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Wax On, Wax Off · Armstrong & Getty One More Thing

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Wax On wax Off. It's one more thing I'm strong.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: And that is an ancient reference to the Karate Kid
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: movies of the eighties.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: I think the eighties. I think the first one is
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: in the eighties.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to say eighties.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Young Ralph Maccio and a young whatever. The old Asian
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: guy was Pat Marita.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: He was Fat Marina from Happy after Arnold retired. It
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: was what was his character's name, doesn't matter? Uh, yeah,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: it's just a fabulous, fabulous character actor, beloved American Institution,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Pat Merita. Anyway. Uh, the whole concept of wax On
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: wax Off, his character was the sense for the young
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Ralph Maccio who wanted to beat down the blond haired kid.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: It was cruel, bully senta. But the the idea of
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: the wax On wax Off was the sort of discipline
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: you need to develop to become a karate master. And
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: they did a lot of prune and the bonds, eye
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: trees and that sort of thing, right right, Yeah, it's
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: funny that popped into my head. We got this note
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: from a semi frequent correspondent, Alvin, who's been writing his
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: emails for years and years and years we're talking about
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: doing chores and drudgery and that sort of thing. Now
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: you're at the following I think I've got a way
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: of dealing with chores as drudgering, making them acceptable like
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: it appears monks and monasteries do, and something you both
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: should relate to, since your musicians. When a person wants
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: to learn an instrument or to sing, practicing is what
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: you have to do to get proficient. Although I have
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: run into people like who as teenagers. The first time
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: they open their mouths, their voices were the sort of
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: voices that people wanted to hear, and other people may
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: don't have that anyway, m M. Practice what you do
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: so you keep doing it even though you don't sound
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: good and it's just hard, but you keep doing it,
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: doing it, doing it until you improve. And then he
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: mentions that back in the day he saw Otis Redding
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: and James Brown and others close up. I've got a
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: friend he's a little older than me. He grew up
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: in Augusta, Georgia, who talks about seeing James Brown working
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: nightclubs for years because he and his friends were they
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: couldn't stand country music. They're all about R and B
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: back in the day, and he says the shows were
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: just magnificent in a club. I can't even imagine anyway.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: Alvin says, I've also had opera singers live nearby and
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: heard them do voice exercises every morning. I think the
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: idea is to translate that into washing dishes and cleaning
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: toilets and shoveling coalmanore into a trailer and then spreading
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: it in the field. He says, speaking for myself, I
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: was a farm boy that makes everything work. Is just
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: another thing like these proverbial monks do. It's talking about
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: how the monks all look at chore as an effort
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: to move toward perfection. That you look at washing the
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: dishes not as getting the dishes clean, but is taking
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: steps to becoming the perfect dishwasher. Wash them with as
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: much efficiency and care as you possibly can, till it's
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: practically an art form. I could believe that if, like
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: I'm painting a house, washing a dish, you got the
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: goof from the mac and cheese on there, You scrub
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: it for a second, and now it's off there.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: Man, this is on here hard. I got to remind
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: of my kids, they got to rinseless stuff off before
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: they put in this thing.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: You gotta soak damn bitches. Yes, yes, are you buying
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: that picture? It vacuuming. I've gotten close to that. And oh, oh,
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: I know one you can relate to mowing lawns.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't. I don't know if I'm the right person.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: I don't have trouble with those kind of things you
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: just described. I've never had trouble with them. Paperwork is
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: the one, and I don't know if you can do
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: that with paperwork.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, although I tell you, one thing we have
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: going that previous generations really didn't is we can entertain
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: ourselves while we're doing the drudgery. Right, you got to
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: You got a big screen TV over there, You got
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: earbuds in or whatever.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's one of the reasons that doesn't bother me
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: to do laundry or stuff like that. I'm just listening
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: to a podcast while I'm doing it.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: Anyway.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, considered exercise and getting information.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: A couple of times through the years I've featured I've
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: praised Martin Luther King's famous street sweepers speech, which is
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: just it's inspirational and I wish more people heard it.
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  Speaker 1: But it isn't convenient to the modern narrative. It's part
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: of King's legacy, and each side leaves behind parts of
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: Martin Luther King's legacy to serve their own purpose. I
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  Speaker 1: get that. But he was talking talk about how if
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: you're going to be a street sweeper, be the best
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  Speaker 1: street sweeper that's ever lived, take pride in that perfect it,
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  Speaker 1: and you know everything you do, do it as well
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  Speaker 1: as you possibly can.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: I used to do that. I when I was driving
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  Speaker 2: feed truck and feed lots. I liked being like really
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  Speaker 2: good at it and faster to everybody else at it,
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  Speaker 2: and that sort of thing, and a lot of people
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  Speaker 2: just had no interest in doing anything other than getting
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: through the day.
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: How was that way when I bust tables?
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, in vacuuming, you know, if you're on the
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: sort of rug where you can see where you've done,
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: because it leaves the you know, like grain changes. I've
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: sought to, like leave the perfect pattern behind. Is that
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: like a weird OCD thing or just amusing myself or
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: is that what the monks are talking about?
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: I guess what the monks are talking about. Definitely do
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  Speaker 2: it with mull and lawns. I always did.
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  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, I'd actually be annoyed if you got
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  Speaker 1: to the end and you got like half a strip
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  Speaker 1: and it's stood out from the full strips that you'd
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: carefully I'd be like, damn, it is that weird or
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  Speaker 1: pride or one I don't know.
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  Speaker 2: I remember when mulling your lawn diagonally became a thing
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: and people just wanted to look different, and that was harder.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: Now. I used to when when Baxter, when we lived
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: in an old house and he'd poop in the backyard,
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: he'd go out and poop as opposed to us taking
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: him in a walk. Because our newer house has no fence.
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: I would certainly be as efficient as I could be
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: in picking up the poop. But I don't think that
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: was like imitating the monks monks. I think it was
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: a person who didn't want to pick up a dog's
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: extrement for a minute longer than was necessary, right, nor
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: to step in it having missed some.
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: I don't want to spend any more time in the
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: hot sun picking up crap for free.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: Right, So I was meticulous about making sure I missed none.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: But again, that wasn't ride that was practicality. So then
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: picking up the crap was my crappiest chore. But I'd
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: rather do that all day long than do paperwork.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: No doubt, no doubt, not even close. Am I gonna
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: have to log into a site that the password doesn't work. No,
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: I'll just stand out here and pick up the dog boot. Sorry,
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: there's already a count with that name. Oh, I gotta
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: get a gun. I'm gonna put it in my mouth.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: There we go. Release.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: You couldn't work any cubicle, could you? Jack? No, you
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: just you're just not made for it.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: No, no, no, I would do some sort of manual labor,
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  Speaker 2: which I'd be perfectly fine with.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm thinking, I'm trying to picture it. I did well. No,
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: I had a desk, I had an office, a little office,
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: but ugh, so bad strokes for different folks. Clean those dishes,
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: get them shiny.
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: That dog boot show some pride, right, Well, I guess
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: that's it.