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The Fifth Hour: Boston Maller Meet & Greet Preview! · The Ben Maller Show

0:00
Speaker 1: Kabooms.
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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
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Speaker 2: of the old republic, a sol fashion of fairness. He
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Speaker 2: treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
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Speaker 2: rich pill poppers in the penthouse.
0:18
Speaker 1: Wow.
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Speaker 2: It's the clearinghouse of hot takes. Break free for something special.
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Speaker 2: The Fifth Hour with Ben Maller starts right now in.
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Speaker 1: The air everywhere, The Fifth Hour with me, Ben Maler,
0:35
Speaker 1: as we hang out together here on this Friday, the
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Speaker 1: eighth day of May. It is World Donkey Day today,
0:43
Speaker 1: so make sure to celebrate appropriately. We love the word donkey.
0:47
Speaker 1: It's a fun word. On this podcast, we will address
0:51
Speaker 1: the accidentally wandering into a Ken Burns documentary and a
0:57
Speaker 1: gassy problem, among other things, as we are united as
1:02
Speaker 1: one here on this Friday. Now, if you have been
1:05
Speaker 1: paying attention the last couple of days, have not been
1:08
Speaker 1: at the watch post, have not been at the catbird seat.
1:12
Speaker 1: We'll get into that right now now. If you had
1:14
Speaker 1: told me a few weeks back that I would voluntarily
1:19
Speaker 1: be leaving my home, the Malor Mansion and again boarding
1:22
Speaker 1: a cross country flight and embarking on what can only
1:26
Speaker 1: be described as a two day traveling circus of sports
1:29
Speaker 1: radio degeneracy. I would have said, Eh, that sounds pretty
1:34
Speaker 1: pretty tiring. Is that on YouTube? What channel is that on?
1:38
Speaker 1: Is that on TV? And yet as we sit here today,
1:42
Speaker 1: we are on the precipice of the big Shindig. Today
1:47
Speaker 1: is the day the start of the great adventure, or
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Speaker 1: at least what passes for adventure when you're a middle
1:56
Speaker 1: aged overnight talk show host whose natural habitat is an empty,
2:00
Speaker 1: dimly lit studio and a microphone that doesn't generally argue back.
2:05
Speaker 1: I just kind of hit the little thing of a jig,
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Speaker 1: the button. I turned that on. I start yapping. So,
2:10
Speaker 1: as you boys know, we've been away from the Post
2:14
Speaker 1: the last couple of nights, which, for someone who thrives
2:19
Speaker 1: on routine and just mild discomfort, mild discomfort felt like
2:26
Speaker 1: a spiritual gap year. It really did. The last couple
2:30
Speaker 1: of days being away from the post. One day was
2:34
Speaker 1: a travel day in a metal tube. Because apparently teleportation
2:39
Speaker 1: is still in the beta testing phase. We have not
2:42
Speaker 1: gotten to that point. We need the goblins to help
2:44
Speaker 1: us out. More from the dimension at the bottom of
2:47
Speaker 1: the Sea, and then we spent a day roaming up
2:51
Speaker 1: and down the I ninety five corridor like a confused
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Speaker 1: tourist who accidentally wandered in to some kind of ken
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Speaker 1: Burns documentary. So Boston, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Portland, Maine and
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Speaker 1: all parts in between, a scenic tour of places where
3:12
Speaker 1: people use wicked as punctuation and every third building looks
3:16
Speaker 1: like it played a major role in the American Revolution,
3:20
Speaker 1: and you have no idea what that role was. It's charming,
3:23
Speaker 1: it's historic, it's much different than what we are used
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Speaker 1: to in southern California. It's also a lot of walking
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Speaker 1: and a yapping around with people you don't really know
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Speaker 1: all that stuff. So tonight, anyway, tonight we pivot less history,
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Speaker 1: more hysteria. Will be at Finnway. Pack for the Red
3:44
Speaker 1: Sox and the Rays, which is Baseball's way of saying,
3:49
Speaker 1: come for the nostalgia, stay for the eighteen dollar beer
3:52
Speaker 1: and what is it like fifty dollars poutine? I'm not
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Speaker 1: getting that lobster poutine. I don't eat seafood. Finnway is
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Speaker 1: one of those places I've been lucky. I've been here
4:01
Speaker 1: a few times over the years at Finway, and you
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Speaker 1: go there, you're supposed to appreciate it like jazz or
4:08
Speaker 1: spending time with your in laws. And I do appreciate
4:11
Speaker 1: Fenway Park. I do. I appreciate the history of it,
4:14
Speaker 1: the fact that Babe Ruth played in that stadium, and
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Speaker 1: all the greats of baseball the last one hundred years
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Speaker 1: played there from a seated position as I sit down
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Speaker 1: and watch with the proper snacks and the monster Dog,
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Speaker 1: the Finway Monster Dog. Now, the game is just the appetizer.
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Speaker 1: The game is just the appetizer. You're invited to the game.
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Speaker 1: If you have a ticket, We're not inviting you to
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Speaker 1: the game because after that it is on. Like Donkey Kong.
4:43
Speaker 1: We begin our first ever back to back event weekend
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Speaker 1: on a maul or meet and greet. Never has this
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Speaker 1: happened before, It may never happen again. That's right. Two nights,
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Speaker 1: two shows, like a stand up comic coming to town,
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Speaker 1: except nothing be all that funny, and instead you have
5:02
Speaker 1: a tight I have approximately not forty five minutes of hours.
5:08
Speaker 1: You know, you know how comedy goes a comedian goes out.
5:10
Speaker 1: There's like thirty forty minutes in a set and it's
5:14
Speaker 1: it's all ready to go, it's all structured, it's all
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Speaker 1: planned out. This is unstructured chaos with you people that
5:22
Speaker 1: I mostly know from your voice on the phone, or
5:24
Speaker 1: sometimes not even that you don't call in at all.
5:26
Speaker 1: I don't know who you are, so I'll be there.
5:29
Speaker 1: Kooble Loop has made the track and Lorraine not all
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Speaker 1: on hand, plus Mike the Leprechaun and Mike in New
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Speaker 1: Hampshire who put this shin Dig together. We thank both
5:42
Speaker 1: of them for their help. And Mike the Leperkhn has
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Speaker 1: been very active in this regard. Alf the Alien Opiner
5:48
Speaker 1: expected to make a rare and appropriate appearance at the
5:51
Speaker 1: Worcester event, so Alf should be there. Danny DeVito the
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Speaker 1: trash man, not the actor, which I feel legal obligated
6:00
Speaker 1: to clarify because some of you don't understand that it's
6:04
Speaker 1: Dandy and Vito, America's favorite trash man. You don't get that.
6:07
Speaker 1: I have to clarify that. Because someone shows up expecting
6:11
Speaker 1: Hollywood and gets something where someone's used to wearing an
6:16
Speaker 1: orange vest and picking up trash cans, it's quite quite different,
6:19
Speaker 1: quite different. So we've done a few of these over
6:22
Speaker 1: the years as you know, and every single Malard meat
6:25
Speaker 1: and greed has its own signature moment. Not planned, not rehearsed, organic,
6:29
Speaker 1: usually not advisable, and not safe for kids. Take Boston
6:34
Speaker 1: for example. We've been in Boston a few times. This
6:36
Speaker 1: is our third Mallard meat greed I think we've done
6:37
Speaker 1: over the years in Boston, maybe our fourth. The last
6:41
Speaker 1: time we were here where we did an event blind
6:45
Speaker 1: Scott and I. That was before blind Scott went through
6:48
Speaker 1: a lot of changes. But Blind Scott and I, along
6:51
Speaker 1: with a couple other pe ones, somehow we're able to
6:55
Speaker 1: not ding Dong ditch Wane from Southee what. We waited
6:59
Speaker 1: for him to go to the bathroom and then skid
7:02
Speaker 1: daddled out of there. So we left Wayne behind the
7:04
Speaker 1: bathroom at the Cask and Flagon and just left. Not
7:08
Speaker 1: our finest moment, also not our worst, which should concern
7:13
Speaker 1: everyone involved. So it was me blind Scott, I remember
7:16
Speaker 1: one of the dudes with some Toronto. We had the
7:18
Speaker 1: couple from Maine and we went out on our way
7:21
Speaker 1: doing our thing and it was fine. It was all good.
7:26
Speaker 1: Then there was Pittsburgh years ago. This goes way back.
7:29
Speaker 1: Pete and Pittsburgh great caller Howard Stern, guy always on
7:33
Speaker 1: the spectrum, loyal to the show, and was hanging out
7:39
Speaker 1: at the famous sandwich shop in Pittsburgh with the fries
7:43
Speaker 1: on top of the sandwich, which is really good. And
7:46
Speaker 1: it was like three in the morning. I showed up,
7:49
Speaker 1: drove in, Pete, met me the bread man the dough boy,
7:53
Speaker 1: but Pete refused to take a photo unless he had
7:56
Speaker 1: a bag over his head, so we had to track
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Speaker 1: down a bag. The people at the sandwich shop gave
8:01
Speaker 1: us a bag, and in retrospect, might have been the
8:04
Speaker 1: smartest branding decision anyone has ever made at one of
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Speaker 1: these events, and so everyone else was like, oh, yeah,
8:11
Speaker 1: I don't mind take a picture of Pete and Pittsburgh.
8:13
Speaker 1: Now gonna put a bag in my head. Seattle gave
8:15
Speaker 1: us the Malorman March twenty all time most amusing events
8:19
Speaker 1: we've done in Seattle. Ed from Spokane and Christina from Spokane.
8:24
Speaker 1: We marched through downtown like we were storming a castle,
8:29
Speaker 1: except the castle was a Seahawks game against the forty
8:32
Speaker 1: nine ers on a Sunday night to close out the
8:33
Speaker 1: regular season, and the only resistance came from people trying
8:38
Speaker 1: to nap on the sidewalk. When I say people, I'm
8:40
Speaker 1: talking about homeless people. This was pre fentanyl, so there
8:45
Speaker 1: wasn't any fentanyl people. There were just people that were
8:47
Speaker 1: zombies without the fennyl. And they were understandably annoyed that
8:52
Speaker 1: we were not napping in the middle of the day,
8:55
Speaker 1: that what we were doing here that that weekend included
9:00
Speaker 1: Robbie the Mariner, Fan Nostradinis, JJ in Ourentan, among other dignitaries,
9:07
Speaker 1: and the Malaar militia that made their appearances at that
9:09
Speaker 1: particular event in Vegas. We've done that a few times.
9:13
Speaker 1: The most famous Vegas malard meet and greet was Mouthwash
9:17
Speaker 1: Mike his time to shine. He showed up with a
9:21
Speaker 1: bottle of generic brand yellow mouthwash from Walmart, highest alcohol content,
9:29
Speaker 1: that is why he chose, said yellow mouthwash. Who knew?
9:34
Speaker 1: And he showed up with a dream. He got completely schnocker,
9:38
Speaker 1: which I don't think is true. I think he already
9:39
Speaker 1: was completely schnockered prior to set event. And at one
9:44
Speaker 1: point he invited me to go swimming in the iconic
9:50
Speaker 1: Belagio fountains. I said, well, that's that's not right, that's
9:54
Speaker 1: not right. We should we get in trouble with that. No, no, no,
9:56
Speaker 1: I do it all the time. Come on, I got
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Speaker 1: my swimsuit like August where it was one hundred and
10:02
Speaker 1: you know, gazillion degrees one hundred and seventy in Vegas
10:05
Speaker 1: or whatever. Say he's like, let's go to the Blagio.
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Speaker 1: We'll go swimming in the fountain. I'm good. I'm good,
10:11
Speaker 1: and a kind of idea that sounds fun until you
10:14
Speaker 1: remember you have to end up explaining yourself to security
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Speaker 1: and get a trespassing citation and all that. Then there
10:21
Speaker 1: was Minnesota that featured hollering James who demanded I come
10:24
Speaker 1: to his table and have a meeting, and like a
10:27
Speaker 1: server who forgot the ketchup, and he he wanted me
10:30
Speaker 1: to watch him eat a cheeseburger. I don't need to eat.
10:33
Speaker 1: I don't need to watch you eat a cheeseburger, James,
10:35
Speaker 1: I don't I'm good. There was the Doc Mike spin
10:38
Speaker 1: cycle Regina Full Wedding, which had all the pageantry of
10:42
Speaker 1: a real wedding but none of the legal consequences. My
10:45
Speaker 1: kind of commitment, which I guess I loosely m seed
10:49
Speaker 1: and you also had somehow, some way nineteen eighties NFL
10:53
Speaker 1: quarterback from the Minnesota Vikings, Tommy Kramer just appeared like
10:58
Speaker 1: a sports themed the great Tommy Kramer, very nice man.
11:02
Speaker 1: I don't know why he showed up, but he was there.
11:05
Speaker 1: He was welcoming me to Minnesota. And just a few
11:08
Speaker 1: weeks ago in Cincinnati watched it was Newport, Kentucky at
11:13
Speaker 1: Strong's Brick Oven Pizzeria. There in Newport, we had Dick
11:17
Speaker 1: In Dayton and Ohio Al providing live music, which was
11:21
Speaker 1: both unexpectedly great and significantly better than anything I've ever
11:27
Speaker 1: done on a kazoo. We thought it would be good,
11:31
Speaker 1: and oftentimes when you think something is going to be good,
11:34
Speaker 1: you are greatly disappointed. At Ohio Al and Dick and
11:37
Speaker 1: Dayton did not disappoint. They nailed it. Then came the
11:40
Speaker 1: postgame party. Now similar to the getaway in Boston where
11:44
Speaker 1: I took blind Scott guy from Toronto, the couple from
11:47
Speaker 1: Maine and we went out and about no, no, no, no,
11:51
Speaker 1: this was a little different. This was more planned out.
11:53
Speaker 1: We had Queen Roxanne. Robbie the Mariner fan was writing shotgun.
11:56
Speaker 1: That's a big shotgun. It's justin in Cincinnati, would say.
11:59
Speaker 1: Tommy from Atlanta and can't close the Deal'neil and his
12:03
Speaker 1: son Corbyn were all with us, a rotating cast of
12:06
Speaker 1: characters that sounds like a rejected sitcom plot from the
12:10
Speaker 1: nineteen nineties. Somehow it just worked, somehow. So we left
12:15
Speaker 1: the Malameat and greet as you know, we went to Covington, Kentucky,
12:19
Speaker 1: this beautiful park overlooking the skyline of Cincinnati and the
12:22
Speaker 1: Ohio River and all the bridges and all that. Then
12:25
Speaker 1: we went to the Reds game, had Greater's ice cream
12:28
Speaker 1: after the game, and then drove all the way up
12:30
Speaker 1: to Dayton Hoober Heights to go to BUCkies. Now that
12:34
Speaker 1: is a perfect day. As we documented in a previous
12:37
Speaker 1: edition of this podcast, the point is you never know.
12:41
Speaker 1: You never know what the moment will be. You just
12:45
Speaker 1: don't know. And that's both the appeal and the concern,
12:49
Speaker 1: because you don't know what you don't know is a
12:53
Speaker 1: great philosophy for adventure and a terrible one for liability insurance.
12:59
Speaker 1: So here we go again. Here we go again. I
13:05
Speaker 1: did a podcast last week giving out details of the
13:07
Speaker 1: Malameat and Greek. Disregard that podcast, Disregard everything that was
13:11
Speaker 1: in that podcast. This today because days the day. This
13:15
Speaker 1: is the podcast of record, So tonight here we go.
13:19
Speaker 1: After the Red Sox game, we will head over to
13:22
Speaker 1: the Mighty Squirrel Taproom. Now, have I ever been to
13:25
Speaker 1: the Mighty Squirrel Taproom? Absolutely not, I have never been there.
13:29
Speaker 1: But we'll head over to the Mighty Squirrel tap Room
13:31
Speaker 1: convenuely located at one David Ortiz Drive, which I guess
13:37
Speaker 1: is the real address, or someone just busting my chops here.
13:41
Speaker 1: It's some kind of weird contest. I'm told. It's a
13:44
Speaker 1: short walk from Finnway, which is good because after nine
13:47
Speaker 1: innings of sitting and eating pretzels and hot dogs and
13:51
Speaker 1: peanuts and all that, the body needs to be reminded
13:54
Speaker 1: that it still functions. So that'll be going. I will
13:58
Speaker 1: be on after not all, and we're gonna be there
14:00
Speaker 1: after the Red Sox game. Who knows who's going to
14:02
Speaker 1: show up. I have no idea. We'll be there. Hopefully
14:04
Speaker 1: you can attend the Mighty Squirrel tap Room. We will
14:07
Speaker 1: be there after the Red Sox game, probably nine point
14:11
Speaker 1: thirty ten is till it closes, I think closes midnight
14:14
Speaker 1: or one or something like that. Then tomorrow or some
14:18
Speaker 1: of you call it Saturday after the WUSS game, We'll
14:22
Speaker 1: be there hanging out. That's a four o'clock start. I'll
14:25
Speaker 1: be throwing out the first pitch. Excited about that. We
14:27
Speaker 1: will then hang in Wooster for the Malor meet and greet.
14:31
Speaker 1: It has been changed. This is a venue change. We'd
14:34
Speaker 1: like to alert all the affiliates down the line. This
14:37
Speaker 1: is a venue change. Venue change. We're gonna hang out
14:41
Speaker 1: at bowl Lands. I don't even know what that is.
14:44
Speaker 1: It's a brand new Irish bar. We've got a private room,
14:48
Speaker 1: so we're gonna be in a private room, live band,
14:51
Speaker 1: great food, all the ingredients for either a very memorable
14:55
Speaker 1: night or a cautionary tale. And we will not know
14:59
Speaker 1: until this event is over. And the beauty of it is.
15:02
Speaker 1: I am both excited and mildly horrified at the same time.
15:07
Speaker 1: And here's why, because, on one hand, this is really
15:11
Speaker 1: the essence of what the show is about. This is
15:13
Speaker 1: the secret sauce, right connecting with you, the listener, and
15:17
Speaker 1: connecting with people who call in at ungodly hours and
15:21
Speaker 1: turn the solo microphone into something resembling a community. And
15:26
Speaker 1: it's a solo act when I'm on the microphone and
15:29
Speaker 1: it's weird, wacky, it's niche, as some would say, and
15:35
Speaker 1: somehow it just seems to work. On the other hand,
15:38
Speaker 1: it does require me to be somewhat social in public repeatedly.
15:42
Speaker 1: And I also want to stress again that while I
15:45
Speaker 1: do not necessarily love this, I do it as something
15:50
Speaker 1: that needs to be done, and I occasionally enjoyed them.
15:54
Speaker 1: I occasionally enjoy them. You don't need an invite to this.
15:57
Speaker 1: There's no invitation required. If you're a fan of the show,
16:00
Speaker 1: if you've heard the show, you never called the show,
16:02
Speaker 1: You've never emailed the show. That's most of the people.
16:05
Speaker 1: You're just a person ease dropping in. You can come
16:08
Speaker 1: in and hang out and be part of the schmooze,
16:10
Speaker 1: because we'll be schmooze. I am, at my core a
16:13
Speaker 1: man who would rather stay home. I get it. I
16:16
Speaker 1: would rather complain about the world and watch my sports
16:19
Speaker 1: and peace. I enjoy people in small doses, kind of
16:23
Speaker 1: like hot sauce or the in laws extended family. However,
16:28
Speaker 1: this is a full buffet of humanity, is what it is.
16:33
Speaker 1: And yet every time we do one of these things,
16:36
Speaker 1: something happens. Something you could not script, could not predict,
16:41
Speaker 1: what's going to happen and probably shouldn't encourage to happen again.
16:46
Speaker 1: Whether it was the guy with the bag on his head,
16:48
Speaker 1: the spontaneous parade in Seattle, the full wedding in Minnesota,
16:54
Speaker 1: the near arrest involving fountains in Vegas, it's all ridiculous,
17:00
Speaker 1: all absurd, it's unnecessary, and it's exactly why we do
17:03
Speaker 1: these things. So if you're in the area today, we're
17:06
Speaker 1: going Boston again tonight after the Red Sox game, will
17:10
Speaker 1: be out at the Squirrel Establishment, and then Worcester tomorrow,
17:14
Speaker 1: or anywhere within a reasonable or unreasonable driving distance. Come
17:18
Speaker 1: on by no password, no secret handshake, no speakeasy, no
17:23
Speaker 1: minimum requirement of sanity, just show up. Because if there's
17:28
Speaker 1: one thing that we've learned from all of this over
17:32
Speaker 1: the years, it's that the world is fundamentally ridoculous. It's
17:38
Speaker 1: absolutely ridiculous, and it's a lot more fun when you
17:41
Speaker 1: stop pretending otherwise. So just you know, if you're a
17:44
Speaker 1: little uppity and all that, just calm down, calm down,
17:47
Speaker 1: everything be fine. We just gonna have a good time
17:50
Speaker 1: and soak it all in and have a great day
17:54
Speaker 1: all right now. Meanwhile, I did want to announce earlier
17:57
Speaker 1: this week, prior to getting on the plane and flying
18:00
Speaker 1: to the East coast. Here we crossed the Rubicon this week. Yes,
18:05
Speaker 1: that's right, not the Rubicon like Julius Caesar crossing the Rubicon.
18:10
Speaker 1: No legions, no empire, no dramatic betrayal of a Roman senate. However,
18:17
Speaker 1: something far more personal and far more upsettling, far more Californian.
18:25
Speaker 1: I paid, for the first time in my life, how
18:28
Speaker 1: much for a tank of gas? How much do you
18:30
Speaker 1: think I paid for a tank of gas?
18:31
Speaker 2: This week?
18:32
Speaker 1: It obviously rose to the level of being mentioned here
18:35
Speaker 1: on the podcast. I paid, you got a number? Okay, good?
18:40
Speaker 1: I paid ninety five dollars for a tank of gas.
18:43
Speaker 1: Ninety five dollars. I didn't buy gas. I entered into
18:47
Speaker 1: a long term financial agreement with a pump. In fact,
18:51
Speaker 1: I feel like I should have taken the pump home
18:53
Speaker 1: with me. There should have been paperwork, a notary, possibly
18:56
Speaker 1: a co signer. I half expected the machine to ask
19:00
Speaker 1: me about my credit score before dispensing the unleaded gasoline.
19:06
Speaker 1: Now I've had the same car the use the car
19:08
Speaker 1: that I take to work. The other cars changed a
19:10
Speaker 1: little bit, but I've had the same car, the Malordmobile,
19:14
Speaker 1: for thirteen years. Now. There's a couple other cars, and
19:17
Speaker 1: I might get to some of those stories over the
19:19
Speaker 1: course of the weekend. But I've had this car that
19:21
Speaker 1: I've been using the last you know, forever many years,
19:25
Speaker 1: for about thirteen years. That's not a car anymore. That's
19:28
Speaker 1: a relationship. That's a marriage that without the arguments, because
19:32
Speaker 1: the car doesn't talk back. It just sits there, stoic, dependable,
19:38
Speaker 1: quietly judging me. We have an understanding. I don't ask
19:43
Speaker 1: much of it, and it doesn't strand me on the
19:46
Speaker 1: side of the one oh one or the four h
19:48
Speaker 1: five at four in the morning, all right, or on
19:52
Speaker 1: my way to the studios there in Sherman Oaks, the
19:55
Speaker 1: Fox Sports radio compound, Premiere Networks. It's what I call
19:59
Speaker 1: a set it and forget it vehicle. We don't do
20:02
Speaker 1: a shout out, so we can't do a shout out
20:03
Speaker 1: to Ron pol Peel, but set it and forget it,
20:06
Speaker 1: like a crock pot or a bad haircut. And so
20:11
Speaker 1: this car is not electric, it's not hybrid. It doesn't whisper,
20:16
Speaker 1: there's no whispering. It roars, It gulps gasoline like it's
20:22
Speaker 1: on an open, open bar at a wedding. It just
20:25
Speaker 1: loves the gasoline. Now, back when I got it, that
20:29
Speaker 1: was fine. Gas was not cheap. It was the m word.
20:34
Speaker 1: Manageable tank of gas. When I first got the car
20:37
Speaker 1: would run me forty forty five to fifty five dollars
20:42
Speaker 1: if I was feeling fancy and blurged on the more
20:47
Speaker 1: expensive stuff. But you know I don't do that. I
20:48
Speaker 1: don't do that. So here's you about fifty bucks. Now,
20:53
Speaker 1: fifty bucks, you grumble, you sigh, you pay it, You
20:56
Speaker 1: move on with your life. You don't rethink your existence
20:59
Speaker 1: at fifty bucks. Now. Now I'm at the pump, watching
21:05
Speaker 1: the numbers climb like they're trying to summit Mount Everest.
21:10
Speaker 1: Sixty dollars seventy? Do I hear eighty? How about eighty five?
21:12
Speaker 1: Do I hear eighty five? I start bargaining with the car.
21:15
Speaker 1: Do you really need a full tank? Do you really
21:18
Speaker 1: need that full tank? Maybe we just do a little
21:21
Speaker 1: top off a snack and you don't need the full meal.
21:26
Speaker 1: The car says nothing. The pump continues ninety ninety five.
21:32
Speaker 1: I swear the gas tank was laughing at me, was
21:35
Speaker 1: pointing and laughing like from the Simpsons. Haha, not a chuckle,
21:41
Speaker 1: a full villainous cartoon laugh, like it had just tied
21:45
Speaker 1: me to the railroad tracks. Don't do that. I don't
21:50
Speaker 1: want to be tied to the railroad tracks. Ninety five
21:53
Speaker 1: dollars for gas. This is not a purchase, you understand.
21:56
Speaker 1: This is a traumatic event. I needed to sit down afterwards.
22:00
Speaker 1: I took a photo of it. I sent it to
22:01
Speaker 1: all my friends. I send it to my brothers. I said, hey,
22:04
Speaker 1: you guys, miss California, Welcome to Welcome to California. Moment
22:08
Speaker 1: here ninety five dollars for tank of gas. And so
22:11
Speaker 1: I took a moment, and maybe a support group would
22:15
Speaker 1: have been nice. It's like, Hi, my name is Ben,
22:17
Speaker 1: and I just filled up my tank. Everyone nods, they understand. Right.
22:21
Speaker 1: There's a guy in a corner who paid one hundred
22:23
Speaker 1: and two. He's not speaking it. And the thing is,
22:28
Speaker 1: ninety five dollars is not just a number. That is
22:31
Speaker 1: a comparison. That is a nice dinner, that is an
22:34
Speaker 1: evening out, that is an appetizer, that is more than
22:37
Speaker 1: one appetizer, that's the entree, dessert, maybe even a drink.
22:41
Speaker 1: You're living dangerously all of that that's an appetizer, the
22:45
Speaker 1: main course, the dessert, the drink all of it. Instead,
22:48
Speaker 1: I poured it into a metal box so I can
22:52
Speaker 1: drive to work and talk into a microphone, even though
22:54
Speaker 1: I have a remote studio at the Malor Mansion where
22:57
Speaker 1: I could work from and not spend ninety five do
23:00
Speaker 1: a week on gas. Make it make sense? The car
23:03
Speaker 1: doesn't even say thank you. It doesn't say thank you.
23:07
Speaker 1: So what makes this worse? All right? What makes this worse?
23:10
Speaker 1: What really pushes my buttons right and pushes this into
23:15
Speaker 1: existential territory is perspective now. As you know, I was
23:19
Speaker 1: just in Cincinnati and Kentucky, lovely places on God's green Earth.
23:24
Speaker 1: People there were complaining about gas. When I was in Cincinnati,
23:28
Speaker 1: gas was about three seventy five a gallon. They were
23:30
Speaker 1: complaining about this. They were grumbling, can you believe the
23:33
Speaker 1: price of gas is three seventy five? And I wanted
23:36
Speaker 1: to grab them by the shoulders and say, don't you
23:39
Speaker 1: understand what you have? Do you understand the paradise you're
23:44
Speaker 1: living in here in Kentucky and in Ohio. And you
23:48
Speaker 1: know there's Scott who's from Socoal. Scott in Kentucky, Northern Kentucky.
23:52
Speaker 1: He knows he's lived the life right and these people
23:56
Speaker 1: are complaining. It's like, what are you doing? You don't
23:58
Speaker 1: complain at three dollars and seventy five cent gas. You celebrate,
24:02
Speaker 1: you throw a parade, you name a street after it.
24:05
Speaker 1: In California, three seventy five is a nostalgic memory for
24:09
Speaker 1: a gallon of gas. That's a story you tell your
24:11
Speaker 1: grandchildren back in my day, we paid three seventy five
24:17
Speaker 1: for a gallon of gas. And they'll look at you
24:22
Speaker 1: the way you look at someone who says they bought
24:25
Speaker 1: a house for eighty thousand dollars in nineteen seventy eight.
24:29
Speaker 1: They won't believe you. They'll think you are making it up.
24:34
Speaker 1: Well that's not true. Well no, no, no, it is true.
24:38
Speaker 1: Know you made that up. So again, here we're flirting
24:41
Speaker 1: with six seven dollars gas in California, depending on where
24:46
Speaker 1: you go, what time it is, and all that. Whether
24:49
Speaker 1: mercury is in retroade is Andrea the astrology insider would say,
24:55
Speaker 1: whether the wind is blowing east or out of the south.
25:00
Speaker 1: There are many variables, many variables. I feel like I
25:03
Speaker 1: need a meteorologist to predict the price of gas, which
25:07
Speaker 1: seems wrong to me. And it's like, well, Ben, we've
25:10
Speaker 1: got a high pressure system coming in from the Middle East.
25:14
Speaker 1: It's a bomb cyclone, and that is going to drive
25:17
Speaker 1: up prices about fifty cents a gallon by Thursday. And yes, listen,
25:23
Speaker 1: we're not naive. We know why the latest conflict involving
25:27
Speaker 1: ran in the Middle East, the instability supply concerns. It
25:32
Speaker 1: all trickles down to me standing at a pump in
25:36
Speaker 1: southern California staring at numbers that look like a grocery bill.
25:42
Speaker 1: The global geopolitical world that we are involved in, whether
25:47
Speaker 1: we want to be or not, it has become intensely local,
25:51
Speaker 1: very local. It's not abstract anymore. It's not something you
25:56
Speaker 1: read about and nod thoughtfully. It's something that empties your
26:01
Speaker 1: wallet in real time. And it's even crazier in California
26:07
Speaker 1: because they tack on a dollar fifty or whatever it
26:10
Speaker 1: is in taxation. And so I'm not even going anywhere interesting,
26:16
Speaker 1: like this is the part that bothers me the most,
26:18
Speaker 1: Like I'm not driving up the Pacific Coast Highway to
26:22
Speaker 1: enjoy the beautiful Pacific Ocean and have the windows down,
26:25
Speaker 1: the music playing, feeling like I'm in a commercial to
26:28
Speaker 1: try to sell you a car. I'm driving to work.
26:31
Speaker 1: I'm driving at night. I'm playing dodgeball with crackheads, fent
26:36
Speaker 1: and all freaks and other creatures of the night, things
26:38
Speaker 1: that go bumpity bump of the night on the same
26:41
Speaker 1: route I've driven for many, many years. There is no
26:45
Speaker 1: romance here. There is no romance. I know exactly where
26:49
Speaker 1: I am based on the street signs. Of course, that's
26:51
Speaker 1: hard to do these days, because every street sign is
26:54
Speaker 1: for a ambulance chasing attorney. There is no adventure. The
26:58
Speaker 1: point is, there is no venture in this. There is
27:03
Speaker 1: just me, the car, and a financial burden that used
27:07
Speaker 1: to be an inconvenience and is now a storyline worthy
27:11
Speaker 1: of a mention on the podcast. Now, I have started
27:15
Speaker 1: to notice things, little things I don't I don't know
27:21
Speaker 1: what's the word I'm looking for. I'm trying to think
27:24
Speaker 1: of that, like some things have changed over the years
27:27
Speaker 1: that I didn't notice before, And you know, I'm trying
27:31
Speaker 1: to deal with it, like the price of gas and
27:34
Speaker 1: things like this, and just take your time. Everything will
27:38
Speaker 1: be great. We'll be fine. It'll be it'll be okay.
27:41
Speaker 1: And you know when you're going to work, you're in
27:43
Speaker 1: a hurry to treat red lights like a like an
27:46
Speaker 1: obstacle to get around, and you're trying to be more calm,
27:50
Speaker 1: be like, okay, this is just an opportunity to relax.
27:53
Speaker 1: I don't know that I've become that guy yet. I
27:57
Speaker 1: am hyper aware of mileage. I check it like it's
28:02
Speaker 1: blood pressure, like my blood pressure. So the car knows
28:06
Speaker 1: the car sense is weakness. I believe the car since
28:09
Speaker 1: is weakness. And then there's Costco gas. Now, Costco has
28:14
Speaker 1: always been the great equalizer. It has always been the
28:17
Speaker 1: great equalizer, the place where you go to feel like
28:21
Speaker 1: you're beating the system. I'm getting a deal where you're
28:26
Speaker 1: getting gas. I'm going to Costco? Why are you going
28:29
Speaker 1: to Costco? I'm getting a deal now. Even there it
28:33
Speaker 1: is expensive. You know, when Costco gas is feeling like
28:38
Speaker 1: a luxury item, something has shifted in the universe. There's
28:42
Speaker 1: something different. We have crossed a line. We have absolutely
28:47
Speaker 1: crossed the line. We have crossed the rubicon. And again,
28:51
Speaker 1: I am not a Caesar. I am not a Caesar salad.
28:55
Speaker 1: No one is conquering anything. However, in my small erotic,
29:00
Speaker 1: gas gustling world. Something fundamental has changed. What used to
29:06
Speaker 1: be background noise. The cost of a tank of gas,
29:10
Speaker 1: the routines stop at the pump, has become four ground drama,
29:15
Speaker 1: a rama. And we are just days away from this thing,
29:18
Speaker 1: crossing one hundred dollars for a tank of gas. And
29:22
Speaker 1: I used to fill up. I would not even pay
29:25
Speaker 1: attention to the price. I would forget about it. Now
29:27
Speaker 1: I fill up, and I remember, okay, I remember it,
29:32
Speaker 1: every dollar, every gallon, every laugh from the gas tank
29:39
Speaker 1: as I am in tears, of course metaphorically, and I
29:44
Speaker 1: drive away, slightly poor, slightly more aware, and slightly more
29:49
Speaker 1: convinced that somewhere, somehow the car is in on the
29:54
Speaker 1: joke and they are having a great old time. Ha.
30:00
Speaker 1: Just like that. Things to look forward to, all right.
30:04
Speaker 1: On that note, we will get out here, out of here.
30:06
Speaker 1: We get the big event tonight, hopefully you can attend.
30:10
Speaker 1: Not sure the crowd for that. It'll be smaller than
30:13
Speaker 1: the one that we do on Saturday tomorrow in Worcester,
30:18
Speaker 1: but again the details on that. Tonight, We'll be hanging
30:21
Speaker 1: out at the Mighty Squirrel tap Room, myself, Lorena and
30:26
Speaker 1: Coop that's located at one David Ortiz Drive. After the
30:30
Speaker 1: Red Sox game, so probably around ten o'clock until that
30:33
Speaker 1: place closes. If the game goes quicker, we'll go there earlier.
30:37
Speaker 1: That's how that works. And then tomorrow on Saturday, we'll
30:42
Speaker 1: get the Wusocks game and we'll be hanging out in
30:45
Speaker 1: Worcester for the Big Malor Meet and greet at Bowlands
30:49
Speaker 1: brand new Irish Bar, Private Room, Live Band. I'm told
30:54
Speaker 1: the food is going to be very good. Mike the
30:56
Speaker 1: Leprechaun and Mike in New Hampshire the Hostess with the Most.
31:00
Speaker 1: Just to make sure to thank them for having us
31:01
Speaker 1: come out for this event this weekend in New England.
31:06
Speaker 1: On that note, we'll be out. We'll have new pods,
31:08
Speaker 1: scheduled to have new pods all weekend long, oh my god,
31:13
Speaker 1: all weekend long. On that note, have a wonderful rest
31:17
Speaker 1: of your Friday, Friday Friday, and we will catch you
31:22
Speaker 1: next time. Bye bye See that's the Dick and Dayton
31:27
Speaker 1: sign off is bye bye