May 23, 2025 • 27 mins
Ben Maller (produced by Danny G.) has a fun Friday for you! He talks: Penny Market, Vancouver on the Horizon, Battering Ram, Phrase of the Week, & more!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Kubbooms.
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 sol 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 3 (00:29):
In the air everywhere. The Fifth Hour with Me, Ben
Mallor and Danny g Radio. Happy Friday to you. It
is the twenty third day of the month of May
and the last Friday Pod before we head to Van
Vancouver for the Malor Meet and Greet.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Hopefully you'll be able to make it.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
If you're in British Columbia, somewhere in Western Canada or
in the Pacific Northwest, come out say hello. All the
details all the information available on the Instagram page Ben
Maller on Fox the Facebook page Ben Maler Show. The
Malar Meet and Greet is coming up on Thursday the
twenty ninth, Unless my flight gets canceled.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Thursday of the.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Twenty ninth Malor Meet and Greet in Vancouver, we'll spend
the weekend there, have a great time. Cannot wait to
check out your fine city. It is going to be
a glorious time. Didn't want to mention today is a
melanancholy day. Is Lucky Penny Day, as in the penny
(01:33):
from kind of like benny versus the penny and all that.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Now.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
I wanted to bring this up because the news out
this week and I think it's been confirmed, but who knows.
There's been rumors on this for a while. The US
will stop putting new pennies into circulation by early twenty
twenty six. You have got to be kiddy me uh
oh spaghettio. Yeah, Businesses will need to start rounding up
(01:57):
or down to the nearest five cents. There was a
statement made by the US Treasury this week. The penny
currently cost four cents to make, so cutting production is
set to save a bunch of money, which is appropriate.
This being Lucky Penny Day, the news would come out
(02:19):
and we're not sure how the Lucky Penny Day started.
We do know some fun facts about the penny. It
started in seven seven fifty seven AD. The very first
pennies were minted during the reign of OFA and Marcia
in Anglo Saxon, England, and then in seventeen ninety three
(02:41):
the first pennies were minted in America. Benjamin Franklin supposedly
designed the first pennies. Eighteen fifty seven the penny was
resized in America, and over the last number of years
it's been pointed out how expensive it is for the
penny to be made. A couple of years back, there
was a story that for eighty million dollars worth of pennies,
(03:03):
it cost one hundred and thirty four million. Gave you
the new numbers here. A penny currently cost four cents
to make. So bye bye penny, but not necessarily bye
bye benny versus the penny. As that iconic TV show
not quite done yet.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
We'll see what happens.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It's up to the good folks over there at NBC's
side whether or not the TV show will have a
longer lifespan than the actual penny. So stay tuned. Inquiring
minds would like to know. But on with the show
we go. On this podcast, we have the surprise cartoon
(03:44):
mascot Storm and Norman and the phrase.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Of the work.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
But we'll begin with this so not so very long ago,
in a kingdom not listing on any map. We went
to the dogs. Because we are suckers for positive feedback.
We do this podcast every weekend, and by request, we
bring you more tales from the Mox, Tales from the Mox,
(04:13):
the files of the Mox. Moxie my dog. Sarah in Minnesota,
who's not the normal. I don't think that's the normal
Sarah that we know, who I met at the Mala
meet and greet there in Minnesota a couple years ago.
But Sarah Minnesota, Lisa in Arizona, and some guy named
Dennis in Ohio, which is.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Kind of a big state, so is Arizona.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
But Arizona's like pretty much here in Phoenix, Tucson or Flagstaff, right,
it's pretty much it the greater Phoenix area of flag Staff, Tuson, Ohio.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
You could be where. You could be in Cleveland, you
could be.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
In Cincinnati, Columbus. You know, there's a few places you
could be in Ohio. Anyway, all of them reached out
and said they enjoyed these stories last week about what
was really one story about Mox. And so here we
are again and I will regale you with another story
because some of you like this, and even if it's
(05:06):
only for Sarah, Lisa and Dennis and that's it, we'll
do it for them. The glamours, the glamours of an
exciting rock star life doing overnight talk radio, being a
professional gas back.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
This job is not that easy. This job is not
so we just take it one show at a time. Right.
We go out there, we do each hour.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
We have sixty minutes of content and we just try
to do good radio.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Right.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
There's no easy radio in overnight talk radio, and you
cannot afford to look past any individual segment.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
I think I got all the cliches, right, I think
I did. I get it, I got most of them.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
So nonetheless, getting ready for the show, as I imagine
you are, we are all wired the same way.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
We're hardwired.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
We have routine, and who doesn't like I like poutine
and I like routine. And next week we'll be in
Canada for the Malor Meet and Greet. We're looking forward
to that. It can be a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Hopefully I'll be able to meet you.
Speaker 3 (06:08):
If you're in the Vancouver area or British Columbia, or
if you want to drive over from another part in Canada,
come say hello and very excited to meet you.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
And also if you're in the Pacific Northwest.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Details on a previous edition of this podcast, but also
available on my Facebook page and the Instagram page. You
can find all of that information there. The Instagram page
Ben Mahler on Fox, the Facebook page Ben malor Show,
two different pages, two different names, and all that. So
get back to the story, please, So the Glamour's Life
(06:42):
of overnight talk radio doing my thing, creature of habit,
and I have my routine, which is not poutine. It's
endlessly looking for things that get my blood flowing. Now
years ago on this podcast, we had one of the
iconic broadcasters of all time, a Hall of Fame Brent Mussburger.
You're looking alive Brent Musburger, who gave some advice, not
(07:09):
on this podcast, but he gives some advice and I
read it somewhere along the way. He said, the key
to life is to stay interested.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Well, it's also the.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Key if you have to do four monologues, which are
each about fifteen minutes, sometimes longer, sometimes less. But if
you have to do those monologues, you got to stay interested.
You can't really fake it till you'll make it, and
you can't fake it till you make it, and all
that stuff, and so passing the test of time and
doing this for a long time my goal every year.
(07:37):
The hardest part of the show, and I've talked about
this to you in the past. To me, the hardest
part of the show is getting the show ready. It's practice,
not a game. We in here talking about practice, if
you will. And so the way I go about it
my ingredients that I get to make the show. And
(07:58):
again I've discussed this, but there's new people listening, and
if not, we're totally porked. So the way I approached this,
if you were to drop into the Malor mansion, most days,
not not all days, there's some days are different. But
most days you'll find me sitting casually on the sofa,
laptop open seventeen to twenty five web pages open, scanning
(08:23):
RSS feeds, and futzing around on some of the dark
corners of the dark web. As I am surfing around
the same way I did for many many years at
my website. I don't do that anymore, but I have
the same tools that I used back then. I just
do it for the radio show to try to find
(08:44):
things that interest me, because, as Musburger said, stay interesting.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
You can't just do monologues and you don't care.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
And that becomes problematic because some days there's not a
lot going on. Now, while I am readily working away
with my laptop, my right hand, as I like to say,
is getting a workout back and forth. I got usually
two or three games in my rotation. This time of
(09:12):
the year. It's a lot of baseball and then the
basketball game. So I'll go to baseball one basketball. Don't
tell anyone, and certainly don't tell Eddie, my old buddy,
Eddie Garcia.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
But occasionally I will mix a hockey game in.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
We don't talk about hockey, but occasionally I'll mix a
hockey game in if the baseball is not that good.
In the basketball game is a blowout. So keep in mind,
this is a story about mox my dog, Moxie erf erf.
While this is going on, my partner in crime. My
wife's at work, she's doing her thing, and so Moxie
(09:46):
is with me, our beloved English bulldog. And Moxie is wonderful.
She's also a fat bulldog. She's so fat. In fact,
she's not even fat She's strong, but she's so big
she cannot fit through the doggy door that we put in,
which was designed for my previous dog, the late Great Bella,
and Bella was a wonderful dog also, so Bella passed
(10:08):
away we got Moxie. And Bella is a very little dog.
Moxie gigantic. Right, Moxie is the round mound of dog town.
And so instead of just having her go out the
doggy door, I have to let her get busy on
the ones and the twos, right, the ones and the
twos every so often so she can go the ones.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
And it is so this time of the year, it's May.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
The weather's nice these days, and so I made an
editorial decision that I would take advantage of the great
weather and the nice air, good temperature where we do
the show from. And so I decided to leave the
door open. And then I just had the screen. So
I had the screen door which was closed, but the
actual door was open. So I let the air flow in.
(10:59):
And I'm on my life and I'm neck deep trying
to find crap that I think is somewhat interesting that
you might be interested in, right, And it's like I
have to be interested. You have to be interested, otherwise
we're totally screwed. So why is this night different from
all other nights? So I'm throwing down bullet points as
I like to do for the Malor monologues. I am
(11:19):
minding my own business. I'm in my own world. I
got the TV going, I'm watching the game. There was
a Phillies Rockies game. That's the game I was watching. No,
I'm a loser watching a Phillies Rockies game. So I'm
watching that and I hear this sound and it sounded
like something was gearing up, and I knew Moxy was outside,
(11:42):
but I didn't really think much about it. I wonder
what that is, and then I thought, well, maybe there
was some kind of rodent that came in the yard
there behind the Malor mansion, and Mox was just going
to attack the rodent and that would be that.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
So I'm focused, but I hear.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
This kind of in the background, and then I hear
a couple of steps, and then I hear nothing, and
then okay, that's probably it.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
That's just over.
Speaker 3 (12:06):
And again I'm just doing my thing, and then again
I hear the same thing, like i'd something gearing up
to attack like maybe Moxie was getting to attack, getting
ready to attack something. It's got kind of heavy breathings,
the sighing's going on, and I'm like, okay, well, you
know again, I'm not just kind of my peripheral hearing.
I'm not really focused on that. And I'm putting the
(12:27):
bullets together for the monologue and just doing my thing,
and all of a sudden, like a police battering ram.
Next thing I know, I'm in a movie and ca boom,
car boom. My friend who I let outside on the
(12:52):
chance that she would go ones and twos, My friend Moxy.
Hand to god, I'm not making this up for the podcast,
crashed through the screen, breaking the screen door like a
picture shaped cartoon mascot known as the kool Aid Man.
(13:14):
The only thing she didn't do was shout oh yeah
as she came through. But I'm telling you, she bulldozed
her way into the house like a freaking wrecking ball.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
And my favorite part.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Of it is not only that, because it's ridiculous that
she just was so desperate to get back in that
she just slammed through the freaking screen, But then she
took one look at me. She was very proud of
herself like a peacock with his feathers out. She took
a look at me, kind of gave me the eye,
and then she was so exhausted because she's out of shape,
(13:49):
she laid down for a nap right in front of me, like, hey, sucker, Yeah,
you're not going to keep me out of here now, sucker.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
It was. It was hilarious.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
That is my story of the week, the one and
only mocks the Tales from the mox.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
If you will now turning the page on that I
did want to mention and this is old guy podcast.
This is what I'm about to do is old guy podcast.
I didn't mention this on the radio, so I think
I might have, in passing brought it up at.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
One point or another.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
But I wanted to spend a few good minutes with
a tip of the headphones, a tip of the microphone
to someone in my youth that I watched a lot
and enjoyed the art that they provided.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
And they left this mortal coil this week. And it's
not Jim Ursay, although he passed away.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
The story here is about a gentleman named George Went,
a beloved member of the Hollywood community who for me
as a kid, one of my favorite shows to watch
was the calm Cheers.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And I grew up in an era we didn't have
the little social media.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
And all that, so in order to get entertainment, we
watched television. And when I was a little kid, we
only had like eight channels or something like that before
cable really took off and on and b see, Cheers
was a very important show. We watched it every week.
Everyone talked about Cheers and all that. My parents liked it.
(15:25):
We all watched it and George Went was the character
known as Norm Peterson. If you didn't watch.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
The show and you don't know what the hell it is,
doesn't mean anything to.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
You, But to me, it was kind of a cool
deal because he was a fat guy, and I was
a big kid growing up.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
I was, hey, this guy's on TV.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
You looks kind of overweight, a little disheveled every day,
and so I fell out a rabbit hole. When someone
passes away, if I don't know them, but I know
of them, I try to soak in as much knowledge
because the further you get away from the person dying,
the less stuff that's out there, and it's fresh and
you want to learn these things, and so I started
(16:04):
going down a rabbit hole, and I wanted to share
some of the things that I found with you from
my sojourn down.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
The rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Is it true that the iconic actor George went that
his character Noorn Peterson was initially intended to have just
a single line in the pilot for the show.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
However, upon further review, upon further.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Review, after the producers and the audience, they did the
testing and all that stuff, they determined that wait a minute,
this is like the everyman like, this is the relatable guy,
and George Wentz character instead of having just a single
line in the pilot episode and that's it, he became
central figures in an ensemble cast, but appeared in two
(16:54):
hundred and seventy five all two hundred and seventy five
episodes of that that show. There's There's a gentleman we
had on this podcast a while back who's a friend
of mine. We did some radio stuff together back in
the day, and he was one of the writers on
Cheers and and has had some great stories to tell me.
(17:15):
I don't think it was here, but about working on
that show and some of the things that happened, and
it was great, and George Went was a decorated actor.
He won six consecutive Primetime Emmy nominations for Outstanding Supporting
Actor because of because of Cheers, and they even tossed
(17:36):
his real life wife on the show. His real life
wife was the voice of Norm's wife, never seen on camera,
never seen on camera, but was was mentioned, right, It
was mentioned on a a semi regular regular basis, right,
(17:58):
And so there was that. Now you had also the
academic part of George Went. He attended Notre Dame right
junior year Notre Dame. His GPA was very relatable. It
was zero point zero zero was his GPA, and yeah,
(18:22):
in that wild Yeah. So he transferred to a school
in can City, Can City, where he completed a degree
in economics.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
So there's some ties there.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
And of course we do some fun stuff in Kansas
City as well, and he was like acting on stage
and all that stuff. He did a bunch of animation
George Went. He did animated versions of Norm Peterson on
The Simpsons and Family Guy and all that stuff. So,
(18:56):
and there's also clearly a sports tie, as he was
on Saturday Night Live and one of the great characters
in the history of Saturday Night Live. George Went was
a lifelong fan of Dump Bears, the Chicago Bears and
had a passion for Chicago sports and that was a
part of.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
His personality and all that.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
And the most famous character outside of Norm Peterson was
in the early nineties.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
On Saturday Night Live.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
It was George Went sitting around as the original super
fan sketch on Saturday Night Live in nineteen ninety one
and just a group of stereotypical sausage eating beer drinking
Bears fans obsessing over Dump Bears and the coach Mike Ditka,
(19:53):
and he played this character, Bob Swirsky, and it was
it was outsetting in fact, that bit. It was so
amazing that it was supposed to be made into a movie,
and as I remember hearing the story, there was something
that happened that screwed that up.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
But it was going to be in the movie.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
And didn't quite didn't quite work out. So anyway, he
was a fan of the Cubs and all the Chicago teams.
In fact, he did celebrate at Wrigley Field as saying
them take me out to the ball game because of
Harry Carey and all that he was a big part
of Chicago sports. So rest in peace. Rest in peace
(20:36):
to the late great George went I know him as
Norm Peterson, the Great Norm Peterson. All right, time now
for the phrase of the week, the phrase of the week.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
And here's the phrase of the week.
Speaker 3 (20:54):
The phrase of the week is to call a spade
a spade. Yes, the expression to call a spade a spade.
Now that means to speak plainly and directly about something,
even if it's unpleasant and impolite. We've heard this phrase.
I use the phrase, let's call a spade a spade.
(21:14):
So the phrase actually comes from ancient Greece. It's an
expression to call a fig a fig was the original phrase,
and it comes from a Greek philosopher there in the
early sixteenth century of the phrase was translated and to
call a ho a hoe, as in a shovel, the
(21:37):
English version which was translated in fifteen forty two, where
hoe was translated to spade, because that was a common
digging tool for the English. So you have this all
kind of moving around and all that stuff. And so
to call a spade a spade has.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Its roots in ancient Greece.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
It passed through Latin and it became a popular phrase
in the fifteen hundreds, and it has always been about
keeping it real.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Man.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
We got to keep it real, is what we gotta do.
We gotta keep it real. So there the phrase of
the week, to call a spade a spade. And now
time for some foody fun. That's right, foody fun, because
we all have to eat, the one common denominator that
(22:37):
we all have unless we're not around, we have to eat.
We have to have to eat, otherwise we're in trouble.
Some of the items I saw this week that I
thought we're interesting that it would like to share with you.
If you are in a region of the company that
has Jack in the Box, what's in the box? Jack
(22:58):
in the Box free the onion rings with a one
dollar purchase. So if you're a frugal connoisseur of food,
of course, all this crap is on the app. If
you're a fan of Windy's, we know we have the
Windy's guy in Minnesota who's a big fan of the show.
Windy's planning their fast food expansion into Poland. Because if
(23:19):
there's one thing the people of Poland need that would
make their life complete, it's fried chicken sandwiches, square burgers.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
What more could you need?
Speaker 3 (23:28):
But they're head into Poland Dominoes has served up for
a limited time. This is in Australia, a meat pie
crust pizza.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Say what.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Yes, this does not look very delicious at all. The
crust features Domino's classic dough embedded with many Australian meat
pies around the pizza's edge and it's there. It's a
cross promotion because I guess for our friends in Australia,
it's Australian soccer season or footy season as they call it.
(24:09):
So this, yeah, this does not look palatable to me.
But if you're in Australia and you're interested in that,
and these things are regional items that if they sell
well and they can test them out in the US
and they come to they come to the States and
then then the next thing you know, to that we're off.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
We're off to the races.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
The flag is up, as we like to say, the
flag is uh, Little Caesars testing a new Artistan style pizza.
They're testing this. If you're in Albertquerque, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Charleston,
West Virginia, Green Bay, or Appleton Hey, my brother, I
(24:50):
have to contact my brother el Central, California and Yuma, Arizona.
You have a chance to test out the artisan style Little.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Caesars Pizzazza pizza.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Yeah, you can shake Shack welcoming Fried Pickles. That's very
important for alf the Alien opinter, So make sure to
make it to shake Shack. The new Fried Pickles the
chain's first ever additional side since it went from a
hot dog cart to a permanent location in Madison Square Park.
(25:21):
I've actually been to the original shake Shack. Fun fact.
Fun fact, fun fact, fun fact. When that started one
of my trips to New York, my brother said, oh man,
this is this amazing burger place.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
You got to try it. So we went over there
and had shake Shack at.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
The original location before before they became this monstrosity that
is everywhere.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
But it started out as just a shack that and
how was the other.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
God, there's a there's a Mediterranean restaurant that started on
my brother's street, right like right next to my brother street. God,
what is the name of it. I forget the name
of it, but there's a It's in New York City.
It's all over the place, and I forget the name,
so it's really no good, and I know I'm gonna
I'm gonna remember the name about a second after I
(26:09):
turned the mic off, which is gonna suck. But that's
the way this works. I can't think of it at
this point, but I know I can kind of see it. Yeah,
what else do we have? Burger King that's a whopper
launched how to Train your Dragon menu featuring dragon flame
grilled whopper.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Who else?
Speaker 3 (26:31):
What else you have Fiery Dragon mozzarella fries and more
available for a limited time that does not start until
May twenty seventh, So today is the twenty third, so
you can do the math on that.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
So next week you.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Can have your dream come true with a dragon flame
grilled whopper. Very very important, very very important, unless unless
it's not, yeah, exactly all right, we'll get out on that.
Have a great rest of your Friday, and appreciate you
(27:08):
listening to this podcast.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Danny should be with me over.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
The weekend, and we're very very happy that you're tuning
in and being part of the show.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
And enjoy the day.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
I'm looking forward to watching that Nick Pacers game Gape
two tonight from the Garden in Manhattan. And we'll talk
to you next time Later. Skater who austa pasta?
Speaker 1 (27:32):
I like the extended winner, got a murder.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I gotta go.
Kubbooms.
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 sol 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 3 (00:29):
In the air everywhere. The Fifth Hour with Me, Ben
Mallor and Danny g Radio. Happy Friday to you. It
is the twenty third day of the month of May
and the last Friday Pod before we head to Van
Vancouver for the Malor Meet and Greet.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Hopefully you'll be able to make it.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
If you're in British Columbia, somewhere in Western Canada or
in the Pacific Northwest, come out say hello. All the
details all the information available on the Instagram page Ben
Maller on Fox the Facebook page Ben Maler Show. The
Malar Meet and Greet is coming up on Thursday the
twenty ninth, Unless my flight gets canceled.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Thursday of the.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Twenty ninth Malor Meet and Greet in Vancouver, we'll spend
the weekend there, have a great time. Cannot wait to
check out your fine city. It is going to be
a glorious time. Didn't want to mention today is a
melanancholy day. Is Lucky Penny Day, as in the penny
(01:33):
from kind of like benny versus the penny and all that.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
Now.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
I wanted to bring this up because the news out
this week and I think it's been confirmed, but who knows.
There's been rumors on this for a while. The US
will stop putting new pennies into circulation by early twenty
twenty six. You have got to be kiddy me uh
oh spaghettio. Yeah, Businesses will need to start rounding up
(01:57):
or down to the nearest five cents. There was a
statement made by the US Treasury this week. The penny
currently cost four cents to make, so cutting production is
set to save a bunch of money, which is appropriate.
This being Lucky Penny Day, the news would come out
(02:19):
and we're not sure how the Lucky Penny Day started.
We do know some fun facts about the penny. It
started in seven seven fifty seven AD. The very first
pennies were minted during the reign of OFA and Marcia
in Anglo Saxon, England, and then in seventeen ninety three
(02:41):
the first pennies were minted in America. Benjamin Franklin supposedly
designed the first pennies. Eighteen fifty seven the penny was
resized in America, and over the last number of years
it's been pointed out how expensive it is for the
penny to be made. A couple of years back, there
was a story that for eighty million dollars worth of pennies,
(03:03):
it cost one hundred and thirty four million. Gave you
the new numbers here. A penny currently cost four cents
to make. So bye bye penny, but not necessarily bye
bye benny versus the penny. As that iconic TV show
not quite done yet.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
We'll see what happens.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It's up to the good folks over there at NBC's
side whether or not the TV show will have a
longer lifespan than the actual penny. So stay tuned. Inquiring
minds would like to know. But on with the show
we go. On this podcast, we have the surprise cartoon
(03:44):
mascot Storm and Norman and the phrase.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Of the work.
Speaker 3 (03:51):
But we'll begin with this so not so very long ago,
in a kingdom not listing on any map. We went
to the dogs. Because we are suckers for positive feedback.
We do this podcast every weekend, and by request, we
bring you more tales from the Mox, Tales from the Mox,
(04:13):
the files of the Mox. Moxie my dog. Sarah in Minnesota,
who's not the normal. I don't think that's the normal
Sarah that we know, who I met at the Mala
meet and greet there in Minnesota a couple years ago.
But Sarah Minnesota, Lisa in Arizona, and some guy named
Dennis in Ohio, which is.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Kind of a big state, so is Arizona.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
But Arizona's like pretty much here in Phoenix, Tucson or Flagstaff, right,
it's pretty much it the greater Phoenix area of flag Staff, Tuson, Ohio.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
You could be where. You could be in Cleveland, you
could be.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
In Cincinnati, Columbus. You know, there's a few places you
could be in Ohio. Anyway, all of them reached out
and said they enjoyed these stories last week about what
was really one story about Mox. And so here we
are again and I will regale you with another story
because some of you like this, and even if it's
(05:06):
only for Sarah, Lisa and Dennis and that's it, we'll
do it for them. The glamours, the glamours of an
exciting rock star life doing overnight talk radio, being a
professional gas back.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
This job is not that easy. This job is not
so we just take it one show at a time. Right.
We go out there, we do each hour.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
We have sixty minutes of content and we just try
to do good radio.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Right.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
There's no easy radio in overnight talk radio, and you
cannot afford to look past any individual segment.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
I think I got all the cliches, right, I think
I did. I get it, I got most of them.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
So nonetheless, getting ready for the show, as I imagine
you are, we are all wired the same way.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
We're hardwired.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
We have routine, and who doesn't like I like poutine
and I like routine. And next week we'll be in
Canada for the Malor Meet and Greet. We're looking forward
to that. It can be a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Hopefully I'll be able to meet you.
Speaker 3 (06:08):
If you're in the Vancouver area or British Columbia, or
if you want to drive over from another part in Canada,
come say hello and very excited to meet you.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
And also if you're in the Pacific Northwest.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Details on a previous edition of this podcast, but also
available on my Facebook page and the Instagram page. You
can find all of that information there. The Instagram page
Ben Mahler on Fox, the Facebook page Ben malor Show,
two different pages, two different names, and all that. So
get back to the story, please, So the Glamour's Life
(06:42):
of overnight talk radio doing my thing, creature of habit,
and I have my routine, which is not poutine. It's
endlessly looking for things that get my blood flowing. Now
years ago on this podcast, we had one of the
iconic broadcasters of all time, a Hall of Fame Brent Mussburger.
You're looking alive Brent Musburger, who gave some advice, not
(07:09):
on this podcast, but he gives some advice and I
read it somewhere along the way. He said, the key
to life is to stay interested.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Well, it's also the.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Key if you have to do four monologues, which are
each about fifteen minutes, sometimes longer, sometimes less. But if
you have to do those monologues, you got to stay interested.
You can't really fake it till you'll make it, and
you can't fake it till you make it, and all
that stuff, and so passing the test of time and
doing this for a long time my goal every year.
(07:37):
The hardest part of the show, and I've talked about
this to you in the past. To me, the hardest
part of the show is getting the show ready. It's practice,
not a game. We in here talking about practice, if
you will. And so the way I go about it
my ingredients that I get to make the show. And
(07:58):
again I've discussed this, but there's new people listening, and
if not, we're totally porked. So the way I approached this,
if you were to drop into the Malor mansion, most days,
not not all days, there's some days are different. But
most days you'll find me sitting casually on the sofa,
laptop open seventeen to twenty five web pages open, scanning
(08:23):
RSS feeds, and futzing around on some of the dark
corners of the dark web. As I am surfing around
the same way I did for many many years at
my website. I don't do that anymore, but I have
the same tools that I used back then. I just
do it for the radio show to try to find
(08:44):
things that interest me, because, as Musburger said, stay interesting.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
You can't just do monologues and you don't care.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
And that becomes problematic because some days there's not a
lot going on. Now, while I am readily working away
with my laptop, my right hand, as I like to say,
is getting a workout back and forth. I got usually
two or three games in my rotation. This time of
(09:12):
the year. It's a lot of baseball and then the
basketball game. So I'll go to baseball one basketball. Don't
tell anyone, and certainly don't tell Eddie, my old buddy,
Eddie Garcia.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
But occasionally I will mix a hockey game in.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
We don't talk about hockey, but occasionally I'll mix a
hockey game in if the baseball is not that good.
In the basketball game is a blowout. So keep in mind,
this is a story about mox my dog, Moxie erf erf.
While this is going on, my partner in crime. My
wife's at work, she's doing her thing, and so Moxie
(09:46):
is with me, our beloved English bulldog. And Moxie is wonderful.
She's also a fat bulldog. She's so fat. In fact,
she's not even fat She's strong, but she's so big
she cannot fit through the doggy door that we put in,
which was designed for my previous dog, the late Great Bella,
and Bella was a wonderful dog also, so Bella passed
(10:08):
away we got Moxie. And Bella is a very little dog.
Moxie gigantic. Right, Moxie is the round mound of dog town.
And so instead of just having her go out the
doggy door, I have to let her get busy on
the ones and the twos, right, the ones and the
twos every so often so she can go the ones.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
And it is so this time of the year, it's May.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
The weather's nice these days, and so I made an
editorial decision that I would take advantage of the great
weather and the nice air, good temperature where we do
the show from. And so I decided to leave the
door open. And then I just had the screen. So
I had the screen door which was closed, but the
actual door was open. So I let the air flow in.
(10:59):
And I'm on my life and I'm neck deep trying
to find crap that I think is somewhat interesting that
you might be interested in, right, And it's like I
have to be interested. You have to be interested, otherwise
we're totally screwed. So why is this night different from
all other nights? So I'm throwing down bullet points as
I like to do for the Malor monologues. I am
(11:19):
minding my own business. I'm in my own world. I
got the TV going, I'm watching the game. There was
a Phillies Rockies game. That's the game I was watching. No,
I'm a loser watching a Phillies Rockies game. So I'm
watching that and I hear this sound and it sounded
like something was gearing up, and I knew Moxy was outside,
(11:42):
but I didn't really think much about it. I wonder
what that is, and then I thought, well, maybe there
was some kind of rodent that came in the yard
there behind the Malor mansion, and Mox was just going
to attack the rodent and that would be that.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
So I'm focused, but I hear.
Speaker 3 (11:58):
This kind of in the background, and then I hear
a couple of steps, and then I hear nothing, and
then okay, that's probably it.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
That's just over.
Speaker 3 (12:06):
And again I'm just doing my thing, and then again
I hear the same thing, like i'd something gearing up
to attack like maybe Moxie was getting to attack, getting
ready to attack something. It's got kind of heavy breathings,
the sighing's going on, and I'm like, okay, well, you
know again, I'm not just kind of my peripheral hearing.
I'm not really focused on that. And I'm putting the
(12:27):
bullets together for the monologue and just doing my thing,
and all of a sudden, like a police battering ram.
Next thing I know, I'm in a movie and ca boom,
car boom. My friend who I let outside on the
(12:52):
chance that she would go ones and twos, My friend Moxy.
Hand to god, I'm not making this up for the podcast,
crashed through the screen, breaking the screen door like a
picture shaped cartoon mascot known as the kool Aid Man.
(13:14):
The only thing she didn't do was shout oh yeah
as she came through. But I'm telling you, she bulldozed
her way into the house like a freaking wrecking ball.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
And my favorite part.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
Of it is not only that, because it's ridiculous that
she just was so desperate to get back in that
she just slammed through the freaking screen, But then she
took one look at me. She was very proud of
herself like a peacock with his feathers out. She took
a look at me, kind of gave me the eye,
and then she was so exhausted because she's out of shape,
(13:49):
she laid down for a nap right in front of me, like, hey, sucker, Yeah,
you're not going to keep me out of here now, sucker.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
It was. It was hilarious.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
That is my story of the week, the one and
only mocks the Tales from the mox.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
If you will now turning the page on that I
did want to mention and this is old guy podcast.
This is what I'm about to do is old guy podcast.
I didn't mention this on the radio, so I think
I might have, in passing brought it up at.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
One point or another.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
But I wanted to spend a few good minutes with
a tip of the headphones, a tip of the microphone
to someone in my youth that I watched a lot
and enjoyed the art that they provided.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
And they left this mortal coil this week. And it's
not Jim Ursay, although he passed away.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
The story here is about a gentleman named George Went,
a beloved member of the Hollywood community who for me
as a kid, one of my favorite shows to watch
was the calm Cheers.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And I grew up in an era we didn't have
the little social media.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
And all that, so in order to get entertainment, we
watched television. And when I was a little kid, we
only had like eight channels or something like that before
cable really took off and on and b see, Cheers
was a very important show. We watched it every week.
Everyone talked about Cheers and all that. My parents liked it.
(15:25):
We all watched it and George Went was the character
known as Norm Peterson. If you didn't watch.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
The show and you don't know what the hell it is,
doesn't mean anything to.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
You, But to me, it was kind of a cool
deal because he was a fat guy, and I was
a big kid growing up.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
I was, hey, this guy's on TV.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
You looks kind of overweight, a little disheveled every day,
and so I fell out a rabbit hole. When someone
passes away, if I don't know them, but I know
of them, I try to soak in as much knowledge
because the further you get away from the person dying,
the less stuff that's out there, and it's fresh and
you want to learn these things, and so I started
(16:04):
going down a rabbit hole, and I wanted to share
some of the things that I found with you from
my sojourn down.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
The rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Is it true that the iconic actor George went that
his character Noorn Peterson was initially intended to have just
a single line in the pilot for the show.
Speaker 1 (16:27):
However, upon further review, upon further.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Review, after the producers and the audience, they did the
testing and all that stuff, they determined that wait a minute,
this is like the everyman like, this is the relatable guy,
and George Wentz character instead of having just a single
line in the pilot episode and that's it, he became
central figures in an ensemble cast, but appeared in two
(16:54):
hundred and seventy five all two hundred and seventy five
episodes of that that show. There's There's a gentleman we
had on this podcast a while back who's a friend
of mine. We did some radio stuff together back in
the day, and he was one of the writers on
Cheers and and has had some great stories to tell me.
(17:15):
I don't think it was here, but about working on
that show and some of the things that happened, and
it was great, and George Went was a decorated actor.
He won six consecutive Primetime Emmy nominations for Outstanding Supporting
Actor because of because of Cheers, and they even tossed
(17:36):
his real life wife on the show. His real life
wife was the voice of Norm's wife, never seen on camera,
never seen on camera, but was was mentioned, right, It
was mentioned on a a semi regular regular basis, right,
(17:58):
And so there was that. Now you had also the
academic part of George Went. He attended Notre Dame right
junior year Notre Dame. His GPA was very relatable. It
was zero point zero zero was his GPA, and yeah,
(18:22):
in that wild Yeah. So he transferred to a school
in can City, Can City, where he completed a degree
in economics.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
So there's some ties there.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
And of course we do some fun stuff in Kansas
City as well, and he was like acting on stage
and all that stuff. He did a bunch of animation
George Went. He did animated versions of Norm Peterson on
The Simpsons and Family Guy and all that stuff. So,
(18:56):
and there's also clearly a sports tie, as he was
on Saturday Night Live and one of the great characters
in the history of Saturday Night Live. George Went was
a lifelong fan of Dump Bears, the Chicago Bears and
had a passion for Chicago sports and that was a
part of.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
His personality and all that.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
And the most famous character outside of Norm Peterson was
in the early nineties.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
On Saturday Night Live.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
It was George Went sitting around as the original super
fan sketch on Saturday Night Live in nineteen ninety one
and just a group of stereotypical sausage eating beer drinking
Bears fans obsessing over Dump Bears and the coach Mike Ditka,
(19:53):
and he played this character, Bob Swirsky, and it was
it was outsetting in fact, that bit. It was so
amazing that it was supposed to be made into a movie,
and as I remember hearing the story, there was something
that happened that screwed that up.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
But it was going to be in the movie.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
And didn't quite didn't quite work out. So anyway, he
was a fan of the Cubs and all the Chicago teams.
In fact, he did celebrate at Wrigley Field as saying
them take me out to the ball game because of
Harry Carey and all that he was a big part
of Chicago sports. So rest in peace. Rest in peace
(20:36):
to the late great George went I know him as
Norm Peterson, the Great Norm Peterson. All right, time now
for the phrase of the week, the phrase of the week.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
And here's the phrase of the week.
Speaker 3 (20:54):
The phrase of the week is to call a spade
a spade. Yes, the expression to call a spade a spade.
Now that means to speak plainly and directly about something,
even if it's unpleasant and impolite. We've heard this phrase.
I use the phrase, let's call a spade a spade.
(21:14):
So the phrase actually comes from ancient Greece. It's an
expression to call a fig a fig was the original phrase,
and it comes from a Greek philosopher there in the
early sixteenth century of the phrase was translated and to
call a ho a hoe, as in a shovel, the
(21:37):
English version which was translated in fifteen forty two, where
hoe was translated to spade, because that was a common
digging tool for the English. So you have this all
kind of moving around and all that stuff. And so
to call a spade a spade has.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Its roots in ancient Greece.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
It passed through Latin and it became a popular phrase
in the fifteen hundreds, and it has always been about
keeping it real.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
Man.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
We got to keep it real, is what we gotta do.
We gotta keep it real. So there the phrase of
the week, to call a spade a spade. And now
time for some foody fun. That's right, foody fun, because
we all have to eat, the one common denominator that
(22:37):
we all have unless we're not around, we have to eat.
We have to have to eat, otherwise we're in trouble.
Some of the items I saw this week that I
thought we're interesting that it would like to share with you.
If you are in a region of the company that
has Jack in the Box, what's in the box? Jack
(22:58):
in the Box free the onion rings with a one
dollar purchase. So if you're a frugal connoisseur of food,
of course, all this crap is on the app. If
you're a fan of Windy's, we know we have the
Windy's guy in Minnesota who's a big fan of the show.
Windy's planning their fast food expansion into Poland. Because if
(23:19):
there's one thing the people of Poland need that would
make their life complete, it's fried chicken sandwiches, square burgers.
Speaker 1 (23:27):
What more could you need?
Speaker 3 (23:28):
But they're head into Poland Dominoes has served up for
a limited time. This is in Australia, a meat pie
crust pizza.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Say what.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Yes, this does not look very delicious at all. The
crust features Domino's classic dough embedded with many Australian meat
pies around the pizza's edge and it's there. It's a
cross promotion because I guess for our friends in Australia,
it's Australian soccer season or footy season as they call it.
(24:09):
So this, yeah, this does not look palatable to me.
But if you're in Australia and you're interested in that,
and these things are regional items that if they sell
well and they can test them out in the US
and they come to they come to the States and
then then the next thing you know, to that we're off.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
We're off to the races.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
The flag is up, as we like to say, the
flag is uh, Little Caesars testing a new Artistan style pizza.
They're testing this. If you're in Albertquerque, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Charleston,
West Virginia, Green Bay, or Appleton Hey, my brother, I
(24:50):
have to contact my brother el Central, California and Yuma, Arizona.
You have a chance to test out the artisan style Little.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Caesars Pizzazza pizza.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Yeah, you can shake Shack welcoming Fried Pickles. That's very
important for alf the Alien opinter, So make sure to
make it to shake Shack. The new Fried Pickles the
chain's first ever additional side since it went from a
hot dog cart to a permanent location in Madison Square Park.
(25:21):
I've actually been to the original shake Shack. Fun fact.
Fun fact, fun fact, fun fact. When that started one
of my trips to New York, my brother said, oh man,
this is this amazing burger place.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
You got to try it. So we went over there
and had shake Shack at.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
The original location before before they became this monstrosity that
is everywhere.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
But it started out as just a shack that and
how was the other.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
God, there's a there's a Mediterranean restaurant that started on
my brother's street, right like right next to my brother street. God,
what is the name of it. I forget the name
of it, but there's a It's in New York City.
It's all over the place, and I forget the name,
so it's really no good, and I know I'm gonna
I'm gonna remember the name about a second after I
(26:09):
turned the mic off, which is gonna suck. But that's
the way this works. I can't think of it at
this point, but I know I can kind of see it. Yeah,
what else do we have? Burger King that's a whopper
launched how to Train your Dragon menu featuring dragon flame
grilled whopper.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Who else?
Speaker 3 (26:31):
What else you have Fiery Dragon mozzarella fries and more
available for a limited time that does not start until
May twenty seventh, So today is the twenty third, so
you can do the math on that.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
So next week you.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Can have your dream come true with a dragon flame
grilled whopper. Very very important, very very important, unless unless
it's not, yeah, exactly all right, we'll get out on that.
Have a great rest of your Friday, and appreciate you
(27:08):
listening to this podcast.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Danny should be with me over.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
The weekend, and we're very very happy that you're tuning
in and being part of the show.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
And enjoy the day.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
I'm looking forward to watching that Nick Pacers game Gape
two tonight from the Garden in Manhattan. And we'll talk
to you next time Later. Skater who austa pasta?
Speaker 1 (27:32):
I like the extended winner, got a murder.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
I gotta go.
Host
Ben Maller
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