Sebastian Maniscalco

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm Dan Shepard. I'm joined by Minnie Mouse. Hi there.

This is a gentleman I've been wanting to have him for quite some time. I find him so funny. Very funny. Sebastian Maniscalco.

Sebastian Maniscalco is a record-breaking stand-up comedian and actor. He's got a hit show. He's got a world record-setting comedy tour. He's a beast.

He's at the top of the pyramid for stand-ups. So fun. So fun. And boy, did I get to experience his hysterical.

Just the moment in this episode when he goes, what's with the spray? I was like, oh, I got Maniscalco'd. Yeah, you did. His credits include Bookie, if unfrosted out right now, the Super Mario Brothers movie, Somewhere in Queens.

He has a new tour starting in July. You have to go see him live. The tour's called It Ain't Right, and you can get tickets for that at SebastianLive.com. Now, also before we go, we have Armchair Anonymous prompts.

We got a big batch. This is covering two months' time. So buckle up. Get a pen and paper.

One of these prompts may apply to you. They are as follows. Tell us your best dad story. Now, we've been collecting dad stories as we get other stories.

In fact, we met two gals that had the same dad. That was so fun. Both stories crazy. So in time for Father's Day, tell us your best dad story.

Tell us your best parent-teacher conference story. Is that from teachers or parents or either? I think no, either way. Yeah, if something insane happened at a parent-teacher conference and you were a parent, that would be fine, too.

Great. Like, if the teacher you were talking to was, like, smoking a doobie during it or something, who knows what could happen. I think it's awesome. Tell us about an embarrassing sex experience.

Sorry, guys. Tell us about a near-death experience. Tell us about a time you pooped yourself. Tell us a crazy beach story.

Summer's upon us. Summertime. We want to get in the mood with some crazy beach stories. So if you have a crazy story for any one of those prompts, please go to armchairexpertpod.com and submit your story.

We would love to talk to you about it. Please enjoy Sebastian. He's an armchair expert. He's an armchair expert.

He's an armchair expert. How are you, brother? Good to see you, man. How are you?

What a sexy machine you brought over here. Oh, man, that's my sexy machine. What do you think of that? I've had it for a while.

It's been, like, 17. I've got two small kids. Seven years. Yeah.

I feel like that's not responsible for a man of your means. You and I both know you could have any number of vehicles. I'm a modest man. Are you?

Yeah. I don't like to buy a lot. I like to do experiences. Let's go.

And was that learned, or that's your natural disposition? I grew up. Next day I brought you up. I'm a hometown of the northwest suburbs of Arlington Heights.

Everyone will think you're from Queens. That's got to be a common... Common name. But that's the Italian-ness in you, right?

That's the immigrant dad. Yeah, he's staying with me right now for 10 days. Where do you live? I live in Los Angeles.

Oh, okay. I can't believe I've never bumped into you in my life. Well, I... Go ahead.

You know where there could have been an incredible bump in, now that I've learned about you? I could have been at a junket at the Four Seasons. You could have. In your...

What would we call that? Your duration there? My time frame. Yes.

Because you were there in 2005. You lived at the Four Seasons? He was a waiter at the Four Seasons. Oh, great.

I knew you would like that. I do love that. Seven years. Seven years.

Okay, so besides that, that's a possibility. Because the first movie I was ever in came out in 2004, so I did do some junkets there. Was it... Without a Paddle.

Without a Paddle. When was the Dane Cook movie? That was 06. 06.

Okay, so around that time. Yeah. Okay, back to you by experiences. Did you have to learn that?

Did you go buy a bunch of flashy shit and then go, no, no, no. That was just upbringing. Because in my world, I always think it's going away. Oh, well, duh.

My therapy this morning was singularly about when will the amount of money happen where I'm not terrified? Because I've passed the number. I told myself I would not be terrified anymore. Many times.

Yeah. And then nothing's helping. Do you have that? Yeah, so are you ever content?

Are you ever satisfied with where you are at professionally? Or is it just a game? We just, oh, we don't get the next podcast out before people don't think we're around anymore. Before they realize.

Yeah. They catch us. Before they realize we're getting shit. And then I don't deserve their attention.

Yeah, it's hard. And you know, I bet you and I have some of the same scar tissue as well because you were out here for a fucking minute, as was I. I moved here in 95, and that first movie we're talking about is 2004. So when you're 20, and that's a third of your life, you're not getting shit done.

It's scarring. No, it is. Is it going to happen? When is it going to happen?

So you go through all those different ups and downs as you're building it. But once you get to a certain level, and you're like, okay, I'm here. Now what? I mean, what are we doing here?

Let's see if I've got two small kids. I've got a six-year-old. I've got a four-year-old. If I keep doing this the way I'm doing, am I going to look back when they're 19 years old going, what was I doing in Montana?

Yeah, why don't you do 200 days? Yeah. So it's a struggle I deal with. I think it's harder for you.

It has to be harder for you because implicit in your job is you're traveling. This is a hack. It's in my backyard. I don't even have to go on a movie set anymore.

And I have two little kids. Imagine it weighs on you. It does. So doing this, we're going to get into the Jordans, too, because I have a whole thing on Jordans.

Okay, great. I can't wait to hear it. As long as we're there, it's just popped in my head. I addressed this about two months ago.

How old is too old to be wearing Jordans? By the way, we had this debate about 12 episodes ago. Oh, you did? Yeah.

When do I look like a fucking dumbass? Already? Is that what your inquiry was as well? I'm 50.

Yeah, I'm 49. In my footlocker, they were 100. In fact, in my very first pair were fives, and they were 110, and my mother said, I'll only get those for you if you can talk the guy down to $99 at footlocker, which they don't even fucking do, but I had to do that, and I did. I don't know if 50's hanging in my head for some reason.

That's so low, Sebastian. For 19 what? I guess you're comparing 86, or I don't know. Tell me, what year is sixth grade for you?

Jordans came out in 1986. So I'll go with that, sure. My first pair was 93, so I guess they could have them. Boy, that would be something.

50 bucks. I'm sick. 50 bucks. We'll do some fact anywhere.

Okay, 50 bucks. I have two pairs of Jordans. One I got as a gift. Currently, not back in 86.

Currently, right now. And I'm looking at myself in these things. I'm going, 50? You're like a grown individual.

You have kids. Should you be walking around in children's shoes? Yeah, children's gym shoes. I'm assuming neither of us play much basketball.

I don't play basketball. No. So I came across these. These are Jordans.

Okay. These are cool. These are Jordans. 23.

All right? Meaning that you're 23 on his number. This is the 23rd Jordan they put out. That feels important, because his number was 23.

You would think. But the guy I got these from, Joe, over at Complex Sneakers, or Complex Sneakers, whatever it So I go, where do these land in the world of sneaker heads? He's like, not too many people have those, because they're kind of ugly. Oh.

Okay, wow. I said, let me have them. This is perfect for me. Because I don't want to walk around with what everybody's got.

So that's my story on my particular pair of Jordans. Yeah, terminal uniqueness. Ugly. Yeah.

You said to be in something ugly, but be the only one in it. That's it. That's my take. That's kind of my approach to cars.

Not specifically ugly, but I got to be in something different. I can't be in a 911 at a streetlight looking next to me, and there's an agent in front of me with one of the director behind me. He's got one. I don't like it.

All the shiny shit. Okay, so where you and I differ is that I didn't get those fucking Jordans in sixth grade. I got them in 11th grade when I had to haggle down the price. So I coveted them.

There were four years where I wanted them so bad. So I'm in Detroit doing an interview 12 years ago, and I'm talking to a guy, and goddammit, he's wearing brand new fours. And I'm like, holy shit, did you keep those that nice? And he goes, no, man, they sell them.

I go, they sell the 93? He goes, yeah. And I'm like, how much are those? They're 130 bucks.

I'm like, oh my god, I've got 130 bucks. I bought them in the interview. In the rush of, poor kid done good was so euphoric that I was off to the races. And then every month I had to buy a pair, because there's so many good ones.

Now, two things. I don't want you to file me into a category of spendthrift. Spendthrift, yeah. Spendthrift, because I'm not.

I'm actually really frugal. I've got to make a lot of money. But cars are also his thing. I'm from Detroit.

That's all I give a fuck. That's the only reason I try to make money is for cars. I don't give a fuck about this house, other than I can park my bus out front. Your bus?

Do you see when you pulled in? No. You got to hop on our phone. There's a tour bus in the front yard.

Oh, I didn't see the tour bus. We'll go through it on your way out. Where did that come from? I go to the standings.

You saw the vehicle. Always rented motorhomes. Got to rent one. Got to get a buddy to drive the trailer out.

I got to pack this shit all the time. We go four times a year. I need a fucking bus. Well, I'm just worried about money.

It's kind of true. That's very stupid. On the side, I'll tell you what percentage of my income I'm actually spending. You might feel better.

It's gross to say. But I'm not going to have a lot of safety. And then I'll go and splurge. But increasingly, that's why I asked if you came to it.

Because I have now come to it. Which is really all I want is trips with my family. That's all I'm going to remember. The only thing that's actually pleasurable.

The bus is pleasurable with the families in it. We're out two weeks every summer. We're driving around the country on the bus. So it works out.

Okay, back to where did I want to go back to? Well, dad's staying here. How often is he out? Comes maybe two or three times a year.

77 years old. He wants to come. Enjoys grandkids. My sister's out here.

She's got three kids. So he's really enjoying his time. And he moved here when he was 15 from Italy. Yeah.

And he's a hairdresser. He's a hairdresser. No, growing up, he was bald with a ponytail. Oh, that's a lot.

That might have been a gift. And he always dressed like he was going to a funeral. So always in black, but very stylish. I borrowed my dad's clothes from him.

It's not like I had one of these dads who was a square. But I am wondering, because so much of your comedy is about your dad. First of all, I'm a huge fan. I just love your shit.

Also, I grew up on Dice, and I missed the Dice energy so much. And you certainly have some of that Dice energy I love. But so much of your comedy is about your dad. Weirdly enough, when I didn't stand up, most of mine was about my dad.

And I just know that had I gotten huge doing comedy, he would have loved it. He would have wanted to come experience it a little bit. Does your dad like the fact that he's so present in your comedy? He loves the fact that he's a staple in the act.

He also loves kind of the residual effect it's having on his life. Since he's so prevalent on Instagram and what have you, he gets noticed a lot. He actually gets upset when he feels like somebody recognizes him, and they don't come up to him. So, listeners, if you ever see him, please go up.

Yeah, you'd be inconveniencing him by not interrupting him for dinner. He told me he was at the airport on the way over, and he's like, I noticed a couple looking at me, and I was upset that they didn't approach. I'm proud of you that you give that to your dad generously, and it's not a complex situation. So my dad left when I was three.

Because I got famous. He goes, oh, good. Tell this woman who you are. Hands the phone to a stranger.

I'm like, who's this? He's like, no, who's this? I go, dad. She goes, no way.

And I go, okay. Can you give the phone back to my dad? Yeah. Good thing you called.

I'm in an argument with this woman at the Walmart checkout. She says, you're not my son. I go, you're in the middle of the afternoon at Walmart. I'm your son.

I got the show biz bug from him. He would have loved to have done this. I had a hard time, A, acknowledging I probably got all this from him, and then B, inviting him in more. I regret that.

I wish I had done that. But it sounds like you're good at that. My dad's always been kind of a critic of what I've been doing my entire life. We just actually were talking about this before I came here.

And I don't know how you are with your kids. You seem like a positive guy. Do you have kids? No, I don't.

Okay. So, oh, good job. That type of... Affirming.

Yeah. Supportive, you mean? Yeah. I grew up really with that environment.

I grew up with... If I scored two goals in soccer, he would point out it was never that compliment than constructive criticism. It was kind of always constructive criticism. Or just criticism.

It's nice of you to euphemize it. Yeah. But he acknowledged now. He's like, yeah, I probably could have massaged the message a little bit better.

But then I always come back with, yeah, but if you did, would that have made me weaker and not who I am today? Are you still swinging hash at this four seasons? Bozo actors on their first movie junket. Hard to know what's right, what's wrong.

I guess you've got to go on instinct and, hey, this is what I know. But now I'm having kids. I'm firm. I love yous going around the house.

That's good. A lot of hugging, a lot of kissing. Sure. Not that I was growing up not given those things.

Well, aren't you Italian supposed to be so affectionate? Was he affectionate? No. I think he's more emotional now than he ever was.

I always feel like he's on the brink of tears at any moment in the day. And I don't know. But that's getting older, dude. I am true now.

I was bawling at my, uh... Gilson's? Picking out fruit. I saw a fucking peach.

Made me cry. I've always been emotional. And my wife is the complete opposite. We'd be watching a movie and I'll be the one crying.

I was over and like, nothing, nothing, nothing, I'm dying. But I'm seeing a lot of that in my father now in his, you know, 77. And I think what happens with parents is they get older. They're reflecting back on their life.

And maybe they're analyzing. Maybe I should have went down this road or maybe I should have done that. And it brings up a lot of different turmoil for them. Let yourself go, like, yeah, it's working out.

Look at these little beautiful kids. I wish I had more of those moments. Did you say four and six? Yeah, it's gonna be seven tomorrow.

I think they are smarter at this age than I ever was at their age. Just what they have access to. These kids nowadays are so much more well-rounded than we ever were. And that has a lot to do with the exposure to even information.

Like, I was on the iPhone looking up stuff. Back in the day, if we didn't know something, you would talk as a family, go, who do I know this? Uncle Joe knows it. He's on vacation.

When he comes back, we'll ask him. If you remember. Yeah. I know you were way more comfortable just not knowing much.

Yes. There's a lot of wondering. And being comfortable and not knowing, which I think increasingly people are so uncomfortable if they don't know something. If you know somebody tells me something, I ain't gonna remember it anyway.

My memory, you're young, but, you know, you're 49. I'm doing a Stevie show right now. Memorizing lines. Bookie?

Yeah. Season two? Some of the actors, I know they're looking at it. Yeah, okay, let's go.

If somebody gives me lines, we change the line. Hey, I need it. Another day. We need to shut it down.

And I can go home again. I gotta be in my bedroom to learn this. You're on season two. How many episodes of season one?

Eight. And this is eight. I had a hard time in movies memorizing lines. It was a beatdown.

I had to write it out. Like, I'd write it on yellow paper. I had all these tricks. Get on Parenthood.

First season, maybe, I think, 18 episodes, maybe 20. Season two, you could come in and hand me a five-page scene while I'm in a makeup chair. And I'd look at it. Okay.

You will get good at it. Yeah, I think it is definitely a muscle that needs to be working. You're like, oh, yeah, it's half as long. We've been four weeks production right now.

I'm feeling, I'm hitting a stride. That being said, I feel like I transpose words and flip them around. And when you're on a movie set or TV set, 150 people are waiting to go home. That's the hard part of acting.

Yeah. It's not acting. It's the stress of performing and everyone's waiting for you and looking at you. You can even harsher.

You're going to fail at your job five times en route to getting it right on the sixth time and 100 people are going to watch and they want to go to lunch. Yeah, it's a unique situation. For a comedian doing this, it's hard not to look at the crew and go, is this funny? Oh, they're smiling.

You're hearing crickets. Well, on purpose, yeah. I'll catch the corner of my eye. The guy's texting.

I'm like, hey, you don't even want to watch this. Look, you caught them watching another show. They're on their phone. Yeah, they're binge-watching other shows while they're doing money.

Watching a different Chuck Lorre show. I wish I was on Young Sheldon. Let's get into those lines. Well, what was Mom's vibe?

My mother often asks me, where the hell am I? You know, you go on these podcasts. We're not talking about me. Mom, here we are.

Yeah. My mom is not as big of a character as my father. So there's not a lot of comedy there with her, although she's extremely funny. And she's the one, I don't say test my material, but if I'm talking about a funny story, my mom is not laughing.

I kind of know that's gold. Yeah. So my mom has been extremely supportive. Both of them have been supportive.

But she's kind of been the quiet one. Not so much coming up to me after the show going, you screwed up a line. Still honest. Can I test some of my Italian stereotypes on you?

Sure. I had a very limited data set where I grew up. But my best friend in sixth grade was Joey Riccardi. And his dad was a bricklayer.

He was fucking Luigi. Hardest working motherfucker. Bought a Bertone. He wanted a Ferrari, but he bought a Bertone.

Bertone? Is that a shoe or a car? I don't know. He was one of the designers for Ferrari.

And he made more of an inexpensive Italian car. But I heard later he did get the Ferrari. But great family. Four sisters.

Joey Riccardi, the mom, always cooking. I loved going over there. The way they were allowed to speak to their mother was like something I had never seen in my life. And the way the mom doted on Joey was also something I never really observed outside of that.

Microcosm. Did mom dot on you? She did, but Rob LaPeste, Northwest Subbers of Chicago. A lot of negativity.

What brand of negativity? Just like the movie. Yeah, anybody see it? Oh, like negative kind of.

The Friends, everybody. I'm from a Detroit suburb. It's the same thing. Boston's got it particularly bad.

It's that you think you're better than me. Shit on her shoulder. Is that what it is? Yeah.

Oh, you think you're fucking better than me? Oh, you were in a movie, huh? That's cute. Yeah, it's like taking everyone down a notch.

Yes, it's required. It's required learning back in the Northwest Subbers. It's taken as a joke and fun. I get it.

It's not like I'm sitting there losing sleep over it, but there's not a lot of complimentary good job. You made it. My mom, she's always proud. I'm talking about just the people that you kind of grew up with.

Not that they're not proud, but we always kind of. Well, no, they're super proud when you're not there. Yeah, exactly. It's just when you're there.

Well, I got to tell you, when I'm there, I think they're proud because no one's paying. They're grateful you're there. I got my friends. I don't even bring out a wallet when I go out.

Not even an offer? Yeah, has that changed relationships? I haven't had anybody ask for money. You got it?

No, everybody's got their own thing. And if I see somebody that might need it, I'll give it to them before they even ask. But I haven't had the money then. What was that?

Make a team. You can't just shoot something in your mouth in the middle of the thing and not like No, listen, Sebastian. This is an improvement. I quit dipping on January 1st.

And half the people I interview, half are you. Half are professors. And they'd be sitting across from me and they'd spend half the interview. He's spitting into that container.

What did he just put in his mouth? I've run through half a tin in one of those interviews and it would be like a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court trying to figure out what the fuck I'm doing over here. So this is an improvement. How many squirts a day?

Whatever it takes. Did you ever smoke? No, never smoked, never dipped, none of that. Drinking?

What's your relationship? I like wine. Yeah, me too. But you know, you listen to these podcasts in Cuberman Lab, Instagram, you go on, everybody's got to take alcohol, poison, you lose sleep, and you get caught up in all this, which we never even had access to 15, 20 years ago.

You just went to sleep, you didn't sleep while you were like, oh, what the fuck? I just had a bad night's sleep. Yeah. My back hurts.

It's true. Now I got to know how much deep REM sleep I'm getting. I don't even do anything with the informational. You know what I'm saying?

Do you sleep ring it or calorie intake? My wife has done all of it. The best version of myself just doesn't say anything about it, but occasionally it comes out and I go, exactly what you just said. What are we doing with this data?

Are we sending it to NASA? We know what to do. Go to sleep, eat well, move your body. Why do we have to introduce all these different devices to reinforce every one of us knows what the fuck to do?

Nobody's literally scratching their head right now at Dairy Queen on their third blizzard going, wait a minute, is this not the best choice for me? We know. Yeah, we know what to do. It's just you feel like you have to quantify your whole existence.

Monitor. You have a ring on it. Yeah, so this is the aura sleep ring that I look at in the morning. I get up in the morning.

I go, look, I look at it. What score do you average? I'm in the low 70s. Okay, I'm in love with that.

And my ideal world, I should be around 82, 85. I don't even know what to say. What does it mean? Yeah.

Also, what a bizarre gap you just laid out. 82 or 85? What a fucking perverted goal. I think 85, you get a crown.

Oh. Okay. But I was talking about a friend, and my friend still does it, and he hates it. Charlie gets like a fucking 40 every night.

And so all this thing does is you wake up and you look at it, and you go, oh, I'm going to have a shit day. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yeah. Well, I don't necessarily look at it like that.

My wife does. That's why she doesn't look at it in the morning. She looks at it at night. So she goes, okay, yeah, I had a great day, but my sleep score was 53, so it doesn't correlate.

This doesn't mean much. Yeah, me. The first thing I do is it's like a game to me. It's like, you know, I look at my stocks in the morning.

Oh, what's going on here? You don't want to stock. I invest in the stock market, so. I'm well diversified.

Do you play Wordle or Connections? You're going to figure out which four go in each category. Which group together? Like Royal, Navy, Baby.

Sky. Sky. What do we got? You play against each other?

No, we're on a chain, and so you do it, and then you send it to the chain. You send your results to the chain. Oh, okay. That's really fun.

All right, I want to go back to Illinois. So you weren't allowed to yell at your mom, were you? I guess that's what I'm getting at. Oh, yeah, no, I was yelling.

I mean, it wasn't disrespectful, but it was a loud house. It was loud. Would the wasps have thought it was disrespectful? No, my house was the house that everybody came to hang out.

So my parents were part of our clique, almost. I wasn't a combative kid. I was very disciplined. I thought my parents were king and queen.

I do what they say. I'm not rebellious. I, like, raised myself with them. My sister was a little bit older, five years younger, a little bit more like, yeah.

Like, my dad, one day, asked my sister, give me a pop in the garage. She's like, no, you'll go get it. You know one of those? And my dad, like, what?

So a lot more combative on the sister side. But our house was like the house. Look, you have children who yell at their parents. That's true.

That is a lot. I'm not into that. But I want to get your pay, because I see this sometimes. I'm at the grocery store, right?

The kid's getting out of line. No, man, I'm not doing it. And then the house calling from the parents, like, it's okay, Johnny. In my house, first of all, that doesn't go on.

If there was a hint of it, it'd be like, I'll leave the groceries right there. We're leaving. And we get in the car, and we're going to have a discussion about it. You don't talk to your parents that way.

It's disrespectful. What should take out of your kids mounting off? Well, let's be very clear about what happens. So first of all, I think Monica would also add, my kids are insanely good at going.

I'm really sorry. When you said that, I felt smaller, and I felt like no one respects what I'm saying. But I realized I overreacted, and I shouldn't have yelled, and I'm sorry. That's correct.

They do do that. So as long as that's where we're getting, all I'm hoping to turn out into the world is two kids that can take responsibility for their actions. I do not expect them to have ideal reactions all the time. But what is absolutely unacceptable in my house is that you don't clean up your side of the street, and that you don't take responsibility for fucking up.

So yeah, I'll be upstairs, and I hear a cereal bowl drop, and I'll hear, you're a fucking piece of shit. This is a nine-year-old talking to an 11-year-old. And I think, man, she can let it rip. And then we talk about it, and then there's apologies.

No, it's not all that frequent. But I'm not panicked. I don't really care. Their words, it's a way to communicate.

The nuns aren't clutching their pearls. Their words and sounds, they're kind, they're loving, and yeah, sometimes they blow. Okay, let me go ahead, clarify. Is the behavior between the siblings, or is a bowl drop, and your daughter to your wife goes, you fucking, what are you doing, you shit?

No. Okay, this one just went, yeah, that happens too. Her face is betraying her. You weren't supposed to say that out loud.

You're not a good side hire, okay? Yeah. Like, you and I now know if you and I ever become friends, and we're at a table, and someone says something super bozo, and I look at you, and I raise my eyebrows, you're going to put me on blast immediately, so you just now absolutely ruled out the fact that we will ever have inside communication, okay? Okay, okay.

Now, just really quick, and I think you'll agree on this, Martha. Once every two months, it's always a nine-year-old. The nine-year-old and my wife have a disagreement, it escalates, it escalates, and as she's walking away, she lets a few swear words ring. It's not every day.

It's not habitual. It gets to that threshold. It's the only thing left she can do to really express how outraged she is. That's my favorite part.

There's no kowtowing. There's no, like, oh, I'm sorry, honey, I'm sorry. No, no, no. It's go chill.

Come back in 10, when you got your heart rate under control, and let's chat about what just happened, because clearly we're not talking to each other that way. Life of you on the same page, a lot of the upbringing. Yeah. Was this just by design, or is this like, oh, yeah, no, she grew up kind of the same way I grew up?

No, it's been a huge evolution, and it has taken many years, and dying to know what you and your wife, what your evolution has been. I did not want to be a dad who, like, rolls in at dinner time, and there's a whole system in place, and I just stay out of the way. I want ownership of the experience. And my wife and I are opposites, and we came from very opposite families, and she went to a private Catholic school.

So I'm a fucking scumbag junkie with a single mom, and it was chaos. So I have a thing, she's got a thing. Over time, it has gotten very cohesive, and we're very much on the same page. And it was a learning curve.

How about you guys? So I'm the disciplinarian. My wife comes from a completely different background. I come from working middle class.

She comes from very wealthy. So her upbringing was a lot of whatever you want, whatever you need. Semester at sea. Wow.

Study on a boat. Only visit 13 countries, right? Oh, wow. Sleepy work camp.

Horse riding? Not so much horse riding. Only because she wasn't interested. Yeah.

It was probably offered. Part of the package. One of the amenities. So a lot of racket sports, a lot of that.

So it works in a way because she's very nurturing, very, hey, you know, what's wrong? I'm a little bit more aggressive and firm. So it's a good balance there. Stay tuned for our marriage, if you dare.

But one thing that I did read in preparation for this podcast, and I got to get your take on this because we're on two opposite ends of the spectrum here, and I want to clarify if this is true. Let's dance. Santa Claus. Oh, yeah.

I heard you on Kimmel railing about this. So go ahead. Lay out your Santa Claus. Your child asked if Santa Claus was real, and you said, it's different than that.

What is the story? So I get that. Yeah, the story is like, okay, Santa's coming. Whatever age that is where you can actually have that conversation.

Maybe it's three. Three years old? Yeah. Like, zero to two, just his presence under the tree.

Yeah, yeah. And they're, right? They're not communicating. Introducing Santa.