What's The Worst Airport Experience? (From Good Mythical MORE)

0:00Rhett McLaughlin: Does anything good ever happen at the airport?

0:06Link Neal: Welcome to Good Mythical More.

0:08Rhett McLaughlin: Since you put that over there, your mug was here, and I just felt the need to balance you out. Symmetry. And now we have like a new, a secondary mug placement for Good Mythical More.

0:20Link Neal: Well, I believe, my friend, that that might be the primary mug placement from the early years. I think that we used to put, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. We used to put our mugs directly in front of us. Well, the desk ended here, first of all.

0:33Rhett McLaughlin: Right, and it was the edge of the desk. It would've been floating. Yeah, it was in between us because there was no, nothing, but then I started putting it right on the edge and it drove people nuts. And then we made the, I mean, there's so much more.

0:45Link Neal: The desk goes 17 feet in each direction. So much more. You can slide it, you would never know. Okay, what we're gonna do.

0:51Rhett McLaughlin: I think you could lay down a dead coyote over there and not see.

0:53Link Neal: There is one. We have a task before us to generate the perfect trip to the airport, but it has to consist of four bad things and three good things, because an airport trip's always a little bit worse than it is good.

1:11Rhett McLaughlin: Yeah, even in a perfect scenario. And then we're gonna transfer those over. And we can move things back and forth so we don't have to be committal to it. When we're traveling, we should delineate a couple of things. If you don't travel a lot, oh no! All right, Blaine. I don't know what happened, but it could be disaster. When you don't travel a lot, maybe when you're traveling it's just for vacation. It's just to go to like a nice little place or something. And then it's all in a positive light, like the Bahamas. But when you start to travel more to just get back to your birthplace, your secondary family, I guess you'd call them, North Carolina, or for business, you start traveling more, you start getting real prickly.

2:08Rhett McLaughlin: That's where we are. Prickly. So forgive us, because we're not really on vacation in this scenario.

2:15Link Neal: Let's run through the good ones just very quickly to go through everything. Upgraded from Coach. This is great. because you did not expect it. That is awesome. This could make your entire week. Super close gate in a giant airport, that's good, but there's an aquarium. Is there an aquarium? Where is the aquarium? Like in the airport? Are we talking about Singapore? I've never seen an aquarium in the airport. Singapore got like a, I mean, like. I watched a movie about Singapore and I was like, I gotta go. To the airport. To the airport. And just come back. Let's me and you go to the Singapore airport.

2:51Link Neal: They're real strict, though. Like, you can't even chew gum. They banned chewing gum. I don't know if it's okay now, but they banned chewing gum. Like, you gotta watch out in Singapore. Because their punishments are off the charts. Nasty.

3:04Rhett McLaughlin: I don't know. Caning? I don't know. I don't know what they do. Right there in the airport, you see people get caned? Yeah, right. For chewing gum? And they're still chewing it. That's the funny part. Keep chewing that gum so they'll know why we're caning you. Yeah, right. Chew, get caned.

3:18Link Neal: Okay, take bump for money. This is basically when they've overbooked... I was recently in an airport, and this happened, and I was actually... I was pretty close to the desk so I could see all this go down, and they came on the thing, and they were like, we've overbooked the aircraft. We are giving away$500 vouchers, and a guy turned to everybody. He was like, don't go for$500. He was like, hold out, and then they sat there, and they went$500,$800,$1 ,000. He was the ringleader. He said, we gotta get to 1 ,200. So this is like a post-apocalyptic leader. And then somebody came in at like 1 ,000 and he like gave him a stink eye.

4:05Rhett McLaughlin: Because he, was he thinking he would be the one? And what was his number? 1 ,200. He said that? Yeah. He said, wait.

4:12Link Neal: He rallied the crowd. It was beautiful. But, I mean, if you've got that guy in your crowd, this is a good one. Lounge access, I mean, it can be, you know what? The lounge is, I will say, we fly so much at this point that we have the lounge access, and I will say that the free food is, and sometimes it's real good. Sometimes it's not great, but if they've got lunch out there, you can get some good stuff. And I mean, you can get drunk in there for free too.

4:47Rhett McLaughlin: Yeah. Alcoholic beverages for free. But I don't do that because the headaches. And I'm old. I get coffee and I get like, I get some nice, I get a chia pudding.

5:01Link Neal: Oh, oh you know what I've been doing lately? I told you about this. I'm taking the oatmeal and putting the yogurt in the oatmeal.

5:11Link Neal: What do you call that? I call it yoke meal.

5:15Rhett McLaughlin: Oh yeah, I remember you telling me about that. I invented something, I just remembered it, and I want to tell you about it. Okay. Oh my god, dude. I go downstairs.

5:27Link Neal: I can tell, something deep happened. I go downstairs for a midnight snack, okay?

5:35Rhett McLaughlin: and there hasn't been cereal in my house because I've been trying to get off the cereal and I did that, but then all of a sudden I look in the back of the thing and somebody has brought in Cheerios. Honey Nut, of course. Yeah, and so I didn't go down there looking for cereal and then I find it and I'm ecstatic and I'm like, yes, but I don't want to go back to the old me so I've got to invent something. You put them in yogurt, didn't you? So what I did was I made my bowl of honey nut Cheerios, and then I went into the fridge, and I said, I need some protein in this, and I took out a big dollop of cottage cheese, the best cheese that ever existed, and I slammed it down there in the middle, and then once I did that, I was like, mm, and then I went and I grabbed a little honey.

6:27Rhett McLaughlin: Did you make a ball, like a cottage ball? It was a cottage cheese. No, I just dolloped it right in the middle, and then all of the Cheerios just go around it like, whee! And then I drizzled more honey on the top because I just felt like I needed that, and I call it rough sex.

6:47Rhett McLaughlin: Okay, well, help us understand that. Explain why. Because the next day I was like, had some rough sex last night. I like saying things like that.

7:01Link Neal: You know? It was also, you could say something untrue the next day? Yeah. Like, I had a little rough sex. I had rough sex, that's like, oh, you did, yeah, but you want to tell me what it is? It's Cheerios with cottage cheese.

7:16Rhett McLaughlin: It's the best. What brand cottage cheese do you eat? Good culture. It's the white and light blue. The good culture, that stuff is so, I'm with you on it.

7:26Link Neal: It's perfect. Now, I'm gonna call out somebody here, just because I feel like I have to, because this is serendipitous. I don't know if it'll still be up when this episode goes to air, and I don't know if it is right now. But if you, my nephew is newish in town, and if you go to the Good Culture website, he is the model eating the Good Culture on the website. That is hilarious, dude. And the funny thing is, is he was living with us at the time that he got this gig, and he hates cottage cheese. So he was eating it. He had to eat it all day. He had to eat it all day. But he did a really good job of seeming like he was having the time of his life.

8:13Rhett McLaughlin: He's an actor. Yeah. I wouldn't have had to act. Come on, good culture. Don't employ Rhett's family members. Employ me. Yeah, rough sex. I'll give you some rough sex. I know you want it. It seems like we're gravitating towards these. We definitely feel like those two are great. Run into a cherished friend. Uh-uh. I don't care about you. Uh-uh. I don't want to connect with anybody at the airport.

8:36Link Neal: Running into somebody at the airport is like, you might as well have not run into them. That's how I feel about it. It has happened, though. And then they're really happy. Because you're getting me at my worst. And I'm not happy. You know what I'm saying? After a night of rough sex at Link's house. curbside car service. Who's had that? I just gotta say, I have met people, and I meet fans more often than I meet cherished friends at the airport, and I gotta say, I think I do a pretty good job of seeming happy, but just so you know, I'm not. He's not. I'm not either, that's why I'm wearing sunglasses, a hood, I'm in complete disguise.

9:14Link Neal: Drawing no tension to yourself whatsoever. Curbside car service is, that is wonderful. Meet the pilot, get wings.

9:23Rhett McLaughlin: Meet a pilot, get wings, you know? I mean. And if you fly with your cat, Jenna. Yeah. What? They gave him his wings. They saw him come on the flight with me and asked, and I was like, yeah, it's his first flight, and then they gave me a pair of wings for him that's on his carrier. And then he ate them. Would you, would you, I don't think I'm putting that out.

9:49Link Neal: over there for me, but... No. This... Jenna would. I would say that not having a line is so, like, like, I can feel the cortisol leaving my body. I don't think that's how it works. But I can feel it going down whenever I look and I see that security is light and easy. It makes me feel so good. And I'm also... When I get in there and I see that there's no line, I'm like, everything's gonna be okay.

10:16Rhett McLaughlin: I got another story for you. Okay, well, that's what this is for. I'm just full of it today. I was in North Carolina over the vacation because my mom had a medical issue and I went home to take care of my mama.

10:32Link Neal: Like a good son.

10:33Rhett McLaughlin: Yeah, because I'm the only one. No other options. I was looking. Right. I'm still open, you know. But anyway, I was happy to take care of my mama. But that meant when I went back to the airport, my flight was at like 6 p.m.

10:49Link Neal: Yeah, that late flight out of RDU, that's a nice flight.

10:51Rhett McLaughlin: It was a direct flight. So I had all day, and I texted Christy, and I said, my flight boards in 30 minutes. I am currently in a record store in downtown Raleigh. And she was like, oh, my God. And she's, like, getting all upset, and I was like, no, hold on, don't get upset. I'm bragging. and she got mad and she didn't talk to me.

11:22Link Neal: Oh, and then I found out about this through my wife, because Christy texted Jesse and then told me. Link's at a record store. He's only got 30 minutes to board.

11:32Rhett McLaughlin: Not before the plane takes off. That's another 35 minutes. You know, it's like, I don't wanna go to the movies and watch the trailers. I wanna sit down and boom, the movie starts. Now that never happens, because I don't go to the movies by myself, but I'm driving to the airport by myself and I'm like, yes, I'm gonna do the perfect boarding situation. I'm gonna shop for some records right up until 30 minutes, and I'm gonna get in the car, and I'm gonna drive there. This is insanity, by the way. And then I'm like, oh, yeah, I gotta put gas in the car because it's a rental, so I do that. Then I go, and I go to the...

12:05Rhett McLaughlin: I would have skipped that. I go to the shuttle. Because all you have to do is pay a little extra in that situation. I go to the shuttle, and the shuttle's waiting right there. I get up and get on the shuttle. I'm like, whew, now we're back. and then the woman's like... You didn't have a checker bag. I didn't have to check a bag. The woman's like, the driver, she says, I can't leave yet, we gotta wait for some more people. And then we go to the first stop and she's dropping those people off. Terminal one. And then the shuttle knocks off. Good, good, good, I'm glad. I'm glad, you deserve this. I texted Christy, I'm like, I'm at terminal one, I need to be at terminal two, the shuttle has knocked off.

12:44Rhett McLaughlin: Cranked it back up. goes on around Terminal 2. I get off. I take my luggage. I walk right up there. Go to the clear line. Because I'm like, now I've got to use my advantages. So I go in the clear line, and they're like, we need your license. Yep. It's like, hold on, you don't need my license. That's the point. You have to update it. So I'm giving them the license. They're like putting it in the system. Updating stuff.

13:12Link Neal: Taking a new picture of me. Can you tell me what time it was as it relates to your flight? Because that would be pertinent information.

13:19Rhett McLaughlin: It was, now it was past the 30 minutes. It was boarding time when I'm getting my license. I would have thought it would have been past boarding time. Somehow it wasn't. And then I go through there. They find illicit paraphernalia, and they have to pat me down. No, they didn't have to do that, because I don't carry that. I go through security. I put all my stuff back together. And then I go around. Should I get a coffee? Should I pee? And then I say, no, I'm running late. So then I go, and they hadn't started boarding. Fail. They delayed boarding, and then I had to wait there for four minutes before they started boarding.

14:11Rhett McLaughlin: and then I bored it. You ever heard of reading a book? I mean, like, so it was so close to being successful. You would have been going nuts, dude. Well, here's the thing. You would have hated it.

14:22Link Neal: You can do that at RDU. It felt so good. The last time that Jessie and I went to RDU, I was like, we can leave at so-and-so, and she was like, that's only gonna put us at the airport an hour and a half early. Are you sure you're okay? I was like, yeah, and then we still, At RDU, on that night flight, you've got time. If you get there an hour, and we had the dogs. So we had the dogs, which you have to go to the counter. You have to pay for each dog. Right. They have to, like, you know, and they screw it up every time where they're like, you got two dogs? Oh, two dogs? There's some math to be done.

15:00Link Neal: Even with that, and it was still, like, we still went to the lounge and, like, ate. So RDU can do that. You can't LAX? I don't play that game.

15:08Rhett McLaughlin: Okay, so those are our three good ones. You want, but this is the one that I would want. So it's like, we're a little, we're gonna have to hash this out because I want curbside. I don't care about the lines. That's my whole point of my story. But I'll give it to you. You would have left me, obviously. You would have been like, oh, you're going record shopping? I'm going to the airport. Of course, yeah. I think we might can start doing that.

15:32Link Neal: I would be happy to leave you. I'd be happy to be left. Okay, all right. All right, now we have in quick succession to pick four bad things. We've got aggressive indoor birds. I actually like, that's good. I get pictures of them. No coffee available, that's gonna be a big, big problem. And are we talking no coffee available on the plane? Or are we talking no coffee available like you get there and are we talking just no coffee available altogether? It doesn't matter, I can't choose that one. Okay, so that is not gonna happen.

16:03Rhett McLaughlin: Aggressive birds. We're choosing the best of the worst, so we like aggressive birds. because what's the worst that can happen? Lose an eye? Pulled to secondary screening.

16:10Link Neal: I don't mind this because I think I've told you this before on the show. The percentage of TSA workers who are mythical beasts is astounding. I don't know what happened if there was a conference and they showed us. I don't know, but I would say we're talking a 50 % hit rate here, so I've been patted down by mythical beasts so many times at this point, and I enjoy it.

16:33Rhett McLaughlin: You know when they do the inside of the leg, and then they're like, they're going like, like, let's say this is your leg. Yeah. That's what it looks like. And this is your crotch. So they go here, and then they go up there on either side. Like this... I got quite a thigh gap. This is your... This is your junk. This is your junk right here. This is your leg, and that's your leg. They go in here, and they do that. Yeah. They're going up there, and I mean... Hold on, you're gonna turn me on. Watch out. The ball... I mean, literally, the back of their hand is hitting the side of the sack. Well, yeah, because that's where you stick the contraband.

17:14Rhett McLaughlin: Three knocks on the side of the sack, and then he's like, big fan, by the way. Yeah, right. Maybe he's just talking about your junk and he doesn't watch the show. Also, the clear employees. Airport folk. Airport folk, because what are they going to do on their break? They're gonna have to watch something on their phone, get a little comforting fix.

17:37Link Neal: So pull the secondary screening. Like I said, I enjoy it. Let's put it there. Last-minute gate change. I mean, they make it so easy now. Do you get the update on your phone? It just doesn't bother me that much.

17:53Rhett McLaughlin: Ooh, escalators out of order, boarding behind big disorganized family. Oh, my gosh. That's bad.

17:59Link Neal: Has anybody ever been to the Miami airport and they've got the people movers and they're broken 100 % of the time. The flat? 100 % of the time. The flatilators? They're flat and they're not working and they're open and there's a guy working on it. Literally every time. I've never been to the Miami. We went there because a lot went to school in Miami so we went there quite a bit and I was like,

18:23Rhett McLaughlin: how is this possible? Escalators out of order is fine though because I try to take the stairs when I can. Link, you have gone to the Miami airport. A few times. Prove it. You're right. I booked the ticket. Jessie, she is a stair lady. I was with you in Miami.

18:41Link Neal: Oh, we have to pick a fourth one. Bags over weight limit. That makes me a little bit nervous. Boarding behind big disorganized family. The reason this doesn't bother me is because I know that I'm going to get work. Once I'm through the gate, I don't care. If I'm at the gate, I don't care what havoc happens. because it's not my fault anymore, and this family isn't gonna keep me from getting where I need to go, you know what I mean? I'm just worried about missing the flight. And then we're not the problem.

19:09Rhett McLaughlin: You know, it's like, they're clearly the problem.

19:13Link Neal: Kids are the problem. Gross bathrooms, that's a problem, I don't wanna deal with that.

19:17Rhett McLaughlin: I think this is a really good bathroom trip, airport trip here, you know? I'll take that every day. Oh yeah, oh yeah, I will.