DOD35: HO HO HO

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:27 Tom: Welcome to Dear Old Dads, the podcast that knows it's only the thought that counts if you're not lazy about it. I'm Tom Curry. I'm joined as always by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick. Merry Christmas!

0:00:39 Thomas: Ho! Ho! Ha

0:00:43 Eli: And oi oi oi for the Hanukkah appreciators out there, you know?

0:00:45 Thomas: Ha ha ha!

0:00:49 Tom: So I want to start this out. I want to tell you guys, we had my family Christmas. We don't do Christmas with my family on Christmas .We never have. We always pick a different weekend because we've got Like, my dad and, you lack of a better term, my stepmom, they don't live together, so they've got to coordinate a date. And then we do our Christmas. My brother has to come in from out of town, so we always pick a date, and we have Christmas.

0:01:08 Eli: She has to pay extra, cause it's two

0:01:10 Tom: She does.

0:01:10 Thomas: Yeah, her Christmas handshake,

0:01:10 Eli: In one week, and it's a whole thing for you.

0:01:12 Tom: It's a serious handshake.

0:01:12 Thomas: Though, it makes the season.

0:01:15 Tom: So, No, this is, like, I think you'll like this story. So my dad says to me the day before we're going to get together for Christmas, so he got together Saturday. Friday night, he calls, and he says, "Hey, I need you to do me a favor. I need you to pick up a cake for me on the way in." And now, mind you, I've got four kids and I've got to rent a car, and like the store is two miles from his house, so it's a little unusual for him to ask me to pick something up, but I'm like, yeah, no, no problem.

He's like, "And also, uh, won't be here, uh, Christmas," which is insane because we literally schedule Christmas on a different day than Christmas in order for everybody to get together. So I was like, what the the hell's going on? You know what? Why not? Oh, she's in the hospital. Wait, what? What? What do you mean? She's in a hospital. How long has she been in that? She'd been in the hostel for the last three days. I don't want to tell this story twice. I'll tell you guys all tomorrow when you get here, but she's fine.

0:01:14 Eli: Um. Mm -hmm.

0:01:30 Thomas: Huh. Huh.

0:02:05 Thomas: I don't want to tell this story, but...

0:02:06 Tom: Pick up a cake, you know? So, okay. So I go to pick up the cake and I get to the house and my dad, now my dad has, has a lot of back problems. He's, broken his back. He's had two or three spinal fusions. His back is just, yeah, right?

0:02:18 Thomas: Scaring all those clocks around for decades. Bags

0:02:20 Eli: Yeah.

0:02:22 Tom: His fucking clock is ticking. I'll tell you That. So he has a tough time getting around on the best of days, but he is just absolutely struggling to stand up or to move at all. And I think this is actually a really sweet story. So Lynn, his partner, whatever, basically my stepmom, she had a health issue. She's been in the hospital. She is home now. She will be fine. But my dad went to the hospital and he slept next to her in the hospital for three days with a terrible back he can barely move and like Christmas happen for everybody like because he didn't want the grandkids to be disappointed so but it's like curmudgeonly sometimes I think as he comes off as like his lady was down for the count he didn't leave her side he slept on that fucking hospital chair despite just pain as a result in order to be by her side for three days while she was in the hospital and then made sure to come home and still have Christmas for all the grandkids which

0:02:22 Thomas: Full of... Ha ha!

0:03:17 Eli: Aww.

0:03:17 Tom: I just thought was like such a wonderful and sweet thing to do and like the only thing he asked for anybody to do is pick up a cake that's it

0:03:24 Eli: And it's also So perfectly your dad, right? Because there's this, like, heart of gold center surrounded by hot, fudgy psychopathia Right, like I'll sit in a chair as my spine fuses To the lattices of the thing, also I won't tell anybody, so that they might, you know, also aid and comfort this No, this is me.

0:03:32 Tom: No. Just just What?

0:03:47 Eli: This is my I'm in the comforting chair, there's no room for anyone in here.

0:03:49 Tom: Yeah.

0:03:33 Thomas: Ha ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, he's a better man And then, then I, I just am remembering when Phoebe, when we had a pretty long labor with Phoebe in the hospital, cause I, um, as I've, I've mentioned to you guys and I don't know if I've sat on the show, but I have, I have pretty, pretty awful back pain constantly. I remember one of the jokes I did at the time of Phoebe being born is, you know, Lydia's going through this long labor, you're like, I'm, I're trying to do that exact thing where I'm trying to sleep on like the hospital.

Cause it was all night. Night. Like it was just fucking, she was induced for Phoebe. So that is a horrible process. Cause they're like, well, we give you this fucking chemical that allegedly is going to start things off, but when it's it's not fucking ready. Like it just isn't. And so it was all night. And the meanwhile, my back is fucking killing me on this table. And obviously I didn't say a word, but like later, you know, later on, I was like in In my mind, I'm thinking, all right, I mean, I know I can't complain, but this really hurts.

0:04:04 Tom: Right.

0:04:37 Eli: Oh.

0:04:46 Thomas: Like, I just, I wish I could just be like, hey, hey guys, hey doctors, this is, I don't know, I guess I'm uncomfortable over here. I'm just, let me say I'm on comfortable over here while she's, yeah, yeah.

0:04:47 Eli: Really? Yeah.

0:04:48 Tom: Can I Get a little, what, she's having, like, we put an epidural in me too like, what's

0:04:56 Eli: A little morphine for the back here, doc? Come on.

0:04:59 Thomas: But I love that, like, no matter the level of pain there, you, there's nothing like you could never, my, my appendix could have burst and I'd be like well, yeah I guess there's

0:04:59 Tom: Doesn't matter, that's not your time, Thomas, that's not your time, nope.

0:05:12 Thomas: There's no amount of pain that would have led me to say a word about it at the time.

0:05:15 Tom: Nope, I, I'll tell you another, you joke about my dad being a chair is a great, is another, like, great example that my dad, one time my dad can't get up, so he's got a chair that like helps him stand up, so we can't just like get up out of a recliner on his own, he did not would work it himself he did not he did, but but

0:05:28 Thomas: Please tell me he would worked it himself and it's like, it's a series of levers and pull. Yeah.

0:05:30 Eli: Yeah. He did it's a series of pulley he's gonna Thomas Minchley himself by the end of his life, oh.

0:05:39 Tom: I love this story, so, so this chair, it's, it's obviously it's electrically operated, so plugs in and it's got like a remote, and so in order for him to stand up the chair has to kind of like lift him mostly to his feet, so he was reclined in the chair one day and then the power went out in the house and so he was just stuck, he was just stuck on his back in this chair, no, there's no backup battery in this fucking chair, so my dad is just like on a like a turtle on his back just in this chair waiting for the power to come back on and he tells me this it

0:05:54 Thomas: Oh, no. There's not back up battery.

0:05:55 Eli: No, oh.

0:06:08 Thomas: Oh,

0:06:08 Eli: This this is 127 hour sequel I can tell already

0:06:12 Thomas: Well.

0:06:13 Tom: Is it is, so he's telling me this story and I'm like, oh my god, dad, that's awful, as, what'd you do? He said, well, I laughed, what the hell do you think I'm gonna do? And he just laid there in the chair like, power will come on eventually or I'll run out of water. Like, that's what I'd say. Like, those are my two choices.

0:06:22 Eli: Yep. Your dad would literally have starved to death and the coroners would have been like, this is so crazy, it looks like he didn't even try to get out of the chair for the 31 days and nights he was here.

0:06:41 Tom: No, there's definitely no getting out of that chair without help for him. But, yeah, so we had our family Christmas with my dad yesterday. So do you guys do your Christmas exclusively on Christmas Day or do you have multiple Christmases to celebrate with different family?

0:06:55 Thomas: Well, I believe in the birth of Jesus Christ, so I can only do it on the day that we decided that he was born or something, which isn't even that day.

0:06:58 Tom: Oh, right. Yeah, silly question, obviously. Yeah.

0:07:07 Eli: I'm sorry, are we just ignoring papacy segregation at this point? They had three councils of Nicaea to decide this guys. Okay, you're wasting councils, you're wasting councils. Uh, no, we do, we do Christmas, but my mother, who I adore, in her last vestige of Judaism in the family, will give everyone presents just every night that she's visiting and be like, "This is a Hanukkah present." So she'll come on like the 23rd, the 24th, and then she'll get a present out and she'd be like, "Hanukkah present," and I'll be like, "Yeah, Hanukah present," she'd be like, "Where's your menorah?" And I'd be like, "Right, with my religion, mom, it's right there."

0:07:13 Thomas: I

0:07:46 Eli: Remember the first year we had Max, Anna was very excited to do the menorah, she'd never heard of it, and she was like, "He's half Jewish, let's do that, we do Christmas, let's see what it goes." I was like, "All right, fine." Went out and bought like a one dollar menorah, might as well have been like a shelf that said like "atheist Jew menorahs here," and I was, I was like, "All right, a dollar on my fucking bedroom."

0:08:06 Eli: Did it. And I was, like, light the candle, light it with the other one. I was , like, then we usually say some prayers. And she was, Like, well, we're not fucking doing that. And I Was, like. You're looking at me. This is your fucking idea.

0:08:14 Tom: Like, I didn't even want the menorah.

0:08:16 Eli: And she sort of went, like., Wait, is that Hanukkah? And I, like,. Yeah, man, that's Hanuk. They just faked it. It's a nothing holiday. And then they, fucking, wanted to compete with Christmas. This is the, fucking. This is, like,, those pay -per -view movies. Yeah. No, Hanukah is a nothing. It's not a nothing -holiday. It always has been, um, and the Jews were just like, look at the goyim giving each other with the presents in the fucking movies with the men, you know what I love, I love, what is it, because there's a Jewish holiday every 14 seconds, so they were like, all right, there's

0:08:22 Thomas: Oh, is that really true?

0:08:38 Tom: Right.

0:08:39 Thomas: Yeah, I was going to say, I thought there would be some story of, Jewish you people getting fucked over by somebody that you squeeze into Hanukkah. Yeah.

0:08:50 Eli: That's Hanukkah. No, that Hanukah is people getting fucked over. They lose a fight, the temple is destroyed, but they light a candle in there and they're like, "Look, that candle, that candle's in perfect shape. They didn't do nothing. I'd clean, I'll do a little clean up. I'll get the robot in here. What's the robot? Sharon, what's the robot called? The Roomba. I'm going to get the Roombah in here, he's going to walk around, it's going to be great. But yeah, it was a nothing holiday. They were just like, fuck you, you don't get a special day. We are also special day, but,

0:08:51 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, okay.

0:09:20 Tom: This is the part of the show where I realize I don't actually know what Hanukkah is at all. I

0:09:23 Thomas: Yeah, I know. I was embarrassed to say I have no idea. Yeah. I know there's a menorah.

0:09:24 Tom: Have no idea I have no idea. What Hanuka is. Yeah,

0:09:27 Thomas: I know you.

0:09:24 Eli: Well, pull up and hear the story of Hanukkah.

0:09:28 Tom: You could tell me any story at all right now and be like, "Oh, yeah, oh, okay, sure, yeah, that's Hanukka

0:09:31 Thomas: Yeah, well, I'm glad that my impression of it was pretty what Eli just said. I would have been able to do that.

0:09:38 Eli: Almost exactly. Yep.

0:09:40 Thomas: Yeah you light a fucking candle and there's gifts I think. I don't know.

0:09:42 Eli: Yeah. Yeah. So the Greeks came and they kicked our asses, and then they destroyed the temple and we were very sad and we were like, "Oh, why is God forsaken us?" And whoever was in charge at that time, I don't know, fuck, his name's on the book, he was like, "Guys, guys, guys, hadn't forsaken. I'm going to go and get some new shit, 'cause our temple's all fucked up. Keep the light on for me." And they were like, "What?" And he was like, "It's a song from the eighties, trust me, people are gonna love that shit." So they lit a candle, but but there was only enough oil for one night. How did they know that? So they goes away and

0:10:16 Thomas: Oh wait, do candles use oil back then? Is it an oil oil candle?

0:10:18 Eli: Yeah back then they were, it was an oil-based candle, they only had one

0:10:23 Tom: Sure just go with it, it was a sensi, it's an MLM thing it's been around a long time

0:10:24 Eli: Yeah

0:10:25 Thomas: So that you like pour into the candle? Oh, I

0:10:27 Eli: Yeah it's just the tin man with flame coming out of the top of him. It was very confusing, but then he came back seven nights later, and the candle was still lit, and that's the miracle of Hanukkah. See, that's a nice thing, or

0:10:38 Thomas: See. Yeah. The miracle. Yeah, because no one could possibly have misjudged how much candle was left or turns out they're like, oh, yeah, no, it's not a miracle. Candles don't use oil. I don't know why we thought it only had a certain amount of oil left.

0:10:46 Eli: Oil or light, or light blown out the candle. We actually have infinite oil here. It's great.

0:10:57 Thomas: Candle has barely used any oil.

0:11:01 Tom: Oh, God's miracles get more and more fucking pedestrian as time goes on. You know, imagine you're- you're God and the first thing you do is create, create time and matter and space and light, and then, like, you fast forward a little bit and you're like, "Keep the candle on." I don't know, like, you're just fucking phoning it in.

0:11:05 Eli: Yeah. Yeah.

0:11:11 Thomas: Yeah. It's Miracles were very fire -based back then, which is, you know, it's kind of a, we got a burning bush, like, wow, there's a small brush fire. That's a, that's a miracle. Okay.

0:11:20 Eli: Yeah. Yeah. Old Testament God, he sucks real hard, right? He's kind of- he's the Thomas' dad of deities. You're just like, yeah, I mean, I guess we should sort of try to

0:11:30 Thomas: Yeah, oh, sure. Oh, I wish my dad had that kind of energy. I wish if my dad, if my Dad had the energy to be like, Like, son, I need you to kill your baby for me. I'd be like, ah, you know, I'm not going to, but it is nice to be asked. You know, it is. It feels good for you to extend the effort.

0:11:52 Eli: Go kill your baby where the heaven used to be.

0:11:56 Thomas: I do appreciate Tom's consistent ethic of dates don't fucking matter because I still I'm still mulling over Tom. The suggestion of scumbag's birthday just be whatever the fuck I want it to be.

0:12:04 Tom: Yeah, no, fuck it, you- just do whatever you want, whenever you want, Man, we'll just do- we'll do we do shit when we fucking when I get around to it that's when we fucking do it. That's it. Yeah.

0:12:09 Eli: Yes.

0:12:09 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Like I, I, Tom wins. Are you celebrating Easter too on the, you should do them all at once. Tom do all your hall. Oh man.

0:12:22 Tom: Do you have to travel for it, or has everyone come to you?

0:12:19 Eli: But we do Christmas Actually, the- everyone comes to me, and by that I mean, in my immediate family, Anna's parents come when they can, um, they've been doing construction on their house the last couple years, so they haven't made it, but they have made it a couple of years in a row, and it's- it's just a very small one, I mean, we couldn't host more than, you know, my family and Anna's family, but friends who don't have places to go will come, um, we used to have my friend Rachel every year, because her family's Jewish, and they would just be like, "Why would you come home, we're Jewish," and she'd be like, "Come on, guys, don't," and so we would- would always have her for Christmas, and yeah, I know, we- I fucking- I fucking love Christmas, man, I never really got Christmas as a kid, right, because it was always like Hanukkah was the present time, and we can talk about how shitty it is, how shitty the present matrix of Hanukah is, that could be its own episode, is just getting fucked by Hanukiah as a Jewish kid, most anti-Semitism is caused by the present structure of Hanukkah.

0:13:18 Tom: Is it that, why is it that bad? You can give whatever you want. Like, don't you get

0:13:20 Thomas: We, we know nothing about it. What do you do? What is it?

0:13:23 Tom: Right.

0:13:23 Eli: Okay, so Hanukah is eight nights, boo. Which means that instead of a day where you run downstairs and you get all your presents and mom sits there in her robe, sipping tea, seeing you unwrap your Red Ryder rifle or whatever the fuck it is, the first night, you all forget. No Jew remembers Hanuklah On the first day. The first night of Hanuka. You're at the grocery

0:13:42 Thomas: Okay. I love that. That's actually my favorite part so far.

0:13:46 Eli: You're at the grocery store eating the free grapes and you hear over the loudspeaker and a very happy first night of Hanukkah, and you're like, oh motherfucker, so you gotta pick up a first night gift because Jewish gifts, they ascend, right, the eighth night is when you get your big present. So your first night, you just get the shittiest

0:14:05 Tom: Oh, that's a pain in

0:14:03 Thomas: Uh, you better not blow blow your load. You're like really wanting to make sure you don't set yourself. You buy a car. You're not going to be able to buy a new car. You don't want to buy your new car, you're like, fuck, what is Ignite 8 going to do?

0:14:06 Tom: The ass. I already hate this.

0:14:08 Eli: Yeah. Mmhmm. Exactly.

0:14:14 Thomas: Twitter?

0:14:14 Eli: 'Cause, 'cause then it's just you give kids, kids, they're present and then you spend seven nights

0:14:18 Thomas: Maybe that's, is Elon Musk Jewish? Maybe that's what happened. Maybe that is why he bought Twitter. He like got a really, just went too hard on the first present. And by the end, he was like, I got to buy Twitter for billions of dollars.

0:14:19 Eli: Yeah. Now he's a Pole. Should there be a seventh night of Hanukkah? Oh, god damn it. Um, yeah, no, uh, so you get your shitty presents on nights one through three, and I'm talking shitty, I'm talk, these aren't even the presents, right? Nobody thought of these presents. Your mom was like, oh god, in the grocery store, she went over, she got like a nice looking pear from the fruit section, she wrapped it, that was your first night, I'm talking notebooks, I'm talking socks, three nights, right? And if this lines up with no socks are not great as a child, yeah.

0:14:54 Thomas: Hey, socks are great. Oh, wait, hold on. As a small kid.

0:14:50 Tom: I socks, oh, We're gonna have to talk gifts Yeah.

0:14:58 Thomas: Yeah, no, that sucks. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry.

0:15:00 Tom: We're gonna have talk gifts

0:15:00 Thomas: Apologies. I was in the wrong mode. As a small child, socks are a hate crime and you want to murder whoever gave them to you. Yes.

0:15:00 Tom: Right.

0:15:05 Eli: Exactly. Yeah. So socks, you get the socks, and then you get the thing, it's not until night five or six, now they're supposed to wait and not blow their load till night eight, but it's night five, you've gotten a notebook, so they're like, fine, here you go, here's Pokemon, this is what you wanted for Christmas, so here you have this fucking Pokemon game, but then you have the sad descent where it's like, and here's the couple other presents we got you, but you already, you're playing Pokemon, you don't give a shit about that, right, Tom's dad comes in with a wooden clocky major, you're like, whatever, man, I got Pokemon, right, it's just the presenting structure is terrible, that's why I like Christmas, it's you get the Christmas morning thing, Max is still not old enough slash doesn't understand the concept of Christmas yet, so he's not excited for Christmas, but I cannot wait for him to be excited for Christmas, yeah.

0:15:06 Thomas: Yeah. Oh yeah.

0:15:54 Tom: It's great, it does, it is great, I will say, like, the kids and whether you like Christmas or not, the kids' enjoyment of Christmas will absolutely, like, unless you're the biggest fucking misanthropic boring ass bah humbug motherfucker ever, like, kids being just happy on Christmas is fucking just genuinely wonderful it's wonderful

0:16:11 Thomas: That's the whole, that's all, that's it is. What else have we been talking about? There's no, I mean, I guess that's my, yeah.

0:16:16 Eli: It's my favorite thing to do, I

0:16:16 Tom: Yeah I I but I love giving gifts to grown-ups too, like I'm a I love to get I love to get, really, I love given gifts I absolutely I love given gifts what

0:16:25 Eli: Love giving gifts too and

0:16:20 Thomas: Oh, I don't give a shit about that. I, yeah, I just can't, I can't do it. I don't know, know, I have no, I that's

0:16:28 Eli: Tom

0:16:28 Tom: Do you mean you can't do it

0:16:29 Eli: Kills it Tom's a great gift giver, Tom got me one of my favorite gifts last year and then just got it for me again this year, so I no

0:16:36 Thomas: Awesome.

0:16:31 Tom: I love to give gifts yeah that that felt a little lazy, but I just thought it was still a good gift like, yeah yeah

0:16:39 Eli: Look when you bat a thousand, and you bat a thousand, yeah

0:16:41 Thomas: Jeez.

0:16:42 Tom: We, I got, uh, Noah a signed copy of Mary Roach's Packing for Mars this year, like, I think we did, like, I love to give gifts, I love the, the thought of it, like, I love just spending time trying to think hard about somebody that I care about and like where I think, they where I think, like, a gift could, like, really, like, impress them and, like, make them, like, genuinely happy. I love the process of gift giving, the the whole process.

0:17:05 Eli: It's like, it's a ton of fun, yeah

0:17:06 Tom: It's such a joy. Do gift giving your spouses? For your wives?

0:17:07 Eli: Yeah oh

0:17:11 Thomas: I mean, the three of us, I just, yeah, no, this is not something that comes naturally to me, I, we had kids, I do like to splurge, and I also, like, for, you know, birthdays and stuff, I know Lydia's favorite things are experiences, you, and so, know, we do nice dinners or, you, trips, I think we've had one or three trips that were Christmas presents, be canceled by COVID, so that's been, that's been cool, we, we even had the COVID cancel, reschedule, then canceled again by another variant back a few years back, so I guess I'm a little, like, since those are the things Lydia like, and those are things I like too, we, COVID, COVID and kids has kind of fucked it a little bit where it's like, oh, what do we get? Do we get an object that nobody cares about? Hopefully, Scombert, and now that I feel like we're not going to be on lockdown anytime soon, I feel like maybe we can get back to the good trip gift giving and restaurant experience gift giving, which is really what we like anyway.

0:17:31 Eli: Yeah

0:17:32 Tom: That sucks.

0:18:08 Eli: I love getting gifts for Anna, she makes a list every year now, which she gives me nice and early, so, like, she gets a nice full tree, you know, that's always a wonderful feeling, is that she's got like a few things, and mom of course goes crazy on Max and then also gets stuff for her as well, um, that's always a ton of fun, to the fun, the problem is, and I was interested if this is the case for you guys, I am very, very hard for shop for, my friends are always like, I have no idea what to get you, even Anna at this point is like, I've no idea how to get you, and the problem is, as that has gone on, as I've known my friends and my wife for longer, it has turned from, like, this guy, this fella is hard to shop border like, oh fuck, it's Christmas isn't it, oh, I gotta, get here we go again, let me try again, because my poor wife, who desperately, because I just buy things that I want, my poor life desperate has spent enough Christmases now being like, huh, and then because I can't lie to her, seen in my eyes, me being like, oh, I love it, and her being like, no, you fucking don't, you fucking hate it, you fat piece of shit, and I'm like, no, I'm gonna put it right over, oh, you're putting it away, you're put it as far away from you as possible, how near and dear to you, it must be.

0:18:57 Thomas: Yeah, exactly.

0:19:21 Thomas: I'm gonna put it right over this fence here into the cornfield, yeah, oh man, that's rough, I, I, here, yeah, Eli, you are impossible, because at least with most dudes you can just buy them a bottle of scotch or something, like you, if anybody, here's what frustrates me to no end, uh, well, no, I don't care that much about it, but it frustrates to me a little bit, which is, if anyone ever says as I'm hard to shop for, it's like, well, no, you can literally just get me a bottle of scotch every year. It doesn't have to be well thought out. It does not. I don't need, especially if it's, we're talking people that aren't like my intimate loved ones.

Like you just get me literally a good bottle of sky, could be the same one every fucking year. And I'll be like, that's awesome, that's a thing I will consume, or want a nice wine, it's all I need. But know if people don't believe me or something, but yeah, like, just literally a consumable good of some kind is fine. Like, it's all, I don't need anything. I, I like Christmas is for my kids. I'll be honest, like I'm to the point where I I just want them to get stuff and to have that experience and to like do the whole tree and everything. That's, that's really all I care about, it's so much fun, Jesus,

0:19:37 Eli: Mm -hmm.

0:19:59 Tom: Oh giving gifts to the to the kids, but I do love giving gifts to grown-ups just as much I really do, like, I I get such a kick out of it, it's not any different, like, I get, I, year, I'm like, I fucking have no idea what to do for Hayley, and I, I'm looking behind me right now, I probably have 12 gifts at least right now behind me, for like, I I just look because I'll spend three or four months and just kind of think, I I you'll be unsurprised, like I wrote a whole blog on like how to be a good gift giver and like how to like think differently about giving gifts, to try to, try to give thoughtful gifts. And I I think a lot of it just boils down to spending time paying attention to what people are saying, like what people like, what people are grouching about like like you

0:20:33 Eli: Yeah.

0:20:46 Thomas: Christ.

0:21:06 Thomas: I've

0:21:10 Eli: I'm not gonna lie. I'm feel like I slammed it one year with Tom. I think I did. I Think I did nail it.

0:21:14 Tom: Did you did the the uh Grendel book

0:21:17 Eli: The Grendel book.

0:21:17 Tom: It's right, right behind me right now, yep, yep, I have that's, but that's, that's what I mean, like you, you listen, you pay attention, you write things down, I keep like a list on my phone, in my Notes app on my phone, when I think of something throughout the course of the year, because I know I'll forget if I wait, I listen to like what people complain about, you know, like what, like little annoyances are in their lives, and look for things to like solve those things for them

0:21:40 Eli: Thomas.

0:21:40 Thomas: Been visioning just, yeah, bookcase of journals of Thomas complaining about the has nothing it's not giving him any gift ideas, he's just, fuck, I gotta write down more Thomas complaining

0:21:44 Tom: Gift I for for I I'd have to get a fucking DeLorean and go back in time to give you a different dad, I've not been able to figure that out, I'm still working, the engineers are working on it, the engineers are working on it but

0:21:49 Thomas: God damn it oh

0:21:53 Eli: Or with a gun and a single bullet as I weepingly install a red box to my computer. And you're going to plug that in every time, plug that in every day. Every time.

0:22:06 Tom: I I fucking

0:22:09 Thomas: Oh, that's his gift to me oh yeah yeah, that's great sorry if I was slightly slow to that, I imagine the listeners might be, that's, that's Tom, Tom giving me the gift of Eli having better sound. That is, that's great.

0:22:10 Tom: Love it yeah that

0:22:11 Eli: Yeah. His gift to you is just me. Yeah.

0:22:19 Tom: Would be, that is what I should do, I should go, I should fly out to New Jersey and fix your shit and then just send a video of me doing it to to Thomas

0:22:25 Eli: Fix my shit

0:22:26 Thomas: I want to like get a or a system or something that is Eli's setup. And like, maybe we can get your dad, Tom, to like put it into furniture. So it's like you can't, you know what I mean? Like it becomes like a permanent fixture. So he can't even do anything. Eli thinks it's just a dresser or something. He thinks it is just, hey, you just talk into this. We hide all the cables, all the everything. And it is like a fucking piece of old-timey furniture. And that is his recording setup. That is what would be great. He would never fuck it up.

0:22:37 Tom: That's it it can't be moved

0:22:51 Eli: Yeah I would so I would figure out a way to fuck it up yeah

0:23:04 Thomas: Yeah,

0:23:01 Tom: He would still fuck it up, he would still fuck up there's a 500 chance he would fuck it off, are you kidding me

0:23:08 Thomas: Into the wall. What happened to that fucking thing? Oh, I don't know. I am not sure where it went.

0:23:10 Eli: Yeah you said it was dresser you said furniture, furniture is wall, wall is drywall they needed a place

0:23:13 Tom: It's just how is it full of crickets, you don't even know, it can be full of crickets, Jesus Christ

0:23:20 Thomas: How is that cricket doing, you haven't heard from the cricket in a while, I thought

0:23:24 Eli: Needed a place to stay and I killed him, so that actually brings me to my very important question, which is, what is, can be kid or adult, what is the best Christmas gift you've ever received any time in your life, can be your childhood, can be adulthood, whatever it is

0:23:41 Tom: Any time in our life I like a childhood is a better answer, I got a dog for Christmas, like very, like quintessential, like I got a cocker spaniel puppy for Christmas and it was, I like, I was so happy, like I was the fucking annoying kid that got back from Christmas break and was like, I gotta talk for Christmus, I gotta talk for Christmas, I just told everybody about it, was before, like you could bring pictures, cause film was still like $300 a picture or some crazy thing in the eighties. But it was like, I was so fucking excited for that, for that dog. And my dad did a great job of hiding it until Christmas. Like he didn't let us know he had had the dog and somebody else was taking care of it. And then like Christmas morning, there was just a dog for

0:23:53 Eli: Oh my God, amazing, yes Yes!

0:24:25 Tom: Us. And it was just so great.

0:24:25 Thomas: It was just like in his shirt that whole time and

0:24:27 Tom: Just, just nobody would get something's

0:24:27 Thomas: He was, and because of your dynamic, none of you, and neither of you asked you know nobody said a word you're just like, I guess my, my dad has a shirt

0:24:33 Tom: Wiggling in dad's

0:24:34 Eli: Don't talk about dad's

0:24:34 Tom: Shirt. Don't say anything. Don't do it. Anything.

0:24:36 Eli: Chest is whimpering again. Just let it go. It's probably part of the heart attack.

0:24:39 Tom: His, his I was, that was a wonderful gift. Like I, it's like a, it's just one of those like childhood things that just like, how do you beat that? How do you be like getting a puppy for Christmas?

0:24:41 Thomas: That's. Did

0:24:47 Eli: A puppy is just so,

0:24:48 Tom: It's fucking baller.

0:24:49 Eli: So good.

0:24:50 Thomas: You do the thing that every kid does, which is like, I'll help take care of it. I'll definitely. And then like you don't at all. Like that was that my sister pulled that with like some. Well, this is going to. Oh, my God. This is going be country as fuck with some baby chickens. Do you guys know that baby chickens are the cutest animals in the world for about six and a half days? And then they turn into disgusting lizards.

0:25:13 Eli: Yep. Chickens, then they're chickens, then their birds,

0:25:16 Thomas: Yeah.

0:25:16 Tom: Yeah, let's discuss birds are disgusting pets.

0:25:17 Thomas: Well, but even a grown chicken is like kind

0:25:17 Eli: Yeah.

0:25:19 Tom: Gross.

0:25:19 Thomas: Of like, I don't know, fine to look at. They turn into a weird, like, I don't know, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Secret of the Ooze, that one. Remember that one? Where the fucking, the ooze gets on the things. They turn it into that. They're disgusting, I can't believe they go from the cutest animals in the world, they're fluffy, they're literally floofs, little chickens, and then they that baby floof stuff and they grow disgusting lizard scale feathers and they look disgusting, but so they're, they're for falling for that trick of like, oh, this is so cute, I need to have this thing, and then in a minute they're, they're disgusting and there's shit everywhere.

0:25:28 Eli: Sure.

0:25:53 Eli: Yeah, I

0:25:54 Tom: And Then did, did your dad fry them up? What happened? Like, what, what happened, tell me this true story what happened, you

0:25:58 Thomas: Oh, so this is, no, this is long past my dad doing a thing. So this, my dad would have been parked in his chair. Uh, my mom took us and God, I don't remember the situation somehow or another. It's possible. My mom wanted to get chickens again. She still has chickens. So it's kind of, that is a nice thing of living in the country. She has chickens and she gets eggs from them every day. So, I mean, it's kinda nice. So I guess, I guess for her, it was a win -win. She did eventually just like having that. But at the time,

0:26:24 Tom: Know, you can go to the store and get eggs and never have to shovel chicken shit like you can just show up with your credit card and get legs

0:26:27 Eli: Yep. Oh,

0:26:24 Thomas: Oh, you don't have to shovel anything. They just live in their own shit eternally. It's great.

0:26:30 Tom: Oh god, oh god, that's somehow worse I

0:26:34 Eli: The chicken weirdos in our audience are going to be so mad at you. They're writing an email right now being like proper coop maintenance misinformation. Please correct on next day. Cause look, if there's any audience that has chicken weirdo's in it, it's our fucking audience. I met seven years ago on citation needed. I mentioned snake weirdos. I get an email every 45 minutes from a new one who finds that episode.

0:26:37 Tom: Know

0:26:40 Thomas: Oh man.

0:26:49 Tom: It's our audience

0:27:00 Thomas: I cannot relate to anyone less than snake weirdos. I'm sorry. I apologize. I know. I literally know snake weirdoes that listen to our show and I can't do it.

0:27:07 Eli: Yup. They're lovely, lovely people.

0:27:09 Thomas: I'm Sorry. There's no, they'll, Oh isn't that snake cute. And I'm just like, Like, you're doing a bit, right? This is a bit. Are you going to keep up this bit of, oh, I'm so interesting that I think snakes are cool. Is that, you doing that forever? Is that your thing for the rest of your, do I, I don't have to participate in it, do I? Can nuts? It's a snake. It's fucking disgusting creature.

0:27:27 Eli: You. Look, you've already raised their ire, Thomas. Now you're gonna get snake pictures.

0:27:30 Thomas: Yeah.

0:27:32 Tom: Our. Whole listener.

0:27:32 Eli: Forever.

0:27:33 Tom: Base. Our entire Patreon base was just snake.

0:27:33 Eli: Yep. Because.

0:27:36 Tom: Weirdos.

0:27:36 Thomas: Our listener base is actually constantly growing but then trimming back because of. A given, like, thing.

0:27:42 Eli: We're. Scaring away. The snake weirdos. Yep.

0:27:44 Thomas: But. Anyway, the point of that not interesting story was my sister. I literally remember on the, like, where we were, on the drive back, I can like see it in my mind's eye of her being like, "Yeah, I'll take care of him every day, I'll do everything," you know, as a little kid. And then cut to nothing. Literally, that did not last a day. And then we just had these fucking chickens. There is a famous story of my dad having, god, I want to say there were ducks on the, problem, yeah, there's some weird shit. There's ducks, there's chickens. And a famous story of being so tired of the fucking chickens, back when he used to do stuff, that is, I think this is before I was born or have memories, but there's the famous Smith family story of him being so mad, for I don't know why, so mad at these chickens for being shit or something, them, or doing. I don't blame him. He was in the right. Like any bird is wrong. That's how bad birds are. They're like my dad, they make my dad

0:28:03 Tom: Oh my god. We're being chickens. Yeah. Birds are horrible pets.

0:28:34 Thomas: Right. Yeah. As they were shitting wrong or deed and who knows what they're doing. And so he wanted to get rid of them. And so there's a story of him shooing them down. You know, I've mentioned, I lived on a big hill in the country.

0:28:44 Tom: This is gonna right into the minds in the back of the house. Like

0:28:46 Thomas: Yeah. Like essentially shoohing them down and down, you know, for a mile trying to like shoo them away, shepherd them away. And And then he walks home and the chickens are waiting for him at home. They

0:28:59 Tom: Hey, asshole, we can fly. Just so, you know, like, we're just yeah.

0:29:00 Thomas: Yeah.

0:29:01 Eli: Chickens, man, What did you think we were gonna do, build ourselves another coop? Poop. Start

0:29:06 Thomas: Yeah, he showed him to a vacant chicken lot. Like it was, you're going to love it here. I promise.

0:29:15 Eli: A right, Thomas, what was your best gift you've ever gotten? I

0:29:16 Tom: Yeah. What was your favorite, guest, what it was, your hockey bag.

0:29:19 Thomas: That fucking ruled.

0:29:20 Eli: No.

0:29:20 Thomas: Yeah, here's the thing, I just also have an extremely terrible memory, but, um, no, lit in my adult life, that gift, I will say Lydia's gotten, you know, trips and stuff that are better than that, but I get something about the hockey bag just really, you, the fact that like I thought there was no hockey related thing that anyone would get me that wouldn't be just fucking annoying, you know, because that's the truth. Here, gift giving tip. And Tom, maybe you're the, you guys are expert gift givers. Me if I'm right in this. Don't try to get someone something that is from their like passion because they know everything about it and you don't. So you will get something that sucks and they'll have to pretend like, oh yeah, this ball whatever. Yeah, no. Cool that you got me a thing I'll never use because it sucks. You know what I mean? Like, don't try to get someone something from their very specialized hobby that, know, unless you know about it, too, you know, because it doesn't never works.

0:29:45 Tom: Yeah. Right,

0:30:13 Eli: I think that hobbies aren't nearly as specialized as people think they are, so with, like, incredibly, like, here's what I will tell you, what I do whenever I have a friend who has a specialized hobby, I go to r/whatever that thing is, and I say, "Hey, I would like to spend blank amount of dollars on a really nice gift that someone who does this would enjoy," I get 90 billion comments that sort themselves my popularity, and usually an Amazon link to click like

0:30:37 Thomas: I would like to revise my advice. Unless you are Eli and are a genius and do the one thing that would actually work, because most people don't do that. Most people, it's some relative that barely cares that sees something in a target that's It's like a plastic version of the thing. So you're right. Yeah, if you're going to actually be amazing and like do that, that's extremely good advice.

0:30:38 Tom: That's a good, no,

0:30:43 Eli: Right,

0:31:00 Thomas: No, for real. Like if you want to blow somebody away with a gift, that is a great piece. Reddit is great for that. Like go to Reddit of their thing they're into. That's such good advice, I can't believe you only gave that to us now. Even sitting on that one.

0:30:49 Tom: Right, yeah, it is yeah,

0:31:10 Eli: Nice.

0:31:13 Thomas: Just to finish the hockey story, some reason, even though Lydia, you know, we've We've done trips, we've done other stuff that have been, you I don't know, better is the word, but like bigger gifts, you know, more significant, something about that. I was just not expecting to open a gift and have it be a hockey thing that was like so much better than any hockey bag I've ever had. I've gone through like five of them at this point because they just melt from being used and disgusting stuff. It's great. Every time I play hockey three nights a week, every time I pack up, I'm like, "God, this bag fucking rules." It's just great.

0:31:12 Tom: Yeah. I, I, Another thing that I'll like do is go, like, if somebody has a specialty hobby. So this year for Christmas, I have a buddy of mine who's very much into music, and, like, his, his office, he's, I know he's decorating his office and he just recently bought some new sound equipment for his office. And, like, you and I have been chatting about it. And so, like, I sent him a screenshot, Spotify in December tells you, like, what you've been listening to, so I was like, "Oh, I want to find some information out," I screenshot my Spotify and I sent it to him, I'm like, "Hey man, what have you been listening to this year?"

And then he gets back to me and tells me like the top four albums he's been listening too, I bought him on vinyl and framed him and had him sent to him, so, like, I think you can, like, you can fish in a way for for information about people's hobbies that they don't know you're fishing for, and that to me is so much more fun than, like, getting a list, because, like, the list is like, yeah, I mean, like, you could just buy that, like, you just put on a list and then just buy it, like, it's fine, you know, like, we're all grown-ups and we have

0:32:13 Thomas: Nice. Yeah.

0:32:19 Eli: Right,

0:32:34 Thomas: Yeah, are

0:32:41 Tom: A little bit of right, yeah,

0:32:41 Eli: Or it's too expensive, so it's weird, right, like, someone, someone will send you their Amazon wish list and you'll be like, "Okay, that's a platinum engraved bracelet that's twenty six thousand dollars why the fuck?" It's

0:32:52 Tom: Right. Yeah,

0:32:54 Thomas: Tom and I that good of friends? All right, I'll get it for Tom.

0:32:56 Eli: Way, so, I, I actually I was gonna say, I usually get tom Tom and Haley specific gifts this year. I had to settle for a gift basket. I was just shame, in shame. I hung my head in shame because, because Tom's into bikes this year, so I went to r/biking, our off-road biking or whatever the fuck it is. It's the kind of biking he does, and They were like no.

0:32:57 Tom: I'm still waiting on that bracelet, Thomas. I feel a little It's

0:32:58 Thomas: Oh, you'll get it.

0:33:07 Tom: Been a bad year, buddy, it's been a bad year, like, yeah.

0:33:18 Thomas: Whatever bullshit Tom likes.

0:33:22 Eli: They were, like, look, if you've got $2,000 to spend, this is a very reasonable bike, and I was like, ah, Tom better fuck me for $2,000.

0:33:32 Eli: I am Haley now. It's like, scooch over, girl.

0:33:21 Tom: Bullshit Tom likes. Oh, my god, yeah, right, yeah, that's the other thing is some hobbies you just can't get anything that's not insanely expensive, yeah, biking, like, the problem with like

0:33:37 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah, my hobby is nuclear fission and nobody got me not a single isotope.

0:33:42 Tom: Yeah,

0:33:45 Eli: I also, if I lock into my brain, too, that you like a thing, it does not matter how politely you inform me that you don't like that thing.

0:33:53 Thomas: Yeah, Eli, I was 14 when I said I was into to fucking Transformers toys, like, oh,

0:33:58 Eli: I will never stop getting you that thing, Haley. Great example. I adore Haley, but Tom mentioned tea in their vows at their wedding, and my brain was like, "Haney likes tea." I've gotten Haley like four tea related gifts at each time.

0:34:08 Thomas: Man, four Boston tea parties worth of tea that just she

0:34:15 Eli: Right, and each time Tom's been like, "Yeah, I mean, she likes tea, I don't know that it's like specifically"

0:34:20 Tom: I don't think that her identity, you know, it's just, she just, it's a beverage. She'll drink

0:34:24 Thomas: Doesn't drink four barrels of it in a morning, that's so I don't know what we're doing with this subscription club. You got

0:34:25 Tom: Yeah, oh, yeah, that,

0:34:30 Eli: It's a Ming teapot. He's gonna come wash it every morning for you from the natural history museum.

0:34:36 Thomas: See,

0:34:36 Tom: I will say though, that is the thing you do, I agree, you have to be careful about telling people, like, "I love coffee," because you'll have like fucking three French presses and two bird grinders and a fucking carafe by the next day, it's like, please, I just, I drink a cup of coffee in the morning. It's not who I am.

0:34:53 Thomas: This is why, look, I know, I promise I'm not a Scrooge, because when it comes to the kids, I'm fucking, I will dress up as Santa and lube myself up and squeeze through a fake chimney in our house, like, I, I'm all for Christmas with the kids, I just don't have the mental energy for it with adults, I, I it sucks.

0:35:10 Tom: Yes.

0:35:10 Thomas: I need to be, I'm a shitty friend, I'm sorry guys, I don't do because like, I just don't, this feels like so much work for, in the end we're just all maybe gonna get each other something that we would have easily picked out ourselves, that's better, I donno, it just feels like a lot of work for that.

0:35:14 Eli: See, I, I converted Noah and Heath to the religion of nice presents because when we first started working together, I got them nice Christmas presents and they were like, "What?" And I was like, "It's Christmas."

0:35:36 Eli: And they were, like, yeah, we're adults. And I Was, like. No, we do it. And I just kept sending Christmas presents until it was weird for them. And now they're in. Now they're it. Now they get nice Christmas present. They're.

0:35:41 Tom: Oh, when

0:35:41 Thomas: Yeah, oh, it worked, yeah, I hear about their gifts for other people now, they, they're, they're totally, and you converted them 100%, it's coming out tomorrow, I'm leaving that in all

0:35:47 Tom: Wait, when Is this episode coming out, because I want to talk about what I got for Cecil, fuck. It, he won't listen. All right, like, he won't listen by Thursday, I gotta tell you, we, a, there's an ongoing joke on Citation Needed about how Cecil has a blacksmith, right, like, see, oh, Cecil's got a black- so what I did this year is I found a blacksmith and I had a knife, I had kitchen knife, a chef's knife, custom made just for Cecil, that has, he does SCA stuff and he has a sigil well, he already had his mom I didn't know what to do so I just his, I got his mama boudoir shoot and all the all the pics go right to Heath

0:36:04 Thomas: Right, yeah, nice. Oh, that's great, sorry,

0:36:05 Eli: Mm-hmm. Amazing.

0:36:19 Thomas: I can't wait to hear what you got for Heath, he's

0:36:26 Eli: Yeah.

0:36:26 Thomas: His mom and a cake or something yeah, either that or a race war you either got his mom a boudoir shoot or you got a race for it, I can't wait to hear which one, as as someone who's listened to every side asia needed that, is gonna be fun that's

0:36:33 Eli: Right, yeah.

0:36:41 Tom: But so so he's got this custom chef's knife with his sigil from the SCA engraved on the handle and then he's, I got him a weekend class at the blacksmiths to make his own knife at the a blacksmith, so like a fucking great gift, that's what I mean, like getting, I love to get adults gifts as much as, I do to some degree, the kids are kind of boring because it's like I want this fucking switch game

0:36:52 Eli: Yeah! That's awesome.

0:36:55 Thomas: Fucking sweet, yeah you're just wanted GI Joe, boring why

0:37:05 Eli: Yeah.

0:37:04 Tom: Yeah I want a switch game, like your switch game's fucking boring, dude like let's get you a fucking knife

0:37:09 Thomas: Don't you go forge something son

0:37:08 Eli: Yeah. And they always want what's popular, like your child just abandons their personality for a second to be like, I want a brr-brr-bruh. And you're like, you hate that. And they're like, everyone will have one, and you're like, all right, fine, stay in the in group. I

0:37:17 Thomas: Uh yeah, what

0:37:26 Tom: Wait, what's the worst gift you ever got

0:37:28 Thomas: Do want it, one more, side as a kid I just want to say real quick that the best gift ever, I, is the family, my mom, I said this on the OA Q&A the other day, but my mom somehow she nailed it with the game consoles, that's the only thing, as much as we were a poor family that got fucking nothing, I think once a year, she figured not once a years old, but like once, every once in a while, when a console came out, she figured like she knew we loved that shit so much, and she bought it for the whole family, I think, so that's how she justified doing it, so the year we got Super Nintendo and and got the fucking the upgraded graphics to the Mario one, two, and three, you remember that Mario All-Stars game that came with it, that blew our little minds, I will never forget that, that was the fucking best, god I love that, that was nothing's better, sorry, the hockey bag is second into that, I'm, apologies, Lydia, that was nothing will beat that, I remember my brother calling, because I was still pretty little, I was probably like or six, eight years old, so it was all as a six or six-year-old, younger sibling watching your older siblings play video games is the fucking best, like, I don't know, it's a weird thing, but when you're little and you can't play it yourself, you know, you're just like, oh, we, I would ask my brother to play video games all the the time because I wanted to watch

0:37:55 Tom: That's nice, oh

0:37:59 Eli: Yeah absolutely yeah yeah oh

0:38:06 Tom: Yeah just let

0:38:40 Thomas: Him do it, yeah and I remember him calling his friend and describing like how unbelievable the graphics of Super Nintendo were, like, I'll, I'll still remember that conversation forever, it's so funny to think about, because the water levels of Mario now had these little waves in them, like there was like wavy on the screen, that blew our minds, oh

0:38:41 Tom: Me watch, just let me sit in the corner and watch I

0:38:43 Eli: Yeah Nintendo 64, that's the wonderful thing about video games, right people were like, oh, I didn't grow up with video games, and I'm like, the experience you missed out on wasn't video games, the experience you missed out on was the new system coming out and you being like, it's never getting better than this, it's literally this, I can't tell the difference, Mario is an Italian man standing in the room with me right now, that's what I know, I cannot see the difference between the two

0:39:04 Thomas: 64 wow yeah yeah yeah

0:39:19 Tom: Can smell his body hair, it's that good

0:39:26 Thomas: Oh

0:39:27 Eli: And it remains to this day, they just released the new Unreal Engine, which is going to be the graphics to the next one, and I turned to my wife, like I was seven years old, and I was like, well, there it is, it's peaked, they found it, it's just what perfect graphics look like, and she was like, okay, got it, thank you so much because

0:39:27 Thomas: My god so funny it's so funny, if you look at N64, that's what I want to know, Eli, is, were our minds addled, or did, how did we think that looked like anything, if you, you look at N64 graphics now, it's just triangles. Like Mario is like too fucking, he's like a triangle standing on a circle. Yeah. It's nothing.

0:39:53 Eli: Yep it's juste thick thick polygons mm -hmm, yep

0:40:02 Thomas: How did we think that was so good?

0:40:03 Eli: Yeah

0:39:58 Tom: Yeah but I remember even before, like, I'm, do you guys remember the game Double Dragon

0:40:08 Thomas: Yeah. I remember double dragon.

0:40:08 Eli: Course yep

0:40:09 Tom: Double, I remember seeing Double Dragon and being like, this basically looks like photographs, this is essentially, it looks terrible, it looks terrible, but I was like yeah, this is, I can't tell the difference between this and this is essentially a video of people fighting

0:40:18 Thomas: Sorry. Are there two ninjas in my room right now? Or am I playing a video?

0:40:23 Tom: Yeah

0:40:24 Eli: I'm living I'm inside the matrix, I'm in the matrix, I'm outside the matrix, and the matrix is Double Dragging, yeah, no, it's fucking fucking ruled, and the worst part, I've had this experience with my sister, because now of course all the video games of our childhood are zero dollars, right, you can go to the mall and there's a man standing by a very sad rack and it says, all the video games you grew up with, 1999, 99, and I was like, oh, my sister loves video games, I'll get her one, so I got her one, and it's got PlayStation 2, PlayStation 1, Super Nintendo, Nintendo, Dreamcast, all of them, all the systems in one, you plug this fucking cell phone sized

0:40:27 Thomas: Oh so good yep yeah

0:41:04 Eli: Box Into Your TV Yeah and then it's all the video games you paid 40 for every single time as a child and I got it for Lily and I was like, yeah, and I was like, Lily, that, walk you through a couple of the good ones, that she was like, why do they look like that, and I was like, oh, yeah, they're, I mean, they're a little older but they're still gravis you're still and she was like I can't tell the difference, and I was like, yes you can, yes you get that one, I remember being like, okay, well, you know what, we'll just start with Starfox, what, because Starfox was like a great game, and watching Starfox as an adult just be the same fucking level three times in a row, and my sister being like, does it ever change, and me, me being like, at the end you get to fight a big monkey head, there's a big, there's a big

0:41:04 Thomas: You plug this paper clip into a thing, yeah, oh eighty dollars they were fucking eighty dollars oh just

0:41:23 Tom: They're horrible. That's because they're all horrible.

0:41:49 Eli: Monkey Head at the ending a

0:41:49 Thomas: The experience of feeling like we were flying, something was so so overwhelming back then. We're like, this is the fucking greatest thing in the world.

0:41:55 Eli: Barrel roll I mean, Jesus, it was just, oh, it peaked, it peaked, so which brings me to my greatest gift, my greatest gift I got when I was like, that must have been eight, I, is able to calculate exactly how old I was, because it was the the original Pokemon game, and there was so much hype about this, I was so excited that I was, seven, eight years old, by bedtime stories that I would request, I would request stories about Pokemon, now keep in mind, Pokemon didn't exist yet in my house, so what my parents had to go on was the word Pokemon and whatever insane drivel came out of my eight-year-old mouth that I was excited about, so my dad would be like, all right, once upon a time there was a great Pokemon and, but I was, I was counting down the day, I counted down the days until that Pokemon game was in my hands the

0:42:46 Thomas: Is this the Game Boy one or was there a, oh, nice.

0:42:55 Eli: Game Boy original, game Pokemon blue, I played, I've never done anything except jerk off for more hours than I played, I just, say I wore out the cartridge, I wore, pour, out the exact, the time dimension of that cartridge is, oh, it

0:43:12 Thomas: So great. And ours. The next year, I think was NBA Jam for Super Nintendo. And oh my God, that was so good.

0:43:18 Eli: Yeah, yeah, One other thing about gifts, because I have other questions for you guys, but one other think I have to point out is that, um, since Heath has entered my life and, and now joined in the sport of nice gift giving, um the nicest, classiest things in my house are from Heath, but they're alone in a sea of garbage. So like, great, the best example of this right now is Heath got me this absolutely beautiful kettle, right? It's digital and it heats the temperature perfectly, exactly right on the water. It's made a sleek black metal with a mahogany wooden hand, literally a teak wooden handle that comes with its own little little thing of oil, just, oh, don't forget to oil this once a month.

0:44:03 Thomas: To Oil The handle of your coffee fucking thing? Oh, wow.

0:44:04 Eli: Yeah. Exactly. Because it's this beautiful, right, and I'm sure in Heath's apartment, which is full of emptiness and silence, you know, it sits on a perfect shelf and spins on a lazy Susan or whatever, but for me it's like it's jammed between fucking bags of vegan chickpea puffs, and I just pick, I picture, like, a princess, you know, the Anastasia story being like, I was told I was going to a castle. Why are all the cupboards open? I wanted to go to a place where the cupboard would be closed when people were done with them.

0:44:07 Thomas: Yeah.

0:44:16 Thomas: In a glass case yeah

0:44:42 Eli: Is he eating lukewarm chicken nuggets out of the refrigerator door?

0:44:42 Thomas: That's so funny.

0:44:48 Tom: Real quick, what's the worst gift you guys have gotten? Because I, I got a really bizarre gift at my, for when I turned 18, my

0:44:53 Eli: Ooh, tell us, tell US, tell Us, tellUS.

0:44:55 Tom: Think it was Christmas when I was 18, so I was just out of high school, or just senior year, somewhere around there, and uh, I really really wanted to get into photography. My dad had been, a for a little bit of time he'd been a professional wedding photographer when he was older, he had beautiful camera equipment. I had gotten in my head that I wanted to learn how to be a photographer, I talked about it all the time, I was fairly certain with the amount of fucking non -subtle 18 year old boy hints I was dropping, I was gonna get a fucking camera, and I was fucking, fucking pumped. And Christmas came along and there was this box and I went and I opened the box and it was, an 18 year old boy, a bread machine.

0:45:34 Tom: A bread machine was like my big gift that year was just A bread machine. And I was, I had never baked. I didn't really, I cooked sometimes, but just, it wasn't like something I was into. And I just got this bread machine and it was the the most baffling fucking present I had ever gotten, it made it just made no sense at all, and still to this day I wonder, like, did he just wrap the wrong thing and then didn't have the heart to tell me and Then I didn't have the heart to tell him anything other than, oh, thank you so much, because then you know, just

0:45:38 Eli: Oh, no.

0:45:55 Eli: No.

0:46:02 Thomas: Yeah, he's stuck with it forever. Yeah. Yeah, in your dad's mind,

0:46:05 Eli: No. He

0:46:09 Tom: Right,

0:46:09 Thomas: He's like, well, he's reacting, acting so well, this bread machine, I guess

0:46:11 Eli: Did like it

0:46:11 Thomas: Uh, yeah, well,

0:46:12 Eli: Right,

0:46:12 Tom: Like somebody else got a camera and they're like, I fucking wanted a bread machine, you know, like, is there somebody up in Michigan right now with my fucking camera, what happened that I got a goddamn bread machine as an 18-year-old boy for Christmas. It was such a weird bizarre gift, but I was so dead set on making sure that he saw that I appreciated it, that that day I was like, I'm gonna make bread, and I, like, made bread and make a big fuss out of making the bread and, like, putting it on the table then at that night for dinner and everything because, like, oh, I really love my bread machine, but in my mind I'm like, I want a fucking camera, who gets me a bread machine, like, what do I have

0:46:14 Eli: No, question,

0:46:47 Tom: This for, yes.

0:46:48 Thomas: That's Funny, because that, that's, you, the appropriate amount, are you supposed to just pretend you love every single thing? Because I do that. That's what I do, but then now We could be on year 20 of Tom just getting bread machine, you know, you know, bread machine peripherals, like each year there's a new addendum to the bread machine, like a module that makes different kinds of, you know, like, is there a certain amount?

0:46:55 Eli: Yes. Yep, Yeah. No,

0:46:55 Tom: Yes. Yeah, 100, anything else is churlish. I would never say anything, would be hilarious. Oh, uh, a focaccia machine, a fucking baguette machine.

0:47:17 Thomas: Because I want to make very clear, I do my absolute best at any time anyone ever gets me something to just pretend I like it every time. I'm not, I'm just, I don't know. I'm saying I don'T, but I, I, where's the line of like, well, now I'm giving this person incorrect feedback forever. And they'll just think they got me a great bread machine gift.

0:47:18 Eli: Yeah, And, and if you're not careful, you become owl girl in your family. Right, you're seven, you want a stuffed animal. Now you're 20 fucking six and you're getting your third 300th stuffed animal of an owl because you've been nice and said, oh, I love owls, right, and that's all anyone in the family knows about you, right? You're fucking, you have your doctorate, you're a medical doctor and a lawyer, and they're like, here's a fucking owl.

0:47:39 Tom: Yes. Yep,

0:48:02 Thomas: But isn't it nice, to be an owl, that's, there's always, that's, all that's a very mom thing, my mom was that way, actually, I actually, it's, I appreciate it because every year somehow in my mom's brain she would decide a thing like that, she'd be like, I'm, I'm an owl mom this year, you know, it was weird, like, she'd just be like, oh, I want everything that's lavender, and we'd be like, oh, okay, just anything lavender, it was kind of

0:48:18 Eli: Oh, yeah, that's great.

0:48:20 Tom: Oh, that's nice. So she just set a theme. She just set an annual theme, try

0:48:26 Thomas: Nice. Yeah, I I'm thinking back, and I don't, I, I don't know if it was conscious. I don't know. Like, she just, she's kind of weird like that. She would just decide she was into a thing frequently, and it actually makes it nice because you could just be like, oh, I'll look for anything that's that, and then it's fine. Maybe that's like a good, do you think we have any responsibility as gift receivers to, like, try to, try to be like, make it easier?

0:48:51 Tom: To steer people in the right direction. I mean, I think if they're, if you're hard to buy for, and I am hard to buy foreign, I thank you. You guys are too. Like, I it's good to drop some hints, like, especially if, like, you know, somebody's struggling to get you gifts. Like, Haley is struggling to find gifts for me this year, and I know it, and so I'll make it a point to, like, look at something thing and, like, show it to her on my phone a month or two before Christmas and be like, oh, this thing is a really, look at this, really cool thing, this would be handy to have one of these when we move to the new house, I'll I'll drop some fucking gift, yeah,

0:48:54 Eli: Ooh.

0:48:53 Thomas: Yeah. Boy, I can see myself unwrapping one of these babies. Babies, I'm

0:49:25 Tom: I mean, especially if you know somebody struggles with gift giving, I think it's nice to just kind of give them a little bit, uh, because everybody likes to feel like they came up with it on their own.

0:49:35 Thomas: Looking forward for the next 10 years of our podcast. You guys just like every show being like, I feel like if anyone is wanting to get me something, I would love this thing. Just every episode.

0:49:38 Tom: You know,

0:49:46 Eli: Right.

0:49:47 Tom: This microphone, I've got, god, it's starting to look a little...

0:49:47 Eli: And Thomas is just like, I'm going to cut this. This is boring.

0:49:50 Tom: Yeah, right.

0:49:51 Thomas: Why do you guys keep doing the same fucking bit?

0:49:54 Eli: Bring it on.

0:49:55 Thomas: I have to.

0:49:54 Tom: Another bottle of scotch from Thomas. All

0:49:56 Thomas: Yeah, you're just giving me more editing work, cutting out your fucking gift suggestions. I'm never going to get you.

0:49:57 Tom: Right.

0:49:58 Eli: It's It's weird. I don't like it. Right, gentlemen, before we go, important question: what does Santa's little helpers learn at school? The alphabet.

0:50:24 Thomas: Wasn't even grown and that was like the most middling joke, it was like, oh, it wasn't even egregious enough to get a groan you know it was just like, oh, we

0:50:25 Tom: Yeah,

0:50:30 Eli: It's like the essays ChatGPT writes you're like, yep, no, those are words

0:50:35 Tom: That does... those are strung together in a sentence like format nicely done

0:50:37 Thomas: Should ask Chat GPT to write dad jokes and see what, what it comes up with for the show that'd be fun, um,

0:50:39 Tom: Oh we should we

0:50:43 Eli: Oh,

0:50:47 Clip: Want to meet sexy DILFs in your area? Email the dads at DearOldDads.com or, better yet, send us a message on Patreon. You can follow us on all social media by checking the links in the show notes. And if you need more podcasts in your life, you can find Tom on Cognitive Dissonance, Thomas on Serious Inquiries Only, and Eli on Godawful Movies and all the Puzzle in the Thunderstorm shows. Dear Old Dads is edited and produced by my favorite DILF, Tom Smith, who also wrote and recorded the intro music, which is used with his permission. This podcast is a production of Daddy Issues LLC. Copyright 2022. All rights reserved.