Latest / The M&M Experience / M and M EXTRA June 5, 2026 Seasonal Creature Comforts/ The Death of Literacy?

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M and M EXTRA June 5, 2026 Seasonal Creature Comforts/ The Death of Literacy? · The M&M Experience

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome to a meeting of the minds crafted from decades
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: of talk show experience, an extension of the magic they've
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: created together on radio in the phenomenon called M and M,
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Hot Topics in the News and Wisdom from Light. It's
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Mark Davis and Mike Gallagher. This is Emin M extra.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Greetings everybody, and happy almost summer. I mean it's June.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: The actual summer solstice is June twenty First. Look, I'm
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: in Texas. Mike is usually in Florida. Do you consider
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: summer to have begun already? That summer is all of June,
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: all of July, all of August, rather than the astronomical
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: summer solstice day.
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: Exactly, and forget the summer solstice craft it's June, July August.
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: That's summer, summer time after Memorah. Summer starts after Memorial Day.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: Boom, exactly, exactly, exactly right, Lord knows, it's already hot
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: enough in both your state of mind, it's been summer
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: in Texas. It's the middle of April.
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: Well, and you know, I think often about having lived
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: in Texas, and you know, Denise and I built kind
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: of our dream home and Keller and we lived in
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: South Lake for a while. Then we moved to Keller
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: and for some reason, the heat when I was in
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: Texas really got to me. And my kids always teased
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: me because I made sure of the house was a
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: meat locker. I mean, I sixty two degrees is maybe
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: not cold enough? No no, no, no, no, that's why
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Saturday night, sixty two at night?
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, night when it doesn't I mean, it's comfied when
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: you're falling asleep. But does it matter what the ac
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: is at four o'clock in the morning when you're asleep.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: Of course, because you need it cold during the night
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: so you can all you snuggle up under all the
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: blankets and you keep it nice and toasty underneath. Yeah,
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: you got to have a cold in the house. Now
• 1:40
  Speaker 3: you have my hero. Oh no, it's got to be cold.
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: But I will tell you this. I don't know what
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: it is about the move to Florida. A few years ago.
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: I was I was chased out of New York City
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: by high taxes and people who wanted to light me
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: on fire if I ran the you know, took the subway.
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: So I went ahead, there's that, and I decided to
• 1:59
  Speaker 3: move to Florida. Came to Tampa Bay Mark. The heat
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: here to unbother me at all. Is you think that's psychological.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: I think it's it's psycho if I could abree it
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: bother me, it's the weird hotter. I have been hotter
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: in Florida and in Washington, d C. At ninety four
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: degrees with ninety four percent humidity than I am in
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: Texas when it's one hundred and three. Now, I think,
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: and it ain't dry heat. It ain't. We ain't in Phoenix.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: There's something about that rep oppressive humidity. I mean, you
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: grew up in the suburbs of DC. I was. I
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: always felt like I was hotter there in downtown d
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: C in August than I am.
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: In Twelles did Intown Manhattan anyway, Midtown Manhattan and those
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: canyons with those big buildings, and you get you get
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: the humidity and all of that. And I always love
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: the it's a dry heat. Yeah, so's the inside of
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: a microw dry heat.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: But you said some time in Arizona, right, I've spent
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: somewhat less miserably. I think I've probably been in Phoenix
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: when it was one hundred and twelve and it's.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: Still Las Vegas, Las Vegas.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Yes, my god, but this is sixty two. I am
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: really intrigued because we are we're sixty eight. Sixty nine.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Sixty eight is our usual thing, and that's a night.
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: I might do seventy seventy one in the daytime, especially
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: when it's hot outside, because if it is one hundred
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: and I come in, it's thirty degrees cooler. I'm pretty
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: good to go during the day, but I do need
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: it cool when I go to sleep. The interesting thing
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: is there is there seems to be the concept in
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: Texas we are going to, single handedly as citizens, counteract
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: God's one hundred and five degrees by making it like
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: a meat locker in our movie theaters, in our office buildings.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: Lisa and I were in a movie the other day
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: and she, you know, one of the kickback they bring
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: you food, and it's a recliner kind of thing. And
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: she always, she always brings a blanket. She just so adoral.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: She brings a banky, so she's got her blanket. I
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: don't bring a blanket. I'm a man. I don't need that.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: I've froze my ass off of that theater because it
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: had to be fifty three in the theater. Since it's
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: warm outside, I'm wearing shorts.
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: I know it, and I and I always wonder if
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: it's because as I get older in life, as I'm
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: getting a little bit older, the cold doesn't. I don't
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: wear the cold as well as I used to because
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: it used to never bother me. For example, I'm always flying.
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: I'm on an airplane. I don't care if it's one
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: hundred degrees outside. I'm going to bring a lightweight jacket
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: with me on the plane, because guy, I'm that guy,
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: I gotta have a little like a I mean it's
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: not like a coat, but like a little like a sweater, just.
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: A little just to get a little wrap. He's got.
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: Granny needs a shawl. Grannie needs to wrap a shol
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: around her shoulders.
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: So is it a sliding scale of tolerance that there's
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: a band name? Is it a sliding scale of tolerance
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: that as you become more tolerant of the up it
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: no longer really bothers you if it's ninety eight or
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: one hundred. But it really does bother you if you
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: walk into a but here you are, mister sixty two
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: degrees in your house.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: So at night, only at night though, and I'm with you.
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: Sick during the day and the house sixty eight, sixty nine,
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: maybe seventy, I'm fine, but at night and Peg Hudson,
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: my dear friend in South Carolina, taught me something about
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: going into bed and sleep habits. Do you guys have
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: an electric blanket?
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: No? No, because I don't want to die. I'm gonna
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: at that thing. Say it's gonna short circuit it. I'll
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: be no ask.
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: You would you stop and it's not going to short circuit.
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: Let me tell you something. When you set that when
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: you set that AC down to sixty two at night, yep,
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: or get under any electric blanket ye, And you turn
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: on the electric blanket about a half hour before you
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: get into bed. There is nothing better than crawling into
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: a toasty warm bed because because when you're when it's cold,
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: even if you want to cold outside, the sheets are cold,
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: and there's like that you get kind of that that
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: jolt of cold sheets. Well, Peg taught me. And I
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: can't now go to bed without turning on my electric blanket.
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: Now I turn it off as soon as I turn
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: the lights off. I don't want to all night because
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: it was.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: I just have a sleep setting does it have like all,
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: I just turn it off on your alarm clock. It does,
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: but I turn it off for ten.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: I just so entertained by this. I love so much
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: because we all have our feelings about the environment and
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: our power use usage and whatever miles per gallon we
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: get on our car, et cetera, et cetera. But the
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: notion of you in your own home of the electric blanket,
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: because it's somewhere outside of your thermostatus sixty two using
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: up as much energy as the data center down the streets.
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: Leaving the biggest carbon footprint I can possibly live on
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: a leaf.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: Let my house. Hey, but you know what your but
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: you know what your your teflon is though, Hello, electric car,
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: there you go.
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: But but but my luxury. But in a way you're
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: not using gas?
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: But how much how much is your electric car slurping
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: up when you're recharging that beast?
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  Speaker 3: But my luxury, my life, what I think is luxurious,
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  Speaker 3: and what I am proud to say that I've level
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: reached a level of success where I could do the
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: following electric blanket. And this is my condo. And I
• 7:01
  Speaker 3: have a condo. I don't have a house, got a
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: condo electric blanket, heated towel wreck in the bathroom. That
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: was once a Christmas gift I got from Joey and
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: Peg and I have a big electric heated towel wreck.
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: That is that is wired in?
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: What is that? Is it?
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: Because the warm towel just feels good when yeah, you
• 7:22
  Speaker 3: get out of the shower. You take that towel off
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: the rack and it's nice and toasty warm, and it
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: feels good on your body. So electric towel wreck. But
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: the most important item of all there is the single
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: most crucial luxury item that everybody ont a splurge on.
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: Electric heated toilet seat.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: So is it squirt your butt?
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: Y know? I've got that too. I've got the whole
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: the day thing, the Japanese s butt right, it's what's
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: the brand? Is it Toto? I think? Or one of
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: the but no, but the but forget the squirt, the
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: water squirt. I don't love that. But the heated toilet seat.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: There is nothing like a chili. You got the temperature down,
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: You got a sixty two degrees middle of the night,
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: mother nature calls you gotta do what you gotta do,
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: nice and warm fanny.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: What is there? So I guess there are two things
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: that I've never thought about. Ooh, that's cold. One is
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: the towel, yeah, because I'm not showering outside. But the
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: cow is there? What about the I probably don't think
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: about that very much at all. Don't need the electric
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: black I don't think.
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: Well, you can't tell me you don't think about a
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: toilet seat. You guarantee if he'll win, I don't.
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: I never. I never sit there. It's three o'clock in
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: the morning, it's the dead of winter. I'm it's not
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: an outhouse in the yard. I'm indoors in my house.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: I lower myself down onto the ball. I never go,
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: oh that's cold.
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: You will, now, you will now, now you'll think about it. Now.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: Here's here's what a jet r. Here's what a jeth
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: throw bodine, I am you talk about the tower rack?
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: The tower rack? Does the tower rack hang on a wall?
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: It just has like this.
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's mounted to the wall next to the shower.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: The first time I saw saw one of those out
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: in the wild was probably in some high end hotel room,
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: and I've probably seen them just about my entire life.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: I probably did not know what it, in fact was
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: until about ten years ago. I just thought it was
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: some strange modern art.
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: I'm swear to God, some tower rack the just this
• 9:17
  Speaker 3: is very complicated, intricate towel rack well tremendous, and some
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: houses in fact have and we did this in the
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: house in Keller, which was pretty cool. How about a
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: heated bathroom floor. How about heat under the floor that
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: keeps the tile or whatever whatever surface you have on
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: your bathroom floor heated.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: How good? I'm on board for that. I'm on board
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: for I was at a restaurant in San Antonio that
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: in order to lose it does get cold in Texas,
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: even in San Antonio, that in order if it's like
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: sixty degrees outside or fifty five, might be a little
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: a little little frosty for people to use the patio
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: that I guess I wish you can remember the name
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: of it, but because it's a really good restaurant too.
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: But they have an outdoor patio with tile that just
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: looks like tile, but there are coils of heat under
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: that heat the tile so that they can so that
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: you just kind of have a little bit of a
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: warmer experience. The thing was interesting is I was wearing
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: crocks on that particular day, and I think I popped
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: on this thirst. I'm kind of scald at the bottom
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: of one of my feet, just kind of swirling around
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: in my chair because it was sixty degrees outside, but
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: the tile was one hundred and ten.
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: That's funny. Well, but think about how at night, you know,
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: you shuffling around in your bare feet, you want to
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: go in and brush your teeth or whatever, and it's
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: chilli out. Now, it's admittedly probably better if you're in
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: a real winter weather climate, if I mean, think about
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: that going on, because to me, one of the luxuries
• 10:40
  Speaker 3: of a home in a real warm, cold weather climate
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: is a fireplace, a nice, big, huge wood burning fireplace.
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: Nothing burning wood burning, no gas gas you know what
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: I did. We used to have in the house we
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: had in Texas. It was gas powered wood burning. In
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: other words, we had real logs, but the flame was
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: was like pushed out by gas. But you could put
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: logs on it. But did you have with the logs
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: burn yeah, oh yeah, but it was but it was
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: powered by a gas flame so that you don't have
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: to create a fire.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: So all it really did was start it for you.
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: No, no, it it pushed out a big, big, robust flames.
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: But then you put the wood, because I mean, who
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: wants to build a fire? What am I a cade man?
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: Rub sticks together? I know that's exactly where I was.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: I've had a wood burning fireplace in some past homes,
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: and the idea of a wood burning fireplace is charming.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: It is awesome. There was one time that I didn't
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: open the flu first time I made the fire up.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: Total fire total nine to one, one total fire department call.
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: This is thirty years ago. I'll never forget that. I
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: think my clothes, my existing clothes, still smell like smoky.
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: But but the thing is, but once the wood is
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: actually burning, you got to go schlep some more wood
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: and stick it on. That's on that fireplace, don't you
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: the gas that I'm the gas? But it keeps the
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: fire going. And then all you do is throw the
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: logs on it. Then once the logs burn down, you
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: throw more flames and more logs on the flame. Now,
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: let me tell you quick, quick, funny warm weather a
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: hot weather story before we move on to whatever we're
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: going to talk about on this episode of M and MXT.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: And we do appreciate you tuning in. We appreciate you
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: watching on YouTube, and we appreciate you listening to the
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: podcast wherever you download your podcasts. Years ago, I was
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: up for a job at a radio station in Oklahoma
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: City and I had to fly to Oklahoma City and
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: it was like mid August, and I was kind of excited.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: It was a big talk station there at the time,
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: and one of the call its w HK. Does that
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: sound familiar for Oklahoma City. I think that's a familiar
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: talk station in Oklahoma City. And there was a guy
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: named Dennis, the general manager, who wanted to interview me
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: for a job there. And I got I put on
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: my best pinstripe suit. I had on the Oxford blue
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: button down shirt and a red tie, and I was
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: all spruced up.
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: And I got on that plane and I flew into
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: Oklahoma City and I'm not kidding, it was about one
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: hundred and eleven degrees US.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: Of course it was.
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: I got out of the airport, I thought, oh my lord,
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: how do I and manage this? Well? We went to
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: a restaurant and it was a Mexican restaurant in downtown
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: Oklahoma City, and Dennis, the general manager, has a table
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: all picked out for us outside outside, and I'm looking
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: at him like he's nuts. It's like, are you trying
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: to torture me? Is this like some kind of Is
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: this the is this the Survivor on CBS? And I
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: said to him, I said, well, Dennis, it's up a
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: little bit a little toasty outside. He goes, oh, no, wait,
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: do you see what happens? He goes, They've got misters.
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: I said, they go what he goes, we got mysters. Well,
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: let me tell you the misters does. All that does
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: was splatter you with warm water. So you're you're sitting
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: out on a patio, but you but you're Then the
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: evaporation from your body then cools you belgey. It was
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: like being in a car wash. This water was spritzing down.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: They had these these spigots in the ceiling and every
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: five or ten seconds, the water would shoot out. I
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: got water dripping into my eyes. I'm sweating like a pig.
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: I'm almost ready to faint. And I thought, thanks, but
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: no thanks. I will not be taking a job in
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, ever, in this lifetime or the next.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: So that's my hot Weather store guest just learned. You
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: know what kind of a company man kind of a
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: devoted uh sort of Salem remember of the family you
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: are well can you went looking in your brain for
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: UH talk radio stations in Oklahoma which right conversing on it?
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: And I lived down here, etcetera. And the first place
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: you went and something went off, and I had like,
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: wait a minute, because you gave me a radio station
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: that starts with w WhK, and those of tend to
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: be east of the Mississippi or the the Ks or
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: west generally speaking. So your mind went to WhK. You
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: know what WhK actually is? Tell me sale station in Cleveland,
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: in Cleveland, Ohio, it's AM fourteen twenty. The answer for
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: Bob France, our friend Bob France. Yeah, but those are
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: the call otters w h k W in Cleveland. So
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking, there's.
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: What's in Oklahoma City? What are the AM talk stations
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: in Oklahoma?
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: K T O K is one. That's a big one.
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's I wasn't that's.
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: Exactly so K O k C. That's good. They got
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: k O k C. That's good. So I don't think
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: that was generally We've just shared things that people may
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: not really know that do you? And you know why?
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: It's the K and the So if you're W O
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: R W A B C, you know all the ws
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: are east, and your K A B C or K
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: L I F, your KKK et cetera tend to be
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: West of Mississippi.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: I think I'm right about this. I think it's fake news.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: You know why the n W no kilowatts? What what
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: the signals and the strength and stuff. And there are
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: relatively few really almost no exceptions except one was the
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: station I used to work for West of the Mississippi WBAP,
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: and another would be like the first radio station ever
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: in Pittsburgh decided the East Mississippi, which was Katieka. So
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: what we've almost without exception, last thing on warmth before
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: we literally before we go to what we're talking about,
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: which we're almost done. You mentioned about the bathroom where
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: it's cold in the bathroom and the notion of a
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: heated floor, especially in cold weather.
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: Uh?
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: Has the era of carpet come to an end? Everything
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I hear is that every house needs to have nothing
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: but hardwood floors, lay down, some throw rugs, some area rugs.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: Has carpet? Has carpet gone the way of the dinosaur?
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: It really in many ways it has. In fact, if
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: you go to a newer hotel, there's no more carpet
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: and hotel rooms they're all wood floors or tile or
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: lamb in it. And I'll tell you what I love.
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: That's probably good. I love a hotel. But at home,
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: I love me some wall to all carpet in in
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: my at least in the master bedroom. And by the way,
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: I still say master bedroom. I don't care what they
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: tell you.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: Yes, you're the white supremacist master bedroom.
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: But I got to have. I want my my my
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: feet seas to be uh just play. And the plusher
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: the better, the the you know. Not now Shag is gone.
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: I don't think Shag isn't making a comeback. But I
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: like really plush, thick, and I just like throw runs.
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: I don't like wood floors and all that. But you know,
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: I've got a look, I got a crisis on my floor.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: So there's there I have. Is it called travertine, That's
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: that's flooring, right right.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: It's a really pretty looks kind of like it looks
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: kind of like marble.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and and and in my condo, uh, it came
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: with a beautiful travertine flooring. And it's their tiles, right,
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: But there's travertine, and it's like a sandy colored and
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: really cool pattern. It's a really big feature of the condo.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: Uh.
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: And I love this place. I want to sell it
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: one of these days, but I'm I'm gonna have to
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: wait because it's not a good time to put it
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: on the market. This this travertine flooring. I had a
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: guy come about a month ago to do some work
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: on the water heater, and the kid spilled water all over.
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: The water flowed out onto the hallway, and now the
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: travertine flooring outside where the water heater was is like
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: stained and the cleaning ladies can't get it out. I
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: guess travertine is porous, right, does it?
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: Thought traverting? I don't know how impervious to such things
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: or how poorous that's that. I thought one of the
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: appeals of that would be that he's going to wipe
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: it up and you're good to go. Nope, I wish.
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: So I got to figure out how long.
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: Was the water? How long was the water is? How
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: long is it standing there?
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: Probably an hour, probably half hour to an hour or whatever.
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: But it definitely stained it because you can still see
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: where the water had stained it. By the way, can
• 18:43
  Speaker 3: I get this off my chest too before you forget?
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: Of course you get It's why we're here.
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: The rabbit Hole, Mark rabbit Hole, Mike. One more personal
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: story and anecdote which I think is a public service
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: to remind everybody of the perils of scams and identity theft.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: A couple of weeks ago, I got a ping, ping,
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: ping notification on my phone that my charge through seat Geek,
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: which is a ticket app you know for events, Oh,
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: I do too, and for me Broadway shows. You can
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: get a lot of good tickets on seat g Yeah, buddy, well,
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: apparently I had attempted to buy two a pair of
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: tickets to the Cleveland Cavaliers New York Knicks game at
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: Madison Square Garden for twenty six hundred dollars.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: Of course you had, right, and I hadn't.
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: That was not me. And they had my American front row.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: At Wicked for a Saturday matinee. Well, that's storm the
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: story water maybe Saturday night. But but look, this was
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: a fraudulent attempt on using my credit card I got.
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: They caught it right away. SeatGeek caught it right away,
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: And of course when they do that, then you got
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: a call and unfortunate, I had to get a new
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: American Express card.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Because somebody got your number. Somebody got my number. One
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: of the readers, you think, how do you think that happened?
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: Well, Seeke told me they thought it was due to frankly,
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: their vulnerability, a recent data breach that people's access at
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: people's accounts were compromised, and they were in there and
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: they were getting access to people's accounts and they tried
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: to and thankfully it didn't go through. But here's the
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: thing that's really important. Beware of the scammers who replicate
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: companies like American Express or Chase Bank or any of
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: these places, because they're really good at it, and what
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: they're going to try to do is extract personal information
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: from you. So I called the number on the email
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: that I got supposedly from American Express and it wasn't
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: the typical American Express number, and the guy answers, American
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: Express fraud, you know, fraud, you know, fraud department or whatever,
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: And I said, yeah, I said I've got a notification
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: there was a problem, and he pausibly be he goes, yes,
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: I see him talking to Michael Gallagher. He said there's
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: a concern about your black card and a fraudulent charge
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: on your black card. Now here's the well he used
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: the frame black card and that immediate and a black card.
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: I mean, look, I get teased about this from some
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: people who think it's a waste of money, but it's
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: a It's actually called a Centurion card, and it's been
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: kind of immortalized in pop culture. Some of the rap
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: artists jokes sing about having a having your MX black
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: card because it's you have to be invited to have it.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: You can't apply for a Centurion card. And years ago
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: I got invited to have one, and I've kept it
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: ever since because there's a.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: Lot of personal who invited you.
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: The head of American Express, he was a listener to
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: WABC years ago.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: Okay, sorry, Oh it's a.
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: Great story, and I and I was on the air
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: once talking about some and he called He called in
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: and said, Mike, I want to take care of you,
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: but you've got to get invited to In fact, a
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: little little sad story one of the but it's playful
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: and it kind of speaks to the joy that I
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: had and knowing Charlie Kirk. One of the last communications
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: I had with Charlie. He wanted a black card from
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: American Express. He didn't have it, and so I was
• 21:59
  Speaker 3: trying to help him get one, and I was working
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: with the American Express folks saying, now, look, this guy's
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: a big deal because supposedly you got to be a
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: celebrity and you got to make an X number of
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: amount of dollars and all that.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: But as a black card holder, are you are you
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: then able to invite others into the cult?
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: I mean, are you, like really, Oh, I try to
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: get you guys one you and Alsia would.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: Like no, no, no no no no no no no no.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: It's but now the fee is I'm good with the
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: crandit cards the rams. Yet the fee is like seventy
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: five hundred a year. So it's but but a boy,
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: it gets you a lot of perks. I mean, it's kind.
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: We asked you, I think you do you feel like
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: you get seventy five hundred dollars a bank for those bucks? Oh?
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: You do?
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: You absolutely know that?
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: For those that did not hear, to take thirty seconds
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: because the answer is only a number. Mike was at
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: a hotel and it was, you know, swiping the black
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: card for whatever his stay at the hotel was, which
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: was not a dime, because Mike likes good hotels, as
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: do we all. The person made a mistake, a wild,
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: outlandish mistake, and an amount got posted to Mike's card,
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: and the car just took it, just took it because
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: it's okay.
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: I'll give you that. Let me give let me give
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: you the number. What she wanted to swipe was two
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: hundred dollars. You know how they take like a deposit
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: when you check into the hotel, and it's two hundred
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: dollars to be charged against any incidentals that you might
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: take in the room. She put in a few more zeros,
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: two hundred thousand dollars. So I'm looking up and I
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: see this charge for two hundred thousand dollars on the counter.
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: And not only did I see her get clear on
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: the machine, then my phone beeps, and I looked down
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: at the phone and says, oh, we've just approved a
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: charge for two hundred thousand dollars. There's no limit on
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: the black cart. There's you could buy it. Clearly, you
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: could buy the doll And the poor woman, the woman
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: behind the counter, she turned white, is a ghost. She
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: started to cry. I said, no, no, no, it's okay,
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: it's okay. I'll call we'll get it. And to this day,
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: every time I see her when I check in, we
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: always we always do. But anyway, back to what I
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: was going to say, when when I had this fraud
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: thing and I think I'm talking to American Express and
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: the guy says, well, there's been some fraudulent activity on
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: your black card. Well, my radar immediately went up. They
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: don't call it a black card, they call it the
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: Centurion card.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: Oh you know. He was too colloquial about the official or.
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: At least it was to me, And I thought, this
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: guy's a fake. This is a scam and they got
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: me calling this number and they want to take it personal.
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: I said, sorry, you just said black card. I think
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: you're a scammer. He kind of chuckled. He said, well,
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: I'm not, mister Gallagher, but you can call us back
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: on the number on the back of your card. And
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: it was legit. But it's the kind of thing that body.
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: But listen for that kind of stuff when you're talking
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: to somebody, have your radar up, have your guard, don't
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: let your guard down, because they're going to try to
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: get extract either your phone number, maybe an email address, the.
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: Heaven forbid, the last theft.
• 24:46
  Speaker 3: Oh, it's bad, it's you.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: They're so aware in a way, the scammers are aware
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: that people are being vigilant about scams. And so if
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: there's some scams that look like scam protection in the follower,
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: I get maybe one of these a week. Yeah, just
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: or something like just verifying the seven hundred dollars purchase
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: you just met on PayPal. Just let us know. And
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: if you didn't make this purchase, we want to take
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: care of you. And you might say, well, I didn't
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: make a purchase on PayPal, blah blah blah, I did
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: this is mark and then and then they got you
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: because of the friend. Well, then give us all your
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: information so we can verify and get this cleared up
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: for you.
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: And they're good. Let me let me tell you how
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: close you can be to disaster. So I got the
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: very same thing. I got a notification saying we're verifying
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: your three thousand dollars pay PayPal charge from Chase Bank.
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: It was an email from Chase Bank, and they said,
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: and you didn't and if you didn't, you know, make
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: this charge, call us well, I thought, well, it's not me,
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: so I called them and it said on my phone
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: it was Chase Bank. I mean they spoofed the number.
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: They can actually make it look like the number that
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: you're calling these scammers is the actual legitimate phone number.
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: Guy answers, I'll never forget. His name is Raji of course,
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: of course, a Chase Bank. Well, and I still have
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: am thinking it's legit, and I said, yeah, I got
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: this is not my charge. What do I do? He goes,
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: hold on, mister Gallagher, I will transfer you to our
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: fraud to our fraud department, and so then and so
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: then he puts me on hold, and I can hear
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: people in the background, and then.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: Because it's a sweatshopping bombay, of course you heard people
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: in the background.
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: And then like Meti or whatever his name was, or no,
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: this is fraud department, this is mehdi, And I still
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: am going along with it, and he says, all right,
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: so that we got let's just verify this. What's the
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: what's your bank account number? And finally it hit me
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: like a ton of bricks, Oh my lord, your scammers,
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: your scammers. And until he asked for my bank account number,
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: I was going to go along with it, so you
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: got to be so so they spoof phone numbers. Never
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: ever ever give personal information out over the phone to
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: somebody you don't know is legit, because it could be
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: it could bite you in the butt.
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: Do you see what has happened here? Because just in ping, ping, ping,
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: ricochet rabbit were always here churning out exactly and which
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: is the other inverted pyramid that's happening here? Because I
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: envisioned there would be something that I would bring up
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: that would then branch out into forty seven things. What
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: we've done is we've covered forty seven things that now
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: funnel down to this one thing that will really we
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: could probably do in about three four five minutes. And
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: this is where I thought about starting. It's huge, it's
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: important to me, but it's just a little touchstone where
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: we are because here we are engaged in what the
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: spoken word. We are huge fans of the spoken word,
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: the written word, et cetera. A proficiency with the language,
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: the language is our stock in trade. I've got a
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: broad a broad question for you, and then a narrow
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: thing that I just stumbled across on an actual podcast. Okay,
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: the broad thing I have. Do you feel like the
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: English language is just taking it on the chin that
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: from texts to kids that can't write anymore? And I
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: wouldn't necessarily need to go to AI because if you're
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: having AI write stuff for you, at least you're seeing
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: what competent English looks like. Up to a point. Do
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: you feel like we are with each year, each decade,
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: each that we are growing horribly less literate and that
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: proficiency in the English language is that that is going
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: to land the dinosaur? I do.
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: I absolutely believe it. I think we're we're we're instead
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: of using AI tools to get better, to get better,
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: and as we use those tools to get better and
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: maybe invite grock or chat GPT to write a paragraph
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: or an email or a letter, you're not exercising your
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: your your your mind muscles. You're not you're not working
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: at it. You're not trying to do it yourself, and
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: you're getting lazy and you're getting sloppy. I find myself
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: doing it all the time because I'll tell you what
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: I'm using chat GPT.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: But you can You've been writing for decades and I'm
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: a good writer. You've earned exactly.
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I like to write but I'll tell you what
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: I don't like to do is put the time into
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: it if I don't have to. I'm serious, I'm I'm sorry.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: I had to.
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: I had to give a little three minute commentary for
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: one of I shouldn't say this out loud. I'll get
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: in trouble for this, probably, But it was a three
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: even a commentary that one of my affiliates asked for
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: and they needed a real quick turnaround, and it was
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: a horribly busy day and I thought, I got I
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: can't spend a half hour to write this this little monologue.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: Did you tell it to write something in the style
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: of Mike Gallagher?
• 29:14
  Speaker 3: And it did, and it did. I said, write this
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: in the style of Mike Gallagher. It's three minutes. Here's
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: a couple of talking.
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: And what that means is whether it was about gun
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: control or strong borders. Halfway through there, because there was
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: an anecdote about the nineteen eighty seven Tony Awards.
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: Yes exactly, Betty Buckley would say in cats that this
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: was not no. But I'll tell you what that three
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: minutes It was great, It was very well.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: I never shouted that mark And you can write and
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: so it's like we've earned this, We've we've put in
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: the chops, so we we've earned this. We I think
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: about today's fifteen year olds, today's twenty year olds, say,
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: twenty year olds, who could no more write a three
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: hundred word essay that they could get up and sprout
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: wings and fly to Mars. Now we can't. We can't
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: be but they can't. And so is it? Well, all right,
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you what then? Is this something that is
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: not so much a lament because I don't know. I
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: guess I'd still be pretty good at adding a column
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: of twelve numbers, but I don't have to exactly. So
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: is it is it kind of like a is this
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: just something I just don't mean to worry about saying?
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: Do you remember when we start started using calculators back
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: in the day and our parents used to say, no, no,
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: you got to do it longhand write it out. You
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: don't don't use that device, that's the that's the devil's handiwork.
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: Don't know that. Don't teach that here. Math would say,
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: you can't use a calculator. Now you know they sell
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: million dollar calculators, are you? And there's the last destination
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: I'm going to this really was sort of the micro
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: thing that we're going to start with. Instead, we'll finish it. Okay,
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: mister writer, would you consider yourself a good speller?
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: Yes, I'm actually an exceptional spell I'm in fact I catch,
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: in fact, I catch spelling mistakes like like like a
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: cougar in the wild hunting, you know, prey. I see
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: a bad spell makes it drives but it drives my
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: team crazy because nobody on my team knows how to spell.
• 31:06
  Speaker 3: Tracy is the world's worst speller. I'm telling you she
• 31:09
  Speaker 3: can't spell if you had her life held. But now
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: but now, to her credit, I'll tell you what she's doing.
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: You know what she's leaning into chat GPT.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: Also does a lot of things, have a lot of
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: things have autocorrect, which often goes very very badly very bad.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: Maybe there's not not even an excuse anymore. But but
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: here's what's okay. Were you okay? Were you ever in
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: a spelling bee as a kid?
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: I was?
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: Remember though, if you if you won, you won? But
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: do you because do you remember the word that you lost?
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: I remember the word I lost on and I was
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: embarrassed by the entire school in front of the entire
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: school by your first sister, the principal. And she mocked
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: me because the word was hitchhike and I hyphenated it,
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: and she said, there's no hyphen in hitchhike. Wait a minute,
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: You've got the letters right, right, But I put a
• 31:59
  Speaker 3: hyphen H.
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: I T C H dash H I K E and
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: got beaten with a ruler.
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: Well almost. She was a witch. She was a witch
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: on wheels, sister Rosina, and she mocked me. She said, boy,
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: that was a pretty stupid mistake. Michael, you lost no hyphen.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Hitchhike is one word. So that was I'll never forget.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Which I which it is? I guess, but you got
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: the letters right. And has there ever been a word?
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: Is there?
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: Is there ever a hyphen? Is there ever a hyphen
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: in any spelling B word?
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: I think special distance, say so eighth grade. I'm pretty
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: darn good at this eighth grade. I'm proud of myself.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: A I'm ready to go. Bam, let's go, bring it,
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: bring it, bring it. So we could start about forty
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: kids were getting down to like six, and I'm one
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: of the sex I'm saying, oh I got it, now,
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: I got it now and up we go. Boom boom boom.
• 32:45
  Speaker 4: Your word is your word is voracious, and I thought, well,
• 32:51
  Speaker 4: a voracious appetite, no sweat, V O R A C
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: I O U S voracious.
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: That's the right spelling. Sure of voracious. The word was
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: voracious v er acios as inbelievable, having something with voracious?
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: I decided, what do you always get the chance to do?
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: Could I have that definition? Please use it in a sentence?
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: You didn't do that, I am it's voracious. Who doesn't
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: know voracious? But that? I don't know if that was
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: in there as as a trap for smart smart alex
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: like me. I don't know. That was eighth grade. So
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: call it nineteen seventy one, fifty five years in, I'm
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: still not over it. And very last thing, because in
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: order to do away with all of this, all these
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: problems in history, there was a movement around Teddy Roosevelt's time.
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: I don't remember what. It's called the the You're Wrong
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: About podcast, which features a lot of people doing history
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: that you don't have overlooked or don't understand. I think
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: it was called simplified spelling. There was an actual movement
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: that in English that what America should do is that
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: everything should pretty well be spelled phonetically. That beauty should
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: be b ut I, that laugh should be la f
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: and that simply is the way it should be. And
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: this this was either a really great idea or a
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: terrible idea. It caught flight for a while, it was
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: a debate in academic circles whether simplified spelling should be
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: the rule of the road. It ultimately did not happen.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: I think I'm glad. I can only imagine because look
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: at look at a U g h o U g h.
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: We are such an amalgamation of so many languages in English,
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: it makes it almost impossible to become good, to become
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: a good speller. Ad. But I'm still glad they didn't
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: do that. But for a while, the notion of simplifying
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: everything to like you're four years old was an actual
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: idea in modern American culture.
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: And on that happy note, that's a wrap for a Friday,
• 34:48
  Speaker 3: have a wonderful weekend. Thank you for joining us on
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: m and M extra See you Monday, my friend, see
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: you next time.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Love you,