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SYSK Live Christmas Spectacular! · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, Uh, what you were about to hear is
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: our very first live Christmas spectacular. Hey, everybody, Josh is
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: here too, so yeah, this is a lot of fun. Man.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: We did a hometown live Christmas show at the Center
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Stage Theater in Atlanta. This was in real time. This
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: is what last just a few days ago. It was
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: and it was a great show. We brought the house down,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: I think is how they put it. Yeah, man, And
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: it was cold and rainy, and Atlanta United was playing
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: in a championship game and people still packed out the
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Center Stage. Uh, and that really meant a lot to us.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: It was great. It was a Christmas miracle. Frankly. Yeah.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: And you're gonna notice something different. We actually used visual
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: cues in this episode for the time, and we're going
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: to post those on Facebook. So if you want to
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: see the pictures that we're talking about, uh in our
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: different segments, you can go to Facebook check those out.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: And we also did a Christmas reading this year of
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: a contemporary book, which was kind of cool. We did
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: a reading, uh from a wonderful, wonderful kids book called
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Meet the lat Because and it tells the actual real
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: story of Hanukah and how that came about in a
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: very fun, childlike way, and it was written by a
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: man name Alan Silverberg. You can buy that wherever you
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: buy your books. It's really wonderful. Or you can go
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: to silver Books dot com that is s I b
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: e Er books dot com and check out what Alan's
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: up to. Uh, and it's not just for Jewish families,
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: like you should just spread the word of Hanukkah to
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: to all children because it's a really great story. Yeah,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: it's a really great book too. So thanks to Allen
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: and uh, here we go, oh ware, we go. Welcome
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: to stuff you should know from house to Forks dot com. Hey,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, there's Charles
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: w Chuck Bryant, Jerry's even out there somewhere, and we
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: are here live at center stage, Peter and our hometown
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: in Atlanta, Geogia. We love you too. I just lost
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: the only gift you've ever given me. That's not true.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: By the way, are you going to put it on? Well?
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: I had it on. I was like, how why am
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: I hotter than usual? All right? There it is, fit's
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: perfectly Yeah, I had the Taylor made for it. Nice.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: So um, Yeah, we wanted to give you guys some
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: information because this is a podcast, right. Yes, I'm redoing
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: the horrible clumsy segue that I did already before we started,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: and we're going to talk to you about the history
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: of aluminium trees. They might have an aluminium tree in here. Okay,
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: a few people over eighty Do you see that over there?
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: There is an aluminum tree over here, and chuck, you
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: get that. Yeah. The story here is is that this
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: is now belongs to us in my family. This belonged
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: to Emily's grandmother. She's still with us. She's not here
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: to night because as you all know, Mary is. How
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: old is she now? Yes, oh, they're over there. It
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: was like, that's so weird that that person over there
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: knows old Mary is and she sounds just like my wife,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: who I've been looking at over here, Emily's and that
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: lady's like, Chucks, a total creep because he's just looking
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: at me. Emily's throwing your voice, that's what he did.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: So she's nine years old. She's still with us, which
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: is amazing. But that was their tree. And as you
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: can tell if you're on the side of the stage,
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: we will describe all these things in greater detail. But
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: that is an original, I guess from the nineteen fifties
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: or early sixties. Aluminium tree completes with color wheel there.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry. You can see it peaking above the bar.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: So it's an aluminum tree, as Chuck said, and the
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: aluminum trees gather start through the great American process of
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: idea of intellectual property theft. That's right. There was a
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: guy from a company called Aluminum Specialties and he was
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: walking down the street Chicago one day and he stopped.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: He saw a tree made out of aluminum, and he
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: thought was the most amazing thing ever. And then he
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: looked at the price. He was like, a hundred bucks.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: That seems a little steep and it looks a little heavy.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: I'll bet I can do better than that. So we
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: went back to headquarters and he said, look, guy, I
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: saw a tree made out of wait for it, aluminum.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: But it was too heavy, it was too expensive. We
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: can do better, and an Aluminum Specialty said Gideo, that's right.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: And by the way, I heard a bell jingling and
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: I was looking here, and I was looking there. It's
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: my hat And I was like, is there someone behind me?
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: The bell? So everyone the acid is kicking in, it
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: should be a good show. Uh So I did a
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: little I know you're the you're the inflation calculator man,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: but I did a little calculating. So those original trees
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: from Chicago that he saw and decided to rip off
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: in today's dollars were close to nine bucks, what yeah,
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: eight and eighty five dollars, and so Mr tom Gannon
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: of Aluminum Specialty, like he said, was like, they're getting
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: ripped off. And if I think if we can package
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: these for twenty bucks and we can make them so
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: that a lady with her little lady arms can pick
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: them up, that's literally well you didn't say that. This
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: was said at a marketing strategy meeting though, but it
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: really was. They were like, well, we need to make
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: them all in and a box light enough for women
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: to pick them up off the shelf, right because it's
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: ninety seven. But they did just that. Yep. Then they
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: put him in a box and on the box that
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: said Aluminum for Lasting Beauty, because you know your tree
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: will rot and die just trying to keep it around
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: past February. It's going to go up in flames, right
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: we do. Plus it was the safety tree too, because
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: it won't go up in flames no matter how long
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: you keep it around. Yeah, I'm not sure about that.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: That thing looks highly flammable to me that one. Yeah,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna test it. I think it just kind
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: of melt into a pool and then we die from
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: the fumes. That's what we get. So they set up shop.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: They already had a plant in Manitowac, Wisconsin, right there
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: on the shores, really right there, represent right there on
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: the shores of Lake Michigan. Uh. During World War Two,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: they were building submarines I guess out of aluminum, which
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: I don't think it's true at all. I had to
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: beat something more durable than that. Right, Well, I don't
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: think Aluminum Specialties is making submarines. The town was known
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: for Oh I told you, I was unprepared. So they
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: started getting these out the door for twenty bucks. They
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: had models that were four two, four, six and seven
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: ft high. Uh, And initially people made fun of them.
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: They called them tin tannin bombs. Uh. People were mad
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: when they saw them at first, in nine because they
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: thought it was gaudy and gross and not a real tree,
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: not some beautiful what one day be appreciated, appreciated as
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: like a kitchy beautiful item. Well plus also it was like,
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: what do you mean an aluminum tree? We just want
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: tree trees. What are your communist tree? Exactly? I'll try
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: to take my real tree. Let's say happy holidays to me.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: All right, there you go. So the aluminum specialties cookies
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: were saved by, believe it or not, tire sales people.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: So in in Wisconsin in the wintertime, they don't sell
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: a lot of tires, and so tire store said, well,
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: we need to make some some bread somehow we gotta
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: get Christmas presents for our kids. How are we going
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: to do this? And they heard about these aluminum trees,
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: and they started setting up in their showrooms. And of course,
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: the pride of every town is the the tire store
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: that everyone walks past constantly. But people started walking past
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: the tire store seeing the aluminum trees in there and said, okay,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: they actually are quite beautiful. I want one, And they
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: started selling them like hot kids. Here's an actual quote.
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: I wish you could have found out who this person was.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: This was someone who worked at Aluminum Treemakers of America.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: He said it was a salesman's dream to have this happen.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Suddenly the guy who wouldn't give you the time of
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: day is your best friend. I think that was actually
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: a tire store guy. Sure, come on, give me more
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: aluminium trees. I need them, man, I'm selling them too fast.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: So they sold something like, um, I think, ninety thousand
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: in the first year, is that correct, Chuck? Ye know
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: they sold over a hundred thousand. They sold forty thousand
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: in the first month, which is crazy. So within of course, weeks,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: because Aluminum Specialty stole it from this other company, other
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: people started stealing Aluminum Specialties idea in the American way.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: They came out with this thing. Within weeks, other people
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: were selling aluminum trees, and so everybody started having an
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: aluminum treat. Some of them were more expensive, somewhere were less.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: But Aluminum Specialty played it smart. They pointed right down
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: the middle, and they have like six of the market share,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: and even today they're ever gleam product was is like
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: the most sought after. It's like the Cadillac of aluminum trees.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: I guess that doesn't that's that's a terrible analogy, but
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: you get what I'm saying. I like it, Tires, Cadillacs,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: it's all coming around. So some of these companies, because
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: it's the nineteen fifties, we thought we'd read some of
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: these names of companies that ripped them off because it's
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: just so nineteen fifties. Morris Novelties, Holiday Industries, Regal electri ONYX,
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: hold On Holiday Industry. This is my favorite. Astra Light
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: lt D. That's a British company. H and As fest
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: As Farms. It's really sweet. I made up that last one.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: This thing just i'd like my nicks itched when you
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: said that, I'm getting uncomfortable, just like every time I
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: look over there, I want to take that off of you.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Can I take this off everybody? Yeah, you're gonna literally
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: come thank you, thank you, little something for you, A
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: little something I constructed and look it's a nice Mounty Garland.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: Thank you everybody, all right. So they started gussie up
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: their trees a bit. One of these is gussied up
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: because you see those little pom poms on the end.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: That was an addition that they made the later trees
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: because I guess they just wanted to make them special.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: They made them a different I think the pink ones
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: these days are the most prized ones that you can
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: buy on eBay. Yeah, one of them sold for like
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: bucks once. Yeah, that's the appropriate. What can I get
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: for that one? I don't know. Are you familiar with
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: the term struggling? Yeah, that tree is struggling. There's a
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: somewhere in smell Bill there's a ninety eight year old
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: woman very angry at so you struggle in it. She's
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: not Snowville. She's down at the the game, the football game.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, she's watching Atlanta United lose. No, I don't
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: want that to happen everybody. I'm just from Atlanta. I'm
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: preparing myself. You just turn the crowd on it, I know,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: all right. So these things are moving like hotcakes. They
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: literally sell over a million of these, uh combined. And then,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: of course, like every sort of Christmas fad that comes,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: it goes, and some people lay the blame at the
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: feet of none other than Charlie Brown. Yeah, and then
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: weird like most people think that Charlie Brown did away
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: with the aluminium Christmas tree because in the Charlie Brown
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: Christmas Special, um Lucy sends Charlie Brown and lin Us
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: out to go get a treat the biggest aluminium tree
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: you can find, preferably pink, right, And so they go
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: off on this mission and they find some Linus taps
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: on one and it sounds like he's tapping on a
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: ship's hole. Um, And Charlie Brown's like, no, no, I'm
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: not doing this. I'm going with this tree, this little
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: weird creekly treat a struggling Christmas tree. Um. And Charlie
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Brown takes it home and loves it. And it was
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: like the spirit of Christmas was found in this little
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: tree and the commercialization of Christmas was personified in the
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: in the aluminum trees. And some people say that's what
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: kind of turned the tide, that's right. Other people say
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: it was just coincidence and it was bound to be
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: a Christmas pad no matter what. Charlie Brown just kind
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: of helps push it over the cliff. Charlie Brown as
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: he does, he's got a lot of blood on his hands.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: But also gradually over the years they did come back,
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: thanks to things like eBay and Etsy uh and people
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: with extra money in their pockets that want to pay
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: three thousand dollars for a vintage street people with no kids,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: I think. In other words, exactly, but we still have ours,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: and and it still looks great despite what Josh says.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: Let's give it up for the treat So we made
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: it to a segment. We made it through one tomorrow.
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: So uh, it wouldn't be Christmas everybody without a good
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Christmas miracle story or three, and we just so happened
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: to have three of them for you. We had more,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: but we found out that a lot of them actually
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: don't really add up when you start digging into them.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: These are legitimate bona fide. The Pope is signed off
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: on them. Christmas miracles. Okay, hey, everybody, that's that's what
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: the folks says. Everybody that was irish. I don't even
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: know what's gonna all right, Miracle number one and this
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: one's gonna knock your socks off. This was we're going
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: back in the way back machine further in time. That's
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: that's that's what powers the way back machiness. Oh yeah, whoa, whoa? Everyone?
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: Really we went too far? Are you dummies? Were in
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: like eighteen fifty two dinosaurs? Can you guys say, whoops
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: in like reverse? That works? It's working all right? All right? Wow,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: I've never felt this powerful before. Alright. So there's a
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: couple named Ed and Julius Stewart. They were making their
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: way across Arizona on a Christmas Eve going home, and
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: they stopped to change attire because it got a flat
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: out in the middle of nowhere near a town called Superior, Arizona.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: By the way, I looked up the population, yes, because
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: you kept saying, you know, it's in the middle of nowhere,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: and I was like, yeah, we'll see about that their
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: population and was about people, and now it's about hundred people.
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: That's a steep decline person. Yeah, that's they're not going
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: in the right direction. But even still people, it's not
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: that many. Plus Arizona is not even a state yet.
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: It's just basically a bunch of people camping out together
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: in the desert is what Superior, Arizona was. And this couple, um,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: their names were Ed and Julius Stewart. Uh. They were
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: about ten miles west of Superior when their car got
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: a flat on Christmas Eve. Oh just wait, just remember
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: it's Christmas Eve when this happened. So they pull over. Uh,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Ed's fixing the car and his wife is like, well,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: I gotta get use the restroom. I guess out here
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: behind a cactus because there's no one around, and oh
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: my gosh, there's a hat box laying in the sand
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: and it's crying. Yes, there was a baby and a
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: hat box. I know, everyone, but this is a Christmas
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: miracle story. Don't get too worried. It's a little girl
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: in there, and she's like, this is weird. There's a
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: little baby in a hat box, almost pete on it.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: They got it cried, uh, and so I think we
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: should do the right thing and not leave this baby
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the desert. I'm hoping that it
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: wasn't even a thought. I'm hoping she didn't even have
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: that thought. They flipped a coin and decided to take
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: a little hat box baby. He went Anton sugger on
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: on the thing. They're like, her baby, call it heads
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: or tails. Everyone's seen no country for old man. Yeah,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: that was what that was referencing. So they pick up
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: hat box baby. They take hat box baby to a hospital.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: You're laughing, but that's what they called this baby in
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: the news. Hat the hat box babe. Seriously should call
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: the baby Christmas Eve or just baby Eves. That's a
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: real name. Oh yeah, sure, you know yeah, yeah, no
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: one names your kid hat box no hat box baby.
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: I'm sure somebody saying like a barbershop quartet song too. Yeah,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: that's true, you're my hat box baby. So seventeen couples
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: ended up that wanted a little baby born in a
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: hat box, and they all apply to adopts little hat
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: box baby. Seventeen couples. Uh, and this is the party.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Don't get how many showed up too? Why what happened
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: in between then? And uh that was yesterday. I think
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: hat box baby fell out of the news a little bit,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. And so two really had
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: what they called stick tutiveness even back then. And of
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: those two couples, a judge had to be like, you, guys,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: thanks for coming. There's some other baby, not from a
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: hat box that they also found in the desert, right exactly.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: I don't want cactus baby, right raised by coyotes. So
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: in the end they did find one couple and they
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: named the baby Sharon, my mother in law's name. A
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: named him after my future mother in law. Little Sharon
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: Elliott never met her biological parents, because this was the
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: nineteen thirties when you buried the stuff deep under the
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: sand and lived a lot your entire life. Not only that,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: she didn't know she was the hat box baby until
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: night nine. Seriously, Yes, she knew of the hat box Baby,
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: don't we all, But she didn't know she was the
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: hat box Baby. Did she find out by opening a
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: hat box and having this weird psychic flashback? All right? Yeah,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: she's like, gotta get out, gotta to get out? Was
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: coyotes after kotes? Is that the end of the story? Oh? No,
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: The end is she did not meet her parents, which
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: is very sad. But for the ninet thirties, she went
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: on to have a career in the aerospace industry, which
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: was uncommon for a woman at the time. So she
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: did really well for herself and lived a long and
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: fruitful life. And she's here tonight. Everybody give it up.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: Hat box Baby's gonna fly in on it. That's how
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: you end a story that was miracle one another one
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: for you, two of three starting now? All right? We
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: we actually had five, and we had to cancel two miracles. Yeah,
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: one because it wasn't that interesting. And I'm just gonna
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: briefly say, I don't know. There was this one story
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: about a lady who got lost and buried in the
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: snow for three days but lived and they found her
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: and I was like, this is amazing. I did some
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: more research, uh and apparently it was a suicide attempt
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: and she lost her arms and legs and then sued
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: the hospital. And I was like, I think we should
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: not do this one here. What's the exact opposite of
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: a miracle? Yeah, it's really bad of a Christmas miracle.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: I can't believe you told them that. Actually, I'm proud
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: of you for stuff you should know. Way, all right,
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: So where are we going? And we going to uh Korea?
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: We are We're going to Korea. During the the onset
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: of the Korean War and the Communist the Communists were
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: coming down from China into the North Korean, into the
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Korean peninsula, sorry, and they were pushing the North Koreans
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: further and further south. Uh In. A bunch of North
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Korean people had assembled at the docks at Hung Nom
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: and in Hung m there were a lot of people
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: hanging out, something like a hundred thousands billions plus a
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: ton of Allied troops being evacuated. There were ships coming
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: and going and coming and going and getting people out
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: but they were mostly getting the soldiers out and there
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: were a lot of civilians standing there stranded. But luckily
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: for those civilians, there was a captain with one of
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: the greatest names ever, Leonard LaRue. And Leonard LaRue said, oh,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: you're gonna die at the hands of the communists who
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: are coming down, not on Leonard LaRue's watch. And he
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: just happened to captain a ship called the S S.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: Meredith Victory. And the S S. Meredith Victory was a
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: large cargo ship, but it was in no way, shape
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: or form a passenger ship, that's right. And it was
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: actually weirdly named after Meredith College in North Carolina, where
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: my niece went to school. It's all full circle. Somehow
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: this Christmas miracle from Korean nineteen fifty has to do
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: with Chuck. I tried everybody I like to feel like
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: I had a hand in it. So they pull up
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: this SS Meredith Victory. And here's where I got confused,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: and Josh was kind of cleared up because in this
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: research it said that it was only designed to hold
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: sixty people. Why don't you lower the boom on how
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: many civilians they ended up fitting on this Leonard LaRue
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: in one shot fit four thousand people. This was a
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: shoddy article. Yeah, So I saw that and I was like,
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: we're gonna have to erase this one because that's obviously
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: a lie. You can't fit fourteen thousand people on a
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: sixty person chip. But that was like sixty beds in
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: the like crew area. It was a large cargo ship. Uh,
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: wasn't large for fourteen thousand people. They literally stuffed them
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: in there like sardines. They were all standing like elbow
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: to elbow. No one could sit, no one could move
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: on deck, below deck. There was no water, no food,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: no heat, no toilets. Yeah. Think about that and fourteen
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: thousand civilians think Yeah, fourteen thousand civilians from Korea were
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: packed elbow to elbow in this ship, navigating mine infested
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: waters for two days at sea. Yeah. I saw a
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: quote from one of the um one of the dudes
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: that worked on the ship. What are you all? Most
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: people dudes that worked on ship ship dudes. Yeah. One
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: of the crew members years later recounted and he was like,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: you know, the Korean people are um somewhat stoic in
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: their nature, he said, But I couldn't believe even with
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: that the way they behaved and no one, he said,
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: it was so orderly. No one fought, no one like jostled.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: Everyone just like sort of work together to make this
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Christmas miracle happen. So so okay, there are two miracles
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: that came out of this. So they make land at
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: gay O j Island on Christmas Day, that's right, And um,
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: two miracles happened. One over this two day period, under
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: these very treacherous conditions, not one person died, not one
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: person was injured. Miracle one. Yeah, you can clap for that. Wait,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: please clap. That was that. I got political again. I'm sorry.
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: That was miracle one. What was miracle to Miracle number
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: two is they showed up with fourteen thousand and five
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: people because guess what, five little babies were born everyone
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: in this little journey. There was a medic on board
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: that worked with the crew. I found out that didn't
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: have any training of course, delivering babies, just running around
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: with a hat box, like just drop it in here
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: and dropping in here. The hat box is getting kind
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: of gross after number two, but they lived with it. Oh,
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: Jerry cut this part out seriously. Make a note. Um, yeah,
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: five little bit bees were born. Everyone lived, those little
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: five babies, all right, and they're here tonight everybody. One
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: of these times, it's gonna come true. Man, wouldn't it
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: be great? That was miracle two. Miracle three is as
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: follows starting now. We should have done these in a
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: different order. Now that I'm seeing what miracle this is.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: Does anyone out there like dogs? Same here? What about
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: miracle dogs? MoMA? All right? Yes, sorry, Oh that's a
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: Simpsons reference. I know. Okay, you told me never to
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: acknowledge people from the stage. Oh yeah, this is a
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: special show. I'm sorry, buddy. I was just doing as
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: told sir. Alright. So April two thousand six, Aurora, Colorado
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: woman named Vanda Lunstrom had a heartbreak when her little
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: pet rat terrier Daisy, got out from her fence. It
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: didn't come home ever, which is, first of all, it's
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: a miracle story. Everyone a rat and a terrier. It's
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: disgusting and that must have been like the ugliest dog
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: on the plant. That's that's not how that works. We'll
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: explain it to me later. Let's keep things going. Like
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: a German bulldog doesn't mean a German Man and a bulldog. Actually,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I'm I'm so sure what happens fine
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: closed doors? So Daisy the rat terrier ran off, and
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: Vonda Lunstrom said, um, well, I guess that's it for
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: for me and being happy. She spent months and then
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: just kind of gave up, resigned herself that she would
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: never see her dog again, never knew what happened to her,
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: and just is like, well, my heart is broken. On
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: Christmas Day of that year, she gets a call, and
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: this call is from a woman in Knoxville, Tennessee, saying, hey,
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: guess what. Oh yeah, I got some Knoxville people here. Huh, well,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: you prepared to be proud of your town because a
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: woman from your town found Daisy in Knoxville, Tennessee. She
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: had made it miles from Aurora, Colorado to Knoxville, Tennessee.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: No one has any idea how, and showed up on
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: this woman in Knoxville, Tennessee's doorstep. Yeah, she said, where
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: you from, little dog? And she went Colorado. It's pretty good.
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: It's so dumb. I can't believe I did that. Port
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: of people. No, she did what you should do, which
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: is called the little number on the tag, got in touch.
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: It was a rabies tag, so got in touch with
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: veterinarian in Colorado. She said, I think I have the
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: wrong number. This is a weird area code to be
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: calling for a lost dog in my neighborhood in Knoxville.
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: And he said, yeah, it is weird. It's in Colorado.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: And she said, I got a little rat terrier named Daisy.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: And the vet went, what a rat terrier? What are
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: you talking about. I don't know how you do it
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: in Tennessee, lady, but uh, right here in Colorado, we
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: breed dogs with dogs. Oh that's not how we do
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: it in Tennessee. So he said, I think that we
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: have a match here there. This is one of my
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: my my clients. And he called up Vonda and he said,
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: believe it or not, we think we found Daisy. This
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: was this dog was missing in April and this was Christmas.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: So you do the math. Yeah, I had it not
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: been Christmas, it would have just been a miracle, not
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: a Christmas miracle, that's right, right. So they were reunited,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: and UM, I guess if we've already told the other
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: story about the other Christmas miracle, we can kind of
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: pull the rug out on this one too. Uh, Daisy
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: was reunited with Vonda, and Daisy got home to find
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: out that Vonda had replaced Daisy and she had to
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: share her house with another dog. That must have been
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: pretty awkward for Daisy, Like finally back home and runs
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: inside and it's like, oh, this is my spot. You
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: haven't been here for a while, so let me tell
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: you what the rules are, Daisy. Yeah, and the dog's
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: like no, all over that, and I'm about you again.
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: Is that our last miracle? That was it? That's what
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I'm saying. We didn't amount of order? Right, Thanks everybody.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: We can tell you guys are the hardcore stuff. You
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: should know fans because you clapped for that one. So
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: I don't know if you guys have noticed the theme
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: or not yet, but we're talking a lot about Christmas.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: I've noticed you shifting it. What is Is there a
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: rhymer reason? They're never just have it? Okay? I thought
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: you were just that was the first time I've ship
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: all right, next segments right, wait, now we just graduated
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: onto the next you know what that side to get
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: cheated and show him your ball? HeiG, everybody get a
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: look at a load shouldn't be hearing. So we're we're
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: talking Christmas, and what would Christmas be without shoving elbows
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: to the teeth, maybe like a little bit choking. You're like,
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: oh wait, I can go to jail for that. Over
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: the must have toy of the season, and we found
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: out that there were not There was a toy that
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: spanned not one, but two Christmas seasons. And that toy
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: spanned the Christmas is of and and his name was
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Teddy rux Let's go ahead and remember that little guy
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: how adorable comes with a cassette in a story book. Yeah,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: and you can buy more cassettes and more story books,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: and more cassettes and more story books because that's how
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: they get you, right, That's how they got you with
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: Teddy Ruxpen. And he was super groundbreaking at the time, right, Um,
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: Teddy Ruxpan. If you don't know what Teddy Ruxpen is,
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: he's this guy. But your your kid would put a
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: cassette in his back and press play with like sticky
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: little chocolate fingers and um, Teddy Ruxben, here we go. Here.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: We don't want to give away the horror that aways
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: and Teddy Ruxben would come to life and be like, hey,
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: you're my friend, whether you like it or not. Kid,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: And like his eyes would open and close and his
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: nose would spin and he would start talking. But he
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: would talk, not just you know, babble or just talk
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: about his day or something like that. He would talk
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: and he would tell a story. Right, I was born
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: in a hat box. Right, he was an amazing bear
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: that told your kids stories and every kid wanted one.
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: But there was actually a pretty great story leading up
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: to it, and it was a Disney imagineer named Ken
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: Forcey who was the guy who came up with Teddy
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: Ruxpen and he worked on him for so long that
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: his original idea was for Teddy Ruxpen to have been
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: a monkey because he wanted to salute the Space program.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: That's how long the guy's been working on Teddy rock Span. So, uh,
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: I hit a little more research into this guy. Like
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: you said, he worked at Disney what do they call
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: themselves mains? Oh wait, I'm sorry. He actually helped design
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: He was one of the designers on the Haunted Mansion,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: So big ups for that best ride ever. And then
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: if you're a long time at Lantern, you might remember
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: over at where Philips Areena now is is was the
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: old Omni CNN and they had the World of Sid
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: and Marty Croft, which is this weird LSD fueled amusement
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: park indoor amusement park. And he helped design that too,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: which is kind of cool. Yeah. So, uh, like we said,
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: he worked at Disney, and he was like, I've I've
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: been to the Hall of Press, and it's why don't
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: I just take Abraham Lincoln and wrap him in for
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: cut his head off, wrap him in for and I
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: think I have a million seller, right, But he works
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: in it for a while. And the reason it took
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: him so long is because originally Teddy Ruxman came in
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: two parts. You had Teddy Rucksman and then you had
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: a box, a big, clunky, ugly box with sharp edges
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: and would like catch fire. And this box sent FM
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: signals to Teddy and then that's how Teddy, with the
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: receiver in his face, would talk and move his his
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: mouth literal radio signals. He could not have been more
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: complicated if he tried, right, So, but also really clumsy
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: and cumbersome a two piece set. No kid wants to
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: like set up a receiver and like to like twist
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: the dials, you know, or they want the hard sharp
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: box inside the bear, right, But it wasn't really. It
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: was a huge move when they managed to combine the
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: two together. And what they figured out was that they
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: could use one track and a regular cassette tape to
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: record the story Teddy's voice, and then the other track
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: they recorded ultra high frequency radio signals that that told
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: Teddy how to move his face. It was it was
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: connected to a little motor you know, cassettes recording stereo.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: So there's two sides and they just used one to
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: sign sin the signal to a little uh motor control,
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: and all of a sudden he could come to life
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: and haunt your dreams. And with that he took off.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: They released him in September and they were sold out
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: within a month. I think forty three thousand units just overnight. Yeah,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: but this guy was thinking big though, Like he was like,
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: this is not a Teddy Bear. Everyone. He created this
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: whole backstory and he wanted television shows and movies and
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: things to accompany this, and it actually worked. He went
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: into the office and said, oh, he's not a bear.
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: He's an iliop, which is a species native to the
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: fantasy world of Grundo and the people he was selling
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: it to areas can you can you just be a bear?
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: I don't want to talk about this today. He got
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: a bear that talks like that. You that's seriously all
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: you need. He's like, no, no, First of all, he's
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: wearing a tunic. Bears and wear tunics. Don't be ridiculous.
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: He's an iliot. So it was a pretty big breakthrough
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: and in uh Teddy Ruxman started to take off forty
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: three thousand units in the first month. Yeah, they sold
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: a million within like the first three or four months.
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: It was like a hit, so much so that it
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: spanned six and nine eight seven Christmas. Yeah, and so
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: much so that he did get two specials out of ABC.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: Believe it or not. He he tried HBO and they're like,
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: that's weird where HBO? But ABC was like sure, why not?
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: So in November in December of nine eight five, they
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: had to live action Teddy Ruxman specials about this cute
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: little iliops from from Grando. Uh. And it came back
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: over the years. I mean, here's the deal. Parents hated
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: this thing because because I mean it was like seventy
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: five bucks back then, which is like a million dollars
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: to million dollars and these cassettes because the kids are like,
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: well I married that one, I want to hear the
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: next one. And they were twelve ninety five a pop
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: to get the little book in the cassette, and he
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: was like, oh, I can write stories all day long. Children. Yeah,
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: in the middle of these stories and be like, hey,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: can go tell your parents to go again another cassette,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: tell him tell him this, just say what I'm about
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: to say that you will hold your breath until you
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: pass out unless you get another cassette today. Okay, all right, okay,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: So anyway, and Grundo, it's always lovely out. That's how
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: he would talk, like there was something wrong with them.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: I found a few of these titles too, by the way. Yeah,
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: there was one called the mush They all had Colon's too.
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: One was called the mush the Mushroom Forest. You can
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: be anything you want to be. It's like a Gladwell.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: I wonder what was going on there. Oh, yes, there
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: was one in the early nineties. And this is not
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: a joke. Everyone grunge music, Colon, tap your feet to
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: the beat. You lie that serious, you lie because grunge
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: the most toe tapping this genre of music out there.
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: And then finally, but also that's a Teddy Ruxmen title.
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: What did what did he tell the story? I don't know,
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: A bunch of stage dive in iliops, I guess. And
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: then finally you know, And Teddy Ruxman came back a
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: few times over the years. In fact, I think you
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: can still buy them, Like just a few years ago
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: there was another company. It was like, sure, we'll buy
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: the license, we'll take. There was one finally where he
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: jumped the shark that was called this This is the title,
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: Teddy Ruxman Visits the Dentist Colin sponsored by Crest. It
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: wasn't implied that was the title. Anyway, we have to
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: take a message break everybody. I'm kidding. I was making
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: a joke about the Crest. Think set down. I do
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: have my and my Christmas light me Andy's It's authentic everyone.
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: So Teddy Rucks been he went away. The market got saturated.
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: There was something called Rapping Rabbit. There was one called
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: Blabbering Bear, which is just a terrible name. They did
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: zero market research. That's how fast everybody was getting this stuff.
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: I would have gotten like that's year's version. Yeah, blabber bear,
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: not by your own choice. Oh same here, Bud, I
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: know what you mean. Nights at the Round Table. Yeah,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: it looks just like Polo except for a little flag.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: Like the kids at school are not going to buy this?
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: Is that the end of that segment. That's the end
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: of that. It's going great, it's going not bad. So again,
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: we're talking Christmas, and what would Christmas be without the
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: most horrific assemblage of monsters that you ever encountered in
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: your entire life. Well, if you're scared by this kind
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: of thing, if you don't like monsters and they make
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: you uneasy, thank you lucky stars that you were not
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: raised in Europe, because Europe has the scariest Christmas traditions
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: of all time ever, and we're gonna tell you about
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: some of them. Yeah. We we talked about this in
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: past Christmas specials. How Christmas was um basically go opted
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: by Christians from weird pagan holidays with horrific beasts and
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: they're like, hey, let's turn that into the Birth of
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Jesus and Christmas is wonderful. What about this angry forest?
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: Got us three wiseman? That's fine, they're gonna be happy
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: to get presents. It's fine. So we're gonna start. You
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: can go ahead and move the slide. Yes, we're gonna start.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: An Iceland everyone with the yule Cat. You have to
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: say it. You have to say it the in the
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: Icelandic chuck that friendly guy. Yes, in Icelandic it is
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: uh yo luck. I'm sorry, but say it like the
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: York please. Oh yeah, hey, that wasn't bad. It was
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: a good or dude, it's oh so quiet and the
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: faith of the movement and you got to do that.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: She actually records these songs, right, Yeah, there's you can go.
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: You can go on to YouTube and look up Yola
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: Kuten and and just just guess how it spelled and
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: h or icelandic leka. And there's a poem that b
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: York has sung that they put to music and it's
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: weird and creepy and perfect. But there's this there's this
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: this tradition in Iceland that if you are a good
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: kid and you do all of your chores and your work,
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: and your parents are hard working too, then you as
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: a kid will be rewarded with a new piece of
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: clothing on Christmas. Right, That's what you're looking forward to
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: as a kid in Iceland like it sucks and you're
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: happy to have it, because if you don't have new
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: socks or new shoes or something, the yule cat will
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: come along and eat you on Christmas Eve. We'll eat
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: you in your house in front of your family. You
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: see that kid, he knows. He's like, there's totally a
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: cat behind me right now. And his friends are going nope,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: wearing their new jackets. Members only. We're all good. So
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: the whole thing is the UK. This goes from a
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: house to house, and I think Christmas Eve for Christmas
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: one of the two. I think if you're being eaten
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: by the ulk, it doesn't matter. Ul cats looking into
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: the windows like you own new shoes, okay, and you're
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: awfu limits new apron. I guess it's an article of clothing.
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: It's just going from house to house, and then the
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: Yule cat will inevitably find some kid who was lazy
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: and didn't do their choice so they didn't get a
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: new a new a new piece of clothing. Pounced tear
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: rip me ow right, ule cat gets it done. But
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: there's something really sad about this too. What if what
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: if you're like a good kid, and you do all
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: your chores, but your parents are not well off. Well
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: t s for you. The yule Cat's gonna get you anyway,
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: because the yule cat doesn't discriminate. The yule cat just
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: goes by whether you have some clothing or not. He
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: hates all children. So what's very sweet is if you
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: read this yule cat poem in the end it says,
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: hopefully this will have you give a thought children, two
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: kids who are less fortunate than you, so you can
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: make sure that they have a new piece of clothing
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: around the holidays, so they won't get eaten by the
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: yule cat. Right and if not, the blood is on
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: your hands, meal, mial, your luck, kudarin. What I love
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: about all these is it was when you look at
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: the progression. Christmas softened to the point now where it's like,
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: well you get cold and you're stocking, And back then
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: it was like a cat will come and eat you,
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: eat you in front of your family, because it's all
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: like good kid, back kid, what are you gonna get?
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: You're gonna get a president or coal? And back then
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: it was like will you live or will you die?
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: It's really amazing, all right, for this next one, we
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: are going to uh Germany, the home of many horrors,
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: a lot Germany and Austria which featured this kind woman.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: And I guess her band of her soul leaders. Yeah,
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: clearly this is uh Fraul Perkta. Fraud Perkta was a
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: witch who would you know, if she thought you were
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: pretty good, give you some candy. If she thought you
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: were bad, she would cut your you open and tear
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: out your guts and stuff you with garbage. That's what
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: they taught kids. Better not be bad or your guts
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: are gonna get pulled out and replaced with garbage by
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: fraud Perkta. Yeah, she would visit over the twelve days
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: of Christmas because she had a lot of work to do.
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: I saw one descriptor that she was often described as
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: having one abnormally large foot called a goose foot. I
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: haven't heard that one. I don't know it's a good one,
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: I don't I don't even know what that is. You
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: got that? You got the goose foot? Did you have
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: a mishap at the Manny Petty place? So the other
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: thing is said too, that she would slit their bellies
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: open and stuff it with straw. And pebbles like garbage,
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: like garbage, because it also makes you think, like what
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: kind of garbage like coffee grounds, banana peels or something
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: or more like she's composting. All right, okay, but I
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: mean that's that's garbage. Remember you have to turn the
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: kid every two days exactly, keep it on the sun
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: so it gets nice and steamy. Maybe put some worms
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: in there too. Well, she was a forest goddess, so
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: it makes sense look at her. So for a character, Now,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: who you wanted to run into if you're a bad kid. Alright,
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: he's next Germany again. Yeah, if you were in Germany,
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: or nowadays, if you're in Pennsylvania Dutch Country, which is
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania, Uh, you might run into a little guy
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: named Belshnickel. Let's bring up Bellschnickel. Guys like that kid
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: is not joking around in that photo. This is supposed
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: to be fun, holiday fun in Germany. I know, it
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: looks like a hostage situation, like an Olympic games. Like
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: can you imagine if that guy came in through your
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: door and was like, no, not your parents, I'm here
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: to see you come here. Wow. So the thing about
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: Belshnickel was this Belsh Nickel was like his name means
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: either like what does it belts in means to wallop
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: in in German? Uh so he either means like walloping
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: satan Nick or satan Nick and pelts and first and
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: if you um, if you ran across bell Stickle. He's
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: like this old kind of woodsy guy who would show
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: up a couple of days before Christmas to find out
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: whether you were naughty or nice. And he would find
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: out like this, he takes the candy, maybe a few
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: nuts because again you're like a Pennsylvania Dutch kids, so
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: like you'll go crazy for a few walnuts. Even he
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: would throw him on to the ground and he just
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: wants you like what are you gonna do? And the
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: kid who went after, like Augustus Gloop or something like that,
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: just jumped onto the ground after the candy. What he'd
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: get a switch right to his back, like two days
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: before Christmas as part of the Christmas tradition. And that's
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: what bells Nickel was doing. He was there to sort
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: the naughty kids from the nights. But he's not nearly
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: as bad as like fraud character or anything like that,
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: because he would he would take time with the naughty
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: kids and kind of teach them like, no, that's going
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: on right there. I think. I think, so this kid's
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: about to be uh indoctrinated into the Belschnickel way of
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: doing things. He just showed himself to that just right.
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: But he would spend time with the kids who were
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: bad to basically say this is how you do it.
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: Here's some candy. And he was meant to be a
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: warning before St. Nick came to say you can still
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: be good right before Christmas. I think that's a great warning.
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: Uh let's go to the next slide. That's another picture
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: of him, just in case you needed some more nightmare fuel,
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: and then let's go one more Yes if if that
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: sounded familiar to anyone. There was an episode of The Office.
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: Everyone knows Dwight Shrude is from Pennsylvania, Dutch Country, and
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: so he brought the legend of Belschnickel to the Office
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: in an episode. He's pretty good. Uh So moving along,
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: We're going to go on over to the Lorraine outside
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: Lorraine regions of France. Actually this has nothing to do
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: with any of these except that this was a Christmas
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: photo from Germany, the home of Belschnik. Alright, let's get
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: away from that, all right, here we go, So Hans Trupp,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: that's Hans trop coming in the window there. Oh it
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: is okay, so this is nothing. The next slide will
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: really kind of give you the feeling of what Hans
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: Chops all about. Hans Chop is a man who was
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: a rich, wealthy man who decided that he wanted to
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: eat children. He was that rich and wealthy, and so
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: he was just going to do it. So he waited
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: for a kid one day and pounced on him and
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: took him and cooked him. Got this far, I was
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: about to eat him, and then God intervened and struck
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: him down with lightning before he could actually eat the kid.
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: But wasn't this a true story? Yes, it was a
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: true story. No, but there was really a guy named
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: Hans Tropp though, right they I mean, according to legend,
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: there was a cannibal, Satanist and Christmas enthusiasts, right who
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: was struck down by lightning by God. Okay, okay, so
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: Hans trop Um was resurrected as a scarecrow man who
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: will come through. Let's go through the next one. In
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: the like around Chris Smith's time to make sure that
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: kids are behaving so that they are not eaten by him.
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: That's the yet another threat Christmas in Germany. Everyone right
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: behind me, Well this is France. Actually, Oh all right,
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: I took off Germany for a minute. Then I thought
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: that was Germany. Now, Hans CHOP's my least favorite Christmas figure.
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: We're gonna stay in France. Everyone with the last one,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: let's switch that slide. Not bad comparatively, right, Like, I'll
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: take this guy any day over the rest of them.
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: This is how do you pronounce that you're there? The
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: frenchie here among us? Perfuitad that last that really finishes
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: it all nicely. Uh. This is the French legend. The
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: name translates to father Whipper. And there was in another
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: evil butcher who craved children to eat. This is a
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: constant theme in euro around Christmas, and if you listened
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: to Our Grimm's fairy Tales or the Graham's Brothers, it's
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: a constant theme in children's literature that if you did
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: not behave you would be eaten by an adult very sweet.
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: So he created children to eat, and he and his
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: wife would lure three boys into the butcher shop or
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: whether they would kill, chop up and salt these children
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: until St. Nicholas comes to the rescue, resurrecting the boys,
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: uh and taking custody of the butcher. I love that
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: he takes custody. He said, you're with me. Now you
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: work for me. I'm St. Nick. Yeah, and he literally
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: put him to work. He was not like, you go
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: to authorities. He was like, coming back to the North Pole,
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: I got something for you. But it wasn't like, come
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: on back to the North Pole. I I want you
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: to start painting checkerboards for the little boys and girls.
• 50:46
  Speaker 1: It was not I like what I like the cut
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: of your jib. I want you to come do that
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: for me. So he would send him out ahead of
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: time to basically Belge Nickel, all the little kids and
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: you heard of just do that. Then St. Nick would
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: come in and be like, oh, hey, at least I'm
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: not parafu it toard, right, you know, I'm St. Nick
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: good cop, bad cop. Basically exactly like that, except the
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: bad cop had no choice in the matter because he
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: was in the custody of St. Nick. And that's France.
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: So he needs a drink us too, all right, We
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: just so happen to have a bar over here, so
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: we're gonna go to it now. Alright, everybody, we're moving
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: to the bar. Set gets hold on, Oh thank you.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: Chuck's gonna give my thing. I'm going to We're gonna
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: talk about hot toddies. Is anybody a hot tottie fan?
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: Thank you? Chi, Well, we're hot toddy fans to Chuck.
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: Haven't you like not had one before, or you haven't
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: had one for a while. I feel like I feel
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: like Emily has made me a hot toddy when I
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: was sick, because alcoholics like to tell each other that
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: it's good for a cold when it's really just like,
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: m I'm sick, but I really still like to drink. Right,
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: they're like, oh, well this is great for that. Just
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: put some lemon and honey in it, and you're all sat.
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: Josh is the bartender. Why don't you walk us through? Uh? Well,
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: first of all, we should talk a little bit about
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: where the hot toddy might have come from. So they
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: actually don't know. Um, they think possibly it came from
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: Scotland Edinburgh, and in Edinburgh there was a well And
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: you didn't say that, right, It's right, there was a
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: well that everybody drew water from and water is like
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: a big feature of the Hot Toddy. And the well
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: was called Todd's Well, t o D's Well. And they think, well,
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: there you go. That's story one. Maybe there's another one.
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: In India, they drink a medicinal drink called the Toddy
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: t a r the Toddy and it's made from tree
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: sat Ye, there's another one. There was a guy named
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: Roberts Bentley Todd Bentley Todd. He was a doctor and
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: he would prescribe this stuff constantly, whether you were sick
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: or not. He'd be like, just drink this. And they
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: think maybe he was the inventor of the Toddy. No,
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: I like that one. You like that one? Yeah. The
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: fourth one that I came across was that it was
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: invented to make Scotch more palatable to women. And I
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: think that's probably where the Hot Saddy came up, so
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: they could sell more scotch basically, and then they came
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: up with these back stories for it. That's right, So
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: you're brewing up some water, Uh, what do we have
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: here tonight? I got a little local ryot looks like
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: resurgence rye whiskey. Everybody, So if you don't know how
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: to make a toddy. It's super easy and it's really
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: actually quite good. This show just took a turn to
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: the left. But a toddy is just just whiskey of
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: some sort. Usually it can be Scotch, could be Irish.
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: It can be Bourbon, were in Bourbon or rye or
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: something like that. Um, a little sweetener usually honey, some
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: citrus and then some hot water. That's it. That's it, right,
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: But depending on where you are in the country there
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: are variations, of course, when you get geographically specific. Uh,
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: in New England you might have one made with clam juice.
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: Just kidding. Now they actually use maple syrup instead of
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: honey in New England, uh worre else in Ireland they
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: use potato water. No, just like we really have gotten
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: into dad joke territory. Couple years some people have pointed
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: it out and I'm like, my god, that that is
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: pretty lazy. I'm like Ireland potatoes right right, iris whiskey
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: There in Scotland they use you and McGregor sweat. Well,
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: that's that's just heavenly kidding you Scotch and then uh,
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: William Faulkner actually had a recipe that used bourbon. I
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: don't have a William Faulkner joke. It's very serious, man.
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: So tell us what we're doing here, Josh, what do
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: we got? So I just put I put about an
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: ounce and a half two ounces of this. This um
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: jigger doesn't actually say how big it is. But you
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: want to put one to two ounces in a couple
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: of tablespoons of honey a bunch of lemon, because you
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: know that's what makes it. The honey and the lemon
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: makes it medicinal. Right, that's right, said the alcoholic. I'm
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: gonna put us talking about me, all right. I was like,
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: just kid, he doesn't know. I'm gonna put a little
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: less than a whole lemon in between the two. And
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: then the kuda gross, which I found out means death blow,
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: not the final touch. Did you guys know that. I've
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: been saying cuda gross my whole life, thinking like, oh,
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: it's the final touch. No, it means to cut off
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: the head a little bit of water, all right. I
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: will say this though, uh jokes about alcoholism aside. Here's
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: another one. There are no there are doctors like Mayo
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: Clinic doctors that have said there is a little bit
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: of legitimacy here. The lemon does help, the honey does help. Warm. Look,
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: I know people are like, yeah whatever. Uh. Warm liquids
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: help with congestion, they help loosen things up, they help
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: stimulate your saliva. Uh. They also said there is a
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: a mental mentally desired effect which is just a nice
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: warm drink which if you're stressed out around the holidays,
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: that can help you potty sick. And the booze And
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: I'm like, are the Mayo Clinic doctors all alcoholics too?
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: Because this all sounds like enabling speech. They recommend a
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: little nip three times a day. So how is it?
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: Have you tried it yet? I know I smelled it.
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: Oh that's pretty good, is it? Cheers? Happy holidays? Happy holidays?
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: Everybody you like that? That's nice? Does it need anymore
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: honey or anything? I'll make it right. I think it's perfect. So, uh, well,
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: that's our drink. That's a hot toddy and the hot
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: tottie what only at Christmas and every other show where
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: there's a bottle of booze on the stage? This is
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: also delicious. I think we should retire by the fire,
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: my friends. We are. We're going to take our hot
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: toddies and we're gonna go over and we're going to read. Well,
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: we're gonna talk first and then we're gonna read a story. Okay, okay,
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: seriously this set. I love to have a set like
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: this at our house. We get one of these, you
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: me little fake fireplace. I feel like I should be
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: walking like this during this song tiptoe in so Um.
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: Has anyone ever really paid attention to the famous Andy
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: Williams song is the most Wonderful Time of the Year,
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: usually sung by Johnny Mathis. But if you really pay
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: attention to the lyrics, he says, there will be scary
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: ghost stories and tales of the glory of Christmas is
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: long and long ago. I have totally never noticed that
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: until you brought me this a week ago. Has anyone
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: else heard that and been like, what are they talking about?
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: Like this doesn't even make sense. It does make sense.
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: You know a little bit about the history of Christmas.
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: You were very close to your don't be dumb set
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: right now, and I need a plank right here. You
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: tell him Josh sent you. Yeah, there's that guy. I
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: just broke the fifth wall. You think about it, I know.
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: So the reason why that song says there will be
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: scary ghost stories. Is that um ghost stories were a
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: part of um Christmas for eons, for eons, Like remember
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: we were talking about like Frau perk to h and
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: Belshnickel and all of them, and how they were kind
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: of um co opted from pagan lower Um that's where
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: Christmas originally came from. Was the winter solstice. And at
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: the winter solstice, the the that's the longest night of
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: the year, the shortest day of the year, and it
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: was typically kind of celebrated by the Pagans as the
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: death of the sun. And then the next day it
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: was the resurrection of the sun. The sun came back
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: and and there was a promise of another year. But
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: on this night, on the night of the winter Solstice,
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: which usually was around December twenty second, maybe who knows, Um,
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: the barrier, the veneer between the living and the dead
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: was the thinnest, and so the dead could kind of
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: come and go as they please and maybe finish up
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: some unfinished business that kind of stuff. Maybe, Um, you know,
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: watch with delight as Belshnickel scared the pants off of
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: little kids. Whatever you wanted to do, you could do it.
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: That night. Yeah, there was is a British humorous name Jerome, sorry,
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: Jerome fuzzy. Oh no, wait, his name is Jerome Jerome
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: Jerome K Jerome. Yeah, I thought I was reading that wrong.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: His name is Jerome Jerome. Good Lord, what is happening?
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: So he sort of explained it around England. Uh, he
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: said this, whenever five or six English speaking people meet
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: round the fire on Christmas Eve, they stopped telling each
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: other ghost stories. Nothing satisfies us on Christmas Eve, but
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: to hear each other tell authentic antidoes about specters, I
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: love each other. Jerome K Jerome was a wonderful and
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: delightful chat. That was great. That's exactly how Jerome K
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: Jerome talked. By the way, specters. There's a very uh,
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: there's a very rare greeny phonograph of him talking, and
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: that's exactly what he sounded like. Chuck spen Weeks hearing
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: this apptually it was lost. I saw a bunch of
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: photos and he was doing this and all of them it.
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: So it was well known in Victorian England that ghost
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: stories were part of Christmas. And that actually explains another
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: weird thing if you step back and think about it,
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: why there's a bunch of ghosts in Charles Dickens and
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: Christmas Carol. Yeah, I never really thought about that because
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: it didn't make sense. I mean, I think it makes
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: sense just because you're born reading that story and seeing
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: those movies. But when you look back, it doesn't make
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: any sense that these ghosts are coming on Christmas Eve
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: because you're in America. Weeks associate ghosts with Halloween exactly.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: But in Jolly Old England, the specters come out. He's
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: going to keep at it until you guys give him
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: a good laugh. So I just get it over with that,
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: and there were three or four good laughs in there.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: I'm with you, all right. So um in a Christmas Carol,
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: Jacob Marley comes and it's like Scrooge, don't be like me.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: He's finishing up unfinished business because he can kind of
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: cross over to the other side. So that's why ghosts
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: pop up from time to time and Christmas stories and
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: Christmas songs. Isn't it delightful? Because it is tradition to
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: tell a ghost story around Christmas, which is why we're
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: not doing that. We're going to tell a story about
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: lacas at Hanukkah's right, because we are non traditional. Look
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: at that. Everyone has anyone read this yet? Do you
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: have any Jewish friends in the audience? All right, this
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: is for you, ma'am. So uh. This is a story
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: called Meet the Lacas. Chuck and I just happened to
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: have the hard bound edition in different editions. Is it's up?
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: Time down? Thank you, and we're going to read you
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: the story of the Laca family, which hopefully you will love.
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: We haven't even practiced this yet, so we'll see how
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: it goes. Meet the Lacas by Alan Silverberg. All right,
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: let's go forward. Two slides, one more. All right, here
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: we go. You wanna start off for me, I'll start
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: all right? Are you gonna do voices and stuff? I
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: don't know. Let's see how it could. Okay, Meet the
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: Loca family. They're just like you and me, except their
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: potato pancakes. That's Lucy Laca and her dog, Apple Sauce, who,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: despite his name, seems to also be a Laca. So
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: Lucy says hello, and Apple Sauce says, I gotta say,
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: we are doing a dog name Apple Sauces. Pretty great.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: It's great, but as you'll find, Apple Sauces a bit
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: of a know it all. You're not. You probably won't
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: like apple sauce by the end of this. All right,
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: moving on, I'm gonna read the top and I'm gonna
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: make you read this word. Well. I just happened to
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: look it up, so I probably get it partially right.
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: Mama and Papa are busy in the kitchen making fried
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: jelly dunnut stuft nice. How is that? Man? I'm good
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: at check out? Okay. Right next side Lucy's older brother, Lex,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: who apparently was raised on the Teddy Rook's Been Grunge story,
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: Lex is reading comic books. Get out of my room,
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: he shouts. Lex as a teenager, he doesn't care about anything.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: I don't care, but Lex should care because the lips.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: Tonight's the night, Lucy sings, she was just turned into
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: Neil Diamond. It's the first night of Hanukkah. No, it's not,
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: oh right, there's someone else in the lack of family. Yes, Grandpa,
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: Hi there, Tonight's not Hanukkah. Grandpa says, it's Hanka. That's
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: what I said. Lucy is confused, as I believe Chuck said.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: We hadn't run through this yet, Hanka. Can I keep going?
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: Let me take this one too. Yeah, yeah, did you
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: really want this one? No, No, that's Grandpa Grimbles say
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: it with me. Huh huh huh Honeka, look at that, Laka.
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: So this is when apple sauce comes along to clear
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: things up, right, This is about the time when we
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: will probably stop liking apple sauce. Actually, both Hanka and
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: Hanka are right. Holiday's name is Hebrew, everyone, so there
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: are different ways to spell it and say it in English.
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: I'm a dog named apple Sauce. That was a good
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: apple sauce. Thanks apple sauce, says Lucy, says Grandpa. They're
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: still getting ready for Hannock. Everyone, Nika. The Latka family
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: cooks and sings just wonderful. They're singing the Drado song. Everyone,
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: Oh Dad, old Dad, old Dredel you know the rest. Yeah,
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: it's very nice. We're singing. Don't worry. And they decorate
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: the house. Look, they've even decorated apple sauce, Apple sauce, like, actually,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: this is more bunting than decoration. And he said, here,
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: apple sauce, eat this. Except for Lex. He still doesn't
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: care about anything. I still don't care. I could do
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: Lex all day. I'm trying to decide who the villain
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: here is? Is it Lex or Apple Sauce? It's Apple sauce,
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: is it? I love you? Knew? Oh yeah, I've disliked
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: Apple sauces day one. But you're you're kind of a
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: Lex though at the end of the day, aren't you?
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: Do you really? I think so? I don't know. I
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: thought more of a Lucy. I thought you were kind
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: of a Grandpa. It's kind of happy got Well, yeah,
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: maybe I identify with Grandpa more sure? Yeah, all right.
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: So after the Menorah is lit and the drados are
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: spun and the guilt gets gobbled, Grandpa plops Lucy onto
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: his Latin. Do you want to hear about the miracle
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: of Hanukah? My little Lucca? And this is the best
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: part everyone. It tells the true story of Hanaka. It's
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: not just fun in games, I do, Lucy says, fighting
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: into her last chocolate coin. That's the guilt. Did someone
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: just correct my pronunciation of guilt? Grandpa begins with just
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: a whisper. First, you need to know about the bees bees,
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: Lucy asked. Grandpa nods. Hanaka is a celebration of how
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: the Jewish temple was saved from destruction. We celebrate this
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: holiday thanks to the brave bees who buzzed and stung
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: and fought to keep our people. Say eight, I'm gonna
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: take the despicable Apple Sauce. Okay, I'm pretty sure there
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: aren't any bees in the history of Hanukkah or Hanukkah fit,
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: says Grandpa, whose story is this. You're a dog named
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: Apple Sauce. I'll do that last part in out and
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: if you guys are falling along, so Lucy's eyes widened.
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: Were the bees, big, Grandpa? Big? They were huge giants,
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: They were megabees. And then Apple Sauce comes in, You
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: mean maccabee's, Grandpa says, No, definitely megabees. And the biggest,
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: bravest of them all was Judah Megabee. That's Judah Maccabee.
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: He was a mighty warrior and a heroic jew who
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: lived in Israel more than two thousand years ago. And
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: there were no bees, wolfp But too late, Apple Sauce.
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: Lucy can see it now, Judah and is swarming or
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: his warm of giant bees, buzzing and stinging and fighting
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: to save the Jewish temple and the lines of everyone
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: who worshiped there. And who do you think Judah and
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: his big bees were battling? Grandpa asked, that's easy. It was.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, everyone, it's alien potatoes. What's the planet's name? Sure,
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: thank you planet. I just thought it was a coincidence.
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: I don't understand why he said planet. I'll explain it later.
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: Zip zip wowie, it's getting too small for my old eyes,
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: said Grandpa. Grandpa continues, outer space spuds invaded Earth. Laser
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: shot from their eyes, and they had a lot of eyes.
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: Everyone was doomed. This is ridiculous, said Apple Sauce, because
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: he's a cynic. Are you kidding me? The enemy wasn't
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: a bunch of alien potatoes. It was a terrible king
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: named Antiochus. Well, it is true. Antiochus demanded that everyone
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: believed in the same religion as he did. Apple Sauce
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: goes on. So for the Jews, that meant no more
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: studying the Torah, no more celebrating Shabat, and never again
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: worshiping God. King Antiochus and his followers almost completely destroyed
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: the Jewish temple. He was a tyrant. Yep, oh, look,
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: he threw a menorah and hit Apple sauce in the
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: head and said, yep, yes, a tyrant agrees Grandpa. Judah
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: and the mega bees were trapped by those evil tater
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: tyrants from planet prisoners in their own high They only
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: had enough honey to last one day. Running out of honey, No,
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: they were running out of oil. They needed oil to
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: keep the temple's eternal flame blowing and burning. And they
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: weren't bees. Everybody is apple Sauce is gonna find his
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: way to a hat box in the desert. I love
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: dogs and I hate applesauce. The megabees plotted and schemed,
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: Grandpa says. And the next morning, when the sun rose
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: on the temple, an enormous wooden dradle stood in the
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: village square. What could it be the alien potatoes, all wondered,
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: And why does it buzz? Lucy waves her arms. I
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: know the megabees were hiding inside the dradle. Lucy was right,
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: all right, everyone, let's spend a strong smart luck, says Grandpa. Plits,
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: plats plots. The megabees burst from the draydole and slice
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: and whipped and mashed those tater tyrants into tatoes, tattered
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: tater tyrants. Lucy asked, try saying that three times. Grandpa says,
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: tattered tator tyrants, tattered tator tyrants, tattered tatored tyrants. All right,
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: you all get guilt. It's not bad, everybody. And then,
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 1: miracle of miracles, Grandpa says, bringing it down a little bit,
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: Juda Omegabee stood in the middle of all those spoiled spots.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: What a waste, he said, And so that great warrior
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: added some egg and onion and a pinch of flour
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: to make something good from the bad potato. Lacus us
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: us by apple sauce. Do we have any apple sauce fans? No,
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: that's great. I love this dropt okay, I got two
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: people like apple sauce. Lucy's eyes and mouth are wide open.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: So the miracle of Hanuka is that a long time
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: ago Megabeas turned alien potatoes into laccas. Is that really true?
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: Of course it's not true. You go and you keep
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: it up with apple sauce on the next one. The
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: miracle of Hanakah or Hanukkah is that not only did
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: the small group of Maccabee's protect their temple from King
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: Antiochus found powerful army, but also the tiny bit of
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: oil left to light the holy minora didn't last for
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: just one day. The oil kept the eternal light right
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: for eight whole days. That's right, you can applaud that.
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: That's fine. Lucy points to her families glowing minora, eight
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: candle holders, eight days of the Hanakah miracle. And then
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: how do you pronounced that? Shamas? Okay? And the Shamas
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: the tallest candle to light all the others. You know what,
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: says Grandpa. I like the dog's miracle. Better me too,
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: says Mama, who we all forgot about me too, says Papa.
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: The same. I don't care, says Lex. Stuff face with chocolate.
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: Kelt Lex, you left your room, cries Mama. It's another
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: hank A miracle. And she gives him a hug, squeezing
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: his his beats by dre clean off of his head.
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: And that is Meet the Wakas by Alan Sibberberg Silverberg.
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: Do you want to sing? I think we should sing.
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: You guys want to sing? Okay, We're gonna sing a carol.
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: We're gonna lead you guys in singing a carol. And
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: we're not joking, okay, And this is uh, this is
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: how we're closing the show. Everyone, so thank you for
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: being here with us. We hope you guys have a
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: wonderful Christmas time, a wonderful holiday time. Happy Honaka and
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: here we go. Wow, what a performance, Chuck like, you
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: did great. My friend you did great as well. And
• 1:14:57
  Speaker 1: I think this might be a new annual tradition, my friend. Yeah,
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: that was a lot of fun. We did greetings, we
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: talked about monsters and miracles. I'm saying a carol together.
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: There was an amazing set on stage. Yeah, man, it
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: was great. It was a good time had by. Also, uh,
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: I guess, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, happy holidays, and maybe
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: the tidings of the season greet you with gladness no
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: matter who you are or where you are. For more
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: on this and thousands of other topics. Is that how
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: stuff works dot com