Latest / Reverse Jackass / Ep84: Evelyn refused to let the potstickers die; Nick gave his life to a taco truck.

Transcript

Ep84: Evelyn refused to let the potstickers die; Nick gave his life to a taco truck. · Reverse Jackass

0:00
SPEAKER_01: It's revolution.
0:07
SPEAKER_01: Do you want to do do you want to do a podcast today?
0:09
SPEAKER_01: Do I?
0:10
SPEAKER_01: Do I?
0:10
SPEAKER_01: That's what I asked you.
0:11
SPEAKER_01: Can you answer it?
0:12
SPEAKER_01: Can you answer the question?
0:13
SPEAKER_00: Literally what I'm here for.
0:15
SPEAKER_00: A normal human being, please.
0:17
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it can pick up me hitting my head against the microphone, but I'm hitting my head against the microphone.
0:21
SPEAKER_01: No, but the the the sigh you let out was definitely picked up, so I'll keep that.
0:28
SPEAKER_01: The feeling is mutual.
0:29
SPEAKER_00: Nick, would you like to lead us in today?
0:31
SPEAKER_00: It feels like our only our only course of action.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: Folks, welcome back to the Reverse Jackass Podcast, the podcast to bring peace between the US and Canada.
0:39
SPEAKER_00: I myself, Nick, am so glad that you are here.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: With me as always, is Evelyn the Canadian Blade.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Evelyn, say hello to these kind people.
0:46
SPEAKER_01: Hello to these kind people.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: We've never harmonized those.
0:50
SPEAKER_00: That's something we should do.
0:51
SPEAKER_00: Ooh, okay.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what to do.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: All right.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: Uh go.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: And what am I doing?
0:57
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna do the same thing.
1:00
SPEAKER_01: Okay, ready.
1:00
SPEAKER_01: And see, the problem with trying to do stuff over Zoom is that there's a slight delay.
1:08
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's what an editor is for.
1:10
SPEAKER_01: I can't do anything about it.
1:11
SPEAKER_00: Not with that attitude.
1:13
SPEAKER_01: I can't do anything about someone's musical incompetence.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh that was your whole previous career was doing something about somebody's musical incompetence.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're not wrong, actually.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: I can't listen to a person.
1:26
SPEAKER_00: Some would say it's all I do.
1:28
SPEAKER_01: I can't listen to people talk and sit in a comfortable yet cool looking chair.
1:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: So it's an Evelyn day.
1:35
SPEAKER_01: It's an Evelyn day.
1:37
SPEAKER_01: It's an Evelyn day.
1:38
SPEAKER_01: Wonderful.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: It is an Evelyn day.
1:41
SPEAKER_01: It is.
1:41
SPEAKER_01: I think, I think we've yep.
1:44
SPEAKER_01: So here's my story for today.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: I want to talk about um being creative in the kitchen.
1:51
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
1:51
SPEAKER_01: And that is one of my favorite things to do.
1:53
SPEAKER_01: I love uh cooking.
1:55
SPEAKER_01: We've discussed that on this on this show before.
1:59
SPEAKER_01: I love not using a recipe.
2:03
SPEAKER_01: That is one of my I might even say signature moves.
2:07
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
2:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
2:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
2:09
SPEAKER_01: And I can you actually once described it as seeing a dish where there is none or where there is no recipe, right?
2:15
SPEAKER_00: Like I can, I can kind of I can You could assemble all the ingredients of a lasagna and come up with a soup.
2:21
SPEAKER_00: Is that where this is going tonight?
2:23
SPEAKER_01: No, no, Nick is referring to uh before we were chatting before the call, and um I was sharing information I didn't think would ever be used against me, but apparently here we are.
2:35
SPEAKER_01: I should know better by now.
2:36
SPEAKER_01: What is this episode 80, whatever?
2:38
SPEAKER_01: At least and uh at least and I went to make a lasagna on the weekend.
2:43
SPEAKER_01: It was using gluten-free noodles, it was turning into I was just I was just looking at the instructions for the noodles.
2:50
SPEAKER_01: I didn't believe what it asked me to do, so I just dumped it all in a pot and made a soup, and it's great.
2:55
SPEAKER_01: It has all the flavor of a lasagna without the structural integrity.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: Sure, yeah, and I know for anybody that ever said this lasagna would be great if I just didn't have to chew it.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, uh Evelyn has come up with a new recipe for you on the fly.
3:10
SPEAKER_01: I have four gallons of it in my fridge for you.
3:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I have I have quite I had to use gallons.
3:16
SPEAKER_00: I had sorry, never before has lasagna been measured in gallons.
3:20
SPEAKER_01: It's true, it's true, but I had to use our biggest Tupperware to actually like store it in the fridge.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: Like I'm gonna eat Canadian Thanksgiving and American Thanksgiving, which as we know are about six weeks apart.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: So that's what I'm gonna be eating that whole time.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: But that's not what this story is about.
3:36
SPEAKER_01: It is though about a time when I was not ready to admit defeat.
3:43
SPEAKER_01: And uh a quote that's attributed to Thomas Edison, but is not actually said by Thomas Edison, I later learned, is when you've exhausted all possibilities, remember this, you have not.
3:54
SPEAKER_01: And I live by that when I'm creating in the kitchen.
3:59
SPEAKER_01: So a while ago, this was in my pre-celiac days.
4:02
SPEAKER_01: My sister gave me a huge Costco sized bag of pot stickers.
4:06
SPEAKER_00: And where this is going is that this is in Evelyn's pre-knowing she had celiacs.
4:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's true.
4:11
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
4:12
SPEAKER_01: That's that is good, yes.
4:14
SPEAKER_01: My pre-celiac awareness.
4:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yes, yes, it is my pre-endoscopy days.
4:20
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
4:21
SPEAKER_01: So she gave me this huge Costco size bag of pot stickers.
4:25
SPEAKER_01: It was massive, and I loved these pot stickers.
4:27
SPEAKER_01: She wasn't a huge fan.
4:28
SPEAKER_01: I had them in the freezer.
4:29
SPEAKER_01: I was like, this is great.
4:30
SPEAKER_01: I'll I'll go through these suckers, no problem.
4:33
SPEAKER_01: Keep that knowledge just simmering on the back burner for a second.
4:36
SPEAKER_01: And we we're now gonna jump ahead to my King Family Christmas get together.
4:40
SPEAKER_01: We have one every year, it's at my aunt and uncle's place.
4:42
SPEAKER_01: Everyone kind of descends upon this house, brings some kind of appetizer.
4:47
SPEAKER_01: There's always like a big ham or a turkey or some kind of meat that's prepared, and everyone else brings everything else.
4:54
SPEAKER_01: And it's a pretty decent sized side of the family, so there's always lots of food.
4:59
SPEAKER_01: So I thought, ooh, you know what I'm gonna do?
5:01
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna use those pot stickers.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: Because when you think potluck, obviously you think pot stickers cooked and then portaged to someone else's house.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: I could think of a worse thing.
5:14
SPEAKER_00: That actually doesn't sound bad to me.
5:15
SPEAKER_00: They're nice, they're individuals, you know, you get to pick them up, like, and probably there's a hundred casseroles, I assume.
5:21
SPEAKER_00: So, like, it's nice to have something a little different, right?
5:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
5:25
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
5:25
SPEAKER_01: You without knowing it said the perfect descriptor, and that was individual.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
5:31
SPEAKER_01: I thought, uh, because also in my creativity, I can get a little hasty.
5:35
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
5:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh-oh.
5:37
SPEAKER_01: I thought that the best way to cook these would be to put them in a massive baking dish with some water covered in foil.
5:44
SPEAKER_01: And that way I'm because they were all frozen.
5:46
SPEAKER_01: So I'm like, I gotta, I gotta cook these.
5:48
SPEAKER_01: Like, I gotta cook.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: And they didn't have instructions on the you know, hop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop.
5:53
SPEAKER_01: We're not asking, we're not asking questions.
5:56
SPEAKER_01: And yes, they did, and none of them involved oven cooking.
5:59
SPEAKER_01: Okay, okay.
6:01
SPEAKER_01: So I had all these pot stickers and I crammed that baking dish full because in my mind they were all gonna come out slippery, slimy, like they would, and then I was gonna pan fry, I was gonna coat them in oil and get them all crispy.
6:13
SPEAKER_01: Well, much to my dismay, I opened up the tin foil off the lid and it had formed into one large, puffy, gluey pot sticker in my massive 9x13 pan.
6:25
SPEAKER_01: I could not get anything away from the edges of this pan.
6:29
SPEAKER_01: The pot sticker dough had all just fused together, and I didn't know what to do.
6:34
SPEAKER_00: I I know what to do.
6:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: What would you have done at this point?
6:38
SPEAKER_00: I would have I would have put that in my fridge so I could eat it later with a spoon by myself and started working on plan B.
6:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: Well, you thought you exhausted all possibilities.
6:48
SPEAKER_01: I chose to believe I hadn't.
6:50
unknown: Oh.
6:50
SPEAKER_01: So I thought, okay, okay, okay, okay.
6:52
SPEAKER_01: Quick thinking.
6:53
SPEAKER_01: What can we do?
6:55
SPEAKER_01: So then I thought, I'm going to just salvage the pot sticker filling, which was like a chicken filling.
7:04
SPEAKER_01: So I scooped it in.
7:05
SPEAKER_01: How cheap are you?
7:07
SPEAKER_01: I'm not.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: That's the thing.
7:09
SPEAKER_01: I'm so not.
7:11
SPEAKER_01: And then I was like, save this.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: Well, then the problem was it like, I'm like, what am I doing with it?
7:16
SPEAKER_01: Like it's it's not right.
7:18
SPEAKER_01: So then I took my, I have a KitchenAid mixer, like a stand mixer, and I just dumped the whole pan into like everything, like filling, uh, dough right into my KitchenAid mixer.
7:33
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, well, let's throw some, let's throw some pot sticker flavors in there.
7:38
SPEAKER_01: So I had some mirin and I I know, I know.
7:43
SPEAKER_01: Why?
7:43
SPEAKER_01: This is what nope, it's too early in the story to be asking why.
7:47
SPEAKER_01: Oh so then I I had a little soy sauce, I threw some green onion in there, like some sesame oil, I threw it in there and I whipped that stuff to oblivion.
7:58
SPEAKER_01: And and then I was like, Well, I'm gonna make like this is like a dip.
8:02
SPEAKER_01: So then I was like, Oh, this is vile.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: This is like a rolled doll book.
8:08
SPEAKER_00: It's like an outtake from the witches.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: It's like it's like George's marvelous medicine potla condition.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: And you're not the hero, by the way.
8:16
SPEAKER_00: There's some poor little abused kid that's gonna come around and turn the story around by the end of it if it's a rolled doll story.
8:22
SPEAKER_01: It's not, no one.
8:23
SPEAKER_01: Well, that might that might have been my sister, because she she was the one who turned it around by telling me when it was time to be done.
8:30
SPEAKER_01: But I wasn't there yet.
8:32
SPEAKER_01: I I wasn't there yet.
8:33
SPEAKER_01: I thought, okay, this would be like a dip, but I thought, gosh, that's kind of weird.
8:36
SPEAKER_01: It'd be better if I baked it.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: So I put it in a different, in a different baking dish, and I smoothed the top top out and I baked it.
8:46
SPEAKER_01: I had that thing in the oven.
8:47
SPEAKER_01: And when I tell you it was the color of flesh, it was the color of human flesh, pureed human flesh, and then I sprinkled sesame seeds and green onions on top.
9:00
SPEAKER_01: And I and I thought, okay, I'm gonna have some wontons and we're gonna dip this with like crispy wontons, right?
9:05
SPEAKER_01: Because then it's like I'm sure as a therapist, you're digging so deep into this, being like, oh, this this person makes so much sense to me right now.
9:13
SPEAKER_01: Like, I really am just learning more and it's all falling into place.
9:16
SPEAKER_01: So I was eating it, like I was taste testing it and being like, if you closed your eyes, it tasted like a pot sticker.
9:22
SPEAKER_01: 100%.
9:23
SPEAKER_01: Because guess what?
9:24
SPEAKER_01: That's what it was.
9:25
SPEAKER_01: The problem was if you opened your eyes and looked at it, you felt like you had put some human body parts in a blender and poured it into a baking dish.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: So I'm like not squimish, and this is revolting, this thing you're talking about.
9:39
SPEAKER_01: It it was really, really terrible.
9:41
SPEAKER_01: And it came to the point where my sister said to me, I really think you need to not bring this to the family potluck.
9:48
SPEAKER_00: Because that was my watching you having a breakdown on the phone, like you disintegrate.
9:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because then because then she would watch me think of a new iteration of what this could be, right?
10:00
SPEAKER_01: Like, oh, what if I did because then oh, before I got into the casserole pan, but after I had pureeed it, I was thinking of rolling it into like balls and rolling it in sesame seeds.
10:11
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, like I had all these thoughts.
10:13
SPEAKER_00: What was what was making you do this?
10:15
SPEAKER_00: Because I'm imagining this is a$15 bag of pot stickers.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: What were you avoiding?
10:20
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm gonna be a therapist.
10:21
SPEAKER_00: Quitting.
10:21
SPEAKER_00: What were you avoiding?
10:23
SPEAKER_00: Quitting.
10:24
SPEAKER_00: What would have happened if you'd quit?
10:25
SPEAKER_00: What would that have meant to you?
10:26
SPEAKER_01: I didn't even entertain that.
10:28
SPEAKER_01: Like it just I it was time.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: Whatever that is, that's what you're running from.
10:32
SPEAKER_00: Tell your therapist.
10:33
SPEAKER_01: That's tell tell your therapist.
10:35
SPEAKER_00: Whatever's at the end of that street is that's what you're running from.
10:38
SPEAKER_01: Disappointing myself.
10:39
SPEAKER_01: Ooh, how's that?
10:40
SPEAKER_01: How's that?
10:41
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, long story short, my sister told me not to bring this.
10:46
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then she noticed I got really downhearted after I was really a little sad that it didn't work out.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: And instead, I brought a tray full of nuts and dried fruit and chocolates and oranges and who cares what else.
11:04
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it was a big hit.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: And I told the story of the pot sticker casserole, and my cousins wanted to see it, but no one else seemed to be interested in it.
11:15
SPEAKER_01: So no, when you describe it, it sounds uh bad.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: Fleshy.
11:19
SPEAKER_01: It really didn't taste badly and it's bad and like kind of gooey and pasty.
11:26
SPEAKER_01: Pasty.
11:26
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
11:27
SPEAKER_01: It was really gooey, like it was really tacky.
11:29
SPEAKER_01: Oh, this is so crumb.
11:32
SPEAKER_01: The mouthfeel was wretched.
11:34
SPEAKER_01: Like, I'm not gonna lie to you.
11:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I'm just imagining you're like the the sesame seeds will turn it around.
11:40
SPEAKER_00: These sesame seeds will turn these green onions, they're gonna turn it around.
11:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I just gotta keep doing it.
11:44
SPEAKER_01: Like, I can't fucking these are load-bearing green onions.
11:47
SPEAKER_01: I can't let go.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
11:49
SPEAKER_01: So my question for you, Nick, is what's a time in your life when you just couldn't quit and went a little too far with something?
12:00
SPEAKER_00: That's a good prompt.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: When is a time that I just couldn't give up and it went awry?
12:06
SPEAKER_01: And you sh maybe you should have realized you exhausted all possibilities.
12:10
SPEAKER_01: While Nick is thinking, I just want to tell our listeners that the fan mail is piling in.
12:17
SPEAKER_01: Like we are, is that the right way to say it?
12:20
SPEAKER_01: Piling in?
12:21
SPEAKER_01: Piling up.
12:22
SPEAKER_00: It's piling on, piling up.
12:23
SPEAKER_00: It's not piling in.
12:24
SPEAKER_00: I mean, like piling in isn't the worst thing, but it's not like how it goes.
12:28
SPEAKER_01: It is piling.
12:30
SPEAKER_01: It's piling piles.
12:32
SPEAKER_01: We have piles over here on the Reverse Jackass podcast.
12:35
SPEAKER_01: And it is piling a preposition of your choice.
12:39
SPEAKER_01: But we want you to know that you're gonna hear every single one of these little fan mail excerpts.
12:45
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna hear every single one of them, and yours could be one of them.
12:48
SPEAKER_01: So you want to check out the show notes, it's gonna tell you exactly how to do it.
12:52
SPEAKER_01: It's really not hard.
12:54
SPEAKER_01: And we Nick and I both know that you all bring the phone into the can with you.
12:59
SPEAKER_01: So don't tell us you don't have any time in your day.
13:02
SPEAKER_01: You're all scrolling on your TikToks over there in the can.
13:06
SPEAKER_01: Take your phone, do something useful with your time, leave us a fan mail, and we'll play it on the podcast.
13:11
SPEAKER_00: I have a story.
13:13
SPEAKER_00: Okay, okay.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: I had a terrible job managing a gourmet taco truck for some of the worst people that I've ever met in my whole life.
13:21
SPEAKER_00: And I just wanted to work so bad.
13:23
SPEAKER_00: I had just moved back to LA.
13:25
SPEAKER_00: I really wanted like I moved in with my girlfriend who's now my wife.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: I really wanted her to know I was dedicated to working, so I was like prepared to take anything, and I was taking all kinds of little jobs and stuff, and I finally got this offer to run this gourmet taco truck.
13:38
SPEAKER_00: And in retrospect, the warnings were there, right?
13:42
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it was a really lousy work, you know, it was in the recession, there was very little work to be found, it was really hard.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: But the fact is, in the middle of a recession, when people were scrambling for jobs, the most senior person at that place that I was working had been there six months.
13:54
SPEAKER_00: Like their turnover was wretched.
13:57
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's very telling.
13:59
SPEAKER_00: And so when I signed my salary contract, they said, um, you know, it's a it's really gonna be a 45-hour week because it's a recession.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: Times are hard.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: We all need to be doing a little bit more.
14:10
SPEAKER_00: But I was so happy to work that I said, no problem, no problem.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: And then they said, okay, on your first day, um, we're actually doing an event at the Peterson Museum, the automotive museum.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: It's a Jonathan Gold, who's a famous LA food critic.
14:24
SPEAKER_00: It's his charity event to raise money for charity.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: So we volunteer the food for it and we ask that our employees volunteer their time to be there.
14:31
SPEAKER_00: So your first day will be not paid, it'll be a volunteer day at this, at this thing.
14:36
SPEAKER_00: So I say, Great, for charity, I'm a team player.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: I'll do it.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: And I show up on my first day and I work a really long time.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: And again, these are all just little signs.
14:43
SPEAKER_00: Each one, any one of these things is a little thing.
14:45
SPEAKER_00: All of these together are painting a picture.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: That part of like going on your volunteer day is that you get to go try this the food.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: And one of my employees had a beer while he was there, but it wasn't a beer, it was like one of those mouthwash cups that they give you at the dentist.
15:00
SPEAKER_00: Somebody had beer samples, and he had a beer, and it got back to corporate, and they were like, you need to talk to him about drinking on the job.
15:07
SPEAKER_00: Now, granted, he was there as a volunteer, volunteering his time for this charity.
15:12
SPEAKER_00: It's really unprofessional.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: You need to talk to him.
15:14
SPEAKER_00: We cannot be consuming alcohol at any point on these things.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, that's weird.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: I don't love that.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: But again, I'm really like putting it in.
15:21
SPEAKER_00: Well, so 45-hour work week turns out to not even be it.
15:25
SPEAKER_00: It turns out to be more like 68-hour work weeks.
15:27
SPEAKER_00: Oh, and on one time, I had a 20-hour day.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: And again, a 20-hour day as a transplant surgeon happens, right?
15:36
SPEAKER_00: 20-hour day as a firefighter happens.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: 20-hour day as a food truck operator means you own a food truck.
15:45
SPEAKER_00: And I did not own a food truck, right?
15:47
SPEAKER_00: I worked for a terrible set of human beings that owned a food truck.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: So it keeps piling on.
15:52
SPEAKER_00: But you know, I don't say anything.
15:53
SPEAKER_00: I'm really like, I'm working these 60-hour weeks.
15:55
SPEAKER_00: I'm working six or seven days a week every week.
15:58
SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to take Mondays off, but it's just really not practical.
16:01
SPEAKER_00: So I'm often working seven days a week.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: It's in Santa Monica.
16:04
SPEAKER_00: I live in Pasadena.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: On a bad day, that's over two hours of a drive.
16:08
SPEAKER_00: On a good day, it's like 50 minutes.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: It's not a good drive, it's bad.
16:12
SPEAKER_00: But again, I'm I'm doing all this stuff to make it work.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: And I remember like about three or four months in, my birthday came and I took a three-day weekend to go to Las Vegas with my wife and didn't think anything of it because I had worked six or seven days a week for three or four months.
16:30
SPEAKER_00: All of my responsibilities were taken care of.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: There was nothing like that I had missed.
16:34
SPEAKER_00: And I got a call from my boss about something, and I said, Oh, hold on.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: I'm in Vegas.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: Let me get to a quiet place so I can talk to you about it.
16:41
SPEAKER_00: So I'm still taking work calls on this thing.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: Oh, geez.
16:44
SPEAKER_00: And she sends me an email afterwards that says, you know, we need to talk.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: You don't get paid vacation for the first six months that you're on here.
16:51
SPEAKER_00: And it's irresponsible that you took this thing.
16:53
SPEAKER_00: And I wrote her an email back that said, I've been working six or seven days a week for months.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: I can't believe you're coming to me to talk to me about this.
17:02
SPEAKER_00: This is so inappropriate.
17:04
SPEAKER_00: Like I have I have worked so far beyond my contract here that the notion that I would take a three-day weekend when I've given when I've had no weekends on several weeks here so far is so inappropriate.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: And she backed down.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: But this was probably the beginning of the end because what they wanted was somebody who would who would give their whole life to this company, right?
17:21
SPEAKER_00: Which, when you're the boss, is a great thing to do.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: If you own a food truck, it's great to give your life to the food truck.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: It's not, it's actually really unhealthy, but it's acceptable from a business standpoint.
17:30
SPEAKER_00: So as time goes on, things get weirder and worse.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: I almost want to turn this into like a couple of podcasts about stupid things that these that these people did.
17:37
SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
17:38
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I just kept trying to make it work and kept being disrespected over and over again.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: And at one point I remember she said, We need more specific pricing.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: I need you to figure out, you know, how much we should budget for the corn husks that we use to wrap our what are those things?
17:55
SPEAKER_00: Our tamales in.
17:56
SPEAKER_00: Tamales, yeah.
17:57
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Do we buy corn husks?
17:59
SPEAKER_00: And she goes, Well, we use them.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: I said, So you're talking about something that comes free with corn.
18:04
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, that's not how a budget works.
18:06
SPEAKER_00: We have to budget it.
18:07
SPEAKER_00: So you have to figure out how much they cost.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: So on some level, she wanted me to interpret how much of what we spend on corn could be attributed to the husk that we would use as a byproduct.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: But that wasn't even the craziest thing.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: So then she has a budget and she says, I want you to figure out how much these bags cost.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Okay, it should be no big deal.
18:25
SPEAKER_00: I look at the bag thing, I look at how much we're paying for it, I say, What's the quantity?
18:28
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have a quantity listed because the bags themselves are so insignificant that they're sold by weight.
18:34
SPEAKER_01: Oh, geez.
18:35
SPEAKER_00: So it's you buy a five-pound roll of these little plastic bags, and and it's$35 or whatever, and that's what it is.
18:43
SPEAKER_00: So I called the company and I said, Hey, how many bags are these things?
18:46
SPEAKER_00: They said, We don't know.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: We just sell them by weight.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: That's how you buy them.
18:49
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Is there any way to estimate?
18:50
SPEAKER_00: And they said, There's not.
18:51
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Okay, so I went to my boss and I said, Hey, they're saying these things are sold by weight.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: Maybe we could track how often we use the roll, like how often we reorder the roll.
19:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
19:01
SPEAKER_00: Um, and maybe we can do it that way, but I don't know.
19:03
SPEAKER_00: And she said, That's not acceptable.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: Like we have to be able to know how much a per bag costs.
19:08
SPEAKER_00: And so I thought, this is the stupidest dispensation of my time ever, but I'm gonna count.
19:14
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna count a roll of these bags, which would be in the thousands.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm sitting in a back room, unrolling a thing, counting, and she goes, walks in and goes, What are you doing?
19:23
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'm counting these bags.
19:26
SPEAKER_00: And she said, Why are you spending your time doing that?
19:28
SPEAKER_00: And I explained the situation to her as I've explained it to you, and she goes, That's not a good use of your time.
19:32
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I don't know how else I'm gonna get a per bag cost, which is surely gonna be less than a penny.
19:37
SPEAKER_00: Yes, right, yes, but this is what you've told me to do, this is what you've told me is acceptable.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: There's literally no other way for me to gather this information.
19:44
SPEAKER_00: And that was one thing.
19:45
SPEAKER_00: And again, I just keep saying, okay, I just wanted I just wanted to work.
19:51
SPEAKER_00: I just wanted my wife to know that I cared and that I was willing to do anything to live with her and to be a productive spouse.
19:58
SPEAKER_00: Do you know what I mean?
19:59
SPEAKER_00: And I was so miserable.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: And the hours get up, and I'm working 60 hours a week, six to seven days a week.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: Um, at one point, the chef of the restaurant was supposed to pre-make our food, which was illegal, by the way.
20:09
SPEAKER_00: You have you're supposed to have it made at the uh commissary, is the law for these things.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: But they absolutely just made it in the restaurant and put it on the truck, right?
20:16
SPEAKER_00: And so the chef's job, in addition to all of his stuff, was to make the food, and my part of the business paid him to make the food.
20:22
SPEAKER_00: So, like it was a revenue source for them to make food, which they would then sell the to the truck part of the business, and then the truck would take it out.
20:28
SPEAKER_00: And one day he said, I don't have time to make your food for tomorrow.
20:32
SPEAKER_00: We're just too busy.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: You'll have to figure it out.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I it's your job.
20:38
SPEAKER_00: And he goes, This is my job.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: This is my job first.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: And I said, They're both your job.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: He goes, he goes, Well, I'm not gonna do it.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: I said, We're paying for it.
20:45
SPEAKER_00: He goes, Well, don't pay for it.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: And I said, What am I supposed to do?
20:48
SPEAKER_00: I have three, I have three drops tomorrow.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and he he pulls the recipe book off the fucking shelf and goes, You make it.
20:54
SPEAKER_00: Oh, no, I didn't cook then.
20:56
SPEAKER_00: I still don't really cook in any credible way, but I really didn't cook then.
21:00
SPEAKER_00: And I, in the middle of a busy restaurant, I got a faraway prep table and I made all my own food.
21:05
SPEAKER_00: No for the next day's drop.
21:07
SPEAKER_00: That was the 20-hour day, by the way.
21:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, no.
21:10
SPEAKER_00: It was me staying, yeah, from 6 a.m.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: until 2 a.m.
21:15
SPEAKER_00: making food for the following day and then going up the next day to do it.
21:18
SPEAKER_01: Do you realize this is the equivalent of me reaching for the green onions?
21:22
SPEAKER_01: This is yes.
21:24
SPEAKER_01: Like this is like this sounds ridiculous when you're saying it.
21:27
SPEAKER_01: For me, I still believe there was a chance.
21:31
SPEAKER_00: And let me tell you, there I'm leaving out so many.
21:33
SPEAKER_00: I mean, again, this could be a three or four parter, and maybe it will be.
21:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh, like it was it was just horrific workplace abuse.
21:40
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you, one way that I sort of maliciously complied was at one point they said we had to hire cooks for the truck.
21:46
SPEAKER_00: And my boss said to me, Hire hire interns from the cordon blue because they work they'll work for nothing.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: Oh and that was her thing was they had to get intern hours, and so you could you could get them to work for no dollars.
21:56
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: So you should do that.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: And so what I did was I hired People from the cordon bleu all the time because they were great and their skills were great.
22:02
SPEAKER_00: And then I would just pay them.
22:03
SPEAKER_00: And I would just, I wouldn't even discuss not getting paid for them.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: Or if they brought it up, I would ignore it.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: And I and I said to my boss, like, oh, you know, oh, you know, I wanted to.
22:11
SPEAKER_00: She wouldn't work for no money.
22:12
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna pay her the same minimum wage we're paying everybody else.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: And she'd go, okay.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: So I got away with that.
22:17
SPEAKER_00: But like she wanted me to exploit people for their labor.
22:22
SPEAKER_01: Right?
22:22
SPEAKER_00: It was so bad.
22:24
SPEAKER_00: The point is, I keep going and I keep doing this because I don't have any other prospects and I just want to do it.
22:29
SPEAKER_00: And then one day I was headed to the office to argue for a raise for my two managers that worked for me.
22:37
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: And my two managers were actively sabotaging me.
22:41
SPEAKER_00: Like they hated me.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: They were so awful.
22:43
SPEAKER_00: One of them was directly angling for my job, and I was pretty positive I had overheard a phone conversation where they offered it to her.
22:49
SPEAKER_00: So I knew my time wasn't there, and yet I still went to argue for her to get a raise because it was the right thing to do because they were underpaid for what they were doing and it was disgusting.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: And so I set up a conversation with my boss to have this thing.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'm so sorry.
23:02
SPEAKER_00: I need to have this conversation over the phone or I need to move to a different day this week.
23:05
SPEAKER_00: I have four drops today.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's just piling up.
23:08
SPEAKER_00: I can't do it.
23:08
SPEAKER_00: And she said, No, I really need you to come to the office.
23:10
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'd love to come to the office.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: I really actually don't have time for this.
23:14
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, No, it's just really important that you come to the office.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: Like, we just really have to have this conversation.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, Oh, they're gonna fire me.
23:21
SPEAKER_01: Like, this is yes, they're absolutely gonna fire you.
23:23
SPEAKER_00: But never underestimate a shitty company because they didn't want to fire me because then they'd have to pay unemployment.
23:29
SPEAKER_00: They wanted me to quit.
23:30
SPEAKER_00: And so she was like, I'll write you a great reference.
23:33
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's nothing about you.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: You're just not a great fit for this job.
23:36
SPEAKER_00: And the real reason was because I had started, I had started only working 50 hours a week.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: I'd started setting a boundary where I was only gonna work 50 hours a week for my 45-hour week job.
23:45
SPEAKER_00: And that was when they started to get really mad about stuff.
23:47
SPEAKER_00: So she's doing all this bullshit.
23:48
SPEAKER_00: And I did the thing that no boss ever wants to hear when they give you this talk, which is, you know what, let me think about it.
23:53
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
23:54
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'm just gonna, and by the way, if you're out there and anybody ever pulls this bullshit with you, say, let me think about it.
23:59
SPEAKER_00: I'll get back to you in 48 hours.
24:01
SPEAKER_00: And I call, and this is a I'm getting emotional thinking about it.
24:04
SPEAKER_00: This is a story for me and my wife.
24:05
SPEAKER_00: I got on the phone with her from the fucking taco truck, driving to the next shitty drop, and I told her what had happened, and I was beside myself, and she goes, Why don't you quit?
24:13
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Because I want to be employed.
24:16
SPEAKER_00: And she said, Do you know how miserable you have been for the last six months?
24:21
SPEAKER_00: Like, I don't want this for you.
24:22
SPEAKER_00: You don't need to do this.
24:24
SPEAKER_00: Quit.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: Get out of there.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: It's toxic.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: Be done with them, and we'll find something else.
24:29
SPEAKER_00: We'll make it work, I promise.
24:30
SPEAKER_00: And I then I just had to get over my own humility of like knowing it.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: But the more I thought about it, the more I thought, oh yeah, I want to be out of here so bad.
24:37
SPEAKER_00: This is the worst environment.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: And so then I still made them wait.
24:40
SPEAKER_00: Then I went and I did finally, then the next day I called in and was like, you know what?
24:44
SPEAKER_00: She had asked me, like, yo, you know, if you just wanted to work out the weekend, that'd be cool.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: And I sent her a voicemail and said, Hey, you know what?
24:49
SPEAKER_00: I think you're right.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna work out the weekend, and then I'll be done.
24:51
SPEAKER_00: I'll set everything up so that you're good to go.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: And my last drop was with the manager who was replacing me, who was sabotaging me, and it was just the two of us.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: And I remember that she showed up 45 minutes for late late for the drop and forgot some of the ingredients.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, you all are all getting exactly what you're doing here.
25:09
SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
25:10
SPEAKER_00: That's all it's a shitty story, right?
25:13
SPEAKER_00: And so all of that is to say that, like, thank God, you know, if you have a good partner, they compliment you in some way.
25:18
SPEAKER_00: And my wife was the person that said, You don't have to kill yourself to do this.
25:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
25:22
SPEAKER_00: And I kind of thought I did.
25:24
SPEAKER_01: You really didn't.
25:25
SPEAKER_01: And as you're telling it seems obvious, but at the time, obviously hindsight's not there.
25:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
25:31
SPEAKER_01: Like you're you're so in the world.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: I was 30 years old, you know.
25:34
SPEAKER_01: Right?
25:34
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
25:35
SPEAKER_01: Like, you don't know what you don't know.
25:36
SPEAKER_01: You don't know that pot stickers don't serve well, pure and heat.
25:40
SPEAKER_00: No, you don't know.
25:41
SPEAKER_00: My story.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: You don't, you don't much as anybody, anybody with a whit of cooking sense could have known you were creating hell in a dish.
25:51
SPEAKER_00: I'm allowed to be confused by my thing.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: I was young.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: You knew better, and you continued to do this anyway to run from whatever bedevils you.
25:58
SPEAKER_01: I I can't well, that's the one thing I didn't try to do with this was devil it.
26:02
SPEAKER_01: I figure that was just kind of that was a bit too far.
26:08
SPEAKER_01: Well, the the difference between the ends of our stories is that, you know, yours has a a beautiful moment of being free from something.
26:17
SPEAKER_01: And I am afraid that from this dish I will never be free.
26:20
SPEAKER_00: From Heather.
26:21
SPEAKER_00: And she's just reminding you, she just wants you to stay sober, so to speak.
26:25
SPEAKER_00: You actually did get reprieve.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: You went and you brought a lovely fruit and nut dish to your family, and your family reacted appropriately.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: That should be the takeaway from this.
26:33
SPEAKER_01: No, no, because the story is shrouded in failure.
26:37
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have a hell of a session with your therapist this week.
26:39
SPEAKER_01: Just so I know, it's gonna be good.
26:41
SPEAKER_01: She'll be like, This is really coming out of left field.
26:43
SPEAKER_01: Where did this come from?
26:44
SPEAKER_01: I'll be like, no, it just comes out in the podcast.
26:47
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna walk in with a fucking either a bowl of lasagna or a uh or a casserole dish filled with like amorphous meat and starch, and she's gonna be like, no, thanks.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: But tell me what this is.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: But tell me, tell me what this means.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: What does this mean to you?
27:01
SPEAKER_00: I just needed you to see what I did.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: I need you to see that I like foods that look like other foods.
27:08
SPEAKER_00: It's like the gross part.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: Willy Wonka had square candies that look round.
27:12
SPEAKER_00: Evelyn has savory Italian casseroles that look like soups, or uh, or like uh something that looks like uh what am I looking for?
27:20
SPEAKER_01: Something that should be living in a landfill.
27:22
SPEAKER_01: Something that a raccoon wouldn't even touch, if I'm being really honest with you.
27:25
SPEAKER_01: The raccoon's like, is this mirror sauce?
27:27
SPEAKER_01: Why?
27:27
SPEAKER_01: Are you putting a hat on a fucking hat here?
27:30
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: Well, Nick, that's a terrible story, and I'm glad that you don't have to do that anymore.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: Me too.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: Me too.
27:36
SPEAKER_01: Oh gosh.
27:37
SPEAKER_01: And you're a better person than I am, because I would have just they would have been like, oh, you don't have any ingredients?
27:41
SPEAKER_01: I would have just gone to the nearest Taco Bell and said, I just need everything you have, please.
27:46
SPEAKER_00: In retrospect, there are so many ways I should have quit that job that would have been funnier than the one that I did, but at least I get to hold my head up high.
27:53
SPEAKER_01: You did it right.
27:54
SPEAKER_01: You did it right, I think.
27:55
SPEAKER_01: I would do everything I did all over again and still not learn.
27:58
SPEAKER_01: Nick, would you wrap this up, please?
28:01
SPEAKER_00: You know, I will because I have 30 seconds left.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: Folks, uh, we love you here at the Reverse Jackass podcast.
28:06
SPEAKER_00: You don't know that.
28:07
SPEAKER_00: Uh somebody in heaven is turning a page on a book right now, Evelyn.
28:10
SPEAKER_00: Is it my page?
28:12
SPEAKER_00: Um in the meantime, we love you here at this podcast.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: We love the US, we love Canada.
28:16
SPEAKER_00: We are hoping to bring peace between them.
28:17
SPEAKER_00: Um, we love your listeners.
28:18
SPEAKER_00: Please keep sending the fan mail coming in.
28:20
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna have more of that soon.
28:21
SPEAKER_00: Tell all your friends about this podcast or die trying.
28:24
SPEAKER_00: Evelyn, say goodbye to the people.
28:25
SPEAKER_00: That's a that's a wrap, everyone.
28:26
SPEAKER_00: That's a wrap.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: Some neighbors are besties.
28:30
SPEAKER_00: Others quarrel bitterly.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: Stuck together through geography.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: One of us has nukes, and the other has tokes.
28:40
SPEAKER_01: It's American and Canadian diplomacy.
28:45
SPEAKER_01: It's revolution.