Every single successful thing (and many unsuccessful things) will inspire rip-offs. Since the dawn of time, there have been people copying other people's ideas, but pretending they're brand new creations. Even the Olympics have apparently inspired a rip-off event, which is what we discuss this week. I wonder if in ancient Gaul they created their own ripoff of the ancient Greek Olympics? I just answered my own question: Of course they did. And they were surely called the Gaulympics. And they surely sucked.

To traverse the landscape, learn to read the signs and signals. The landscape, in this case, is the city, and the signs and signals are the various things you hear and smell in the city. Especially the things you smell. And basically all of them are bad.

Can you believe it? It's the return of silly pitches! If you listened to my brothers make fun of me a few episodes ago, I bet you can believe it. Did it turn out to be a bad idea, just like they said? You'll have to listen to find out! But yes, it did.

Ben went with another rambler this time. Big shot, thinks he's so great, Mr. Doesn't-Have-To-Come-Up-With-A-Topic, ooh, look at me, I'm Ben, I can just show up and start talking. Some bullshit, right there.

Today we watch an entire 90-minute movie in 10 short minutes. How do we do that? By skipping all of the inessential parts. How do we know which parts are inessential? All 90 minutes of this movie were inessential, so it really doesn't matter what we watched or what we skipped.

Matt just has too damn many cold opens happen to him. Basically nothing ever happens to me, so I have no cold opens to share. Stuff is constantly happening to this guy Matt, though. Sharing these happenings once per week is just not enough, and it's piling up. He's in danger of a cave-in at this point, so he's got to spend a week to let them all loose.

- Select Episode 388

- ctrl-Z

Enough fartin' around. We've spent enough episodes "getting to know" the contestants already. Let's get to the elimination episode. That's what everyone watches these shows for. Who's staying, who's going home? That's what people want. And that would be great if this were a competition reality show, but it's not. Instead, it's a courtroom drama, and this is the big trial scene. You wanted Survivor, but you got The Verdict. At least this one has Paul Newman punching a lady square in the face.

Whomb amongst us hasn't wondered if our lives couldn't be improved with a little sex magick? Why did they put that 'k' on the end, you ask? Because cult leaders intentionally misspell and misuse words in order to rewire your brain into something that obeys them unthinkingly. And because it looks cool.

100 years ago, people were idiots who acted against their own self-interest. That's still true today, and though the degree to which it is true is perhaps debatable, it can't be denied that humans ain't changed much. Well, I guess we do have fewer street rats playing something called "piggy", but that's the only change I can think of.