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2022 Holiday Spectacular! · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
0:04
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the Holiday Cast. I'm Josh,
0:24
Speaker 1: and Chuck is here and Jerry's here, and there's a
0:27
Speaker 1: million elves surrounding us and making us kind of nervous
0:30
Speaker 1: because they're just looking at us and not saying anything.
0:33
Speaker 1: And this is Stuff you should know. The Holiday episode
0:37
Speaker 1: the last recording of the year for us. It's great
0:43
Speaker 1: and I'm so excited about that. And you and I
0:46
Speaker 1: love our jobs, but it doesn't matter how much you
0:49
Speaker 1: love your job. Vacation is better. Yeah, some vacation is better. Yeah,
0:56
Speaker 1: I agreed. And this is gonna be our longest Christmas
0:58
Speaker 1: break yet, and we're both super excited to do that.
1:01
Speaker 1: But we're even more excited to share with you another
1:05
Speaker 1: set of it's getting thin, but another set of great
1:09
Speaker 1: stories for Christmas. I disagree. I feel reinvigorated. I think
1:14
Speaker 1: we hit the We hit rock bottom two years ago
1:18
Speaker 1: and and we've been coming back ever since then. I
1:21
Speaker 1: feel great about this one. Did you really look at
1:23
Speaker 1: two years ago? Was it bad? No? No, I just
1:26
Speaker 1: remember it. It was not It was not great. Yeah,
1:29
Speaker 1: I don't know. I need to be invigorated by you then,
1:32
Speaker 1: because every year I keep thinking, oh boy, have like,
1:36
Speaker 1: that's a lot of years to be doing six to
1:38
Speaker 1: eight Christmas stories, Like how many are out there? There's plenty. Man,
1:42
Speaker 1: we'll we'll never run out. Come over here. I'll invigorate
1:45
Speaker 1: you right now. Okay, all right, thank you Hamana Hammanahammed.
1:50
Speaker 1: Uh okay, we're gonna start out with your pick, one
1:53
Speaker 1: of your picks. Yes. Um, this is actually from uh
1:57
Speaker 1: a listener named Alexandra stock Or Still I'm not sure.
2:01
Speaker 1: I bet it's stuck. She wrote in for several years
2:03
Speaker 1: with a bunch of really good ideas, but she really
2:06
Speaker 1: really was pushing for the chestnut one. And I understand
2:10
Speaker 1: why now, because um, it's a really interesting story, the
2:14
Speaker 1: story behind why chestnuts used to be basically like the
2:20
Speaker 1: the the symbol of Christmas in America for a couple
2:24
Speaker 1: hundred years, until it just suddenly stopped being that way. Um,
2:29
Speaker 1: and let's talk about that. Yeah, and big thanks to
2:31
Speaker 1: USA Today for a great article from Cape Morgan. I
2:35
Speaker 1: wonder if that's the same Cape Morgan that writes for
2:36
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works. Oh, I don't know. That's a great question.
2:40
Speaker 1: I bet it is at any rate. Uh if you've
2:43
Speaker 1: ever heard the Christmas song, not a Christmas song, but
2:47
Speaker 1: the Christmas song from Coroon or net King Cole. You
2:51
Speaker 1: might not even know. That was the title of what's
2:54
Speaker 1: more commonly referred to as Chestnuts Roasting on an open fire. Yeah. Uh,
2:59
Speaker 1: this was corded in nineteen forty six. It was a
3:01
Speaker 1: very big hit, one of the biggest Christmas songs of
3:04
Speaker 1: all times. Uh. And I guess it's sort of acted
3:07
Speaker 1: like everyone around was in America was sitting around roasting chestnuts.
3:13
Speaker 1: But I've never seen a chestnut, nor roasted or tasted one.
3:17
Speaker 1: And that's because by that point there were no chestnut
3:20
Speaker 1: trees in the United States anymore. No, very sadly, a
3:24
Speaker 1: blight started to spread, I think starting in nineteen o four,
3:28
Speaker 1: and within forty years almost every single American chestnut tree
3:34
Speaker 1: was dead. And how many were there, There were a
3:37
Speaker 1: lot of them. At one point, half of the trees
3:41
Speaker 1: in the forests on the East coast from Maine to Alabama,
3:44
Speaker 1: as far west over to Kentucky and Ohio were chestnuts.
3:48
Speaker 1: Half of the trees in those in that stretch were chestnuts,
3:52
Speaker 1: and I think there were as many as four billion
3:55
Speaker 1: of them, So that's a lot of chestnut trees, and
3:58
Speaker 1: that's a lot of chestnuts. That's a lot of roasting
4:01
Speaker 1: because people used to eat these things. The chestnuts themselves
4:05
Speaker 1: were small, They're about acorn size, and they had a
4:09
Speaker 1: very obviously nutty flavor, but very sweet and carrot like
4:13
Speaker 1: is what I've seen. When you just eat them out
4:15
Speaker 1: of the shell. But then you roast them up a
4:18
Speaker 1: little bit, things got even nuttier, and they got a
4:20
Speaker 1: little sweeter, as things often often happened when they roast,
4:24
Speaker 1: And it was a it was like a American and
4:28
Speaker 1: especially a Christmas staple, where on street corners and cities
4:33
Speaker 1: all over the United States and the Eastern Seaboard there
4:36
Speaker 1: were chestnut roasters serving up bags and bags of this stuff. Yeah,
4:41
Speaker 1: Kate Morgan puts it really, really great. She says, for
4:43
Speaker 1: more than a century it was the smell of Christmas
4:46
Speaker 1: in America. Nice I even wrote, gosh after that in
4:50
Speaker 1: my notes. But it's sad, I mean, think about that.
4:53
Speaker 1: There was this amazing tradition that dated back easily to
4:56
Speaker 1: the eighteenth century, if not even a little earlier in
5:00
Speaker 1: North America. Um, once Europeans came over and discovered chestnuts,
5:05
Speaker 1: that I'm quite sure the indigenous people's were well aware
5:08
Speaker 1: of for long before that, and they said, hey, these
5:10
Speaker 1: are pretty amazing, and they made it not just part
5:14
Speaker 1: of Christmas, but you could find chestnuts and dishes in
5:17
Speaker 1: America and like throughout the year. But something about roasting
5:21
Speaker 1: chestnuts that Christmas time was was very Christmas ee um.
5:24
Speaker 1: And it's like you said, Chuck, were bereft. Those of
5:27
Speaker 1: us alive today who were born after the mid forties
5:31
Speaker 1: have never tasted a chestnut the way that it's supposed
5:34
Speaker 1: to taste in America because the stuff we got now
5:37
Speaker 1: it's not it's not holding up. No, they're importing chestnuts, uh,
5:42
Speaker 1: I think largely probably for the Christmas season, even though
5:44
Speaker 1: you can probably get them, I imagine all year round,
5:47
Speaker 1: but they're mainly imported from Korea or Italy or China apparently,
5:52
Speaker 1: and these are not the American chestnuts. They apparently do
5:56
Speaker 1: not taste like they taste that Apparently they don't taste
5:59
Speaker 1: that great at all. Uh. The way this one person
6:02
Speaker 1: that was interviewed in here described them was this is
6:05
Speaker 1: Libby O'Connell, who's a food historian. Wrote a book called
6:08
Speaker 1: The American Plate colon a culinary history and one bytes.
6:14
Speaker 1: But Libby describes them as sort of like a soft
6:17
Speaker 1: potato and bland and not like this crunchy thing that
6:22
Speaker 1: you would think of when you think of eating a
6:24
Speaker 1: rusted chestnut. No, and in a horrible ironic twist, those
6:28
Speaker 1: chestnuts that were eating today in America, like shmos, come
6:33
Speaker 1: from the very same tree that was imported to Long
6:35
Speaker 1: Island in the late nineteenth century that started the blight
6:39
Speaker 1: that killed off the American chestnut. You won't catch me
6:43
Speaker 1: buying those, then, it's terrible. Luckily, there is a glimmer
6:46
Speaker 1: of hope. There is a group called the American Chestnut Foundation.
6:50
Speaker 1: Since three they've planted at least seventy three thousand test trees.
6:57
Speaker 1: They've been trying really hard to crossbreed American chestnuts with
7:02
Speaker 1: Asian chestnuts so that they'll be um immune to the blight.
7:06
Speaker 1: But they'll still produce those American chestnuts chest nuts. They
7:10
Speaker 1: think maybe in a decade, maybe a little longer, we
7:14
Speaker 1: will be able to experience the Christmas chestnuts like they
7:18
Speaker 1: used to have back in the days of Nat King Cole.
7:21
Speaker 1: That's right. So if you live in North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee,
7:24
Speaker 1: or Pennsylvania. Then your state is growing those chest chestnut trees,
7:31
Speaker 1: and uh, we all have our fingers crossed. A lot
7:33
Speaker 1: is writing on this. Yeah, yeah, that's really well put
7:37
Speaker 1: in chunk. So shall we climb in our sleigh and
7:40
Speaker 1: hop over to the next roof. Yes, let's and we'll
7:42
Speaker 1: have Jerry give us a little musical interlude in the meantime.
7:57
Speaker 1: I gotta tell you the song's Jerry puts in or
8:00
Speaker 1: that's my favorite part of this whole time. I like
8:02
Speaker 1: us talking, it's fine, but the the holiday trimming that
8:06
Speaker 1: that Jerry puts on it is just magnificent. And you
8:09
Speaker 1: know what you're not gonna hear. Oh yeah, what ads?
8:13
Speaker 1: That's right. We we we wall this one in the
8:17
Speaker 1: Halloween episode off every year and say don't come near
8:19
Speaker 1: my episode. That's right. And I think it's a great
8:23
Speaker 1: tradition if you ask me, I think it is too.
8:25
Speaker 1: There's nothing like leaving money on the table, all right.
8:29
Speaker 1: So you dug up some cool stuff along with Sean
8:32
Speaker 1: Flynn of Forbes Magazine on some very special places all
8:35
Speaker 1: over the world that kind of have a cottage Christmas
8:41
Speaker 1: industry in one way or another and for different reasons. Yeah,
8:45
Speaker 1: there's places that say this is Santa claus is home.
8:48
Speaker 1: Another places, No, this is Sant Claus is. Another places,
8:52
Speaker 1: this is Santa claus Is summer home, um and or
8:55
Speaker 1: other places are just like we're not saying that, we're
8:58
Speaker 1: just celebrating Christmas year round. One of them is called
9:02
Speaker 1: Rovaniemi Finland, where in Finland they know Santa Claus. You lpuki,
9:09
Speaker 1: that's in Finnish. I've seen Rare Exports enough times that
9:12
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure that's how they pronounce it. It's rare Exports.
9:16
Speaker 1: It's a Finnish Christmas movie that came out five six,
9:20
Speaker 1: seven years ago. Yes, but they envisioned Santa Claus is
9:24
Speaker 1: like a demon, not a not a friendly elf, and
9:27
Speaker 1: they have to basically capture them and it's really interesting.
9:30
Speaker 1: It's a great movie. Okay, I'll have to check that out,
9:32
Speaker 1: you pukey uh so, and you'll wait. Not in yolla puki,
9:37
Speaker 1: that's that's Santa Claus. What am I saying? And Rovaniemi
9:43
Speaker 1: they are one of the ones to say, now this
9:46
Speaker 1: this is where Santa was born. It's the official home
9:48
Speaker 1: of Santa. We have the Santa Christmas House right over there.
9:51
Speaker 1: You can go visit it. Uh, we have a post
9:55
Speaker 1: office here where it is chock full of letters from
9:58
Speaker 1: children all over the world, and we even have a
10:01
Speaker 1: toy factory, so we lay claim. I looked at pictures
10:06
Speaker 1: of Rovaniemi and enchanting under states that place. It's amazing.
10:12
Speaker 1: It looks pretty pretty sweet. So that's one place. They
10:14
Speaker 1: don't necessarily say Santa lives here now, but they say
10:17
Speaker 1: Santa was born here. They've got a contender over in
10:21
Speaker 1: Norway called drew Back, and they say, oh, yeah, you
10:24
Speaker 1: think Santa was born in Finland. Wrong, he was born
10:27
Speaker 1: in Norway under a rock outside of this town. Nothing
10:32
Speaker 1: is more fun and disturbing than Scandinavian folk tales. It
10:36
Speaker 1: seemed like they always fought something really weird, right, like
10:40
Speaker 1: sa was born under a rock a few hundred years ago,
10:43
Speaker 1: and that rock is right over there. Uh. They also,
10:46
Speaker 1: of course have their own post office. Uh where kids
10:50
Speaker 1: in their list? So kids are they're sitting their list
10:52
Speaker 1: of different places all over the world where. I guess
10:55
Speaker 1: it depends on where your parents allegiances lie. Yeah, but
10:58
Speaker 1: I think all of these post off us is like
11:00
Speaker 1: in drew Back and Roviniemi and the other places. We'll
11:02
Speaker 1: talk about nowhere to forward him onto the North Pole.
11:05
Speaker 1: So they get to Santa right. There a mere way station,
11:09
Speaker 1: right exactly? What about Alaska? Isn't there a North Pole Alaska?
11:14
Speaker 1: There is? Um. There's a place called the Santa Claus
11:17
Speaker 1: House in North Pole, Alaska, and it is um supposedly
11:22
Speaker 1: Satan Nick's home. I think it's one of as many
11:24
Speaker 1: how homes UM and it's really cute. It's pretty kitchy looking.
11:29
Speaker 1: There's a lot of strange paintings outside of it. UM.
11:33
Speaker 1: But one of the other things that they have are
11:35
Speaker 1: light poles. They are shaped like candy canes. That's yes,
11:39
Speaker 1: that's stretch along um roads and streets called Santa Claus
11:43
Speaker 1: Lane St. Nicholas Drive. Um, there's one. I'm wondering if
11:48
Speaker 1: this is a nod to the vacation movies Holiday Road.
11:52
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that was Lindsey Buckingham, was it? It may
11:57
Speaker 1: have been Fleetwood mac r i p Christine mcneeh. He
11:59
Speaker 1: just asked away in real time. Yeah, very sad. Yeah,
12:03
Speaker 1: I know. It's it's pretty neat to see how many
12:06
Speaker 1: people are like this is a big deal. Yeah, very
12:09
Speaker 1: big deal. That was very sad. Listen to it all night,
12:11
Speaker 1: No but but that's not what this is about. This
12:15
Speaker 1: is about Santa Claus Is sounds around that world. Snowman
12:18
Speaker 1: Lane in North Pole, Alaska. Yeah, so North Pole, Alaska.
12:22
Speaker 1: Another place that says this is where Santa lives. There's
12:25
Speaker 1: a place in Indiana called Santa Claus Indiana and they say, no, no,
12:28
Speaker 1: this is where Santa Claus lives. I can understand the
12:31
Speaker 1: distinction here because Indiana is much further south than Alaska
12:36
Speaker 1: or Norway or Finland. So this is possibly Santa Claus
12:40
Speaker 1: is like summer home, one of his summer homes. Yeah,
12:43
Speaker 1: this seems like the k o a campground of kitche
12:46
Speaker 1: Santa places. Yeah, because they do have a campground. They
12:50
Speaker 1: have a Lake rootolf there with a campground and they
12:53
Speaker 1: they pour it on pretty thick there in Indiana with
12:55
Speaker 1: a light show that tells the story of Rudolph and
12:59
Speaker 1: his Trevia Hills. And they have a Santa's Candy Castle. Yes,
13:04
Speaker 1: it's you know, they've made it. I'm glad you included
13:06
Speaker 1: links to these places. You should go look them up.
13:08
Speaker 1: It's it's pretty fun to look at. Santa's Candy Castle
13:11
Speaker 1: was sponsored by the Curtis Candy Corporation, who make Butterfinger
13:15
Speaker 1: and Baby Ruth and they they opened this place in
13:18
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty five to really kind of give Santa Claus
13:21
Speaker 1: Indiana boost. Of course, there's also a Santa Claus Museum
13:25
Speaker 1: that would be worth visiting. I'd love to go visit
13:27
Speaker 1: that someday. Yeah, you get in the Christmas spirit, right, Yeah.
13:31
Speaker 1: Another thing they'll get you in the Christmas spirit in
13:33
Speaker 1: July even is the eighty one foot wide star over Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
13:40
Speaker 1: That's right, that's on South Mountain that was built in
13:43
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty seven, and apparently in nineteen thirty seven it
13:48
Speaker 1: was a real, uh sort of sign of hope during
13:52
Speaker 1: the Great Depression, right, And I believe that the city
13:56
Speaker 1: itself was founded on Christmas Eve there in a lahem,
14:00
Speaker 1: and so I'm sure, I mean that's why they got
14:02
Speaker 1: the name, right, Yeah, for sure. And they make no
14:05
Speaker 1: claim whatsoever on Santa Claus having a home there, having
14:08
Speaker 1: been born there. They're just fans, really big fans, you know. Uh.
14:13
Speaker 1: And then finally, I guess Santa has his beach condo,
14:17
Speaker 1: because who wouldn't if he were Santa and you could
14:19
Speaker 1: just you know, he basically prints money every year. You know, sure, Uh,
14:25
Speaker 1: this is where where exactly? This is in Florida. This
14:28
Speaker 1: is inland, um kind of along the St. John's River,
14:31
Speaker 1: So rather beach, he would have like, this is his airboat,
14:34
Speaker 1: um swamp? Getaway. Okay, give me a north or south.
14:38
Speaker 1: It's south south of what South Florida is. It's south
14:44
Speaker 1: of Gainesville. It's east of Gainesville. It's due east of Orlando. Okay,
14:51
Speaker 1: so I got you, I got you, so right there
14:52
Speaker 1: in the center of the state sort of, yeah, pretty
14:55
Speaker 1: much the center right. The Florida is very misleading because
14:58
Speaker 1: it takes as long to drive to Miami me from Atlanta,
15:01
Speaker 1: as it does to drive to New York, which seems
15:04
Speaker 1: hard to believe, but it's true. But to drive from
15:07
Speaker 1: um like Orlando to Tampa, it takes a hour and
15:10
Speaker 1: a half. Basically, it's crazy. You can get to so
15:14
Speaker 1: many places in Florida in two or three hours. It's
15:16
Speaker 1: it's just nuts, right, But from tip to top to
15:20
Speaker 1: bottom it's a long way. Yes, agreed. But Christmas, Florida
15:25
Speaker 1: used to be Fort Christmas because it was a ford.
15:27
Speaker 1: It was an army stock aide that was built an
15:29
Speaker 1: eighteen thirty seven and they said, hey, I guess we
15:32
Speaker 1: got this place with this name, and we got a
15:34
Speaker 1: post office that kids are gonna want that postmark once
15:37
Speaker 1: again from Christmas on stamped onto their letter. So that
15:41
Speaker 1: seems to be the main industry. How yeah is their
15:44
Speaker 1: post office? It's it's true, and they keep it decorated
15:47
Speaker 1: year round to really attract people. Yeah, I love it
15:51
Speaker 1: for sure. So there's some places you could visit if
15:54
Speaker 1: you were like I really wanted to feel closer to
15:55
Speaker 1: Santa this year, and I feel like doing some traveling.
15:59
Speaker 1: There's a great list for or you everybody, all right,
16:07
Speaker 1: and now we are going to talk about the two
16:10
Speaker 1: worst Christmas songs in history. Oh my h you might
16:15
Speaker 1: be right though, now that I think about it, I
16:17
Speaker 1: hadn't hadn't considered that, but I think you're right. I mean,
16:19
Speaker 1: there are certainly some annoying like pop rock versions of
16:23
Speaker 1: Christmas songs, but it does not get much worse. Then
16:28
Speaker 1: Grandma got run over by a reindeer and all I
16:31
Speaker 1: want for Christmas is my two front teeth. Uh. I
16:35
Speaker 1: will say this, Grandma got run over by a reindeer
16:38
Speaker 1: is so infuriating, Lee catchy. It's been stuck in my
16:42
Speaker 1: head all day and I didn't listen to it. Oh wow,
16:46
Speaker 1: that's hilarious. Just from reading it and doing this research,
16:49
Speaker 1: I've been walking around bashing my head against the wall
16:52
Speaker 1: all day. It is catchy. It's what people in the
16:55
Speaker 1: corporate world would call sticky. It's very sticky. Um. And
16:59
Speaker 1: it's actually way older than I thought. I think of
17:03
Speaker 1: that song is firmly in the mid eighties, but apparently
17:07
Speaker 1: it was written all the way back in the seven
17:09
Speaker 1: by a songwriter from Dallas named Randy Brooks. And depending
17:14
Speaker 1: on who you ask, either his grandmother left him out
17:17
Speaker 1: of her will or he no, I don't either. I
17:22
Speaker 1: think it was a joke by whoever said it. And
17:24
Speaker 1: then um, the likelier one that I think Randy Brooks
17:27
Speaker 1: says that he was just thinking about those country songs
17:30
Speaker 1: he as he put it, where they dragged you into
17:32
Speaker 1: love with the character and then killed him off in
17:34
Speaker 1: the third verse, and how he was kind of sick
17:37
Speaker 1: of that, that kind of songwriting, and he wanted to
17:40
Speaker 1: kind of make light of it. So he started thinking
17:42
Speaker 1: about grandma being killed off, and even worse, what about
17:46
Speaker 1: Grandma dying at Christmas? And he started wondering, like, exactly
17:50
Speaker 1: how would Grandma die at Christmas and it hit him
17:53
Speaker 1: like a flash. Yeah, it strikes me that Brooks may
17:57
Speaker 1: have been sort of trying to get on the out
18:00
Speaker 1: tales of like Ray Stevens, who was a country sort
18:04
Speaker 1: of hed He wrote some serious songs, but he was
18:08
Speaker 1: kind of known for novelty and joke songs, and it
18:11
Speaker 1: was like the American Yakov. Yeah, sort of. Uh. He
18:14
Speaker 1: definitely looked like, I'm not any thing about it. But
18:17
Speaker 1: it was sort of a thing back then in country
18:19
Speaker 1: music where you could write some songs that were humorous
18:23
Speaker 1: and they could end up being big hits. So Brooks
18:26
Speaker 1: would apparently do some of this apparently, Uh, did you
18:29
Speaker 1: mention the Johnny Walker thing? No, I didn't. Supposed he
18:32
Speaker 1: was headed to bed with his guitar and quote his
18:35
Speaker 1: co writer Johnny Walker black and and wrote this song,
18:40
Speaker 1: which you know, if you've never uh, certainly that chorus
18:44
Speaker 1: will stick in your head. But how I'm not gonna
18:47
Speaker 1: sing it, but I don't remember any of the words.
18:50
Speaker 1: I knew Grandma got run over just from the chorus.
18:53
Speaker 1: But when you look at the lyrics, it is, uh,
18:56
Speaker 1: it's very dark. Grandma's drunk on Eggna is like leaving
19:01
Speaker 1: the party and they're like, no, don't go, Grandma, and
19:04
Speaker 1: she's like, I need to get my meds and goes
19:07
Speaker 1: to get medication drunk and gets run over by Rudolph
19:12
Speaker 1: and they say they find her dead in the snow
19:15
Speaker 1: with footprints on her forehead and claws as in Santa
19:19
Speaker 1: Claus marks on her back. That's pretty clever. What else? Um?
19:25
Speaker 1: So the family celebrates Christmas dressed in black because their mourning,
19:29
Speaker 1: and they have like a whole conundrum in front of him.
19:31
Speaker 1: They were like, should we just open Grandma's presence or
19:34
Speaker 1: should we send them back? And then the song goes
19:37
Speaker 1: over and focuses on Grandpa, who's handling the whole thing
19:40
Speaker 1: really really well. He's having a party. He's hanging out
19:43
Speaker 1: watching football on TV and drinking beer and playing cards
19:46
Speaker 1: and seems to be okay about this whole thing. Yeah,
19:49
Speaker 1: so that's the essence of the song. Uh, Like I said,
19:53
Speaker 1: Brooks had made a name sort of. It sounds like
19:56
Speaker 1: regionally um writing these Ray Stevens esque country song And
20:01
Speaker 1: I was performing it out one night when a married
20:04
Speaker 1: duo married at the time just divorced a handful of
20:06
Speaker 1: years later named Elmo and Patsy were in the audience
20:11
Speaker 1: and they were recording artists, and they said, hey, can
20:13
Speaker 1: we record your song? Uh. There they weren't huge stars,
20:17
Speaker 1: but I looked them up and they were. They were
20:19
Speaker 1: pretty well known at the time in that in the
20:21
Speaker 1: country music scene. Uh. And Dr Elmo went on to
20:25
Speaker 1: be a doctor veterinary medicine, which I thought was interesting.
20:29
Speaker 1: I saw that too. Yeah, so um uh Randy Brooks
20:33
Speaker 1: said sure, you guys can record my song, and they
20:35
Speaker 1: actually started pressing their own copies of this. I guess
20:39
Speaker 1: a single like a forty five of Grandma got run
20:42
Speaker 1: over by a reindeer, so this was I saw. They
20:46
Speaker 1: met at a high in Lake Tahoe during a blizzard
20:49
Speaker 1: and that's where the whole thing happened. But the upshot
20:52
Speaker 1: of it is um. By Christmas Day ninety nine, one
20:55
Speaker 1: of these singles had made its way into the hands
20:57
Speaker 1: of a DJ in San Francisco, and this DJ played
21:01
Speaker 1: it on the radio for the first time, and uh,
21:04
Speaker 1: it apparently was very polarizing from the outset. Some people
21:07
Speaker 1: called the radio station and said, don't ever play that
21:09
Speaker 1: record again. Other people said, like, where can I get
21:13
Speaker 1: a copy of that record? And year by year, it
21:16
Speaker 1: just kind of slowly started to spread around the country,
21:19
Speaker 1: and then in three that was the year it just
21:22
Speaker 1: absolutely blew up. Yeah. I mean that's why you remember
21:25
Speaker 1: it as mid eighties because in eight three it became
21:28
Speaker 1: a big, big hit for ish plus years after it
21:33
Speaker 1: was written and a few years after it was first recorded,
21:36
Speaker 1: So that's it's definitely or I guess actually more like, uh,
21:41
Speaker 1: six years after it was written, in four years after
21:43
Speaker 1: it was recorded. Yeah, Apparently it got a big boost
21:47
Speaker 1: because Elmo and Patsy had gone to the trouble of
21:50
Speaker 1: paying for a video to be made just in time
21:54
Speaker 1: for MTV, and MTV put it in heavy rotation and
21:57
Speaker 1: it ended up being the number one song on the
22:00
Speaker 1: Billboard Holiday Charts for several years in a row, and
22:03
Speaker 1: it spawned a whole bunch of stuff. It went gold,
22:05
Speaker 1: it eventually went platinum. There's toys, ugly sweaters, there's a
22:10
Speaker 1: cartoon based on it, sended candles. UM. Randy Brooks said
22:14
Speaker 1: there was a hot chocolate mix. Couldn't find that to
22:17
Speaker 1: corroborate it. Uh. And then there's a Christmas theme podcast
22:21
Speaker 1: I found UM that seems to have released the most
22:25
Speaker 1: recent episode last year. UM but they have twenty nine
22:28
Speaker 1: episodes under their belt. Grandma got run over by a podcast. Uh.
22:33
Speaker 1: And as far as the two singers, they got divorced.
22:36
Speaker 1: I think that next year or so. So yeah, maybe
22:40
Speaker 1: all that success went to their head. Yeah, that'll do it.
22:43
Speaker 1: I've seen that movie. It could happen to you. Can
22:46
Speaker 1: I read the last line? You wrote this last line right? Yeah,
22:51
Speaker 1: not a bad run for a man who's co writer
22:54
Speaker 1: is Scotch. You like that? That's great, very much tickled me.
22:59
Speaker 1: So are we going to put a musical interlude in
23:01
Speaker 1: between these two? Are we gonna head right over to
23:04
Speaker 1: All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.
23:06
Speaker 1: Let's just head right over there. Big thanks. I got
23:10
Speaker 1: most of this stuff. There's a bunch of histories of
23:13
Speaker 1: this song, but the most thorough was from the Greenville
23:16
Speaker 1: Theater in Greenville, South Carolina at Greenville Theater dot org.
23:19
Speaker 1: And they they do Christmas plays and I think they
23:22
Speaker 1: performed this every year. It will have been ended by
23:26
Speaker 1: the time this comes out, But support local theater and
23:29
Speaker 1: support the Greenville, South Carolina Theater. Yeah, And I found
23:32
Speaker 1: it confusing at first. I was like, what does Greenville
23:34
Speaker 1: Theater in South Carolina have to do with this, because
23:37
Speaker 1: this whole thing took place in at Smithtown Elementary in Smithtown,
23:41
Speaker 1: New York, Long Island, Yeah, where a man named Donald
23:44
Speaker 1: Gardner and his wife Doris Gardner were music teachers at
23:48
Speaker 1: Smithtown Elementary. And Donald Gardner was coming trying to come
23:53
Speaker 1: up with a song for the second graders at one point,
23:56
Speaker 1: and he noticed that they were talking amongst themselves and
23:59
Speaker 1: kept saying like all I want for Christmas is, all
24:01
Speaker 1: I want for Christmas is, And that's kind of a
24:03
Speaker 1: phrase that they used. And then at some point, I
24:06
Speaker 1: think Donald Gardner told a joke and all the children
24:08
Speaker 1: started laughing, and he noticed something very significant about those
24:12
Speaker 1: kids that inspired him. Uh, they did, and he actually
24:15
Speaker 1: put a number thanks to the Washington Post, I know,
24:18
Speaker 1: the actual statistic is sixteen out of the twenty two
24:22
Speaker 1: children in the classroom, we're missing their front teeth. The
24:27
Speaker 1: front two thing is funny when you have a kid.
24:29
Speaker 1: My my daughter is pretty late on her teeth, losing
24:34
Speaker 1: her baby teeth, so she still has this cute little
24:36
Speaker 1: top baby teeth. Uh. But sometimes you'll see, like as
24:41
Speaker 1: a kid as young as like four and five that
24:44
Speaker 1: have these giant honkin front teeth because you know, those
24:48
Speaker 1: adult teeth come in sometimes they don't fit in the
24:50
Speaker 1: mouth so well. Yeah, true, but it's always funny to
24:53
Speaker 1: see her friends at school, like a lot of them
24:55
Speaker 1: have those big teeth. She still got her little teeth.
24:57
Speaker 1: But losing the two front teeth is a big deal.
24:59
Speaker 1: I remember I lost my front two in pretty quick succession.
25:03
Speaker 1: We talked about uh, and I even put it on
25:05
Speaker 1: my Instagram when my mom dressed me up as Huckleberry
25:08
Speaker 1: Finn for the photo shoot, which you can find at
25:12
Speaker 1: Chuck The at Chuck the Podcast. On my Instagram, you
25:16
Speaker 1: have to dig back because I'm not going to repost
25:18
Speaker 1: it or anything like that. But losing the front teeth
25:21
Speaker 1: is a big deal. All these kids had their teeth
25:23
Speaker 1: out and it struck. Donald Gardner is very funny and
25:26
Speaker 1: apparently he whipped up this song you can tell in
25:29
Speaker 1: about thirty minutes. Yeah, that's that's pretty amazing. Though he
25:33
Speaker 1: was also like he he was a music teacher, he
25:36
Speaker 1: also was really good at writing music as well. He
25:38
Speaker 1: went on to write um songs for musical textbooks, among
25:42
Speaker 1: other things. But Um the song initially was just relegated
25:48
Speaker 1: to Smithtown Elementary for the first several years. Um, but
25:52
Speaker 1: it became like a tradition that they still carry on today.
25:54
Speaker 1: At Smithtown Elementary they have a holiday sing along and
25:58
Speaker 1: um invariably they play or sing all I Want for
26:01
Speaker 1: Christmas is my two front teeth. Um. But it really
26:05
Speaker 1: kind of blew up in night when it was first
26:08
Speaker 1: recorded and kind of hit. I think that's the impression
26:12
Speaker 1: I have after Spike Jones and his City Slickers recorded it. Yeah,
26:16
Speaker 1: there was a lady right before this who heard Gardner
26:19
Speaker 1: sing this thing at a teacher's conference and said, that's
26:23
Speaker 1: really catchy. Why don't you meet my boss at wit
26:26
Speaker 1: Mark Music Company. They published the song and then, like
26:31
Speaker 1: you said, Spike Jones and his City Slickers put it
26:34
Speaker 1: out and it was Yeah it was. It was a
26:36
Speaker 1: number one hit. Doesn't get much bigger, and it got
26:40
Speaker 1: covered most um, notably by the Chipmunks. Yeah, it was
26:45
Speaker 1: a Chipmunks song, wouldn't it. It was me and the Chipmunks.
26:48
Speaker 1: Christmas songs are great. We listen to a lot of
26:51
Speaker 1: Christmas music over the course of December. I love it
26:56
Speaker 1: until I don't, right, But um, Emily she dives in
27:00
Speaker 1: right after Thanksgiving and in fact, I wanted to play
27:03
Speaker 1: it before Thanksgiving this year. I was like, Babe, it's
27:06
Speaker 1: come on too early, just too early. Can we at
27:09
Speaker 1: least wait till after Thanksgiving? So we haven't put on
27:12
Speaker 1: the Chipmunks yet, But that's always a fun one in
27:14
Speaker 1: the house. My favorite of all time is Frante and Tiger.
27:18
Speaker 1: They're dueling pianos. I haven't heard that one good stuff. Yes, yes,
27:24
Speaker 1: it is just I mean, I'm sure it's nostalgic for
27:27
Speaker 1: me because I grew up on that, but I don't
27:30
Speaker 1: I can't imagine anybody would hear it and be like
27:32
Speaker 1: this is terrible. It's like, it's really great. Ferrante f
27:35
Speaker 1: E r R A n t E and Tyker t
27:38
Speaker 1: E I c h E R. And they actually did
27:40
Speaker 1: the theme to Midnight Cowboy too. They were really accomplished musicians,
27:44
Speaker 1: but they would both play grand pianos. That was like
27:47
Speaker 1: their thing and their take on Christmas songs with two
27:51
Speaker 1: grand pianos, and once it is really really something to hear. Well,
27:54
Speaker 1: that's what I will try and do most times, is
27:56
Speaker 1: put on like Christmas piano solo stuff to keep from
28:00
Speaker 1: area the bad pop music. So I love them. Yeah, yeah,
28:04
Speaker 1: that in a little Mannheim steam roller, and I'm all
28:06
Speaker 1: set stirring stuff all right, I think it's slight time,
28:11
Speaker 1: right it is. Let's slay on over to something else
28:16
Speaker 1: with the musical annard leader. So chuck. Um. We've got
28:26
Speaker 1: a little shorty here that we're gonna squeeze in about peppermint,
28:30
Speaker 1: because if you stop and think about it, I can't
28:32
Speaker 1: think of a taste, especially now that chestnut trees are
28:35
Speaker 1: all dead. Um that is associated with Christmas more than peppermint.
28:39
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, you might get those little peppermints on
28:43
Speaker 1: the way out of a restaurant, but aside from that,
28:46
Speaker 1: you're not going to be tasting a lot of peppermint.
28:48
Speaker 1: I don't think outside of December. No. And there's a
28:51
Speaker 1: writer named Sam Worley for Epicurius who kind of rattles
28:54
Speaker 1: off some good examples, like there's a bunch of Mochas
28:57
Speaker 1: and Starbucks that uses it. There's ice cream treats called
29:01
Speaker 1: frosty trees that I looked up. I was not aware
29:04
Speaker 1: of frosty trees, and now I really want a frosty tree?
29:06
Speaker 1: Have you ever had one? Now? Is it like a
29:09
Speaker 1: hand by basically? But in the shape of a Christmas
29:14
Speaker 1: tree made of peppermint ice cream a frozen handpie. So
29:18
Speaker 1: so the peppermint is it's kind of the unofficial flavor
29:22
Speaker 1: of Christmas, and Warlie asks a pretty good question like
29:25
Speaker 1: what you know, why how did that happen? He ascribes
29:29
Speaker 1: it to peppermint candy canes. I think that's a pretty
29:31
Speaker 1: good case. But I also think you could make a
29:33
Speaker 1: case that peppermint is like a cool blast of winter
29:36
Speaker 1: in your mouth. So I can see just from that
29:39
Speaker 1: as well being associated with it. Yeah, totally. It's not
29:43
Speaker 1: like it tastes like you know, broiled liver. No, boy,
29:49
Speaker 1: that would be imagine the world if that was the
29:52
Speaker 1: taste of Christmas. Oh, as the story goes, and I
29:58
Speaker 1: found this in a bunch of different places, and I'm
30:00
Speaker 1: more like kind of helped to verify it at epicurious
30:02
Speaker 1: but um, as the story goes, and certainly in the
30:06
Speaker 1: book The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, there was
30:09
Speaker 1: a German choral master uh in Cologne, Germany in the
30:14
Speaker 1: sort of latest seventeenth century who had some rally German
30:19
Speaker 1: kids at a live nativity and was like, this is
30:21
Speaker 1: getting out of hand every time these kids come in.
30:24
Speaker 1: All they're doing is cutting up. So can I get
30:27
Speaker 1: something Mr. Local candy maker, like a candy that will
30:31
Speaker 1: last for an hour or so and keep them busy?
30:35
Speaker 1: And voila the candy cane, right, because nothing settles kids
30:39
Speaker 1: down like a sugar stick. Yeah, but that's how it
30:43
Speaker 1: came up. And apparently because of that link to the Nativity,
30:47
Speaker 1: that's the reason that candy cane is curved. It's supposed
30:49
Speaker 1: to replicate a shepherd's staff or echo what I guess
30:52
Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, And I think originally they were only
30:55
Speaker 1: white and the red stripes came a little later. Uh.
30:58
Speaker 1: And I think, you know, it's funny you think of
31:00
Speaker 1: peppermint is like red and white, but that's I think
31:03
Speaker 1: that's probably strictly coloring, right, Yeah, peppermint is. I mean,
31:07
Speaker 1: it's it's a lot like spearmint. It looks very green
31:10
Speaker 1: and leafy. Yeah. Um. And it's apparently indigenous to the
31:13
Speaker 1: Middle East in Europe. Um, and it was used as
31:16
Speaker 1: like a medicine for a really long time. But yeah,
31:20
Speaker 1: I can't imagine peppermint is anything but red and white
31:23
Speaker 1: striped too. That's what we know it as. I am
31:26
Speaker 1: not a big peppermint guy. But I'll I'll munch on
31:28
Speaker 1: a little candy cane every now and then for nostalgis sake.
31:31
Speaker 1: Oh sure, I like the fruity kinds though more than anything.
31:36
Speaker 1: Oh like the rainbow colored m What about the big
31:41
Speaker 1: giant miniature baseball bet peppermint candy canes that you would
31:45
Speaker 1: get as a kid. It's a little ostentatious for me.
31:48
Speaker 1: Do you remember those though? Sure you're like, uh like
31:52
Speaker 1: billie clubs. They were, and if you had an older brother,
31:56
Speaker 1: they were probably used like a billy club against you,
31:58
Speaker 1: although not Scott. Scott would ever do something like that.
32:01
Speaker 1: He would never do that. He would he would lick
32:03
Speaker 1: his into a vampire killing spear, right and just drive
32:08
Speaker 1: it right through the back of your knee. That's right. Um,
32:10
Speaker 1: So here's a little fact for you. You can you
32:12
Speaker 1: can bust out at your next Christmas party or holiday gathering.
32:16
Speaker 1: The candy cane was invented about two years before it
32:19
Speaker 1: became peppermint flavor. It was this kind of clean sugar
32:22
Speaker 1: flavor up to that point. Yeah, like lick him stick. Yeah,
32:27
Speaker 1: I love those as well. All right, that sleigh is
32:32
Speaker 1: calling our name, my friend, let's get in the seats
32:35
Speaker 1: still warm. Gross. Sorry head wish had net at broiled liver.
32:48
Speaker 1: I thought with the open air of the sleigh it
32:50
Speaker 1: might not really hit your nostrils too bad. But no,
32:52
Speaker 1: Christmas is ruined. I was mistaken. So speaking of Christmas,
32:58
Speaker 1: how about Elvis? How about him? So you dug something
33:02
Speaker 1: up about um Elvis and and Christmas? Apparently the two
33:06
Speaker 1: went hand in hand. And if you stop and think
33:08
Speaker 1: about Elvis, I am not at all surprised that that
33:11
Speaker 1: that this particular season was like the end all be
33:15
Speaker 1: all to him. Yeah, Elvis was very into his family
33:18
Speaker 1: and his friends, very into just sort of home in
33:23
Speaker 1: America and just a well grounded Tennessee druck at it right.
33:30
Speaker 1: I was about to say really into Ben's a dream,
33:33
Speaker 1: but he was way into Christmas. And I have been
33:35
Speaker 1: to Graceland two times. I went once regular and I
33:38
Speaker 1: went once during Christmas. You show off. It is really lovely.
33:42
Speaker 1: I would recommend going not at Christmas. It's sort of like, uh,
33:46
Speaker 1: if you've ever been to the Biltmore House in Asheville,
33:49
Speaker 1: I find that the regular tour is better than the
33:51
Speaker 1: Christmas because it's so over overdone Christmas it kind of
33:56
Speaker 1: gets in the way, a little bit of just the
33:58
Speaker 1: regular beauty of both of the places I see. But
34:02
Speaker 1: Elvis did it up for Christmas. Um colored lights everywhere. Uh,
34:06
Speaker 1: six eight ft Christmas trees out front, blue lights up
34:10
Speaker 1: that long driveway. Uh, it's funny they call it a mansion.
34:14
Speaker 1: Graceland was not that big. Every time people go to
34:18
Speaker 1: Graceland for the first time, they're always like, uh, this
34:20
Speaker 1: is it. Yeah, I remember thinking that. But it's a
34:24
Speaker 1: fun visit, and you should, I mean you and you
34:26
Speaker 1: we should definitely go at Christmas. If you haven't been it,
34:28
Speaker 1: it's if you've seen it regular, then you should go
34:29
Speaker 1: at Christmas. Yeah, we saw it regular style, not peppermint style.
34:34
Speaker 1: You said that he lined his house with blue lights.
34:37
Speaker 1: I just find that so wonderful. Like, yes, plain white
34:41
Speaker 1: lights are good, even multi colored lights are good. But
34:44
Speaker 1: something about blue lights at Christmas are just they just
34:48
Speaker 1: they really kind of make it more Christmas Eve to
34:50
Speaker 1: me for some reason. Totally, And that was sort of
34:52
Speaker 1: the style back then before everyone thought like the only
34:55
Speaker 1: thing you could do was classy white lights, right exactly.
34:59
Speaker 1: I know you like your color lights, yeah, Now I
35:01
Speaker 1: love the big fat multicolored bulbs. Something about the small
35:05
Speaker 1: blue lights too. I'm kind of my tastes have evolved
35:08
Speaker 1: into that, I think. So we have a quote here
35:11
Speaker 1: from the Memphis Press Scimitar in nineteen sixty six where
35:16
Speaker 1: Elvis said, it really is the best season of the year. Man.
35:21
Speaker 1: Christmas carols, trees and lionses just grab you. Something about
35:24
Speaker 1: Christmas and being home I just can't explain. Maybe he's
35:27
Speaker 1: been with family and friends, time to read and study,
35:31
Speaker 1: and of course snowball fights and the sleigh rides and
35:34
Speaker 1: you know, just home beautiful. That was wonderful, Elvis. Yeah,
35:39
Speaker 1: I think he did a great job describing it. So
35:42
Speaker 1: you can imagine that Elvis, as he was, and as
35:45
Speaker 1: rich as he was, uh, and as much as he
35:47
Speaker 1: liked Christmas, he really overdid it with presents. Um. Usually
35:51
Speaker 1: employees got big fat cash bonuses. Um. Friends and family
35:56
Speaker 1: would get anything from like jewelry to cars, uh to
35:59
Speaker 1: daw dogs. He gave a girlfriend a poodle once. Um.
36:03
Speaker 1: He just really liked to do it up. Um. And
36:06
Speaker 1: apparently between nineteen fifty four and nineteen seventy six he
36:10
Speaker 1: celebrated twenty three Christmas is at at Graceland. Whenever he could,
36:15
Speaker 1: he would make his way home and and spend the
36:18
Speaker 1: holidays at Graceland. Uh. And more often than not he
36:21
Speaker 1: was he was able to, that's right. And we know
36:23
Speaker 1: this because of the book Elvis Colan Day by Day
36:27
Speaker 1: by Ernst Jorgensen and Peter Girl Nick Garrel, Nick, I
36:32
Speaker 1: think you got it the second time. I think so.
36:34
Speaker 1: But they went year by year and it sounds like
36:37
Speaker 1: day by day. But we're gonna go over a handful
36:39
Speaker 1: of these years that are notable. In fifty four, this
36:43
Speaker 1: is before Elvis was a big famous star, and his
36:46
Speaker 1: family lived in a little apartment on Alabama Street. And
36:50
Speaker 1: just the week before that, Elvis made his first sort
36:53
Speaker 1: of musical appearance at the Louisiana Hayride radio program. A
36:57
Speaker 1: few days after Christmas, he ended up playing a club
37:01
Speaker 1: in Houston and his career started on its way basically. Yeah,
37:05
Speaker 1: But nineteen fifty six was his breakout year. Get this.
37:09
Speaker 1: He had seventeen songs on the Billboard one that year.
37:12
Speaker 1: Three of them were number one in nineteen fifty six.
37:16
Speaker 1: So nineteen fifty seven he had bought Grace Lane and
37:18
Speaker 1: this is his first Christmas at Graceland, but it was
37:22
Speaker 1: ruined by the U. S. Military that's right. A few
37:26
Speaker 1: days before Christmas he got his draft notice and on
37:29
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve he asked for a deferm it and got
37:33
Speaker 1: it and pushed that by just a few months. Oh,
37:36
Speaker 1: actually a year and a few months. Pushed this deferm
37:39
Speaker 1: it to March twenty nine nine. Yeah, let's still just
37:43
Speaker 1: a few months. Oh okay, yeah, that's how yours work.
37:50
Speaker 1: You're gonna make me cough? What else? Seven in ninety Well,
37:53
Speaker 1: his mother died. Um. It was his first Christmas without
37:57
Speaker 1: his mother. I'm sure that was rather sad. It was.
38:00
Speaker 1: It was also a Christmas that he's spent in Germany
38:04
Speaker 1: because he was stationed there during his military service, so
38:08
Speaker 1: he probably was not very happy in Christmas nineteen fifty's
38:11
Speaker 1: trying to make the best of it. Not a blue
38:13
Speaker 1: light to be found in Germany and his his mom
38:15
Speaker 1: was missing, So not the best Christmas of all time. Uh.
38:19
Speaker 1: Fifty nine was his first with Priscilla. But you mentioned
38:23
Speaker 1: the girlfriend who got the French poodle. Um, he had
38:27
Speaker 1: a girlfriend at the time named Anita Wood, and he
38:30
Speaker 1: sent Anita the French poodle while he was car noodling
38:34
Speaker 1: in Germany with Priscilla. But by nineteen sixty six, he said,
38:40
Speaker 1: it's I'm I'm I'm gonna make an honest man out
38:42
Speaker 1: of myself. And he proposed to to Priscilla are on
38:45
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve, which now I understand that's a super Elvius
38:49
Speaker 1: thing to do. UM. And apparently between nineteen sixties seven
38:53
Speaker 1: and nineteen seventy three there wasn't a whole lot going on,
38:57
Speaker 1: just happy normal holidays. Be as we pick up again
39:00
Speaker 1: in Yeah, and this was you know, the last few
39:04
Speaker 1: years of Elvis's life are well documented. Is not being
39:07
Speaker 1: great for his health. Uh, he was having some health
39:10
Speaker 1: problems in seventy four during Christmas, and so to pick
39:14
Speaker 1: his spirits up, I think he flew in a gospel
39:17
Speaker 1: backup group called Voice a few times in and out
39:20
Speaker 1: of Memphis just so they could sing with him at Graceland. Yeah,
39:24
Speaker 1: that's pretty cool. What about the last one? Why are
39:28
Speaker 1: you leaving that to me? I'll take it then, So
39:32
Speaker 1: this is the year I was born. I've always been
39:34
Speaker 1: convinced that I am the reincarnation of Elvis. Seventy six
39:39
Speaker 1: is the last Christmas of UM of Elvis's life. Um.
39:44
Speaker 1: He apparently it says that he had a bizarre last
39:47
Speaker 1: Las Vegas engagement. Was that the very famous like Vegas
39:52
Speaker 1: fat Elvis? Well, sure in seventy six, absolutely, Okay, so
39:58
Speaker 1: then that that happened right before Chris Miss then yeah,
40:01
Speaker 1: but that was I can't remember the incident, but there
40:04
Speaker 1: was one concert in particular that kind of went off
40:06
Speaker 1: the rails. Okay, it sounds like it was this Las
40:08
Speaker 1: Vegas one. Yeah, I think I think it's one where
40:11
Speaker 1: like he couldn't remember lyrics and he was sweaty and
40:13
Speaker 1: it was just a bad scene. That's not good. So um,
40:16
Speaker 1: that was his last show before Christmas. I guess he
40:20
Speaker 1: went and recuperated, and then two days after he started
40:22
Speaker 1: up another tour at Wichita State UM. And then six
40:26
Speaker 1: and a half months later he died. Where chuck on
40:30
Speaker 1: the toilet at Graceland, right, Well, I was just gonna
40:33
Speaker 1: say it Graceland, but yes, yeah, you can't go up
40:37
Speaker 1: there in his in his personal quarters as you know,
40:40
Speaker 1: totally can't go up those stairs at Graceland. So that
40:43
Speaker 1: was Elvis and Christmas in the blue lights there. I
40:46
Speaker 1: loved it. They were like, all right, Elvis, you got
40:49
Speaker 1: one more tour in you. Let's let's launch it at
40:51
Speaker 1: which is All State University. Right where all the best
40:54
Speaker 1: tours are kicked off. All right, so we finish up
40:58
Speaker 1: with a boozy recipe like we like to do. I
41:01
Speaker 1: think we should be first. How about a musical interlude
41:03
Speaker 1: from Jerry Okay, Chuck. I don't know if we had
41:14
Speaker 1: a boozy recipe the last couple of years, so it's
41:16
Speaker 1: time to bring it back. And this one anyone can make.
41:20
Speaker 1: You can make it with your eyes closed, you can
41:22
Speaker 1: make it with your feet, You can make it very easily.
41:25
Speaker 1: If you're you could have your eight year old child
41:27
Speaker 1: make it for you if you wanted to. It's just
41:29
Speaker 1: that easy. But what's interesting about it. It's called moose
41:32
Speaker 1: milk and it's associated um exclusively with the Canadian military.
41:37
Speaker 1: That's right. Apparently all of the militaries in Canada, the
41:42
Speaker 1: Army and the Navy and the air Force and their
41:44
Speaker 1: moose patrol, they all claim I guess, ownership, or at
41:50
Speaker 1: least claim to have written the recipe. But we do
41:53
Speaker 1: know that regardless of who did it, it was a
41:57
Speaker 1: drink that was concocted back in World War Two and
42:00
Speaker 1: has become just a very very customary drink to have
42:03
Speaker 1: in Canada. I think, certainly for the military, but I
42:06
Speaker 1: think all the way around Canada, right, Yeah, especially on
42:10
Speaker 1: Christmas and New Year's Day. So, um, there's a lot
42:14
Speaker 1: of different things you can do. There's a lot of
42:16
Speaker 1: different ingredients. As you'll you'll get the gist of it
42:19
Speaker 1: from this, and you can kind of let your imagination
42:21
Speaker 1: run wild. And that's kind of what you're supposed to do.
42:23
Speaker 1: You're supposed to make it to taste, using as much
42:26
Speaker 1: or as little as as you want. Um. But our
42:29
Speaker 1: friends at Atlas Obscura found a recipe from the Cape
42:32
Speaker 1: Breton News, and um, they recommend that you basically stay
42:37
Speaker 1: with whiskey, rum or vodka. I've seen rum more often
42:41
Speaker 1: than not, and apparently though the military used rum when
42:44
Speaker 1: they ran out of whiskey. So I would recommend one
42:47
Speaker 1: of those two. But if you don't like the Brown liquors,
42:50
Speaker 1: vodka apparently works. Yeah. This sounds barely even drink anymore.
42:55
Speaker 1: But I am inspired by this very soothing, sweet sounding
43:00
Speaker 1: Christmas treat, So I'm gonna have one of these soon, Okay,
43:04
Speaker 1: but you should probably have it in the morning because
43:07
Speaker 1: of the first ingredient, or else you'll stay up all night.
43:10
Speaker 1: Coffee didn't keep me up, so one cup of cold coffee,
43:15
Speaker 1: a cup of half and half. It's a lot totally
43:20
Speaker 1: cal Uh. What else you got in there? Ice cream? Maybe? Yeah,
43:24
Speaker 1: one and a half cups good vanilla ice cream, not
43:27
Speaker 1: the cheap stuff that could be vanilla bean perhaps so.
43:31
Speaker 1: And this is UM. This is basically I don't know
43:35
Speaker 1: how many UM servings this makes now that I think
43:38
Speaker 1: about it, but based on the amount of liquor, I
43:40
Speaker 1: would guess one serving because it just calls for two
43:42
Speaker 1: ounces UM of rum, whiskey or vodka actually says and
43:48
Speaker 1: or uh, and then a tablespoon of kohlua, and you
43:52
Speaker 1: mix it all together in a bowl, whisk it until
43:56
Speaker 1: the ice cream has melted, and then you put it
43:58
Speaker 1: in a cup and top it off with either nutmeg
44:01
Speaker 1: or dark chocolate shavings to make it classy. I would
44:05
Speaker 1: say not for the lactose intolerant, No, definitely not. And
44:09
Speaker 1: I've seen that mentioned like this is this is not
44:11
Speaker 1: for for you if if you are lactose intolerant UM.
44:14
Speaker 1: But regardless of what UM recipe you use, whoever posts
44:20
Speaker 1: the recipe invariably mentions that if you're in the military,
44:23
Speaker 1: go ahead and double the amount of alcohol. Call for yeah.
44:27
Speaker 1: I mean, if you've got a cup of coffee, a
44:29
Speaker 1: cup of cream and ice cream, I think you could
44:33
Speaker 1: stand you know, a half a cup of rum. Sure,
44:37
Speaker 1: I could Navy strength No, wait, that's gin. Yeah, I
44:42
Speaker 1: think there's navy strength rum too. Though. Okay, this is
44:45
Speaker 1: I mean, this is not too far off from a
44:48
Speaker 1: one of those trendy espresso martinis. That's right, that's right
44:52
Speaker 1: because the in the coffee, yeah, really kind of make
44:55
Speaker 1: it like that. So that's kind of a fancier version.
44:58
Speaker 1: I found another one on a cooking website called with
45:02
Speaker 1: Love from Beck's b e X and her recipe apparently
45:06
Speaker 1: her husband was in the Canadian military, so I'm getting
45:09
Speaker 1: the impression that it's adapted from him. It's way easier,
45:13
Speaker 1: it's way more straightforward. And this is the one that
45:16
Speaker 1: you're eight year old can make for you. Yeah, this
45:19
Speaker 1: one's got ice cream, vanilla again, uh and rum, but
45:23
Speaker 1: this time it's got egg nog in it and then
45:26
Speaker 1: just a little nutmeg. That's about it. So but again
45:29
Speaker 1: you just mix it all together, mix it all together,
45:32
Speaker 1: and then whip it up into a cup. And she
45:36
Speaker 1: she uses like two leaders ice cream, four leaders, eggnog
45:38
Speaker 1: two leaders, rum and a tablespoon of nutmeg. Obviously this
45:42
Speaker 1: is for more than one person. I hope, I really hope. Yeah.
45:47
Speaker 1: I wonder if our buddy, our colleague Alex at work
45:51
Speaker 1: has a great tradition he does every year where he
45:53
Speaker 1: makes the George Washington recipe for boozy eggnog and he
45:59
Speaker 1: makes a big matches and bottles and leaves it on
46:01
Speaker 1: his front porch and sends out the email to all
46:04
Speaker 1: of us and says, hey, it's out there again this year.
46:07
Speaker 1: Come by and get some if you want. Yeah, And
46:09
Speaker 1: he makes the nog from scratch, like eggs and everything
46:12
Speaker 1: I've made. I've made the recipe with store made eggnog,
46:15
Speaker 1: but then with brandy, I think whiskey and rum and
46:19
Speaker 1: it's really really good, is it? But yeah, and I've
46:22
Speaker 1: yet to have any of Alex's. I'm sure that it's
46:25
Speaker 1: just knock your socks off when it's made from scratch.
46:28
Speaker 1: And Alex says a great podcast as well called Ephemeral
46:31
Speaker 1: that we can recommend. And also before we close, I
46:35
Speaker 1: did a guest spot on another I Heart show called
46:40
Speaker 1: Parenting is a Joke. It's a great O'feira Eisenberg of
46:44
Speaker 1: asked me another fame and she's got a show with
46:47
Speaker 1: us or old buddy Julie Smith produces it. Oh really
46:50
Speaker 1: that's awesome, Yeah, said, Julie got in touch and she's like, hey,
46:52
Speaker 1: you want to be on talk about parenting, And so
46:56
Speaker 1: I'm on an episode that has already dropped. It will
46:59
Speaker 1: be a few weeks old by the time you hear
47:00
Speaker 1: this where I talk about parenting and uh and Ruby's
47:04
Speaker 1: adoption story. And if you stay and listen through the credits,
47:09
Speaker 1: there's a very short, little forty five second interview with Ruby.
47:13
Speaker 1: That's adorable. Oh that is adorable. Great plug, Chuck. It's
47:16
Speaker 1: a check it out and it's a it's a really
47:18
Speaker 1: good show and check out aphemeral and happy holidays everybody. Yeah, yeah,
47:23
Speaker 1: here's the part where we wish everybody happy holidays, right,
47:26
Speaker 1: I mean I just did. Okay, Well, I'm gonna take
47:28
Speaker 1: it up from there. I'm gonna say Merry Christmas, Happy
47:31
Speaker 1: New Year, have a tip top Ted, Happy Hanukah, Happy Kuanza. Sure,
47:38
Speaker 1: happy holidays in general, however you celebrate them. We're really
47:41
Speaker 1: glad that you hung out with us, and we hope
47:43
Speaker 1: we gave you some holiday spirit, right, Chuck, that's right.
47:46
Speaker 1: And uh, we always like to think of our listeners
47:49
Speaker 1: who have a bad time this time of year, because
47:51
Speaker 1: it's true for a lot of people. It's not all
47:54
Speaker 1: merriment for everyone. So if the holiday seasons are rough
47:57
Speaker 1: for you, then we are thinking about you, and you
48:00
Speaker 1: are not alone. And uh, we just want to wish
48:03
Speaker 1: everyone well and uh, let's let's head into feeling good. Yeah.
48:09
Speaker 1: So from Chuck and Jerry and me and from Frank
48:12
Speaker 1: the Chair, from Dave, c, from Max, from Ben, from
48:18
Speaker 1: everybody here. Stuff you Should Know, I have a happy holiday.
48:39
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of I Heart Radio.
48:42
Speaker 1: For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,
48:46
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.