Smells Like Humans
Top 5% global podcast! Smells Like Humans is a seasonal podcast dedicated to bringing a humorous perspective to quirky and curious aspects of human behavior. Each show, the SLH crew will focus on a different topic, and share personal stories and observations in a way that sounds like you’re hanging out with your funny friends. The stories and commentary are presented with humor and warmth, since let’s face it: we all smell like humans. (Contact us: contactSLH19581980@gmail.com)
Smells Like Humans
YOU LOOK GOOD ENOUGH TO EAT! (THE CANNIBAL EPISODE)
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Jaimee and Ross somehow connect cannibalism, all you can eat buffets and gambling in one conversation. Tangents include: Wagyu Beef; eating friends vs. strangers; used bacon; puffy rolls and pie; The Donner Party; Las Vegas; Comedy Mules; Kennedy half dollar; Wendy's vs. McDonalds.
Notes:
- https://time.com/4728703/cannibalism-calories/
- https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/23/style/cannibalism-tv-shows-movies-books.html?searchResultPosition=1
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-science-behind-behavior/201510/how-all-you-can-eat-buffets-use-psychology-make-money
- https://medium.com/the-technical/the-buffet-paradox-tricks-buffets-use-to-slow-you-down-stay-in-business-d3e86a1232a3
- https://creepycatalog.com/cannibal-movies/#best-cannibal-movies
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donner_Party#:~:text=The%20Donner%20Party%2C%20sometimes%20called,the%20Sierra%20Nevada%20mountain%20range.
Contact us: contactSLH19581980@gmail.com
You look at the buffet! It's $40 just to look. Right. It's like a nudie show or something. Oh, you saw! That's you have to pay. Welcome to another episode of Smells Like Humans. This is the podcast where we explore the curious things that people do, the very human things that grab our attention, and cause us to wonder why and why. I'm Ross, your host, and today's guest is a special person who is as cool as a lava lamp and five times as iridescent. Jamie! Hi Ross. Hi, Jamie. And welcome to the show. Everyone, thank you so much for listening. As I always say, we need your help, we're totally independent. So please share the show with somebody you think you might like it. That really helps us grow. If you can rate us on an app like iTunes or Apple or Spotify, any place you can rate us, if you can give us the highest rating, and if you can give us a sparkling review, that would really be helpful to us. We'll mention some more things you can do for us if you're so motivated at the end of the show. But I want to get started. So, Jamie, we know that humans have been interested in cannibalism, that is, people who eat people, for a long time. It goes back thousands, possibly millions of years. And there's been tales about cannibals going back to the Greeks like Homer and so on and so forth. And in more recent times, there's been a stink ton of movies about cannibals and even a musical called Cannibal the Musical, which was done by the same people, I believe, who did the Book of Mormon, which you should find relevant, being an ex-Mormon. That's right. It all connects. Some of my favorite titles, I haven't seen all these, but Slave of the Cannibal God. That's a movie you can watch.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Haven't seen it.
SPEAKER_07Soylink Green is a famous one where they shout, Soylink Green is people, sorry for that.
SPEAKER_04Spoiler alert.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you don't have to watch it now. Cannibal Girls.
SPEAKER_04Oh.
SPEAKER_07And then uh the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, apparently. I can't remember them eating people in that, but apparently they're including that in the list of famous cannibal movies. By the way, speaking of movies, I read that venison apparently makes very good prop meat.
SPEAKER_04Huh.
SPEAKER_07Because you gotta have something that the actors can eat that isn't really human flesh. The other thing I thought was interesting uh about cannibals and our fascination with them is that eating another person is not the most nutritious thing you can do. Huh. And that's probably has some evolutionary advantage. If you're a tribe of like 20 people or something, you're roaming and you're eating other people, you're not gonna be able to feed everybody.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_07And and humans are hard to catch.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_07Like it's easier to grab a hold of a raccoon or something. You can trick a horse or a beaver. But a human, you know, they're kind of wily.
SPEAKER_02You know, they're thinking depending on the human.
SPEAKER_07Well, depending. Catch some of the slower ones. So they were saying that it, you know, didn't make sense really, and most of the stories of ancient cannibalism were more ritualistic. But I was reading about all the calories that you can get out of eating a person, and I don't want to get gross here, but what would you think would be the highest calorie thing that you could eat?
SPEAKER_02In a human?
SPEAKER_07Yes. That would if you were just interested in caloric intake, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Maybe like uh liver or brain.
SPEAKER_07Brain is a is a good one. That's a high calorie one. Uh the thighs are a lot of calories. Get some thighs going.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_07Uh, but the big one, and this I didn't think about this, but it makes sense. What do you always do with chicken to make it more healthy? What are you supposed to do with chicken?
SPEAKER_02Oh, the skin.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you take the skin off.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the skin's got the largest organ, right?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's got super packed with calories.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_07So if you're eating another person, you need to sign up for the skin.
SPEAKER_02Fried, I'll take the skin. Crispy fried human skin.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I'll take the skin, please. So uh, you know, there have been real stories that have been propagated over the years. There was a story of the uh South American soccer team that crashed in the Andes and they apparently ate parts of each other. Um there's the Jeffrey Dahmer, which is a horrible story by that. Crazy.
SPEAKER_02I just watched that new documentary that just came out where they show like the interviews with him.
SPEAKER_07What did you think?
SPEAKER_02And they interviewed his dad. Uh yeah, it was nuts.
SPEAKER_07Um What does his dad say?
SPEAKER_02You know what was funny in the Dang kid.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02What was funny in the documentary is that the dad like he insisted on wearing sunglasses because he thought that nobody would recognize him if he wore sunglasses.
SPEAKER_07The dad did?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the dad. And he was like pretty sympathetic towards Jeffrey and You know what?
SPEAKER_07I gotta tell you, when I read about Jeffrey Dahmer, I actually this uh will be controversial, but I actually kind of felt sorry for him because I mean, yeah. He was struggling with a lot of mental health issues. Totally.
SPEAKER_02And he did actually seem like remorseful about his crimes, what he did, but he like couldn't control himself and like he like felt bad when he did it, but he still kept doing it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's a sad, it's really a sad story, but of course everyone knows about that. And then of course they know about the infamous, well, a lot of people in this country anyway, uh, know about the infamous Donner Party, where people, some uh pioneers from the Midwest were headed over the mountains to California for a new and better life, and that didn't go well, and I'll talk about that more in a minute. Uh, I've read that some people claim that our interest in cannibals and these kinds of stories is because lunching on another human is the ultimate taboo. So it's very exciting and thrilling and also disgusting all at the same time.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Let's face it, we love us some cannibals and cannibal stories. And the idea that, you know, someone could be driven to pork out on their partner activates our curiosity, you know, and triggers all sorts of emotions. So, you know, we're fascinated, we're repulsed. That's perfect for our rubber-necking selves. We like kind of looking at the at the crash and burn of society. We can't help ourselves sometimes. So let me ask you something personal question. Okay. If you got hungry enough, could you chow down on your buddy?
SPEAKER_02Ooh, man.
SPEAKER_07And there's a follow-up question.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_07I feel like um assuming your your pal or person is already dead.
SPEAKER_02Oh, they're dead already.
SPEAKER_07You're not chomping on them while they're sleeping in their sleeping bag. You're not like buttering them up while they're, you know, reading a book. You could do it, you think?
SPEAKER_02If I was starving, make some some skin cracklings, sure.
SPEAKER_07Hey, I see that I recognize that tattoo. Do you think it would be would matter if you knew the person or not? So if you know the person versus not know them, would it make a difference to you? They were if they're equally dead, you're equally starving, that's the only you're delirious with hunger. No, I don't think you just go, I'm good to know.
SPEAKER_02They gave me this sacrifice to keep for my survival.
SPEAKER_07I did they? Did they give you a note about that? I don't know how they died, but if I didn't do it yeah, it's like I didn't do it.
SPEAKER_02I didn't do it. You're here. I hope it's not hot out and your corpses getting bloated and rotting.
SPEAKER_07Wow.
SPEAKER_02If it's freezing, right, it preserves the Yeah, preserves, yeah.
SPEAKER_07You just get into my hoagie bun. So I know uh from person past experience that I have trouble eating animals that have names that I have met. So I've had a relative that had a small farm and they would serve up some animals every once in a while, you know, like here's Billy. Yeah, here's Henry, this is Henry stew, and if I had met Henry, yeah, I would wouldn't want to eat it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but but if you had met Henry and you were starving to death.
SPEAKER_07Yes, that's an important thing.
SPEAKER_02That's a distinction. I I would not eat my friend if I was not about to die myself of starvation.
SPEAKER_07If you had a cheeseburger versus a friend, yeah, you'd most likely choose the cheeseburger.
SPEAKER_02That sounds great.
SPEAKER_07That does sound good, doesn't it? I think I'd be more interested in the stranger buffet. That's what I think I want.
SPEAKER_02Instead of a friend, you mean not the cheeseburger.
SPEAKER_07Somebody I don't know, I think would be easier to uh, you know, g get into the whole lunch meat scenario with them.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but then you don't know like their backstory. Like, what if they're into some weird stuff and their meat's tainted?
SPEAKER_07But by that point, if they're like there's probably not much weirder stuff than eating another person. So like who am I to judge at that point? Oh wow, they're they they ate gluten. Well, I can't take this arm away. I will not eat it. Leave the fingers, take the arm away. Um I also think, and there's no way of knowing because I was reading about the Donner Party and how desperate they became, but I would kind of feel like one other option I could turn myself willingly into a snack by like throwing myself off a cliff or oh you would sacrifice your own self-group. Yeah, I wouldn't have to make a choice, especially when it came down to eating people I knew. I just don't you'd rather not.
SPEAKER_02I'd rather be food. You'd rather be the buffet.
SPEAKER_07Yes, I would rather be the buffet. Yeah. And uh I've got thighs. Yeah, I've got some thighs that people would like. You know, that would be nice, not roasting on a spit. Yeah, it would bring some momentary joy to my friends. Sure. That Ross, man, those are juicy thighs.
SPEAKER_02Juicy thighs. That's what the people say around here. Ross has them juicy thighs.
SPEAKER_07He's got them juicy thighs. That's what they say. Some people say that these cannibalism movies and stories in literature are really about the state of consumerism or capitalism. You know, that it's a metaphor for how we behave, how how we uh proceed through life ravenously destroying things in front of us and killing, you know, everything that matters, including the planet.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07So I thought that was interest interesting. I hadn't thought about that before. So the Donner Party was a group of American pioneers. They migrated to California or wanted to migrate to California in covered wagons.
SPEAKER_04Oh.
SPEAKER_07And uh they got into a horrible snow as they were trying to cross the mountains. Many of them ended up not making it. Most of the animals didn't make it.
SPEAKER_02Did you say most of the animals didn't make it?
SPEAKER_07Only three mules made it out of all the animals.
SPEAKER_02And they they ate the humans before the mules.
SPEAKER_07Things got really bad. A group of people tried to get help.
SPEAKER_03Ah.
SPEAKER_07And so they had the mules. Yeah. Any animal that was standing around for the people who were stuck in the snow, they would have been eaten immediately. Okay. They were eaten and re-eated.
SPEAKER_02Just to clarify. So they must have been hell of a mule if they survived.
SPEAKER_07That was one tough.
SPEAKER_02One hell of a mule.
SPEAKER_07Clever mule. The mule kept coming up with. Well, let me let me tell you, guys, hold on a second. It's like a prison mule. It's like keeping everybody distracted with jokes.
SPEAKER_03Okay, we'll eat this guy first. We can't eat him. He's killing us. He's jokes.
SPEAKER_07He's so funny, that funny mule. We can't eat that mule. The mule likes wiping his brow. I live another day.
SPEAKER_06I gotta come up with new material.
SPEAKER_07So I so I knew about the Donna Party. I've been to the little memorial space along the highway there, going up to uh through the mountains there, where you know that you can sit, and there's a picnic table, and I did not feel good about eating there. I ate my sandwich later. I felt it was rude.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_07And what what's happen what's going on with a picnic table at the Donner Party? It's kind of messed up. Yeah. I think so. So, but I really thought it was just pioneers who just didn't know about the snow and started their journey too late and just kind of blew it. Yeah. You know, and I didn't know that they had been bamboozled.
SPEAKER_02Did you know they were bamboozled? I didn't, but I love that word.
SPEAKER_07So they were bamboozled by this cat named Hastings who claimed to have been uh come up with a shortcut. So there was a pretty established path from to get from the Midwest over the mountains into California. And he claimed so that's that's the one that everybody took, and then it was wagon ready, you know, people could get up, and people had done it many times before. And so that was the route they were gonna take, but then this they heard of this route by this guy Hastings, it was supposed to be a shortcut, it would cut a lot of miles off, yeah. And it was propagated by this guy, this rumor or this uh idea, this shortcut by this guy Hastings, who had only actually done the route one time in mild weather with no wagons. Also, he was very interested in getting pioneers into California as quickly as possible because he believed that he could, if he had enough people, he could stimulate a rebellion against the Mexican government, and California would be taken over and he would be the basically the head of California. So it was in his interest to encourage people to get there as quickly as possible and to and to encourage them to use his route. Okay, but his route was no good, trash, it was horrible, it was and it and it was not a shortcut at all, it was a long cut, so they lost all this time just trying to get through it. So by the time they finally got to the mountain pass, it was too late, and they got caught in a really bad storm. This guy, Hastings, was a selfish goon.
SPEAKER_02Sounds like it.
SPEAKER_07But reading that, I realized, wow, so these Donner people, um, they weren't so dumb. They just got misled. Bamboozled. They got bamboozled and it cost them, you know, because they ran out of food, obviously, and they were freezing. And, you know, initially they had taken some of their oxen and they'd made like um so they made these little lean twos that they could shelter in, and the roofs were made of this oxide, like strips of ox skin, oxide.
SPEAKER_04Delicious ox skin.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, but after a while they ran out of foods, head to eat that, they started eating the oxide strips, and they would boil them to make this glue-like jelly. And then they would take the bones of the oxen and the horses, and they would boil that in a pot, and that would be soup.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Over and over, though, same bones, over and over and over, see it less and less and less. And it was just horrible, you know. And so uh of the 87 people that were in the group, only 48 survived, which I actually thought was pretty good.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's more than I thought there was gonna be.
SPEAKER_07I thought they all died, actually.
SPEAKER_02Same, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Some admitted that they ate people, some denied it, but later admitted. So there was always like there's always a little bit of controversy over well. Did people really eat? Yeah, but they think that it actually happened.
SPEAKER_02There's just one like really big guy that's like, no, no, and it coughs out an armbone.
SPEAKER_04Joey.
SPEAKER_07You know. So I think the relationship between people and their food is very interesting. Whether you're eating humans or whether you're you know going to Wendy's and getting uh, what do they call those things? The triple, what do they get at Wendy's? I don't know.
SPEAKER_02I don't know, but it sounds great.
SPEAKER_07I don't like a square hamburger myself.
SPEAKER_02Oh, I'm a Wendy's fan. You like the square hamburger? I like Wendy's over McDonald's or any of the other. How come? I don't I it's I don't know. It's superior. McDonald's chicken nuggets are like uh an air pocket of breading.
SPEAKER_07Yes.
SPEAKER_02Wendy's chicken nuggets, chef's kiss.
SPEAKER_07Delicious. Oh. I like an air pocket of breading. I like the sound of that. So the relationship between people and and their food to me is very interesting. What they eat, how they eat, when they eat, how they talk about what they eat. Ever hang out with somebody on a new diet?
SPEAKER_02Oh my god, yes.
SPEAKER_07They want to tell you about what they're eating, how they're eating it. Yes, what I'm doing now.
SPEAKER_06So, what I'm doing now is I'm licking everything first. But then I step back and look at it. And then I roll in it.
SPEAKER_02Yes. I smell it and then I suck on an ice cube.
SPEAKER_07So anybody with a new diet or dietary restrictions, they will kill you with that. They just are so excited about it. And it's fascinating. The whole thing is fascinating to me. And so one area that always has gotten my attention is buffet behavior. Yes, the psychology of buffet behavior. It should be of its own little branch of psychology. Absolutely. I just think it's fascinating, especially the famous all-you-can-eat buffet.
SPEAKER_02Yes. I just watched that Simpsons episode, actually. Well, I don't know. Homer gets banned from the buffet because he ate too much.
SPEAKER_07He got banned.
SPEAKER_02He got kicked out. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Well, the thing, the thing I always wondered is so what is the how can you make a profit on an all-you-can-eat buffet? How can you do it? How do they do it?
SPEAKER_02Just serve garbage food.
SPEAKER_07Well, that's cheap garbage food. That's possibly the exact right answer. Um, it's that's very close to the right answer. Um, there's something very enticing about telling human beings that there's no limit on how much food they can eat. Yeah. It's so wonderful when someone says you can just make a complete pig out of yourself. And it's okay. So most of us like that. We like the idea of that. But what they do is the secret to making up any kind of profit, and they don't make a lot of profit off buffets, but they do make a profit because right. And the way they do it is exactly what you said. They surround the items that probably are the most expensive with lots of carbs and sugars that they know people will choose, and that'll quickly make them feel full.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07The average person actually doesn't end up eating that much expensive stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I actually feel really guilty when I go to a buffet because I just physically can't eat that much, so I feel like I'm like paying for the buffet or whoever I'm with is paying for the buffet, and I have like one plate and I'm like, oh, I can't possibly, couldn't possibly do more.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. I you know what happened how people do it. You know what happens to me is um, well, there's a couple of things. I think that's a good one. I because I think sometimes people feel embarrassed about going up for more.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Even though they've been told it's all you can eat. Yeah. There's something about going up there again.
SPEAKER_01Like you feel like you have to do it because you paid for the buffet.
SPEAKER_07But but it's embarrassing. And the other thing I see I've felt this way sometimes, but I know other people have felt this way because they've told me, is that even though they just want certain things like pie, they'll start they'll take like all this salad stuff that they never eat, and these vegetables.
SPEAKER_02And it's like they look there, they feel like they have to take all it's kind of it's a performance. Totally. It's like I'm getting a healthy thing.
SPEAKER_07I I know what I'm supposed to do here, but by the time you eat that junk, you know, it's like, can you really chow down on those beautiful, delicious ribs? Yeah. The way you would have. The city of Houston in Texas has 182 all-you-can-eat buffets. Wow. Just in one city. Crazy. 182. That's a lot. That's a lot. Yes, that is a lot. So um, I want to talk about these buffets and buffet behavior. And the first question I have for you, because I know that you will know what the right answer is. Let's say you're in a buffet line.
SPEAKER_02All right.
SPEAKER_07And the person in front of you is Dithering over like which tomato to choose for their salad that they don't really want anyway. And you don't want salad. You're skipping that whole thing. You're going charade. Yes, the charade of the salad. You're going right to those pluff, what are they called? Not puffy. They're puffy rolls. What are the puffy rolls called?
SPEAKER_02I don't know. I like puffy rolls.
SPEAKER_07They're puffy and soft, and they're like 98% butter. Yeah. They're delicious. Give me the rolls. All I want. I think they used to call them Parker House rolls. That was from another. Ooh, the Parker's. I don't know. They were probably with the Doners. So uh you want to go to the Puffy House Rolls, but they're behind this person. And so is it okay to pass them in the line? If you're not going to get salad, you're not doing any of that. So they're stuck there. They're like overwhelmed with salad choices, dressings, and all the things. And you just can you zoom by them?
SPEAKER_02Absolutely, you can.
SPEAKER_07Or is that rude?
SPEAKER_02No, I don't care if it's rude. I'm going past you if you're dithering.
SPEAKER_07I find that people um at a buffet, it's a combination of well, first of all, everyone knows by now. Anyone listens to the podcast knows I have a patience problem. So no matter even if people were just running through and grabbing things randomly with their hands like it was a race, I would still feel like they were taking too long.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_07But I find that so put that aside. Okay. I'm impatient. But I do find that people either are overwhelmed with the majesty of the buffet, like, oh wow. And it's just so much to take in. They can't, like they're paralyzed. Yeah. Their choice mechanism is breaking down because of so many choices. And the other thing I think that happens is people really, and I've said this before, people like that experience of, ooh, look at this. What's this? What is this? Let's look under each pot. Let's see what everything is. Let's take a little of this. It's part of the fun of the buffet.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I don't, I don't get that. I know what I'm about. I know what I want. I go straight for it. Nice. Go straight for the check you or step over your mother to get the thing that I want.
SPEAKER_07That's that's that's what I think. But I I've see people like really going slowly. But if you cut around them, they often don't like it. And again, I'm not saying you reach in and take the thing that they're taking. If you're gonna say, I'll come back for that later, or I don't want it, I'm just gonna go ahead. I find that some people feel like that's rude, like, oh, yeah, you're rushing ahead.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_07As if it matters, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I usually just pretend like I don't notice their display.
SPEAKER_07That's a good strategy for everything. Just pretend you don't notice.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_07And I also think uh, you know, again, that people feel motivated to take things that they don't normally want, which is puffy rolls and pie. That's all you really want. Puffy rolls and pie. Uh, I learned that another thing these buffets do, besides sort of load up on inexpensive vegetables and lots of carbs, and they give you these big giant cups so you can get a big giant coke, which is very cheap for them. Yeah, and all that sugar makes you feel full. They don't have full-size plates. No, they're like salad plates, right? So you even if you're loading it up, which everybody does, like they stack it up, yeah, they're actually not getting that much food.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_07And if you really wanted to maximize your value, you would just take the meat and stuff, the protein and the pie and the desserts.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_07So meat and desserts. Skip everything else.
SPEAKER_02Do you think that the cannibals ever like treat themselves to like a buffet style meal? You know, they like when they chop up their victims, there's like a little tray with the intestines and a little tray with the skin.
SPEAKER_07The cannibal buffet.
SPEAKER_02The cannibal buffet, yeah. And do you think they put you know, carbs in between the different trays to maybe sl slow them down?
SPEAKER_07What yeah, maybe.
SPEAKER_02Maybe maybe it would make it kind of fun.
SPEAKER_07Would they put people's names like this is Joe's thighs?
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah, maybe.
SPEAKER_07You know, like they like to put name, like those little name tags on everything.
SPEAKER_02And people would kind of put people come and they go, like, oh, I want some intestines today, or maybe like a little bit of brain.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I don't know. You know, because the way you always think about it.
SPEAKER_02But there's a vegetable next to it, so I have to take the vegetable too.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. You the way you think about cannibalism is that it's this really kind of down and dirty kind of business, but why couldn't it be more revenue?
SPEAKER_04They could make it fun.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, they could make it fun. It's a diversion, lean into it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_07If you stay at hotels that have like a little breakfast place, not one of these free breakfast things where it's like the continental breakfast where it's like a tiny box of cereal.
SPEAKER_02It's not that.
SPEAKER_07I hate that, by the way. Yeah. Everybody else likes it, but I just like I don't like cheap pastries, yeah. The worst kind bad coffee. Yes, yes, and it's like it's absolutely free. No kidding.
SPEAKER_02It was probably free for you.
SPEAKER_07This is dumpster food. Now I've noticed a trend. Trend number one, which was a few years ago, started where they would have the buffet, but you could still order off the menu. Right. But they really pushed you toward the buffet. We have the buffet, you should check out the buffet. When I've got the buffet, most people are doing the buffet. Why don't you go see the buffet and see all the things? And I would always feel like I don't, it's breakfast. I don't eat big breakfast, and I don't want to like just go and because it's usually really expensive, and I end up having like scrambled eggs and some toast and coffee and a juice, and I have to pay like $40. Right. Because I've had access to the buffet. Does it matter if I don't eat anything? No, we don't care. You still pay the $40. You looked at the buffet. It's $40 just to look. Right. It's like a nudie show or something. Oh, you saw. That's you have to pay. So uh so you could order up the menu, and they would always be a little cranky about that. Oh, yeah. You you can order up the menu, loser, jerk. I'm gonna spit in your food. I'm gonna spit in your single egg. So that was the thing, though. And then I was just at a place like a Marriott, I don't know if it was a Marriott, that kind of place, like middle of the road, decent hotel. You know, it's nice. And they offered no menu, it was buffet only or no way. Like you gotta do the buffet. If you want anything, yeah, you want to suck on a Cheerio, you gotta lay out whatever it was. Yeah, and whatever it was, it was a lot. Yeah, it's at least like 25 bucks.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_07Because you have access to all of this majesty in the little guy with the chef's hat cutting some roast beef at the end of this, at the end of the line. Like what? It's breakfast. Right. The only thing that does well in a buffet for a long period of time is the bacon. There's pretty much nothing you can do to bacon to make it taste bad. It's good anytime.
SPEAKER_02Always tastes good. Sometimes it's floppy, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07You like it cooked.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07But you can get bacon, you can get used bacon, and it's okay. Like I day old bacon. Like an bacon. Like you could like it, could be any age. Like it'd be fossilized bacon. You'd be like the goodwill. This really is helping me deal with these.
SPEAKER_02Go to the goodwill, pick up some bacon.
SPEAKER_07Ross's juicy thighs are made really much more scrumptious with this day old bacon. I started reading about the Vegas casinos because they're buffets. They are not like the standard all-UK buffet. They're very fancy. Yeah. They have like expensive steaks like that Wagyu beef. They have all kinds of the best stuff. And of course, why? They don't care if they lose money on the buffet.
SPEAKER_02No, they're not.
SPEAKER_07Because they got you in the doors. They got you in the casino, and they know that once you've you porked out on some wagyu beef and some puffy rolls, you're heading over to the slots and you're gonna drop some coin. That's right. And probably a lot, and all of a sudden that that buffet is very cheap for them. Yeah. If they can get 30% of the people just to go over and drop a couple hundred bucks, it's they're they're doing great. And of course, that's casinos are always set up that way, right?
SPEAKER_02Not me. I go to the buffet in Vegas, and then I like I'll play the penny slots for a minute, and then I'm good.
SPEAKER_07Wow. So then watch a show. You know what? They they probably track you like they track hard counters. Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
SPEAKER_02She scracked the code.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, because they don't care if you graze like a milk cow as long as you're gonna after you grubhub that you're gonna, you know, hit the slots. But if you're like cheating the system, yeah, you're not gambling, you're not spending any money, they probably track you and they're probably gonna like you gotta get you have to leave.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I've got like a chip in my bloodstream now, they know where I'm at.
SPEAKER_07They surround you with muscle. Yeah, you're in your mouth filled with puffy rolls and wagging beef. You gotta get out of here, ma'am. Look, yeah, you you can never come back to this casino buffet again. You're banned. This could happen. Are you much of a gambler?
SPEAKER_02No, I like uh there's like a Willy Wonka game, like the classic Willy Wonka game. What? Yeah, like or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, whatever it's actually called. But like the classic one, I like that one. Um and then yeah, I usually play the penny slots. There's one uh game at the MGM Grand that's like ancient, but it's like these little like toy horses that like run around track and you put quarters in. I like that one.
SPEAKER_07Yes. Otherwise, who has change anymore? You're walking around with quarters. You are like an 85-year-old woman. You really are. Dragging a wall.
SPEAKER_02Me and my squash with my spider mites.
SPEAKER_07One arm's got squash with spider mites, the other arm's got a paper sack filled with quarters.
SPEAKER_00I'm filled up on the buffet now. I just want to pump a few quarters into the horse game. That's right.
SPEAKER_07That's a pretty good imitation, I think. I like yeah, that sounded just like really got into that for some reason. So uh I used to gamble. I I like gambling. Well, I first of all, I can only spend a day and a half in Las Vegas.
SPEAKER_02Now, do you actually have like gambling skills like you play the like the card games that you actually have to know how to do something, or do you do the You mean Bacchara?
SPEAKER_07I sure no, I I like blackjack. I like playing blackjack, so there's a some skill in that, but you know, everybody's a loser in the casino if you stay there long enough. So I don't have any illusions to that, and I don't think I'm and have any special anything.
SPEAKER_03But I besides your juicy thighs.
SPEAKER_07I got my juicy thighs. That's repeal. Everybody's always saying to me, saying, You really don't have any redeeming features, but those juicy thighs are gonna you're gonna do well on my size though.
SPEAKER_00The size of those thighs.
SPEAKER_07So I uh have always played blackjack from when I was a little kid. We gambled, uh, you know, friends would gamble, we'd try we'd usually have to like play secretly, but our parents wouldn't find out. We'd play all people they would have like sleepover parties, and but we it'd be all gambling-based. We'd gamble in school, we'd sneak around and gamble and find plays ways to play cards. Okay. And we used to bet on other things too. So there was a lot of betting, and I loved all of that. And but I was saying that in terms of Vegas, I can I can only take that community for a day and a half, and then I just burned out so fast. Yeah, but it's fun for a day and a half. Yep. But when I was a kid, we would play blackjack all the time. And one time a friend of mine slept over, and I was probably about 14 by then, and he slept over, and we were getting you know playing blackjack in my bedroom, and uh we played for hours until he cleaned me out. And I don't know how much money I would have had back then when I was 14 with no job.
SPEAKER_02It was a sock full of nickels, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Whatever it was, it was significant to me. It was all I had, and he cleaned me out. So then he's so greedy like a cannibal, he starts rifling through all of my drawers to find change of any denomination so we can so he can win that. Keep going and he's doing that.
SPEAKER_06He's like, Oh, look at this.
SPEAKER_07I thought a quarter, let's play for that, and he's giddy, he's giddy, like he's sky high on my juicy thighs. I do not know where that came from. But he's like, he's to have that excitement, right? So he finds a Kennedy half dollar, a real one, like completely silver, which is how they made them. And I don't remember who gave it to me. He found it and he said, Aha, let's play for this. And I'm like, Man, that's kind of a special thing. Somebody gave it to me, might have been Kennedy himself.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_07I don't know. He flipped it to me on the grassy knoll before everything went sideways.
SPEAKER_00Hey kid, keep this 50 cent boom.
SPEAKER_07No, so uh no, he didn't they didn't make the Kennedy half dollar until later.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_07He wasn't on it. You don't get on money when you're alive. While you're alive, right? That's part of the thing about getting on money.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_07You gotta be dead to be on money. As the old saying goes, if you're on money, you better be dead. So there's so many things you can learn listening to us. So, anyway, I have this moment where I'm like, do I take this last chance that I can win? Or do I take a chance on losing this little keepsake? Well, I go for it because I have no impulse control, but I win the first bet.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_07And then I win again, and then I go on an impossible winning streak of epic proportions, and I win all my lost money back. And then this is like three o'clock in the morning now. We've been playing like our like we're just like delirious, yeah. Again, like cannibals, or just like totally lost uh control of like our uh better uh angels or whatever it is. I win all my money back. I win all of his money, I clean him out. His greed was his undoing. That's right. If he had just not, if he had just accepted that he cleaned me out, we went to bed, he could have gloated the rest of the night, he could have gloated the next morning, could have flashed all his new money around me. There's nothing I could have done, but no, he had to go through my sock drawer and find a Kennedy half dollar, and his greed was his undoing.
SPEAKER_02Do you still have the Kennedy half dollar?
SPEAKER_07I do. I actually do, I still have it. I uh never gambled at it again, and I kept it safely. I've had it all these years. It's a symbol of my battle against greedy consumption.
SPEAKER_02That's right.
SPEAKER_07I appreciate you talking to me about cannibalism and buffets.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, this was great.
SPEAKER_07And cannibal buffets. All of the things, all the things that we did. So thank you for joining me, and thank you everyone for joining us for this episode. If you like what we're doing, please help us by sharing the show. Follow us on Instagram, send us a message, talk to us. We love it when you reach out. As I mentioned, you can rate the show, give us a high rating and a glowing review. That really helps us a great deal. If you can take just a moment to do that, it really would be helpful. And we're also on Patreon and you can support us that way. You can visit our friends if you're happening to be in Portland and you need to record your voice or music, come down to Portland Underground Studio and they will love to see you. And we hope you will tune in to another episode because whether you are riding high on your juicy thighs, or just someone eating into a casino's profit margin, it's important to remember that we all smell like humans, especially after cooking. It's people, people who eat people are the hungriest people in the world. That's true. You want to sing it with me?
SPEAKER_02Uh no, I don't. Alright.