Born To Love with Ellie Kemper and Scott EckertEllie and Scott are joined by critically acclaimed cartoonist and best-selling author, Roz Chast. Roz shares her love of leftovers! She loves not fussing over food and isn't afraid to combine Chinese food with a little tuna. Roz even collects the names that different families have for eating leftovers, like "fending," "scrounging," and "goblin meal." Plus Ellie shares with Scott her love of returning home after an evening out.
No no, no, no no no to Love.
Hey Scott, Hey Ellie, This is Ellie Kemper, and this is Scott Eckert.
That this is Scott Eckert, and.
This is our podcast Born to Love. Every week we have someone on the show to talk about something that they love. And this week we have the iconic, lovely, brilliant and very funny Ro's Chaste.
If you've ever read a New Yorker cartoon, she probably wrote.
It, seeing as she's drawn over eight hundred of them. Yeah, the odds are pretty good. It was a chast.
She's going to be talking to us about her love of Leftovers, and I just want to I.
Got to cut in right now. And for any of our listeners who are thinking, oh my gosh, she's gonna talk about the TV show Leftovers, No, she's talking about the food.
Right And it's not a bleak exploration of existential crisis and the meaning of life. That's what the show was.
It's old Dale, old spaghetti.
It's Dal old spaghetti, guys or three day old pizza. People didn't just disappear off the earth.
It's food.
But Ellie, before we bring her in, was was there anything this week that you loved.
Yeah, there was Scott speaking of leftovers. I I'm gonna talk about something that has nothing to do with leftovers. I had a great week. I had a fine week. I had every week. You gotta look for those slivers of light, right, every week is every week is darkness, but you got to look for the slivers.
The week was the sky is black, the clouds are thick. But then just peeking through that tiny little needle point of hope.
And there is what I'll talk about, Scott. I had several evening events this past week, and that's not usual for me. You know me, I'm late to bed, early to rise. I mean, I think most parents of young children enjoy going to bed early. I'm gonna put that out there, so I don't think I'm unique in that way. But I find that I have plenty of energy during the day and then starting around four thirty PM, that's when it starts to teeter off. However, I had teeter off?
Is that the right? What did I teter out? Teeter off? Both of them work, I get it.
My my energy starts to drain at four thirty. But I had several evening events, and you know they were not they were fine. One was a back to school events, one was an outing with friends, and then the other was, oh, just some meeting that I had to attend.
Oh well, now we all know you're gonna leave us hanging, and that's okay. That's a way. That evening meeting you just had to attend. What could it be?
I know I'm not giving you any further details of the evening meeting I had to attend, but I came back from each one, and the thing is, getting yourself ready to go out at that time takes a different energy. You just got to stay focused. I'm always looking for a way to think, Oh, I wonder if this could be rescheduled. I wonder there's a way I could leave early. Blah blah blah. Nope, you got to have your blinders on. You got to just go in and stay laser focused on getting through the event.
And Scott, it has been a tough week for you, Ellie. Didn't I tell that obligatory evening meeting really took the wind out of your sales.
I'll never tell. I'm not going to tell anyone what it was about ever, but let's just say you'll find out. I'm kidding you planning a surprise.
The evening meeting was like a hilarious sketch. It's gonna premiere at primetime television.
Can I tell you what the meeting was?
Though?
It was just a meeting for my apartment building.
I just want to.
I want to say that because I don't want anyone ending the podcast and thinking what was she talking about? So I was for my apartment.
It was like a like a neighbor meeting. Like aghoro, that's okay, Eli, No one believes you. We all know that it was super secret, cool stuff.
Okay.
So the best part of my three evening obligations this past week was coming home. I feel like I've accomplished so much. Is that feeling of I've engaged with the world. I've been out there talking to people, and now I can kick off my shoes and I can just relax. And there's nothing like it, Scott, because, like you know, the there's this similar thing of after you put your kids to bed and you have cleaned the dishes and you can finally watch I don't know, an episode of The Leftovers or whatever or.
Whatever have you.
That's fine too, but there's something after coming home from being out that is so much more rewarding because I can feel all of the energy has it's out of my body. I only have energy to be calm. And I tell you, do you know what I did one of those nights, Scott.
What.
I don't have an iPad, I don't have a TV in my bedroom. I watched a movie on my iPhone, which I've never done before. I said, good night, Michael, that's my husband. He was watching something in the TV room. I said goodnight.
I went to my room.
I turned on my iPhone and I watched Marriage Story, or twenty minutes of it.
Oh my god, Ellie, what this seems like such a bummer. This is what you were born to love. In a grueling week full of secret meeting in late nights, you go into bed, curl up and watch Marriage Story on your eyePhone. I was genuinely expecting it to be like you know what. I watched Groundhog Day. Bill Murray at his peak is so funny. No no, no, no, no no, it doesn't seem fun at all. I did, Scott.
I didn't get to the sad part. I only watched the like setting up of the story. I met the characters, I saw the you know lovely reparts.
So from your perspective, it's a happy marriage.
Yes, before the marriage got bad, it was great. A Laura journ.
You gotta hold your feet to the fire on this h Here we go, Here we go. Well, I'm gonna tell you the truth. Your love this week broke my heart. And I'll tell you why. Because sometimes we chitchat a little bit before we push record, because we're friends. We do that. And you warned me, you said, Scott, you are gonna hate the thing I love this week. Yeah, and the thing you love is coming home. You think I hate that? You think I hate my family, my bed, You think that after an exhausting week like yours. I've got meetings too. They're not so secret. I've got kids too. I stay up later than I want sometimes, and when I when I come home, I share exactly that sense of comfort and relaxation that you described. Why would you think I don't love that? It might be the thing I love most.
Oh, Heavens to Betsy. I always took you for a night. You and Vanessa are always out on the town. And I don't mean you're neglecting your children. I mean you may you sometimes you're with the children out on the town. You make it a point to get out after a life and chomp it up. And that's why I thought, oh you you. The disappointing part of the evening must be when the fun is over and you go home. Now I'm learning were united in that love?
M h, No, we are united in that if you if your love had been I like curling up in bed and watching marriage story on my iPhone, Yeah, I would not have loved that, right, But coming home and and you know, asking in the comfort that home provides. I try that every night.
I like that.
It's it's the part of my life I most look forward.
To, Scott, Ellie, were united in that love.
Let's bring Roz in.
What do you say speaking of apartment build holdings? Somebody else knows something about them in New York City. That is because she is a born and bred New Yorker. How's that for a segue, Scott our guest today, she is the lovely Roz Chast. Roz Chast is a best selling author and critically acclaimed cartoonist who has published over eight hundred cartoons for the New Yorker. Her graphic memoir Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant was named one of the New York Times Book reviews ten Best books of twenty fourteen, and her new book, I Must Be Dreaming, An exploration of dreams and their Meaning, comes out today October twenty fourth. When we come back, we are going to talk to Ro's chast about her love of leftovers, the food and Scott. I can't wait.
I can't wait. I'm thrilled. Stick around.
Okay, everybody, we are back. We are here with the iconic Roz chest. I hope it's okay. I use that word.
I love that word. She agrees, She's an icon.
It's your podcast, your word, thank you, my podcast, my adjectives. Roz, this is such an honor to have you on our show. We are so happy to be talking to you, and we know that we are here to talk about one of your great loves in life, which happens to be leftovers.
This is true.
I happen to love leftover, Scott. I don't know your take on leftovers.
Well, I want to get Roz's take on leftovers before I start throwing bombs. Okay, okay, so, ros you're an artist, you're an icon. What is it about leftovers that appeals to you.
Well, there are a lot of things about leftovers that appeals to me. For one thing, I don't like waste. I don't like when people go to the restaurant and then they leave like half the food on their plate and I know it's just going to go into the garbage. I don't like if somebody like cooks something and then there's all this leftover and then you know, you're just too busy so you don't eat it, so it just goes into the garbage. So there's I like the sort of thriftiness and just just seems like a good thing to do to like you eat it unless like totally like disgusting or something like that. Also, like when you have leftovers, you have this wonderful variety of like textures and tastes and something might not go together, but like, so what, you're not going to die?
You know, It's like.
How can you eat like, you know, leftover Chinese food and like tuna together, And it's like, what are you, like, you know, a princess or something.
I mean, it's fine, fine, I want to know what friend you were imitating just then. But yes, that's the beauty of it, and that's what I so strongly agree with you is that, no, if you were having a dinner party, no, I would not serve Chinese food alongside tuna. Of course not. But it's left overs, and by definition it's what's in your refrigerator. Yes, and it's not toxic.
Yep. Yes, hopefully it's not toxic. That's where I draw the line. I don't want to eat like toxic things. And there is always it has to ask the like smell and like appearance test. I think I also, like I get bored, and so even with food, I like this sort of add aspect of leftovers. You can have a little bit of the fried rice, you can have a little bit of the tuna, and then if you're bored, maybe there's like a half a bagel with cream cheese or something like that.
Yep.
It's just like a mishmash of wonderfulness. Yeah, for some people who just hate this, but I kind of like it, and I like the way it sort of looks, and you know, there's a collage sort of aspect to it.
As someone who doesn't love the idea of commitment, don't tell my husband. No, I'm kidding, But in regards to like food, and cars. I guess I don't like committing to things, and so I appreciate that sort of flexibility that leftovers provide.
Yes, yes, yeah. And also I had written a humor piece for The Worker about leftovers because my husband and I were in the kitchen. It was like, you know, do I feel like cooking not? And he said, well, you want to just fend because fending is the word in our house for when you go into the refrigerator and you pull out what you want for yourself and we eat together, but we might have different meals. And I started asking my friends what they call or if they have an expression. Most people I knew had other words. There were scroungers, like do you want to scrounge? Scavengers? Foragers?
Forgers, I think is a sort of positive way of looking at right. I feel like that's proactive scavengers, seems I wouldn't. I feel like that's insulting in a way too.
It's a little bit like, you know, you're a raccoon kind of digging through like other exactly.
Yep. And I love this piece that you wrote for The New Yorker, examining what you know so many people call leftovers do you have an expression I'm ashamed to say. In my house, I think it's left. We call them left. We're not creative and we didn't come up with another word.
I mean, can I read a few of these things?
Yes?
Please?
Okay? These were my favorites because I got like I put it to Instagram and I got over seventeen hundred responses. I mean it was absolute mad Wow. Some of them were so incredible. California plate, spot plate, Eeke mustard with crackers, having weirds, get yourny, Goblin meal, Gishi, fumfering, Peewa, Diddley, Picky Poke, Screamers, trash, Panda, rags and bottles, black cow Night, blackout, bingo, missed, muffer, moof anarchy, kitchen mush, pooey, Fassic going feral, going Darwin Schluns, Google, Google, Google, you getsy jungle dinner, dirtne mousey mousey and having Poucci that what yep? Having Pouci not Pooci like dog Puuci, like the designer p.
U c C. I what do you think it mean?
What is put?
I don't know enough about Pucci the designer? What does Pucci have? Like an eclectic style?
I have no freaking idea. You know, some of these just missed muff remove.
I mean what, No, it doesn't.
If I had to guess, if I had to guess what having pouci meant, it wouldn't be eating leftovers.
Yeah, exactly, exactly. I completely agree.
I think I love goblin meal, which is like great because it is a goblin meal, like Chinese food and tuna that's a goblin meal.
I like anarchy kitchen.
I love anarchy kitchen. I've heard chaos dinner.
Oh I did not have chaos dinner.
I like that.
I liked going feral, Going Farrel's very good and act.
Someone told me that her grandmother called it eating promiscuously.
Oh that's the having pouci set promiscuously.
Were you expecting such a response. I didn't know that was such a common occurrence. I guess completely not.
That's you know, one of the fun things about Instagram, like, you know, yeah, just ask a question and it's like all these other people also have these you know terms, which I love.
Ye. So yeah, I'm very impressed that so many people are coining their own phrases. I just call them leftovers. Like Ellie said, Now, I feel like I've missed an opportunity, Schluns.
I well it's not too late, Scott. You and I can bring these terms into our respective households. And also, by the way, as parents of young children, I think we could make that maybe more fun for them, because I hate to say it, like, I don't even know how my kids can tell that they're leftovers. I mean, their memories, I feel like, are a day. But then if they seem to remember when we've had, you know, spaghetti two days ago and now we're having it again, Oh.
Do they not like that?
Well, probably it's just because it's something I'm doing.
Yeah, you know, it's not actual food, it's just me.
But if we came up, you know, I think if I called it a go I'm really hooked on goblin meal, I'm really pushing that that, it seems like that would be more fun.
Yeah, definitely, they could make up their own words for it.
Yes, mush gooey. I also like Screamers. Streamers is good or Cali Graamers is crazy.
Yeah, California plate is Like as a lifelong New Yorker, there's something sort of like, yeah that makes sort of sense.
Yeah, I don't have but no, because it's kind of it's like it's healthy and it's and it's fresh, and it's California. Like I sort of I see that there's a phenomenon that I saw on social media. It's girls dinner.
Yeah, that's sort of I don't know, kind of irritates me in a weird way.
What is girls dinner? I'm not familiar with.
Because what's your take on girls? I mean, what's your interpretation of it?
I think it's kind of like when your husband or partner is not there and you're just kind of like, you know, pulling stuff out of the refrigerator for yourself, and it sounds kind of like mush gooey to me. It sounds, you know, just leftovers and stuff. And I know, like when my husband isn't here and I'm cooking for myself, like I like Kraft macaroni and cheese, you know, love which is which is like that's form when he's not here. That's like the sort of centerpiece of my meal, and then I add other stuff to it. I just it just appeals to me. But I would not make that for somebody else probably, I mean, he's that a big fan of you know, Craft macaron and spirals the shells.
But this girl's dinner and then I'll move off. It is I share your Well, you weren't even ambivalent. You seem not to like it. But it feels different from leftovers. It feels like it's it's elevated. Yeah, but in a way that maybe isn't nourishing, right, right, it's your stupid meal, it's your stupid dinner. It's just whatever, you know. It's not supposed to, like, you know, elevate you to you know, the top of mount Maybe for some people it does.
It's just you know, some sort of it's all this act of improving yourself or something like that.
That's it.
And by the way, I have to correct myself. I've been told by our producer that it's actually girl dinner. There's no girls. It's apologies to all the girls out there, but it's girl dinner. Yes, and we remain ambivalent. But anyway, there we go. All right, do you like to cook?
No?
No, Well, I guess I have mixed feelings about it.
Yeah, sometimes it's okay.
I wouldn't say it's something I really like to do. I don't absolutely hate it, but it's not like at the top of my list too, Like when you're you have daughters, I have two sons, two sons.
I was close, yes, and when your children were growing up, because right now, so my kids are seven and four, and I find it impossible to choose to find things that everyone will eat, and every attempt is like usually a failure, and it makes me not want to seek out new things because I know what they'll only eat spaghetti and pizza. So that's the stage of cooking I'm in right now. Pieces all the time.
Man, you just flip in those pies.
Oh my god, do you use that kind of like pre made? Because I made pizza when my kids were little, and they called it rock pizza because I used Pillsbury pre made crust. I think I tried buying the crust and the plastic bags where you have to let it rest, and it was just like, am I allowed to swear?
Yes, please, please do rise, because I.
Think I swear more than my kids. But like at a certain point, it was just like this, this is taking way too long. I have other things I want to do in my life. I'm actually working, you know, so I would buy the Skillsberry, you know, you bang the roll on the thing and it goes.
I love that. I do too.
I'm so afraid of it, but also I kind of like it. And then I tap it with a spoon, right, Oh, I would bang it on the side of the counter and then.
Oh you would.
Yeah, you know, it's just goop it.
It comes right out and.
Then you like put it. But for some reason, the crust always got like really hard, Like I guess I should sorry for the kids with those like baby teeth, those little tiny milk teeth. They's just like, go to school, no teeth, and like what happened. It's like my mom made pizza and like all of the.
It is a hard crust. It's all right, I know what you're talking about. And it shouldn't be that hard.
Yeah, it should not be that hard.
So Ross, what did you put on your rock pizza? Was this a leftover situation where you also putting fried rice and cream cheese with bagels on the rock pizza? What were your topping?
My topping were as boring as can be. It would usually be like some sort of tomato sauce, because you know you're cooking for kids and you don't like fancy. I mean, I still remember making a salad that had like different greens in it, and my son saying that he wouldn't eat it because it had all this fancy like four leaf clovers, and it was it never had four leaf clovers in it, Like that'd be a very expensive salad.
You eat. You eat a salad of four leaf clovers and you're lucky for like six months.
Yeah, yeah, exactly right.
Ros. I don't want to bring it back to Leftover specifically necessarily, but something that you said sort of struck me, and that is that is that you're not going to die like and if that is your sort of threshold, it seems like a lot of things would would would cross it. And it reminds me of we actually were having a brief conversation immediately before we started recording. You're also a fan of airline food. Yes, So the three foods that I know for sure you like are are Leftover's, Kraft, Macaronia, Jeezon, airline. Is that a mischaracterization? No?
No, I mean there's other things I like. But the thing about airline food that's so great is that it's an activity and it doesn't just start when the tray is plopped down in front of you. It starts when you hear that kind of like tinkle of like the trays starting to be and it's like ooh ooh, foods are coming. Yes, And so your mind is taken off the sort of deep seated horror of being in an airplane thirty thousand feet in the air, and then it's all like neatly sort of packaged in this way, and you take the little foil thing off and just I don't know, it just it's like a little activity, you know.
Oh, And more than the activity I enjoy. I'm trying to think through this. I enjoy the actual food because it's been a sign to me, at least in I don't know if they do it as much anymore, but I just remember flying from my grandma's house. She lived in Bridgewood, New Jersey, so we'd fly from Newark to back to Saint Louis and there was it's not a long flight, but they always served dinner and it wasn't like you had a choice. It was just dinner. So I loved that there was no choice. This is what you're having, yes, and it's hot, then it will fill your belly.
Yes, it was fine. It was like a TV dinner because it had the role, and it has the main course, and it had a little section for the dessert, and I don't know, it was just this very satisfy kind of thing. It's certainly not like going to a restaurant and it's like, well, this chef really, you know, knows his stuff. It's not that it's some other enjoyment of consuming food that is not about like ooh, chef's kis, isn't it?
You know?
But there's other aspects of eating that I think are kind of interesting and fun. You know, yes, I completely it's.
The eating an airline meal is absolutely the daintiest thing that I've ever done. When you say that, it's like, oh, it's a little package and you remove this, and that the meal itself is as big as the I you broke the seal. So I'm gonna swear it's as big as the fucking tray. Right, there's no space to put anything anywhere. But instead of seeing that as like, uh, I don't know, so the whole tragedy, it's like I'm excited by it. It's like where am I going to put it? And all the little trash? Where does it go? I'm going to eat my roll first, so that compartment's gonna be where the trash goes. So the food to me is I don't know, it's it's schluns. But but the activity I love.
It would be really funny to like ask for like leftover bag. That would be so you know there's someone who's done it.
There's definitely someone who's done it.
There's one.
There's definitely people who ask for one for the road. They're like, yeah, the chicken and the beef.
Yes, yes, yes, it's probably true. It's probably yeah.
What is your How do you feel about asking for the dog when we're on the back, on the ground, how do you feel about asking for the doggy bag?
You mean, like in a restaurant and a restaurant, I'm fine with it. Although I was once in a restaurant with some friends and it wasn't like you know, Ultra, It wasn't like Jean Jeorge or something like that. It was just some nice place in midtown and that I think this person had chosen because it had gotten some press or whatever. Yeah, And I couldn't finish my meal and I was going to ask for a doggy bag, and she acted as if like I had announced her that I was going to run around the restaurant and grab food off people's plates. It was not something that one.
Did in this place.
And it was just like, I mean, I never forgot it. It was like, oh, well, I guess you're kind of fancy, aren't you.
You know, did you stick to your guns? Did you get the Oh?
I didn't? I was.
I think I was younger.
I was.
I would have stuck to my guns now, but like I was, you know, in my probably late twenties, and I was kind of insecure about what one did, and like she was older and maybe this was like really not something one did in a nice restaurant New.
York, you know.
So you said to her, I'm going to ask. I think I'm going to I'm going to take the rest home?
And she said, oh yeah, she was horrified.
Yeah, wow, extreme, you were in the You were in the right ra Having said that, I do feel an awkwardness when I'm out with friends, and I don't know what it is. Why should it feel like embarrassing? But sometimes it does. If you're going to take the doggy back home. But the alternative is that everybody's just going to throw it out.
So like that, Yeah, I mean sometimes if I'm not going straight home, then you can't, like you're not going to bring a bag of food to the theater, you know. I mean that it seems like that's pushing things. Yes, but if I'm going right home, you know, I'd like to take it home.
So yeah, most of my awkward doggie bag etiquette experiences are in the opposite direction, where I will have, you know, maybe not finished all of my meal and waiter it will be like, do you want a doggy back for that? And the truth is I do not, right, And I hear the thriftiness and the clean play club, and you don't want food to go to waste. I'm a big believer in that, but sometimes the portion's not big enough, and frankly, sometimes the meal wasn't good enough. No, I don't want a doggy back, and you're going to insist that I ought to have one. No, thank you, sir. But of course I take their doggie.
Bag right right, Because you didn't want to offend or you didn't want it, whatever the reason is, that makes perfect sense.
You know you don't want it. It insults, right. I mean, I was just talking with a friend of mine about whether either of us ever send food back, and I never do. I cannot stand the idea of it. That just like, oh my god, what it?
What if they got your order? You know what, if you can't stand onions and you're not allergic, you can't stand them, I just take off.
Okay, I mean if it was like all like mushed up inside, yeah, oh probably if I couldn't stand them, I would work my way around them.
This is a deep cut for Born to Love listeners rise, But where do you come down on Let's just hypothetically say you ordered a salad and then a moth or a grasshopper appeared in that salad. What do you think the appropriate response to that situation would be, Because Ellie's husband has an interesting take.
On it, Oh, I think I would probably pick the thing out of the salad and eat the salad.
See Born to Love Michael Coleman, my husband, Born to Love Ellie's husband.
What a cockroach or a water bug?
No?
No, no, nope, cockroach, water bug. There are certain kinds of insects that no, no, a cricket, you know, a grasshopper? Those are all okay, those seem okay, they seem sort of like out of like Charlotte's web or something totally and perhaps good luck, maybe good luck. They're they're kind of like out of the hayloft in the country. Cockroaches and water bugs. They're like from underneath my refrigerator in my apartment. You know, I don't find that in my salad.
Draws the line at cockroach yep, yeah, yeah, Well that that says so much to me about you as a person, because I mean not the cockroach piece, because well that also says so much to me. You're you're you have respect for yourself. You're not going to have something that a cockroach has touched. No, but the moth, the grasshopper, the praying mantis.
What have you?
I I it was there. It's you know you're eating, especially if it's a salad, it's it's it's roughage. It's like you know, been in the garden where bugs are, or it's been in a kitchen where bugs are.
Yeah, and the and you'll.
Take it on meat around and think about how much you eat every day that you don't even know what bugs have been on. My husband's argument is that, Mike Scott, what was the argument was that like we as Americans feel entitled.
Yeah, Americans feel entitled to stuff, and that just because there's a bug in your salad doesn't mean that you should send it back. Yeah.
Yeah, I think also, you know, I've never worked in a restaurant, but my impression from people I know who have is that it's really really hard. It's hard work, and sometimes, you know, I just feel, you know, that they're under a lot of stress and they don't want to deal with people acting. And I think, also this is like very personal.
But my mother was very like, well, she was an assistant principal and drawing with this is not to my liking, you know.
And she didn't say it quite like that, but you know, if something was wrong or sauce had touched something, and she had asked for sauce on the side because she's very you know, concerned about her figure, and she sent it back because the sauce had touched the food. And I was like, your listeners will not know, but I'm pulling my shirt.
She's going into her shirt like like that. That's mortifying to be dining with that person.
Yeah, it wasn't.
Even though the server understands, it wasn't.
You whose that I'm still friends with that person.
Yeah, and also it is your fear is it angering the chef or the staff, or is it that they will retaliate.
It's both, it's both that they will retaliate, that I've offended somebody that I don't like to cause, you know, anybody extra work or you know, just the whole thing. It just seems though, uh, fraught with like you know, I can just fall down there rabbit hole of like I never should have been born.
You know, it's just.
I mean, it's just like it's really like three steps away from that feeling.
So so that definitely has something to do with it. Then, because your mother would send it back, it sounds.
Like yeah, yeah, and she was more you know, possibly confrontational or assertive and you know all that kind of stuff. And I've probably run in another direction, yeah, gone and and made different life choices.
You've gone on a different journey, yes, journey, Yes I have.
I am I'm amazed, I'm astonished. I've You've totally convinced me I was a leftover skeptic and now I think that I'm going to introduce goblin meal back into my life. Yes, So thank you for that. Rise. If you have a minute, would you stick around and play this game with us?
I would love to.
Here we are, We are here with Ro's chast and Roz has agreed to play one of our favorite games, I Eat, our only game. It's called Love It or Loathe It? So, Roz, what we're gonna do is, we're gonna throw out some subjects, some topics to you, and you just tell us if you love that thing or you loathe that thing, but you can't be meth about it.
You okay, go all in or all out?
Okay, okay, okay.
Love it or loads it? The color yellow?
Hate?
Please tell us why.
Not?
Sure? Not sure?
Just an instinctive loads all yellows? No, not all yellows?
And I use it in my word for artwork. Totally different way of judging these things. Interesting because sometimes you need it, and there is worse yellows and better yellows, deeper yellows. I don't mind as much as the really shrill, very bright ones that just they're just so assaultive and I just cannot stand them.
So like you see a school bus drive by and it fills you with fury.
No, no, the school buses are actually usually more like that deeper yellow and that's not quite as horrible. But but there are certain bright, bright, bright yellows. They're just so sunshiny and assaultive. I just can't stand oppressive.
I get it, I get it, okay, well, roz in that vein love it? Or low that the color orange?
Don't like it? Don't like it? Too closely related, too closely related, also assaultive, but different different it comes to art. Because of art, sometimes you need it and it's fine, it's good.
That's so.
So do you eat oranges or you just it's like I see oranges, I like art.
What about bananas? Bananas acceptable or no? Too yellow?
Bananas have a texture thing and I like them, but they have to be like within a probably fifteen minutes of perfection, you know, are very like avocados. They have a very short window.
It's it is minute. It is so tiny, that window of acceptability. And I think bananas even more sovocados.
Yeah, they can turn on you.
Yeah, so, Russ, if we went through all the colors, what percentage of the colors would you say you loathe?
I love them all for artwork and people's artwork, it's a whole different thing. But just like as a sort of idea. I like dark colors, hate passels. White is. Did you ever read some very pretentious but have you ever read Moby Dick?
Yes, years ago.
I've never read it.
Remember what he wrote about white, the whiteness of the and the color white, and the horribleness of white, and how much worse it was than black. And it's really really good. It's really really good.
So so we'll look up that passage that Herman Melville screed against the color.
Wait, white is the absence of color? Right?
No, black is I think the absence of color, and white is supposed to be all the colors like mush together or something. This is you're talking about spectrum rules.
Okay, yeah, well, I first of all should read Moby Dick. But second of all, that's so fascinating because white I associate with, like, oh brightness, and he writes so well about it.
It's all right, Well, I appreciate an artist as such as yourself. Of course, it's such informed opinions about good and bad colors. I've got to defer love it or loathe it. Roz driving So she's covering her face.
She's fallen back in her chair.
Oh, she's marshaling the energy to answer this question.
Yeah, yeah, I don't know if there are words enough to describe how much I hate it. It goes beyond loathing. I think it's the worst. It's really you hate it?
Do you hate it more than the color yellow?
I hate it more than almost anything.
But you had to so much, especially when your kids were young.
Yes, I had to learn. I didn't learn to drive tillaps thirty eight. I grew up in New York and was one of those New Yorkers who just never learned how to drive. I never had to, but moving out here and having kids, I did have to learn how to drive, and it's just awful. It's just everything about it is terrible. I don't like cars. I constantly feel like something is going to go horribly wrong. You know that they're going to explode, or the wheel, the steering wheels going to come off in my hand, or like, what do I do if I get a flat? And I know theoretically I call AA, but like I don't want to do that. You know, there's like where is the insurance? I don't even know any of this. You know this is Yeah, I don't like merging. I don't like trucks. I don't like bad weather. I don't like lanes, I don't like highways. I don't like any of it anything.
You're obviously competent at it because you've had to do it, and you're you're you know, but are you Are you good like I'm bad at it?
I think I've never had an accident knocking. I'm a very nervous driver, so I don't, you know, take it for granted that I know I'm doing. I'm very cautious, but I am a very avoidant driver. So if I can avoid driving, I will. I've only driven into New York once and never again.
Oh, I can't imagine I would not like doing that.
The only time, the only time I ever drove into New York was with Ellie. Yeah, and we she and I were roommates briefly for about a year. It was our first apartment in New York. Ellie, do you remember this? Of course I do.
And it wasn't just any car, Scott, it was not.
We had like stuff that we were bringing into the city, and we rented a U Haull And the first time driving in Manhattan both of us was driving a U haul across a bridge halfway through we realized trucks, including ours, not allowed on this bridge. It was a terrifying driving experience I've ever had.
Can you imagine that? Did we just name your nightmare at Roz? I mean, and Scott, it was you driving. I wasn't driving a U haul truck across some unknown bridge into Manhattan.
That really terrifying. That is absolutely terrifying and terrifyingly close to why I don't drive into New York YEP either anymore. Which I was certainly not driving a U haul, But I was dealing with my parents' apartment in Brooklyn, and my husband didn't want to drive, and so I said, you know what, I'm just going to do it myself. I'm going to you know, put the address into the GPS and blah. And I actually got to Brooklyn, which I felt so proud of myself. But then somehow I found myself on a ramp going back on another bridge out of Brooklyn. And at that point I had no idea what bridge this was. I didn't know where I was going. Am I going to New Jersey? Am I going to Staten Island? Am I going to Manhattan? Where am I going? I'm on this bridge and I hate this. I've never driven on a bridge before. I don't like this at all. I'm lost, I'm terrified. I felt like I was going to like totally decompensate and like just park the car on side of the bridge and just like step outside of the car and just say, wow, I can't do this. But I just sort of followed my GPS. I was briefly on on the Bowery, and somehow it like routed me back across the bridge again and I got back into Brooklyn, and then I deliberately drove like against the GPS to get deeper into Brooklyn because I was afraid that I would make another loop on that ramp. And then I had to park on their narrow street, and I think I tied up traffic for like about I don't know how to parallel park, so that's terrible. Yeah, it was just a nightmare. So that was the last and only time I've driven into the city.
Hats off to you for even attempting that, because you know you did it for your parents, and that's really scary, I think, a scary thing to do. I don't understand how people are just so casually driving in New York all the time, and like, oh, I got to move my car. It's opposite side or whatever. The rule of the law is, what is the alternate side of the street. Yeah, I'll never understand that. I parking like as a performance, like an unwitting performance, when people are watching and waiting for you. It's truly, it's the stuff of nightmares. Maybe you write about it in your book. I can't wait to read it. But it's very scary. All right, Roz, this one for the game.
Okay, you've won all the last one, but the last one.
Love it or loaded.
Ukulele ah ukuleles.
I love it. I love it.
It's it's fun, it's easy. The entry bar is very low. It's, as somebody once told me, a ukulele is halfway between a toy and an instrument. And you know, it's portable. It's fun.
Yeah. Do you play?
I do?
I do?
Yeah?
Did you teach yourself?
Yeah, it's very you can. It's believe me. It's so easy. I mean you just watch. You can watch the tutorials on YouTube. There's a million of them. And uh, my friend Patty Marks I collaborate with a lot of books. She's the one who got me into the ukuleles, and we we played. We do this sometimes if we just did a kid's book together also and we'll be playing are ukuleles and it's fun.
Is the kid's book out?
It comes out October tenth, so it's actually two books in the fall.
You have two books this month. What is the name of your of the kid's book.
It's called Tired Town, and it's really get it. It's actually pretty good, I must say.
Patty wrote Surprised Okay, oh yes, okay.
Patty wrote it and I did the drawings, and it's very fun. It's very very fun. It's you know, okay, who doesn't want to go to sleep?
So we all okay, I think I think I know the type. I think I know two of the types. Yes, and Roz that well, that's a nice little segue because first of all, that's the end of our love it or Loathe it? You won as predicted. But second of all, I wanted to ask as we wrap up, are there any other projects you would like to promote? We have Tired Town, your new children's book.
And I Must Be Dreaming, which comes out on October twenty fourth.
That's today. If you're listening to the day that our podcast came out. That's today and.
And yeah, that's about it.
Well, that's about it. That's two books that you wrote that we cannot wait to read. Roz, Thank you so much for taking the time chat.
With us was a pleasure.
Thank you, Roz. Thanks for listening to Born to Love. We'll be back next week with brand new things that we love.
We want to hear from you. Leave us a review in Apple Podcasts and tell us what you love. We might even ask one of our guests in an upcuting love.
It or love it. Born to Love is hosted and created by Elli Kemper and Scott Ecker.
Our executive producer is Aaron Coffman. Our producers are Sheena Ozaki and Zoe Danklab.
Born to Love is part of Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network in collaboration with iHeart Podcasts. Special thanks to Hans Sonny.
Rachel Kaplan and Adrianna Cassiano
Michael Fayles, Alex Korl, and Baheed Frazier.
