Audrey and Toby enjoy some peas as a snack, only to discover an unexpected prize inside!

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James:

Hey, podcast people. Welcome back to that story show, episode 4 51, brought to the week of September 28th, 2023. I’m your host. My name is James Kinison. My good friend is here. Hey,

John:

I’m John, and that’s not important. James. You know what? I used to be addicted to soap, but I’m happy to say I’m clean now.

James:

You used to be a

John:

What? I used to be addicted to soap.

James:

You’re clean now. That’s great. That’s good. I just liked the way you paused at the wrong time during that sentence,

John:

What

James:

You did. That was a micro pause. Anyway. No, no. Let’s keep it. Let’s keep it. I like it when accidents happen.

John:

Yeah, just don’t isolate that and just play it over and

James:

Over. No, no, no, no, no.

John:

I used to be a,

James:

No, I wouldn’t do that. And also, I’ve never been tempted to log onto one of those AI voice generators and feed it audio from you, from the podcast and create a fake John. So then I could make you say whatever I want and play it on the podcast. And you could never say it wasn’t really you. I would never do that, and I’ve never been tempted. There we go. Really

John:

Kind of wish you were tempted. I’d like you hear what I would say at your best.

James:

I could make you say anything I wanted. I’m so tempted to though. I so tempted.

John:

So tempted. Oh

James:

Man. Man. Wasn’t Lionel Harris awesome last week?

John:

Yeah, he was a super cool dude.

James:

I miss him. I’ve been kind of chatting back with him this week, and he’s super grateful to have been on the show. He reposted us and all that kind of stuff, and he’s good people.

John:

Yeah, he’s a good guy. I could totally see doing that Again. I know

James:

Every time I am by myself, I feel really stupid about my dream to be a standup comedian, but then when I talk to one of those guys, I feel like these are my people. I could do. I could do this.

John:

They inspire you and give you hope, huh? Yeah.

James:

We always start with an opening story. This is called Sour Squares. It’s from Jenna. It’s a great name. I love that name. It’s my second favorite name in all the world, actually, because my daughter, Jenna from Fenwick, Ontario, she says, as a girl, my mom’s family was very frugal. For example, if she or any of her siblings didn’t finish the plate for supper, they got to eat it as a cold breakfast the next morning. Yeah, I can relate.

John:

My kids might’ve had to do that once or twice.

James:

Yeah. Yeah. Most often, this punishment was only enacted at the picky eaters of the family. My mom was not a very picky eater, so she rarely had to eat cold mashed potatoes for breakfast. However, there was one food that my mom absolutely hated. Date squares. Have you ever heard of this? Have you ever heard of this?

John:

Yeah, I think they’re delicious.

James:

Really? I had never heard of date Squares. Really? It sounds like love connection mixed with Hollywood Squares, like a 60 early seventies TV show.

John:

I’ll take Henry Winkler for the win. For the X.

James:

Exactly.

John:

We’ll go on a date later.

James:

Date Squares.

John:

Date squares.

James:

Her mom made them regularly and packed them as a snack for school lunches. Eventually my mom decided enough was enough she could not eat another Date square again. So from that day forward, every time she found a date square in her lunch bag, she put it in the bottom of her backpack. And there, there’s the doom sound kicking in right there, because if you were smart, you would’ve just thrown it away with your lunch bag. But no, kids aren’t smart, are they, John?

John:

No. Well, no. I wasn’t

James:

Like, my kids used to sneak food out of the pantry when they were little, and they would eat it in the bathroom and then throw the trash in the bathroom. Trash can where they knew the only people in the house that emptied the bathroom trash can where the parents hers, not very wise. I wonder what

John:

This little Debbie wrapper’s doing here.

James:

Yeah. These snack crackers, these little goldfish package. What’s this doing down here? Anyway, I’m sure you can imagine what the bottom of her backpack started to look like and how heavy it started to get,

John:

How sticky it was on the other side. As I recall, those are not dry things.

James:

Yeah. Prune packs, prune squares, squares, whatever. As weeks went on, eventually spring came, so time passed. Eventually it was time for the annual spring cleaning at home, walking into my mom’s room, her mom noticed an odd smell wafting from the closet. She followed her nose. She realized the atrocious smell was coming from my mom’s backpack. She opened the backpack, and that night, instead of eating supper, my mom sat at the table and choked down several months of gooey, mushy, possibly moldy. Date squares. Gosh, I want to throw up Jenna. Hope it makes it on the show. She says, Fenwick Ontario. Goodness gracious.

John:

Wow. Wow. Months old.

James:

Months old.

John:

I can’t even imagine. I can’t even imagine.

James:

So you said you like date squares?

John:

I do, but not with mold

James:

On ’em. They were mentioned in the story as being packed as a snack. Yeah. Not like a vegetable or a main course.

John:

So can you run a little dessert? I

James:

Was about say, run me through what I’m missing here. What’s the flavor and texture? What would she hate about it?

John:

Well, a date is, it’s one of those Mediterranean kind of fruits. They’re dried and you can make all sorts of great stuff out of ’em. But the way that I’ve had my envisioning of a Date Square from what my experience is, it’s likes like a cookie kind of bar. Like a cookie bar. It’s got a cookie kind of bottom, and then there’s the process date, which is like, it’s a gooey sticky

James:

Mess. It sounds horrible. I’m going to be honest. Yeah. Well,

John:

And sometimes they’ll put chopped up nuts in it and then make a cookie kind of thing, like a big cookie and then cut it into squares like you do with brownies or something. Right.

James:

Well, this was a lighter thing. Jenna’s grandmother that was enforcing this and making this, and that was definitely a sign of the times back then. I know my parents were like, you have to clean your plate.

John:

Right? Yeah.

James:

No matter what. That was a big deal.

John:

Got it. Clean. I mean, if all the efforts going into preparing that.

James:

Well, I think it was because of their parents having gone through the Depression era.

John:

Right? Yep. Don’t waste anything. Don’t waste

James:

Anything. There are people starving in China. That’s what it was. Now it’s Africa.

John:

I remember hearing that.

James:

But yeah, China, let’s do some news nuggets. We got a couple of good ones for you today. The Wienermobile is back. Hey, did you know that they even changed the name? They did. I’ve heard that. What was it that they call it? They named it the Frank Mobile.

John:

The Frank Mobile. Yeah.

James:

I’m pretty sure it was to get the word wiener out of there is my guess. But just four months after announcing the Shape or the change, the distinctive Wiener on Wheels is reverting to the original name. And that’s good because Frank Mobile may be more politically correct, but Wienermobile is a lot more fun.

John:

Yeah,

James:

A lot more fun to say. So the Wiener mobile rides, again, the name change was announced by Kraft Heinz Company in May, and it was meant to pay homage to the brands. 100% beat Frank’s and their news recipe. Yeah,

John:

Right. Okay. Yeah, sure. It’s not to get Wiener out of

James:

Name. You were trying to please the five percenters, that wine on social media. That’s what you were trying to do. So Oscar Meyer was headquartered in Wisconsin for nearly a hundred years before it moved to Chicago in 1915. I know the first Wienermobile was created in 1936, and it has gone through several iterations since then, including a naming, a renaming to the Frank Mobile that just doesn’t even roll off the tongue. Right. Frank?

John:

No. Frank Wiener. Have you ever seen it in real life? I’ve

James:

Seen it driving down the highway.

John:

I saw it in Louisville, and it was parked on the side of the road, and we got to walk by it and look at it. We didn’t get to go in it, but there’s, I don’t know, wiener people. I don’t know what they are. They’re the people that take care of it and yeah,

James:

They’re out there answering questions. I can’t know what they’re called, but it’s like dog stirs or dog drivers or something like that. It has to do with hot dogs,

John:

The wiener people. That’s

James:

Terrible. Yeah. But is frank people any better? No, we’re just going to tell you like it is. We’re very frank here, so yeah.

John:

Hey, let’s relish today and catch up tomorrow. Sorry.

James:

No, that was actually not bad. Okay, so the Phillies deny emotional support. Alligat