MBMBaM 767: Look at Me, An Outdoor Kid

A sign has come from above in the form of mysterious lawn scooters, so we got the ZOOMIES! We’re running around to Ghostbust some bugs, spin some spin-offs, and lift some dads, all fueled by taco chicken nuggets. Suggested talking points: Raspberry City, Sneaky Grinders, Maximum Frasier, Their Muscles are Dough, Absence is Noted and Suspicious Transgender Law Center: https://transgenderlawcenter.org/

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  The McElroy brothers are not experts and their advice should never be followed. Travis insists he's a sexpert, but if there's a degree on his wall, I haven't seen it. Also, this show isn't for kids, which I mention only so the babies out there will know how cool they are for listening. What's up, you cool baby?

• 0:21Speaker 01

  It's the start of something beautiful.

• 0:27Speaker 01

  A small acquaintance has blossomed, it's rapid into a precious friendship.

• 0:33Speaker 01

  I could have never seen what was coming for me. Hangs at the skate park, hangs by the beach. My life, it feels like. Life, ah, it's better, it's better with you. My life, ah, it's better, it's better with you. This is true, ah, it's better, it's better with you. My life, ah, it's better with you.

• 1:10Travis McElroy?

  Hello, everybody. Welcome to my brother, my brother and me, an advice show for the modern era. I'm your oldest brother, Justin McElroy. What's up, Trav Nation? It's me, your middlest brother Travis, Vroom Vroom McElroy.

• 1:21Griffin McElroy?

  What's up, Trav Nation? This is Griffin McElroy and I'm sorry dudes, but I gotta jet.

• 1:27Travis McElroy?

  Oh, wait, you have to jet?

• 1:28Griffin McElroy?

  Sorry dudes, sorry dudes, no can do today. Gotta zoom.

• 1:32Travis McElroy?

  You think you were ready? Like, we have this schedule.

• 1:35Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, I'm ready to fucking zoom.

• 1:37Travis McElroy?

  Where are you going?

• 1:37Griffin McElroy?

  Cause the roads, shh, shush. The roads calling me and I need to go zoom because this morning I woke up, you guys, and I looked out my window in my front yard, was not much of a yard, but I looked out on the sidewalk in front of my house. Someone had left two electric scooters there for me.

• 1:57Travis McElroy?

  Are you kidding?

• 2:00Griffin McElroy?

  Two electric scooters delivered, like a stork or an angel did it and said, God wants you to zoom and left me not one, two electric scooters for me.

• 2:12Travis McElroy?

  Griffin, like, in what state? In what state? Sorry. In what state?

• 2:16Griffin McElroy?

  Not a state.

• 2:16Travis McElroy?

  It's the District of Columbia.

• 2:20Griffin McElroy?

  It's not a state, it's the District of Columbia. We're pretty fucking sore about it.

• 2:23Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, right into that one. Topic.

• 2:25Griffin McElroy?

  What state? I mean, they, I'm not an electric scooter guy. God wants me to be one because he put two beautiful fucking grinders on my, on my doorstep this morning. They look fully ready to fuck. Like, they look good to go.

• 2:38Travis McElroy?

  So you busted out, you busted out the quiver that you have for the second one, right? So that as you ride the first one, charge the pleats, you whip that second one off your back.

• 2:48Griffin McElroy?

  And you can hop from one to the other while you're on the highway, because these motherfuckers look street legal and ready to go.

• 2:54Travis McElroy?

  They got NOS?

• 2:56Griffin McElroy?

  What's that?

• 2:56Travis McElroy?

  They got NOS?

• 2:58Griffin McElroy?

  I don't, Travis, I don't know anything about electric scooters. You keep asking questions about like the, the gizmos and gadgets.

• 3:04Travis McElroy?

  Are they still there?

• 3:06Griffin McElroy?

  Are they still? Yeah, man, I don't know. I, I, I saw them fucking 10 minutes ago. Now you're gonna make me paranoid that I have to check periodically that somebody's not gonna scoot.

• 3:13Travis McElroy?

  Bring them inside, Griffin! Are you a little bit worried, Griffin, about the fact that someone drove, not one someone, two someone?

• 3:22Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah. Oh dang.

• 3:24Travis McElroy?

  Drove to where you live, and they were like, this is the place, and then left.

• 3:28Griffin McElroy?

  Looks like we'll stop right here. Our journey ends here at Griffin McElroy's house. Yeah, Jews, the game's afoot. I am, I've been keeping my eyes peeled all morning for these fucking sneaky grinders who have, uh, rolled up to my house, left me a beautiful gift. I can't wait to zoom on these things.

• 3:46Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, but it is like where is?

• 3:48Griffin McElroy?

  Where are, but like, for real though, where are you guys? Cause there's two of you.

• 3:55Travis McElroy?

  And there's one of him, and you knew that, didn't you? You knew that going in, that there's one of him and two of you. It might be a Pennywise thing.

• 4:02Griffin McElroy?

  Oh, they are a little bit close to a, to a little sewer, whatever you call that.

• 4:07Travis McElroy?

  I think that renting a scooter rather than buying your own is quite Pennywise, Travis. Thank you.

• 4:12Griffin McElroy?

  Oh, that's cool, man. But I don't know what you mean by rent.

• 4:15Travis McElroy?

  They never talk about that in the It storyline of how frugal he is. Like, that's not his real name. His real name's Tony, but everybody calls it Pennywise because he's so good with money.

• 4:25Travis McElroy?

  And he eats kids or whatever that like, yeah, obviously that's overwhelming. Take it from Jonathan Swift. That's a perfectly logical reaction to economic pressures. You know what I mean? There we go. Thank you. It's his social commentary he's doing. How more penny wise can you be? The children for fuel. Can you get, you know?

• 4:44Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, sure. Sure. So I got a fucking zoom, guys. I'm not kidding. I don't got a show in me today when I know all the incredible fucking road adventures waiting for me out there.

• 4:53Travis McElroy?

  Well, do you want to, we can pause the recording, Griffin. You can go have like a two hour sojourn on your electric scooter and then come back and report to us what it was like?

• 5:03Griffin McElroy?

  Okay, yeah, let's take a quick two hour break and then we'll, we'll pick it back up.

• 5:06Travis McElroy?

  Okay.

• 5:06Griffin McElroy?

  Oh, fuck you guys.

• 5:08Travis McElroy?

  Oh, no, what happened?

• 5:09Griffin McElroy?

  Oh, fuck you guys. Fuck. I fell down a 20 times and I fucked up my legs.

• 5:17Travis McElroy?

  No. Oh, man.

• 5:18Griffin McElroy?

  Both of them. Fuck. A road rash much? I look like Raspberry City over here. Fuck guys, those things. And get this, you need to pay for them on your fucking phone? Crazy. And I found the two guys. They stabbed me a little bit.

• 5:36Travis McElroy?

  No.

• 5:36Griffin McElroy?

  It's been a bad two hours. I'm glad we weren't recording all that.

• 5:39Speaker 04

  Griffin, give me their location and I will destroy the Australian.

• 5:44Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, during the two hours, Justin got that Robocop upgrade that he's been talking about.

• 5:50Griffin McElroy?

  Damn.

• 5:50Speaker 04

  Ready to go, punks?

• 5:53Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 5:53Speaker 04

  Ready to zoom?

• 5:56Speaker 04

  You bullied my brother off his scooter while I'm bowling your dick off your balls.

• 6:02Griffin McElroy?

  Um, I did try putting one foot on each scooter and then blasting and it tore my, it tore my, uh, wiener and butt apart. Into two. Yeah. There's a, there's a Yiddish expression of you can't ride a horse, two horses with one behind, one, one fanny. And it turns out that that's true for scooters. And that the penalty is.

• 6:24Travis McElroy?

  Your peanut tin bucket gets torn torn right in half. I I got into a habit of pre show and post show when we would be a little bit of a distance from the venue and our hotel of like grabbing one of those rental scooters. Yeah. Zipping on down to the venue, grinding down to the venue or grinding home from the venue in the dark. Yeah. And I had to get honest with myself at a certain point that when I was zooming in the dark past people who had just come to my podcast. Yeah, it was the coolest fucking thing in the world. I had to accept that some part of me is trying to have the funniest death possible. Sure, sure.

• 7:08Travis McElroy?

  Some part of me is over the fact that this dipshit on a scooter after his podcast in front of people who had just listened to his podcast like. Yeah.

• 7:18Travis McElroy?

  I mean, you don't want it. I don't want it. No, not at all. Scared of it. Huge scared. We are three professional comedian entertainers and I think that if once, God forbid, we pass the question, how'd he go was followed with, you're never gonna fucking believe this. Think I'm fucking with you. That's the best, best case scenario. Remember when they released the Whopper three in 2060? Well, he choked to death on that. Yeah. Believe he choked to death. I like that, actually. He was singing the Munch Squad theme song while chewing on the Whopper on the Whopper three. Wait, wait, Munch Squad, he stopped doing that podcast 30 years ago. Yeah. No, he did it. They just stopped recording it. Doing just that. He never stopped. Munch Squad continued in perpetuity.

• 8:03Travis McElroy?

  He was eating the cyber Whopper. They got him. Have you, Trav, did you get down there to try all the how to train your dragon meals yet? Did you enjoy those? Uh, no, because I it's not how to eat your dragon, Justin. And I. Okay. Upset my interesting. It should be. No, Justin, I was too busy last weekend to eat the How to Train Your Dragon thing because I had to watch, my children are in dance class and they're wonderful and talented and great. And they were in two separate sessions of recitals. Hey Trav, so's Glenn Powell, but you don't hear me bragging about it. You know what I mean? You had to go watch Dan Powell, Glenn Powell's dance recital? Sorry Trav, you were trying to counter burn me, but you fell on your own feet.

• 8:48Travis McElroy?

  But I'm sorry, I was at dance recitals basically from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Last weekend. Um, there were breaks in between, but what am I gonna do with that time? But it's cool because the second dance recital ended with pre-k through first grade hip hop class of 30 kids and it was a balm to my soul, Justin. It made it all worth it. These kids, uh, they've turned, they've turned their striving to dance and I loved it so much, Justin. Oh God, it was good. There is nothing I dislike more than a dance recital, man. That is weaponized art.

• 9:28Travis McElroy?

  You're holding people prisoner to do art at them. It makes, it's, it's rough. If my kid was on stage the whole time, I'd love it. My kid's on stage three minutes out of 60. I, it's exhausting to watch other people's kids do dance. Like I, I was so tired by the end of it.

• 9:53Griffin McElroy?

  My kids don't even do dance, but I could fix dance recitals real quick. You ready?

• 9:56Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 9:56Griffin McElroy?

  It's, it's, now it's competitive. Uh, now it's competitive. Now it's how, so you, how you think you can, how you think you could dance now, kids with the stars? And the, the different classes, hip hop, dance crew, kindergarteners goes up against like, you know, the fifth grade, uh, you know, ballet team. Obviously they're gonna get fucking rocked. Um, but it's competitive.

• 10:16Travis McElroy?

  Though, right?

• 10:17Griffin McElroy?

  It is seated for us. Yeah, we are, we are seated. And then at the end, they come out and they're like, all right, kids come out, everyone wins. And everyone gets like a medal that said like, you're a winner, you did it. And then as soon as the kids get off the stage, the adults are like, okay, for real. Now it's time to announce the winner. Because you gotta know whose kids rocked whose kids had competitive dance in there.

• 10:34Travis McElroy?

  I do like that when I watch a dancer's side, I'll build storylines in my head of like behind the scenes drama. Where I'm trying to guess which of them don't get along with each other, which one's like the teacher's favorite. Which one's the one that the teacher's like, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna put you over here. And that kind of keeps me entertained a little bit behind, you know, like making a behind the scenes drama. I will say also the dance recitals are one of the few places that I do get exposed to new music, which I appreciate.

• 11:03Griffin McElroy?

  That's a shame.

• 11:04Travis McElroy?

  It's so hard to discover new music these days.

• 11:07Griffin McElroy?

  Such a huge.

• 11:08Travis McElroy?

  Whipping your phone out, shazam.

• 11:13Travis McElroy?

  I'm trying to get it. Start it over. I didn't shazam it in time. Why are you only doing a mashup of it? I can't shazam half a mashup, Darlene. Is this Shawn Mendes? I'm gonna report to the RCA, Charlene. Shawn Mendes X DeBarge? You're crazy for this one, Belinda.

• 11:36Griffin McElroy?

  Uh, how about we do some advice?

• 11:37Travis McElroy?

  I'm an entomologist, so I'm comfortable around insects and other creepy crawlies. It's scenarios where there's a bug inside. I'm more than happy to be the go-to person who scoops up the critter and humanely relocates them. It feels good to alleviate a potentially stressful situation for human and bug alike. I've just moved into a new neighborhood. I'm thinking about offering my bud catching services to my neighbors. What's a good way to advertise my willingness and enthusiasm for performing these sorts of one-off insect rescue missions? That's from Critter Catcher in North Carolina.

• 12:10Travis McElroy?

  That's wild.

• 12:11Griffin McElroy?

  I mean, you know, it's wild.

• 12:12Travis McElroy?

  You know, it's wild, right?

• 12:14Griffin McElroy?

  We don't have to dwell.

• 12:15Travis McElroy?

  The problem is, this, I think, okay, it's wild, but I'm gonna nail down why it's wild. Because there aren't journeyman, like, uh, you know, in- insect.

• 12:27Travis McElroy?

  Jobs, what's what are my exterminators, right? There's no midpoint, so either they're gonna call you constantly for shit because there's bugs everywhere. Yeah. Or no one's gonna contact you about this and you're throwing yourself out. We know, we said at the beginning.

• 12:44Griffin McElroy?

  We just said it was wild.

• 12:46Travis McElroy?

  I know, but just to tell someone it's wild. If they wrote the question in, they don't have the context for why it's wild. Yeah, they do because they sent it to us, the wild boys.

• 12:55Griffin McElroy?

  Travis, I, we, we have to assume better of our dear, sweet listeners that when they send in a scenario like this, they know how fucked up and twisted.

• 13:04Travis McElroy?

  That's true.

• 13:05Griffin McElroy?

  To have a bespoke, a la carte bug relocation service offered to your neighbors is simply not a thing. Now, can we play with that? Sure, we can have fun with that.

• 13:16Travis McElroy?

  Can we willingly eat these sins so they're not exposed to reality? Of course, yeah. Get them out of your noodle, put them here. You need a barter system. What's the thing you don't want to do around your house? Yeah. That when someone calls you and they're like, yeah, got another moth in here or whatever. And you're like, cool, I need to like turn this hand on, I don't want to do that or whatever. Like, what's the thing, what's the exchange rate? Here's what I would offer. Singular bug relocation. The, because I don't mind bug relocation. Bugs don't stress me out, so I could do this gig. What I would tell people is, uh, I will come to your home and remove the bug. Uh huh.

• 13:56Travis McElroy?

  But when I come to your home, I will have in my possession, something that will then be yours. Oh, cool. So this will, this will no longer be my possession. It will be your possession.

• 14:08Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 14:09Travis McElroy?

  And, uh, it's your thing to deal with now.

• 14:12Griffin McElroy?

  And it's your problem. Are there any restrictions on that? Because that's such a fucking bum deal for me, the person with the bug.

• 14:17Travis McElroy?

  Physical lifting, physically hefted. It has to be physically lifted. Single hand.

• 14:22Griffin McElroy?

  One hand dude, because you're bigger.

• 14:24Travis McElroy?

  How about this, size of, number of legs, number of legs of bugs. This is what I'm saying. There has to be an exchange rate, Justin. Cause if I ask you, oh, there's an ant on my counter and you come get it and you bring me a broken microwave. But don't, but that's, you're bringing capitalism into it Travis. No, I'm bringing bartering and exchange rate. Every bug is the exact same amount of effort to get rid of unless you've got one of the craftier ones. That's not true. And you know it. A stink bug is so fucking easy to get. A bee, I individually, I was saying you're being called for individual bugs. There's no one bug that's harder to get than another bug. There's a wasp in my house versus a stink bug. Justin, you're telling me that I get the same piece of shit from your house? Very quick sidebar on wasps. Yesterday I was unrolling a sun umbrella, you know, yes? Yeah.

• 15:09Travis McElroy?

  I'm unrolling it and a wasp comes out of nowhere and stings me. And I get instantly like very angry, but a little nostalgic, like, oh man, look at me, an outdoor kid. But then I forget that part and just get really, really in a lot of pain, a great deal of pain.

• 15:26Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 15:27Travis McElroy?

  And then I'm getting angrier too, cause I really wanna roll this umbrella up. And I'm thinking about how small this guy is and how big I am. So I go up there and I, uh, un- unrolled the, start to unroll the umbrella. And when I do that, you guys aren't gonna believe it. I thought these guys could only do that trick once, but I think that's bees. Cause this dude comes back for a second helping.

• 15:47Griffin McElroy?

  He gets a second dish of juicer.

• 15:49Travis McElroy?

  Justin, could it be, rarely is a wasp a loner, right? A wasp, rarely do you see a wasp who's like, I'm gonna, I'm striking out on my own. Yeah. And perhaps, Justin, this, this wasp was rolling like nine deep, 10 deep and coming. And it was the first wasp's lover. Entirely possible. At one time. Well, he stung me a second fucking time and my kids started laughing at me cause I was crying a little bit, like not even.

• 16:20Griffin McElroy?

  When you get stung by a bug or shit on by a bird or anything like that, isn't there a little bit of a part of you that gets excited like, I got a story for later? Always, man.

• 16:31Travis McElroy?

  Not in this moment, and maybe not with wasps. Maybe I've never got stung by a wasp before, but I felt nauseous and sad. I felt sad about it. It hurt on my hand so bad and there was a bump. Aw, man. He stung me twice and I knew where he was. The second time I knew exactly where he was.

• 16:49Griffin McElroy?

  You look at that bump, you think is a part of it still in there. That's what I think and it freaks me the fuck out.

• 16:54Travis McElroy?

  I know where all of it is. It's in my vacuum. Nice. Whoa. You got him? Yeah, man. I snaked him right out of the air. You ghost busted him.

• 17:01Griffin McElroy?

  And then you released him some, you released him.

• 17:03Travis McElroy?

  I lured him in for a third bite and when he came out for a third taste. Put some salt on your skin. You're like, what's up? I guess humanity still has a couple of tricks left in it.

• 17:12Griffin McElroy?

  Vacuum? Vacuum is my non-offensive, it's my non-lethal bug relocation service that I offer to bugs.

• 17:19Travis McElroy?

  This was the service I provided this gentleman. He had to get away from the kids.

• 17:23Griffin McElroy?

  It's like a, it's a small dust buster and then there's a trigger on it that flips the tank open to just launch whatever bug out that you are done with and then you job done. And then if they're too hard to catch with that, or if they're real bastards about it, then I do have a bug assault launcher. And that's if they, if they can't get, if they don't want to get revacuumed, sucked up and they threaten me in my, my, my house or bite me or my kids. The vacuum is the first wave of what we offer here at my house. If a, if a wasp gets in the house and he doesn't want to get vacuumed up, sorry pal, you're going to catch the smoke.

• 17:58Travis McElroy?

  I also do not extend any protection to locusts or cicadas. And I'll tell you why. Right now, we're in a plague. And plagues don't count. Dot, my five-year-old who has the soul of like a 90-year-old trapped in them, looked at me the other day, just randomly, we're like sitting on the couch and she goes, Probably gonna be a lot of cicadas this year. It's another hot one.

• 18:23Griffin McElroy?

  Damn dude.

• 18:24Travis McElroy?

  What? What the fuck? Like, I was like, okay, cool. I don't know if that's connected in any way. I don't know if those two things are related to each other, but she said it with such confidence. She said it like an old man saying like, gonna rain today. My knee's acting up. Hey, she's got the soul of an old man that made up a bunch of bullshit. Yeah. It got me so deep.

• 18:46Griffin McElroy?

  Our Wabi's back, because he made up a bunch of shit too. I see Wabi in your daughter's eyes, Travis.

• 18:53Travis McElroy?

  Our step great grandpa.

• 18:55Griffin McElroy?

  Our step great.

• 18:58Griffin McElroy?

  When I look in your daughter's eyes, it's like looking into the eyes of our step great grandfather.

• 19:02Travis McElroy?

  Who was a no way blood related to us whatsoever.

• 19:06Griffin McElroy?

  I fucking hope not.

• 19:07Travis McElroy?

  Listen, I think the barrier to entry has got to be so low on this thing. That's the biggest issue is that if it takes me remembering your phone number to get rid of the bug, or texting you to get rid of the bug, no way. If there is a button that makes an alarm go off in your house and you can be there, I'm not kidding. Thirty seconds guaranteed.

• 19:27Griffin McElroy?

  Or it's free.

• 19:28Travis McElroy?

  Yeah. And the first time it doesn't work, I'm tearing the button off the wall. I'm canceling my subscription.

• 19:32Griffin McElroy?

  But that sucks for you, because now you hear the alarm, you have thirty seconds to grab some random shit from your house that you're gonna sprint over there.

• 19:39Travis McElroy?

  You're gonna have to schedule times that you're available. You're gonna have to be walking loops in the neighborhood, just ready. Maybe get yourself a truck. Um, yeah, or some kind of, if you could pneumaticly ship yourself there quickly, that might work. So, or put the bug in the pneumatic tube, send it to me.

• 19:56Griffin McElroy?

  Oh, create a zip line network that starts on your roof.

• 19:59Travis McElroy?

  Yes.

• 19:59Griffin McElroy?

  And it goes down to every other house in the neighborhood. Why did I say roof?

• 20:03Travis McElroy?

  I don't know.

• 20:04Griffin McElroy?

  Did you hear that?

• 20:04Travis McElroy?

  And then a second zip line goes down to your basement, so you can get back.

• 20:09Griffin McElroy?

  Yes, that's cool. Build a prism of, of zip lines all throughout your neighborhood.

• 20:14Travis McElroy?

  This is the problem with zip lines. There are only one way. We gotta figure this out. And that's why we've come here today. How do we get balanced zip lines so I can go back and forth?

• 20:24Griffin McElroy?

  Hmm.

• 20:24Travis McElroy?

  Think about it. That's professional motion, right? Is what you're talking about. Yes, put me on. You cracked that one.

• 20:29Travis McElroy?

  Put me on an infinite loop of zip lines until I die. I was visiting my girlfriend's friend who have a three year old. Upon meeting the child, he immediately asked, are you strong? I'm no athlete or bodybuilder, but my job requires a fair amount of manual work and I have a reputation for being able to lift heavy things at work and in my personal life. It's weird that those are two separate reputations, but let's go on. So I Well, I got my work strong reputation and my life strong reputation. I they know I'm they know I'm strong at work and at home. They think I'm pretty strong, but maybe they don't know exactly how strong, but it is a reputation.

• 21:05Travis McElroy?

  That's like Clark Kent and Superman. You know what I mean? You look at Clark Kent and you're like, I bet that guy could live.

• 21:09Griffin McElroy?

  He's fucking cut. He's built.

• 21:10Travis McElroy?

  On like a big box. And then you look at Superman, you're like, I know that guy could live to bust. But Justin, they're the same person.

• 21:16Griffin McElroy?

  They're the same guy.

• 21:18Travis McElroy?

  Superman is when he's at work.

• 21:21Travis McElroy?

  Uh, so I said, yes. He immediately counted countered with, show me. Brothers, how do I convince this three year old stranger that I'm strong when there isn't a phone book? Or or a board to chop in half nearby. That's from supposedly strong in San Jose. I just to drill down on this. My girlfriend's friend has a child. So this is your girlfriend's friend. It's basically a stranger. I mean, to you.

• 21:48Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 21:48Travis McElroy?

  We can agree. This is not a They even said this three year old stranger. It's three year old stranger. I mean, I've learned that children are inherently weak. They're very small. Their muscles are dough. The ability to prove to them that you're stronger than they are is so easy. You could pick up anything large. It doesn't have to be dense or heavy. And if you make this noise

• 22:17Travis McElroy?

  when you do it, the kids lose their shit.

• 22:20Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, they love it when you yell.

• 22:21Travis McElroy?

  It's really hard to top physically picking someone up like because their moment like everything. All the different stuff that they can do at that point is severely limited because they no longer have the ground to work with. You know what I mean? Like. You just kind of lift them up. And I think as terms of strength, I mean. Yeah, I can't pick myself up. I've tried. You know what I mean? If I try to pick myself up, I don't go anywhere. So if someone picks, someone else picks me up, they're stronger than I am. I used to think about that in class, like when I was younger, I would think if you got so strong that you could lift more than your body weight.

• 23:01Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah. Yeah, no, I mean, the Lorax figured this out and he's a dumb little puppet monster. I don't understand why I can't fucking lift myself up by the seat of my pants and fly up into the sky.

• 23:11Travis McElroy?

  Do you guys ever have recurring, I have a recurring dream where in the dream, I figured out how to jump up and not come back down and just kind of hover around like I'm glitching.

• 23:22Travis McElroy?

  And every time in the dream, I will say or think, ah, I finally figured out how to do it in real life. And I was so excited. And then I wake up and I'm so disappointed. And it happens maybe twice a week. I have that dream. I'm sorry, Travis. Yeah, but I've basically, in the dream, what I'm saying is I've figured out how to pick myself up. You know what I mean? But you've forgotten by daylight. Yep. Ain't that the way? What? Oh, you just gotta pick yourself up by your bootstraps. Have you ever tried that, Justin? Grab your bootstraps, pull up real hard.

• 23:52Griffin McElroy?

  Ass hanging down?

• 23:53Travis McElroy?

  Yourself in the air. That's, well, Trav, that's why, that's why that expression exists, actually. Funny enough, the fact that you can't pull yourself up by your bootstraps. It's exactly why it's used the way it is. Because the idea that you would be able to elevate your own position by pulling on your own bootstraps. Is so ridiculous. And that's why the idiom is the way it is. You know, Justin, it's the same with the world is your oyster. Because the rest of that is go out there and shuck it, which means it's there if you're willing to work for it. Not it's laid open before you. Anyways, welcome to.

• 24:26Griffin McElroy?

  Let's go, what's go, what's going on? Hey, guys, what's going on?

• 24:32Griffin McElroy?

  Like, don't get me wrong. I love that it's a service we can also provide. Like, we can do joke, but we can also do like, you know, Roman Mars shit. And that's cool. It's just like, it's a switch there with so.

• 24:43Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, what do you want to talk about, Griffin?

• 24:44Griffin McElroy?

  I would rather do like jokes about Mario's balls. Or like a fucking

• 24:49Travis McElroy?

  We can do some of those. We barely touched on The littlest bit of serious.

• 24:54Griffin McElroy?

  It felt like five whole

• 24:55Travis McElroy?

  Oh no.

• 24:56Griffin McElroy?

  Felt like five whole Gregorian minutes to me of spent of just like, and it's not just, and guys, it wasn't just that you started to drop fun facts. Your whole like tone, like it was like a mask came on. You're like, it's funny. You should say, like you

• 25:10Travis McElroy?

  We said one fact each, Griffin.

• 25:12Griffin McElroy?

  But it was the way you said it was like maximum Frasier and it was like, what's going, really, really felt like you guys were

• 25:20Travis McElroy?

  I've actually been pitching that to Paramount Plus. If you would keep that to your maximum Frasier, my post apocalyptic Frasier reboot. Please, I've told you not to share that with our audience. It's not ready yet.

• 25:32Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 25:33Travis McElroy?

  Please. It's so important when a group is trying to show versatility, that at least one

• 25:40Griffin McElroy?

  You're doing the voice right now. This is your like, do you understand what I'm saying? Like where's my brother?

• 25:43Travis McElroy?

  I'm kinda sick. I've been outside all the time and I inhaled everything. It's dangerous out there. I inhaled everything because I'm at the park all the time and I'm just kinda sick, Griffin. I'm not trying to do a voice with you. I just knew that about bootstraps. Okay, if you can stop bullying me, I would really appreciate it. Why are you being like this?

• 26:01Griffin McElroy?

  I just want us to

• 26:02Travis McElroy?

  Griffin, why are you being like this?

• 26:03Griffin McElroy?

  Me right now am expressing a desire for us to feel safe and comfortable in this environment to be ourselves.

• 26:10Travis McElroy?

  Okay, Justin and I, hold on, Justin and I. You're doing expressly the opposite.

• 26:16Griffin McElroy?

  If that makes me a bad, I'm trying to make this a safe place where you know you don't have to be anything other than exactly what you are.

• 26:24Travis McElroy?

  Are you, you're, okay, your submission is that the

• 26:28Griffin McElroy?

  What I'm doing is good.

• 26:29Travis McElroy?

  Midnight Society, your submission of the Midnight Society. The boisterous, the boisterous happy guys. That's the true us. Anything less than that. Anything less than that is a put off.

• 26:38Griffin McElroy?

  You don't have to be happy. No, you're misrepresenting me.

• 26:40Travis McElroy?

  Any bit of dourness.

• 26:41Griffin McElroy?

  You're misrepresenting me. We could do a sad joke about Mario's balls. Like it doesn't have to be happy guys. Like look around.

• 26:46Travis McElroy?

  Mario's balls.

• 26:48Griffin McElroy?

  No fucking, we hear how Mario's balls got stuck in manhole cover. He got stuck in manhole cover going down to try to kill Bowser down there. See, you could do a sad joke about Mario's balls. It doesn't, I'm not going to force us to, I want you to be what you are. And if that's sad or mad at me, always like

• 27:05Travis McElroy?

  Mad at you about Mario's balls? Not fit mad at you at all, Griffin.

• 27:09Griffin McElroy?

  What did I do?

• 27:10Travis McElroy?

  Tomorrow's balls.

• 27:12Griffin McElroy?

  Trove my car over him. But I did, I just want. I guess I'm trying to be a good brother.

• 27:18Travis McElroy?

  And you are.

• 27:19Griffin McElroy?

  Take me away jail. Take me away, take me away to jail for trying to be a good fucking brother for once.

• 27:24Travis McElroy?

  Lift their dad up.

• 27:26Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 27:27Travis McElroy?

  Is their dad around? Pick their dad up.

• 27:29Griffin McElroy?

  Well, that's a dangerous, that is a, that is a, may, we, if we don't know the answer to that question. I don't know that we can suggest.

• 27:37Travis McElroy?

  If the dad's not around, you become the dad because dads are inherently strong to their children. Boom. I'm sorry to your girlfriend, by the way, uh, for whatever.

• 27:48Griffin McElroy?

  Are you strong to your kids, Juice?

• 27:50Travis McElroy?

  No, no, no. No, his kids are two old.

• 27:51Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, I was gonna say, Travis, you can't just drop that. Yeah, by, by five or six, they crack it. By five or six, they know.

• 27:58Travis McElroy?

  Get in the phone book, which I think still exists. See if you can find a place.

• 28:02Griffin McElroy?

  They literally said, they literally, literally fucking said the question that they do not have a phone book.

• 28:06Travis McElroy?

  Okay, then Google. Travis, that is. They said.

• 28:10Griffin McElroy?

  You could not have fucked that up.

• 28:11Travis McElroy?

  Okay, just rip your phone in half. Pull your iPhone out, rip it in half. The trial will, one, respect your strength. Two, respect your commitment to the bit. Three, love your commentary on how we've become too connected to our devices in this day.

• 28:26Griffin McElroy?

  Yes, yes.

• 28:27Travis McElroy?

  Thank you. Don't use your real phone, though. Don't use your own personal phone. Use his, break his dad's phone. See what his dad does. See, look, your dad's not doing shit. That's how strong I am.

• 28:38Griffin McElroy?

  And if the dad's not around, you say, I found your, this is your dad's phone. I found it.

• 28:44Travis McElroy?

  He tried to hide it. He wouldn't follow him. I got it.

• 28:47Griffin McElroy?

  It's full of, uh, messages for you, anyway.

• 28:51Travis McElroy?

  It's all the clues. You need to find it.

• 28:53Griffin McElroy?

  I've just denied you, I've just denied you a great cathartic moment. That's strength.

• 29:00Griffin McElroy?

  The strength is the denial of emotional presence.

• 29:04Travis McElroy?

  That's power.

• 29:05Griffin McElroy?

  That's power, baby.

• 29:07Travis McElroy?

  I was gonna say hire a bunch of extras to compliment your strength, but I actually like this better. If I'm hiring extras, I'm gonna teach them how to fake a fight. Yeah. Fake beat them all up.

• 29:18Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, recreate the whole pool hall fight scene from Step by Step.

• 29:21Travis McElroy?

  It's getting expensive. Oh, yeah. Fuck. Good pull, Griffin. As long as we're touching on this, Griffin. The scene from Family Matters.

• 29:30Griffin McElroy?

  Another kick ass fight scene.

• 29:31Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, no, when Urkel is challenged to the rope climbing contest and he builds a jetpack instead because he uses his strongest muscle, his brain, which isn't a muscle, I don't think. And he flies up with the jetpack to get to the top, which I think is cheating, but in the show it's seen as a celebration. But then he busts through the ceiling and ends up, I think, crossing over to Step by Step.

• 29:51Griffin McElroy?

  He ends up at Step by Step.

• 29:52Travis McElroy?

  Recreate that scene for the three year olds. It's gonna blow.

• 29:55Griffin McElroy?

  So you want this person to...

• 29:58Travis McElroy?

  Basically a TGIS.

• 29:59Griffin McElroy?

  This child said, prove to me your strength, and your suggestion is strap on a jetpack, blast through the ceiling. First of all, first, if I could say the first problem, I mean, okay, let's step, let's take this step by step. There's no jetpacks. You'd die if you blasted into the ceiling.

• 30:18Travis McElroy?

  Because he used his brain. He didn't go buy one at the jetpack store.

• 30:22Griffin McElroy?

  Urkel has invented a jetpack. He smashes into the ceiling. He'll, he's dead now. There's no fucking way.

• 30:28Travis McElroy?

  Urkel didn't die.

• 30:29Griffin McElroy?

  You've left the child alone. Bye, kid. See ya. And then you want them to land.

• 30:35Travis McElroy?

  Wait, wait, you are solely responsible for that child's care. That should have been established.

• 30:40Griffin McElroy?

  I'm assuming maybe a lot, but then the last step of your plan is to go to Step by Step. And I simply don't know how to.

• 30:46Travis McElroy?

  Urkel doesn't aim for Step by Step. He ends up there, takes Al to the dance.

• 30:50Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 30:51Travis McElroy?

  And then he does the Urkel for everyone and everyone on Step by Step ends up doing the Urkel. It was a huge crossover event, Griffin.

• 30:58Griffin McElroy?

  I remember.

• 30:58Travis McElroy?

  Strength, what is?

• 31:00Griffin McElroy?

  But.

• 31:01Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, brought the Tommy Westfall universe to its knees.

• 31:04Griffin McElroy?

  What if?

• 31:04Travis McElroy?

  Just like the TGIF special where Salem had a time traveling hairball and all the different shows, including Teen Angel and Boy Meets World, were shot in different decades for that weekend. Or the Mussy TV event where a New York City blackout crossed over between Caroline and the City and Friends. And. And Seinfeld. And what's the one with Paul Reiser? Mad About You.

• 31:26Griffin McElroy?

  Mad About You?

• 31:27Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, it's a four part continuity that ties together. So good.

• 31:32Griffin McElroy?

  TV used to rip. What if in that scene in Step by Step where Urkel lands with the jetpack, what if instead he, the jetpack malfunctioned in the sky and he fell to his death in the yard of the Step by Step family and then they just had to kind of deal with that? What if you're watching?

• 31:48Travis McElroy?

  It's not Ozark, Griffin. It's Step by Step.

• 31:51Griffin McElroy?

  You're watching Step by Step and just a body just fucking.

• 31:54Travis McElroy?

  And now it's a cover up? Okay, no, no, no. Step by step. Urkel crashes into the yard, dead.

• 32:03Griffin McElroy?

  Dead.

• 32:03Travis McElroy?

  And then the Fargo logo pops up. It's like, holy shit. Yes.

• 32:07Griffin McElroy?

  Yes.

• 32:08Travis McElroy?

  Season seven? Are you sure? It's a soft. It's a soft. People do spin offs all the time. They don't do spin ins. I'm saying you do a spin in where a show is concurrently happening within another show.

• 32:21Griffin McElroy?

  Absolutely. Um, how about we go to the mannequin?

• 32:25Travis McElroy?

  Let's do it.

• 32:35Travis McElroy?

  You're living in the future. Look around you. Doctors are at your fingertips.

• 32:42Travis McElroy?

  Yeah. It used to be you had to go places to find doctors. Now you go get this on your phone to find doctors. Or your computer or whatever. I don't know how you access the internet. Uh, but, or as Mission Impossible would call it cyberspace. Cyberspace? If you're accessing cyberspace, good news, you can find a doctor through Zocdoc. And not just a medical doctor, but a dentist doctor or a brain doctor. What do you need? Um, Travis, I have it on good authority that the entity's efforts to corrupt the information within cyberspace has not been affected with Zocdoc. They have, uh, top of the line protections to protect them from the entity

• 33:26Travis McElroy?

  and to assist Ethan Hunt whenever he needs a physician. Whoa dude, so it's not an impossible mission to get the healthcare you need with Zocdoc. The co-branding opportunity that no one expected, no one paid for, and no one allowed.

• 33:42Griffin McElroy?

  And no one will be happy about probably with our client.

• 33:47Travis McElroy?

  Hey, in that three hour movie, I don't think of them like- If they stop the entity, it will destroy cyberspace no less than 12 times. Then they stop the entity, spoilers, and cyberspace is never addressed. The world seems fine. It really gives you blue balls. I want to see that bitch go down. I don't want the world song to cyberspace. I want to see cyberspace closed, please.

• 34:12Travis McElroy?

  Hey, I'm actually- Does it? You know who doesn't want to see that? Zocdoc. You know why? Because they're committed to helping you find the best doctors in your area. And they love cyberspace. They love cyberspace. If you've relocated or you're looking to switch a position, whatever the, the need, stop putting off those doctor's appointments and go to zocdoc.com/ mybrother to find and instantly book a top rated doctor today. That's Z O C D O C dot com slash mybrother zocdoc.com slash mybrother. I think another weird thing for the Mission Impossible movies is how the entity never eats. Maybe it's too busy. Maybe it doesn't have time to eat. You know what I mean? That happens to all of us. Where do you even find the time to eat?

• 34:58Griffin McElroy?

  Um, well, I get, um, fresh meals sort of delivered to my house, ready to eat from Factor.

• 35:03Travis McElroy?

  La di da, must be nice.

• 35:05Griffin McElroy?

  Okay. Weird energy to bring.

• 35:07Travis McElroy?

  I'm waiting for Ethan to come home so I can make dinner. He's so busy all the time finding the entity, Griffin. I don't even know what ingredients to buy. I don't know how to make it.

• 35:17Griffin McElroy?

  Well, you don't have to worry. It should just, you sound ridiculous right now because Factor's chef crafted meals are ready to eat in just two minutes, taking the hassle out of eating well. So you can get right back to wearing a big suit that inflates to make you look bigger and change the way your face and head looks.

• 35:32Travis McElroy?

  Thank you.

• 35:32Griffin McElroy?

  Or chewing a piece of gom that lets you turn invisible like some sort of chameleon.

• 35:37Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 35:37Griffin McElroy?

  Um, you can get right back to doing that, shooting a gun that has a computer, little, it shoots a little computer out and there's a little guy that comes out of the computer as a hologram.

• 35:46Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 35:47Griffin McElroy?

  And it's, yeah. So all that shit comes in your first Factor box, all of this incredible Mission Impossible technology and also delicious chef crafted meals.

• 35:57Travis McElroy?

  Only one of that, only one of those things is true and we're not going to tell you which one.

• 36:01Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, I mean, it, it will take you a while to pick from the delicious weekly menu options, 45 different weekly menu options. There may very well be Mission Impossible technology on there, but, um, you're also going to get like good, good nutritious breakfasts and on the go lunches and premium dinners.

• 36:21Travis McElroy?

  They're ready so fast.

• 36:23Griffin McElroy?

  Whatever. What?

• 36:24Travis McElroy?

  They're ready so fast.

• 36:25Griffin McElroy?

  They're ready so fast.

• 36:27Travis McElroy?

  This offer won't self-destruct when we're done reading it.

• 36:32Griffin McElroy?

  Um, no, yeah, I don't even know how that would, what had you, what you said would happen.

• 36:37Travis McElroy?

  I don't know how it works in the Mission Impossible franchise either, but they're always.

• 36:41Griffin McElroy?

  It says here in the Factor ad copy, don't even joke about how their phone might blow up because of this commercial.

• 36:47Travis McElroy?

  Fuck. Yeah, please, please, we ask again.

• 36:50Griffin McElroy?

  Get started at factormeals.com slash brother 50 off and use code brother 50 off to get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box. That's code brother 50 off at factormeals.com slash brother 50 off for 50% off plus free shipping, factormeals.com slash brother 50 off.

• 37:06Speaker 05

  Hello.

• 37:07Speaker 06

  Hello, I'm calling on behalf of the Beef and Dairy Network Podcast.

• 37:10Speaker 05

  No, I'm sorry, no sales calls, goodbye.

• 37:12Speaker 06

  It's a multi-award winning podcast featuring guests such as Ted Danson, Nick Offerman, Josie Long.

• 37:17Speaker 05

  I don't know what a Josie Long is, and anyway, I'm about to take my mother into town to see Phantom of the Opera at last. You are wasting my time, and even worse, my mother's time. She only has so much time left. She's ninety-eight years old, she's only expected to live for another twenty or thirty years. Mother, get your shoes on. Yes, the orthopedic ones, I don't want that to carry you home again, do I?

• 37:35Speaker 06

  Right, well, if you were looking for a podcast.

• 37:37Speaker 05

  Mother, you're not wearing that, are you? It's very revealing, mother. This is musical theatre, not a Parisian bordello.

• 37:43Speaker 06

  Simply go to MaximumFun.org.

• 37:45Speaker 05

  I'm reaching for my Samsung Galaxy Four as we speak. Mother! Mother, not that hat!

• 37:51Travis McElroy?

  Pokemon, Insecure, Love Island, Paramore. What do all these things have in common? Black people love them. That's where Black People Love Paramore comes in. We're a pop culture podcast, taking a funny look at the common and sometimes very uncommon things black people love. From asking why so many black kids were secretly emo, to debating whether Beyonce is underrated, hint, she is. We're getting into all the things that make us feel a little bit more seen. Get it? And yes, everybody's invited, no matter your niche, we have room for you. Listen to Black People Love Paramore on MaximumFun.org and wherever you get your podcasts.

• 38:37Griffin McElroy?

  Yes, dude. Right.

• 38:43Travis McElroy?

  I want a month squad.

• 38:47Travis McElroy?

  One, two months.

• 38:50Griffin McElroy?

  Squad, dude, you're eating and you left no fucking crumbs, dude.

• 38:56Travis McElroy?

  Welcome to my squad, it's a podcast of the podcast, profiling the latest and greatest of brand eating. I'm just inspired, guys, I've been directing this show, The Prom, at the theatre, at the Ritter Park Amphitheatre, you can get tickets at hartprom.com, H-A-R-T, prom.com, it's this weekend. How dare you promote art? This weekend, not next weekend, you missed it last weekend, I wish you'd come, but this weekend you can come on out. Unless you're gonna be in Columbus with us. Unless you're gonna be in Columbus. Hey, listen, love, folks, do both, alright? It's not that far, what, four hours? No, Prom's three nights, you can make it all happen. Our show's two, Prom's three, figure it out. Get committed, or get out of the way. And let somebody else, a real fan. Whoa.

• 39:36Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah. Hot, super hostile. Yeah, absolutely.

• 39:40Travis McElroy?

  Super hostile. That's how they sell tickets on Broadway, Griffin. They stand outside and they yell like, I thought you were a real fan. And you're like, what show is this? And you're like, Once Upon a Mattress. And they're like, I like Once Upon a Mattress. I'm like, do you? Cause you're not in here. You're about to be once upon in a coffin forever. Whoa.

• 39:57Griffin McElroy?

  I'm gonna fucking kill you if you don't come see Once Upon a Mattress.

• 40:02Travis McElroy?

  Come see Beetlejuice or you'll learn a thing or something about being dead for real.

• 40:06Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, cause I'll make, I'll make you dead meat if you don't come to Beetlejuice.

• 40:10Travis McElroy?

  With these two hands and this knife.

• 40:14Travis McElroy?

  You're in town, you're in trouble. If you don't come to see our play.

• 40:18Griffin McElroy?

  I'm gonna spill your Beetlejuice, by which I mean the blood inside you, if you don't come see Beetlejuice.

• 40:24Travis McElroy?

  Cats have nine lives, but your stupid ass doesn't. So come see cats. Uh, I'm glad that was about cats, or I would have been really lost. Okay, listen, Taco Bell has debuteded crispy chicken tacos and burritos. They have what? They have debuted. They have debuted, you know what I'm saying? Just having some fun. Uh, those are available today, I think, if I'm doing the math correctly. Taco Bell is unleashing a full flavored and full size, yet just as craveable, version of crispy chicken in its boldest move yet. Okay. That's a big, that's a big claim. Taco Bell saying their boldest move yet.

• 41:08Travis McElroy?

  Now, when they say full flavor, was there an, was there a different option that they considered?

• 41:14Griffin McElroy?

  They did shitty chicken nuggets for a minute.

• 41:16Travis McElroy?

  We're gonna, we're gonna expand the chicken, but not the flavor part, just the size. Yeah, the flavor's perfect. Starting June 17th, the brand is loading its crispy chicken strips into its most iconic formats with the debut of crispy chicken tacos and burritos, available nationwide for a limited time. Okay, Justin, can I stop you for a second? Uh, you have. Yeah, I think it's real bold and brassy of these Taco Bell PR people.

• 41:49Travis McElroy?

  To act like, hey, we had this protein based thing and you're never going to believe what we thought of doing with it. We put it in a taco. Like that that is supposed to Yeah. Blow my brain out of the water or whatever. Travis, a hundred percent. And I think you can, if there is a theme of this press release, I do believe it is that hubris, that toxic hubris where they have discovered that people like to buy crispy chicken and they've gotten what we in West Virginia might call above their raisin. You know what I mean? Yeah. They're, they've forgotten where they came from and now they're, they're thinking like their shit don't stink. Listen to this.

• 42:30Griffin McElroy?

  I mean, they made a McDonald's snack wrap. Do you want?

• 42:32Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 42:32Griffin McElroy?

  A fucking wrap trophy?

• 42:34Travis McElroy?

  Eight dollars for it? I bet you do. Quote, no, I'm not to the quote yet. I'm still trying to finish this. It's the same signature recipe fans loved in the sellout nuggets and the latest step in what's quickly becoming a full on crispy chicken era for Taco Bell. They're trying to restart the wars.

• 42:53Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, they can't. It's so irresponsible. I don't think there's a person alive who it's too fresh. We just lived through it. I think there's a weariness and I don't think Taco Bell's going to get anyone.

• 43:03Travis McElroy?

  We don't have the resource. I'm not going back to rationing. Hey, tell me this is someone who is being cautious of their words and deeds. Quote, crispy chicken is having a moment, but our fans have made it a movement, said Taylor Montgomery, chief marketing officer at Taco Bell. Bold. Good. Bold.

• 43:20Griffin McElroy?

  Just like, just like, just like, just like Hamilton.

• 43:23Travis McElroy?

  Just like Hamilton. So we decided.

• 43:25Griffin McElroy?

  That weird song in the middle of Hamilton where he does a whole thing about crispy chicken?

• 43:28Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 43:29Griffin McElroy?

  I thought was cool. My favorite part of the show.

• 43:31Travis McElroy?

  And it's weird because it's start and it's like, I, if you could pull up, um, Mr. Burr, it'll be ready in like 10 minutes. He's like, I'm gonna wait for it. And it's like,

• 43:39Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, he says about how he's gonna wait for it.

• 43:41Travis McElroy?

  Yeah. And so we decided to bring out our sellout nuggets recipe to the formats that define. Our brand because true innovation means elevating the icons, not replacing them. But it's not. But we're not like every- They took the thing that we're making and put it on tacos. Travis, we're not like every other chicken spot out there. We're doing crispy chicken the only way we know how. Full of flavor and unmistakably Taco Bell. It's weird that we didn't start with tacos and work our way backward. It's our core competency. They needed to see if it was good enough to put in a taco and then they did it. After the breakout success of crispy chicken nuggets, these motherfuckers.

• 44:22Travis McElroy?

  It's chicken nuggets! If you put it on the menu, everybody will buy it. You know what? There's a hot trend, there's a hot trend at every motherfucking restaurant in the Walt Disney World Resort, and it's called serving chicken nuggets, because they will be purchased. Fuck! The next move is obvious. Take the craveable tortilla coated crunch fans love, and pack it in the formats that may may talk about famous tacos and burritos. At the center is the new crispy chicken strip. All white meat chicken marinated in fan favorite zesty jalapeno buttermilk flavor, and breaded with crispy tortilla chips. The inclusion of the word flavor there sucks.

• 45:06Griffin McElroy?

  They keep, they keep, they-

• 45:08Travis McElroy?

  I would say-

• 45:08Griffin McElroy?

  Insisting that there's flavor.

• 45:10Travis McElroy?

  Then it's loaded into bold builds with layers of texture familiar favorites like shredded cheddar and pico de gallo. Whoa, they put cheese on it? They put cheese on it.

• 45:20Griffin McElroy?

  It's just moving closer to the light of Christ in the McDonald's snack wrap. That's just what you're making, guys. I promise you.

• 45:27Travis McElroy?

  From Liz Matthews. And there's just a wisp of lettuce on there, as if we almost forgot to include it. The wettest, softest lettuce.

• 45:34Griffin McElroy?

  This most transparent lettuce you've ever seen.

• 45:36Travis McElroy?

  Is the full perimeter of the lettuce brown? Why, of course it is. It's the kind of lettuce that makes you ask, is that part of the wrapper? Mm-hmm. It looks like a child's science experiment where they soaked it in food coloring and the food coloring was brown. Enjoy! Crispy chicken is growing every single day, and our fans have told us loud and clear, give us more. Or we listened. Continue to innovate and now have delivered, said Liz Matthews. Taco Bell's-

• 46:05Travis McElroy?

  Global Chief Food Innovation Officer. Hardest job.

• 46:08Griffin McElroy?

  Hardest job on the planet.

• 46:09Travis McElroy?

  Yeah, let's hear of our frontline workers.

• 46:11Griffin McElroy?

  Give it up, Liz.

• 46:12Travis McElroy?

  From our viral crispy chicken nuggets to redesigning it. You can't, I think we gotta start being a bit more careful about what we call viral and what we call popular. Because I feel like for virality to be achieved, the nuggets have to in some way be self-replicating, right? There has to be some amount of the nuggets that are just perpetuating themselves. I would also like to avoid referring to anything edible as viral. Yeah. The obsession with perfecting the crispy chicken recipe, the sauce, the they're still throwing a parade for themselves for adding chicken nuggets to the menu. I also like the imagery of the obsession of like, listen, we as a company didn't want to do this,

• 46:57Travis McElroy?

  but Todd would not let it go.

• 47:00Griffin McElroy?

  Fucking free, you fucking sickos. And your fan favorite jalapeno flavorings.

• 47:06Travis McElroy?

  We didn't want to do it. We hate selling these things.

• 47:09Griffin McElroy?

  We hate doing this. We are not called Chicken Bell.

• 47:11Travis McElroy?

  The obsession runs so deep Taco Bell couldn't pick just one person to help launch it. Because if crispy chicken nuggets proved anything. It's the existence of God. It's that everyone's into crispy chicken done the Taco Bell way. So a full-on crispy chicken cameo casting call was unleashed, tapping unexpected icons and devoted fans from every corner of culture to taste the crispy bold greatness for themselves. Is Young Gravy in the mix? Because Young Gravy's always in the mix. I, no, his absence is noted and suspicious, I will say, Travis.

• 47:48Travis McElroy?

  Young Gravy, where art thou? That's what I say. Yeah. They probably had to turn him away. It was opt out for Young Gravy. We have comedic nods from Kate Flannery to surprise voices like Gata. And expert tastemakers like Christian Petroti. A wide array of cameos is all about this shared obsession because when the chicken hits this hard, everyone's got something to say. I don't know.

• 48:13Griffin McElroy?

  So are we gonna get to see those Taco Bell?

• 48:15Travis McElroy?

  Wouldn't that be something? Wouldn't that be something? They talk about them in here, but I don't know if we can find them, maybe.

• 48:21Griffin McElroy?

  So in this press release you're saying-

• 48:23Travis McElroy?

  Back from summer vacation, lying to their friends about the cool shit their uncle let them do.

• 48:28Griffin McElroy?

  I for sure met young gravy. It was crazy, man.

• 48:32Travis McElroy?

  Film the coolest TikToks about this. He loved it. He thought it was good. He did a cameo for me for free. I wasn't allowed to share them with you because you don't deserve them.

• 48:41Griffin McElroy?

  We got our cameo and we just went nuts, gang. Anyway, enjoy the chicken.

• 48:45Travis McElroy?

  Anyway, yeah. Uh, so that's the chicken. They're doing chicken tacos. If you can believe it. Believe it or not.

• 48:53Griffin McElroy?

  I, I, I housed so many of those McDonald's snack wraps. It was my favorite sort of go-to guy and I think they stopped doing them.

• 49:01Travis McElroy?

  Great guy.

• 49:02Griffin McElroy?

  I think they stopped doing them in like 1999 perhaps. And so I'm excited that they, wait a minute.

• 49:11Travis McElroy?

  No, you made them come back just now.

• 49:12Griffin McElroy?

  No, no, no, no, no.

• 49:16Griffin McElroy?

  McDonald's snack wraps are coming back on July 10th.

• 49:19Travis McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 49:22Griffin McElroy?

  The fuck's going on, man?

• 49:23Travis McElroy?

  What?

• 49:23Griffin McElroy?

  How can there be, how can, how can we go from zero snack wrap offerings? In the, in the, in the fast food marketplace to now, like the, the big fucking dog is coming right back as Taco Bell steps into its territory.

• 49:36Travis McElroy?

  Here's what, here's my, where I'm at currently is that there is not so much food trends as there are food extras. So everybody get pumped for chicken because we have lots of chicken. We just ended up with a lot of chicken as a nation. Well, eggs, eggs are too expensive to buy and the damn things keep turning into birds.

• 49:59Travis McElroy?

  Damn it. There's some logic that that makes sense in there Travis. I'm I'm searching for it. Nobody bought these eggs. I'm a supermarket. It's full of birds again. Carl McDonald's. We bought too many eggs. Um, you want to do another question? Yes. Recently, I requested a book through my library's purchase request form. You can do so much with your local library now, you know?

• 50:19Griffin McElroy?

  Amazing. They make so good. They're all free. They're online.

• 50:23Travis McElroy?

  Libby. Check out your local library. There are a lot of great folks there. They love books and they love you. Recently, I requested a book. Periodicals, micro fish. I don't know. It's film or fish. So I went with both in one word.

• 50:35Griffin McElroy?

  You really split the uprights.

• 50:37Travis McElroy?

  Thank you. Within a day, I got a personalized email responding to my request and said that my book would be in by the end of the week. Brothers, much to my chagrin, by the time I made my way to checking out the book, someone else had gotten there. So now I'm on the hold list. Funny enough, I feel me and this person could maybe be friends, given their interest and quickness to seize the specific book and

• 50:55Travis McElroy?

  we'd have a good conversation starter. My question is, how can I get the library staff to give me this potential foe turn into a friend's email? That's from Tomless in Tampa. I, you know what? I realize. See, I'm making a, I'm making a, oh. Yeah, but this is a second question like this, and I'm realizing what's happening here. We have entered, we've entered the A's, the, the, the, the era of our advice giving where like now people come to us. It's like an Ocean's movie where there's like one old guy that used to crack this certain kind of safe and they're like, listen, I got this thing and he's like, can't be done. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like this is the kind of question we get now. They want us to be like, can't be done. And then we walk out and they're like, wait,

• 51:39Travis McElroy?

  it's against this guy you hate. And I'll be like, how much money do you have? That's the rules, dude. That's where we're at. You know what I mean?

• 51:46Griffin McElroy?

  And maybe he die, and maybe he dies at some point in the movie and you're like, it's poignant that they.

• 51:52Travis McElroy?

  It's for him. Well, it's for, it's for there, but it is very much like, hey, brothers, um, I want to meet a stranger based on a book we both like, and I have no way of doing it and I have to convince other people to do it, help me do it. They want us to say, ah. Can't be done. Can't be done. Waste someone else's time, young buck. I got it. You ready for this? It's a, a, a term that I have been using lately to describe like Theresa and I read different books and then talk about them to each other and I refer to it as an asynchronous book club. You can do an asynchronous book club here where the librarian is going to become your like dead drop, right? Where you're like, give them this note, it's anonymous.

• 52:35Travis McElroy?

  And I want an anonymous response about this, right? And we're gonna Trev, I love that so much. Wait, before you even, before you even detail this idea, I'd love to kind of play it out a little bit. So I'll be the librarian and you be the person trying to get the email. Okay?

• 52:47Griffin McElroy?

  And I'll be just, and I'll just be someone standing around.

• 52:51Travis McElroy?

  All right. Just standing around, listening, like just hearing it. And, and I really want to try, let's just really buy in. Okay. I don't want to, I just, let's really try. Go ahead.

• 52:59Griffin McElroy?

  Read my book.

• 53:01Travis McElroy?

  Hey, um, the book, the book that I ordered. Sorry. Yeah. The book that I ordered and somebody like checked it out first. You're be, you're being too loud. Okay.

• 53:12Griffin McElroy?

  I'm in a really good part of my mystery book right now.

• 53:15Travis McElroy?

  I'll, I'll cut my, I'll cut my hands around the librarian's ears. Specifically.

• 53:19Griffin McElroy?

  You're still going.

• 53:20Travis McElroy?

  Um, so I'd love to, I'd love to contact them. Um, only you can hear me now librarian because I'm covering my hands around your ears. Um, I'd love to contact them. If you could deliver them this anonymous letter. No. Now here's the problem with Justin. I feel like what you're failing to keep in mind is that someone doesn't become a librarian because they're not interested in playing out storylines because they don't want to see where the story goes. I'm saying that I think. Ah, damn it. You're right. Because I work at the library. Try again. Okay. Just do the last few words. I was wondering if you could like give this anonymous letter to them.

• 54:02Travis McElroy?

  And and because I'd love to talk to them about this book. You've intrigued me. I do love a classic tale of missed connections. Let me see.

• 54:18Travis McElroy?

  There you go.

• 54:21Travis McElroy?

  I'm sorry, Jeremy.

• 54:22Griffin McElroy?

  Why'd you just blow all that fucking dust on me, dude?

• 54:24Travis McElroy?

  Forgive me, Jeremy.

• 54:27Travis McElroy?

  Your asthma, I've forgotten again. Apologies. So you wish to contact Daniel Peterson? Oh, his name was Daniel Peterson? Okay, thank you.

• 54:38Travis McElroy?

  Hey, hey, Sven.

• 54:40Griffin McElroy?

  Are you a different guy?

• 54:41Travis McElroy?

  Give out another customer's name?

• 54:43Griffin McElroy?

  Sorry, Trav. I gotta know, are you a different guy right now?

• 54:45Travis McElroy?

  I'm a different guy. Now I'm the boss of the library.

• 54:48Griffin McElroy?

  Okay.

• 54:48Travis McElroy?

  Okay.

• 54:48Griffin McElroy?

  Say, all right, say you're, give me my cue again. Make the voice like way lower because I'm getting, getting.

• 54:52Travis McElroy?

  Hey, Sven, did you just give out another library patron's name? No, Father. Oh, I heard you said Daniel Peterson. No, Father, that was a miss. You've misheard again, Father. You've forgotten your daily nap. I am pretty tired. Father, have you been, have you been taking care of your mind? Father, it sounds like you're slipping in your old age. I've been taking my ginkgo bilobob. Jeremy, you hear this, right? You're my witness, Father, slipping.

• 55:23Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah, where's the Bible section?

• 55:28Travis McElroy?

  Thank you so much. Thank you so much for listening to our podcast, which is still called My Brother, My Brother and Me, despite it not being great for SEO.

• 55:39Griffin McElroy?

  Yeah.

• 55:39Travis McElroy?

  You have to enjoy yourself. Time for a rebrand.

• 55:44Travis McElroy?

  Hey, everybody, as mentioned, we're going to be in Columbus this weekend. Um, you should come see us. We're doing, uh, My Brother, My Brother and Me and Adventure Zone, and we'll be at Events of the Origins Game Fair. Uh, if you're coming to a live show and you want to get a question answered or a fear read aloud, you can email it to MBMBAM at MaximumFun.org and put Columbus in the subject line. And announcement, the Dadlands Anaheim Tash Show with Brennan was originally supposed to be on Friday, July 11. But it's been moved to Saturday, July 12th. And the My Brother, My Brother and Me live show that was scheduled for the 12th will now be on the 11th. We apologize for that.

• 56:23Griffin McElroy?

  Which sucks. We're very sorry that we have had to do that. There was a scheduling mishap. And so previously purchased tickets will be valid for the new date. If you're unable to attend refunds are available up to 14 days before the show at the point of purchase.

• 56:36Travis McElroy?

  Tickets for all the shows for the rest of the year are on sale now. You can get all the information and ticket links at bit.ly/macaroytours.

• 56:45Griffin McElroy?

  We got some new merch in the merch store, including a Faster Than Fear Miggy Standee. A lot of just absolutely off the wall shit present in the merch store.

• 56:54Travis McElroy?

  And 10% of all merch choices this month will be donated to the Transgender Law Center. Go check out all of that stuff Griffin just mentioned and more at macaroymerch.com.

• 57:05Griffin McElroy?

  And thanks to Montane for the use of our theme song, My Life Is Better With You. Do we have a fear?

• 57:10Travis McElroy?

  We do. We do. Justin, do you want to read it? Oh, I'd be happy to, Trav. Yeah, thank you so much.

• 57:19Travis McElroy?

  This year, I want to be faster than my fear that an extra lizard will appear in my lizard enclosure. My name is Justin McElroy. I'm Travis McElroy.

• 57:28Griffin McElroy?

  I'm Griffin McElroy.

• 57:29Travis McElroy?

  This has been My Brother, My Brother and Me. Kiss your dad. Square on the lips.

• 58:05Travis McElroy?

  Maximum Fun. A worker-owned network. Of artist-owned shows. Supported directly by you.