2026.03.12: Labubu Strays

This for me is like coming home from work, at the end of the day I work really hard,

and nobody appreciates me, my wife doesn't appreciate my kids don't appreciate me,

like some bitch.

Hey, we're recording the podcast!

I've got up!

Good!

More than you, wherever you are, because it is-

More like somewhere!

No, or March 12, 2020!

Six!

Nailed it!

My name is Bernie Burns, sitting right over there, that drop was not a passive-aggressive

move.

Dassey Burns, say what?

Are you sure?

I'd ask the everybody-

It feels a little targeted.

I still think one of my favorite things on the internet these days is when someone is

recording something off of like a playback or a TV or something, and then the person recording

it, who you never see, starts laughing and the camera starts shaking.

They're so tickled by what they're recording.

That guy is referring to a scotch whiskey that he is sampling from a casket, and that's

with his- those are his tasting notes.

That feels like being under- under-

It tastes like I've been unappreciated.

I love it.

Hey, everybody, it is- there was day.

It is Thursday.

How do you feel about being Thursday, Ashley?

I feel pretty good.

I'm feeling like we're making a lot of progress on the week.

We're 60% done.

We're on our way to 80% done.

We're the second half now.

It's good to know that we're keeping the week on schedule.

It's on track.

You know, second half here, we just got to make our plays, you know, keep our head in

the game.

You know, just keep signal call works.

We'll see what happens.

Okay.

Thanks.

Actually, though, I do have some catch-up from yesterday's to do.

I had a thought that I started and then didn't finish, and I need to finish the thought.

I was talking about the Nintendo key cards yesterday.

And I think I gave people the wrong impression.

I was talking about how, you know, the key cards have like certain physical advantages.

And the Nintendo had initially said they weren't going to be using these key cards on first

party titles.

And yet, here we are with Pokemon Pocopia being a key card title.

And that it's selling out everywhere, right?

Which would then imply that people are happy about it.

I want to be clear.

Vocal Nintendo fans have been very clear that they don't like these key cards, right?

Because of, because it does have some of the disadvantages of digital titles, that it's

either do the cartridge or do the digital, don't this key card is silly.

It's just, it's muddying the waters, right?

So I want to be clear, I absolutely understand that a lot of Nintendo fans have been vocal

about not liking the key cards, where I was intending to go before we got sidetracked by

talking about fried dough, which, let's be honest, is a delicious and irresistible topic

shift, was that this game selling out is an indicator that, unfortunately, being unhappy

with key cards may not have the impact that we hope that it would with Nintendo, right?

It's a little bit like, remember Hogwarts Legacy, the Harry Potter game, and there were

a lot of calls to boycott the game because of JK Rowling's, you know, trans views and people

on wanting to give her money for this game. So there were a lot of calls to boycott the game,

right? Game came out, sold millions, millions of copies, set records, did amazing, continues

to sell a bunch of copies. So the boycott in the end didn't have the impact that people

hoped that it would, right? They didn't, they were trying to send a message, but a lot of other

people went, I'm going to play the game. I think it's like that with key cards, right? There's

a lot of people that are like, I guess it's fine. I just want to play the game. So I'm not going

to worry about it too much. Well, that's a single drop thing, right? Right. Yeah. Like, I like

micro transactions because I feel like I'm supporting the team that made the game and the

company that put this game out that's free, but apparently I'm contributing to a huge problem

as well by doing that. Well, it's interesting. You say that. So Valve is apparently going through

a lawsuit in New York, like New York is suing Valve over loot boxes. I don't know why they

singled out just Valve when like Fortnite's right there. Is it because of time zones? Is that

why it's probably because of time zones? They've been New York erasure.

But yeah, New York has been has a lawsuit going against Valve and Valve's responded basically

saying like, yeah, we'll see you in court. They're trying to valve the New York wants to basically

take away the tradeability. You know, with with a lot of like the valve loot boxes and stuff,

you can like open like, you know, I don't know counter strike gunskins or whatever. And then you

can sell those on the valve marketplace. And so the New York has been making the case that it's

like gambling that that if you pay for loot boxes or like or buy a loot box, whatever, you're

basically gambling, right? Because the what you get could be of whatever value. Valve is trying to

defend that by saying, one, on loot boxes are nothing new like blind packs of Pokemon cards or

like magic gathering cards or like blind box things like Labubus. I did see that Labubus were

cats and strays in that conversation. Labubus over who being like, what did I do? But they're

they're making the the defense that these sort of like blind packs things that you buy and then

open and find out what you've got have been around for ages without having any kind of problem.

And that being able to trade and sell them on sometimes for much more than what you paid for

the initial pack has always been like a part of like trade trade tables and collectibles. So they're

saying it's it's nothing different. It's just that it's digital. Do you ever engage with something

and you still don't understand how it works kind of like us with like daylight savings time?

It's like we just do it every year. I know to spring ahead. I know to fall back, but I don't know which

one is which and I don't take the time to figure out how it saves daylight. Everything else like that

is a specific thing in mind for steam. What's that? They're cards. They have cards. They're for every

game you play on steam. You get cards and you unlock them. And if you wouldn't look for them in your

inventory on steam, why would you ever go in there anyway? You wouldn't even know about these

things. But like say for instance, a game like seven days tonight, there's like let's just say

there's six cards and there's you unlock three by playing the game. And then that's it like as

far as I know, there's no other way to unlock the rest of the cards. And then you can go to the

marketplace to go buy them for like depending on the game like 12 cents or whatever to complete the

set. But I just never understood it. I never understood what the card system is. I'm sure there's

some people who make a good living by selling stuff on the steam marketplace. And I've looked at it

and I've engaged with it and I still just don't get it. I don't get it. I understand the skins

and stuff like that. I understand that you know, people like it and if people like it, it's got value.

And then you can sell it to someone else for whatever they'll pay for it. That stuff I understand.

But like the whole system of like the inventory on steam has just lost on me. I feel like there's

there are a couple of these little like pockets of steam that go really deep that 99% of people,

do you just go on steam and you buy the game and you play the game? Yeah. Right. And then there's

like 1% of people that are like they are really into I don't know, collecting cards. I can tell

you what those cards do. I think I've I think I've traded for cards once or twice before when I found

out. I was like, what's my steam level? I've had I'd had steam for like, I don't know, 15 years at

that point. And I was like, why am only level four? It's bullshit. I should be higher than that.

And found out that like by trading my cards or something or like completing trading card packs

whatever, I could like dramatically boost my level. I'm proud to say that today only 20th to 122

years after I got steam, whatever. I'm a level 28. Yeah. Yeah. And that those cards are how

that level goes up, right? Yeah. That's one of the ways that you can like level boost yourself

pretty quick. Right. I think I'm like level 50 because I went through and completed a bunch of

cards. I was like, I said, I've engaged with it. It's just lost on me. Like I have no urge to go

back and complete any other sets or anything like that. I wonder if that was like someone's pet

project. There were like, we should have trading cards and like implemented this whole thing. And

now it's this unseen thing that like all games like there's someone who works on like every game

who's had to make like five trading card artists. Yeah. Right. And they're like, well, we had to do

this. This was like part of the checklist for releasing on steam. So we did this. But like no

one will ever see these things. It's like having a one of those Easter eggs that you're like, yeah,

it's been 20 years and no one's found this Easter egg in my game. We were just talking about an

Nintendo getting a pass for trying new things all the time. Valves the opposite. They get a pass

for not changing a goddamn thing ever. Like that that steam UI feels like it's been the exact same

since 2001. Yeah. So whatever half life two came out. It's almost like it. It went through the

dated phase and is now like a retro phase. Right. And nobody wants them to mess with it. Right.

It's like, don't I know what's a feature on steam that you would want that you don't have. I can't

think of anything. Yeah. It's like, it's got them all. And it does have things like you can do

big picture mode. So that if you're using it in like a like a either your handheld or a console

sort of format, you have a different interface for it. And the looks, you know, shiny and much

more TV friendly. Right. But it's one of those things. They probably looked at all the updates that

are to like Reddit and to YouTube and to everyone hating every update that every platform has ever

put out ever. They went, I'm just not going to. Yeah. Also, it's like when you look at like the

menus across the top of steam and like the sub menus, most of those don't make any sense. You

probably use like two out of like the 50 options that are buried up in there anyway. Like they

literally make no sense to me. But I get why they don't change it because gamers is one of those

subset of people. When you change the UI, you never want to mess with gamers muscle memory because

then it pisses them off. Right. Like I know exactly just from muscle memory, how to get to what I

need to get to. And if you move that to a different place, even like a pixel off, you're going to

piss me off. Right. And a lot of that's because like I can navigate something without thinking about

it. Like it's been there is like some tiny corner of my brain that it's doing that part while I

think about something totally different. And then the only time I'm going to notice it is when it

didn't work the way I expected it to go. What the fuck? Right. The current UI doesn't make any

goddamn sense. But I've memorized how it doesn't make any goddamn sense. Right. And now it's in my

brain. It's pathway. Well, Bernie, sometimes what's old is new again. And what what some people on

the internet are getting very excited might be new again is firefly. Now you didn't watch firefly

a lot when it came up. Right. That was me being stubborn, though, because people were so big into

firefly. And of course, I heard about after was canceled after what seven episodes. Yeah, they

can't get out of order. Yeah. The first season was aired out of order. And it also kept moving.

Like it didn't have one consistent time slot for its season. So it moved around a bunch in

this schedule. So no one knew when it was going to be on. So it didn't do great. Got canceled for

season. And which has been a sore point for every fan of firefly that will that you listen to

for more than 30 seconds will tell you all about how it didn't get a fair shake. But how long has

happened? That's been 20 years too, right? Over over 20 years. There's some steam groups dedicated

to bring you back firefly. But there's there's some buzz because the cast of firefly has been doing

these like teaser social media videos basically where Nathan Filion who played Captain Malcolm Reynolds

he was like the lead in the show has been going around to and knocking on the doors of various

cast members houses and they answered the door and they're like is it time and he's like it's

time they're like we're doing the thing and he's like we're doing the thing and they're like

is it what I think it is that he goes it's what you think it is. And people are guessing it's

so yeah that that understandably has the internet going are we about to get a firefly reboot

or like is it going to come back somehow and there's a lot of speculation going out I swear to

God Bernie if this is like them putting out their steam trading card collection people are going

to be pissed extremely pissed that they're trying to collect firefly you know they put out

serenity was the movie right yeah that they put out and it was like okay look there was a few

things at that point in time that were really bolstered by fan interaction it was the beginning

of the internet or kind of like the modern era of the internet where people were getting really

involved and okay wow look at this there's all this like basically a writing campaign to make

more firefly the best example of it weirdly enough is family guy family guy was canceled family

guys been canceled a couple times hasn't I think I just canceled the one time and then it got such a

ground swell on home video and the internet they brought it back and now that's been around for

about 25 years as well still going strong it's crazy to think about it like if in the absence of

you know the internet and the home video push for it like that show would have been like one two

seasons and then done and that's it and you wonder what Seth McFarlane's career looks like

without the light of that yeah but anyway serenity came out and this is where I got this is

this is what's stuck in my crawl was serenity came out it did $25 million total domestically

even at the time that was not a huge hit yeah and I think for something everyone swore was the

greatest thing ever made and everybody wants it to come back then it came back and it did

$25 million domestically yeah I think that's one of those examples of like very very vocal

fans yeah and only vocal fans yeah right like there there wasn't like a silent majority behind

them so yeah that movie came out to sort of cap off and not finish the story because even after

that it feels like there's like much more firefly to be told but that that came out didn't do great

so it didn't go anywhere after that I think there's there's some graphic novels which I read that

you know that tell additional adventures set in the firefly verse but I think what everyone is

desperately hoping this tease is for is that somehow someone got the rights to firefly and they're

going to reboot the series I don't know I don't know how that's going to go because this was also

a Joss Whedon series at the time when Joss Whedon was everyone's TV darling and no one likes Joss

Whedon now but it was it did have a lot of that like very like quippy dialogue that he is well

known for and so I'm not sure how they plan to handle the series given all that or that it would

even come out the same like you know it comes out and people go yeah it wasn't what I was up

I'm having seen it now I think it's a great premise for a show and I think it's a great show

I just at the time when it was going on I was like one of those like stubborn cynical people

and now I'm more in the like great if people enjoy this yeah absolutely hope they do make it

I I I don't I hope I hope this isn't some like um oh we're doing a full cast audio book

well there's something like something like that where I'd be like okay that's cool but

motherfucker we got really worked up for something really big now I think people have guessed

a convention thing and they said no people have guessed a podcast and they said no

they've already got a podcast well the little pockets right yeah individually or in

little small groups but that sounds familiar I've even seen speculation that in one of the

videos that Nathan Philly and holds up a green apple and that indicates that it's an animated

show because voice actors use green apples to preserve their voices and that's a nod to that

and everyone's like what the fuck are you talking about this was even firefly fans going like

dude that's like too much come on it's you're stretching yeah so good I hope it does you know

I hope you know for people who like firefly I hope they bring back and have something for them you

know I like you said I won't be collecting the steam collectible cards for firefly anytime soon

no but any my level from one to two on firefly you know while we're talking about entertainment

stuff actually the Oscars are this weekend yeah yeah and it's like first of all they're really

late I always associate the Oscars with February I associate them with January is that maybe I don't

know why I guess that's when maybe a lot of the campaigns for nominations start ramping up but I

always expect it in January and then it doesn't come until later and I'm always like yeah maybe

I move back as a COVID but I don't know why I was associated with late February I mean we're in

mid March so might as well be late February but the the categories that I'm interested in are

best picture and basically best actor seems to be the most interesting race but I don't know

I'm not really paying too much to Oscar stuff and I even saw this quote from somebody that was in

one of the trades where it was somebody in the academy going yeah I just don't even watch these

anymore I don't vote because I want to vote for this one movie but I don't want to watch the other

four that I know we're gonna be much worse than it I don't feel like I can vote so I'm just

not gonna vote yeah it was it was a letter that that an academy member sent you I think it was

deadline and it was things like yeah I want to vote for K-pop demon hunters but I don't want to watch

the other four entries in order to be able to do that so I'm just not which I know going in I'm

gonna find to be inferior than K-pop demons I already want to vote for K-pop demon hunters so

that that's the category that I'm watching is animated which is interesting to me because I that's

good approach right if you're not going to watch the material don't vote right I would hate to

think that somebody just voted for the thing they know because that's often what happens in those

awards right especially for categories that are deemed to be less than you know in a meeting and

I think the animated category is deemed to be less than for a lot of people not this year baby the

cast of huntrix is going to be singing at the Oscars I was trying to find what's the big K-pop demon

hunters thing that's what the song golden golden that's why that's okay good to know kids love that song

so we have an interesting thing we have made a this is a big transition for us because in addition to

this weekend being the Oscars in addition to this weekend being projectile Mary early screenings

whatever the fuck that mean in addition to this weekend being the six nations rugby tournament

super Saturday it is also we've made the transition to now it is UK Mother's Day so if you're a

Brit out there call your mum this weekend but we have made the full transition we used to celebrate

Mother's Day on the U.S. Day here and now we're not doing that we made a conscious decision

you get Mother's Day this weekend well I got really lucky for a couple years where I kind of got

two Mother's Day because we weren't sure when to celebrate it so the you know the kids schools

and everything they've got like programs where they'll like make you know make your mom a card

and things like that and so I kind of got some things for you came Mother's Day but then we would

celebrate the U.S. Mother's Day anyway just out of habit and so I kind of got to double up and

I was just in quietly enjoying that but we've we've made the transition now so we're we're doing

all UK dates might have been damaging my reputation too because then people would say to me like

oh what do you have planned for Mother's Day this weekend I'm like well we'll do it in a month

in a month maybe two we'll see what's the sound it's so callous like we know it's celebrate

Mother's Day in our house at this time not in March she's just doing her job I wouldn't be nice

though to do like a Mother's Day out kind of a thing but this is not quite yet the weather for it

although it's getting there we're getting the boo you've seen the little shoots coming up little

yeah little snow drops and then the little daffodils the daffodils are beginning to bloom we're

getting there and then in about a month all the trees are gonna explode with leaves and then we'll

know that we've arrived then we'll know that we've arrived but we are starting to get those days where

you look outside and the sky is blue which is a nice change and you go outside and you go oh

it's only chilly instead of frigid that's nice so some quick world news before we end the podcast

the war in Iran still continues and it's having some knock on effects that people might not be

aware of one is that everyone has kind of got their eye on the price of oil because of the

straight of hormones and of course Iran being a huge oil producing nation itself but also this

is affecting dramatically the price of fertilizer Bloomberg is now saying this is the worst fertilizer

crisis that we've seen probably seen recorded time but some of the materials that are used to

create fertilizer that come out of the Middle East are now now coming out of the Middle East so

we could see a massive spike in the price of fertilizer which then of course affect as I'm sure

you can imagine price of food as well right and not not only that but it's going to dramatically

affect the the mood of your dad in his socks who's always trying to like you get out and fertilize

the lawn right exactly perfect so the fertilizer island home depot right so not only is your dad

gonna be in a bad mood but also your food's gonna get way more expensive right as long as your food

doesn't need fertilizer and doesn't need to be transported to you via like a giant truck then

you'll be fine you'll be okay let's get to victory gardens going again you can eat your tiny

tomatoes out of your front yard garden you get your balcony trullis is ready everybody yeah there

was something that I think it's gone up 25% in the last like two weeks fertilizer yeah really so

it's already people are seeing the price and then of course once the idea starts that it's going

to be scarce then the price starts to go up as well because then people start stockpiling

yes like toilet paper the other thing too is that there's been a report that there could be

targeted drone attacks in California this is something I've been concerned about with the war

which is that you know a lot of Americans me being one of them grew up in a world where we don't

understand what it's like to have a foreign war reach our shores we don't know what that's like

and so I think this war could be the one where we have finally unless you consider 9-11 to be a

wartime attack you know could we could see what could be the biggest ever domestic attack

in the United States on domestic soil I know and that would I wonder what that would do in

historically when that has happened it has bolstered the resolve of the US but not I don't know

I don't know if we live in that environment anymore I really don't I mean it'll be one of those

things that if nothing else would certainly bring home the reality of the conflict with looking

up domestic attacks you know during wartime I tried to figure out like what was the worst one

got reminded Japan bombed like Oregon at one point but then we don't really talk about that

very much what did Oregon ever do lip the weather closest to Japan that's what it was and it was

hard to get there so they had some limited bombing runs and there was like some balloon attacks as

well those come up every now and then like there was a balloon I think the only person who's

ever been killed by an attack of a foreign aggressor on American soil during wartime was

somebody who got hit by a balloon attack what's a balloon attack like they've floated literally

floated a bomb on a balloon oh that's what they did yeah until the the balloon finally like loses

its helium and they just what drops this payload yeah everybody talks to Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor

always comes up in this discussion Pearl Harbor was attacked in 1941 Pearl Hawaii was not a state

until 1959 so at the time that was not an attack on US soil was attack on a US territory yep base

but not technically not quite the same thing as we're dealing with right now in the UK where there's

a base in Cyprus you know obviously it's not the same thing but kind of like that so there's

been an attack on a UK military base but it's not in the UK that's like Pearl Harbor was Pearl Harbor

was in Hawaii which was a US territory where we had a military base it was bombed and that got us

into the war very famously but yeah it wasn't a US state until 1959 same year as Alaska really

yeah I think so I think Alaska and Hawaii came in in 1959 a lot of weird things that are that are

way more recent in history than they feel like yeah like kind of like the I did a rod when you're like

wait what how was it that recent the weird thing was it started in Hawaii that was a weird race

the sled dogs were so confused it was just dogs running but they called it dead

they're on that's right actively so to begin a dogs I saw this thing that I wanted to bring up

which is just a weird I like weird like facts like you talk about the I did a rod so many people

in the comments were like I can't believe the I did a rod started in 1973 that's insane

there was an article I saw by the American Kennel Association

Kennel Club thank you the American Kennel Club that was an article about how

as you know dogs are born in leaders so most dogs are fraternal twins so it kind of make the

question you would assume like oh well there's probably a lot of identical twin dogs that probably

occurs it's actually extraordinarily rare and in fact from this article there's only been one

documented case of identical twin dogs so if I remember I wish for for fraternal twins are

are twins that they're they're born the same but they all are from individual eggs right different

different brother and sister twins right could be their fraternal by definition um whereas

identical twins have to be a fertilized egg that's then split correct right and so with what

they're saying that that doesn't happen in dogs I guess it doesn't happen in dogs ever which

then I got to thinking about is that that I also got to be clear about this they're probably not

going out and sampling dogs all the time like how often with this even come up unless there was

a study done on it but it did make me think that of dogs that have the same genetic makeup

there are now probably more dogs who are identical twins because of cloning

then there have been identical twin dogs in all of history of dogs basically yeah all of dog

history yeah because I mean I guess like from a genetic standpoint a clone would be an identical

twin it's an identical twin yeah asynchronous identical twin essentially right because it's

it's a lot younger well look I mean there's no twins that are born at the same time right like one

twin is always born a few minutes ahead sometimes it's 12 years and they will let you know that

forever forever five minutes you should never tell kids that right like who came first I guess

they can check on the birth certificates of the you know but never tell kids that stuff no it's

that's going to be one of those things forever although I feel like that's always an advantage for

the younger twin because they they're like yeah well you'll always be older than me yeah well

later in life it switches right yeah you want to look older when you're younger and then you spend

80% of your life trying to go the other direction right so the the older twin house the advantage

for childhood when they're like well I'm older so I get to make the decision yeah which every kid

of course does and then when you get older then the younger it flips the younger one has the

advantage because they'll never be as old as you obsession with youth is kind of interesting

isn't it it's like that you know we spend so much time trying to appear young it's like yeah I

want to appear like I did in the point of my life where I was very unhappy had no money had no

job had no experience and had no wisdom I want to I want to make sure the people think that's what

I'm like today yeah but buddy my knees didn't click back then it's a really good point so yeah I want

that I didn't have to wait 30 seconds after I climbed a set of stairs to talk all right Ash who do

we have to thank for helping us get out of the chair today a big thanks to stove and Mike Longfellow

for sponsoring this episode of our show at patreon.com slash morning somewhere and Rochartute.com hey thanks

everybody who's been sending in so much feedback on the app beta test which started yesterday so

it's going really really well the apps looking fantastic all right that does it for us today March 12

2026 we will be back talking tomorrow we hope you will be here as well.

Bye everybody.