'Wait Wait' for Feb. 19, 2022: With Not My Job guest Marlon James
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON, BYLINE: The following program was taped before an audience of no one.
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BILL KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. There's nothing seedy about an under-Billy (ph). I'm Bill Kurtis. And here's your host...
(LAUGHTER)
KURTIS: ...A man celebrating three days without a workplace injury, Peter Sagal.
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PETER SAGAL, HOST:
Thank you, Bill. Thanks once again to our fake audience. Later on, we're going to be talking to author Marlon James, who's written an epic fantasy series based on African folklore. You need to read them now so by the time the inevitable HBO series comes out, you're ready to be insufferable about how the books were better.
We want to get your comments on our source material, so give us a call. The number is 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Now, let's welcome our first listener contestant.
Hi. You're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
FRED DINWIDDIE: Hello. This is Fred Dinwiddie (ph).
SAGAL: Hi, Fred. Where are you calling from?
DINWIDDIE: Bradyville, Tenn.
SAGAL: And what do you do there, sir?
DINWIDDIE: Well, right now for cash - well, for cash flow, I'm a temporary worker for an international warehouse.
SAGAL: Yeah.
DINWIDDIE: And also a - since we moved to a really rural area on 17 acres, trying to establish a permaculture farm.
SAGAL: Well, that's great.
KURTIS: Peter, I'd like to jump in for a moment...
SAGAL: Go ahead.
KURTIS: ...'Cause I'm taken with Fred. I'd like to get his email and build an entire podcast around that voice and that accent.
DINWIDDIE: Oh (laughter).
KURTIS: You...
SAGAL: It is something.
NEGIN FARSAD: (Laughter).
SAGAL: I mean, I guess it's agriculture's gain, sir, but it is voiceovers lost.
DINWIDDIE: Well. Well...
KURTIS: You can do both, Fred.
DINWIDDIE: Well, I hear that all the time about my voice, and I don't really understand that. But I'm pursuing - I'm studying guitar, and I'm near Nashville, so.
SAGAL: Yeah. Well, Fred, it is a pleasure. It is literally a pleasure to talk to you.
DINWIDDIE: Oh, well, thank you.
SAGAL: But let me introduce you to our panel. First, comedian and host of the podcast "Fake The Nation." You can see her at Purdue University in Indianapolis on March 1, Negin Farsad.
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FARSAD: Hey, Fred. How's it going?
DINWIDDIE: I'm fine. How are you?
SAGAL: Next, an actor and writer who'll be appearing in the upcoming play "Good Night, Oscar," starring Sean Hayes at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago March 12 through April 17. It's Peter Grosz.
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PETER GROSZ: Hi, Fred.
DINWIDDIE: Hi, Peter.
SAGAL: And making her debut on our panel, she's a writer for Adult Swim's "Alabama Jackson," which premiered this week on YouTube, and she's the host of the podcast "TV, I Say." It's Ashley Ray.
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ASHLEY RAY: Hello. Hi, Fred. With that voice, please tell me about your acreage any time.
FARSAD: (Laughter).
DINWIDDIE: Well, hi, Ashley. Well, I'm on Facebook, so.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Oh, OK.
RAY: OK.
SAGAL: Well, welcome to the show, Fred. You're going to play Who's Bill This Time? Bill Kurtis is going to read you three quotations from this week's news. If you can correctly identify or explain two of them, you'll win our prize - any voice from our show you might choose on your voicemail. You ready to go?
DINWIDDIE: Sure.
SAGAL: OK, here's your first quote.
KURTIS: Let's snow for the gold.
SAGAL: That was one of Elite Daily's 35 captions guaranteed to get you Instagram likes when you are posting about what big event that wraps up this weekend?
DINWIDDIE: The Olympics.
SAGAL: The Olympics.
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SAGAL: That's right, Fred.
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SAGAL: The 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics are coming to a close. It was an amazing, thrilling Olympics, especially for the 18 people who actually watched it 'cause they will be able to lord it over the rest of us forever. There was drama, victory, heartbreak. For example - this is true - a skier was a shoo-in for the gold medal when he suddenly went the wrong way.
GROSZ: Uphill?
SAGAL: Well, he wasn't a downhill skier, but wouldn't it have been cool if he were? Well, OK, I guess they want me to climb back up. That's new. Did you guys watch the Olympics at all?
GROSZ: No.
RAY: Oh, absolutely not. I really just consider it the thing that interrupts new episodes of comedy TV. Like, that's - I'm like, where are the new episodes of things? And then it's like, oh, the Olympics is happening.
SAGAL: Right. And they're not very funny, I can't help but notice.
RAY: No.
FARSAD: No.
SAGAL: It was a very strange Olympics to watch because once again, there were no crowds in all the stadiums because of COVID. This was the Olympics for you if you like watching sports with an audience that's just other athletes texting.
GROSZ: It's like an improv show.
RAY: (Laughter).
SAGAL: A little bit.
FARSAD: (Laughter).
SAGAL: So few people watched these Olympics, in fact, we could just make up things that you missed. Oh, man, I loved how this time, in 2022, they combined biathlon with ski jump. They just sat at the bottom of the jump with their rifles, aimed them upwards and yelled, pull.
(LAUGHTER)
RAY: Yeah.
FARSAD: Wait. Can I just say, though, they are so dangerous. And just as a mother, I want all of these athletes to, like, turn in their skis for something a little safe - for, like, a nice sport of walking or something.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: Like, it is so dangerous the way they are flying through the air and going at high speeds. And I don't need it. I'm very worried about all of them.
RAY: I'd like to see them introduce something like winter ultimate frisbee, just things that are a little more fun, casual to watch.
FARSAD: Yes...
RAY: I'm not terrified.
FARSAD: ...Winter, like, keep yourself up on your tiptoes for a long time. Like, something - you know, like, let's innovate these sports.
SAGAL: You realize you're basically describing curling, you realize.
FARSAD: I'm OK with curling. Yeah, yeah.
RAY: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
SAGAL: There you go. All right, Fred, here is your next quote.
KURTIS: I love truckers.
SAGAL: That was a sign held by a man supporting the truckers who were protesting where?
DINWIDDIE: Would it be Ottawa, Canada?
SAGAL: Yes, Canada, sir.
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SAGAL: You got it.
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SAGAL: The great Canadian trucker convoy protest had made its way across Canada and completely shut down the capital. It's historic, both as an act of protest and because it's the first time anybody ever has said the words, yes, we made it to Ottawa.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: They made this journey from British Columbia to Ottawa to protest vaccine mandates, but they also brought an essential, much needed shipment of fresh COVID to the city.
(LAUGHTER)
GROSZ: You know what's kind of brilliant is, like, that a giant 18-wheeler or 50 or 100 - however many 18-wheelers - I was listening to a story that said you can't tow them because it takes an hour just to hook up the tow. So even if the cops...
SAGAL: Right.
GROSZ: ...Were like, all right, let's clear it out of here, they'd just be like, no. And there's nothing they can do about it.
SAGAL: There's also - it does suggest a great way to park wherever you want in the city. Just drive an 18-wheeler. You know, park wherever you like.
GROSZ: Yeah.
SAGAL: You know you'll be done with your meal before they ever tow it away. You're golden.
FARSAD: But I think one thing that you're not mentioning is that Trudeau also used this opportunity to unveil to the world his new haircut.
SAGAL: I did not notice his new haircut, Negin. Tell me all about it.
FARSAD: He's doing like a Justin Bieber 2015 kind of, like, swoop, longer-on-one-side thing. And I feel like maybe this whole thing was just an elaborate excuse for him to show off his coif (ph).
RAY: (Laughter).
SAGAL: Now, one of the things that helped bring this protest to the end was a group called the Ram Ranch Resistance. Well, what's that you ask? Well...
GROSZ: It sounds like a (unintelligible).
SAGAL: ...They infiltrated the convoy's online planning meetings. They kind of Zoom bombed them. And they repeatedly played this 2012 heavy metal song "Ram Ranch," which is about, quote, "18 naked cowboys and the extremely graphic things they do to each other." And look. That might've been funny the first time, but the more they played the song, the funnier it got.
All right. Fred, your last quote is from the owner of a Mexican restaurant who's started making his guacamole with zucchini.
KURTIS: You have to tell people it's not guacamole.
SAGAL: This guy had to do this not because he's some sort of sadist, but thanks to a new ban on the importation of what?
DINWIDDIE: That would be avocados.
SAGAL: It would be, Fred.
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SAGAL: Avocados.
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SAGAL: Americans have banned the importation of avocados from Mexico. Yes. You know what this means? Without avocado toast to tempt them, millennials will finally be able to buy a house.
GROSZ: (Laughter).
SAGAL: The U.S. has...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...Blocked a shipment of avocados from Mexico after a threat was made against an American avocado inspector there. Yes, avocado inspector is a real job and not just something I say before I steal guacamole from a stranger's plate. It's all right, sir. I'm an avocado inspector.
GROSZ: And also, it was like the cartels were involved, weren't they?
SAGAL: Well, this is the crazy thing, right?
RAY: Yeah.
SAGAL: So what happened is...
GROSZ: Which, if any of them is listening, I don't have any problem with.
SAGAL: Yes, I know.
(LAUGHTER)
RAY: Yeah. And I agree the avocados deserved it.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The U.S. only allows the importation of avocados from Mexico after they are inspected by American officials in Mexico, and one of these inspectors was apparently threatened by a cartel, so the U.S. instantly ended imports. Now, it is not an avocado cartel. It's a drug cartel - although an avocado cartel would be kind of hilarious. They mark their victims by putting a toothpick through them and putting them on a glass of water on the windowsill.
FARSAD: But quick question - is the cocaine still coming through? I'm just asking for a friend.
SAGAL: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.
FARSAD: OK. Good, good, good, good, good. No problem then.
SAGAL: We would never do anything about that.
GROSZ: So coca-mole (ph) is good to go.
FARSAD: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SAGAL: You know what would be hilarious? If, you know, desperate to get good Mexican guacamole, they started smuggling the avocados inside kilos of coke, right?
(LAUGHTER)
GROSZ: Yeah, the cocaine masks the smell of the avocado.
RAY: Of the avocado.
SAGAL: The cocaine smuggler's standing there, you know, sweating bullets while the inspector is, like, poking the kilos of coke with his knife, looking for that (unintelligible) avocado.
GROSZ: It's just cocaine. I don't know what you're looking for. It's just cocaine.
SAGAL: (Laughter).
RAY: It's just cocaine.
GROSZ: It's coke.
SAGAL: I hope - I do hope they resolve this soon because nobody wants to eat, like, New Jersey avocados. Those are just decommissioned hand grenades.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Fred do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Not only did he win three in a row, but he began a new career.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: We all - Fred, congratulations.
KURTIS: Way to go, Fred. We'll be talking.
DINWIDDIE: Thank you so much.
SAGAL: Thank you so much, man. Take care.
DINWIDDIE: All right.
(SOUNDBITE OF DAVE PORTER'S "BREAKING BAD MAIN TITLE THEME")
SAGAL: Right now, panel, time for you to answer some questions about this week's news. Negin, in an email to all its subscribers, Netflix did not say they were raising their prices. They said they were doing what to them?
FARSAD: They were shortening - cutting off the endings of movies.
SAGAL: No.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: They...
SAGAL: Wouldn't it be great if, like, you subscribe to Netflix, and the movie - and right - like, eight minutes before the end of the movie, it just stops and says, to see the end of the movie...
RAY: (Laughter).
SAGAL: ...Please upgrade to the premium plan.
GROSZ: Yeah.
FARSAD: I mean, it's kind of genius. I don't know.
SAGAL: I wouldn't put it by them.
FARSAD: I feel like I'm giving Netflix a great idea.
SAGAL: I'll give you a hint. It's like what you're constantly asked to do to software, and you always ignore it.
FARSAD: Oh, upgrading?
SAGAL: Close, so close.
FARSAD: Update.
SAGAL: Up, up.
FARSAD: Up installing?
RAY: (Laughter).
FARSAD: Up - updating.
SAGAL: Updating.
GROSZ: Yeah.
SAGAL: Yes, updating.
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SAGAL: They said - Netflix - in an email to subscribers this week, Netflix wrote that they were, quote, "updating their prices" in the same way that eating tons of snack food updates your weight because the updated price.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: What do you know?
RAY: Yeah.
SAGAL: We're all going to have to pay an extra $2 a month for the joy of saying, wait a minute, it's not here. It's not here. Oh, yeah, that one's on Hulu.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: We do want to thank Netflix for this new way to cushion bad news. No, honey, I don't want a divorce. I just want to update our marriage.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: They should have said that they were consciously uncoupling from their previous rates.
SAGAL: There you go.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: I think that would have made more sense.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MONEY")
DEBORAH EVANS-STICKLAND: (Singing) The best things in life are free, but you can give them to the birds and bees. I want money.
SAGAL: Coming up, rock and roll secrets are revealed in our Bluff The Listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to play. We'll be back in a minute with more of WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME from NPR.
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KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR news quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. We are playing this week with Ashley Ray, Negin Farsad and Peter Grosz. And here, again, is your host. And thanks to an incident during the break, celebrating zero days without a workplace injury, it's Peter Sagal.
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SAGAL: Thank you, Bill. Right now, it's time for the WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME Bluff The Listener game. Call 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to play our game on the air.
Hi, you are on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
CLAIRE: Hi. This is Claire (ph) from Atlanta, Ga.
SAGAL: Hey, Claire. How are things in Atlanta?
CLAIRE: Peachy.
SAGAL: Well, that is expected, it being the Peach Tree State. Very good. Very good. That's excellent. What do you do there in Atlanta?
CLAIRE: I work in the film and television industry as a script supervisor.
SAGAL: A script supervisor - now, this is great because I've always wanted to ask this. What does a script supervisor actually do?
CLAIRE: Oh, boy. You're going to be sorry that you asked. Basically, my job is to protect the writer's words that are on the page and to make sure that that's what we see. I also help to coordinate continuity with hair, makeup, wardrobe and props, basically so that people show up in the right clothes and they make sure that they hold their coffee cup in the right hand.
SAGAL: Right. I mean, I had heard that, that part of your job is to make sure that, you know, you don't cut away from somebody who's, like, got a patch over their right eye, and then you come back to them - it's a patch over their left eye. Like, that's your job.
CLAIRE: Sure.
SAGAL: Oh.
CLAIRE: That is one of the things that I do.
SAGAL: So every time that somebody's patch is over the right eye in every shot, I should thank the script supervisor.
FARSAD: Peter only watches pirate movies.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: That's it. That's all I do.
FARSAD: Just so you know.
SAGAL: I - also, apparently, very poorly made pirate movies, given how often the eye patch is jumping around.
GROSZ: Budget pirate movies is his favorite genre.
SAGAL: That's my genre. Everybody has a thing. Well, welcome to the show. You're going to play the game in which you must tell truth from fiction. Bill, what's Claire's topic?
KURTIS: Secrets of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
SAGAL: Did you know, for example, that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame's beloved wax sculpture of Keith Richards is actually Keith Richards?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: That's just one of the shocking secrets of the world's biggest rock stars. Our panelists are going to tell you another one. Pick the one who's telling the truth. You will win the WAIT WAITer of your choice on your voicemail. You ready to play?
CLAIRE: Let's go.
SAGAL: All right. Let's do it. Let's hear first from Negin Farsad.
FARSAD: OK. You know how Radiohead is one of the most lauded bands in the world, known for being consummate musicians wielding their instruments to incredible effect? Well, turns out the keyboardist for the band didn't even actually play his keyboard the first several months he joined the band. That's right. Jonny Greenwood, now Oscar nominated for his score on "Power Of The Dog," would secretly turn off his keyboard during rehearsals for several months. His fingers were essentially lip-syncing on a piano, except no sound came out. So I guess it's more accurate to say that his fingers were air tapping, which is like a way less cool version of air guitaring, which is also very uncool.
You see, once Greenwood got in the band, he realized the guitars were so loud no one would even notice if he didn't play. It worked. At one point, frontman Thom Yorke actually said to him, quote, "I can't hear what you're doing, but I think you're adding a really interesting texture because I can tell when you're not playing," which he could not because Greenwood was never playing.
SAGAL: Jonny Greenwood, the keyboardist for Radiohead, reveals that during his first months with the band, he never actually played his instrument, and they loved it. Your next story about a rock 'n' roll secret comes from Ashley Ray.
RAY: Fab Five Freddy told me everybody's fly. DJ's spinning. I said, my, my. Thus begins what has recently been revealed to be the most influential hip-hop song in history. Performed by Rock & Roll Hall of Famers Blondie in 1981, the single "Rapture" may just seem like exceptionally white lead singer Debbie Harry trying out some rhymes. But as it turns out, with that song, she became the founding goddess of a whole new art form. Ms. Harry recently revealed that the late Tupac Shakur wrote her a letter detailing the impact of "Rapture," saying that his track "California Love," a song about the city of LA's ability to party, was inspired by Harry's, quote, "classic, fun, tough and freestyling flow," unquote, while Dr. Dre and his friends who formed N.W.A sought out producer Fab Five Freddy because, quote, "anybody name-checked by Blondie has got to be the real deal," unquote.
Harry stated that she decided to keep the praise from Tupac and other seminal artists a secret, not wanting to involve herself in the nation's dangerous East Coast-West Coast rivalry at the time, but was inspired by this year's Super Bowl performance to share her role in this piece of history.
SAGAL: It turns out that Debbie Harry from Blondie was the seminal figure in the creation of hip-hop. Your last shocker about a rocker comes from Peter Grosz.
GROSZ: This week, we learned the biggest news to come out of. New Jersey since Aaron Burr shot Alexander Hamilton in Weehawken. Bruce Springsteen isn't from there. The Boss gave a candid interview with the Newark Star-Ledger this week in which he admitted he was actually born Bryce Springsworth (ph) in Darien, Conn., where he attended the prestigious Choate Rosemary Hall Private School and later Dartmouth College on a polo scholarship.
(LAUGHTER)
GROSZ: But when launching his music career, Bryce went shopping for a new identity. He recalls, my butler had mentioned that I should try to come across as more working class. Or was it my driver? No, I remember. It was Montague, one of my valets. Bryce kept up the ruse for years, but it was tough. Whenever some critic described me as a working-class poet, he said, I would nearly spit out my caviar in disgust. I wouldn't actually spit it out, of course. It's caviar, after all. Bruce told The Star-Ledger he was writing from a place of truth, though, and you just have to replace the words factory with country club and car with dressage horse. He concluded the interview by saying, one thing that is true - New Jersey is indeed a death trap and a suicide rap, and I strongly recommend people getting out of there while they're young.
SAGAL: All right. So here are your choices. We learned something interesting about a pretty well-known musical act this week. Was it, from Negin Farsad, that Jonny Greenwood, the composer and keyboardist for Radiohead, never even played his instrument while trying out for the band and got in the band; from Ashley Ray, that Debbie Harry from Blondie helped found hip-hop by influencing the greats of that genre; or, from Peter Grosz, that Bruce Springsteen is really a rich kid from Connecticut?
CLAIRE: Oh, gosh. As someone who would love to be in a rock band but can't play an instrument to save their life, I really hope it's Negin.
SAGAL: All right. That's your choice. Well, to find out the correct answer, let's hear from the musician in question.
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JONNY GREENWOOD: When I got the chance to play with them, the first thing I did was make sure my keyboard was turned off.
SAGAL: That was Jonny Greenwood himself talking to Terry Gross on Fresh Air about how he faked it till he made it with Radiohead. Congratulations, you were correct. Negin was telling you the truth.
RAY: Congrats.
SAGAL: And you have won our prize, the voice of anyone you might like from our show on your voicemail.
CLAIRE: Thank you.
SAGAL: Take care.
(SOUNDBITE OF RADIOHEAD SONG, "THE NATIONAL ANTHEM")
SAGAL: And now the game where people who have won prestigious awards try to win something very different. It's called Not My Job. Like a lot of people who love epic fantasy fiction, Booker award winning author Marlon James wondered why stories like "Game Of Thrones" or "Lord Of The Rings" take place in fantastical fictional worlds with magic and dragons, but somehow, the demographics of a Greenwich, Conn., PTA meeting. His new series of fantasy books changes all of that. The second volume is out now. Marlon James, welcome to WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
MARLON JAMES: Oh, my god. Thanks for having me.
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SAGAL: It's my pleasure. So I want to get to the books, but I want to talk to you about your background. We heard that, again, you have won the Booker Prize - you are a serious guy - that your first novel was rejected 78 times.
JAMES: It was. It was. And I actually burned it. I did this sort of ritual burning. It was like a Viking burial. And it was very cleansing, I got to tell you, until somebody showed up a year later, and she was like, I'm not leaving this country until you give me that book.
SAGAL: Wow.
JAMES: So I had to find that thing. So things you should know if you don't know, if you deleted something a year ago, undelete does not bring it back.
SAGAL: No. No. Good to know.
JAMES: Just in case you all did not know that or control-Z.
SAGAL: Not going to happen.
GROSZ: Statute of limitations on that.
SAGAL: But before we get to that, I just want to talk to you. So you write this novel. You send it to a publisher, an agent, whomever, and they reject it. And that happens again. So you get to 10, you get to 20 rejections. How do you - what do you tell yourself after 20 rejections? How do you keep going?
JAMES: Well, you do it by not knowing you have 20 rejections. So the thing is I sent them out in batches of six. And if I didn't hear from anybody, well, that's just six. Whatever. I just find six more names and I send it out. And it wasn't until this press sent me the not-for-us card. They can't even write you a letter, just a card that says not for us. And I was about to send out the next batch, and I just stopped and thought, how many of these have I done?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: And so you sort of realized like, oh, my God, that's a lot of rejections.
JAMES: I was the reverse Sally Field. I was like...
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: I love that you were rejected so many times. Do people say that to you? I think it's so - it's just awesome. It's inspiring.
JAMES: People that I have as - you know, I have students - like, oh, my God, my story was rejected four times. I'm like, oh, sweetie.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: You got 74 more to go. OK.
SAGAL: Yeah. And have you ever heard from any of those people who rejected, any of the 78?
JAMES: Oh, yeah.
SAGAL: Do they? What do they say?
JAMES: Yeah. I ran into somebody who at one time was at - I think he was at Random House. I forgot his name, which is a polite thing to say...
(LAUGHTER)
RAY: You have the name. It's on a list somewhere.
JAMES: He was like, oh, my God, your novel. Oh, my God, I still think about it. I can't forget it. I was like, why didn't you publish it then? It was like five years later, you're still telling me how you couldn't forget the book.
FARSAD: He's like, I had so many of these not-for-us cards. I needed to do something with them.
SAGAL: That's kind of an amazing story. And so eventually you left Jamaica and you ended up in Minnesota, where you've been teaching at Macalester College, fine Institution there. And how was the transition from Kingston, Jamaica, to St. Paul, Minn.?
JAMES: Oh, it was a breeze. Absolutely. You know, from 90 degrees to the minus 90 degrees. Yeah. But yeah, you know, it's funny. In my high school yearbook says in the picture, ambition to work for Prince.
SAGAL: Oh, yeah. I mean, not an actual prince, but the musician.
JAMES: Yeah. So it's always funny. When I moved to Minnesota, and I ran into people people from high school. Guess where I'm living. No. Are you working for Prince? No, I'm not working for Prince.
SAGAL: Well, but you can let them know - they live in Jamaica - you can let them know that you see Prince all the time.
JAMES: Well, I did try to break into his house.
SAGAL: You did?
JAMES: Well, yeah, it was my 30th birthday. What else am I going to do?
SAGAL: Makes sense to me. So what happened?
JAMES: Yeah. We all got in this car, and we drove to Chanhassen, which is not near Minneapolis, by the way.
SAGAL: No. It's way out there.
JAMES: It's way out there. So we had a lot of time to realize this was a bad idea. We drove all the way up to Paisley Park, and we got out of the car. And we're going to scale the gates.
SAGAL: You are kidding me.
JAMES: Oh, yeah. I pretty much hit the gate and then all the alarms went off.
SAGAL: How drunk were you guys or...
JAMES: We were pretty drunk, but not drunk enough to not - to start screaming we're English professors, we're English professors.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So it was you and a bunch of other tipsy English professors from...
JAMES: It was pretty much the English department of Macalester College.
(LAUGHTER)
JAMES: Yeah. And then the security stood up. And for some reason, they believed us when said we're English professors because who else would come up with a lie that lame?
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: That's true. That's true.
JAMES: And yeah. And we ended up talking to the (unintelligible).
SAGAL: Really?
JAMES: And it was surreal. It still ended up being a pretty cool birthday.
SAGAL: Yeah.
JAMES: Prince didn't show up, though.
SAGAL: All right. Let's talk about your trilogy. The first book was "Black Leopard, Red Wolf." And you decided you wanted to do something using African myth and folklore. Is that right?
JAMES: Right.
SAGAL: And, of course, because you were writing a fantasy novel, it has to be a trilogy. That's the rule.
JAMES: That is the rule, unless you're going to write a tetralogy.
SAGAL: Oh, really? Do you know yet? Because I've read that you plan...
JAMES: No. No. I'm definitely not writing four.
SAGAL: Right. You know - you realize that that's what George R.R. Martin said. He was going to write a trilogy.
JAMES: That's what he said. And that's what he told me. I'm like, it's not happening.
SAGAL: So you obviously, you've met George R.R. Martin, the author of "Game Of Thrones" books. Did he give you any advice on being a successful fantasy author?
JAMES: No. I think we talked about shoes. We had dinner. What else did we talk about?
RAY: It sounds like you guys didn't talk about the ending of "Game Of Thrones." So...
JAMES: No, and I got issues with that ending.
SAGAL: Really?
JAMES: I actually didn't watch the final season of "Game Of Thrones" because I was so upset.
SAGAL: Really? With the world in which we live in - right? - in which fantasy, science fiction, comic books are so huge, you've got to be imagining, you know, the HBO series, the big film adaptation. Is that like a thing you think about?
JAMES: Oh, yeah, kind of. I mean, people ask me have I thought of who would star in it. And I like to be like all sort of literary author, no, I haven't thought of that. That's such BS. Of course I've thought about it.
(LAUGHTER)
JAMES: I've thought about who will play a tree in that show.
SAGAL: Well, Marlon James, it is an absolute joy to talk to you. We have asked you here this time, though, to play a game we're calling...
KURTIS: In this epic fantasy, the Buffalo Bills won the Super Bowl.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: So you write epic fantasy. So we thought we'd ask you about fantasy football. Answer two out of three questions correctly, you'll win our prize for one of our listeners, the voice of their choice on their voicemail. Bill, who is Marlon James playing for?
KURTIS: Andrew Levy (ph) of Portland, Ore.
SAGAL: Here's your first question. Fantasy football was created in 1962 by a man named Bill Winkenbach who was a part owner of the Oakland Raiders NFL team. What was his reason for creating fantasy football? A, the Raiders were so terrible, he wanted to at least pretend he owned a good team - B, he realized there were three hours a week in which he was awake and yet wasn't thinking about football - or C, he wanted a version of football in which the players would be armed with swords.
JAMES: Well, I mean, I used to really like these early rap groups who wore Raiders caps. And I'd say, oh, is that a good team? And they always go, oh, they're terrible. So I'm going to go with answer one.
SAGAL: That's exactly right. He was so frustrated with his actual football team that he invented a way that he could pretend to have a better one. That's right.
JAMES: You all have Ice Cube to thank for that.
SAGAL: Yeah. Ice Cube. All right. Here's your next question. The most important part of a fantasy football league is draft day, where the players in the league get to pick their players from the real NFL rosters. A man named Steve Shrub (ph) was so committed to getting his draft right that he did what? A, dumpster dived outside of NFL stadiums to look for discarded medical records - B, stayed at his computer managing his draft during a missile attack on Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, where he was serving - or C, invented his own fake news organization so he could score interviews with players.
JAMES: I'm going to go to with Baghdad.
SAGAL: Not Baghdad, but Bagram. And you're right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: He was an active duty guy sitting at his desk in Bagram. There was an air raid. Everybody ran to the shelters. He was like, nope, draft's going on. He says, you know, the rockets hit 50 yards away. He was fine. Last question. Fantasy football, just like real football, has its scandals. Once the commissioner of a Fantasy Football League was caught cheating all of his players just so he could win. Even worse was what? A, he injected himself with horse testosterone, but it turns out that only helps real football players - B, the league was entirely made up of pro cyclists, and that commissioner was Lance Armstrong - or C, he and everyone else in that league were pastors.
JAMES: I mean, Lance Armstrong is connected to some dirty stuff.
SAGAL: Yes.
JAMES: I can't imagine that they were pastors. I'm going to go with No. 1.
SAGAL: You're going to go with the horse tranquilizer. No, I'm afraid it was actually they were all pastors.
JAMES: Really?
SAGAL: It was a league in a big megachurch in Oklahoma.
JAMES: Look at me. I can't even recognize the holy.
SAGAL: I know. It's terrible. Bill, how did Marlon James do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Marlon, you got two out of three, and here, that is a win. Congratulations.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: There you go. Marlon James's newest book is "Moon Witch, Spider King." It's the second in his planned trilogy of fantasy books. It's amazing. I recommend it. Marlon James, thank you so much for joining us on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME. I'm really enjoying the books.
JAMES: Thank you so much for having me, guys.
SAGAL: Take care, man. You're great.
GROSZ: Thanks, Marlon.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: (Vocalizing).
SAGAL: In just a minute, Hines has a new challenger in our Listener Limerick challenge. Call one 1-888-WAIT-WAIT to join us on the air. We'll be back in a minute with more of WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME from NPR.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
KURTIS: From NPR and WBEZ Chicago, this is WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME, the NPR News quiz. I'm Bill Kurtis. We are playing this week with Negin Farsad, Peter Grosz and Ashley Ray. And here again is your host, now broadcasting from Del Rio, Texas, where he is currently being detained for smuggling avocados.
(LAUGHTER)
KURTIS: It's Peter Sagal.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: Thank you, Bill. In just a minute, Bill demands rhy-numeration (ph) in our Listener Limerick Challenge. If you'd like to play, give us a call at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924.
Right now, panel, some more questions for you from the week's news. Peter, a nuclear engineer for the Navy decided to sell secrets to somebody he thought was a foreign agent. And at one point, he hid highly classified American state secrets in a what?
GROSZ: Butt.
SAGAL: No, not in a butt.
RAY: (Laughter) Very good guess, though.
GROSZ: OK, can I have a hint for where...
SAGAL: Yes, you can have a hint. It is terrible when the nuclear weapon specs stick to the roof of your mouth.
GROSZ: He - oh, I saw this. He hid the secrets in a jar of peanut butter.
SAGAL: Close enough - in a peanut butter sandwich...
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: ...Specifically, half a peanut butter sandwich. So a navy engineer named Jonathan Toebbe wanted to sell state secrets, and he was contacted by an FBI agent posing as a foreigner. Toebbe, who missed obvious signs, such as Saudi sheikhs are not usually named Jeff (ph), he proceeded to pass on these nuclear secrets, including, at one point, hiding a flash drive inside half a peanut butter sandwich, right? And he left the peanut butter sandwich in a public place, so the supposed foreign agent could pick it up, but it disappeared. In other news, the squirrels of Annapolis, Md., are now a nuclear power.
(LAUGHTER)
RAY: I wonder, why a peanut butter sandwich? I think I would have gone with a meatball sub, maybe an Italian sub - just something...
GROSZ: Oh, it should at least be a sub.
SAGAL: Yeah, I know. If you're going to sell naval secrets, you need to use a submarine just for the...
RAY: You go with a sub. You make the obvious pun.
SAGAL: Exactly.
FARSAD: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
GROSZ: Or you get a sandwich that nobody wants. You get like a...
SAGAL: Liverwurst.
RAY: The Subway tuna.
GROSZ: (Laughter) Yeah, the subway tuna sandwich. You leave it there, and then, like, a year later, it's still there because nobody's...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Yeah. Even the seagulls are like, I don't know, man. What is that stuff?
GROSZ: Like, I'd rather eat that flash drive.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Peter, Canadian doctors are ditching, quote, unquote, "medicine" and prescribing what to their patients instead?
GROSZ: Peter, laughter - just laughter.
FARSAD: (Laughter).
SAGAL: Laughter - just joy. Just joy. I'll give you a hint. It's like, here, take two magnificent vistas to the Canadian Rockies, and call me in the morning.
GROSZ: Getting out and traveling.
SAGAL: Yeah, they're giving them passes to national parks...
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: ...As a kind of therapy. Doctors in Canada are prescribing people national park passes because, seriously, what can't a trip to Banff cure? Well, cancer. It absolutely cannot cure cancer.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: The initiative is meant to help people enjoy the curative and preventative aspects of being in the great outdoors. Everybody knows that's good. Plus, it's a great scam for doctors. Nothing gets more patients in the door like telling people to go on a strenuous hike for the first time ever. Oh, you're back already, Jim (ph)? Broken ankle, eh?
GROSZ: Yeah, but for what maladies are these things...
RAY: Yeah.
SAGAL: I think mainly for mental health.
RAY: Yeah. I can't think of anything better for mental illness and depression than being alone in the woods.
GROSZ: (Laughter).
RAY: That just sounds great.
SAGAL: Yeah. If this were in America, of course, the makers of the parks would be taking out, like, medical ads for it on TV, and they'd have a list of the side effects like, side effects may include bear attacks.
FARSAD: Sawing off your own arm after it gets caught under a boulder.
GROSZ: Ask your doctor about Yellowstone.
(LAUGHTER)
GROSZ: Not the TV show. Ask your parents about that.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WIDE OPEN SPACES")
DIXIE CHICKS: (Singing) Yeah, yeah. She needs wide open spaces, room to make her big mistakes.
SAGAL: Coming up, it's Lightning Fill In The Blank, but first it's the game where you have to listen for the rhyme. If you'd like to play on-air, call or leave a message at 1-888-WAIT-WAIT. That's 1-888-924-8924. Or click the contact us link on our website, waitwait.npr.org. There, you can also find tickets for upcoming shows - March 3 at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, April 7 at the Harris Theatre in Chicago, and two shows at Wolf Trap on August 25 and 26. We will notice if you're not there. Hi. You're on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
CARINA: Hi. This is Carina (ph) from San Clemente, Calif.
SAGAL: San Clemente, Calif., famous as being the home of Richard Nixon.
CARINA: It sure is - and a lot of surfing.
GROSZ: That's right. Nixon moved there.
SAGAL: I see those pictures of Nixon surfing in his dress shoes. It was really something. It was his style. What do you do there in San Clemente?
CARINA: I'm a hydrogeologist, so I work on a lot of groundwater remediation projects.
SAGAL: Right. And are you worried that, it being California in an epical drought, that you're going to be out of work anytime soon?
CARINA: No. Actually, the work is only ramping up since there is less and less of it, and more and more of it is getting contaminated. We have to fix that problem before it's too late.
SAGAL: Right. I was when I was about to say that if we run out of water, you hydrogeologists will be out of work, but that really would be, at that point, the least of our problems.
CARINA: That's a good point.
SAGAL: Yeah. Well, welcome to the show, Carina. Bill Kurtis is going to read you three news-related limericks with the last word or phrase missing from each. If you can fill in that last word or phrase correctly on two of the limericks, you'll be a winner. Ready to play?
CARINA: Ready.
SAGAL: Let's do it, then. Here's your first limerick.
KURTIS: We cows are acutely aware that food science has answered our prayer. Now carbon dioxide is saving our backside. This steak is made out of thin...
CARINA: Air.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: A company called Air Protein is taking carbon dioxide and turning it into a fleshy meat substitute by feeding it to microbes and then grinding up those microbes into a kind of flour. Now, once they have this flesh flour, they use, quote, "culinary techniques" to make it look and taste like steak or chicken or salmon. I'd say they're making meat out of thin air, but it's really kind of more of a thick air, if you know what I mean.
FARSAD: I want to say out the gate, it sounds delicious.
GROSZ: Every time there's some sort of, like, what if we did this with pollutants or carbon dioxide? Like, that is good that it helps, but it's just going to make people be like, well, it's cool, then we can, like, keep polluting, right?
SAGAL: Yeah.
GROSZ: If people are going to, like, make meat out of it, then, like, I'll just, like, not get rid of my car and, like, leave my lawnmower on all day.
SAGAL: I'll buy a Hummer because someone can just eat it someday. Yes. All right. Here is your next limerick.
KURTIS: Near our town church, my headache just swells. Quasimodo here really excels. But our quaint local priest must start taming that beast. He got fined now for ringing the...
CARINA: Bells?
SAGAL: Bells. Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: For years, the entire population of a small town outside Florence, Italy, has been unable to sleep through the night because the local priest insisted on clanging those church bells all day. At least, that's what they say. This is clearly a case of anti-hunchback-ism. According to residents, the deafening sound of the bells would ring out for at least five minutes every hour, including in the middle of the night. Even worse than that, some mornings, the priest did the thing where he knew he had to get up at 7:30, so he set the bells to ring at 7:00 and then 7:05 and then 7:07. Worst thing in the world is church bells with the snooze button.
FARSAD: Maybe there was no priest. Maybe it was just a ghost.
SAGAL: I know. Bong, bong. Bong, bong. Bong, bong.
RAY: Maybe it was just someone trying to make the bells popular again. It's a really overlooked instrument these days.
GROSZ: Yeah.
SAGAL: That's true.
GROSZ: Somebody from, like, hand bell choir from junior high school or something was trying to, like...
FARSAD: Wait. Did you have a hand bell choir in junior high school?
GROSZ: I did not, but...
FARSAD: That feels entirely made up.
GROSZ: Oh, no.
SAGAL: All right. We have one more limerick for you. Here we go.
KURTIS: As Her Majesty is cooking a batch up, fresh tomatoes and dates are the match up. And her quaint royal seal will enhance any meal. Queen Elizabeth sells her own...
CARINA: Ketchup.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: Or, as they call it, over there, cat-chup (ph). The Queen of England, is selling her own line of ketchup - because when I think queen, I think dipping sauce? The Queen of England is now selling a kind of homemade ketchup, unless it's just a coincidence that Prince Andrew was found completely drained of blood. I find this amazing. The Queen - the longest-reigning queen in British history, if not world history - she's in her mid-90s. And she decides, you know what I'd like to do now? Sell my own brand of condiments.
GROSZ: Oh, my God. She's going to be on Instagram being like, yo, what's up, everybody? Please follow me. We're doing a pop-up in Cardiff.
FARSAD: We will be at the Camden farmer's market.
SAGAL: Exactly. Bill, how did Carina do on our quiz?
KURTIS: She did great - three in a row, Carina. Congratulations.
SAGAL: Congratulations, Carina. Well done.
CARINA: Thank you.
SAGAL: Good luck keeping the water flowing.
CARINA: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOG BARKING)
SAGAL: Thank you, Scout, as well.
(SOUNDBITE OF JERRY LEE LEWIS' "DRINKIN' WINE SPO-DEE-O-DEE")
SAGAL: Now it's time for our final game, Lightning Fill In the Blank. Each of our players will have 60 seconds in which to answer as many fill-in-the-blank questions as they can, each correct answer now worth 2 points. Bill, can you give us the scores?
KURTIS: Peter has 2. Ashley has 2. And Nagin, with her experience, has 4.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: Peter...
GROSZ: Yes.
SAGAL: ...I am choosing you arbitrarily to go first. So fill in the blank. The clock will start when I begin your first question. On Sunday, Representative Adam Kinzinger said he expects former Trump lawyer Blank to comply with the January 6 Committee.
GROSZ: Oh, Rudy Giuliani?
SAGAL: Yes, Rudy Giuliani.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
GROSZ: Ha-ha.
SAGAL: On Tuesday, the family of the cinematographer accidentally shot on the set of the movie "Rust" filed a lawsuit against blank.
GROSZ: Alec Baldwin.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, a courthouse in Alabama was shut down after someone called in a suspicious package that turned out to be blank.
GROSZ: A Bible that someone was going to swear on.
SAGAL: No. Two crates of food from Taco Bell. On Wednesday, the first message was posted on blank's new social media platform.
GROSZ: (Laughter) Trump?
SAGAL: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Sunday, Erin Jackson became the first Black woman to win a blank in speedskating.
GROSZ: Gold medal?
SAGAL: Yeah, gold medal.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, the mayor of a town in Ohio...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SAGAL: ...Resigned following the backlash to his statement that legalized ice fishing leads to blank.
GROSZ: Heroin use.
SAGAL: No, prostitution.
(LAUGHTER)
FARSAD: Close.
RAY: Very close.
SAGAL: At a city council meeting, the mayor of Hudson, Ohio, Craig Schubert, opposed ice fishing on the town's lake. He said, quote, "If you allow ice fishing with shanties, then that leads to another problem - prostitution." When asked for evidence of this, Schubert couldn't point to any, but he did ask people to please purchase his self-published book, "Cold Ice, Hot Nights."
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, how did Peter do on our quiz?
KURTIS: Peter had four right for 8 more points. He now has 10 and the lead.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: Congratulations, Peter. All right. Ashley, you're up next.
RAY: OK.
SAGAL: Fill in the blank. On Tuesday, Virginia Giuffre settled her case against Prince blank for an undisclosed amount.
RAY: Prince Andrew.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Thursday, a new report stated that over two-thirds of the U.S. is now immune to the blank variant.
RAY: Omicron.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, the White House rejected blank's claims that his visitor logs fall under executive privilege.
RAY: Trump.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: According to a new nationwide poll, 75% of people back local mandates on blank.
RAY: Mask mandates.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, a British police captain who created the force's drug policy has resigned after he blanked.
RAY: Did heroin.
SAGAL: That's the only one he didn't do. He smoked weed, dropped acid and tripped on mushrooms.
RAY: Oh, that's a double hippie backflip - is the appropriate name for that.
FARSAD: (Laughter).
RAY: And it was my second guess, actually.
SAGAL: On Monday, it was announced that Wanda Sykes, Regina Hall and Amy Schumer would host the 2022 blank Awards.
RAY: Oscars.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Sunday, the Los Angeles Rams made a late-game comeback to win the blank.
RAY: The Super Bowl.
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SAGAL: ...A Canadian woman in a town called Durham tried to report a break-in, but she accidentally blanked.
RAY: Ordered pizza.
SAGAL: No, she accidentally called the Durham, England police.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Instead of contacting the police in Durham, Canada, the woman accidentally messaged the Durham County Constabulary in England 3,500 miles away. The woman is safe and well thanks to the quick-thinking emergency operator over in the U.K. who asked her to stay in the line while they dispatch an officer to Heathrow International Airport, who then took the red-eye to Canada's Waterloo Airport...
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: ...And then waited at the Hertz counter for a rental car and then drove it the 90 miles to Durham just in time. Bill, how did Ashley do on her very first-ever Lightning Fill in the Blank?
KURTIS: Well, the newbie did very, very well. She had six right for 12 more points. She now has 14 and the lead.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: Well, good for you, Ashley, but this means that...
RAY: Feels good.
SAGAL: This means Nagin needs how many to win?
KURTIS: Five to tie, six to win.
FARSAD: Oh, God.
SAGAL: All right, here we go, Negin.
FARSAD: OK.
SAGAL: This is for the game. Fill in the blank.
FARSAD: All right.
SAGAL: On Tuesday, a jury rejected blank's libel suit against The New York Times.
FARSAD: Sarah Palin.
SAGAL: Right.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: On Thursday, a judge ruled that blank must testify in a civil probe of his business practices.
FARSAD: Trump.
SAGAL: Yes...
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: ...And his kids. This week, U.S. deaths from blank exceeded 1 million people.
FARSAD: COVID?
SAGAL: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: This week, a man in Michigan called police to report that someone had stolen his blank in the middle of the night.
FARSAD: His jet skis.
SAGAL: His entire 12-by-28-foot cabin.
According to a new study, the blank currently gripping the Southwest is the worst in 1,200 years.
FARSAD: Drought?
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: According to a new filing, Elon Musk donated nearly $6 billion worth of blank stock to charity in 2021.
FARSAD: Tesla?
SAGAL: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)
SAGAL: In a basketball game this week...
(SOUNDBITE OF GONG)
SAGAL: ...A student in Minnesota made it a once-in-a-lifetime shot while standing blindfolded at half court and won blank.
FARSAD: Tuition to college.
SAGAL: No. He won a hat.
FARSAD: Oh.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Typically, when they have you come out during halftime and make a trick shot, they give away, like, tuition to college or lots of money. So spectators were shocked when the student, blindfolded, sunk it. (Imitating basketball net). Swoosh. Nothing but net. And the only thing he won was a hat. He should've read the rules, which said, if you get this ball anywhere in the building other than in a net, you get a Ferrari.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: Bill, did Negin do well enough to win?
KURTIS: She had five right for 10 more points, which means with 14, she and Ashley are this week's co-champions.
(SOUNDBITE OF APPLAUSE SOUND EFFECT)
SAGAL: Good going, Ashley.
(LAUGHTER)
SAGAL: In just a minute, we're going to ask our panelists to predict what will be the big surprise out of the closing ceremony in Beijing. But before we end this week's show, I wanted to tell you a story about a friend of ours.
Back in 2001, we had to do our first show after 9/11, and our guest for that show bowed out. They just didn't want to have to do comedy about such terrible events. But a producer reached out to the writer P.J. O'Rourke. P.J. specialized in being funny about terrible things, and he came on and was as hilarious as we hoped he would be - so much so we invited him to be a panelist. And much to my delight, he accepted.
There are a lot of stories all of us here at WAIT WAIT could tell you about P.J., and we will someday. But right now, we want you to know that his persona, the curmudgeonly cynic who mocked everything and everyone, was just that, a persona. In real life, P.J. O'Rourke was one of the kindest, most generous and caring people you could ever hope to know.
We will miss him a lot, but I will quote the man himself in a note about grief he wrote to me after my mother died last year - quote, "you don't exactly get over it, an offensive phrase under any circumstances, but the grief, in time, does turn into a nostalgic ache that is almost comforting," unquote. We are comforted already by the fact that we were able to get to know him. Rest in peace, P.J., and all condolences to his family.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
SAGAL: Now, panel, what will be the big surprise out of the Winter Olympics closing ceremonies? Negin Farsad.
FARSAD: 50 Cent does yet another surprise rendition of "In Da Club," but this time standing right side up.
SAGAL: Peter Grosz.
GROSZ: President Xi of China will sing "Closing Time" by Semisonic. (Singing) You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.
SAGAL: And Ashley Ray.
RAY: A special Olympic Village-edition COVID variant will be introduced.
KURTIS: Well, if that happens, we're going to ask you about it here on WAIT WAIT... DON'T TELL ME.
SAGAL: Thank you, Bill Kurtis. Thanks also to Negin Farsad, Peter Grosz and Ashley Ray. What a great debut on our show. Thanks to all of you out there for listening. I'm Peter Sagal. We'll see you next week.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
SAGAL: This is NPR.
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