Latest / The Ben Maller Show / The Fifth Hour: Smash Kitchen More Than Burger

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The Fifth Hour: Smash Kitchen More Than Burger · The Ben Maller Show

0:00
Speaker 1: Cutbooms.
0:02
Speaker 2: If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes
0:05
Speaker 2: a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
0:09
Speaker 2: of the old Republic, a sol fashion of fairness. He
0:12
Speaker 2: treats crackheads in the ghetto gutter the same as the
0:15
Speaker 2: rich pill poppers in the penthouse. Wow to Clearinghouse of
0:19
Speaker 2: hot takes, break free for something special. The Fifth Hour
0:23
Speaker 2: with Ben Maller starts right now.
0:28
Speaker 3: In the air eywhere The Fifth Hour with Me, Ben
0:34
Speaker 3: Mahler and Danny g Radio A Happy Saturday to you.
0:39
Speaker 1: We survived Friday the thirteenth. It is now the fourteenth
0:43
Speaker 1: day of March, a day closer to the start of
0:48
Speaker 1: the real baseball season. With apologies to the World Baseball Classic.
0:54
Speaker 1: On this podcast, though, on this Saturday, we have a
0:56
Speaker 1: Toddler's flip flop living room of doom, and we'll see
1:01
Speaker 1: if we have time for anything else. But I wanted
1:03
Speaker 1: to start with this now. I always start with the
1:07
Speaker 1: life of Malar. So I am not a mountain man.
1:10
Speaker 1: I am not a mountain man. I think you know
1:13
Speaker 1: that I am a creature of the city, and so
1:17
Speaker 1: we'll just get that out of the way early on.
1:19
Speaker 1: If you're new to the podcast Welcome and we do
1:22
Speaker 1: the show from LA. People that live in Los Angeles
1:26
Speaker 1: like to pretend that they are rugged outdoorsman, a regular
1:31
Speaker 1: grizzly Adams. And people do that because they drive a
1:37
Speaker 1: couple hours into the mountains. They rent a cabin that
1:41
Speaker 1: has WiFi, and that of course is not wilderness. That
1:45
Speaker 1: is an airbnb with pine trees, is what that is.
1:49
Speaker 1: So last weekend, apparently I was Big Bear Benny, Big
1:55
Speaker 1: Bear Benny. My wife announced that we were going to
1:58
Speaker 1: the mountains. Maybe not, Hey, let's think about it. This
2:04
Speaker 1: was presented as a FATA complaint that the way that
2:09
Speaker 1: a desk spot announces or you know, the dictator, that
2:13
Speaker 1: there's a new infrastructure project that needs to be done
2:15
Speaker 1: by this date, we're going to Big Bear. So when
2:18
Speaker 1: your wife says we, what she means is I think
2:23
Speaker 1: you know this. If you're married, I have already made
2:25
Speaker 1: plans and you are part of them. Period. Stop. That's it.
2:29
Speaker 1: So the malormobile, the station wagon was packed like we
2:34
Speaker 1: were evacuating some kind of coastal fire situation. Maybe there
2:40
Speaker 1: was a hurricane. I don't know. My wife does not
2:45
Speaker 1: believe in traveling light. God bless her. She does not
2:49
Speaker 1: believe in traveling light, which is weird. I watch a
2:52
Speaker 1: lot of these travel you know shows whatever on YouTube.
2:56
Speaker 1: They are well, travel like a professional traveler. No, we
2:59
Speaker 1: bring out, We bring our entire house wherever we go, coolers,
3:04
Speaker 1: grocery bags, jackets, fans, you name it, gloves, this obviously
3:10
Speaker 1: snow stuff. We had our boots, We had enough food
3:13
Speaker 1: to feed a minor league baseball team. So we left.
3:17
Speaker 1: We drove through traffic, rush hour traffic, mountain roads, winding
3:22
Speaker 1: around the hills of southern California, climbing through the fog
3:27
Speaker 1: the big trees, until suddenly it looked like a Harmark
3:32
Speaker 1: movie that ran out of a plot. We arrived at
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Speaker 1: the cabin. Now, I've been lucky enough in my time
3:39
Speaker 1: to travel some beautiful mountain places. The most beautiful trees
3:44
Speaker 1: and mountain combo that I have seen are in the
3:48
Speaker 1: Sequoia Forest of California. But traveling around Vermont. When I
3:54
Speaker 1: went to see Arnie in Vermont, it was awesome. It
3:57
Speaker 1: was nothing but trees, and a lot of the New
4:00
Speaker 1: England states are like that. I just happened to drive
4:02
Speaker 1: up the main road in Vermont and it was amazing.
4:06
Speaker 1: That's where they filmed the Hallmark movies. So we arrived here.
4:09
Speaker 1: It was beautiful, truly, just breathtaking. Big trees got out
4:14
Speaker 1: of the concrete jungles. There was snow on the ground.
4:18
Speaker 1: There was a lake. We got this place right in
4:20
Speaker 1: front of a lake that was sitting there like it was
4:23
Speaker 1: posing for some kind of tourism brochure or some feature
4:27
Speaker 1: on a documentary or something like that. Temperatures were in
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Speaker 1: the thirties. It looked exactly like the kind of place
4:34
Speaker 1: people from Wisconsin or New England call a Tuesday a Tuesday.
4:40
Speaker 1: Right now in Los Angeles or southern California, this counts.
4:45
Speaker 1: I can't stress this enough. This is an expedition. The
4:48
Speaker 1: fascinating thing about SoCal is that you can experience winter
4:53
Speaker 1: for a couple of hours here or there. In this case,
4:57
Speaker 1: you know, a couple of days, but a lot of
4:58
Speaker 1: people just do six hours and then return down the
5:03
Speaker 1: hill around the winding mountain roads and return to palm
5:07
Speaker 1: trees and iced coffee. You could, theoretically, and there have
5:12
Speaker 1: been many people that have done this over the years,
5:13
Speaker 1: you could surf in the morning, get up early, go
5:16
Speaker 1: surfing when the sun rises, and then by late afternoon.
5:22
Speaker 1: You're in the sled and you're in snow, and that
5:28
Speaker 1: just seems unnatural, like the climate itself is confused. And
5:34
Speaker 1: now I should mention this is somewhat important. I believe
5:39
Speaker 1: it is something important. When I say we rented the cabin,
5:43
Speaker 1: what I actually mean is that my wife and my
5:46
Speaker 1: sister in law they rented the cabin. They went on
5:51
Speaker 1: they searched a bunch of places to rent, and I
5:55
Speaker 1: was what you might call an invited contributor, not an
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Speaker 1: invited guest, an invited contributor, which I discovered shortly after arriving.
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Speaker 1: You see, because there was a schedule. This was not
6:09
Speaker 1: just chill out hang out. No, no, there was a schedule,
6:12
Speaker 1: not a vacation schedule, a work schedule. Friday was Benny
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Speaker 1: makes burgers, Okay, Saturday, my brother in law, Chris, he
6:25
Speaker 1: makes pizza. We had lunch on Saturday. The pizza was dinner.
6:31
Speaker 1: Pizza was dinner Saturday lunch, Deli, sandwiches, cold cuts, breakfast,
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Speaker 1: something involving eggs, which I was not. Party two. I
6:43
Speaker 1: do not eat breakfast unless it's corn beef hash and
6:46
Speaker 1: it's rare and appropriate. This was not rare or appropriate.
6:50
Speaker 1: I was too close to home, so I was assigned burgers.
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Speaker 1: As I mentioned, now, you've heard over the years that
6:57
Speaker 1: I am a fan of the burger. I like futzing
7:00
Speaker 1: around in the kitchen and being a bit of a
7:04
Speaker 1: sugar huh. I've fallen down rabbit holes watching a bunch
7:07
Speaker 1: of YouTube videos trying to master the burger. And I've
7:11
Speaker 1: talked about Benny's Burgers. Betty's Burgers are smash burgers. This
7:16
Speaker 1: is not a casual passing fancy. I've been doing this
7:19
Speaker 1: for several years now. There's technique involved, there's timing, there's
7:24
Speaker 1: surface area, the crisp edges of the smash burger, the
7:29
Speaker 1: melted cheese cascading over the sides like a like a
7:34
Speaker 1: volcano of cheese. The lava is the cheese, and it's
7:40
Speaker 1: just great. So I walk into the kitchen expecting to
7:43
Speaker 1: begin a Mallard masterpiece, a culinary masterpiece. And I was excited.
7:48
Speaker 1: I was like, listen, this is I'm ready for this.
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Speaker 1: This is the big weeks here, this is it. Got
7:54
Speaker 1: my family, I've got my in laws, everyone's there. It's great,
8:00
Speaker 1: It's gonna be wonderful. I'm ready to go. And then
8:05
Speaker 1: I met my mortal enemy. The kitchen, Now not just
8:11
Speaker 1: a kitchen. If you could imagine, and this is theater
8:16
Speaker 1: of the imagination, but if you could imagine a kitchen
8:19
Speaker 1: designed by someone who had heard about cooking but really
8:24
Speaker 1: never had seen how that works, you would be close.
8:32
Speaker 1: I walked in and I wanted to do that Homer
8:36
Speaker 1: or Grandpa Simpson thing where you walk right back out.
8:38
Speaker 1: It was essentially a shoe box with a stove. It
8:41
Speaker 1: would have been fine if I was Kyler Murray's size.
8:44
Speaker 1: There was no griddle, there was no prep space. There
8:48
Speaker 1: was like one half of one thing that was counter space.
8:53
Speaker 1: There was technically a cutting board, but it was roughly
8:55
Speaker 1: the size of a toddler's flip flop. It was small, small,
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Speaker 1: So the refrigerator was like judging me as I was
9:03
Speaker 1: in there, like, what are you doing here, loser? The
9:06
Speaker 1: stove made a noise that suggested it was not emotionally
9:10
Speaker 1: prepared to be used, that this assignment was too much.
9:15
Speaker 1: And who are you? Why are you here? This is
9:18
Speaker 1: not for you, Paul Harvey used to say, And now
9:25
Speaker 1: the rest of the story, So let's get to the
9:27
Speaker 1: rest of the story. The rest of the story is
9:30
Speaker 1: that smash burgers require smashing video at eleven. They require smashing,
9:36
Speaker 1: You need space, you need obviously heat. There's a power
9:41
Speaker 1: dynamic involved in this. Instead, I had a burner that
9:45
Speaker 1: looked like it had survived the Nixon administration, tricky dick,
9:52
Speaker 1: and a pan that seemed offended.
9:56
Speaker 2: It was.
9:58
Speaker 1: Resentment that it was being awoken from its retirement in
10:03
Speaker 1: the mountains and still in show business. As in cooking,
10:07
Speaker 1: the rule is the same, The show must go on.
10:11
Speaker 1: Seven people were hungry, and that was the mission. To
10:16
Speaker 1: feed the seven people. I had already rolled the meat
10:19
Speaker 1: in the little meatballs for the burgers, the way I
10:22
Speaker 1: normally do for the smash burgers. The buns were buttered,
10:25
Speaker 1: the toppings were lined up, the cheese and all that stuff,
10:29
Speaker 1: the onions, and then the math stopped. Mathing seven burgers
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Speaker 1: one tiny pan. Everyone wanted to eat at the same time.
10:41
Speaker 1: This ain't gonna work. The kitchen was roughly the size
10:45
Speaker 1: of a broom closet, and even though it was in
10:48
Speaker 1: the thirties outside, I was sweating. I was sweating like
10:52
Speaker 1: I was being interrogated under hot lights. The stove was weezing.
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Speaker 1: The spatula seemed like it really didn't want to be either.
11:00
Speaker 1: It was really nervous. The burgers themselves were confused. They
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Speaker 1: had been promised smash burgers instead, their final act before
11:10
Speaker 1: they go into your belly. Instead, they were slowly turning
11:14
Speaker 1: into regular burgers, not good regular burgers, very small ones,
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Speaker 1: petite burgers. If burgers could sigh, these burgers would have
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Speaker 1: sighed instead of crispy smash burgers with again the glorious
11:28
Speaker 1: cheese and oh my god, it's so good, it's so delicious.
11:32
Speaker 1: Everyone received what can only be described as a diet hamburger. Now,
11:39
Speaker 1: they were fine, They tasted fine, the meat was good,
11:42
Speaker 1: the seasoning was on point, and people claimed they liked them. However,
11:50
Speaker 1: I knew, you know, when people are being polite, I've
11:53
Speaker 1: done that dance. I've done that dance. I mean, you
11:55
Speaker 1: can't give an honest opinion, just a little white lie.
11:58
Speaker 1: It's a little white lie. And I knew the truth.
12:01
Speaker 1: Somewhere deep in my culinary soul. I had this voice
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Speaker 1: that was whispering, this is not good. You can do better.
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Speaker 1: Rest of the trip thankfully improved. After my burger humiliation,
12:17
Speaker 1: the family dragged me outside to play in the snow
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Speaker 1: with my niece and the nephew and everyone else there.
12:23
Speaker 1: Now I'm a middle aged man. I don't like to
12:27
Speaker 1: say that because it feels I don't feel like I'm that.
12:29
Speaker 1: Every once in a while it pops up my back.
12:31
Speaker 1: On this day was already barking. The mattress felt like
12:36
Speaker 1: it was filled with concrete. I don't think that was
12:38
Speaker 1: a sleep number mattress. And so that, you know, the
12:42
Speaker 1: children want to go sledding, so whatever they want, they get,
12:46
Speaker 1: which means I became Benny the Bob's letter. Obviously you
12:50
Speaker 1: knew that. We pulled over in the malamobile on just
12:54
Speaker 1: on the side of the road. That's how you do it,
12:56
Speaker 1: small country road, you know, in the hills there Mountain Road,
13:00
Speaker 1: grabbed us lead and launched ourselves down a hill like amateurs.
13:05
Speaker 1: In a low budget version of NBC's Winter Olympics. Mike
13:09
Speaker 1: Tarico was not doing commentary at the end of the day. Now,
13:13
Speaker 1: it was fun. It was cold, We had jackets on
13:16
Speaker 1: and all that. We were prepared. We had a couple
13:17
Speaker 1: of layers of clothing. It was fun. I had not
13:21
Speaker 1: been to Big Bear since I was a kid in
13:23
Speaker 1: the Cub Scouts and the Boy Scouts and all that.
13:25
Speaker 1: It's been bit a minute, bit a minute, a little kid,
13:28
Speaker 1: I'm old now, And the place still had the same
13:31
Speaker 1: slightly ramshackle mountain town charm, what you might call it.
13:39
Speaker 1: So we drove around a little bit after we got
13:41
Speaker 1: done playing in the snow, me and the wife. Everyone
13:43
Speaker 1: else wanted to stay at the cabin, and we drove
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Speaker 1: around exploring. There was a general store that appeared to
13:49
Speaker 1: sell every item humans forgot when they came up to
13:53
Speaker 1: the mountains. Flashlights, batteries, canned goods, some kind of weird
13:59
Speaker 1: mystery snack that I wouldn't eat, and I'll eat pretty
14:02
Speaker 1: much anything. And they were open from ten am to
14:06
Speaker 1: two pm, otherwise known as the easiest radio shift of
14:10
Speaker 1: all time. Middays four hours. That's it. If you need
14:14
Speaker 1: milk at two oh five, you're out of luck. Plan better,
14:19
Speaker 1: Plan better. We also visited Lake Arrowhead, which felt like
14:23
Speaker 1: it was Manhattan compared compared to where we were staying.
14:28
Speaker 1: Arrowhead had things not just Santa's Village. It had McDonald's.
14:34
Speaker 1: I think I saw five guys. There was an actually
14:36
Speaker 1: there was an actual grocery store right there. Civilization, civilization
14:43
Speaker 1: was going on now. Meanwhile, our cabin, which was deep
14:48
Speaker 1: in what I can only describe as po dunk pines.
14:54
Speaker 1: That was where we were here. We were visiting Arrowhead.
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Speaker 1: There was this windstorm blowing across the lake which created
15:01
Speaker 1: this dramatic wave. There was Arctic style gusts of wind.
15:06
Speaker 1: A lot of ducks, my relatives, the Mallards, the mudhnds.
15:10
Speaker 1: I love mudhens, not Toledo mud hens. These were just
15:13
Speaker 1: regular mud hens. And they were all floating along merrily, merrily, merrily,
15:17
Speaker 1: merrily down the stream or in this case, the lake,
15:21
Speaker 1: very happy in the chaos. They didn't mind the cast
15:23
Speaker 1: They're in the water. They were being fed by it,
15:25
Speaker 1: not us. But there was some random tourists, and there
15:27
Speaker 1: was this shop that sold all kinds of It had
15:30
Speaker 1: like tours, your typical touristy shop. It offered tours of
15:35
Speaker 1: the lake and you could buy different souvenirs and all that.
15:38
Speaker 1: And so they also sold bags of food for the ducks.
15:44
Speaker 1: So the ducks aren't idiots. The Mallard ducks the smartest
15:47
Speaker 1: duck of them. All the geese, all the water fowl,
15:51
Speaker 1: they were just hanging out waiting because they knew that
15:55
Speaker 1: random people were going to buy those bags of food.
15:58
Speaker 1: And they were gonna get fed, and that's all all
16:00
Speaker 1: they cared about. And they were delighted. The wind was
16:04
Speaker 1: not The wind was very angry. And I was standing
16:07
Speaker 1: there and I realized something remarkable that I kind of know.
16:10
Speaker 1: And you've done it. Everyone's all you forget, because I
16:12
Speaker 1: hadn't done this in a long time. In sokl Within
16:15
Speaker 1: a few hours we had gone from thirty six degrees
16:18
Speaker 1: in the mountains with snow capped on the hills and
16:22
Speaker 1: the sheds and the stores and everything, thirty six degrees
16:27
Speaker 1: in the mountains. We got back to the Malor mansion,
16:30
Speaker 1: it was eighty five degrees down the hill. Two days
16:34
Speaker 1: later it was ninety nine, not ninety nine in the
16:36
Speaker 1: store in Boston. Ninety nine. That's not whether that's a
16:40
Speaker 1: mood swing. Despite the burger disaster, the cramped kitchen, the
16:47
Speaker 1: sledding induced spinal complaints, the trip was good. The trip
16:52
Speaker 1: was good because sometimes the things that happen on these vacations,
16:55
Speaker 1: it's not about luxury, Those small inconveniences, those are the
16:59
Speaker 1: things that turn into pretty good stories. The shoe box kitchen,
17:04
Speaker 1: the Kyler Murray's sized cutting board, the toddler sized cutting board,
17:09
Speaker 1: the burgers that don't quite smash the way they're supposed to,
17:13
Speaker 1: despite the efforts and the quiet realization that even when
17:19
Speaker 1: the cooking goes bad, the view outside the window spectacular, spectacular,
17:25
Speaker 1: And that's my favorite time to go to the snow.
17:27
Speaker 1: It's kind of the end of the snowy season. There's
17:30
Speaker 1: still snow, it hasn't melted. You get to enjoy it. However,
17:34
Speaker 1: it's not an active crime scene where snow's falling down.
17:37
Speaker 1: And even if the stove is judging you like it
17:40
Speaker 1: was me is fine. So turning the page on that
17:46
Speaker 1: it's the Saturday. But a lot happened this week. A
17:48
Speaker 1: lot happened this week, so I wanted to share it
17:49
Speaker 1: with you on the podcast. So in a small village
17:53
Speaker 1: on the ragged edge of the enchanted forest known locally
17:58
Speaker 1: as the north Woods, though those of you that are
18:02
Speaker 1: not from the north Woods might simply call it suburbia,
18:05
Speaker 1: we like to call it the north Woods in southern California.
18:08
Speaker 1: And otherwise ordinary ritual that we do. Every man and
18:13
Speaker 1: woman in the United States does it.
18:16
Speaker 2: Well.
18:16
Speaker 1: I don't know about women, but dudes do it. Just
18:19
Speaker 1: ordinary ritual was underway. Supper Chow and televised sports. That
18:26
Speaker 1: was the plan on this day. The wife was at
18:29
Speaker 1: work and I had my thing, so that the stage
18:32
Speaker 1: was set for a sort of modest event that, in
18:37
Speaker 1: this case, would lead to high drama disguised as a
18:41
Speaker 1: domestic routine. Now, the star of the evening was not
18:47
Speaker 1: Team USA. It was the World Baseball Classic, right, No,
18:53
Speaker 1: actually wasn't. It wasn't Mexico. None of that was the star.
18:58
Speaker 1: They were the opponent this day, the real, the real
19:04
Speaker 1: I don't know, not villain, but protagonist. I'll use the
19:07
Speaker 1: word protagonist. The real protagonist in this was a burrito. Now,
19:11
Speaker 1: the burrito had been assembled in the kitchen, admirable craft.
19:16
Speaker 1: I just mentioned how I fed up the burgers the burrito,
19:20
Speaker 1: I'm happy to tell you, for years I did not
19:23
Speaker 1: know how to properly wrap a burrito. Thank god for
19:26
Speaker 1: YouTube and a old babushka. I don't think what's the
19:31
Speaker 1: Spanish word or the for the old grandma I watched
19:35
Speaker 1: this bobushka. I'll just used the word babushka. It's fun word.
19:37
Speaker 1: So the babushka showed you how to properly like in
19:41
Speaker 1: a real, authentic like in Mexico City. How to wrap
19:44
Speaker 1: a burrito. It's like, okay, I'm into it. So I
19:47
Speaker 1: know how to wrap a burrito. So the origins of
19:50
Speaker 1: this trace back. I make a lot of food on
19:52
Speaker 1: the weekends just to eat a little bit every day
19:55
Speaker 1: during the week. So we made a surplus of chicken.
19:57
Speaker 1: We had a stockpile of bach block chicken. One of
20:01
Speaker 1: those culinary wind windfalls. The chicken is unseasoned. You can
20:07
Speaker 1: do whatever you want with it. You can manipulate it
20:10
Speaker 1: how you see fit, and so whatever inspires you that
20:15
Speaker 1: day as the home cook. So I imagine myself when I'm
20:20
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, I'm like, well, you know, I'm only
20:23
Speaker 1: the phone call away from someone who loves the Overnight show,
20:27
Speaker 1: who happens to work in Entertainment's like, hey, let's get
20:29
Speaker 1: the overnight sports radio guy on the Iron Chef. We'll
20:33
Speaker 1: give those influencers a break and we'll get Mallard on
20:36
Speaker 1: the Iron Chef. Now, the kitchen unlike the one in
20:41
Speaker 1: the mountains around Big Bear, the kitchen that the Malla Manchion,
20:44
Speaker 1: I mean, that's pretty good, good, good, good spot. And
20:48
Speaker 1: the chicken was reheated, it was fortified. I added my
20:52
Speaker 1: own spice on this day, it was cayenne pepper, chili powder,
20:56
Speaker 1: black pepper, a few other things, little garlic, and then
21:00
Speaker 1: I tucked it into the tortilla. I had some cheese,
21:04
Speaker 1: layer of cheese, put the meat on top, had some
21:07
Speaker 1: grilled onions and some belt pepper, and then I did
21:10
Speaker 1: the burrito wrapping maneuver. And I am now prepared. If
21:16
Speaker 1: I lose the radio show, I can work at Taco Bell.
21:20
Speaker 1: I'm coming for your job. If you work at Taco
21:22
Speaker 1: Bell now. Not Nick, the Wendy's guy, He's got his
21:26
Speaker 1: own thing. They don't have burritos at Wendy's. But I'm
21:28
Speaker 1: talking about Taco Bell now. The plate was accompanied by
21:32
Speaker 1: air fried fries. That is the add on item off
21:37
Speaker 1: the secret menu, an accessory item that shows you both
21:42
Speaker 1: health consciousness and somewhat optimism culinary optimism. So there was
21:49
Speaker 1: also a drink, sort of a middle aged elixir. If
21:52
Speaker 1: you will enjoy the crystal light, The strawberry and the
21:55
Speaker 1: grape are my favorite. If you want to send me some,
21:57
Speaker 1: feel free. It has like ten or twenty calories, depending
22:00
Speaker 1: on what you're drinking. Some have five calories. The mathematics
22:04
Speaker 1: of aging done one pack at the time now. If
22:07
Speaker 1: you have any suggestions, sure, I'm not being full of crap.
22:12
Speaker 1: If you have any suggestions. I've dabbled with the Crystal Light.
22:15
Speaker 1: If you have any other I saw there's like a
22:17
Speaker 1: Welchers product grape that I haven't tried. I haven't seen
22:20
Speaker 1: that at the store. If there's any of those other
22:23
Speaker 1: things that you can just mix in, let me know,
22:26
Speaker 1: let me know. I like to try some others, but
22:27
Speaker 1: I want you to tell me it's good first, because
22:29
Speaker 1: I've tried a lot of the Crystal Light stuff, which
22:32
Speaker 1: is just a little packets you add to the water
22:34
Speaker 1: and it tastes makes the water taste the better. I
22:37
Speaker 1: only do that when I'm eating my meal. I only
22:39
Speaker 1: do that when I'm eating my meal. Otherwise I just
22:41
Speaker 1: drink water. So let me know if any of those
22:43
Speaker 1: other ones are good, email me Real fifth hour at
22:45
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. So again, back to the story. So
22:49
Speaker 1: at dinner and baseball, which is the American utopia? Is
22:53
Speaker 1: it not the American utopia? I think it is. I
22:57
Speaker 1: think it is the sort of quiet cultural image that
23:02
Speaker 1: Norman Rockwell would have painted if he owned an airfire.
23:07
Speaker 1: Unfortunately he never did. He never owned an airfire. And
23:10
Speaker 1: then as the the diner was I was in the
23:16
Speaker 1: Benny's Diners, I call it the whole thing, and the
23:19
Speaker 1: dinner was prepared, it was ready to go. I then
23:25
Speaker 1: transferred to where I wanted to eat. I settled into
23:27
Speaker 1: the to the sofa. I was prepared to watch team
23:31
Speaker 1: USA do whatever team USA does in the World Baseball
23:35
Speaker 1: Classic on that day. Is a fugazy tournament that Baseball
23:39
Speaker 1: cooked up because the Olympics kicked him out. And this,
23:43
Speaker 1: this was not a dramatic moment. There was nothing cinematic
23:46
Speaker 1: about it, just a flicker in the peripheral vision, the
23:51
Speaker 1: way a shadow might slip across a wall, right in
23:55
Speaker 1: a suspense movie, a horror movie, just before the violins
24:00
Speaker 1: begin shrieking. So, my companion who doesn't do well with pumpkin, Moxie,
24:09
Speaker 1: she was not responsible for this movement. You'st well, that's
24:12
Speaker 1: probably Moxie. No, no, no, Moxie was in what might
24:15
Speaker 1: be described as canine solitary confinement, which is just indoor
24:19
Speaker 1: outdoor living. She had been placed outside. Some say the
24:22
Speaker 1: bark jail. I say the outdoor sofa, which I have
24:25
Speaker 1: not even sat on. That we bought this outdoor sofa
24:28
Speaker 1: years ago, and I've never even sat on it. And
24:32
Speaker 1: that's Moxie's outdoor abode. She's all about comfort. So anyway,
24:38
Speaker 1: that evening burrito ritual proceeded because Moxie was outside without interruption. Again,
24:47
Speaker 1: I'd seen something. Was it a ghost? The mystery deepened.
24:52
Speaker 1: Was it a rat, rat, a tat tat ratatui? Was
24:55
Speaker 1: it a cat? No? No, no, no, no, none of those.
25:01
Speaker 1: The intruder turned out to be something far more appropriate
25:04
Speaker 1: for southern California's ecological environment, the theater, the animals, the critters.
25:11
Speaker 1: A lizard, not a gargantuan creature, not the sort of
25:17
Speaker 1: reptile that might cause a news helicopter to hover overhead
25:21
Speaker 1: and make national news. However, it was not insignificant either,
25:25
Speaker 1: roughly the size of a human hand, which is large
25:28
Speaker 1: enough to provoke the kind of adrenaline normally reserved for
25:32
Speaker 1: the seventh inning of a seventh, eighth or ninth inning
25:36
Speaker 1: of a playoff baseball game. Now, following a minutes long
25:40
Speaker 1: mallear investigation, the reptilian trespasser has been identified as a
25:45
Speaker 1: person of interest, a Western fence lizard, which I did
25:51
Speaker 1: not know was a thing until the minutes long mallear investigation. Now,
25:55
Speaker 1: this particular species has the delightful quirk of possessing bright blue,
26:02
Speaker 1: a very bright blue underside, a color so vivid that
26:07
Speaker 1: looking at this you could liken it to Dodger blue.
26:11
Speaker 1: It's time for Dodger Baseball. Now, if LA ever decides
26:15
Speaker 1: to expand its brand identity, talk about the Dodgers. Here
26:19
Speaker 1: into the reptile kingdom, the Western Fence lizard is ready
26:24
Speaker 1: for a Shohei Otani level endorsement deal. Now, the lizard,
26:30
Speaker 1: no doubt completely unaware that it had wandered in to
26:35
Speaker 1: a random home which happens to host a sports radio
26:39
Speaker 1: guy in the living room during an international baseball competition. Now,
26:45
Speaker 1: lizard had apparently slipped inside the door when we let
26:49
Speaker 1: Moxie go out for the potty time. Potty time. Now
26:55
Speaker 1: you might imagine the creature I was thinking of this.
26:59
Speaker 1: I was like, let's get in the head of the creature,
27:01
Speaker 1: the lizard. The thought process to the lizard. Did the
27:05
Speaker 1: lizard realize where it was? To a lizard, a human
27:09
Speaker 1: is a monster a monster mash. To a lizard, a
27:14
Speaker 1: human is a deadly thing. In a human home must
27:22
Speaker 1: resemble a climate controlled paradise, warm floors, interesting smells, a
27:28
Speaker 1: buffet of possible insects that are going undetected. It's an
27:33
Speaker 1: Airbnb for reptiles. Now eventually, with the assistance of the kid,
27:38
Speaker 1: every great American domestic crisis requires one. The back door
27:43
Speaker 1: was opened, the lizard was gently encouraged to return to
27:47
Speaker 1: the wilderness. There was no violence. The lizard did not die,
27:51
Speaker 1: was not harmed in any way. There was no melodrama,
27:56
Speaker 1: just a brief cameo appearance by Mother Nature in the
27:59
Speaker 1: middle of a baseball broadcast. And the episode raised questions
28:07
Speaker 1: that philosophers should consider. For one thing, we'll give you one.
28:12
Speaker 1: What else has slipped through the doors of the modern
28:15
Speaker 1: American household. Now the north Woods, like many suburban environments,
28:21
Speaker 1: suburbia exist in this delicate truth between civilization and the
28:27
Speaker 1: natural world. I install these patios, you get the Wi
28:32
Speaker 1: Fi router or router. The animal installs itself wherever it pleases.
28:41
Speaker 1: Fence lizards today, King Cobra's tomorrow, I granted spiny lizard things,
28:51
Speaker 1: perhaps a coast old horned lizard. It means something more ambitious,
28:58
Speaker 1: a coyote. If coyote is here, can wander through the neighborhood,
29:02
Speaker 1: the casual entitlement. I'd like to see the parrots. We
29:05
Speaker 1: have parrots that fly around. They escape from the jail
29:08
Speaker 1: years ago and they just have been breeding and travel
29:12
Speaker 1: around and they live a great time, a great life
29:14
Speaker 1: and all that stuff. So nature it turns out, well,
29:19
Speaker 1: it turns out an excellent gate crasher. Excellent. They do
29:23
Speaker 1: not believe in laws. They like for them, it's Joe
29:28
Speaker 1: Biden's president, and just do whatever you want and that's it,
29:32
Speaker 1: you know, knock yourself out. That's where that's where they're at.
29:35
Speaker 1: And so there's there's also this curious overlay going to
29:41
Speaker 1: rock and roll. I remember when I when I heard
29:44
Speaker 1: years ago a kid Jim Morrison was dead before I
29:48
Speaker 1: was alive, but I remember hearing the Doors very popular.
29:51
Speaker 1: People are strange when they all time great songs, which
29:55
Speaker 1: does apply to overnight radio. So I remember the the
30:00
Speaker 1: reptilian mind of Jim Morrison will so we had visitors
30:06
Speaker 1: that were reptilian or one. So for some reason I
30:10
Speaker 1: was saying with Jim Morrison, the Doors front man, who
30:12
Speaker 1: famously dubbed himself the Lizard King and according to legend,
30:17
Speaker 1: believed he could communicate with reptiles, thus the nickname the
30:23
Speaker 1: Lizard King. Now, history suggests that what likely happened is
30:28
Speaker 1: Jim Morrison. His reptilian diplomacy was fueled by a cocktail
30:34
Speaker 1: that was a little less, little, less wholesome than my
30:38
Speaker 1: crystal light pack. And still the thought it was lingering here,
30:43
Speaker 1: like what if one could converse with reptiles If I
30:47
Speaker 1: just went down to the San Diego Zoo and I said,
30:50
Speaker 1: let me have a deep, thoughtful conversation with the Komodo
30:54
Speaker 1: dragon now, And what would the Komodo dragon say? If
30:59
Speaker 1: given the chance to watch a baseball game, would the
31:02
Speaker 1: dragon say, well, that's boring, or I want to watch
31:05
Speaker 1: other sports? I don't know. Would a heal a monster
31:08
Speaker 1: offer a scouting report and about Team USA's lack of
31:13
Speaker 1: buy in factor? And perhaps the deeper question, would reptiles
31:18
Speaker 1: enjoy sports radio because I need more listeners. I need
31:21
Speaker 1: more listeners. Would they be podcast listeners or would they
31:24
Speaker 1: be all night listeners? I don't know. Now one suspects
31:28
Speaker 1: they might appreciate its elemental qualities, the raised voices of
31:34
Speaker 1: sports radio, the territorial arguments of sports talk radio, the
31:39
Speaker 1: ritualistic debates over who's a winner, and who's a loser,
31:43
Speaker 1: and who's good and bad? Who should retire? Who's the
31:46
Speaker 1: goadie mcgoat. In many ways, sports talk already resembles the
31:50
Speaker 1: animal kingdom, a chorus of random callers and echoing through
31:57
Speaker 1: the night, and all that. So as for the stock market,
32:01
Speaker 1: as for this stock mind, reptiles might have the right
32:04
Speaker 1: temperament to go to Wall Street. They might. They might
32:08
Speaker 1: cold blooded, patient, unmoved by emotional swings. Wall Street could
32:14
Speaker 1: probably learn a few things from a lizard. Now. In
32:19
Speaker 1: the end, the Western Fence lizard returned to the backyard,
32:23
Speaker 1: Benny's burrito was consumed, and the World Baseball Classic continued
32:27
Speaker 1: its march to the television schedule. However, the evening left
32:32
Speaker 1: behind another memorable moment. Life's all about the stories you
32:36
Speaker 1: pick up along the way. A memorable event happened. A
32:40
Speaker 1: man on a sofa, a burrito in hand, a baseball
32:45
Speaker 1: game on television, talking baseball, and for a moment, just
32:49
Speaker 1: a litle flicker, little flicker in the corner of the eye,
32:54
Speaker 1: the ancient wilderness, reminding the modern world that it's still exists. Well,
33:02
Speaker 1: we don't have time for a full foody fun. I
33:04
Speaker 1: did have a couple of stories I wanted to share
33:06
Speaker 1: with you from foody Fun. Hooray for food he fun.
33:08
Speaker 1: Hooray for food he fun. Yeah, foody fun. All right,
33:12
Speaker 1: thank you for that. So ihop is offering free bottomless
33:17
Speaker 1: pancakes with purchase of select breakfast combos. That is through
33:23
Speaker 1: today is the fourteenth, and that'll take you all the
33:27
Speaker 1: way through March thirtieth bottomless Pancake promotion. Everyone can enjoy
33:34
Speaker 1: endless amounts of pancakes with the purchase of select combos.
33:39
Speaker 1: The combos that you need to buy are the Breakfast Sampler,
33:44
Speaker 1: Surloin Tips and Eggs, Split Decision Breakfast Chicken and Pancakes,
33:50
Speaker 1: T Bone Steak and Eggs, and the Country Fried Steak
33:53
Speaker 1: and Eggs. Prices for the qualifying breakfast combos range from
33:58
Speaker 1: eighteen dollars twenty five dollars, so if you spent eighteen dollars,
34:03
Speaker 1: you're getting a couple of meals out of it, getting
34:06
Speaker 1: a couple of meals out of it. The buttermilk pancakes
34:10
Speaker 1: are are They're pretty good. It's hard to screw up pancakes.
34:16
Speaker 1: So those are the things you have to buy to
34:17
Speaker 1: get that. What else do we have Pizza Hut launched
34:19
Speaker 1: a ten dollars any Pizza deal nationwide, So if you're
34:25
Speaker 1: jones in for some pina for some pizza, there's that.
34:29
Speaker 1: And it's now to be clear. The ten dollars any
34:32
Speaker 1: Pizza deal includes up to five toppings on Pizza Huts
34:36
Speaker 1: medium or large, hand tossed, original, pan, thin and crispy,
34:40
Speaker 1: or Chicago Tavern style pizzas. It's valid for carryout orders
34:45
Speaker 1: placed online or via the Pizza Hut mobile app. Okay,
34:51
Speaker 1: thank you for that. What do we have? Chick fil
34:52
Speaker 1: A debuting the new Jalapano Ranch Club Chicken Sandwich nationwide
35:00
Speaker 1: and they test marketed it in Salt Lake City? How
35:04
Speaker 1: did that happen? For years? It was always Peoria. We've
35:08
Speaker 1: talked about that in previous episodes of The Fifth Hour.
35:10
Speaker 1: I know Lucky, Tony and Ferg Dog went back and
35:13
Speaker 1: listened to those I don't know about alf. I don't
35:15
Speaker 1: know about alf from maloprop Guy. However, the Chick fil
35:20
Speaker 1: A Jalapeno Ranch Club Chicken Sandwich woof tested in Salt
35:25
Speaker 1: Lake always used to be Peoria. The line, if it
35:27
Speaker 1: plays in Peoria, it'll play anywhere. Does that apply to
35:31
Speaker 1: Salt Lake City, Utah. Okay, who goofed? I've got to know. Well,
35:37
Speaker 1: on crustables, that's something that didn't exist when I was
35:41
Speaker 1: a kid. We had those, we just didn't know that
35:43
Speaker 1: would be a major money maker and all that stuff.
35:47
Speaker 1: So the burst in blueberry flavor, we talked about that
35:50
Speaker 1: in a previous episode. Well, it turns out now the
35:54
Speaker 1: big news from Incrustables, the latest news coming down the
35:57
Speaker 1: pipeline here is that this song, this summer crust list sandwiches, uh,
36:05
Speaker 1: having to having to wait for them to thaw will
36:08
Speaker 1: be a thing of the past because uncrustables are being
36:11
Speaker 1: upgraded to fridge friendly. Fridge friendly status. While you're still
36:16
Speaker 1: able to freeze the new uncrustables, you'll now be able
36:21
Speaker 1: to store them in the fridge for up to five days.
36:25
Speaker 1: Oh my god, what kind of chemicals did they put
36:29
Speaker 1: in there? But that is from the VP of Marketing
36:33
Speaker 1: at the J. M. Smucker Company. Here, you go, all right,
36:38
Speaker 1: very excited. What else do we have on food?
36:40
Speaker 2: He fun?
36:41
Speaker 1: Holl ready for food he fun.
36:45
Speaker 3: I don't know.
36:45
Speaker 1: As Taco Bell revealed this whole menu, I don't think
36:47
Speaker 1: we want to go there. That'll take too long. We'll
36:49
Speaker 1: get out on that. Have a wonderful Saturday. I know
36:52
Speaker 1: this podcast went a little longer than normal, and thank
36:55
Speaker 1: thank you for staying to the very end. We'll have
36:57
Speaker 1: the mail bag on Sunday, hopeful Danny G will join
37:01
Speaker 1: me on that. Have a wonderful Saturday, my felation Aloha,