(upbeat music) – Welcome to “Ear Biscuits”, the podcast where two lifelong friends talk about life for a long time. I’m Link. – And I am Rhett. This week at the round table of dim lighting, we are getting to know the latest addition to the Neal household. Jasper. – A dog. I got another freaking dog, y’all. So we got Jade. – He’s here. – We got Saka, the cat. – He’s here. He’s hiding under the table. – He’s hiding in the wings. And he’s gonna show himself. – What if the wings are your lap? Yes. I can see him right now. He’s very Jade like that he’s just in your lap, but no complaints. – Remember that, ’cause that’s a big factor in this. But yeah. So, we’ve got three animals in the Neal house, now that we got Saka the cat and Jasper the dog, and I wanted to introduce all of you loyal Ear Biscuiteers to the new wildlife in the family. – My phone is like… It’s responding like Siri is listening. – Constantly. – What if you stopped talking? Will it stop listening? – I don’t like the feeling of being constantly listened to while having a conversation. – Won’t it eventually realize that we’re not talking to it? – You mean her? – No, it’s it. – Okay. – I don’t give that kind of personhood to Siri. – Well, I think you might need to hit the thing because even that glowing orb that indicates that it’s constantly listening is gonna run down your battery. I mean that thing’s a battery sucker. – Oh look, she just took all that information and then just said, “One sec.” – Oh, so the entire intro to “Ear Biscuits.” Let’s see how she responds. – She’s still working. – You see you’re saying she now. – Okay. It’s still working. – What’s gonna happen? – Well, I don’t even know what she’s working on. – I’m working on that. – What are you working on? What do you mean you’re working on that? – I mean, we gave it a lot. – Yeah, something went wrong. That’s right, Siri. – Let’s not try again. Let’s just keep going. How about that? So yeah, I’m gonna tell you all the introductory struggles and experiences associated with adding a third animal and a second dog into the Neal household, as we are slowly creeping out of quarantine. You know us? Averse to change. – You’re not averse to new animals though. – No, we’re not. – Which is, we will discuss the irony in that. – I did not know it was gonna happen, but it makes total sense in retrospect. But I wanted to start out just giving you an update and I’ve got another experience that I had on some recent travels. And I just didn’t know if I was going crazy. So I kinda need you to tell me that I’m good. – Well, I’m not gonna judge whether or not you’re crazy based on one experience. – Well, you can add it to the annals… – I take the whole of your… Well, everything that I know about you. – I said annals and you said whole. Okay, that’s fine. Let’s get into- – Anal hole is not anything. Anal hole is is just a hole where you keep records. – Okay, well, let’s dig deep and see what we conclude. – Everybody should have one in their basement. – We took a family trip to visit a campus. Campus was entirely closed, but there’s a lot, we could walk around outside because Lily was accepted to this place. I’m not gonna say the place because I don’t wanna talk about the place. That’s not what this- – But it’s Harvard. – That’s not what this is about, but yeah, it’s definitely Harvard and Yale at the same time. – Right, she’s going to both of ’em. She’s doing a double major between Harvard and Yale. And it means majoring in both places. – There’s a tunnel that connects them. We wanted to see what this tunnel was about. You know, this Harvard, Yale tunnel. – The most elite of college experiences. The Harvard, Yale double major. – So we went to college and just to kinda really give a sense of, hey, this is happening. You’ve been accepted here. You’re most likely gonna go here. Let’s wrap our minds around the fact that you are going to college and we all need to kinda get with the program. – Who was this trip for? What percentage of like… – It was mostly for Lily, but yeah. I think it’s definitely for- – That’s what I meant. – I mean, for me and Christy, it was like still coming to grips and starting to prepare emotionally. And I think Lily’s anxious. It’s a huge life change. The biggest one she’s ever experienced maybe. – Besides being born. – And for Lincoln, I wanted him to be there to be like, okay, I’m just, this coming year, his junior year, he’s gonna start- – He’s gotta start thinking about this. – He’s gotta start thinking about it and gear up for it. – Did you see any evidence of that? – We weren’t gonna leave Lando home alone. – Did you see any evidence that Lincoln was beginning to think about it? (both laugh) – It’s not the type of thing you see. Like, I can’t look at his face and tell like, any wheels are turning. – What did he say though? He was like, “Oh, college.” – It reminds me. Ben told me the other day. Ben’s on camera again for “Good Mythical Morning.” So he’s like one of the closest people to us, almost as close as we are to each other on set. And in-between takes or something, he was like, “Are you angry? You look angry.” He kinda leaned in. I was like, “No, I’m just thinking. – Yeah. Right. – When I think I just look angry. Like if I’m really thinking? – I think actually both of us have a tendency to look angry while thinking. – We’ve got thinking angry face. – One of the things I’ve noticed this year and being in so many Zoom calls, is that our resting Zoom call face, both of us look a little bit judgy. And I would say even Stevie as well. So like, when you’ve got me and you and Stevie- – But that means we’re engaged. – Who are really engaged with you, ’cause we had some people pitching us some things and- – Yeah, they’re doing all the talking. – And I think about how I feel when I’m on the other end of that pitch process. And I know that there are people who have a very warm, sort of resting smiley face, an acceptance face, accepting face. And I love talking to those people but I am very well aware that I am not one of those people, you’re not one of those people, and Stevie’s is also not one of those people. – And when you’re on Zoom, you can see everybody’s face. I mean, it’s not like being in a room where you’re like, you could see everybody at once and you can be drawn to the person who looks the angriest. – I had to remind myself in… – It helps to be able to see yourself. – I go, like… – A little smirk. Well, Mallory does a good job. – She’s great. – Mallory’s our head of development. Yeah, I can see her. Like if I’m looking at the person talking, I can look over there and see anybody else. – She’s got a good listening face. – She nods and she smiles. She’s being supportive. – But you might look at us and say, “These guys are having the worst day of their lives.” – We’re not making it easy, but we’re not doing it on purpose. So, and this is a nice teaser for what we’re gonna talk about in the next episode of “Ear Biscuits,” because we’re talking about being on the receiving end of that. – Rejection. – Us trying to develop ideas. And we’ve decided to… So next week, we’re gonna give you this. I didn’t mean to make this a teaser right now, but we’re gonna give you a download of all of these ideas and projects in the traditional realm. For years, we’ve been adding to a list of projects that we’ve been trying to get off the ground. – All the things that people have said no to, that we’d never talk about. And so we’re gonna share all of those projects with you. So if you’re not into… – It’s a lot of stuff. – Into dogs or colleges or anything like that, then next week is gonna be just about, yeah, all the projects that have been squashed, along with our hearts, question mark. Might make it a two-parter. I don’t know. There’s a lot to unpack there, but we’ll start with just all the ideas we’ve had. Yeah, I’ve done some digging there. I wanna see what you remember. But anyway, back to the story. So we take a road trip and we got an Airbnb. ’cause we were gonna stay there the night, get up the next day, spend basically all day walking around what’s basically a deserted campus but still a very cool campus. And I will go ahead and tell you, it was a great experience. I think Lily was confirmed, more confirmed in her decision to go there. So I’d say she’s at like almost 90% now. She’s on a couple of waiting lists. And so getting those answers and making those decisions will make it official, but it was totally worthwhile. But I wanna talk about this Airbnb. I’m not gonna talk about the college stuff at all. ’cause then we stayed there the next night and then drove back the next day. So we stayed there two nights. Now, this is a nice Airbnb. It had four bedrooms. And so everybody, every kid got their own room. They were excited about that. But I knew reading the description and the reviews that this was the house that… It was a permanent residence of the family that lived there. A couple and their two sons. – And so the Airbnb, if they go out of town or something. – Well, apparently. – I have relatives who have done that. Who Airbnb their house when they go on vacation. Why not? You make a little scratch. – I’ve stayed at a lot of Airbnbs so I have a lot to compare it to, but I didn’t think anything of the fact that this was a permanent residence until we get there. And there’s, I mean, it’s not like they’re everywhere, but there are pictures. – Personal items. – Of the family. And there are- – Personal effects. – There’s a couple of grandparent pictures. And then in the pantry, there’s a clean shelf. And then above it, there’s a shelf full of stuff that says do not eat. – Do not eat. – Do not touch, and there was some cereal there. And boy, I had a difficult time. I was very tempted. – Oh, that’s tough. They should put that in a cage. – They did let us use their coffee. But still I wasn’t thinking too much about it. You know, that night, after we watch “Survivor.” No matter where we are on the planet, if the sun’s gone down, the Neals have to watch “Survivor.” I’m tucking Lando into bed. And Christy comes in there and we’re tucking him into bed. And it’s a bunk bed room. And apparently these boys, it’s the boys room that they share. And Lando just looks concerned. And so I’m like, “Buddy, what’s going on?” He was like, “Well, people live here. This is somebody’s room. I feel kinda weird about it.” And then he said, “I feel like Elias is here with me.” (Rhett laughs) And I’m like, “You know this boy’s name?” – This is like the beginning of a horror movie. – I was like, “Please tell me he is not visible to you and speaking to you right now.” – How did he get his name? – On the front door, it’s like, Elias and whatever his brother’s name is room, like says it. And then it’s like, got all of their books, their toys and all their stuff. – But why did he feel like only Elias was there? Elias and Toby. It is creepier that only Elias is there. – I know. – And his name is Elias, which is a perfect horror movie name. – And when he said that- – Elias is here with me. – I kinda looked at Christy and I was like, I knew my mission was to just blow it off. But I couldn’t help but acknowledge within my own self that when he said that, it kinda creeped me out. So I’m like, listen, everywhere we’ve stayed, people have stayed there. Like a typical Airbnb, like a hotel, I mean, every day there’s somebody new staying there. Every week, there’s somebody new staying there. Yeah, you’re sleeping in Elias’ bed. – But that’s the difference. Elias’s spirit is much more present in a place where he lives. – You’re feeling Lando’s vibes. First of all, that whole track that I was on didn’t help, because it was like, oh my gosh, you mean all the other places I’ve been, there’s been hundreds and thousands of people that have slept there? And he didn’t know what to be more disturbed about. And as I was saying it, come to think of it, neither did I. – You even thought about this? As much as you enjoy Airbnbs. – I don’t like to think about… People talk about the black light of it all. especially at hotels, but I have a higher trust in Airbnbs. It’s a different type of travel. – That’s your mistake because- – I don’t want to hear it. – The nanny cams. I mean, there’s hidden cameras in all Airbnbs. No. Okay. For legal reasons, I can’t say that. There has to be hidden cameras. – That can’t be legal. – Of course, it’s not legal. It’s highly illegal and you can get to a lot of trouble for it. But I’m just saying that people are nuts, man. – Do you think about that when you stay at an Airbnb? – Yeah, I go into… – You look for cameras? – I assume that I’m being recorded when I’m in an Airbnb. – Teddy bears where one eyeball is a lot darker than the other one? – It’s never that obvious. I just assume I’m being recorded. – Are you telling you’ve found a camera? You’ve never found a camera. – No, I just assume I’m being recorded, and I act like I’m on a reality show. So sometimes there’s a little… I get a little bit angry about something, but it’s just for the camera. – Okay, as long as there’s a resolution at the end of the 22 minutes. – And especially during certain activities, I really think about the cameras. – Oh God! – You gotta get the angles right? – So, I didn’t know what to say to help him feel better. So I just was like, “Hey, it’s no big deal.” And his last words as I was leaving the room were, “I feel like Elias is sleeping with me.” And I was like, “Don’t put it like that.” (Rhett laughs) – But he was kinda messing with you a little bit. He thought it was funny. He wasn’t really scared. – No, this is coming from a place of this is what he’s thinking. But based on me and Christy’s reactions, he did kind of cool off a little bit. He did sleep in the bed and he ended up being fine, but I went downstairs and I ended up watching some stuff with Christy and then she goes to bed and I’m the only one downstairs. All of our bedrooms are upstairs. And then I’m turning off the lights and getting ready to head upstairs. I go to the front door and I lock it. And then to the right of the front door, as I’m walking back, there’s another door that’s closed. – Owner’s closet. Well, and then I realize this is not a closet. This is the door to their garage. We couldn’t park in the garage. We had to walk around it to the front door, but there’s a door right there. And with all the lights off, I noticed something I hadn’t seen before. There was light spilling out from the bottom and a little bit of the sides, up the sides of this door. – That means there’s a light on on the other side of the door. – Exactly. There’s a light on in this garage. – Okay. – And I stood there and I realized I was kinda getting freaked out. Now you’ve seen “Parasite.” – Yeah. – I started to think that the family was in the garage, because I’ve been wondering… I knew the family was still in town ’cause I was in contact with the wife about some things. – You think Elias, his mom and dad and his little brother, Toby or whatever his name is, go into the garage and then let a family of five stay in their house? – Yeah. And I think that they’re all- – This seems implausible. – I was just standing there in the dark with the light spilling around the edge of the door, staring at the door knob and thinking, Elias and his family are huddled in that garage just trying to make some extra scratch. Waiting for us to leave. And they’re listening to all of our conversations. I mean, it’s like the webcam thing, but worse. And then, I make up my mind and I slowly… – You should open it quickly. – Reach for the knob. I grab the knob. And I turn it. It’s locked. – Yeah, ’cause they’re in there. – They’ve locked themselves in there. – Yeah. Yeah. They’re in there huddled in a circle. – And I adjusted it a few more times and then I just like stood back and I was like, oh, now they know I’m on to ’em. And I just went upstairs and went to bed. End of story. – They’re in there pooping in buckets. – I know. It’s like, I mean- – It’s sad, actually. – Do they have another… It’s a permanent residence. Do they have another house in town? I know they were still in town. ’cause I know they came back when we left. Because of, I got a message after checkout pretty quickly from her, and I’m pretty sure it was her. – They probably have another family that they can go and stay with, because the town that they’re in is a town that people would want to visit. – Or they could be in the garage. – They’re not in the garage. I can safely say that, but you were being filmed for sure. – Well, the laugh’s on them because now I’m exploiting it for a podcast. – I mean, let’s just assume that they’re not in the garage and they just left the light on in the garage, which is probably the more likely thing, do you feel differently about staying in… Are there other differences, but staying in somebody’s house that is a designated Airbnb where it’s not a permanent residence? – Once Lando got in my head, man, I am definitely team not permanent residence Airbnb. I definitely think that’s right because you kinda wanna make a space your own. But I would say that maybe every 10th time you stay in an Airbnb, you should stay in one that’s a permanent residence because to me, a lot of… You know me, I think a lot about the apocalypse and I think about what it’s gonna be like to just go into people’s homes after the world has ended. – Oh, you’re into this. – And like just assume their life. – You’re like rustling through their books? I mean, in the bedroom, are you looking through their drawers? Christy and I slept in their bed. – Yeah, but again, like you said earlier, in a hotel bed, you’re sleeping in a bed. – It’s better. Yeah. – You’re sleeping in a bed that so many other people have slept in. And people do things. – I’ve never thought about this stuff. This is Lando’s fault. – People do things in hotel beds that they won’t do in their own beds. – Oh yeah, yeah. That’s right. – Yeah, they’re like, this is a hotel bed. – From personal experience. – We don’t have to worry about breaking this bed. – What have you done? – I mean, you have to watch some of the tapes that people have made of me, that are somewhere on some website. The Airbnb files. It’s called analhole.com. – Oh gosh! (both laugh) Oh gosh. I mean, I definitely felt like I was under more scrutiny to take good care of their house, but Christy had an opposite effect. When we were leaving- – She was gonna miss it. – She went to a local plant shop and she bought a plant and gave it and left it with a note. – ’cause you know that there’s somebody who’s gonna experience it and appreciate it. – Well, she felt like she had gotten to know ’em. – Yeah. Right, yeah. It’s not just people passing through. This is their space. – I mean she was wearing the wife’s underwear. She went through her drawer and she was like, “Oh, should I get something like this? What about something like this? – So they didn’t have any locks on their drawers? – Underwear drawers? Nope. – Now, ’cause I recently stayed at an Airbnb and there was one, there were two doors. One closet that was locked. – Yeah, there’s always the closet that’s locked. – And then a weird handle-less, hinge-less door in the bathroom. Actually in the bathroom, in the toilet closet. They have one of those bathrooms that just has a little toilet room? – Oh wow. Another room from in there? – And then there was a little room in there, and it said, it had, they had done a lot of labeling. – Yep. – Owner’s private closet. – And they were in there, dude. – I think it meant to say owner’s closet, private. – Was there light emitting from the cracks? – No, the family wasn’t in there. – They were squatting in there. – But I will say… – They came out when you went to sleep. – I could not get into it despite trying. And it wasn’t because I wanted to get in and get into the owner’s private closet, it was that there wasn’t a handle. And I was like, well, how do they get into this closet? Do I push on it? Do I pull on it? Do you need a crowbar? I didn’t do any damage to it, but while taking- – You got frustrated and just kicked it in. – While doing a BM, which I was probably on the pot for seven to eight minutes, which I know is more than you really need. But I spent a lot of time trying to, while my pants were completely around my ankles, try to get into this private closet. – It was a short closet? – Oh yeah. I would have had to… – They’re really hunkered down. – Squat, but I was already squatting. So if I had gotten it open, I would have just rolled off the toilet right into the closet. – I mean, my biggest critique besides all of the critiques directed toward Lando, who basically ruined my trip. There was a squeegee in the shower. Now, much respect. We don’t have that, but I’ve certainly thought about it. But to leave a squeegee out for your guest to use is a bit much. That’s a bit heavy handed. Because here I am squeegeeing somebody else’s shower. – So you took the bait? – The glass door. Yeah, it was there. I felt like I had to do the squeegee. – Was it hanging on something or was it sitting in the shower? – It was propped up on the floor of the shower against the door. – Yeah, that’s offensive. – Yeah, I should have taken this squeegee. They can afford- – You should have broken something. – Two days of not squeegeeing. – You should have broken a lamp. – It kinda sent the wrong message. – The best thing to do… – You’re being watched from the garage. – If you ever wanna take revenge on somebody in an Airbnb, first of all, just for legal purposes, this is for entertainment purposes only. This is a fun thing to do. You take a lamp. Don’t get a nice lamp, get a lamp that looks like it was maybe, just like a Bed, Bath & Beyond purchase. You know what I’m saying? And crack it. – Crack it. – Crack it with something. – Break it. – Break it, but break it so that it still stays together. – Okay. – And if it comes apart, put it back together in a way that it’s sort of standing and then everything looks awesome. And then when they get home and they reach to turn on the lamp, the whole thing falls apart and they think they did it. Yeah. This is to take revenge. If they do something offensive like leave a squeegee out for you to use. – Oh, it’s like, look, you broke your own lamp, that, spoiler alert, is not your lamp. Oh my gosh, I just broke this lamp that they left for us as a gift? – No, you’re not understanding what I’m saying. – Nope. – You break an existing lamp of theirs in revenge, but you make them think that they did it. – But I bought the lamp. – No, no, no. You make sure that you pick a lamp that doesn’t look like it’s too expensive. That’s why I said Bed, Bath & Beyond. – I thought you said buy it from Bed, Bath & Beyond. – You need to be able to look at lamps and decipher their values, which is something I can do. – Create a booby trap. – I think I’ve proved it. – Booby traps. Okay. All right, that’s cool. That’s cool. All right, let me tell you about my dog. But first, let me tell you about this mug. You put hot liquid in it and it reveals. Here, you hold yours up in front of mine. Yours has cold liquid in it. And then you remove it and you put hot liquid in it, it turns into that or turn it around. – This is even cooler on this side. A whole Cocker tree is breathing fire. – Put hot liquid in it. – [Rhett] It’s magic. – Mine simulates having hot liquid constantly. Get it at mythical.com. You see it on the desk of “Good Mythical Morning,” if you watch that show. Or maybe you’re just into this one and you’re seeing it right now for the first time. Get that design revealing heat activated mug, mythical.com. Jasper, come here. – Your dog’s running around. Sniffing. – He got tired of being in my lap. Okay. Come here, buddy. I want everybody to meet ya. This is Jasper. Today on “Good Mythical Morning,” we brought him out. – Yep. – And you’ve met him. You’ve hung out with him a little bit. He likes to… Let me move this over here so he can see you. He likes to just lay right under my chin. And he’s so sweet. He’s a sweetheart. Look at him. – Well, he’s sweet to some people. – I’ve always been jealous of how, when you hold Barbara, Barbara will lean her head against your chest. Like that’s something Jade doesn’t do, but he does it, and it feels so good. Like, this is so worth it, man. All of the problems and trials that I’m gonna tell you about are worth it because he’s a sweetheart. We got him on February 20th. So we’ve had him a while. I’ve been kind of keeping it under wraps, because, I mean we talked about the cat on the show and like, by the time that episode came out, we had already gotten Jasper and I’m like, I don’t wanna go that hard with pet episodes. People are gonna start rolling their eyes. But I had to show him off because- – [Rhett] He’s gone to sleep. – He’s a little baby. He’s like a little baby. – Let me see if I can pet him. Hey, bud. – Well, he thinks that it’s my hand. No. – Hey, buddy. – Yeah. That’s good. – Don’t look so skeptical. Don’t look so skeptical. – He has his issues. How did this begin? I mean, you know when we got Saka, I was telling you that Christy was like, “Well, I wanted to get a dog. I didn’t wanna get a cat.” And I’m thinking, well, we’re not gonna get a dog now. Of course I was wrong. She had been looking at adoption pictures and stuff like that. And my stipulation was, if we can get a dog that looks like Jade, I want another Jade, but in a different color. If you can show me one of those dogs, then I’m listening. But I’m not interested in getting a dog. I’m interested in getting a sibling to Jade. – Now, you tell me, since you know what you wanna talk about, how much time do you wanna spend talking about that particular aspect of this? And have you talked to your therapist about it? (Link laughs) – No, I haven’t. We can talk about that. – ’cause I just wanna know. I haven’t really thought about it. I find it very Link-ish that that was a stipulation. And I was just wondering, have you thought about why that’s the case? – Yeah, I’m so attached to Jade. Jade is my dog. Jasper is Christy’s dog, first of all. That’s what’s happened and I’m fine with that. And Jade is the queen and she’s the queen of my heart. She’s what I think some people call heart dogs. You have this one dog that changes how you feel about dogs and pets in general. And so, yeah, I have this like deeply rooted connection and love of Jade that like, I don’t want a dog to replace Jade, but everything I love about Jade, I would insist in being in another dog. Like, a dog that just lets you hold him or her like a baby or like a cat. Everything that, yeah, the fact that Jade doesn’t do anything. – I understand all that. But I’m saying specifically wanting to look the same. Because that’s the only thing that I’m talking about. – Oh, just looking the same. Well, no, because looking the same means a similar breed, which means acting very similar. And I mean, as you can see, he’s just laying here on the table. He has a very similar temperament to Jade. And I assume that like, if you get the same breed or similar breed, breeds are so different. So like with a long haired miniature dachshund mix, you know what your problems are. Like, we’ve dealt with the… There’s a lot of problems with house breaking and training a dachshund. But you get a lot of good stuff with like the cuddliness and the, you know, just the lay around. They don’t have a lot of energy and they’ll sleep with you in the bed. So it’s like, you take the good with the bad but it’s a known entity. – I misinterpreted it unless you’re only giving me half of the reason. Because I thought that you wanted the dog to look like Jade. It wasn’t a necessarily a breed thing. It was like, does her face look exactly like Jade’s face? Because that’s what you kept saying. That’s what you were vocalizing. – Yes, that’s what I boil it down to from my criteria. So then Christy shows me the picture of Jasper and I was like, ’cause I’m following all of these miniature dachshunds on Instagram. And there’s these that are like peanut butter colored. And I was like, “That’s what I want. I want a peanut butter colored Jade.” And so Christy’s mission apparently was to find Jasper. And so she showed me the picture and I’m like… And she’s like, we know the foster mom. She’s here in town. Lincoln played baseball with her son. So we knew her years ago. And so like, there was even more of a connection. We’re like, all right, we’ll visit this dog, but here’s the thing. We can set an appointment for this coming Saturday. We can go there as a family, we can check out Jasper ’cause it’s only one picture. You don’t know exactly what they’re hiding or what the full story is. – It might just be a dog that’s ahead. – And kids, you gotta be prepared for that. So I said, “Listen, we’re not gonna go and get attached to this dog and then have to adopt it, and have this awkward conversation in front of this foster mom.” What we’re gonna do is, we’re gonna check out the dog. We’re gonna spend some time with it in this woman’s front yard with our masks on, and then we’re gonna leave. And then when we get back in the car and get back home, we’re gonna each say what we think and we’re gonna give our assessment, and we’re gonna vote basically to see if we want to adopt this dog. – And you can do that in your family ’cause you got five people. Votes actually matter. – That’s right. – If our family votes on something, we got to bring Kamala Harris in to actually break the tie. – That’s cool, man. – Yeah. I’ve got her on speed dial. – That is cool. So we get there and the description of Jasper before we got there was, wait, he’s 11 months old. His family, his parents were owned by someone and they wanted to keep him but then they couldn’t afford to get him fixed. So they ended up giving him up for adoption because they couldn’t get him fixed. And he is super lovable. This is the description. And he will want to sleep with you. And we’re like, this sounds great. We want him to sleep with us. This is, Jade’s been sleeping with Lincoln because she started waking up more often and giving us bad night’s sleep. Lincoln’s got a bigger bed and he’s not sleeping with a woman. So he can just sleep with the dog. He’s got a lot more room. So our bed’s empty. So I’m like, well, we’re gonna do our plan. We’re gonna assess the dog then we’re gonna leave. It’s funny how he’s just laying on the table. This is just like he did in “Good Mythical Morning.” Jade doesn’t do this if you put Jade on the table. – You gotta watch yourself rubbing that belly though. There’s a penis. – This one’s got a wiener. The other one doesn’t have a wiener. Oh, and look, he’s got a tattoo right there. Look at that. – What is that for? – I think that’s where they put the microchip in. – Oh, they put a little tattoo. – Yeah, yeah. – Right next to your wiener. That’s interesting. That’s where I’d get it. – I’m thinking about it. Put like an arrow and then like like a caption or something. Caption this. So we get there and this dog has a cone on, and I’m like, “Ooh, a cone.” ’cause he had just been fixed. So he doesn’t lick his own fixture. After a few seconds, I’m like, “Well, can we take this cone off?” ’cause I’m thinking, I cannot assess this dog with a cone on, like, that’s not gonna happen. We can put the cone back on afterward. So she takes the cone off. He is so clingy to this woman. She’s a blonde woman, foster mom. So just like Christy’s blonde. But then, so then she hands Jasper to Christy and then he just curls up and he’s so timid. And she said, “He’s really clingy, he follows me around everywhere. He wants me to hold him all the time.” And I’m like, hmm. So he’s got this separation anxiety, where he has to be with her the whole time. Now, Christy’s holding him and he’s putting his head on her neck. And then I was like, “Let me hold this dog.” Now. I was like, dang, this dog got some long legs. Like, I mean, look at the legs on this dog. This is crazy. – [Rhett] Do you know where the leg length comes from? – We think that he is long hair dachshund and Pomeranian. So we’re thinking- – Okay. – But we don’t know for sure. – Pomeranians have long legs? – I thought. That’s what Christy told me. – I don’t know about that. I thought maybe part deer. – I was like, he’s so much taller than Jade. He’s like a deer, but his face looks like Jade’s face. These are the things that I’m thinking. And then I hold the dog and I’m like, oh, he’s so cuddly. – So he let you hold him the first time? – He was really scared. – But he didn’t growl at you? – No. Well, no, he didn’t. But he definitely likes women a lot better than guys. Like, he’s growling at you. – Both when we recorded him on GMM and also this morning, like, if I just walk into the office, like, he’s fine with me right now. He lets me touch him, he’s not growling, he doesn’t seem too skeptical. In fact, just a second ago when he was laying there and I stopped petting him. He hit me with his nose to get me to keep going. But if I walk into the room and he’s just like on the floor, immediate aggression. Well, fear that then turns into aggression. – So I was holding him. I look over at the kids. They’re like taking him in, analyzing him, but they could tell that I’m inspecting him. I’m inspecting him everywhere, looking at his teeth. Measuring, like, is this arm too long? – Like a dog judge that knows nothing about dogs. – Yeah, yeah. Like, lifting the tail. It’s like, how tight is the tuchus? – The anal hole, yeah. – I don’t know. I really wasn’t looking at the tightness or anything. I don’t know why- – But it is important. – And then I looked at Christy and I looked at the kids and I said, “Let’s get him.” (laughs) And they were like, after all your lectures about what we were not gonna say and not gonna do. – This is the classic story. – And I knew it was gonna happen. That’s why I told them not to do it. – You can’t go see the dog. You had to know that you’re gonna bring the dog home. – ’cause you gotta be like, man, well, he’s got a cone. That won’t last forever. His legs are never gonna get shorter, but his face. His face is so good. So, we bring him home. Jade, we want you to meet somebody. We got somebody new we want you to meet. Right here, this is, working title, Jasper. I’ve got footage of introducing him to Jade. – This is your new home, buddy. Look over here. So maybe we put Jade down and I’ll keep holding Jasper. That’s okay. Look it here. That’s a good girl, Jade. – [Link] Yeah, and look, you got a brother. – That’s good. – Another one. – [Lincoln] This is good. – [Link] Look at the cat’s tail. – [Lincoln] Yeah, the cat’s in a defense mode. – The cat’s like, oh boy, here we go. – [Lily] Here, buddy. – [Link] Three kids and three kids. – Oh, yeah. – Jade is definitely Lando. Jasper’s Lincoln and Saka is me. – Yeah. You’re Saka. – Nobody likes Saka and Saka likes mildew. – [Link] So any prediction on who this dog is gonna love the most? – Me. – Hopefully me. – That’s a no brainer. – Me. – I’m the alpha. – Yeah, he completely attached to Christy. Almost literally, like for the first couple of weeks, it was like, he would not leave her side. He insisted on being carried. I’m like, this is a problem. We gotta fix this. We eventually got him… We put him in like the place where we board Jade, and they also did some initial training for Jade. Like we sent him there for a week to get more training. So he’s a lot better in terms of being able to walk and sittin’ down and… – Jasper, sit. Okay, he’s sitting. Sit. Sit. Stay. – Good boy. – Stay. – I’m crate training him now so that he can get over his separation anxiety. – Is he pooping in the house? – Yeah. I tweeted that I stepped in some poop barefoot. That was Jasper from way back. You gotta sneeze? – Yeah. – You’re allergic to him. (Rhett sneezes) – Oh yeah, I’m allergic to dogs and cats. So does that mean that the people who had him before just didn’t even try? I don’t understand. – I don’t know. And because he doesn’t like guys, I don’t know if there was something else going on but sometimes they’ll give you more of a sob story so you’ll adopt them, but I think she could tell that we were already hooked. So that was pretty much the end of it. He and Jade get along. When Christy sits down on the couch Jasper is gonna be right there curled up with Christy. But then Jade will go over there and try to get above Jasper on Christy. – But not aggressive from what I’ve seen. – It’s just more of like a hierarchy of positioning. And then when the cat comes in the room, they both go after Saka, but they’re all playing and they’re friends. Jasper, it turns out, really likes Saka, because well, Lily locked Saka out of her room by accident, and Saka couldn’t get to his litter box. And he went under the kitchen table and crapped. And it was like a juicy one. – Oh, cat turds on the ground? – I wasn’t there for this. They told me this. But like, I’m like, “God, that’s horrible.” And then Christy said, “And when I realized that it had happened, the way I realized is because Jasper was over there eating it.” – Oh. Bad boy. – Gah! This is the first time the cat hasn’t pooped in the litter box. And we’re like, “What the crap are you doing?” And then she’s like googling and trying to figure out, what do you do when a dog eats cat diarrhea? – Oh, gosh. I don’t even wanna think about this. – And then he vomits. – Good. – It back up in a different spot. So now she’s cleaning up cat diarrhea over here and then vomited dog vomit, cat diarrhea over here. – Did you learn your lesson? – And I’m like, “Christy, which one smelled worse?” – Oh gosh. – It turns out the vomit smell worse. I didn’t know if that would make it smell better. – No, it even gets worse. – Sorry. Are you happy? – He’s doing really good right now. – Yeah, I think he’s tired. He’s just chilling. So, you start to learn the things that make him different from Jade. And one of the things is that he’s a jumper. His original name was Kobe. – Oh, he kinda responded to that a little bit. – We’ve got to change that. – Hold on, he was Kobe, but until 11 months old. – I know. I know. – This is like a confused little man. – I was like, I’ve met the man and he had a tragic passing. Those kinda cancel each other out and make it where, like, I don’t want to name my dog after a basketball player. I’m not that into basketball. And he doesn’t jump that much. On the ride home from adopting him, I’m saying this. I’m like, we gotta come up with another name. I’m like, “Well, let’s just go with another J name.” Jade was Jade’s name from the adoption agency. We never changed it. And I’m like, Lily’s like, “What about Jasper? Because it’s another J name and it’s a rock. It’s a gemstone, just like Jasper.” I’m like, “Ooh, I like that.” – Like Jade, yeah. – And everybody else is like, “I don’t know about Jasper. I don’t like the name Jasper.” I was like, “It’ll grow on you.” It’s just a good theme. We gotta stick to themes here. We gotta get this out of the way. By the time we get home, he’s gotta have a new name. Then we get home, we’re calling him Jasper. And then I noticed that like pretty early on, Christy has shortened Jasper to Jazzy. She’s calling him Jazzy. So he goes from being Kobe to coming home to a new family that calls him two different things that are not Kobe. – And I called him long legged, peanut butter, Jade. – Okay, more and more confusing. – That’s what I wanted to call him . – Long legged peanut butter Jade. Sometimes I still do. I’ll call him peanut butter Jade or I’ll call him long legged peanut butter Jade or I’ll call him long legs. – Some aggressive… – He doesn’t care. – Some heavy petting going on here. – But Christy calls him Jasper or Jazzy. And I’m like, “Ooh, Jazzy. We can call him DJ Jazzy Jeff, after the famous DJ who is behind all of the success of “The Fresh Prince.” I’ve always been a big fan of Jazzy Jeff. More so than Fresh Prince. I just felt like he didn’t get enough credit. He’s still doing his thing. He was a pioneer in the field. He wasn’t just some pop, rap DJ dude who was along for the ride. No, he made a lasting impact on the world of hip hop, and still does. I’d love to meet you, Jazzy Jeff. I named my dog after you. But I also named him after Jeff Probst. The best host in the history of television. – You have to land on one thing that you call the dog though. The dog has a name- – Jasper DJ Jazzy Jeff Probst. – You can’t call your dog multiple things. – When we train him, we call him Jasper. – (laughs) Okay. So when he is expected to do something, he is Jasper. In any other circumstance, he’s something else. – Yeah. And look, you can move, or I can mop the floor with this guy. – He’s kinda like a Smithsonian exhibit. The way you can just kinda manipulate him like that. – Yeah, I know. See, and this is what I wanted. And this is what you get with this type of dog. It’s like, well, I’m just gonna stay here. He’s a love sponge, man. And he’s got this thing we call the face. Have you seen this? When he’s excited. So when I come home, he still barks until he realizes it’s me. And this is why we think this is a Pomeranian thing unless he’s not Pomeranian, and then whatever part he is. This is where this comes from, ’cause Jade doesn’t do this. He will snarl his lips. – [Rhett] Like a smile a little bit? – He’ll snarl his lips and move his jaw like this. When he gets excited, he’s doing this with his lips. And we call it the face and we don’t like it. So we always tell him, “Don’t do the face.” – Well, I’m gonna tell you right now. He doesn’t get his long legs from a Pomeranian. That’s what I thought. That’s what a Pomeranian looks like. – Well, there’s a big mane. Under that mane, aren’t there like, long legs? – That’s not that long. These are really long legs. – Yeah, he’s something else. – Here, look, here’s a Pomeranian with a… – A fake leg. – A prosthetic wooden leg. – Oh man. Jasper. That could be cool. – But he could be part of that because his, I mean, his face is that color. – His face is the same as Jade’s. I mean, he’s definitely got some dachshund in him. Long hair dachshund, but I don’t know what the other thing is. I mean, doing the genetic analysis is something that- – You should do it. – Just because it’s fun to know. – I mean, ’cause like a real long haired dachshund has those really long ears. And both Jade and him have… – Shorter ears. – The short ears. It comes from something. – Yeah, we’ll have to figure that out. But the thing that I’ve noticed in including him in the family is, I think I’ve gone… Well, I thought I was a dog person because of Jade, but I think I was just a Jade person. Like, I like dogs a lot more but I’ve noticed now that Jasper’s there and we’re like going through training again and trying to get him to cooperate and learn and understand. It’s like, there’s a reward associated with that that I hadn’t experienced because I didn’t train Jade that much at all. And I’m not training him that much. But even a little bit of obedience, it’s very rewarding. And I start to feel like I’m moving from being a Jade lover to actually being a dog lover. But Jade will always be my number one. We started watching this show about dogs because he started getting into it. And there’s this like grooming competition show. It’s absolutely obnoxious. I can’t even remember the name of it. I couldn’t get through a whole episode because the pilot episode, it was just obnoxious. But the competition was, these groomers were given a dog that looked like what they called their heart dog, which is like the first dog that won their heart over. So for me, that’s Jade. Jade is my heart dog. I assume Barbara is going to be your heart dog. You won’t really know until you get another dog. Because all of these people, their heart dogs had passed away. And now they still love dogs and they groom ’em and stuff like that. But they have this special attachment to this one dog that connected with their heart. And so they brought out these dogs that looked like their heart dog, ’cause they would show a picture of, this is so-and-so. He died in 1986. And then, but I’m gonna groom this dog to look like him. And then they’re in tears grooming these dogs. – What is this on? – One of the streamers. Netflix maybe. I don’t know. But the thing that I couldn’t help but notice is that none of the dogs- – Looked like the heart dogs. – Looked like the heart dog, yet these people were still bawling. Like, doesn’t he look just like my munchkin? And I’m like, “No, he doesn’t.” But I think there’s like some sort of blindness. – I mean, first of all, I’m a dog person and I’ve always been a dog person. But without a doubt connected much more with Barbara than any other dog that I’ve ever had. If for no other reason than Barbara’s been around for like what, five years now. – But she’s also your first indoor dog. – No, no. We had Murl and Gypsy. – Oh, that’s right. That’s right. – But both of them died within a year. If you’ve read the “Book of Mythicality” you know the dog curse. But it’s interesting because, I mean, first of all, Jessie for the entire pandemic has been, every couple of nights, she’s on the couch, she’s going through the adoption websites. Like she is big, let’s get a second dog. Jasper, he sheds more than Jade, ’cause I’m seeing his hair go around and that’s why I’m sneezing. Here’s the thing, I’m not opposed to a second dog. I know for a fact that I would… You see those classic TikToks, which I think, you kind of represent the classic dad situation, which is like, a dad who’s completely opposed to getting a dog, doesn’t think he likes dogs. I mean, I’ve seen like a hundred TikToks where it’s just like dad saying, “You’re gonna have to take care of this thing.” And then cut to, they play the song and it’s this dad doing what you’re doing with the dog. And it’s like, it’s a trope at this point, but that’s not me. I knew that I was going to be sickeningly in love with Barbara, say embarrassing things to her that sometimes my wife tweets about what I say to Barbara. Barbara is my mistress. She’s my girlfriend. I’m completely in love with her. And I do want another dog and… Or I’m open to another dog. And I don’t feel like it would be this thing where it’s just like, oh, this dog is replacing Barbara. I’m so happy and content with Barbara that I don’t feel a need for another dog. And the thought of the initial sort of like process of training and… And first of all, my kids aren’t gonna do anything helpful. My kids don’t help at all when it comes to this stuff. Are they saying that they also want a dog though? – Of course they want a dog, because they don’t have to do anything except play with it. – Yeah. It wouldn’t be theirs. – It would be on me and Jessie to do the stuff to make it a good dog. And I’m just like, I don’t know. I could easily be broken down. This is not some giant barrier. – If you went home today and there was a dog, you would… – I’d be super happy. – So is it really, Jessie’s not, she doesn’t know if she’s ready. – Well, there’s complicating factors with us. I don’t think we could have Jasper in the house because I would be sneezing all the time. I know there’s controversy over this but hypoallergenic is a thing. There are dogs that are less prone to give you allergies. And they’re the ones that have hair rather than fur, and I don’t know what Barbara is. She’s a mix of some kind. But she doesn’t cause me to start sneezing when I hang out with her. So we would need to get a dog that fits in that category. But yet we would want to adopt a dog versus go to a breeder. So it’s like, it kinda complicates and makes our decision a little bit more difficult. But an interesting thing is, I don’t have any desire for my next dog to look like Barbara, but I am very interested in the disposition being the same. – Once you get used to one kind, it’s easier. You know what you’re dealing with. It lets you get a baseline. – I don’t have… The fact that it takes a lot for, it took a lot for Jade and it takes more for Jasper to warm up to people. And that feels like more of a project to me. I don’t think Jessie has a lot of capacity for a project dog. It’s more just like, I mean, I love Barbara, but I do understand that if Barbara were to go to an Airbnb where somebody else lived and then we forgot her and left her there and the other family came home, she would immediately acclimate and love them just as much as she loves us. Like, she is a endless supply of attention and cuddling, but it is not exclusive to us. – I actually saw it as an advantage to, almost a download Jasper at 11 months old, to adopt him at that age, because yeah, you get the cuteness of the puppy, but at least I thought, I mean, there’s a lot more training that goes into it. And we were told that he was housebroken. We also knew that if he’s part dachshund, that like, he’s still gonna sneak off and poop for the next three years. – Eat a little cat shit here and there. – Yeah, that too. But what we didn’t know was that, okay, you give up all of the puppy learning curve and you lose the cuteness, you get more of the dog that you know you’re gonna be with, but you also get some sort of, if there’s any emotional baggage or trauma or something like that. Like, his separation anxiety is something that we’re dealing with. And if Christy’s goes out in the front yard and leaves him in the house, he’s barking and howling. And like I said, I’m doing some crate training to get him better at that. And you know, in a few months, I’m sure he’ll be a lot better. But I think ultimately I’m glad that we got a dog that was a little bit older. And Christy is so attached to him because he needs her so much that like, she just loves it. She just eats it up. And she’s like, I mean, she’ll say, “I didn’t save him. He saved me.” And I’m like, “Christy, are you doing what’s best for the dog? Like, you really, you cuddle him so much, that like, that’s not really helping with the separation anxiety.” You know, it’s like, I mean, she doesn’t take a shower with the dog and we do get him in the crate now for that. But yeah, for a while I was like, “Are you making him worse because it makes you feel that much better that he needs you so much? – Are you saying this is like a Munchhausen situation? Or however you say that? – I don’t really know what that is enough to agree or not. – That’s when, not to make light of it. This is a real thing that happens. So it’s when a parent purposely keeps a child sick so the child is dependent upon them. – Oh my God. – It’s like the little girl in “Sixth Sense” that is under the bed and yeah. I mean, this happens all the time. It’s like, this kid is being constantly like, usually they’re poisoning the kid or doing something to keep the kid sick, because it creates this co-dependent relationship that makes the parent feel like they’ve got some self-worth. So you think your wife is doing that with your dog? (laughs) – Yeah, she’s definitely poisoning the dog. No. – She’s the one who… That wasn’t cat shit. That was something Christy made and said it was cat shit. – Okay. Yeah. It seems like Christy and I have something to talk about tonight. Okay. So we got another member of the family. I don’t regret it. I’m actually feeling pretty good about it. And I think he’s feeling good about it. He’s loving everybody in the house and he doesn’t hate you anymore. He’s just barking at you. – Yeah, I think the cool thing about a dog like Jasper is that there is a… He presents a challenge. He just picked something off the ground. – He tastes a lot of things. – And it’s a challenge that, I’m okay with that challenge if it’s my friend’s dog. (laughs) You know what I’m saying? It’s like, I’m trying to get Jasper to warm up to me. And one day he will, like Jade used to bark at me and now Jade wants to lick me every time I see her. It’s just the process of making that transformation happen is something that I don’t know if I have the patience for my own dog. So I’m happy for you to do the work and me to experience the benefit. – I think you should do it. I think you need to get another Barbara. – Well, you know what we did? It’s funny, we went through this phase with Barbara where I was so sure, like, I was talking seriously about cloning Barbara. – You loved her that much. It’s not that I love her less. It was that I hadn’t had a dog in a long time, hadn’t had a dog that I had connected with to the degree that we’ve connected with Barbara. Began to believe that maybe the dog curse was over, especially when she got out and literally left the house and jumped into somebody, a stranger’s car and still came back to us. At that point, I was like, okay, maybe the curse is broken. And we started to think like, oh, what if we always had this little white dog? We always called her Barbara. ’cause there are people who do this. And it was just like, let’s just do this for the rest of time. You know, the price of cloning a dog is dropping every year. And then I was like, that’s crazy. I mean, I was like, that’s crazy and also insisting on it being Barbara and looking like Barbara. No offense to you. I was like, I feel like I’m giving in to some unhealthy tendency. – I’m not gonna clone Jade, but I do still think about it. – I let go of that, and I know that I’ll love the next dog as much. Jessie wants- – I just wanted Jade to not be threatened. I didn’t want a new dog to get more attention. So. I didn’t want an upgrade. ’cause I thought Jade could pick up on that. I wanted Jade to stay the queen. And she’s still my dog. Now this is Christy’s dog, and Jade is still the best. – Well, the thing that Jessie keeps saying is that she doesn’t want there, she wants there to be a crossover between Barbara and the next dog. And so why not begin the process now? – Yeah. You’re talking about lifespan here. – Yeah, she’s like the idea of Barbara dying and then going through this grieving phase and then finding another dog, which I think there’s an argument to be made there. But Barbara is only five years old. She’s a little dog. She’s gonna, probably at least be 12, 13, maybe significantly older, I don’t know. I don’t know. I’m sure we’ll get another dog at some point, and I’m sure I’ll love it just as much as I love Barbara. I mean, well, maybe a little bit less than Barbara. – A little bit less. – A little bit less than Barbara. – I don’t think I’m ever gonna love a dog as much as Jade. And I don’t want to. I can give you a rec though. It’s totally related. I said we were watching that dog grooming show. The reason why Lando got me to watch that, ’cause he thought I’d be into it, is because he had gotten me into another show that I’m recommending called “Canine Intervention.” “Canine Intervention,” it’s kind of like “Dog Whisperer,” if you’re familiar with that show. But I actually haven’t watched that show. – Cesar? – Yeah, Cesar’s show. But it’s like, you got problem dogs that then this guy, I call him Jas. It’s J-A-S, like short for Jason, maybe. But the way that he says his name is like, Johs. – Okay, that’s weird. That’s a little weird. – They don’t say his name enough for me to get it straight in my head. But it’s this guy from Oakland who travels all around California and helps with troubled troubled dogs. And like, he’s got this training facility. And the way they do these shows now, it’s like, all right, there’s a story of these dogs and it’s really compelling, like tears in my eyes watching these dogs transform. That’s the other thing that made it click for me was like, I wanted to watch this show because I’m trying to help train Jasper. But then I’m connecting to all these dog stories and I’m like weeping. It’s a really good show. And then at the end, like with all these reality shows, you see him back home with his family talking about like, oh, they got a newborn. And then they got these seemingly ferocious dogs that are just so well-trained and all around the baby. And so you get to know their home life and his professional life. And he’s just got such a- – It’s called “Canine Intervention?” – “Canine Intervention,” but it’s super cool. I mean, the stories are really good. It’s really well produced. And that’s my rec. If you’re into dogs, you should definitely watch it because all of the stories and transformations are inspirational and moving. – All right, “Canine Intervention?” – Yeah. – Thanks for listening. Send my wife links to dogs that you think that we should adopt and oh #EarBiscuits. – You know not what you ask for. – #EarBiscuits. (laughs) – All right, we’ll speak at you next week. Let us know what you think about adopting dogs, second dog adoption experience, all this stuff if you relate to it. #EarBiscuits. Next week, we’re gonna be unearthing all our ideas in traditional entertainment that were squashed. To watch more “Ear Biscuits,” click on the playlist on the right. – [Rhett] To watch the previous episode of “Ear Biscuits,” click on the playlist to the left. – [Link] And don’t forget to click on the circular icon to subscribe. – [Rhett] If you prefer to listen to this podcast, it’s available on all your favorite podcast platforms. Thanks for being your mythical best. (upbeat music)