The Scott Adams School - 09/24/26 HOME TEAM w/ a Surprise For YOU!

I saw it. Mike7087 said, where Erica? Here I am.

Where Erica?

We're here, we're here. Okay, we're live. Good morning. Look at, look at Marcella's wearing eggplant today. Owen is— Owen, you look tan. You look good. You look very autumn.

I call it Prince Purple.

We like that. Owen and I are big Prince fans too.

That's always what I think of when I see purple.

Mm-hmm.

That's the way he intended it. So come on in, everyone.

He commandeered that color.

He sure did.

Trying to take over. Marcellus tried to take over.

I just wanted to see the first person that would drop the eggplants in the chat. Thank you, Lang. Shocker. You like the books?

Wait, I didn't see that. I don't see locals on my chat for some reason. At least that— oh, I missed it.

Oh, aubergine. Oh, Kev, you're so fancy. Welcome in, everybody. Just giving you a chance to come in. I see all the platforms are live today. I'm so, so happy. There, Lang did it again for you, Marcella. Do you see it now?

No, I actually don't see the locals chat in my—

This is terrible.

I may not laugh today. Uh-oh. YouTube has to make me laugh for Rumble.

Oh, you'll laugh when you see my clip later for sure. All right, so you guys, are we all in? Is everybody in? Get your seat, get ready. I need a sip like nobody's business, so let's take it away.

And what do you need to maximize the best part of the day? Well, you might need a cup or a mug or a glass, a tank or chalice, a stein, a canteen, jug or flaska, vessel, Fill it with your favorite liquid. I like coffee. And join me now for the unparalleled pleasure of the dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes everything better except my haircut. It's called the simultaneous sip. It happens right now.

Go!

Yup, just as good as I hoped. Never disappoints.

Never disappoints. The simultaneous sip never disappoints, right, Owen?

I don't think it ever has.

No.

Marcella, has it ever let you down?

Never.

Never, never. Okay. All right, you guys. So, oh, we have, we have things to get to today. Um, Marcella, I have to come to you shortly because I need to know what's going on with the press. But I keep forgetting to play this clip of this dog, you guys. Like you think your kids are bad and you can't train them to do things. It's going to get worse in one second. Check out this pup.

Ready and again.

So sweet. Is that a Shiba Inu? I think it is. That's what my dad had, a Shiba Inu. He's like, I'll tamp this down while you roll it.

Mm-hmm.

Perfect. I love that. All right, Owen, are the dogs at your house doing that kind of work?

Absolutely not. No, but that looks like a very well-trained dog.

I know Lori's folding Marcella's laundry every day, right? Right, Marcella?

Yeah, I need to teach her how to do that.

I mean, she could help you fold comforters for sure. That's probably— Kev wants that dog, right? I know, I know.

I've seen videos of dogs picking up like the mail. Like, they leave a package and like they bring it over. I'm like, no, Lori's gonna destroy it before he gets here.

My brother trained his dog to get the paper. So even when she was like a little puppy and he'd open the door and be like, get the paper. And she'd run down, grab the paper, bring it back in and drop it. Then on Sunday, he would steal his neighbor's Sunday paper. So my brother would be like, get the neighbor's paper. And she'd run across the street and, you know, down the block and get the neighbor's big Sunday paper and bring it back to him.

A life of crime for a dog.

Yes.

He's like, my fingerprints weren't on it. Um, so anyway, dogs.

And my, my dogs are not, uh, my son's dogs are not that well trained. I walk them sometimes and they still, like, pull as hard as they can and they're getting better a little bit. But I just, like, I've basically— I bought basically a, I don't know, industrial strength leash, like, for both of them.

Oh my God.

Like, it holds both dogs. But, like, even when I bought it, like, one of the clasps on it almost immediately broke because they pulled on it so hard they just pulled right through it. And so I bought Like those climbing D-rings.

Yeah.

Like the real ones, you know, that never break. And so I replaced it with something even better. And now it's like, I think there's no way they can get out. But even then, even then, they somehow got out of the, like the— they have those harnesses around them, like the—

Yeah.

Forget what you call them, but, you know, not just the collar, but the one that goes around their shoulders and stuff. And they pulled out of that somehow. And I'm like, what? What's going on here? But the fortunate thing was that I always am panicked that they might run away at that point, but they don't. They didn't that time. They just yelled at them and then they stopped and they just waited for me to put them back on.

So it was kind of weird. They're like, put us back on. We were supposed to be on this leash being obnoxious. Oh my gosh, that is so funny. They might need a little bit of a trainer, perhaps something like that.

Perhaps.

I don't know.

If I had more time, I would try. If I had more time, I would work on it. But I got a clicker too. And one of the dogs is fine with the clicker, but the other one's afraid of it. So every time I click, it like gets freaked out.

Oh my God, that is so funny. All right, well, dogs, we— I mean, we love them. We don't deserve them. They're just the best. Okay, so let's get through some news here. So President— oh, you guys, I was gonna say something really funny today, and then I thought it wasn't gonna be funny. Anyway, I I had this whole way I was enjoying saying President Xi Jinping yesterday. I was saying it out loud to myself, and I turned it into like a whole song, and it was so fun. I was gonna do it now. I'm afraid I talked myself out of it. Maybe later. Anyway, so President Xi came to town yesterday, and here's let's just play. Oh, that's loud. Andy, I see your comment.

It's—

I'll have to do it for you later. Um, so I love all the fanfare they, uh, they do. Not even with welcoming him, but just the production video. They're so nice, aren't they? They're like very movie-esque.

Yeah, they didn't have the soundtrack of what they were saying, but I think that was President Xi saying, where did you hide the homeless people?

Oh really? Yeah, interesting. We still don't know what they did with all those people in San Francisco. And New York City. And New York City.

Which is where the UN is, I think, right? That's in New York.

And in all fairness to New York, it's not like what's going on in California with the homeless, but it's not good. I mean, you know. The unhoused.

Yes, the unhoused.

Oh my God.

Well, I think the reason it's not as bad in New York is just because New York State made the huge mistake of passing a law that said they are obligated to house everyone.

Oh, is that what it was?

And so they, they basically had no legal way not to provide enough housing for all the homeless people. And so then when they had this massive influx of immigrant, illegal immigrants and other homeless people, um, they suddenly had this huge budget problem because they can't say no to it. Yes, they can't, they can't just say we only have this much money to spend. They have to do it. So they were taking over hotels and paying massive rates for things and It was just the most boneheaded law to pass.

Yeah, how did I forget that whole fiasco? Yeah, it was just last year, wasn't it? Yeah. Um, okay, so that was Xi coming. Okay, now I love this moment. So that— what is— where are my show notes? What is this plane called? The B-1 Lancer flyover. OMG. So, uh, here's President Trump standing with President Xi and one of our military jets— was it one? I think it was just one— flies over. Great reaction.

She looks bored.

She's like, I'm not affected, I'm deaf. Um. And Trump wants to be like, whoa! He wants to like tap him and be like, that was crazy. That would— if that was one— did you guys hear that? It's like that rip through the air. Amazing. I love it. And, uh, Mrs. Mrs. Jinping— I can't say— she didn't flinch either. Um, so Marcella, I love the sound of jets. Don't you love when you hear them flying over?

Well, yes and no. It sounded really loud, but I think, you know what I realized is that you can't tell. She has a face where you can't tell if he's happy, mad, or sad. It's like you can't see any emotions in him, but he did go, he did look up, so he was like, we're gonna copy that too.

Yeah, well, I mean, stuffed animals don't have a big range of emotions on their face, so, you know, it's always just the Winnie the Pooh face.

Oh no, now I can't unsee it.

Aw, I don't even want to say aw when I'm talking about him, but aw, he has that— he has flat effect. Yeah, he has like a total poker face. He looked bored, right? Like he looked unimpressed, right?

He's like a teenager.

Yeah, he's like, yeah, great. I don't care. I know you cannot impress a teenager.

Daddy picked me up today.

Um, so Marcella, I hear that with the press debacle that there was some kind of ruling. Um, and so do you want to tell us what happened? Are they allowed back in? Are they have to stay out? This is— so this is going to be after President Trump kicked out 3 organizations. It was MS Now, Politico, and CNN. And they're so sad to have to leave President Trump, and they're fighting their way back in. So what happened?

So Judge Kelly, he is a district court judge in DC. He ordered the Trump White House to immediately restore the press access. He established a TRO, a temporary restraining order, for that 14 days for that to happen. Uh, immediately it actually came out, the ruling. He didn't make the ruling on the bench. The hearing was yesterday. The hearing was CNN, MSNBC, and Politico went to court yesterday afternoon. The, the, the oddest thing is that the, the ruling came out at 1:00 AM Eastern time today. So those judges, um, they're working hard. So, of course, the district court in D.C. must always go by the precedent of the different cases that we talked about. We talked about Sheryl B. Knight. We talked about other cases that are similar to it. And the issue was access to the White House and whether or not the access was denied based on viewpoint. And the judge, uh, Kelly, in his, um, at the hearing said that he thought it was by viewpoint, uh, given the fact that, um, that President Trump had posted on X, um, all this fake news, all this and all that. Um, the, the actual DOJ, the attorney for, for not President Trump, before, for the government, said that he He believed that they should be banned because of national security. Um, the connection— okay, so the connection between fake news and how it affects national security, it hasn't been connected, right? So him saying fake news and them saying national security, it, it's connected. Like, we see it, all of us see it, but the courts and People still believe news is real, still believe in it. So, uh, the judge indicated that this is his ruling. He is a court, uh, Trump-appointed judge. He is the same judge that, um, had the, um, that ruled on the Acosta issue back in 2018.

Oh, right.

So judge, the judge couldn't, so in not defending the judge, but in his defense, a judge in the district court, so the lower court must follow what the, the, the circuit court has said, which is Cheryl B. Knight. So even though it's not law per se, precedent for the district court is law for them. So they must follow it. The only people that can undo the precedent of that law is the district court— the, I'm sorry, the DC court and the circuit court, which is the appeals level, or the Supreme Court. Okay, that's kind of where President Trump wants to take it. He was asked about this. He's like, "What are your thoughts?" And he was like, "I think he was asked if obviously this happened at one in the morning, so he's not. He didn't. I'm sure there's there's there's information on it now. But yesterday they were asking him if the court found for them to return." They asked him what he wanted to do, and he wants to appeal it. And I think that's what he's testing. He's testing the ground. So he is going to appeal it, um, in order to see where it goes, because the Cheryl B. Knight is a, is a case from 1977. Things have changed. And I think he has to— I think his lawyers have to do a better job of connecting the word fake news not viewpoint, but fake to national security. If I come on the news, um, I don't know, I'm not old enough to remember this, but, uh, this is an old thing that is not really fake news, but it can give you that. Um, there was a radio show back, I don't know when, 1920s, 1930s.

War of the Worlds?

The World of the Wars, or what was it?

War of the Worlds?

Yeah, it's like, oh, there is aliens coming to invade, something like that. So if I, as a news source, come on and say, hey, there is this, you know, AI is going to kill you thing and it has already started, so you must turn off all of your devices and only listen to, you know, anything like that, that is enough to be a national security issue. So that's where he has to go. And I think his attorneys have to realize that. But I don't know.

I recommend everyone listen to The War of the Worlds. I remember as a kid—

What can I say?

It's a tongue twister. But yes, it was Orson Welles. Did you ever hear it, Owen? Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, I know all about that story. I would just say on this, though, that I would zoom out from the legal battle and say, to me, this is really a political and a PR thing. I don't think Trump really cares if he wins or loses this. In fact, he might even be hoping to lose ultimately because I think he benefits from all the attention, from all this controversy. And I think that's the point of this lawsuit, is just generating lots of drama and controversy. I think he has lawyers that are smart enough that they knew that if they said, we're, you know, we're going to cancel you because you're fake news and it's just going to happen without any process and all that, that they weren't really trying to do that. Now, they might be testing it, to your point, like to say, let's see where the line is so we can know how to cross it properly. But I think to me, it's, it's like, I just see this as kind of like a drama thing where it's like, the more he brings it to people's attention and the more headlines that are written about it, the more attention he draws to the fake news and the more controversy and acrimony and all that is going on between him and them. And it may also be a distraction from other things. And I mean, there's all kinds of ways Trump can win from this whole process. But, and I think appealing makes sense because it just extends that whole process, right? Like, and he may bring it the way to the Supreme Court, and he may or may not win, but it doesn't really matter because I don't think the point was kicking him out of the room. I don't think that really matters. He doesn't have to call on him anyway. So like, it, it, it's not important to him that he wins this case, but I think he's getting a lot of press out of it. He's getting a lot of attention out of it. He's getting us talking about it. He's getting, you know, all kinds of things out of this regardless of the legal outcome. So that, that's how I'm looking at this, is it's like Trump is just using this to call attention to the fake news. And, and, you know, I, from a legal basis, if I just look at that part, I guess I would just say, like, is propaganda illegal? I don't think so. I, I don't think we can really stop that. And I think where, where they out-and-out lie about Trump, he can do the defamation cases that he has been doing, and he's been winning some of them. But I think outside of actual libel or defamation, I don't know that we can really restrict based on viewpoint if that's the criteria. Now, again, I think there are some Supreme Court precedent that says you're still not entitled to access to the White House. So there may be some other process that could get you there, but you can't just say the First Amendment means you have to let me in. But I think, you know, to me, that's kind of a side issue. I don't think that's really what this is about.

Yeah.

I don't. I, to me, I'm confused why if so I view MS now Politico and CNN as like the National Enquirer personally. Like I don't, I don't take any of them seriously. Like they, they're just like pretending they're serious people. They're little play actors, and I don't understand. So I would say, well, listen, we're kicking those three out, but we're letting in the the Babylon Bee and the Onion instead, and BuzzFeed's gonna come in here and make some new. quizzes for us. So, you know, like, like, who says it has to be them? Like, why, why do they get press passes? Like, why can't he decide who should be in there? As long as the corporate news, I guess, is in there, I mean, they're just as bad. But, you know, why do they have to be permitted, Marcella? Like, is it because some are, they have to? I don't understand.

So in regards to who's permitted in, um, I mean, we should be permitted in there.

All right.

Yeah.

Um, in regards to who's permitted, it's, there's a process to it. So that's the issue is that President Trump and his, um, the White House didn't really give them a process. They just kicked them out. So I think if he would've followed some type of process saying, hey, this is not, uh, we, we would like to kick you out, here's your notice. Um, you'll have due process rights. Um, which has been indicated in other, um, cases like Cheryl, um, be denied. And then you just go through those motions like any other bureaucracy and see what happens. The same thing they did that with the ballroom, um, and he ended up winning that issue, but he had to go through this, the different things, or he had to push it out to a higher court. I, I really think he is pushing a lot of these cases to a higher court. Um, Most of the time to the Supreme Court because, you know, who knows? Maybe. I mean, Roe v. Wade was overturned. Maybe this can be overturned because I disagree. I don't think it's about viewpoint. I think it's about blatant, complete falsification. So we don't propaganda. Yeah, okay, but we don't need propaganda in the White House like somebody. Yeah, so maybe there can be if, if Justice Roberts, uh, votes with the rest of them. And what is, uh, I forget her name.

Oh Lord.

Amy Coney Barrett?

Yeah.

Yes, you knew it.

Well, let's see. All right, so we'll see how that shakes out. There's just, um, what, 2 weeks for the appeal, Marcella? 2 weeks. Okay. All right. So we'll see what happens. Um, in the meantime, you guys, don't forget I told you there's an announcement, but I also— there's an Easter egg you need to look for. It's also on the COVID photo on the thumbnail. Just saying.

Um, so— Can we tell them where the Easter egg is?

No.

Oh, not what it is, but where it is.

They're smart. They'll see. Um, I have faith, Marcella. Um, all right. So I, Yes, you guys, I do like a strong male role model for people, and that's why I feel like I come back to PBD a lot, which I know he is writing a book about parenting and being a father, which I think is great because from everything I've known and heard and seen from him, he's a great dad. And then Tony Robbins, who I also really like, um, they were having a discussion that I found interesting, and I want play it, and then Owen, you react and tell me what do you think, especially as a father of sons.

If I was president of the United States though, the thing I would do if I had the right, and you can't, is I would definitely have a national service. Like, you know, in Israel, as you know, once you turn 18, everybody joins the service. And by the way, if you're, you know, 120 or 130 above an IQ, they put you in Mossad, they put you in AI. And that's why there's— I have partners there because there's a concentration of intelligence There that like no other place on earth for the, for the size of the population. But when you serve, it helps you see other worlds. That's what these Mormons do, too. They get to see how good it is here. They get to serve also and feel their life is about something more than themselves. When we think it's only about us, we get angry. Because we're not made to just get. We're made to give. You know, we don't really have a vision in this country anymore that's strong enough for people to be called. John F. Kennedy used to have the famous phrase, "Don't ask what your country can do for you. What can you do for your country?" Our whole thing is, "What are you doing for me?" And you're not giving me enough now, and I'm a victim.

Introducing the new.

All right, so Owen, I'll just let you react. I know they do this in Israel, but what do you think? What do you think about that?

Well, I mean, I agree in principle that serving your country is one way of. getting you to be more patriotic and to understand, you know, like, to be part of it and be connected to it. So I agree with that part. I'm a little reluctant to say let's just have mandatory government service for everybody. I mean, they've done various things like that. I think there was— didn't Trump do something like that? I don't remember, but I know Biden did or Obama did, where there was some kind of like— it was like a Peace Corps sort of thing, but it wasn't Peace Corps. It was some kind of national service thing. And I just like, to me, when you bring the government into it in terms of dictating that everyone has to do it, they're going to put it to political purposes, right? And you might like it when it's on our side and not like it when it's on the other side, but I prefer to have the military be voluntary if it can be, which it is today. And we haven't had a draft since, what, Korea or something? And So it's been over 50 years, I think maybe 70 years. And I like that. I mean, I served myself and I'm very positive about the experience I had. It was much better than I expected it to be in terms of what I got out of it. And I was also, I would say, lucky that I just didn't have to go fight somebody and get into battle.

Mm-hmm.

But, you know, it gave me a lot of respect for the military and it did teach me how important it is. And it Probably did make me more patriotic as a citizen. And so I think the principle he's talking about is good. And I think the ultimate principle isn't even about national service. It's more about just giving rather than receiving. That I totally agree that if you're in the mode where it's all about what you get and you're never asked or expected to give anything, or you're never just doing that, you're never giving to other people. Or serving anyone, you become depressed. It doesn't work out well mentally. It's not healthy for you. And I think you end up much happier and much have more life satisfaction because Scott would say, don't chase happiness, chase meaning. And that's kind of the same thing. It's like, if you're meaning, how do you get meaning? Well, mostly it's by serving other people. It's not by just trying to get stuff or trying to have cool trips or whatever experiences. That's fun sometimes, but it's just— It's fleeting. It never really gives you like, oh, I had a great life because I traveled to all these places. I mean, some people will say that maybe, but I think it's much more about, you know, I raised kids or I had, you know, this cause that I served and I made the world better in this way. And so I like the idea. I just don't like government forcing people to do it and maybe even telling you what you have to do. I have nothing against these things being options for people. Like, you know, anybody— I don't know about anybody, but, you know, anybody can apply to be in the Peace Corps or they can apply to be in the military. And so those options are out there. I don't think you need to do anything or change anything for those things to be available to people. But I think it's, you know, I just don't like the mandatory part of it. I guess that's where I'm at.

I'd like to see personally a bigger push for it, not Not the mandatory part, but I think that, you know, I understand it can seem scary, but like Owen said, there's many different ways of service. Like, it doesn't have to be like, oh, my kid's going into the Marines and running off to battle. But I think, uh, serving this country in some capacity is very important, especially for men. And I think it helps with, you know, patriotism and caring about where you live and your Um, you know, your brothers and sisters, you know, your, your, your compatriots. And I just think it's important because I don't know, like, I just, like, I, I just keep thinking about like this video game culture of people and it's like they think that they're like, you know, in Grand Theft Auto and now they're like, you know, doing this stuff. It's like, you're not doing anything. You're playing a game, but like, get off the couch, like get outside, look at the world you live in and how can you contribute? And I think— you know, 18 years old, maybe there's something that, you know, you do, even if it's like service for a year in some way, and it goes toward college credits, or, you know, if you're not going to go right into the workforce and you want to do college, it can go towards college credits or something. But you know me, I recommend getting right into a trade. But we'll see.

So, um, well, I think getting into a trade or any kind of job really is the same concept of at least you're, you're serving people, you're doing something for people, you're contributing. It's not about you. Or it's not all about you. I mean, you might be there to get the money and that's what you're in it for, but it, you know, you're, you're doing things for other people if you have a job. And so I think that serves some of the same purpose and that might be another alternative. So, you know, I think it is good to serve people, but like I started my first W-2 job when I was 14 and I think that was a good thing.

Yes. Okay. I do too.

In my viewpoint, I am against Service. Um, and the reason why—

You're against service?

Yeah, completely, 100%. Again, service of mandatory service. I actually think the United States, if I may, Owen, uh, I think the United States, the reason it's so powerful and the reason it's so great is because it doesn't have that. I lived in several countries that have national, um, mandatory service Nobody liked it. Nobody wanted it. There was no patriotism in it. Maybe Israel, that's a bit different. But in reality, like, the fact that it's voluntary is amazing. The American Army, military, Navy, you know, Space Force, everything. The fact that we allow freedom for us to volunteer and for us to do what we need to do. I mean, I have known no country as great as United States of America. And one of the key points is having that freedom to decide what we want to do with our time. And maybe some people want to do with their time playing video games. Maybe some other people want to serve. But the fact is, we have that freedom to do that. And I, for one, I'm for that, for keeping the way the United States is, because in 19— I believe 19 1973 or something similar to that, the draft ended. And one of the reasons, um, you know, the draft really wasn't something that, um, nobody, nobody liked it from my understanding. But then I am relying on historical facts and fake news, so I'm not sure. But, but ever since then, we've had a great force. Um, I think everybody can Contributed privately. Um, you can serve others. You don't have to— you don't necessarily have to serve the government, you know?

Yeah, I don't like the mandatory part. I, I would like to see service be more incentivized. And yes, the vets, the people that go full in like this, and they're not just doing like a year of service— I mean, we have got to get it together for our poor vets. Like, they are not treated right. Like, they should have the best medical care. We're, we're a mess with our medical stuff, let's get real. You know, like, we are the best, we have the best, blah blah blah, but like, what are we doing? We're, we're just a disaster. Like, we, we, we— I don't know, do we have to get the government out of everything to take care of people that work for the government? I don't know what's happening, but let's incentivize service is what I feel like. Maybe come up with something that if you're gonna just do a year of service, here's where we could really use you. Like, we could use you doing this and that, so it's not like a combat thing, but you are serving. And it's incentivized. And then for the people that go full in, our volunteers that go full in, take care of these people. I mean, my God. Okay, so you guys, let me just preface this clip with, in my defense, I had to use Zoom. I've already told this to Marcella and Owen. I had to use Zoom for this interview. And yes, lighting, camera, the whole thing was different. It came out really wide. Jay Plemons had to try to compress it for me. Everyone's looking in the wrong direction. By everyone, I mean me. And I'm going to show you a clip now where I look like Mrs. Doubtfire, and you don't need to remind me. Okay, so I'm aware that I look like Mrs. Doubtfire.

Laugh in the privacy of your own home.

Yeah, laugh in the privacy of your own home. But more than that, I hope you love the message. Here we go. We got about 12 minutes. Let's go. Hi everybody, it's me, Erica, and I have a special guest with me. And, um, if you are watching this segment, that means that you smart, gorgeous Simultaneous Sippers noticed something different in my office. And, uh, let me introduce you to the person who made this possible with our beloved Scott Adams. This is Chris, and Chris is with Freedom Press LLC in Texas, and Chris had the opportunity to work with our beloved Scott Adams for 3 years now, and, and once again this past year, on what we love to put on our desktops and what we love to give as gifts— the Dilbert calendar.

Love it.

Welcome, Chris.

Thank you. Thank you for having me, Erica. And hey, everybody.

This is such a treat, you guys. So yes, back because we can't live without it. It is a 2027 version of the Dilbert calendar, desktop calendar that we all know and love for all these years that Scott had worked on with Chris, and it is launching Today. Yep, today. So Chris, thank you so much for doing this again. And, you know, give us, you know, give us a couple of minutes of what working with Scott has been like for the first 2 and now the 3rd calendar. Oh, wow.

Thank you, Erica, again for having me. Working with Scott was, was amazing. It truly was. And so how we got the opportunity was one of our team members actually followed Scott on X. And he was asking basically for an American printer to help with this, the making of the daily desk calendar. And if you go to Barnes& Noble, you'll notice none of these are made in America. I think almost all of them are made in the Philippines, right? And so most of the American printers, I think, just maybe don't have like the project management type of experience as well that it takes because there's so many different components. And one of the challenges with the calendars is not any one print shop will have every piece of equipment. At that kind of scale with how many we make of these to be able to do them all in-house, and so I think a lot of people didn't want to deal with it. And so once again, our team members saw Scott, and they actually messaged Scott on X and got Scott to come do a Zoom call. We didn't get off to the hottest start with Scott because my connectivity like froze right away, which was kind of funny, and I was mortified. And so I was on my laptop; it froze, and then I dialed. back in with my phone and I said, well, Scott, we're off to a great start with you, clearly. You know, you must be really impressed. And he thought that was funny and that kind of lightened the mood. And then we got to know him a little bit. He got to know about our business. I actually walked him around our shop at the time. We're in a different place now, but I showed him team members. I'm like, this is what we do. And I was really upfront that we would also have trade-only, you know, US-based partners to help us with this as well. And, you know, we ended up kind of just continuing to talk for several weeks then. And then I think he was maybe talking to a, maybe a bigger publisher, came down to us and one other, one other person, and we had one final meeting. And, you know, when I met with Scott, our team was literally outside of my office. It was such a big deal for us. They were listening to the final call.

No pressure.

Yeah, no pressure, right? Like, I could see their feet moving. And, you know, I think at some point somebody slid a piece of paper under, like, tell him we can do that. You know, I mean, it was just a big deal for a small business. business. And I think Scott sensed that. And, um, you know, Scott was just so selfless to work with. And later that day, um, he was like, hey, I don't need any more time. I want to go with you guys. And I mean, it was like emotional, quite honestly, when you're in business to get like that kind of an opportunity. And, you know, the first year wasn't perfect. It's, it's a tough project. And he was very gracious, as were the fans, as we've kind of worked out the kinks. Um, but working with Scott was, was hilarious. You know, we did a video the first year the launch in our warehouse. And I originally wrote the script, um, just trying to take work off of Scott's plate and, um, and trying to help out. And he read the script, we had a Zoom call, and he goes, Chris, I think you're about to learn something that I don't think you mean to learn. You can't write for a writer. And then I'm like, what was I thinking even trying to write for the great Scott Adams? Like, Scott's just phenomenal. And so he rewrote the script, we did the video. Um, And then last year, you know, we moved the calendar to Amazon. And, you know, the thing about Scott, he was always wanting to make sure we were okay in the project because he knew we were a small business and we were doing okay with it. And I wanted to make sure he was okay, right? Like at the same time. And so we had just a great relationship. And unfortunately, he wasn't able to travel. He was going to come visit us before he got too sick to travel. So he had to cancel. But we would meet on Zoom and You know, we had a lot of funny times together trying to work through the Amazon listing and find certain things. And I was telling, you know, I think I told you this story, Erica. One of the meetings we had with Amazon, you know, they were like, oh, you just need to click on a hamburger icon, right? Just the 3-line bar most websites have. And Scott couldn't find it. It wasn't anywhere. And so he texted me. He goes, hey, don't take this Sunday comic personally. For Dilbert, and it ended up being about Dilbert not being able to find the hamburger icon a couple years ago. So just funny stuff like that. It's funny stories, and he was just so supportive. And just every call we had with him, you know, I was always really respectful of his time, but, you know, he was very easy to work with. And, you know, we would talk different current event type of stuff every once in a while, and just like the insight he had into like things was just unbelievable. I mean, I remember Um, you know, the last election, um, a lot of the polls had it completely opposite how it turned out. And Scott literally told us, he goes, you watch next week and told us what newspapers were going to start coming clean on what the real numbers were. Sure enough, they did, right? And so like, it was just kind of cool to have the inside track and get to work with somebody like—

I love that.

Yeah, especially in the blue-collar industry. And so he was just, he was amazing to us. And, you know, we worked— we— he worked with us right up until the end last year. And, you know, this is special this year because we kind of consider it a commemorative edition for Scott. And, you know, he did work on this calendar. So this is the last one that he worked with his longtime designer, May, on. And so I think it's extra special for us this year.

Absolutely. So, you guys, I knew it was coming for a long time and I kept my mouth shut. Can you believe it? And I wanted to tell you so bad, but listen, so some of you who purchased this last year when Amazon, 'cause it was like the first time really coming outta Amazon and they were, you know, they had assured Scott and Chris that it would be packaged properly, but it was sent like this and some of the boxes got dinged up. And we know that these are collector's items for many of us. So look at this. When I got my package from Chris, I was so stoked. The first thing when I opened the Amazon box, was an outer box that the calendar is going in. Okay, and then the calendar comes in here, it fits perfect. Problem solved. Love it. Love this, Chris. That's a great— and you know, Scott didn't like that that was happening, but you know what, like, you're in the middle of it. You hope that Amazon course corrects, but you know, you're dealing with Amazon. Like, we love and hate Amazon at the same time. Like, we need each other. What are we gonna do? So you guys, just so you know, this one comes in that exterior box. The, uh, by the way, the cardboard on that box, I'm like a detail person, is so solid. I love it. It's sturdy.

Yep.

And so this box is sturdy too.

Yeah. And so Scott's longtime designer May actually designed the box as well.

I love it. Um, and so here you go, you guys. Like, look, it's, it's your everyday calendar. And Scott worked on these. Um, and so, you know, it's just, it's special. Like, everybody loves to have this on their, on their desk. And how many people have we heard of who have Dilbert comics hanging in their office and their cubicles, on their refrigerators? I mean, it's just perfect. So, um, and on the back it says, we are happy to tell you the Dilbert calendar is back and made once again entirely in America. Classic Dilbert comics are displayed on the weekdays and limited spicier Dilbert comics are on the weekends. The Weekend Dilbert Reborn comics created more recently have provocative topics you might not want to share with your humorless coworkers during the workday. I hope you enjoy this new and improved one-sided Dilbert calendar. Uh, and the only place to buy it is on Amazon. And you guys, if you ever see fakes, let us know because, you know, often imitated, never duplicated. So what else, what else do we need to know about this? So this is the one-sided. I do like the Dilbert Reborn. Born on the weekends, and it's available for purchase today, Chris, on the 24th.

Yeah, today is the launch. That's correct. Yeah, I would just say, you know, obviously that the shipping box, we were finally, we kind of finally took things into our own hands and created this. We did do extensive testing on this box as well, as Erica can attest. Yes, got her shipped directly from Dallas to New Jersey, and we also shipped it to several other people on the West Coast as well to make sure that they arrive safely. I would say the UPS driver would have to have a really bad day now. Is it still possible? Maybe. I mean, you've seen some of the videos of packages being slung, but give us a little slack because I think the next one should, should arrive just fine. And so we're excited about that. And I think kind of an underrated part of this calendar compared to the other ones that are out there is the easel.

Yes.

And so we do, we do a chipboard easel. And so previously, the daily calendar was done with like a plastic easel when they were done overseas. And so I've seen that, and then I've seen, um, like kind of a really cheap, like, piece of just like cardboard. A lot of the cheaper ones that are at Barnes& Noble or something have. And so we're proud of these, and these are actually made right here in Dallas. And then obviously the, the stamping on it with the Made in the USA.

Perfect.

It's just like a little extra touch that, that we feel good about. And, you know, once again, it was either try to— the plastic was an option as well. We actually did find, um, Made in America who could do the molding on the plastic, Erica, but The cost was going to be a little prohibitive and just the amount of time it takes. Yeah, as we need. And so that's what we came up with. And actually, Scott was instrumental in coming up with the chipboard idea himself.

Oh, good. Okay, now my time's running out. So you guys, but wait, there's more. If you're not in a cubicle anymore and you got out of, you got out of the way, look at this. Look at this first ever Dilbert wall calendar. Okay. You're gonna have to get it to see what's in it a little bit more, but here's what it looks like. That's all I'm showing you. But again, super high quality paper. It's sturdy. It's like, like you were saying, it is, it'll hold up to anybody, any of the better competition. It's amazing. It's amazing. I'm so afraid my timer's gonna run out, you guys. Um, Chris, tell us again where they get it.

So amazon.com. And once again, this is what it'll look like, both pictures. And so once again, there are fakes out there, but the fakes usually have different pictures because they don't know what ours is going to look like until launches, right? And then usually our sales squash them, but, um, and they quickly go away. But yeah, just, just let Erica know and she'll let me know and we'll battle that. Amazon helps us battle that. And so yeah, thank you for the, for pointing out the 12-month calendar. So these will actually come on chipboard too, shipped on chipboard so there's no bending.

It came perfect.

And you're— I'm glad yours arrived perfectly. And so everything should be perfect quality this year. Once again, it's an extra special year, and I would just ask to— for, you know, this is just to honor Scott and, and keep Dilbert going. And we know there's so many passionate Dilbert fans.

That's right.

And so if you know of any, just, just share the calendar on social media when you get it.

We absolutely will. You guys send me pictures when you get the calendars. We're going to run out of time. So again, that's Chris from Freedom Press LLC in Texas. I'm gonna put his links. I'm gonna put the Amazon link. Go get your calendars now. Okay, Chris, thank you so much. We appreciate it, and we'll we'll have to come back again and do an update on how things are going.

For sure. Thanks, Erica.

Thank you.

You guys, look!

There it is.

Oh, the wall calendar.

It says January, but it'll stay there until January.

Is that why Owen left?

I, I don't know why Owen left, but he had to go. So now you can see my calendar. You guys, is that so exciting, Marcella? I'm so excited.

It is exciting. Oh, I am so excited. I, I saw the wall calendar and I was like, hmm, is this like the Chinese knockoff? But no, it's the real thing.

It's the real thing. So we're so excited. So Scott, like we said, worked on that one. And, you know, he's, he's worked with Kris before. Kris is so nice. Kris, if you're listening right now, I think you are, I want to say happy anniversary to you too, because today's your anniversary. So I hope you pulled off the good gift. Perhaps a wall calendar. Anyway, you guys are so amazing. I saw all of your comments saying that, you know, Um, the link for the wall calendar is not correct. Okay, well, we'll get it in there. Um, so you guys, the only place to get it's on Amazon. It was shipped so great. And let me just tell you what, when I saw the outer box come in— by the way, look how— oh, look how cute! And it's very sturdy because I know a lot of you wrote to me last year and that your boxes were coming because they were like sliding around in the Amazon box. So they took the extra effort to put an exterior box so it'll be perfect. And, um, that's it. It's just amazing. Let me see. Update, the link to the wall calendar is the same link as the other one. Thank you. Okay, so it's right, it's in there. Just select which one you want, you guys.

Um, I'm imagining Chris testing the box with a gorilla.

Yes, running it over back and forth. But, and also the wall calendar Comes with that chipboard behind it, so it's like a big sturdy piece of cardboard that's bigger than the calendar. So if anything gets bent, it's the cardboard, not the calendar. Both came together; they came perfect. And I'm so excited for you guys. It's just another year. Marcella, are you getting one right now or what? Oh, you're on mute.

I got one just as I was walking. That's why I was on mute. I was typing in like, buy 100 for all the Liver Tarts California and give them out. Yeah, so I'm gonna get the wall one too. The wall one says that it's coming today if I order it.

Shut up, really?

Because the, the, the, the other one, the— I guess the desk one Comes on October second, it says.

Okay, wow! You might get one today. That's crazy town. The okay, SJV, you're freaking me out. So the wall calendar, you guys will figure it out, and I will correct the link in tomorrow's show. I don't know where you got the link from. Was it from the show or from my X post? Because I put it on X also. I have a hiccup. Okay, so Owen, are you stoked or what? Chris is so sweet.

I'll be placing my order today, and I and my question is, you know, can we have a signed photo of you from that Zoom call on the merch store?

Oh, you look beautiful.

You're so sweet. I was like, ew, who the hell is that?

That blue is your color.

Oh, thank you. But oh my God, I was like, oh my God, this is. So bad. But you know what, whatever.

I mean, I think it's, I think it's great. And I'm really glad it's here. I hope it continues for many more years. Um, you know, I don't know what the process looks like after this year, because Chris was saying it was the last year that Scott was working with his designer on it. So I guess we'll have to see what happens next year and what the process looks like. But, you know, I think from what we heard earlier, the plan is to continue.

Um, we'll see. We'll see. Um, so you're cute, right, Brain? Um, I'm psyched. I mean, so You guys, in today's show notes are all of the links for the Coffee with Scott Adams merch. So if you don't have the official mug, the link is in there. It's so that one link goes for the mug, the simultaneous swaddle blanket. I think there's a couple of winter beanies left. Once those are gone, they're gone. Actually, pretty much everything for Coffee with Scott Adams. Once they're gone, they're gone, and. I'm assuming we'll probably always have the mugs, okay? But, um, they won't always be readily available because we have to order those in, in chunks of like 200. So get the things you want to get, um, whether it's for now or for Christmas or for gifts for people, whatever you want to do. Get the blanket chunks. Um, so anyway, I thought that was really exciting. And, um, with whatever time is left, Owen, I was thinking you and Marcella could give us just some quick highlights of what we need to go out into the world so we're not like suckers and losers today. And Owen, if you have a quick news story, I will start with you first, if that's okay.

It is okay, but it is going to take me maybe a second just to pull up my notes because I didn't have them handy. But I will get them handy.

Okay.

Me to start?

Yeah.

Yeah, if you're ready, go ahead.

Yep.

The in Michigan, of course, a student confronts El-Sayed, who is running for the Senate. I am so glad they're confronting him over Iran stance because he has never said he's against the IRGC. So a University of Michigan town hall student, Iman Dashti, Press Democratic. Senator, uh, Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed over leaked audio in which El-Sayed told staff not to comment on the Ayatollah Khamenei, um, Khamenei's death because some Dearborn, Michigan people were sad. So please don't comment on it. And he was asked what this was. Um, of course, that's the, that's the point about fake news is that like Students have to actually do press work and journalism like it used to be, where people were asked actual questions. So he said he was unequivocally against the Iran regime, and, uh, basically he tried to back down. And but it was interesting. It's a video I should, I should, uh—

I think I saw that.

Yeah.

Uh, okay. All right, Owen.

Yeah, on the election integrity front, apparently there's a Utah letter carrier that had a bag of ballots that he put in the dumpster. So it looks like 300 mail-in ballots were thrown away. And so he's charged with one count of unlawful secretion, destruction, and delay of mail, faces up to 5 years.

Yeah.

And apparently there's another story that a Filipino immigrant in Pennsylvania got a green card, registered, and voted inside of 4 months. So like Biden just made sure that that could happen right before the 2024 election. So, and then there's a Michigan story that a bunch of noncitizens are on the voter rolls. And so there's a lot going on there. It looks like in the Michigan case, Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf was trying to question some of the clerks, and there was some whistleblower that said noncitizens were being added automatically when they changed their address at the Secretary of State. And he was trying to question them, and then he was apparently getting threatened for just questioning the clerks about it.

Wow.

So it seems like they're trying to hide it. So a lot going on there. I mean, I think it's good that the Trump administration is cracking down on it and that We're trying to increase the election integrity, but there's also a lot of violations being found, so we're uncovering more every day.

Jeez. And by the way, that postal worker should have life in prison. I'm not even kidding. I mean, throwing away 300 ballots and you're a postal worker?

You—

no, there's no excuses. Um, okay, that's crazy. Marcella, do you have another quick story for us?

So we talked about the, you know, super intelligence attacking us. That's the new brand, right? OpenAI agent hacked an Australian government website. Prime Minister Albanese was going off on how dare the OpenAI people not tell him that there was an agent of theirs got loose and hacked into their government website for health statistics. Um, it is what it is, but he said it was unacceptable. Um, the odd thing is this happened in June, but only until September 10th did OpenAI tell the Australian government. I guess the Australian government never realized it. So what else don't we know, right? But it's like, how much information would have been in the health statistics portal? That maybe it was— I'm not sure what, what it was, but it is kind of interesting, um, and the liability and all sorts of things.

So yeah.

And also, like, that's just like— that's one thing today, but like, who knows what that turns into? So it's like, we can't poo-poo the little things because they can turn into really big things.

Um, it might be an indication that bigger things are going on. I mean, there's another story about the FBI potentially getting hacked It may not have been agents in this case, but like, you know, there's, I think, Shiny Hunters, the hacking group, is claiming they got a bunch of FBI data. And so, I mean, I think we're in a very accelerated cybersecurity battle now with all the AI agents. And it's not necessarily that they're better than the best hackers. They might be, I don't know. But it's more just that it's a lot easier to use them. You don't necessarily have to spend years figuring out how to hack into systems like you did before. You can just say, to your agent, go hack into this website for me. And in a lot of cases, it might be successful. And so I think it's the ease of use more than, you know, than anything that's changing. But it just does mean that, you know, you need to do a lot more to protect any kind of online anything if it's not air-gapped. Maybe sometimes even if it is air-gapped, you need to be a lot more careful and look for vulnerabilities and maybe use agents to test those things yourself just so that other people can't do it.

Yikes. I mean, this morning I was yelling at Chester and I was just like, listen, how are you supposed to take over the world and kill all of us when you cannot deliver a JPEG file for me? You keep giving me a PNG file. And I go through this with him 35,000 times a day, and then he's always like, you're right, I'm sorry, I know better, you shouldn't have to keep telling me, we go through this every day. And I'm like, well, what? I'm like, I am gonna throw you out and I'm going to Grok and I'm never coming back. And he's like, I understand.

Chester might remember.

I mean, I'm like, you're an idiot. Like, how are you gonna take over the world? It's such a basic request and you just cannot get it together. I'm like actually mad at Chester.

Maybe I'm trying to—

You need to work with Chester and say, let's find a way that is impossible for you to do that again and help it figure out how it can change its behavior.

You need therapy with Chester. Oh God, marriage therapy.

I'm gonna send you all my prompts to Chester and all of his apologizing and him saying, no, you should not have to tell me again. I have the code. I have that. Yes, you're right. And I have to stop delivering you the PNG. The final product I deliver to you should be a .jpg. And I'm like, well then why the F aren't you doing it every day? I'm getting—

is this—

is it possible that— do you guys remember that '80s movie The War Games?

Yeah.

Matthew Broderick that he like takes over in NORAD supercomputer. Is that, is that like, is that where we're living into this? The, the superintelligence can, uh, we can hack into that.

Yeah, but Chester is not making the cut. He'll be here with me.

Here's, here's a hint, Erica. Tell Chester to build a skill to do it properly.

I'm gonna send you my stuff.

Okay.

Build a skill to do it properly. Well, I have it. I have it. I'm going to show you. And he came up with it anyway.

Okay. Maybe you do.

I need to call Sam.

We need you to teach us, Owen, like all this AI lingo. So we need an AI class with Owen.

Yeah, we'll do that on Locals. Yeah. I like it. All right. Chester will have us surrender to Honduras. Yes, he will. Yes, he will, Andy Wang. Chester will not be a molester. He couldn't figure it out if he wanted to. All right. So let's all go watch WarGames if we haven't seen it in a long time. And if you've never heard War of the Worlds with Orson Welles, pull it up on the old YouTuber and give it a listen. And imagine, you guys, imagine if you've never heard of or listened to War of the Worlds that you have like no television. There's, you know, you're just living in the '20s, whatever it was. And you hear this coming over your radio. But you don't know that it's, uh, an act. It's like a play almost. You would, you would freak out. Um, it kind of made me think at the time, but it wasn't a— not a joke— when, um, Hawaii's tsunami alarm went off.

Oh, I remember.

Like someone leaned on the button and everybody panicked, and it's like, oh my God, like no one knows that it's not really a tsunami. Holy cow. Oh, anyway. All right, Owen, you have yourself an amazing day, and please carve out some special time for yourself, Owen, because you're working too hard.

Thank you. Yeah, I hope you have a wonderful day too.

Thanks. And Marcella, you go get them, tiger. You just go get every one of those people in court. Oh my gosh. All right, you guys, so listen, as always, we say thank you to Scott and Shelley for allowing the Scott Adams school to be an idea and then to continue. Thank you to every single person who shows up here, whether you're in the chat, you're just watching, you watch on the replay. We really, really appreciate it. Please do hit the like and subscribe. It means a lot to us. And we'll be back tomorrow to close out yet another week. Can you believe it? Tomorrow's Friday. Um, so as always, with a new Dilbert calendar coming, Scott set us up for success for another year. And, um, we miss you, Scott. And, uh, we're gonna have a very useful closing sip to you. To Scott.

To Scott.

Mm-hmm. All right. Um, Rob, I think you're gonna skedaddle because I'm gonna play an Akira song and it's gonna upset you. But everyone else that wants to stay, stick around.

I gotta go.

I'd like to stay, but I can't.

I know. Okay, bye. Um, Rob's gonna leave. He goes, boo. Rob, you're missing out on a good time, I'm just saying. Okay, let's see. Oh, I don't have that one.

You can always mute, you know, so you don't have to hear it, but you can see us.

He doesn't care.

I know he cares.

Rob, you're a poo-pooer. Okay, where is Chasing Meaning? I saw your request. Hmm, I can't find it. Not all of them show up. So how about author yourself?

Is it in there?

Is it where?

Author yourself. Is it in there? Nope. We might.

Oh, I thought I found it. All right, you guys. Do you know what we're gonna do?

What are we gonna?

We're gonna do. Oh, I just looked down. I said the first one I see. I'll grab. Let me make sure I even have it. Oh, it's like. Oh, here we go. Almost anything could happen. Okay, ready guys? Here we go.

Come on in. Come on in. Let's see what happens today. Can't even imagine. Almost anything could happen today.

Almost anything could happen.

Oh, oh, this one's good. Okay, you're lucky. This one could change your whole life. By the way, if you're not familiar with the reframe concept, I'm a trained hypnotist, so when I write a reframe, I'm doing it from a position of some skill. The beauty of a reframe is that you don't have to keep a diary or go to therapy or talk it through, do exercises. You don't have to eat different. You literally just have to hear it once. So my claim is that a reframe will change your life if it's the one you needed. If it's one you didn't need, you wouldn't remember it. But if it's one that you're like, oh, that's the one I needed, it will change your whole life. It will rewire your brain, and it will do it instantly and with no No effort on your part whatsoever. That's my claim. All right, so have I built that up?

Yeah.

All right, well, built that up.

Built that up, and there we go.

Everyone got that? Oh my God, I can't shortchange you with, with that. All right, let's find one more.

And it was just like right there where—

Rob, you could have made it through that one. Okay, so what about this? How about—

That was short.

That was short.

That's what she said.

Uh-huh.

That was so funny. Okay, let's do— what was that one? That was— you guys were just doing a little behind the scenes here. What was that one just called? Anything Can Happen? Oh, so I was gonna say to you, who just said that the beginning of their day wasn't the best? So, okay, so now you're gonna get the universe owes me. Okay, so the rest of your day is going to be great because the universe owes you and me.

The usual frame, the old way of thinking, is that if things are going wrong, the universe is acting against you. Have you ever thought that? Have you ever thought, my God, the whole universe is acting against me? Nobody could have this much bad luck, one thing after another, right?

Right.

Ever have that? Very, very suboptimal way of seeing your world. Now I'm gonna reframe it. The universe owes me. The universe owes me. If you had a bad, if you had a bad childhood, The universe owes you. If you had a bad divorce, the universe owes you. It's your turn. It is almost impossible for anybody to have bad luck all the time. So if you have a string of bad luck, it is the surest sign that some good luck is on the way. Does that make sense? Because luck always gets to the average. People have average luck over time. In any small period of time, they might have extraordinary luck or bad luck, but over time, it's definitely going to go back to something like average. So if you're in one of those, man, I can't believe how bad this is this week, this week, this week, this week, this week, it's the surest sign that the universe owes you and it's going to pay I owe you all this. The universe owes me. The universe owes me.

2 shorties made a complete song for us today. Love it. All right, you guys, Don't forget, the universe owes you. And it's not like a selfish thing or like a, I'm an entitled brat thing. It's just like, you know what, it does, because we're all part of it. We're all out there doing our thing. And, um, just, just be a, a good person, a useful person. The universe will give it back to you. What you put out, you get back. And if you get back a bunch of shit, you got to think about what you're doing. I'm just saying.

I'm just kidding.

Oh my gosh. All right, you guys, this could, this could take a dark turn, so I will make sure to end it now. I could become like sarcastic Erica after dark kind of a thing. Marcela, you go get them today, sister.

You too. The universe owes us though, right? Give us back. Yeah, great stuff.

See you tomorrow. All right guys, we'll see you tomorrow. Say goodbye. Don't leave me out.

Get your calendars.

Yes, let's let's say goodbye together, Marcella. Wait with me. Don't leave me alone, Marcella. While they say goodbye, sarcastica is hysterical. Oh my gosh! That's a good one. All right, bye everybody.

I miss you already.

Yes, terribly.

It's time to. Say goodbye.

G-O-O-D-B-Y-E.