January 11, 2025 • 32 mins
Ben Maller (produced by Danny G.) has a fun Saturday podcast for you! He talks: Encino Approach, NFL Wild Card, Cookie Drop, Oldie But A Goodie, the Cone Head, Phrase of the Week, & more!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Kabbooms.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes
a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
of the Old Republic, a soul fashion of fairness. He
treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
rich pill poppers in the penthouse.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
The Clearinghouse of Hot takes break free for something special.
The Fifth Hour with Ben Maller starts right now.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
In the a eywhere the Fifth Hour with me, Ben
Malor and Danny g Radio Happy Saturday. Saturday. Saturday is
the eleventh day of January, and we continue our in
depth team coverage here on the Fifth Hour. Oh what
(00:52):
a wacky week it's been with the wildfires here in
southern California where we are emanating from. Danny was supposed
to be with me today, but he is away. He
is producing this podcast. But Danny's away, He'll be with
us on the Sunday Mailbag podcast. It's a fluid situation
with the way things have gone this week. In fact,
(01:15):
last night on Friday night, the Palisades fire, which is
the biggest of the fires. There's like a fire circles
Dante's inferno here in Los Angeles and the Palisades fire
made its way over the hill, heading towards the San
Fernando Valley. Now we broadcast from the San Fernando Valley
(01:40):
our studios in Sherman Oaks. If you're familiar with the
geography of southern California. The fire was headed towards Encino,
which is the next the next city over from Sherman Oaks.
But last I saw its early here on Saturday. But
last I saw they had a pretty good handle on
(02:03):
keeping it out of that part of the valley, which
is a tremendously well populated part of Los Angeles. We
emanate from Ventura and some Pulvida, the corner of Venturnasalvida,
and it is insane, insane how many people are in
(02:24):
that area. There are a lot, a lot, a lot,
a lot, a lot. As far as the whole sporty thing,
it's concerned because I don't even know if this is
a sports podcast at this point, I'm not sure exactly
what it is. It's just about it's the podcast about nothing.
It's the podcast about nothing. I was watching last night
as the Ohio State University. You look for that dramatic
(02:47):
plot twist and there it was Quin Ears, the quarterback
for Texas, set up the Longhorns about to tie the
game at Tory, and then all hell broke loose as
Jack Sawyer with the play of the decade and many
(03:12):
decades for Ohio State stripping the Texas quarterback is former
roommate back in the day and returned that fumble eighty
three yards touchdown. Buck Eys in Ohio State gets a
twenty eight to fourteen win last night in Arlington over
the Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl, and that sets up
(03:34):
a made for TV extravaganza. Ohio State. The Buck guys
who looked we had all fired their head coach Ryan
Day after they lost to Michigan, and now they have
a chance at their sixth national championship. The Buck guys
and a kid from Ohio making the play there Ohio
(03:55):
State thirteen to two. They have been the most dominant
team in the college football Playoff and now they'll take
on the fighting Irish in all Upper Midwest battle Royal
Ohio State versus the pride of the State of Indiana
South Bend, Indiana. Touchdown, Jesus, and that's it. The Southeastern
(04:20):
Conferences out you have an independent in Notre Dame taking
on the Big Ten traditional old school Big Ten Ohio
State for the championship game a week from Monday. A
week from Monday, it is on now. Later today we
have NFL Wild Card Action. A reminder, Benny Versus the
(04:45):
Penny is available. Benny Versus the Penny is available for
you can check out the latest stylings on Benny Versus
the Penny available on Peacock, airing all day long throughout
the country on NBC Sports regional cable channels. Hopefully we'll
have a chance to watch that. Very proud of the show.
(05:07):
Otherwise I wouldn't do it, but it was crazy week.
We talked about that a lot on the Friday podcast
about having to work out the logistics our studios at
Universal Studios. We have a little studio there that we
use to do Benny Versus the Penny. We were unable
to get in there because of the fires. The studios
were closed. Hard to believe that doing a television show
(05:31):
picking NFL games against the spread is not essential, but
apparently it was deemed non essential. The games today, I
assume you know the games today, they'll kick off the
NFL playoffs Wild card Saturday, the Los Angeles Chargers. We'll
take on the Texans in Houston, and the Chargers a
(05:51):
three point favorite in that game on the road over CJ.
Stroud and the Texans. It is interesting to know, then,
in the eyes of television, that is the least attractive matchup,
that is the matchup that has no juice, according to
TV How do we know that it's the first matchup.
(06:11):
It's kind of like in the baseball playoffs they often
put if the Blue Jays make the playoffs, or the Royals,
or that the first game that's played during the day
is the team least attractive in the eyes of television. Now,
I do work in television, but barely work in television,
So I just want to point out that that's just
(06:33):
what TV pop will say. They they judge us on
who's got the most juice, who's got that Gennis Aquah,
who can bring eyeballs to the schoolyard, who can bring
all the eyeballs to the schoolyard. So the Texans are
deemed the Chargers also, so that's the first game. Kind
of like in basketball, they would they would put trying
to think like the Memphis Grizzlies would play that first
(06:54):
playoff game, Chargers and Texans again. First game Chargers favorite
on the road, the Lake game, which I think is
on Amazon on the Amazon the Pets, Bag Stealers, the
Insers taking on the Ravens in Baltimore, third times the Charm.
The Steelers won the first game. The Ravens won the
(07:17):
second game thanks to some gifts by Russell Wilson. That
game will kick off later today at eight o'clock Eastern Time,
and the Ravens a nine and a half point favorite.
Holy Smokes Batman a nine and a half point favorite
for the Baltimore Ravens in that game. Are you kidding me? No? Now,
(07:38):
turning the page from the NFL. On this edition of
the Fifth Hour podcast, the Saturday Special, We've got the
cookie drop, the Oldie but a goodie, the code head,
and the phrase of the week. You phrase the week.
We'll start with this so we hear doing the show
(08:02):
from southern California been affected more so than most by
the by the wildfires. Now I'm fortunate where the Malor
Mansion is. I'm pretty far removed from the fire zone,
as I do not live in any place where the
fires are directly the smoke is is very real. Depends
if your down range from the from where the fires are.
(08:24):
The wind changing directions, so we've gotten a fair amount
of smoke. The wind has calmed down, and it was
like a haunted mansion. At the Malor Mansion the other night.
My dog, Moxie, the mox Alatto, freaked me out. Right,
Moxie freaked me out. Now, I didn't realize this was
the thing. I'm sitting there getting ready for the show,
(08:47):
and I'm preparing for the show. The wind is howling.
It is. I feel like we're in like some kind
of hurricane or somebody was. It was insane. There were
hurricane strength winds, whole level hurricane blowing around and everything's
flying all over the place. And I'm sitting there and
I'm like, I'm trying to get ready for the show,
(09:08):
and I'm I'm distracted because I got the I got
the local news on. They're showing the fires and people
are panicked and they're leaving and things are burning and
it's a big to do. And Moxie starts shaking her head.
She's freaking out with all the wind. My dog mocks you.
The bulldog starts freaking out right, going crazy and all
this stuff, and I thought she was having a seizure.
(09:29):
I was like, I was like, oh, crap, I don't
know what to do. You know, what do you do?
You know? I had no idea, so I started googling,
and it turns out, and I didn't know this because
this is the first time I ever had a bulldog,
but the English bulldog they have bulldog head shaking SYNDROMEFFERF
(09:51):
say what yeah, also known as idiopathic head tremors ihcheese.
It just carriterized by a sudden episodic head bob, come on, Pippin',
get your tims up. Tremors or nodding of the head,
(10:11):
which is what my dog Moxie was doing. The nodding
of the head. The exact cause of the idiopathic head tremors,
according to the Internet, is unknown. However, they believe it's
because of great excitement or anxiety. In this case, it
(10:33):
appears it was anxiety. So Moxy was freaking out. This big, strong,
muscular bulldog absolutely freaked out by the wind. And so anyway,
I was like trying to hold Moxie. Anything be all right.
But eventually she chilled out and then she just slept
(10:54):
for like seven or eight hours. My dog, so dog
just sleeps nonstock just wonderful. If I could sleep as
much as Moxie man, would life be good. Last week
I bought a dog and I needed an emotion. Now,
as far as the cookie drop is concerned, my sister
(11:16):
in law was one of those that was affected by
the fire. She lives in the foothills. The Eaton Canyon fire,
which is not the Palisades fire with the Palisades fire
was the one that's making its way tried to make
its way over the hill last night into the San
Fernando Valley. But the Eaton Canyon fire, which I love
eating can you used to go hiking there quite a bit.
I've been there with my dad back in the name
(11:37):
my older brother. We all went up to the waterfall
at Eaton Canyon. But that area burned in the Altadena
area of Los Angeles, and my sister in law and
my niece and nephew, who I see quite a bit,
they all had to vacate, so they were at a
park with some other I don't know, fire refugees I
(11:59):
guess you'd call them, and a couple of my sister
in law's good friends lost their homes already, they burned
down from the fire. So they're trying to figure out
like what to do, and so they've been staying with
other relatives, the friends of my sister in law. So
they had a like a playdate thing at the park.
And so I as uncle Benny. When your uncle Benny,
(12:21):
you got to go help the kids. You know, this
goes to the grown ups can figure out how they're
going to rebuild their lives. And so Uncle Benny went
to the park and I was the monster that and
I make a great monster that was attacking the kids.
And there's nothing better in life. Because there were kids
of all age, all the way from one probably to
like nine or ten, you know, in that age range.
(12:44):
And there's nothing I love more than a There was
a one year old kid there, little red headed kid.
And if you ever ever you know, like an uncle
or a dad or whatever, if you're around kids, you
know whatever, and the kid, like, you know how they
like fake punch you. And then when you act like
(13:06):
you have been taken by this atomic fist and it's
you know, just a total body blow body blow and
you fall back. And to see the pure joy. The
pure excitement on that kid's face is just outstanding. Right,
It's just the greatest thing in the world. And sure
(13:27):
enough I was able to provide that service. And I
feel like I'm one of the top fake punch guys.
I could have been a stunt man. I could have
been a Hollywood stunt man, you know, doing the thing.
And but it was a lot of fun. And I
actually I stopped by and made some cinnamon cinnamon raisin cookies,
(13:53):
cinnamon raising oatmeal cinnamon raisin cookies. Now I was going
to make chocolate chip. I text my sister in law.
I said, Hey, what what cookies do the kids want?
And she said, well, you know they're good with like
chocolate chip, but your sister in law would love oatmeal raisin.
So then I realized I had I had some cookies
(14:14):
I had made for last weekend, and so those were
kind of laying around. So I had the cookies for
last weekend, the chocolate chip. They had some walnuts in them,
and I I said, you know, the kids don't give
a they don't give a crap whether the cookies are
fresh or they are a few days old. But I said,
I make some oatmeal raisin. I'll drop these off, the
(14:35):
oatmeal raisin or these other cookies the kids will have.
So that's what I did. So we stopped by. There
was a like I said, they were a meeting at
a playground at a park so the kids could play
and the parents could figure out how they're going to
deal with the insurance and all the grown up crap,
and just just absolutely terrible as they got to get
everything right. All their clothes are gone. Just I mean,
(14:56):
if you've ever been through that, I know some of
you have. I've heard email, I've gotten emails from people,
have heard stories from people who have sent me emails
about what that's like. So, and the fire is still
going on from what i've from what I understand the forecast,
the winds are supposed to pick up here in La
(15:17):
again I think on Tuesdays. So they only have today
and Tomorrow and Monday to get this thing under wraps
before there's another round of fires. And I promise you
there will be, because it appears that several of these
fires have been started by arsonists, by people that should
(15:39):
be sent to be executed by a firing squad. In fact,
there's an apparently video of two people caught lighting a
fire with gasoline moments before the Palisades Fire, which is
the biggest fire in the history of I believe, United
(15:59):
States in many, many different categories. So there's video of that,
and there's multiple other fires that have been started by individuals. Now,
are these people all related? Are these just people who
are opportunistic who realize what was going on? I mean,
and it's one of these catch twenty two situations. I
was texting a friend of mine about this, not to
(16:21):
get political, however, Yeah, no, we were talking about the
local news. However you get is whether it's the Internet,
old school media, television, radio, whatever, they make such a
big point of emphasis and we're gonna have extreme wind conditions.
You know, it's being very dangerous, you know, high fire warning.
(16:44):
Isn't that like a dog whistle to people on the
spectrum who are up to no good? They're like, oh, look,
it's gonna be really bad if I were to start
a fire right about here, and boy, that would be
really bad, do it. You know, there's a whole bunch
of Internet conspiracies. Who knows what's true and who's not.
(17:04):
Who knows what's not. One thing I've learned though from
the whole COVID thing when they say, oh, it's one
hundred percent of conspiracy, there's no truth to it. Like
a lot of stuff people they were saying about COVID
being conspiracy theories have been proven correct. So just because
somebody says something is a conspiracy theory does not mean
it's just a conspiracy theory. That is a way to
dismiss a claim. That is a way to belittle a claim. Right,
(17:30):
And so I you gotta you gotta judge things for yourself.
You gotta you gotta determine what's important, what you think
is real in your world in the multiverse. Right, So
that's that's the way that goes. That's the way that goes.
So we'll see what happens. But apparently this video of
at least the Palisades fire, which is the biggest, and
(17:53):
a couple of the other fires, which makes sense, right.
I know, I know it's going to be devastating to
the climate change crowd. They're gonna be very upset by
this because they were really hoping this is just climate change,
but no, it's opportunistics people. It appears that you would
not have this number of fires strategically placed all around
(18:13):
Los Angeles unless some, if not all, of them were
being started by individuals. And so the pieces to the puzzle.
We don't have all the pieces, but the pieces we
have are leaning that direction. We will see. But anyway,
I brought some cookies over. That was the big cookie drop.
(18:33):
Now the oldie, but a goodie, the oldie but of goodie.
So this is in the next month. My wife has
decided that we ate out a lot in November and
December because of Thanksgiving and Christmas, and we had a
lot of events. And so for the next month from
this point in January until this point in February, right
(18:56):
around the Super Bowl, no eating out, no restaurants. Every
meal will be prepared and consumed inside the Mallard kitchen.
That's how this is gonna go. That's how this is
gonna go. And so we've been preparing. For example, this weekend,
(19:17):
we back on Friday, made corn dogs. And the reason
I made corn dogs because they came up on the
Overnight Show this week and I was like, I haven't
had corn dogs in a while. And then I was like, well,
I can't get one because we're not allowed to go
to restaurants and normally I get my corn dogs at
the restaurants. So I told my told the wife and
so home. So we got the corn meal, We got
(19:38):
everything we need, the eggs, all that stuff, milk, whatever,
put it all together, and obviously the hot dogs and
made some corn dogs. We made some corn and they
were very good. There were more like corn biscuits than
corn dogs. There was hot dog in there, but these
things had a lot of corn meal on them and
they were really delicious, delicious. And so we're trying different
(20:04):
recipes and whatnot. But the reason I bring up odie
but a goodie date line, date line, the hot tub
time machine. Is it true that a container in the
Mallard kitchen belongs to the archive of years gone by?
(20:31):
A container of Morton salt? Morton salt in the very
back of a cabinet, the Malar Kinchen Malar kitchen. I
would like you to take a guess. Guess the year?
Can you guess the year of the salt? All right?
(20:52):
Inquiring minds would like to know? All right? Reveal answers,
Reveal answers, pens down, no more guesses. Survey says, how
about twenty oh four? A container of Morton salt from
the year twenty oh four in the back of the
(21:15):
malar cabinet. Now, this was not mine originally, this was
my dad's. I inherited this when my pops passed away
a few years ago, and it survived a bunch of
moves and all kinds of stuff, and there was and
I was saying about it, like, salt doesn't really go bad, right,
(21:37):
Why would salt expire? It's salt. It's the salt of
the earth. So anyway, we were using it, we'd been
using it. We're not dead, so apparently everything's okay and
just wild. I was tving like where I was in
twenty oh four, it's twenty twenty five now, and then
(21:58):
I'm like, you know, a lot has changed around me.
I've lost a lot of my friends and my loved ones.
My parents are both gone. But I was still working
at Fox Sports Radio in twenty oh four. Like, professionally,
it's cool. I have a TV show now and that's
pretty neat and I'm very proud of that. But like
(22:19):
the radio stuff, I wasn't doing the overnight show. Well
I was. I was doing the weekend overnight show in
twenty oh four, and I was filling in. I was
doing shows with like Chris Myers and people like that
at Fox. And but that's a long well, I mean
twenty one years. That salt has been on the shelf
(22:40):
at a mallor home for twenty one bleeping years. That
is insane, absolutely insane. Now you know it's also insane.
Want to tell you a story. Story time on the
fifth hour. So the other day, a few days back
(23:03):
in a galaxy far far away, I pull up to
the iHeart Premiere Network building in the Oaks, Sriman, Oak.
So I make the long drive from the North Woods
on many highways and byways, and I'm pulling into the
parking lot place I've worked for many, many years. So
I get in there and the very front space, which
(23:27):
is where I usually park because at night there's not
many people there. It's a barebone staff. It's a barebone staff.
So at night I park in the front because I
get there early, and this space is always open. So
this space, there were a couple of cones, those orange cones,
(23:47):
you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, So there's two
orange cones in the space. And I had seen this
last couple of days and I was like, well, somebody
must be fing around, you know, somebody must be moving
those cones out. So I said, you know, this is ridiculous.
There's no one here. It's late at night. So I
(24:08):
stopped my car, I got out, and I moved the
cones out of the space, and then I backed into
the space and I'm grabbing my possessions. I have a
couple of bags I take with me to work, and
I grab the bags and I'm like, okay, I'm gonna chop, chop.
I'm gonna get to work and you know, do my thing.
(24:32):
And all I turn out my peripheral vision to my left,
I see this, this guy sprinting out and it was
the security guard for the building, the Conehead security guard.
I've never seen the security do anything. There have been
people doing shooting drugs up in their veins in the
building when I've left, and they haven't stopped them. There
have been homeless people sleeping in the parking garage, haven't
(24:55):
stopped him. I saw a guy drive on his bicycle
in there to break into cars plot because he had
the tools to break in. They didn't do a damn thing.
This security guard sprinted out, said what are you doing?
What are you doing. And I looked at him. I said, well,
I'm I'm parking my car. He said, you can't park
you are you allowed to park there? You can't park there?
(25:17):
What are you doing parking? You can't park there? And
guy was all flustered. I so, I've worked here for
twenty five years. I've always parked in this spot. I
don't know why the cones were there, so I just
moved the cones and I said, that's there. He says,
you can't. You're not allowed to park there. You cannot
part there. So then the guy tells me, and I
(25:37):
don't think he was supposed to tell me this. He
says that some some broad right, some woman who works
the building is paying an extra five hundred dollars a
month to have that parking space secured in the building. Now,
(25:59):
keep in mind, I cannot stress this enough. At the
time I come in, the entire parking garage is wide open.
Now I get saving a space during the day, the
building gets very busy. There's a lot of people that
worked there during the day. But to think somehow you
need that space reserved overnight is ridiculous to me. It's
(26:24):
like the dumbest thing I look at the guy. You
gotta be kidding me. And another guy makes like no
money and probably you know, this is a guy I
don't know. Some of the security guards. I get along
with the one guy, James. He's been there a long time,
and I just love the guy, like he's great, dude.
I know his whole story, the whole thing, very positive guy.
(26:47):
This guy's kind of knew and just the way I
don't know, the whole the whole vibe thing was like,
you gotta be kidding me. So it was the to me,
it was the funniest thing in the world. It was
just another example of like here we are twenty twenty
five in an empty parking lot. Literally there was two
(27:07):
other cars. There's hundreds of parking places in this parking
garage goes up like eight stories of parking. It's a
very large car. There's only a few cars in there,
and this space was reserved. This is so stupid to me,
but I moved my car. I moved my car, and
I snickered as I walked by, and I was telling you.
(27:31):
I was talking to a few people in the building
and we were like, this is this is crazy, this
is absolutely nuts. But that's that's what happened. Anyway, why
do we have the phrase? All we here we go
the phrase of the week and the phrase of the
week sent in by Steve O Steveo's New Jersey. He says,
(27:57):
Ben and Danny, I in the pod, I am not
that far away from the city that never sleeps. I
want to know where that phrase came from. Is it true?
It came from the Sinatra song. That's from Stevo. So yeah,
(28:18):
this will be the phrase of the week, the City
that Never sleeps. So I did a little bit of investigating,
and while it is true the iconic New York New
York song Frank Sinatra nineteen seventies, late nineteen seventies, he
said he wanted to wake up in a city that
doesn't sleep. The phrase is actually much much older than
(28:40):
the Frank Sinatra song. And you can actually thank the
United States Postal Service for the phrase the city that
never sleeps, not some slick marketing firm. No, no, no,
let's take you back in the DeLorean. We're gonna set
the year nineteen oh seven seven. It was August of
(29:02):
nineteen oh seven, big announcement that in Manhattan the mail
would be delivered at night. That's right, the mail was
going to be delivered at night. So the New York
Tribune in New York City, they had a headline that
(29:28):
read about the mail delivery and said New York City
a city that never sleeps. That was from the New
York Tribune around that time. And then later on in
the early nineteen seventies, the people at City Bank, their
slogan was the city never sleeps, as in Citi, and
(29:53):
that was in the nineteen seventies, and then the Sinatra
song in the late seventies, want to wake up in
a city that doesn't sleep And so oh, anyway, the
city for Stebo, the city that never sleeps. The slogan
of New York City actually from a newspaper headline. But
you can thank night mail delivery. They were delivering the
mail at eight o'clock. Big news, big news back in
(30:16):
the day in Manhattan. And that is that the phrase
of the week, the city that never sleeps. All right,
have a wonderful rest of your Saturday. Enjoy the football today.
We will have a mail bag. That's right, a brand
(30:37):
spankin new mail bag will have that for you on Sunday.
Don't forget to watch Bennie Versus the Penny. Later today,
Bennie Versus the Penny, we will have our live well
live on tape coverage of every game against the spread.
Information you can only get on Bennie Versus the Penny
(30:57):
that'll be available later today. Let's available right now on
Peacock Nationally airing in Los Angeles on the Spectrum Lakers
cable channel, and also in San Francisco, NBC Sports Bay Area, Philadelphia, Boston,
a bunch of Spectrum cable channels around the country, a
(31:17):
bunch of national affiliates. Check that out. Watch it. Don't forget.
We'll have a new Fifth Hour podcast tomorrow. And if
you want to send a question in to the mail bag,
you can do that. The address, the mailing address. You
don't have to do it right now. If you want
to do it later, in a couple days, whatever, in
a future mail bag. Keep it somewhat generic if you
want it in a future mail bag. Real fifth Hour
(31:40):
at gmail dot com. That's Real Fifth Hour at gmail
dot com. Danny G would say, if he was here,
Asta pasta, you killed it later, skater? Is that how
it works now? Vapulation
Kabbooms.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes
a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
of the Old Republic, a soul fashion of fairness. He
treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
rich pill poppers in the penthouse.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
The Clearinghouse of Hot takes break free for something special.
The Fifth Hour with Ben Maller starts right now.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
In the a eywhere the Fifth Hour with me, Ben
Malor and Danny g Radio Happy Saturday. Saturday. Saturday is
the eleventh day of January, and we continue our in
depth team coverage here on the Fifth Hour. Oh what
(00:52):
a wacky week it's been with the wildfires here in
southern California where we are emanating from. Danny was supposed
to be with me today, but he is away. He
is producing this podcast. But Danny's away, He'll be with
us on the Sunday Mailbag podcast. It's a fluid situation
with the way things have gone this week. In fact,
(01:15):
last night on Friday night, the Palisades fire, which is
the biggest of the fires. There's like a fire circles
Dante's inferno here in Los Angeles and the Palisades fire
made its way over the hill, heading towards the San
Fernando Valley. Now we broadcast from the San Fernando Valley
(01:40):
our studios in Sherman Oaks. If you're familiar with the
geography of southern California. The fire was headed towards Encino,
which is the next the next city over from Sherman Oaks.
But last I saw its early here on Saturday. But
last I saw they had a pretty good handle on
(02:03):
keeping it out of that part of the valley, which
is a tremendously well populated part of Los Angeles. We
emanate from Ventura and some Pulvida, the corner of Venturnasalvida,
and it is insane, insane how many people are in
(02:24):
that area. There are a lot, a lot, a lot,
a lot, a lot. As far as the whole sporty thing,
it's concerned because I don't even know if this is
a sports podcast at this point, I'm not sure exactly
what it is. It's just about it's the podcast about nothing.
It's the podcast about nothing. I was watching last night
as the Ohio State University. You look for that dramatic
(02:47):
plot twist and there it was Quin Ears, the quarterback
for Texas, set up the Longhorns about to tie the
game at Tory, and then all hell broke loose as
Jack Sawyer with the play of the decade and many
(03:12):
decades for Ohio State stripping the Texas quarterback is former
roommate back in the day and returned that fumble eighty
three yards touchdown. Buck Eys in Ohio State gets a
twenty eight to fourteen win last night in Arlington over
the Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl, and that sets up
(03:34):
a made for TV extravaganza. Ohio State. The Buck guys
who looked we had all fired their head coach Ryan
Day after they lost to Michigan, and now they have
a chance at their sixth national championship. The Buck guys
and a kid from Ohio making the play there Ohio
(03:55):
State thirteen to two. They have been the most dominant
team in the college football Playoff and now they'll take
on the fighting Irish in all Upper Midwest battle Royal
Ohio State versus the pride of the State of Indiana
South Bend, Indiana. Touchdown, Jesus, and that's it. The Southeastern
(04:20):
Conferences out you have an independent in Notre Dame taking
on the Big Ten traditional old school Big Ten Ohio
State for the championship game a week from Monday. A
week from Monday, it is on now. Later today we
have NFL Wild Card Action. A reminder, Benny Versus the
(04:45):
Penny is available. Benny Versus the Penny is available for
you can check out the latest stylings on Benny Versus
the Penny available on Peacock, airing all day long throughout
the country on NBC Sports regional cable channels. Hopefully we'll
have a chance to watch that. Very proud of the show.
(05:07):
Otherwise I wouldn't do it, but it was crazy week.
We talked about that a lot on the Friday podcast
about having to work out the logistics our studios at
Universal Studios. We have a little studio there that we
use to do Benny Versus the Penny. We were unable
to get in there because of the fires. The studios
were closed. Hard to believe that doing a television show
(05:31):
picking NFL games against the spread is not essential, but
apparently it was deemed non essential. The games today, I
assume you know the games today, they'll kick off the
NFL playoffs Wild card Saturday, the Los Angeles Chargers. We'll
take on the Texans in Houston, and the Chargers a
(05:51):
three point favorite in that game on the road over CJ.
Stroud and the Texans. It is interesting to know, then,
in the eyes of television, that is the least attractive matchup,
that is the matchup that has no juice, according to
TV How do we know that it's the first matchup.
(06:11):
It's kind of like in the baseball playoffs they often
put if the Blue Jays make the playoffs, or the Royals,
or that the first game that's played during the day
is the team least attractive in the eyes of television. Now,
I do work in television, but barely work in television,
So I just want to point out that that's just
(06:33):
what TV pop will say. They they judge us on
who's got the most juice, who's got that Gennis Aquah,
who can bring eyeballs to the schoolyard, who can bring
all the eyeballs to the schoolyard. So the Texans are
deemed the Chargers also, so that's the first game. Kind
of like in basketball, they would they would put trying
to think like the Memphis Grizzlies would play that first
(06:54):
playoff game, Chargers and Texans again. First game Chargers favorite
on the road, the Lake game, which I think is
on Amazon on the Amazon the Pets, Bag Stealers, the
Insers taking on the Ravens in Baltimore, third times the Charm.
The Steelers won the first game. The Ravens won the
(07:17):
second game thanks to some gifts by Russell Wilson. That
game will kick off later today at eight o'clock Eastern Time,
and the Ravens a nine and a half point favorite.
Holy Smokes Batman a nine and a half point favorite
for the Baltimore Ravens in that game. Are you kidding me? No? Now,
(07:38):
turning the page from the NFL. On this edition of
the Fifth Hour podcast, the Saturday Special, We've got the
cookie drop, the Oldie but a goodie, the code head,
and the phrase of the week. You phrase the week.
We'll start with this so we hear doing the show
(08:02):
from southern California been affected more so than most by
the by the wildfires. Now I'm fortunate where the Malor
Mansion is. I'm pretty far removed from the fire zone,
as I do not live in any place where the
fires are directly the smoke is is very real. Depends
if your down range from the from where the fires are.
(08:24):
The wind changing directions, so we've gotten a fair amount
of smoke. The wind has calmed down, and it was
like a haunted mansion. At the Malor Mansion the other night.
My dog, Moxie, the mox Alatto, freaked me out. Right,
Moxie freaked me out. Now, I didn't realize this was
the thing. I'm sitting there getting ready for the show,
(08:47):
and I'm preparing for the show. The wind is howling.
It is. I feel like we're in like some kind
of hurricane or somebody was. It was insane. There were
hurricane strength winds, whole level hurricane blowing around and everything's
flying all over the place. And I'm sitting there and
I'm like, I'm trying to get ready for the show,
(09:08):
and I'm I'm distracted because I got the I got
the local news on. They're showing the fires and people
are panicked and they're leaving and things are burning and
it's a big to do. And Moxie starts shaking her head.
She's freaking out with all the wind. My dog mocks you.
The bulldog starts freaking out right, going crazy and all
this stuff, and I thought she was having a seizure.
(09:29):
I was like, I was like, oh, crap, I don't
know what to do. You know, what do you do?
You know? I had no idea, so I started googling,
and it turns out, and I didn't know this because
this is the first time I ever had a bulldog,
but the English bulldog they have bulldog head shaking SYNDROMEFFERF
(09:51):
say what yeah, also known as idiopathic head tremors ihcheese.
It just carriterized by a sudden episodic head bob, come on, Pippin',
get your tims up. Tremors or nodding of the head,
(10:11):
which is what my dog Moxie was doing. The nodding
of the head. The exact cause of the idiopathic head tremors,
according to the Internet, is unknown. However, they believe it's
because of great excitement or anxiety. In this case, it
(10:33):
appears it was anxiety. So Moxy was freaking out. This big, strong,
muscular bulldog absolutely freaked out by the wind. And so anyway,
I was like trying to hold Moxie. Anything be all right.
But eventually she chilled out and then she just slept
(10:54):
for like seven or eight hours. My dog, so dog
just sleeps nonstock just wonderful. If I could sleep as
much as Moxie man, would life be good. Last week
I bought a dog and I needed an emotion. Now,
as far as the cookie drop is concerned, my sister
(11:16):
in law was one of those that was affected by
the fire. She lives in the foothills. The Eaton Canyon fire,
which is not the Palisades fire with the Palisades fire
was the one that's making its way tried to make
its way over the hill last night into the San
Fernando Valley. But the Eaton Canyon fire, which I love
eating can you used to go hiking there quite a bit.
I've been there with my dad back in the name
(11:37):
my older brother. We all went up to the waterfall
at Eaton Canyon. But that area burned in the Altadena
area of Los Angeles, and my sister in law and
my niece and nephew, who I see quite a bit,
they all had to vacate, so they were at a
park with some other I don't know, fire refugees I
(11:59):
guess you'd call them, and a couple of my sister
in law's good friends lost their homes already, they burned
down from the fire. So they're trying to figure out
like what to do, and so they've been staying with
other relatives, the friends of my sister in law. So
they had a like a playdate thing at the park.
And so I as uncle Benny. When your uncle Benny,
(12:21):
you got to go help the kids. You know, this
goes to the grown ups can figure out how they're
going to rebuild their lives. And so Uncle Benny went
to the park and I was the monster that and
I make a great monster that was attacking the kids.
And there's nothing better in life. Because there were kids
of all age, all the way from one probably to
like nine or ten, you know, in that age range.
(12:44):
And there's nothing I love more than a There was
a one year old kid there, little red headed kid.
And if you ever ever you know, like an uncle
or a dad or whatever, if you're around kids, you
know whatever, and the kid, like, you know how they
like fake punch you. And then when you act like
(13:06):
you have been taken by this atomic fist and it's
you know, just a total body blow body blow and
you fall back. And to see the pure joy. The
pure excitement on that kid's face is just outstanding. Right,
It's just the greatest thing in the world. And sure
(13:27):
enough I was able to provide that service. And I
feel like I'm one of the top fake punch guys.
I could have been a stunt man. I could have
been a Hollywood stunt man, you know, doing the thing.
And but it was a lot of fun. And I
actually I stopped by and made some cinnamon cinnamon raisin cookies,
(13:53):
cinnamon raising oatmeal cinnamon raisin cookies. Now I was going
to make chocolate chip. I text my sister in law.
I said, Hey, what what cookies do the kids want?
And she said, well, you know they're good with like
chocolate chip, but your sister in law would love oatmeal raisin.
So then I realized I had I had some cookies
(14:14):
I had made for last weekend, and so those were
kind of laying around. So I had the cookies for
last weekend, the chocolate chip. They had some walnuts in them,
and I I said, you know, the kids don't give
a they don't give a crap whether the cookies are
fresh or they are a few days old. But I said,
I make some oatmeal raisin. I'll drop these off, the
(14:35):
oatmeal raisin or these other cookies the kids will have.
So that's what I did. So we stopped by. There
was a like I said, they were a meeting at
a playground at a park so the kids could play
and the parents could figure out how they're going to
deal with the insurance and all the grown up crap,
and just just absolutely terrible as they got to get
everything right. All their clothes are gone. Just I mean,
(14:56):
if you've ever been through that, I know some of
you have. I've heard email, I've gotten emails from people,
have heard stories from people who have sent me emails
about what that's like. So, and the fire is still
going on from what i've from what I understand the forecast,
the winds are supposed to pick up here in La
(15:17):
again I think on Tuesdays. So they only have today
and Tomorrow and Monday to get this thing under wraps
before there's another round of fires. And I promise you
there will be, because it appears that several of these
fires have been started by arsonists, by people that should
(15:39):
be sent to be executed by a firing squad. In fact,
there's an apparently video of two people caught lighting a
fire with gasoline moments before the Palisades Fire, which is
the biggest fire in the history of I believe, United
(15:59):
States in many, many different categories. So there's video of that,
and there's multiple other fires that have been started by individuals. Now,
are these people all related? Are these just people who
are opportunistic who realize what was going on? I mean,
and it's one of these catch twenty two situations. I
was texting a friend of mine about this, not to
(16:21):
get political, however, Yeah, no, we were talking about the
local news. However you get is whether it's the Internet,
old school media, television, radio, whatever, they make such a
big point of emphasis and we're gonna have extreme wind conditions.
You know, it's being very dangerous, you know, high fire warning.
(16:44):
Isn't that like a dog whistle to people on the
spectrum who are up to no good? They're like, oh, look,
it's gonna be really bad if I were to start
a fire right about here, and boy, that would be
really bad, do it. You know, there's a whole bunch
of Internet conspiracies. Who knows what's true and who's not.
(17:04):
Who knows what's not. One thing I've learned though from
the whole COVID thing when they say, oh, it's one
hundred percent of conspiracy, there's no truth to it. Like
a lot of stuff people they were saying about COVID
being conspiracy theories have been proven correct. So just because
somebody says something is a conspiracy theory does not mean
it's just a conspiracy theory. That is a way to
dismiss a claim. That is a way to belittle a claim. Right,
(17:30):
And so I you gotta you gotta judge things for yourself.
You gotta you gotta determine what's important, what you think
is real in your world in the multiverse. Right, So
that's that's the way that goes. That's the way that goes.
So we'll see what happens. But apparently this video of
at least the Palisades fire, which is the biggest, and
(17:53):
a couple of the other fires, which makes sense, right.
I know, I know it's going to be devastating to
the climate change crowd. They're gonna be very upset by
this because they were really hoping this is just climate change,
but no, it's opportunistics people. It appears that you would
not have this number of fires strategically placed all around
(18:13):
Los Angeles unless some, if not all, of them were
being started by individuals. And so the pieces to the puzzle.
We don't have all the pieces, but the pieces we
have are leaning that direction. We will see. But anyway,
I brought some cookies over. That was the big cookie drop.
(18:33):
Now the oldie, but a goodie, the oldie but of goodie.
So this is in the next month. My wife has
decided that we ate out a lot in November and
December because of Thanksgiving and Christmas, and we had a
lot of events. And so for the next month from
this point in January until this point in February, right
(18:56):
around the Super Bowl, no eating out, no restaurants. Every
meal will be prepared and consumed inside the Mallard kitchen.
That's how this is gonna go. That's how this is
gonna go. And so we've been preparing. For example, this weekend,
(19:17):
we back on Friday, made corn dogs. And the reason
I made corn dogs because they came up on the
Overnight Show this week and I was like, I haven't
had corn dogs in a while. And then I was like, well,
I can't get one because we're not allowed to go
to restaurants and normally I get my corn dogs at
the restaurants. So I told my told the wife and
so home. So we got the corn meal, We got
(19:38):
everything we need, the eggs, all that stuff, milk, whatever,
put it all together, and obviously the hot dogs and
made some corn dogs. We made some corn and they
were very good. There were more like corn biscuits than
corn dogs. There was hot dog in there, but these
things had a lot of corn meal on them and
they were really delicious, delicious. And so we're trying different
(20:04):
recipes and whatnot. But the reason I bring up odie
but a goodie date line, date line, the hot tub
time machine. Is it true that a container in the
Mallard kitchen belongs to the archive of years gone by?
(20:31):
A container of Morton salt? Morton salt in the very
back of a cabinet, the Malar Kinchen Malar kitchen. I
would like you to take a guess. Guess the year?
Can you guess the year of the salt? All right?
(20:52):
Inquiring minds would like to know? All right? Reveal answers,
Reveal answers, pens down, no more guesses. Survey says, how
about twenty oh four? A container of Morton salt from
the year twenty oh four in the back of the
(21:15):
malar cabinet. Now, this was not mine originally, this was
my dad's. I inherited this when my pops passed away
a few years ago, and it survived a bunch of
moves and all kinds of stuff, and there was and
I was saying about it, like, salt doesn't really go bad, right,
(21:37):
Why would salt expire? It's salt. It's the salt of
the earth. So anyway, we were using it, we'd been
using it. We're not dead, so apparently everything's okay and
just wild. I was tving like where I was in
twenty oh four, it's twenty twenty five now, and then
(21:58):
I'm like, you know, a lot has changed around me.
I've lost a lot of my friends and my loved ones.
My parents are both gone. But I was still working
at Fox Sports Radio in twenty oh four. Like, professionally,
it's cool. I have a TV show now and that's
pretty neat and I'm very proud of that. But like
(22:19):
the radio stuff, I wasn't doing the overnight show. Well
I was. I was doing the weekend overnight show in
twenty oh four, and I was filling in. I was
doing shows with like Chris Myers and people like that
at Fox. And but that's a long well, I mean
twenty one years. That salt has been on the shelf
(22:40):
at a mallor home for twenty one bleeping years. That
is insane, absolutely insane. Now you know it's also insane.
Want to tell you a story. Story time on the
fifth hour. So the other day, a few days back
(23:03):
in a galaxy far far away, I pull up to
the iHeart Premiere Network building in the Oaks, Sriman, Oak.
So I make the long drive from the North Woods
on many highways and byways, and I'm pulling into the
parking lot place I've worked for many, many years. So
I get in there and the very front space, which
(23:27):
is where I usually park because at night there's not
many people there. It's a barebone staff. It's a barebone staff.
So at night I park in the front because I
get there early, and this space is always open. So
this space, there were a couple of cones, those orange cones,
(23:47):
you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, So there's two
orange cones in the space. And I had seen this
last couple of days and I was like, well, somebody
must be fing around, you know, somebody must be moving
those cones out. So I said, you know, this is ridiculous.
There's no one here. It's late at night. So I
(24:08):
stopped my car, I got out, and I moved the
cones out of the space, and then I backed into
the space and I'm grabbing my possessions. I have a
couple of bags I take with me to work, and
I grab the bags and I'm like, okay, I'm gonna chop, chop.
I'm gonna get to work and you know, do my thing.
(24:32):
And all I turn out my peripheral vision to my left,
I see this, this guy sprinting out and it was
the security guard for the building, the Conehead security guard.
I've never seen the security do anything. There have been
people doing shooting drugs up in their veins in the
building when I've left, and they haven't stopped them. There
have been homeless people sleeping in the parking garage, haven't
(24:55):
stopped him. I saw a guy drive on his bicycle
in there to break into cars plot because he had
the tools to break in. They didn't do a damn thing.
This security guard sprinted out, said what are you doing?
What are you doing. And I looked at him. I said, well,
I'm I'm parking my car. He said, you can't park
you are you allowed to park there? You can't park there?
(25:17):
What are you doing parking? You can't park there? And
guy was all flustered. I so, I've worked here for
twenty five years. I've always parked in this spot. I
don't know why the cones were there, so I just
moved the cones and I said, that's there. He says,
you can't. You're not allowed to park there. You cannot
part there. So then the guy tells me, and I
(25:37):
don't think he was supposed to tell me this. He
says that some some broad right, some woman who works
the building is paying an extra five hundred dollars a
month to have that parking space secured in the building. Now,
(25:59):
keep in mind, I cannot stress this enough. At the
time I come in, the entire parking garage is wide open.
Now I get saving a space during the day, the
building gets very busy. There's a lot of people that
worked there during the day. But to think somehow you
need that space reserved overnight is ridiculous to me. It's
(26:24):
like the dumbest thing I look at the guy. You
gotta be kidding me. And another guy makes like no
money and probably you know, this is a guy I
don't know. Some of the security guards. I get along
with the one guy, James. He's been there a long time,
and I just love the guy, like he's great, dude.
I know his whole story, the whole thing, very positive guy.
(26:47):
This guy's kind of knew and just the way I
don't know, the whole the whole vibe thing was like,
you gotta be kidding me. So it was the to me,
it was the funniest thing in the world. It was
just another example of like here we are twenty twenty
five in an empty parking lot. Literally there was two
(27:07):
other cars. There's hundreds of parking places in this parking
garage goes up like eight stories of parking. It's a
very large car. There's only a few cars in there,
and this space was reserved. This is so stupid to me,
but I moved my car. I moved my car, and
I snickered as I walked by, and I was telling you.
(27:31):
I was talking to a few people in the building
and we were like, this is this is crazy, this
is absolutely nuts. But that's that's what happened. Anyway, why
do we have the phrase? All we here we go
the phrase of the week and the phrase of the
week sent in by Steve O Steveo's New Jersey. He says,
(27:57):
Ben and Danny, I in the pod, I am not
that far away from the city that never sleeps. I
want to know where that phrase came from. Is it true?
It came from the Sinatra song. That's from Stevo. So yeah,
(28:18):
this will be the phrase of the week, the City
that Never sleeps. So I did a little bit of investigating,
and while it is true the iconic New York New
York song Frank Sinatra nineteen seventies, late nineteen seventies, he
said he wanted to wake up in a city that
doesn't sleep. The phrase is actually much much older than
(28:40):
the Frank Sinatra song. And you can actually thank the
United States Postal Service for the phrase the city that
never sleeps, not some slick marketing firm. No, no, no,
let's take you back in the DeLorean. We're gonna set
the year nineteen oh seven seven. It was August of
(29:02):
nineteen oh seven, big announcement that in Manhattan the mail
would be delivered at night. That's right, the mail was
going to be delivered at night. So the New York
Tribune in New York City, they had a headline that
(29:28):
read about the mail delivery and said New York City
a city that never sleeps. That was from the New
York Tribune around that time. And then later on in
the early nineteen seventies, the people at City Bank, their
slogan was the city never sleeps, as in Citi, and
(29:53):
that was in the nineteen seventies, and then the Sinatra
song in the late seventies, want to wake up in
a city that doesn't sleep And so oh, anyway, the
city for Stebo, the city that never sleeps. The slogan
of New York City actually from a newspaper headline. But
you can thank night mail delivery. They were delivering the
mail at eight o'clock. Big news, big news back in
(30:16):
the day in Manhattan. And that is that the phrase
of the week, the city that never sleeps. All right,
have a wonderful rest of your Saturday. Enjoy the football today.
We will have a mail bag. That's right, a brand
(30:37):
spankin new mail bag will have that for you on Sunday.
Don't forget to watch Bennie Versus the Penny. Later today,
Bennie Versus the Penny, we will have our live well
live on tape coverage of every game against the spread.
Information you can only get on Bennie Versus the Penny
(30:57):
that'll be available later today. Let's available right now on
Peacock Nationally airing in Los Angeles on the Spectrum Lakers
cable channel, and also in San Francisco, NBC Sports Bay Area, Philadelphia, Boston,
a bunch of Spectrum cable channels around the country, a
(31:17):
bunch of national affiliates. Check that out. Watch it. Don't forget.
We'll have a new Fifth Hour podcast tomorrow. And if
you want to send a question in to the mail bag,
you can do that. The address, the mailing address. You
don't have to do it right now. If you want
to do it later, in a couple days, whatever, in
a future mail bag. Keep it somewhat generic if you
want it in a future mail bag. Real fifth Hour
(31:40):
at gmail dot com. That's Real Fifth Hour at gmail
dot com. Danny G would say, if he was here,
Asta pasta, you killed it later, skater? Is that how
it works now? Vapulation
Host
Ben Maller
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