Is financial literacy missing from your life like that sock you swear went in the dryer? Tiffany Aliche, AKA The Budgetnista, is here to help you find it—minus the lint. She shares her journey to financial wholeness and takes us behind the scenes of her brand-new PBS special.
Meanwhile, Joe and OG break down why financial education starts with community (not overpriced guru courses), why ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’ is the financial equivalent of eating fast food in your car—feels great now, but you’ll regret it later—and how even a trip to Texarkana can teach you a thing or two about money. Plus, a story involving World War II espionage that somehow made its way into the mix.
Here’s what’s on tap this week:
- Kicking off Monday with a solid dose of grumpiness (and a passionate store-brand rant).
- Hanging with The Budgetnista—Tiffany Aliche takes us behind the scenes.
- Why financial literacy isn’t just about numbers—it’s about community.
- The sneaky financial traps that might be eating your wallet alive.
- Tiffany’s PBS special—how she tackled stage fright and delivered a knockout show.
- Headlines that made us go “Wait, WHAT?!”—including Klarna and DoorDash teaming up.
- ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’—why it’s like borrowing money from Future You (and Future You is not happy about it).
- Mortgage strategies, financial independence, and the art of dodging debt.
- Could you survive a week on cash only? One of us is trying (and maybe crying).
- Food waste: it’s not just bad for the planet—it’s silently draining your bank account.
- Upcoming meetups, tax tips, and basement-style money wisdom you can actually use.
And if you stick around long enough, well… who knows what else might show up?
FULL SHOW NOTES: https://stackingbenjamins.com/budgetnista-financial-literacy-1663
Deeper dives with curated links, topics, and discussions are in our newsletter, The 201, available at https://www.stackingbenjamins.com/201
Enjoy!
Monday Mentor: Tiffany Aliche
Big thanks to Tiffany Aliche for joining us today. To learn more about Tiffany, visit The Budgetnista – Tiffany Aliche, America’s Favorite Financial Educator. Grab yourself a copy of the book Made Whole: The Practical Guide to Reaching Your Financial Goals. Check out Tiffany’s new PBS special, Get Good with Money.
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Episode transcript
It’s Monday. You know what that means? Uh, Joe’s pissed off at the world. I’m, I’m not pissed. Who’s pissed off at the world? You are? Oh, gee’s. Pissed off at the world. That’s not new. My goodness. That story you told us about baseball, I’d be pissed too. I mean, we were winning, so whatever. Anyway, now that we’ve said pissed three times.
Yeah. What? To get the month, the week started on a grumpy note. No, I know. Rewind. Start over. Come on. Let’s put on our happy face. Turn that frown upside down, as it were. Yes. On behalf of the men and women at Navy Federal Credit Union and the Men and Women making podcast in mom’s basement. How about og? We start off with a salute to the troops.
That always makes me happy is people keeping us safe? I just found out by the way, that my, uh, my nephew is joining the Army Reserves. Awesome. Yes. Here’s to our troops. Let’s go stack some s together, shall we? Thanks everybody. I’m just gonna keep on drinking my store brand, Theraflu store brand. The, it’s so nasty, dude.
Like, I like the real brand name. Theraflu. This is a, this is a tee up for what we’re gonna talk about later because not a great way to save money is buying the store brand of anything that’s flavored. And this tastes like I’m drinking hot Kool-Aid. It’s nasty. It’s a, oh yeah. I don’t go with the store brand.
Tums. It tastes like chalk. Don’t go with store brand. Theraflu. Yeah, store brand NyQuil is okay. I’ve had some experience with that last week because you’ve done lots of shots that you don’t want to taste. No. Just get it down there as fast as I can, just quick. All right. Speaking of quick, let’s have it open to the show, Doug.
All right.
Live from Joe’s mom’s basement. It’s the Stacking Benjamin Show.
I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor Dug, and today we go behind the scenes with Tiff, the Budgetnista, and her new PBS series. What does it really take to create some mass market financial literacy? You’ll find out. Plus, how about paying for your fast food in seven easy payments? You are now able to, and we can’t wait to share the details.
And of course, like fireworks on a summer evening, as your girlfriend is breaking up with you, I’ll share some absolutely memorable trivia. And now two guys who, I just made that up. That’s not a real thing. And now two guys who think a side hustle is trying to sneak over to the fridge while Joe’s mom is distracted by final jeopardy.
It’s Joe and oh ju,
our stackers would never have all those things happen at one time. That would, that would not happen. That’s a moment That burns in your brain though. Yeah. You would never forget that. I’ll give you that one. I mean, hypothetically, oh, did, did this really happen? I don’t, I mean, did this happen to you? There are rumors that this might have happened.
Holy. Oh man. I feel bad. Hey everybody. Welcome to start off the week on a Melon Kelly note. All I can think about Doug is the scene from, uh, home alone. When Kevin realizes his family’s gone, he’s like, made my family disappear. I made my family disappear. You’re like sounding all downtrodden about getting broken up with on 4th of July.
You’re like, I broke up with my girlfriend. I broke up with my girlfriend. Not free. Not free. It’s all about how you look at life, right? Yes. It’s all about how you, you respond. We have a great show today as Doug, you so eloquently said earlier, we got Tiffany Aliche. The budget needs is back og yay. And she is always, always bringing it.
She is a new PBS special. We’re gonna look behind the scenes at the making of, I mean, this woman always looks like she’s so confident, so excited to spread financial literacy. And, uh, we’re gonna find out if that’s truly the case. When you’re, when you’re like behind those lights and you got 16 cameras in your face, I remember the old days of like, Susie Orman doing those PBS specials.
Remember that? Yeah, that’s not that old. That’s not like old days. That was like 10 years ago, right? Five years ago. I think that’s longer than that. Dude. I think it’s a nineties 25. Oh crap. It’s the nineties. Of course. Our friend of the show Ed Slot doing those, I remember that too. Wayne Dyer. Remember all those ones with Wayne Dyer?
I would watch the Wayne Dyer Ones Couldn’t change the channel fast enough. Really? Really? There’s a reason they put all the boring shows on PBS, Joe. Oh, if you waited long enough, you could watch all of the Les Miz. You just had to sit through. This is like seven hours, 18. Fun drive. Like little, little commercials in between, but you could watch the whole thing.
But J had Wayne Dyer. I’m with you og. I like Wayne Dyer. Yeah, Wayne Dyer was legit. I thought that was good stuff. Core of intention. We got great stuff. Today in the world’s best headline, we’re gonna see if we can make OGs head explode with this headline. This’ll be amazing. But first, your sinus pressure should be easy.
She’s a woman. I. Who has not only one of the top books in the personal finance space in the last 10 years, she also is a woman who has been stolen from by people that should not have stolen from her. She’s somebody that had to learn a lot of financial lessons the hard way. She’s also had the last time she was here, oh my goodness, the story about her husband passed away at an early age.
And, uh, just going through all the things that she’s been through, the fact that she is such a firebrand, the budget needs to Tiffany Aliche will be our mentor today. But first, we have a couple brands that make this show go so that you don’t have to pay a penny for this awesomeness. We’re gonna hear from them.
And then the budget needs to Tiffany Leche, Guess who’s back in mom’s basement. Tiffany Leches here. How are you? I’m well, Joe. How are you? I’m just trying to keep up with you. You are all over the place. Every time I turn around and while we’re gonna talk about the latest place you’ve been, but you have had time for some sleep. I gotta hope once in a while, Tiffany.
Yeah. Honestly, I’m not nearly as busy as social media will have you appear. I definitely have a lot of downtime. That is good. Hey, I got a question From where you sit. I see all these fantastic financial educators now I see all of these people trying to teach financial literacy like you do so well. It’s available everywhere and yet.
Every day, Tiffany, you and I come across people who say, I don’t know where to look. Mm-hmm. Like, thank God I found the budget needs to, because I have no idea where to look. And I’m like, are you, have you checked YouTube? I don’t know. There’s like 9,000 people as a group, as financial educators, as a group.
Mm-hmm. What are we doing wrong? Like how come the message isn’t getting out the way you And I would hope, I think one, it’s not in enough school systems. Mm. I think by the time people start looking, they’re typically in some sort of space of desperation. Maybe they’re about to lose their home or they wanna move out and they can’t afford it.
And so I think sometimes when people navigate from a place of panic, that’s when they’re like, I don’t know where to look. Or maybe they’re just overwhelmed by the number of places they can look. I don’t know that we’re doing anything wrong. This is way better than when I first started. ’cause I really didn’t know other than like a random book, where do I even turn around?
Where do I tap into? But with social media. With so many books. Like my bonus daughter, she’s 18, and she thought she was going for a job like opportunity and she was like, it seemed weird because, I don’t know, they were telling me I had to pay money and it was an MLM. Oh my god. You know? Yes. But thank, but we thank goodness for TikTok because once she jumped off and she went on TikTok and typed in Primark because that was the company, and she was like, Tiffy, that’s what she called me.
Do you know what an MLM is? I said, I do. We’ve all been scammed. But she had so much more access to information that she was really confident, like, and then they do this, and then this happens and this, I said, exactly. She didn’t even know to ask me, but she took it to TikTok and so I think people are looking, it’s, it’s just maybe younger people that are finally figuring out how to look.
I love that. I love the fact that you’re living in the gain instead of the gap, so to speak. Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? Hey. It isn’t as good as we want, but it’s, and by the way, way to lead like a school teacher with, it’s not in enough school systems. Like I caught that loud and clear. Yes. But now you differentiate yourself for people that are brand new to the budget.
Needs to though you really do though, kind of start in a different place. Not with the panic, not with the what’s the stock market doing today? What’s all the news of the minute? Talk about where we really should start if we’re on step one and trying to get whole with our money. Well really, I just like for people to start with what’s actually happening now.
Well, let’s look at your finances and what’s happening. You know, what does your debt look like? What’s your credit score? Are you budgeting? How much do you make? I like the foundation. And then I like to know, how do we get here? Because even if we fix it, if we don’t know how we got here, you’re gonna be back, you know, again and again and again.
Mm-hmm. Um, it’s almost like losing weight, you know? You’re like, oh yeah, I lost weight. But it’s like, okay, but you don’t realize that you have insulin resistance. So until you address that, you’ll be back. 10 pounds up again. And so we have to figure Yeah, found it. Yeah, exactly. So then figuring out like, okay, how did you get here?
Then I like to build community around the financial goals. So maybe it’s your best friend, maybe it’s your work mom. Maybe it’s your, your partner, your husband, your wife, whatever, you know, and then putting a plan into place. Because if you don’t figure out how you got here, address that, have community around your goals, but even understand what you’re addressing, then you’re just gonna go right back.
’cause now you have those things in place. Now you can work on the plan. And I don’t like to teach from a place of like, you know, finger wagging and you ought to, ’cause I’ve made every mistake possible, foreclosure, credit card, debt, scam, overspending, all the things you could think of. I’ve done it. And so we get it.
Wha wham, wham, we get it. You made a mistake. But now that you have those things in place, you know what the mistakes are. You know why you made them. You have community around your goals. Now you can start to put one foot in front of the other, and that’s what I’m here to help you with, to once you ready to ask for help.
Man, when you talk about every mistake, I mean, some of them that you’ve described to me over the years, my spouse, Cheryl Tiffany, still gets a pit in her stomach whenever she sees you. But just remembering the story, not not from seeing you, that’s sounded bad. I did that wrong. But just from you relaying that story very openly and candidly about how that dude, the financial dude ripped you off.
Yeah. Like he totally got scammed by somebody that you should have been able to trust. Yeah. But you know, I always think about one, I take delight that he’s in jail, but also two, I would too. But also I’m actually really grateful for that opportunity to grow and learn, because I didn’t think that at the time, but.
Up until then, I was financially perfect. Not because I knew what I was doing, but just because my dad was an accountant and a CFO and would say, do this. And I’d say, okay. Then do that and say, okay. It’s like cooking when your mom tells you exactly what to put in the pot, and then when you’re on your own and you have to make food on your own, you’re like, wait, what did they say?
You burn some chicken at first, you overcook the pasta till you finally get a rhythm. I didn’t know how to manage my money on my own. It forced me to be a financial adult. It was a really rough road digging my way out, but there would be no budget needs to without that, that mistake. So I’m grateful for it.
I love that messaging too, that if it doesn’t kill you, you know you’re gonna be okay. Mm-hmm. We will live through this too. Yes. And I can’t tell you how many times that I’ve told people, you know, they’re struggling, they feel shame about their thing, and then I tell them my story and they’re like, oh, I’m not as bad at too.
But I love that though. Tiffany’s like, Tiffany’s like, Hey, hold my margarita. Yes. I got one for you. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I love that you brought up community, because lately something I’ve spent a lot of time doing is studying what, like happy retirees. You know what they really like and some of the math that you do when you’re getting ready for retirement.
It’s not the same math as when you retire, like mm-hmm. Happiest retirees have no debt. Right. I mean, they’re smart enough to know the arbitrage thing and they don’t do any of that. They’re like, forget it, but also the happiest retirees keep connections and we’re learning this, that this idea of I retire and I go sit in a chair.
Yeah. Equals I die. Yes. So for all of us, even if we are introverts, I think this idea that you brought up a connection is so important, but I’ve gotten pushback, TIFF, from people going, I live in the middle of nowhere. Mm-hmm. How do I find these connections that you talk about when, you know, I live in the Ozarks or someplace where there’s not a lot of people or small town America.
Even if you’re in small town America. I remember I was watching this Netflix documentary about, oh, where are they called? People who live to a hundred, not Arians. Oh yeah. The Blue Zone. Yes. And what they found, so there are certain places, it’s like a place in Japan, there’s a place in Italy and there’s some, there’s a few other places around the world where they’re like, how do so many of these folks here live to 100 and a hundred percent?
Joe, what you said, they are integrated into the community. If you are someplace far, you might honestly consider moving closer to other people. This is why you see so many retirees are like, I’m gonna move next to my kids. Yeah. And the grandkids. Yeah. So that might be, that’s a big move, but you might wanna do that.
But also too, even if you live in a small town, well, who lives here? Are there three or four people that you could connect with regularly? Can you start something? I know a friend of mine, she joined a walking club just to meet people in her new neighborhood where I live now. I have such a great group of people around me, the neighbors across the street, Maddie and Rhonda, my friend Rihanna, and her husband Jermaine, around the corner, Maria and her two kids.
But I had to make a concerted effort to like meet people speaks, invite them over, you know, it’s like, you have to remember what it was like making friends as a kid. That’s thing you can do is bring your coolest toy. You know, like, hey, I got a basketball wanna play. So it’s like, you know, you knock on the neighbor’s door and you’re like, Hey, I’m having a dinner or I’m having a cookout.
Would love if you come. So you can’t wait for community to find you. Sometimes you have to create that community, even if that means moving closer to people. Man, I love that Tiff, because when we talked to Scott Galloway a few months ago, he was talking about how everybody’s busy arguing about politics and nobody joins the Kiwanis Club that helps your little town, you know, or wherever you live.
Nobody’s joining the local groups, the local church, the synagogue, the whatever group that you below. Like join those groups and, uh, heck to your point, maybe even start your own. I wanna ask you one more question before we, before we jump into your PBS special. It is just so awesome to see you rocking the stage again, but before we get there, you know, stock market lately all over the place, you can’t get away from politics no matter what you do.
You got everybody arguing all the time. What are you telling your dream catchers about setting your stuff up so that you sleep at night with all this crap going on? Well, I tell them what my therapist tells me because I was stressed. Because honestly it was taking me out. You know, because every time you turn around you’re like a trade war.
The stock market’s down, everything’s well, you know, I felt like chicken little and the sky is falling. Yeah, yeah. So what I was doing, which is not healthy, was I was blocking everything. I said, you know what? I’m just not gonna participate in any of it. I’m just gonna not be on social, not look. And the problem with blocking everything is that you block the good as well as the anxiety inducing.
And so I was missing out on the good things. So she was just like, you know that all of these emotions you’re feeling, you are allowed to feel them. Let them come in like a wave. It’s like, I don’t know, like I’m, I’m, I live in Jersey, so every year we go to the Jersey Shore. And if you’ve ever been at the beach and you know when a wave comes in, you’re supposed to jump with the wave to let it kind of wash over you and then it waves back out.
Because if you stand stiff, that wave is gonna knock you over. And so what I’ve learned is that I can listen to some of the news and even if it comes in and it says, oh my gosh, that is kind of troubling. I let it wash in, acknowledge it, but then let it wash back out again. Because I also wanna leave myself open to the fact that like, oh, my niece’s birthday is coming up and we’re gonna have a birthday party.
And my neighbor across the street was so nice because they baked me a cake. And so I’ve just allowed myself to stay informed to allow when, whatever, worry to wash in, but not to stay and then wash back out. ’cause it’s not the only thing that’s happening. It is one of the things that are happening, but it’s not the only thing.
And then also, two, it depends where you are financially. Anytime a recession is coming, the number one thing that people need. It’s access to cash. And so if you’re not already saving, you wanna buckle down, tighten up and save, you might wanna drop down to your noodle budget, which is, I call your bare bones.
Like, you know, when you’re a college Ramen noodle, budget ramen, get rid of the Yeah, yes. Get rid of all the non necessities just for a few months so you can stack up a little. Now if you’re someone that does have extra capital, the market doesn’t stay down forever. We’ve seen how many recessions, you know, um, that this might be actually a time to, to get into the market even more.
So, you know, you know, the s and p 500 is gonna rebound. And quite honestly, we were on a trajectory upward for a long time. There was always gonna be a market correction, whether it was because of the current administration or otherwise, the market was going to dip and come back down because that was, that’s happened for the last hundred years.
That’s just how it goes. So if you have the extra capital. You’re living below your means. It might be a great time to jump into the market. This is not financial, like, you know, investment advice. Just something to consider every time something like this happens, I see a bunch of people online that were like, how did, where did this come from?
What do you mean? Where’d it come from? The market will go down. It does go down. Yes. And this idea, and you talk about squirreling away stuff, you know, like the squirrel with the acorns, like put it away. Yes. All right. Let’s talk about this. You have on PBSA brand new special, and I love the behind the scenes stuff, but let’s play just a little bit of it.
So everybody, this is coming out of the break into the last segment of, uh, get good with Money. We’ll give you just a little preview here, everyone.
I’m so excited because we are finally gonna get to 100% financial wholeness. Yes. Right. We’re here. So let’s just do a quick review. Right. One, you’ve got your budget for 10%. We did that. Two, I showed you how to save like a squirrel. Savings, three debt, 30% your credit. We knocked it out at 40%. Retirement at 50%.
You’re investing there and investing for wealth at 60%, so more than half there. You are really so close to truly answering that question. Can you help me get good with money? The answer is yes. Now that we’ve built up all of those assets, we have to protect those assets. The best way to protect your assets is going to be insurance.
And then you dive into insurance and you’re just such a natural. I mean, just the teaching they talk about in teaching and training. Tiffany, this idea of efficacy. Show them the top of the mountain. Show ’em, you’re almost there. How easy it’s been so far, but still not my first rodeo. I was on TV for nine years.
This is hard as like this. What? Lemme tell you, I was ready to poop my pants on that stage, but it’s so smooth that it’s so you, so can we talk first about how did this start out? Did you get a phone call? Like what happened? Um, Heather Jackson, she’s my book agent. She’s the one who got me deal. Okay. Yes. We forget.
Good with money. Yes. And Heather, one day she’s so random, was like, do you want a PBS special? And I was like, okay. Like I could, like she was asking if I wanted a slice of pizza and I said, sure. Okay. And she said, no, I have a friend that’s a producer. She’s like, it’s a long shot. I’m not, I’m just asking. I didn’t wanna ask him if you weren’t interested.
She introduced me to her friend Bob. We had a chat. He’s, I love Bob. Very ornery. You know, like one of these guys that was like, I’m not impressed with anybody. The answer’s probably no. But he was like, you know what Tiffany? I kind of like you. Wow. I know. Like crusty guy’s been doing it for like 150 years.
Yes, yes, exactly. And so he was like, I’ll pitch it to PBS. They’re probably gonna say no, but we’ll see. And I just said, okay. And so he pitched in the PBS and they said, okay, we, you know, we’d love to, to do a special. Okay, so wait a minute right there, because I remember like in the nineties. Mm-hmm. Do you remember these Susie Orman doing the special, Rick Steves, that travel guy?
Mm-hmm. Even Ed Slot had one, Wayne Dyer. Mm-hmm. So how weird is it after watching all those, that you’re on that similar stage with those people around in the audience? It was just so, I think, so normally I’m pretty hyper, but when I get freaked out I become very stoic. Mm-hmm. Because it’s almost like, but heart can’t take it, you know?
So I was like, I couldn’t focus on the bigness or else it would like overtake me emotionally when they said PBS said yes. Even then I was still like, okay. And then as we started to work on the script, that’s when it really hit me. Like, this is kind of a big deal. Oh my God. And then I’m like a script. Oh my God.
’cause usually I do like a keynote and you know, like I have my notes or whatever, but I’m like, this is a script. Script. Yeah. Like got your points down when you do a keynote, like, I gotta hit this mark, this mark, this mark and this mark. But this was like a script. Script. And I was like, uh, okay. So we did the script and then I had to practice it with them on Zoom, which is kind of awkward ’cause you know, you have to.
Perform, but you’re like, on Zoom. And then we hit a, a taping day and I was okay until, so just the week before, I have a best friend cab that owns an optical center called Elegant Eyes in Newark, and he was like, Tiffany, you’re 45, you need glasses? I was like, I don’t, he was like, I guarantee you, you know, like this is just what eyes do.
And so I’d gone there and he was like, yeah, you’re 2050. You need, you’re probably five years late. And so I was like, all right. I ordered them. I said, I’ll get them later. Big mistake. So I get to PBS the next week. I never did a, what is that, that screen called the, um, teleprompter. Oh, the teleprompter. Oh my God.
Oh my God. That’s so hard to read and imagine with not the glasses that you need. Oh God. So it was the day before. Well wait minute. Even before, let’s, let’s go back to the teleprompter in a second because how long was that script process? That’s gotta be three or four months. Where you scripting the stuff out?
No, they, well, they went very quickly. So it took about like a month because thankfully they, they took my book. Pulled that as much as they could. Oh. And then I had to go through it and then we worked through the script together for like a week or so. So it took about a month or two months to like really work through the script.
Okay. So then they feed it all into the teleprompter then. Oh gosh. And now blind Tiffany Aliche, like leaning forward. Like she, she’s 80 my crossed on the stage and I’m like squinting, like, hello, my name is how Tiffany, the way the room was dead silent. It was so brutal. I don’t know that I’ve ever bombed like that.
I don’t know ever. And it was just like, I mean, you’ve got like, you know, ’cause they’re testing everything out. They got the camera guy, PBS person, everyone’s there and all you hear is, you know, like that lone cough into the wilderness. And I’m just like, oh my God, I, my heart was racing. I was like, oh my God, I cannot read this teleprompter.
So we tried everything. They’re like, let’s make it slower. And I was like, that was worse. And I said, okay. Literally I said, can we just stop for a moment? ’cause you know, all eyes are on you. And I said, can I do it like how I would normally do it? And they said yes. I said I would not look at the teleprompter.
So I took, I had the script written and I highlighted like the like, because essentially it’s the book that I wrote. I know the 10 steps. And I said, so I would just, I just highlighted like the word budget. So I knew teach the budget lab part credit. And so I was like, we started from the beginning and I just saw, okay, budget is first I taught about budgeting.
Credit was next. I taught about credit and it was way better to their credit. The director was like, so what are you doing there? I said, the truth is I could teach these with my eyes closed. I cannot read the prompter, but if you made it really big to just let me know what the subject matter is. I will teach.
Oh, nice. And then the next subject matter, you know, so literally on the, on the teleprompter, it just said budget. Oh, see, you’re not gonna miss a step. You’re not gonna miss anything. Yes. And so I was like, okay, budget. Okay, then credit. Okay. And so the next day, so all night long, of course I couldn’t sleep. I probably got two hours of sleep and I practiced practice, practice, practice some more.
The next day we, so they tape twice, they do an hour fully dressed, full makeup, full everything with no audience. That way they need to like plug in and then they tape again with audience. And so during that first taping, I did really well because I was like, okay, we got it. Budget credit, I taught. And then I did even better because I am somebody who really reacts off of people.
So they bust in some of my audience dream catchers three hours from New York. They, well, they bust them in from Newark and they bust them in. And first I thought, they’re not gonna come, but they wanted to. So they spent three hours on a bus, about 50 of them to come and see me do my thing. And because they were there, it just gave me even more energy.
And I slayed the second full taping. I didn’t take a break. They were like, do you need a moment? I’m like, no, we just pushed all the way through. And that’s what you see. You see a, um, a mix of the taping by myself and the taping with the audience. But I’m telling you, like I, I had never been that afraid to perform.
You know, like I’m always nervous, but I was like, this might be the time, Tiffany, that I can’t do this. That’s what I was thinking. I said, I don’t know if I could do this. I think they chose the wrong person. So I’m, because you’re coming on set and your face is on set like. They printed out dollar bills with my face on it, and the budget needs is everywhere.
So it was like the magnitude of, it’s just you, Tiffany. This is not a keynote where they’ve come to see you and like, you know, breakout sessions. This is not, it’s literally just you, you. And so it was, even think about it now I’m like, oh my God, you could feel the energy. I was watching some of the special, and you could just feel the energy in that room.
It was such a powerful connection. Like whenever. You made a point, you could hear the audio from them and they’re not micd up. No. And you can hear them go, Ooh. Or, you know, laughing with you or as you’re making a point, you know, everybody heard the clapping that is at the beginning, but then there’s parts where they’re clapping right in the middle of the thing just ’cause people are excited.
Like that was mm-hmm. That was super cool. I, I didn’t realize though, it’s funny watching it, they did such a good job of the editing. Mm-hmm. I never once thought that’s a result of two tapings. It totally looks smooth. Like it’s all just one taping. Yeah, no, they were great. And honestly I don’t even know the difference.
I couldn’t tell. So they did a really great job and. Then they sent me kind of like the raw footage just to make sure like all of the words on the screen match what I wanted them to say so I could make those edits there. And now it’s live. It’s crazy ’cause just last weekend, so I had a premier party to celebrate, which is awesome.
Um, my parents, my friends, my family, it’s about a hundred people. It was such a fun time. Then the next day my mom called me and said, you’re on tv. You’re on tv. Because she was watching it on PBS. Her friends called her and she was just like, because if you knew I gave my parents a run for their money as a kid, they’re still shocked that I’m okay.
Okay. Maybe some of our stackers missed that when you were on before, but I know that Yes, yes, yes. Tiffany was hell on wheels. Yes. Well, you know, to like my sisters, you know, but they’re always in awe like, wow, it really worked out for her. That is so awesome. I love that you told that story because a lot of what you and I work in every day, TIFF is helping people through fear, right?
Yeah. Address the fear. I don’t know how to open a Roth, IRA. Mm-hmm. I’ve never had a savings account. I’ve never hooked up a 401k plan before. Yeah. And a lot of it is, you know, people learn it’s, it’s between your ears, but man, if you can step out there on that stage Yeah. And go, oh my God, everybody can feel my heartbeat and not throw up on camera.
Like, you can probably open a Roth IRA. Mm-hmm. Well, this is what I tell people for most, and I had to tell myself this on that stage, Tiffany, this is a confidence issue, not a capability issue, because honestly, if it’s capabilities, not much we could do about it. But honestly, for almost everyone, it’s just a confidence issue.
The only way for me to break past that confidence issue, just like with everyone else, is to ask for help. You know, whether it’s to build community, lean into them, look for a financial educator leaning into them. For me, I had to ask for help and say, can I do it the way that fits me? Like, what if I was too timid?
Because I feel like Tiffany maybe 10 years ago wouldn’t have said that because I would’ve been too afraid to be like, no, they have the teleprompter. You have to use the teleprompter. It’s like, who said, ask them, can you do it the way you need? And they were like, we are here to help you, Tiffany.
Absolutely. So asking for help is critical when you have a confidence issue. Well, and I’d love that we’re ending on that because like you said, there’s so many places now with social media mm-hmm to look for help and there’s so many brilliant people out there trying to help you. And joining the community I think is.
The best way to get help because then you know the person you trust, the person you trust, the community. It’s so, so, so freaking Great. I am just, uh, ecstatic for you just even watching this stuff. It’s so, so damn fun. People are going to have to look at their local PBS areas of my understanding to see when it comes on, and it also looks like if they belong to something like it’s PBS Plus or something that might be able to get it on demand.
Mm-hmm. So if you just go to pbs.org and type in get good with money, you’ll be able to find like your local station, like in New Jersey, I believe it’s like Channel 13 and 21, and you’ll get to see like when it airs and just catch it, you know? And then yes, you can watch it online if you do have like PBS Plus I believe.
And if you don’t catch it. Tiffany might have a book that you might be able to read. Yes. That one or two people might have heard of before. Yes. It’s also called Get Good With Money. Tiffany, thanks for mentoring us really on bravery today. Thank you so much. No, thank you Joe. It was good being back. Tell your mom I said hi.
Hey there, stackers. I’m Joe’s Bombs neighbor Doug, and it’s windy outside like Oklahoma. Well, the wind comes sweeping down the plane on today’s date. Back in 1943, the Hit Broadway play debuted an anniversary that reminds me to try out for the next local theater production. Can you see me on stage performing a comedy like Tuesdays with Maury or maybe some deep, dark tragedy like Mama Mia.
And of course, have you not watched Mama Mia? Trust me, that’s a tragedy when you watch that. Anyway, of course, you’d all be invited to Texarkana Theater and Bear Witness as I totally dominate the stage. Speaking of Oklahoma, in the Hit Show Euphoria, A woman, everyone Calls my twin sister by another mother actress, Zendaya dominates.
On one episode of euphoria, one student creates a play called Oklahoma, but different from the original. It’s just an excuse for her to air dirty laundry about everyone in school. Zendaya also starred in a hit movie recently, one that’s been reimagined a whopping five times since 1984. So here’s today’s question.
What movie is it? I’ll be back right after I go search Joe’s Mom’s Spice Cabinet for something good. It’s all about the spice they say.
Hey there, stackers. I’m spicy guy and guy who doesn’t appreciate the looks he gets when he talks about being Spicy. Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug Zendaya is a tour de force, not yet 30 years old. The young actress not only starred in euphoria, but she also has two primetime Emmy awards and a Golden Globe.
Not quite the Glorious Plutus Award. This show has won, but it’s a start. Today’s question is what Zendaya starring hit film has been remade five times since the mid eighties. You can have one with two different answers. You’re correct if you said Dune part one, but the judges would’ve also been okay if you’d gone with the cryptically named Sequel Dune part two, and now with part two of this show.
And this headline’s gonna be fun, so buckle up Buttercup. It’s Joe and og. Did you watch the movie Dune OG? No, no, not your thing. There was explosions. Did anybody die? There was tons of people die. I mean, that’s why I’m surprised. Yeah. Didn’t go with that one. Hey, uh, what I’m not surprised by is, uh, this headline, am I not surprised by this headline?
The cynical part of me is not surprised by this headline. Let’s do a headline. Hello darlings. And now it’s time for your favorite part of the show, our Stacking Benjamin’s headlines. Our headline today comes to us from CNBZ. Heck, it came from just about everywhere and we have had so many stackers. Thank you.
Send this to me. Going, you gotta talk about this. Let’s go there. Mackenzie. Als. Right. My favorite part about doing headlines is listening to You pronounce the name Klarna. The Buy Now pay later lender that’s headed for an initial public offering said two Thursdays ago that it’s signed on. Wait for it, og.
Wait for it wa Watch him. Doug. Watch this. Set it signed on DoorDash as a partner. Another sign of momentum for public market investors. It’s door Dash’s first, BNPL Alliance in the us. BNPL, by the way, is the way all the cool kids say buy now, pay later. Oh, so layaway. Yes. And gives users of the restaurant delivery service a new way to pay for meals, but it’s not layaway.
You get your food right away. Right now, have you not ordered Chewy’s DoorDash before? It’s like $170. Yeah. I mean, just think about it. I could have my chewy’s today. What is Chewy’s? I. Stop. Oh, by God. Really? No. What the hell is chewy’s? Oh my God. So buddy. Like a Chewbacca themed restaurant. Yeah. Yeah, that’s it.
Yeah, that’s a hundred percent. Anyways, I mean, it’s pretty pricey to get DoorDash, so you might as well have a payment plan of some kind. He said sarcastically. No, no. There was no sarcasm in there, Doug. I know where he gets DoorDash from. Anybody else would need a payment plan from Del Frisco’s, right?
Exactly. That restaurant. I do know who doesn’t. DoorDash Del Frisco’s. Because steak tastes better when it’s right. Delivered by a person who’s doing a side hustle. Drives across the state. Drives our across the city. Definitely not spit on your fries. No, they put the little sticker on there. Yeah. This is a bad idea.
What was the meme that I saw? Did you guys send it? It was like the, uh, the hamburger guy from Popeye. No, I haven’t seen it. Brutus. And it said uh, or wimpy. Yeah, wimpy. And it said, you sir, may have your cheeseburger today. Because, and 99% of people listening to the show have no idea what we’re talking about.
Why? That’s funny. I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today. That is, uh, it has finally come full circle. So now you can pay Tuesday for your hamburger today. You know, I was pretty angry. I was at this big mall in Houston and uh, the place we were going to dinner was there. And as I was walking through these corridors, just thinking about.
All the people spending money around the holidays. I turn a corner and there’s a huge Klarna sign, og, and it was talking about how the holidays can be brighter with Klarna. And I thought, how? How? How are the holidays brighter when I’m buying stuff that I know I can’t afford? Like as my kids are opening up their gifts and I know that I’m gonna be paying for it in April and May of this year.
There’s no interest on it though. Right? There is no interest if you make the payment every payment on time. Which is why Klarna is making money hand over fist. Yeah. Because people enter into these relationships with Klarna going, oh yeah, I can do that without any clear plan to actually pay it off. The reason they have a huge profit margin is because that’s where they get you is.
Yeah. That’s how they get you. The last Apple product I bought, I feel like I bought a computer. I. They had a 0% pay a hundred dollars a month for 24 month thing. And I was like, why wouldn’t I do this? It hits my Apple credit card. It’s auto paid like that to me makes a lot of sense. I don’t know that it makes sense to, you know, whittle that down to a $45 DoorDash order and be like, well, I could just pay this over time.
But it’s still zero interest. So as long as you do make the payments. I don’t wanna associate my future productivity with stuff I did in the past, like as little as possible. Mm-hmm. I wanna leave, you know, when we take a look at stocks, right? If you’re looking at an individual stock and you’re deciding if it’s a good buyer or not, what’s the first line you look at?
Free cash flow. Hmm. And if I got all my cash flow tied up in the sins of yesterday, of three weeks, ago’s Taco Bell order, and that’s, that’s gift that keeps on giving though, in more ways than one. I get, I get to give all my friends a little toot from time to time, and then you get to invest in your plumbing.
I think that, um, when you have debt payments, I think what’s so, uh, I don’t know, insidious, is that the right word? Is that too strong about it? Is that it, it seems easy to keep track of and easy to account for. Just take something as simple as a mortgage, right? It’s like, Hey, my mortgage is two grand a month, or it’s 1500 or 3,500, like whatever the number.
And you go, yeah, I can pay for that. Like I make 10,000. I can pay 3000 on my mortgage. The thing that of course we know having been in a mortgage for a long time is, well, it’s not always 3000, right? It’s ’cause your taxes and your insurance go up. So that number’s gonna change as you’re thinking about your financial future and you’re thinking about like cash flow and you’re thinking about resources that you need and that sort of thing.
If you’re going into financial independence or kind of closing in on financial independence and you have this. $40,000 a year payment, how much money do you need to have set aside in addition to your normal living expenses to pay this 40,000 a year that’s going out? Or how much less money do you need set aside by the time you get to financial independence if you don’t have this $40,000 a year?
We have a great interest rate on our house. We refinanced in 2021, like a lot of people did. I did a 15 year term at two and a half percent. And people, maybe even you, Joe, were like, whoa, whoa, whoa. What are you doing? And do the 30, get the two and a half for 30. That’ll be a lower payment. And I’m like, I wanna have this.
You know, my daughter at the time was five. I was like, if I can have this paid off by the time she goes to college, that’s $4,000 a month that I don’t need to pay. Yeah. I don’t need to have going out when I have this other thing that I know is happening, or at least I’m pretty certain will happen in terms of college or from a financial independent standpoint.
You know, not withstanding the interest and yeah. Okay. Well maybe if you invested the difference, you make a few extra dollars or that sort of thing. It’s like, I don’t need 50,000 a year. If you have to pay 50 grand a year in payments, you have to make 75. You know, like, like, you know, there’s that, um, day that happens.
It might be coming up where on average you get to keep the rest of the money. Yeah. The tax freedom day. Tax freedom day. There you go. It is, and it’s coming up. It’s sometime in April or May, I think for most people, and it’s like, until then you’ve just paid the government basically. That’s one way of looking at it in terms of percentage of the year, and so you think about it from a cashflow standpoint.
You’re like, I gotta, I gotta make 75 freaking grand go pay taxes, do all these things with my money so that I net out $48,000 so that I could pay my stupid mortgage. It would just be easier not to have that, in my opinion. And it takes a lot of stress away. You know, it takes away, I, I’ve never met anybody.
People ask me this all the time, do you think I should pay my house off? Like, yeah, I think you should. I absolutely think you should. Not saying anything about the financial aspects of it or the interest rate, arbitrage, nonsense, and that sort of thing. ’cause I’ve never met a single person in my life that’s like, man, I’m so mad I don’t have a mortgage payment.
No, I’m with you. No one said, I don’t have Mor. Do you think I should go get a loan on my house? I’ve never had anybody say that to me. Should I go get a mortgage after being debt free? I talked about this on the main stage at economy, and what’s funny is scoreboard, we did a, I put a case study up on the screen and I said, Jane has reached financial independence.
She saved $2.2 million. She has $3,000 a month coming in on social security, a thousand dollars a month of rental income. Can she do it? And of course, the whole audience, 500 people altogether, just go, yeah, yeah. She’s there. I mean, these are people that know the financial independence journey enough that they go to Cincinnati for a conference on the topic, right?
Yeah. Kind of do a little back of the envelope calculation. Yeah. These people have already done all that math. They’re like, yeah, easily. And I said, she has a mortgage of $189,000 left on it at 3.2%. Should she pay it off? You know, and I know what the whole audience said. They all went, no. Yeah. The entire audience went, no.
And then I took ’em through a couple more slides and said The answer is the happiest retirees. They’re not stupid. They know the math, they know the arbitrage. They get all that. The happiest retirees pay off their debt. Yeah. I’m gonna jump in here and say paying off my mortgages has made me more.
Mortgages. I like that flex. There’s a flex scoreboard. Oh, oops, sorry. That’s my bad coach. Pay off. I paying off my auto loan on the El Camino. Yeah, that’s, I mean, I didn’t, it’s so rough. It’s already divulge too much. But anyway, paying those, that one off, paying off my homes. Say that has made us more financially responsible, because you don’t wanna screw it up.
You’re like, I’m in a spot where I’m debt free, so I do not want to get off of that platform. If you think of it like as, or like you’re at second base and you’re, you’re like, oh, I made it here safely. I’m not gonna leave. I don’t wanna steal coach. I don’t wanna take a risk because you’re here and you don’t wanna mess it up.
And so I’ve actually, I wouldn’t say I’ve gotten more frugal, but I’ve definitely, whether or not I wanna go into debt, I think a lot harder about now that I am debt free than I did when I wasn’t. Mm-hmm. And it’s just like, well, the cookies are in the cupboard. I might as well eat ’em now. ’cause sooner or later they’re going in there.
So I’m gonna get fat. Let’s just do it all at once tonight at 1145. Stupid analogy. But I, I’m with you, og. I mean, I’ve never heard anybody who regretted paying off their mortgage at any interest rate that they had or mortgages. Well, and just getting back to this piece and Klarna, when you go to any creator conference, what do they emphasize?
Create recurring income, sell subscriptions. If you can sell people subscriptions every month, that is just solid money in your pocket. And you look at all the companies that you work with, they want you to do some subscription based service because they want your free cash flow. Your free cash flow helps them create free cash flow.
Yeah. And then you go to a place like economy and you’re talking about retirement. How do you retire? You get away from all the subscription services. You get away from all that. You get rid of payment mentality. You have to get out of payment mentality, I think OG to, yeah. To win this game. I don’t know if it was Warren Buffet, Dave Ramsey, David Bach.
I don’t know who said it, but, uh, well, you’re about to, so we’re going to, we’re gonna put TM on it after you said it right now. Oh, I just payment. Okay. Or Thomas Stanley maybe even says, you know, wealthy people ask how much and not wealthy people ask how much per month? You can see that when you go do any sort of large transaction purchase, whether it’s something as big as a house or a car, cars are comical, right?
Because you’re like, how much is this car? They’re like, well, how much can you afford? You’re like, no, no, like, and it’s just how they’re trained, right? Well, this one can be yours for five 50 a month. You’re like, I didn’t ask how much it was per month, man, how much it was, or something a little bit smaller.
Like you’re at, uh, the audio visual store Best Buy or something, and they say, would you like to apply for the Best Buy credit card? You can pay this off over 12 months with no interest. Again, every one of those things, it’s like death by a thousand paper cuts. Even the Apple computer that I mentioned earlier.
It’s, it still requires me to make money consistently. Even though it’s a hundred bucks, it still makes me make my credit card payment on time. It still makes me keep track of it because God knows I can screw it up just like anybody else. You know? And, and the first, to your point before Joe, it’s like the first one you miss, they go, oh, well how howdy, how, how’s, how’s that 30% back interest payment?
You know what I mean? Like, you know, so there’s a lot of risk associated with that to have it work out the way that you want it to. You know, there’s a really interesting challenge that we’re about to embark on. I don’t know, I think it’s interesting. I think we’re gonna do it in April. I should know. ’cause we’re gonna, that would mean starting tomorrow, but I think we’re gonna do a month of cash only.
And I’ll include debit card in cash because like many of us, we have plenty of plastic in our wallet. It’s like, oh, we gonna order DoorDash from Chewy’s. ’cause it’s easy to do, you know? Oh, who cares? 150 bucks. But you don’t really feel that pain until, until the AMEX bill shows up. You know what I mean? So my interest in this is, I wonder if this will help us make a little bit better contemporaneous decisions then the one time pain of the Amex bill.
You know what I mean? When you kind of overextend yourself in a month and you get the credit card built at the end of the month, you’re like, oh, that hurts. I gotta tip it in my savings. Oh, I gotta take it from me fund. I gotta work a little overtime. Like you feel that pain. But my thought is, is that if you see it literally coming from your checking account, you’re, you know, using a debit card or cash every single time you make a transaction, you get to experience that pain every single time.
And we have hundreds of transactions a month. I mean, it’s profound. Like how many times you get hit Amazon or you know, a vending machine or go to the coffee shop or whatever, and it’s like, I. I just wonder, and this will be my little experiment, I, I’ll, I’ll report back whether we do it in April or May. I just wonder if that will be a, an interesting awakening and maybe other stackers have done this before and.
Can talk about it. Does everybody in your house look at the bank statement throughout the month to feel the paper cuts? Well, we use Monarch. Listen, I do. And uh, and yeah, we talk about it not every single day by any means, but certainly several times a month. All right. I love the idea of calling it out.
You know, every time you take cash out of your wallet, you’re calling it out. Yeah. We’re gonna have a guy named, uh, Brian Sudi on the show. Brian and his spouse did some extreme non-food waste stuff that I found really interesting, who likes tongue, but that kind of extreme food waste. These guys got to the point that in 2024, I believe the number we’ll have him on, oh, soup to verify this, they wasted $3 and 25 cents worth of food.
Like it went from $30 to $5 and 50 cents. But, but you know where that started, OG. It started them calling it out every time they took the, he said, it’s funny. He’s like, we don’t throw away leftovers. We put them in a nice container to put in the refrigerator for two weeks to throw away later and then we throw it away.
Yeah. He said, but what? What started it was the game of, we just decided that when we heard that the average American, Frankie Lenza said this on our show. Waste a third of the food that’s in the refrigerator. They waste a third of it. He said, once I heard that stat, every time I threw stuff away, we put a little thing on the refrigerator and we had to write it down that we were throwing it away.
Yeah. Like a bell or something. Yeah. And like this idea of just culling it out every time, Hey, we’re spending money. Here’s the cash money. I think it’s the start of a, a fun game. My call out is our compost pile because every time I walk out there with a bag salad that costs six bucks and it’s never been opened.
And it sat in the drawer, in the refrigerator. Yeah. And I have to open, I’m opening this brand new bag. I have to like fish out the salad dressing package inside that’s all covered with nasty wilted lettuce. And I’m pouring that into my compost, fooling myself into thinking that, oh, well, at least I’m, at least I’m feeding the compost.
That’s right. Yeah. At least I’m, I’m making compost. You know how much fertilizer I could have bought for the bag salads that I throw into my compost. It’s funny, and I can’t wait for Brian to talk about this because he actually went over that. He’s like, we have an order now, Doug, of things that when we go to the grocery store, he’s like, we order the same stuff.
He’s like, that bag salad you pay extra for because it’s already in there and made up. He goes, that has to be the first thing we eat because that goes bad the quickest. Oh, he, so I bring, I bring that home from the grocery store that’s in two days. He goes, I bring home carrots. Those things never die. Yeah.
Yeah. Carrots, it’s true. Three, I think they found carrots in the Egyptian tombs. Right. I’m pretty sure. Well, those are those big, you know, underneath the, the pyramids they found now one those big doors. Yeah, those are carrots. I mean, the other piece is, you know, when talking about food, you guys don’t have kids in the house anymore, but I’m sure you remember it.
You know, and the kids will like stare into the pantry and go, there’s no food. You like look and you go, bruh, there’s more food here than I remember ever having when I was a kid. There’s no cookies right now. Yes, but there’s 47 cans of tuna. Like there’s plenty of food. That’s the other piece that I think is a good exercise to do every so often is like, just empty the freezer.
You know? Just be like, we’re just eating the stuff in the freezer until the freezer’s empty. There’s hamburger in there, there’s sausages and leftover hot dogs, and. Steak with a little bit of freezer burn and you know, like half a bag of wontons that look great at Costco. Yeah, exactly. Like just get that stuff out and clear it out.
You’d be sitting, I mean, you could, you talk about cutting your food budget. My gosh, you, if you just ate the food that was in your house, you could probably go without buying food for a month. When Cheryl and I did that as part of our success sessions last year, that’s one of the things that we do is we have all the participants take part in a challenge and you get to decide what the challenge is.
But for Cheryl and I, last year it was eat the food in our freezer. To your point. Yeah. I thought it was gonna take us maybe two and a half weeks. It took us like two and a half months to get through all the food. Yeah, because there’s so much in there. It was in the freezer. It was so much, it was such a, such a lesson.
We’re gonna dive more into these topics in our newsletter called the 2 0 1. We give you the best in the internet, uh, best links, most curated links on the internet, on all of these topics that we talk about. Klarna payment systems. Man, so much that, uh, we’re giving Kevin Bailey today to dive into. I know this is gonna be fantastic.
Stack benjamins.com/ 2 0 1 to subscribe to the 2 0 1. That also helps us, because when we go on the road and I’m getting ready to have meetups in the next few months in Boston and in Cleveland, when we go on the road, I like that when we go, well, well, you guys, you guys did the same thing. What are you talking about?
You went on the road and you did a meetup. I went on the road. I did a meetup. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Our meetup was amazing. That’s true. God, I keep on blocking it. And then you les keep bringing it up. He got to meet James and two pyramid scheme. Yeah. Dudes who were James, James saved the night. He absolutely did.
Because those other two guys, man, they were just sucking off the stacking Benjamin’s teets, just there for free beer and to draw circles. If you guys get two people selling our stuff Yep. And then they get two people selling your stuff. Yeah. I think we accidentally wandered onto the back porch the last, uh, segment of the show.
The only thing I think we have today for the back porch is if you’re doing your taxes, our tax guide is live. You pay for it one time and you know what? You get it forever. So as the government changes the game, as your tax situation changes, as, uh, like og, you just keep having more kids and your tech situation changes as you have more young OG juniors.
Stacky benjamins.com/i don’t think we’re having any more OG juniors. No, no more stacky benjamins.com/tax guide. And, uh, we dive into two areas. Number one, tax prep, which is some of you might be in tax prep. Hell right now, we’ll help you with that. And then on the other side, tax planning, which I think is even more important so that when you get this time of year, next year, you won’t have the problems that you might be having right now.
So stack your benjamins.com/tax guide. That is, uh, all we’re gonna do today for the back porch. Doug, you’ve got it from here, man. What should we have learned on today’s episode? Well, Joe first take some advice from Tiffany Aliche. Financial literacy starts with community, find like-minded people, and soon you’ll be dream catching your way to financial success.
Because everyone around you is supporting your wins and you’re supporting theirs. Duh. Second, thinking about financing your Burger King over five easy payments, plain Broil doesn’t taste as good when you’re still paying for it three months later. But the big lesson, apparently, you can’t just call Zendaya people and tell ’em you’re her brother by another mother, and you wanted to say hello.
Well, I mean, I guess you can, but for some reason they won’t put your call through. Yeah, that’s weird. Yeah. So weird. Huge thanks to the budget nea Tiffany Aliche for joining us today. Check your local PBS station to find out when her special airs. Now you’ll know the behind the scenes story while watching This show is the Property of S SP podcast, LLC, copyright 2025 and is created by Joe Saul Sea.
Hi, Joe gets help from a few of our neighborhood friends. You’ll find out about our awesome [email protected], along with the show notes and how you can find us on YouTube and all the usual social media spots. Come say hello. Oh yeah, and before I go, not only should you not take advice from these nerds, don’t take advice from people you don’t know.
This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any financial decisions, speak with a real financial advisor. I’m Joe’s Mom’s neighbor, Duggan. We’ll see you next time back here at the Stacking Benjamin Show.
Welcome to the after show. This is a part of the show that doesn’t exist. It was fantastic getting a, uh, an email also from Derek. Derek, by the way, knows how to pronounce the name of a town in Tennessee that I said completely wrong. Doug, how do you say? SEVI. E-R-V-I-L-L-E isn’t it Seaville? It’s uh, Ville.
Seville, Ville. Ville, according to Derek Seville, I think Derek Derek’s probably gonna correct that too. Derek writes, Joe, I’m the smart ass from Tennessee who assisted you with the pronunciation of Ville last year? I’m listening to the Go Bag episode, and this is what’s in your financial go bag, right?
What do you take with you if your house burned down? Whatever might happen. And you asked Paul if she’d carry gold. She said, no way in hell, Joe. That’s my interpretation. And OG said Heavy, which reminded me of an f and a awesome movie you guys need to check out on the back porch. The plots related to gold’s weight, although it isn’t mentioned till the last three seconds of the movie.
Oh, spoiler, Derek. Nice job. If you haven’t seen the 2022 World War II era, finish movie sisu. You need to nay. You must splurge the $4 and 32 cents and stream the thing on Prime. It’s John Wick. For old dudes like me slash us, speak for yourself, Derek. Very bloody. But killing Nazis is always allowed. I say I guarantee, oh gee.
Will give it two thumbs up. And I hear sequels coming soon. Well, I guess I should get back to work since they’re paying me and all your pal Derek. Derek wrote us on the job to let us know that we need to, have you guys even heard of this movie, SISU? Never heard of it. No. But World War II movie killing.
Nazis. Nazis. Nazis. I’m all in. Yeah, that sounds Fabish. Uh oh gee. You have to up to date on reacher. Um, I think I might be a week behind. Doug, how about you? No, I haven’t even started this latest season of it. Oh, gee. I think it’s really good this season, don’t you? I thought the, um, it was like, it got to the spot where I was like, okay, this kind of seems like the ending and then.
I’m like, well, this is episode three, so this must not be the ending. Somebody else said that to me. It must get really turned on from here. I don’t like we’ve, we’ve killed all everyone on this. We’ve killed everyone. There’s no one alive left, so must be time to wrap this up. That’s what Cheryl doesn’t like it because Reacher’s bloodier than ever.
And she really likes that character. And she’s like, he just has no thought at all when he just breaks somebody’s neck. And I’m like, look at who he’s dealing with. These guys are gonna kill him any second if he like, the stakes are so high. Mm-hmm. On these episodes. Seems like it. So yeah. A little, little behind on that.
We started the show with my son, zero hour, zero day zero, something on Netflix. Haven’t really gotten into that yet. And then I’m trying to get my kids to rewatch 24 with me. Oh, you love 24. I loved it. It was so great. And so we got through the first, I dunno, maybe four or five episodes of season one. And, and you know, they’re still trying to find it, you know what I mean?
Like, it’s not vintage Jack yet. You don’t know any of the characters. So I do, of course. And I know how it ends. So, you know, it’s kind of fun watching, watching the scenes and the kids are like, oh yeah, he’s totally a bad guy. And you’re like, is he? I don’t know. We’ll see. You know, and you’re trying to figure out who the, who the Mole is the first season.
And, um, anyways, they’re, they’re much more interested in playing video games and hanging out with old man. So yeah, it’s a great, I mean, 24 is a great concept and I got my kids to watch it quite a while ago when they were younger, like 14, 15. And even they loved it. And a newer show, brand new show actually that has, I’ll say, a similar plot convention.
A structure is called The Pit on Max, and it’s essentially er part two. Remember the er, the hospital drama from the nineties, and George Clooney got his big, uh, tons. Julia Marlas and what’s Juliana Margolis? Uh, Margoles. Yeah. Margo tons. I mean, lot of people. Noah Wiley, who is in the pit, and they actually wanted Noah Wiley and John.
Um, might have been John Wells. John, uh, no. John Wick wanted to actually create ER two and the Michael Creighton estate said no. Really? So they kind of, they went ahead and did it anyways. They just moved it to Pittsburgh. It’s Noah Wiley is the lead doctor for n er, and the whole season is one shift. It’s one 15 hour shift.
And so each episode is an hour long, much like 24, but I think they’re gonna do 15 episodes if I’m not mistaken. It’s pretty cool. Now that structure comes with some limitations. You can’t really develop a lot of relationships with people in one shift. So even over the course of a whole season, people can’t really like get to know each other, have any romances or any of that kind of stuff.
’cause there’s just not enough time. Which is the thing you mainly look for in that’s ER shows. Yeah. Well, but it happened in er. There was a lot of that. There was a lot of hanky panky, which apparently is a very real thing in hospitals. Whole reason I wanted to go to med school. That’s. I mean, practice uch, would you practice buch ba day or whatever the, in the bar closet.
But, uh, it’s really good. It’s very graphic because it’s on max and it’s not on a b, you know, a broadcast network. TV saw more of a birth scene. I saw more in a birth scene than I saw when my own two sons were born. Did you pass out watching it on tv? I, I looked away a couple times. Hell yes. Mrs. Neighbor Doug comes in the room and you’re sprawled out on the floor.
Yes. What happened? But, uh, well, you, when, when OG brought up 24, it made me think of the pit. It’s, it’s good. I’m gonna keep watching it. Here’s what I don’t like. They have got a checklist of all of societal current day societal ills, and they’re just checking the box on every one of them. And so I’m only in like hour number nine of this one shift, meaning I’m on episode nine and we’ve had.
Every headline you can think of. We have teenage pregnancy, we have fentanyl crisis, we have, uh, white collar opioid addiction. We have, you’re taking them all on violence, on, you know, medical staff. They’re all incredibly valid, real things that are happening. I just don’t know that every one of the, oh, we’re about to have a mass shooting.
I don’t know that every one of those things happens in the first eight hours of an ER shift. That’s a busy city. Yeah, that’s the part. I know Pittsburgh has its challenges like every other big city, but I don’t think it’s quite that bad to get one of everything. The tri, the tri in Pittsburgh is lit. My niece, uh, just told me this last week, she’s gonna go to college in Pittsburgh, so I’ll be visiting Pittsburgh soon.
Chatham University, the Pirates, I wanna do just a Pittsburgh Pirates that is not the Chatham Pirates. I don’t know what the Chatham, I know little, little liberal arts school. Pittsburgh, I wanna do a quick movie review before we say goodbye. Uh, two years ago my, one of my favorite movies, if you guys remember, was called Cabrini, about Mother Cabrini.
I’ve been looking for, I remember you raving about it and I’ve been looking for it. Is it on streaming yet? I can’t find it. Well, the Angel Studios fantastic studio. That makes feel good movies. Wait, it sounds horrible, by the way. It sounds like those people that make board games that are educational and you’re like, hard pass.
I don’t, I don’t go to a movie to feel good. I do not play board games to learn anything, but they do a really, really good job. Cabrini, sadly Doug, they have their own app and you, you have to stream on their own. Friends of ours were able to watch it on an airplane for some reason it was on an American Airlines flight recently.
Cabrini, and they saw it. But same studio just came out with a movie that we went and saw last week called Rule Breakers. And here’s just a little clip ’cause I know Doug always wants to, he’s like, play the clip.
Welcome the first drove bikes worldwide. Competition, Afghanistan.
The computers come today for the boys. Girls outside. The first time I touched a computer.
It is like a light in the darkness and my tiny world got bigger and bigger. We have no computer classes. I’ll learn how to use these and then I’ll teach girls and have honest time. 10 classrooms are a drop in the ocean. It’s not changing anything. We’re looking for four girls who would like to learn about robotics and compete with teams from other countries.
It’ll show Ahan girls. Can you imagine starting in 2007 that you want to teach Afghani girls how to use computers? And then, uh, as you heard, uh, the woman, this is a true story, by the way, just like Cabrini was. This woman says, you know what? I got 10 classrooms of girls learning how to do computers. That is a drop in the ocean.
We’re never gonna get my mission accomplished. And she decides after she consults with some Silicon Valley people that, you know what, we gotta get the word out nationwide about what we’re doing, not nationwide, excuse me, worldwide, about what we’re doing. So they create a team called the Afghan Dreamers, which is an all girls robotics team to go compete around the world.
So they’re dealing with Afghan societal pressures. They’re dealing, obviously with upheaval over the years in their backyard. They’re dealing with social mores that are different. There’s a scene where one of the other contestants from one of the other countries, they, they had a custom where they would autograph each other’s shirts at the end of the competition.
And one girl. Let a boy touch her shirt and that is a no-no. And there were death threats to the woman that created the robotics competition. There’s so much tension you don’t know what’s gonna happen next. Guys, this, this was another great movie, just, just a great, great, great movie called Rule Breakers.
And I know that it’s only gonna be in the theater for a short amount of time, but if you get a chance to see rule breakers, a hundred percent, I left the movie. It was funny, the first thing I said when the lights came up, I turned to Cheryl. I go, oh, what a waste of time. And she, and she started laughing ’cause she knew exactly where I was.
She’s like, that is the best two hours we’ve had in a long time. Wow. And at a time when everybody’s bitching and complaining each other all the time, you know, I gotta spend part of my day on social media, which drives me crazy a lot of the time. Or you turn on the news and it’s people complaining and ugh.
Just to have a heartwarming story about people trying to succeed against all odds. What a, what a great, great, great story. Rule breaker. How’d you hear about it? What made you pick that movie to go see? You know what’s funny? You know, Cheryl and I, Doug look every Tuesday for the movie to go see. And, and we just went and we looked up, I’m like a rule rubric ’cause I dunno what this is.
And it’s funny because it came up and it said from Angel Studios and I remember Angel Studios. I’m like, okay, that’s Cabrini. And then I see the preview and I went, gotta see that next. Gotta see that next. And then, yeah. Cool. Ran to the theater. ’cause I didn’t know how long it was gonna be there. Uh, which you’ll probably need to do too, if you wanna see movies.
I can’t say I’ve ever picked a movie to see based on the studio that made it. Yeah. Never. A lot of times, you know, I wanna see Black Bag because it’s a Stephen Soderberg movie and I’m really excited about that movie with, uh, Kate Blanchet and, um, Michael Fastbender. It’s the Spy new spy movie that’s coming out.
We’re gonna see that tomorrow. Uh, so I’ll pick it based on director, right? Yeah. That’s more common. Yeah, but never, oh, that’s an MGM movie, right? Oh, ne Netflix made that. I know it. Yeah. So rule breaker, big thumbs up.
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