Podcast Episode 25: Brenda Song and World Travel (Annotated)
Hi, I’m Craig The Intern, and they make me transcribe these every week. Everything’s going great so far! I like being her just where I am, which is the total opposite of what this episode is actually about. Oh well.
The Guest: Brenda Song
The Lowdown:
Did I mention Stewart P. Miller of Columbus, Ohio is also back? Because he is. But he doesn’t really leave for long, so can he really, truly be “back”? Mysteries. Matt’s wearing a Christian Laettner jersey, and Stew’s nails are naturally shimmering, even though he hasn’t had a manicure in eight months.
Springboarding once again off of Matt’s trip to Thailand to visit Mack, Brenda, and the gang on the set of Seth Green’s Changeland (not “Changeling,” kids, so don’t be confused like I was) this week’s show is all about travel in general. Matt made a cameo in the movie, and painted his thumbnail for it, which he has kept doing.
Stew was in Thailand also for a week, but not because of any related reason. Matt and Brenda talk about some scary experiences with the locals.
Mack remembers that his very first vacation, to Dallas, Texas, at age 7, to be in Born of the Fourth of July, a movie he was cut out of. Brenda remembers crossing the Golden Gate bridge, and Matt brings up the superstition of holding your breath in tunnels and over bridges, as Brenda wonders why that is a thing and recalls her days in child beauty pageants at age 5. She had bangs back then, and it turns out everyone else in the studio did too. Stew might have gone bald because of cutting his own.
Matt recalls many trips to Las Vegas and Atlantic City, and he likes the former much better, calling the latter one of the shadiest places in the world. Stew did road trips every summer to Fire Island in a Volvo station wagon, which leads into a memory from Matt about how his family once rented a station wagon and pretended to be WASPs.
Stew went to London when he was six, but what’s more important is that he holds the podcast microphone in a weird way.
Everyone except Mack, who has never been, says the Florida Keys are extremely disappointing; nothing but a party town. Stew said he managed to have a good time because he’s a Jimmy Buffett fan and Margaritaville is fun…but there isn’t much actual beach.
Brenda has actually gotten to stay in the Cinderella castle in Disney World, and its most impressive feature is a portrait of Cinderella and the Prince that turns into your TV screen. Meanwhile, Mack recalls being disappointed by Paris, and Stew extols the virtues of St. George and the dragon statues in Stockholm. Ziplining past monkeys was a Costa Rica highlight for Brenda.
Mack discusses changing his mind about Paris after an initial disappointing time at a crackhead barbecue. When Matt traveled through Europe, he found Switzerland the most beautiful place, despite the fact that Stewart P. Miller lived there for two years; Matt likes to study history while he’s on vacation and talks about old stuff for a bit, and how he’ll study a place for six months before going there for two weeks (he recommends Atlas Obscura). Then he gets mad at Glendale and Sherman Oaks for being too new.
Stew once followed Vladimir Lenin’s exile path out of Switzerland into Russia, just because he thought it’d be cool. Brenda has traveled primarily for work and is only now starting to take advantage of that. Mack is known to book tickets four hours before departure time to get good deals. Matt wonders if there’s anywhere Mack can go that he’s not recognized, but so far, no—everywhere he’s been, there’s some recognition. If you listeners know of any country where he’s not famous, let us know.
They discuss places they would like to visit, and which places seem scary for now. Mack wants to go to the edge of the Earth, because it’s flat. But he must be good at science because he can name all the Doctor Who actors, and Matt can’t. Everyone discusses the craziest things they’ve ever done, and Mack’s is about shrooms and Matt’s, of course, is mostly about pot, but he manages to one-up Mack’s shroom story with an Amsterdam tale about tripping in Edam (the town, not the cheese)
Stew initially can’t think of any crazy stories, but after being pressured by Brenda’s story about swimming with sharks, finally comes up with a wild and wacky account of…going to Canada to gamble at 2 a.m. Matt one-ups that with a tale of chugging wine at age 16 on a teenager tour, and getting so blackout drunk he was sent home.
Stew, however, gets the last word with a story about a train trip that ended in the German mountains, and a run-in with a man who had his tongue ripped out. And since nobody can top that, that’s pretty much the end of this week’s show.
The Highlights:
5:17-6:40 In Thailand, Brenda suspects Matt wanted to sell her into slavery
7:33-9:20 Young Mack writes a cute letter to his classmates and the teacher embarrasses him by reading it aloud.
14:20-15:23 The tale of how Matt’s family “cosplayed” as WASPs because they had a station wagon.
23:30-25:13 Mack gets invited to a barbecue and trapped with crack-smokers in Paris
26:20-27:51 Brenda tells the story of Mack meeting Stephen Hawking (allegedly)
41:40 Matt dismisses the appeal of visiting the pyramids.
The Links:
-Here are the Born on the Fourth of July parade scenes starring…not Mack.
-If you are like Stew, here is where you can find every single Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville restaurant.
-Find out the weird things about places you might be going at Atlas Obscura.
-Everything you need to know about Christian Laettner., the only collegiate on the 1992 US Olympic basketball “dream team.”
-A look at the Onitsuka Tiger flagship store in Harajuku where Matt got his Kill Bill shoes.
Contact the Guests!
Brenda Song
Twitter: @brendasong
Instagram: @brendasong
Facebook: @brendasong
Contact The Guys!
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @bunnyearspod
Instagram: @bunnyearspodcast
Telephone: 845-EZE-HOAX
Mack
Twitter @IncredibleCulk
Instagram: Culkamania
Stew
Twitter: @SuaveAdventurer
Instagram: @SuaveAdventurer
Matt Cohen
Twitter: @Cameltoad
Instagram: @Cameltoad
Image: Flickr/Sam Howzit
Join the Conversation
Leave a comment
I Dressed Like Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater For A Week And I Still Can’t Kickflip
WWE Crown Jewel 2019 Spoilers (From The Future!)
Your Beanie Babies Ranked By Their Self-Worth
Your Most Recent Social Trauma Tells Us Which Of Our Candles You Should Buy
So Culkin had a Killing Zoe experience, minus all the bank robbery and blood. Très magnifique!
Worst trips? My story takes the cake! I grew up in Oklahoma and all my parent’s family lived in Cali and Washington so every summer we had to road trip from Oklahoma to Cali and up the west coast then back home. So we were obviously on the road for like 2 weeks. One year was the absolute worst though. Every horrible, ridiculous thing you could possibly imagine, happened. So to set the scene, this was in the 90’s and we had one of those blue caravans, my dad driving, mom in the passenger seat, me and my older sister in the back seat with our backpacks full of items to keep us busy (coloring books, walkman, etc.) We’re going through Arizona and my sister and I had our heads down not paying attention to shit when my dad yells out “GIRLS DON’T LOOK!” So obviously we picked our heads up and looked around to see that some dude had just committed suicide by jumping off an overpass and the interstate was covered in police, fire trucks, ambulance (not sure why, dude was dead), and bloody body splattered everywhere.
Following that fun event, we’re heading up through Cali, we’re on the interstate, and an aluminum boat flies into our windshield and flips up over our car and lands in the middle of the interstate behind us. Yup, we got hit by a boat on the interstate…. The people it belonged to apparently forgot to tie it down.
The final kick to the teeth on this fun filled trip was stopping in Northern Cali at my grandparent’s house. My parents left the windows cracked on the van overnight and when we went out to the van the next morning a cat had gotten into the van and sprayed EVERYTHING in it. So the entire interior was covered in long white cat fur and piss. It smelled like cat piss all the way back to Oklahoma from California.
Worst vacation ever. Also the funniest.