Sneaky Dragon Episode 288

Welcome, dear Sneakers, to the “Happy Birthday to Ian” episode of Sneaky Dragon. This week Ian and Dave are live from a haunted house and make much ado about Sabrina the Teenage Witch; talk humour versus comedy; Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley; the keeping track of expenses experiment; the miracle of miracle water; the miracle of a Swamp Thing television show; rockin’ ocarina; vacuum harmonica; turning fifty; being an olds with the youngs; so over Doctor Who; stay young, don’t be cool; stay young, don’t be a ladies’ man; cheating and the mid-life crisis; Ian dreams big; Dave has weird podcast standards; Dave has new glasses; a little bit of Wonder Woman and its parallels with Superman; and, finally, why is Ian’s hand bandaged?

As always, our contests and demands for your participation continue:

  1. Have some dinner with Ian and Dave, and, if you want, watch Sneaky Dragon being recorded. All you have to do is send us a little message that says, “I’d like to eat with you!” and Ian and Dave will treat you to an after-show meal at their favourite White Spot.
  2. Send us your story. That’s right. Just your story. If you need a prompt, Ian suggested “your secret origin” and Dave suggested “how how you found Sneaky Dragon” Please record a two to three minute story and send it to us via email (sneakyd@sneakydragon.com) or our Facebook page. Or Skype Sneaky Dragon and leave a message on our voicemail. David will add a playlist for your story as well.

Department of Clarifications:

The water Dave was referring to in the show was “Miracle Water” from the Peter Popoff Ministries. Horrible man.

Here is the classic Robert Benchley sketch, The Treasurer’s Report:

Vacuum plays harmonica:

Rockin’ ocarina!

17 thoughts on “Sneaky Dragon Episode 288”

  1. It struck me that, regarding Ian nitpicking things, that it’s harder to crack wise about stuff one really enjoys. There ain’t no jokes in delight.

    Source: my own personal uresearched ass, so I’m probably wrong with this as a truism.

  2. Welcome to the 50s, Ian! Since you are at the half-way point now, you should check out Danny Gold’s documentary “If You’re Not In The Obit, Eat Breakfast” now on HBO Canada. It features Carl Reiner and other creative people in their 90s and some in their 100s who are still working (Mel Brooks, Stan Lee, Betty White, Dick Van Dyke, Norman Lear, etc.) There are also profiles of non-celebs and you can pick up some tips on how to stay vital. Jerry Seinfeld has some interesting things to say on the topic as well.

    1. Thanks for the tip. I’m hunting it down now. The original name for Sneaky Dragon in my mind was going to be, “The Half Time Show” referencing our age but SD was much more fun.

  3. Wonder Woman was a fantastic experience, despite it not being, y’know, a GREAT film. And I have no arguments with Ian’s criticisms. I’m not a woman, of course, but I still was moved to tears many times during the film. Most often it was from the pure elation of seeing strong women being gloriously adept to wise to forthright. The biggest force behind my delight, though, was Gal Gadot’s magnificent presence as a hero postitively overflowing with her essential goodness. As a counterpoint to a trend I saw as DC trying to out-Marvel Marvel, the desire to infuse ever more grit and angst into their films has felt shoehorned. This—this felt like a shift.

    Maybe it’s different as an American viewer. It felt like exactly the kind of thing we need right now, with Trump sucking every ounce of dignity and noble aim from the top of our government and encouraging the basest and most puerile instincts from his fans and opportunistic, tenuous allies alike. An impossibly good and fearless woman kicking all kinds of ass is wish fulfillment of the highest order.

    This isn’t to slight Chris Pine’s role, either, since I agree he’s just about perfect in the film, providing comic relief of his own when he continually attempts to assert his patriarchal position, only to get brushed aside by a Diana with no time for such nonsense. Go see it.

  4. Laurel Robertson

    HAPPY 50TH BIRTHDAY, IAN!!! This is a little late; hope you had a super day. Remember: you are never too old to podcast! Thanks, as always, to you and David, for Sneaky Dragon! Here’s to you, and a year ahead that shines! 🙂

  5. Two more local Vancouver podcasts, one of which definitely used library podcasting resources:
    Book Club for Masochists – librarians who pull a random genre out of a hat to read outside their comfort zone
    Adventure.exe – D&D adventure/improv podcast

    ????

      1. Hey,
        I’m Matthew, one of the co-hosts of Book Club for Masochists. Our podcast used to be recorded at the VPL Inspiration Lab (and its facilities are why we started), but two of us moved to Las Vegas, so we now record it at home through Skype.

        We do tend to have 3-4 hosts though, so hopefully you’ll be able to deal with that. : ) I think it works fairly well for our format.

        And as to why you haven’t heard of us? We’re terrible at promotion and kind of aim it at an audience of people that work in libraries. Any suggestions for promotion would be appreciated!

        And since you mentioned zines, I’ll also mention my anthology zine Two-Fisted Library Stories. It’s filled with fiction, art, and comics about libraries. (You may have guessed by this point that I’m a librarian…) Anyway, here’s a link: http://twofistedstories.blogspot.com/

        1. Thanks, Matthew! The best way to promote your show that we’ve found is to somehow get yourself invited onto other people’s podcasts and win over new listeners with your wit and charm.

  6. Hey Dragons, I am one of those folks who rarely listens to podcasts, or rather I can only handle regularly listening to one at a time. I find if I have just two shows on the go, the content will be produced faster than I can consume it and after a while I find I’m 50 hours behind. Part of the issue is I only listen during my commute or walking around doing errands and my default mode is listening to music. But Sneaky Dragon is the one show I consistently listen to and keep up with, so kudos to you two.

    That said, when I’m all caught up on Sneaky D and I’m still in a podcast-listening mood, the other one I’ll tune into is Pop This! hosted by Lisa Christiansen and Andrea Warner. In their own words: “2 women talking about pop culture & feminism”. Not only is it a locally produced podcast but it’s proudly recorded in the Vancouver Inspiration Lab at the Central Library. Lisa is a reporter at CBC and the show has actual producer, so perhaps it has a little more of a professional sheen than your typical podcast, but at the same time it’s very down to earth and it’s great just to listen to two good friends talk intelligently and entertainingly about pop culture.

  7. First and most importantly, happy 50th, Ian!

    Regarding Vancouver podcasts, I don’t know of many, but I really enjoy Retail Nightmares. I had no idea there were podcasting facilities at VPL. It makes me want to record a podcast, except I hate hearing my voice, and I don’t think I have anything I’m passionate enough about to use as a subject.

    Also, I saw Wonder Woman last week, and yeah, it’s not a great movie. But it’s good! I didn’t really know anything about Wonder Woman going in, and she was a great character.

    Cheers!

  8. I’m late to getting to this episode, but still wanted to wish Ian a very Happy Birthday!

    I loved Wonder Woman. It certainly had it’s problems and most definitely wasn’t a perfect film, but I’ve had so few films in my life like that one, where I can root for the kick ass heroic woman without her accomplishments being minimized or sexualized, that I was jazzed throughout the whole thing. I was squeezing Dennis’ hand so hard during the Amazon fight scene, and also got teary-eyed during that one scene that seemed to get so many other woman teary-eyed, too.

    There’s certainly stuff I would criticize, but dang if I didn’t have fun watching it, and it’s the first superhero movie in a long time that I’m looking forward to seeing again.

  9. I’m sorry but I disagree. I’ve seen Superman The Movie several times, I actually seen it recently and despite it’s flaws, I would gladly tell you or anybody it’s a good movie. Some people I know (some of them not really big Superman fans) watched it for the first time recently and thought it was a good movie that holds up quite well.

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