Latest / Stuff You Should Know / SYSK’s 2021 Glad Tidings Bonanza Holiday Special

Transcript

SYSK’s 2021 Glad Tidings Bonanza Holiday Special · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff you should know a production of I
0:04
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the Holiday Cast. I'm Josh,
0:25
Speaker 1: and there's Chuck and Jerry's with us in spirit, and
0:28
Speaker 1: everything is merry and bright, and the tidings are glad
0:33
Speaker 1: in the halls are decked, and uh, Santa's on his way.
0:38
Speaker 1: That's right. Are Christmas episode that we look forward to
0:41
Speaker 1: every year. This, along with the Halloween episodes or episodes,
0:46
Speaker 1: are two of our favorites. And they are both ad
0:49
Speaker 1: free because we insist upon it, because Christmas has been
0:52
Speaker 1: commercialized enough for doing our bit to reverse that trend
0:56
Speaker 1: just ever so slightly. And I think it's it's been
0:59
Speaker 1: having a measurable effe, don't you, Chuck? I think so.
1:01
Speaker 1: People's fingers are spared that fast forward button for the
1:05
Speaker 1: next forty five minutes, and let's do this. So what
1:20
Speaker 1: are we going to do first? Maybe the mystery behind
1:22
Speaker 1: the world's most famous Christmas poem? Yeah, did you dig
1:26
Speaker 1: this one up? Or no? I believe this was a
1:28
Speaker 1: listener suggestion. It was so. This is based on an
1:31
Speaker 1: article by Stacy Conrad in Mental Floss, but it was
1:35
Speaker 1: suggested to us by one of our listeners named Adam Stevenson,
1:39
Speaker 1: and thank you very much to Adam for sending this
1:41
Speaker 1: idea in And the whole thing, Chuck, that we're talking
1:44
Speaker 1: about is probably the world's most famous Christmas poem. It's
1:48
Speaker 1: called a Visit from St. Nicholas, and we've read it before,
1:51
Speaker 1: but it's actually, in most people's mind called Toys the
1:54
Speaker 1: Night before Christmas. That's what I was confused a couple
1:57
Speaker 1: of times I read through this. So that poem has
2:02
Speaker 1: the authorship of it is disputed and has been disputed
2:05
Speaker 1: for some time now. And it's not one of those
2:08
Speaker 1: questions where somebody says, no, no, it was my great
2:10
Speaker 1: great great great great grandfather who wrote it. Instead, there's
2:15
Speaker 1: actually like evidence that kind of backs this up. So
2:19
Speaker 1: right now here in one and maybe for the rest
2:21
Speaker 1: of all time, we're not a certain who wrote a
2:26
Speaker 1: Visit from St. Nick also known as Towards the Night
2:28
Speaker 1: before Christmas. That's right. We know. It first popped up
2:33
Speaker 1: in Troy, New York's Troy Sentinel on December appropriately three,
2:40
Speaker 1: with no authorship attributed, and then thirteen years after that,
2:45
Speaker 1: a professor and a poet named Clement Clark Moore was
2:49
Speaker 1: named as the author. Because of the story that his housekeeper,
2:54
Speaker 1: without him knowing it, sent the piece in. It was
2:57
Speaker 1: a poem he wrote for his kids, supposedly, and sent
3:00
Speaker 1: into the newspaper. And then in eighteen forty four, which
3:03
Speaker 1: is twenty one years later, right, it was officially included
3:08
Speaker 1: in one of his poet poetry anthologies. That's right, So
3:13
Speaker 1: it officially became credited to Clement Clark Moore. And then
3:18
Speaker 1: at some point, in a not entirely certain win, another family, um,
3:22
Speaker 1: the family of Henry Livingston Jr. And again by family
3:25
Speaker 1: we mean um, five generations grandchildren step forward and said, hey, um,
3:32
Speaker 1: I don't think this is quite right, because it turns
3:35
Speaker 1: out that great great great great great grandfather Henry had
3:40
Speaker 1: been reading this poem to our to his kids, my
3:44
Speaker 1: great great great great grandmother for like fifteen years before
3:50
Speaker 1: it was first published in the Troy, New York Sentinel. Right,
3:53
Speaker 1: So if that was three, they're claiming it goes back
3:56
Speaker 1: to eighteen seven. Yeah, that's what I saw, all right.
4:00
Speaker 1: So let's duke this out on the livingstone side. And
4:04
Speaker 1: we're not taking sides because neither one of us know
4:06
Speaker 1: or care, but uh, on the livings, they certainly do.
4:09
Speaker 1: On the Livings in side. They say, you know what,
4:12
Speaker 1: we have Dutch heritage in our family and ancestry. Um
4:16
Speaker 1: great great great great great great grand Peppie Henry's mom
4:19
Speaker 1: was Dutch and there's a lot of Dutch references in
4:23
Speaker 1: the poem, so it's his. Yeah, apparently this is where
4:27
Speaker 1: we get the names for Santa's eight Reindeer, And originally
4:32
Speaker 1: Donner and Blitzen's names were Dunder and blicks them. If
4:35
Speaker 1: you read that, I know it's great. What makes it
4:38
Speaker 1: like a cheap T shirt you would buy or something?
4:40
Speaker 1: What a dunder brand T shirt? Well just know, like
4:43
Speaker 1: you know, you're off brand toys. That seems like the
4:47
Speaker 1: Christmas shirt. Yeah, so don't but it Dunder and blicks
4:50
Speaker 1: them mean thunder and lightning and Dutch, so hence the
4:53
Speaker 1: Dutch references. And the thing is that Clement Clark Moore
4:56
Speaker 1: wasn't Dutch and he didn't have Dutch heritage, so it
4:59
Speaker 1: does make it a little more sensible that Livingston, who
5:01
Speaker 1: did have Dutch heritage, would have used those Dutch names initially.
5:06
Speaker 1: That's right. And for all of you thinking I'd just
5:08
Speaker 1: stepped by a Dunder and Mifflin joke, I just want
5:11
Speaker 1: to acknowledge it, so you know that I did think
5:13
Speaker 1: of it and I chose not to same here, all right,
5:17
Speaker 1: it's a Christmas miracle for growing up. Yeah, we really are.
5:21
Speaker 1: Uh So blix Um changed to blix in first, I
5:26
Speaker 1: think to rhyme with vixen, and I believe in the
5:29
Speaker 1: etour More stepped up because you know, he was like, hey,
5:32
Speaker 1: this is my poem after all, right, uh and changed
5:35
Speaker 1: it to the Germanic Blitzen, and then Dunder eventually became Donder,
5:40
Speaker 1: and then in the early twentieth century it was went
5:42
Speaker 1: to Donner because it's also Germanic. Yeah, so there's the
5:46
Speaker 1: whole thing. Originally Dunder and blicks Him were two of
5:49
Speaker 1: the names, and those are clearly Dutch words, which has
5:51
Speaker 1: nothing to do with Clement Clark Moore. Um. There's another
5:54
Speaker 1: thing to remember. We said that Henry's children said, and
5:58
Speaker 1: apparently a neighbor at times said that they remember him
6:01
Speaker 1: reading this to them back in eighteen oh seven, uh sixteen,
6:05
Speaker 1: years before it was published, and they there's also family
6:08
Speaker 1: legend among the Livingston's that there used to be a
6:11
Speaker 1: handwritten draft copy that had markouts and scratches and revisions
6:15
Speaker 1: to it. That would Yeah, I would basically suggest this
6:18
Speaker 1: is the original version of the poem, and the case
6:21
Speaker 1: would be closed had that not burned up in a
6:23
Speaker 1: house fire at some point in family history. I don't see.
6:26
Speaker 1: I was when I was reading this stuff, I was like,
6:28
Speaker 1: all right, here we go, it's over, case reopened. Yeah,
6:32
Speaker 1: the mysterious house fire. Now I'm like, I don't know
6:34
Speaker 1: about you. Livingstone's right, okay, very fishy. Well, then the
6:39
Speaker 1: literary professors got involved, and then things got really taken
6:43
Speaker 1: off the rails, right, Yeah, they've there have been plenty
6:46
Speaker 1: of well know about plenty, but at least a few
6:48
Speaker 1: literary professors who have gotten in the archives and the
6:51
Speaker 1: anthologies and said, you know what, this more guy never
6:55
Speaker 1: wrote anything like this thing. Uh, it's in this anapestic
7:00
Speaker 1: scheme where you have the two syllables followed by a
7:03
Speaker 1: more stressed third syllable, and you never wrote anything like that, buddy,
7:08
Speaker 1: So I think you're a fraud. Yeah. And I had
7:10
Speaker 1: no idea about that scheme until I kind of spelled
7:13
Speaker 1: it out myself and got it wrong. Though. Did you
7:15
Speaker 1: notice that? No? I didn't. You got the first half right,
7:18
Speaker 1: but then you lose it at you lost it after
7:20
Speaker 1: and all through the house, Oh I did. Yeah, that
7:23
Speaker 1: was pretty much like oh yeah, I see now okay,
7:26
Speaker 1: can read it like yeah, please do, please do. Itwas
7:29
Speaker 1: the night before Christmas and all through the house not
7:33
Speaker 1: a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. Oh man,
7:38
Speaker 1: this is like my math. You got tripped up. Yeah
7:42
Speaker 1: that's all right, good stuff, But that's anapestic scheme. They said,
7:45
Speaker 1: you didn't write anything like that, buddy, But Livingston wrote
7:48
Speaker 1: plenty of stuff like that. Yeah, so again case closed. Right,
7:53
Speaker 1: if you want to put a nail in that coffin.
7:55
Speaker 1: Another professor from New Zealand, a guy named McDonald Jackson,
7:59
Speaker 1: stepped up and said, get this, everybody, I could. I've
8:02
Speaker 1: devised a statistical analysis machine, and I said it loose
8:06
Speaker 1: on Clement Clark Moore's manuscript notebook and it says all
8:09
Speaker 1: of those poems are Clement Clark Moore's. But when I
8:12
Speaker 1: feed that same machine towys the night before Christmas, you know,
8:15
Speaker 1: a visit from St. Nicholas, everybody goes, oh yeah that
8:17
Speaker 1: one he goes. It just starts coughing and smoking and sputtering,
8:22
Speaker 1: and it broke. Yeah. Basically, uh, if you talk to
8:26
Speaker 1: them more as they're like, yeah, but you know what
8:28
Speaker 1: you're you're just constructing us in a way that makes
8:31
Speaker 1: it look like you never anything like this, because I
8:33
Speaker 1: know for sure he wrote the Pig and the Rooster
8:35
Speaker 1: and that's antipestic. He wrote one like this, and that's
8:40
Speaker 1: that I should I should spell out some of the
8:42
Speaker 1: Pig and the Rooster and antipestic scheme and see what happens.
8:46
Speaker 1: So on the more side this, I mean, I sort
8:49
Speaker 1: of get this, but more was buddies with Rip van Winkle,
8:52
Speaker 1: who was very much into the Dutch culture up there
8:57
Speaker 1: in New York State. And I guess the argument is,
8:59
Speaker 1: but because he was good friends with Irving that, uh,
9:04
Speaker 1: it just he picked up on that Dutch stuff. Is
9:06
Speaker 1: that the argument? That's the argument. But the argument that
9:09
Speaker 1: I saw that basically is like, no, that's it's Clement
9:13
Speaker 1: Clark Moore. Is that Clement Clark Moore, who has otherwise
9:17
Speaker 1: never been accused of doing anything nefarious in his life,
9:21
Speaker 1: um stepped up and claimed credit and an authorship of this,
9:26
Speaker 1: and that just doesn't seem to be something that he
9:28
Speaker 1: would have done had he not done that. And the
9:31
Speaker 1: Livingston's Henry specifically, who was alive after the thing was
9:35
Speaker 1: published for five more years, never stepped forward to take
9:38
Speaker 1: credit for it, and that to a lot of people,
9:41
Speaker 1: they are like, well that, I mean, that's that, Like, yes,
9:43
Speaker 1: you can create statistical analysis machines to say whatever. But
9:47
Speaker 1: as it stands out, if you go on to the
9:48
Speaker 1: Poetry Websites Foundation, they say that there's a lot of
9:51
Speaker 1: scholars that credit Henry Livingston with authorship, but they still
9:56
Speaker 1: if you search Clement Clark Moore, the poem that they
9:59
Speaker 1: have on their website for him is a visit from St. Nicholas. Still,
10:03
Speaker 1: so everybody's like, who knows, but ultimately who cares? Just
10:06
Speaker 1: read the poem. It's so great it doesn't matter who
10:08
Speaker 1: wrote it anymore. I agree. So I think, Chuck, that
10:11
Speaker 1: we've done our first little segment, which means it's time
10:14
Speaker 1: for some of Jerry's delicious Christmas interstitial music. Huh all right,
10:18
Speaker 1: let's hear it. Oh boy, that didn't that so much
10:30
Speaker 1: better than an ad? Yeah? That is so nice. Jerry
10:32
Speaker 1: really knows what she's doing. She's gotten really good at
10:35
Speaker 1: this stuff. All right, where are we headed next? Oh jeez,
10:38
Speaker 1: I'm driving? Huh Okay, I guess he said you want
10:41
Speaker 1: to skip around, So yeah, let's do one of yours.
10:43
Speaker 1: How about red and green? It's Christmas colors. Yeah, we
10:47
Speaker 1: need to thank u Wanderopolis Reader's digests and our old
10:52
Speaker 1: buddy Robert Paulson, Mr RP funding himself, longtime listener, he said, us,
10:59
Speaker 1: I think he's done this past few years since it's
11:01
Speaker 1: a bunch of Christmas ideas because you know, it gets
11:04
Speaker 1: hard you guys to think of new things and to
11:06
Speaker 1: find new stories, and Paulson's always sent this good stuff.
11:09
Speaker 1: So this was inspired by Robert. And this is the
11:13
Speaker 1: idea that where did green and red come from? For Christmas?
11:17
Speaker 1: And there's quite a few theories and no one knows
11:19
Speaker 1: for sure. No um, which is fun because that means
11:23
Speaker 1: you get to toss out a lot of theories that
11:25
Speaker 1: might be right or wrong, who knows. But um, if
11:27
Speaker 1: you go talk to a Christian, say hey, that whole
11:30
Speaker 1: red and green thing for Christmas? You're a Christian, where
11:32
Speaker 1: did it come from? And they'll say, well, sit down, friend,
11:35
Speaker 1: I'll tell you. It turns out that the green represents
11:38
Speaker 1: an evergreen tree, which in turn represents Jesus. And you say,
11:43
Speaker 1: I didn't see Jesus coming in this But here we go. Yeah,
11:47
Speaker 1: it's only Christmas. And the reason that the evergreen represents
11:50
Speaker 1: Jesus is because Jesus has eternal life or offers eternal life,
11:54
Speaker 1: and the evergreen was representative of eternal life and living
11:57
Speaker 1: through the winter time even the bleakest part of the winter,
12:00
Speaker 1: and evergreen is still green. Hence the green part. And
12:03
Speaker 1: you say, well, what about the the red. Don't say blood,
12:06
Speaker 1: don't say blood. What do they say blood? Yeah, blood
12:10
Speaker 1: of Christ. It's always the blood of Christ. So supposedly
12:13
Speaker 1: that's where the red and green came from, as far
12:15
Speaker 1: as Christian scholars are concerned. That's right. Other people say, well,
12:20
Speaker 1: i'll tell you what. In the churches would put on
12:23
Speaker 1: these miracle plays, is what they were called, And on
12:26
Speaker 1: Christmas they would perform one called the Paradise Play, which
12:29
Speaker 1: retells the story in Genesis of the creation of Adam
12:32
Speaker 1: and even the garden of Eden when Adam was instructed
12:35
Speaker 1: not to eat from the tree of good and evil
12:37
Speaker 1: did so. Anyway, they were banished from Paradise. And when
12:41
Speaker 1: they put on these miracle plays, apple trees weren't in season,
12:44
Speaker 1: so they couldn't drag a dead apple tree in there,
12:46
Speaker 1: so they would bring in a nice, lovely green evergreen
12:49
Speaker 1: pine and then fastened apples to them, and that is
12:52
Speaker 1: where the green and the red comes from. And every
12:55
Speaker 1: single year there was always one townsfolk, one annoying towns folk.
12:59
Speaker 1: It would stand up in point and say, that's not
13:01
Speaker 1: an apple tree, that's right, Cleidas a slack gelgyokel. But
13:06
Speaker 1: then now we get into probably the true origins of it,
13:10
Speaker 1: because we're going back beyond the origin of Christianity and
13:13
Speaker 1: starting to get into pagan and Roman culture. And as
13:16
Speaker 1: we've seen time and time and time again with a
13:20
Speaker 1: lot of the holidays that we celebrate these days, they're
13:24
Speaker 1: ultimately based on Pagan and Roman rituals and this is
13:28
Speaker 1: no no different. Um. They think that Saturnalia actually used
13:32
Speaker 1: to claim as it's holiday colors red and green again
13:36
Speaker 1: because of evergreens and the berries they bear. And and
13:39
Speaker 1: then we talked about Saturnalia before in a Christmas episode, right,
13:43
Speaker 1: we had to have. Surely at some point that's the
13:45
Speaker 1: only way I would know about it. Uh. The Celtic people, also,
13:49
Speaker 1: the ancient Celts, they loved their holly plants because they
13:52
Speaker 1: were evergreen, and holly is very much associated with Christmas,
13:56
Speaker 1: and they were saying, well, that's where the red and
13:58
Speaker 1: green comes from. Then a little bit later on they were, uh,
14:02
Speaker 1: these religious screens called rudes medieval churches were dyed red
14:07
Speaker 1: and green. But other people say, well, that's because those
14:10
Speaker 1: were the pigments that were available at the time. So
14:14
Speaker 1: no one really knows for sure, no, but it does
14:16
Speaker 1: like present like a connection between Christianity and red and green.
14:20
Speaker 1: Those medieval church screens definitely do. So. The Victorians came
14:23
Speaker 1: along and they had a bunch of different color schemes.
14:26
Speaker 1: Blue and white, blue and red, red and green all
14:29
Speaker 1: were pretty much equally associated with Christmas with the Victorians.
14:33
Speaker 1: And uh, it wasn't until one when Coca Cola commissioned
14:38
Speaker 1: Um had in Sunbloom to do his famous illustration of
14:42
Speaker 1: Santa Claus, where Santa Claus became fat and fully clothed
14:45
Speaker 1: in red for the first time and for the rest
14:48
Speaker 1: of all time before that he was naked as a
14:51
Speaker 1: j bird. That's right. It was a gross Christmas tradition,
14:56
Speaker 1: all right, Jerry, how about some more of that music?
14:59
Speaker 1: Take it away, Jerr. Okay, Chuck, So now I think
15:24
Speaker 1: it's your turn to pick which one we're gonna do next.
15:27
Speaker 1: It's a it's like opening Christmas presents. We're gonna just
15:30
Speaker 1: switch off. You know where I'm headed. I'm headed to, Uh,
15:34
Speaker 1: I'm headed to the nineteen eighties. I'm headed to December seven,
15:38
Speaker 1: and I'm watching the TV show ALF, and I'm shocked
15:41
Speaker 1: at what I'm seeing on my screen. It's right, mainly
15:44
Speaker 1: because I never saw an episode of ALF. Oh you know, yeah,
15:47
Speaker 1: you were a little old for it. I definitely did.
15:50
Speaker 1: It was a cute show eighty six, so I was fifteen,
15:55
Speaker 1: maybe just on the cusp, but yeah, I didn't see
15:57
Speaker 1: way too old for what was ALF. Like an eightyear
16:00
Speaker 1: old exactly the right age to hate ALF more than
16:04
Speaker 1: any other age group on the planet, I think. Yeah,
16:07
Speaker 1: I was like I started listening to Pink Floyd when
16:09
Speaker 1: I was fifteen, So right, okay, yeah, you wouldn't have
16:10
Speaker 1: like alfin people who have never seen ALF, like you. Um,
16:14
Speaker 1: I was thinking our younger viewers, but I guess anybody
16:16
Speaker 1: who has never seen ALF. It's a eighties sitcom about
16:19
Speaker 1: an alien who crashed lands on Earth takes up a
16:23
Speaker 1: residence with a family, who he in short order starts
16:25
Speaker 1: to drive crazy with his wise cracking, his troublemaking. He's
16:29
Speaker 1: good hearted, but he's just a lot. He's a handful.
16:32
Speaker 1: And then on top of that, they have to keep
16:34
Speaker 1: him a secret from nosy neighbors, from the government. Um.
16:38
Speaker 1: And it's a it's a cute little show that that
16:42
Speaker 1: like a six year old can follow the plotline of.
16:45
Speaker 1: Uh you want to hear something more shocking. Yes, I
16:47
Speaker 1: didn't know until yesterday that Alf was an alien. What
16:50
Speaker 1: do you think he was? I don't know. I never
16:53
Speaker 1: thought about it. I just I knew it was a puppet.
16:57
Speaker 1: It looked like a little fuzzy beast of some kind.
16:59
Speaker 1: I never really thought about I had no idea what
17:02
Speaker 1: Alf was. But now that you know, I see this,
17:04
Speaker 1: and I see the year clearly capitalizing on a post
17:07
Speaker 1: et kind of thing. Let's do a sitcom. I'm sure
17:11
Speaker 1: that was brought up in the room, you know. Yeah. Yeah,
17:13
Speaker 1: and Alf actually stood for alien life for him. It
17:15
Speaker 1: was the name that the dad Willie gave to him.
17:18
Speaker 1: His real name was Gordon schum Way, and he was
17:20
Speaker 1: from the planet mill Mack. Was it really Gordon Shumway? Yeah,
17:24
Speaker 1: it's Have you ever seen that movie Permanent Midnight? Uh? Yeah, Oh, sure. Yeah, Yeah,
17:31
Speaker 1: that guy that was based on the Ben Stiller place.
17:33
Speaker 1: He was a writer for Alfred. Yeah, that's that's all
17:35
Speaker 1: I knew of alf was that movie. Okay, gotcha? That
17:38
Speaker 1: was one of my favorite lines from any movie is
17:41
Speaker 1: when Owen Wilson and Ben Stiller have lost their percocets.
17:45
Speaker 1: Owen Wilson and his voice goes, if I were a percoset,
17:49
Speaker 1: where would I be? That? I can totally envision that. Wow.
17:55
Speaker 1: That was a dead on Owen Wilson. By the way,
17:58
Speaker 1: Wow there was again. So with alf Um, what you
18:03
Speaker 1: see was what you got. It was very straightforward as
18:05
Speaker 1: far as episodes were concerned. Sure, it was kind of jarring,
18:08
Speaker 1: like you were saying when you tuned in on December, Oh,
18:11
Speaker 1: I don't remember, but in and you found out that
18:14
Speaker 1: there was a not just a one part as a standard,
18:17
Speaker 1: but a two part episode shot on film of alf
18:22
Speaker 1: And it was a very special Christmas special of alf Yeah.
18:26
Speaker 1: It was, uh, to say the least, not very funny there.
18:30
Speaker 1: You know, I watched some of it today. They didn't
18:33
Speaker 1: forego the jokes entirely. They used them, tried to use
18:36
Speaker 1: them effectively to sort of you know, punch up some
18:39
Speaker 1: moments here and there, but it was definitely different. It
18:43
Speaker 1: was Alf gets outside the house, get hitches a ride
18:46
Speaker 1: with Cleveland Little from Blazing Saddle's fame as Santa Claus,
18:51
Speaker 1: and they go to a hospital where Alf is mistaken
18:55
Speaker 1: for a Christmas toy and given to a little girl
18:59
Speaker 1: who is dying. Yes, which is basically the main plot
19:04
Speaker 1: line of this episode. Alf hanging out with this dying
19:07
Speaker 1: girl in her hospital room. And this is not like
19:09
Speaker 1: the kind of thing where the dying girl doesn't know
19:12
Speaker 1: she's dying. She actually talks openly and frequently about dying
19:16
Speaker 1: and how she's being scared of it. Yeah, it's being
19:18
Speaker 1: scared to die. Yeah. Not exactly like the typical Christmas
19:22
Speaker 1: themes you would you would expect. There's also a part
19:25
Speaker 1: in the second part where Alf talks um uh talks
19:30
Speaker 1: Cleveland Little's character out of taking his life by jumping
19:34
Speaker 1: off a bridge, not another I Actually I was about
19:37
Speaker 1: to say that's not like a very Christmasy thing, but
19:39
Speaker 1: thanks to a wonderful life, jumping off of a bridge
19:41
Speaker 1: actually is kind of Christmas now that I think about it. Yeah,
19:44
Speaker 1: But you know, being Alf and being a TV sit
19:47
Speaker 1: come from the eighties, you would think at the end,
19:48
Speaker 1: of course, the doctors come in and they say we're
19:52
Speaker 1: going to save this girl, or or Alf, your heart
19:55
Speaker 1: was big enough to heal this girl. But no, it
19:59
Speaker 1: ends with Alf leaving and waving from the back seat
20:02
Speaker 1: of the car, and she waves from her hospital window,
20:05
Speaker 1: and the assumption is that she dies. Yeah. I mean,
20:08
Speaker 1: there's a part early on in part one where Alf
20:11
Speaker 1: over here is a doctor talking to Cleveland Little and
20:13
Speaker 1: saying like, yeah, she's she's a goner, like there's nothing
20:16
Speaker 1: we can do from her. This is going to be
20:17
Speaker 1: her last Christmas. And the show makes no efforts to
20:21
Speaker 1: change that whatsoever. And so like today, if you um
20:24
Speaker 1: read about it on the internet, people like to tee
20:26
Speaker 1: off on it um and in some pretty annoying like
20:30
Speaker 1: think pieces. It's an easy target if you look at
20:32
Speaker 1: it from a really cynical point of view, but if
20:34
Speaker 1: you actually stop and watch it, it's an extremely touching episode.
20:38
Speaker 1: Apparently viewers in seven were very touched by it, and
20:41
Speaker 1: Alf went on to become a big hit in part
20:44
Speaker 1: because of this kind of daring limb that they went
20:47
Speaker 1: out on. But there's a guy who writes for Yahoo
20:50
Speaker 1: News named Ethan Atler, and he noticed that at the
20:52
Speaker 1: end of part two there's a little title card that
20:55
Speaker 1: said that that episode was a memory of another girl
20:58
Speaker 1: named Tiffany. So he was like, well, what is this.
21:00
Speaker 1: That's the name of the dying girl in the episode.
21:02
Speaker 1: Who's this Tiffany? And he started to dig into it
21:05
Speaker 1: and he found out there actually was a real life
21:06
Speaker 1: Tiffany who was dying who was a fan of Alf.
21:10
Speaker 1: That's right, uh, And apparently this was something that happened
21:13
Speaker 1: a lot, is that kids who were, you know, battling
21:17
Speaker 1: cancer or something terrible like that, would get involved in
21:20
Speaker 1: either with Make a Wish or just had a wish
21:23
Speaker 1: to see Alf and to meet Alf because kids loved Alf.
21:26
Speaker 1: And that's what happened. Tiffany went through Make a Wish
21:29
Speaker 1: wanted to meet Alf, so they set up a video
21:32
Speaker 1: conference in seven no small feat between Alf and the
21:37
Speaker 1: puppeteer Paul Fusco obviously, and then Tiffany was in her
21:40
Speaker 1: hospital room and the mom says, you know what, if
21:44
Speaker 1: it hadn't been for this, like this gave Tiffany an
21:47
Speaker 1: extra month of life. It like picked her spirits up
21:49
Speaker 1: so much. Brandon Tartakov, who was running NBC at the
21:53
Speaker 1: time heard about this and of course, you know, you
21:56
Speaker 1: can imagine what happens from there. That's how this story
21:59
Speaker 1: was born. He was like, this is gold, Christmas gold, everybody,
22:03
Speaker 1: that's right. So they actually did make this two part
22:05
Speaker 1: episode again, shot on film, um and they dedicated it
22:09
Speaker 1: at the end title card to Tiffany Lee Smith in
22:13
Speaker 1: her memory, which is pretty sweet. Um. But I mean
22:16
Speaker 1: that that that video conference, that meeting between those two
22:19
Speaker 1: was significant enough that like they did they did that,
22:22
Speaker 1: you know, and if you go back and watch it.
22:24
Speaker 1: I've only seen part one because I accidentally stumbled onto
22:29
Speaker 1: an internet mystery Chuck. Part two is not on the internet.
22:33
Speaker 1: Part one you can get anywhere and you watch it
22:36
Speaker 1: and you want to see part two, and you can't
22:38
Speaker 1: see part two anymore interesting there there. I watched this.
22:42
Speaker 1: Uh you probably saw this too. There's like a ten
22:44
Speaker 1: minute video where this guy kind of breaks it down
22:46
Speaker 1: and goes over the story and shows clips from it.
22:49
Speaker 1: Apparently out delivers a baby at some point too. That's
22:52
Speaker 1: where some of the laughs come from. Uh. But yeah,
22:56
Speaker 1: it's interesting. And the guy in the video too said
22:58
Speaker 1: that um alf fan sites it can be rated the
23:02
Speaker 1: worst or the best episode of ALF, depending on which
23:05
Speaker 1: one you go to. Yeah, I read like a little
23:07
Speaker 1: article on MeTV and they were saying, the ALF Christmas
23:10
Speaker 1: Special is the ALF movie we always wanted. But anyway,
23:16
Speaker 1: it was nice. It was very pleasant to watch, at
23:18
Speaker 1: least the first part of it. I recommend anybody who
23:20
Speaker 1: can go check it out. It's good and it maybe
23:22
Speaker 1: want to watch more ALF again. Yeah. I looked up
23:24
Speaker 1: the girl. I was like, I wonder where she is today.
23:26
Speaker 1: She's born in seventy five, so she's a year older
23:31
Speaker 1: than you, And um, I didn't she had She didn't
23:35
Speaker 1: do a lot of stuff after her childhood. But she
23:36
Speaker 1: was on that TV show as a cast regular. Uh
23:40
Speaker 1: not Full House, Our House. Yeah yeah, with Wilford Brimley. Yeah,
23:45
Speaker 1: I never saw that. Shannon Doherty and Wilford Brimley. She
23:48
Speaker 1: was one of the little girls in that too. So
23:53
Speaker 1: you know, now she's she's locked into Christmas history. That's right,
23:57
Speaker 1: trapped forever with ALF. All right, Jerry, this is your
24:01
Speaker 1: chance to shine. Tune up that violin and let's hear it, man.
24:23
Speaker 1: We're just careening from Christmas Spirit to Christmas Spirit, aren't
24:26
Speaker 1: I know? Uh? So that was yours. Why don't we
24:30
Speaker 1: go with well, no, you pick from mine? Oh is
24:32
Speaker 1: it my turn? Yeah, that's what we're doing. Okay, because
24:36
Speaker 1: I I we got a big finish if you ask me.
24:38
Speaker 1: Let's do Christmas songs, which is interesting, but you know
24:41
Speaker 1: the one I'm excited about. Okay, all right, fair enough, okay,
24:45
Speaker 1: uh yeah, Christmas songs. This got me thinking about I
24:49
Speaker 1: saw the movie About a Boy recently, again movie that
24:51
Speaker 1: I really love, and in that movie, Hugh Grant's character
24:55
Speaker 1: is still living the good life as a fat cat
24:58
Speaker 1: because of a Christmas song that his father wrote. I
25:01
Speaker 1: can't remember the name of the song, but it's sort
25:04
Speaker 1: of the idea. And it's correct that if you are
25:08
Speaker 1: a pop star or even not, if you write, and
25:11
Speaker 1: especially if you write and record and have those all
25:13
Speaker 1: those rights to a popular Christmas song, then you are
25:17
Speaker 1: living on easy street. My friend. Yeah, you can pretty
25:20
Speaker 1: much just retire, and it's possible your kids and their
25:23
Speaker 1: kids might be able to retire to and such as
25:26
Speaker 1: the case Chuck with Jim Lee, who figures prominently in
25:29
Speaker 1: this article you found about Christmas music in the music industry.
25:34
Speaker 1: He was the bass player for Slade, who until today
25:38
Speaker 1: I didn't realize was the originators of Quiet Riots Come
25:42
Speaker 1: On Field of Noise. It's actually Slades Come On Field
25:45
Speaker 1: of Noise. And I went back and listened to both
25:47
Speaker 1: of them and I was like, this Slave Boy is
25:50
Speaker 1: so much better. I mean, I love the Quiet Riot song,
25:53
Speaker 1: and then I heard the slave version. I was like,
25:55
Speaker 1: oh wow, this is this is amazing. Yeah Slade and
25:58
Speaker 1: by the way, this is from Rob Pachetta cnn um,
26:01
Speaker 1: but yeah Slade. I love Slade. When I was a kid,
26:03
Speaker 1: they had that great video MTV video hit Run Run Away,
26:07
Speaker 1: and that's how I got introduced. But previous to that,
26:09
Speaker 1: in the early eighties, they were a big glam rock
26:12
Speaker 1: band in England and Jim was the bassist and he was,
26:17
Speaker 1: you know, he was talking about the pressure of of
26:20
Speaker 1: writing that next big hit all the time, and he
26:22
Speaker 1: was in he was sort of dry of ideas, and apparently,
26:25
Speaker 1: as the story goes, in seventy three, in a hotel
26:28
Speaker 1: bathroom kind of wondering what to do and remembered that
26:33
Speaker 1: his manager and his mom had both said, why Christmas tune,
26:39
Speaker 1: you can bloody retire. He's saying that inspired him. My room,
26:44
Speaker 1: I mean a hotel bathroom so that inspired him and
26:49
Speaker 1: he uh he he came up with the outline of
26:53
Speaker 1: a verse and then a bridge apparently, and then all
26:56
Speaker 1: of a sudden had a Christmas hit by Slade, which
27:00
Speaker 1: isn't as big here in the States. I definitely heard
27:02
Speaker 1: it quite a few times, but it's really big in
27:04
Speaker 1: the UK. Yeah, I've never heard it before in my
27:07
Speaker 1: entire life until yesterday. I think, Yeah, it's called Mary
27:11
Speaker 1: Xmuss everybody, and um, yeah, I think it's enormous in
27:15
Speaker 1: Britain because Against Slave was British, but I mean, it's
27:17
Speaker 1: so big in Britain. I'm very surprised. I've never heard
27:20
Speaker 1: it before. But it's a it's a cute, fun little
27:22
Speaker 1: song about how not so Christmas is. But it was
27:25
Speaker 1: a huge, huge hit for him, and it's kind of
27:29
Speaker 1: one of those things where um Slade, the guy, the
27:33
Speaker 1: bass player, Jim Lee, when he came up with this
27:35
Speaker 1: idea like to do a Christmas song. It wasn't like
27:37
Speaker 1: the band had been had been thinking of doing a
27:39
Speaker 1: Christmas song. He really had to go sell it to
27:41
Speaker 1: talk this awesome hard rocking glam rock band into doing
27:44
Speaker 1: a Christmas song. And they didn't release it as like
27:47
Speaker 1: a single or special. They released it on one of
27:49
Speaker 1: their regular albums. Yeah, you're gonna say the name of
27:53
Speaker 1: their lead singer, oh um, uh, it's great. Hold on,
27:57
Speaker 1: what is his name? Naughty Holder? That's it's a great name.
28:00
Speaker 1: And he actually looks a lot like a Naughty Holder does.
28:05
Speaker 1: But Lee talks about the fact that it's like having
28:08
Speaker 1: a pension basically here, you know, as he's aging, and
28:12
Speaker 1: he said, you know, my grandkids just like we were
28:14
Speaker 1: talking to He said, they're gonna be getting money for
28:16
Speaker 1: this thing because Christmas tunes don't go away. If you
28:20
Speaker 1: if you managed to wed yourself in there with a
28:22
Speaker 1: popular tune, at least in your home country, uh, you're
28:26
Speaker 1: gonna make a lot of money. And that's why Freddie
28:28
Speaker 1: Mercury came to jim Ley at one point and said, Hey,
28:31
Speaker 1: I'm kind of thinking about doing a Christmas song. Is like,
28:34
Speaker 1: is that okay? Like I'm not gonna be stepping on
28:36
Speaker 1: your toast or anything, am I? Yeah? Well, I mean
28:39
Speaker 1: that was part of it. I think also, like Slade
28:41
Speaker 1: was the ones who made it okay for people who
28:45
Speaker 1: weren't being Crosby and Gene Autry record Christmas music because
28:49
Speaker 1: after them Bowie recorded that Little Drummer Boy with Bing Crosby.
28:53
Speaker 1: Queen came along and recorded There's and it just kept
28:55
Speaker 1: going from there. I have the distinct impression that Slade
28:59
Speaker 1: where the origin eights of that trend. I think, I think,
29:03
Speaker 1: I think you might be right. It seems to be
29:05
Speaker 1: what this uh, what this article is indicating. Uh And
29:09
Speaker 1: you know now it's I think they said that, uh
29:12
Speaker 1: and this was No one knows for sure, because no
29:15
Speaker 1: one really wants to share these numbers, I think partially
29:17
Speaker 1: because it goes against what you want to think about
29:21
Speaker 1: it Christmas. But like that Mariah Carey song Ineen, they
29:26
Speaker 1: estimated had earned her about sixty million bucks. It's it's
29:30
Speaker 1: a great song. I'm not even a Mariah Carey fan,
29:32
Speaker 1: but I love that song. It is a really good one.
29:34
Speaker 1: Apparently she has more uppersly that have been coming out
29:37
Speaker 1: lately to Christmas album. I think, yeah, I think she
29:40
Speaker 1: just released another one. But that I mean that is
29:43
Speaker 1: like it is a definitive recent Christmas hit, But it
29:47
Speaker 1: also points out how hard it is to make one
29:50
Speaker 1: of those, like because she's definitely not the only artist
29:53
Speaker 1: who's working still today who's released a Christmas song every Christmas.
29:57
Speaker 1: Tons and tons of artists like they're audited Christmas song
30:01
Speaker 1: and one of the reasons why they take their song
30:03
Speaker 1: was because they will basically be able to stop working
30:06
Speaker 1: whenever they want if it's a hit. It's just so
30:09
Speaker 1: rarely a hit. And there's this guy who has interviewed
30:11
Speaker 1: in them in the article who basically said, um, he's uh.
30:16
Speaker 1: He works for PRS for Music, which manages royalty payments.
30:19
Speaker 1: He said, basically, you can count on your fingers the
30:22
Speaker 1: number of artists in the last twenty five years we've
30:25
Speaker 1: had like a bona fide Christmas hit. And it's true,
30:28
Speaker 1: like there's plenty of Christmas songs, but Christmas hits are
30:31
Speaker 1: few and far between. Yeah. I do think it's funny though,
30:34
Speaker 1: how everyone, even bands you don't think you're doing it,
30:37
Speaker 1: they try to get some of that Christmas juice because
30:40
Speaker 1: if you will bring up like a modern Christmas rock playlist,
30:46
Speaker 1: it is just littered with bands that I haven't even
30:49
Speaker 1: heard of that are throwing their name in the hat. Basically,
30:54
Speaker 1: I mean, I love a lot. I love Elton John's song,
30:56
Speaker 1: I love Queen song, Thank God It's Christmas. I think
30:58
Speaker 1: my favorite might be Tom pet ease uh and the
31:01
Speaker 1: Heartbreakers Christmas all over again. I don't know that one. Oh,
31:05
Speaker 1: it's great. It's great because at the end, I think
31:07
Speaker 1: I talked about this some movie Crush a couple of
31:08
Speaker 1: years ago. At the end, it's kind of fading out
31:11
Speaker 1: with some jingle bells and Tom Petty and that sort
31:14
Speaker 1: of Florida Southern draw says Santa this Christmas, I want
31:19
Speaker 1: a thender Twin Reverb Chuck Berry song. Yeah. Yeah, And
31:23
Speaker 1: he's just like listing things out. Is that it even
31:25
Speaker 1: fades out on his voice. It's real. Hey, I remember
31:28
Speaker 1: that song. That is a cute one. What's your favorite?
31:30
Speaker 1: I think we poked about this before. My favorite Christmas
31:33
Speaker 1: song of all the time, A recent Christmas hit, favorite
31:36
Speaker 1: just pop rock of any era. Christmas song. Man, Somebody's
31:42
Speaker 1: going to find me on the street and strangle me.
31:44
Speaker 1: But I gotta say Last Christmas by wayamb Oh, it's great?
31:48
Speaker 1: Are you kidding me? Yeah? A lot of people really
31:50
Speaker 1: hate that song. But it's not because it's a bad song.
31:52
Speaker 1: It's just because it's really overplayed. That's one of the
31:55
Speaker 1: other problems with the fact that so few Christmas songs
31:58
Speaker 1: are Christmas hits because that means that is a small pool.
32:01
Speaker 1: It gets played over and over and over again. Such
32:03
Speaker 1: good stuff. What a big mistake to get a Christmas
32:07
Speaker 1: Heart and the very next day give it away. That's
32:10
Speaker 1: it is a big, big mistake. There's one other person
32:13
Speaker 1: I want to give a shout out to, though, is
32:15
Speaker 1: Carly Kylie Minogue. She had some good Christmas songs and
32:18
Speaker 1: there's actually um did she did a duet with James
32:22
Speaker 1: Cordon called like every Day Is Christmas? I think, very
32:27
Speaker 1: very cute. It's not it's not a hit in the
32:29
Speaker 1: United States, but I would bet a lot of marmalite
32:32
Speaker 1: that it was. It's a big hit in Australia. Uh.
32:36
Speaker 1: I know people are sick of hearing it, but I
32:37
Speaker 1: still love Paul McCartney's Wonderful Christmas Time and I love
32:41
Speaker 1: John Lennon. So this is Christmas good stuff. Yeah, it
32:44
Speaker 1: is good stuff. And then I also, um My, the
32:47
Speaker 1: thing I've been playing Chuck and this will come probably
32:49
Speaker 1: is a little surprised to you, Bias wanting to shout
32:50
Speaker 1: it out to. Um. I found a YouTube video that's
32:53
Speaker 1: an hour long called Kmart Store Intercom Christmas Music nineteen four.
32:59
Speaker 1: Whoa knock your socks off? Is this a playlist? It's
33:03
Speaker 1: apparently an hour that they took from the kmart store
33:05
Speaker 1: intercom because at one point they call for security in
33:08
Speaker 1: section three. Um. But it's like just small, like instrumental,
33:13
Speaker 1: smallty Christmas music that will make you pucker. It's so sweet. Uh.
33:19
Speaker 1: Emily has been She usually likes her her rock and
33:22
Speaker 1: roll Christmas mixes, but she's a big Christmas music person.
33:24
Speaker 1: From Thanksgiving to Christmas. It's always on in the house. Yeah,
33:28
Speaker 1: but this year she's just so crazy with work and
33:30
Speaker 1: really stressed. She's listened to nothing. But I mean, we're
33:34
Speaker 1: calling it jazzy Christmas. I don't know what it is,
33:36
Speaker 1: but it's the these it's sort of like dentist office
33:39
Speaker 1: Christmas piano stuff. Oh yeah, nice, very relaxing. But I
33:44
Speaker 1: do miss step into Christmas and Christmas all over the world,
33:47
Speaker 1: and so we're gonna have to rock it out soon, okay.
33:51
Speaker 1: Um oh. Another one that we um we should mention
33:54
Speaker 1: is that Donnie Hathaway song. Um This Christmas I think
33:58
Speaker 1: is what it's called Christmas. You've heard it a million times,
34:03
Speaker 1: you know, listen to Dolly. I think I put this
34:06
Speaker 1: before I left social media. Last year, a full of
34:10
Speaker 1: Dolly Parton's Christmas songs are about having sex. What go
34:15
Speaker 1: listen to? Go listen to Dolly Parton's Christmas songs about them.
34:19
Speaker 1: At some point she's talking about like screwing Santa, or
34:23
Speaker 1: like the guy in neighbor, or like what, it's really funny.
34:27
Speaker 1: I'm telling you just do it. And you know it's
34:30
Speaker 1: in the Dolly Parton way, like yeah, yeah, of course,
34:32
Speaker 1: it's not like we had a few drinks and canoe
34:35
Speaker 1: told or something. Really, I had no idea. It's really funny.
34:38
Speaker 1: But that she she deserves another shout out just for
34:41
Speaker 1: candy Christmas alone. Well, but I think that one talks
34:45
Speaker 1: about it. Yeah, I think she talks about going to
34:48
Speaker 1: the bar and picking up somebody maybe at once. I
34:51
Speaker 1: know what you're talking about. I hadn't really thought about
34:54
Speaker 1: it because it's just Dolly, you know. All Right, I'm
34:56
Speaker 1: gonna look at the lyrics for that. Well, we need
34:58
Speaker 1: to move on or else we're just gonna spend the
35:00
Speaker 1: next forty five minutes talking about Christmas songs that we
35:03
Speaker 1: we thought of. All right, Jerry, that's your cue? All right?
35:24
Speaker 1: Is it my turn? It's your turn? Buddy. All right, well,
35:28
Speaker 1: I guess there's nowhere else to go for you than
35:31
Speaker 1: Advent calendars. That's true. I don't know how that happened,
35:36
Speaker 1: did I Did you choose first or something? I must
35:40
Speaker 1: have huh, all right, I'm not sure. It's it's kind
35:43
Speaker 1: of like the antipestic rhyme scheme all over the place.
35:47
Speaker 1: But we're talking to Advent calendars, and I realized that, um,
35:50
Speaker 1: I didn't set out what an Advent calendar was. Maybe
35:52
Speaker 1: not everybody understands that because I was raised Catholic, so
35:55
Speaker 1: I had an Advent calendar every year, did you No.
35:58
Speaker 1: I got into them when took German in high school
36:01
Speaker 1: and we sold them for German Club. Okay, alright, so
36:03
Speaker 1: they're a super German thing. But also if you're Catholic
36:06
Speaker 1: in the United States, they're a pretty Catholic thing too,
36:08
Speaker 1: but I think they're also a lot of Protestants usom.
36:11
Speaker 1: But it's just basically a little calendar, but it's a
36:14
Speaker 1: calendar plus because for each day from December one, that's
36:19
Speaker 1: the extent of an Advent calendar. Each day it has
36:22
Speaker 1: like a little door on it each day, and you
36:24
Speaker 1: open up the door and there's like a swede inside
36:27
Speaker 1: or something like that. And the whole point of an
36:29
Speaker 1: Advent calendar is to get kids jazz about the coming
36:32
Speaker 1: of Christmas, as if they needed any extra jazzing whatsoever.
36:37
Speaker 1: But that seems to be the whole point of Advent calendars. Yeah,
36:40
Speaker 1: we I don't know why I didn't get one this year,
36:42
Speaker 1: because we've been getting them, and I've seen with my
36:44
Speaker 1: own eyeballs how delighted my daughter is because you know,
36:47
Speaker 1: it becomes the ritual every day. He used to open
36:50
Speaker 1: that door and get that little piece of chocolate. Uh, jeez,
36:53
Speaker 1: I didn't get one this year. If you look at dope,
36:55
Speaker 1: it's not too late. You can just pick up the
36:57
Speaker 1: pace and just started like you know, December twelve. Oh yeah,
37:01
Speaker 1: I guess that we're recording this in December nine, So
37:03
Speaker 1: you're right. I need to find a local German club,
37:06
Speaker 1: high school German club. That all right? So these things?
37:11
Speaker 1: There isn't one on the twenty, does it end. I've
37:14
Speaker 1: seen both ways, and I don't remember. I haven't had
37:16
Speaker 1: one for years either, but I feel like there was
37:19
Speaker 1: there the last one you opened on Christmas, I thought,
37:21
Speaker 1: But maybe it is Christmas Eve that you opened the
37:24
Speaker 1: last one and you wake up and it's Christmas and
37:25
Speaker 1: you burn it. Then you set it up fire uh
37:29
Speaker 1: Latin uh in Latin, coming or arrival is what Advent means.
37:34
Speaker 1: So obviously the arrival of Christmas and the first Advent
37:38
Speaker 1: calendar that uh, you know, we kind of recognize. This
37:41
Speaker 1: one was introduced later than I thought, in nineteen o
37:44
Speaker 1: eight in uh Munich or as we would say in
37:47
Speaker 1: German club Munichian Germany, by Gerard Long. Gerard, No, I
37:55
Speaker 1: think it would be Gerhardt line. That's what I thought.
37:58
Speaker 1: He really threw me off. They were in Saxony or something,
38:03
Speaker 1: so Long actually said. It was my dear sweet mother
38:06
Speaker 1: who introduced me to the Advent calendar. She used to
38:08
Speaker 1: make them for me by hand herself, put little pastries
38:11
Speaker 1: in there so that every day, um, I would get
38:15
Speaker 1: to eat a little sweet and that was my treat
38:17
Speaker 1: for Advent. And he loved it so much and loved
38:20
Speaker 1: his dear sweet mother so much that he grew up
38:22
Speaker 1: as an adult and in nineteen o eight he released
38:24
Speaker 1: the first Advent calendar. But it was the suckiest Advent
38:28
Speaker 1: calendar you could possibly get, because it was just a
38:31
Speaker 1: flat piece of paper. There were no treats involved. There
38:33
Speaker 1: are no doors to open. You just crossed off the day.
38:37
Speaker 1: And I think gerhart Lang's mother haunted him by his
38:41
Speaker 1: bedside for years until he finally in nine added doors
38:45
Speaker 1: to his Advent calendars and put sweets inside. And then
38:48
Speaker 1: everybody said okay, and his dear sweet mother could rest
38:52
Speaker 1: in peace from that point on and went off to heaven.
38:55
Speaker 1: That's nice German heaven. Uh. This went throughout Germany of first,
39:00
Speaker 1: and they were they were selling and printing these things
39:03
Speaker 1: like crazy up until World War One and in World
39:06
Speaker 1: War Two when they stopped doing it because of the
39:09
Speaker 1: paper rations. But you'll be glad to know. Then in
39:11
Speaker 1: World War Two, the Nazis still printed their own Advent
39:15
Speaker 1: calendars with Nazi propaganda stuff behind the little doors. Yeah,
39:20
Speaker 1: they took all the churchy stuff out. Yeah, but in
39:22
Speaker 1: the little pagan symbols. Uh. And then after World War
39:25
Speaker 1: Two they kind of cranked up the operation again. Yeah,
39:27
Speaker 1: they got back to normal. Everybody's like, thank God. And
39:31
Speaker 1: apparently they just stayed basically in Germany. It was a
39:34
Speaker 1: German tradition among Lutherans and other German Protestants. And then
39:38
Speaker 1: in the fifties h Dwight Eisenhower, dear old Ike was
39:43
Speaker 1: photographed with his grandchildren around Christmas time opening an Advent calendar,
39:47
Speaker 1: and everybody said, I like Ike. So they went out
39:49
Speaker 1: and bought event calendars, and they suddenly became a lot
39:51
Speaker 1: more widespread in the United States, and today they are widespread,
39:57
Speaker 1: to say the least, and they really bear little rese
40:00
Speaker 1: went to that original Sucky Night Advent calendar that Gary
40:03
Speaker 1: hart Lion came up with. Yeah, you know, when I
40:06
Speaker 1: bought them, they do resemble it. It's still sort of
40:09
Speaker 1: the traditional Advent calendar with just the simple little chocolate
40:13
Speaker 1: in there, but they can get quite fancy. Now. Apparently
40:17
Speaker 1: you can get large calendars with beer or wine or
40:21
Speaker 1: whiskey in them, which I think is kind of cool.
40:24
Speaker 1: What else, Um, if you're a little kid and you're like,
40:28
Speaker 1: I really want to be exposed to branding all month
40:31
Speaker 1: long to really get me primed to ask for certain
40:35
Speaker 1: certain presents, then they've got Advent calendars for you. They
40:38
Speaker 1: have roadblocks, they have Lego hot Wheels minecraft. Some of
40:42
Speaker 1: them managed to be doubly branded. There's Harry Potter Lego
40:46
Speaker 1: Advent calendars, Pokemon Funco Advent calendars, it's an advertising bananza
40:53
Speaker 1: all about the arrival of the baby Jesus. I bet
40:57
Speaker 1: Amazon sales one that's just a tiny little QR code
41:01
Speaker 1: for five percent off something that's right, and like you
41:04
Speaker 1: open each jour in the messages you love Amazon, I
41:07
Speaker 1: love Amazon. You cannot do without Amazon. Uh. And then
41:12
Speaker 1: there is one that uh I meant to look this
41:14
Speaker 1: up and see a picture of it, but apparently if
41:17
Speaker 1: you have way too much money and you're a uh no,
41:21
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say what kind of person might do?
41:22
Speaker 1: Is okay because it's our kids are listening. But you
41:26
Speaker 1: can get one from Tiffany and Company, which has it's
41:29
Speaker 1: a big crate with you know, legit jewelry inside each
41:34
Speaker 1: day to give your special someone twenty four individually wrapped
41:37
Speaker 1: Tiffany gifts. I think in this crate man the spirit
41:41
Speaker 1: of giving. That's what they call that. I guess so.
41:44
Speaker 1: And by the way, everybody advent calendars was the suggestion
41:47
Speaker 1: of another little helper named Alexandra Stock who sent in
41:51
Speaker 1: that one and a whole list of others. So thanks
41:53
Speaker 1: for that, and Chuck, I think it's Jerry's time to
41:57
Speaker 1: shine again right now? All right, we're back and Uh,
42:18
Speaker 1: we need to shout out Time magazine and and this
42:23
Speaker 1: is going to be a dead giveaway Festivus web dot
42:26
Speaker 1: com for this next bit. Yes, so we're talking about Festivus, Chuck, Festivus,
42:33
Speaker 1: the festival for the rest of us or the festivals
42:36
Speaker 1: for the rest of us, depending on who you talk to.
42:39
Speaker 1: That's right. Uh, if you don't know what we're talking about,
42:42
Speaker 1: then you probably are not a Seinfeld fan. But Festivus
42:47
Speaker 1: was in the of an episode of The Strike in
42:50
Speaker 1: the ninth season when Frank Costanza the great great Jerry Stiller,
42:55
Speaker 1: Uh has he left us or is he around? Don't
42:58
Speaker 1: know when? And Mara died? Don't know? All right, should
43:02
Speaker 1: we get our our our person to check on this? Hey,
43:05
Speaker 1: check on that? Will you on it? I think people
43:11
Speaker 1: think we do have like a dedicated researcher at our
43:13
Speaker 1: side at all times, and they're not very good. So
43:17
Speaker 1: Jerry still er, Uh, this is great. He staged a
43:21
Speaker 1: war on Christmas and created Festivus. With one of the
43:25
Speaker 1: great lines in Seinfeld history, he said, many Christmases ago,
43:29
Speaker 1: I went to buy a doll for my son. I
43:30
Speaker 1: reached for the last one they had, but so did
43:32
Speaker 1: another man and here's the line. As I rained blows
43:36
Speaker 1: upon him, I realized there had to be another way
43:39
Speaker 1: that Christmas twice today? You you watched it twice today.
43:45
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh. It is flawless. Man. It has it all.
43:49
Speaker 1: Cramers on a bagel strikes like giving her fake number
43:53
Speaker 1: out and trying to get a free sub, Kruger's in it,
43:57
Speaker 1: George's Human Fund, like fake charity, Cherry's two faced girlfriend,
44:03
Speaker 1: like everything is in that one. It's just an amazing
44:06
Speaker 1: flaw this episode. I love it. Uh So this is
44:10
Speaker 1: on the show. It's celebrated on December twenty three because
44:14
Speaker 1: he wanted to get a leg up on Christmas. Uh
44:17
Speaker 1: and he he practiced festivals with the Festivus pole, which
44:20
Speaker 1: was a bare aluminum pole in the living room or
44:23
Speaker 1: the backyard with no decoration. And they have, of course
44:27
Speaker 1: the airing of the family grievances and then engage in
44:31
Speaker 1: the feats of strength. That's right. So everybody knows that
44:35
Speaker 1: Seinfeld and Seinfeld writers just created this out of whole cloth,
44:38
Speaker 1: and Festivus was born. And I mean almost immediately people
44:42
Speaker 1: just started taking up festivals and celebrating festivals as well,
44:45
Speaker 1: and still do today. Very much. But it turns out,
44:48
Speaker 1: and I had no idea about this, but one of
44:52
Speaker 1: the writers on Seinfeld, Dan O'Keeffe, his father, Daniel O'Keeffe Sr.
44:57
Speaker 1: Actually created festivals back in the six these and little
45:01
Speaker 1: Dan O'Keefe, as a kid in the seventies and eighties,
45:04
Speaker 1: celebrated it with his family every single year. So Festivus
45:07
Speaker 1: was a real thing. The other writers of Seinfeld forced
45:10
Speaker 1: Dan O'Keefe to basically include in an episode. Yeah. I
45:15
Speaker 1: think I may have heard that at some point, but
45:17
Speaker 1: didn't really have it ingrained in my mind until this
45:21
Speaker 1: popped up. And it just makes it all the better
45:25
Speaker 1: the fact that this was a real thing. As the
45:27
Speaker 1: family story goes in nineteen sixty six, on the eve
45:32
Speaker 1: of the first date that Daniel Sr. Had with his
45:35
Speaker 1: UH fiance to be Deborah Uh, they commemorate Festivus and
45:40
Speaker 1: they became an annual tradition. Some differences is they did
45:45
Speaker 1: not have a Festivus pole. I was creative for the show, uh,
45:50
Speaker 1: and it was not on a set date. Apparently in
45:52
Speaker 1: the O'Keefe family, happened at any time in the year
45:55
Speaker 1: and never actually happened at Christmas. Yeah, I reade an
45:57
Speaker 1: interview with Dan O'Keefe, and he said he never knew
46:00
Speaker 1: when they were going to celebrate festivals until he got
46:02
Speaker 1: off the bus after school and his dad like had
46:06
Speaker 1: the decorations on, was playing weird sixties French music and
46:09
Speaker 1: I guess I love that so much better than it
46:14
Speaker 1: being a Christmas thing. Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, there's no
46:17
Speaker 1: no idea when. But they actually did air grievances. That
46:20
Speaker 1: was part of it, and it seems to be part
46:22
Speaker 1: of like the actual theme or reason four festivals. As
46:25
Speaker 1: Daniel O'Keeffe senior conceived of it, that it was partially
46:29
Speaker 1: just kind of like blow off steam, get out what
46:33
Speaker 1: was bothering you about the rest of the family, and
46:35
Speaker 1: then you drew off. You know, it's a healthy thing
46:38
Speaker 1: to do. They didn't call it the airing of the grievances.
46:41
Speaker 1: They just you know, basically spoke about their beefs uh.
46:45
Speaker 1: They um apparently were inspired or the senior Daniels inspired
46:49
Speaker 1: by a Samuel Beckett play called Crap's Last Tape where
46:53
Speaker 1: the protagonist in the movie or I'm starting to play
46:56
Speaker 1: Um tapes himself speaking at different points in his life.
46:59
Speaker 1: And so the O'Keefe family used a tape recorder to
47:02
Speaker 1: record their festivus and these some of these tapes still
47:05
Speaker 1: exist apparently from little Dan's life, which is great. Yeah,
47:09
Speaker 1: and there's actually in that episode Frank Costanza brings into
47:13
Speaker 1: old tape recorder and plays an audio tape of one
47:17
Speaker 1: of the festivals. Is where they just saw the whole
47:19
Speaker 1: family descends into screaming and George's crying and it's it's
47:23
Speaker 1: pretty good. Seriously, you need to watch the episode again.
47:27
Speaker 1: So good. I'm like, man, this show was good, and
47:31
Speaker 1: that was a really great episode. I'm gonna do that
47:34
Speaker 1: right after this. Actually, this was exactly what I'm gonna do. Um.
47:37
Speaker 1: One of the traditions that they did that that was
47:40
Speaker 1: not on the show was this is really funny. It
47:43
Speaker 1: was called a clock into bag or a clock in
47:45
Speaker 1: a bag. And the thing here is that apparently even
47:50
Speaker 1: the kids still don't know what that was all about.
47:53
Speaker 1: This is something the dad did and they would ask him,
47:56
Speaker 1: like Dad, what is the clock in the bag all about?
47:58
Speaker 1: And he would say, that's not for you to know.
48:02
Speaker 1: So they just had to go along with it and
48:04
Speaker 1: honor the clock in the bank. And apparently one of
48:08
Speaker 1: the other famous things about Festivists. The Festivals for the
48:11
Speaker 1: rest of Us is what a lot of people say.
48:13
Speaker 1: It's the slogan that's on that episode. That actually was
48:17
Speaker 1: a slogan for Festivus with the Keith family, they called
48:20
Speaker 1: it the Festival for the rest of Us, And initially
48:23
Speaker 1: um was kind of a bit of dark humor reference
48:26
Speaker 1: to Daniel O'Keeffe Senior's mom dying, and so it was
48:29
Speaker 1: a festival for the rest of them left over after
48:32
Speaker 1: his mom died. But it was part of the point
48:35
Speaker 1: was to um move on each year, to like, you know,
48:39
Speaker 1: are your grievances and kind of bid a dude to
48:41
Speaker 1: whatever problems you had and just move on rather than
48:44
Speaker 1: dwelling in the past and your problems and that that
48:47
Speaker 1: seems to be tied in with that. So it was
48:50
Speaker 1: I as if Festivus could have gotten any better, It
48:52
Speaker 1: just did for me. I love it. So we should
48:55
Speaker 1: do that now, Josh, I've been meaning to say, you're
48:58
Speaker 1: not so great at mass, and oh, yeah, that's all
49:02
Speaker 1: I have to say. Uh, your your putdowns are actually
49:06
Speaker 1: not that bad. How about that? That's my big problem?
49:09
Speaker 1: All right, we've gotten it. We've gotten that out of
49:11
Speaker 1: the way. I feel so much better. I do too.
49:15
Speaker 1: I love it. I think it's great that it was
49:17
Speaker 1: a real thing and the writers had to kind of
49:19
Speaker 1: put him up to it. Apparently Dan was a little
49:21
Speaker 1: reticent about sharing this, but his since I think he
49:24
Speaker 1: went on to write a book about it even Yeah,
49:26
Speaker 1: I think so too. He fully embraced it. Yeah, I
49:29
Speaker 1: mean with a set of cash. He right, and he
49:31
Speaker 1: definitely likes set loose, a huge cultural juggernaut on the
49:35
Speaker 1: on the world, which is cool. I love it. And
49:37
Speaker 1: this makes me think of Aaron Cooper, So we want
49:39
Speaker 1: to shout out Aaron, because I know Aaron loves Festivus
49:41
Speaker 1: for sure. Happy Festivus, Cooper, and happy Festivus to all
49:45
Speaker 1: the rest of us. Yeah, and thanks thanks for another
49:48
Speaker 1: great year everybody, and you and Jerry and Dave and
49:52
Speaker 1: UH and Max who helps uh helps us with the
49:55
Speaker 1: ads and and the ad sales team and everyone at
49:58
Speaker 1: I Heeart who helps us put this thing out. It's uh,
50:01
Speaker 1: we gotta think Dave Ruse, we gotta thank our newest
50:04
Speaker 1: member Libya, and we gotta thank Grabowski and uh, Julia, Yeah,
50:08
Speaker 1: that's right, Julia Layton. And also thank you to our
50:11
Speaker 1: special elf helpers Um, Adam Stevenson, Robert Paulson, of course
50:17
Speaker 1: Alexandra stock Um for coming up with these great suggestions
50:22
Speaker 1: for us. Were appreciate that big time. And like Chuck said,
50:25
Speaker 1: happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Hanuka, happy Kwanza,
50:32
Speaker 1: as they say in that episode of The Simpsons, have
50:35
Speaker 1: a tip top ted. And we appreciate you guys joining
50:38
Speaker 1: us every year for this thing because we really look
50:40
Speaker 1: forward to it. And Chuck, I have to say, after
50:43
Speaker 1: a wonky ish episode, which I think was very appropriate
50:47
Speaker 1: for I feel like we got our our Christmas spirit
50:50
Speaker 1: back in this one. I think so. And of course,
50:53
Speaker 1: if this is a tough time of year for you,
50:54
Speaker 1: which it often is for some people we're thinking about you,
50:57
Speaker 1: hang in there, get through these holidays and uh and
51:00
Speaker 1: look forward to hopefully a better next year. So in
51:03
Speaker 1: the meantime, everybody, happy holidays from all of us. It's
51:08
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know. Stuff You Should Know is a
51:36
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
51:39
Speaker 1: visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
51:42
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.