This is our Halloween episode drop! In an episode that starts with Halloween and mysteriously ends up at the morgue, we talk about our decidedly different approaches to costumes. One is phoning it in as a "drone bee" to his partner's queen, while the other dreams of creating a giant foam replica of his own head. Our conversation quickly becomes a trick-or-treat bag of topics, from the unforgivable sin of handing out candy corn and Tootsie Rolls to fond memories of toilet-papering houses in our youth. The chat ultimately decays into a surprisingly detailed debate on the biological logistics of being Frankenstein's monster, proving that the scariest thing about Halloween isn't ghosts, but a good conversation gone wonderfully off the rails.

Speaker 1: Um, hey, welcome to today's topic. Uh, today's topic is Halloween. We're we, the new metal of podcasting, uh, talk about what we're doing for Halloween. So yeah, so what are you doing for Halloween, bro?

Speaker 2: Are we gonna talk about what we're doing for Halloween? I don't want anyone to geolocate me based on what... because I'm going to a big event. I'm going to my friend's Halloween party. If I said his name though, it's gonna be such a legendary Halloween party that you would know where it was and I would dox myself because, you know, I can't mention... I'm at the Halloween party.

Speaker 1: Don't... well, don't name drop. We don't want... we don't need name drops, you know, we don't need name drops. What are you going... have you decided on what you're going as?

Speaker 2: Um, you know what, what's funny is, as a kid, you know, you care a lot about your Halloween costume, and then you become too old for kids' stuff, and then you become an adult and then it becomes appealing again, and you really take your Halloween costume seriously for a little while. And then you become an adult and an adult who doesn't drink a lot, and then you don't care about your Halloween costume again, or you have kids or something and then you care about their Halloween costume instead of yours. So, um, yeah, I'm at the point where I'm at this point, I'm just kind of like, eh, like, whatever. The first idea that seems like all right and isn't crazy expensive, I'll just go for that. And so we're, we're Bumblebees this year. We're bees. I'm just wearing literally a striped sweater and some bee ears.

Speaker 1: You're... so you're doing bee... you are doing the full antennae. Going with the antennae.

Speaker 2: Going with the an... you know, just a little, like, cute little thing on top of there.

Speaker 1: Are you gonna... are you gonna paint your face at all? Is there gonna be any makeup?

Speaker 2: Oh, fuck no. I've never painted my face or done makeup. Respect to people who do.

Speaker 1: So yellow and black sweater and antennae. That's what you're...

Speaker 2: Yep. So yeah, you can tell I'm really phoning it in. Just the minimum to be something else.

Speaker 1: That's okay. To be...

Speaker 2: To be...

Speaker 1: I have done the just the vampire teeth, inserting vampire teeth into my mouth and wearing those, and not the like the nice ones, but like just the cheapo thing you find at the Dollar Tree. I have that and a black cape, and I'm a vampire every year since my kids were born. So...

Speaker 2: That's what I was saying. You got kids, like, yeah, whatever, who cares.

Speaker 1: And I don't... I actually, uh, but, but I have been obsessed with like big, big face, big heads made out of like foam or whatever. And I have had this dream where one day I, I like take a full camera of my head and then project that out onto a piece of cardboard and foam and like make a big foam head of myself and go as myself, but like big head style.

Speaker 2: If you do that, you need to start a YouTube channel and put that, put a video of you doing that on there. I'll film it, all right? I'll come all the way over there, I'll fucking, I'll film you doing that because that is crazy. I don't think anyone's done that one before, you know, that's fresh for the internet. A bigger my own head.

Speaker 2: Well, that's so old, no one remembers back that far anymore. Just like AI, we have terrible memories, so refresh us.

Speaker 1: Oh. But yeah, my big thing is handing out candy. That's what I'm doing. I'm doing that for Halloween. What does it mean? Does it mean anything for you for Halloween? Like, does, does Halloween have any meaning? Like is, where does it rank on favorite holidays for you?

Speaker 2: Halloween, um, is the harbinger of winter, my least favorite season. So, not a huge fan because it's always cold as tits. It's always when it's starting to get cold. But I mean, it's just like an excuse to drink at this point. It's like the one time a year I really drink, so, yeah. And also, uh, you know, winter's coming. I got to build a little, little insulation, a little fat store around my belly. So I start really loving candy. It's like the only time of year I eat candy is Halloween. No idea why. It's just 'tis the season.

Speaker 1: What's your, what's your go-to on candy?

Speaker 2: Dude, just whatever's sweet. Whatever. I, I ate the Haribo bears the other day just because that's what was nearby. I'll fucking eat candy corn. Fuck it.

Speaker 1: You'll candy corn it?

Speaker 2: Is it literally made out of wax? Like what do they make... because you bite into it, the texture is unlike anything I've ever seen. Like, what the fuck is candy corn made out of, dude? What is it made out of?

Speaker 1: I feel like it's made out of the same things that like oral pills are, you know, the ones with the caps, the capsules?

Speaker 2: Like chalk? Yeah.

Speaker 1: No, not the chalk part. I'm talking about like the capsule ones that like the long release, the late release or whatever.

Speaker 2: Oh yeah. Isn't that like cellophane or something? Or not cellophane. It's like plant wall cell or something. Yeah, so it dissolves. Plant cell wall. Oh man.

Speaker 1: That's what it's like made of.

Speaker 2: How about you? You eating candy corn?

Speaker 1: No, no, I refuse. I refuse. Candy corn, Tootsie Rolls, uh, there's a few others.

Speaker 2: See, that's why you don't need a bidet is because you're eating not the worst things you could possibly put in your body. Shout out to our previous episode. Let's see that one. The first time...

Speaker 1: Yeah, go see the most disgusting episode we've ever recorded.

Speaker 2: I feel like the first time someone got handed a Tootsie Roll and the researcher at Candy Company said, "Eat this," they must have been like, "Is this a poo? Like, you are pranking me. What?" Like, how did Tootsie Rolls become normal? How did they become normal? Like...

Speaker 1: Cheap, dude, cheap. That's why.

Speaker 2: I'll fucking eat a Tootsie Roll. Don't get me wrong. I'm not acting like I'm above Tootsie Rolls, but like, yeah, I guess cheap because they just, they're unlike food. They're just the least food thing that we eat. Like, how, how is, who sees that and is like, that needs to be inside of my digestive system.

Speaker 1: When I was a kid, when I was a kid, if you gave me Tootsie Rolls or candy corn, you were tricked. I was going back and toilet papering your house. Like, dead nuts. That's what my friends and I would do.

Speaker 2: Is that the trick in trick-or-treat? You give me good candy or I'm going to fucking prank your house?

Speaker 1: That's what it was. Hell yeah, that's it. That's the, that was the 80s baby, that was the 80s baby mentality at least.

Speaker 2: Oh okay. I'm not an 80s baby. We're more polite in our time. In the 80s, you know, all those babies were doing cocaine and fucking...

Speaker 1: We were, we were doing cocaine. We were, we invented crack. 80s babies invented crack, you know? Yeah. And meth, I think we invented meth too. We invented all the good drugs.

Speaker 2: In the 50s, you know, they were too polite for that sort of stuff. They were too God-fearing. They'd also get beaten by their parents. In the 80s, it's been the perfect time period for egging people's houses, I guess.

Speaker 1: We just got yelled at. We didn't get beat, we got yelled at. That's what that was our, we didn't get beat. We got yelled at. But you can't do it anymore. Everyone's got a doorbell recorder. You know?

Speaker 2: We live in an age of recording everything.

Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the, that's the issue with all of that stuff now. And what's funny is, is it's not like we didn't get caught. We totally got caught. You know what I mean? We totally did get caught. And the neighborhood just kind of rallied around punishing us. And that was kind of the deal. You know what I mean? It wasn't like, uh, it wasn't like we then got the, the cops called on us, our parents then had to get involved, and all that stuff. Like the person who got TP'd or egged eventually figured out who the hell did it and then would go tell our parents and our parents would be like, "God bless America, you... all right, well, dude, you can't do that anymore." You know? And then we'd have to like clean up the stuff or whatever, right? Like...

Speaker 2: See, I was just thinking like if my house got egged by some kids, I don't have any cameras. It's not an invitation to anyone. I don't have any cameras, I have a lot of guns. Don't come to my fucking house. Um, one listener. One listener, stay the fuck away from me. I am paranoid and crazy, all right? You do not want to fuck around. If you've listened to this podcast long enough to know that I'm liable to do anything. If I saw some kids egg my house and I saw them on a camera and I knew which kids they were, I don't know if I would do anything. Like, especially if I didn't know who the parents were, I feel like I would just be like, "What am I going to do? Like, like CSI hunt down these kids?" Like, what? I would probably, I probably figure it'd be easier to just clean it up than to make sure those kids got justice. I don't know. It just seems like a lot of effort to put into like some egg on on your siding. Like, okay.

Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean for us it was, uh, the damage, like if there is damage, I think that's, I think you probably should.

Speaker 2: Oh yeah, then I'd be like, "What the fuck?" Like, pay for this. Mow my lawn for a year.

Speaker 1: That's when, that's when we would get reprimanded was when it was like, you know...

Speaker 2: So if it, if you didn't break a window or something, it was just like, "Boys will be boys."

Speaker 1: Boys will be boys. And like, you know, as long as it didn't rain the next day with the toilet paper, you know, it was pretty, it's a easy peasy to clean up.

Speaker 2: Ah, raining on the toilet paper.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Because that's happened.

Speaker 2: Bummer. And then you had to clean it up?

Speaker 1: Then I had to clean it up.

Speaker 2: Well, I mean if you throw it, like can you really be that mad at anyone except for yourself? I guess that's kind of the point of making you clean it up. Huh. So what age do you stop TP-ing houses?

Speaker 1: I think it's when you get caught or when you get, you know, reprimanded. I think that's when you...

Speaker 2: You got caught once and then you stopped?

Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: Dude, you weren't true to the game, bro. The game I know nothing of. You got caught once and you just stopped because they asked you to?

Speaker 1: The tricking was not in my heart, dude.

Speaker 2: Dude, I don't know if you had tricking in your heart, dude. I don't know if you had tricking in you.

Speaker 1: I'm not a trick. Not a trick. I'm not in the corner doing tricks. I don't know...

Speaker 2: I'm not pulling tricks out there.

Speaker 1: I'm not pulling tricks out there on the street anymore, dude. I'm not doing that.

Speaker 2: It's just something really magical about pretending to be something else but not really. Because it's like you're kind of an actor for like a day, but you're like not really acting. Once I was in a Zuko from Avatar costume because I had just watched it and I thought it was the tits. And um, someone was like, "What are you?" And I was like, "I'm Zuko from Avatar. I'm hunting the Avatar." And I did a karate chop and I kicked the air. And I was just like, "Hey, isn't that funny? Like, that's the guy from Avatar and I'm doing a really shitty impression of him." And I got looked at like I was the biggest nerd to ever exist in the entire world. And I was like, "We are literally dressed up as characters and a random shit." Like, what, I can't play the part a little bit? You know, I feel like that's what I'm trying to elevate Halloween. You know, what if you elevate it to the point where you act a little bit like the character? That's the moment that you stopped caring about your dress, is this the, is this the trigger moment for you? That's why it's fun to be something straightforward like a bee or a vampire because everyone knows what that is. If you show up, if you show up with something and no one gets your costume, like your fucking Halloween's ruined, dude. It's over. I also, I hate not knowing what people are, not figuring out what people are or guessing wrong, because I'm like, "No, I'm fucking up their costume. No, I'm so sorry. It's great. I swear. I get it. I swear."

Speaker 1: So do you not ask then if you don't know who what their costume is? Do you not go go up and be like, "Oh, what's your costume?"

Speaker 2: I never start, I never use that easy conversation starter. It's low hanging fruit. I'm above it. You know, I go for harder conversation starters. I walk up to people and I'm like, "So what do you think about the economy?" That's where I start with.

Speaker 1: So, so Halloween doesn't really excite you? The the topic of Halloween, you'd rather be talking about the gang problem in Haiti?

Speaker 2: Okay, no. I swear I'm not as unhinged as I sound. For some reason, I just decided to be unhinged in this episode talking about don't come to my house, I have guns, all this and that. Don't egg my house, I will...

Speaker 1: It is a direct threat on my life.

Speaker 2: ...No, I'm playing.

Speaker 1: But, but what, we're getting way too far again. We're getting way too far again. But, but your bee costume sounds exciting.

Speaker 2: It's not.

Speaker 1: Um, is, is your partner uh a queen bee or just a worker bee?

Speaker 2: She's the queen bee.

Speaker 1: She's queen bee and you're, and you're the lame ass drone?

Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm just the lame ass drone. That's what I do around here, dude. I just do drone work. I just toil. I just toil. I look... like a true drone, I find meaning in the toil and that's why I love it. That's why I do it. That's why I drone.

Speaker 1: It's why I drone.

Speaker 2: Yeah, man. So basically art is imitating life and I'm just going to, uh, I'm gonna try to act the part. I'm just gonna go "Bzzz." I'm gonna buzz around. I'm gonna maybe work in some bee puns.

Speaker 1: I think... well yeah, I think what you should do is work on a drone dance because I think, don't they have to like... don't drones like dance and stuff?

Speaker 2: I'm gonna wiggle my butt a lot. They do a butt wiggle. That's what they say.

Speaker 1: Like you got to find like the drone dances and like try to be like a drone bee, you know?

Speaker 2: Yeah, people are gonna say, "What are you, a bee?" I'm just gonna go, "Ah," and I'm gonna wiggle my ass at them. "Ah." Yes.

Speaker 1: I think we're just, I think us shopping your, your, you're gonna be a better bee for it.

Speaker 2: It's gonna be a good Halloween. I finally get to fulfill my desire and act the part.

Speaker 1: It is cool that this Halloween is on a Friday. I do like that. I like that this, this Halloween is on a Friday.

Speaker 2: It's just so lame that you just, you put up this whole costume and then you're just like, I'm just still a regular guy. I'm just wearing a weird thing. And it's look, it's still fun to just be wearing a weird thing for one night, but come on man. Why don't... if you're a, if you're a werewolf and there's a vampire across the room, you guys have to fight like that one movie. You know, the movie where they all fight each other, where vampires and werewolves. They're natural enemies, all right? They're too similar to both coexist. You have to fight. You have to get into a fist fight if you see a vampire. Sorry, dude, those are the rules.

Speaker 1: That's the rules. Those are the rules.

Speaker 2: I feel like werewolves are the enemies of everyone. I don't feel like werewolves are like...

Speaker 1: You know, I don't know. I feel like werewolves are the natural enemies of like all other monsters. We're like, I feel like the other monsters kind of get along. The werewolf is the one that just kind of rails against everyone. How about Frankenstein? If a werewolf and a Frankenstein are in the same place, do they... they kiss maybe?

Speaker 2: Frankenstein hates the werewolf, man.

Speaker 1: Frankenstein? I, I don't... Oh, I thought Frankenstein was like, uh, Dracula's like right hand man. I could see them being, I could see them being pals. They should do a serial collab because they both have those cereals. They should combine them into one. A Frankenberry. Count Chocula. Count Chocula, Frankenberry. Who got the monsters into the cereal business? Like, how much, how much of a cut do you think the monsters get from their cereal? Like Frankenstein's probably living good right now, right?

Speaker 2: No. Zero. Absolutely. They're exploiting Frankenstein for cereal. Absolutely. Exploiting his likeness. He must have not had a good agent. You want to know why? I bet they, I bet they had Count Chocula as his agent. And so Count Chocula got double money to screw over Frankenstein. He's like, "Don't worry, Frankenstein, I'll give you bits and bobs. I'll give you a new, a new penis every year if you sign this contract." He's like, "Don't worry, Frankenstein, I'll give you bits and bobs. I'll give you a new, a new penis every year if you sign this contract." He got one fresh out of the graveyard. That's got to be like the first part to rot off, right? Of Frankenstein.

Speaker 1: Is the penis? You think the penis is the first to go?

Speaker 2: I feel like it's such a small appendage and it's so by itself. I feel like that's the first place that like scavengers would pick pieces off of him. You think like Frankenstein probably wakes up with like, like getting eaten by rats, right? Because he's just like rotting body parts. He's probably got like a fly living in his, like a fly colony living in him. Like, could you imagine being made out of old body parts and like trying to stay, just keep the integrity of your body? I feel like that's the real tragedy of Frankenstein is just trying to keep rotting flesh running and just able to move it. It's rough. I feel like Frankenstein is really just like our first attempt at robotics. Like before like robotics were like a real thing, like automatons before automatons were a real thing, we're like, "Oh, we'll bring people back from the dead." They'll be like, uh, you know, "This is the way it would be." I feel like that's what a zombie is. I feel like that's what all that stuff is. But you're right, it is just like a, the idea of it, right? Like, three weeks in, you're like, "Dang bro, my intestines, they are done. They are done, son." "Why is that?" "Well, I've got like dung beetles like hanging out in there and they've eaten through everything." You know? Yeah. Man, maybe they have to like cover themselves in like Bug-Be-Gone or something. But isn't it true though that the brain is like the first thing that that scavengers eat every single time? I, I thought that was the, I thought the brain was the first thing to always go.

Speaker 1: I had no idea. Yeah, I guess maybe it's like nutrient dense or something.

Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel, that's again, I'm not educated in this. I do not have a degree in, um, Forensics?

Speaker 1: Brainology? Then I said neurology.

Speaker 2: Neurology. Oh, I don't know. I was thinking more of like...

Speaker 1: You should ask that question in like a pre-med medical class. "Professor, what part of the corpse do you think..."

Speaker 2: That's a way to get sent straight to undertaker school or like morgue school. I was thinking like, what, you need to be a mortician.

Speaker 1: But what do they study? What do morgues study? Like what is their...

Speaker 2: How to embalm corpses. Embalmology? They've got like one field for their whole thing. You think they, do you think they have like a separate class for embalming the bodies and putting makeup on them and stuff? Like, is it a whole separate school or a separate course, course to be like, "All right, here's how you handle a dead body," which is creepy, "and here's how you are neutral towards grieving people." Because they're never just like, "Oh my God, this is the biggest tragedy ever." They always have the perfect amount of respectful mourning for a complete stranger. They're always just like, "I'm sorry for your loss." But they're so professional about it. Like, is that, is that taught or is that just like different, they all have a different technique, you know?

Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like the undertaker has like multiple levels of hats to wear, you know? One is this like, I gotta take care of this body, you know, kind of situation. I don't know if the funeral home does all of that now all in one place though, do they?

Speaker 2: They do. And they also have to organize the most depressing party ever, basically. Like a wedding.

Speaker 1: Well, I mean, the... I understand they have like the coffin and they have to get that all fit, but do they, do they literally have a lab? Like does every funeral home literally have like a lab downstairs to process the body?

Speaker 2: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Or do they like ship that off and like brought it back or something?

Speaker 2: Maybe, maybe funeral homes are outsourcing. Maybe that's our topic next time. Maybe that's our topic next, next week.

Speaker 1: We should do some actual research maybe. And by that, I mean ask Chat GPT.

Speaker 2: Just ask Chat GPT for a whole week and then report back to our one viewing audience.

Speaker 1: Oh boy, that was a lot of work, viewer. I had to ask him for a whole week for the same question.

Speaker 2: I did a whole week with ChatGPT. This is what, uh, this is what came out of it. A complete hallucination. Anyway, email us at today's topic.productions, what you're going to be for Halloween. If we get enough of those...

Speaker 1: Today's topic.productions is the website where the email is. If we get enough emails, then we'll do a special episode.

Speaker 2: Or what you were for Halloween because this is probably, this is going to come out after Halloween, so...

Speaker 1: Well after. You know, if we turn, if we turn this around quickly, maybe we can do a, you know, a drop, you know what I mean? Maybe.

Speaker 2: Stay tuned, listener. Final word. Final word. Get out of here.