the other premium brands. But Raycon started at half the price. So that makes them a great gift in my book. You can use them for calls, music, for work, for play, home or on the go.

It's a gift that keeps on giving. Griffin, let's say I wanted to get a pair. How would I do it? Well, you can get a pair and you can also get them for 15% off. If you go to buy. What? Griffin knows the guy. Yeah, I know Ray. And so go to buyraycon.com slash my brother.

And you're going to get 15% off your Raycon order. That's buyraycon.com slash my brother. Just one more time for good measure buyraycon.com slash my brother. And while you're there, if you need tires or a stereo or like, I don't know, a new jacket, you let Ray know. Just ask Ray. Just ask Ray. He'll take care of you.

But whatever you do to not to use a post office. Don't go in a post office. Ray will know. Hi, I'm Joe Firestone. I'm Manolo Moreno. And we host after game show a podcast where listeners submit games and we play them regardless of quality with a dozen listeners from around the world. We've had folks call in from as far as Sweden, South Africa and the Philippines.

Here's an example. This is a game we called Zooey Deschanel, where you turn a celebrity's name into an animal pun. You have an example Manolo. Brad Gorilla Pit. Oh, that's a pun on Gorilla Pit. Yep. I don't know.

That's Brad Pit. Oh, okay. That's a high quality game that you would expect. That's the game show has new episodes every other Wednesday on Maximum Fun. Check us out, please. How about a Yahoo? Yes. Yeah, I love that.

Okay. Are you going to interrupt me with a bit? No, sir. Okay. I'm not. I'll miss the most sacred of days. Sure. I'm just saying if you were sucked up into a human sized salmon cannon,

wouldn't you just be like, oh, I'm dead. Like before you even got to the other end, you'd be like... No, this is your own interruption. Okay. But that assumes that the salmon is aware of what's happening, Griffin. Absolutely, they are not. Absolutely, they are not. Brian sent this one in.

Thank you, Brian. It's from Yahoo Answers user DaddyBear1964. Who asks, how do you start a new city or town in Texas? Would like to have the area where I live become a city. What does cities have? I have wondered about this for a good long time. Yeah. Got ahead.

There used to be a time in this great land of ours where you just walk into a big, empty space and you're like, all right, this is traveston now. This looks like a city. Yep. Colispy Huntington did it, thank God. Walked into, I don't know, Holderby Landing, correct? It's like, hey, this place sucks.

I want to build a train right through the middle of this pit and you're all going to love me for it. Then I'm going to call it Huntington after me. City. Cities have Mayor City Hall. Mayor, that's you. Yeah. I think if you start the town, you got to be the first mayor.

That's it. Hey, everybody, welcome to Coolville. Order number one, I'm the mayor. Order number two, we got to get a Chili's up in here. Yeah. Does anyone know how to start a Chili's franchise? Because that's going to put Cooltown on the map. Did I say Cooltown or Coolville?

I forgot. How long you have to have an area that is separate from other town, right? Town, well, real city will not take kindly to you sort of making a middle city in the city. You know what I did? What? And it's been long enough now that I think I can reveal this. I started my own city here in the middle of Cincinnati,

but what I did was my city is also called Cincinnati, but with one extra N in there and I won't tell you where. Oh, no. And so like nobody knows yet. And I've been slowly pushing the fence one inch every year. Yeah. And Travis also has his own like pirate bootleg version of Babes in Toyland where they sing,

I come from C-I-N-C-I-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-N-A-T-I Cincinnati. And I've got my own form of chili here. And what do I put in it? Well, the extra ingredient is salt for my friends. Only beans. This is Travis's 50 bean chili. It's loose dry beans. And I call it the chili that crunches.

It's Travis's crunchy garbanzo surprise. Welcome to Cincinnati. That's not where the N is Griffin. You'll never guess. And you wouldn't tell if you got it right. No, I wouldn't tell you because that's how they get you. If my town had an army, I feel like that would help me to be respected by nearby towns that maybe wouldn't recognize.

Now, Justin's making my sovereignty. Justin's making a joke point that many a militia has actually made in this terrible world of ours. All right. Now that I've backed into it myself, I can see the logic. I'm sorry I've been so hard on militias. Thank you for defending us from the government. You're all doing a great job. No, let me say this.

Speaking of government, I think if your city immediately starts paying taxes to the government, the federal government probably isn't going to do anything to stop. The city that you are annexing from is going to be like, hey, government, do something. And they're like, we recognize that they're giving us money and you're giving us money. It's win-win. It's double money. That's a good point, Trav.

How big is the city going to be? Big enough for a chili's in a town hall. You start with a hamlet. You guys start with a hamlet and then your town ship, then you're a town, and then you're a town burg, and then you're a burg city, and then you're a city it. Then you're a metropolis, and then you're a super metropolis, and then it's a kingdom. I think kingdom comes after that. Yeah, that's right.

How are we going to get statehood, though, for my cool city that's just a town hall in Chili's, so that we can get two senators there? This is a good question. I think first you need a professional sports team. Everybody's always fighting about the Senate, and we got to take it, and we absolutely do need to take it, but gosh, that would be easier if Chili's Town could just put up two more. And let's say Chili's Town is also the most progressive city on the map. San Francisco seems like a very conservative city compared to Chili's Town.

Could you get your city sponsored by Chili's and have them get your statehood? I bet someone at Chili's knows a guy. I'm just saying, everyone eats at Chili's, probably including the Supreme Court justices. You could probably make this happen. Yeah, it's like how NBA players eat at Cheesecake Factory so much when they're on the road, because they just know that Cheesecake Factory's gonna, this is not a joke, whenever, it's like a thing. NBA players just like, when they're going to a city, and they don't know what the food's like at that city,

they're like, I know what Cheesecake Factory has, and it's always there. Now, Justin, you're laughing, but that's also what we do. Yeah, we have stuff, I'm laughing at a familiarity, because we have stumbled into this exact practice where we're traveling. I know they're gonna have something that everyone will eat, because it's Cheesecake Factory. We have five children, six adults. Yeah, throw a Cheesecake in there. Yeah.

You remember for another question, you think? Yeah, sure. Okay. I interrupted myself, though. It's a present to you and a holiday present. Welcome to Haunted Doll Watch. It is a dip in paranormal. Where we're going to talk about the hottest, sexiest paranormal items on eBay.

Now, this week is very special. And of course, it's special because this is candle nights. So, do we have a holiday spirit? We do, Travis. We do have a holiday spirit, but you know what we don't have with this one? What? A doll. Huh.

Okay. So that begs the question. What's the question? That's a haunted thing. What is it? What are you talking about? This is listed as haunted, not doll. Christmas elf spirit will be sent to you.

New, never before seen. That part, I bet, is very accurate. Yes. So, it's a spirit of a Christmas elf. Yeah. They're going to send it to you. Just wait, sorry. Just a loose, loose jingling around in that box spirit.

Christmas elf, special mystery spirit will be sent to you. Mystery spirit. So, it's like a slime bag. It's like a chase elf. Ghosts actually hate it when you call them slime bags. We're not all slimmers, okay? Yeah. New, never before seen.

Very true. This mystery spirit will travel on his or her own once you submit. Or there. Come on. Come on. Are there, once you submit payment. About this mystery spirit. These mystery spirits come from many creatures.

Of course, the one we're talking about today is the ghost of a Christmas elf, I guess. But we sell spirits from ancient unicorns. Single-headed dragons. Double-headed dragons. Wolves. Sentires. Wow, wait, did this drop wolves in the middle of this? Like wolves are like, uh, hey, hey Debbie.

You know I'm real, right? Mermaids. Mermen. Chickens. Giant moths. Orcs. Wait, sorry. Back up?

Sorry, did you say chickens? Was that really in there? Yeah, bud. Mermen. Chickens. Giant moths. Orcs. Finguses.

Griffins. Oh, no. Oh, no. Fonds. Nyads. Dryads. Cyclopsies. And more.

Oh, boy, I'll take one wolf and eight chickens. Or is this a grab bag thing? They can't put them both in the same bag. Oh, god, no. But I'll also take a spirit of a bag of grain, please. Yes. And it's like, oh, how do I get them across the river? Upon winning this auction, we will send you a message

when Mystery Spirit will come to you after you submit your payment. They can't be more clear about that. Oh, boy. Different kinds of spirits travel at different times of days, but each Mystery Spirit arrives within 24 hours. These Mystery Spirits travel very quickly since they are only in spirit now

and are not weighted down by their bodies. They do not need to travel in a box. Well, thank god. Since they are in spirit form, they travel to you in spirit on their own. Hey, Seller, I recognize that they don't need to travel in a box, but could they just? So I feel like, what will the kids open?

Just so something is, and maybe also you could put a little note in there that says definitely a spirit in here. Something. Just put some smoke in a box. I don't know if it'll keep, but I need something to come out of a box or else my kids are going to be pretty ticked off.

Warning. These Mystery Spirits have different personalities. We cannot guarantee one personality over another one. However, we will let you know what kind of personality the Mystery Spirit you buy has and any other information that would be helpful to you. Wait, what? We can't wait.

You're going to buy one. You can't guarantee a personality, but after they've shipped it, they'll be like, this is a mean one. Hang on for the ride of your life. It's a mean Minotaur, so uh-oh. Hey, can I just real quick, I just want to put up some,

just a curtain here real quick and say, this is all made up. Why don't you guarantee the spirit? Why don't you say like, they're going to be super nice? I'll tell you exactly why, Travis. You pretend that you are this mystical seller and I'm the recipient. Hi, I want a triple headed dragon.

Oh, you don't have those? Then I guess give me two headed dragon and one headed dragon at the same time, please. You got it. When will they be here? They'll be here within 24 mystical hours. Okay, 25 hours later, I'm partying with my ghost dragons

and I call you up. Hey, I didn't get them. Are you sure? I didn't get them, I want my money back. I didn't get them. I hear a party going on in the background and I know that these were radical dudes. But it's my son's birthday

and we got an entertainment dragon. But that's not the dragon that I wanted. I'm partying with a two headed dragon and a one headed dragon. You can send me three more dragon heads arranged on as many bodies as you want or my money back. I'll just keep sending you dragons.

All right, 25 hours later again. Hey, where are those dragons? I said the dragon, you didn't get them? Nah, but just send me a few centaurs, I guess. Oh, I'm fresh out. Pretty soon I got my own fantasy ghost menagerie. How will you know mystery spirit has started preparing to travel to you

when we send you, I'll just read it, exactly word for word. Please. You will know your mystery spirit has started preparing to travel to you when we send you a message via the eBay messaging system. Your mystery spirit will arrive promptly within the next 24 hours. That is not prompt, by the way.

That is, that flies in the face of the definition of prompt. Each mystery spirit has one or more feelings that come with, oh, I can relate to that. 2020. How are you, man? Happy still. Yeah.

You will know that your mystery spirit has arrived when you sense the feeling that is included in the message that we send you. This feeling may start small and be hard to identify at first, but it will set in soon. This has become some, because some mystery spirits take longer than other

to completely move in, and they like to make sure they are welcome. So make your special mystery spirit feel at home, and they will get more comfortable around you, and your feeling of will increase before long. Finally, this is fascinating to learn, and I really appreciate them sharing this last tidbit. Most mystery spirits like to have

the company of other mystery spirits, too. Oh, oh, gotta catch them all! Gotta catch them all! For more mystery spirits, if you enjoy what you receive. Now, I have been dying to know, Justin, how much. Ask me anything. How much. Okay.

Okay, well. God, so much of this is not gonna seem real to you. Well, sir, it's $49.99 each. All right, all right, all right. But, if you buy two, it's $49.49 each. Oh, boyzy. That's a good discount. That's awesome.

You buy three. Well, friend, you're getting them for $48.99 each. That's big savings, baby. Just a quick sidebar. Do you think in the Pokemon universe, there's shady individuals who are like, hey, kid, you wanna buy a ghastly? It's, yeah, it'll be $20.

Okay, where is it? It's right here in my hands. Can't see it? Yeah, it's a dead person. There's two more things I wanted to share. First is that this is sold by a seller named Omar D. Zero. And they have gotten a few complaints because they sell mystery boxes

and they don't tell you what's in them. And then people are leaving reviews that say is rip-off. And they say, well, I don't know, it's a mystery. It specifically says- You sold it, though. The listing specifically says they're worth more or less than you pay. I didn't know you could just do that.

Don't buy this. A flashlight for $25 is the only thing I got, rip-off. And it says the response from Omar D. Zero says, you paid $24.99 for electronics. Please tell me how a $25 flashlight is a rip-off. It makes light. Got him. That's a miracle.

You traveled back in time. You pulled out that flashlight. You're a king. Yeah, you're in charge. The last thing I wanted to tell you guys about this Christmas. They, this Christmas elf spirit, sorry. They can't guarantee delivery before Christmas. Huh.

28th is the, December 28th is what we're looking at. Right. That's one. We know it might make it a bit more appealing if you could get your Christmas elf before Christmas. Sure, that's the ideal. But they cannot guarantee Christmas arrival of this spirit.

December 28th is the best they can do. Now, does that make sense? Judging from what I know about these mystery spirits, I'm not sure I'd have the sort of emotional bandwidth to be able to focus on them in the way that they need in their run-ups. Well, and also they're booked up right now trying to convince old jerks, old rich jerks to be nicer.

And as you might know, that isn't an easy thing to do. So maybe we can cut them a little bit of slack. Well, and maybe after Christmas, Santa kills a bunch of them. There it is. Cut down on food costs. Well, that's it. In order for a new elf to be born, it has to rest in a pool of blood from an old Christmas elf.

They don't talk about this, but every year, the workforces are replenished or else we'd run out of magical elf spirits pretty quickly. Pretty fast, yeah. You want to do one more question? I'd love that. My girlfriend and I are celebrating our first holiday season living together and have loved decorating

and getting into the holiday spirit. But there's one very obvious hole in our decorations. What should we put on the top of our Christmas tree? Should we stick with the classics? Should it reflect 2020? Or should we be thinking outside the box? And that's from Hatless Tree from down in D.C. What do you guys put on the top of your trees?

I mean, a bow. A bow. It's so easy. You don't have to balance the big heavy. We used to put a big heavy metal star. What was I thinking? Dangerous is what that is. A bow.

You just kind of throw it up there. Whatever. It's at a crooked angle. It's a bow. It's a bow. I put a picture of myself up there. Of course. Yeah.

But it's me. Every... It's very tastefully done. It's me as an angel, fully nude. Every year, we... For the past 10 years... Yeah, Justin, I know you're wondering. My jumble is out.

Every year for the past 10 years, we've put our little Yoda up there. And we've had this Yoda tree topper for 10 years. You plug them in and there's little lights there, but lights up. It's fantastic. And then I see on Twitter, training topic yesterday,

millennials are going wild about putting baby Yoda at the top of their tree. And it was infuriating to me because I got here first. Well, and I'll see you about this. They're all putting gogurt up there. And it makes you look like a real boob. They're putting TikTok up there.

It should make you angry, Justin, because now you've got an old, busted, ugly, dirty, adult Yoda up there. Yep. Gross. I want to keep them watching some Star Wars stuff here at the house. And whenever I see old adult Yoda,

it makes me want a freaking barf. That dude makes me sick because... He looks like a green prune. Yeah. And now I know what he could look like, which is the baby Yoba. And it's not even close. It makes me sick.

So I don't want to come to your house. I'm not going to be able to anyway. But even if I could, I wouldn't because of how gross your old Yoda is. You know what would be cool? Up there, go the next step. Right? You got old Yoda.

And then you got baby Yoda. Put some Yoda sperm up there. All right. So that's it. It would just... And here's the weird thing that we don't know about the... Well, I do. And I'm going to tell you about the Yoda species.

It's just one big sperm. Not a bunch of little ones. Just one big sperm. And hey, can I tell you? It's adorable. One shot I will have. You better start swimming. Here comes my blast.

No, no, no. Don't move. I only have one blast. You know, we're getting dangerously close infringing on magic tavern. Yeah. Territory. What would be sick is a full-sized basketball hoop.

And then you could just... Then you could just do some... Do some powerful dunks. Drain some threes. What about a live owl? That's pretty good. But can he be perched on the basketball hoop just blocking shots?

Don't bring that leaked stuff here. To convey my tumble. Another tree? Huh. What about a weird, funny cowboy hat? And then on the bottom, what's that? Spurs. That's cool.

That is funny. I'm glad you told me that was going to be funny before you said it or else I wouldn't. Yeah. Or else I wouldn't. Well, because that's something that we tried like past... What? If you hadn't said it, I wouldn't have known.

Huh. Well, it's just that sometimes, you know, things just get silly and silly on the show. And I wanted to bring it back in to like possible actual... And sure, we escalated. We de-escalated from Yoda's sperm back to... Yeah. Wouldn't a cue look like that.

That was the obvious off-ramp. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much for listening. Very quick, just to reiterate, our fund ratio special is still available until January 4th. It's bit.ly-4t-slash-canonite-2020.

Wonderful is doing a live fundraiser for the Austin Bat Cave. Which is about books and not bats. Tickets are five bucks. It's December 29th at 9 p.m. More info and tickets available at bit.ly-4t-slash. Wonderful ABC. We've got a book launch event for our book. Everybody has a podcast except you.

January 26th at 9 p.m. It's free. We partner with a bunch of independent booksellers if you pre-order from them, then you'll get an exclusively designed book plate signed by one of us with your copy while supplies last. Go to bit.ly-4t-slash-mackle-roy-podcast-book-event for bookstore links and more event info.

Travis, take over. You got it. We got lots of cool merch over at macroemerge.com, including a Festo pen of the month from the Adventure Zone graduation that benefits the Transgender Law Center, as well as a Thunderman LLC patch. Candle Knights merch, which you need to get on now, and proceeds for those items go to Harmony House

for all sales through January 1st. Once again, macroemerge.com. You can pre-order the Adventure Zone graphic novel book for Crystal Kingdom over at the adventurezonecomic.com. Also, the Sawbones book is out in paperback on December 29th. It's new and revised for 2020. And that's at bit.ly-4t-slash-sawbones-paperback. And MBM, BM, BM, BM, BM, BM Angels is back.

Go to mbambangels.com to claim a stocking. I want to give a quick plug for that. That's a program that has been going for a long time, and we sort of got the ball rolling, but we've had a lot of amazing fans pick it up since then. Every year people in our area have this list called the empty stockings that is published in the newspaper. And it's for people that aren't going to have a Christmas

without some help. And every year our listeners take that list and they demolish it. They burn it down with generosity. Yeah, in a good way. In a good way. And if you can join in with them, it's not a big push this year,

because honestly, it's been a hard year for people, and it seems weird to force it really hard. If you can, it looks like they're judging by the progress bar. It looks like they're about 75% of the way there, so Christmas is coming soon. Please, please, please go to mbambangels.com. You can just donate money if you don't feel like calling, but there's specific stockings.

You can claim one and help people out. And there's a lot of really deserving folks in there, so please go help out. Thanks to John Roderick and the Long Winters for the use of our theme song instead of Parture off the album Putting the Days to Bed. It's getting me through this Long Winter, if you know what I'm saying.

And thanks to Maximum Fun for having us on the network. Go to maximumfun.org, check out all the great shows there. I got shows like Triple Click. I got shows like Mission to ZX. They got all kinds of fun stuff all at maximumfun.org. Do you want the final? Yes, we do. This one's actually holiday themed.

I know the other Yahoo wasn't, but this one is. It was sent by Graham Robot. Thank you, Graham. It's from Yahoo Answers user Brian who asks, Is it weird to find the Monty Python footcrushing thing sexy? My name is Justin McElroy. I'm Travis McElroy. I'm Griffin McElroy.

This has been my brother and me. Kiss your dad, score on the lips. Audience supported.