Transcript of Emily & Matt Hyland (Emily Burger)

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert Experts on Expert. I'm Dan Shepherd. I'm joined by Miniature Mouse.

Hi there.

Boy, y'all, you've been hearing us talking about this burger for 8 long years. It's our obsession. It's our religion.

It's our life force.

It's our life force. Emily Burger. So today we have Emily and Matt Hyland on who started Emily Loves Pizza and Emily and Emmy Square and all these yummy restaurants that serve it. Emily is also a poet and an educator and a mindful movement teacher. And Matt is a chef and a restaurateur. Please enjoy Emily and Matt Hyland. He's an object expert.

He's an object expert.

He's an object expert.

Hi.

Yeah, great to meet you. Yes.

I hope you know you've influenced me. I'm in my Jenny King because you look so cute.

Hello.

Hi, good to see you.

Did you guys get eyes on the poster?

Yes, of course.

That's why I'm sitting on the bed.

You already spotted it?

Well, we have some gifts for you.

Oh my goodness.

Oh my gosh. Notably.

I don't know if we deserve them, but we'll receive them.

I'll take.

Our shop at the Santa Monica Emmy Square.

Put on a cereal.

Oh.

Oh my God. Amazing.

So first of all, I just love these little squeeze bottles.

Yeah, you wouldn't know where to purchase one. Yeah, so now you have one, you can reuse it. This is so yummy.

Yeah, so enjoy.

Oh, I can't wait.

It's like the mustard squirter at a Coney Dog.

It is, it is. Or like a Fuddruckers.

And so it's like extra matter. You have the sauce.

Yeah, I like that.

Exactly, exactly.

Can I give you the rest of our gifts? We kind of decided to— we're so honored to be here. Matt's wife is a chocolatier.

Oh, she made special, special bonbons. What?

And my new book is coming out this season, and so I wanted to give one of those to each of you.

Are you coming from Santa Fe and you're coming from Austin? Yeah.

Yeah.

You guys visit here often or not?

Occasionally.

Yeah, we love— LA is like one of my favorite cities. Growing up in New York, it's so different. We both grew up in New York City. Coming to LA is such a nice treat. It's like a big beautiful town with the best weather ever and great food. It's so much fun being here.

How often do you guys go visit these different locations? Let's start with how many Emily or Emmy or all the different iterations restaurants are there right now?

So we still co-own and operate the original Emily in Clinton Hill. Yeah, that's why you got the VIP reservation.

Yeah, that started it all.

That was our intro.

What are there now, 21?

No, I think there's more like 30.

30?

30?

Emmy Squares, not Emilys.

The franchise is called Emmy Square?

Correct. Yeah.

Okay.

The West Village is a weird mishmash.

Hybrid. It's a hybrid, right?

Yeah.

So the burger is a little different. We use the same sauce, but it's a double patty. But yeah, Clinton Hill is definitely the original.

Yeah.

The burger at the West Village seems to me like it's evolved closer to Clinton Hill over the years. Is that at all true? There's more soupy onions now on the West Village one, which is what I like so much about Clinton Hill. But I don't think originally when I went there, they had the soupy onion.

Probably put a little bit less on. It has evolved. We opened in 2017, so it's almost 10 years we opened that one. So, like, your menu changes happen, and chefs come and go, and things like that. But we're pretty hands-off with that one more recently. The bigger company owns that one specifically.

Matt has come back in to do some corporate stuff, corporate chefing, but I'm a silent partner in the Emmy Squared group, so I just basically run the show over at the original from there.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fortunately, our chef and our manager are very reliable.

You still have to check in all the time with this bigger business that you guys are silent partners in. You get updated and stuff?

Yeah, and since they asked me to come back to sort of consult our corporate chef, and I will retrain some of the other chefs and come up with some new menu items. We're opening one in Greenwich where I grew up, which is very strange.

Oh yeah, Connecticut?

Yeah, like right on Greenwich Avenue, which is like a strange place to start.

Right down from where you grew up, literally.

Yeah, and I took restaurant that I went to growing up, so it's kind of cool. But we'll launch a new menu there that'll like roll into the other 30 locations.

So that'd be like kind of a test kitchen.

Exactly.

R&D stuff.

Yeah. And I'll be living in my mom's basement at that point.

So that'll be great. Yeah.

Really full circle.

Yeah, exactly.

Which was the plan if the restaurant failed in the beginning.

It's nice to have that backup basement, to be honest.

It's full of crickets. It's great.

You guys would open one on the east side of LA. Ah, Santa Monica. I'll tell you, it's another state. It's like us going to Brooklyn.

Duly noted.

What I didn't know that Emily pointed out was there's one downtown.

In the—

what is it? L.A. Nation Life? What is that? What?

It's called—

there's one downtown now.

Yeah.

How long has that been online?

A few years.

No, no, no. In 2 months.

Yeah. Because when we've ordered in the past, they will deliver. I don't know why they'll deliver from Santa Monica and it's good. It's still good, but it takes a beating.

Yeah.

An hour and a half car ride here. You got to really be a diehard Emily bird.

Exactly. I'd like one on Hillhurst. I'm going to be very specific. I'd like one on Franklin.

The powers that be.

Oh my God.

Yeah, listen up.

Town of Morrissey, right?

Yeah, there is a building there that could use some cute stuff.

He'll relay it.

Yeah, he'll relay it.

We'll start with you, Emily. You're from New Jersey, yeah?

I am, Jersey girl.

And what did your parents do?

They were teachers. My mom was a teacher of graduate students for the visually impaired. So she was a sighted person who could actually read and write in Braille, which was pretty cool.

Oh, that's really cool, actually. How did she stumble into that? That feels very niche.

She did her doctorate at Columbia in special education. I don't actually know the why of that, but she felt very called towards that population. And my dad founded a charter school in northern New Jersey and was the principal of that school.

Did you attend that school?

I did not attend that school, thankfully.

Did they meet at Columbia?

They met at Columbia.

Yeah.

And then your parents, you started in Brooklyn but ended up in Greenwich, right?

Yeah. So I was born in New York City. Everyone's born at NYU, I guess, in the '80s. Yeah. So then I was in Brooklyn until I was 9, and then my dad grew up in Greenwich, so we moved back up there because he was sick of living in New York City, and my mother grew up in deep Brooklyn, and we lived like 10 blocks from where she grew up. She traveled, obviously, but never left Brooklyn to live.

And what did they do?

They were both transportation analysts at Standard Poor's. That's where they met.

Okay, again, this is very fucking niche. Your mom reads Braille and they are transportation—

Like, they specialized in airlines and trains. So my father would go up and be like, this is why we should not give them this kind of rating, like a AAA or AA credit rating. And my mom would go up and be like, no, no, this is why we should. Oh, adversaries.

But they both worked at Standard Poor's.

Yeah, Standard Poor's, S&P.

And they rank stuff and they say what the quality of their debt is and stuff like that.

Exactly. I didn't follow in that path.

Yeah, right. So you guys meet in Rhode Island at what school?

Roger Williams. I was Matt's RA.

Oh, you were?

I used to key into his room and steal his candy.

You were like 2 years younger than me.

I was 18.

I was like 20, I think.

Nobody listened to me on the floor. I was an RA for one semester after that.

So you were a good student. Student. You were like a Type A.

Still am.

Yeah, still true.

Yep.

Had a drawer full of candy. That was the kind of student I was.

And you were computer science major?

Computer science, yeah.

Okay, all this is hilarious where you end up. And then you were doing writing and sociology?

Oh yeah, creative writing.

And when did you first meet? Literally, were you in his dorm room?

The second week of Spaforia.

Yeah, we ate pizza together. Oh, on the dorm room floor.

3 straight pizzas.

Yeah, 3 straight pizza meals. And then it was pretty quick. Pepperoni and olive oil?

Pepperoni I'm gonna say olives is my—

Olives, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good.

You are good.

That is good.

That's a deep cut right there. I forgot that.

What's yours? Or do you know hers?

Well, no, I know what they ate on the first date.

That was our first, yeah.

Oh my God.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Were you there, man? This is incredible.

That's not hard to find. Okay.

Oh, you're right.

So you guys graduate in 2004, and do you already know by the time you graduate you are not gonna pursue sociology and you are not gonna pursue computer science?

Yeah, I was gonna drop out junior year. And go to culinary school. And then my mother and Emily convinced me, you're already there junior year. Why would you drop out now?

Yeah.

And that's obviously in retrospect a great idea.

Yeah.

I majored in creative writing actually. So I wound up applying and getting into graduate school at Brooklyn College for my MFA in poetry. And then Matt got into culinary school at the Institute of Culinary Education. So we came to the city.

Which is unfortunately known as ICE.

Yes.

It is unfortunately.

Yeah. Yeah.

They have a campus here in Pasadena now. They're like, we gotta change our name.

That might need a rebrand.

Rebrand.

I was like, oh, I'm gonna read this interview with you for ICE.

Yeah. Yeah.

Oh yeah, they need a, they need a different acronym or just drop the acronym. Okay. So yeah, you guys are together 2001, you graduate 2004, and then for the next 3 years between '04 and '07, you're getting your master's and you're going to ICE to be an agent and throw people. What does a culinary program entail? I have no clue.

The one I went to is only 6 months. It was just more of like, here's your basic skills, just throw you into the wild and kind of get like wrecked in a New York City kitchen. I was passionate about cooking and food, but I had no technical skills. So I went there, I learned everything, even like how to heat up the pan correctly to put the oil in. So they really start from the basic.

How does one heat up a pan correctly? You don't just throw it on the fucking burner? No, you do.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

But like, you know, it's like how hot you want it before you put your oil in. Ah, okay. Okay.

I got you.

I got you. Nuances.

I was like, we're not raising slowly the temperature, are we? You want to dedicate a good 45 to an hour to it.

Or you want that oil to shimmer.

Shimmer?

Shimmer.

Yeah, you need all the oil to shimmer. I know about that. I know a little bit.

Just a little bit.

How to clean cast irons. You know, it's always important.

Is there longer programs than 6 months?

Okay.

People can go for years now.

Yeah. If you want to go to like CIA Upstate New York, that's another good name. CIA.

Why are they all like this?

CIA. Homeland Security is a great program.

They specialize in omelets.

So yeah, you can go like 4 years, like it's actual college. But I picked the 6-month one because I kind of wanted to get into the restaurants. While I was in culinary school, I did like staging for a few nights in different places too.

What's staging?

You go and work for free for a night to see how a kitchen operates because every kitchen operates so differently with a different chef and different ways to prep things and cook things. So it's kind of like has a giant restaurant to it, has a tiny restaurant to it, and you kind of go for a night and just watch your service and they'll give you some onions to chop while you're doing it.

And then how does this interest lead you ultimately to pizza? That's where your obsession lands you, right?

Yeah. So, you know, I was kind of getting burned out of just regular cooking and I took like a year off. And then you were going to school for being a principal, right?

I was in yoga school at that point.

Oh, you were in yoga school. That's right. And then this pizza place, Sotto Casa, which is still there. It's on Atlantic Avenue and Smith in Brooklyn. They were just opening that week. I walk in, I was like, I don't know how to make pizza, but like I've always wanted to, you know? And I had experience helping open restaurants and pizza guys like really aren't chefs, so I could kind of come in there and help just be like, this is a better chefy thing to do than how you just make pizza. And then Luca is like my pizza mentor.

He taught you the why of pizza?

Yeah.

What is the why of pizza?

The simplicity of it, right? Making the original form of pizza, like the Neapolitan pizza, was great because every pizza is a replica of that pizza. And then like there's a replica and then a replica, and then all of a sudden you have like a Detroit pie or something that doesn't even look like the original. It's like, why is the original the original? How did these clones come out of it, basically?

Yeah. And why was the original the original? The Italians were trying to accomplish what?

It's basically like peasant food. So the guys would get off the boats, they'd get a round red pie, they'd put their fish on it and kind of roll it up like a burrito, eat it like street food. Right. That's why marinara is called marinara sauce. It's like the seafood red sauce.

Oh, like marine marinara?

That's interesting. You would hate fish pizza.

I wouldn't fuck with it.

He's scared of fish.

Yeah, I can't get down with fish.

But I remember the day he came home from one of the early days at Sotto Casa, and it really did feel like he put his hands on that dough and he was like, this is what I want to do. And we had had this kind of fantasy of like, one day we'll open a restaurant. And the conditions in our life were so that we were like, let's do this now. Let's jump in. And what's the worst that happens? And now we're sitting here with you.

Let's go to your yoga instruction because that's what's happening. So you've picked up a master's and you are teaching. Yes. And then you're also learning to be a yoga instructor. Where did that interest stem from?

I was an athlete my whole life. I went to college to play basketball, and then I quit basketball my freshman year very quickly and discovered that trifecta of beer, pizza, pot, and gained a lot of weight, was really unhealthy. And by the time I got to the end of graduate school, I was very obese and really struggling and very medicated and that sort of thing. And my sister brought me to a yoga class and encouraged me, and I got there and it was like, this is something I can do. I don't feel judged. I feel safe and held and kept showing up. And so it's been one of the biggest throughlines in my life and was really the lens through which I approached the ethos of the restaurant in terms of my work with it, which I think was really valuable.

What would you say if you had to stereotype people that are drawn to yoga? I've attended some yoga classes. I've probably done 20 in the last 26 years I've lived here.

Okay.

And there's a vibe. And I'm curious what the connective tissue is. Sounds like it answered a whole host of things. Holistically change your life, not just, oh, I want to get in shape. So would it be fair to say people that are drawn to it are looking for some kind of holistic experience?

I think it's been really appropriated and watered down in our culture. It came through California and like aerobics workout culture in the 1970s. And so it started to really become this thing that's like hot power exercise.

But Bikram.

Yeah, the physical practice is just 1/8 of what it means to practice the 8-limbed path of yoga. So it is a philosophical way of living, not just posture practice. And that's been grossly misinterpreted.

What is it grounded in? Like what ancient text, or is it an offshoot of some other religion?

It's not a religious practice as much as a philosophical practice. So the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali is kind of the text. It's the threads of all of the strings of what it means to practice. And it's yoga chitta vritti nirodha means yoga is the quieting of all the changing states of the mind. So The work of yoga is to quell the thinking mind. It's not to be able to like do some crazy arm balance in a matching set on Instagram.

If that's an added bonus of it, great.

Sure, yeah. And I don't claim to be any sort of expert, but just growing in that world and trying to do my duty as a white woman of privilege who runs a yoga studio to not be appropriating and to be aware of how I've been brought up on it and the impact it's had on me as a person has been life-changing. But I think is slightly problematic in our society. But who am I to—

I think India too, they look at yoga as a white person thing.

Maybe now they might.

Like, it's so much bigger in America, like a cultural— not a cultural phenomenon. It's kind of been here for a long time.

It's kind of like pizza if you're Italian, literally. Like, I think Italians look at America like, they have more pizza than anyone could imagine in every single shape. Somehow it came from here, but look what they've gone bananas. There's a weird parallel between—

I think it's like sushi in America too, right? Like, everything spicy, crunchy rolls, they're delicious, but definitely somebody, Japanese person, would be like, that's Yeah, we like the McDonaldized stuff.

By the way, I'm here for it. I love a spicy tuna crispy rice.

I love that. Yeah.

Okay, so you get married in 2007. After 7 years, I guess you've been together, 2001. And then you start the first restaurant, which is just Emily, in 2012.

Oh, 2014. We just celebrated 12 years operationally.

Okay, so you knew you wanted to make pizza and you knew you wanted to do what? What were you wanting to accomplish with a restaurant?

I wasn't.

I feel like—

I dragged her into it. Oh, you didn't drag me.

I very much got pulled. Pulled into that space. I withdrew from the graduate program I was in studying to become a school building leader in New York City, and I'd resigned from my job as a public school teacher, was not happy. And so I was teaching yoga 2 classes a week, making no money. That seemed like a place of possibility, but also like, what the heck? And he was working as a line cook, making no money. And so again, the time felt like, if we're gonna do it, let's jump in and try Can I ask, where the fuck did you get the capital?

It sounds like you were barely paying your rent. How did you get the capital to start something?

Matt's dad died and he inherited a little bit of money.

Grandma too. It was like $100 grand or something. So we had to really keep it on the cheap to open it.

Yeah. This is also very risky. If I'm dead broke and I inherit $100 grand, I don't know that I'm immediately going to gamble it on opening a business.

Well, his mom's basement was the plan if we failed, right?

Yeah. Grandma died and it was like 3 years later, I think we did it. It wasn't like, oh, hey, you got money.

It takes risk. Yeah, we dumped like everything into it.

We're like, we got to go all in. And we did, and then it worked out.

We were so broke, though, we couldn't even put tap lines in in the beginning.

We did the Kickstarter for the pizza oven.

That's right.

Yeah. So, wow. Beautiful pizza ovens.

And when you guys were sitting down dreaming it up, were you drawing pictures? How were you thinking of what it would look like? And what were you thinking was going to be your guys' novel offering into a very, very crowded restaurant space in New York?

Well, we were super impulsive. We had gone for a walk to go eat at a restaurant in Clinton Hill that Matt had been told about by Dale Talde, who was a buddy of ours. That's right. Yeah. And we get to the restaurant and it was shuttered. And we were like, that's where we're putting our restaurant. And we had never really been in that neighborhood and hadn't been living in Brooklyn that long. We had no business just doing this the way we did.

Just wander up.

But we went and found a coffee shop and we drafted on a sheet of paper in my journal, how much might it cost to get in here? I think we called my dad to come look at the space that night with us or the next day or whatever.

Yeah.

Hustled to get in there and that was it.

Okay. So almost location before overarching game plan of what it's going to be.

We knew we wanted to do pizza.

And what was going to be unique about your pizza?

Well, I love Neapolitan pizza, but I think my favorite pizza style is New Haven, which has like a very charred crust on it. Because Neapolitan pizza is wet in the middle. That's why you eat it with a knife and fork. So I wanted to have more of a dry pizza of Neapolitan.

Doesn't like a soupy middle.

No soupy middle and no big puffy crust. So we push our crust down and go toppings to the edge because people want more toppings than crust. You hate those bubbles. You fucking hate those. I don't hate them. I just don't want to serve them. Okay. You just don't want to serve them.

You're fine to eat them.

I'll eat them. Yeah.

Okay.

It's obviously not New Haven style, but I tried to base how they cook their pizza on how we kind of cook our pizza.

Is the original pizza that you guys started with what I have eaten there? Was it rectangle and what we might call Detroit stylish?

No.

So we have a big wood-burning oven at the original location. So it's round wood-fired pizza.

And then the Emmy Squared is the Detroit style one.

So what's the timeline from dad comes, he looks at it, he must be thinking this is a terrible idea, but they're young and I'm going to be supportive.

Very supportive. Was he? Yeah. He was just like, I don't know. He was supportive. I even said that, but I bet he was like, He was like, what are they doing?

Right.

He was like, you got to do this, you guys. Because we were thinking about buying an apartment or something. And then we were like, let's use that money to open a restaurant. And your father was just like, no, you guys are opening this restaurant.

Was your dad worried that you had had so many interests at this point?

My parents were both educators. They were not happy I resigned from my career track job at the Department of Education to pursue yoga and then open a pizza restaurant.

They believed in the vision, right? They were both—

That's true.

Yeah, they were both very supportive.

He's a very talented chef, and they knew that from the get-go. And so we were doing it, so they got on board. In the beginning, it was a real affair of our family. My mom was there scrubbing sinks.

My mom was baking some cheesecakes.

Everyone really jumped in and helped. My sister was one of our first employees. Oh, it was a family affair.

Assistant manager, basically.

How old were you both at this time?

30— what is that, 24?

I think I was 33.

Yeah, that sounds about right.

So early 30s.

Yeah.

What was the original menu? It was just pizza or when did the burger arrive?

So before the burger, we had like 5 pastas. Was it spaghettini or something? Oh, great Brooklyn-based pasta. And then that was my real passion too, because I always wanted to cook pasta, like a pasta restaurant with pizza. And then the big burger comes around.

Oh no, Matt was bored of eating pizza.

Yeah.

And so the burger started as something for him.

Actually, it was the wings first. That's where that sauce came from.

We had an employee named Tim Wynn, and he really was the catalyst for the Emmy sauce and was crafting and playing and then merged the wing sauce with mayo and The Emmy sauce emerged.

I made a plate of crispy pig ears with the wing sauce on it, and I drizzled the Kewpie mayo on top. And then when they mixed together at the bottom, like, that became the Emmy sauce.

Wow.

Because that sauce was so much better, they started making it for the family meal.

How long into this experiment does that happen?

That's probably like a year and a half.

That far? I thought it was like 6, 7 months in. It's all such a blur.

Yeah, I'm sure.

I looked at that New York Magazine article and it was like June of '15.

Oh, maybe it was about a year then. Okay, because we hadn't taken any vacation and I was gone with my family when when that whole infatuation article came out. Anyway, Matt put the burger— it was for him.

How well was the restaurant doing in that first year?

It was—

was it kind of immediately successful?

We were making money. Both of us were working there 16 hours a day, so we're taking positions.

25 hours.

Yeah, it was rough. And we were purposely closed on Tuesdays because most restaurants are closed Monday and we want to go out to dinner. Yeah, uh, it was open on Tuesday night.

I greeted every single guest and he made every single pizza that first year.

Yeah, really?

It was a lot, but it was working.

Open right away.

Yeah, it was.

We went for the first time, you guys would have already been open for probably 3 or 4 years.

Yeah, because it was a live show.

'19, probably. 2019.

Rob, when was our Brooklyn live show?

I'd say around '18 or '19. It still wasn't a location that would scream this restaurant should be there. And I'm sure the neighborhood's only gotten better in those 4 years since you opened. So to me, it doesn't seem obvious you guys would have picked that spot. There's not a bunch of other great restaurants all around, maybe increasingly so, but certainly not at the beginning, right? No, not at all.

Good neighborhood places.

You hit the timing lottery in that a lot of people were moving to Brooklyn, and probably people gonna go out and pay for a nice meal.

I found you because I was doing the thing I do when I go to a new city, which is what are the best new restaurants or best restaurants. And I think you were on Eater, the 38th. Yes, you were on the 30th.

You did best burgers specifically.

Maybe I did.

I think so, because you were like, we gotta go have the burger.

And I had actually already been— I'd been to West Village one with your kids when Kristen was shooting a movie there. So this was early. This must have been pretty soon after you guys met.

I was shooting Buddy Games.

You were shooting Buddy Games.

In Canada.

And she was shooting Like Father. And the kids were really little and I was there to babysit. I like went there to go help. And I must have found like, oh, there's this good pizza place. And I took them. There's a picture of me and the little kids like at the pizza place. I was like, the pizza's so good. I could not believe how good it was. And then the burger. Unfortunately, I have not really gone back to the pizza. I want to go back for the—

she drug me. We had a show that night, and I had shot the night before, a live show, up till like 1 in the morning, took a red-eye, landed, and was like, I'm gonna sleep until the show. And she's like, we've got to try this burger. So I was a little like, what are we gonna do here? And then I know you've heard me tell the story, I'm sure, or it's gotten to you. We got there, and at that time it was $27 for the burger, and I I go, this is fucking not— this is ridiculous, Monica. $27 burger. And I took like 3 bites and I look at her and I go, this is the most underpriced burger I've ever had in my life. I would spend $55 for this burger and not fit.

Also, it was packed when we got there. I was like, oh no, we might not be able to get in.

And we went right when it opened at like 5 PM. Okay, so it's working right away. And what are the stresses? Commenting on it. You guys are both working around the clock. You guys, I guess, have Tuesday to not be coworkers. How's that all simmering?

Not well.

Not well.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's hard, right?

It wasn't like not well. It was just like we couldn't take that day off and just like not worry about the restaurant. There's always—

it's your child.

Someone doesn't show up and then a food delivery doesn't happen. That Tuesday, we couldn't be like, let's just go out to dinner and chill and not worry about the restaurant. But we're always like checking our phones. We're always worried about the restaurant.

I think people really do underestimate the amount of work it requires to start a restaurant, wouldn't you say?

Yeah, they do. And when you do it with your partner, and we were very solid. I mean, we'd been together for a long time and felt solid. We weren't able to compartmentalize and everything, 3 o'clock in the morning arguing in bed over something.

I feel like actually that didn't happen until Emmy Squared opened.

Maybe.

I think the original restaurant, we were a little more—

You were in the probably honeymoon phase of having created something that's working.

And then we opened the second one.

I mean, ask Ibu. He might.

I love Ibu.

Our dishwasher is the keeper of all secrets. There's no— office, 'cause the restaurant basement is so tiny. So we would get in fights in the little wine room, and poor Ibo would be, like, turning the volume up on his jazz.

Oh my God.

He's been there since day one, and he's amazing.

But I think a big rift was that Matt was in his calling. I have just these memories of looking across the dining room. It was an open kitchen 'cause we wanted it to feel like an extension of our home. We love to, like, host things. And he would be at the oven glowing in what he was supposed to be doing, and I was missing the mark. I'm very good at operations and systems and hospitality, and I was doing well in terms of my job, my performance, but I was really struggling as a human because it wasn't aligned with how I wanted to be spending my time.

That's why I said I dragged you into it.

Yeah, yeah. I was melting down. I didn't have the resilience.

He was living his dream and you weren't living your dream.

Yeah.

And the pressure—

so supportive though of it was amazing, right? It's not like she would ever crack and be like, I don't want to do this anymore. It's just like she was always—

well, I'm good at it, but it was also like I was Emily of Emily, which was weird as an identity thing too. Yeah.

That's right.

But I would say too, when couples work together, and I've worked with my wife a bunch of times, generally if someone's having a very stressful moment in their job, the other person necessarily isn't having their most stressful moment.

Right.

And then vice versa. And often there becomes a nice rhythm of like, okay, it's kind of my time to take up some space and now it's your time to take up some space. When you're in the exact same pursuit, you're both dealing with the exact same stress at the exact same moment. So it's like there's no one around who's like outside of the bubble that can be the outside objective person going like, yep, I know, and it's gonna work out.

Comfort.

Your sister was kind of like that.

She tried.

Yeah, she was pretty good.

Yeah. In your partnership, you want your partner to be a source of comfort, and if you guys are both experiencing the same stress, neither of you can really be. It's different with us, obviously, because we're not in a relationship, but we're at the same stress level at the same time, always, when it comes to the job. That causes That causes fights. That causes friction.

If we can't fill the schedule, we're both stressed out dealing with that. And then something else pops up and it's like, oh yeah, we're already— our baseline is like freaked out about 2 weeks from now.

Or we might have differences of opinion on how to handle it. And we both care about it. It's very complicated.

That was a big part of it. I think we operate from very different perspectives in terms of how we manage, and we're very different people and are very suited not to be together working or in relationship at this point outside of friendly relationship now.

Yeah.

And that any kind of kind of fissures that were under the surface that we didn't notice in terms of— we grew up together and we became very different people, so that was really amplified by the pressure cooker of that circumstance.

Yeah, I don't even need to ask what the different vibe was. It's very obvious to me. You're very kind of laid back and you're on a spiritual surf mission, a pizza surf mission, and then you're going to figure everything out, get it done. Yeah, yeah.

We also had different problems at different times in the restaurant. She's very good at front of house stuff. I don't know a lot about that So she did that thing and she'd be frustrated by employee problems or like liquor deliveries and stuff like that. And then I'd be in the back of the house and same thing where it's just like the dough doesn't rise correctly or hamburger buns didn't come in. We would have different stresses and try to lean on each other, but when you have different stresses and also trying to come together, it's still hard.

Yeah. You're not terribly sympathetic to the other person's job.

Yeah. It's like, yeah, you don't, you don't just go down the street and buy one. What's the big deal?

Yeah.

It is a big deal.

Was there ego stuff happening?

Sharing the—

Yeah. Sharing the fame.

As they start getting, if you start getting written about and accolades are coming, is that challenge?

Well, I love Emily taking care of all that, right?

All that stuff.

She was good at it. So she is good at it. She's good at the publicity. She's good at doing the interviews, setting that stuff up. And she comes in, she's like, don't forget to smile. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Things like that.

Don't speak too quickly in the podcast today.

But did you, Emily, were you like, uh, I'm not really getting the credit? I'm doing a ton of the work. I'm making sure this thing runs.

She's going to get all I feel like maybe it was the opposite.

And I mean, I don't know. Matt named it after me, which wasn't expected. We really couldn't land on a name. And so then suddenly he names it Emily, and then it becomes this personality that I'm wearing, which was very strange in terms of my identity at that time. And yoga and poetry were stripped away because there was no time for anything else. And so I was very much that. And because I was forward-facing, I do feel like maybe there was some unconscious, under-the-surface friction where you were doing all of this, but I was the person with the camera on me. Even though you didn't want that.

Yeah.

Like if I created the burger and then Emily's doing an interview about how great the burger is and just won all these awards, I might be like, yeah, but also I created it.

Right.

She's a hype person then, right? Why would I try to force my way into do something that she's better at doing? She's not going to come and cook the burger.

I mean, that's extremely healthy point of view.

Yeah.

But under stress and everything else, that would be hard for me to always manage.

I'm okay with her being Emily and being front-facing and then like I make the food in the back. That's a mom-and-pop shop, right?

But it got very complicated. So we opened the West Village. We literally signed on with our growth partners, Open the West Village.

Did they approach you or did you go out seeking?

They approached us with all the acclaim and everything. And then that same month is when our marriage fell apart. And so then the brand is Pizza Loves Emily. It's built on our love story. And that felt very challenging. And I think that's when personalities, egos, whatever you want to call it, hurt and all these things.

I thought more people would care that we got divorced in the sense of publicity, right? Like nobody cared.

I don't think a lot of people know.

I was gonna say. Okay, maybe that's the point.

Maybe nobody knows.

Before we get there, when we go to the Village, we name it Emmy Square.

It's still Pizza Loves Emily, but it was like a mishmash.

Well, Williamsburg came first.

Williamsburg did. That was the flagship. Emmy Squared.

Pizza Loves Emily was Williamsburg.

No, that was West Village.

So we have Emily Original in Clinton Hill. Emmy Squared opens in Williamsburg in 2016. And then we open the Pizza Loves Emily kind of combo in West Village.

Stay tuned. Soon for more Armchair Expert, if you dare. We are supported by Allstate. Checking Allstate first could save you hundreds on car insurance. That's smart. Not checking the pockets of your jeans before doing laundry? Classic oversight. That mystery clunking in the dryer? Yeah, that was your lip balm's final moments. And somehow there's always one random receipt in there to dissolve into confetti. Yeah, checking first is smart. So check Allstate first for a quote that could save you hundreds. You're in good hands with Allstate. Potential savings vary subject to terms, conditions, and availability. Allstate North America Insurance Co. and affiliates, Northbrook, Illinois. Okay, so what is Emmy Squared? How's it going to differ from Emily?

Matt wanted to do a second concept, wanted to grow the brand.

I want to do like a square slice place right next door to the original The original one.

He used to make a lot of focaccia sheet pan pies for us at home, which was delicious, and loves a Frico crust, right? And so found his backdoor entry into what the amazingness of Detroit-style pizza is.

We ordered a bunch frozen from Buddy's.

Yeah, Buddy's.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I grew up eating at Buddy's.

So my nickname, he called me Emmy, and so it was Emmy Square Pizza, second location, Emmy Squared. And that also took off and has a great burger on that menu.

Yeah. The Big Matt is a different burger.

You created the Le Big Mac for Emmy Squared.

Correct.

Yeah.

So now here's the part I really relate to, which is I have my own identity, and then my wife has her own identity, and then we have a shared identity, which is us doing commercials together. I know I read an interview where you were talking about that fear of, "Oh, we have this other thing. We have this combined identity, which is these restaurants." And they're famous, these restaurants, and they're getting written about. You're winning lots of awards and stuff. Stuff. And yeah, that's an interesting third person in a relationship. Every couple has a shared identity at a dinner party, but I think when you have a very public-facing shared identity, it's quite complicated. Would you agree? You can start to feel like you're servicing this third thing and not the original thing.

I think a struggle for me with that was it felt performative, and that's not how I operated in terms of the founding of the original. And Matt would always I would say it's a business. It's not emotional. It's a business. It's not personal.

Well, I think the original one's personal and emotional.

Well, so, and in terms of that third member of the relationship, that was our custody battle during the divorce was the reason we still co-own and operate Emily's, 'cause neither of us could part with it.

That was the child. You were gonna have shared custody no matter what.

It really complicated things. And then the copy for the cookbook was due that summer that our marriage fell apart. So I'm writing our love story.

Emily the Cookbook.

Yeah, we met over pepperoni olive pizza sitting on the floor of the dorm. So it was all just very weird.

Yeah, did you feel fraudulent?

Yeah.

And were you starting to wonder like, if I let that whole identity go, who am I?

Yes, and I took a leave of absence from the business 'cause I couldn't function.

'Cause of that tension?

In terms of all of it, yeah. I left and never really came back in in the same way 'cause then pandemic came and everything changed. And I mean, it all worked out for the better, but that had a huge impact on my role as an operator of the business.

And Matt, how were you dealing with the death of this third identity?

I sort of mentally left also. Like, I'm still kind of going through the process of it. And I think restaurants, they can be like a beautiful stage, like a staged area. I would try to separate personal feelings from the restaurant, just being like, okay, we're going on. And it's more of just like, let's do this performative thing and then, like, you know, be done and then whatever. But I had mentally basically checked out.

Not that you were in an abusive relationship, but it does remind me of, like, Cher was hating Living with Sonny, and then they would go do the show, which actually loved the show because they could be their old selves there. It was like this weird little sanctuary from all their problems.

It was always weird when Emily wasn't at the restaurant because it's just like, I don't trust anyone but her to be in front and do that stuff. 'Cause even though we had our differences, like, in the marriage, always the restaurant, there's never, like, an argument about it, really. It's just like, this is what we're doing, and we knew it. We always had each other's back when it came to the restaurant. So when she wasn't there, I just felt alone there. My partner is not here to guarantee it's gonna go well, 'cause that's what she does.

Yeah.

That's nice to know. Thank you.

Thank you.

It's true.

I say this to my wife all the time.

When we work together, together, I literally can't help but say, like, oh, you're my favorite person to work with. You're so good. Always, immediately. You're easy to work with. If we got divorced, I'd still love working with her. She's still the easiest person for me to work with. She's just such a professional, and we have such a communication working together.

And she's always got your back too, right?

Yeah. It's very fascinating how you can have these compartmentalized relationships within a relationship, and all of it's happening at the same Yeah. Yes!

There's no breathing room.

Were the fissures— so they were not about the restaurant. I mean, obviously everything's all tied in, everything's muddy, and it's a soup, but were the breaking points not connected to the restaurant?

I think they were connected to the restaurant. It was so enmeshed. I mean, our life was just that, and we were angry at each other. And I don't want to speak for you, but I feel like it's fair to say we were angry at each other and just not on the same page, and our interests were were divergent.

You guys did this amazing thing in the New York Magazine, maybe I read, Unhitched or something.

Oh, New York Times, when my first book came out.

Yeah, you were saying, I mean, look, you guys met in college as sophomores, and you're now into yoga, and you're on a path, and you're a chef, dude. That's what you live for and want to pursue. And they're not getting closer together, these interests. They're getting further apart. And neither of you want to do each other's thing, per se, in the off time. That's getting old.

Yeah.

You just kind of grow up, and our friendship took a hit, obviously, because we're getting divorced.

Yeah.

But, like, after that, we come back together. We're still fans of each other being in the original restaurant. We still have each other's back when it comes to the original.

That took years, though.

Yeah, but, you know, on the other side—

Yeah.

We've both grown up into, like, adults with separate interests. We can still have relatable things, like the restaurant and just life in general.

We've had some of our first healing conversations about our relationship relationship just this past year.

Okay.

I was gonna ask how long this, 'cause it looks from the outside that you're very comfortable with one another and still good friends.

You're both remarried.

Yes. Yeah, exactly. We're much more suited to be with.

Yeah.

His wife is lovely. My husband is amazing.

Some people never get there right after a divorce where they can say that they can say his wife is lovely. Like that doesn't happen all the time. So you guys obviously took some care.

Thank God she's here to referee while we've been in LA together. Yeah.

Thank God for Simone this week is all I'm gonna say.

That's all I'm gonna say. Otherwise, there would've been tears for sure.

Well, you had a lot of fun, right?

Went to the club.

Yeah.

I had his number blocked up until, I guess, we sold Emmy Square. Really?

That's good to know.

Yeah.

Because I think most people can't relate to, well, we got divorced and we're just still best friends. That's not normal. No.

Yeah. There was a lot of drama, a lot of pain. And it's only recently that in our therapeutic work separately, I mean, I think a big part of it was, which we just recently talked about, we both come from very codependent family of origins. So at 18 and 20 years old, we just perpetuated those behaviors. And now that we can look back and start unwinding some of those narratives, it's like, oh, we can see how we were doing that and how we're different than that now. So this is actually the healthiest I feel like we've ever been, honestly.

Yeah, yeah.

I've had fun this week too.

Yeah, yeah. What kind of pains came with growing? I think that seems daunting. Perfecting Emily seems doable, and and then 2 more. How was that challenging, and how do you oversight it? You guys must have both cared so much about it having the same quality at all 3. What were the kind of the challenges that were popping up?

Before you get to the food, I didn't want to grow it. Let's get back to our life. Emily is functioning. I don't want to do more. And Matt was like, this is our chance to do this. We're doing it. And thank God. I mean, we did. It changed our lives. But I think that was a core moment of strife just in terms of, okay, now I'm helping to scale this thing that's already overwhelming me, that my nervous system can barely handle. I'm like completely a hot mess as a human.

Yeah, yeah. And now you're gonna times that by 3.

Yeah.

I took a more scientific approach to it. I knew I wanted to cook the square pies in the convection oven, which is like the big oven with the fan in the back of it. But then like every time you open the oven, like it cools down, right? And then you start having inconsistencies and then you need timers and you have to trust who's putting it in and So I went to like, I think a Jets or something. I don't know. One of those like chain pizza places that has a conveyor belt oven. And I was like, oh, you know what? Every time a pizza goes through, it'll be the same.

It'll be the same.

Won't lose any heat. Such a complete opposite of wood-fired oven where it's like so high maintenance and you got your temperature right and your hot spots and your this and that. So it's like, what if I just made the actual cooking process easier?

Right? Yeah.

Yeah.

Like it gets topped and then it goes in and like comes out the thing.

Because labor is impossible to monitor when you're scaling. Yeah.

Yeah. So having even that little control where we could take one person out of the kitchen in the kitchen was helpful. But then obviously Emily's dealing with the front of house and just a whole new squad of like—

Yeah, there's no way to mechanize that.

Yeah, I mean, thankfully you're a teacher because I'd like walk upstairs from the kitchen and there'd be like a white—

Love my chart paper.

Oh yeah, chart paper, chart paper, basically teaching the staff how we want this done. And being a teacher really worked out for that.

Yeah, I really enjoyed doing staff trainings, especially as the Emmy Squared organization grew. I helped open a few of those restaurants and would do that and build the curriculum for that in the early days. So that was an enjoyable part of scaling things. But how do you maintain the special texture and dimension of this ethos, this energy with 30 locations?

Yes.

Yes. Before we get to that, where did the crinkle-cut French fries come from?

As a fan.

Yeah. The waffle fries.

Yeah.

How do they come about? I mean, they're not as good as burger, but they're pushing up against it.

I usually cook and put stuff on the menu that I want to eat.

Yeah.

So the original restaurant has straight fries. Emily West Village has curly fries.

Yeah, that's right.

I don't know if it still does. But then Emmy Squared has waffles.

Now it has waffles.

That one has waffles.

In West Village. I was just there. Yeah.

But they used to have curly fries. So I wanted each one of my restaurants to have different fries. I'd go to that restaurant and be like, these are the fries I want to eat today. Or I'd go to the other one and get those fries.

But when you sit down to design a waffle fry, what does one do?

Oh, these come in frozen.

Oh, okay. Okay.

We were making our own fries at Clinton Hill.

It wasn't sustainable.

Well, we served like 10 burgers a night before it got popular. Yeah. You know? So it's like making your own fries. It's easy because we're going to sell 10 burgers and like 3 300 pizzas. And then when the burger explodes, it's like, uh-oh.

Yeah, if you've ever stood at the counter at In-N-Out and watched them actually make the fries manually, there is someone on that fucking smasher all day long.

That's not a great way to make fries though. You want to double cook your fries.

You cook them, then you freeze them, then you cook them again. Is that what happens?

I did 3 cooks. I do like a cooking— a baking soda bath, sort of like circulate them in a circulator, and then do a par fry until they got slightly brown. And then we cool them down and portion them in a little baggie. And then when the order comes in, then it goes in the fryer.

No wonder. I do feel like I'm going through 6 or 7 layers of the crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch. Oh, gooey.

It's a good fry.

So once the three were up and running, weirdly, I can't believe I've never been to the Williamsburg one. I mean, like, I'm just learning.

Oh, it did.

Yeah, I'm never gonna—

fortunate. It's so beautiful too. We had like this cool bar in the basement, the burger bar. The burger bar. So we don't serve burgers in the basement. Oh yeah, there's a bar down there. Did you ever go there?

That part of the neighborhood changed a lot during COVID Oh yeah, yeah. Dang, right down by the BQE.

So those So those three, you had the original, then you had partners in the second and the third, right? And is it the same partners that then became a part of this thirdie?

Yep. So we have this restaurant businessman, Howard Greenstone, who found us. And I had strange, random, like, family ties.

You babysat his kids, I'm sure.

No, I grew up next door to his brother's family. So, like, his nephews and I grew up together. So weird. But there were many people sniffing around, and it felt like with that connection, Howard was the person. He had the vision to scale it in this way that we didn't have those skills. And so he really shepherded this journey into what Emmy Squared has become.

Does he call and say, hey, we have one here, or does he call and say, hey, what do you think about being here?

There's like a big research team now. So we have like a real estate agent, a lawyer, and they are in charge of let's look at this lease. Is it a good lease? Is it what we're looking for?

What's the foot traffic?

Yeah.

It's not necessarily like when we found the original or we found like Williamsburg or West Village.

Yeah.

It was sort of like we stumbled on them and they were cool.

Well, it was in our heart and now it's a company, so it's a little bit different. Yeah.

But when we found the locations, we were like, oh, Oh, these are exciting locations. But now it's just sort of a little more like corporate people finding the location.

Right, what will work in this place.

Especially with that many restaurants, it's not about your gut feeling anymore.

It needs to work.

Well, you have to be kind of an expert on the area to understand. So do you guys like Ray Kroc it and drive around and stop at different ones to check the quality?

We used to. We haven't done that since it got very big.

Yeah, because at some point you almost have to divorce yourself from all the personal things. So what happens if you go in and then you're like, ah, I don't like this about this, that's too much, probably.

Micromanaging with 30 restaurants isn't going to work.

Exactly. I mean, this is a dumb analogy, but like, yeah, if we had to go listen to a podcast that was somehow armchair expert, but it wasn't us, that would be very bizarre. I can hardly even imagine what that experience would be like.

I'll just say for me, it was a little bit of relief in a way where, you know, we have a corporate chef. He takes care of the training. If I want to do something, he'll make it happen. I was in Nashville a few weeks ago with him. You know, we just started coming up with some dishes and it was fun. And I can be creative and he can be creative, but he can implement all that. Every restaurant have different ordering people. So he's good at that.

It is, though, weird. Whenever I'm in the city, I'll go to the West Village and walk by or take my picture there. But to be the person who was picking out things down to the paint color on the walls, which was mushroom bisque, by the way.

I was like, we have to have mushroom bisque.

The ceiling is shaken, not stirred. Fun facts. But nobody in that restaurant would know me as Emily. Or if I come in and I'm like, hi, I'm Emily. I mean, if I walk into the front of the house there, they wouldn't know I'm Emily of Emily. I can go see Oz in the basement. I'm sure. But it's different to be removed in that way.

Yeah.

Does it feel sad?

It just feels like a very different time and place in my life. And then Emily Original, though, our first hire, Ibu. Shout out to Ibu. He's this amazing, talented Senegalese artist, by the way, who is our dishwasher extraordinaire. But he's been there since day one. Sammy.

Sammy's the burger guy.

Every burger you've ever eaten has been there. So we have a lot of folks that have been with us through the whole thing at the original. But it changes when a company grows.

So he's the head chef, Sammy. So he's been there for 12 years now?

I think he started 2015.

About a year in.

Yeah, about a year in. And he was a prep guy.

Thank God for Sammy.

And then it just kind of worked its way out. Somebody just didn't show up to work. I'm like, Sammy, let's cook these burgers. And then the first day he's up there cooking burgers with me, it's just like, he's like, yo, I want to do this all day. It's like, you got it, man.

Yeah.

You got it.

It's like, let's just do this. And then it's like thousands of people cooking every single burger. And he'd watch me every single time. He didn't like touch a burger until like 6 months in, basically, because I just had him there assisting with like onions. Putting the sauce on the burger. We just go through it over and over.

Oh my God, I'm starving.

I want the burger so bad.

Yeah.

I know.

I mean, in retrospect, we should have coordinated so that he could have cooked you burgers.

Oh, that's what we should have done. I've gotten the kit like 4 or 5 times.

Yeah.

Oh, cool. And it works out very well.

Oh, nice.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Old belly. If you can't get to a restaurant, that will feed you. Yes.

And the hack is the instructions are perfect. They really walk you through it. But putting the bun on the patty while it's sizzling is primo to get it nice and steamy and juicy.

Yeah.

So good.

Yeah.

Okay, so things blew up. You retreated to New Mexico.

Before that, I was just hunkered down in Brooklyn helping open a yoga studio there.

Oh, okay.

Before New Mexico pandemic or after?

No, just 2018. Between us.

Oh, okay.

In the article, there was a big fight in front of Emily.

Yes.

That was time to regroup.

I spent the night in Central Booking in downtown Brooklyn.

Yes. You were arrested for hitting Matt with a bag.

Yup.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. We're going to have to talk about this.

I was charged with assault with a weapon for a canvas bag.

Oh boy.

Two cops were walking.

No, I—

Yeah. And student essays from teaching at CUNY. I had just a bunch of college essays to grade.

So you just took your aggression out? Yeah.

I lost it on him in a way I've never been so disembodied. I found out something about someone he was dating and it activated me. And two officers were walking by.

It was so random. Two cops like popped out of the subway. Exactly what happened. As opposed to do their basic job.

To do basic duty and de-escalate what was clearly a marital dispute and solve the problem. They wound up handcuffing me and arresting me, and I was taken downtown right at like 5 o'clock. So then I wound up staying overnight.

Oh, God. Yeah.

Oh, God. It was horrible. My mom had chemo the next morning, so my dad and my mom and my sister and her brand-new husband, who was like, "What the fuck is going on in this family?" were like walking around in downtown Brooklyn trying to get enough money out out of the ATMs to, like, stuff it in my sister's pocket so that tomorrow she could come out and make bail. And that was the lowest moment of my life.

I was gonna say, what kind of emotional clarity came from sitting in the jail?

The beauty of that was that moment changed my life because there was also a restraining order put on me to be around him. All of this was dropped and sealed and dismissed. But because of that, I was very much pining and desperately wanting to keep the restaurant alive and begging and pleading. And Matt was just firm line in the sand, like, this is over, I'm moving on, which, thank God he held that boundary because as much as I beat up against it, that was good. But the restraining order was a next level of like, "Boundary, or else you're gonna be in trouble." And I actually met my forever husband, Jeff. So I spent the night in central booking on Thursday, and then I went on a date with Jeff that Monday night. And my friend at the yoga— my friend at the yoga studio— I was very erratic that weekend. I feel like I went on a bunch of dates. And she was like, "Maybe you shouldn't be going on dates right now." right now. And I was like, I'm going on this date with this guy. I'm going. And then I wound up telling him everything and he thought it was hysterical.

He's my husband. But that boundary of the restraining order— this was done. I cannot go over there. I saw this beautiful— the Rumi quote, the wound is where the light enters— on the side of this church that next morning. And the light just entered from the depths of the wound. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The universe is weird. And you probably needed some weird nudge in the form of a restraining order to go, okay, now we have to choose There's another path. This one is a dead end.

And there was the most amusing part about that restraining order. So the cookbook was now at this point about to debut.

Oh my goodness.

And so there was a caveat in the restraining order that I was allowed to be with Matt for the book launch. Yeah. And that was the first time—

You guys, what you've gone through.

The first time we saw each other from the moment of this thing on the street was sitting at Greenlight Bookstore, signing books.

Signing cookbooks, and you were pretending.

The love, right?

It was horrible.

This is so human, I love it.

Oh God, it was awful.

This is making me feel itchy.

In retrospect, they escorted me down to the subway police station. It's Hoyt-Schemmelhorn in Brooklyn. And like, take your shirt off so we take pictures of you. And I was just like, after I just documented the abuse, all bruised up all over my side here. And they're like, can you take your shirt off? Like, I don't really want to get in the police station.

Smack you that hard?

Yeah, I was completely—

I was completely—

I don't want to say you deserved it because I don't— the The entire time. So can you imagine, like, a cop in the subway's like, all right, take your shirt off.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, get your shirt off, kid.

You probably both were like, what is my life?

I shouldn't have gone there.

Well, the restaurant was doing so well. To have your business be doing so well and your personal life be doing so poorly, that's such a mindfuck. It looks like this, but it's so the opposite in real life. Is really hard.

Or it feels like if you're like me and your modus operandi is the shoe's always going to drop. To me, in some weird way, confirming and validating my story.

Interesting.

Which is like, yeah, I knew it's too good to be true. I don't deserve this. Look what a fucked up mess this is. Because of course this is too good for me to have.

Yeah, it's like imposter syndrome, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like in some weird way, the beatdowns are like, yeah, that's right. That's what it should be. Because I don't deserve a spectacular restaurant that everyone loves and we're getting awards for. But it's tricky.

Because then you can self-sabotage. You can cause it. You can, like, cause these things, you know?

Oh, yeah. Oh, we're so weird and complicated. I love it.

I know.

My sister was at that point on the emergency call list to pop in for a service at the bar. And so this all happens, and our manager is like, "Fuck, okay, I need to call Emily's sister." And so my sister was at some sort of event, and she's getting calls from Meg, thinking— It's a Thursday night. Meg is calling me to come in and do a bar shift at the restaurant. I'm not picking up. Meg keeps calling her. She's like, "Why the fuck is Meg calling?" me I'm not going to work tonight at the restaurant. And then she finally picks up and it's like, oh, your sister is somewhere in the New York City prison system right now.

Yeah.

Wow.

I think that's where they held El Chapo too at the same time. So you're in there at the same time as—

Oh my God.

Okay, now the second chapter of everyone's life, which has landed beautifully. So you went on the date with the dude on a Thursday after the Monday arrest, but you do go to New Mexico, to Santa Fe, to to do some kind of a grieving workshop.

I was seeing this amazing acupuncturist during the separation, the divorce, and she was giving me these homework assignments like, go flirt with a barista, get me into some competency, things that were low stakes. And then finally she was like, you need to go take a trip by yourself somewhere, do something. I Googled writing retreat New Mexico. I had no reason to type that in, and up pops this writing your story of loss and transformation, which was a grief retreat at this beautiful center called Ghost Ranch, which I highly recommend. I landed there and was like, I've I've never felt called somewhere like this. And so I want to get here. And pandemic, just for an array of reasons, expedited that experience. So, yeah, we moved there in 2022, and then got married. And if you look at pictures of me from when I was arrested and when I was at the peak success of my life, I was almost 250 pounds, drinking 2 bottles of wine a night. You know, like, not a healthy human. And New Mexico has also been just this research lab emergence of me getting to be me.

So you live there now permanently.

And you're a yoga instructor.

Oh, wow.

I am. I co-own and direct a studio called Yoga Source.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Gosh. So you got there.

Yeah.

I still think the ice cream's more interesting than—

And you published Divorced Business Partners?

Yeah.

Which I saw is on your shelf over there.

Yes.

Yes.

We have. So what year did that come out?

That came out in 2024. There's a great poem in there about my night in jail. Just saying.

Okay.

About bodily functions in jail.

Oh, there you go.

We love bodily functions.

Yeah, we do.

And then my second book is coming out, My Wise Little Ghosts There, officially in July.

And that's all poems?

It is, yeah, narrative poems. So that's about processing the abortion I had during our divorce to add more strife to the whole situation. I wound up getting pregnant a week after everything fell apart. And so processing that experience of grief through the lens of psychedelic therapy, which has been just life-changing for me.

Psilocybin or ayahuasca?

Psilocybin predominantly.

Okay. And LSD?

MDMA therapy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I had a, a preventative double mastectomy 3 years ago, and so I started the psychedelic therapy to help integrate what felt like a very Frankenstein-y torso. So the MDMA helped with that, and then as I graduated to the psilocybin, this whole experience of healing with who would have been my daughter came through in this book.

Oh wow.

Wow.

So yeah, just to wrap up your story, and you You kind of said it. I'm having the greatest success of my life and things are the lowest. I think this is a bizarrely common experience. And to think that you're happiest now.

I think so.

Yeah. And then you. Okay, so, Matt, how did you meet your wife? You ended up absconding to Austin, which is my favorite city.

Oh, we got a good barbecue truck there.

Oh, I'm going at the end of the month. Where is this barbecue truck?

15 minutes north of the river.

Oh, let him feed you barbecue.

By the campus?

No, it's above the campus.

Probably by your— what's your home? Hotel you like?

Oh, Commodore Perry.

Yeah, it's beautiful. Oh my God, the food is so good.

Is it anywhere near there?

No, it's near where like all the big tech campuses are.

Oh, okay. She gets arrested, she has, uh, she has a restraining order, she goes on her journey. What do you do after that arrest? How do you start to rebuild?

Our business partner Howard created a restaurant out of nowhere for me to like do something, to escape to. Yeah, we got a Michelin award for that, like a Bib Gourmand, which is really great.

What kind What restaurant was that?

We did grilled pizza, just like Al Forno in Providence, which was our favorite restaurant. We did grilled pizza, and then it just couldn't survive through pandemic. People took advantage of the protests to riot. That was unfortunate because the protests were happening and we were supportive, but then we got broken into and our liquor was stolen. So people were abusing the protests. And then we were just like, fuck it. Everything was trash.

Really quick, when you win a Michelin star—

It was right below the star. It's the Bib Gourmand. So it's almost a star.

Do they present you with a plaque?

Yeah, it's in my kitchen.

Okay, so the plaque is in your kitchen. And that got a Times review too, Violet, right?

Pete Wells is from Rhode Island, and we kind of did some Rhode Island-y stuff. So, you know, after like a month, he reviewed it like quickly. We caught him there twice. And then Dale Talde.

Really quick, these reviewers come unannounced, obviously, right?

Yeah, yeah. But like, I wouldn't know.

And what happens when they arrive? Everyone shits their pants?

Yeah, everyone's just like, you know what, he's here. And it's like, Dale was more experienced with dealing with reviewers, so he's just like, we make 2 of every dish, and then we taste each one, and then one goes out to him, and the other one just doesn't matter.

Goes in the trash.

He goes to the dishwasher.

So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he was very very good with that.

Scary.

Yeah. Also, how do you take a bite out of each dish without fucking up the dish?

Well, it depends on the dish, right? It wasn't like we bit a burger or pizza.

They're probably— the sauce is all the—

yeah, like, you know, he ordered a few pastas.

Okay.

I had met Simone maybe a few months before that opened in New York. In New York? Yeah. She had a restaurant nearby called Little Tongue, or she had a few of them. I'd been to them, but like, I never knew her. And then I became friends with her publicist, and then we started going, and then kind of started thinking through that way.

Do chefs share a common bond?

Yeah, we like to complain to each other about like labor and people not showing up and things that have gone wrong. So yeah, there's a camaraderie there of chefs. Comparatively, there aren't a lot of female chefs compared to male chefs in New York. You know, when I met Simone, I was like, oh cool, it's like a female chef. Yeah, yeah, that's hot. That was in May of 2019, and then we started really dating in October, and then she got pregnant like 3 months later.

Oh wow.

She was pregnant all during pandemic, and our son was born in August of 2020. Which was so bizarre.

To bring a baby in at that time feels like, ah.

And we didn't know if groceries would be infected, right? Like, there's a time it's just like, do you wipe down groceries? What do you know?

What's in a hospital?

Yeah.

And also that also New York was uniquely visible and hard compared to other places.

Luckily, the hospital we're in, it delayed opening because of pandemic. So we were one of the first people ever.

Oh, really?

Hospital was cool. Oh, yeah.

Fresh sheets.

Yeah. Like snip a ribbon at the door. So like, be the first, like, baby.

Oh, wow. Wow.

I was at a hospital in New York also during the pandemic, right before the pandemic.

That's terrifying.

Like week or two before.

Oh wow.

With my seizure. And guess what? After the seizure, Kristen and I went to Emily.

Oh, so that's right. 'Cause I remember you sat at the chef's table.

Yes.

Yeah. And then everything closed down right after that.

Exactly.

It was like third week in March, I think.

Oh, you had the first baby. She had the last burger.

Yeah, exactly.

I had my birthday party and then like 2 days later, March 12th, baby was like, that's it. Everything's closed.

Yeah.

Yeah. So how do you end up in Austin?

We were living Clinton Hill, like right down from the restaurant. And then I was just like, I was born in New York and then lived in Connecticut for a few years, and then the next 20 years I'm in New York again. So I've never lived anywhere other than the city. So I want to leave. I think a lot of people during pandemic were just like, I'm leaving.

Yeah, yeah, change it up.

Yeah, like a lot of the New Yorkers went to Miami and Californians went to Austin. Didn't want to go to Miami. I was like, all right, let's go to Austin then. Yeah, go where the Californians go. It's a city that I've always loved.

Great food, outrageously good food, laid back.

It's easy to get around. Everything's no more than 20 minutes away from everything else. So it's like a big town that's just really friendly and cool.

It is. And then how quickly do you decide, let's open a restaurant here?

Just won't get pregnant again. We had our daughter.

You say it like you don't know how this happened. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, both times, like, she got pregnant. Yeah, yeah.

So then we were really looking for spaces for maybe a year, and then we stumbled upon this one that had a smoker in it. So we did some Chinese food with some smoked stuff, and then we opened the barbecue place. We met our pitmaster. His name is Jonathan Lagos. From Terry Black's.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, so he was like one of the pit guys from there. He's like our Austin Sammy. He's like this big gentle man.

You ever go to Laurel?

Yeah, I love Laurel.

I love Laurel. So I'm wondering, how are you and your Chinese wife fusing your backgrounds into one restaurant? Is it a hybrid?

We closed it, but the Chinese restaurant was sort of like a hybrid. I like cooking more Southeast Asian food, like Singaporean stuff, and she likes cooking more like Chinese and like French style. So we kind of just had some hybrid dishes there.

But you were smoking meat too, so it's got an awesome flair.

Smoking meat. And then we had a little truck in the patio, so you could get your barbecue there if you want, or come in for some Chinese food. And then the sides for all the barbecue, we'd make homemade Chinese noodles with, like, queso on it and, like, don don. And, like, instead of coming with that gross white bread, Algal Barbecue does, we had, like, flaky rotis.

Oh, yeah.

Does some part of you still want to create another thing?

I think going back to Emmy Squared should be fun now because I can focus on that. And just reinvent the menu again. Our partner Howard just like, "If you were to rewrite this menu for 2026, not for 2016, what's the dishes?" And obviously being a different chef now and more mature, it's just like lighter vegetable. When I left, everything just turned to, like, carbs in the appetizers. That's just too heavy.

Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

It's the right time for him to be back there, it feels like. In the arc of this whole story, he's landed back there at the time and place it needs him, and he's ready to help it come into the next wave of being.

I'm excited to open a chocolate store with Simone eventually, but that'd be more her project.

Who's on the food truck? Are you on the food truck ever?

Not usually. Like, I'll go up and visit every week or so.

You designed that menu and taught him how to make everything?

No, no, no. I mean, our pit guy taught. He's the man. Jonathan's our barbecue savant. Simone and I just kind of came with the side dishes. Basically. And then they started doing a burger.

Oh!

Uh-oh.

There's a really good burger place in Atlanta called NFA. This guy's name is Billy Kramer.

Have you been there?

Do you know NFA Burger?

It's in Dunwoody.

I'm from Atlanta.

It's in Dunwoody.

Oh my God, I'm gonna go!

It started in a gas station. So Billy and I became friends, and then we did a pop-up in Austin with him. He was training Jonathan and our other pit guy, Trevor, how to make a burger, right? And then George Motz comes from Hamburger America, and he starts training them how to do a good burger, right? And then our friend Cole from Dream Burger now Nashville comes, and then he starts teaching them how to make a burger. So the two of them, they have like these three master burger people, right? And they're like, let's make our own based on what we learned. And it's, it's pretty great. I don't make smash burgers. They want to do a smash burger. They put their onions on the smoker and like they made their special sauce. It's like a smoky oniony—

you're going to have to get—

oh, I got to get out there. I have a rental car, I could do it.

Yeah. So I have no notes for them. I was like, you guys do your burger the way you want to.

My last question My question is, are you able to have some pride in what a successful thing it was, even though it ended?

I mean, we're sitting here together on this couch with you. There was a very long time I didn't think we would ever be here in relationship. And now it just feels like we're family members who had a falling out and have come back together. And it feels really beautiful to co-own and operate our baby together. Every breath gets us to where we are. And so everything that we've done together informed how we've grown and the amount of learning and resilience skills I've built through the process of navigating our divorce has allowed me to be the person I've become. And I'm forever grateful to that and just grateful for the love that we had in the way that we had it. Mm-hmm.

Birthed that restaurant.

Exactly.

It still stands. I would imagine it's kind of similar to like when divorced parents are at graduation for their kid.

Yeah.

And they look at each other like, ah, fuck, look what we did.

Yep. Yeah.

Yeah.

That feels very on point.

That's true. Well, you guys, this was lovely. It's so fun to meet the people who we've We've never talked about a food item in our lives like our obsession with that fucking burger. I mean, the whole damn spread is beautiful. The fucking— sometimes it's broccoli, sometimes it's cauliflower.

Brussels sprouts.

Brussels sprout appetizer. Good way to trick me into having some veggies.

It's so good. You guys really made something very special. Thank you.

Yeah, incredibly special. That will probably outlive all of us.

And wait, we wanted to do something special for Armcherrys if you were game. We thought if anyone gets this far in the episode, we could have like a code word that for the rest of the month after this episode comes out, they get a free dessert if they say the code word in the original.

Absolutely.

Well, we know what the code word is.

We do too.

Let's see. What? What?

Dolphin asparagus.

Yeah, we got it!

It was—

look, it was going to be that or reverse back, but dolphin asparagus is bad.

I thought dolphin asparagus too.

Dolphin asparagus.

You didn't credit—

that was wrong.

You told us earlier.

I just got Both are incredibly perverse, so either would work. But dolphin asparagus, I love that. So if you're an Arm Cherry and you're anywhere near—

maybe they can order it. I'll have the dolphin asparagus.

Oh, there we go.

Okay, and it means the burger and a dessert.

So we'll say for the 2 weeks after this episode airs—

reasonable. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

If they say that at Emily Original, Emily Original, they'll get dessert on the house.

Okay, Clinton Hill, go to Emmy Original or Order the dolphin asparagus and you're going to get a dessert on the house. I love this.

And if you take a picture under Monica, you get extra credit.

Yeah. Well, yeah, Queen Monica.

Beautiful picture there, right in the waiting area.

It's so nice. A lot of people will post that, that they're there.

Oh, wait, can I air a grievance? But I could be wrong.

Sure.

I believe I have to go next door and buy Diet Coke and smuggle it in. Do you guys have Diet Coke?

Probably.

You motherfuckers. What is with these restaurateurs who think they shouldn't have Diet Coke? Is it that you're too classy? What's going on? Of course.

Why wouldn't you? Just New Yorkers.

Why wouldn't you?

Elitist.

Elitist. I don't think New York is a big Diet Coke.

Oh, I think it is.

Finance experts have Diet Coke. Our partner Howard drinks Diet Coke. Okay.

Okay. Howard knows what's up.

Yeah, he knows what's up.

But let's get Diet Coke at Emily so I don't have to go next door and smuggle it in.

Accommodate.

I'll figure that out.

You got to pull the dolphin asparagus coat to get your Diet Coke, right?

That's right.

That'll be reversed back. You want to have—

geez, we have so many coats.

Just like the staff's going to be like, hold on a second. It's like learning the specials that night.

Yeah, exactly.

What is it? Oh, it's Diet Coke.

That's Diet Coke.

Special. We're serving Diet Coke tonight. Well, Emily and Matthew, this was wonderful. Thank you so much for coming.

Thanks for coming.

So great. So fun. Everyone check out My Wise Little Ghost. Of course, you could still get Emily the cookbook. It's still a great cookbook, whether or not it was fraudulent in its messaging at the time.

The recipes are still great.

Yeah, yeah, the recipes didn't know. So thanks for coming, you guys. This was great.

Yeah, thanks for having us.

Thank you.

Yep. We hope you enjoy this episode.

Unfortunately, they made some mistakes. I broke my phone yesterday. I cracked the front.

Okay, so you're a little bit grumpy?

No, I'm not grumpy at all.

Oh, all right.

I cracked the screen, and it's crazy how much it hurts my feelings when that happens.

How did it happen?

I was doing what I do often, which is try to save trips.

Sure.

By carrying way too many things. I mean, I'm never going to learn this lesson. I'm 51.

Yeah.

And I will continue to try to reduce everything to one trip everywhere. So I was doing one of those. I was carrying a lot of different things from the sauna to somewhere else. And yeah, and it fell out of my hand. It didn't seem like a biggie. And then I looked and sure enough, crack, crack city.

Oh, man.

And I just go like, oh, It hurts more than it should. I mean, I think because it's your phone and you immediately go, oh, I'm gonna be without it, or it's gonna be— I don't know, there's something interesting about it where, yeah, I'm like, oh, I'm sad.

I'm sorry.

I mean, that was yesterday.

Oh, okay. But do you get sad every time you see it?

Well, I have an appointment at 12:45 to get it fixed.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So I'm on it, I'm on it.

Nice. Are you going to the Americana?

I am.

Nice.

Yes. And then I'm gonna snoop around, and I'm bad this, but I keep asking Lincoln for birthday suggestions. Yeah. Again, ultimately, I do interpret this as a great thing, which is like when I was a kid, I wanted everything. But I keep— I'm like, Friday's going to come and, you know, I want to be able to give you something. She's like, oh yeah, I have a list, but it's— I'll give it to you later. Like, it's just never— so I'm presuming it's going to take a minute to fix this thing. So I plan on perusing, which I never do, but I'm going to walk that Americana and see if something leaps out at me that Lincoln would like for my birthday.

Well, I can advise a little bit. The Americana, as much as I love it, shopping-wise, it leaves a little to be desired.

Okay.

There's some, like, very fancy— like, there's a Tiffany's there.

Oh, okay. So I could buy her, like, a $4,000 tennis bracelet.

You could. Yeah.

Yeah, I'm not going to, but I could.

Yeah, you could.

Tiffany's pricey, right?

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, it is. But then they do have some like teen stores. I just don't think you want to go in there. It's like teen clothes stores and like—

I'm in there.

Yeah. I don't know if it's—

I don't imagine like other 13-year-olds. Would you like this?

Exactly.

When I really am just trying to find something for my daughter.

I know.

But then I get tackled by a husband, uh, father from behind.

That's right.

Would you feel cute in this?

Oh, do you think this is flattering on a body like yours?

But you could really be totally above board in the questions and I could sound horrendous.

Yeah, you really could. Um, also, like, the lighting in those stores really hurts my eyes.

It hurts your eyes.

And there's something I'm like, kids are way— you know, it's when when you really feel very old, where you're just like, oh no, this is what they're wearing now.

Okay. So is it too bright is your issue?

That's part of it.

Okay. And then the clothes, you're like, I don't relate.

I'm just like scared of the clothes. I'm scared of the youth.

I would never fuck with clothes. That's a stupid—

Right.

And also, I remember sweet grandparents would get me clothes and then everyone's in a bad position because you feel terrible and you got to act like you love the sweater granddad picked out out for you. Oh, and I'm— that's, that's what would be the case. I'd be like, I thought this was rad. Oh, whoa, she is wearing all my old punk rock t-shirts.

You could get a vintage shirt. They won't be at the Americana.

No, sir, there's nothing old there. It's all new.

But there are vintage stores other places in the city.

I told you about— this is a long-standing grievance— I told you about the one time I was at the Americana, also for the, um, Listener, I'm in a mall maybe once every 2 or 3 years. Yeah, I am never there. I know. So I went to see a film at that AMC at the Americana, and I walked by the Golden Goose store or whatever it is, the shoes.

Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah.

CGG. And a pair of shoes leapt out from the window at me.

Okay.

And I walked in. Do you have that in 11.5? Oh, yeah, we do. Great. I'll take them.

Oh, you didn't try them on?

Great. Let me sign you up for for a, um, an account. Okay, what's your email and address? And I said, oh, I, I don't— or a membership or something. And I said, oh, I don't want a membership, I just want to pay. And she goes, well, you have to, you have to sign up for a membership. And I said, you won't, you won't sell this to me unless I enroll in some program? And she said, yeah, like it won't even let me. And I'm like, okay, thank you. And then I left. Right. And I was like, is that what we have come to?

A membership? I've never had to do that.

Oh, good. We're on grievances. I got another one. And maybe I've already aired it on here before.

Okay.

Stop asking me to rate everything. I'm so fucking sick of— I go to use something, I want to use my food delivery app, and first I got to be asked to rate it, and then I got to go to YouTube. You don't need me to rate YouTube and all these things. Enough. You don't mind. I can see on your face you're not bothered by me. That one doesn't get me. It's a pop-up screen you got to go through. I don't—

on YouTube, I I just X out of that. But on DoorDash and stuff, I click it because I, you know, I want the person to get their 5 stars.

Yeah.

But also, you would think if you rated it once, that would be it for the rest of your life. Like, what are you going to rate it every week? Is it a daily rating? But it just keeps popping up because also if you go, oh, fuck it, okay, I'll give you 5 stars. And then it says— and then a new screen comes up. Would you like to write a review?

Right. And you say no.

I know, but I—

oh, wow.

Why does everyone need to get reviewed all the time? Just let me use the service that I'm I'm paying for, and, and don't ask me to review. Or you go to the doctor, there's 3 email follow-ups. How was your visit? Please rate your visit.

I know, I just ignore it.

I know, but it's a lot of traffic that doesn't need to be there. No one needs to rate.

Okay, well, they want to know if they did a good job.

Rob, do you like rating stuff?

No, I hate it.

Okay, those screens bother you?

Yeah, yeah, I'm always hitting skip and I get pissed.

It's because— okay, great, I'm not crazy. And then also the gas station. Here's another one. You go to the pump and it's like, do you want to sign up for a membership? No. Do you want a car wash? No. Do you want a receipt? No. And at some point you just want to go, I want gas. That's why I came here. Yeah, for gasoline.

It's frustrating. It is indeed frustrating. Um, I don't have any grievances. Oh, oh, you probably agree. About that. Let's see, let me get out of here. Let me do— let's do a do not disturb. Do not DND.

Please rate the rejection of this call. Was that— was it easy to use? 5 stars.

Okay, I thought it was easy.

5 stars to reject that.

Totally. Yeah, well, let me—

let me add some positives.

Let's—

yeah, they have made it easy because I get so many junk text messages. I get like, you would think I have a credit score of zero. I get about 15 texts from different numbers.

This is a positive?

Every day. Yeah. From debt collectors. They're not real debt collectors.

Yeah.

They're trying to trick you into something. Yeah, scams. And what I like now is you can just slide to erase and it says delete and report junk. One button.

Love that.

Boom, boom, boom. I love that.

Wow.

Because I want the junk reported. I want to save other people from it. And so that feature I love.

Great.

Yeah, congratulations.

That's a positive of technology.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Um, I worked out again.

How'd it go?

I think well.

Okay.

So I'm just getting huge.

I'm just getting jacked over here.

I'm really swole.

And you spend a lot of time in front of the mirror?

I look.

For how long?

Not very long, but I look just to see like how are my gains.

Yeah, your Gains.

Big. I showed you yesterday this. You can't see, I'm wearing kind of a long sleeve.

I'm surprised you're not wearing a tank top to show off the gunners.

No, like, I am sore also, obviously.

Um, but what part are you sore in?

I'm sore here.

Tricep?

Yeah, cuz I did that yesterday.

Yeah, good. It's a good feeling, isn't it?

It is, it is. Um, it is, yes. I I do, I will say I do prefer the feeling after cardio than I do the feeling after weight training, but that's why I'll just have to do both.

They're time horizons, really. So after cardio, you do get an endorphin blast for sure, but the muscle thing is a less spiked, much more protracted, like that feeling of tightness all day is this gentle mental reminder, like, oh yeah, I pushed myself. I pushed myself. It's such an esteem-building, just all-day gentle reminder, like, oh yeah, I pushed myself. Huh.

Yeah.

So it's not like the endorphin spike, but it is a real elevated self-esteem for a lot of people. For me, for Kamau, I know that's what he experiences.

Loves about it. Yeah, so—

I'm in a tricky situ— This is gonna get really esoteric. So my leathers that I'll be riding in on Monday—

That's the outfit you wear to ride in the motorcycle?

It's a full leather bodysuit. It was made for me. It's a gorgeous suit. You've seen it. It's got arm cherries. It's got cherries on the arms. It's got a little homage to Nikki Hayden, my friend who used to race. There's a lot of great— They're awesome. I would never want another pair of leathers. The problem is they were made for me when I was— 185. Oh, and not only was I 185, I just had a completely different body composition.

Yeah.

So we have had the suit let out like 3 times. It has been sent— I don't know if it gets sent to Italy or what, but Alpine Stars has, who made the suit, they have adjusted it 3 times. And the lower half, that was the killer, is my thighs got way big. My thighs got like 30% bigger and I could barely get them in the suit.

Yeah.

So those Those were fixed. Okay, but now it's the fucking— my biceps and my arms, it's so tight because I just rode 3 weeks ago and I'm like, it's so tight I can barely feel my hands.

That's not good. You need to have mobility.

So, okay, now here's my Sophie's Choice. Okay, this is the— cannot believe I'm gonna admit this out loud on the show, so I will likely wave the checkered flag at the race. Oh, I did last year.

Okay.

And I, I hadn't planned it last year. I just—

they asked me to wave the checkered flag and I did, which starts the show.

No, it's the end of the race. The winner. I'm sorry, I'm like— I'm in the tower as they come across the finish line. I'm waving the checkered flag.

Cool. And this is for the race MotoGP, not the thing you're riding in?

Nope.

Got it.

Okay, there's a MotoGP, the Formula One of motorcycles, is on Saturday and Sunday.

Yes.

Okay, sprint on Saturday.

That's like a legit— that's on TV. That's like a thing. Oh yeah, you're gonna, you're gonna wave.

And last year I was on TV.

Got it.

Waving the flag.

Okay, I see.

And I'm gonna tell you egomaniacally and with all vanity, I noticed when I was waving the flag, oh, your bicep looks awesome.

Oh wow. Okay, it really—

like, you couldn't miss it.

Uh-huh.

And I was like, this is great. I love— people commented.

I'm sure they did.

Okay, so now I'm kind of addicted to that reaction.

Oh, no.

So I don't want to do arms for like a week because I'm going to ride. But I also want to do arms like the day before I have to wave the flag. So my biceps look great.

Uh-uh.

Yeah. Which one?

No, you need to be able to ride your motorcycle.

I think I'm going to pick the flag waving.

This isn't funny, actually.

It is.

No, you could fall.

No, no, it doesn't hamper my ability to ride the motorcycle.

How do— of course it does if you're like, I can't even— like, you can't even move.

It's just uncomfortable.

I think your arms are huge. A week off's not going to change.

Exactly. Thank you, Rob.

Like, it's not going to make it—

you need to look up the video of me waving the flag. You might change your mind. Why do you want—

who cares about you not breaking your neck?

How long ago was that too? If your arms are too big for the suit, that means they're still bigger than then.

Well, no, they were too big for my suit last year too.

Yeah, but if they're bigger now too—

why is it sickening that you're gonna prioritize that over your, like, potential comfort? You're making it about safety. There's no safe— there is no safety issue. Okay, I can ride the motorcycle whether they're tight or not. It's a comfort issue. It's very uncomfortable.

Don't you need to be comfortable if you're gonna be nimble on the bike?

No, you don't have to be comfortable.

You don't.

It's just like you could race a car in an uncomfortable seat or a comfortable seat.

You're a gymnast and you're in a, um, you're in like high heels.

Yeah, they would impede your performance a lot. This won't impede my performance, it's just uncomfortable. And then I'll add to it, it, it determines whether or not I come in and out of the suit. So in between sessions, it's also Texas, so it's going to be like 95 degrees, right? It'll be hot, I'll be sweating bullets. And when you come off the track and my 30 minutes of downtime, I kind of want to take my arms out of the suit. Now we get into my shoulder issues. This is another thing with all the surgeries, getting in out of this. It's— the whole thing's a little rough. So then I'll just end up kind of staying in the suit in between.

Dehydrating?

No, I drink a ton of water. There's no hydration issues. You know I drink a ton of water.

Yeah, but you're not drinking electrolytes like I tell you.

Yeah, I drink— I drink Gatorade when I'm at the track. Oh yeah.

All right. I just— and you're gonna get a UTI because you can't take it off because you'll— you can't pee.

No, no, I can unzip it down to my, uh, weenus, which which I do, and then— but I do have to pull the whole package up over the leathers and then the zippers down there.

And so that's all tight.

It's gonna—

it might cut off your entire package.

Again, that hasn't— that's not affected by the size of my arms. I wish it was.

Oh yeah. Well, oh my God, I just— I just— it is body dysmorphia that you can't see that like your arms are, as Rob just said, huge.

Yeah, yeah.

And with—

oh, I can see that.

With or without you doing more.

Well, that's just maintenance. I'm not like, I'm trying to do—

you think in one week your arm's gonna look like mine or something?

No, I don't.

By the way, mine are pretty swole, so you would be excited.

They do look different when I've pumped in, when I haven't. I mean, that's just— that's okay.

They look huge if you haven't. Yeah, that's the whole thing. So you don't have to.

I know.

So you, you probably have like a shirt that great, and then you might have a blazer you like to put on over. And I could be telling you, the shirt alone looks great. And you're like, yeah, it does. It looks great. I prefer it. My thing is I want to look great with the blazer and the shirt.

I know, but if the blazer was a detriment—

Oh, please pursue this line of thinking, because you and I both know you operate in grave discomfort to go on the carpet with the super high heels and the dress that's too tight. And you've told me, I can't breathe.

I fucking hate it.

Yes.

So you do it for the picture.

Yeah.

Not for safety. Not for then me to go do something that's like safety. It's going to impact my safety.

These are one for one.

No, they're really not. They're really not. Because you're riding the motorcycle. I feel you need to be in— you need to be capable of like, like doing that if you're about to fly off or something.

Yeah.

You're not, you're not listening to me. There's This doesn't at all augment my safety.

How could it not?

Because, because I'm uncomfortable doesn't mean I can't operate it exactly the same.

Can you lift your arms all the way up in it? You can?

Yeah. It's just like when you're wearing an extremely tight dress, you're like, oh, this is uncomfortable, right? So you prioritize your look over discomfort often.

Well, okay, I'm going to say one thing.

Okay.

I actually am someone somewhere in the middle. I don't wear like a super high— sometimes I look around and I'm like, how are they doing that? I can't. I will look like an idiot. Like, I will— won't be able to really do it. So I, I do prioritize some level of comfort and style.

But I've been with you when you're like, oh, I can't breathe in this, or my feet hurt.

Oh yeah, my feet always hurt. But even if—

yeah, so, so we, we relate. We, we know what it's like. To be willing to experience discomfort so that we look a certain way.

Sure. Yeah, I'll give you that. I'm more— I'm not— I don't care about the day of the tux.

You want it to be a safety issue, but it's not. There's no safety issue. It's a discomfort one. And I'm acknowledging even that's preposterous. I am acknowledging that I want my arms to look a certain way on TV, and I'm willing to be uncomfortable for a whole day at the track.

Can I tell you something that's different? Okay. Me in a flat shoe on the red carpet carpet legitimately looks— I can't, I feel bad because somebody's wearing a flat shoe on the red carpet and they probably look great in it.

And by the way, it's just as subjective, Monica. You're saying, you're saying to me the, the thing I noticed the difference in is not real, and, and you're saying the thing you notice the difference in is real. And I'm saying plenty of people would think you would look just as great not in heels on the red carpet.

You know who's not? The fashion police.

Okay, great.

There's like a legit amount— there's like people who look at your outfit and scour it and say, that's chic, that's not, why they do this, why did they do this? And so for— you do have to look sort— you don't have to, you don't have to.

I mean, they're identical things. We both want to look a certain way and we're both willing to be uncomfortable to look a certain way.

I guess I just don't think the judge—

I mean, you're the only one. I'm not judging you for what's happening on the red carpet at all.

Judgment. I'm saying, I'm saying the judgment from the outside world. I don't think the outside world is gonna see you waving the flag with or without the pump. Yeah, I think much different.

You— I know you think that just like because you're not a dude, and, and I think people wouldn't say she looks crazy without high heels on.

So we both think that, but Rob is an equal, and Rob said that your arms will look huge regardless.

They will look big. Could they look bigger? Yes. You will look very cute. Can you look cuter? Sure.

Okay.

I mean, these are just really tit for tat.

They are. And I mean, maybe, yeah, maybe I just don't understand that thing, but they are different. Like, heels do something to your leg shape. Like, it's not like—

and veins, uh, sticking out of your bicep do something to what they look like on TV.

Sure.

I mean, they're noticeable.

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay, we do the same thing. Okay.

Okay. I just— I— on a— uh, you're— that's fine as long as it's not a safety thing. You do never—

it's just massive discomfort, which I am willing to own. I'm happy to own that. That's preposterous. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert. If you dare. I admitted the other day, I thought when I was down in Florida for, um, Rat Ditty— yeah, I was like, oh, we're looking too big, right? But then I was like, but it kind of works for that character. But I don't want to look that big. So I don't think I have full dysmorphia. I think I have face dysmorphia for sure. I don't think I see what my face looks like. At all.

How do we know?

You know, this is where AI could help us.

I think this is like, this is like, you know, the age-old what color are you seeing versus what color am I seeing. Uh-huh. You know, it's like there's literally— there's no way to know. And, um, not to mention that we're adding in everything subjective. Like, everything looks good— something looks good to one person, to you. Yeah, exactly.

Someone's like, I hate muscles. Someone's like, I love muscles.

Yeah. Yeah, this is a whole—

I love big noses, I hate big noses, right?

It's all subjective.

And there's a couple consistent ones. Thank you.

Well, yeah, I mean, there are people that everyone can universally agree on.

No one's like, I fucking hate perky breasts. I've never heard that in my life. I've been around for a long time. I've heard I hate big dicks. Yeah, but you've also never heard it's like, fucking, I hate perky.

But some people probably hate big breasts.

That's why I said perky.

I know, but like, it's of course a perky if they're non-existent.

The male equivalent, I've never heard someone say like, I hate how wide his shoulders are.

I could see someone saying that depending on who the person is. I actually could see myself saying that about—

Oh really? Yeah, I don't like wide shoulders.

Remember I told you sometimes like, but sometimes it's too much.

That's a different thing though, right? That's too musky. Muscular, not soft. Yeah, but just the frame of a man having wide shoulders.

Well, it's not as big as this room. That's too big.

I'd love to meet the person who had shoulders.

I don't want to meet them. I'm scared of them. Oh my God, did you hear about this basketball player who's like 7'8" or something? He's so tall. Everyone was talking about this at Charlie's birthday party.

And college player, or he—

Rob, do you know about No. Okay, look him up. He's like— I think he might be like 16 or something, or 18.

Or Shaq 2.0.

I was gonna say height's probably the biggest comment.

He's taller than Shaq.

Okay, 7'9". Oliver Rue. Does that sound right?

That sounds right. Is he like a young kid?

Let me find— yeah, he's in college.

The whole thing is there's been plenty.

That's him. That guy is like 7 feet tall, the one next to him.

No.

Yes, we were doing this.

We were doing this. I don't know exactly. No, I promise you, it's like shocking.

He's 20.

I want to watch this kid play.

Florida?

Yes. Are they in the—

look at him.

Holy shnikes. For the listener, he's standing with his teammates, all of them, and presumably they're all above 6 feet tall. They're all below his shoulders.

These are tall men. These are basketball players. And he is—

and he's behind them, which that also makes him smaller in the photo.

And remember, like, oh my God, like, that guy's your height.

No, he's not.

No, that guy—

that guy's 5'7".

No, he's not.

That's why they put him in the picture.

This is what we've talked about, remember?

After you—

yes, after you hit 6 feet—

no, here's—

here with you—

no. Oh, she's 5'2".

Yeah, that guy's 5'7" because that guy's She's at his elbow.

She's taller than me. Like, listen, 1 inch taller.

But this, this guy really is 5'9".

This guy is, is over— okay, once you hit 6 feet, the theory is in this room, each inch, we think after 6'4". No, I think it's after 6 feet.

I really—

yes, I think you look much taller than than someone who's just 6 feet, right?

Over someone that's 6 feet and 5'10"? Yeah, when someone's 6 feet and 5'10", you can almost not tell.

Yes.

Yeah. Okay, I'm on your— what is he standing on the ground?

I mean, I wanted— I need a picture next to him so badly, you guys.

He's holding the rim and is— honestly, his feet are a centimeter off the ground. Oh my God.

I feel like I could— you know when when you're a baby and you like put your arm around your dad's leg and you're like under his knee and you're just like holding on to his leg. I feel like I'm that for him.

You might be right at nuts level for him.

I'm under his knee, I think. I'm just holding on to his little leg and I just want to meet him.

Okay, can I switch the topic to PSA? Because I think this is a long, um, fun healing journey for me. So I have traveled once since the— they have stopped getting paid. And I'm about to travel again.

Uh-huh.

These people have not been paid for one month, and they've continued to come to work. I am so in awe of them, and I admire what they're doing. And I thanked all of them when I was going through the airport. But more than that, I— what I was— it was driving me nuts when I was leaving New Orleans. I'm like, I want to bring a 5-gallon bucket from Home Depot, and I want to stand up and go like, hey, I'm putting a brand in here.

Oh, that's nice.

Everyone dropped $20 as you go through. Like, these people should get fucking paid something.

That's nice.

And I'm like, is that allowed? I got really hung up on like, can you do that? Is that allowed? Then I'm— then I'm past security. Now what? There's a bucket there. No one's making the announcement.

People might take from it.

Someone take it. Is the TSA allowed? They can't make an announcement, hey, put money in here. So I'm like, do I put a sign on there? I got really bogged down with how can I make this happen. So of course I'm about to go to the airport airport on Saturday. I'm having the same thought. I'm like, I want to bring money and grease everyone I see.

Yeah.

So guess what? Elon Musk offered to pay for all of their one month's of salary out of his own pocket.

The whole country?

Yes. He offered the White House— he's like, let me pay these people's salary while you guys fight over this, right?

Because like, we need the airports to function.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I was like, oh, thank God. And he's someone could really just write a check for all of them.

Yeah.

And, uh, they turned it down.

Really?

Yeah. And it makes me— it drives me nuts.

Yeah.

Is there like rules because they're government employees?

They're— yeah, they— somehow the explanation was like that somehow he would be liable for something. I'm like, why don't I— like, we are so bogged down in bullshit, phony red tape. It's like, but I think these people need to get paid.

Maybe do it. Like, maybe like you—

well, he's an individual, but he was going to do it through the government. No, he just said, I'll write a check to every TSA, give me their names, and I'll pay everyone's past 4 weeks that they haven't been getting paid.

It says it's because of his various government contracts that he's not allowed to do it.

Okay, again, it's all bullshit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, maybe then Jeff Bezos should do it. Like someone who—

well, he probably has government contracts. I'm sure they cloud compute for the government.

Right. Oh, okay.

Well, I just hate when, like, something great could happen.

Yeah.

And everyone's going to— because of political reasons or they don't want to be affiliated with Elon Musk, take his fucking money and pay these people.

Oh, yeah, for sure.

Just whatever the bullshit is, it's like we have an opportunity to pay these people who've been working for a month for free. How are they paying their bills? A lot of them are not showing up to work because they have other jobs.

Exactly. I know.

It's horrible.

Um, maybe, I mean, you could just give some to the people you see. I mean, I know it's not the same.

That is what I'm going to do. But, but also, I— what I wish was somehow we could all collectively like put a fucking bucket out. If everyone dropped $20 who went through the— that would, that would cover their salary for the day. Tens of thousands of people go through LAX.

Huh.

I don't know how to organize this, but I, I— it drives me nuts, and I would be happy to pay, uh, while, while they're not getting paid.

We could try to start something where we started on this show, we—

everyone bring a bucket. There's so many buckets, and then that became its own problem why flights weren't getting out.

Yeah, exactly.

And just the idea that like ICE is coming in with zero training to— there's no way they're gonna help speed things up. Do you know they've been deployed to, to, to, um, cover the gaps? It's like, what could be worse in the speed of the airport than a trainee? Yeah, basically.

This—

what a bad plan.

They're like putting them at the exits because they said that's an issue.

Oh, okay.

Which is— which is not—

I don't know, exiting the airport is an issue.

Yeah, I think maybe if you have the means and you have some extra cash, maybe if you can just give it to your TSA.

I wonder if they would get in trouble. Like, I wonder if I hope they're forbidden to take money because look, it could look like, what, did they just bribe him? Is— is— he's not pre— he doesn't have a real passport, his license not good, he got something through. Exactly. They're going to turn a blind eye. So, so yeah, it would be a terrible policy to allow TSA employees to accept money from people.

I didn't even think about that.

But if it's anonymous in a bucket, yeah, then no one's getting fair, you know, unfair, whatever. I don't know. What I know is we shan't accept this. This is not—

Okay, I have an idea.

Okay.

Um, you could host a gala.

Okay.

Because I'd like to come.

Okay.

And, um, I'll wear my suit.

I'll wear my leathers. I'll do arms right before I put my leathers on.

Yeah, that I feel fine about. I'm not worried about your safety there. Um, and then, uh, we can raise money at the gala for, for these workers. And like, then you can do what Elon was gonna do. Then we have all the money and like you can just write these checks. Howard can help, your business manager.

Yeah, I mean, I, I wish I had started thinking about this 4 weeks ago because I do think by the time we pull off this gala and distribute the funds, it will be sorted out.

Then we can keep the money.

I'm gonna knock on Before I say this, because I know this is going to make you nervous, but I did just think of what would be the most hilarious outcome to this whole debate about the suit is next fact check, I'm in a sling.

I've already—

I'm in a sling and I'm still in the suit because I can't get my arms up.

Oh my God, what do you think I'm imagining when we are talking about this? You're so arrogant to think that like someone's tight, tight, tight, tight leotard isn't going to affect their twists. It does.

Well, hold on a second. I ride them. I, I know I've ridden with arms that are tight and arms that are not. So you're gonna have to trust me that I know.

Okay.

Yeah. Um, and it doesn't affect it. If anything, it might give me more stability. It's just incredibly uncomfortable. That is the issue. It's very uncomfortable.

Okay.

And it's hard to get in and out of the suit. You're gonna like grab a sleeve and fuck, you know, there's like a lot of teamwork to get us in and out of these.

It is like getting ready for a red carpet.

Yeah, like cinching each other's girdles up or whatever.

Yeah, yeah.

I was getting in and out of our suits. That's the hardest part of the day. I can't relate at all to what you guys are going through with the shoes and shit. I mean, I just simply can't. I wouldn't do it. I, I know me. I wouldn't do it. I can barely even wear the goddamn dress shoes. But the one thing that is borderline that I deal with as a man is like your collar on your neck of your shirt with the tie on and an Adam's apple, and I swallow and it wants to go below that line, and it's too tight for my Adam's apple to go down into the—

your shirt's too tight.

But they, again, to look good, you can't have a gappy collar. That's a huge no-no for guys. Like, that's got to look tightened up, and the tie's got to be tight. You can't have a— you can't be swimming in your collar.

It looks terrible. That's fair.

But, um, James Bond's never been swimming in his collar.

You're right. I just— the problem is it also, you run the risk— we've talked about this. The neck on a man in a suit is tricky.

Is that everything?

Yeah, because it can make someone look very stocky.

Oh, okay.

It has— it runs a risk.

I want to see, um, I'm looking up a Lorne right now, my favorite actor to be. What did he— what happened to him? He did good.

No, he looks great. And like, you're right, it's flush with his neck.

There can't be any visible gap between the collar and your neck. Neck.

It's not a good look, but it's not stocky. It's like, it's long and it's, um—

he also has a very elegant neck. You picked a great— yeah, if you look at Statham— I was trying to think of, um, my favorite actor, and I can't believe I can never remember his name. It's like, it's so weird to me.

Jack Reacher?

No.

Speaking of, that's really— as yesterday when I was, um, working out, I had a podcast on and they talked about It got to you. Yeah, it finally got to me after it got to me.

Yeah.

Yeah. No. Mobland. Tom Hardy.

Oh, yeah.

I struggle with his name.

Yeah, it's a pretty standard name.

I love him. I love him so much. I started Mobland over again yesterday.

Wow.

But I can't imagine what he's dealing with with a collar.

No, but Dax, look.

Okay, who do we got?

This is him and his collar's not right.

You see? Great.

I'm glad you just found this. He can't even have a collar tight to him.

Yeah, but you just said—

isn't that— I kind of knew he doesn't have a goddamn choice. Oh, there he goes.

Okay, that's good.

He's so fucking hot. Look at his eyes. Oh my God.

Anyway, I think everyone should look exactly how they want to look.

Me too.

And, um, do the best you can with what you got. Just do whatever you want, you know? Do whatever you want. Uh, but I do think maybe if it's hurting your Adam's apple.

I gotta live with it, you know? It's like an hour of my life once a year.

What about if we undo this button?

Well, I've had to do that, similar to my leathers. Also, all my dress shirts were made at a certain era of my life, and then I stopped acting, so I wasn't accumulating any more dress shirts. So I was having to put, uh, braces rubber band in the fucking hole and then around the button. So little did anyone know, there was an elastic.

He sometimes keeps his shirt, but that's not—

that's not a tie.

When—

once you throw a tie into the mix He's wearing a bow tie.

Maybe you should take the tie out.

I've done bow tie. I don't like bow tie. I don't understand what the fuck that thing is.

Nice.

I'm like, what is this?

Is like, it feels like something you'd like because it's kind of like it's a little femme in a cute way.

It's just like what? It's a bow.

It's so cute.

Dax, this Dax, you're trying to show me your Facebook login page.

This is a tick.

Oh my God. Is it TikTok?

No, this is somebody else. Tarot Cats. I just Googled it.

Jacob Elordi.

Um, you could—

but you could be showing me videos of Elordi in a fucking, um, potato sack. He's going to look awesome and better than I look.

No, that's not true.

Oh yes, he look— he's significantly better looking than me.

No, that's—

and good for him.

He's like your height.

He's taller.

Oh yeah, I forgot.

Remember he made me look like a little—

I forgot.

He made me look like that fucking 5'4 guy next to the basketball wait for you to be next to him. Oh, we're the tall guy. Okay, let's do some facts.

Okay, Emily Berger.

Interesting episode.

Our favorite burgie used the sauce last night. What'd you put it on?

Shout out to Burger Lounge. They have a paleo option. Now that I'm not fucking with cheese. Yeah, it's brutal to have to remove cheese from stuff. Yeah, I also went to Yucca's Taco Shack yesterday. Yesterday.

Yum.

Best burger.

Yeah, you love it.

You haven't tried it yet, right?

I keep meaning to.

And I had to say no cheese, and the cheese is such a good part of it. But you know, it was still great. That's the thing about quitting things— it hurts, and then the thing is still great.

Good.

Anywho, uh, this I don't have to mess with because I guess paleo people aren't fucking with cheese. Okay, that's my assumption based on this paleo burger. It's got avocado, sprouts, tomato, lettuce, and then just the burger.

Yeah, boom.

Yeah, ordered it, put a bevy of different classy mustards on it, and then was like, oh, I have Emily burger sauce. So I, uh, I doused it. Funny enough too, Nate is in New York. This is a very ding ding ding. Nate is in New York with his kids for spring break, and I said, you have to eat here, go get the burger, the kids will love the pizza. And I just sent that to him. An hour ago, and now here we are. And I used the sauce last night.

Wow.

But such an interesting interview to interview two divorced people that still have to work together.

Yes.

Unbelievably fascinating.

Very fascinating. I mean, the interview itself is interesting, but just like the psychology of that is so, so wild.

Yeah, that was a first for us.

Yeah, it was.

Yeah.

That we know of.

Yes, I guess we could have had a couple on that was secretly separated.

Yeah, we've had Melissa and Ben on, and it— and you know what, they're very much together.

No, I know that one. I happen to know, but the others, I guess I wouldn't know. And who knows, maybe I wouldn't know.

You're doing a great job keeping it a bit.

They seem really, really—

this started a horrible rumor. No, they're together.

But, um, as everyone is an individual, and then you put those two things together, and every person, every relationship you observe is unique unto itself. Certainly every separation is also unique unto itself.

Yeah. Oh yeah.

There's not gonna be any two dynamics that are exactly the same.

Yes.

So rare, fun experience.

So fun. Yeah. This podcast I saw—

I wanna interview more divorced people who work together.

Yeah. I mean, yeah, let's do it.

Let's do a dedicated show.

This podcast that I've been listening to for like a day, it seems that one of the people on there has a very good relationship with their ex-husband. Uh-huh. Yeah, is very much in their lives.

That was my mom and dad, right? They were best friends. They did stuff all the time together. Um, yeah, anytime we went to the movies, my mom and I, it was in the town that my dad lived in, we'd always invite him. He'd sometimes come for dinner. He spent the night on Christmas pretty, pretty often till she was remarried, but even maybe a couple times then. I don't know. It was more a testament to like Barton, my stepdad, who had to deal with my dad being around all the time. My dad did not have a small personality.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's nice.

Yeah.

Okay. Some facts. So when did the Emmy Squared in LA Live open downtown? That was April 3rd, 2025.

Oh, so it's been there for a minute.

Coming up on a year.

So I should be able to order from that one.

I hope.

That would be much warmer.

When was our Brooklyn live show? It was on September 22nd, 2018. Early.

Did you say September? Uh-huh. Yeah, 6 months in.

Yeah. Okay, what is right below the Michelin star? He had this for, for one of his restaurants. It's called the Bib Bib Gourmand.

That sounds fancier than a star.

I know.

I thought it was above stars.

Yeah, because this one has no association with tires.

Well, no Michelin still.

I know, but like you don't hear Bib Gourmand and think tires. No, you hear Michelin and you think tires, which is not so fancy.

Right, right, right.

Okay. High quality food at a good value, or as a Michelin selected restaurant formerly, quote, the plate. These spots are recognized for using quality ingredients, proper cooking, and serving a, quote, simply good meal, even if they lack the prestige of a star. Okay, reminder to anyone that for 2 weeks, I believe it is, or a month— you have to go back in the episode to hear it— um, the code word if you go into Emily's— oh yeah, to get a free dessert— is dog Dolphin asparagus.

Oh shit, but Nate isn't gonna be able to benefit from it. Shit.

Okay, I don't know what to do.

I don't know what to do either.

Okay, well, he can just order and pay for his dessert. Yeah, so guys, dolphin asparagus, get your dessert. This is exciting.

We've never had a tie-in.

I know, I love it, I love it. Um, okay, so you, uh, expressed a beef with them about Diet Coke.

In the restaurant.

Yeah, it made me look up, uh, soda consumption by state.

Oh, fun.

Why don't you guess what you think is the state that has the highest percentage of people who consume soda daily? But this is— oh, what happened? Um, 2010 to 2015. This is on World Pop Review, so it's like really—

I'm gonna say Mississippi. Sodas would be number 1.

No, this is a surprise. I'll tell you, this is a surprise.

Okay.

Although it might not be a surprise when you find out, but it's—

It doesn't correlate with our obesity scales?

I don't think— well, no, but also there's some tough parts of this place.

Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh.

So maybe— not that soda makes it a tough part, but it's Hawaii.

Oh, interesting.

It's surprising, right? Right.

Okay.

Hmm.

Maybe not if I think about it.

Exactly.

This is exactly— Yeah.

Okay. So Hawaii, number 1. I'm still going to stick with like Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama.

You're close. You're missing one.

Kentucky.

Arkansas.

Arkansas. They're number what?

2.

Okay.

Okay. Then we got Wyoming. I'm surprised.

I am too. That doesn't make any sense to me.

Wyoming is 73.2% of people have a soda a day.

Very tiny population, right?

Right, true. Okay, then we have South Dakota.

Okay.

Connecticut.

Okay.

South Carolina. New Hampshire. New Jersey. Louisiana. New Mexico. Georgia. Ding ding ding!

That should be number one as the home of Coca-Cola.

It's embarrassing.

Yeah, not, not, not, um, enjoying your bread and butter or whatever they say.

Well, it's like one of those, like, you you take it for granted. Uh, Delaware, Vermont, Florida, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Rhode Island, New York, Maine, Maryland, Alabama, Montana, Arizona, Mississippi, Nevada, California, Illinois, North Carolina— California is above North Carolina— that's Texas, Virginia, Colorado, Guess last. Okay.

Utah.

No.

Damn it.

Alaska.

Oh, they can't get it up there.

Yeah. And then right above that is Wisconsin.

49.

So they're too—

they're drinking beer. So let me state for the record, my stereotyping was completely wrong. There's clearly no consistency whatsoever between north and south, and I was wrong.

Also alcohol consumption, because, because Because a lot of people have drinks with soda.

Sure, Jack and Coke. Yeah, that's all I really know of as a popular— Ramen Coke.

But yeah, um, Sprite and stuff.

Right.

And Shirley Temples.

Yeah, sure, Temples. That's true. All right, let's see. That's it.

That's it.

Okay, that's it for Emily and Matt of What a joy. Yeah, it was really— it was also so fun. We've just been talking about Emily Berger for so long, and it was full circle.

All right, love you.

Love you.