Drink and Be Merry

[00:00:03] is a Bramble Jam Podcast. Hi, I'm Bran and pour one up for Christmas because I love the Christmas movies. I'm Dan and pour one up, pour one up for Christmas because I despise the Christmas movies. I'm Alonzo and the title is ironic. And this is the Deck The Hallmark Podcast. Oh! Deck The Hallmark, it's this podcast.

[00:00:34] Follow up. Friends host this podcast. Follow up. We hope you like this jolly podcast. Hello, everybody. Do we need a designated board draw? Yeah. The title is ironic, got Bran. Yeah. Bran was thinking we were all on board with drinking. This movie was a pro-drinking movie. That was my understanding.

[00:01:03] These people aren't Mary at all. Mary, did you know? For those of you that did see it, the movie Drink and Be Merry, I don't think it'll come as a surprise to any of you that Alonzo brought this movie to my attention. Can you believe it? I had no clue what this movie was told. I literally started watching it and immediately recognized Jefferson White from Yellowstone. Like, immediately. He's in Yellowstone. Ah, I wondered about that. I saw that he was in that and I figured he would.

[00:01:29] It saddled, no pun intended, with one of the worst plot lines in the history of that television program. Wow. And it saddled. And we, Justin Kirkland and I, when we did our, you know, long forgotten Yellowstone podcast, we would talk about it. John Donovan must die. John Donovan, pretty regularly we would talk about how mad we were about us giving more time to Jimmy. But it turns out the actor, it's not the actor's problem. It was the... No, not his fault. Not his fault. Not his fault. Yeah. Alonzo, how are you?

[00:01:57] Mary, almost half missed to you. Yes, we're getting there. I'm okay. I'm having a summer cold, which is not great. Nothing. Christmas spirit can't help. I, one will hope. Is that why you wrote a Get Off My Lawn review about Disclosure Day? No, I was feeling 100% when I wrote the Get Off My Lawn review. And I stand by it. We were trying to give you an out, Alonzo. No, no, no. I'll tell you. I'll tell you.

[00:02:27] More and more people are like, it's like this secret cabal of people texting me like, oh my God, I didn't like it either. Aren't you just ahead of your time, Alonzo? I'm just saying, we're not crazy. I will say this about that movie. That's not what this podcast is about. But when I finished the movie, which I did adore, I did feel like there were some legitimate things that would make people not like the movie when I left the theater. I did not feel that way about the opening sequence that you told Breakfast,

[00:02:57] the Christie about. I didn't get that feel it vibe at all that you clearly did. And you know, I'm giving you a hard time. Obviously you hate Steven Spielberg and you hate Chris Nolan. You hate America's greatest entertainers. Hey, look, I will take a bullet for Spielberg's West Side Story. West Side Story, yeah. Which is an unpopular take in many circles. It's my favorite movie musical I've ever seen in the theater. It's extraordinary. It's unbelievable. Yeah, it's unbelievable. Yeah. Yeah. We actually got our own files to disclose that just say Alonzo's wrong.

[00:03:26] So I'm happy to do that here. Don't worry. Brands are written in crayon. I'll print his guaranteed Odyssey pan next to his disclosure day pan and I'll get him framed is what I'll do. Look, I live in hope. I'm walking into the Odyssey being like, Nolan, you've dazzled me before. Let's bring that back. The only reason I can. Let's not have another tedious example of navel gazing for you.

[00:03:55] This is the only reason I can make these jokes is because I know you're a professional who would never do this. You know that. Well, hopefully you two can come to a closer agreement on Drink and Be Merry. We want to find out. That's exactly right. Let's talk about it. It premiered at all sorts of film festivals in 2025, but the first. They got the exclusive at the Brooklyn Film Festival June 2nd, 2025. They got it first.

[00:04:23] Just daggummit. Smod, Smod Castle Film Festival a month later was like, wait, what? Smod Castle, Kevin Smith stuff. It is. Yeah. Smod Castle. Yeah. And it went a little something like this. Here's the song this time that you've been looking for. Chet is busy working at his bar, talking with a couple of regulars who are complaining about kids these days. Am I right?

[00:04:47] Chet is flipping the channels on the TV when he sees an episode of a TV show that was filmed at the bar, talking about how cool it was. How the lead, Dan, wanted to give him a couple lines. That's right. Because he really thought that he had promise back there, and he hasn't forgotten about it. The regulars, though, they're not impressed by this. A couple of women come into the bar. They are like, oh, slow night, huh? Well, we'll have a mojito.

[00:05:16] And he's like, can't do that. Yeah. No, thanks. I don't have what I need. And they're like, okay, well, a couple of vodka. Do vodka. Do soda. Do ice. And we'll go with that. Chet is pumped, though, because he has wanted to turn this bar around for a while. And he thinks that the key to do that is younger people in the bar. But the bar regulars, they're not making it easy on them. The ladies are named Maeve and Miranda.

[00:05:45] And while Miranda is in the restroom, Chet shoots his shot. Talking about whole more Christmas movies. Heck yeah. My guy. And surprisingly gets Maeve's number. They leave, and Chet ends up having quite the night of his own, thanks to these regulars. It's a full-time job with these guys. You know what I mean? After shutting down for the night, Maeve ends up coming back, and she tells him, hey, I gave you a fake number.

[00:06:14] But I thought maybe we could keep talking. And they end up going back to his place. And the next morning, she starts looking around his room and is concerned, I guess. It reminds her of her high school boyfriend's bedroom. And she's like, I don't care. But most women would leave the minute that they see your room. He goes to sleep. He has a weird dream. He wakes up, and she's gone.

[00:06:43] Turns out, she left a note letting him know that she was engaged, and this was a little bit of a whoopsie. To make matters worse, the other guy, the other guy, the engager, engagee. The fiance? Fiance. Yes. The engagee, as we call them. That's something that I'm pushing for. Common parlance here in America is engagee. Engagee. Thank you, Dan. And I appreciate that. Chet shows up and doesn't punch him.

[00:07:12] They just kind of talk for a while. He ends up getting pretty drunk. Chet goes home to spend Christmas with his mom, and she gives him a book about acting and encourages him to go for it. So he goes back to the bar to talk to the regulars and decides that he's not going to live life afraid anymore. I'm not afraid anymore. I'm not afraid anymore. And the movie ends with him pouring one more beer, but this time walking away.

[00:07:41] And that, my friends, was drink and be merry. We did do it. Let's take a break. We will come back, and we will break this movie down some more here on Deck the Hallmark. I don't know if you guys can hear that outside, but they're doing a lot out there. They're doing a lot out there right now.

[00:08:09] This is a real Alonzo getting his trash picked up situation. It's a big garbage. Look, and also, we're lucky because literally the apartment next door to us is getting new floors installed. Oh, my gosh. So this weekend, not only have I been having to deal with the summer cold, but every single time I've tried to, like, lie down and wrestle. Oh, my goodness. Yes. So, you know, you've got to just take it as a care. And that's why you don't want to get on Spielberg's bad side. He will send the workers.

[00:08:37] That truck does say Amblin on the side. It does say it. It's Amblin's floor services. Ours is just the corporate park that we're in here. They're paving the parking lot. They're paving the parking lot. It's a massive... Even though the parking lot was new. It was new. The building was new, but they're paving it. Paving the parking lot. We got that notification last night. So there's that. Sometimes you got to do it again. They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum. You said it. Uh-huh. All right. Let's get to our thoughts. I got the reference. I got it, too. Okay.

[00:09:07] Let's hot take it. Let's hot take it. Alonzo, what did you think of Drink and Be Merry? I liked this quite a bit. You know, it is... This is a shape of an indie film that we know pretty well. It's funny. Dan mentioned Kevin Smith earlier. Like, he had access to a convenience store, you know, when he made Clerks. Clearly, they had access to this bar. Like, what can we do with this bar? And, you know, they get a lot out of the location.

[00:09:33] And I think they use it as a way to sort of give us this character who is sort of at a crossroads, who is kind of stalled out in life. You know, the fact that his childhood bedroom still looks like his childhood bedroom. You know, it's one thing to live with your mom. It's another thing to, like, not have taken down the stuff that you put on the wall when you were in high school. All of that, I think, is communicated really well. I think the performances are all really good. I was not familiar with Jefferson White before this, but I think he anchors the film really nicely.

[00:10:02] That's Siobhan Fallon Hogan as his mom from SNL. Oh, Men in Black. Yeah, Men in Black. Edgar. Edgar Suit. Yeah. Yes. You know, I thought... Griffin Newman, by the way, plays Tony. I don't know if you guys know. He is one of the hosts of the very popular Blank Check podcast. Oh, okay. And he was also Arthur, the sidekick, in the live-action version of The Tick. Wow, I didn't see that. But I do know the Blank Check podcast. Yeah.

[00:10:29] So anyway, yeah, I think a strong ensemble. It is not overplaying its hand. It is giving you enough Christmas stuff and talking about Christmas and using it as a way to bring these characters to a reckoning, which I think is a thing that you can do in these movies. Very often where people are like, well, why does it have to be Christmas? And I think there is something about the Christmas season that, you know, it's toward the end of the year. It's a time of reflection.

[00:10:57] It's a time of maybe seeing people you don't usually see and making decisions about your life. And all of that worked for me. So, yeah, I think in a very low-key way, this movie absolutely does what it sets out to do. I don't disagree, Alonso. I quite enjoyed this movie overall. You know, I was intrigued by the love story angle of it. I don't know if you noticed I like Hallmark Christmas movies. So that spoke to me immediately. But the bar itself was fantastic. Decorated, lovely.

[00:11:26] The music throughout this movie was the perfect vibe for this. And, yeah, the performances were fantastic. The regulars, specifically the two that are there to start the movie and end the movie, were hilarious and awesome. And his back and forth with them was great. And, you know, you feel this. It's something that I think everybody has ever lived, has felt.

[00:11:50] This feeling of, I feel maybe stuck and there's a thing I want to do, but I can't do it. And they spend just the right amount of time kind of with that storyline, the acting, the fact that the show seems to always be on TV was funny. So, yeah, this movie really worked for me. I really liked it. Dano? Yeah, I echo the sound of that echo. I really, really enjoyed this movie. It's kind of like a minor chord. It's not like trying to do some major thing.

[00:12:19] But for its characters, it is major. And so, for me, it really worked. I think the bar is a character. It's so incredibly homey. The way alcohol is a character in this movie, the shots of all of the different drinks that are poured have this crazy effect where they look incredibly enticing at the beginning of the movie. At the end of the movie, they look sickly, and maybe that was just me.

[00:12:42] As he changes and as you see what happens, and the director does a great job of showcasing a similar shot, but after you're watching a story, it kind of turns your stomach. And it's very, very successful in that regard. Jefferson White, who is really good in an unfortunate, sometimes unfortunate plot line in Yellowstone, is really excellent in this movie. I think he has a scene where he eats a plate of cookies and cries in silence, and it's great.

[00:13:12] Like, really, really good. And so, you know, for a... I was like, how'd they get that footage of me? Am I right? I kept waiting for him to throw up, and I was going to be like, oh, it's the Bran story. It's Bran. It's Puke Face. I will say, unfortunately, unlike me, I wasn't able to get away from the... You could hear it when I did it. They were able to stop recording or edit it out, and I wish! I wish!

[00:13:38] I just think that there's a lot to be said for anyone in the stage of Arrested Development who is just kind of spinning and going through the motions and have a lot of things represented, you know, in that process for this character, where the other characters have kind of gotten over the hump of that, but not in a good way. They've just basically rolled over and decided that it's not Arrested Development. It's just development by... Like, development's gone. It's done. It's not happening. I'm not going to progress anymore.

[00:14:07] That's right. And so there's a little bit of symbolism of it being about something bigger, about how it's probably important that we all progress and look forward. I always laugh when people show me, like, clips of presidents from 30 or 40 years ago saying something that, you know, one political party now thinks is still okay. And I'm like, yeah, that's what progressivism means. That's what it means to move forward.

[00:14:31] And so this movie, I think, if it ever gets bigger than the Jefferson White character and the guys that attend the bar, it is to tell you that, like, it's very easy to just kind of go from Arrested Development to not trying to just, this is what it is. And I love that about the movie. And I think the performances are great. And, yeah, I don't know if I'll, like, watch it every year. But I really, I think it's a great type of Christmas movie that we don't, around here at Deck the Hallmark, don't see nearly enough of. So I was here for it. Let's get to the feels.

[00:15:00] This is where we talk about what this movie gave us feels. We'll start with you, Alonzo. Yeah. Dave White was kind of walking in and out of the room. He goes, ooh, this is sad. I think I want to see this. Yeah. He may actually give it a whirl come December, which is, you know, high praise indeed. I'm going to put on my film critic hat for a second because Dan touched on something that I had forgotten about. But it's true. The way that the drinks do go from enticing to, like, sort of off-putting.

[00:15:25] There's a thing in film theory called the Kuleshov effect that dates back to, like, Russian silent cinema. And it's the idea that you could film somebody with a passive expression on their face. And what the experiment was, they had, like, somebody with a very neutral expression. And then they cut to a plate of food and then back to the face. And then they cut to a child playing and then back to the face. And then they cut to, like, a body in a coffin and then back to the face.

[00:15:55] And people would ascribe emotions based on the thing that the face appeared next to, even though the face never moved. Yeah. That's awesome. And so, yeah. So sometimes the thing itself doesn't change, but our context for it does. And that's why we look at it differently. And, yeah, I think this movie is doing that. So, yeah, this is a cinematic film, but at the same time, it is very theatrical. Like, there's a lot of really good monologues in this movie. Yeah.

[00:16:25] The, you know, the Tony's big monologue, which you think is going to be him coming in and starting a fight and instead just sort of, like, acknowledging the disaster that is this relationship and that he's going to get married anyway. The guy who comes in and talks about, like, his sort of forbidden romance that he feels uncomfortable about. The mom at the end kind of giving him the pep talk that he needs. Like, just moments like that. And I think in a film like this, it could very easily sort of grind to a halt while the actor does their thing. Yeah.

[00:16:54] But it all feels integrated into this story, into this very sort of small, granular kind of, you know, 48-hour, 24-hour, whatever long period this is for these characters. And, yeah, I think it carries that stuff off really effectively. Of course, I felt a bit of a kinship with Chet when he brought up Hallmark Christmas movies. Something that we don't get. I don't know if we've ever seen. I mean, I'm sure we've seen it a couple times.

[00:17:23] They're occasionally referenced, but not nearly enough. Mentioning by name Hallmark Christmas movies is always a fun treat and really enjoy that conversation. But also, Alonzo, you and I, we both share an affinity of, like, a slow TV, like this, like, just vibe-centric thing that you can put on your screen. And at the end of this movie, we have this shot looking up at the bar. Lights are all over the place. It's a Wonderful Life is on, but you can't hear the movie.

[00:17:53] Music is just playing over top of it. And that is all that I want. I just want, like, that vibe. I want, like, hours of it. Put it on my TV. Get me in the Christmas feels. Like, that was beautiful. It was beautifully shot, but also it just felt great. And I loved it. I need that. Dano? There's a Netflix short that was actually nominated last year called The Singers. Alonzo, did you see The Singers? I did not. Okay.

[00:18:20] I've been trying to get other people to watch this movie ever since I saw it. And it's, like, 20 minutes long. And I literally, in the first 15 minutes of Drinking Me, Mary, had to look up The Singers on my phone because I swore it was the same bar. It isn't. Very similar. What I will say, this is an excuse to talk about The Singers, which I just think everyone needs to go see. The Singers is the photo negative of this movie.

[00:18:46] It is the what good can, what are the good things that can be found from male camaraderie in a bar? Like, what can be found from community and a safe space and going through things together? So, like, if this movie's like, man, this is depressing and alcohol is ruining everything and, like, all of that, yes, we get it. Well, well taken.

[00:19:11] 17-minute long, The Singers on Netflix was nominated for Academy Award for Best Short Film Live Action. This movie reminded in its aesthetic, reminded me of that movie, even though it's not a Christmas movie. But I just need people to go and watch it. I need people to watch this so I can have someone to talk about how moving it is. So, yeah, please go see The Singers on Netflix. It'll take 17 minutes of your time. Shot chaser is what you're saying. Yes.

[00:19:39] Yeah, especially if you watch this first and you're like, man, like, I was moved to tears. You know, short films, moving you to tears in 15 minutes is doing something. I was moved to tears by The Singers is excellent. Wow. Okay. But when I sing to you, you tell me to stop. Well, it gets weird, Bran, because you're right next to my face. But I say, you like the singer, like me. I love the singer. Let's take a break. We'll come back.

[00:20:08] We will get to the way what and the what the hallmark here on. The hallmark. Hi, everybody. Welcome back. We're talking about drink and be merry today. Let's get to the way what. This is where we're talking about what in this crazy, wacky flack made us go. Wait, wait, what? I'll start with you, Alonzo. Yeah, not a ton for this one.

[00:20:33] There was one moment where I thought that the bar TV was showing. It's a wonderful life out of order. But it is entirely possible they just changed channels and it was on another channel. Yeah. Because that was certainly what my childhood was. When that movie was in full public domain, you could just show it any old place.

[00:20:54] This is the thing that, Brandon, you left out of the synopsis where after Maeve gives him her number, which turns out to be fake, she goes to the restroom and Miranda comes out and Miranda tells him, do yourself a favor. Throw that number away. You don't want any part of this. She doesn't want any part of this. And of course, obviously, it's that thing where if she just said she's in game. That's right. Yeah. You know, instead they make us think that Miranda is a bad person. Exactly.

[00:21:22] Or that there's some, you know, other thing happening with Maeve that is trouble. But yeah, like that was a wee bit contrived. She told him just enough to intrigue him. That's right. Just enough to be like, I definitely would love to hear more. Yes. Trouble, you say. Interesting. When they come in, Maeve and Miranda, they. I, they weren't.

[00:21:47] They seemed pretty okay with the setup, which is a bar pretty empty. Two guys at the bar. That's right. And this one guy behind the. I like. Why? How did they get to that specific bar? Like, it just seemed like so crazy. Like they're on their way to a Christmas party. Let's stop at this bar. I would have opened the door. Looked in and gone. Let's try another. Maybe not this one.

[00:22:13] But they go fully in and they go, you know what? Let's sit down. Which I, I, I am not even a single woman and I would have been sketched out by this place. Like they, they were really going for it that night. And that, you know, they already had some drinks. I guess maybe that played into it. But reckless. Throwing caution to the wind. And then they would think this bar would have living mint in it. You know. Well, that was my what the hallmark. But like what parts of a mojito does he not have? Well, like a mint.

[00:22:42] Mint would be the one that I would give him. Yeah. Like I, you know, the rest of that, I feel like every bar. Yeah. I think that, I think the bit was he doesn't know how to make cocktails. Yes. Right. This is not a cocktail crowd. Correct. He just doesn't know what's in a mojito. That's right. So he doesn't. And what's the thing with the. The muddler. Right. The muddler. Thank you. But I, like he doesn't know how to make cocktails. I thought was like, he's not a mixologist. Yeah. Like he's definitely serving some rum and Cokes or some things like that. Sure.

[00:23:12] You know, a mojito is like what? Four. Like it's mint, a muddler, simple syrup, lime and rum. Like you think this bar has simple syrup in it? Yeah. Let alone the lime. This was a. Well, that's where that, I guess that is my actual question. I saw a bar with a lot of bottles. If this is three taps, a bunch of cans of PBR and bourbon on the counter. All right. We're going to Deadwood. That's fine. This bar at least looks as though like they have things to service drinkers.

[00:23:40] Well, like, you know, for that matter, it's called the witch and ale. Whatever. Yeah. Is there any food being served in that place? Is there a witch to be found anywhere? That's crazy. No, there's actually just an actual witch in the back. And she kind of like helps. La Bufana is, you know, in the ladies room with the towels. Now, I think maybe that's part of the thing of the like, maybe when the uncle ran this place and it was a neighborhood joint, you know, they had all the bottles and they could make you whatever you wanted.

[00:24:08] And he sort of inherited the what's left of this place, which is, yeah, all the bottles will show there. But nobody, you know, nobody ever orders the amaretto or whatever the things that are lining the back wall. And somebody's making him go into work. He's like his mom references like that guy's making some like some dude we don't meet. Right. Is actually in charge of it ahead of him. And he's making him work Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Right. I don't remember. I don't know who that is. That was my. I think maybe the I think maybe the uncle is like retired. OK.

[00:24:38] I got you. Chet is like my understanding was Chet's basically running the place, but he still kind of has to middle management still play by like this is what they've always done. Got to play by the rules. Yeah. Dana. My only other one is, is that I I appreciate how hard they went on. Look at Chet's bedroom. I also think it's a click away from a horror movie. Like, I don't know how many high school boys rooms have the bottom half of dentures like up on a man.

[00:25:06] Like, like I know I was a high school boy. My room was a train wreck and it probably had less wall coverage than what Chet has in the movie. But some of the stuff in there is just top 10 signs. You're an axe murderer. Like it's not a mask. Yeah. The monkey mask. The bottom. The main is that the maxilla or the mandible? It just one half of a jaw is sitting there. And I was like, we need to go this hard.

[00:25:33] When you see random shelving and a Pulp Fiction poster, we get it. Like we all understand. We understand you've not grown up. We understand it. Did I have a Batman and Robin poster up in my room as a kid? Yeah, man. Because I thought Alicia Silverstone was awesome. And I was like, happy pride month, everybody. Yeah, I'm here to help. I'm trying my best. You're an ally, man. Yeah, thank you. No, no, no. That's why I told that story.

[00:26:05] And so I just thought it was overkill. I see it in your notes. That this guy. That's right. Yeah, yeah. That this guy had just a mandible. And I just like the monkey paw, that movie. Whoever did that. Like there are some things going on in this guy's bedroom. You want to talk about going to the bar and being skeeved out. You walk into this bedroom. You're walking the other way. 100%. You are walking the other way. And then what movie was that? The Brad Pitt movie that looked like it was in Chinese or Japanese. What movie was this? It was a Brad Pitt right behind his bed.

[00:26:34] Oh, oh, oh. God, I forget. It wasn't seven years in Tibet, was it? No, but he wasn't a suit, but he looked like he was an action movie. Is that Bullet Train? That would have been way too soon for that. Yeah. Maybe it was seven. Maybe it was seven, yeah. Could have been seven. That's why I'm going with seven. There you go. Yeah, fair enough. Let's get to what the Hallmark questions that we still have that we would like some answers to. I'll start with you, Alonzo.

[00:27:00] I, for one, would watch a whole movie about the impending nuptials of Maeve and Tony. Yeah. Because those two are a train wreck. The fact that they both cheated on each other and are sort of like resigned to being stuck together because the families are already bonded. It's like, oh man, let's sort through this debris. I need to know more. I don't want to beat you up. I just kind of want to chat. I just want to come to you. I just want to chat with you.

[00:27:29] What a funny, like the way that scene unfolded was real funny. Yeah. They did a great job with it. Um, I'll keep going down the, uh, the witch road, uh, which is running this bar and, um, the TV, you mentioned the TV, Alonzo, but like, it's a wonderful life is shown all out of order or on every net channel. The bar, the TV show that the bar is in is on all the time on the scene where the bar is

[00:27:57] like where it's like on a loop. I, I am, I think that there's something shady going on with this TV. I think the witch is up to something. The witch is up to something. It's a, it's a very specific witch that only wants you to watch, uh, two things. Yes. It's a wonderful life and a specific scene from a TV show and soccer. And soccer. Of course. One of those, communist soccer. Of course. That's my theory on what's going on there. Dana.

[00:28:24] I mean, we did mine already, but I will say I, this may be just, it is, it's my naivete in South Carolina. If you run a bar, you have to serve food. It's required. You can't just, you can't be a place that just serves beer and wine and liquor. You have to serve some sort of food. It's required. I don't know if they think that that's like just more moral. I don't know. But like, that's, that's the rule. You won't get as drunk as you eat. Are we talking like big jar of pickled eggs? Yeah.

[00:28:50] Well, they'll do a lot of like breweries would have a, at like a, a handheld menu and it would literally be like, there are four options and it's like pretzels. And it's like, it's very, very basic, but it has to meet a certain criteria of food is being made in the facility. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So like you have to be heating up a pretzel or whatever. And so like, I guess. So a rack of like golden flake potato chips will not do. No, no. You have to have a kitchen. You have to have an action. Did you know this? I did not know this. I'm trying to, yeah.

[00:29:19] So you got me thinking when breweries started to do tastings and it was a bit like South Carolina still had many bottles and no free pour 20 years ago. So like we had blue laws where you couldn't do anything. It was like South Carolina is just so behind the times, but you know, when breweries started to become a really big thing, they would give tours in the South Carolina, you couldn't do tasting. And so what happened was breweries started to have a place where you could sit and do tastings and they had to offer you a little menu, this tiny little, and they were just

[00:29:47] basic like toast points with pimento cheese and just, and so I don't have to eat to order drinks though. No, you do not. They just have to offer it. You have to offer it. That's right. And so I like, I guess a lot of bars in New York don't offer food of any kind, I guess. I don't know. Yeah, no, I, this is, this is all new, a new concept to me. I think in a lot of places in the country you can just serve alcohol and that's perfectly fine. Yeah. Do you think man? Unbelievable.

[00:30:18] How do they sleep at night? Have they read the Bible where there's always alcohol and food together? That's right. You gotta, you know, you gotta have something to soak it up, Dan. Yeah. It's to soak it up. But I mean, like, I mean, when I was 23, you could not go anywhere in South Carolina to a bar and get someone to grab a full size, like whiskey and pour you. It was all like, if you wanted a shot of whiskey, you had to have a whole mini bottle, which was more than a shot. Like that. Isn't that crazy?

[00:30:45] And then the mini bottle, it was not a union, but the mini bottle, like lobbyists fought and paid money to South Carolina lawmakers to keep free pour out of, out of our bars. Of course they did. Yeah. The Southwest Airlines single-handedly made sure that there would never be a Dallas to Houston train line. Yeah. Like I, like it, it was, I remember being at a restaurant in like being out of college in right by the university of South Carolina and having the mini bar league take over the

[00:31:14] restaurant as their like meeting place to talk about their next steps as to how to make sure that we kept mini bottles. And I'm like, this is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. It's so stupid. What are they going to take from us next? Hotel refrigerators? Unbelievable. Well, we did it everybody. Congratulations to us. Next week, we're heading from the bar to a different bar. It's Nashville. We're heading to Nashville. We're raising the bar. We're raising the bar.

[00:31:43] Nashville for music city mistletoe. All right. Okay. So we'll see what that's all about. Come on back for that. It's going to be fun. I hope. Until then, we're the first to wish you a Merry Christmas. Deck The Hallmark is a Bramble Jam podcast produced by Brandon Gray. And yeah, that Greenville, South Carolina for more information on the show. You can go to deckthehallmark.com or follow us on the socials at Deck the Hallmark. Leave us a five-star rating and review. Helps others find the show and help to support the show financially. You head over to bramblejamplus.com.

[00:32:10] Find the best corner of the internet, ad-free podcasting, live video watch-alongs, movie chats, and so much more. That's bramblejamplus.com. That was nice. Thanks, man. Really in a rhythm right now. You're about to hear some ads that help keep the lights on here in the old studio. Thanks for listening or don't listen. It's really up to you at this point. It's at the end of the show. I mean, you're listening to me. Hi. But here they come. I promise they're coming. Yep.

[00:32:40] Here they are. Happy day.