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PNP 608-Gary Stern To Announce Price Increase@The Degenies+ MAJOR Change at The Beast+ PORTAL2Pounce!

Poor Man's Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·35m 42s·analyzed·Mar 15, 2025
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TL;DR

Gary Stern to announce price increases at D-Gennies; Beast tilt feedback; Portal 2 news.

Summary

Orbital Albert announces Gary Stern will appear at the Pinball Degenerate Awards (Saturday, March 15th, 8 PM ET) to announce price increases due to economic factors like aluminum and tariffs. The episode also covers feedback on Beast tournament tilt settings and P3 Multimorphic's Portal 2 announcement. Albert makes a personal appeal for listener donations to help with financial hardship from tariffs and business challenges.

Key Claims

  • Gary Stern will make an announcement at the Pinball Degenerate Awards on Saturday, March 15th at 8 PM Eastern Standard Time regarding price increases due to economic factors like aluminum and tariffs

    high confidence · Joe Chervino of the Pinball Degenerates Awards confirmed this directly to Orbital Albert; quoted word-for-word in the episode

  • Stern has not raised prices for quite a while, with the last major price increase being around COVID

    medium confidence · Orbital Albert's analysis of Stern pricing history; notes that topper prices and shooter rod prices have gone up but no major game price increases since COVID

  • Beast tournament (2024) had tilts that were too tight, causing multiple players difficulty

    medium confidence · Steve Bowden reported tilting twice on Classics machine at Beast; Jeff Teolis confirmed in response that tilts will be adjusted for 2025

  • P3 Multimorphic is making an announcement about Portal on Monday morning at 10 AM Eastern Standard Time

    high confidence · Orbital Albert directly references P3 Multimorphic social media announcement with free cake promotion

  • Steve Bowden is ranked in the top 50 competitive pinball players globally (out of approximately 130,000 IFPA-ranked players)

    medium confidence · Orbital Albert estimates Bowden's competitive ranking; acknowledges uncertainty but confirms top-tier status

Notable Quotes

  • “Gary Stern will be making an announcement appearance on the D-Genny's to update the public on the future price increases due to economic factors like aluminum and tariffs.”

    Orbital Albert (quoting Joe Chervino) @ ~mid-episode — Core news announcement of the episode; confirms Stern CEO will publicly announce price increases

  • “Not this year. Tilts will be just fine and a lot easier. Practice time will show us on Thursday where they need to be so everybody can enjoy the games. Lesson learned from 2024.”

    Jeff Teolis @ ~early episode — Direct response to Beast tilt feedback; indicates tournament organizer is responsive to community concerns

  • “I think Jeff Teolis, in trying to make the Beast such a really good high-end event, he might have swung the pendulum a bit too far.”

    Orbital Albert @ ~early episode — Analysis of Beast tournament design philosophy; suggests over-correction toward difficulty

  • “This is the milkshake that gives you that bubble yum that makes you want to have a little some birdie num-num, okay?”

    Orbital Albert @ ~mid-episode — Comedic lead-in to Gary Stern price announcement news

  • “Steve Bowden is a world class pinball player all the big pinball tournaments he goes to he does well, he's won several huge ones in the last year, at least middle level to upper echelon and he always does well”

    Orbital Albert @ ~early-mid episode — Endorsement of Bowden's competitive credentials and tournament record

Entities

Orbital AlbertpersonGary SternpersonJoe ChervinopersonJeff TeolispersonSteve BowdenpersonStern PinballcompanyP3 MultimorphiccompanyPinball Degenerate Awards (D-Gennies)eventBeast Tournamentevent

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Tariff uncertainty creating significant economic hardship across pinball operator/creator ecosystem; Canada Post shutdown impacting e-commerce sales; job security concerns in manufacturing

    high · Orbital Albert discusses personal business losses (coffee sales to US/Canada dropped significantly), family job uncertainty, 94% of Maritime exports to US affected

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinball Degenerate Awards (D-Gennies) occurring Saturday March 15th with major industry announcement; drawing significant community attention

    high · Event date/time confirmed as 8 PM ET; Gary Stern appearance secured; Orbital Albert highlighting importance of tuning in

  • $

    market_signal: Aluminum and steel tariff increases impacting pinball manufacturing costs; potential 10% tariffs on all items across all directions globally

    medium · Gary Stern announcement references aluminum and tariffs; Orbital Albert notes escalating tariff situation with potential 10% across-the-board impact

  • $

    market_signal: Stern Pinball announcing price increases due to aluminum costs and tariffs at public event; first major price increase since COVID era

    high · Gary Stern confirmed to appear at Pinball Degenerate Awards to announce price increases; Joe Chervino provided direct confirmation

  • ?

    announcement: P3 Multimorphic announcing Portal-related news Monday morning with promotional giveaway

    high · Orbital Albert references P3 Multimorphic social media announcement; Monday 10 AM ET timing; free cake promotion mentioned

Topics

Price increases and tariff impacts on pinball industryprimaryGary Stern announcement at Pinball Degenerate AwardsprimaryBeast tournament tilt difficulty feedbacksecondaryP3 Multimorphic Portal announcementsecondarySteve Bowden's competitive credentials and careersecondaryOrbital Albert's personal financial challenges from tariffssecondaryListener fundraising appeal for podcast sustainabilitymentionedPinball community awards and recognitionmentioned

Sentiment

mixed(0.45)— Episode contains significant positive industry news (Stern announcement, Portal reveal) but is heavily weighted by Orbital Albert's personal financial anxiety and vulnerability regarding tariff impacts, family job security concerns, and business challenges. The tone shifts between enthusiasm about scoops and genuine concern about economic hardship. Positive sentiment around community support and event enthusiasm is tempered by economic uncertainty.

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.107

0:00
All get around, he's on the rebound, hear the sound of our buddy, oh lordy, it's Orby, pinball now to rejoice, he's tugging pinball, craft beer and coffee, mixed with syrup and honey, he wants to laugh with his family in a random tangent, stories of his boys, he's On the Poor Man's Pod Network, we're going to get more listeners for the Pinball Nerds Podcast.
0:32
Coming to you from beautiful River Hibbert, Nova Scotia. Welcome back, Pinball Nerds, to episode 608 of your fifth favorite podcast. My name is Orbital Albert, and on today's show, I actually have some big news for you. I was planning on taking at least a couple weeks off. I think it's only been about a week, but I rarely have any scoops. Today, I have more scoops than Raisin Bran. In fact, I have two scoops. I'll say one of them is a tiny, tiny little baby scoop, and that, you could call it a scoop, you could call it a bob, you could call it a tilt bob. That one I'm just going to throw out there right now. That one was in response to Jeff Teolis just posted about the Beast. And a really cool rad poster talking about the days, the times.
1:31
And Steve Bowden had shared it and said he thinks he tilted twice on the Classics machine just by posting this. And I guess the joke there was funny to us who didn't go, maybe not as funny to the people who went. But the tilts were so tight they just weren't that fun. I think Jeff Teolis, in trying to make the Beast such a really good high-end event, he might have swung the pendulum a bit too far. And I know that's true because this tiny little scoop I have for you,
1:57
Jeff Teolis writes here in response, actually, to... And I don't want to bury the leak because I've got a big, big juicy story. Maybe the biggest scoop I've ever got from Joe Chervino of the Pinball Degenerates Awards, which is this Saturday. But I just want to touch on this small one with Jeff Teolis first because Gary Stern himself will be on the D-Genny's to make this big announcement. And Joe was kind enough to share that with me, so I wanted to be kind enough to make sure to let all the pinball nerds know, as far in the future as I could possibly know, that the show must go on, my show's back, tomorrow the D-Genny's are on, and Gary Stern will be there with some big news, which I'm going to tell you about in just a second. Okay, I am going to tell you about that. But first, in response to Steve Bowden posting this, I mean, Steve Bowden is a world class, say what you will, whether or not, you know, you agree or disagree or think maybe he knew more than he did or didn't at Deep Root. And I guess maybe that the same thing could be argued at American Pinball, even though I'm sorry. At least in Minecraft, I'm going to blame most of it on Mr. David Fix. And when I do get the opportunity to speak to Mr. Stephen Bowden, I might ask him about that in person. But it's not something I'm going to bring up in public, hopefully. even though I guess I just did here on the show. However, it is to the best of my knowledge that Steve Bowden has just done a killer job working at all these companies and had some bad luck. And I hope whichever company picks him up next gets to use his obscene rules knowledge. Not only did he literally write the pinball dictionary on his Fun With Bonus site, but he also was a world-class commentator and he understands pinball rules better than 99% of us. In fact, he's in, what, the top 50, So of 130,000 people, he's like in the top less than half a percentile. What is that? Quarter percentile? Not even. Like it's astronomically slow. It's like, well, what is it? There's 49 people on planet Earth better at pinball than him or something like that, right? And I could be wrong. Maybe he hasn't traveled much since he was AAP the last year, maybe 75th or something. But no doubt about it, okay? One Canadian to all the Americans listening. Steve Bowden is a world class pinball player all the big pinball tournaments he goes to he does well, he's won several huge ones in the last year, at least middle level to upper echelon and he always does well, so what I'm saying is that when Steve says the tilts are hard to Jeff it means the tilts were probably too hard and I don't know if he was there and he noticed it himself, that's what I would assume or if he just heard it from everybody else But even people that were there, I heard it from them as well. So I think Jeff is listening to the feedback. So in response to Steve Bowden saying that, you know, he tilted twice, Jeff responded and said, not this year.
Pinball Nerds Podcast
media
Portalgame
Poor Man's Pinball Networkorganization
Angry Alpaca Coffee and Teacompany
Backhand Pinballmedia
  • ?

    competitive_signal: Beast tournament 2024 had overly tight tilt settings; organizer responsive to feedback and committed to adjustments for 2025

    medium · Steve Bowden reported tilting twice; Jeff Teolis directly responded confirming easier tilts will be implemented with practice time Thursday

    • 4:46
    Tilts will be just fine and a lot, Jeff, we're going to hold you to this, a lot easier. Practice time will show us on Thursday where they need to be so everybody can enjoy the games. And then in brackets, he put lesson learned from 2024. So thank you very much for Jeff, the golden voice of pinball. I would call him the goat of pinball voices. How about that? He's not quite the dote. But now we've got to talk about the dote, because this is the news that brings all the girls to the yard, okay? This is the milkshake that gives you that bubble yum that makes you want to have a little some birdie num-num, okay? First of all, I did delete my last two podcasts. To the 300 or so of you that listened to my apology one, thank you. I think it was the only podcast that I had, like, at one point I tuned in and I had equal number of listens to my basically political rant, which I always say it's better not to talk about on the show. And you know what? I am, alas, just human. This is, I do call it somewhat of a blog. But at the same time, it's just not the vibe I want to have. It's not the type of, I don't want to be a ranty, ravey, lunatic-y, like, angry, upset dude. I don't want to use this $50 snowball mic as like, you know, in place of therapy. That's the type of thing you should talk about with friends or family or, you know, a therapist. And honestly, like, yeah, I got it off my chest. It was very cathartic, I think is the right term, to get it off my chest. And thank you, thank you so much. A couple of content creators did reach out to me and say, dude, you don't have to apologize. You're just saying your feelings. I was just saying my feelings. And I honestly do feel that way. I was exaggerating a lot of it, though. There was tons of hyperbole. I went overboard, as I usually do. I let my... I'm embarrassed because I allowed my anger to get the best of me instead of just... I was reacting instead of acting, and I don't want to be that old Albert or that old Orby that reacts. I want to be the new measured one that's, like, calm and chill about it and really thinks about it. And to be honest, like, if my son does get let go from his job, and even today my dad was, like, upset about it. My dad is way more conservative than me. I'm maybe slightly right of center, but he's probably, well, we usually don't talk about politics because we're kind of like, we're definitely very different. And he was still wondering, like, how's Hayden doing? And I said, well, he hasn't got let go yet, but his mental health isn't that well. He's not sleeping that well every single day, hearing you might lose your job, you might not lose your job, you might go down to part-time hours. They've already almost guaranteed them they're switching them to like a new shift in the summertime anyways, just due to fears of there being possible tariffs. They're already losing future work or not having as many people look into contracts. So even if the tariffs are gone in a month or two from now, there's already been so much damage done to a factory like so many where I live in the Maritimes that are completely dependent upon. We sell a lot more of our stuff to, you know, New York State and to Maine and to many other like northeastern states than we do other provinces across Canada. So we really are like I'm humbled by it. Like, I did not know that 94% of exports from, you know, I didn't know 94% of exports from the province we live right beside New Brunswick went to the U.S. I had no clue it was quite that high. I just didn't know. I didn't know we were that reliant. And maybe at the end of the day, like, yeah, maybe I talked about politics when I try not to. I'm going to try not to moving forward. That being said, I'm forced into talk about politics today because Gary Stern himself will be making an appearance on the Pinball Degenerate Awards tomorrow, Saturday, March 15th. That's right. Let me bring up the time here. I have it right here. Can I have a little sip of my, and just to show my American brethren and sisteren, is that how you say sisters? What up sister? No, is it American sisters? I don't know. To my American brothers and to my American sisters. To my American pinball nerds. To almost every tribe member other than what? Who Brad Hopkins Ian Harwer Oh shout out again to Ian Harwer for joining P3 Multimorphic Oh some big news on that front before I give you Gary Stern what he going to be talking about what his announcement is going to be like on the Pinball D-Jennies. On Monday morning, I believe 10 Eastern Standards, go over, check out P3 Multimorphic's social media on Facebook or wherever. You will see they're making a big announcement about Portal and there's free cake, guys. I don't know how they're going to get that cake through YouTube or through Facebook, but I'm willing to eat it. I need every penny I can get here with all these tariffs and all this uncertainty and this financial trouble and me finding out my PSA cards may have a 25% surcharge because most of the Pokemon and sports cards and even comic books that I submit are very low end and they might have a profit margin of 20 to 30, maybe 40 or 50 percent if I manage a 10 which is so rare but 90 percent of my cards maybe even 50 percent of them most of the time come back at PSA 9 or worse where you can even lose money so you know the fact that they could have a 25 percent surcharge means my one side hustle is basically useless my other side hustle which I had already hired or talked about hiring a very prominent member of the pinball community to do really rad voices to help sell coffee we lost all of our coffee sales here in Canada and the United States because Canada Post, which is the only reliable way to ship coffee to Canada or the United States for a reasonable cost, they got shut down. And so we lost all of our sales then. That's our two biggest sales months of the entire year. And we've never really recovered from that. And then all the way for the last five or six weeks with the tariff threats, there's been absolutely no point for me to get that member to help me record a commercial for Angry Alpaca Coffee and Tea because there's just no way. I don't want a single solitary customer to be upset. And our coffee and tea is already very expensive due to the fact that we don't grow most of it ourselves. We're kind of just sort of a repacker, you know, to be honest. Even though we do change up the recipes and certainly with, like, our best-selling coffee, you know, it's a mixture of four different blends. The Force, of course, which is a medium roast on the dark side. but let's go back here to what you tuned in for so the pinball degenerate awards are coming up live saturday march 15th at 8 p.m eastern standard time uh so make sure you check in your local area but i not only want to tell you what gary stern is going to be talking about but i also want to talk about why else you should be watching but first let's talk about mr gary stern himself i was actually a little surprised i thought maybe we would see like a zach sharp talking about this you know someone maybe from marketing I thought maybe we would even see Seth the new CEO talking about this I didn't but you know maybe this is something big and it's big enough they're bringing in Gary so that we all like I think in the pinball industry they know they want us all to be paying attention to something like this so yeah let me have a little sip of my I'll call it um I'll call it by country? By country drink here, by NELC? So the main founding member of NELC is Kyle Forgarden. He's from Mississauga, Scarborough. And I'm actually drinking this right now.
    12:19
    And yeah, he actually lives in the States. Most of the members of NELC and Happy Dad are from the States and Americans. However, it also gets bottled and they employ a whole bunch of people in Toronto. And it's also a mixture of Death Row Records. I'm drinking the grape. Isn't it grape? I'm drinking the grape one. Zero sugar, by the way. So awesome product, guys. But this, and then to even conflict it further, they're a mixture of their Death Row Records, which supports obviously an American company, right? Is Snoop Dogg on Death Row? I don't know. It's like a big, I think, pretty sure Snoop's with them. It's like a big record label, obviously rap hip-hop label from the states so it's like five different americans are profiting from this three or four different canadians plus hundreds that work in the bottling factory and then multiples other that are in the company and then death row records and it's like so is this drink am i supporting america or canada i don't know and at this point i do care but i don't because i bought this over a year ago in canada in halifax from the dudes like at the actual event my sons were there so anyways let's get on to this news from gary stern so i'm going to read this directly from Joe Cervino, just because I don't want to mess it up, okay? So, word for word, Gary Stern will be making an announcement appearance on the D-Genny's to update the public on the future price increases due to economic factors like aluminum and tariffs. So, not only has Stern not raised their prices for quite a while now, the topper prices have been going up I have to I have to be on but I have to be like you know I have to be unpartisan here a little bit the topper prices have definitely been going up in the shooter rods and that those sorts of things but we haven't actually seen like a major improv you know price increase I believe since COVID there might have been like one minor one since then but very little so uh Joe thank you very much for giving me that tidbit I hardly ever get news out there I don't know if Colin just put out his weekly. Thank you so much for the call. And that was awesome. Colin, I know he had mentioned on social media, he's been a little bit burnt out recently. Colin, of course you have been, you've been so busy between the twippies, the kineticist putting out that rad, probably the coolest pinball toy in the last year. Like that awesome, uh, the Roger Sharp toy figure. So like, dude, you've been busy. Give yourself a little bow, give yourself a break, spend, catch up with your family and friends. Don't get burnt out. When I get too burnt out, I take a little bit of time off. I fall on the ice. I hit my head. I come back and I record a stupid podcast. I feel like an idiot. I delete it. And then I come back a week later and try to give you guys some news. So when I can give you guys some news, I will try to give you some news. Look, is the news about Jeff not making the tilts too tight at the Beast? Big news. Not really. But I hope Jason from Naps Arcade or Colin from the Kinesis, if you're listening, Please report that I put this out here because that would be cool to get a shout out from one of these guys. It kind of makes me feel like, hey, you might be the 20th favorite pinball podcast at the Twippies, but you can still throw out some good news and have a decent episode once in a while. I tried not to go off topic a lot here, guys. I tried to give you a good, fun, quick, not hour-long podcast. And I thought about this. I really thought about this hard over the last few days. instead of me ranting and raving and saying oh poor me why didn't I just ask some of my best friends about a year ago when the airline went out of business here in Canada which was supposed to help me travel to uh pin masters and to nationals when they went out of business I asked y'all for some help I humbled myself and I got a lot of help now this isn't nearly as big of a crisis or at least it isn't yet because everyone in our house is still getting their same number of hours at work even though I'll tell you what is a crisis.
    16:07
    I've been drinking Big 8 Root Beer and it is gross. If y'all don't believe me, come out here to the East Coast and get something they call Ginger Ale. I don't know what this is because it's not ginger beer. I like ginger beer. Ginger beer is pretty well known out here. It's not ginger ale. It tastes like someone took tonic water and then they gargled with Coca-Cola and they spit it in there. And this person had like the worst halitosis you've ever tasted or smelled. You know when that person just gets a little too close to you when you're like at the supermarket or something? You're like, whoa, that's how bad this tastes. And I just don't want to drink it anymore. So then I'm just down to water. You don't want Orby just drinking water. First of all, I'm uncaffeinated. I'm not hyper. I don't get much done on the homestead.
    16:53
    So I thought instead of me just like losing my shots, why don't I just reach out to y'all? the three biggest things not only that have tariffs so I can't afford them but as being a proud Canadian until the tariffs are dropped I'm not supposed to spend money on American products and I thought why don't I just instead of like judging Americans by their one president that's a goof um which I'm going to try to not say his name or talk about politics moving forward but of course when we talk about tariffs we have to kind of talk about that right because it's not just the aluminum it's going to be the steel it's going to be now it looks like there's 10% on everybody across the whole world everywhere on every item coming every direction.
    17:31
    So pinball is going to get harder. Everything is going to get harder for everybody. But what I'm asking you, I have done 47 shows, and I've deleted at least two or three, plus I've been on Don's Pinball Podcast for episode 100, plus well we did episode one in the last year with Ryan Barry from Oh my God I the worst person ever
    17:56
    Phantom Tilt Pinball Podcast, thank you. I need a little sip there to parch my thirsty mouth to remember Ryan Barry and Kimba over there. Can't wait to hear a new episode from them as well. Last two interviews have been bangers. Love getting updates from them. But Ryan Barry and, of course, Don of Don's Pinball Podcast, we all did a show but when you what I'm getting at is between that never mind wormhole but yes that counts I guess kind of between all my other pinball appearances I've done well over 50 shows in the last year other than on my birthday requesting that someone or asking if someone would like to tip me enough money to take my wife out for a rad meal on my birthday other than that I have not asked for any money on the show since last March so it's been a whole year and I'm not even really gonna ask I'm gonna say if you've enjoyed the show over the last year some of them have been great some of them have been horrible they're not all going to be they're not all going to be diamonds i don't do editing i don't overthink the show it's more of a water cooler show where i just get off my chest everything i think love feel hate about pinball and i share it with y'all if you've appreciated any of the shows after i've done over the last year could i ask you from the bottom of my heart please so that i can go buy some pepsi cola it's like $14.99 a case right now. They haven't raised the price quite yet at Costco, but it's still American money going to an American company. And I'd love to spend American dollars on American products. Then, A, I don't have to feel morally and ethically bad. B, if someone shames me in line, I can be like, hey, Americans are paying for this with American money. It's not for me, okay? This is for all my pinball nerds down south. And then on top of that, my wife can feel like all the time and energy I spend watching live pinball, like every minute I spent watching all the incredible pinball from last weekend when I watched Pinmasters. Thank you to Backhand Pinball, by the way. And here you go, even just a couple days after saying I wouldn't spend any money on America, I subbed and gifted, well, I gifted a sub to Backhand Pinball and bought lots of biddies. Well, not lots, but in my mind, lots. I donated not that many, but the membership was something. So there you go. Even though I said I wouldn't spend much money. But here's what I just can't buy right now, which I would love to buy. The three things. A case of Coke.
    20:14
    Okay, a case of Coke. The next thing is a Happy Meal each for all of my family. Because it's killing me that I cannot go to McDonald's. Even today, my son's going to drive right by McDonald's. I have to make him go to A&W Canada to buy a couple burgers. Because it's American and I can't support it. But they have Pokemon Happy Meals there. You don't understand. Even the boxes, the Charizard boxes look incredible. I'd love to go there, but I can't because I'm not, you know what I mean? I can't morally and ethically do it. So that's why I'm reaching out and asking you. Instead of me being mean and rude to one big Cheeto in the U.S., I'm going to ask all of you out there, my family's already going through financial, mental, day-to-day issues because of this. Not because of you, per se, but because of who you've voted in. and I thought rather than me losing my temper and being a jerk why don't I just calmly ask everybody not like oh I feel sorry for Orby or anything because I you shouldn't I've got a pretty good life out here I got to semi-retire before I was 40 years old that was my goal since I was like a teenager so that was incredible even though right now with the maple syrup flowing between that getting the veggies going having two dogs the chickens the kids the two companies everything else the collectibles I'm probably putting in the most hour I'm putting in way more hours than I worked for the bank back in the day, especially with pinball podcasting. And I want to bring you more shows, but I've basically waited for a year till I kind of needed money. And this is the closest to us being as fricking broke as we've ever been. So if I ever wanted to ask for money to give me just a little bit of mental stability in my life, I'm going to do it now. So if you guys would like to donate, I've had about 50 shows in the last year. I would love, even if you think I'm only worth 50 cents, that's one game, one game of a classic game of pinball here in Canada. Maybe they're 25 cents some places in the U.S., but 50 cents per show, that works out to 25 bucks. If I could ask just a couple of you to do that, that would be incredible. Then if I could get even one of you to give a buck per show, or a loonie per show if you're Canadian, but I'm mostly asking the Americans here, you know, because I think really maybe instead of me being mean and rude about it, I should have just asked for help and said, I'm afraid. I'm freaked out. I don't know what's going to happen to our finances. I don't know what's going to happen to our coffee company, who 85% of our online sales in the past three years were to Americans. I don't know what's going to happen when 90% of our sales in the summertime are to people visiting and tourists. I don't know when 95% of our sales at Christmastime at all the shows are done directly here in provinces where people are already broke and probably won't have any extra money to spend 20 bucks on a three-quarter pound bag of coffee, or I guess 15 American, right? So I don't know what's going to happen with my son's job. I don't know what's going to happen with my wife's job. I don't even know if there's going to be many jobs in the area for me if I go out and decide to work part-time at this point. We're going into a full-fledged recession at this point. But what I do know is the Americans that listen to this show are some of the most generous, kind, and lovable nerds out there. And if I let them know that I would appreciate a small tip for all the hard work I've done over the last year. I've interviewed probably 10, 15 people in the last year.
    23:20
    I've also brought you some news stories, but mostly. I've just I've just given you the joy or the hate there's lots of hate listeners too the joy or the hate of listening to me ramble on forget what the hell I'm talking about most of the time and once in a while makes sense but most of the time probably not but giving you my unfiltered truth in a way that's actually kind of challenging most days for me frankly I usually have a gummy or I have a drink before I chat with you guys because it's really hard to spill your guts like this I mean, it would be much harder in person than just in front of a mic, but even just hitting the upload button afterwards is challenging. And every content creator on planet Earth, whether you're on YouTube, whether you're on Twitch, whether you're a podcaster, it doesn't matter. You know how hard it is putting that content out there. And here I'm just going to be open and honest and say the number one thing that could help my mental health would be y'all tipping me over the last year. And if there's just one super duper duper kind person out there who would tip me a toonie, that would be crazy. I don't expect that to happen. That would be $100. I guess that would be like, I don't know, $100 Canadian or $80 American. If that happened, that would blow my mind. No one's going to pay me $5 a show. That would be crazy. That would be $250. If somehow that happened, I know exactly what I would buy because there's something American I've wanted to buy for a long time that I can't get, which is one booster box of Twilight Masquerade or Paradox Rift. A box for my family. There's 30 packs in it. I would take seven. Drop Target Danielle would take seven. Hurry Up Hayden would take seven. And Little Orby Jr. would take seven. Both Elowen and Franchi would both get one pack each. And you know if they pull a hit, they're getting that back in doggy toys the next time we go to the store. So I will treat everyone in my family. I don't think that's going to happen. But I'll tell you this. Every penny that I get in will be spent on American products. like going to McDonald's or going to Wendy's sometime when we're on the road in the next week, right? So 100% of this will be spent, and Pepsi, or I just found out my favorite spring rolls are made in the United States. It's like, what? I live off those things. They're incredible. Even today, we just had the butter chicken ones. We had the Goja Jong ones before. Say that twice, Goja Jong, Goja Jong, Goja. Anyways, they make incredible, I forget the name of the company, but I just found out, Yum Yum maybe? I forget what they are, but I just found out that they're either made or they're owned or they're packaged or something in the U.S. So there's so many products that I love and I love supporting America, but I'm just not supposed to right now. And honestly, frankly, if a whole, if like, you know, 375 of my 400 listeners that listen to me all the time, literally I looked at the last stats. There was, at one point there was 24 Canadians that listened and like 400 Americans, right? So it's like, or 375 Americans. So literally 25 people listening to this are from Canada, maybe 10 from Europe, 10 from Australia, but the other 300 and whatever are going to be from the United States. So if a couple of you, and not as an apology for your president or whatever, I'm not suggesting you voted for him, yes or nay, it doesn't matter. What I'm saying is if you could do this as a small tip to me, it would go a long way for really helping me out and feeling like there's validity in the 20th favorite pinball podcast. So if you'd like to do that, I'd really, really appreciate it. It be cool if a couple people could do that My PayPal account is angryalpacatee at gmail I going to post a link down there Someone surprised me. Someone shocked me. I won't be surprised if I don't get any, especially after my last two shows. You're like, whoa, you just like went bonkers on America, and now you're going to be asking for donations? Yeah, I am. And if you'd like to give, great. I'm telling you right now, if you're listening to this and you are even close to low income, please don't give me a penny. Keep that money for yourself. Go spend it on some joy at an arcade. I always say $0.25, $0.50, even a buck. The best joy you will get in life for the amount of money you spend to go play a game of pinball. Go help out a local arcade. When you're there, if you can afford it, get a beer, get some food if they have food. Tell another friend about it. Take pictures. Post it to social media. Support your local barcades. and tomorrow night, for the love of God, this is the fun part of the show, okay? For the D-Jenny's, my wife and I, even last year, we were celebrating her birthday in Prince Edward Island in Charlottetown. And the Friday night, we went out on the town, we had wood-fired pizza, we went to all the good breweries, we checked out the fireworks, we threw some snowballs at each other, we took funny pictures in front of nine-foot-high snow banks. We had a great time. we may or may not have closed the brewery and knocked over a beer after the doors were closed and forgot the vaporizer there and had to go back and knock on the door and freak the guy out but we had a great time and the saturday night i said honey we are staying in we can order food from your favorite i think we ordered uh asian food in and we got dressed up and we had fun and we had drinks and we made a whole night of it of watching twippies or sorry the twippies the d jenny's and It was a great time. It was hilarious. It was funny.
    28:35
    It was entertaining. I got to be in chat. I think I won something in chat. Joe's going to be doing trivia live on stage and in chat. And if you're in the GTA or you're listening to me right now from London, Ontario, which you might be, get your butt to Toronto if they're not sold out because that would be such a great time. I would love to be there. I would...
    28:54
    Okay, see, I'm trying to monitor myself. I was about to say I would give my left pinky finger. I would give my left pinky finger to be there, but I can't be. But if you live in southwestern Ontario and you could be at the D-Genny's, get your butt there. If not, watch it online, 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Double, triple, quadruple check. Go on to all the social medias. Double check my time's right, but I think it is. Joe, thank you, thank you, thank you for running such a rad award show. I'm excited to watch it. I'll be in chat. I haven't decided if I'm going to be on YouTube. If I'm on YouTube, it might be under Living with Albert or might be under Hummingbird Homestead or Angry Alpaca.
    29:37
    And if it's on Twitch, it'll probably just be under Orbital Albert. So I hope to see all of you in chat. Wonderful Twippies. I know it's not good news coming from Gary Stern about the tariffs, but I think overall it makes more sense. we all want Stern to be around three, four, five years from now, the worst thing Stern could do is say, oh no, we'll just pay for the extra 25%. Because to be honest, on a Stern Pro, I highly doubt there's 25% fat to cut. Maybe, but like they can't blow 100% of their profits and not have, they've got to be able to put a little bit in the bank. So it's smart for a company, and I'm sorry to say this, but it is smart for a company to actually raise the prices slightly more than they think the max tariffs could ever be because that way they don't have to re-raise the prices a month later if the tariffs get raised from 10% to 20 or from 5% to 10 or 25 to 50, God forbid, right? So I actually think it's really smart that Gary Stern and Stern is getting ahead of this and just being open and honest. Look, isn't it convenient truth where they may be already going to raise prices? Possibly. I don't have any proof of that, but it could have happened. I have no clue. But what I can tell you is that if you're a company, the worst thing you could do is not raise your prices and go bankrupt because you just can't afford to pay for all the extra prices for all the extra goods and tariffs. And if you're a company like Stern, it could take not months, but even like JJP, it could take years in procurement. I never say that word right. procurement in ordering and purchasing. It could take years to find all parts that are made in America that are not from China, that aren't from Japan, that aren't from Canada, like all aluminum, all steel, all wood, all like you're going to get every single solitary circuit board only made in America. It's going to be, it's going to take a long time and the cost will go up either way. It doesn't matter if they pay the tariff or if they try to get made in America, either way, it's going to cost more, at least at the start. So right now, what I'm saying to you is, this is the one advice I would give you. If you got a little bit extra, a lot of extra money in the bank, and your job is not at risk from all these tariffs, which most people's jobs are, whether you work for the government or not, but if your job is not, and you have more than enough income, I would go out and buy new in-box pinball machines now. I would go out and buy even used pinball machines that you want right now, because the prices are probably about to skyrocket. The prices that we thought were really high for new in box are probably terribly low because i'm not even kidding you i wouldn't be shocked if we saw an increase of 25 to 45 percent on some stern and jjp models i could be wrong i hope i'm wrong but we could see that happen and i warned you all that would happen i warned you all that could happen i hope it doesn't happen i hope tomorrow we all wake up and this was a fucking nightmare and all the stupid terror bs is gone and we're back to and buds and we're friends because i most of my friends are american i just want to think positively about them and get excited to hang out with them and go to more shows in the u.s but i can't do it with this much financial uncertainty and american companies can't really decide how to do pricing if they have no clue what percent like like we've heard many times from stern the only product that has more parts in it would maybe perhaps be like an automobile or a rocket. Like basically a mode of transportation is the only thing that has more parts from more different places than a pinball machine. So, you know, if there's tariffs on, now there's tariffs on everybody in Europe and more counter tariffs coming. Everybody on Canada, everybody in Mexico. I don't think Mexicans buy a lot of pinball machines, but I wouldn't doubt quite a few parts come from Mexico because the labor is significantly less than even in Canada, right? So anyways, I'm getting a bit ranty. I love y'all. I'm sorry for losing my temper and being a bit of a dick two shows ago. I did delete both of them. I'm allowed to go delete them. You can say, oh, you delete. Like, I know people have uploaded them and anyone can listen. I don't think they were as off kilter as my big stern rant, but definitely two shows ago.
    33:47
    I could have been nicer about it and I should have been nicer about it and I wasn't and I apologize. So, and I have already. And you know what? Multiple people have written me and said, dude, you already apologized. It wasn't a big deal. Don't worry about it. And it's like, yeah. But if I try to say that this pinball podcast space is our safe space to not talk about politics and get political, and then I get political, then I'm kind of going against everything I'm for. However, it is now actually trickled into pinball prices and pinball news. And if you thought you heard people complain about pinball prices until right now, you ain't heard nothing yet because they're about to go through the roof. you better run out there and get, if I was a location in the States and I could afford to, I would buy every, like I would buy a backup Jurassic Park. I would buy a backup. I would go out right now and buy up everything before the prices go up. Because if for some godforsaken reason, and this could happen, I don't know if it will happen. I hope it doesn't happen. But if distros increase the prices going backwards, watch out. That's when you're going to see like, We're already seeing a big slowdown in people purchasing at these prices. So it's going to half with the market. And I wish it wouldn't. And my promise to you is I'm going to try not to talk about politics. I'm certainly going to try not to get as amped up as I did last time. And I will try to attempt to only let it be a very small portion of what I talk about. Moving forward, if you'd like to make a small donation to me, even 50 cents a show for my last 50 shows, I would really appreciate it. American, Australian, UK dollars, Great British pounds. I'll accept them all. It's just going to my PayPal account. What I can promise you is these dollars will be spent on American products that I don't feel comfortable buying right now and can't really afford, to be honest. So, yeah. I'd love some orange juice, too. I need some. Listen to my voice. All right. Until next time, Pinball Nerds, remember to eat, sleep, and breathe the Pinball D-Jennies.