I'm Tony. I'm Eric. We are the sons of San Fernando. But we've been friends for over 40 years. And grew up together in the San Fernando Valley. These are the stories of our experiences as adventurous Gen X latchkey slackers from back in the day. And don't forget to hit the follow or subscribe button so you don't miss an episode. So you just told me about a new mall in the San Fernando Valley. It's not a new mall. Well, it's an old mall, but it's a new mall. It used
to be Topanga Plaza. I know someone named Chris Mall. That's his real name. He was a tour guide. Who's a tour guide with me? My friends called him Doogie because he reminded them of Doogie Howser. There's nothing about this that I care about. He then became an assistant for Kelsey Grammer for a long time. Still not caring. He now gives VIP tours at Universal Studios to all the celebs. Wow. Chris Maul. That's... He's a good guy. That has no bearing on my life.
I like him. Children, wife. I'm so glad for you. That's useless information. Chris, if you're listening, we love you. No, we don't. Oh, I do. He's great. He's hysterical. Super great guy. Chris Maul. M-A-U-L. To Maul. To Maul means to... To... Destroy Chu. Uh, attack. Yeah. Attack basically is mall. Yeah. Interesting that it's a homonym for with the word mall
shopping also means shopping mall. Where does that word come from? Paul mall, Paul mall, the cigarettes to put a Paul upon something is metaphor to putting the Paul upon the casket. So, uh, the mall is a place to call is it is a dark, sad. uh... moment you putting a poll of upon something you're changing the moods of palm all cigarette is a dark sad all place shop Yes. And you just went to a refabbed Topanga mall. Yeah. So the old Topanga Plaza in the
valley in Woodland Hills, California, the Topanga Plaza. Plaza? Plaza. You really have a very light A. Plaza. I say Plaza. Well, excuse me, Plaza. Wait, wait. What do you put flowers in? What you fill it with? A vase. Oh, not a vase. No, no, no. It's a vase. Whatever. Plaza was British the mall that one of the malls we went to growing up in the valley and like all the other ones that got bought out by Westfield. Right dude, who are these people? Everybody?
Well, they've got off bought ton of money because they are they have upgraded malls, thousands of malls all over farm wide, dare I say so now the Westfield depending there I just went Uh-huh. Like a couple weeks ago. Uh-huh. And it is just like high-end everything. Right. Everything. Right. Like you've got Cartier, you've got Gucci, you've got all the high-end watch places. You got it. You name it, you got it. Yeah, they got every, it's so- Rolexes, Tudors. You got
it, you got it. You got it. All the high-end clothes, all the high-end watches, all the high-end shoes, all the high-end- High-end. Yeah. Say high-end one more time. No, no. Okay, that was good. I enjoyed the restraint there. It's very much unlike what our mall experience was. What was your mall experience? What was the main mall you went to? Main mall. Galleria, man. The gall... The galleria! All right, can we name a couple movies in which
the Galleria is featured? Okay, the interior is featured. Is featured. The Galleria is featured in Fast Times or Richmond High. Absolutely. What else? But what was the exterior? Oh, in Fast Times, it was something else? Oh, I don't know the answer to this. Really? Yeah. Really? What was the exterior shot? The exterior shot was the Santa Monica Place in Santa Monica, which is still there. Wow, I did not know that. That's an interesting factoid. The Santa Monica
Place. And you know who was in Fast Times at Ridgemont High then? Well, yes, a lot of you. Judge Reinhold does. No, somebody that I know. Oh, wait, yes. One of the Pat Banatars. Yes. Who was that? Blair Tufkin. Blair Tufkin. I mean, Blair Tefkin, yes. Artie Fuffkin. Blair Tefkin was the main Pat Benatar. She was the number, there were three Pat Benatars and she was the main Pat Benatar. She was the main Pat Benatar. You knew somebody in Fast Times, that's
amazing. I still know somebody. And Fast Times was very much built around the mall culture and that's, you know what? It was. I gotta say. The mulcher, if you will. The mulcher, it was Cameron Crowe, right? That made Fast Times? Really? Was it? No. I don't know. No, no, Amy, Amy heckling. I don't know. Oh crap. Now I'm going to have to learn this. Oh yeah. You're on your own. I'm just shooting. All I know is Sean Penn and Blair Deffken. Uh, and Jennifer
Jason Lee and Jennifer Jason Lee. She used to come to our gigs with Blair Deffken when I was playing with Blair. Oh, Jennifer Jason Lee. Jennifer Jason Lee would come to the gigs. Yeah. They were friends. Yeah. Maybe they're still friends. I don't know by the way Do you know in that movie when judge Reinhold is driving and he's making a delivery and he's working for that No, no, he's got the he's delivering with a with a pirate hat. Oh, yeah And he pulls
up next to that chick. Yeah, he's like, you know, yeah making eyes at her and he forgets that He's got a pirate outfit. You know who that woman in the car is? No, Nancy Wilson. No Wow, that's another good fact. Great cameo, right? Wow, I did not know that. But the Malt culture in that is exactly. The Malt-cher. The Malt-cher, I'm sorry, I stand corrected. The Malt-cher, the Malt culture is exactly what we lived back then with the movie theater.
Oh God, yeah. And the pizza joint. And the guy selling tickets. By the way, Damone I became friends with when my kids were born because. He would go to Starbucks. He opened a coffee shop. And then he opened a coffee shop, yeah. In the valley. But let me just tell you, I don't even know the guy's name, but I would talk to him all the time. Robert, oh god. And I just wanna say, super cool guy. Yeah, oh yeah. He was great. We used to have all kinds of
conversations, but I never learned his name. Chew for Blue Oyster Cult and Little Brother. And Van Halen, he was selling the Van Halen tickets too. Yeah, he had a, DeMone had it all, but. The interior in there, yeah, was the mall. Was the Sherman Oaks Galleria. Which still exists, but it's not the, it's still called the Galleria, but it's not a mall anymore. No, I mean, no, they tore the whole thing down. It was a whole, they call it the Galleria,
but it's a different thing. There's a fuckin' P.F. Chang's and a DSW and a 24-hour footrest over there. Lots of initials. All kinds of initials. Everything, you actually have to be in it. The whole thing is initials. You don't have initials, you can't be in the mall. No, it's not even a mall, really, frankly. It's a corridor with office buildings above it. Now, but it's a sham and a shame and a disgrace. But it was an indoor Mecca for, we didn't even do, we
didn't even do shopping. No, you know what we did at the mall? We loitered. We loitered because we didn't have any money. We didn't spend any money. We had no dollars that we had. So window shopped. And here's another reason why it was great to go into the Sherman Oaks It was cool when it was f***** hot outside. Oh well, because the valley. And you know that there was some SIG alert and some sort of, oh, I guess the SIG alert is traffic. There was some sort of...
The heat alert, yeah. No, not what's the... Oh, when it's a heat alert? No, no, it was a air quality. Oh yeah, because... We had air quality alerts every single day. Because of all the smog and the heat. It was smogalicious in the valley back then. So what did you do? You go to the mall. Because it was cool. And we did not cool like we were cool, like cool like it was cold. No, you'd ride your Diamondback or your Robinson over to, what'd you have?
Bicycle? Yeah. I had a Schwinn. I had a fucking Huffy. Oh, you had a Huffy? No, that's bad. I know, but so was the Schwinn. Dude, the Huffy was. I had a banana seat. Excuse me? Dude, the Huffy. The Huffy was like five steps below the Schwinn. The Schwinn was like four steps below the mongoose. And we still rode over to the mall. And then, yeah, we got out of the 105 degree. 108. Yeah. And then you go in the mall and then you do nothing. You hang out.
And so one day me and Angel Cat are hanging out. OK. Oh no, tell me this. One day me and Angel Cat are hanging out. And because we had no money, we were sitting in McDonald's. I don't even know if we bought anything at the McDonald's. I think we were just sitting in the booth. at the McDonald's. They were kind of lucky about that. I'd have to ask Angel Cat and see what he said we were doing. But all of a sudden this man walks up to us who
looks just like Jesus Christ. And we assumed it was. Wait, wait, wait. Okay. And by just like Jesus Christ. He had a robe and long hair. He looked like the European Da Vinci Jesus motherfucking Christ. Like you, like he walked out of a Renaissance painting. Was it, was it, did he, uh, did it, Birkenstocks? That I don't remember, but I will say. robe that was disheveled. He was disheveled, a beard, he looked kind of European, thin, long head. Did he have
a glow behind his head? No, but he did have. Sheep? He did have a half gallon bottle of liquid that he put down on the table and sat down with us. Was it water and then he changed it into orange, right? It was golden liquid and not pee. I was just going to urine. Not pee. No, it was more, I know it was like sunlight golden. It was sunlight golden. And he sits down with us and he says, I don't know, he honestly don't remember what he said. Wait, wait, could
you smell the booze on his breath? No, it was Jesus Christ, my friend. Okay, so can you stop blaspheming? Jesus sits down with us and we let him, because of course, right? Well, of course, when in Rome. Let me just say, how old, we were probably 14, maybe 13. For 13 and 14. And Jesus. If Jesus sits down with you, you let him. You let him. You don't say, get the fuck out of here, Jesus. Someone asks if you're a god, you say yes. So he sits down with us
and he puts his jug down of what was. Golden liquid. Ostensibly a Sunny D jug. Oh, a Sunny Delight jug. Okay, so it's a plastic jug. And I'm assuming that at least a large portion of the liquid in that jug. was remaining sunny delight. Right. Okay, I think it may have said, it was, it may have said sunny Dion. It may have been an actual sunny D-Jug. And he says a few things to us. Oh, what's that we think? We're so stunned by seeing Jesus that I don't
really remember the conversation. All I remember is that he starts to leave and he says, this is for you guys. And he leaves us the sunny D-Jug. That is, that is, there's. Ritalin, early Ritalin. There's something. Oh, it's good. It gets good. There's something moving in there. Here we are, 14 year olds in the middle of the Sherman Oaks Galleria in the valley in the scorching heat of the summer. A safe place. I'm all supposed to be a safe place for kids.
A random Christ shows up. A random Christ. And gives us a half imbibed jug of Sunny D and God knows what. What do you think Angel Cat and I did? You absolutely swig it. We went and got water cups from the fountain. and we brought the water cups back. Oh, you didn't lip it? You didn't go right there and just lip that thing? No, we got two water cups. You wuss. We got two water cups and poured each other a glass of the elixir. It's Jesus juice.
That Jesus brought us. You know that you're gonna see the light. I think that's what we called it. Do you see the light? And shockingly, we drank the Jesus juice together. And I'll tell ya, it was a Sunny D screwdriver that Jesus delivered to us. Of course it was. Yeah. Thank God it wasn't laced with anything else, but there was definitely a Sunny D and probably the cheapest vodka one could purchase at the time. Jesus was trying to enlighten you with
alcohol. We were 14 and we got absolutely lit on this Sunny D screwdriver. Jesus wanted it that way. Jesus felt like you have a better chance of finding your way. I will tell you. On a little bit of vodka. There were no negative effects. we got lit on Sunny D screwdriver. This is not one of those live and learn stories. Was that the end of your day at the mall or did you then go around and loiter some more? We loitered the rest of the day drinking Sunny
D screwdriver. Do you remember a lot of the stores that were in the gallery? I'm trying to remember some of the places we would like loiter. I mean, there was like Pacific Sun where- Oz. A-H-H-H-H-H-S. No, no, they were like- A-A-A-A-A-H-H-S? I think there were- four or five A's and a couple H's or one H. You know why there were so many A's? Because it would come up first in the phone book. Oh, smart. Very smart. And Oz, Oz sold all sorts
of, they had the t-shirts. It was a novelty and assorted sun greaves. So it was like Spencer's. Yes, Spencer's very similar. They had a bunch of weird, they had a little bit of everything, nothing you really wanted. I remember there was an adult section. That was cordoned off. Where they would just keep adults? It was James cordoned off, yeah. There was an adult section that you, yeah, there was like porn and stuff in there, I'm assuming. I don't know, I never
went in. You never went in my ass. No, I never went in your ass. No, I never did. That's crazy. What is wrong with you? What is literally wrong with you? You have, Think about what you are saying. No, I have. You never went in the adult section. Nor at your ass. Of Oz. No. I mean, we spent a lot of time. You say we didn't go in anywhere, but we would sneak into the movie theater every once in a while. Yeah, well, no, for me, I remember not sneaking in, but staying
for multiple movies. Oh, right. You'd get one ticket for a movie, and they would come to like, and you know what, that's the thing. You could stay for more than one movie because they'd. didn't always clean up between movies. No, and you could go in. There was a movie theater that we did sneak into that maybe you did, maybe you didn't. It was more in our hood, closer to us, because the gallery was, yes. The movies of Tarzana before it was Man Valley
West, it was the movies of Tarzana. In the back, there was a parking lot. Oh yeah, no, no. That was where the exits were for the theaters. And you could just walk in and people walked out. Yeah, and we did that multiple times. What, you went to the mall and you went to the movie theater, what was your snack of choice? Snack of choice? Yeah. Snack of choice. What was your snack of choice? Snack of choice. My snack of choice was always popcorn, of course, and
red motherfucking vines. Fuck red vines. Okay, I'm never gonna talk to you again. Are you kidding me? The best. The worst ass food ever. You're not gonna tell me that your ass likes Twizzlers. No, I don't like any of that shit. Oh, red vines are amazing. No, red vines were like chewing fucking. Look. Human flesh. Yeah. They were, no, it's, you probably want to know why I know what chewing human flesh feels like. I don't, but I have a feeling you're going
to tell me. Licorice chewies, no, there was a terrible one. Hannibal. There was nothing good about fucking red vines. Delicious. No. It was as good as the screwdriver from Jesus. I. Oh, I love Mike and Ikes. And jujubes. No, I hate jujubes. Jujubes. No, jujubes are, now that's terrible. That's basically like... That was the mall of... Jujubees were basically eating number two pencil erasers. You know what? It just reminded me of the... Flavor and texture.
Eating these items at the theater reminded me when we would go to the mall when I was young, my mom would always get my brother and I some candy. Cause they always had like a candy counter. What is wrong with our parents? Yeah, they would. They would have, the malls would always have that. They have like some candy counters. Either you go to C's candy, which is still around eight billion years later, even though they're candy. Suck. Plus $4,000 too for a C's candy.
It is a lot of money. One sucker is like $58. Yeah, 58, 50. And plus tax and installation, yeah. But. Delivery. But. There was always a place in the mall to get candy. So it would keep us kids, you know, shut us up while we were, it was before the days where we were teenagers and loitering. This is when we were kids. Delivered by mom. I always liked, they were called, later on called snow caps, but they're like nonpareils or something like that.
The flat dark chocolate disc with the white little crunchy things on top. I used to get. and like a sack full of those. I'd eat like eight billion calories of those in a mall session just to shut me up. Was never really into those. Love those. But great mall snack. Mall snack, ball sack, Slee stack. What's Slee stack from? Robert Stack. What's Slee stack from? Land of the Lost. Thank you. Name... name Marshall, Will and Holly on a routine expedition to the
greatest earthquake of them all. Come on, dude, if you don't know it of them all, stand aside. I thought you said of them all of them all. Oh, I thought we were going back to them all. By the way, a quick commercial break. Yeah. You know this. I don't know the name of the only sleaze stack that could talk. The gold sleet stack. Oh wait, Enoch. Yes. Wow, God. Yeah, I didn't know that was in there. No, you had it. Honestly didn't know. I could see it
in the rear. And you know the name of the little monster thing that was friends with Holly. Chaka. Yeah. Yeah, later became a tag artist. Chaka? Chaka, yeah, it was like a graffiti artist here in LA. I don't know if it's the same Chaka though. No, it was a little furry man. Running around. Yeah. Um, but it will go back to the mall stores. I'm trying to remember what was around at the gallery at back at that time. Where would we loiter? It was mostly
like in the hallways. I mean, we didn't like go with Spencer's. Oh, you said that. All right. Spencer's, but there was another, what play, uh, there were a lot of like clothing boutiques and the clothing boutiques that sold parachute pants. Oh yeah. Parachute pants. Yeah. They, uh, they did. Oh, you were just doing, uh, Rick James sampled by MC Hammer. Okay. Yes, there were there were lots of parachute pants there were lots of zippers. Yeah the whole look.
The better in the did you ever have a real members only Jack lit Jack lit you know that's a smaller version of a jacket you know what I had so it's gonna be you Jack lit so buying clothes at the mall for me was sad because... You need a soundtrack for this? Yeah, yeah. Can you give me some sad music, please? So, I never got the name brand items. I was always stuck with, instead of members only, it looked like a members only, but it said Hunt Club on it.
Who the fuck is Hunt Club? What is the hunt? And Keds, I had a lot of Keds, but- Look, I had the fake members only too. I never had a real members only. My dad got me a cheap knockoff from downtown. You know what? But your dad knew clothes. So it was probably really quality. It just didn't say members only. I remember rocking it like I was Michael Jackson. What color is yours? Red. Oh, see, that was the thing. That's how you did it right. You did red. You
know what mine was? Beige. Motherfucking brown. Yes, motherfucking brown. Who has a brown knockoff of members only? It's like I show up thinking I'm going to be this shit. You're like, no, you look like shit. You are a poser. Here's the amazing thing. this. When you asked me what color it was, I could see you made it. I think I remember it. Yeah. I was like, oh yeah, it was beige. I remember putting that thing on. I'm like, mom got this for me at
the mall. I'm going to put this on and walk it. I'm like, I'm going to be the shit. And like, that first, I think, I think she bought it for me. And then I wore it to school that one day I knew I, I never wore it again. I'm like, there were so many knockoffs. There were like, I mean, that was the thing was the members only jank and then everybody had a knockoff. Only Jacket. The members only jackets were expensive. Right, but we it was only our parents buying
stuff for us. We weren't buying anything. Yeah, we were ten. I don't really remember hardly any of the stores because all we did was hang out at the food court. Yeah, food court was the place to be seen. Sparrows. How is Sparrows still around? That's the worst fucking pizza ever. It tastes, the container it comes in tastes better than the actual pizza. And we didn't even eat it willingly. And that was even more expensive than McDonald's. So we did, cause
there was a McDonald's on the lower level, which is where Jesus was found. And that's where we would hang out. Is that the McDonald's? Jesus has been found. The second coming at McDonald's on the lower level. That was the actual second come. That was the actual Jesus. Here's the thing that blows my mind. Nobody else knew it. An addict. If he was just some homeless dude, right? Some homeless addict. that's dressed like Jesus, why would he give us the remainder
of his screwdriver? The only reason he would have given us his sonny D motherfucking screwdriver is if he was actually the second coming of Christ. I can't argue with that. You can't argue with that? No, I can't, no, that's, yeah, yeah. That's sound logic. It never made the papers. No. It didn't get on Twitter. Well, it's not only Angel Cat, Angel Cat and I saw him. But Angel Cat will verify this story. Why have you not told the masses about this? Well, you are now,
I guess. Well, we'll be shamed and humiliated, of course. That's why, because you never get the true, you can't just tell people about the aliens that you saw and that you were abducted because of people. You know what I think, because that was back in the 80s, right? Oh yeah. Well, he was risen because he reappeared on the Metro. Oh, you saw him on the Metro? Oh yeah, I saw Jesus on the Metro. What year? Oh, this is like. Yesterday early 2000s. Yeah, it was many years
later, but Jesus it was six foot. Did he have any sunny D? I'm pretty sure he He had something stronger than sunny D. That's unfortunate. And then what was he? What would he do? Did he talk to you? Did you talk to him? I know he would he would just kind of stand. Wait, you saw him multiple times Oh on the metro. Yeah, it always be on the red line. Is he still there?
No, he died and had just died yet again. So for probably the third time. Once, you know, nailed to a cross, second time probably from Sonny D. Too much Sonny D. And third time he probably got pushed under the tracks in the metro. And that's the way it goes. That's just a very long. And you know, that's the right ending for Jesus. It is, you know. Oh, and that was another reason to go to the mall, by the way. Teen females that were older than
us. Yeah. That were, yeah, that were hanging out at the mall. So you'd go and again, start at the food court because. What else are you gonna do? You're gonna have some- You're potentially get drunk on Sunny D. Jesus D. And if Jesus got you drunk on Sunny D and vodka, you might have enough juice to go up to the girl that you liked in school who is now at the mall shop. Yeah, actually that was nothing. It was great for hanging. It was hanging and like,
it was- Hanging and jiving. It was jiving and hanging. Yeah. It was the play before we were old enough to go to the bars and hang out and totally get shot down by girls. The mall was the place to get shot down at the food court. That's the name of this episode. I mean, DeMone was not, that was not a typical like happening where he like hit on the girl and wind up like, you know, actually he did because it was a, it was. What song did they play in the dugout
when they're having sex in the dugout? Jackson Brown. Yes. Somebody's baby. That's exactly right. She's got to be somebody's baby. It never worked out like that. It never worked out. I never heard Jackson Brown. No, but I'm saying we... At the mall. Yeah, yeah. We... And what song did they play in the Phoebe Cates scene where she comes out of the pool? Oh God. Beep, beep, boop, boop. The cars? Beep, boop, boop. Beep, beep, boop, boop. the greatest scene
in cinematic history. I mean, that was like, if you were our age, and that scene, I mean, it's like, you sort of made your head explode. It still does. But it was the pick-up place. It was the place to go in, not pick-up, but hang out, like, because you couldn't really, you wouldn't really approach girls at school. No, and you could barely approach, we were like, how old are we? 12. Yeah, 12, but you know, you get to the pizza joint, or you get
McDonald's, and you're sitting at the same table as sharing fries. Yeah, at that point you were like hanging, at least you're hanging out with the girls. You're both dipping in the same ketchup. That's as close as you got, yeah. Yeah. Who, how, I remember first kiss was a, for me, was a female from middle school. Do you know who, I don't think I ever told you. Mm-mm. It was Melanie Schaeffer. Was it the fair? No, it was like in a gutter somewhere. But I'm
not kidding. We were literally on the asphalt in the street below a car in the gutter. Why don't we do it? I don't think, yeah, well we didn't do it. I was just, it was a kiss, that was it. But I don't remember. In the gutter. That is a good, I don't know if I've ever heard a better first kiss story than. Oh, where are you? Now we were in somebody's car. No, we
were in the mall. No, we were under a car. Undercar, in the gutter. We were in the gutter, on the asphalt, on the ground, underneath the, like, you know, the underside, I was looking at the undercarriage, the undercoating. You were looking at her undercoating? No, I was looking at her undercoating. ["The Undercarriage"] Thanks for listening to the Sons of San Fernando. Don't forget to hit that subscribe or follow
button in your favorite podcast app so you don't miss an episode. Drop us a review, we'd love to hear from you. If you'd like to support the Sons of San Fernando, the best way is to share the show. We'll catch you on the next episode.