cover of episode 128: The Thonged Pumpkins Dilemma

128: The Thonged Pumpkins Dilemma

2024/11/4
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We're Here to Help

AI Deep Dive AI Insights AI Chapters Transcript
People
G
Gareth
J
Jake
考虑在低收入年份进行 Roth 转换以优化税务规划。
J
Jesse
J
John Gabrus
K
Kevin
通过《AI For Humans》播客,推广和解释最新的艺术智能技术和趋势。
L
Lamar
S
Steve Berg
Z
Zach
Topics
Kevin: 作为节目制作人,我分享了一些节目中有趣且具有挑战性的来电经历,例如关于‘屁股灰烬’、‘父母的性爱录像’以及‘被迪士尼人物绑架’的来电。这些经历让我体会到节目制作的乐趣和挑战。 Gareth: 节目中最难忘的来电是关于一位女士声称自己被迪士尼人物绑架的事件,虽然前提有趣,但内容令人不安。节目中关于绑架的来电很难处理,因为既要保持节目的趣味性,又要避免触及敏感话题。 Jake: 节目的通话内容难以预测,有时会出乎意料地偏离预设方向。与嘉宾一起进行节目通话更具挑战性,因为时间有限,且嘉宾可能不熟悉节目风格。节目嘉宾有时会在节目开始前几分钟取消通话,特别是当节目有其他嘉宾参与时。

Deep Dive

Key Insights

Why did the caller decide to put underpants on all the pumpkins?

The caller's brother-in-law and his partner admitted to the prank by putting underpants on the caller's dog, thus confirming their involvement.

How did the caller plan to respond to the pumpkin prank?

The caller planned to create a series of fake voicemails from a character named Lionel Smithy, who is obsessed with the pumpkins, to scare the pranksters.

What was the caller's main concern about the prank response plan?

The caller was worried about not being a good liar and potentially blowing the prank response by not being able to convincingly act out the story.

How did the hosts suggest the caller execute the prank response?

The hosts suggested creating multiple voicemails that escalate in creepiness and sending them to the pranksters over time to build tension and fear.

What was the caller's reaction to the prank response plan?

The caller found the plan hilarious and was excited to execute it, appreciating the creativity and detailed execution suggested by the hosts.

Why did the caller feel the need to apologize to his friend before a comedy show?

The caller accidentally told his friend, who was about to perform his biggest set, that he didn't like any of his jokes, which was part of an ongoing bit but went too far.

What did the hosts suggest as a way for the caller to make amends with his friend?

The hosts suggested the caller perform his friend's set before the friend's performance, praising the jokes to build him up, and then having the friend do the same for the caller's set.

How did the caller initially connect with his students using a false fear?

The caller told his students he had an irrational fear of ostriches, which became a running joke and theme for gifts and decorations from the students.

What did the hosts suggest the caller do to end the ostrich-related pranks?

The hosts suggested the caller create a video of himself trying immersion therapy with ostriches, then announce he's going into hypnosis to overcome the fear, and use this as a fundraising opportunity.

What was the caller's ultimate goal in turning the ostrich prank into a profitable venture?

The caller wanted to use the ostrich prank as a way to raise funds for himself, potentially through a fundraising event where he would wear an ostrich costume at a school event if a certain amount was raised.

Chapters
A caller seeks advice on how to respond to a Halloween prank involving thonged pumpkins placed on their pumpkin display by a brother-in-law. The hosts suggest creating a fictional character, Lionel, who becomes increasingly obsessed with the pumpkins, to scare the pranksters.
  • Create a fictional character, Lionel, who becomes increasingly obsessed with the pumpkins.
  • Send voice messages from Lionel to build tension and scare the pranksters.
  • Space out the messages to mimic real-time calls and increase suspense.

Shownotes Transcript

Translations:
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We are back. Kevin, if you had to say you were put on the spot because I'm putting you on the spot, what has been your favorite call or your Mount Rushmore for the show? Oh, gosh.

I mean, as the producer, I've enjoyed the ones where it was like the butthole ashes where it was like when there's some like behind the scenes coordinating is a lot of fun. The like sex tape where I got that, the alleged sex tape of the parents that I got converted. What was it? Zoo animals.

Yeah, it was that ended up being like 1960s San Diego Zoo. Even though that was a that was a bus, it was still just like following up with like a local film department to be like, how's the like that stuff is fun. Little behind the scenes stuff where it's like following up with callers is a lot of fun. I know your favorite call. Go ahead. The woman who thought she got kidnapped by a Disney character.

That was the most... Did that ever air? It will air on the free feed. It might have aired already, but it's definitely on Patreon.

If you haven't heard it, it was the most confident I've ever gone into a call and the least confident I've ever left a recording in 10 years. Kevin jumped in and he was like, I think what you're trying to say, like the woman was like, no. Well, that's because it went, because afterwards we all talked about it and

I got where you were coming from because the premise was fun and funny. Yeah. But it was just so jarring because she made it seem like she had been kidnapped.

And yeah, it helped her. And I'm like, I love the premise of the show. I can't think kidnapping kid is fun to pitch on. I hate this. Also, this is giving me a stomachache. Not a kid. It was the hardest one to figure out. I'm watching Kevin in a like a trying to seem comfortable panic. Yeah. What were other hard ones, Kevin?

Rather than go in the full circle, we'll do ours on another episode, Gareth. What have been other ones that you were like, while it was happening, you're like, this is way harder than I thought.

I don't have an example off the top. I'll think of something, but I will say that is the biggest, the funnest and most stressful part of the show is sometimes you have absolutely no idea how a call is going to go when we start. I'll have it all set up and go like, man, this is going to be really cool. And then it can go sideways or I'm like, this will be okay. And then it's like one of my favorites was the cat

charity event that you got. And it was a short one too. Oh yeah, that was the Patreon one. Yep. Caddyshack. Yeah. Yeah. And you guys just immediately have like so many incredibly strong pitches that even the caller was like, Jesus. Yeah. I mean, I'm literally using all of these. Yeah. I think they're the ones who bought us the bell. We have the bell to ring. Yeah. Caddyshack bought us that, but, but yeah, you do have a high pressure job and, you know, I give you credit because, uh,

Gareth and I's job is very easy because we are reacting. But it is true if a call, especially when we have a guest, because it feels like you're... Oh, even more, even more. Like when it's just us, who cares? Yeah. Because we've done those where it's really fast and then we're like, nah, this isn't quite working or the tone's not right. Like I remember early on, we had that like really drunk lady. Yeah.

Yeah, we're going to release that one. How fun. Where you're like, when we were really finding what we were trying to do, but it's hard with a guest because you have specific amount of time. And a lot of times our guests have come on and they haven't heard the show. So you're trying to convince them like, have a good attitude and have fun. I promise you this isn't a really waste of an hour. And then the call starts and you're like,

oh no and then we've communicated where i've tried to say during like do we have another one yeah and i've seen you go back and then do like there's no panic email yeah and you're like well yeah you also there are times where you'll like have one in line and then they'll bail five minutes before when we have a guest too when we have a guest because when we have a guest it feels like we have company yes yeah totally look alive best behavior everyone yeah yes

Also, really quick, we got three very special guests on today's episode. Our buddy Steve Berg. Check out his podcast, High Strangeness. Comedian and actor John Gabrus. He hosts the podcast High and Mighty and Action Boys, Super Funny. And previous guest Lamar Woods, former New Girl writer, and he has an album out called Highly Sensitive Person. Okay. All right. Well, without further ado, everybody, enjoy the show. Hello.

Well, hello, my friend. Welcome to We're Here to Help. My name is Steve Berg. I'm joining our friend Jake Johnson today on the show. Oh, my God. Hello. Gareth is traveling today, so we got the great Steve Berg with us. What an awesome surprise. Hello, Steve Berg. Well, it's really nice to meet you, my friend. Why don't you tell us your name and where you're from?

Hi, I'm Kyle. I'm from Brooklyn, New York, and I was expecting you to ask me my age, so I was ready to say I'm 33. 33, great age. Hey, where in Brooklyn are you? I'm up in Greenpoint in the Northern Port. Sure. I used to live in Greenpoint back in 2000, 2001. Beautiful little area. Is it nice? Truly no better place.

I love Greenpoint. Yeah. So Kyle from Brooklyn, Greenpoint, what can we do for you today? Yeah. So actually my question is a little bit about my neighborhood. It's full of creative people. There's always these huge, cool, creative Halloween kind of decorations on everybody's stoops. And so my husband and I were not creative, but we were like, hey, let's throw our hat in the ring this year. We went up to a farm upstate and got

a ton of pumpkins, just like 20, 25 pumpkins, put them all over our soup and people were loving it. We were getting like good feedback. People taking pictures of them, putting their kids up there. And, uh, yeah, so it was cool. Um, and so, but then one morning I walked out my door and somebody had put, um, songs like underwear on every single pumpkin. Yeah.

All right. So what we're looking at here is we got 12 to 13 pumpkins. Some of them are funky pumpkins. And somebody really did put underpants on everyone with the butt facing out. So you got some thongs. You got some regular ones. You got some looks like, I mean, what is that, tiger print?

Yeah, there's some really exotic garments there. Yes. I will say somebody really invested a lot on this print because I got to think underwear of any kind is not very cheap. You're looking at $20 a pop there. Am I wrong on that, Kyle? I think you're right. I think you're right. This is about a $250 bit. It's a lot. Or it's just old underpants, which is even grosser.

Yeah, we were wondering about that. My husband and I kind of spent a week like reeling, like who likes us enough to spend this much on underwear or who hates us enough to put old underwear on these pumpkins. So we kind of asked around like, did you know?

did you do this? Did you do this? And got a whole bunch of no's. Then one day, my brother-in-law and his partner, who also live in the neighborhood with us, came clean by, sometimes they watch my dog, and they put a pair of the underwear on my dog and sent him home with the underwear on. Oh, okay. So,

Yeah, so they kind of declared war. And my question to you is, what do I do about it? How do I respond? I feel like this isn't something I could just walk away from. Okay, so it is the brother-in-law and the brother-in-law's partner who did it because they put underpants on your dog. And by doing that, they admitted to putting underpants on your pumpkin displays. Exactly.

Exactly. And they later followed up with pictures. I sent one to the shark. They put on like full cat suits and kind of came out in the middle of the night and did it under the cover of darkness. So it's fully confirmed to be them. All right. So they snuck to your place and they pantied your pumpkins. Yeah. And so your question is then what? How do we get revenge?

Kind of. It's enough is enough. This is too much. What do I do? So is it kind of like, is what you're looking for, if I may just be specific, is a Halloween prank, like, you know, back at them, right?

I think so. I mean, you know, they have done this before. When we came back from our honeymoon, they had covered every surface in our apartment with googly eyes. So this is kind of a long standing, you know, sort of situation where they've gotten us with little little bits along the way. So I think this is kind of the last straw. So if we could make a Halloween theme, that would be great. Right. My first pitch is not going to be to prank the prankster.

I don't think we tit for tat and you put like boys underwear on their scarecrows. There goes my idea. Berg just turns off his video. I mean, I think you could do that, but I don't know what we're getting out of that. I think what we do is we try to fuck with them a little bit.

And the area I'm going, which I don't know how it ends or if it works, is that the city called about the underpants or like a family member in the neighborhood was really offended. And it's created a world of trouble for you. The HOA. Yeah. Yeah. The HOA is like breathing down their neck. Right. Like there wouldn't be an HOA in Greenpoint. I don't imagine. Oh, really? Is that correct, Kyle?

Yeah, that's correct. It's kind of anarchy out here. But there is the NYPD. There is the NYPD. There is something we could set up that or we create a crazy neighbor and we have Steve Berg right now leave a mad voicemail. Right, right. And it's like, you know, I got an idea, Kyle. What do you think of this?

What if you say, hey, really funny, but you guys have actually made our lives a living hell? And they go, what do you mean? And you go, apparently we have like a true psychopath who lives on this street. He lives in his mother's basement in the little basement apartment. Yeah. He's in his late 50s, lives with his 90-year-old mother.

And he has like 17 cats. We've never seen him, but he got our information and he is really one triggered and two turned on by these underpants.

now we're getting voicemails at all times about how he hates us he wants to kill us and he wants to have sex with all our pumpkins and he's asking for a meeting and we don't know what to do and he's asking for a meeting at 2 a.m at face to face and he would really like to speak to the woman who wore all those underpants and she should bring all her socks oh my god i love it so i love it the one thing that i'm worried about is i am not a good liar how about doing it over email

I think if you, you know, I mean, I'm telling you, I like where Jake's going, especially with the voicemail, because they're like, you can start over the email and think, and I just got a voicemail. Listen to this. You can see the digital recording. Cause then you're, then they'll have their, that like little stomachache, like, Oh, what did we do? What we could do. So your only fear Kyle is you don't feel like you're a great liar and you don't want to blow it.

I think I could sell it if I had a prop, like, like, like Steve said, the voicemail, I think could help me sort of fortify it with like evidence a little bit. Um, but on my own, I don't know if I could think on the fly fast enough to really have a fully built out story. So I like the voicemail idea. So, you know, we could, you know, we could do Kyle is we could make little, uh, voicemails right now and send them to you as little clips, uh,

And then we could put together an email that you send and you send all the little voicemails and we could make like 15 short ones that get like scarier and scarier as they go. It's good with the Halloween theme. Right. I mean, here's the reality. You have to act fast. Halloween is on Thursday. So I think you're going to have to get these messages, start this exchange tomorrow if you want to have a couple of days of fun with it.

Yeah. Agreed. I love it. I'm actually seeing them tomorrow for, um, for an event. So this works out great with timing. Um, and you know, there's another wrinkle you guys should know is that, um, somebody like a random person walking by took a photo of it and, and kind of tagged this like famous New York Instagram account. And it's in like a photo carousel that has like almost

50,000 likes at this point. So it could be from anywhere in New York city. It seems like it's kind of, Oh, that's interesting. But you know what it could. So that's really good info. It could be the person found it and they happen to live in green point and they know the house. Yep. So the first one, let's start doing this, Stevie. Uh, Kevin, can you put the images up? Yeah.

So let's do the first one. And Kyle, what's the name of the Instagram that got the New York one? Yeah, it's called What is New York? Of course, I follow What is New York. It's great. It's so funny. It's so funny.

um i love this okay so steve your first one uh let's just do one where uh you saw it on what is new york you're not a scary person yet okay and you recognize the house wait what's uh what street do you live on kyle and we'll beep it out wait how did but how do we get your phone number kyle

That makes it scary. I mean, if you Google any address, you can get the phone number through PeopleFinder. So it adds an element of like this person stalking. I mean, I don't know how serious and scary you want to get. We want it scary. We're fucking with them. I think so too. I totally agree. Another thing you might want to consider is it's like a very family-oriented neighborhood and kind of a lot of people know everybody. So I think like asking friend of friend could also be an

but we we want this weirdo um steven what do you think of the name lionel i think yeah or yeah who do you like more what do you feel comfortable with lionel is great lionel smithy okay so i think personally people find her scarier than asking around what do you think kyle

Yeah, I do. I agree. Okay. So Steve, this is the first one you saw it on. What is New York? Yeah. You recognize the house. You found a number on people finder and it's just positive and it's short. Yeah. This is like a 30 second. So am I complimenting? I like to feel like, yeah. Okay. So funny. It's so, you know, I have a game we can play. Yeah.

What if this is the weird game? This is so funny and so silly, but you see that yellow one with the pink underpants?

Yeah. Your game is that we might get in a few calls. You would like to buy that with the underpants and you're willing to spend $1,500 on it. And then when she doesn't respond, you're in love with it. Yeah. So then another call is like, you little son of a bitch. Yeah. What are you doing with Carol? You're going to put that out there and taunt me with it. And now I can wait, but let me purchase it. $500 more than reasonable. All I've ever been is taunted my whole life by these cute asses in these panties.

I got nothing but nothing. Yeah. And you know what? If you're going to keep her from me, then I'm going to break in that fucking house and get it myself. All right. So let's just, let's start with the first one.

Hi, my name is Lyle Smithy, and I'm just reaching out to say I love the Halloween decoration. I live on 3. I actually happened to find your phone number from People Finder, and I just want to say I love it. Usually we don't get, you know, kind of, you know, adult themed Halloween pranks like this, but this is very, very funny, very creative. And I just want to reach out and say, well done. I'm not sure if it was you or somebody else, but very good. Very good. Thank you so much. Bye.

Great. Okay. Now, number two, what if we go and... Hey, this is Lionel Smith again. Weird question. Yeah, weird question. Are any of the pumpkins for sale, perhaps? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love this. And then what if we created a...

Yeah, no, you know, your number is on her phone. So like you could just call back up the number that was ringing. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. And then whatever you think. Hey, hi, this is Lyle Smithy again on Street.

Weird question. I'm having a small little Halloween gathering on Thursday night. We're going to hand out candy and all the whatnot. And I was wondering if perhaps that any of these pumpkins are for sale. I think my friends would get a real kick out of it. Yeah, you can just hit me up at this number. It should be in your caller ID. And thanks a lot. I appreciate it. Bye-bye.

okay now how about number three you're still waiting on the response let's say yeah yeah yeah let's like let's start ramping up a little tension right i'm going to clarify which pumpkin i'm interested in i think that's totally right yeah uh does the pumpkin have a name yet yeah yeah hey happy monday how are you doing it's lyle again uh

You know, just kind of a follow-up to be more specific about my prior question. There's a yellow pumpkin I'm kind of interested in terms of purchasing. And it's white and kind of black. From my vantage point, it kind of looks like black polka dots. It's squash-looking. It's a yellow pumpkin on the right side of the frame. And a couple questions. That is the one I would like to purchase. So I'm not sure what it would take for you to be willing to part with that. And also...

goofy question but doesn't have a name okay yeah my number should be on the call already thanks a lot bye-bye this is insane okay so kyle you know the brother-in-law and partner more than us right at this point yeah we're thinking you're just going to send an email and you're going to label these call one call two call three what's your guess of their vibe right now

I think they're going to have just a little sort of tinge of what the hell did we do on top of a lot of laughter. Yeah, I think that's right. That's the goal. But it's kind of like, ooh, what's going on? But it's still a little innocent. So do you guys think, what do you think, Cal? Should call number four start showing that?

Lionel's kind of a dark noob? What do you think, Stevie? I was thinking, hey, I haven't got a response yet. I can make an offer. I don't know if $150 sounds fair to you. I could always just drop by the house, too. We could talk in person. That's kind of a scary one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's do that.

Hey, Lyle again. I didn't get a response back about the possible sale of the yellow polka dotted pumpkin. I guess I would just come out offering probably close to my top offer, $100 to $150. You know, if it would just help out easier, it might be a little quicker if I just drop by the house. So I get off work usually mid-afternoon around 3.30, so I could just swing by and we could negotiate then or whatever. Okay, thank you so much.

Okay, do another one really fast. You were lying. You aren't currently working. Okay. Hey, sorry, Lyle again. Sorry to keep on bugging you. FYI, I felt bad about telling a little bit of a fib there. I actually am unemployed. I'm probably like a lot of people in this neighborhood. But yeah, it's been tough to find employment for a graphic designer in this AI age. Anyways, you probably understand. Anyways, this is Lyle again. Give me a call. Bye. Now again, call back and lie. You are not a graphic designer. Yeah.

Hey, this is obviously it's Lyle again. Probably recognize the voice by now. I am not a graphic designer, but I did study at Sunny Purchase for about a couple of weeks into a semester. Graphic design is something I'm definitely passionate about, but no, I'm not technically a graphic designer. So just want to clarify that in case you look me up. All right. Thank you. Bye bye.

Now call you lie about Sonny Purchase. But also it's called Suny Purchase. Yeah. But that's okay. That's okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hi, this is, you know who it is. Yeah, I did not go to Sonny Purchase. In fact, I just found out it was called Suny Purchase from my great aunt.

I don't know why I'm trying to make myself sound a little more official. I am unemployed right now. I live with two roommates. It's not like a flop house or anything. It's actually pretty nice. We all, we share a kitchen, you know, two bathrooms. So, you know, I'm not like destitute or anything. Um,

but yeah i did not go to school there i went to the police academy was kicked out um for bad eyesight so anyways you you have my number probably in the car give me a call back if you're interested in selling that pumpkin otherwise i like i said i could swing by and we could just do it in person probably a lot faster that way or have it if i know you whatever bye-bye now be very mad steve you live with your mother but who the fuck is she to judge you yeah hi uh lyle again um

I don't have three roommates. I live with my mother. And honestly, who are you to judge me? I feel like I am being judged. We live on the same street. Technically, we are neighbors. And the conduct of you just not...

Getting back to me, responding to me, acting like none of these calls ever existed is not very neighborly. Where I come from, we help our neighbors. If they're sick, you bring them a casserole. Get it? So all I'm wanting to do is make a simple transaction, and that is I offered a more than fair price, $100 to $150 for that yellow pumpkin with the black polka dots on there. Please give me a call back. Last one.

uh you want to fuck the pumpkin yeah but i would say crazy mad you are now off your rocker right they're teasing you you've been teased before let this one get a little bit goofy and then this is it this is the last one we said right right what do you guys think do we just end i'll go i'll go big on this let's see get a little scary yeah you know who this is i don't need to say the name

I would like to purchase the pumpkin. And the reason why I want to purchase the pumpkin is not important, but I will tell you, I have a fetish for inanimate objects, especially of the produce variety. And that pumpkin does something to me. It's not just sexual for me, okay?

There is some people out there who like to nurture, to take care, to form a relationship. And yes, make love to produce. I am one of those people. And it's 2024. So how dare you judge me for what? Look, my proclivities are my proclivities. My mother doesn't judge me. My other neighbors don't judge me. And clearly you have something. You are a very closed-minded individual, miss.

I don't know you. I have never met you, but I know your kind. They've teased me. They've made fun of me my whole life and I will not be bullied by my neighbor. Very good date to you. This is Lyle. You have my phone number. Okay. Kyle, what do you think about now putting an email together?

that we send to them, and then you attach all of these as individual things one at a time. What do you think about this as a comeback?

First of all, terrified of Lyle and terrified of where Steve Berg can go when asked. Thank you. It's simply my craft. It's my craft. What can I say? I disappear into Lino. It feels good to be back in my body again. Where's Steve? I understand John Malkovich these days better.

almost darkness inside of you um yes that sounds good i i think i'm i might need i just don't know what to say or like what the call to action is for them like is it just like holy shit i'm scared like what do i do do i write it out like i just don't know what what to say i would play it like you know

Here's what I would do. I would send like you got these two voice messages kind of close together. So send these out like one of my neighbors is really up in arms. I can't tell if he's mad or really happy about this and kind of go, ha ha ha, LOL. But I also put in like a thanks a lot, guys. Yeah. Because make sure you're. So the main thing, Kyle, is because the whole point of this is we're trying to get back at them.

So thanks a lot for your funny prank where you perved out pumpkins because you really brought a creep element into my life, LOL. Not even joking, there's been this guy calling me in caps. So thanks. And then they'll write back like, is that real? And then send the first couple. Yeah.

Then I love that. I would space out like in terms of like the sendings, just so it feels like they're coming in in real time.

You know what I'm saying? Like, like, like when you get this, like, look what I just got five minutes ago. Oh my gosh. That is the best. So then like 33 minutes later, like, and he keeps on calling and he keeps, he keeps on like, he keeps on editing what he said in the prior one. So this guy seems a little weird, you know? I think that is exactly right. You take your time, Kyle, and sending it and you can send them at like 10 at night and 11 at night. And then like the last couple be like, these came in at two,

in the morning is it yeah like i would start this no later than tomorrow so like you can like maybe like have the last one be on halloween day i think that's ridiculous oh wait now let's oh wait let's do one last one oh yeah as you and me what are their names kyle um their names are mike and emily and is your real name kyle

It is, yeah. Okay. So now, Lionel, start the message, and then I'm going to jump in as us, and we're going to tell Mike and Emily to leave Kyle alone. Right. Hello. This is Lionel. Obviously, you have my number. I don't know what else to do. I am extremely distraught right now, and...

I just would really like to purchase the yellow pumpkin with the pink polka dots. Yes, I've had some setbacks in my life. Not everyone can go after their dreams of being a graphic designer at Sony or Sunni. I don't know how you pronounce it. I didn't go to college. I just would like, I would just like some time with the pumpkin. Maybe you can at least let me take it out for 24 hours. I will bring it back. Can I ask you a question? Who is this, sir, on the line? Mike and Emily. Was it worth it?

Yeah, Mike and Emily. Was the pumpkin panty prank worth it to Kyle? Huh? Yeah. Hey, this is Jake Johnson and Steven Berg.

and the shark from the podcast we're here to help and we're here to teach you a lesson about mean drinks on halloween because you can't be going around putting underpants on pumpkins because it brings out weirdos on the street named lionel and lionel lives with his mother and can't pronounce sunni purchase and the thing is while lionel is fictitious

There could be a real one. There's one lurking out there. So this is a message not only to you, Mike and Emily, but to everybody on this Halloween. Cool it with the pranks. Oh my God. So what do you think? Kyle, what do you think of this? And that's the final one. And you send that to them after, ideally they're building up, but don't break in the middle. It's not fun if after six, you're like, this is all a joke. You gotta live in it.

I'm in. I'm in. I called you guys because I'm not a creative person. I didn't know how to get them back. And this is amazing. I can follow directions. So Kyle, we're going to send you these clips and will you please follow up with us? Yeah, absolutely. Thank you guys so much. This has been so fun. Good luck. Happy Halloween to you. Happy Halloween. Thank you. Happy Halloween. Bye. Bye. Bye.

And we're brought to you by Squarespace. Listen, we love Squarespace. We talk about it all the time on this show. We use it to make websites for callers. We fix problems. My personal website is Squarespace.

Kevin, you have any Squarespace heat? What do you got? I'm in a very niche job market world where I'm a freelance podcast producer. There's no like IMDB for podcast producers to show like, here's all the shows I've worked on. So I just wanted to make something simple that just have like the album art of all of the shows I've produced over the last decade. You're bragging.

I'm flexing. I'm not going to lie. It's a little bit of a flex for me, but I was just so easily able to make a website and put the album art on. Like it's very visually stimulating and I am not a creative, visually stimulating person. So I was just I looked very impressive on there and I was very happy to make Kevin Bartelt dot com.

No, no, no. We're not doing that. Gareth Reynolds dot com for shows and information. We're not doing that. But no, it's true. I mean, that's exactly what I went through with my website. I just could not believe how easy it was. And I was like, oh, my God, I look legit. So listen, they have tons of stuff you can use. Design intelligence, Squarespace payments.

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The outfit that Jake ordered, this doesn't speak well about me as a man, but this is as a product. It's unbelievable that this outfit just got delivered to my house. I didn't really think anything of it. I started to wear it and then I showed up to record the show and Kevin and Jake like, man, you look good. Yeah. And then I was like, I don't think I got my doer stuff. And then I was like, oh, I did.

And I'd been wearing it and loving it. But even since then, we've ordered other stuff on Dewar. I have so many Dewar clothes. It really is just...

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The restaurant business is tough, but that doesn't stop celebrities from trying to open their own spots over and over again. On each episode of Wondery's podcast, The Big Flop, comedians join Misha Brown to chronicle one of the biggest pop culture fails of all time and try to answer the age-old question, who thought this was a good idea?

Britney Spears had Niall, Guy Fieri had Times Square Empire, Eva Longoria had a steakhouse called She with a baffling gender-themed concept, and they each went bust in their own special way. Peloton star Cody Rigsby and Amanda Hirsch, host of Not Skinny But Not Fat, joined Misha to review this trio of failed celebrity restaurants. Follow the Big Flop on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. How you doing? Welcome to the show.

Thank you very much. I'm doing great. Great. Can we get your name, please? I am Zach. Zach? I'm 36. I'm from Ottawa. I think that's the normal feel. Yeah, I'm Zach. I like it. You ever see the show New Girl? Oh, yeah. So one of the writers from New Girl, a guy who wrote an episode that features somebody No, no, no, no, no.

The architect of Brian. The architect of Brian? Yeah. The security guard. That's right. I created him. Yeah, the creator of the... That's right. You created Brian. The movement. Yeah. Brian... You are the puppet maker and you are the puppet good sir. I'm like that white dude at the end of The Matrix. I'm the architect. I did this seven times already. That's so funny. The man who wrote...

the episode that created brian yeah from xoxo gossip kings podcast a man who is also in a weird pilot presentation i did in my backyard you guys were back there but you did not talk brian that day well finish the intro okay mr lamar

I wonder if Brian was kind of the seed was planted in your head in the backyard that day. Yeah, because that was after that, right? Yeah. No, New Girl was done when we did that podcast. Are you sure? I can't go pilot for a show when I'm on New Girl, Garf.

It was so much going on. I don't think we had a chance to talk about it. Sure. But again, I mean, I think we want to get to the call. Obviously, we want to talk. Is he still there? Yeah. But I mean, it must be amazing to be kind of at the captain of the Brian ship.

Yeah, I mean, it was the last season, but it was good. You were great. Y'all had a great time. And just being Brian, I mean, it was such a it was such a movement. Go ahead, Jake. You wanted to say how many years did you write for New Girl? Just the last two seasons. Well, for season six and seven. Season six and seven. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it was a good time, man.

I love working with you, Jake. You too, man. That was fun. We had a good time on set. Yeah, we did. Do you remember this episode? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was really funny. Yeah, Lamar directed. That was cool. How is Lamar as a director? And by the way, rest in peace. Yeah, yeah. Is he dead? We're not an expert. That version of his body is dead. Yeah, I want that picture at my funeral. Yeah.

Me too. By the way, anybody who passes away should have that funeral, like all the photos of them. And then just one of those where somebody goes, is that what he looked like? Yeah. Is that what he looked like with no clothes on? Like when Obama dies, it's just like, hey, what a legacy. They're like, Barry did great. Lamar, Lamar's body looks great. Nobody wants to bring it up. Hey, Zach, what can we do for you today, bud?

I've got a problem here. I've got an old friend of mine who I did wrong. He and I used to do amateur stand-up comedy together. And last year, right before probably the biggest set that he'd ever done, he called me up because he wanted me to be part of the moment. He's backstage. He's about to go on stage and he runs through his jokes with me. And he's like, here I am. I'm about to go up. What do you think?

And kind of by accident, I said, I don't like any of your jokes, man. Oh, Zach. And so now I need to make this up to him. Hold up. What's up, man? Why'd you do that? You're trying to be funny. Was it a bit? Yeah. So this is the thing. It was a bit. It's an ongoing bit that he and I have done for years now. When we moved to different cities, we texted our jokes to each other.

And the ongoing joke was we never laughed at each other's jokes. Yeah, I got you. You know, bag on each other's jokes, make fun of each other's jokes. So I took the bit too far. I know that. I can't even tell a story without uncomfortably laughing because I know how bad it was. Right. So I need to make it up to him. And the second edition of this show that he did last year, where I gave him this bad line right before his show, he's doing a second edition of it in May. And he's invited me to perform with him.

So I want to use that opportunity if I can to make it up to him somehow. And I was curious what you guys might, might come up with. Yeah. So you have, so just to recap, so we're all on the same page. You got an old friend, two standups. Uh, you guys do mean jokes, the mean jokes that you never laughed at each other's bits right before his big show. He said, Hey man, let me run. You got to run some bits by you at the end. You said, I don't like any of those. He goes on set. And how did he perform that night? Did he die?

No, he killed it. He did great. Lost Last, it was a really good show for him. And just to be clear, he wasn't even running you through the jokes before he went out. He was just like, man, I'm excited. And you were like, nothing. No, he said he wanted to run through all the jokes.

Yeah, like he wanted feedback. Yeah, no, he ran to joke me. He's like, here's my set. What do you think? Wow. And you said, I don't like any of them. And then he went out and killed. Here's what I think you could do. I got my first pitch. I think the first thing is you're opening for him. Yeah, I'm not opening. I'm like second or third up, but I'm going before him. Okay. So I say potentially you retell this story.

And you say, coming up later, he's a great comedian. He's a friend of mine. He did all this. I said this. You really set it up for this big moment. And then you said, I don't like any of them. And then you go, I'm the audience killed. So what the fuck do I know? So then you're killing yourself a little bit to build him up on that. Yeah.

Look, it's not a great idea. I'm just pitching, guys. I don't like any of your fucking ideas, Zach. Fuck this fucking guy. And Lamar, fuck you. Get out of here. I like that idea. But here's what I think. I think it's too late. You already fucked him up. Are you in therapy? You should go to therapy with him and talk about it. No way. No way. This is a worse idea than mine. If a comedian friend said to me, if I said to somebody,

follow that go. I don't like your thing. And I went like, all right. And then I went out and crushed. First of all, I think, fuck you. Who cares? Second, if he goes like, Hey Jake, it's Zach. And I go, what's up Zach? And he goes, Hey man, you want to come to a couple of therapists with me so we can talk about how I made a mean joke. I'd go in what world?

You got to get to the heart of it. No. With like a male comedian body? First of all, your pitch is good. The reason why you felt your pitch. My idea is great. Your idea is good too. Your idea is progressive and interesting. It is. It's very progressive and sensitive. Imagine if you went and performed one night and a random dude, a buddy of yours, made a mean joke before you went on and it didn't affect you.

Yeah. You crush. And I crush. You crush. Now, if you died, it's when you crush. Then a few months later, he goes, hey, Lamar, what are you doing on Wednesday? And you're like, I'm free. Why? You want to get lunch? He goes, no, I want to go to therapy together to get to the root of our issues. And you go, what's your last name? I don't even know you. I don't know your hand out of my pocket. No, I because I had a friend do this yesterday. I had a show the other day.

Or is that like, it's not really about the show necessarily, right? You do the show, you're going to kill it. It don't matter what you say. But you have friends where you're doing bits all the time. And sometimes you're not ready. I'm not ready. I'm not in a bit mood. I'm actually kind of nervous about this show real quick. I'm tight. My man, he, I had got it. I was about to go on. I just got off stage and I had to go on stage.

And I thought I did really well. And then I saw him and I said, man, did you get to see me on stage? He was like, man, don't nobody want to see your shit. And then I was like, you know, who is this legend? I can say that because he's he does this. Ronnie Adrian is hilarious. But yeah,

but sometimes I'm like, man, I was actually in a really vulnerable, like I wasn't, I wasn't like ready for that. What's the guy's name again? Ronnie Adrian. Ronnie. So then imagine if you said like, Hey man, do you want to go to a zoom couples therapy session? Please. That's what I'm telling you to do it. Cause I'm gonna do it. I,

I think you could do. I think that's so true, too. It's like people think that you're like it happens a lot with like strangers who will be like, hey, I'm going to bust your chops. And they'll say something like, man, sorry about that. Like, actually, I don't know you. And that hurts. Yeah. Well, I'll ding me. We busted. So Gareth and I have known each other forever. I bust chops. I like getting busted. But yeah, we were making a somebody had commented that.

I'm not bringing up an old thing, but he told us we were doing bits, me, him and Kevin about like mean comments you've gotten. Yeah. Like maybe we could use it for the show. And he goes, the worst one I ever got was somebody said, why does he look like fat Aaron Paul? And so we started calling him fat Aaron Paul on the show. It follows me. One show after, you know, I gave it no thought. We're goofing around. Right. We do a couple of chubby bits on the thing. Yeah.

That night we call, we're just bullshitted. And as we're talking, I hear like, he's like, yeah, I mean, I definitely agree if we can get YouTube.

going, it's definitely going to help, but what's fun? And I went like, what the fuck are you so breathy for? And he's like, no, he goes, God, no, he's like, shut up, shut up. Just whatever. I think what I'm saying is it's good. It's trying to get the right track. Then he goes, water real quick. I need my electrolytes. He goes, there were three chubby comments and I'm on a Peloton. And I was like, all right, it was cool. But it's like, all right, I need to say, and I said, we're done making mean jokes. We're taking a break. We have, I've slowed down a lot. Which shows, uh,

I... It was much worse. The funniest thing was when we were talking about it and I was like trying to find the comment on the video. And because that one... I just saw that one randomly. So when we were scrolling through, I was seeing all these other comments. Yeah. And these comments were just like, is this Amy Schumer? I'm talking physically. I was like, Jesus Christ. I was getting assaulted. But I actually...

first of all, I think your pitch worked well. The problem was there's this weird satellite delay because this dude's in Ottawa. So you heard- It was the pause. Yes, you heard a pause. You fucking lost your mind. Oh, okay, yeah. But I also think- I thought that was like- Okay.

My idea is not a real thing. I think you definitely... Well, no, I think Lamar... The therapy could be interesting. I think that's good. I think what Jake said is right. You totally... Because it's his night, it's all that. You want to keep him up proper. Yeah. I like your pitch. What you could do is you could do a therapy session where either you're doing it for like a social media thing or you could do a live show where you're going to like... Oh! Like two nights before the show you're going to do. Yeah. You guys could get together. You could bring like a...

Like, whatever. Find a therapist who's going to be stage comfortable. That's fine. Bring them up on stage and you talk it out with the therapist in front of him and talk about like for a half hour, bust and chops. And then you each can cap it with like 15 minutes. Zach, is that a world you guys are in? Because you did start this with amateur.

So are these, these events, are they getting bigger or are you guys are the kind of people out in Ottawa where you could maybe fill some seats for a night of you do stand up? He does stand up and you have like another comedian be a therapist. Is that a reality there? Yeah. Right. That probably is not. We're like open mic. That's what I mean. I'm going to be able to draw a crowd for a show. Yeah. Right. Right.

So guys, what can we help with that? Are we leaning into in May lead out with it? I think you could do that. Here's one other pitch. Please add a show. You do your buddies, your buddies there and

and you do his set in front of him my buddy and i used to do this on the road where you'd hear each other's sets so many fucking times right that sometimes we go i'm gonna i'm gonna just do your joke tonight like let's just swap jokes a little bit because you know them so well so if you go to a show you bring him and you go i'm gonna do your set and talk about how great it is right low stakes get up on stage you're cleaning the slate with an homage set right that's my pitch it's not great either so zach i think that's funny yeah i think zach what are you thinking

So my problem with your pitch, Jake, is I think it's a bit of a downer when I tell the story like that was your reaction. Yeah. Interesting. Jesus, why did you do that? Yeah. It was a pretty asshollish thing to do. And I know that and I feel bad about it. So I don't want to bring the mood down. I think I'm leaning towards the Garfman pitch. I like it. And walk us through what you're going to do there when you do the Garfman just because I don't fully get the pitch.

You want me to run you through it? No, let's have Zach. All right, Zach. I got to find an open mic where he and I can get some spots together and then just make sure I'm up before him and do his set, the one that he did last year. He'll have new material now because we're always trying new stuff. And that way I'm not stepping on his toes. I think he's pitching do his set on stage. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, that's what you're saying. Oh, you're saying get up there and get up there and blow sucker.

But what if they like those really well and he just blows up? Well, that is. We got a project we're going to work on together. I'm going to add this. You do that set. You talk after every joke. Man, that joke is a killer. These are all killers. Then he gets up, does your set, and he gets to shit all over it.

So you're still swapping in front of an audience. Yeah. Oh, Zach, what? That's actually a fun idea. What about apologizing to him for the night? He'll say, I'll forget it, dude. And then go, so I want to pitch something. We do a set swap where you shit on the jokes that your writer wrote. Yeah. And I compliment the jokes and we see what the audience thinks when we do each other's jokes. Did you ever try that? We've talked about joke swaps before, but I think this is a great idea. It's the perfect way for me to maybe make it up to him and,

you can get some revenge. Let's get on with the win here. Thank you so much for the call. All the best. All right. Enjoy the hills. It was a pleasure, guys. Nice to meet you, Lamar. Thank you. Dell Technologies' early holiday savings event is live. And if you've been waiting for an AI-ready PC, this is their biggest sale of the year. Tech enthusiasts love this sale because it's all the newest hits plus all the greatest hits all on sale at once.

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You seem sweet. Welcome to We're Here to Help. You know the deal. It's America's number one podcast. Don't look it up. Listen, my man, we're going to get your name and your information. We're going to help you, whether you like it or not. But before we do, you're on with Gareth. And in Jake's stead today, we have the amazing John Gabrus. So you're going to...

Let's party. Upgrade. You got the new guy. So, all right, man. What is your name? Where are you calling from? Do you want to tell us your age? Seems like we've gravitated away from that. Yeah.

My name's Jesse. I live in Charlottesville, Virginia, and I'm 30 years old. Okay. Hell yeah. All right. Well, Jesse, listen, John is a busy man. I'm not, but we don't have time for this. Kevin invented Nike. I don't know if you heard that, but what's going on? What can we help you with? Yeah, so I am a teacher, and I teach middle school geography. Oh, thank you for your service. Yeah, obviously.

It's a wild time. So when I first got this job, I asked another teacher who had been doing it for a while, like, you know, how do you teach middle schoolers? And they advised me that... What did that person think of that question? Were they like, holy shit, should you be doing this? Well...

They were like a mentor. So I think it was their job to answer, but yeah. Okay. It's kind of a weird question just to throw out there. Yeah. Okay. All right. This is at the job, right? You're asking, you're asking, you're at the middle school about to teach going, Hey, heads up. Which one are the students and which one are the teachers? Just me or there are a lot of kids here. Crazy. Yeah, there are. There are a lot of, a lot of crazy kids. Yeah. Uh,

But what they said is to take like a small part of my personality and make it like a big part of my like teacher persona. And I think what they meant by was like being really into sports or like really into like Halloween or something. But I think that's like what a sane person probably would think of to go with. But what I told my very first class of students was that I had an irrational fear of ostriches. Of what? And...

Of an ostrich, yeah. Of an ostrich, okay. I thought you said oxygen for a moment, and I was like, R.I.P. Jesse. He's got scuba gear on. I'm not a big oxygen guy.

I'm a big auto-erotic asphyxiation guy. I'm what we call a plant man. He's got branches. You might notice I'm a tree. Give me the CO2, baby. Fuck this oxygen shit. Let's walk through what I do. He's just got gills. Guys, I'm not like your other geography teachers.

I like this advice. This advice is kind of like, you know, Running Man or G.I. Joe rules where it's like, take a little part of your personality and like let students into that world and then you can hide 85% of who you are. But the setup is great to be like, mine is a phobia of the non-flight bird. Yeah. Also...

Middle school kids, if my teacher told me that, I would have bought 20 ostrich costumes on Amazon on day one. I bet you we're headed in that direction. Yeah, I think we might be. I'm sorry, Jesse. Okay, Jesse. And is this true? You have a fear of ostriches?

No, no. I don't like that. It's not even true. Okay, so it's day one, you lie to the kids. Day one, you lie to the kids and your lie is, with all due respect, bananas. Yeah, so you're exactly right. Middle schoolers, whatever you expect them to do, they do the opposite of. So it started just with some hand-drawn pictures and then for Teacher Appreciation Week, we'd get shirts with ostriches on them. We're seeing some images right now

Yeah. These kids. But it's a lot. There's some people call making Jesse the ostrich your homage. Can you bring that back up again, Kevin? Yeah. Here's one more, too. Oh, so. OK, well, I saw a Mr. Womble drawing. And then you're getting merch. You're getting merch. You're the ostrich man. You're getting T-shirts. You're getting stuffed ostriches. People are giving you ostrich cards. It's kind of become your apple. OK.

Okay, so here you are. You're painted into this ostrich corner because you are trying to connect with your kids and they're taking advantage of it by ostrich assaulting you. Yeah, 100%. Even kids I've never taught before, I've never even seen before, will just come in my classroom and just say the word ostrich at me.

Even like parent-teacher conferences, parent will come in and say, you know, oh, you must be the ostrich guy. So it's definitely like an all-out assault for sure.

Off of a lie. What drove you to say that? Were you like, look, I'm not letting... Do you have actually weird hobbies? And you were like, okay, I can't actually tell these kids. He's got a skin couch. Ostriches freak me out. No, I think it was like I was excited initially, kind of naively thinking it'll be fun to come up with reasons why. But I'm out of reason. I tell them a different story every year and I think I'm just out of...

I've reached a breaking point. How long has this been going on? You might have said that. Forgive me. Six years. Six years of this. That means new students are coming in and finding this out. You can't phase it out. This is, it's, oh boy. This just reminds me of the social phenomenon where you meet someone and

And in the context in which you meet them affects how you think about them. Yeah, right. Like, oh, the first time I met Gareth was when we were next to each other at urinals, cocks in hand. So now every time I think of Gareth, I'm like, oh, right. The guy with his cock is like, he actually only does that when he pees, you know, like or like.

Oh, the last time I saw you, you were drinking gallons of milk for calories. Milk guy. That's not who I am. And they're like, yeah, but you're the grass fed milk guy. You know, honestly, John, what's so funny is, I mean, I've met you a few times, but you have this tweet that always, this is so weird. I don't have this with a lot of people, but you have a tweet that has always stuck with me, which is the hardest part of being an actor is figuring out where to take a shit. Yeah.

I was like, it hit me in a way where I was like, man, that is so true. Eventually you get to the level of having your own trailer and that answers that question. It's not ideal. Hey, wardrobe's going to come by your trailer. It's like, can they wait till the exorcism occurs? Let them know an elephant had it yesterday. Okay. All right. So keep going, Jesse. Yeah. I guess my question is how,

how to put an end to the ostrich thing or if you think it's too far gone and then my question is how do I turn it into a way to make money?

Jesus, what a twist at the end. What a health. That last question of your three-parter question, your A, B, and C subsets, that last question is like the most American thing. It should just be said at the end. It is. It should be at the end of every... Instead of at the end of a call when they're like, press one and let us know how we did. It should just say, how can I make money doing this? And it's...

The ending of your question is phenomenal, obviously. Well, first of all, we all agree teachers don't get paid enough, so you should be able to. Are you talking about how you personally do it, or are you talking about can you start fundraising off of it for the school? I think I know the answer. I just want to make sure you're not magnating us. Yeah, it would be personal. Personal. Okay, sure. Absolutely. Wow, this is a banger. It's hard to put the genie back in the bottle to some extent, right?

It's hard to put that head back in the sand. Yeah, exactly. Once it's been removed, your reality is your reality. You've been, you've been taken out of the matrix goo. You cannot unsee what has happened.

My advice would be every year introduce a slightly smaller bird that you're afraid of until you get it down to hummingbirds. Like next year, it's like emu, and then you go turkey vulture and just keep shrinking down until eventually I'm terrified of mosquitoes. And then by the time you retire, everyone will have a different story to tell about Jesse. I like the idea that in your pitch, the merch shrinks along with the shot. It's like...

Mediums only. He's like, I can't even see what they gave me this year. I think, well, obviously we're all saying the same thing. Bring in a hot plate and eat a bunch of ostrich in front of the kids. Have a meltdown. Oh, you should do that. You should go, I'm facing my fear and eat like ostrich jerky in class in front of all of them. I do actually think that is the best way to go. I think you have, like you have really honestly, and I don't even know if it's going to work, but.

But you have you have lore now. So the only way to undo the lore would be to out front be like, I'm confronting a fear and be like, I am going to go into hypnosis and I'm going to try to undo my ostrich phobia.

You need a second round of lore. The only way out of lore is more lore. Now you love ostriches. Yeah, more lore. So I think you should do something like that. One does not simply walk into more lore.

That's great. I do think that's to answer your first part, okay? How do you do that? So what I would say is, I would say you're going to go into hypnosis. You're going to try to undo it. There's also this...

Ringo Starr at one point put out this video that is so goddamn funny. Oh, here goes Gareth again, his fucking guru Ringo Starr. We always got to hear. The best beetle. They're letting him survive. Who's the most talented? Ringo's got me doing cold plunging. I'm just like in Ravi Shankar outfits. Like, well, you know, we were actually... Ringo's been pretty weird this week.

Um, see Tarith. Uh, so I, he has this video where he made it and he basically said, no more, don't send him shit anymore. He basically was like, I have enough shit. Do not, do not send me stuff. So I would think you could kind of do a combo. What you could do is you could be like, look, I have so much ostrich stuff. You guys keep giving it to me. I think it's really funny. But my, are you married?

No, no. Okay. Well, whatever. You're like, it's a lot. It's been a lot. So I am now trying to undo this and I am going to go into hypnosis. It's like a six week thing. All that. Now, as far as how can you make money off it? Here would be my pitch.

Do this six weeks ahead of like homecoming or something like that. And you tell the school and be like, hey, so what I'm going to do is I am going to do an announcement at like before six weeks before. And I will my deal will be before I finish hypnosis, I will wear an ostrich costume at the homecoming event.

But why don't we do it where if we reach X amount of money, I'll do it for the kids. We could put some money towards homecoming, but I want 50% of it. Yeah, you got to be upfront about what percentage you want from the fundraising. That's how you minimize tackiness. Otherwise, you have a new quirk and it's not as charming. Oh, that's the guy who embezzled.

I'm doing some light research here, Jesse. And how far away are you from Isle of Wight, Virginia? It's a couple hours. A couple hours? Okay. There is Zuni Ostrich Farm is there. I think you need to go make content for your students and make it seem like you are doing immersion therapy for ostriches.

bug out on camera and shit. Just peak this fucking lore now. Then come back with not being afraid of ostriches anymore. And then the Jesse legend is bananas. Then it's just like, oh, when I had him, he actually got over his fear of ostriches. I think that's great. I think you can maybe do that. That could maybe spearhead

You could combine the two pitches and that can be your way of announcing that you tried immersion therapy. It didn't work. And now you're trying to fund your hypnosis therapy via some kind of fundraising. Something like that. You could be like, I'll release the unredacted version of this if I make enough. You know, hold the video hostage a little bit.

save the ostriches like is there like are they endangered in any way because then you can make it like your cause like yeah like or or fucking go in on the lore you know like set up a fake police report about a family that was killed by an ostrich and only a young boy was a and he was he was next to a globe and that's how you got in love with world geography because during the tragedy when the ostrich

pecked your family's innards out in front of you. All you had was a globe to look at and you're like, that's where Madagascar is. I can't wait to spread this knowledge to kids. You're then just going to get more pictures with them pecking out the faces of people. Fuck you, Jesse. No, that's incredible. I'm so into it.

Okay, so just to be clear, I mean, we've pitched you a few options. The ostrich content, the fundraising potentially, the building of the Moralore, your origin story, lore-igin story. One more thing to throw out there is if you want to go full scumbag is next time... All teachers do. Yeah, eventually. Everyone makes that heel turn, trust me. The heel turn? Yeah.

I might be the cause. Like, I might be the common denominator that makes every teacher slowly go fucking ape shit where it's like, you have to stop talking to me like I'm a 12-year-old as well. But maybe you go full scumbag. Next kid who comes in with, like, an ostrich type thing, you fake a fucking panic attack and then sue the school. Oh, my God.

Oh, my God. Well, that is... Kevin, can we legally be associated with this picture? It's out there. Kevin is your lawyer? Oh, you're fucked, dude. It's not good. I'm a multi-hyphen on this show. Found it Nike. Tonight on Twitch, I'll be testing pens and going over Gareth's court cases. My lawyer? Why is he twitching the case? You're all in contempt. Kevin, what the fuck, dude?

All right, Jesse. So walk us through what your plan is. Yeah, I think what I'll do is I'll go down the path of making some content, maybe take a little trip. You know, I'm not above lying to my students, so I think I can do a pretty good job of...

of really pretending to go through some real therapy there. I also love your confidence that none of the students listen to this podcast. It's insulting, but we need that. That's my immersion.

Is your podcast on TikTok? Because I think you're safe otherwise. Honestly, I don't even know, John. Here to help is the number one Cocomelon podcast. I know. I mean, we have some Twitch crossover because of Kevin's pen stuff. That shit does Boku number one.

Okay, and then what about the monetary side of that, Jesse? Right, and I think this idea of, I also coach basketball, so maybe even coaching a game in an ostrich suit of some sort or coming out at halftime. Great. Yeah, shoot, try to shoot, try to make a half-court shot in the ostrich costume.

The ostriches seem like the kind of animal that would be on an animated basketball team. Yes. If there was a spinoff to Madagascar, why do I keep saying that word? You guys know that's my safe word, and I'm being held hostage in my house. Kevin Madagascar. We didn't notice. We didn't know. I'm holding up a newspaper with today's date. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, well, why don't you go with that? And then just real quick, is there something you're passionate about? Because I think you could also replace here. This is the right move is to get a little touch of honesty. Yeah. So is there something where you can maybe benefit off of it a little? Is there something that you're really into? Like another bird? Nope. All right. Listen, Jesse, we got to go. You know, not everyone has to be creative. Yeah.

Some people just need to teach world geography to 12-year-olds. And God bless you, Jesse. It's just globes.

Honestly, gloves are awesome. That could be your thing. Start a globe collection. Think about your fucking neck deep in ostrich merch. Is there anything you actually could... Is there anything you could actually use? Should you be like, I'm really into laundry detergent or something and then the kids can all... And every year you just change based on what you need in your house. Or I was also thinking if you were like

Whatever, like if there is like fitness or like movies or something like that, you might not benefit in the way you are of the ostrich thing, but you could try to replace your personality over the years. I mean, you're going to be tenured at this point.

Yeah. So I think it may be like concert tickets or something like that. I don't think that's going to work, Jesse, but that's what I would do. Marinate on something. You could replace it with temple of the doom bag of sand for the idol. But, uh, but look, honestly, it's got to weigh the exact same amount as it has. And I don't believe concert tickets. I think that's how you're going to get those little spears shooting at you. Um,

Well, keep us posted on how it goes. I think you're in a good zone and give it a shot. Let us know how it goes, okay? Yeah, thank you guys so much. All right, buddy. And if you do a sketchy GoFundMe, send it our way. Oh, and if you do the video, send it our way. All that stuff, obviously. We have ownership over this, except for the legal issues. We have ownership over this. Kevin, take that out. Kevin, lose all that. Thanks so much. I think we need to lose most of the call, to be honest. All right, Jesse. All right, have a good one. Bye.

We're Here to Help is hosted by Jake Johnson and Gareth Reynolds. The show is produced and edited by Kevin Bartelt and the associate producer and editor is AJ McKeown. Our social media director is Caitlin Tanwakio and our video editor is John DeBruyne. The theme song is made by Oliver Raleigh and you can check out his music at OliverRaleigh.com. That's Oliver R-A-L-L-I dot com.

The album artwork is by James Fosdyke. You can find him on Instagram at James underscore Fosdyke, D-I-K-E. And if you'd like to see me do stand up on the road, go to GarethReynolds.com. Additional artwork by Patty Holland. You can find him on Instagram at P-A-D-D-Y Holland 2004. And if you'd like early access to episodes, subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com slash here to help pod. And if you'd like to be on the show, email us your question at helpfulpod at gmail.com.

All of the advice given on We're Here to Help is for entertainment purposes only, and all listeners should be adults and make their own decisions.

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