LIVE: Andrew Zimmern

[0] Ain't my fault, I'm out here getting loose.

[1] Gotta blame it on my juice.

[2] Blame it, blame it on my juice, yeah.

[3] Yeah, yeah.

[4] Ain't no way to explain to say how painful the hangover was today.

[5] In front of the toilet, hands and knees, trying to breathe in between the dry he's.

[6] My baby made some coffee.

[7] Afraid that if I drink some is probably coming right back out me. A couple of Advil relaxing.

[8] at a stand still with how bad I feel.

[9] Let's get fucked up and die.

[10] I'm speaking figuratively, of course, like the last time that I committed suicide, so, so suicide.

[11] So I'm already dead.

[12] The inside, but I can still pretend.

[13] With my memories and photographs, I learned to love the life.

[14] He's an unchite.

[15] I was dreaming when I wrote this, so soon as it goes astray.

[16] And I woke up this morning, could have sworn it was a judgment day.

[17] The sky was all pure, but there were people running everywhere from the destruction, but you know I didn't even care.

[18] They say 2000 -0 -0 party over, oops, out of the time.

[19] Party like it's 19.

[20] He's an option -out -smout.

[21] Well, welcoming.

[22] Thank you so, so much.

[23] So, I love you, Gail.

[24] I'm embarrassed to admit I've not spent a ton of time in Minneapolis.

[25] I know, I know, but the reason being is I'm from Michigan and it's the exact same fucking state.

[26] You guys are the land of 10 ,000 lakes, and we are the Great Lakes.

[27] We have Motown, you have Paisley Park.

[28] It's the same shit.

[29] So I came here, really, for the Super Bowl a couple years ago, year ago, 18 months ago, whatever.

[30] Not warm here in February.

[31] I had a friend staying at a hotel four blocks away, and I was like, not a problem.

[32] I'm from Detroit.

[33] Big, big problem on block two, I was like, they're going to, find me cryogenically frozen here.

[34] No, I say this sincerely, when I was here last time, and you know I'm not pandering to you if you listen to the podcast, because I've brought it up several times.

[35] I was absolutely bowled over with how unbelievably lovely you guys all are.

[36] It's truly, from the bottom of my heart, I can't think of a place I've visited in these 50 United States where the people were nicer.

[37] It's incredible.

[38] I thought Peter Krauseau was like an anomaly, but no, he's dead normal for.

[39] the Twin Cities.

[40] It is important to me that when we come to these towns, we don't just bring another L .A. person and I'm a discussing L .A. person and we're just visiting.

[41] I like to have someone that really represents the area.

[42] So just why don't you think of that when I introduce our guests tonight, but before I do that, I have a very good friend who's not from the Twin Cities, but she's from She's my soulmate.

[43] She's brilliant.

[44] She's powerful.

[45] She's miniature.

[46] Monica Badman.

[47] I love you.

[48] Put your eyes on the friendliest people in America right here.

[49] When someone gets a flat here, there's a traffic jam of people trying to help them.

[50] Change it.

[51] We got to move here, ASAP.

[52] Do you guys get in nice -offs here?

[53] I bet so.

[54] I bet.

[55] Those are the fights.

[56] Yeah.

[57] Like 12 rounds of thank you cards and stuff.

[58] Yes.

[59] Oh, yeah.

[60] We have had a blast.

[61] We've been traveling around the country in our Chrysler Pacifica.

[62] Yeah.

[63] I made many, many wrong turns leaving Chicago today.

[64] Took us a while to get to the airport.

[65] O 'Hare is also a city, not just an airport.

[66] So if you put O 'Hare into Google, you may end up an industrial complex looking for airplanes.

[67] Now you know.

[68] And then you've got to put that Pacifica through its paces, which we did.

[69] Yeah.

[70] 6 ,000 RPM's the right.

[71] rest of the ride.

[72] It was glorious.

[73] It's a nice van.

[74] If I remade Smoking the Bandit, it would be with a Pacifica.

[75] Oh, wow.

[76] That's the kind of handling and performance I witnessed today.

[77] So, this tour was brought to everyone from Chrysler, so we thank them.

[78] Thank you.

[79] And also, I want to thank the kind folks at Lazy Boy.

[80] Lazy Boy, don't know it's all this stuff, and then we give up to Habitat for Humanity, so, you know.

[81] So thank you, lazy boy.

[82] Okay, back to my point about the guest.

[83] Yes.

[84] There is a man who lives in this town who has named it, his husband.

[85] His home, even though he's from New York, which is not a bad place to come from either.

[86] He is a famous chef.

[87] He is a teacher.

[88] He is a TV personality.

[89] He's a journalist.

[90] He's Andrew Zimmer.

[91] I can only pray that the front row gets a whiff of Andrew because he smells like a trillion dollars.

[92] Andrew, what fragrance are you?

[93] Oh, you do smell nice.

[94] Why, thank you.

[95] I like it.

[96] It's actually a funny story.

[97] How you smell?

[98] Yeah.

[99] I never used to wear a scent.

[100] And then something happens to you.

[101] It will happen to you soon.

[102] Okay, great.

[103] Whereas all of a sudden you get to a certain age and you can't help but do dad things and dad jokes and dad stuff.

[104] And I was in a store in Europe.

[105] And I had like 15 minutes on the street to shop.

[106] We were shooting a show.

[107] And I was in a little French village.

[108] And I went to this little boutique.

[109] And I, oh, these are cool socks.

[110] So I got like three of those.

[111] And I got a t -shirt.

[112] And then the lady, there was these like little like bottles with, with wax dripping on them.

[113] Oh, okay.

[114] And like handwritten.

[115] Like the house of stark labels.

[116] Yeah, I mean, really, they were all laid out on this little tray.

[117] And I was like, oh, what, and the lady who was helping me was like put a little bit on my, you know, a piece of paper and waved it.

[118] Then made me sniff coffee grounds.

[119] and then I smelled this stuff and I was like, oh my God, that's like the best smelling stuff of all time.

[120] So it was a little bottle that I went to check out and I handed them my card and the lady says to me that's 6 ,800 euros, which is about $8 million of American money.

[121] And it was actually so much money that my first instinct was like, oh gosh, you must have made a mistake because I only have three pairs of socks.

[122] a child's t -shirt, and this.

[123] This fragrance.

[124] Was there ground -up diamond in it or baby foreskin?

[125] I realized, first of all, you don't make perfume out of children's foreskins, you eat them.

[126] Oh, that's true, right, right, sure.

[127] When you're in Madagascar.

[128] Yes.

[129] Have you done that?

[130] The foreskin was passed to me, but it's, it's.

[131] Wow.

[132] Definitely a question.

[133] I wasn't expecting to get a yes to.

[134] Please continue.

[135] Oh, starting off with a band.

[136] Traditionally, in Sakalava culture, which are the indigenous tribal people who live in the southern half of Madagascar, a lawless country, I mean, literally a lawless country.

[137] At five years old, there's a ritual circumcision ceremony, which I think is about four years and 51 weeks.

[138] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[139] A little late.

[140] Too late.

[141] Yep.

[142] As someone who's experienced this before and thankfully doesn't remember it.

[143] Yeah.

[144] And this five -year -old boy that the maternal grandfather is supposed to eat the foreskin and this is a sock -a -lava thing, but the maternal grandfather decided that the honored guest should have it.

[145] So it was passed to me to eat and I was told this might happen and you don't want to insult, I'd rather be a better guest than a smarmy asshole TV host.

[146] And I've sort of predicated my career on that.

[147] Jumping in the deep end.

[148] Well, I mean, it's, you know, what am I going to do?

[149] Say no, this is the biggest moment in this family's life, and they're going to share this with me. And thank goodness, the paternal grandfather hated the maternal grandfather, and he snatched out of my hand and threw it in his mouth as if to say, like, screw you!

[150] Oh, wow.

[151] Then I realized I was in the middle of a Hatfield -McCoy's thing, and everyone started fighting, and we literally ran.

[152] out of this party.

[153] But I digress.

[154] I'm in this little boutique.

[155] Yeah, how did you handle the bill when it came your way?

[156] Well, she said to me, it's this stuff.

[157] Yeah.

[158] And I was, well, is it worth it?

[159] Is it worth it?

[160] Is it worth it?

[161] And, you know, one of my videographers was with me, and he was like, dude, you smell really good.

[162] And so I got it.

[163] And now it's the most expensive addiction that I have.

[164] Oh, wow.

[165] No, that's not true.

[166] I've developed a guitar addiction as of late.

[167] Do you play?

[168] Yes.

[169] That's a no. Here's the thing.

[170] I play five times a year.

[171] But, you know, as you will also find out when you're older.

[172] That's what Hendricks did.

[173] You will start collecting things that you don't use that much, but that you're kind of obsessed with.

[174] Every time you read that famous Eve Schwinnard quote that's like whoever dies with the least toys wins, which I love, and then you feel very small and feel like you've made too many mistakes in your life, but then you realize, I'm old, fuck it.

[175] I mean, ship sailed.

[176] There are people who know both of us in Los Angeles.

[177] They're friends of mine here.

[178] They're colleagues at my work who are as in love with your podcast as I am.

[179] We listen to it all the time.

[180] Thank you.

[181] It's amazing.

[182] It's really magical.

[183] I can relate to it for a gazillion reasons.

[184] Sure.

[185] But they wondered how on earth you and I were going to literally share space.

[186] A bubble of space.

[187] Audio space.

[188] Yeah.

[189] Yes, it'll evolve.

[190] It'll grow.

[191] I'm not scared at all.

[192] But that bill, moment.

[193] It just immediately took me back because my wife and I were invited as guests of a designer to the Metball in New York, something I did not want to do.

[194] So the designer had put us up at the Mandarin Oriental in New York City.

[195] So we're checking in my wife and I, and we had decided like, well, they already bought us a plane ticket.

[196] Let's stay two extra days, right?

[197] So I say to the person at the front desk, can we add two nights to this reservation?

[198] She's like, oh, no problem, Mr. Shepard.

[199] Yes, we'll have you out on Thursday then.

[200] And I go, great, great, great.

[201] That's And I go, oh, how much is it a night?

[202] And she goes, um, your sweet is $2 ,800 a night.

[203] And I go, um, so we will not be staying two extra nights.

[204] And then I got really embarrassed.

[205] And then I just looked at it and I go, we're very wealthy.

[206] Because I was just so humiliated.

[207] I was like, I was just, I'm not paying five fucking grand to take two naps?

[208] No way.

[209] Yeah.

[210] I'd sooner buy your perfume than do that.

[211] Correct.

[212] So look, and I fall into this thing, and by the way, this has been one of my chips on my shoulder that you can address because you have made a living in fine dining and a career out of it.

[213] And one of the chips on my shoulders, the kind of classest thing is like, I hated when I'd go to these restaurants, and I felt like the server was looking down at me, like he was a billionaire and I was a fool for wanting to use my fork with my left hand.

[214] I was like, hold on, Buster, unless you own this whole chain, it's all my issues.

[215] I recognize it.

[216] I always feel like people think I'm poor and stupid.

[217] It has nothing to do with the server.

[218] But there is a little bit of a snooty right now.

[219] Am I imagining all of it or some of it?

[220] I'm not sure that you're not spot on correct.

[221] I'm not sure that you're not supposed to.

[222] I'm not trying to co -sign your bullshit.

[223] Okay.

[224] Thank you.

[225] The hospitality business, right, is about an emotional transaction, not a financial transaction.

[226] And people try to predicate the history of the restaurant business.

[227] Oh, it started in France in the 18th century when the great chefs came out of the houses of royalty and began to open.

[228] Yes, that's true in France.

[229] In Japan, restaurants have existed since the 4th or 5th century.

[230] In Italy, they predate Pompeii.

[231] Wow.

[232] I believe in the caravans of what is now the Levant, the Middle East, hospitality in exchange for emotional safety and food given freely and then later in markets being paid for is thousands and thousands of years old.

[233] But mistakenly in the modern world and especially in the West, what has happened is people have forgotten about the emotional transaction.

[234] And so therefore, there is an element, it's not abusive.

[235] What it is is it's not being as Brias Savoran said, fully responsible for the guest happiness while you're in there, under their roof.

[236] And if you're going to be in the hospitality business, you need to be responsible for someone's happiness while they're in your building.

[237] And that starts from the phone call all the way through.

[238] And so if a waiter, if I go to one more restaurant and somebody says to me, chefs suggest the cucumber sorbet is your third course and eyes me because I've, ordered, you know, the mustard semi -fredo.

[239] I'm just like there's a difference between a suggestion and a subtle reminder that maybe I've made a mistake.

[240] And how that's handled is very tricky.

[241] I give servers a ton of credit because there's nothing worse.

[242] A bad service experience for a guest is not half as bad as a bad guest experienced by a server.

[243] I mean, we've all seen that in the restaurant when we're there and that's just, oh, horrifying.

[244] Yeah, I've given some real bad service in my day.

[245] Were you a server?

[246] I worked at California Pizza Kitchen in Brentwood, California.

[247] And my issue with this place was because it was in Brentwood, the folks that lived there that are very, very wealthy were absolutely appalled you couldn't make reservations.

[248] It was unacceptable.

[249] And they would lecture me at my host stand about how uncivil this was.

[250] And in my head, I'm like, the fucking pizza's $9.

[251] One really quick, funny thing.

[252] I think I've told this before.

[253] I'm going to say it anyways.

[254] When I worked there, I got a review after three months.

[255] My manager, Dan, took me into his office, and he had all these categories.

[256] He's going through him, going through him.

[257] We get to punctuality.

[258] Everything's out of ten.

[259] He goes, okay, punctuality.

[260] Gave you a seven.

[261] That's great.

[262] And then for appearance, and I go, oh, hold on, Dan.

[263] I've been 15 minutes early to every single shift.

[264] And he goes, yep, and we appreciate it.

[265] And I go, how does one get a 10?

[266] Like an hour early?

[267] And he goes, well, no. Just, you know, it's your first review.

[268] We want to give you something to aspire towards.

[269] And I was like, so there's nothing objective about this review.

[270] It's just to manipulate me into doing some more stuff.

[271] And in that moment, I had like an existential or some kind of of a moment and I go, Dan, I think I'm done at California Pizza Kitchen.

[272] Thank you.

[273] And we didn't finish the review.

[274] I basically quit.

[275] I left.

[276] Go out that night, get hammered, wake up the next morning on my message machine.

[277] I missed the call from Dan.

[278] Hey, Dax, it's Dan at California Pizza Kitchen.

[279] I've been mulling this over and look, I'm willing to go to an eight on punctuality if you can come in and take your 3 o 'clock shift and I didn't okay you have an incredibly fascinating story your story starts in New York you're born into a Jewish household what I couldn't find out about you in my research is what did mom and dad do circus people oh fantastic your mother was the hairy woman and your dad was like she was But not famous for it.

[280] No, you know, my mom and dad met and courted in the 50s.

[281] My father wanted a son.

[282] He wanted to be a dad more than anything in the whole world.

[283] He had lied about his age, had gone off to fight in World War II, joined the Navy, had come back to New York City.

[284] Smart guy.

[285] He'd gone to Bronx High School of Science.

[286] And when he returned on the troop carriers, he'd got into New York Harbor.

[287] and the Ivy League schools had big, thick applications, the way they do now.

[288] And the big Midwestern state schools had like a postcard.

[289] Sure, sure.

[290] So my father liked the postcard that you had to fill out for Wisconsin was the smallest.

[291] Okay.

[292] For Madison?

[293] And so my dad was a badger.

[294] Was a badger.

[295] Wow, yeah.

[296] So he came back.

[297] He helped start a big advertising agency in New York.

[298] Oh, he did?

[299] Yeah.

[300] In the 60s?

[301] In the 50s.

[302] So Mad Men to a team?

[303] Oh, 1 ,000 percent.

[304] And, you know, a little bit, you know, legendary in the business and created a lot of really famous ads and was one of those.

[305] Can you name one of the famous ones?

[306] In the 60s, drinks changed.

[307] It went from being like whiskey and soda to a margarita.

[308] All of a sudden, margaritas became popular.

[309] Sangria became popular.

[310] And there was a line of mixers, tonic.

[311] club soda, gingerail, made by a little company, and he had decided, well, they had decided they were going to go out of business.

[312] They really couldn't.

[313] And they put out one last desperate RFP because nobody was using mixers, ginger ale tonic and club soda, in drinks anymore.

[314] Because they were making, people were making fancy Bloody Marys and margaritas.

[315] And they literally tanking.

[316] And And that little company was Canada Dry.

[317] And my dad came up with an ad, a campaign called Not Too Sweet.

[318] He said, don't sell it as a mixer.

[319] Sell it as a beverage where you pour it over ice.

[320] Sure.

[321] And ginger ale kind of lifted off.

[322] And my dad always, whenever he heard people ordering gingerail, didn't matter what brand in a restaurant or something.

[323] He's like, that's because of me. I made that.

[324] Anyway, he met my mom.

[325] They dated.

[326] They fell in love.

[327] They had me. My mom was an artist in New York and designed windows for department stores and stuff like that and had a pretty thriving business.

[328] I just liked it because one of the guys that worked for her early on was a guy named Mark Benicki, who was the opening doorman at Studio 54.

[329] So my friends and I could go to Studio 54 when we were in high school.

[330] I saw that as my mother's great contribution to my growing up.

[331] They divorced when I was six, and my dad had fallen in love with the great love of his life, another man named Andre Laporte.

[332] Oh, get out!

[333] So I had two dads.

[334] What a fun twist.

[335] I had two dads, which I always found sort of, I mean, I've gotten, you know, it was always my dad's story to tell he and my stepfather have, you know, they finally got married, and it was wonderful that they got to spend the last three years married.

[336] married.

[337] My father was a very closeted, big, tough, like, conquer of the world, greatest generation.

[338] My stepfather was a diminutive French painter.

[339] Oh.

[340] And the two of them just sparred at each other.

[341] I'm Andrew.

[342] My stepdad was Andre.

[343] Their housekeeper, a stripper, that they had befriended.

[344] Oh, wow.

[345] They liked.

[346] I can't believe you ended up an alcoholic.

[347] I mean, I can't.

[348] What a shock.

[349] Can't imagine how.

[350] They befriended this woman at a strip club And she told them her tale of woe And said this is why I'm a sex worker And I just can we go to why they were at a strip club They liked Female strip club This is this is the greatest thing of all time They would be they very frankly were very up front One of the things they like to do for fun Was go with all their friends All same sex couples to these big strip clubs That was a fun night Oh wow that is a fun night Totally fun night You know it's very similar to my desire to see thunder from down under.

[351] It doesn't make any sense.

[352] I just want to.

[353] Those are tear away, aren't they?

[354] Oh, they can be.

[355] The stripper ran their house and her name was Andrea.

[356] So it was Andrew, Andre, and Andrea.

[357] I mean, it was just, it was, I had the most wonderful childhood in many ways and a lot of different advantages.

[358] But my mother she had a horrible accident in a hospital in 1974.

[359] She went in bikinis became popular and low cut bikinis came into vogue the summer of 73 and summer of 74 my mother decided that the appendix scar that she had from the 1930s was something that she wanted to have plastic surgery and have it removed and they gave her the wrong anesthesia during the surgery and she was in a coma Oh, my God.

[360] For about, I came home from summer camp, and my whole life had changed.

[361] And, you know, my mom was gone, and my dad was living downtown with my stepdad, which was fine with me. I always knew it, except it, wasn't a big deal to me. And my stepdad actually loved me in a very special way and was actually the parent who believed in me the longest, maybe because he wasn't my bio parent.

[362] Sure, sure.

[363] So he was the one who always said when I was out there, he'll come back, he'll come back, he'll come back.

[364] But when I found my mom in that condition, you know, we had a charge at the drug store because you could do that in those days.

[365] We had a charge at the liquor store because you could do that in those days.

[366] And you were allowed to go get your parents like a carton of cigarettes and a couple fifths, right?

[367] Like an eight -year -old.

[368] I had tried, especially growing up in our neighborhood on the Upper East Side.

[369] I mean, you called down, hey, it's the Zimmer and send up, whatever.

[370] And I had tried drugs, you know, drinking with my cousins, drugs at my last year of summer camp, smoke pot really didn't think much of it.

[371] But when I got home that summer with a father, two fathers living downtown, an empty apartment, living with housekeepers, my mother in an oxygen tent in a coma, I so desperately didn't want to feel what I was feeling.

[372] and I knew the best way to get rid of the way I was feeling was in the medicine cabinets and the liquor cabinets and stuff all throughout the house.

[373] So that set me on a fast course.

[374] That was the summer that I turned 13.

[375] Okay.

[376] And so things very quickly devolved.

[377] And by the time I graduated high school, I was a weekend hallucinogenic, bon vivant.

[378] I was a daily drinker, a daily pot smoker, a daily Coke user.

[379] I tried heroin and fell in love with it New Year's Eve of my senior year in high school.

[380] So I became pretty much your standard New York City garbage head and held it together for 10 years until I quit hard drugs because everything was wrong with my life.

[381] I couldn't maintain relationships.

[382] Everyone had abandoned me. I was a user of people and a taker of things.

[383] And I didn't want to be that anymore.

[384] the answer was quit drugs.

[385] They were illegal.

[386] And I did, but the problem was I didn't realize that booze was so much stronger than all that other stuff combined.

[387] And in my system, when you took away the drugs and I went just on the booze, I mean, I couldn't even keep life together.

[388] I went homeless and, you know, ended up trying to kill myself.

[389] And I wanted, some friends had an intervention for me and put me on a plane.

[390] And the, Loving people of the great state of Minnesota gave me my life back.

[391] Yay.

[392] Yeah, you went to Hazelden, right?

[393] 27 years, six months, and a day ago.

[394] Wow.

[395] Congratulations.

[396] It's amazing.

[397] Stay tuned for more live show after this exciting commercial break.

[398] Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and add free right now.

[399] Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts.

[400] Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts.

[401] Prior to the wheels coming off the bus, you discovered cooking or a love for cooking very young, 14 or something.

[402] Well, I knew when I was four or five years old and my parents knew too that I was going to be in the food business.

[403] I just, I wanted to cook.

[404] I love to eat.

[405] I love to travel and eat.

[406] I'm a pale version of my father.

[407] He would, we'd go skiing in Europe and then drive six hours across the Alps to eat in a three -star Michelin restaurant.

[408] He was a gourmand and a traveler and just a larger -than -life figure in so many ways.

[409] And I knew at a very early age I was going to be involved in food.

[410] When I turned 14, my parents said, you have to get a job.

[411] My parents had two women, two of my, I had two sets of fairy godmothers.

[412] And Irene and Maggie were a couple that had opened a restaurant on Montauk Highway.

[413] in the late 60s called The Quiet Clam.

[414] I like my clam noisy, but that's a side note.

[415] Well, which was a great name for a restaurant, you know, seafood restaurant that Irene and Maggie owned.

[416] And they said, we'll give him a job.

[417] And so five nights a week, my mom would drive me there, and Irene or Maggie would drive me home because their house was just past ours.

[418] and that's when I fell in love with the restaurant business.

[419] And I fell in love with that clickety clink of the gin and tonic coming across the lawn and the nightly theater of restaurants.

[420] I just, I fell in love with every single thing about it.

[421] And cooking something and giving pleasure to someone that way to me was one of the great joys in my life.

[422] I fell in love with it.

[423] I have just a couple of curiosities.

[424] One is both parents work a ton.

[425] Right?

[426] So as much as you adore them, could they have been a lot?

[427] around a little more for your liking?

[428] Well, my mother spent six months in the auction to tend and then years in a mental hospital and I ended up being the parent in that relationship and it was very dysfunctional.

[429] Sure.

[430] It took me 20, well, four years ago, I tried once a year ago somewhere to work on my emotional sobriety.

[431] Okay.

[432] And I did an intimacy workshop and a men's trauma workshop at the Meadows.

[433] They have these workshops that you can attend and you can really dive deep on this issue and I was there first hour day one and the guy who was leading the men's trauma workshop was like you were traumatized by the abandonment of your father and I was like are you fucking kidding me?

[434] I'm 24 years sober I've worked on this in inventory the crap of it that baby is in a box with a bow on it in the attic dealt with I wasn't traumatized he was the greatest man in the whole world he was my hero I had him on a pedestal 15 minutes later, I'm sobbing hysterically.

[435] He abandoned me. He abandoned me. I have the same thing with my mother.

[436] Yeah, but the truth of the matter is that you can love someone, you can put them on a pedestal, you can worship and idolize them, and miss them, and adore them.

[437] And at the same time, coming to grips with the fact that at that point in his life, intentional or not, and I believe it was unintentional, I believe parents are doing the best they can.

[438] Yeah.

[439] And once you are one, you're like, oh, that's right.

[440] They were human, like, I'm a human.

[441] Yeah.

[442] But the fact of the matter is that at the same time, he also made a choice.

[443] He did make the decision to live downtown with Andre, and I would live alone in the apartment with caregivers.

[444] And there was an abandonment moment there when he got in the car, and I had stuffed it down so far.

[445] It was one of the more healing things that has happened to me, and that was a 24 -year sober.

[446] It's crazy, right?

[447] Because we create these narratives.

[448] So in my narrative, my mom was an angel and my dad was the bad guy.

[449] He's to blame for everything I hate about myself.

[450] And that's that wrapped up to your point.

[451] Easy, done.

[452] Yes.

[453] And you know, my mother, God bless her.

[454] It's a testament to how amazing she is.

[455] She told me, I don't know, four years ago maybe, she goes, hey, you can be mad at me. Like, you deserve to be mad at me, you know.

[456] There was a lot of stepbads around.

[457] I didn't pick well.

[458] There was a lot of shit going on.

[459] I'm like, no, but, but, you can be mad at me. You deserve to be mad at me. There was a lot of stepbads around.

[460] I'm like, no, but, but, but, but, but, thought you did a great job.

[461] She's like, I'm giving you permission to be mad at me. I know you love me. Go do it, which is such an amazingly gracious thing for a parent to be able to tell a kid.

[462] But I also wonder, the other question I have because they were busy, and that makes sense, is you may have been great with the fact that dad was gay and with Andre.

[463] What about the amongst your group of friends?

[464] Were you embarrassed by that?

[465] How did they take that?

[466] Everyone was cool with it?

[467] One of the great gifts was geographic and situation.

[468] I wasn't living in Fargo Right In 1960 Right I mean Fargo Fargo now I've been to Fargo Oh it's not just a show It's What?

[469] Wait what?

[470] You know You know small town USA is I mean I wish it was more out And more hip Even in the late 60s early 70s I mean it was not unacceptable And because my father had other status it was a little easier right yeah and both my parents Andre was a famous artist my dad was very successful in his business and you know and was financially successful and so there was and in my group of friends growing up in a private school in New York City in the 70s everyone yeah no we'd say everyone was I mean parents every everyone was rebounding from the strict upbringing they had and they felt like they had just missed the 60s you know and so everyone was experiment I mean it was a crazy crazy time and I never never felt marginalized or othered because I had one set of gay parents in fact it was I mean people were kind of jealous because my parents were the super cool parents and it was just a place to hang and it was you know it was wonderful very loving nanny again but I mean that's That's a rarefied air right there.

[471] I have had a lot of friends over my life.

[472] None of them had a stripper housekeeper.

[473] To my knowledge.

[474] X stripper.

[475] That you know of.

[476] House stripper house.

[477] Old habits die hard.

[478] The bigger point that you bring up, though, is really, really important.

[479] The truth of it is when it comes to parents, and I want to make sure I get this right because it's somewhat of new learning for me. Love without honesty is hypocrisy.

[480] love without honesty is hypocrisy i like that right and and so i really believe in transparency with children yeah me too for that for that reason yeah because they will pick up on the fact that you're not being 100 % honest with that that the flip side of that is that honesty without love is abuse and if you're just you know hey you're fat you know i mean so it's it's really fascinating stuff to play around with and the i'm 58 next Wednesday.

[481] Yeah, for the July birthday.

[482] And so at 58, and we hear this all the time, I mean, you're very public about your sobriety.

[483] I'm very public about my sobriety.

[484] I'm still a work in progress, and I make a ton of mistakes.

[485] I've made almost as many mistakes in sobriety as I did when I was out there.

[486] But the difference is that you're by, it's like I'm actually trying hard.

[487] The more you go on in life, and if you're, you're sober and if you're pursuing wellness, your number of types of problems shrink, right?

[488] Yeah.

[489] But those two or three things that are just, some people use the excuse, well, it's just how I am.

[490] Well, you know, you want to die that way?

[491] You want to die being an asshole?

[492] I don't want to die being an asshole.

[493] So you've got to confront this stuff and work on it.

[494] And the minute we cease being teachable, we're fucked.

[495] Yeah, but how about the also, the frustration of, I wonder, few experiences.

[496] I like to learn the exact same lesson many, many times.

[497] That's what I'm talking about.

[498] It is not unlike working out.

[499] It's not like you do that last set and you're going to be ripped for life.

[500] No, you've got to fucking do the whole thing again a day later or the next day.

[501] Every single woman that I've ever spent any amount of time with or had any kind of emotional relationship with at some point says to me, turns to me and says the exact same line like the script has been handed like a baton in a race.

[502] They always turn to me and say, you know, sometimes dating you is like being in a relationship with myself.

[503] Oh.

[504] And I just sit there and I'm just like, so in my current, you know, life, I try to make sure as best I can that that's something that I'm working on all the time.

[505] Yes.

[506] Because it's not just with significant others.

[507] It's with your key work relationship.

[508] It's with any relationship.

[509] That's what I do.

[510] My business coach actually said to me the other day, she said, you're elusive.

[511] And I got so pissed off.

[512] Like, absolutely like off the charts, pissed off.

[513] Well, that's how you know.

[514] And then I realized.

[515] Truly.

[516] No, you're spot on.

[517] This is my secret recipe with my marriages.

[518] If I'm actually angry or emotional, there's some fear that's been triggered.

[519] You hit the nail on the head.

[520] Yeah, but my example I give is you could shout at me all night long.

[521] You're just too short.

[522] You're too short to get anything done in this world.

[523] You're too damn short.

[524] I would always be amused by it because I have zero fears of being short.

[525] Lucky you.

[526] Monica, you're too tall.

[527] You're just too tall.

[528] You're not going to fit into any of the door frames we go through tonight.

[529] You're too tall.

[530] People here are intimidated by you.

[531] Well, they could still be intimidated by me. Jolly Green Giant.

[532] People are intimidated by your smarts.

[533] They're intimidated.

[534] They're intimidated.

[535] They're intimidated by your looks.

[536] We just met tonight.

[537] Yeah.

[538] Okay.

[539] She's the babyest.

[540] But the fact of the matter is that it never occurred to me. I've seen pictures of you, right?

[541] And I listen to you all the time.

[542] And it was so funny when you introduced Monica and you made the height joke.

[543] And it's not the first time I've heard that.

[544] Okay.

[545] But yet I never imagined you as not being something, like when I imagined you driving down here, like what's she going to be like as being someone sort of like super intimidating, powerful human.

[546] Like that's how in my head you were.

[547] Oh, wow.

[548] You weren't, you weren't like small.

[549] It's just fascinating.

[550] Wow, that's interesting.

[551] And am I living up or no?

[552] Not so much.

[553] You've come in way over the way.

[554] Oh, good, good, good.

[555] I have something to say really quick about your pattern that the women are telling you.

[556] You think that's because you spent so much of your life being solitary.

[557] You have grown to become accustomed to being by yourself.

[558] No, I think what happened is my survival mechanism since I was seven, eight years old was elusivity.

[559] I think that while I'm very lucky and I lucked in because we are very lucky to be in the entertainment if you're collecting a check and you're in the entertainment business you're like the luckiest human being on planet Earth you're in the Matrix but it's very interesting that that's where I sort of selected and pushed I knew I had certain talents and I could have chosen other places to do that but I went to the place where there's the potential for elusivity.

[560] There's more places to hide out.

[561] There's more time away.

[562] And as we know for recovering people, well, for everyone, we're only as sick as our secrets, right?

[563] So I have to work extra hard to, like, not have secrets.

[564] It's a crazy thing, but it's really, your question is such a good one.

[565] It's really because my comfort zone was not letting everyone see all of me, but that's why today in my life, I try to be as transparent as possible.

[566] It's like telling on myself.

[567] If I'm transparent as possible all the time, then there's nothing to find out.

[568] Right.

[569] You know?

[570] Let me ask you this, though.

[571] Do you find it hard to be as kind and understanding and non -judgmental of yourself as you are to dudes and meetings?

[572] Because I can't.

[573] I'll hear someone tell some horrific story, and I'm like, yeah, dude, that's because you're a human being and we're all pieces of shit.

[574] We're trying our best to not be pieces of shit, but you're occasionally going to be a piece of shit.

[575] But when I mess up, I'm like, you are the world's worst human being.

[576] Yeah.

[577] They should put you in jail and kill you.

[578] You're vile, and you're a fraud.

[579] Get out of my head.

[580] I think my goal in life is to be as kind to myself.

[581] as I am to the people we meet in the rooms, you know?

[582] And it's fucking hard.

[583] I think I'm uniquely shitty.

[584] No, no, no, no, you're just a run of this.

[585] The great part about it is they're all just run -of -the -mill average alcoholics with run -of -the -mill average alcoholic minds.

[586] But that mind, the great part about the recovering community is that we're able to find so much empathy and kindness and do anything for that newcomer.

[587] I mean, I literally will drop everything and look to everyone, just go, hey, newcomer, got to go.

[588] Right.

[589] Right.

[590] Because I know how important it's a life or deaf thing.

[591] I mean, look, for 10 years, people were throwing me life preservers, and I was throwing them back because I didn't like the color orange.

[592] Eventually, someone threw me a life preserver, and I never let go of it.

[593] I mean, it's like, you can have my seat in the rooms.

[594] You can have my space in the recovering world when you pry it from my cold dead hands i mean i will kill you for that right however as much love and tolerance and kindness as i'm able to treat the newcomer and other people i'm not half as kind to myself i don't think any of us are of course not and so the the deal you know my my sponsor always told me treat everyone like you treat the newcomer in meetings and that should start with yourself if you're not treating yourself with love and kindness that way that you can't give it away if you don't have it.

[595] And so like many things in recovery, it's counterintuitive, but yet it makes sense when you're living it.

[596] Now, I don't know if you've ever even attempted to boil it down or isolate it to a single ingredient that I feel like I've observed in your story really takes a turn when you are able to do this is humility.

[597] You got out of treatment and you had worked in many, many restaurants, but you got a job just washing dishes, right?

[598] Well, first I was washing toilet.

[599] I get out of primary treatment.

[600] I'm 40 days clean.

[601] It's the middle of winter in Minnesota.

[602] I go to Hazelden's halfway house on 7th Street called Fellowship Club.

[603] I would have, I was desperate for sobriety.

[604] I would have sobered up in a liquor store.

[605] I was ready.

[606] This place, they were giving me a bed and three meals a day.

[607] I had no money.

[608] I was in debt $400 ,000, $500 ,000 to the IRS.

[609] Oh, wow.

[610] I had stolen a bunch of shit in New York.

[611] I had like three court cases against, I mean like I was literally hiding out at a halfway house.

[612] So no bills were coming there.

[613] No one knew I was there except a handful of friends.

[614] It was a great space to get sober.

[615] And I woke up there after the first night's sleeping there.

[616] They said, okay, you have to go to spot job group.

[617] And I said, what's that?

[618] It's like that's where you have 24 hours to get a job.

[619] And if you don't, they'll assign you to one.

[620] So I immediately went to my counselor and said, I need to see the director of the house.

[621] house and I walked into John Curtis's office.

[622] I sat down and I just like rambled on at him for 20 minutes.

[623] I'm supposed to get a job.

[624] I'm a famous culinaryian from New York City.

[625] I've run all these companies.

[626] I've managed all these restaurants.

[627] I'm a very accomplished chef.

[628] I can do this.

[629] I want to take over the whole food service system here at the house.

[630] The food's terrible by the way.

[631] Obviously you know that.

[632] I'm going to cut my standard fee in half.

[633] So for, you know, you know, $10 ,000 a week.

[634] I'm happy to do it.

[635] And I was like, okay, there we go.

[636] This is great.

[637] Just I'll get some papers drawn up.

[638] And he literally, he literally just hit his intercom.

[639] It was like, Mike, and my counselor came in and they dragged me out.

[640] And 20 minutes later, I was on a bus going to hospitals and jails, you know, county lockup, washing toilets and bathrooms.

[641] Wow.

[642] That was so awful that after 48 hours, I got a job washing.

[643] dishes at a coffee shop on Snelling Avenue called Dubens.

[644] And I washed dishes and bus tables there and then I was getting ready to leave the house after four or five months and there was a fancy French restaurant opening in town and I knew the owners from New York.

[645] And I went in there and I applied for a job as a dishwasher, hoping to avoid anyone who knew me from New York.

[646] And I And it opened for about a month until my cover was blown through a, I mean, one of the most craziest stories of my whole life within a matter of weeks, I was a chef and partner.

[647] I'd gone from dishwasher to chef and partner in the restaurant.

[648] Well, the chef didn't show up, right?

[649] No, one of the line cooks, who was also like the day sous chef, called in sick or something like that.

[650] And at 10 o 'clock, they were in a panic to find, it was a 150 seed grand cafe over in the Fochay Tower.

[651] We did two turns at lunch, you know, 300 covers in an hour and a half.

[652] It was at the time the hot restaurant in town.

[653] And the day guy, day sous chef didn't show up and he worked the grill station.

[654] And I'd be the dishwasher there.

[655] And I waved my hand and I said to the chef at the time, I said, you know, look, if you need someone to do it, call in another dishwasher.

[656] I'll work that guy's station.

[657] And he was like, you're the dishwasher.

[658] Shut up and keep washing dishes.

[659] Yeah.

[660] So eventually they had no one to do it.

[661] And I kept saying, look, I really think I can, I know I can do this guy's station.

[662] French onion soup.

[663] And so then I went and I put out the lunch and it's 1 .30 and I'm chopping chives in my station to get the nighttime doing mise and plaza for the nighttime guy.

[664] And the owner of the restaurant opens the door to his office and he could see down the line and he looks at me and he gives me this long finger.

[665] And I walked into his office and he shut the door and I thought I was going to be fired.

[666] And because I thought, what have I said?

[667] What have I done?

[668] Because to me, I'm always the bad guy.

[669] Like, I've done something.

[670] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[671] And he looks at me and he says, can you explain to me why my dishwasher is putting out nicer food than anyone else in the restaurant, including the guy who I've hired to be the chef here?

[672] And I said, well, I kind of been cooking for like 20 years in New York at a pretty high level and in Europe.

[673] And he's like, like, what kind of places?

[674] And I gave him my quick QV, which was a lot of Michelin Star.

[675] places and a lot of pretty fancy pants restaurants with a lot of fancy pants chefs and he asked me to take over then and there he didn't really like the guy was currently the chef and I said I can't I'm living in a I mean I still have a month to go in the halfway house and we negotiated a little thing I took it back to my sponsor and my counselor they said yes once you get out you can do it but you should be honest with him and tell him what you need and so I told him I need you know Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays off.

[676] Three -fifths of Jack Daniels.

[677] Well, that's what it was.

[678] But, you know, the incredible thing was, is I actually practiced.

[679] I was so scared shitless to ask for what I needed that it really did change my life.

[680] He offered me money and expected me to ask for more.

[681] And I didn't.

[682] I just said, I need Monday night off, Wednesday night off, Saturday.

[683] Like, here's my meetings.

[684] Here's what I need to do.

[685] My sobriety comes first.

[686] and I want to do a meeting during the day in the back of the restaurant and within three months after taking over the kitchen there's so many treatment centers here in the Twin Cities and so many amazing culinaryians coming from all over the industry chews people up pretty quick right?

[687] Pretty quickly and they started back when I was getting sober it started you started to see more and more food people showing up and so we had the executive chef from this resort in Florida my friend Tommy K. He became my sous chef.

[688] Little by little, all of a sudden, we put together a sober kitchen.

[689] And for a good solid three or four years, we were, you know, there were two or three or four best restaurants in town.

[690] We were lucky to be one of them.

[691] We had an amazing, amazing crew, and we just, you know, we did things a little differently.

[692] I have a very similar story.

[693] I worked at Elias Brothers Big boys in Michigan.

[694] I don't know if you guys have big boys here in Minnesota, or used to.

[695] They were all over the place of Michigan, and I was a bus boy, and I also washed the dishes, and I was making $2 .35 an hour, and they only gave me 50 % off the food, and I could only work four hours because I was in junior high, and so I would eat my exact paycheck every day.

[696] It was a push.

[697] So what I started doing is the slim gyms were cut in half in the kitchen.

[698] So when I was clearing the table, if someone didn't touch that half of the slim gym, I would go in back and eat.

[699] eat it.

[700] And I was doing that for a couple weeks.

[701] Everyone does that.

[702] Okay.

[703] Well, I was going to say, it progressed to, by the time I did not get elevated to cook, I got fired, I was picking up a big boy and just eating right where the teeth marks were.

[704] Oh, wow.

[705] Half eating French fry, I'm good with it.

[706] And I lived.

[707] Look, the cook staff was on work release from the state prison in Michigan.

[708] Sure.

[709] And they thought it'd be funny to put the animal grease, the fat, you know, thing.

[710] They smeared it all over my moped, and I had to ride a grease -up on the spree home in the wintertime on snowy roads.

[711] And I'm here.

[712] I made it.

[713] It worked out.

[714] Yeah, yeah.

[715] It worked out.

[716] So I guess what I was asking is, did you, would you eat people's food?

[717] That's really what I wanted to know.

[718] I think, I think everyone does.

[719] You have to remember, you also have to remember what my job ended up becoming for the last 15 years.

[720] Is eating weird shit?

[721] Yeah, so good training.

[722] The last year before I sobered up, I was living in an abandoned building casements open with no electricity.

[723] We pirated it from the bodega a couple buildings over.

[724] And I was stealing Comet Cleanzer from said bodega every couple of days to sprinkle it in a circle around the pile of dirty clothes I passed out on every night.

[725] So the roaches and wouldn't disturb me in my sleep, super classy.

[726] So if that's how I, and I didn't find anything wrong with that, by the way.

[727] Those were just my circumstances.

[728] Yeah, yeah.

[729] So if that's how I was willing to sleep, you could imagine what my dining life was like.

[730] That's true.

[731] That's a good point.

[732] So I would, I mean, I would steal food and it's fascinating to me, would take doggy bags of their leftovers, and then you'd see couples argue, like, don't bring that in the cab.

[733] You're not going to eat it.

[734] We would just throw it in the garbage can.

[735] And so, you know, they hate that.

[736] This is me after every meal that I don't finish at a restaurant.

[737] They're like, do you want to take this home?

[738] And I'm like, I guess I'm a bad person.

[739] If I don't, I'm wasteful.

[740] And then I take it, yeah, and it ends up in the trash a week later.

[741] But I think that's why the, you know, day one, scene one, moment one of the pilot that would eventually become the 13 -year Bizarre Foods franchise opening shot.

[742] that's probably why I was so willingly able to eat the, you know, fermented frog anus or whatever it was.

[743] Oh, yoy.

[744] Because I was like, well, this is no big deal.

[745] I mean, I crawled out of a gutter, and now I'm shooting a TV pilot for a lifestyle network.

[746] Yeah.

[747] And this is pretty good.

[748] Well, you did this show.

[749] Was it 13 years or 15?

[750] Yeah, 13.

[751] Well, 15 years at Travel Channel, because I did a couple specials, and it took a while to sell the show.

[752] and then 13 years ago, Bizarre Foods premiered, and thanks to Jay Leno, it became a monstrous hit.

[753] I probably made 600 episodes of, 500 episodes of eight different shows, all of which were Bizarre Food shows.

[754] They just named them different things.

[755] Bizarre Foods was like the first three, four, then they decided let's do Bizarre Foods America, then let's do Andrew Zimmerman's Wild World of Food, then let's do this show.

[756] You know, because they're always trying to mix it up.

[757] Sure, sure.

[758] Let's go back to bizarre foods.

[759] Well, that's the problem.

[760] If you start with a show called Bazaar, you've got to top it.

[761] You started off way too hot, in my opinion.

[762] It'd been like your sex show is called three -way reverse cowgirl anal 69 party.

[763] Where are you going season two?

[764] You've done every sex act imaginable.

[765] I was making the wrong show.

[766] How have you avoided not becoming morbidly obese?

[767] Great question.

[768] Because you're an attic and your job is eating food and making food, and that sounds like a recipe for disaster.

[769] People say this to me, and maybe it's the tape in my head, but I'm 5 '10, and I weigh 225 pounds.

[770] Now, 225 pounds of romp and stomping pig iron, but 225 pounds nonetheless, the less, I would like to be about 185 pounds.

[771] So I find, while maybe morbid isn't the case, I would love to lose weight, but I have fallen in love with all the people on Instagram who say it doesn't matter how you look, and it's body shape, and all the rest of that.

[772] I'm like, they're right, they're right.

[773] And it's almost like they've given me ice cream cart blancs.

[774] Yeah.

[775] Uh -huh.

[776] Yeah, it's a...

[777] It's hard.

[778] It's a tricky.

[779] that whole thing is interesting.

[780] It's interesting.

[781] It's hard.

[782] And I think one of the problems for me, and I've always, I've always been heavy set.

[783] Hold on a second, though.

[784] Whatever your self -image is, which I'm sure you suffer from dysmorphia, as we all do.

[785] Yes.

[786] Well, you think you're tall, which is the most hysterical thing of all time.

[787] No one's first thought when they meet you is this guy's heavy set.

[788] So that's all in your head.

[789] Yeah, yeah, that doesn't happen.

[790] But I'm curious, being an addict, regulating internal emotions with external things, all the external things that can regulate those emotions are going to be appealing on some level.

[791] I have found that if you transfer your addictions into other things...

[792] You can do 500 episodes of television?

[793] So what you do is, I had a choice, become morbidly obese, or go all in on workaholism, Spendholism, guitar shopping, fancy hotelitis.

[794] Fancy hotelitis.

[795] By the way, when you said $2 ,800 a room for that suite at...

[796] You were like, what a bargain.

[797] I was like, wow, $2 ,800, you must have gotten a discount.

[798] I was kind of...

[799] Fascinating.

[800] Stay tuned for more live show after this exciting commercial break.

[801] What's up, guys?

[802] Kiki and my podcast is back with a new season and let me tell you it's too good and I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest.

[803] Okay, every episode I bring on a friend and have a real conversation and I don't mean just friends.

[804] I mean the likes of Amy Polar, Kel Mitchell, Vivica Fox, the list goes on.

[805] So follow, watch and listen to Baby.

[806] This is Kiki Palmer on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast.

[807] We've all been there.

[808] Turning to the internet to self -diagnose our inexplicable pains, Dilitating body aches, sudden fevers, and strange rashes.

[809] Though our minds tend to spiral to worst -case scenarios, it's usually nothing, but for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

[810] Like the unexplainable death of a retired firefighter, whose body was found at home by his son, except it looked like he had been cremated, or the time when an entire town started jumping from buildings and seeing tigers on their ceilings.

[811] Hey listeners, it's Mr. Ballin here, and I'm here to tell you about my podcast.

[812] It's called Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.

[813] Each terrifying true story will be sure to keep you up at night.

[814] Follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries wherever you get your podcasts.

[815] Prime members can listen early and ad -free on Amazon Music.

[816] So you were a chef, and then you were a journalist you wrote for the Minneapolis and St. Paul magazine.

[817] And then you were on Fox 9.

[818] Well, I have crashed the morning news here in St. Paul, Minnesota, Twin Cities, Minneapolis.

[819] He's in a few more names.

[820] Yeah, I got to do the weather here.

[821] It was a riot.

[822] I loved it, and I hoped to do it again.

[823] Now, what I'm pointing out is that you were a chef, then you were a journalist, then you were the star of a reality show, a big radio stand, and then you now are a restaurateur.

[824] tour.

[825] Is that the right word for?

[826] No, I mean, I've always, I've always had my hand in restaurants one way or the other.

[827] The TV thing has been my primary deal.

[828] I like to tell stories about culture through food, and I will never stop doing that.

[829] I have too many jobs.

[830] I have too many jobs.

[831] Right.

[832] And now the pot's about to call the kettle black, but pretend I'm your sponsor for two seconds.

[833] Sure.

[834] I want what you have and I'm willing to go to any lengths to get it.

[835] It would appear that you set your sights on something, you get that thing, it didn't give you the feeling you thought you were going to get.

[836] So then you set your sights on another thing, and then you go get that thing, and then that didn't result in the feeling you thought you were going to have.

[837] And then you just...

[838] It's never enough.

[839] It's never enough.

[840] It's never enough.

[841] What is your relationship with that?

[842] With these goals and thinking you're going to feel a certain way, or maybe you don't think that.

[843] I certainly always have thought that and then found out that it wasn't a permanent mental state of mind that I was going to achieve.

[844] And it brings one to a lot of questions.

[845] You've been fortunate enough to accomplish a lot of things that most people don't get to accomplish.

[846] But then on the other side of that is also, oh, it didn't really fill that hole, right?

[847] It never fills the hole.

[848] Well, some things fill the hole for a day, others for a couple of days.

[849] The only...

[850] When I buy Jordans, I get about four hours of being happy.

[851] Yeah, yeah.

[852] Now I've got to buy another pair.

[853] Yep.

[854] The only thing that has never stopped making me happy and filling that hole is telling adventure learning stories in media that make the world a better place that I'm proud of and I can defend when I'm sitting on a couch with someone because to a lot of people, bizarre foods was about a fat white guy that goes around the world needs bugs and that's great.

[855] It's an entertainment show.

[856] I knew it was an entertainment show but I needed to turn it into a platform for change and I had originally I sold Travel Channel a Trojan horse They bought an entertainment show About a fat white guy that goes around world and eats bugs I was trying to make a show About preaching patience and tolerance And understanding in the world Because I sensed that we were We were defining ourselves by our differences Rather than by our similarities Yeah And my internal recovery life Was not matching my work world.

[857] And I said, patience, I'm understanding.

[858] I talk about that every night in my recovery life.

[859] Why can't I do something that actually contributes to the growth of that?

[860] And that's how bizarre foods came out.

[861] I had to put a hook on it and some window dressing and other stuff.

[862] But I want people to identify with that family meal.

[863] That family meal in every episode of our show, we never had an arrow pointing at it or a lower third that said, this is the family meal.

[864] Pay attention.

[865] Every piece of TV I've done with a handful of exceptions has always had a family gathering and meal in it because I needed to show the world what people in one corner of our planet looked like when they ate and people could say oh my God that's how my family looks like even though I'm all the way on the other side of the world even though the maternal grandfather shoving the foreskin in his mouth yeah you know oh my god that's like my drunk uncle Harry at Christmas grabbing a Brownie.

[866] So that's the only thing that's ever filled the whole.

[867] We discussed a, you know, a while back, this idea of continuing to learn and be teachable.

[868] The last couple of years, the big, you know, awakening that I've had, I say yes and chase too many things.

[869] Right.

[870] You know, saying no to some stuff means saying yes to a whole bunch of other things.

[871] And, you know, my sponsor told me that when I was.

[872] you know, six months sober.

[873] He was talking about other things, but I still had that defect of character inside me that was like aching.

[874] Something's going to fill the hole.

[875] Something's going to fill the hole.

[876] And I finally got to the point, this is the year of saying no. Is there a person that you were aiming at?

[877] Did you have an idol that you're, someone's path that you're trying to replicate or you think if I was that person, then I would be like, ooh, I did it.

[878] Time to relax.

[879] No. There isn't that person.

[880] I don't know of any.

[881] one or anything because my addiction is more.

[882] More, yeah.

[883] And so it doesn't matter.

[884] I don't want to compare myself to other people.

[885] I want to pursue my own bliss.

[886] What I'm trying to do is identify, here's what's going to make Andrew, Andrew.

[887] And let's lean in, let's lean into that.

[888] Right.

[889] So there's a famous West Wing episode where Bradley.

[890] Whitford.

[891] Thank you.

[892] uh is he's he's he's lost faith he doesn't know why he's you know the president's going to run again and he doesn't understand and he finds himself on a snowy night in the Midwest at the bar in some little tiny motel with an average Joe his battery runs out on his cell phone he can't contact anyway he's basically stuck having to talk to this guy that he was kind of rude with at the beginning at the end of the the episode Bradley Whitford his case character has had this conversation with this every man who just says, you know, I just love my family and I'm just trying to keep it simple.

[893] And the more I keep it simple and the less I ask out of the universe, the happier I am with everything.

[894] And, you know, it's not that I don't worry about money.

[895] It's just that if you give away what you have and if you have a good attitude about it, you know, then that financial insecurity just doesn't come to prey on you.

[896] You know, what you're, you're happy with what you have.

[897] And he basically throws at him all of those.

[898] You know, you know, sandbox rules that we really wish we lived by.

[899] We know what they are, but we wish that we lived by them.

[900] And I think about that all the time.

[901] You know, you keep your expectations low, keep your nose to the grindstone, simplify and distill.

[902] And I mean, that's the goal, right?

[903] And then, you know, hopefully by the time I'm all the way at the end, I will have the least toys and Yves Schwinnard will say I win.

[904] What's interesting about it is, because we're here, huge Scandinavian population here, right?

[905] Mm -hmm.

[906] Yeah.

[907] And they have something.

[908] They have something in, you know, Norway and Sweden and Finland.

[909] And in Denmark, they have this communal living that really is working.

[910] They're the happiest people.

[911] When they win something, they don't celebrate.

[912] And Peter Krause was telling me, you know, that's very much the kind of St. Paul, Minneapolis.

[913] Eat it.

[914] is like, you don't show off, you try hard, you don't rub anyone's nose in it, you know, and you just stay in your lane and do your thing.

[915] And I think it's really admirable.

[916] And I think it's not an accident that you were drawn to this place because this was probably the medicine you needed.

[917] It's one of the reasons why I stay here.

[918] People always nudge me and they're like, well, you're in the entertainment business.

[919] Wouldn't you be better off on the coasts?

[920] And if I was on the coast, a couple more jobs may come my way.

[921] I could do a few more talk shows because scheduling would be easier.

[922] I'd also probably be dead.

[923] I mean, I just don't know, you know, one of my best oldest friends, oldest family friends, came and visited me when I was about five months sober.

[924] And he looked at me, he said, what's your plan?

[925] And I said, well, I'm going to be working and I'm going to save money and, you know, probably come back to New York, but I promised him I'd stay here until I was one year sober.

[926] Now, you have to remember, this is April 1992, right?

[927] And I'm telling him I'm going to come home in seven months.

[928] And he looked at me and he said, why would you go back to New York?

[929] And he just looked at him.

[930] This is someone that I trusted and loved.

[931] And I just looked at him.

[932] I said, well, what do you mean?

[933] And he goes, well, are things better now than they were a year ago?

[934] And I'm like, oh, yeah.

[935] I mean, I've got my life back.

[936] I feel.

[937] good.

[938] I'm going to list, list, list, list.

[939] And, you know, he's like, great.

[940] Well, you know, why don't you move back to New York when your life stops getting better?

[941] You know, I feel like this is where I was always meant to be.

[942] Well, it's interesting because I don't miss the weather of Michigan.

[943] I like riding motorcycles, and you can only do that for a couple weeks in Michigan a year.

[944] And, but the thing I missed, and it was funny, because Monica and I were staying at this house on Lake Michigan with my whole family and it's unbelievably beautiful like it was two nights ago it was just glass I've never seen Lake Michigan just glass and we're watching like a thunderstorm come over Chicago and it's moving across the thing and I'm like God I just I really want to live here again and Monica goes well but don't you think you'll you would just get tired of it like every other place right and I was like yeah would I and I'm really thinking it over and then I realize one of the gifts.

[945] I mean, it's, it's not a gift, but it is a gift.

[946] I go, no, you know what?

[947] Everyone here knows that this is very finite, that it's going to go away in two months, and then we're going to be back to hell on earth.

[948] And as much as I hate the hell on earth, it does, it has a magic to it that it makes you appreciate every day.

[949] There's not a day on a lake that you're like, I'm over it.

[950] Because you know, fucking winter's coming.

[951] Ever.

[952] And I'll tell you, it's a real bipolar lifestyle and i respond to bipolar but all these people out there know the same secret that i know there's a look you give each other when the high that day is five below zero it's like yeah we're going to get through it it literally is like john snow and the rangers setting out north of the wall where it's like yeah we're tough we wear black we've made a commitment but it's we don't know why but it's also So, do you know why?

[953] Because something happens in, you know, the end of April beginning of May, where you go to sleep one night and it's just twigs on trees.

[954] And you wake up the next morning and you squint and you're looking at the trees, like out your window at the office or in your house.

[955] And you're like, shit, everything is just greening.

[956] It's just tipping just a little bit.

[957] And the next day, it's just a little bit more.

[958] And then the next day is like seven.

[959] 72 degrees, even though there's still snow in the parking lots at Target.

[960] And everybody walks around, everybody walks around in shorts, and it's like, yeah, I'm, I'm hitting 18 tonight.

[961] My favorite is in Michigan.

[962] It just, it hits 45 in April.

[963] And dudes have the top down, yeah.

[964] Guys are riding motorcycles and bathing suits.

[965] It's not nearly that warm.

[966] I'll add to it.

[967] And I think you and I share this in common, which is I have a ton of political opinions.

[968] I'm a lefty progressive, but I also think that my shared humanness is a far greater piece of that pie than my political opinions on literally a concept that was invented 100 years ago.

[969] So I resist the urge to make it my identity.

[970] And I desperately want us to be reminded that we're humans long before, we're Americans long before, we're left or right and all this stuff.

[971] And I think we share that.

[972] And the thing that you guys have here, and we have it a little bit in Michigan, but not as much here, is there is an awareness that you might need one another.

[973] Well, like, Brune Brown made a great point.

[974] And she was in Houston, and, you know, they had the hurricane.

[975] And the people that came down and rescued people, when they put their arm out to lift them into the boat, they didn't ask them who they voted for.

[976] It got crystal clear.

[977] It transcended all that.

[978] I think there is just an undercurrent here.

[979] that she can get real, the power goes out, you get snowed in, you might need each other.

[980] And I think that's an incredible thing to be aware of all the time.

[981] It sucks that you need eight months of winter to do it, but here's the other, you know, you raised a really good point.

[982] There is something intrinsically kind that is embedded in the culture of the Midwest because it was people who moved from the coast at great peril, at great expense, at great risk.

[983] The ancestors, the people who were here, you know, unless you're part of the indigenous first peoples of this amazing place, and there are a lot, we all came from somewhere at tremendous risk.

[984] We wanted to be here and we wanted to stay.

[985] And I think some of that culturally comes down into all of us to the fact where we, that's where that Minnesota nice thing comes from.

[986] I just moved.

[987] I was in New York before I went to Detroit.

[988] I was in New York doing press and I'm walking down the street with my buddy Steve DeCastro in this gal, young girl, pretty clearly going out on a night on the town.

[989] She is wearing a skirt and tripled that piece of toilet paper that was hanging off Donald Trump's shoe when he got on the plane.

[990] She had a piece of toilet paper so far hanging out of the back of her skirt.

[991] Oh.

[992] And I was like, is that part of the outfit?

[993] Like, I had a moment.

[994] It's not a new trend.

[995] It was like, and it was busy, and it was the West Village, and I was like, I've got to tell her.

[996] Like, you want to talk about a good Samaritan law.

[997] You should go to jail if you see someone with shit paper hanging out of the back of their skirt, and they're on their way out on the town, and you don't say anything.

[998] So I go, excuse me, excuse me, she's like, ugh, you know, she's like, New York.

[999] And I'm like, hey, I'm like, hey, you're going to hate me now, but you're going to thank me later.

[1000] She's like, I go, you have toilet paper hanging off your skirt.

[1001] And she was like, I don't know.

[1002] you.

[1003] I was like, that was the hardest thing I've done this year is no good deed goes unpunished.

[1004] I mean, she could have been on fire and could have been holding a pail of water.

[1005] Yeah, you would have been bothered.

[1006] If you did that in Minnesota, you would have gotten a hug.

[1007] Yeah.

[1008] Yeah.

[1009] That gives me. Hold on, hold on.

[1010] Hold on.

[1011] Hold on.

[1012] I watch the E. True Hollywood story of Jesse Ventura.

[1013] It's the best 30 minutes of your life.

[1014] I recommend you find it.

[1015] And he has And two of the greatest quotes I ever heard, I forget the tiny town he became mayor of before he became the government.

[1016] What?

[1017] Griffith Park?

[1018] Brooklyn Park.

[1019] He goes, he goes, I got to Brooklyn Park and there was a big problem in the park.

[1020] So I decided to clean up the streets, Navy SEAL style.

[1021] Gave no details of what that meant.

[1022] Like, in an amphibious land.

[1023] at the park.

[1024] That's what the Navy SEALs do.

[1025] They come in on zodiacs and start gunning people down.

[1026] Apparently, that's how he dealt with the drug problem there.

[1027] And then they ask him, like, what was it like to win the gubernatorial race?

[1028] And he said, well, I got to tell you, when I found out I won, my wife and I went to the hotel and drank nine bottles of Don Perignon.

[1029] I did my acceptance speech half in the bag and I was like that says a lot about the people that live here that they'd have that guy God bless you guys God bless Andrew God bless Monica you're an awesome guest you're using your superpowers for good you're helping deal with you know a lot of kids 20 some million kids get free lunch during the school year and then summer comes and they're left malnourished or undernourished or no food.

[1030] There's a lot of words for it, but you're working with YMCA to curtail that problem.

[1031] The meal gap is very, very real.

[1032] 80 % of the kids who get meals during the school year don't get them during the summer.

[1033] The YMIWCA has had a summer food program since 2011.

[1034] last year, after only seven years doing this, they gave out their 100 millionth free meal.

[1035] 100 million.

[1036] Yeah.

[1037] And this is why I love working with them because when you're doing service work or you're writing a $10 check to donate to a charity, you want to make sure it's actually going to a place that's figured out how to solve the problem.

[1038] The why, they do satellite programs.

[1039] They take their programming into the inner city in apartment complexes.

[1040] They go out to city parks.

[1041] They have 2 ,500 locations.

[1042] They've figured out a way to take care of kids after school, before school, during the school year, all summer long, from early in the morning to late at night, and all they do is give kids a safe place to be, and they feed them.

[1043] What a radical concept.

[1044] Yeah, revolutionary.

[1045] And so God bless them.

[1046] It is our obligation to ourselves and to our future.

[1047] I want to live in a society that believes that a single hungry child is a problem.

[1048] If you're four hungry children, I mean, what the fuck is wrong with you?

[1049] I mean, I just, I don't get it.

[1050] Well, if you're Oscar Meyer and you make luncheables, then you're hoping kids are hungry.

[1051] I mean, not to point that out, but there is a situation where you're praying kids are hungry.

[1052] Speaking of Oscar Meyer, there is one thing left, one open -ended thing here.

[1053] Was the foreskin cooked?

[1054] Was it cooked?

[1055] It was cut and, wow, straight off the bone.

[1056] It's straight off the boner.

[1057] Minnesota, St. Paul, Minneapolis, the Twin Cities.

[1058] Thank you guys so much for having us.

[1059] I really hope you'll have us back.

[1060] Thank you so much to Andrew.

[1061] Thank you so much to Monica.

[1062] Thank you, Wabiwob.

[1063] Thank you, Bob Merveck.

[1064] you guys thank you so much we love you have a fantastic night and now my favorite part of the show the fact check with my soulmate Monica Padman okay so you're getting your ears pierced tomorrow and you're going to get a couple well you're going to get four piercings I am so I got my ears pierced originally when I was like one day old no maybe not one day but maybe like a month my parents got them do Indians do like the Latinos Yes, I think so.

[1065] I mean, I didn't know that about Latinos.

[1066] You didn't?

[1067] I've had three different experiences on the playground in L .A. Where I've been talking to other dads, Latino dads, and they were looking at Lincoln with long hair, and they were like, and they didn't know her name yet.

[1068] It's not like that's what misled them.

[1069] And they said, oh, how old is he?

[1070] I said, oh, it's a she.

[1071] And then they said, oh, she don't have her ears pierced.

[1072] And then I started noticing every single Latina child on the playground has their ear pierced.

[1073] Really?

[1074] Yes, it's very omnipresent, ubiquitous.

[1075] That's interesting because our friend Molly.

[1076] Yes, who is of Latino.

[1077] She's Ecuadorian descent.

[1078] We were on a Marco Polo and we were talking about these ear piercings and I had said, I got, you know, mine were done when I was a baby.

[1079] And she said, me too, as it's the Ecuadorian way.

[1080] Well, again, I think it's the Latino way.

[1081] Okay, so we can expand.

[1082] But yes, Indian parents do that too.

[1083] Well, there's a lot of fun things about India, right?

[1084] Well, one of them is the gold.

[1085] Of course.

[1086] Indians love gold.

[1087] They've really driven up the price of gold.

[1088] So my grandmother had all these gold necklaces and stuff.

[1089] And those were the, no, necklaces.

[1090] Oh, okay.

[1091] The one I love?

[1092] Yes.

[1093] Yes, my hot grandmother.

[1094] Oh, my God.

[1095] I need to visit.

[1096] I mean, attracted to her.

[1097] I am.

[1098] You are to her old self.

[1099] Maybe you're her current self.

[1100] I wish you would be.

[1101] I bet I would.

[1102] No, you wouldn't.

[1103] She's an old lady.

[1104] I did a movie with Jane Fonda.

[1105] Uh -huh.

[1106] And I was married to Kristen, but she's very flirty in a very professional fun way.

[1107] And I am very flirty.

[1108] And I was looking at her and I was like, 100 %.

[1109] If I was single, I would roll around with her.

[1110] Whoa.

[1111] I mean, she is a unicorn.

[1112] She is.

[1113] But I got a hunch.

[1114] You know Elvis Presley at the end of his career, he would do these concerts, and he was, you know, several hundred pounds.

[1115] He was shooting dope.

[1116] He was a mess, so sweaty.

[1117] And he would lay on his back on the stage sometimes.

[1118] He would sing like a full song laying down, couldn't even stand up.

[1119] That's really hard to do, by the way, singing -wise.

[1120] Yeah.

[1121] But you'd see, you'd cut to the audience and the women, they still loved it.

[1122] And, you know, my theory is like, no matter what, they see the 1950 Elvis Presley.

[1123] Yeah.

[1124] And so there's a good chance that I would look at your grandma and I would see the woman in the wedding photo.

[1125] Maybe.

[1126] I'd like to put this to the test.

[1127] Okay.

[1128] I'm sure Kristen would let me out of our marital contract.

[1129] To lay with your grandma.

[1130] Okay.

[1131] Your grandpa's gone, right?

[1132] No, he's still there.

[1133] Oh, that's going to be a big issue.

[1134] He might be worried for her health.

[1135] Like when Chris and I are in our 80s, and if I see a young, big man who wants to make love to Kristen.

[1136] I might be worried about her health.

[1137] Yeah, is she going to make it through?

[1138] Yeah, kind of like a surgery at that age.

[1139] Yes, yes.

[1140] Are they going to make it through?

[1141] You have to sort of weigh that.

[1142] He's like, please be very gentle with her.

[1143] She is older.

[1144] Yeah.

[1145] My grandma had a lot of gold jewelry.

[1146] Yeah.

[1147] And yeah, it was very coveted.

[1148] Like those were the things that you kind of kept away and that you gave away, like, for very special occasions.

[1149] Have you received any of it?

[1150] um yeah you have what do you have well she gave me a necklace i've gotten a couple necklaces solid gold necklace yeah i mean look i don't want to talk about it because one of the knuckles is i don't know it is oh shit i know will you be expected will everyone be expected to wear all that to her funeral all the different pieces that have been handed out over the years oh i hope not and you'll have to go buy one that looks just like the one you lost yikes i listened to that benedictine monk that the A of it brothers were.

[1151] Oh, you did?

[1152] Yes, I got the book, and I listened to, I've listened to half of it.

[1153] Okay.

[1154] And it's good, it's good.

[1155] He's like, you know, a kind of secular.

[1156] I mean, he's not.

[1157] He believes in Jesus Christ.

[1158] Yeah.

[1159] But he's also like, you know, all these divisions are stupid and religion's not about that.

[1160] So he's kind of progressive and all that.

[1161] But the final thing, like when he's really boring down into what it is, he goes, you know, know, to imagine God's love, you must know the love you have when you look at your own child to see yourself in this creation is so rewarding, which is 100 % true.

[1162] Yeah.

[1163] It gives me this crazy good feeling.

[1164] And he said, that's what God does when he looks at us because he created us.

[1165] And I was like, that's a pretty vain God.

[1166] Like, I expect me as a human to have that.

[1167] Like, just seeing myself in something feels so good.

[1168] But that's so fucking shallow.

[1169] I expect the creator of the universe to not be fucking tickled by this thing he created when he looks at us.

[1170] I totally bailed out at that point.

[1171] I was like, that's who you're worshipping as a guy who's vain.

[1172] No, I don't.

[1173] What he loves about is seeing himself in the creation.

[1174] Isn't that ego maniacal for a God?

[1175] No, I think it's that there's a pride.

[1176] There's a pride.

[1177] Yes, God has pride.

[1178] That's terrible.

[1179] Pride is terrible.

[1180] No. Being proud is not terrible at all.

[1181] Well, let's be clear.

[1182] Yes, being proud is not, but having pride is.

[1183] No, it's the same thing.

[1184] It is.

[1185] Well, generally, you go, don't let your pride get in the way.

[1186] You have a lack of humility.

[1187] It can get out of hand, I think.

[1188] But generally, I think being proud of others, it's great.

[1189] Well, do you know, this is not to get two in the weeds on it, but do you, have you ever notice that when you get something, I've never said I'm proud of you.

[1190] What I always say to you is I'm happy for you.

[1191] I'm so happy for you.

[1192] Because to me, saying I'm proud of you is condescending.

[1193] It's like, who am I to be in a position that I could be proud of you?

[1194] It's not like you're my child.

[1195] Yes, I am.

[1196] I don't know.

[1197] It's triggering for me. Okay, we got a deep dive into this because this is about you.

[1198] This is not about, I think.

[1199] Everyone.

[1200] No, no, no. I love it that people are proud of me. But don't you think I'm proud of you Declare some ownership over you?

[1201] All I want is for you to be proud of me. Yeah, but I think it's a little egocentric.

[1202] Like, I'm happy for you.

[1203] I am so happy for you.

[1204] I'm proud of you makes me feel like, I don't know, I've watched you grow and...

[1205] You have.

[1206] Well, that is objectively true.

[1207] All of this is true.

[1208] Yeah, I wonder if a lot of people feel this way if I'm anomalous in this.

[1209] I feel it's so opposite.

[1210] Oh, that's interesting, because I've been about to say I'm proud of you several times, and then I go, no, she probably feels like I do.

[1211] And then I always just go, I'm so happy for you.

[1212] In fact, I only say I'm so happy forever.

[1213] Yeah, well, that's fine.

[1214] You can stick with your plan, but I don't feel like even I tell you I'm proud of you.

[1215] I've told you that.

[1216] But from you, I like it because I would want you to have some ownership of me. Right.

[1217] Well, that's what I mean.

[1218] If it's people you love you, you hope that they do feel an ownership and a connection in a way where their accomplishment makes you feel pride.

[1219] Yeah.

[1220] I love that.

[1221] That's a little weird.

[1222] Like, what does it have to do with you?

[1223] It has to do with you because you care deeply about that person.

[1224] And if you are connected.

[1225] Yeah.

[1226] I see your side for sure.

[1227] I see what you're saying.

[1228] Yeah.

[1229] Well, how do we even get on that?

[1230] I like.

[1231] Oh, God, having.

[1232] looking at his own creation and feeling, you know, so elated with his accomplishment.

[1233] I just feel like his very vain and human for a God.

[1234] Don't you think that you're hoping that at the end of your life you'll look at it and be proud of it?

[1235] Oh, yeah, I'm talking about God being, having these mortal feelings of pride.

[1236] I know, but that's a good feeling to look at it.

[1237] Like God's like, I did it.

[1238] I created this perfect animal.

[1239] Well, maybe it's not perfect.

[1240] but it's still like...

[1241] Well, we're very imperfect.

[1242] So, I forget what we were talking about.

[1243] Earrings.

[1244] We seem stoned.

[1245] I know.

[1246] We've been trying to talk about the earrings.

[1247] It's because we're on a field trip.

[1248] We got to tell people we're still on our field trip.

[1249] We now live on this field trip.

[1250] Yeah, we do.

[1251] Anyways, I'm going to get double studs and I'm going to get two earrings on the side of my ear.

[1252] Hoops.

[1253] They're very cool.

[1254] Now, the problem I'm foreseen is, you know, you don't generally wear your hair behind your ears.

[1255] Oh, that's what's going to be extra cool.

[1256] It's like you'll normally not notice.

[1257] Only your boyfriend will see it.

[1258] No, just every now and then you'll see it.

[1259] You'll get a glance.

[1260] You'll think, oh, whoa, she's edgier than I thought.

[1261] Yeah, that's a fun reveal.

[1262] You know, I tell people what I was urging you to do, knowing that you're going to have these new piercings.

[1263] Tell.

[1264] Shave one side of your hair.

[1265] I think that that would look so cool on you.

[1266] Oh, you also wanted me to not do anything physical at all, but then get a vagina piercing so that that's really mixed messages.

[1267] Well, I said, I said how far, what I said is how far are you going with this?

[1268] Are you going to get a navel piercing and then a vagina piercing and then a geish, they call it, a geish when you pierce your perineum?

[1269] How do you think that feels?

[1270] Awful, awful, awful.

[1271] I bet it's just like a searing pain.

[1272] Oh, my God.

[1273] Like a hot steak knife.

[1274] Never, no. Do you think?

[1275] Whoever doesn't know what a perineum is, it's the gap between your ball sack and your anus or your vagina and your anus.

[1276] It's a very thin skin there.

[1277] And there's so much stuff there.

[1278] Like it feels like the gnautist, like there's just knots in there.

[1279] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[1280] It's a dense area of the body.

[1281] But also thin.

[1282] But also thin skin.

[1283] Do you think if I got a vagina piercing, my PQs would be even more intense?

[1284] For sure.

[1285] But do you want random PQs throughout the day or would it be distracting and would you feel like you would need to go into the latrine and let off some steam a lot?

[1286] I like to feel horny.

[1287] We talked about this.

[1288] I like getting waves of horniness.

[1289] Yeah, I like it.

[1290] It feels good.

[1291] It's a euphoric.

[1292] What's not to like about it?

[1293] You're right.

[1294] Let's go.

[1295] We'll get our genitals gears.

[1296] Except if you always have to go to the potty and deal.

[1297] Well, then that's more it sounds like sex addiction.

[1298] Logistically, that's a problem.

[1299] It is.

[1300] Especially if you go on the porta potty with a disgusting her.

[1301] Exactly.

[1302] I mean, maybe that was the source of all of it.

[1303] Maybe that person put that there to dissuade people from masturbating in the porta potty because it takes too long and there's a line.

[1304] No. I think that person either just masturbated or was taking out their vagina ring and so they had to put it back in and so they had to use the napkin and then some hair got out.

[1305] Okay, so Andrew Zimmern.

[1306] Yeah.

[1307] We had a very hard.

[1308] hard time with it.

[1309] Well, I'll say I had a very hard, because you want to say Zimmerman.

[1310] You do.

[1311] You do.

[1312] Zimmern.

[1313] Andrew Zimmern.

[1314] He, I just want to say, before you say any facts, he took the three of us out for a meal afterwards that was so fun and tremendous.

[1315] It was.

[1316] And it was, I'm so glad we got the experience of hanging out with like a chef and going to a place that he knows is great and the way he, they treated him and the way he ordered for us so we knew.

[1317] It was fun.

[1318] It was fun.

[1319] so fun.

[1320] I loved it.

[1321] And Wabi Wobb.

[1322] It was stiff from the second we walked in the door.

[1323] The foodie day is.

[1324] What was the name of the restaurant Wabi Wobb?

[1325] Young Jony.

[1326] Young Jony.

[1327] And that was probably already on your list before we even got to the city, right?

[1328] Yeah, I knew about it.

[1329] Chef Ann Kim.

[1330] Oh, Wobby Wob.

[1331] She came to the table and she was so nice.

[1332] She was super nice.

[1333] And obviously talented.

[1334] Yeah, talented.

[1335] In and out of the kitchen, I heard.

[1336] Oh, wow.

[1337] Vagina ring?

[1338] Vigina ring.

[1339] He made a job.

[1340] about the cologne he bought that was so expensive.

[1341] Oh, yes.

[1342] And he said it was 6 ,800 euros, he said, which translated into, I forget what he said, like 8 million American dollars or something, which it translates to 7 ,567 American dollars now.

[1343] Oh.

[1344] So it could have been different then.

[1345] It was probably more before.

[1346] It probably was.

[1347] The exchange rates, the worst it's been, I think, in a long time for them.

[1348] Great for us.

[1349] That's, you know, who am I to say?

[1350] I have stupid cars that people are probably like, how on earth could you spend that amount on a thing that takes you from point A to point B?

[1351] So I'm not, I don't have the grounds this thing.

[1352] I also have a stupid watch.

[1353] So, but that does seem crazy to me because it is crazy to me too.

[1354] It is inherently a finite commodity that you're going to use and it's going to go away.

[1355] It's like a purchase that you know is going to disappear.

[1356] And like the stress with that, like every time you're using it to think like a thousand bucks, gone.

[1357] Or if it spills.

[1358] Oh, my God.

[1359] You did a panic attack.

[1360] But in a weird way, it's totally in keeping with a chef because chefs believe that you should spend insane amounts of money on something that you're going to eat and it'll be over.

[1361] You're right.

[1362] So it's like almost a lifestyle to go like, I'm about the experience and that's why I make money.

[1363] So it kind of is in keeping.

[1364] Yeah.

[1365] Do you like perfume girls?

[1366] Not generally.

[1367] My mom has one.

[1368] I think it's called Tova.

[1369] Okay.

[1370] And I loved when my mother wore it.

[1371] I loved it.

[1372] And I used to ask her to wear it.

[1373] And then through her and I talking about it a ton, maybe, you know, I was like, what was that perfume you used to wear?

[1374] And then we figured out it was Tova.

[1375] And what we really figured out is we took a trip to Phoenix, Arizona when I was like 10 years old.

[1376] And it was the best vacation we ever had.

[1377] We went to go -kart tracks.

[1378] We went to this place called Chaparral, which was go -carts with snowmobile engines.

[1379] I got my first skateboard.

[1380] We went to Flaky Jakes for the first time, which I've talked about.

[1381] We stayed at Woolie's Petit Suites.

[1382] I mean, this is the stuff I remember about that trip.

[1383] Everything.

[1384] Yeah.

[1385] And that was the first time she ever wore that perfume.

[1386] So I think that smell is interwoven with this great family vacation.

[1387] Yeah, you associate it with that.

[1388] I love it.

[1389] Interesting.

[1390] Even just thinking about it now, I'm getting so happy.

[1391] But in general, no. You know, Kristen and I wear the same smell, amber oil.

[1392] but you have such a specific smell oh that's horrifying no it's lovely it's lovely when i hug you i can smell your hair and so maybe i'm smelling like whatever shampoo you wear or something yeah but you have a very specific smell that i associate with you that's not the um the amber oil the amber oil the amber oil i probably just think women smell like that because you're the only two women i really see and smell and you both smell the same so i think i just think girls smell like that well you actually for real because all of us wear like Amy wears it a lot Simone is the first one that wore it but it's funny because the amber oil specifically smells a little bit different on everyone oh interesting yes so I still think whatever you're smelling on me is probably that and mixed with my soap probably okay and we'll use that charcoal volcanic soap I love it it's my favorite soap it's very exclusive yeah and then what are you going to hair and shampoo do you use?

[1393] Purr?

[1394] Purr plus?

[1395] Head and shoulders?

[1396] Selsen Blue.

[1397] No. These are all dander.

[1398] Shampoos.

[1399] I might need to.

[1400] I don't know.

[1401] Honestly, I remember when I was like a teenager and I would go into someone's bathroom at their house and I would see a jar of Selson Blue and I'd think, oh, someone in this house has dandruff.

[1402] Oh my God.

[1403] And then a couple different times.

[1404] in my life I needed to get a bottle of Celsen Blue or the other one I just said.

[1405] Do you think you jinxed yourself for that?

[1406] Well, I just know that I would use it and then I'd pull it out of the shower and hide it in the back of the cover in case friends came over.

[1407] I wouldn't want them to know that I was wrestling with some dander.

[1408] Oh, wow.

[1409] Yeah.

[1410] Okay, the only other fact, which is not a fact, is something really interesting happened.

[1411] Okay, at one point you called him an addict, which he is.

[1412] Yeah.

[1413] But you pronounced it attic.

[1414] Oh, no. Yes.

[1415] I was laughing so hard.

[1416] You pronounced addict addict, addict.

[1417] And as we all know, you pronounce addict addict.

[1418] Oh, my goodness.

[1419] Oh, wow.

[1420] It's all twisty terny in your head.

[1421] You know, as much as we laugh about it, I do fear it's getting worse because my father, oh, my God, at the end.

[1422] Like, maybe every third.

[1423] It's not the end.

[1424] No, for him at the end.

[1425] I know, but.

[1426] But at the end, and it progressed, every third word.

[1427] word was wrong.

[1428] I mean, it was, you were, you were on a slalom course of trying to figure out what the fuck he was talking about.

[1429] Oh, boy.

[1430] Every celebrity's name he tried to say, what did he call Harardo?

[1431] He loved watching Harardo, which was Geraldo Rivera.

[1432] Yeah.

[1433] Herrardo.

[1434] And I mean, every name he had wrong.

[1435] Yeah, and he tried to ask me about Jessica Alba.

[1436] You know this story about Jessica Alba.

[1437] Oh, my goodness.

[1438] No, what happened?

[1439] Holy shit.

[1440] Let me first say, I fucking love my dad so much.

[1441] I would love to see him and squeeze him.

[1442] He's such a sweetheart.

[1443] But on this day, I had to go to the Teen Choice Awards or some award show.

[1444] And my father had drank like 11 pots of coffee at that point.

[1445] Like enough that in the car, I was like, oh, his breath is very rough.

[1446] It's very sharp and rough.

[1447] And we went into the award show.

[1448] And my father, I should have explained it to him.

[1449] He didn't understand that there are seat fillers.

[1450] At a award shows in the event that one of the celebrities goes to the bathroom they don't want to pan out in the audience and have empty seats so people rush in and they sit there and they're professional seat fillers so my dad I sent my dad to our seats I had a couple seats like in the second row so I could really see from the stage and I had to go present and then I was going to join him at that seat well while I'm on stage I see my father yelling at a young girl oh he is in a fight in in the audience um And I'm trying to like say the shit on the monitor, but I'm noticing my father's getting very heated.

[1451] And now there's an usher coming over.

[1452] No. And then the usher's explaining something to my dad.

[1453] And my dad's like shaking his head like, oh, this is bullshit.

[1454] And I know in that moment exactly what happened.

[1455] He thinks that this girl's trying to steal his son's seat.

[1456] Right.

[1457] And he's telling her she can't sit there.

[1458] This is my son's seat.

[1459] He's on stage.

[1460] He's coming back and he's like, he's getting hotter and hotter.

[1461] Now there's an usher involved.

[1462] And I'm watching.

[1463] all this from the stage and I'm like oh my goodness I really can't take him anywhere and so that that goes so poorly that I decide I got to get him out of here I just want to get him out of here so I go to the seats and I say to him you know let's just get out of here oh there's a woman trying to steal your seat I'm like yeah dad there's seat I should have told you there's seat fillers blah blah so we're walking now backstage and we're walking across the parking lot to go to the cars and as we're walking across the parking lot, Jessica Alba's walking across.

[1464] We have subsequently become friends in real life.

[1465] But at that point, we weren't friends.

[1466] All that had happened was she was on an episode of Punked with me. My father watched her show Angel or whatever, that Dark Angel show she had was.

[1467] And he was obsessed with her.

[1468] He thought she was the most beautiful creature alive.

[1469] Okay.

[1470] So she's walking across the parking lot.

[1471] She stops to say hi to me. Hey, Dax.

[1472] And he right away puts his hand on her shoulder.

[1473] He gets into her face like he's talking into the microphone at a bank tailor.

[1474] No. He's using her nose as a microphone.

[1475] Oh my God.

[1476] And he goes, oh, Dax talks about you so much.

[1477] I'm like, what?

[1478] What is he saying?

[1479] I don't, I don't talk about her son.

[1480] I don't think I'd ever, other than him telling me he loves Dark Angel and me saying, yeah, I was in an episode of punk.

[1481] I never talked about her.

[1482] And he is speaking into her nose.

[1483] Like, a tiny microphone and he's going on about how often I speak of her and he goes you you guys should exchange numbers like he was trying to be a good wing man and hook us up yes oh I was I was deep you know the way only your parents can embarrass you like I'm sure you hearing the story you're like oh whatever everyone knows it's an older guy exactly but because it was my father and I thought again back to the ego it was a reflection of me I know did you did you say I was just completely fucking embarrassed and then we got in the car and I was like I just mental note cannot bring him to an event like this and I love him and I'd love him and I'd love to snuggle him on the couch very affectionate man very kind and affectionate until you try to steal his son's sick and then buckle up miss him and I love him I'd kill to have them embarrass me today yeah that's nice well I love you and I really thank Andrew for such a fun night.

[1484] Me too.

[1485] By the way, Minneapolis, what a fun, fun audience.

[1486] What a great city.

[1487] We love that place.

[1488] It was great.

[1489] What a place.

[1490] Should we talk about my mosquito bites or no?

[1491] All right.

[1492] Love y 'all.

[1493] I love you.

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