Junk Mail

Ben Maller. Because listen, five nights a week not enough, not enough, So we provide you with marginal audio content eight days a week. And here we are so exciting twenty hours a week on the radio and a flee give or take three hours, three bonus hours on the weekend. And we have yet to take a call from the most famous famous prank caller of all time. He has not called this show. But the phone is ringing. The

phone is ringing, so you never know. At any moment we might actually take a call from the aforementioned And how exciting would that be? My God, that would be that would be great? Right the phone ring in there. We won't stop ringing. This is not a call in radio show. You might want to stop that, Howard. That's a that's a problem. Anyway, Listen, this is the fifth Hour. This is all about Yet, it is all about your questions and our answers on the Fifth Hour podcast. So

without further Ado, let's strike up the band. I'm not gonna waste any time here. He is the man, the myth, the legend, our guy. Ohio. It's well said, OHIOO well said. So the first email comes from Glen in Chicago and he says, Hey, Ben, what is with the forty seven minute obesity chubby kid commercial that you do that's on this podcast. It feels like it never ends. Glenn in Chicago complains, I don't know if it's the same commercial

plate multiple times in a row or one long ass commercial. Alright, First of all, Glenn, thank you for your listenership. As you know, you've been with the show while now and we do appreciate that. And I'm sure the people that spend a lot of money on that commercial are happy that you called it a forty seven minute obesity chubby

kid commercial. That is what's known as a mead role in the podcast game and the advertiser paid a good amount of money, and it's just pretty much me telling a story, me telling a story, and then I plugged their website and that's pretty much it, and I thank you for listening. I don't think it's a bad commercial. It's pretty good commercial. It's I will tell you this though, Glenn. I've done a lot of spots over the years for advertisers. That is the longest commercial that I have ever done.

And I remember when I was contacted by management. They're like, hey, you know so and so I want you to do a spot. I was like, well, well that's great. You know, I almost never turned down advertisers because I, as I learned from John Sterling on this podcast, The Voice of the Yankees, the most important thing is selling the soap. You've got to sell this up. So I'm like, all right,

I would like to sell the soap. But they contacted me and said, well, they want you to tell a story about your life and losing weight, and they want to help other people lose weight, and they have a website that can give people advice and direct people. I was like, all right, yeah, that sounds good. You know, anything that can lead someone to lose weight. I'm all for right. Yeah. I also think if you're happy fat and you don't want to lose weight, I'm good with

that as well. Uh. And I've told this story many times, Glenn. But when I was growing up, and I remember being at at social evance bar Mitzvah's weddings funerals, and my my cousins, my old cousins, aunts and uncles would all give me the lecture, you really would you need to lose weight, Ben, You'll feel so much better. And I remember thinking at the time, I did not feel bad

at all. I felt fine. I thought things were going great, and and all this talk about oh no, no, you need to lose x amount of weight, and and I was like, come on, you know what's wrong with you? You people are so you're wrong, you really are. And uh, anyway, I may get to the point. When I was at my fattest, I was like, all right, let's uh, let's get it on, let's get it on right now. And uh. And then even even when I lost weight, even when the weight came off and I had that big accomplishment,

I lost two hundred pounds, I was so fat. I was so overweight that I could able. I was able to lose two hundred pounds and I was still a big guy. That's how fat I was at the at my biggest and and then I remember the conversations turned from you need to lose the way to oh my god, you're probably feeling so much better right now. And then I remember telling people and how upset they were when I pointed out, you know, I didn't ever feel bad when I was fat, and I don't really feel that

much better now. I feel about the same. Yeah. Sorry, I mean that's uh, that's the problem. And they were like what I mean, I don't I don't understand. Come on, I mean, what is that all about? You lost all this weight here? And I'm like I'm shutting them down, you know, I'm like sorry anyway, So, Glenn, that is one commercial. If if you're talking about the one I am talking about, it's one commercial, like three or four minutes. I don't maybe it's even longer than that. I have

no idea. Next question from Neil in the real Miami, not the fake Miami. The real Miami. Uh, Neil says, So I'm on the road in Orlando. Boy, that's gotta suck you live. I've seen Neil's home there the view picturesque. He's got the showcase home high rise Miami we talked about in previous episode. And and Neil's living the life. He's in the penthouse overlooking all of Miami. That got

the Heat Arena right next door to him. And as he pointed out, you live in a place like that, after a while, you don't even appreciate the views, the coast of the Atlantic Ocean right there and all that. You just forget about it because it's you know, it's home,

and you just live your life. Anyway, back to the email, Neil in Orlando visiting for work says he was hanging out with his brother watching Goodfellas on a rainy day and there is a scene with Jimmy he wanted Spider to dance before he shot him, and the word Mama Luke was all over the place. So he says, I was wondering if you, uh, if you have a favorite old school gangster movie. He said, you and your partner to be named later have an old school gangster movie

that you like. Well, you actually mentioned my favorite one of those women. Many people say Godfather Too is the greatest of all time. But for me, it is the aforementioned Goodfellas. I love that movie. I've watched that movie many times. It's held up for me. I enjoyed very much, and uh, I love it now. The term mama luke.

I actually learned it from not that movie, but I watched a movie that I'm not even that big a fan of it, the Raging Bull boxing movie Martin Scorsese, famous name in Hollywood, and they used the term mama luke quite a bit in that that movie, and that's where I first learned mama luke. I stole it from the movie. That's a good word, which I guess if I'm an Italian, but if you're of Italian heritage, i'd

say a word that you're familiar with. But I it's become it has over the years become mainstream in lexicon. And so that is the the back story on that, Neil. But yeah, Good Fellas, you can't go wrong with that. I love the Sopranos. That's obviously not a movie, but I enjoyed the hell out of The Sopranos back in the day, and I don't normally enjoy that kind of content, And I'm pretty much documentary guy, it's gonna be real

or it's not for me. But when it comes to to a good mob show, I I'm all about it. I am all about it. Yes, very very nice. There cannot get enough of it? All right, moving on in the mailback, Next up, any meany mighty mo. Pick a caller by their name, and let's say hello to Pierre from Springfield. We're actually not gonna say to low to him because if he says all back, he's a phantom.

And it goes. And as much as Pierre the keeper of Alfie Adiano Piner listens to the show, I mean this guy, this is a dedicated member of the Mala Mush. I wonder what Pierre does, like I wonder what he does for work, what he does in his free time. I've seen him at Red Sox games, driving down from

Springfield Tow, Massachusetts to go to Red Side games. But man Pierre is able to listen to all of the content, whether it's the middle of the night when I do these other bits on on radio shows, Pierre is always there. He is. He's great. As far as a p one brigadier general in the mallem listen, I'm very lucky, like a lot of you have been very loyal. But Pierre Alfie and pineers right near the top of the list.

No matter when we put content out, Pierre's like, I'm here and uh, and he's just he's all about it. It's like and even when I do stuff at the last minute and then Pierre pops up and it's like, motherfucker, here he is. Here's Pierre Alfieri, Li Piner ready to go. It's a Whodini. Yes, he is like Pudini. That's a good point, very much like Pudini, the way that he pops up like that. Anyway, all right, yes, let's get

to it. So, Pierre from Springfields, this man. As I type this question, I think that I just heard you say that Benny versus the Penny maybe returning to the radio. Maybe it's just that I haven't had a coffee yet and I didn't hear it correctly. Would you care to elaborate on the state of the Juggernaut YouTube show? So, Pierre, here's where I am. I know for sure there is a date down the line where the Benny versus the Petty segment will return to terrestrial radio. So I know

that is true. Uh, one date in late November around Thanksgiving. The plan is all everything lines up in a row, we will have Benny Versus the Penny on terrestrial radio. Now, as you know, because I've been very open about this, the reason that we do Benny Versus the Penny on YouTube is to provide some tape so that we can get a TV show. We actually were in conversations with several big media companies to provide and don't laugh, all right,

it's not it's not funny, but we were. We were in conversation to to put Benny Versus the Penny on a major media platform. Um. One was Old Media, a couple were New Media, but the deal fell apart at the very last minute. Has often happens, you know, something, something goes wrong. Uh So the goal is to eventually move that to a television or internet streaming platform with a lot of sponsors, a lot of bells and whistles, and then everyone will be like hey, congratulations, yeah, and

we'll be thank you, thank you for that. But as of now that has not happened. Um and I have got a lot of complaints with people even know Benny Versus the Penny. The bulk of it has been off the year now off off radio. It's been on YouTube for a couple of years now, and we did on the podcast for a year, so really it's been off Terrestaural Radio for three years. It's just been in other platforms.

And I still get people that call up and they're like, yeah, you gotta bring it back, man, you know, and I'm like, all right, well maybe we will from time to time. I still do the Thursday night game. I still do that. Uh and and and and that that goes well. I will keep you posted, Pierre when it moves, if it does move off YouTube back to terrestural radio, but I guarantee there is a date that it will happen. Alan in Akron writes in he says, do you get residuals

for any of your TV work? Uh no? Uh no. And the reason I know, I've been on a few TV shows. I worked at NBC on Sports Talk Show at NBC out of Stanford, Connecticut, did that for about a year. Uh that is not an evergreen show. That was not a union a gig, so didn't get any kind of residuals. And then I was on the Sports List that's one with Summer Sanders on the Fox Sports Network. That's one I wish I got residuals for because that

thing was an evergreen show. And five six, seven years after I did that show, I'd walk into a sports bar occasionally and they'd have that on one of the monitors after a game, and I was like, if I only got paid like a dollar every time that thing aired, or fifty cents, I would have made a killing. But they didn't work that way. Uh So that sucks. And then the other thing I just did for Vice also not anything that pays residual. So the answer is no,

But I do. I do know that Coop gets money on the show, the shows that he did back in the day, he gets residual checks from that. Be sure to catch live editions of The Ben Meller Show weekdays at two a m. Eastern eleven p m. Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio. Kevin in Kansas, Right, so he says, dear beat, besides playing the plastic recorder or the flute, oh phone in grade school? Were you involved in music or theater any time in school? Thank

you for great the great podcast. Well, Kevin, thank you very much. I appreciate that first of all. Now secondly, I was in the band in elementary school. I was in the band, and as the largest kid in the elementary school, I had a very large instrument and I forget the name of it. It was like a violin, but it was massive, right, it was. It was massive, and I had it was it had a lugged this thing around and I don't think it was againness world

where it wasn't actual violin. It was a different, different name for the instrument. But it's been so long that I forgot. And I was really bad. I barely knew English in elementary school, so learning music, I pretty much just did my own thing. And I was in the background in the band, and as long as the other kids did what they were supposed to do, I was okay. Like I was just kind of background noise in the band, you know, I was. It was elevator music, and I

was kind of doing my thing. And plus, as you know from working in the educational system, Kevin, when you're a kid in school, it doesn't matter how terrible you are, it is irrelevant. You get applause. You cannot do a bad job. Right, no matter what you do, you are going to get support. You're you're gonna get people as like, hey, good job by you, you know, matter what, and they're not gonna laugh at you. And I gotta have point figures and gonna say the doing Yeah, then I gonna

say what that dog doing back there? No, none of that's gonna up. Uh. So I didn't get any negative feedback. But I did play an instrument. That's one of those things I wish I had paid more attention to my mom. May she rest in peace. We had a piano that my grandparents have got had gotten, and I attempted to play the piano and I knew a few songs, just

kind of by memory, not really reading music. But my my mom tried her darnist to get me to learn how to play the piano professionally, and it just never never really clicked. She was really good, I mean, she knew she picked it up, but she knew how to read music. And very talented woman on the piano. Who's next, it's the mail bag? Don't we have Matt in bow doin Maine? Yeah? I gotta looked at up bow doin Maine.

You think that's a real You know, I only know a few cities in Maine and most of the cities I know in Maine are from doing the radio show, and that's not one that i've I've heard of. Let me let me check this out and do a little, a little reconnaissance on the town of bow doin Maine. What can I learn from the interweb? What do I know about bow doin Maine? Population three thousand, sixty one as of the census. It is part of the Portland's

metropolitan Portland, Maine metropolitan area. So there is that not that far from the Atlantic Ocean. It was developed as an agricultural town, raising sheep, producing apple's, wheat, hey and potatoes. All right, look at that. That's kind of cool. But since the early nineties, oh, this is interesting here. Since the early nineties, alpacas normally an animal you see in South America. But according to the Internet, it can't be wrong. It's on the internet. Alpacas who look like weird looking

goats with a long neck. That's what an alpaca, you know, those furry fury that. Yeah. So if I wanted in alpaca, I could call Matt up and Matt could get me a deal, and then he could he could have it shipped the alpaca out the Cali and I could have bella and a pet alpaca in my backyard. How great would that be? That'd be wonderful. Anybody famous come from Bodin Main, Boy, the odds of famous people come from there. Not great when you have so, you know, such a

few assistant small population, such a small population. Uh, it says here according to the Internet, Mike mckugh the most famous person to come out of that town in Maine. And he who is that? You ask? A hockey player who was drafted by the Minnesota north Stars, a team that doesn't even exist anymore, is the first pick of the nineteen supplemental Draft. He played at the University of Maine and he played in the NHL for twenty games. He scored one goal and that was his only point

in the NHL. Yeah, so this guy's like the Moonlight Graham of hockey. Mike McK things you did not expect to hear on the fifth al. Anyway, back to Matt's email, and Bo bow doined me and I hope I'm saying that right. I'm just guessing at that. Uh. And Matt says, does Marcel in Brooklyn dip his pizza in ranch dressing before consumption. It's a great question, Matt. I'll try to work that into the show this week. I will ask Marcel if I remember, Marcel, do you enjoy ranch dressing?

And I'll ask him questions. I do enjoy quizzing Marcel about various things food related. He revealed had never eaten beef before, but he does enjoy hamburgers. This past week, Matt's Marcel is a great character on the show. He's a wonderful character on the show. He loves the show, he loves being on the show. Now I've got an email from people saying your mean to Marcella. I'm not mean. No, Marcel loves being a radio star. We allow him to be a radio star, and he loves being a character

on our show. But I have to ask him about ranch dressing. I'll have to phrase it the right way. What country does ranch dressing come from? What is what is ranch dressing made out of? I could ask that, right, That's a good question. Then I'll answer some some nonsense most likely, most likely, and then I'll be good. Mike is next on the mailbag. Mike from Los Angeles writes in he says, Man, I know you are a tight wad. But everyone splurges on something or another. What is worth

spending moron to get the best? So, Mike, I have I mentioned this in the past. I guess you're new to the podcast or maybe you missed it in a pre be a s mailbag. The one thing that I will spare no expense on I look out for, Mike took us, uh the toilet paper. I do not go cheap on toilet paper. We've all been to that truck stop, We've all been to that grocery store that has toilet paper that is thinner than you thought was humanly possible.

And you have to use a whole role to get a decent amount of toilet paper to take care of your business with your number two. So I when I go to Costco, they have a cheaper version, and they have a more expensive version, and I go with the more expensive version of toilet paper. That is one area, Mike, I do not cut corners. Uh. As far as food, there's a lot of things that you can save money just on generic brand. Um. You know, gasoline is one of those things. You can go to any gas stations,

all regulated by the government. All that, Uh. Rob Parker told the store about airlines, and that even the cheap airfit, even the cheap airlines that you think are just you know, terrible, are regulated by the government, so they have to they have to follow the rules and regulations to have a license to be allowed to fly. So but I usually

just fly, I I when I fly. I don't fly very often anymore, but when I do, I will go on there, Mike, and I'll go to one of the travel websites, punch in why I'm going, and whatever pops up as the cheapest I'm in. Don't matter what airline it is, as long as it's you know, saving a couple of bucks. I'm good. Matt from Indie writes in on the mail back. He says, Ben, my wife is habitually late to appointments. It drives me crazy. Matt says, are you usually early or late? Well, Matt, I'm glad

you're concerned about my punctuality. In live and I do have a job. I have one of the few jobs where you have to be there on time. And if you are not there on time, bone and their mother will know that you are late. You have not shown up right when I when I missed a few shows at the beginning, we had gremlins. We've been I mean, knock on wood here. Fortunately we've been in pretty good shape. But in the past I've had gremlins that have affected the beginning of the show. And there's no way to

get around that. There is no way to pretend like you are there when you're not there, because you sound like bozo and it's just I mean, I could play a sound bite over and over of me, uh you know, doing that and pretend that I was me, but the listener knows. Listeners now, I have gotten away a little bit on the radio show, Matt. Sometimes if I have a few issues that we need to work out, we have to reset the equipment that I used to connect

to the mothership from the home studio. Uh that I What I will do is I'll have Roberto play a song every once in a while, little cheap Code on the Ben Mallery Radio Show inspired by Matt from Indie. If you hear one of the Mallard themes songs at the very beginning of the show, and it's like a dedication and said, it's just something different. It's actually because the gremlins have attacked my equipment. Hand to God, that's

why we do it. Like the gremlins have attacked and I, you know, I have to you have to kill time, kill a couple of minutes to have everything reset. And so that's that's how that goes. J from Cleveland, Cleveland one of my favorite cities. They love me in Cleveland. When the Cavaliers ended the Curse of Cleveland, the fan famous photo there held up a sign had all these

people that were Calves haters. And I was on this right next to Skip Bayless, a man that makes seventy five times the amount of money that I make, actually more than that anyway, Jay from Cleveland, right, and he says, I recently learned how to speak somewhat fluent Italian. Congratulations, Uh riva. Drcha was wondering what skill would you like to master? So Jay, we did answer a version of this question earlier in the mail bag. I think it was was it Kevin who asked that I forget. I

think Kevin in Kansas asked the question. But the the general question was about you know, instrument a thing like that, and then there was another question that was similar. Um. But the the way I will answer uh this question right is hey, I I wish I had learned another

language and mastered it. When I being of the Jewish faith, I learned Hebrew, but just enough to get my bar mitzvah, and i've had had had all that pretty much got Now I know a few words and a few phrases, and and Yiddish I picked up That stuck with me

a lot. My grandfather, may he rest in peace from Springfield, mass who when he was trying to talk dirty, when he was trying to say mean things, would talk in Yiddish at the house, and occasionally when he would say things the US kids as grandkids, he would use Yiddish terms, and so I picked up some of those phrases. My mom would also use some of those things, and her dad had was the one that had done that stuff. So it would have been cool to learn how to

fluently speak that. I need a Rosetta stone, hell, I need a Rosetta stone for English. Barely speak English, you know. At one point, as I said, I knew Hebrew and all that, but I have want to be I know a few words in Spanish living in Los Angeles. Just biasmosis. You picked that up, right, You just picked that up a little bit, Uh, and it's it's really spanguish at this point, it spangs. I don't even know if I answered Matt and Indy's original question about being on time.

I want to go back to that. Uh So, as you know, I am buy the clock for the clock, plausibly all about the clock on time, Mallory in my civilian life, Matt, I am not on Lombardi time. Vincimbardi legendary story. He believed that being on time was not good enough, and you always had to be fifteen minutes early. Tom Coughlin, the Old Coach and Jacksonville with the Giants, he ripped that off from Lombardi. I'm not like that. I like to be on time. I don't like to

be late. My wife also generally tries to be on time. We have relatives. I have a cousin of mine who I love, who just moved into the area where I now live, and we catch up and she is habitually late. But it's good because it reminds me of her mom, because her mom was like that too. And I'm you know, if you follow your parents as much as you say when you're a kid, you know I'm not gonna be like my mom. And I'm not gonna be like my dad. There's one day you wake up and having epiphany and

you're like, crap, I'm doing that. My dad used to do that. I'm doing that. My mom used to do that. But my mom was always on time, and her sister was always late, and I'm on time and her daughter, who's my cousin, is often be sure to catch live editions of The Ben Maller Show week days at two

am Eastern Pacific. Moving on, dog handler Dale from Orlando, Right, so we had we had our guy from Miami's and I guess we're big in Orlando anyway, Dale writes, and he says, recently, I have fallen down the the rabbit hole here of binge watching conspiracy theory documentaries on YouTube. Lately, I've been watching documentaries about nine eleven, big Foot, and several other interesting topics. It got me wondering, Ben, what conspiracy do you wish that you knew the answer to?

So this is a good question. Now be careful, Dale, because conspiracy theories have been weaponized. And if you tell too many people Dale that you enjoyed conspiracy theories, you will be called an extremist. You will be called all kinds of nasty names, uh and polite society political, it's been politicized. But I enjoyed conspiracy theories also, and I'm

not watch a lot of those documentaries on YouTube. But to answer a question Dale, the one that there's two that are on on this number one would be Roswell New Mexico. Did aliens drop down and Roswell New Mexico many many years ago. I am of the belief that that happened, and I I do believe that that is not I don't I don't think that it didn't happen. No, I think it happened. Uh. And I don't think it's fair you are fake. No, I believe it is legit.

And my hypothesis has been since that date. Look at the while and crazy things that have happened, and how rapidly in the Western world humanity has progressed with the technology we have available. Now, I look at this, this iPhone and the computer that you're probably listening to this on some kind of device, whatever your your smartphone is or however you're listening to this, maybe it's some other way.

But I'm just amazed by and this technology and how quickly it has changed considering what it was like a hundred years before. Roswell. I just think that that that is legit, and they re engineered alien technology somehow to create what we have. I'd like to know if that's true or if I've just I've taken stupid pills and I'm a big dumb dumb uh and I should put on my bows of the clown nose and all that.

So that's the first one. The second documentary dale that I would love to know if it's what happened, is dB Cooper D. B. Cooper. This is one of the great documentaries. I've read books on this, I've read many stories online, I've watched documentaries. It is fascinating that that incident, the hijacking of a plane from the Northwest, lead to the change of all airlines used to get on airlines in the back on the planes in the back, and they got rid of that because dB Cooper jumped out

of the back of the plane. The famous story that he was flying. He demanded money, he demanded ransom. He held people hostage on the plane and they gave him the money, figuring they'd get the money back when eventually they catch the guy. He took off and then jumped out of the plane randomly in the Pacific Northwest and was never found again. They never found the money, and many people have died on their deathbed said they were dB Cooper. There have been some people that believe they

cracked the case. I think one one was a police investigation by former law enforcement people. We talked about that on this podcast a while back, who claimed that it was a done deal. They had they had solved and cracked the case. And uh, I'd like to know what really happened, maybe even go back and be on the plane and like C. D. B. Cooper and and find out what what happens. It really was. It really as good an amazing tale as has been told by the

storytellers over the years. Who else do you have? Fred in Spring Texas? Is to either one of you speak foreign languages? Was a solo act thread And I just said I don't. I do not. Dave in Toronto right so and he says, hey, hey, Bett, would you recommend towing an electric generator during vacations? If all we have all we have our electric vehicles. Yeah, that's what the political class right as telling us that we have to have electric vehicles that we're gonna we're gonna run out

of fossil fuels. Uh yeah, alright, Uh, good luck on that. I've had an electric car in the past. I'm not against electric cars, but I'm also not against fossil fuels. I think everything in moderation, everything in moderation, and there's still a place for for those cars that use gasoline. And I I hope I live a long life. I hope I live to see the date. I know. I live in a place in America here California, where they've said by X year they're gonna get rid of gasoline.

They're not gonna produce gasoline cars anymore. It's all gonna be electric, and we're all driving Tesla's or whatever the hot electric car the day is. And I will believe it when it happens. I believe what happens. All Right, that's enough mail. Thank you all for contributing, and again we'll have some big news coming up on the Fifth Hour podcast and the questions. We had a fair amount this week. We want some new people, though, and a

lot of the same people. We love the same people, but we'd like to get some new voices also, some new questions. If you want to be part of the fifth Hour mail bag, very simple. You can drop me a note anytime. You can send it right now and say, hey, what up, I got a question right now. You don't have to wait till Tuesday when we post online to to solicit questions. Any time you want seven just put question in the headline on the mail uh that you said real fifth hour at gmail dot com. That's real

fifth Hour at gmail dot com. And you can also submit if you want a song for the radio show or this show, you can send something like that, ohio Al he's getting played every week because he gave us a little jingle for the mail bag. And also if you're not into the email game, because you're like, oh, come on man, what are my thousand years old using the email? If you're on Facebook and you're also a thousand years old Ben Mallards Show Ben Maller Show on Facebook.

That's our little community for the Mallard Militia. And every Tuesday we post, usually in the morning, sometimes afternoon, saying hey, give us your questions and and then we just take the questions off there, the good ones and we read them on the podcast. The other ones we just pretend didn't happen. So I have a wonderful rest your Sunday, enjoy the NFL. We'll be back on terrestrial radio tonight tonight eleven PM eleven p M Sunday in the West until three am in the East where most people live

two am to six am, so check it out. Have a wonderful rest of your day. I will talk to you next time.