99: The Inner Circle with Andy Richter
01:14:38 Share

This is a HeadGum Podcast. If you're a new parent, a bad day means you either ran out of coffee, diapers, patience, or all of the above. Stocking up on cold brew and deep breaths are all you. Hello Bello's got your baby's butt covered. Because Hello Bello believes all families deserve premium, affordable baby products. With their ultra-convenient diaper bundle subscription service that includes seven packs of diapers and four packs of plant-based wipes, you'll never run out of supplies.

Better yet, they're delivered to your door. Set, change, and cancel your delivery schedule whenever you want. If you're a parent, your to-do list is longer than all your baby's wake windows combined. Let Hello Bello take care of diaper runs until you're done potty training. It was named Best Diaper Subscription by New York Magazine and winner of the 2022 Good Housekeeping Parenting Award for a reason. Go to hellobello.com slash wondery to get 30% off your first customized bundle and a full-size freebie product of your choice.

That's hellobello.com slash Wondery to start bundling with 30% off your first order. Don't forget, that's hellobello.com slash Wondery.

We are

You're moving the mic away a little bit. Yeah, a little sound effect. Give a little bit of a producer pop. Which is ridiculous because they can do it all in post. It's also like what people need to hear you like. Trippy, dude. You know what it's the equivalent of? An ice cold and everyone's smoking weed and you got like weird lights in your room.

where you're like, hey, check this out. And they're like, what? And then it takes a ball hit and you're like, was that cool? And they're like, yeah, pretty cool. I got like three cool things in my room. Check this out. Check out the ceiling. Check out the ceiling. Stars, man. And you know what I never understood? Because I had those stars on my ceiling. Some people would do like mine. I just stuck them up at random. You know what I'm talking about? Some people would go like,

What is that? Is that like the actual galaxy? And I was like, you

You mean, am I going to study something? No, I just literally put them on. What you're seeing is Jake God. This is if I were to design the universe in my way, it would kind of go a little something like this. And then you would see certain people where you'd go like, it happened in college where you'd be like, it's some random girl's place. You'd be like, cool. And then she'd be like, that's where Jupiter is. That's Alpha Centauri. What? I don't even know what that is. I didn't say anything. I just stuck them where I could. Do you want to get high and I'll show you some stuff? Mine was like,

all of them right near the bed and I was too lazy to get a ladder over there. So my galaxy- So my galaxy sort of stops where I would have fallen from the bed. And then- I didn't want to bring a step ladder in here. There was a ton on the wall and you go, why? And you go, I don't even know, but I didn't do it on any of the walls. And then I did like three in the bathroom, one on the hallway floor.

All my floor. He's like, fuck it, man. It's cool. Whatever. And then at first I'm like, you can have a whole line of them. Didn't stick with it. I would love to see little Jake. It was. Sorry, Arnold. Yeah. Coming up with his little galaxy. My mom said to me, and it was a really weird realization, but she was saying that

As a kid, I used to play games. I'd try to get my brother and sister to play Monopoly with me or War or whatever. This makes sense. Or Darts. Russian Roulette. Russian Roulette. She would say, the weirdest thing in the world would happen because they wouldn't play with you and you'd go play Monopoly alone as different characters. And she's like, but you would lose. Oh, that is like the craziest character development. That would be like something you'd put in a script.

the kind of guy who'd play monopoly alone and somehow find a way to lose and be disappointed and say like i would do it by country i'd be like russia beat usa and she my mom would be like what do you mean and i would go i lost and she's like how could you be disappointed you're you were alone and so and i would try my hardest as each character and when one of the characters i didn't cheer for i'll play horse alone uh and i would lose at horse because i'd be like

- Fuck, Russia hit it from three? - Oh my God. I remember playing, I remember like, 'cause we had similar, like there were probably five, four years where I didn't talk to my dad. And so I'd be playing basketball alone in my front yard. And I remember the one day when my little English mother came out

and goes, "What you playing?" And I was like, "Horse." And she's like, "Mind if I have a go?" And she threw one shot and we were both like, "Go back in the house." We were to each other, she was like, "I guess I'll..." I was like, "Yeah, just let me be kind of lonely and sad out here." - It's what makes single moms... My mom did it once with me where I was in the backyard throwing a baseball against a wall. - Yeah, the bat. How big of a player was the garage door? - Everything. - It was everything. - And she was like, "I'll play with you. Pitch it to me." I threw one at her and she was like, "Ah, Jesus!"

You're like, go on, go in the house. I was like, mom, first of all, thank you. She's like, we could also throw the football. I'm like, pass. Go. I would rather not play sports than do it with you. Go in the house. I remember that so vividly. Me too. It's such a funny sad. Just sad. And then the sweet mom looking at her son and being like, he just needs someone to play with. And you know what? I'll do it. Well, but I think that probably led to why I was allowed to start drinking in my house probably around like 15 or 16. Say it again. How did we make that joke?

Eventually my mother was like, you just come into my world. By the way, that's another connection. I was allowed to drink beer at around 15 in my house. Really? We had, my mom one day said something, we had like, somebody had moose head at a party and I was like, I had moose head and I really liked it. And my mom did not drink.

And she was like, if you really want moose head, why don't we go and get a six pack and put it in like the basement fridge? And I was like, I'd like that a lot. That would be really cool for me. Thank you so much. Yeah. You're like, what do I say to close this? I would have friends over. We could drink at my house. That's what I had. That is what I had. What about cigarettes? No. See cigarettes. We even opened it up to that. Did your mom smoke? Yeah. Oh, that's why. Yeah. We had a good few year run where we crossed over as smokers and she found my cigarettes. What brand?

I had Marlboro mediums at the time. Yeah. Sure. The best, by the way, I always think Newports, I, what that reads, I always, your outfit. Yeah.

Sorry. - I always think if there's like a meteor headed for Earth, the first thing I'll do is go buy a pack of Marlboro mediums. - This is not a joke. I've had a very similar thought. If I ever get diagnosed with a disease and it's over. - Yeah. - I'm gonna smoke pot every single day and I'm gonna rip cigs. - Yeah, cigs will be back. - I miss them so much. - We'll get like, you and I would probably get five deep and be like, I don't wanna do this anymore. But the romanticized version lives in my head where I'm like, I will. - Well, I'll tell you what I, well, we're not doing a cigarette commercial on our intro.

We've got a hand. Okay, yeah. So first of all, to anybody, what I will say, the dumbest part about cigarettes is when you realize what they do to you and the companies making them trying to kill you and you're getting hooked because you've seen people in movies. Yeah. So nowadays, if I see somebody smoking- It's weird.

I think they're honestly, especially a young person. It's way lonelier than it used to be. You're the dumbest thing on planet Earth. Way lonelier than it used to be. You do not look as cool as you think you do. You're the worst. No. Stop it. And it smells weird to everybody who's not smoking. Andy Richter is on the show. And for people like us. We'll talk about the years when we were that, you know, in high school, our formidable years. He and Conan. It was the best. The best.

Best it's such a trip like that's one of the things that's great about a show like this is like meeting people who you're like Totally like when we had David Cross on or Andy Richter. You're like, dude you you really were Informative into what I wanted to do. It is crazy funny. He's so good on the show. He's got his podcast three questions he's just

He is exactly what you want him to be. Yep. As always funny, always charming. Great on the show. Great problems. Great producer. Chunk with a hunk. And this is coming on after we've done the 100th. Day of, right? No, this is coming on Monday.

No, this is Thursday. So this is tonight. It's not too late. Thursday, Thursday, Thursday. If you want to join us for the live 100th in-studio Patreon after dark. Get on Patreon tonight. Help after dark, we're calling it. Patreon.com slash here to help. Pod.

Here to help pod. Here to help pod. Get on. If not, you're going to hear it soon because I think this is episode like 96. This is 99. That's insane. Yeah, it's wild. So everybody, first of all, a little bit of gratitude towards you good people.

Thank you for being with us. We are at a hundred. Gareth, thanks for initiating this pod. Jake, thanks for agreeing. Loving it. Eventually. Yeah. It took years. Wore me down like everything in life. Kevin, you're a hell of a producer. Oh yeah. Thank you. To our whole team of people working, you guys are all killing it. Yeah. And to the audience and the base who are here, we just had like Matt Walsh and we recorded one with him. Yeah. And what he was even saying, he's like, man, there's a whole community forming here and we feel that and,

It makes it really special. Well said. I think we really are so appreciative. It's a blast. Yeah, we feel the feedback and we appreciate the hell out of it. Let's make a hundred more. Let's make a hundred more and enjoy this episode without further ado. Hello. Hi there. Welcome to the show. We're here to help. Can I get your name, age, and where you're calling from, please?

His name is Will, 34, calling from Jersey. So ready to go. Well, Will, I'm not going to lie. You've got Jake, blah, blah, blah, Hollywood superstar. You've got me. Hollywood superstar. Stop it. Yeah. Sag after eligible. But you've got a banger of a guest helper today. Yeah.

I'm sure I speak for Jake when I say we've been a fan of this man for a long time. He's killing it in the podcast industry. You know him from the food podcast he just hosted. In Culver City. In Culver City that he didn't know he was going to host. But he's a staple and a great friend of the show already.

You've got Andy Richter. Andy Richter is here. Andy Richter. Yeah. Well, listen. Hey, buddy. Will, how are you? Jesus, be calm, Will. Jesus Christ. You do know who I am, right? I do, yeah. I'm 34. I'm not 12. 12 or 60. Yeah.

We're going to dig on the 12-year-olds, though, Will. Yeah, yeah. No, he's right, though. He's right, though. You're not an influencer on YouTube? No, and you know what? I'm constantly trying to make headway with the 12-year-olds, and it gets me in trouble. Yeah.

Gets me in a lot of trouble. All right, Will. So listen, you've got three great heads to help you with the problem. What's going on? So here's the issue I have, guys. I have an Italian restaurant that's two blocks from my house. My wife and I, we frequent this restaurant a lot, right? And what I need your help with is I need to get into the owner's inner circle. What? Why? Why?

I think I know why. I'm glad you asked. Okay. Here's why. So I live in a dry town. It's BYO when you go there, but they don't serve alcohol. But the owner has this cabinet of top shelf whiskey and bourbon. And when his regulars come, he gives them a big glass of this whiskey when they sit down and chats it up with them, right? I need to get to be a regular. I want access to that shelf of bourbon.

I get this. I get it. Yeah. Why is your town dry? Yeah, what's going on over there? So it was a Quaker town, right? So the Quaker, that was our high school mascot, too, the Quakers. And so their high school mascot was a Quaker? Very intimidating. Oh, fuck, here come the Quakers. All right, we'll show those Wildcats we're Quakers. Yeah, it wasn't the best in high school, I can tell you that.

OK, well, you didn't leave. OK, so he's got a nice whiskey operation going over there and you want to be on the inner circle of of this Italian restaurant. OK, pretty, pretty straightforward. Yeah. So, Will, is there anything we need to know about you, about the Italian restaurant? What's your dynamic over there? And what's he like? What's this guy we're trying to get in with like? Yeah.

Got it. So an Italian immigrant, right? It's his own restaurant. He started it. Antonio is his name. He knows me and my wife. We go there every month or so. So we have a favorite waitress that is there, and he sees us. He says hello. He leads us right to our waitresses section and sits us down there. So he knows who I am, but I need to take it to the next level. I need to get there so I can be in the whiskey club. But is it just because of free booze? Is that what we're dealing with here?

It's the aura of sitting down at an Italian restaurant and the owner comes and says, hey, my buddy, here's a glass of my finest whiskey. That's like some mafia shit that I'm trying to tell them. I literally wrote mafia. You want to be in the mafia. Kill his enemy. You want to walk in, kiss each other on the cheek. And mouth. Not on the mouth. Put it in the kitchen. Right, right. Different mafia. Okay. Eventually have them, you know, like,

twist the arm of a studio chief to make you a movie star. Because you have a beautiful voice. And you got killer eyes, but nobody knows you. And nobody wants to work with an Italian in Hollywood. Yeah, you can't in a nightclub act. You can only go so far with that. It's true. So in terms of, I think the pitch on this one's going to be pretty clean, Will, and that is he's the godfather. Yep. You are not 100% Italian blood.

But how do you get in? There's always like a weird Irish guy. There's always like the weird, in those mafia movies, they're like, they're like the Jew. And the Jew's in the group. You curb stomp someone and everyone's like, whoa, we need him. Yes. So it's either we go that direction, which I'm going to pitch against. Yeah. The curb stomping. Okay. Either you beat the hell out of somebody outside. Yeah. I think you hit his enemy with a car. Yeah. I think that's the move. But I think the way you get in good graces with the Godfather, again,

Our gifts. I agree. That's what I was going to say. You greased the palms. Hold on. What happened? You went so hard with curb stomping. As soon as I say gift, without hesitation, you want 80. Well, in many ways, a curb stomp is a gift. It's an offering to the God. Garrett's first pitch. Curb stomp is enemy. I go gifts. Garrett goes, and I agree. That's our pitch. I couldn't agree with you more. Legally speaking, that's where I'm at. Curb stomp is...

put someone's open mouth on the curb and then stomp on their head, right? - Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah. - And that's very different than what I was saying, which was a gift, which I quite literally mean like a bottle of wine. - Yeah. - Or, I mean, and this is my quite serious pitch here,

Bring him a bottle of nice whiskey and say, can I add this to your collection? Because I like to have a nice drink after or before my dinner. And since we come in here so much, it would just I would have to bring the bottle with me and I wouldn't be carting back and forth an open container. So can I just store my nice bottle of booze in, you know, with your and it would become like the stepbrother.

of your nice bottles of booze. And then you're saying then slowly work your way to actually be in a circle. And then the first time he comes in, or the waitress, they bring you some, you tell him, hey, you really should try this. You really should try Jim Beam. That's smooth.

Yeah. What do you think about sneaking your way into the inner circle by giving a nice bottle and then also saying, help yourself to give it to your other guests. Right. But when I come in, you know, can I get this? But this is just a gift to you. Yeah. What's your thought on that? How would Antonio respond? What's the vibe?

I think that would work. My fear is I don't want, if I'm just doing this at the start, if I don't get into the inner circle, then when my bottle's done, does that mean I just got to keep supplying my own stash and he's just serving me my own whiskey to me? No.

Well, very, very fair. Yeah. If it's not meant to happen. I mean, you do have to confront the fact that this is not meant to happen. The man already knows you. The man already knows that you are quote unquote a regular. He says hello to you. Now go sit over there and don't drink my fucking whiskey. So but if you, you know, if you soften him up, even if it's a little against his, you

He might soften up enough where you become like a pity member of his inner circle. We'll take it. So, Will, that's the first pitch. That's not the pitch I'm going to live in personally. You like curb stomp. Well, no. Well, I'm done. I'm actually going to leave. Great to see you. Thank you for hosting. Because what I like about that is that's the backdoor way in. But what I'm afraid is, Will, is what you said. And that is when it's done, he goes...

Do you remember the Johnny Walker Blue? Can you get a case? My guys liked it. And you go, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not the whiskey supply man. So what are you going with? I'm thinking...

Mafiosos, I'm thinking gifts. So I like the idea of starting with if it's a bottle of wine. I like the idea of something for his shop, finding out what he likes. What kind of artwork's on the wall? Is it horses? Is it landscapes of Italy? Your standard Italian restaurant-like painted scenes of Italy. Okay.

Okay. Right. I would try to find something that you could gift to him that feels personal so that he's forced to look at you and go like, it's pretty thoughtful, Will. Yeah. And you go like, I just want to say, Antonio, I love the restaurant. I love being part of the community. I respect everything you're doing. And here's a Zabaro gift card. Yeah. And there's a place down the road that gives free breadsticks if you want to make an adjustment. I like this, but I would say...

You know, bringing wine to a restaurant, that's like Coles to Newcastle. Unless it's like, oh, this is a good Portuguese, you know, like it's like some other country. Here's a pitch. Okay. Where's Antonio from in Italy?

Oh, that's a good question. I could find that out. You got to find out the time. The wine is from that region. Yes. And you just say, hey, for my wife and I, we love having this in the neighborhood. Right. This is a regular place. It means a lot to us. And I just want to say, you know, in a town like this, that's dry. Yeah.

It's really nice having you here in a place like here. And I thank you for being here. Yeah. The home country to this new home. Right. That's a good way to open up. What I like about Andy's pitch is you're telling him I like whiskey, which you're not getting if you're giving him a painting. So who are the regulars that he's drinking with?

Well, I mean, the thing is, I don't know if it's an age thing, because most of these guys are like 50s and above. So I don't know if I just I don't have the respect from him. When they're when they're hanging out there, are they like rat packing it up or are they with their wives? Are they all coming to dinner together? Oh, with the Gumas. That's a mix. I have seen them. There might be some Gumas there, too. But it's usually a mix between family and they're with their wives or with their other friends. I got a real question, Will. Could this could they actually be mafia? Well.

Can we just blow the lid off of something? I mean, it might actually be. You going back to Curbstown? Yeah. It might actually be. Guys, let's remember this is a Quaker town. Yeah, right. But they might be in the Quaker town because there's less cops. That's what's so great about it. Or it's all witness protection and they're meeting up again. They're my blue heavening at the Antonio's. Is there a reality, Will, that, you know, it is Jersey. It's not. We're not talking Utah. Yeah, yeah. But, you know.

But do you really think that these are truly connected guys? Yeah. There's a possibility, but I don't think it's very strong. Does that exist? I mean, because everybody knows whether there's connected people in their neighborhood. Yes. Yeah, yeah, that definitely exists. It does exist. In your town. In your town? Yeah, they're here. Oh, okay. Guys, we're talking about an Italian restaurant. It is a possibility, yes. So if there's a group of people sitting, well, you're just...

Without any disrespect, because I would consider you one of us on this couch. You're just a geek who's watched mafia movies and you want whiskey. Be careful what party you're asking to go to. You don't want to go like, this is from the home country. And then they give you a gift and then they go, now here's the gift we need from you. Go kill our bookie. And you go, I'll just pay you the $84 for the three drinks. Or what do you do for a living, Will? Sorry.

I'm in sales. See, then I'll be like, hey, why... Perhaps we can get some speakers. Yeah, exactly. Whatever you're selling, why don't you sell it to us at a discount? We would love them right off the truck. Yeah. Right off the truck price. Well, how weird do you want to get, Will? I mean, we could go that route where you bring him a bunch of minks from a truck you held up or something like that. That's what I was going to say. Cards and cigarettes. Yeah, just bring him a bunch of cigarettes. The other thing is just find out his wife's size and just wheel in...

a rack of dresses on that side. Take your pick and tell me what's all I'm saying. And then there's like the ones with pockets have bottles of whiskey in them. So, Will, how weird do you want to get to get this spot at the table?

I think the last suggestion, I'm going to look like a rival to them. Who is this guy bringing in all these mint toasts? Exactly. What cartel is he in? Well, you don't understand. This young buck coming in here. You're a threat because these are older guys. Yeah, okay. All right, how about this? How about this? How about... I think you can combine all of these, but maybe you don't want to overly grease the wheels here. But what if...

You the next time you go out there, bring a like a backpack with you and have this nice bottle of whiskey in there. Yes. OK. And if you've got the mafia guys over in their little whiskey corner having the whiskey jam session, that's when you kind of drop it on the table, drop it on the table and bring it to them with Antonio and say, I always see you guys here drinking whiskey. This is my favorite whiskey. I kind of like this. And then you're kind of like portaled into the group as well. Let me get a pitch on that pitch.

You can't have your wife with you. Well, you go to dinner. But you go to dinner. It's a different animal to invite them both. What if you go to dinner and you let her know this is going to happen one of the next three days? So you go to dinner with her and then they're there and you go, all right, look, order quick.

You got to get the hell out of here. Get the fuck out of here. All right? You're going to get curb stomped. You're in too deep, Felicia. So she... Felicia. Whatever her name is. So we're now turning Will into full Donnie Brasco. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So his girlfriend or wife is Anne Heche now. Yeah. He's gone way too deep. Yeah. Right. Exactly. Have you ever considered dressing a little bit more...

How about this? How about this? Wear a lavalier, a Hollywood microphone. You know, a little more. How do I say? Mustache, slick hair, toothpick, leather jacket, shirt on button low, tight slacks. Chef's hat. Check out a pizza box. Dress like that. Have you ever considered that maybe your look isn't right? Get a pizza slice outfit. Show up. Start napkinning yourself a little bit. I'm so greasy. Yeah.

Sure could use some whiskey. I tell you what, a little whiskey might have dried me out. So, Will, real question about you. 34 from Jersey sales. What's your look, man? If there's going to be a black and white photo of that table, are you going to fit in?

That's another thing. Yeah, I mean, I definitely probably don't look the mafia part, I can tell you that. But I also think dressing in as a caricature of like a pizza shop owner might not do me too well either. I was kind of kidding about that. Kind of, once you projected it. Now we're just joking, Will, but Jesus Christ. You ever heard of a yes? But the idea, Will, of having a look that looks a little bit cooler.

Well, yeah, I guess a bracelet's cool. Yeah. A bracelet's the weird addition that nobody understands. Sure. But yeah, maybe a nice, a nice, a nice suit, a nice suit. How do they dress at the owner's table? I need, we need to get an image of this circle. What's the vibe? You said over 50, but what's the vibe of this table? Are they a bunch of like golfers?

No, no, we're talking like three top buttons are unbuttoned, hair and chest coming out, gold chain. These are the guys. We've all seen the movies. Sure, yeah. I've been to a buko to that. And Will, what's your look?

Not that. I can tell you that. Only two buttons. But for real, Will. Sport coat, no shirt. What do you look like? How do you dress? Good question. Usually like some sort of like even a collared shirt or like a golf polo. I'm not looking like these guys. Let's change it up a little. We were joking a little bit, but I actually think this is real. Their little circle is because this is who the owner relates to. Makes him feel like he's home.

So he's not selling them drinks because they're his family. They're his people. He moved from Italy to here. This is his group. You are a Quaker guy from New Jersey who he likes. But he's not feeding a weird golfer who's 34. You're not one of him. So to be in the mafia and not be a full-blooded Italian, you got to find a way in because they're always the guys who find a way in. But you've got to fit into that table. And part of it

is how you look, how you talk. You don't go to the table and if they're all going like, hey, did you see the Yankees? And you go, well, baseball is nothing but a bore. You're not going to fit in, right?

So I think the first thing is, is you change your look a little bit. You start dressing a little only when you're there. Yes. But you have your Antonio's look. Yes. There's a jacket. There's a shirt. What if he bumps into Antonio at the grocery store and he's out of his look? Then he fucking hides. He runs in the back. I think he's got to commit. He runs in the back where the employees go to the bathroom. Yes. That's what Donnie Brasco eventually did. But he didn't start that way.

But I just think, yeah, but he lived in a different town. He's in the thick of it. Well, I got to say, I am 100% with this. I think you should find a way into this inner circle. What do you think about changing your look a little bit? And I'm saying subtle at first. Yeah.

Sport coat. Subtle at first. I'm on board with the change of the look. Because what you don't want to do, don't turn this shit into Halloween. Don't look like a clown because one of those guys might be a real guy and they might kill you. Yeah, you got to look cool. So just watch Saturday Night Fever and dress like Tony Manero. But Will, what do you think for real about, you know, look at what they're wearing and then have something that those guys would think you look sharp and just showing up.

I think you- A restaurant or two like that. Lay the foundation, two or three trips like that. With the look. Trip three, then we bring the whiskey. Yes. We do the drop off. So, because that drop off is then, and what do you think of if you do the look, right? We would love to see photos of your look before you go. Andy, you don't like the look? As we talk about it, it just seems-

It seems phony. Yeah. And I think knowing Antonio as I do, he can smell a fucking rat. It's true. And if you go in there in costume. You're saying Will's a fugazi. Yeah. You don't want to be a fugazi. I just think you got to kind of be a little more. I mean, think of it like you're trying to woo him. But you have to be subtle. But I think that you do have to let him know, hey, I want to be your pal. I'm your pal.

I love this restaurant. You could also just butter him up, too. You could also just take one moment to say, you know, I really want to let you know how much this place means to me and my wife. You know, this is such I mean, I feel like I'm at home with family when I'm here and he'll be like, oh, my family. Look at the way you're dressed. No, no, no. You don't know him like I know him.

I think we're all coming back to Kurt. He came to America to get away from the stifling Italian aesthetic, and he went to Quakertown, where it's so much more loose. So, Will, here's where we're kind of at.

A change your look, which Andy does not like. Andy likes a butter up, be authentic, maybe give a whiskey. Yeah. I like a find something where Antonio's from, but I'm really into the Donnie Brasco, not even as a bit. Can I add on to that? Yes. You might want to just lay the foundation with a, you could tell Antonio, I just did an ancestry and I'm way more Italian than I thought.

That foams the runway for the makeover. Or Will, here's a quick question. Do either you or your wife cook or bake? Hmm.

Yeah, we cook. Something homemade is always appreciated. Cannoli. Interesting. You bring him in. No, not cannoli. Cannoli's with a nail file in the middle. That's cold stuff. Curbs to Newcastle. No. You know, bring him a cake. Bring him some cookies. You know, bring, you know. A cake that says, hey, we're Italian. You're a cannoli are so good. Here is our famous banana bread. Or I don't know what the fuck you bake.

I mean, I don't live your life. So, Will. Yeah, Will. Leave Andy alone, Will. We've given some solid options. I mean, you're really being aggressive towards Andy, honestly. Will, we've given some options. We've got a slight Donnie Brasco. We've got a butter up. We've got a mention that you did a test in your more Italian. Anastasia. Bring him some version of a cake. Bring him a bottle of whiskey and say,

Is there a chance when I'm here, I could be drinking this? And then hopefully you get part of the community and maybe you find out that owner circle. I'll bring the whiskey to and say, if you want to pass it around to your friends, feel free. Like, I love this whiskey. What do you think you're going to do?

For real here now. I think I'm going to do a blend of your ideas. I do think I could dress the part a little more. I think I could when I go in there. So I am going to take that advice. And I do think I could get like a nice bottle of wine as a gesture and tell him, like you were saying, hey, Andy, this place really means a lot to me. So I think if I do those three steps, I don't want to push it too far where all of a sudden now I'm getting mixed in with the mob because I don't have time for all that. But I agree. I think if I start...

If I start light with the dressing and the getting him a nice bottle of wine, I think that could get me in the inner circle. And compliments about the thing. Andy, your thoughts? Yeah, no, I think there's validity to all of these. And I think that a hybrid approach is good. One thing that did, I forgot to ask.

Can you enlist this waitress in your campaign? Like, do you feel... Yeah, yeah. Because I think, I mean, is she... That's a smart move. Is she aware of your desire to be his... Are we saying the same thing? Yeah, yeah. Have her put a gun in the bathroom. I need to get a better idea of what he's like. Yeah.

Please wear this wire. I'm going to be able to man outside that says bouquet delivery. No, but like, can you tell her like, what do I got to do to get into the whiskey club? Ha ha ha. No, seriously. What do I got to do?

I tip her like 40, 50% every time we come. She's cool. We're trying to help her with her bills. She doesn't know about my desire, but if I go in there and ask her, she could definitely give me some insider details. That's your first step. I think Andy's right. I think Andy's absolutely right. Yeah. And I'll add one more thing. The night where you feel like one of these nights,

Go in a half hour earlier and tell your wife you're going to have one drink alone at the bar or you're going to have a wine at the table alone. You've got to bring. There's no bar. There's dry. Well, I mean, you're going to. Calamari at the table. Well, yeah, but you can bring your own booze. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah. So you're going to like you. You're going to just sit there and be like solo smart. Yeah. You wheel in a wet bar of your own. Bring a decanter and stand at the window forlorn. Yeah.

Have your pinky ring hit it a couple times. Well, I think we gave great advice. I think Andy hit a home run at the end. I think the waitress is a big start. And then from there, I think slowly do the other one. But I think she's I think she's option one. What do you think?

I love it. Yep, this is perfect. I'm glad I called. This is some great advice. Keep us posted. We really want to hear what happens on this one. This is important. Tragedy today. Thank you, Will. Quaker towns known for their quaint behavior turned dark today.

Hungry Root. Hungry Root is the easiest way to eat healthy. They send you fresh, high-quality groceries, simple, delicious recipes, and essential supplements. Hungry Root gets to your personal health goals, dietary restrictions, favorite foods, how much time you want to spend cooking, and more. And I understand that our former hunk with a little chunk...

who now is just back to hunk, is a big fan of Hungry Root, as we all are. But you have a little story, Kevin. I've for years have been looking for a meal delivery service that caters to vegans. A lot of them do not have a vegan version. They're closest they have is a veggie. And those aren't really that good. I literally Googled three months ago, best vegan delivery service. Hungry Root popped up.

I have for three months had it delivered for, I get a box of five meals a week every single week. I love it. Super easy to make. Lee and I have a blast making them. And you've never looked better. I feel great. Yeah. Highly recommend it. I'm a huge fan of Hungry Roots.

We love them. And right now, Hungry Root is offering, we're here to help listeners, 40% off your first delivery and free veggies for life. Just go to HungryRoot.com slash HereToHelp to get 40% off your first delivery and get your free veggies. That's HungryRoot.com slash HereToHelp. Don't forget to use our link so they know that we sent you.

And we're also brought to you by Babbel. Jake, we've talked about this before. Babbel is the science-backed language learning app that actually works. Saves you money. You don't need to hire a tutor. It's 10-minute lessons, handcrafted by 200 language experts. Helps you speak another language. So...

I spoke French when I was in high school and all that stuff, and then I had completely forgotten it. So I used Babbel and French is coming back. As a matter of fact, the other day I was in Toronto doing a show and talked to a French person from the stage.

Gareth, give us a taste of what Babel has helped you with with your French. Je m'appelle Gareth. J'ai étudié dans l'école française pour deux ans.

Babbel helps. It really is so easy. It does not take very long. You can do it anytime. So here's a special limited time deal for our listeners. Right now, get 60% off your Babbel subscription, but only for our listeners at babbel.com slash hth. Get up to 50% No, get up to 60% off at babbel.com slash hth spelled B-A-B-B-E-L dot com slash hth rule and restrictions. Babbel.

And Jake, we are brought to you by Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that finds and cancels your unwanted subscription, monitors your spending, and helps you lower your bills so that you can grow your savings. We've talked about this before. We've both had multiple things we did not know we were still paying for. That's why we're here.

That's part of the business model of some companies where they're just like, hey, sign up for a week. You'll be good. And then like two years later, like without in mind, sign up to our Patreon. We're never let Rocket Money call you out for it. So Rocket Money has over five million users and has saved a total of five

million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year. And you could just use that on our Patreon when using all of the app's features. So stop wasting money on things you don't use. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions by going to rocketmoney.com slash help. That's rocketmoney.com slash help. rocketmoney.com slash help.

Hello there. How are you? Hi, I'm well. Hi. How y'all doing? Well, let's find out where you're from. I'm detecting a southern accent a little bit. What's your name, age, and where are you calling from?

I'm Lexi. I'm 33 and I'm from Atlanta. Okay. Atlanta. Beautiful. Dirty birds. Now, Lexi, look, you've got Jake, you know, and love him. You've got me. I love you, but you have a home run hitter. We just learned the hard way that our guest, our guest helper knows how to dish out advice. He also gave me the nickname Garty, which won't stick, but give it up.

For the great Andy Richter, who's going to help you with your problem today as well, Lexi. Wow, hello. Thank you so much for helping me.

Oh, I'm happy to. Well, I mean, you know, hold your horses. I was just going to say. Let's see what happens. Things get weird, but we'll bring you home eventually. Yeah. All right, Lexi. Tell him to fuck off. Hold on. We haven't heard it yet. Yeah, but I bet that'll work. Things get weird, but we'll bring you home eventually is never what a dad wants to hear. No. All right. Well, the curfew's tight. All right, sir. Well, things are going to get weird, but I will bring her home eventually. Yep. We might take the long way. No, we're not going to go with Garrett. We'll see some

You might see a pond with a head in it, but listen, we know the freeway. You'll get her back in some form. Lexi, what is the issue? The floor is yours. So the issue is around my girlfriend's mom. So my girlfriend's mom doesn't live in Atlanta, so we try to call her a lot.

But whenever we call her, she really wants to spend the whole time kind of complaining or gossiping about her work. And she only wants 100% support, no opinions, perspectives, no solutions. Like you just have to 100% support her. Is your girlfriend's mom named Eve Johnson? Okay, keep going.

Sorry, mom. That was a joke. Don't get mad at me. Enough. The problem is I really love it. I absolutely ask her questions. I egg her on. Great. And my girlfriend hates it. Yeah. I'm familiar with that where like you're the like your in-laws are

don't have the same magical power over you as they do over their actual children and vice versa. Because like, yeah, like, you know, there's the shit that like, because I've been married twice now and like with both of them, both in-laws, my ex-wife would be like, oh, they drive me. And I'm like, it's not so bad. I think they're kind of funny. Fuck you. That's drama. Yeah. And it's the same thing with like my, like,

My siblings and I will be about my mother. We'll just be like, oh, God damn it. And then there'll be like a spouse there like, what's wrong with you guys? She made everybody cake. I know, but she's forcing us to do what she wants. She's buttering you up. Yeah. That's her victim cake. Did you notice the V on it? I will say it's very good. And very thoughtful. So Lexi, what's the issue then?

The issue is, so when we're on calls with her, I'm asking questions, I'm egging her on. And my girlfriend is like giving me the like, hang up, stop it. And then she ends the call early. Good stuff. And so now I think she's making calls with her mom, like when I'm not around, so I won't ask these questions anymore. Well, can you make solo calls to her mom or is that weird? It's weird. I think that would be too weird right now. Okay. But you could build towards that. I,

I can build towards that. How long have you guys been together? Three and a half years. Honestly, I think you could take the plunge. I do too. I think it's a full-on honesty approach of like,

Honey, I know she drives you nuts, but I mean, I'm delighted by her. I think, you know, her insouciance. Can I just give her, let me talk to her separate. Or when she calls, put me on with her. You go away and, you know,

And then come back in 10 minutes. That's what I was going to pitch. Maybe. Well, let's give your girlfriend a name, whether it's real or fake, which we call her. L. L. Okay. E-L-L-E or the, or the, I just need to know. Is it just a big L like a Sesame Street character? E-L-L-E. Okay. All right. Great. French. Lovely. Nice. Better. Yeah. Cause it would be weird if we just pictured a, anyway, um,

So I, I think that's kind of right. Like if you said to Elle, I like this part of the conversation and it gives your mother a chance to kind of unburden herself of this part that you don't like. Do you mind if I kind of take that? Do you? Yeah. Have you had a conversation along those lines?

It's similar, but not quite that. I've said like, you know, you know, she just needs someone to talk to. I don't mind it. And she's been like, well, I want to talk about other things. And, you know, I want to ask her about family or about her hobbies. And I don't want to hear about her complaints about work. And then I kind of been like, you know what, I'll just call her later this week. And she'll be like, you're going to call her without me. I can tell it would maybe irritate her, but I haven't pushed further than that.

So maybe we kind of hybrid it. Go ahead, Andy. What do you got? I'm just going to say she's going to be irritated one way or the other, and you let her pick which way she's irritated. Or I got a different one, guys. Okay. Chill out, Lexi. Stop talking to her mom. She likes it. There is that. There's like a huge elephant in the room. We're going around it. This is her mom. She's got issues with her mom. She loves her mom. Put out. Go find another 65-year-old lady to hang out with.

Yeah, just ride the bus and let's overhear complaints. There's plenty of old ladies who want to complain about their days. Does it have to be this old lady? But I think you could pitch this to Elle in a way to kind of take the heat off of the thing that she doesn't like. Okay. Like, if she doesn't like this complaining part, what you could do is you could have a code and you could tell Elle, like, all right, look,

Anytime we get in a conversation, you can talk about work. You can do the part you like. Yeah. And the second that you feel like it's veering into the direction of she won't stop complaining, a part that I'm not going to lie, I kind of do enjoy. Why not you just say, oh, gosh, sorry, I got to go like do this or oh, I got to go downstairs. Some version of that. And she excuses herself and you get 10 minutes with her mom where you just let her rip. Yeah. So like Elle could have a code word like fuck this. Yeah. Yeah. Something subtle that her mom.

A question for you, Lexi. What is the specific question on this one? The specific question was, what should I do? Should I stop gossiping to make my girlfriend happy? Or do I try to find a way to gossip around her or keep doing it in front of her? Yeah. Another option that occurred to me.

And it's just salesmanship here. Tell Elle, I want to talk to your mom because I want to get to where you are. I want to get so sick of her bitching and complaining that I can't take it anymore. And then we can go back to group calls because you and I will both avoid that topic because I hate it so much. While you're secretly delighted to soak up all of this misery. But I think that's fun. I am missing something here, Lexi.

What's so great about her mom?

Like, you're not saying, I'm talking to her mom. She's a fascinating woman. She's just complaining about work. I promise you, that's 85% of women over 60 who work. Can we hear a complaint? Like, what would a complaint sound like from the mother? Just so we sort of feel what your fascination is. Gareth, will you do it first? You do your guess. All right, okay. And then Lexi, you be Lexi. Okay. And let's see if this is actually kind of accurate. Okay. So Lexi, you're you. Gareth is your mother-in-law, okay? All right.

Ready?

Okay. Oh, God. I'm just so, you know what I am so sick of? I keep putting out all this. It's Atlanta. It's Atlanta. You know what I'm just sick to death about? I keep putting out bird seed for the songbirds, and these nasty old crows keep coming in and eating all that songbird food, which is not cheap, by the way. Like, I bought three bags because they were on sale for $8 each, but now they're back up to $15 each. And so these nasty ass crows are coming in. They're eating all the songbird food.

God, I'm just so sick of it. She works at a bird sanctuary. Yeah. I'm also curious what Lexi would have to say. Well, I'm just letting her know. Jake, Jesus Christ, you don't have to direct everything. Jake's not here. Jake's not here. Well, it sounds like he is. Anyway, Lexi, isn't that just annoying and L? Oh, God. You're just driving me crazy. Crows are just such alpha birds. And she doesn't complain about birds.

I don't know if I would. All right, Lexi, give me a world. Jamie's directing everything. Lexi, what does she complain about? I had some real surprise. I will win this character. Yeah, no way. That's insane. That's not a bullseye. What the hell? Lexi, the guys are having fun, but you and I are obviously still connected trying to solve the problem. Give me, what's a world that she complains about? Lexi,

Like someone in her office left their door open and is speaking too loudly. Oh, I'll tell you what drove me crazy. Chad this week, he did the same thing where he talks on speakerphone on his phone. So you hear both sides of the conversation and he's just shouting and he leaves that door open. So everyone in there knows his gossip. I guess he has a ham road. Darlene sits at her desk and she eats praline so loud. She's just crunching away. Smack, smack, smack all day long.

I'll say, what did you do after that? I was just furious. Well, I sat there stewing, but I'll, you know, Chase and I just keep gossiping to each other about it, but it's just nothing ever gets solved. Plus everyone keeps eating our lunches. I put it on my share with ale list. So Lexi, I got a question for you. In hearing typical old lady work gossip, what is it you like about this?

I think one is that usually she's like, she's very fiery. So she'll do something back. So I'm always interested in like, what did she do? Is it funny? She'll scream. Yeah. She'll scream outside of their cubicle. Are you egging her on? Like she's a character. Yeah. Do you think she's doing it partially because of your audience?

Like she knows you're into it. Or you're teasing her. And this isn't a mean way. I don't mean this in the mean way. Cause I also do this, but you just find her as a funny character and it just tickles you how she behaves on planet earth. And so when she has a story, you go like, Oh my God, this is the funniest 15 minutes of my day. Is that part of it? I think that is it. And your girlfriend feels, she knows you're kind of making fun of her mom. Yeah.

I mean, I'm asking. It's an excellent point. Because there's a vibe, and we used to do this to my dad a lot. My brother and I would egg him on, but we were teasing him. And when my wife was around, she would get really mad at us, and we would have to do it when she wasn't around because we're like, we are teasing him. It's also so funny to us. You're pranking him. You're pranking him. And they don't know they're being pranked. So they'll go like, well, I was really mad. You go like, well, what'd you do? Well, I threw the cake at him. And you go like,

Fair reaction. Yeah, yeah. Totally fair reaction. A 76-year-old woman throws a cake, and then what happened? She was mad, and she should have been. What'd you do? And your girlfriend might be like, stop teasing my mom. Stop winding her up. Yeah, yeah. Is that partly what this is?

Yeah, I mean, she hasn't said that, but I'm now realizing her reaction, and I think that's probably right. Do you think Elle understands what you're doing as you being a helpful caretaker and, you know, in a sympathetic ear? Or does she think of you as somebody who's sort of enjoying everything?

you know, viewing her like you viewing her mother the way Jane Goodall does apes. Another title. You're a title. Does she not like that? You're Janie. Yeah.

I was going to say not the first one, but I definitely don't want to say it is the second one. So I've got a question for you because this might help. Cause what Andy was saying before is right. And that is our view of our parents is very different from the other. Yeah. What have you explicitly told her the game that you are playing so that it's like, take your emotions out of it. You're like, it's just really fun. So maybe your girlfriend could,

roll her eyes a little bit but at least see the bit as opposed to being like now i'm 15 again my mom's driving me crazy she's doing it about my teachers i hate this bitch i hate this bitch rather than you're older now you don't live with her it's really funny and we don't get this forever and i also think it probably provides her mother with like she loves great outlet to just kind of let it rip

So if you say, look, you're going to kill two birds with one stone. We might enjoy it. Yes. She likes it. It makes her feel good. So why don't we just, you know, come up like 10 minutes into any conversation. Excuse yourself and I'll do it. And how about this? That's asking a lot from the girlfriend. Yeah, that's speaking on Elle's behalf. That's asking a lot.

Because if somebody asked that of me with my mother, like the list of symptoms is kind of funny. I'd be like, no, it's never fucking funny. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right. The list of symptoms is, I just feel like that's the clock running out on my life. You're right. While I listen to it. It's a true point. It's a true point. So Lexi, I don't know. You're in kind of a tricky one. What are you thinking of doing?

I do think what will buy me time to maybe build a relationship with her mom is for a little bit. I think I can kind of trick my girlfriend into thinking it's fun. Yes. Okay. The way you just said it, I could be like, Oh, it's very funny. She's such a character. We're not going to have her around forever. A little bit on that and really just try to get her at least to not be annoyed with me and let me talk to her about it. And then eventually, um,

Can I be able to call her? Can I pitch on that? Yeah. What if your girlfriend gave you a hand signal and that meant it's over? So if you're doing it, you're having fun. And then whatever reason you tell your girlfriend, you're the boss of these calls.

As soon as we're starting to go into zone and we're talking about Chad at work and your mom is getting hot and I'm dying and you're not having fun anymore, just give me like a wrap it up finger and then I'm done. Yeah, that's a really good idea. So she's in control of it. Yeah, because I really like that. You do really have to.

Let L lead the way. It's her mother. And I understand you enjoy this, but is your enjoyment more important than L's discomfort? Right. But you're going to be with L for a long time, correct? Yes. Hopefully. So there might be a time that mom's living in your house later in life. Yeah. So the longer you guys are together, the deeper this bond is. And what you're saying to L is, I have a relationship with your mom apart from you.

But at the beginning of it, you can be in control of it. But eventually, me and mom are going to just let it rip about the nurses. You're going to need a clubhouse. You got a living nurse who's coming around? What do you think of her? And she's going to go, she's terrible with the ice. She makes me drink too much water. She's stealing my mints. And if you can enjoy that ride, that's nice for the two of you.

Yeah, that sounds great. I really appreciate it. I feel really good now. I feel like I have a solution and something to try that will make everyone at least happy. Well, goddamn, we're here to help. We're here to help. America's number one podcast. Don't look it up. I'm flying into the weekend. Sky high. This is high. I'm a goddamn Mother Teresa.

We appreciate the call. Please follow up how it goes when you talk to Elle about it. If it goes sideways, it goes well. Where were we at? Thank you, Lexi. Thanks, Lexi. Thank you.

This episode of We're Here to Help is brought to you by Booking.com. Booking. Yeah. So people are traveling a lot during the summer. And if you're looking for a place to stay, go to Booking.com. Stylish hotels, family-friendly resorts. I told you yesterday, Jake, I was driving back on a brutal...

drive and needed to get a hotel on the fly for one night and bing bang boom baby booking.com i'm booking a family trip to new york as we speak and i'm using booking.yeah

Truly just makes booking a place to stay so easy. So go to booking.com and get yourself a great place. The right stay can make you a fan of any U.S. city. Book today on booking.com on the site or in the booking.com app. We are brought to you by Hero Bread Wafers.

We love hero bread here in the show. Love it. We love the bread. We love the tortillas. It's, you know, it's one of those things. Yeah. And, you know, you kind of try to like cut bread out if you're trying to eat healthy. That's kind of one of the first things to go. And then think about it like summer barbecues, all that stuff. And you're going like, I don't know, but they have all they have now made it so that

not only is the bread way healthier for you and you should not feel bad, it has protein in it, you should not feel bad about eating it. It is just as good. I mean, it tastes, it's just, you are not missing bread when you use Hero Bread. So yeah, and like we said, nutrition, the tortillas, they fit your health goals, all that stuff. So all your favorites, no consequences or compromises, zero to one grabs of net carbs, zero sugar, high in fiber, just delicious. So-

Keep the carbs out of summer without compromising flavor with Hero Bread. Get 10% off your order at hero.co and use code HELP at checkout. That's help at h-e-r-o dot c-o.

And we are brought to you by Squarespace. We love Squarespace. Squarespace has so many things to help you build your business. I use Squarespace for my personal website. We built Squarespace for the Suits and Wigs party. Look, they've got...

blueprint AI and SEO tools, flexible payments. You could sell your content. There's video collection, client invoicing. I've been with Squarespace long enough to be like, I remember when it was pretty simple, but now you can really, really build up your business with

It helps you build merch, all these things. So go to www.squarespace.com slash gil sent me to save 10% off of your purchase of a website or domain using the code gil sent me. Hello. Hi, welcome to we're here to help America's number one podcast. You know,

Fixes get pitches. So can we get your name? Did you fake it on purpose? Can we get your name and can we get an up? We got a smart audience, right? Can we get your name? I'm sorry. Jake is on one today. He's been tough to work with, to be quite honest with you. Come on, Gareth. Just like rock and roll, you don't want to go backstage. Can you tell us your name? With you.

All right. Three, two. Can you give us your name and can we get an update on what your situation was and remind us and all that jazz?

Yes. Yes. Um, this is Lexi. I called because I like to gossip with my girlfriend's mom and it was you two and Andy Richter and y'all helped me figure out and a very kind, sincere way, um, to kind of come up with this. Like we're on the same team mentality with my girlfriend, make her feel like, you know, we're enjoying her mom's character as well as like giving her an out, um,

I'm creating kind of like a word, a safe word or like a sign for when she was done with the conversation. Great. You basically would engage with your girlfriend's mother too much, too much. And your girlfriend became uncomfortable, but you did it because you were kind of entertained and her mother would like go on like little tears. Her mother's a little nutty. Yeah. And you enjoyed it. And she did not enjoy that. You enjoyed it. And also because the girlfriend was getting triggered by a lot of stuff. And so what is happening now? Lexi, where are we at?

Well, after I felt quite motivated and like very like this is going to work. You guys do such great advice. Don't love this setup. Don't love. Do we feel it? Does everyone feel it? No, I was the other way. I was falling for it. No, see, let me tell you what she's doing right now. She's chumming the waters and we're going, oh boy, there's some meat up there. There's some meat up there. There's meat, Garrett. No, it's not Jake. There's a hook.

She's about to hook us. I'm biting. Don't bite you, idiot. No, there's a lot of meat. It's just floating. I'm biting. No, it's just floating blood. Stop. Oh my God.

Well, she was. I think I really did convince her. I gave her her favorite beer. We were talking. She came up with a sign. She was like, okay, let's do it. So the next time we called her mom, it was great. We got to gossip for a little bit, but it only lasted about five minutes until my girlfriend did the...

did the sign which is you know putting her finger across her throat like cut it out. Yeah subtle sign you came up with. Right in front of mom I hope. Not like touching the nose or pulling on an earlobe or something you did the pirate kill you move. Okay right. So good. Okay so I was you know I was like okay that was great five minutes she's happy I felt like maybe she wouldn't complain

Then about like a week or two went by and we hadn't called her mom. And I was like, we should call your mom. And she's like, okay, but I don't want you to gossip with her. We'll do it next time. I was like, okay, no problem. Then a couple of weeks went by. So I finally asked her, I said, we haven't talked to your mom in a long time. Can we call her? And she says, I've been calling her without you because I don't like that you gossip with her. So in the end, it didn't quite work out, but I still got those lovely five minutes.

And Jake immediately said, stop doing it, which I think probably would have made my friend more happy. So it didn't work out, but I still appreciate it. And I think it got me five more minutes than I would have gotten. And I will say Gareth was right on this one. I got a hook in my mouth right now. I'm in a boat. I don't know how I got here. The water was warm. I'm looking at a couple. I just, someone just lifted me up and took a photo of me. Yeah.

I don't get the vibe. I can't breathe. You're in an igloo cooler. You can't go back and forth. There's some guy with a stick trying to hit the back of my head and he's saying he's not dying. He's not dying and he's doing it wrong. It just hurts. I hate this. Mo finally gets beaten. Mo gets beaten by Piggly all the time, just not on air. Uh,

Um, well, I mean, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no

My girlfriend can't do that fine in front of her. So I think I'm just going to maybe lean into the situation in person a lot and just annoy her and then make it up to my girlfriend afterwards. Why don't we do this also? Maybe when you go into that situation,

Give the watered down version of it where you get some, but it kind of forces your girlfriend into maybe feeling like you can modulate this a little bit so that going forward, so that after that you could say, hey, you notice your mom and I had a couple little gossips, but we didn't do too much. So maybe going forward, we could have, you know, a one or two a month session where I talk to your mother as well. Or, let's see. Break up with the girlfriend. I agree. Yeah.

you gotta let mom go i think you know sometimes you can't love two women at once

Oh, boy. A tale as old as time. You know, look, we wish everybody had everything all at once. You wish your great girlfriend had a little bit more of her mom's gossip, but she doesn't. Look, I love Gareth and Pam, but I've had to choose. Jake, you haven't. And stop it right away. Go ahead. Stay on track here. Hurry. I wish Gareth was Pam. Stay on here. Stay on track. You can focus.

Jake? You're right, I can't. Jake, when he's looking up, it's bad news. I'm going to hold it low. I think you're self-hooking. No, it's Pam's hook. Stop talking about my mother, okay? Agreed, I agree. Stop saying that because that means you don't. I'm in love with her. Stop. She's in love with me. Stop it. You don't have to call me dad. I want you to call me Jake. Jake. Lexi, back to you, please. Good Lord. I'm in love with you. I actually... Jake!

It's not back to her. It is back to her. Lexi, you were going to say something. I think that's important now. I actually think that my girlfriend would be very happy with both of those suggestions. Selfishly, I'm going to try the watered down one. I think there's an opportunity that if she doesn't feel overwhelmed and if she doesn't feel like maybe

like I'm not enjoying it so much. Yeah. Don't overly revel in it. Okay, let's do this. Gareth, you're the woman. Thank you. Lexi, you're you. I don't need to hear anymore. And I'm your girlfriend. And let's see a watered down version. And Lexi, really fast, can you remind Gareth what the mom is like? I got a feeling I know your girlfriend. She's Moe, too.

My girlfriend's mom is Southern. She loves to talk about work gossip. And she loves to talk about how she doesn't listen to anyone in the office and she does whatever she wants. And I really enjoy that. Okay. All right. Oh, gosh, what a long day I had. That flight was so long. I'll tell you what, I came back to like 35 different emails. I was just overwhelmed. By the way, five of them were from Candace. You remember I was telling you about her?

Do you remember that, Lexi? Yeah. Well, you know, she's the one who has the twin daughters who are at Penn State. And all she does is just tell me everything they do at Penn State. And I'm always just like, well, I don't even care. Like, what are you doing? But she just keeps going on and on. So she forwarded me two emails, one from each of them, talking about how they're having some trouble in the dorms. I guess there was a big water leak. And I'm just like, Jesus Christ. I mean, I may as well check the box and throw y'all the spam right now. I mean, that's just crazy.

You know what I'm saying? Like, I just don't understand how many different times I'm going to have to hear about these daughters. Keep in mind, I have met them. So if I were going to be invested, I'd be invested now. Guess what, Candy? I ain't. Okay?

I could listen to that all day. Yeah, but that's the thing with Candy. Candy will ramble. God, she'll just go on one. She'll just go on one. It's just like a bag of cocaine did a bunch of cocaine. You know what I'm saying? I'm just like, good Lord, stop. It's just crazy sometimes. And it's even worse at work. Because if we sit around during lunch and there's a lull, I mean, she will tell you her whole biography with a mouthful of tacos.

And you're just sitting there going like, can I just can I enjoy something? I'm trying to have some noodles and company. I'm not sitting here. I didn't turn on a Netflix six parter, you know, just knock it off already. It's just getting ridiculous. You know what? Speaking of noodles, what should we have for dinner tonight?

Oh, God, I couldn't have noodles. I'll tell you, a lot of times when I have noodles, I get cramps. I don't chew them as well as I should. You know, in a lot of Asian countries, they'll just slurp them up. They don't even chew them. So I tried doing that for a while. It just didn't feel good. And then one time I did that with spaghetti when I was at Maggiano's, and everyone looked at me, and I said, well, they're doing that in Korea.

but everyone looked at me funny, and I tried to bring up a video, but I didn't have Wi-Fi, and then when I asked Magianos for the password, the waiter came over, gave it to me, and it was one of those ones where it wasn't working. I wasn't trying to make the whole dinner about me logging on to Magianos' Wi-Fi, but you know how those malls are. They'll just have that public Wi-Fi, and you're like, what, Magianos can't afford a modem? I mean, Jesus Christ, I could get one from Spectrum here within two days.

Speaking of which, if you move to a new neighborhood, you can only get spectrum. I mean, I don't know why. Remember when you used to have opportunities? I remember when I first moved to Arkansas, you could get Castle. Castle Cable was the one. And they had Wi-Fi too. But now you have no options. And I love how they go, do you want high speed? Oh my God. No, I want slow speed. Yeah, whatever takes the longest. Why haven't you given that option? I never understand that in a car where you have the max AC button. It's like, yeah, okay, I want all the AC. What do you think I'm turning?

I'm turning it on for. I want AC. Give me the AC. Or low power mode on your phone. Yeah, okay, yeah. No, why doesn't the whole thing just have a low battery mode? That would make way more sense. How about they always put it in low power mode and then I charge it, I get to 80% and it shuts off low power mode and then I'm back to waiting for low power mode and I do that at 79%.

It's like, what are you doing? Just make the whole thing. You know what I mean? It's just crazy. But that's my way of saying I don't think we should do Panera, maybe. I don't know. Their commercials always do nice slice of life representations of big family moments. Could be for us. What do you girls think? That sounds great to me. Elle? Awesome. You think you helped her, Gareth? Yeah, I mean, didn't hurt her.

Do you think that was the premise of our show? I mean, I don't know. Look, I think we all got a little lost in that one. I don't know. We were all going. I mean, I don't know. There's a lot of talking over each other. It was pretty spot on, though, for what happened. She's a talker. Imagine someone like that.

And I think I love to listen and engage and ask questions and else like, what are we having for dinner? How do we move on? You didn't do anything wrong, Lexi. That was a perfect, you didn't egg her on. If she's mad at you about that, then she's mad at her mom. Okay. That's all you do? Well, I might ask questions. I might have asked questions, but I didn't this time because we were practicing me not doing that. Yeah. See, that's what we were going for.

Well, pitches get fixes. Well, keep us posted, Lexi. After that time when she comes, will you let us know how that goes? And if you're able to contain yourself? Yes, I absolutely will. I really appreciate y'all. We appreciate the call. We're sorry it's not going smoother, but I don't think you're doing anything wrong. Nothing wrong.

Oh, wow. Thanks. You're just killing it. You like her. I think her mom's getting a lot of fun out of it. It's a sweet thing. Yeah. Maybe we should actually do. Let's bring your girlfriend on the call. I love it. Let's do a follow up with the girlfriend and go, what is the problem with engaging mom? What do you think about Lexi?

Okay, yes, I think I could do that. I do think... Because then we could do a practice with Gareth where he'll talk for five minutes as her. You're bringing me back? We'll bring you back. Oh, that sounds nice. You and your girlfriend will, she'll see, maybe we'll role play where she's you. Yeah. And you're her and she'll see that like, it's a tough spot. I like that.

Okay. Yeah. I like that. I think, I think that's a great idea. I think she'll, um, hopefully see that I'm trying to, and, uh, and

And maybe just give me a little bit more room to gossip, which is really what I'm after. By the way, at the core of it, you're being nice to her mom. And just like that, they threw us back in the water. We're out of the boat and we're back alive with the chum. And we're eating on our way down. Let's not eat the chum right away again. But yes, exactly. There's food right here. I'm eating it. Again, you got hooked last time. I'm eating it. Well, Lexi, thanks for the call. We look forward to the next one.

Okay. Thanks, y'all. Hey, everyone. Producer Kevin here. This next segment is an edited chat with our guest after the calls. To hear the full extended conversation as well as early access to episodes, you can go to patreon.com slash here to help pod. Enjoy. Before we go, Andy, we're done with the calls, but do you mind if we ask you a couple of questions before we get ready to...

So I told you on yours, but I'm a big fan. I was a huge fan of everything you and Conan were doing. Thank you. Huge. Everything? Everything. There's a lot of off-screen stuff you probably wouldn't be a fan of. Tell us. Tell us. But I was reading about, because I'm a guy who can read the internet a little bit. Woo!

Getting into the internet a lot. Ooh la la. I just learned to read and I'm realizing there's a lot of information in words. It's very helpful. Before I thought, not worth it. You know what? I get it now. Reading? I get it. I'm 45 and guess what? Reading is cool. And it's just audio books. Ha ha ha.

Yeah, everybody reads this way. You do this, you smoke a joint, you have a beer, you got everything. Oh, man. Fucking Shakespeare. Then you take this off and just watch TV, right? Yep, exactly right, yeah.

But what I didn't realize is you got the Conan thing kind of by accident. Is that correct? Where I'd read that you met Smile, you did the Brady show. Yeah, yeah. Which brought you out to New York. You then met the kind of like world of the SNL writers and artists. Yeah, because a couple of women from Chicago got hired on SNL. Yes. Like at that same time. Yeah. Like 91-ish, something like that.

Melanie Hutzel and Beth, Betty Cahill both got were on SNL. And and so I, you know, I'd hang out with Beth and met Smigel and we just kind of hit it off. And then.

the brady show came to la he came out here for the summer uh to work to work on the ill-fated hans and franz movie oh my lord uh that that schwarzenegger put the kibosh on wow because last action hero was a bomb and he like he compared those two well no no it was just because he was gonna be he was like gonna be hans and franz's

like Odin or something. I think like he had a bit, the whole movie centered around the whole character. But it was like, but he, yeah, like he was going to be a central feature, like a supernatural character in the movie. And, um, and he, he said, I can't make fun of myself anymore. So,

Because of Last Action Hero. Yeah, because Last Action Hero didn't work. And it's just like, no, I don't think that. I don't think that's a sum total of it. What's hard about those characters is there's nobody who, like mostly in this business, you ever thought like everybody's replaceable? Yeah. Not him in that one. No, no, no. You can't go, I'm Hans, I'm Frans, I'm into my muscles. Well, if you can't get Arnold. Right, right, right. Lou Ferrigno will work. Well, then it seems like they're making fun of the disabled. Yeah.

With the accent, you know. But yeah, no. So he was here doing that. And we just hung out, like, you know, because we had hit it off. And Conan got the job.

uh, he, Robert being a head writer was one of his conditions to do the job. And, um, and then Robert just reached out to me and I was out here, I was doing the movie or maybe I'd even finished the movie cabin boy. Uh, yeah, yeah. I had come, I had,

Brady Bunch ended in L.A., kind of Christmas time-ish, and then I was back, like, literally sleeping on my mother's couch. Yeah, sure. Well, just like, oh, boy, I want to tell you. Like a real high point in my life. Driving home drunk. Yeah. And then I got...

i actually flew back out i had already read for cabin boy but then they had me come back and i read you know another like three or four times um got the job went back to chicago drove my uh toyota pickup truck out here and was like all right here i am i'm an la actor now you know in a movie in a movie i did a movie it's like this is my nest egg which

turned out to be a hummingbird egg. And, uh, when Robert called me actually the day that he called me to tell me that I got the job, I, uh, I was supposed to go have a, like a, I don't, you know, second interview to be the assistant manager of a movie theater in Westwood. No way. Yeah. So I, and I was able to call him. I was able to call him and say, I'm sorry. I have that movie theater meeting with a little bit more

confidence. Listen, all I'm saying is I have options. So what do you got for me? The free popcorn. I put my face in the popcorn. Bottom line, Andy, do you want the job or not? Sounds really cool about your talk show career. Working at the movie, it would have

I was like, okay, that's an okay job. Except for the fact that I was really worried that Cabin Boy would play there. Oh, man. And that I'd be selling fucking milk duds. You look familiar. No, I don't. And so then Smigo, and then you got hired as a writer. Yeah, yeah. First I met Conan.

He said, you should go meet him. And because Conan was out here, he is a Simpson writer, you know, and he had he had done like that. He did like a little test thing that there were clips of on the Internet. And he did like they they just kind of threw him in.

after Leno and had him interview Jason Alexander and Mimi Rogers. Interesting. Yeah, which I think that they were just like, find us some celebrities, you know? Yeah. And so he literally had a sport coat in his trunk, threw it on, drove to Burbank.

after a taping of The Tonight Show, they told people, stick around, we're trying out another... Same set. No way. No, just really, seriously. Leno just sat in his seat. He just came in and sat down and did his thing. To see how he would be. Yeah, yeah. And they put that on NBC. They released clips of it. Oh, they released... They released clips of it when they announced, like, Conan is the guy. Fun. And so he got the job. And I had seen that, and I actually sat...

I went with Kate Flannery, who's an old friend of mine. Kate Flannery from The Office and I were in our first improv classes together. And she was here and I just came back. And there weren't many people around that I knew because everybody had sort of split and they're still mostly Chicago and somewhere in New York. And

So we went to a taping of a Jeff Garlin pilot

in which he played a cop like it was like his family life yeah and like jeff garland as a cop which is just like like could you imagine jeff garland and a cop like oh like just just give me the ticket already yeah yeah all right all right uh but it was pretty fun but we went to the pilot taping of that and i sat in front of bob oldenkirk and carol liefer sat behind me and i eavesdropped

on them talking about this guy conan that got the job and you knew did you know i knew bob i knew bob from chicago but mainly because his then fiance was on an improv team with me interesting so she was claire's boyfriend claire's uh you know fiance and stuff so i just i knew him casually enough to go like oh hey bob oh hey andy and then i just eavesdropped as they talked about

conan getting the job and bob talking about and at the time and bob was like yeah i'm gonna help him out and bob did bob and his brother came out and worked on the like first three months of the show like just help really build it yeah just kind of be there to pitch the ideas and stuff and and bill i think bill like dropped out of like mit or something bill odin kirk to come do this and then and he's been a simpsons writer ever since i think so

So, yeah, so I had all this backstory about Conan. And then Robert said, would you meet him? And we met at Junior's Deli. And, you know, like, I was... And for me, especially, I mean, you know, it's like, oh, wow.

fucking free lunch yeah like all right fuck yeah i'll meet with him and um and can i get another potato salad in the jar to go just a one pound to go yeah but uh so we just hit you know we just hit it off you guys have a great stupid immediately like i just like i knew i just had a hunch and i mean and sometimes

I mean, I don't know how you guys are, but like you sense like a kinship. You sound like, okay, this guy is an idiot. You know, like he's an idiot the way I'm an idiot. And there's no point in like finding out like, here we go. You know, it's like, yeah, like I hear I'm going to say something really stupid and you're going to, you know, and you're going to go like, oh, hooray, we are both idiots. So, I mean, I kind of went in there and just, I just kind of had this feeling of like,

because I knew from knowing Robert, I just, it was just like a really safe bet that I could be my total self. And, uh, and he delighted in it. And we, you know, and apparently, and Robert told me, I don't, he didn't tell me right away, but he told me that like right afterwards, Conan got on the phone and was like, hire him, hire him, just hire him. And Robert was kind of like, well, let him write a packet first, you know, um, you know, which I did. I wrote a, I wrote a packet to, uh,

which I didn't, you know, like when they don't teach you that at Columbia College Film School, like in case you're going to be on David Letterman's replacement late night show, here's how you're just was like, well, I don't know what, you know, and I don't I'm honestly, I don't I'm not even sure I still have it anywhere that packet. I should, of course, saved it. But I didn't know. I mean, you know, I mean, you were like, yeah, whatever. Yeah, yeah.

Well, it was amazing. And it was amazing to have you on the show. Thank you. It was fun. It was a fun show. And it's just really like the advice is,

that we gave today, I feel like it was all like... We get there. We get there. Gareth was in line when he said, it's going to be weird, but we're going to bring you home. No, you sometimes are on a really weird journey. But, you know, I mean, that's why it's low stakes. But we do, it always kind of ends, and then with the follow-ups, people actually do it. Oh, yeah. And you see, like,

It's working. Wow. Sometimes it does. For the most part. Sometimes they'll call and they'll go like, I did the advice that went sideways. And we're like, we're very sorry. And that's when we walk away. We don't hear those. Have you guys created a monster where you both think that like you can basically, you know, like you're both Dr. Phil or something? Well, to be fair, we're as much of a doctor as Dr. Phil. That is true. I think the saving grace was honestly when we started this one, we didn't quite know. So we were taking all sorts of calls and calls were real.

And so people would have issues like about depression, relationship, like we were doing bits on it. And early on, we felt like this isn't that's not the show. That's not what we want to do. Our advice has to be about. I truly think you should dress like an Italian. Yeah. Gareth is doing a bit about curb stomping, but then bring some. Not a bit. It becomes a thing. Those problems were.

Interesting enough, relatable enough. And it's important to them. Yeah, important to them. But also, like, it's like, if the guy doesn't give you whiskey, who fucking who? The pitch of this that Gareth kind of pitched me on, it took me a while to say kind of yes before I was, like, finally getting what he was saying, but...

It's we're in a bar and our friend comes and goes, I want to fucking be at that table. And we are just drinking. So rather than go like, fuck off, we go, well, let's figure this one out. Yeah. Yeah. And you're like, oh, when you said that, it gets like, oh, that's a lot of fun. Yeah. But Andy, we're both really big fans. It's an honor you came on with us, man. Thank you so much. And we'll plug all the podcasts you're doing in our intro and all that good stuff. Good, good, good. Especially that food when you're hosting. Mr. Culver.

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

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

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