The episode you are about to hear contains explicit words. The opinions within are those of the hosts and in no way imply that anyone listening to this podcast agrees with anything we say. Please send complaints to thisflippinpodcast at gmail.com. Hey! Hey! Ho, ho, ho, and Merry Christmas. You are listening to the 2021 very merry christmas episode of this flipping podcast with tommy and taylor uh apparently it is episode number 116 i've lost track about how long ago we started doing this uh we've been trying to get together talk for a few days now and everything's just been a little hectic with holidays with wrestling new jobs dogs and some other very exciting news i plan to share today uh yeah taylor's face just lit up but uh yeah man let's talk a little bit of pinball and stuff what's up man merry christmas day before christmas to christmas people um yeah it's been a it's been a really it's been a really crazy week uh crazy crazy week we have all kinds of crazy shit happening we've got a new new covid variant that's affected my family on multiple levels um lots of negative tests have been taken which is cool but um and some positive tests for a lot of people i know so if you're if you if you're if you're if you're hey if you're having a positive covid christmas we hope you get better soon because a lot of people are getting hit with the Omicron. So yeah, man. Yeah. Everyone, you know, uh, it's been two years of this at this point. Uh, we kind of should have a routine now on how to properly protect yourself. But if you're going out into large gatherings, hopefully you're vaccinated. And if you're not, hopefully you're masking up, uh, do your best to, uh, protect yourself and you know, others who can't protect themselves for whatever reason. But at this point, like it should just be routine by now. Yeah. So but yeah, so our Christmas, our Christmas has been a little crazy because of that. Like my daughter, my daughter has a cold. We had a like Tommy and I were going to record the other day and I had to go get her tested. And that was negative, which is great. Like so we're going to head over to my in-laws in about an hour, an hour and 50 minutes to do Christmas Eve. So Tommy and I were going to do a quick, quick Christmas special. Talk about. Yeah, good things, positive things. And do you want to share your news now? Yeah, I'd say on positive things, we can't get too much more positive than that. So it's weird to talk about, but very exciting news. We mentioned last time I've got a new job coming, I think, and I have started that. The big motivator for the new job is that I'm going to become a father. Yeah, I'm really excited. So Alyssa and I have actually been trying to have a child since about May. And there was a point where we didn't talk for a while. We had a miscarriage in August, which it's been a very unique experience because I found like we knew statistically how common it was. But until it happens to you, you kind of take that common, you know, the fact that it's not you for the most part and that it was us. and uh taylor definitely helped me talking me through some things and met a ton of other people who have experienced that but it was very sad and depressing uh without a doubt and i'm usually like not that i'm super upbeat but i'm pretty even keel and that that wrecked me for a while yeah not just myself but taking care of alissa too it was tough you know so that was the bad side On the very positive side, we waited until we got clearance from the doctor post-miscarriage that we could attempt again. And apparently after decades of trying to not have kids and being scared that I just couldn't, it turns out that I'm physically capable at least. And we've made it into the second trimester at this point. We have had an ultrasound, and we got our genetic testing back telling us that everything is healthy and that we are going to have a baby that we'll reveal stuff on later. But yeah, that's the exciting news. We had another brief scare this past weekend that resulted in us making a trip to the ER. And we were in the middle of our charity stream for Sleep and Heavenly Peace, which we will talk about today. But I had to immediately leave there and head to the ER. So even though we have entered that second trimester, it is still terrifying. So, um, as much as I've always known that becoming a parent would drastically change my life. And as part of the reason that I have waited until being as old as I am now to start trying to have a family, um, it's even more terrifying. Like once you realize it is becoming a reality and there's so many things out of your control and like, I don't know how you do it, man. Like it's, it's very stressful already. And, uh, it's just something I'm going to have to get used to at this point. But as of now, everything is looking good. Everything is healthy. Yeah. A million different things can still go wrong at this point. But I know we've become friends with a ton of people through this podcast over the years. And I have definitely let some people know at this point. My parents do know, but we'll be letting my sister know tomorrow at Christmas that she's going to be an aunt for the first time. So I'm excited to let her know that. I know she'll appreciate that. and uh well for those of you who are like part of our pinball family that haven't heard at this point yeah i'm having a kid man it's crazy tommy's gonna be a daddy yeah i'm very excited i'm terrified but i'm very excited it's terrifying yeah we called uh my uh i i realized we're we're actually going to have christmas dinner with my parents tomorrow and we're taking uh lissa's mom with us uh they've all never met each other so they're going to meet each other and they're all awesome people so that's exciting but we realized we weren't going to have time uh we wanted to stop by and see my wrestling coach because i've always been very close with him and tell him but we realized with the dogs and with the travel and the fact that everyone's kind of playing it cautiously on travel and who we're exposing ourselves to uh that we wouldn't have time so we called him today to tell him and they were very excited too that's awesome it's uh it's cool getting to give people kind of that good news here especially around the holidays and also explain why you're not getting very nice gifts this year because I'm now saving money for a child. So yeah. Well, congratulations. I, um, yeah, I know obviously like you guys have been kind of down that the rough road that a lot of people go through, but you don't really, you don't really know how many, like you said, it's, it's hard to say like why it is that people don't talk about it because it definitely helps me talking to people who then shared their experience, yeah but it's not one of those easy things that you bring up so i think a listen i have tried to be open with people about it to an extent um not like hey i went and recorded a podcast about it but like people that i see on a regular basis you know i work with a lot of college age people at the bar i work at with and i let them know and i let them know what it was like because it was it's one of those things you always hear about it but just didn't realize how bad it is and not just obviously mentally and emotionally, but like physically it's, it's an experience, man. It was rough. It's a, um, yeah, like, like my wife and I, we had a miscarriage, um, when we were first starting to try to have kids and yeah, like we, it was the same type of thing. Like we, once it happened to us, we found out a lot of other people that we knew had had, had it happen. Um, and I don't know if it's, I mean, we, we were absolutely just like absolutely devastated. I mean, like I've never, I've never felt like, I don't even know how to explain how I felt. Um, like just empty. Like I felt empty. Like there was like a week where we were just, I mean, I still like vividly remember the, like the moment I would got the call from her. Um, I remember going up to, you know, my boss and explaining, like, I mean, I just broke down and, like, explaining, like, why I needed to go. And, like, it's it was like just it was just awful. And I don't know. And like so knowing that you guys when you guys were going through it, I just I mean, I talked to my wife about it. And like we both just like felt, you know, you feel really bad. And, you know, it's I think it's also one of those things. It's just such a personal thing. Right. Because at that point, like you're not really opening up to people about what your situation is. Yeah. So that's the other thing. It's kind of like you have this like little secret that, you know, it's kind of like you're super excited. um you don't really think about how things could go wrong but it's also and one of the things that like tommy and i talked about like developing a human body inside of a human is a very complicated process and like when your body like first takes on that role of developing a fetus like I don't really think it really knows what's happening you know it's like no it's obviously a new experience for the body like you know no matter what so it's like I said man it was crazy you know the most you were everybody I talked to was super supportive in so many ways but like the craziest account I heard was from one of my administrators at my school uh when I let him know I this happened like the first or second week of school is the day before our 10-week ultrasound. So like that also really hurt. We were thinking, you know, Tuesday is going to be this great day. And Monday ended up kind of wrecking things. Yeah. But he let me know his, his wife's a labor and delivery nurse. They had two before they ever had their first kid and five in between their first and second kid. Wow. And like, you know, he was like, take all the time you need again, really appreciated that. But it just kind of like, it blew my mind to think like how bad some people want to have a kid that they could go through that of motion that many times but it also again also gave me that feeling of like okay i'm not alone it's okay to have these feelings right now right and uh again obviously we decided that we were going to try again and so far so good man so my fingers are certainly crossed uh it's it's it's just been a crazy semester we both switched jobs we went through all this together we're both still coaching we got a new dog in between that and like i imagine life's probably not going to slow down for me and for the next like 20 years or so no no i have i have a high schooler now and i'm like what happened like it's yeah it it is really i mean i once you like yeah once you have kids it's it's crazy it's a wild ride but yeah so you guys are good right now so we are good right now yeah that's that's i figure some good news we can share with some people and then you know anyway for all those of you who we've become friends with uh if it's new news to you there you go and uh thanks for all the support and everyone uh don't be surprised when i come on here next year and instead of asking for pinball repair tips and stuff i'm asking for how to properly take care of a child tips but you know i figure it can't be too much more complex on a pinball machine. The first poo, man. The first poo. It's all about the first. It's once you get past that first poo, you're all in. I've changed two diapers in my life, so I think I'm prepared. Well, congratulations. That is absolutely like some of the most exciting news and positive news that I can think of right now. So I'm super psyched for you guys. Yeah, I love being a dad. It's a wild ride. It's a roller coaster, but it's absolutely the best. I mean, like, that is what I enjoy. I enjoy being a dad. And people who know me know that. You are, I believe, Taylor the dad now on Instagram, right? Taylor the dad on Instagram, yeah. I was like, you know what? I think I'm doing more of this than I am pinball, so maybe I need to, like, I don't know, truth in advertising. I'm always one who's been willing to admit that I am not the smartest or most experienced in anything, and I look for help from those people that are. And you, as a friend, have served as a role model. I've spoken to several other of my friends in the hobby who have kids and have shown me how they can do family and jobs and taking care of kids and having a hobby still. And that's all served to inspire me or influence me to know, like, yeah, I'm ready for this. I can do this. Not that it's going to be easy, but I appreciate you guys all kind of setting a good example for me and talking to you and Ryan about stuff. There's a lot of you who have been very good examples of being good fathers to me, and I appreciate that. Well, I appreciate that. I appreciate that a lot. Well, look, Merry Christmas. Pinball, do you want to talk pinball? Yeah, man. Let's see. Godzilla got a code update. I assume you've got, what, 200, 300 games on it by now? I have 400 games on the new code as of last night. No, no, no. Yeah, Godzilla has new code. I – it only jumped up to .85 from .81, and there's a ton of updates, which is insane and also exciting about what's still to come because there's still a lot of stuff in there that's just not there, like Godzilla power-ups. but um and outside of godzilla a lot of credit to stern they updated code on basically all of the spike 2 games at this point um a lot of it is just to get insider connect in there but i know turtles has a scoring balancing mandalorian they've altered the upper play field excuse me monsters uh they added stuff so some games that people didn't really anticipate getting some changes definitely have so stern's really been cranking things out here for the holiday which is cool um i played my last three games on godzilla are 1.4 billion 900 something million and 1.7 billion um i am really digging the new code and i am like obsessed with starting saucer attack multiball i don't know why because it's yeah like it's not like it's the most lucrative thing but it is so fun to shoot at and the new light show for a saucer attack now is amazing now that's very cool now saucer attack multiball it seems like it was made easier to achieve but you had to actually defeat more saucers to get to it right because i think originally it was and i maybe i wrong i thought i didn pay enough attention to it initially to really know i just started to understand when that light flashing I need to shoot the pop to hit the saucer So I'm not sure if it's just more of me understanding the game or how much of it changed. Yeah, I don't know. I feel like I've gotten it much more frequently with the new code. Yeah. My understanding with the rules, at least for the first saucer attack multiball, You have to hit the saucer pop bumper five times, and then it qualifies to be destroyed, right? And then that's when you get the light that – there's like an insert that lights up. Or if you go through that little – like there's that little switch that's by the pop bumper. I think that that also triggers it. So I didn't know you could just hit the pop bumper. I thought you had to hit that switch. So in that case, in the early code, you definitely had to hit that switch. There was no pop bumper hit rule. So that's been added in then. Yeah, so at least – and this – I went back and I read over the Tilt Forum rules after the new code had come out because I think that there was a clarification there. And so, yeah, I think it's like five pop hits, and then it qualifies to be killed. But I think it's – I think that kill shot is on a timer. It is, yeah. That insert that says saucer attack starts blinking. I want to say it's a decently long timer, maybe 10 seconds, 15. It's pretty long, yeah. It speeds up. Like when you're getting to the end, you'll see it's blinking quicker. That's telling you that it's about to expire. What's ironic is like I feel like I'll randomly hit that pop bumper all the time. And sometimes when it's lit, I'm aiming and now I'm just hitting the scoop. I'm hitting the scoop and it actually times out. And this is the one where if you do a shat in lane pass. It gives you two hits, right? I think it might give you like it might double whatever that shot value is at the time or something like that. So shatting from the left flipper through the right end lane. Yep. Yeah, it's really cool. Some really cool rules that Keith always throws in there with the shatting. I'm trying to think, like, of what – I don't feel like I've gone deep enough into the game past that. Oh, the train. The train mode has changed a lot to where what it was before was the train you could just – when you qualified a train, super trains, you could just hit one ramp over and over again, and it would feed back to that same flipper. now especially if i i shoot for the right ramp just because i think it's an easier shot you shoot the right ramp a certain amount of times and then it actually lifts the building up so the ball diverts to the it will end up diverting to the right flipper so that you then make this like a super jackpot shot to the left and so that resets so you can't just spam the ramp over and over again, which is good. I still see like you can still put up 160 million just in that mode. But that has changed. I think that that was a good way to deal with that, not exploit, but just rule. But I'm trying to think like other changes that I'm really like aware of outside of those. I actually got through all the modes the other night for the first time. Like all the battles? Yeah, defeating all the Kaiju battles and then all of the double team ones. The whatever, because I think, you know, you have choice in which order you do them. But whichever one I did last for the team up battle, it was really cool. It basically was one of those. Again, I love like the idea of risk, reward and player choice. And it had shots you could keep hitting. and then it was building up a value and you could shoot it into the saucer to collect or keep going um can't remember what that mode's called on uh metallica but something similar to that so you're building up this jackpot value and the saucer will let you collect it or keep playing to raise it higher and i collected it with like one second left and it was like 140 million or something like i'd got a night i'd hit almost all the shots like each shot had a level to it I think you could hit each shot three or four times, and the value would go up each time. And, yeah, that was fun. I really liked that mode. I want to say it was the King Ghidorah one, but I can't remember for sure. That was cool to see all that. That's one of the things I like about L1's games is you can approach it from a way – you can approach it like, hey, I just want to blast through this and try to get deeper into the game, or you can really try to like blow up certain modes with points. But it's not a gimme. It's not like you're just going to – I mean, when I got to my – so when you're switching your cities, you collect the city bonus, right? And I don't fully understand like what it is that's building that up. But when I switched to my fourth city there, it was over $100 million I collected just for switching the city. God, you're just kicking his ass. I need to get – I had a really good game. Like that one was – but that game is unique though because I'll also step up and finish with like $15 million sometimes. Like, yeah, you can just have an ass kick of a game on there. But I was I was yeah, I was having a good night the other night. So that one that was fun, man. I again, I'm still loving it. I'm really enjoying it. I have not played the new code on Mandalorian, but the reports I've gotten from everybody said basically the biggest change is to the encounters which take place on the upper play field. and instead of only doing one at a time through the three stages at each level now, it'll let you keep going and you don't play the bonus mode to the end. So, Lincoln, no. Sorry. Link, come here. So, anyway, it makes it much easier to actually potentially go through the game and defeat the upper play field, which they said it just makes it feel a lot better. So, I need to get down and try to play that. It won't be until sometime next week, but I'll give it a shot. Yeah, that definitely felt as – I mean I haven't played Mandalorian in a while, so I don't know what code I was playing. But that upper – the encounters were always – seemed very unbalanced as far as difficulty progressing through that. But back to Godzilla, I actually made a mod that I will share on our Facebook page. But it was a – I took a Godzilla vinyl bank, painted it, and then I worked with Joe Zinkas. It goes by Toyota Boy on Pinside. And Joe printed up these, like, little 3D-printed trains that I used these, like, flame LEDs from this place called Evan – I can't remember. I'll post a link to everything. Um, but basically like Godzilla, you replace the original Godzilla with this bigger Godzilla bank, which is like maybe three times larger. And so it's just like the bus of Godzilla. But then in his hands, he's holding four train cars and they light up and they look like they're on fire. And that's linked to the, um, it's linked to the insert. That is the train lit insert or whatever, like collect train advanced train. So that's flashing. Like, so when you have a train qualified on the, on the left ramp, the train cars will light up like they're on fire. Or if you are in super trains, the train cars will light up like they're on fire. Um, so that's something I did. That was a present to myself. I worked on it. It didn't take that long to make it. Actually, that's not true. It took a while to make it, and so I'm not making them for other people. But I will share. I'm going to put together a pin-side thread and post, like, links to all the stuff I got. And Joe is willing to print people the 3D parts. I sent Tom. I sent you some. Did you get them yet? I did. I just got them yesterday, actually. I opened them yesterday. I've been – packages have been coming left and right all week. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Things keep getting set around. I'm still waiting for my vinyl Godzilla to arrive from Amazon. Okay. So once that gets here, I will be reaching out for some of those instructions or reading the thread on how to put it together myself. I have the bridge mod that Joe designed as well on mine. And then I have the pop bumper mod that my buddy Brandon at Gov on Pinside. And he's selling those now, right? He is, yeah. I think he's selling them. Did you get yours yet? I know he's got – he printed one for you. he was yeah i have no i don't think i've gotten it yet it might it might be coming today really good yeah it was cool i stopped down last night real quick we had some with like a christmas dinner with some of our friends in town here and then uh i forgot to turn the games off free play from the night before so i stopped in there to do that and uh max a player who comes down he's actually from here but he lives in wisconsin so when he comes home for the holidays he's always playing and he even pointed out he really liked that mod so it looks yeah it's cool man it's a a little nice design on there. Yeah, the mods are starting to, like, when I first saw Godzilla, I didn't, other than the Godzilla sculpt, like I wasn't really sure, like, what mods you would put on there. But I did, so I did my mod, and then I just got in a mod by somebody on Pinside called T. Diddy, and it's just T-D-I-D-D-Y, and they printed off, it's like 3D printed parts, but they're towers, and they tie into the Tesla Strike spinner or just the upper spinner. And so it's like power line towers with lights on top. And so when you hit the spinner, like the lights go off on top of the towers, but that's pretty cool. So I did get that. And there's somebody else who did a backbox lighting mod for the premium that when you hit the spinner, I think this is how it works. When you hit the spinner, the lights on the backbox, like it adds lights to the backbox where Godzilla's like heat ray is so that that just flashes while you're doing that. So it reminds me of I had the Lord of the Rings, like the Eye of Sauron mod that went in the backbox. So like when you hit the spinner, the eye in the backbox would light up. I think it's the same kind of thing. so i'm going ahead i'm grabbing that because i've gone crazy i've got some side blades coming in yeah i'm not a big modder but i will admit the inner art blades they are a nice touch to basically every game at this point like they do add just it gives it a more complete and polished look i'm a big fan of mirror blades too um but when you've got like these official art blades getting released the ninja turtles that i picked up came with them yeah and they just look really nice in there they I get it now. I get it. I'm still not huge on all the other mods, but some of them look really good. You know, like I don't get as much pleasure out of doing it. The waterfall. But having them in there, I mean, they look good. I see why people get so into modding their games. I think, yeah, I don't know. I really don't do a lot of mods. I like making them every once in a while. Like, you know, I've done that. But yeah, generally, I don't care. I think with Godzilla one, I think when I added my mod, like that sculpt is so big that the left the right side of the back of the play field starts to look really empty. and so I think those Tesla towers actually like help balance it out and yeah the Art Blades I think they look cool I mean I really like some of the stuff like I can't remember who did them but they've done them where they actually like power up like they're tied into certain features which are kind of cool the old paper ones they've done them for a lot of games now those are really cool they're expensive I think the Art Blades not like Topper expensive but expensive Not topper expensive. I will say like a lot of top. I think Marco posted that they had a lot of toppers available. So if you're looking for a topo, check out Marco specialties. And speaking of Marco specialties, we should mention the passing of Marco, which is like super sad. but I mean I'm pretty sure he was the founder of Marco Specialties. I met him back at I think it was the free play that I went to a while back but Marco Mandeltort passed away this past week and he was just a like old school pinball guy who was always great to chat with. I know that him and his wife, I was at free play and I'd been working my ass off. I went down there to help with the tournament down there and we were just scrambling. I mean, it was just like the most work I've done for like in a pinball thing ever. And I just remember I was in their booth. I was hanging out with them and they were all like super great. But they were like, you need to sit down and drink some water. Like they were like, just sit like they took me behind their booth and they sat me down. gave me water, and, like, we just started talking about, he just started talking to me about just being in the parts business for however long he's been. It just, like, yeah, it was just a really great, warm guy, and it's, the hobby is a lesser, it's just, we've lost a giant in the hobby. So, yeah, that's. yeah i've definitely sent them a lot of money over the years and i'm sure there's many people out there who have um i've only briefly interacted with him at shows when i was near his booth but it always stood out to me is like while we're at a show to have a good time the reality is it's much like when i'm working in the bar like people come to the bar and they're like super happy and sometimes i'm not because like i work multiple jobs and i'm tired and it's 2 a.m and they don't quite grasp like oh like what's wrong with you shouldn't you be having a good time i'm like i'm at work man are you always happy at work like you know yeah but that dude was always smiling when i saw him at a pinball event and the reality is like he's still at work like he's working when he's at a lot of those shows and sure maybe he's seeing people he likes to see and stuff but that dude was happy to be around pinball um and i i've become you know close friends with a few people that work there over the years just through the hobby and knowing them and reached out to them when I heard the news. And that to me is always a good measure of something, you know, like not that people are going to speak ill of people who have passed. But when you can tell that someone who, especially when it's a workplace thing and somebody who was your boss and their employees are still devastated that they're gone, that's when you know it's a really good person, you know? I think a lot of what Marco did by their presence at shows also really helped the hobby through what seemed kind of like darker periods of the hobby. They had a presence. They were showing up with games. So a lot of those new games you would see, they were not – it wasn't like Stern was bringing them. They were being brought by Marco. They were bringing – Oh, yeah. Even at recent shows, they've done a huge job of pre-selling games. So that way they could provide more games at a show to go along with their booth, and then people like us get to take them home. Yeah, I got my Jurassic Park from them. So it's like I have my Marco tag. I'm looking at it right now. I've got the Marco symbol on my – what is it? My price card or whatever. It's Marco Show Game. And they even printed it up so it says courtesy of Taylor James Rees This Flippin Podcast Like you know I It those little little touches like that that you know create loyalty And I try to support all the pinball parts suppliers and mod makers and our friends who are doing stuff. Cause it's, again, this is a small hobby. Like it is your reputation means a lot in this hobby, at least to me within our community because we're a very tight knit group. Absolutely. And, you know, again, he's somebody who had a great reputation and it was well earned and it was for a reason. So without a doubt, he'll be missed. I did see Marco, you know, was taking some time off here for the holidays. But they also posted that they'll be back at it next week because, you know, I think by and large, this dude wanted to keep pinball machines working. That was his kind of dream was to provide people with things that they could continue to keep machines highly functioning and for others to enjoy, which I think is probably why he was so happy at show because you got to see so many people enjoying pinball. It's one of the things I love about being at my location is seeing other people get to enjoy these machines that I've worked on or that I've bought. It's fun. So I think he would be very happy to know that his business is going to roll along. and I'm sure they'll be missing his presence and his leadership, but he built something that's going to outlast him. I think that's something we all want to do. And I think going along with that, I think one of the things that's been really impressive with what Marco, the company, has done with him as the helm is it has grown. It's not like this, like, it's just an old-school company. It's not pinball resource where it's like, we're not going to change with the times. We're just going to do it our way, and we're going to, you know, I love pinball resource. This isn't a knock on them, but like watching the evolution of Marco from being an online store to like that big presence at shows to hosting like regular streams about doing repairs with like in what they've done, like Kyle, who does that and Emoto. Like it is like it has become a next generation thing. Like they are they are they are like there is a current. It's a current model of how you can integrate a business with like a culture, right? Because now I think that pinball has more of a culture than it did even five years ago. And a lot of that has been done by people who have a presence. And I think that Marco really, I think Marco may have been the trailblazer for it. I think that pinball life has as well. And I think that Stern is kind of now following along with that. like where it is it's becoming more of a cultural thing than it is just like oh it's a business it's just like you know what i mean like i don't know it's interesting i think the growth of the hobby has been pretty amazing the way that it's kind of changed in the last five years and marco was what marco was like i said one of the like leading they were the trailblazer with a lot of that stuff yeah i mean i got into the hobby roughly 10 years ago and that was the first place you know i ever learned to get parts from uh and it's it's been great man like they've done like you said i i can't say it any better they've contributed to the hobby and made it a better place so it's been very cool um all right pinball pinball um pinball christmas uh what uh what what what what well i was gonna say uh in in the holiday spirit we had our uh our second an annual bed drive, as I mentioned earlier this past Sunday, where me and my buddy John Hawksby basically planned to get as many people together as we could and stream pinball for 12 hours. We had everything against us that day. The internet went down at the bar, so we were running the stream off a hotspot from my phone. Oh, man. As I said earlier, I ended up having to go to the hospital with Alyssa for part of it. Yeah. It was just like a bunch of little things. They had a four-band concert the night before at the venue, so I had to move the machines around that morning and get everything physically set up. And then on top of that, the internet issues, all sorts of things. But for everything that went wrong, it still went really, really well. We talked about it before, but Sleep in Heavenly Peace provides beds for children who don't have a bed to sleep in. there are chapters and states all over the country so if this is anything that interests you you can help out locally you can just donate to the charity as a whole whatever you want but last year we set the goal of raising four hundred dollars which would provide one whole bunk bed so beds for two kids and we ended up raising twenty eight hundred dollars last year. This year, the price of the bunk beds went up to $500 because of inflation, essentially. And that's just the reality. So we did up our goal to $1,000. We were still hoping to be able to provide two complete bunk beds, so beds for four kids to sleep in this year. And we flew past that goal. We ended up raising $3,154. That came through several methods. We put all the machines on free play that day down at North End so people could just bring in cash and donate whatever they wanted to the cause and hang out and play. We had some people bring checks. We were also taking money online via Venmo or PayPal for people who just wanted or watching the stream wanted to donate. And then we had donations set up through Facebook, which went just directly to the charity. So we didn't have any access to that sort of money that just all went in. But luckily, Facebook kept track of it for us. So between all of those, we raised the $3,154. And after processing all of the Venmo and PayPal transactions and getting them swapped over to my account, right now, while we are recording, I am going online and I am submitting that donation of what we took in in cash that day then essentially, plus the Venmo and PayPal, which is $2,359. The check has already been mailed to them, and the rest of it was coming from the Facebook. So that will have to be done through that way. But, yeah, I'm really excited we were able to do that for the second year. With the amount we raised, that is going to allow us to provide, what did we figure that is? What is it, six? Six complete bunk beds. That's awesome. So 12 kids will have a place to sleep thanks to the pinball hobby, you know, like people being willing to give. And this is going to your local chapter, right? We are. So this last year we donated completely to Indianapolis. That's the closest chapter to us in Lafayette. And John, my buddy who does this with me, he's been like a road trip buddy for a lot of our pinball stuff that I've done over the last couple of years, too. He actually is part of, well, he's the leader of a men's club called the Bearded Villains. And it's basically a bunch of really big, like John is a giant human, like six foot something. I don't know. It's a bunch of really big, burly dudes with beards and tattoos that if you saw them now, you wouldn't want to mess with. And the whole idea behind their group is they're trying to change that image of like, just because we're big dudes with tattoos and beards, like doesn't mean we can't do good stuff. And they go out and they do all these charitable causes. They did a toy drive last week on top of John doing this. He's a great human. I'm very lucky to know him. And he's doing a great job leading these guys. But they actually go on the bed builds for Sleep and Heavenly Peace. Yeah. So that's another way you can help out sleep and heavenly peace. We'll post information. You contact your local chapter on when they have like these one day bed builds where they bring in the community to build the frames and stuff. And then he actually does the bed deliveries too, where like you take the bed frame that you've now built, you set it up in the kid's house. And that $500 includes like the bed frame that they're building, the mattresses, the bedding, the pillows, everything. So it's one of those things where it's like the more money you put together and you can buy in large quantities, you know, it sounds expensive when you hear $500 for a bed, but then when you think of everything that goes into it, Oh yeah. Uh, it's, it's, it's awesome. So it's, it's 500 for two beds. Yeah. Yeah. So it's like two mattresses, two mattresses, two beds, two pillows. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's amazing. Yeah. It's, it's, to me, it's a very worthy cause. Obviously I work with kids. Um, I've worked with kids who are disadvantaged at times and like, it just means a lot. Uh, So we're very happy with what we ended up raising. We both kind of talked about how last year we did the 12 hours and we were like, that was so long. I don't know if we'll ever do that again for that format. And then as it was like rolling around this year, we're like, we've raised a lot of money. Let's just do it again. Yeah. And then same thing this year. Kind of like we're really tired that day. And two days later, we were like, what can we do to do more? Like we got to keep one upping ourselves because the reality is it's like one day of us being a little bit tired because we have to set up some things and hang out. But like when you think about what it's going to mean for those kids, it's it's a lot easier to motivate yourself to do it. So, man, it's awesome. Like, yeah, we did. I know my buddy Mark, who has some games down at the location with me. I for whatever reason, I just didn't even post it to Pennside this year. I was busy dealing with a bunch of stuff and I didn't think to post on there. But he posted about, you know, coming down and playing just from him posting about it in a thread. Somebody else said, oh, I've never heard of them. I looked them up and I donated to. He's like, I got a fan. I got family members in Fort Wayne. So I donated to that chapter. I bought a mattress and a bed and it breaks it down on their website to literally, you know, donate five dollars. You're providing a pillow, ten dollars, a set of sheets, twenty five dollars as a comforter, one hundred dollars as the mattress, two fifty is the single bed, five hundred is the whole bunk bed. Yeah. So like, you know, you can see how you want to break it down. Exactly. If you want to know where your money is going. But again, like these chapters exist all over the place. So you can be directly helping in your community, which is how I got on this rant. But last year, Indianapolis was our closest. This year they opened another chapter in a little town called Frankfurt, which isn't terribly far from us. Yeah. So we're kind of splitting our donation between those places this year. Nice. So keeping it local and, you know, the reality is like I don't care how they split it between the two places, but I just want to know that we're helping kids in our communities. So that's all I'm making that donation right now. So then I will let you talk about like pinball Christmas stuff. Well, I just want to say that it's awesome. And one of the things that I miss the most, like during the covid times is not getting to do my pins for kids, which is just a charity tournament that I love doing. And it was I don't know. I think that there are certain charities, charity event, charity, not charity events. There are certain charities that are like just impact charities. And I think especially kids charities like you have no idea how much of an impact something like having a good bed, a good comfortable bed to sleep in or having school supplies. so you don't have to worry about whether or not you have the crayons that all the other kids have or like a coat. You know, like those are impact gifts. Like those are things that like really go above and beyond like – I don't know. Like I don't know. I just – one of the things that a local charity does is they put out like refrigerators, like community refrigerators where they make sure that the refrigerators like have food stocked. And so people in the community can come and just get some food out of the refrigerator. So, yeah, like if you're looking to like make an impact in your community, like like what Tommy is doing. Yeah, especially in the pinball hobby where it's like we have these. I mean, it's tough because of COVID right now. It's tough. But I really do think like there's a really owning pinball machines and inviting people over is a really easy way to raise money for a charity and look for those impact charities, especially ones that help kids. No Kids Hungry is a big one. That's a national one. Like my local food bank has one where they provide meals for kids. It's a backpack program. That's the one that we always put our money towards. And so, yeah, so, yeah, just I think it's awesome that you're doing that, man. Yeah, it's great. And, like, what you guys were able to raise is awesome. And thanks to the pinball community for coming through. Yeah, and we had people – I think one of the coolest things was we had an older couple show up, like, right near the start. And we go from 12 noon to midnight. So, like, we kind of don't know when people are going to come and what sort of, like, help we're going to have as far as just sitting in front of the camera and talking. And this older couple showed up from Chicago. and they were like, yeah, we were literally just driving home to Chicago and I pulled up things to do in Lafayette because we were coming through the town and she said, I haven't played pinball in decades and this popped up as something to do locally. So we came by. She was like having a blast. She played everything. The husband was kind of an older, gruff guy. He worked for the city of Chicago for years. He just sat down with me and John and talked. And at the end of the day, they handed us 60 bucks and said, you guys are really doing something cool. So that was nice. you know, like complete strangers, not members of the pinball community. Uh, I was really glad that day that the Google search function worked in our favor. Uh, that was, but that was cool. And, you know, I saw people that I don't see at the location very often. Uh, I saw people that come by all the time. I saw people that couldn't make it that day donating online. Um, like we said, man, like this, this hobby, it means a lot to us. Obviously we're sitting here recording a podcast because of how much we like this hobby. Uh, but when I see people come through for something like that it means a ton and uh we already talked we're definitely going to do it for a third year um my goal this year would be to inspire another location somewhere uh to do a similar thing you know so we know enough people within the hobby that i hope somebody else will take this up and do it for their location or their local community as well because at the end of the day it's not like it's a ton of work uh obviously the internet troubles this year uh hampered kind what we were doing. Yeah. Hopefully we are switching providers down there because I can't connect my Stern Insider Connect kits I have right now either, which is frustrating. But, you know, at the end of the day, like I said, there's going to be 12 kids who it's just so hard for me to comprehend because I was always provided for. I never, ever worried about having a bed to lay down in. And I take that for granted. So when I think about that possibility and knowing that I'm like able to help just a little bit with the help of a lot of other people here uh it means a lot that's awesome um yes let's keep the positive train going man as far as pinball goes you need to congratulate jack danger who has now been announced as a official pinball designer for stern pinball so congratulations um obviously like he designed the jurassic park home edition and he has now been announced by Stern as officially joining their design team. So congratulations. Yeah, everybody knows Jack. I did see him post out the picture of the game he had been doing as a homebrew on his stream for a while, a couple years back, and saying it's time to dust this off and reassess it. And it was interesting. It was a really unique layout that looked like it was kind of like a TNA, beatles style street level game um so i i honestly hope that they allow him to do that because i have added a beatles to my location as we mentioned briefly in the last one and dude like that game just sucks me in so bad uh it's just so fun so fast paced i could see a layout like that with a with a modern theme maybe really succeeding yeah it be it be interesting um Yeah it be interesting Yeah it be interesting I just think that pretty like a dream job, right? I mean, first of all, doing home brew still blows my mind that people can sit down and figure that out. That's just not in my wheelhouse. Yeah, there was a great article that came out about that this week. Oh, I saw that. Somebody posted it to the, there's like a Facebook I sent it to a friend of mine. It was actually Casey, who's the owner of my location. And Casey's a great friend, but he's always like, he's always so, I'm so impressed with what you can do on these machines and how you're able to, you know, fix things. And he literally asked me last week, he's like, how far away are you from being able to actually just build your own game? And I was like, dude, I'm so far away, like you can't even comprehend. He's like, well, like you've restored a few and stuff. you built scratch games i built a scratch game but i built a scratch game that already exists that already has a blueprint that i was like it's like putting together a puzzle versus like cutting all the puzzle pieces yourself and making it fit again um yeah yeah like it's it's just it's in a crazy amount and i i can't find the damn link to that article but it was it was very well done it largely covered the homebrew games that were at pinball expo um and just trying i sent that to him and he's like now i now i understand better what you were saying like there's just so many parts of a pinball machine that people take for granted uh that go into it and not only like okay could i probably assemble something yeah i think i could do that but then like making it fully functional with code and then on top of that making it actually fun like yeah that is it is a challenge man like pinball is you know it's an art form it really is and there's a reason that stern and jersey jack have so many employees and how these machines are designed in teams like that's why when i look at tna that was a one-man show from scott denisi like i'm just it's so mind-blowing what he did on that thing and that's also why he refused to do another one and he who you know with rick and morty he had a coder he had somebody helping with rules like it's a it's a really cool challenge but it's just not something i'm capable of or wanting to be capable of right now there's so many yeah there's so many i think i mean you know going back to elwynn like what he's been able to do as far as you know archer um but I think also like just the rules like there's just yeah there's so many different levels of knowledge that need to go into designing like a homebrew what's a sonic the hedgehog looks at me I mean there's just so it's really cool I've played that one like yeah yeah it's it's amazing like what's what's happening right now in the hobby um and all and a lot of that is happening like while we're in a lockdown. So it's not like you're even can really get out there and collaborate like you might in like a more open world. Right. Um, I don't know. I think it'll be really interesting. I think there's going to, there will end up being an explosion of stuff happening once we kind of calm down a little bit. Um, yeah, it's part of the reason the the p3 has me so excited um because you're designing less of a play field and there's already a solid code base out there for people to build upon yeah um and there's a lot of people working on games for that system right now on top of like the official p3 games but that to me is where like i plan to hopefully and again i'm fully recognizing that i have a child on the way and like all of this might just be delayed drastically by years because that's going to be my priority drastically But, yeah, the P3, it feels like it's like me walking into the shallow end of a pool and giving me, like, a little bit of a glimmer of what it might take and see if I can do it versus starting completely from scratch. Yeah. And speaking of Multimorphic, they added two new members to their team, Colin MacAlpine and Bowen Kerins. Yeah. Which is amazing. Obviously, Bowen was at Spooky for a while. He was helping with rules there, yeah, specifically. Because he wasn't, you know, he was working remote, essentially providing rule consultation. Yeah. And so now, yeah, they're over at Multimorphic. I think that was just announced, like, in the last couple weeks. Within the last week, yeah. Within the last week, yeah. So congratulations. Obviously, Colin, winner of Pinburgh. I basically, I think that was all us, personally. Oh, absolutely. He got that. That was like. This flipping podcast bump, man. That was a flipping, this flipping podcast bump. But yeah, that's awesome. So I'm looking forward to seeing what happens with them on board. There's a lot of – there's rumors about – they've got a licensed title coming out at some point. There's rumors about what it is. Do you know what it is? Dude, I don't know what it is. Okay. I ordered mine knowing a new game was coming but not knowing what it was. I know they've announced they had this new flipper upgrade that came out and I know that's going into all the new machines being built which would include mine which I've heard good things about I've heard very good things about that supposedly according to Cointaker which I'm now realizing going through the Alien and Cointaker thread is that my Alien was supposed to be sitting at a boat in New York and I'm supposed to have it by the end of the month they've got seven days left uh and i've heard nothing so uh not feeling good about that but then i was just like no it's cool it's just sitting there hanging out there's all sorts of delays but now i'm seeing people get theirs from that boat and i still haven't heard anything so i'm not feeling great about my alien at the moment uh but uh i believe when i talked to jerry at expo my P3 was looking like most likely February-ish. Okay. So that is where I remain the most excited for. I'm just curious. But yeah, supposedly when mine's ready, the new title should be ready. I don't think by any way they're waiting for me or anything like that. I think it's just timing is working out. And I'm really excited. But no, I'm in a P3 Discord with people who are making games, people who already own them. all sorts of people who work there and there hasn't even been like a hint really what the game is like they are they are we know people we know people who know we know people who know i i mean i imagine yeah i we do but they are they're doing the right thing and they're keeping their do you want to know or do you prefer i honestly don't i've gotten to the point where like so like stern has rush coming out right it's not a secret we're just kind of waiting till officially show it and it's still really exciting to officially see it yeah but like dude tomorrow's christmas morning and like i remember being a kid and not knowing what my presents were i don't want to know what anything is yeah and i'm not big on surprises but with like pinball machines we're getting a couple new ones a year like enjoy the mystery you know like i i don't have i i don't have the slightest idea of what this p3 theme could be other than they're fairly confident a A lot of people are going to want it, which really makes my mind wonder, you know, like, what is this? And yeah, I trust them. I'm I've played heist enough at this point where I'm really excited. I went to the Cincinnati show and got a few more games on it. Somebody was nice enough to bring their P3 there. I've loved cosmic kart racing for years. After I played that for the very first time, we interviewed Jerry just because I enjoyed that game so much at Texas. And Lexi Lightspeeds, actually, like, I've really enjoyed that. I don't know it super well, but I had a great game on it at a show to where I was like, okay, I get this now. I'm understanding it. And the reality of I'm going to have less space. The room I'm recording in right now, I don't have a pinball machine in this room for the first time in 10 years because it's going to become a nursery. So, you know, like I'm losing space for a good reason. There will be a crying baby in the background of episode 125. Yeah. But, you know, I'm just being realistic. I know things are going to change. So if I can have one machine with swappable playfields that doesn't take up as much of a footprint, that's going to be a good thing for me. I want to put it on location because I want people to experience it. But I also like jealously really want to keep it home because I really want to play it a lot. So we'll see. I plan to still put it on location. But eventually, if I had to bring something home, it might be tempting to do that one. All right. So Christmas is tomorrow. It is. I'm going to drop I'm going to try to drop this episode today. so christmas christmas is tomorrow so merry christmas everybody um yes do you have anything under the tree that is pinball related that you know about i i don't uh alissa and i bought new washer and dryer last month we were like merry christmas so one of us bought the washer one of us bought the dryer that's beautiful um yeah wonderful it's actually been awesome like we were like wow we're we're actually adults maybe we can handle this kid thing because we're excited about laundry there's a lot of laundry that a lot of laundry will happen yeah but between my new job alissa has also changed jobs like our last several months have just been insane yeah i had a friend come over and help me put up the christmas tree last week to try to surprise alissa as like hey look we finally did something for christmas and i just had like me and her put the lights on uh so when alissa would come home the tree would be there with the lights and then Alyssa and I could decorate it. She was like, that's awesome. Alyssa has also been very tired and very sick throughout the pregnancy. That's been rough on top of everything else. She's like, that's really sweet. I'm really tired. I'm going to go to bed. That's it. We hung up three ornaments total that were ornaments we got each other as gifts. That's pretty much it. The whole Christmas year has just felt off, man. It's totally felt off. I usually love decorating for Christmas. And this year we were just not about it. So I'm like, man, I'm regretting putting the tree up. So I'm like, I'm just going to take this thing down like on Monday. I haven't put up any lights outside. Um, and not that, not that I go crazy. I don't go crazy with it at all. Like I do like the mental, like I do Halloween. I'll be honest. Yeah. Um, yeah, it's just been really weird. And I, and like I was talking to my wife about it. We like went on a walk before we started recording. Yeah. And I was just like, it just doesn't feel. Well, it's also literally almost 60 degrees outside today. Same thing here. So we haven't had any snow this year. But I feel like I feel like it's that that whole like I have I can't really put myself. I've lost my relation to the time of year at this point. Like it's just. Yeah. So the last two years are a solid fog of I can't remember when I did anything. I remember things happening, but I've lost, oh, that was this month, or we did that before this. Everything has just been really strange. So it makes me kind of sad, because I usually love Christmas, watching Christmas movies. I'm all about it. But at the same time, I also have started to already think about how next year I could have a six-month-old at Christmas, and how they won't remember anything, but how I really want to make it special, if that makes sense. So yeah, I'm excited about that already, that potential. We have our friends in town, Michael and Danielle, and their three daughters that we hang out with a lot. We did Christmas with them last night. Nice. I shop for their girls every year, and I pick them up a couple things. But then I go to the store, and I see something else, and I'm like, oh, she'll like that, or she'll definitely want this. I end up getting them way too much stuff, but I love giving. I enjoy seeing kids enjoy Christmas. We took them stuff last night. When you have your own kid? When you have your own kid? Oh, my God. Remember Simon? That was the number one. I got them all this stuff that I thought they were playing Simon. They love Simon. So like, Hey, if you never know what they're going to like, but, uh, yeah, man, that's it. If anybody's out there looking for like a secret Santa and they just want to hook me up a Dolly Parton play field, I want to restore that one eventually. But yeah, there's nothing under my tree. Um, I did get some Christmas decorations from upkick pinball. They're on Instagram. They did these like cool, like a printed three D or plastic etched, ornaments. If you're looking for some ornaments for next year, check out Upkick Pinball. Yeah, I got some plastic protectors from them, and I think they actually... Michael got me a clear-cut set of Harlem plastics that I'm going to be using on a Space Rider Geiger build that I do for somebody. Oh, nice. Yeah, Upkick, they're good peoples. Hey, I'm trying to think. I don't really... I don't know that I'm not... You know, I don't think I'm... Well, technically, I can move the box of the Godzilla mod parts from my kitchen table to under the tree. There you go. Wrap it up. Wrap it up. Put my name on it. To Tommy from Taylor. I appreciate it. I have to go. I have to go get ready to go to my in-laws for Christmas Eve dinner. I'm going to go cook a ham so I can take it with me tomorrow because I work from 5 to 3. Because we're not closing early on Christmas Eve because people got to get drunk, you know. Well, hey, Merry Christmas, everybody. I hope everybody, you know, I hope everybody is healthy for the new year. Be safe out there. And yeah, Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, Tommy. Congratulations to you guys. I'm super psyched. And yeah, I can't, you know, I look forward to next year recording this, the Christmas special with a little crying baby in the background or a crying six month old, not a baby anymore. Yeah. Six months. I don't, I don't know. I might have to learn all the terms for all the, one of the girls last night was like, I'm a toddler. I'm not a baby. And I was like, Oh my bad. Okay. Sorry. Sorry. I guess if you could tell me that you're definitely not a baby. Good point. Good point. You're not a baby anymore. Yeah. Um, yeah, man. Well, have a merry Christmas. You too guys. Tell your parents. I said, hi, that's the same. I will do that. Tell your, Yeah, tell your dad I said hi. Tell your dad get a tent, and we'll talk about that later. Okay. But, yeah, Merry Christmas, everybody. And, yeah, Tommy, so I do think, like, hopefully this upcoming year, I was telling some friends recently, you know, I hope that you and I can get together and record more because you'll be home. So even if we do shorter episodes, we could be more frequent with them. Yeah, man, I'd love that. I'm looking forward to that. So let's try to do that. And so, yeah, everybody have a, you know, be safe out there. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year, because we are not going to record between now and then. Don't get too excited. But, yeah, hopefully in 2022, we can get out there. I will be able to get out there hopefully more. And, yeah, so I just hope everybody has like a good holiday. Same here, man. Thank you guys for listening for all these years. And we're not gone yet. We're going to keep going. We're not gone yet. All right, Tommy. man good to talk to you i will talk to you later yep later bye guys all right man bye Thank you.