103: Minimum Viable Joke

This week kicks off with some follow-up on John's epic fridge journey. In addition to *many* photos of uneven refrigerator doors, John has also received several warnings about what he needs to be watching out for. John also appends his anecdote to include a related new appliance, and Merlin recommends a tactical ice option. Your hosts discuss the mysterious tween Whisper Network. Merlin thinks John might be a Buddhist. John revisits Merlin's oopsies with apparently not remembering to record podcasts. There's initially some confusion about lists, but there's clearly no confusion about Merlin's overdue need for a checklist. Merlin hopes that John can help remove his defects of character. John shares that he didn't get his money's worth from a recent podcast. In a mini-topic, your hosts talk about _Game of Thrones_ and kids. Hey, everybody likes dragons, but could you ever *really* produce a suitably kid-friendly version that makes any sense at all? An edited collection exists, but John is definitely not sold on how the edits got made. Merlin suffers a brief distraction to perform some financial tech support, and John briefly impersonates a YouTuber. Merlin needs some help finding an artifact from his youth, and John has beef with whether the artifact is actually funny. Then, that becomes a whole thing, and the guys reminisce about old newspaper cartoons. Next up is what John describes as a "quick item" about buying a couch. The struggle is real, people, and John hasn't seen anything he really likes. John has twice as many kids as Merlin, and they loosen the legs of things. Your hosts seem to agree on the widespread problem of improper furniture scale, but they do forgive the monsters their Brobdingnagian home furnishings since they live in the midwest. Which is large. Is it okay for a couch to be permanently moist? Finally, John closes by extolling the benefits of a proper headboard. (_Recorded on Tuesday, April 23, 2019._)