Well, I invited you here.

I thought I made myself perfectly clear.

When you're a guest to my home, you gotta come to me empty.

And I said, no, guests, you're presences presents enough.

I already had too much stuff, So how do you dare to surbey me?

Welcome to I said, no gifts, I'm preature winegar.

We're actually in the backyard, we haven't been here in a minute, and the weather is uh.

It's actually working for me, it's working.

I don't want to speak for everyone right now, but I think it's working for most of us.

We're hearing the children screaming in the local elementary school.

There may be bells, there may be helicopters.

These are all things that you get in an outdoor podcast, And so you're getting a little extra for your money.

Well, what's going on?

I clean my shoes with a magic eraser and that worked out really well.

I shouldn't have given away my secret.

Actually, I've been going nuts on Etsy.

I recently got a class action settlement, let's just say a little settlement for a two hundred and ninety dollars gift card, and it's ruining my life.

I have been thinking about how to spend these two hundred and ninety dollars for six weeks and I finally settled on some coasters and T shirts.

So that's my life up until now.

Then I'll be picking my mom up at the Burbank Airport this afternoon.

I'm sure we'll start fighting immediately, So let's get into the podcast while we still can.

Today's guest is kind of a podcast icon.

I would say he's fantastic.

He has a show that I actually listened to.

It's Rishi Keish Hairway.

Welcome to I said, no gifts, Thank you so much, thank you for having me.

I'm so glad you're here.

It's, you know, a rare thing to have someone on the show who I've listened to before.

Well that's I'm I was honestly thrilled and surprised to be invited.

You know, I don't listen to a lot of podcasts because I listened to a lot of music, So yours is a nice and listener.

If you're not aware of song and explodeer, get with the program.

But yours is one of the rare podcasts that does both, and often with music that I like, Which is I mean it's just such a small target.

You've been doing it for.

Like ten years, more than ten years now.

Who was your first guest?

The postal service?

Oh wow?

And the episodes used to be significantly.

Shorter, right, that's right.

Yeah, And then I started to slowly learn how to make a podcast.

How long do you think it took before you were like, oh, now I'm really making the podcast I wanted to me.

I think this next one could be the one.

Because they're no, like probably between thirty and forty minutes, which is.

Like twenty and thirty Oh okay, but that's significantly longer.

Yeah, like three times is long.

Are you seeking out musicians to be on the show or are they coming to you?

At this point, I still do a little bit of outreach, but it just never works out.

You know.

Really, the only people who end up wanting to do the podcast are people who actively want to do the podcast right that moment, and it's people who have you know, music out or some some event going on and right, So then it's just a lot easier to be able to say yes to someone who's interested in doing it than to try and convince somebody who's not interested in doing it.

I'm familiar with that feeling.

Yeah, and I'm sure on Alise and our book are also familiar with it.

Do you have like a white whale?

Is there somebody who'd really love to get on the show?

Or is this and you also don't have to answer this question, I feel like I'll just say I feel like you're a much more respectful podcast host and about talking about music than I possibly could be.

So at any point, if you feel uncomfortable talking about music, which is your business, say Bridge, cut it?

No, no, no, I would be more interested in knowing who would be on your wish list?

Who would you like to hear on the show?

Well you have to answer for well you think about it.

Okay, I'm going to respectfully decline to you.

I should think of something that I'd like to hear on your show.

Yes, Yes, that's what I meant.

Oh, that's what you're asking.

Who would I love to hear?

You know?

I love Dan Bahar of Destroyer.

Yes, I love Grifferies of Super Free Animals.

Who else are.

These people whose music you love?

Or you also have heard them speak and you'd like to hear them speak more?

Both?

Yeah, you've had Nico case.

Yes, she was on, but I didn't get the interviewer.

Who interviewed her, Tao Win.

Who's guest hosting at the time.

Oh, that's troublesome for you.

Who else do?

I mean?

The list could go on and on.

I am now, you know, anytime someone asks me about music, I like revert to this middle school panic.

I think of like bullying, Like that's not real punk, That's essentially what I'm expecting.

What were you listening to?

Almost nothing?

Because I grew up in a family that listened to almost no music whatsoever.

My dad listened to modern country music, which I still have a huge problem with, and then we would kind of listen to the radio so that my brothers didn't really listen to music.

My older brother for a short period had kind of an interesting like he would listen to Doctor Dre and Metallica, So those were two great combination.

And then it was kind of nothing until ninth grade when I started just like finding out about music myself.

What about you?

What were you listening to in like middle school?

In middle school, I think, well, Public Enemy in Metallica, Oh fantastic, that is very I love it.

And and yeah, I think it was really like I in middle school, I started to get excited about music that was a little bit transgressive or felt transgressive.

So a lot of gangst rap.

Have you metal?

Right?

Yeah?

I kind of like the most obviously transgressive thing that you can get into, and then I think you can go into more subtle tiers of that interesting.

Would you have a favorite band in that period?

I think Public Enemy and Metalloy those were the two bands that I had T shirts?

Okay, which and I remember the first time I wore a Public Enemy shirt to school to middle school in seventh grade or eighth grade.

People were very confused.

They didn't know.

Of course that's what I would be into.

You know.

I think I was a nerd, and so I think people assumed that I probably, I don't know, went home and listened to classical music only right, I sat in my room in silence.

Yeah you had an edge that you were letting people know about it.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, you were much cooler middle schooler than I was.

Certainly that's almost certainly not true.

Fight about this.

I'll fight about this all day.

I can show you pictures.

I'll look at me shirt aside.

It was pretty rough.

Had you bought either of those T shirts at concerts or were they like no, no at them all.

How did your parents feel about that?

They?

I don't think loved it.

There were definitely some Metallica shirts that they were explicitly against, but the one that I had was Ride the Lightning.

Okay, sure, I think it just was obscure enough.

They didn't really pay close enough attention to it that they could really object.

And was there ever a point where they're like, we need to listen to the music you're listening to.

I would try and play the music well, you know, into I didn't try and hide it from them.

They weren't excited to hear it.

Sure, yeah.

Yeah.

For me it was like I had a weird al CD oh yeah, and it was like that was kind of like listening to pop music because obviously they're parodies.

But yeah, there was really I think there was like a slight fear that my parents will be mad about it, and then.

Because because he was making jokes, its not weird.

I'll just listen to any type of music that was above Beach Boys.

Yeah, and God Blessed the Beach Well part of the Beach Boys catalog, So yeah, there was a it was a lot of and then I like, I remember I bought a Wheezer CD in ninth grade and then we're just listened to that over and over while playing Wave Race sixty four and that kind of just set the table for the rest of my life.

Yeah, I mean, why ruin a template that's working for you.

Right exactly?

And then as high school and you got into college and stuff, what sort of music were you listening to?

Well?

When I got into high school, you know, I was playing drums in bands and stuff.

And then by the end of high school, I started playing guitar and I started to listen to more sort of singer songwriter stuff.

So around that time early college, I got into Elliott Smith and Nick Drake and of course the sort of that.

World right right.

And this is another thing you don't have to answer, but whenever musician talking to a musician, I'm curious about their least favorite.

Song of my own or no of somebody else's.

And you don't have to answer.

I want to.

I understand, yeah now, and I'm in a it's a different thing.

But there was a song in college that my friends used to sing specifically to annoy me, which was the Sugar Ray song which one Chinese food makes me sick.

Oh yeah, that feels like it could be any one of their songs Every Morning.

Is that what that one's called.

That's actually LFO Summer Girls.

Oh that's right.

Yeah, yeah, sorry.

I was a middle school girl when that came out, so that.

Was Oh yes, that's the one that the girls in Abercrombri and Fitch song.

Okay, well there you go.

That's a great picks a least favorite song.

I think that even whoever was involved with that piece of music probably could probab look back at this point and say mistakes were made.

Yeah, we've unleashed something on the world that was ultimately just kind of a bad piece of anything.

They literally would chase me singing that song and I would yeah, try, that's really unfair.

How did they find out that you found it annoying?

I don't know how it could have come up.

Yeah, because it's not like you were humming it to yourself.

Yeah.

Interesting.

I mean maybe it was just the obvious.

I think anyone can assume that that would be an annoying song to someone, And if they knew your musical preferences already, they probably could assume.

Oh, he's not into LFO.

Yeah, and suddenly my group of friends just transformed into my big sister and found exactly the button to push.

Do you have an older sister?

I did her musical taste have any influence on you?

Yeah?

I mean she listened mostly to the radio when we were growing up, and so we kind of had I would say, pretty generic top forty tastes right growing up.

At then as she got older she's five years older than me, she went to college and she started getting in I think that's really more where she found her her taste.

But even before that, the first music I ever owned was because she got a Columbia House subscription and she allowed me to get a couple.

Of very generous it was only a penny or exactly.

Yeah, So she's but she's been hugely influential on me, not just in music, but especially like with books and TV shows.

So much of my taste has been determined by things that she recommended to me.

I'm so jealous of that to have someone leading the way.

Oh yeah, and yes, really on the on the books and TV.

Side, Oh yeah, I was just really to this day, to this day, what does she recommend it to you?

Recently, you know recently, we I think both tried to recommend the same thing to each other because we knew it was really a bulls eye for both of us, which was the the British TV show Detective Show Ludwig.

Oh, I'm not familiar with this.

Oh, it's fantastic.

What is it?

David Mitchell plays a twink.

He is a puzzle setter.

Oh, I've heard about this because I love him, Yes, as do I.

And it's but it's a bit of a mystery too exactly, but also funny.

Yeah.

He he is a puzzle setter and I love doing crosswords and things like that.

Sure, so that is his occupation.

And he has a twin brother who is a detective who goes missing, okay, and so he's convinced by his sister in law to pose as his twin brother as a cop, sure, to try and find out what happened to his brother.

This sounds wonderful, and his his puzzle solving and setting abilities allows him to actually solve crimes accidentally.

Right, right?

And I imagine each season is not too Long's.

There's only one season?

Yeah?

I think it's just six seasons, you know, the.

Rightish one, right, just a very easy thing to get into.

Yeah.

Yeah, when someone recommends a show to me, I need to know that it's going to be less than you know, ten episodes before and for the initial investment.

Okay, but what about Little House on the Prairie.

Well, okay, Little House on the Prairie is a difference.

How did you how did you fall into that?

If that's your criteria.

Well, I mean we are kind of at a low point as far as television goes, at least how I feel, and we had run out of everything.

Yeah, you got to the end of TV.

Yeah, we got to the end of quality television.

It was like what else could there possibly be?

And then it was just there.

And Jim, my boyfriend, had seen He's seen every episode, knows everything about the show, and so he was on board with it because usually there's at least an initial fight about what we'll be watching.

And so we got into it.

I became just absolutely obsessed with this thing.

Have you ever seen it?

No, you got to get into it.

Yeah, I mean I've seen it in terms of I've seen ads for you know what, growing up.

I've seen Michael Landon in a sort of blousey shirt.

You haven't seen him topless yet, you will when you watch the show.

Yeah, yeah, I have a sense of his long hair and maybe a lot of chest hair.

No, you're less chest hair than you would assume something on the prairie would have.

Okay, you know that's where the seventies comes in.

I think where it's a he was thinking about how he was going to look without his top on.

But the show is very it's wild.

We've slowed down a little bit.

We're trying to pick back up.

But then we got into season two and watched a couple of episodes and things were rolling along, and then we watched an episode that was just watching them play a baseball game.

The episode was watching a.

Baseball in real time essentially.

It was horrible.

I couldn't believe.

I was like, if this was on TV right now, the show would be canceled mid episode.

There was no way that this would air on modern television.

But we we forced our way through it and hopefully the next episode will have hopefully someone will get a disease or drown in a river or something.

They've got to they've got to make up for lost time.

Yeah, yeah, this was no, absolutely not this was like, you know, mid March, and they were just like, well we got put something in an hour to fill but yeah, the show was like, well there's here's something with a novelty that does have about four hundred episodes.

Let's give it a shot.

And so far, pretty smooth sailing.

It goes down very easy.

It kind of is the same feeling as watching reality TV because it's just like you don't have to be that invested in it.

Things just roll along and it's bizarre and if you get distracted, you're not worried about missing a plot point.

But do you actively watch or is it something where you're you put it on in the background.

We rarely put put things on in the background in this house.

Yeah, I approve, Like when we sit down to watch TV, we try not to be on our phones, which we often will point out to the other one that we're on the phone, and then there's the friction there.

But it's I'm trying to think of a show where I would I guess if I was watching like House Hunters, I would be on my phone.

But I'm just like, I don't want to be part of whatever this disease is.

I need to have be able to pay attention for twenty to forty five minutes.

Yeah, yeah, something.

Okay, so you're watching Ludwig.

Or watch watched Ludwig and loved it?

Okay, yeah, you watch stuff?

Do you ever have solo shows that you watch?

You always watching things together?

What do I watch alone?

I watch Secret Lives of Mormon Wives alone.

But outside of that, we basically watch everything together.

I'm trying to think if, thank god, I found a partner that like our taste overlaps in a way that basically everything we want to watch is the same thing.

Yeah.

I think maybe if I watch something that's like an animated show, if I'm watching like old episodes of Futurama, that'll be on my own.

But what about you?

I almost always watch things with my wife, Okay, but she has stuff that she watches without me, just because you know, sometimes I'm traveling or these days, I've been doing a lot of editing and working on stuff, either music or podcast stuff at night, right and my workload is like that this fall, and so I'll be like, well, we'll watch one thing together, we'll eat our dinner, and then I'm I'll check out for a couple hours and then come back to go to sleep, and so during those times she has to find something that she can watch that won't offend me that she's watched right that.

You would like to be watched.

So what is what is she.

Watching right now?

She is watching Tennyson Prime Suspect kind of say not fin it's the sort of prequel of the Helen Mirren British oh Inter Detective show.

The amount of British detective shows, I would say it makes up eighty five percent of the pie truly.

Yeah.

Okay, So she's watching tennis and then you don't care to watch tennis, and.

Well, I don't know, I've never I never seen it.

I came in, I was like, what's that and she's like, oh, I'm watching this show and I was like, oh, and is it so good that it has to be good enough that she wants to watch it?

But not so good?

That's an interesting bar.

Yeah.

Yeah, But I think that's the nice thing about British crime dramas is there just so many that they like.

The spectrum of quality is everywhere.

I wish I could unlock an interest in more of those shows because it is an endless well, yes, that people adore yeah.

I usually choose a new show based on an IMDb rating.

Oh, interesting, you trust an IMDb rating?

I do, yeah, because it's you know, it's user generated, right, it's the fan rating, and there's often a lot of votes, right for popular things.

But I've kind of watched all the popular things, so now I'm looking at stuff that maybe has slipped past me, right, right, And I've now basically watched everything that is an eight or above.

Okay, but the world of the things that are seven out of ten, from seven point five to eight, it's a really thick slice of British mysteries.

Does that makes sense with that genre?

Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, they're all pretty good.

There are so many shows that are pretty kind of good.

Yeah.

Weirdly, I think like the paradox with that sort of like I usually within most TV or movies, I feel like rating between seven and eight point five is really good.

Yeah, it's like the more interesting stuff because it's not universally like, so it's got something different about it that's turned off some people.

But within British crime dramas, I think you do want the absolute best.

Yes, yeah, I wonder why that is.

I don't know, I'm not sure, I'm with you on the first part.

You don't agree with this, no, the seven to eight point defend yourself.

Well, I want to see the best stuff.

But I feel like, I think maybe this is mostly with movies.

Rotten Tomatoes is ruined what we believe as like a review score.

Yeah, something that's one hundred percent on Rotten Tomatoes, I'm like, it's probably fine.

I don't personally trust Rotten Tomatoes sort of for these reasons, so I go.

To Metacritic Metacritic, but yeah, I guess metacritics a little more trustworthy.

I also use Metacritic for an important reason when it comes to movies, because I don't watch trailers ever, and I don't read reviews so well, not to say ever, I will watch the trailer after I've seen the movie.

Then I'm really interested in seeing the trailer.

But before I go to see a movie, I want to know as little about it as possible, and so the only way I can kind of get a sense of whether something is good or not is by looking at Metacritic.

And they have both the aggregate of the critic reviews and that the user reviews.

So if something's hitting now you can see that something has high critic reviews and low user reviews, and you might be like, this is going to be homework of the movie.

I don't want to watch that.

Sometimes you can see that it has a high user review and low critic reviews, and you think there's some fan service I'm getting very yeah, exactly.

Also sometimes you get the high critic reviews and then low user reviews because people have decided to review bomb.

The thing this phenomenon is, I think we need you should have to have a license to use the internet.

Yes, it's unbelievable, that's relatively new.

Like this is start to put a dent in my my ability to trust Metacritic.

Sure, but if things are both are high on both quadrants, right, then I'm really gonna check it out.

Do you show up at the movies late to avoid all of the trailers?

Well this is where the real gift of pre assigned seating right changed my life, because before that, yeah, I would I would be sitting there, not like, well I get a seat, or I'd have to go with someone and say, okay, you go ahead, you're gonna watch the trailers, please save me a seat, but let me see where you're saying because I don't want to come in the middle of the dark, being like where are you?

It was a whole thing, but now in so many places you know where you're gonna sit.

Oh yeah, And of course so I can.

I will do the thing where I'll say, does anybody want any anything from the concession stand.

It's really great.

I get to use up the time and you know, do do a favor for everybody come in at the last minute.

You're almost like a designated driver exactly.

That's really right.

When did you start doing this?

When did you create this rule for yourself?

Gosh, I can't remember now, but it has been I would say over fifteen years ago.

Wow, amazing a long time.

That sounds great.

I mean I've the only time that I've done that recently in the past couple of years was I saw that movie where they I think it's a finish film, just someone I think somebody gets kidnapped by Nazis and it's just deeply violent.

What is this movie?

Do you remember?

On Elise?

Look up Finnish Nazi revenge movie I've seen.

I have seen the trailer for that one.

Actually, yes, I saw.

I had no see Sue yes, yes, see Sue saw knowing Nothing and it was quite an experience.

Yeah, because it's incredibly violent.

Yeah.

Yeah, So I'd like to do that more often, especially with movies.

I'd like to see.

Oh.

I think that my favorite movie going experiences have always been under those circumstances.

When I just go in, I'm like, I don't know what this is, and every frame of the movie that I've seen is I'm seeing it for the first time in the context of the story.

Sounds wonderful.

Yeah, I need to do that more often.

I mean, the only thing I need to know in advance is the run time.

Yeah, I've created a rule, and the listener knows has heard about this too much.

If a movie's three hours or longer, I leave ninety minutes in, yeah, and then I'll see the rest later.

But maybe I need to just cut trailers out of my life.

It's tempting, though I'm always want to take a peek.

I kind of like not knowing the run time too oh a little bit, because it is kind of a spoiler.

I was thinking about this the other day, that every book kind of has a spoiler built into it because you always know where you are in the story.

That's true, that's very true, and you can know what percentage you're through.

Yeah.

How many times have you watched a TV show and you know, say a detective procedural or something, and they're like, well this person didn't You're like, no, it's you're twenty two minutes in.

Yeah, that's not right.

That's very true.

Wow, But I just I couldn't do it.

I can't imagine getting into a three hour movie not knowing it was three hours.

Yeah, I would lose my mind.

Your life.

But sometimes you have to prioritize art.

I suppose maybe I should give that a shot and see what it does to me chemically.

I think that could be devastating on me in every way.

But do you have people who you could rely on to sort of be your guide in that way?

So you can take out any kind of pre information that you might have and just say, hey, I'm following you.

They'll say, come to this movie.

We're not going to tell you the running time, but you just know you're going to see something good and it's not going to be necessarily be six hours of your life gone.

I can rely on no one in my life for anything.

I trust no one.

Yeah, no, I don't think I would trust any of my friends or family to give me to help me with that situation.

I'm lucky that my LA friends all know about my weird stuff about no spoilers.

They've been my friends for two decades ye or, and they're all movie buffs.

Most of them work in, you know, in entertainment some aspect.

And so I can usually they can say, like this one you got to see.

Right right, Well, I think there's something else we should talk about that.

I you know, I'm not that comfortable even bringing this up with you right now, but I feel like I have no choice otherwise.

I thought he's a professional, he'll come by, we'll talk, we'll chat, have a nice time, and then move on with our days.

The podcast is called they Said No Gifts.

Oh ah, so I was a little surprised.

I would say, it was actually shocked that you showed.

Up with a gift.

I thought the show was called I said, No Boxed Gifts.

Oh.

Interesting, Now that's another podcast which is a you know, And I was like, oh, yeah, I know, I understand No Box Gifts.

That is very familiar to me as an Indian person.

I get it, so, you know, I brought you this.

Oh okay, so you you've felt like an envelope gift would be.

Okay, Well, if I think you've if you open it, you'll okay, you'll see.

Have you ever been to an Indian wedding got an inventation that says no boxed gifts?

Is that a real thing within an Indian community?

It is no boxed gift, no box gifts.

Why, well, I think you'll.

Okay, let's maybe open this.

It's actually I'm going to say, this is also a nice envelope.

Oh well, you know it's a gift.

Okay, we're opening it up here.

Oh and a nice little card with some like floral in gold.

Oh my god.

Ohcation okay, So I've got twenty one dollars, which is that significant?

It's significant in that it ends in a one.

Okay, and in the card it just says deer Bridger all the best reciacs.

Yes, yeah, okay, Well.

This is obviously I will say this is the second second episode where I've gotten cash.

Oh well, I'm I'm sorry.

But you've out done it.

You've out done the first I got.

I believe I got twenty dollars the first time from Chris estrata.

Oh okay, and I bought a T shirt and now I've gotten twenty one dollars.

We need to keep this pattern.

Going so you can get one dollar more every time.

And we need to do at least four episodes a day.

Okay, Well, then I need I want explanation.

I'm so curious.

So I so I said, no box gift.

Not actually what they but they will say no box gifts please, okay, and that means give money.

Oh, that's genius.

Yeah, that that is the code for just give us money.

That's what everyone should be doing.

Yeah, and that's you know, that's what the appreciated present is, right sometimes.

But the first I remember the first time I saw it on a wedding invitation, being like, what does that mean and having to ask my parents and they laughed, They're like, well, obviously this is what it means.

And then the other part of it is that for all gift giving when there's money, and for Indian people, or at least within my family, you never give a number that ends in zero.

I think the superstition has to do with the idea that a zero, like a number that ends in zero, is like a whole number.

It is a complete number.

It has reached the end of something and actually what you are the most auspicious thing is to celebrate the start of something new.

It's kind of that's very sweet.

Actually, yeah, it's really kind of a beautiful superstition.

Yeah.

So I would get because I would get birthday gifts, you know, and it would be eleven dollars a check for eleven dollars, And again I had to ask why is that?

And wow, yeah, that does feel like a thing where everyone just kind of always seems like they're trying to outdo someone else.

So I put another dollar in there.

For you, I think it's there is something nice about it.

But for me, mostly it just was a superstition.

Right.

What really stuck with me is that it's bad luck to give a gift that ends in a zero.

Yeah, especially at a wedding where it's like, well things are over at the end of the Did you have a traditional Indian wedding?

I didn't.

Okay, no, there was nothing traditional about my wedding.

Actually, what was your wedding?

Like?

It was in Palm Springs?

Oh, wonderful, it was very nice.

Part of the reason why it was untraditional is because my family, and especially the people here in the US that I consider you know, family, our family, friends who are as close as family.

It's just a huge number of people.

Sure.

And my wife, by contrast, as a very small family.

Her entire family, you know, is I think fewer than ten people.

Wow, and that's remarkable.

As we were filling out our guest list, you know, she was like, Okay, I've got to the end of my family.

And I was in you know, the fifties or sixties, we're still going in.

The venue was not that big, so we ended up saying, Okay, we're just going to invite.

I think the way we determined it was mutual friends of ours whose houses we'd been to or they'd been to our house.

That was a very good Yeah, that's that's how everyone should do that.

I think it just there are so many people I'd like to consider my friend.

But I think that once you've been to somebody's house, its just it's a literal and metaphor crossing of a threshold.

Right.

That's a good I think even for parties and everything.

That makes it way more efficient guest list.

Yeah, yeah, because anytime I'm planning a party, I panic, right, I think of one person and then it like branches out and like, well, there are four people that kind of should be in behided and then if I put them on that, I mean, it just falls apart so quickly.

Yeah, and this is this is step one of every wedding.

Yeah, of course.

Wow.

So how many people total ended up coming in the end?

We had ninety something people?

Okay?

And did you say no boxed gifts?

No?

I think we were open to anything.

Did you do a wedding registry?

We did?

We did, which feels crass.

I mean I think it is.

But everyone does it.

Everyone does it, literally, everyone does it.

Yeah.

I think when it gets really crass is what you put on it essentrally.

I mean, and you know there's this like honey fun thing now, which is the Western way of saying no.

Box, getting right, give us some money for a honeymoon or whatever.

I remember, like the most egregious thing I've seen seen on a wedding registry.

This was years ago when I was still living in Utah.

Was someone requested an xbox.

I just thought, this isn't a Christmas lips a child?

What are you?

Why would you ask for?

I really respect it.

I guess you know, it's some people want to toast her oven, someone wants to play Halo or something.

But I remember thinking, come on.

Maybe that's their romantic activity.

Interesting.

Yeah, I guess it was.

I'm to blame for not thinking that maybe they were playing together.

Yes, let that couple have a cooperative game experience, yes, exactly.

But yeah, wedding registry that also seems stressful to me.

It's you know, it was actually, once you get over the guilt of the idea of sort of assuming that people are going to give you gifts, it's it's pretty fun, I think, right, you just go crazy, I think so.

I mean, you know, there's because the way that you can do your registry I think could potentially also say something about you.

Of course, and in a wedding registry, I think it's different than say, like a baby shower, where you're like, we just need boxes of diapers.

Is somebody going to get us the box of diapers?

That's not a fun gift to ask for or receive, right, but you do need it.

But I think with the wedding registry you could hit those essentials.

But it was fun to be able to say, like, what's something that we imagine in our dream home, you know, how do we It feels like part of the imagination of your future together.

Right, What sort of stuff were you putting on them?

I think we put you know, some dishware, Okay, one of the things it was it was me only like home things.

Right when we got married, we were living in a little condo that I had lived in by myself previously, and then my wife, Lindsay moved in with me, and this was really a chance for us to reimagine the space as something shared, as opposed to her living with the stuff that I already had.

You know, we've done a little bit to try and make it a shared space, but this was really like we're starting over.

And so I think we had like a like a little light fixture that we could put in the kitchen to replace the things that are and we had dishes and things like that.

Wait, so where were you registered?

I think that it was a service that lets you pull in things from the place of a Yeah, so we could say, oh, this lamp and then these dishes and in different places.

You weren't locked into one retail.

Yeah, I'm like thinking back to like Macy's in two thousand and three.

Yeah, this is a different world.

Different you know, I've long thought that at some point you should get to register as someone who's not who has no plans to get married.

Oh sure, yeah, because it is.

A nice thing that people get at their wedding.

Suddenly everyone's just by furnishing their home.

I think you should be able to register for your Christmas presence.

Sure, let someone buy you an Xbox.

Those Amazon things which I find extremely strange, but.

Maybe it's time to normalize them, normalize adult Christmas wish list.

Yeah, maybe maybe it's time.

And then I yeah, the Xbox goes right on there.

Yeah.

The whole point of it is to save everyone some heartache, sure, in terms of getting something that people want and getting things that you want.

And then you don't have to have returns.

Yes, so you just have to go to Walmart to return something.

Oh I did, that's right.

Imagine put me in a very tight spot there, registry.

Yeah, I should have centered the registry.

I've got the correct Apple pencil now, so everything is fine.

Apple needs to get it together.

With the amount of Apple pencils they're selling, it's very confusing.

There more than one.

Oh, there are several and it's what are we working on in the neighbor's yard.

Listener, you're just going to hear some of this going on.

This is being outdoors, and that sounds like the machine's falling apart.

I'm just picturing someone back there in adjacent mask.

That's just somebody practicing their Halloween costumes.

Yeah, that's what they're going to apply for a job at not scary farm or something.

They're doing a self tape with a chainsaw.

I'm going to start doing all of my self tapes with chainsaws, regardless of what character.

That's not a bad idea.

I also want a headshot with a chainsaw.

I'm going to become the chainsaw guy.

Everybody needs a gimmick.

Yes, this should become the next time we do photos for this podcast, I'll be holding a chainsaw.

No, I think I should create a I said no gifts registry.

The guests can look at the registry.

That would be great.

You know the ways that I'm trying to cheat the system, yesimately, I'm trying to think of what should I spend twenty one dollars on?

What do you need?

Well, this is let me put it this way.

What don't you need, but you want.

Oh see, that's that's really what you should be spending it on because it's gift money, right.

That's kind of what happened with this class action settlement recently.

Yeah, because usually I'll just like, I'll get a gift card and I'll just put in my wallet and then let groceries or where food purchases drain it and then it's gone.

But I said, I'm going to be purposeful about this, and I can do that with these twenty one dollars.

I'm just remembering.

It was last fall the Libman brothers brought me a thirty dollars money order, is that right?

I think it was thirty dollars, and we had listeners vote on what I spent it on, and they voted on me going to get a photo shoot at the JC Penny Photo Studio, and I think it ended up costing me one hundred and fifty dollars, which is a tough pill to swall.

Yeah, but I mean the photos will last forever, very high quality obviously, so I'm going to try to avoid that situation again.

But twenty one dollars.

Could you my request?

Maybe?

Since we started the conversation this way could you spend that money on buying yourself some music, maybe physical media.

That's not a bad idea.

I'm trying to get back into the mode of physical media, at least with Blu rays.

I'm starting with Blu rays again because it, I mean, for so many reasons, is so much better than streaming.

Absolutely.

I got an email last night about of sale at the Criterion Collection.

Oh, and I think there were some things that you could get for twenty one dollars.

Did you buy anything?

I have them in my cart, but I haven't.

Didn't mean this is my style of shop.

Yeah, just forget it in the.

Car because I just got something from them.

But what did you get?

I got the Blu ray of you can count on me?

Oh great choice.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Maybe I should get a new play and I or just even get on band camp.

Band camp yep, But I think of physical Do you still have a CD player?

Do I have a CD player anywhere in my home?

No?

I still have two iPods, but they need some help.

Do you have a record player?

I don't see.

This is something I I've got to get to a place in my life where I can buy.

Once I buy a record player and begin buying records, it's going to ruin my life, you know, because that is something I would like to have.

But moving back and forth across the country.

With books, I finally gave up on buying mostly I don't buy a lot of I'll only get book digital books because I can't pack boxes with books anymore.

I mean, I I now live in this house, so it's not like knock on wood.

I won't be fleeing in the night.

But with records, it's a similar thing.

And I've gotten records on this podcast before and I love getting them.

But there's a there's a fear that it's going to take over my space and then just be a huge money drain.

But CDs, I'm excited that CDs are coming back.

They're coming back.

Yeah, I'm not familiar with this.

Yeah, where do you even buy CDs?

Well, I think I mean on the internet online?

Sure, and that shows Wow.

Yeah, interesting, there are CDs at the merch table.

Why do you feel like people are getting back into CDs?

What I heard, I don't know if this is true, but what I heard is that because gen Z thinks it's cool and kind of cool phenomenon art fact, novelty, I'm not sure, and I don't know if that's if it's driven by irony or just or legitimate excitement or just because they're into all things nineties right, But whatever the reason, I'm excited about it.

Yeah.

I have so many CDs at my parents' house.

I have giant tupperware of CDs, and I'm just like, I have no use for these cars no longer have CDs.

Well that's that's the thing that I'm hoping will change if this gets big enough again, can we put CD players back?

It would be so great.

Yeah, CD players and buttons, Let's get them back in cars.

Yeah, the climate control buttons on my car are I mean, there's no but so I have to do looking at this thing in order.

It's an absolute nightmare.

No bad engineering, I would say.

But CDs.

I feel like CDs are there are so many good qualities to them.

My number one thing is just being able to listen to it over and over.

Yeah, whereas with a lot of streaming services you have to like manually turn on the play this over button every time you want to, or the shuffle thing gets all.

It's a nightmare.

It's a nightmare.

I think that's my wish for you is spend that on us.

How WI should we charge for a CD at this point?

I think fifty dollars okay, So the price has basically stayed the same.

I think I feel like there was a point when CDs got super expensive and then dropped to about when they were on their decline to like nine to ninety nine, and then vanished for such a long time.

When a band puts out an album, now, does the record company still produce CDs every time?

Well?

This is part of the reason why I've been thinking about it, because I'm I'm going to be putting out a new album next year, and and I just had to send it off to get mastered.

Right.

The mastering engineer said, do you you know what formats?

Am?

I am?

I mastering this for it?

Right?

And I said, you have vinyl and CD and digital?

Okay?

And I got excited about that.

Yeah, of course yes, because most bands will at least put out vinyl when maybe tapes.

Yeah, but the CD is still now it's like an option.

Yeah, I see CDs now, Wow, that's really fast.

New CDs for new music.

And see the tape renaissance when cassette tapes came back.

It is like that it's not a good format.

This is driven by irony on some level, right, But a CD is a pretty good format.

Yeah.

The quality is very good.

They're more not bulky.

Yeah, I don't know.

I'm into that idea.

You can't play vinyl in the car yet?

Yeah?

Was there ever appointment people were playing vinyl in the car?

No, but it feels like someone probably tried at some point.

It was like, oh, right, this it's not.

You go to the show.

You're like, I loved this band, I bought the vinyl.

I want to listen to it on my way home.

Now I still have to put on.

The streaming, right.

Oh and then the other problem with CDs is now that no computer has a.

Disc drive, right, No computers have anything.

I mean, they're just essentially an iPad with a keyboard.

Yeah, just unfortunately they're just ken dolls with screens.

For me, Yeah, because I do like to rip my music if I have a CD.

Oh, there's so many things to worry about.

But I'm gonna have to go.

I would like to go to a store and buy a CD.

I guess Amiba has CDs.

Yeah, that's mostly what a meba I haven't been to Amba in a long time, but you're still going through CDs there, right.

I think they do still have a CD section.

Yeah, I can't believe like I'm talking about this, I'm talking about CDs in this way.

It's like that they're just totally like they really vanished pretty quickly, Yeah, and are now back, and I guess Electronics Company are going to start making portable CD players again.

I think so fascinating.

I like, otherwise you can listen to it in near the xbox that you get on your.

Yeah, most of my music listening coincided, Like there was a brief period of listening to music on CDs, but most of it was iPod era.

So yeah, the idea of just like putting it one CD into a disc player and then having that it's kind of foreign to me.

And then but unfortunately you can't even put them in my car.

I guess I could buy an entire like a Honda Civic from two thousand and one.

I get that probably would cost almost as much as buying a new CD player or a new CD, yeah, or a new CD.

I worked at best Buy for a brief period, and that was there was very little employee discount, but you could get a CD for five or six dollars and it was a dream world just buying CD after CD for half the price.

As an aside, can I tell you that I really love hearing all of the other jobs that you had in your past to be I think one of the things that I really appreciate in the way that the show is there are these anecdotes that come up that revealed the sort of multitude of lives that you lived.

Life I've stumbled through.

Oh my god, if you saw my resume, you'd be like, this person cannot be trusted to.

I have a job.

I have the same thing.

What was your first job?

My very first job was as a bookshelvert at the library.

Oh yeah, which is probably I bet that feels like a satisfying job.

It was great.

I really enjoyed it.

I love libraries.

Yeah, see my above comments about being a nerd, and so it was great to be able to be in the library and get paid to do it.

Right, You get to be in a nice, peaceful atmosphere.

You probably get to see books that you weren't you haven't really thought about before because you're seeing everybody's books and it's Were you ever infuriated when somebody would reshelve the book themselves?

No, I don't know if it would have even occurred to me that that happened, because you know, I'd show up the library and like, here's the here's the many carts of books that.

Okay, so you didn't have to worry about the reorganization.

Yeah, who does that at the library?

Well, I would, you know, have to take take it and put it back in the right place.

But once it was and if you're you're on the shelf and you see things are out of order.

You do it yourself there.

But yeah, I because I feel like you could really make librarians a life life a nightmare.

Yeah, I reshl Yeah.

But then I went from that, uh to then my my job that summer was working in McDonald's.

Wow, what a swing.

Yeah, were you uh front counter or a cook front counter?

Only I was fourteen, so I was not allowed to to work anywhere else.

Was that like a state law?

I think?

So yeah, oh yeah that's going on in the McDonald's.

It's child labor laws.

Good for them.

Yeah, i'd make fries.

You can make fries.

Actually, it's like the most dangerous thing to make.

Yeah, but that was, you know, outside of the the kitchen, so I couldn't couldn't go to where there they were, like the interesting burners.

But because I feel like there's very little going on in the mc donald's kitchen outside of boiling hot oil.

Yes, yeah, that was part of it.

No one should be handling.

Yeah, that feels like a machines job.

Wow, how interesting?

How long were you McDonald's for.

Just the summer?

The summer?

Okay, yeah, how.

Was that as a job.

I've never I've worked in plenty of front counter at restaurants, but not at a McDonald's.

Yeah.

I have to say I didn't mind it.

Okay, you know, I certainly wished, I guess I had a job that required more thinking or something, but it was.

It was fine.

It was I liked going to the mall and I liked McDonald's and dream job.

There just weren't that many options at fourteen years old for a job.

But I needed to work, so that was kind of that was kind of it.

Yeah.

My first job at that age was it was at Schlatsky's Deli.

Oh yeah, which is a miserable experience.

Yeah, I mean parts of it are fun.

Did you have to do any of the dishwashing or anything?

No, okay, once you get I don't think.

That they're our dishes to Washington McDonald's.

Great, it's only.

Point paper packaging, right, There's probably very little back there that needs to be cleaned, right.

Well, the grills and stuff like that, But that was what the adults did, or at least you know, and anybody who was over the age of sixteen to me, wasn't adult.

Right.

Meanwhile, you're living your teenage dream.

Yeah, how interesting.

The worst part of any food job, I would say, is closing, Okay, just agony being there at the end of the day and having to clean everything up, especially if somebody shows up late.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

I feel like as a society, most people at this point have it's kind of occurred to them.

Oh maybe don't show up ten minutes before a restaurant closes and then stay for an hour after.

So you worked in a place that had that was a standalone Yes, I worked in the mall.

Oh, and the mall has very strict like get out.

Or also just it's not our problem if you're in the food court.

Oh interesting, right, what else was in the food court.

Oh God, paint me a picture.

I don't remember what else was there.

What I remember most was to come to the McDonald's.

It was not the sort of like main front entrance.

The closest entrance was the side entrance where there was an old navy Oh interesting.

Yeah, so the clothes must have smelled like French fries.

It's a feature, not absolute feature.

This comes from the French fry old day.

Yeah, just greasy smelling clothing.

Okay, well, I'm gonna buy some at least one.

CD with grease, which do you know, No, you'll buy Yeah, that's a great I think maybe maybe your listeners can.

I'm not letting anybody not with music.

Yeah, you won't even let your friends recommend a movie to you.

So yeah, I'm very picky.

I'm I'm not crossing that bridge.

But what I will do is I'll pick an artist who's alive and active, so some of the money can go to them.

Excellent, and uh, I'll let everybody know once I buy the CD.

Okay, great, yeah, well you please please tell me.

Yeah, it'll be purchased new because obviously you use none of the money will go to the artist.

This is going to take again.

This is what happens to me.

I begin overthinking, and in my life it just chips away at my mental health.

So really, I've given you homework.

You've given me homework in there probably the most difficult way.

But I'm really excited.

I haven't bought I can't remember the last CD I even bought.

I mean it was probably in twenty twenty ten, maybe, yeah, I wonder what it was.

Yeah, I've been buying vinyl just because it's more fun.

To buy, it's more collectible.

Put on the record.

But I'm excited, and also because I don't have a way to play a CD right now, right, But I'm going to invest, reinvest.

I have so many CDs sitting in my garage.

Yeah, and minor are in good conditions.

Oh yeah, do you remember the first CD you bought?

Yes, the very first CD that I bought with money that I made working McDonald's, because that's what I used the moments to buy my first CD player and first CD.

It was the last Action Hero soundtrack.

Who was on that soundtrack?

The main theme was performed by Buckethead, Oh, and it was the score was composed by Michael Kayman.

I think a CDC was on the soundtrack, and yeah, there was something.

It had a little bit of a hard rock and I really enjoyed the movie.

That was the one where like Arnold Schwarzenegger comes out of the screen, yeah, or someone goes into the score both both.

Wow, World's really collide?

Yeah, I do think I saw that movie.

I saw it again just recently at videots.

I'm sure it holds up very well.

It's great.

It was really perfect film.

Yeah, what's the conceit?

Why does why do the world's collide in that film?

You know, like some magic ticket kind of scientist.

Yeah, I'm sure it makes perfect logics.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Wow.

Was it an original a CDC song for the film or was it a.

I think it?

Oh, I think it was tough to hear.

You know, you want one of their hits.

Yeah, I don't want them composing a new song.

You don't know it could have been a hit.

You have to be optimistic.

I'm not going to be optimistic about them writing a new song.

For that.

You have to put a dollar at the end of their their gift.

It's the start of something new.

No, I feel like at this point in their career, we were at twenty dollars.

Okay, well, I'm excited for my adventure in CD buying.

I think they might have written that like a new song that might have been called Last Action Hero.

On Elise, can you confirmat in fact check the track, let's find out.

I'd like to hear the title of their song for this movie.

Last Action Hero by Tesla, Oh, by Tesla?

Tesla?

Tesla was a band.

Interesting they shredded?

Okay, well, I think we should play a game.

Okay, We're going to play a game called Gift or a Curse.

But I need a number between one and ten.

From and has to be between one and ten.

Well, it's up to you.

How about twelve twelve?

Okay twelve?

Wow, you've really broken a rule hair, Yeah, and I appreciate that, act.

I just feel like we've already started talking about superstitions, which are really the biggest curse that you can give someone as a gift.

Oh, absolutely the worst thing that I've gotten from my family and really anybody, anybody who wants to tell me a new superstition, I instantly believe and I'm instantly cursed by.

Yeah, you're planting a seed of paranoia in someone's brain exactly.

Well, they cannot let go for the rest of their life.

Yeah, because what if it's Yeah, that's real.

And so twelve is my lucky number.

Okay, okay, so you know I'm going to try and counteract that a little bit with a little positive superstition.

Yeah, lucky superstision.

Okay, I have to do some like calculating to get our game pieces.

You can promote, recommend, do whatever you want.

I'm not sure.

Thank you so much for speaking kindly about song Exploder.

I have another podcast that I make these days called Home Cooking, which is a show about cooking my friend Samine nos Rat, who is incredible chef and cookbook author.

She wrote Salt, Fat, Asset Heat, and she has a new book called Good Things.

We've Been We started in the pandemic and it's sort of a call in question, question and answer format.

We try and help people who were struggling with the ingredients or techniques or things like that.

And mainly it was something we started for a little bit of companionship during the pandemic in lockdown, and now we've brought it back and that's been really fun.

That sounds great.

Were you cooking prior to this podcast.

I mean, I'm I'm not a trained or expert to cook anything like that.

I'm sort of like I could sort of a guy for a meal right together with the press.

Actually, I can improvise a meal, and in fact, I'm probably better at that than following.

I'm very bad at following a recipe.

Okay, sure, sure and correct me if I'm wrong.

You like chocolate chip cookies, that is correct, and you bake them?

Yes?

Do you have your own recipe?

I have a few that I feel like I've made that I'm excited about.

Okay, what's your ideal cookie?

There's one that I that I made that I was excited by where I didn't have quite enough of either like chocolate chips or chocolate chunks.

Okay, bar right for thing, So I just I combined the two, but then it still wasn't quite enough, so I also threw in It was basically like a kitchen sink kind of chocolate cookie where I also had raisins and pecans and coconut.

Okay, great, And that was sounds.

Fantastic because then I didn't have to choose, you know, one thing or other is just it's kind of.

A trail mixed cookie.

Yeah, that sounds fantastic.

I love to bake a cookie.

Really.

Oh yeah, I'm baking constant well, baking only chocol the chip cookies.

Essentially, what podcast can I start that you will bring me chocolate cookies?

Oh that's a great question.

I can't come on song exploder.

You should create a baking podcast.

Yeah.

I have a newsletter that is called Accept Cookies.

Oh okay, perfect, So maybe the ideal.

I'll bring it to the newsletter.

Great, great, great, you find me on your newsletter.

Okay, this is how we play Gift or a Curse.

I'm going to name three things, and you're going to tell me if there're a gift or a curse and why.

Oh, then I will tell you if you're right or wrong, because there are correct answers.

All right, This first one is from the senurnamed Annie.

Gift or a curse when streaming services ask you to choose which AD experience you'd prefer.

And there's no way to get out of this by just paying your way to the ad free tier.

No, there's as far as Annie here is concerned.

You started up and they ask you which of these would you prefer?

Is that a gift or a curse.

I suppose it's a gift, because I know what my answer is.

My answer, give me all the ads at the beginning.

Don't break up the thing in the middle of it.

You know, I'm, as you might have gathered, kind of dogmatic about the way that I watch things, and I don't want to be interrupted right in the middle of the act or something like that, especially artificially, because so many things are made now where they it wasn't intended with the three acts, I mean, with the commercial breaks right right, So you're gonna throw ads in there just while in the you know.

It gets chaotic.

Sometimes the ad breaks become in the weirdest.

Spot at this point halfway through a sentence.

Yes, but it feels like a glitch sometimes.

Yeah, So I appreciate.

I guess that they're not forcing that upon me, and I'll take my ads up front.

Please, So gift wrong verse.

Uh, First of all, don't make me complicit in the ad experience.

Just you're the one creating the problem with the ads.

Just force them on me in whatever way you.

Want, whatever way you want.

I don't want to be part of the decision making with the ads.

It's not my job.

Just shove the ads down my throat wherever you want.

Wow, don't I don't want to have to click one more button.

I've never been so happy to be wrong.

Okay, you got one wrong, and that's fine.

This next one is from a listener named Jeff Gift or a curse sitting in multi thousand dollars massage massage chairs at airports or them all but not paying to use them.

So they're just chairs.

I guess there're those giant chairs with the you know, they probably cover your legs on some way.

If the machine was running, it would be crushing your body.

Sure, I think that's a gift because I'm always grateful for a chair.

I mean, like it's giving it's already giving me two options.

I could not use the chair standing, or here's a second option.

And even when it's not working, it's still a chair.

And if it's the massage chair, it's probably more comfortable than whatever plastic nonsense is in the regular area.

Correct, Gift.

Look, I'm not giving them my money, but the chair is there.

Yeah, I'm happy.

To take advantage of the airport.

At the mall, you're kind of getting a discount massage yes.

You're getting a little something, yeah, beyond the bench that they provide or whatever.

And I don't know, I feel like, why not, why not experience the leather in the mall?

Yeah, be covered up by you know, in the airport, and they're usually further away from everyone else.

It's a quiet spot and it's a chance to be confronted by security.

So why not.

My friends and I have something that we call cheap thrills, which is the opportunity to do something that costs nothing, right, but it adds a little excitement.

Like when you're walking down the street and there's a little curb raised curb, you can just walk on that like a tight rope for a few feet until it ends, and then you hop back.

Oh that sounds great.

That was a cheap thrill.

That was more exciting than just walking on the sidewalk and an unoperational massage share.

Oh yeah, that's free.

That's a cheap thrill.

Your heart is pounding thinking, I am kind of breaking a rule right now.

I'm supposed to be paying for this.

I'm wasting the space.

Yeah, it's just upgraded my experience of sitting.

What a bargain.

Yeah, that's a gift.

All right, you've gotten one right so far.

This final one is from a listener named John.

Gift or a curse when a video game has a fishing minigame as a bonus, A what kind of mini game?

A fishing minigameishing.

Minigame where if you play it correctly, someone steals your identity and your credit rights.

You're you know, you get a weird text and you just said, well I might know this person.

I'll give them my social security number?

Why not?

What's about a gift about that?

No?

You mean an f I okay, yeah, because I was also kind of hoping that maybe there's a to game that you're can unlock where you listen to fish.

Albums other than the video game is like fifty hours long.

Yeah, exactly and mostly silly.

But there are a lot of people.

Who there's so many people that are so passionate liking every part of that.

Yes, they find a way to enjoy the entire improvised video game.

I have never encountered a video game where there's a secret.

Fishing fishing mini game.

I have played games where there's like a there's gwent you know in the Witcher games.

Oh yeah, of course, where it's like a it's a card game, right, yeah, and you can just get lost in quent and and I'll say that's a gift because that's just that's just more game.

Sure, yeah, correct gift.

Why not have a fishing mini game in every video game Mortal Kombat, you should be able to fish in that that would.

Be great and use your special powers, you know, like like.

The Scorpion throws his thing into the water and catch fish.

Yes, exactly, Wow, they I feel like Mortal Kombat.

Actually every character probably has something they could use that would make them a better fisher person.

Yeah.

Yeah, interesting Mortal Kombat reach out.

I'm rethinking all games and seeing how flawed they are for not having a fish.

Absolutely.

Do you play a lot of video games.

We've talked about your Xbox I play.

I play probably two to three complete video games a year.

I love playing video games, but I rarely like sit down to play them anymore.

But why was that.

Attention span?

All sorts of things.

A lot of video games now just don't really appeal to me as a person.

A lot of them just feel like worse movies.

Yep.

So, but when I get into a video game, I absolutely adore it.

And one video game that had a phishing mini game was a couple of the Zelda games had fishing mini games.

I love phishing in these things.

Very satisfying to catch a fish.

Yeah, every game should have the ability to fish.

It's just a nice break from what else, what the other thing you're doing?

Yeah, I am.

I just recently, as in like last week, climbed out of the hole that I had dug for myself by starting Ghost of Sushima.

Oh, my boyfriend's in the middle of Ghost of Yote.

Well I'm excited about that.

When and I thought I should play the first one so I can get all the references, right, you don't want to see the sequel, right, so this is very you all the in jokes you know you'd be missing, yeah, all.

And those games are very comedy.

Yet that feels like a game that could have a fishing mini game.

Well, I felt like there's this It is sort of a thing that helps unlock the actual game.

But you know, all the little moments where you get to go follow a fox around, right and find a shrine and then you get to pet the fox afterwards.

Wonderful idea.

Really, just I was so happy that there was the part where you can pet the fox.

That was a great, great, great little break from all the just you know, killing and brutal beheading and stuff like that.

Yeah.

I feel like that game.

I've more and more like violence and video games stresses me out.

I'm not like opposed to it, but I'm just like, just take all of that out and let me follow the animal through the woods.

That's I've got too much else in my life.

Yeah, of the everything else but the fishing game.

Yeah, maybe I just need to buy a fishing game.

Yeah, that's probably my problem.

Well you got two out of three, all right, not too bad.

Yeah, and I still stand by my first answer.

Well, and that's up to you.

I don't know what to tell you.

Okay, this is the final segment of the podcast.

It's called I said no emails, and people are writing in or sending voicemails to voice notes.

I suppose that are sixty seconds long in a quiet place.

I said no gets at gmail dot com.

We hope answer question.

Yes, I'd love to.

All right, let's get into it here.

Let's see.

Okay, Now this one just starts with bridge or usually they say and guests.

So this person's not.

Very considerate, explicitly excluding me.

Yes, but I would love for you to participate, even though this person doesn't deserve it, it says Bridger.

My mom is turning seventy and in all that time I have never given her a gift that she's liked.

She's extremely frugal, and her major concern is how much did it cost?

Or was this purchase with a coupon?

And for God's sake, why not We live in the Midwest.

She's a big fan of murder mysteries but already has a ton of books.

I hop yarn, sign language and bland, breakfast food with decaf, but hates alcohol, technology, gun lobbyists, and couponless monetary decisions.

Do you have any suggestions as a gift expert, Christopher Christopher, Oh, okay, well again, I'm sorry I didn't include you.

Whatever sounds like he's I mean, has failed his mom in so many ways.

This is a great question for you, especially as you're about to go pick up your mom.

Yeah, that's true.

I didn't even think about that.

Now, my mom, when I give her a gift where there's a lot of crying, she's impossible to.

Give a gift to oh, crying because she's unhappy.

No, that she's just like she doesn't want us to give her anything else our way in a sweet way, which is also so infuriating because it's like, Mom, please let me just give you something.

Yeah.

But I think she and I are finally on the same page as like, Okay, I give up.

Yeah, are you bringing her a gift when you go pick her.

Up to No, she won't take anything.

Yeah, it has to be.

It's very well.

I did send her a nice little snoopy tile recently from our friend Dave Clock Dave reach Out, but that was a thing that was through the mail, and she loves snoopy, so I thought she can't resist.

You're not there for her to protest against it.

Yeah.

So but what does this mom want?

She loves going to I Hop and Bland breakfast food.

I think the answer would be for Christopher to use a coupon to buy the ingredients to make pancakes at home for his mom.

This feels like he's trying to teach her a lesson.

And it doesn't matter if the pancakes turn out well or not, because apparently.

She doesn't really care.

These could be essentially just flour and water.

Yeah, and he could potentially, you know, not even mention the fact that he bought the ingredients, just say I'm inviting you over to make you food.

Then she's not thinking about the sort of the consumeris right, consumer's part of it.

But then if she says, how much did you spend on this, he can say, well, I used a coupon.

I used a coupon.

There's nothing you can complain about, mom, this is your ultimate gift.

And it's also just such a loving act to make pancakes or someone.

Oh yeah, although if someone made pancakes for me but I had to drive to them, I'd be like, you're really ruining my morning.

Don't make me do something in the morning.

It has I have to What about night pancakes?

Night pancakes, Well, now we're getting getting into territory of like, well, they've got to be very good.

Pancakes, Like, have you ever had night I Hop pancakes?

Going to I Hop late at night is a fun experience, going to a diner late at night.

Yeah, maybe he takes her to I Hop late at night.

But then she could potentially complain about spending money.

Well, if he gets the coupon.

Yeah, or if he there's got to be another way to get the price down, I hop kind of haggle with the waiter.

Can you use your connections to get an I hop sponsorship that you can then transfer a coupon code over to Christopher.

I imagine I hoop will just give me a franchise and then we'll be Bridger's ie Hop and I will give this one customer a slight discount on pancakes for his mom.

He has to pay full price for his pancakes.

That's only fair.

I think that's perfectly fair.

And considering that I had to read his.

Email, considering he didn't even include me.

Yeah, the emotional labor he's made us do here has been disgusting, and his mom hates him.

You know, he's he's struck out as far as I'm concerned with the gifts.

So the final and he can make one final attempt have her over for a flower and water pancakes and see what that does to the relationship.

You know, she's seventy, it's time to start experimenting.

I think we answered the question perfectly, Christopher.

And if Christopher writes back in I don't you know I don't even I don't.

I don't want to talk about it.

You already said no email, I.

Said no emails.

This one, this one crossed a lot of lines for me.

Well, I've got twenty one dollars for my future CD purchase.

I'm so excited about this to go to the record store and buy a CD.

I'm going to seem so gen z.

Everyone's going to be looking at me and I'll have my la boo boo and La booo must be out at this point, right, I think it's got to be.

The trend was probably dead like four months ago.

I think if this many people know about it, Yeah, it's no longer cool.

It might almost be like in the irony psychologists.

Yeah, things go very fast these days.

I'm very excited about my twenty one dollars and I've had such a lovely time with you here.

Maybe you could consider changing the name of the show too, I said, no boxed gifts.

Maybe that can be our show together?

Oh yeah, Oh, and then people just bring us cash.

Yes, great, And then it will become a huge you know, it's going to become a lawsuit at some point.

There'll be a bitter court battle between the two of us trying to divvy up the cash.

Yeah, but until that point will have a great time.

Yeah, there'll be a class action suit and then you'll have to spend more on.

Well.

Thank you for being here, Thank you so much for having me listener.

The podcast is over.

I hate to break it to you, but I imagine you know how most podcasts work, and you certainly don't how this one works.

So don't you know, don't feign like you've thought that this was going to keep going, because it wasn't.

I have to get out of here, move on, I love you, goodbye.

I said, No Gifts is an exactly right production.

Our senior producer is on A Lisa now Nelson, and our episodes are beautifully mixed by Ben Holliday.

The theme song is by miracle Worker Amy Mann, and we couldn't do it without our booker, Patrick Cottner.

You must follow the show on Instagram at I said No Gifts, that's where you're going to see pictures of all these wonderful gifts I'm getting.

And don't you want to see the gifts?

I invit?

Did you hear?

Thunna made myself perfectly clear, But you're a guess.

To me, You gotta come to me empty, And I said, no guests, your presences, presents, and I already had too much stuff.

So how do you dare to surbey me?