Travis McElroy has been a familiar voice in the podcasting world for well over a decade. Alongside his brothers Justin and Griffin (and often their father Clint or other extended family members), the McElroy family has become known for their wildly popular projects – ranging from the chaotic advice of the podcast My Brother, My Brother and Me to the imaginative storytelling of The Adventure Zone graphic novels – that all contain their signature blend of humor, sincerity, heart, and a genuine connection with their audience.
Nerds and Beyond recently had the opportunity to speak to Travis, discussing how the McElroys keep things fresh after hundreds of episodes, how they navigate burnout, and the joy of creating with family. He also shared his favorite con moments, why fan kindness matters, and the unforgettable day he learned Lin-Manuel Miranda was a listener.
Nerds and Beyond: We were supposed to connect at Dragon Con, but as you know, there was a scheduling mishap. With that, though, I want to hear about your con experiences! It seems like you and your brothers have been making the rounds, and I’d love to hear your thoughts on why it’s so important to connect with your fans this way.
Travis McElroy: I love doing conventions, and I’ve been doing them well over a decade at this point. First of all, as you mentioned, it’s a great opportunity to get face time with people. As you know, we work in this online universe [where we] put stuff out there and see comments or things like that. Or social media posts about it. But a lot of times, it just feels like such a disconnect between the audience and the creator, and [conventions provide] a chance to talk to people, and [give us] a chance to say thank you for listening. And they get a chance to say hi and feel connected in that way. And I just think it’s a nice opportunity to make me into a real person for them and make them into real people for us, you know?
Nerds and Beyond: For sure! Do you have a favorite or most memorable con moment with fans?
TM: I mean, I have plenty of getting to meet people that I am also a fan of! Matt Dinniman, who writes the Dungeon Crawler Carl books, [was at Dragon Con]. And I’m a huge Dungeon Crawler Carl fan, so I got to – through lots of coordinating my own schedule and checking where his panels and stuff were – get a copy of the Adventure Zone graphic novel into his hands, as a way of saying thank you for making a great book series and I hope you enjoyed this even one tenth as much as I’ve enjoyed your books. I also love seeing people’s cosplays from our shows. And it’s always so funny because people will start talking about how much our shows mean to them. And they’ll always say, like, “I’m sure you get this a lot, and I’m so sorry,” and I’m like, “Why do you think I’m here? I love knowing that our shows mean something to you! That’s very nice, thank you so much!”
Nerds and Beyond: I also obviously want to talk about your podcasting. When you started My Brother, My Brother, and Me, podcasting was still in its infancy. How has your approach changed since the beginning? If you go back and listen to early episodes, your subject matter and content has definitely gone through an evolution!
TM: It’s so interesting because I think it’s a very symbiotic relationship with the audience, [especially My Brother, My Brother, and Me], because the questions that we get inform the topics that we talk about, but also the questions that we answer inform the questions that get sent to us. Like we’ve reached a point, especially now, where [any of the three of us] haven’t worked in an office in so many years that we have to stop doing office interaction questions as much, ’cause we have no idea what we’re talking about. And same with dating. We’re at a point where we have each been married [so long] – Justin, I think close to 20 years, and Griffin and I close to 15 years. I can give you the basics, and the idea of relationship advice is fine, but dating, man, f***, I’m so out of that loop. I do not know. But with the nature of My Brother, My Brother, and Me being, first of all, fake advice, but also conversational, means that there’s a lot of flexibility in the topics we talk about and the way it has been able to naturally evolve as we’ve gotten older. And the hope is that it’s still the same kind of comedy and entertainment, but with all of our experiences and – I hate to use the word “maturity” to apply to what we do, but that kind of idea of it being connected to us and the way that we like look at things now, it just kind of naturally worked out that way.
Nerds and Beyond: Is there anything you know now – about storytelling, about the whole podcasting process, etc. – that you wish you had known then?
TM: The benefit of good quality equipment. We were not using good-quality equipment when we started. And I think we’ve gotten a lot better about being able to make jokes without making fun of people. I think that it’s very easy to – when you’re just talking to people in life – make an offhand comment and not even think twice about the impact that that would have on the person if they were listening. And [then you put out a project and] you don’t know who’s going to listen, and occasionally someone in that group or whatever that you made that offhand joke about is listening. And they’re like, “Hey, I don’t like that. That made me feel bad. That’s not cool. It really feels like you don’t understand the thing that you’re making a joke about.” And you’re like, “Oh no, you’re absolutely correct. I wasn’t even thinking about it. I was being very thoughtless.” I would say that now, we’re able to really be a lot more careful about what we’re saying, where the joke is coming from, what the humor is behind it. Are we making a joke? Or are we making fun? Those are two different things.
Nerds and Beyond: How has your relationship dynamic with your brothers changed as you’ve all grown and taken on more projects?
TM: We actually talk about this a lot! [In the] early days of the show, we had a conversation [about how] we will always be brothers first and co-workers and collaborators second. So if we start to get into a fight about, I don’t know, an idea for something or a creative project, that is less important than our relationship. And so it’s just like, okay, great, we just don’t do it. Let’s not worry about it anymore, because we don’t want our co-working relationship to damage our brother relationship. But we also made the decision at some point – I don’t remember when – [to say that] we need to be able to very openly communicate about the things that we’re working on. What we think works, what doesn’t work, [and to] be able to give feedback – deliver it and receive it – without it becoming like a personal thing, right? Like, yeah, man, if this thing didn’t work, that’s not because I don’t like you, right? And being able to brainstorm things together and to really figure out the way each other’s creative processes work. And to be able to be like, “I know exactly where you’re going with this and I know exactly what you need to do it.”
We did an episode of At Midnight, and it’s usually three different guests, right? [When we were on], they paired us each with a writer and sent us to three different rooms with these writers to work on stuff. And we could not do it. And then, like some kind of scripted scenario, we almost simultaneously came out of these three different dressing rooms looking for each other. We then found the showrunner and were like, “Hey, [the writers] are great, but if the three of us could just get in a room together for, like, 10 minutes, we’ll have it.” And they said, “Okay.” So the three of us – without writers there – just sat down and came up with it together.
Without each other, it’s like, “I don’t know, man. Is this funny? I don’t know.” I need those two because that’s my process.
Nerds and Beyond: What do you think has been the key to keeping all of your projects fresh for so long and avoiding burnout?
TM: I wouldn’t say we’ve avoided burnout. I think burnout naturally happens, and that’s one of the things that [in talking] to a college class or other people who want to do this kind of stuff – anything in the creative field – [I tell them] that I think burnout happens, right? There are days where you go to sit down to do the thing, even if it’s something you absolutely love and it makes you completely happy [that] it’s just not there, right? And that’s when it’s like, yeah, it’s a job. I still have to do it and I still have to get it done, but I would say it helps to have collaborators that you trust. Because rarely are all three of us like super energized at the exact same time about a thing, but [we have] the ability to be like, I’m super energized about this right now, while you two are maybe super energized about other projects or, [on the other hand], distracted by all the stuff that goes on in your life, and I will carry the ball for right now. And then when that changes, we’ll change it.
The first time we ever did a live show, I was very, very nervous. I called my then-girlfriend, now-wife, Teresa, and I was like, “I’m so nervous. I don’t know how this is going to go.” And she was like, “You guys just worry about making each other laugh. Don’t worry about the audience. The audience will come along. Just focus on making each other laugh.” And that sums up the way I think we do it, right? Because when we’re doing the show, the moments where we are most excited and when you can feel the energy crank up is when one of us starts losing it at something, and the other ones will start going and building on that bit.
So we’ve never really felt locked into like, well, I don’t want to do this thing, but we have to because the audience likes it. Because the thing is, if we’re not excited about it, I wouldn’t deliver that to an audience. So instead, we look at it more like, well, if I’m not excited about this thing, I’m going to find something I am excited about. And that will make the audience excited about it.
Nerds and Beyond: Going back to your history, you’ve helped shape modern podcasting in such a big way. What does that impact mean to you?
TM: A lot of white guys with microphones out there, and I’m so sorry about that. [laughs] You’ve come to the right brother, because I will sound grandiose where the other two won’t! But I’d like to think that we have, at the very least, helped keep the through-line of “anybody can do this.” I think there have been a couple of different cycles in the life of podcasting where you have seen celebrities and actual famous people start podcasts. And it’s like, oh, [they’re an] overnight success! [But it’s] because they have a built-in audience and they can immediately have PR teams and publicists and stuff behind them and [have] all the connections and everything. And I think that, as with a lot of stuff – it happens in YouTube, it happens in podcasting, it happens all over the internet – where as soon as something is seen as like, oh, this is like a viable monetary option, people will start to throw a bunch of money at a project. And people without those resources are like, well, the landscape has changed, and if I wanted to make a real go at this and try to make a living off it, there’s no way that I could compete with somebody who’s starring in blockbuster movies and has a whole creative team behind them. So I’d like to think that there are plenty of podcasts out there – not just ours – that show that you don’t need to be a huge A-list celebrity with a million-dollar podcasting studio to do this. You can still go get a $50 microphone, sit down, and start doing it right now. And as long as you like what you’re doing, and people like what you’re doing, then you are doing it, right? The barrier for entry is very, very low still, and I’d like to think that we’ve had some impact on that.
I’d also like to think that we’ve maintained a level of trying to be kind [where] other people are like, “Oh, I don’t have to be a jerk like some other podcasters and internet people [and] build an audience of jerks around me. That I can stay kind and empathetic and learn from my mistakes and admit when I’m wrong and still do the right thing and still have fun.” I’d like to think that is some of the impact we’ve had.
And also probably just making a lot of the humor dumber, but in a kind way. In a kind, silly, dumb way.
Nerds and Beyond: I had a question about that later, but since you’re literally talking about how your fandom is kind right now, let’s jump ahead. What does that mean to you to have that kind of community around your work?
TM: I’m gonna break the mold here and say that I think our audience is the best audience. [laughs] But I think that they’re incredibly supportive and I think that, in many ways, our audience holds us accountable in a very good way. Here’s a bunch of people that trust us to be kind and thoughtful. And even if we’re being snarky, or even if we’re trying to make light of a situation or be funny about something, that [it’s important] we know where the lines are. That we’re being careful about it. We’re being thoughtful about it. And knowing that inspires us to be that. And because of that, I think it’s made the three of us, as people, more thoughtful about those things. And I will now see, in my everyday life, somebody make a comment about a group of people or a type of person or something like that. And I’m like, hmm, you don’t know that. Who are you? Where are you getting that? Oh, very funny. Jerk.
It’s like I said about the symbiotic relationship with the subject matter of the questions, right? They are kind and expect us to be kind, so we are kind and expect them to be kind. And it feeds back in a very positive way.
Nerds and Beyond: To jump back a little bit, you were talking about your development process. When you’re developing something new – a podcast, live show, or book – where does your creative process usually start and how does it evolve?
TM: It’s absolute madness. So it’s Justin, Griffin, and I, plus whoever, right? Or if it’s a Taz thing, dad’s there, too. If it’s a video thing, then we’re working with our business manager, Amanda, and our content supervisor, Sarah, or our video editor, Tom, or our sound editor, Rachel, any of these people. And [let’s say] it was a two-hour conversation, it ends up being an hour and 55 minutes of throwing absolute spaghetti at the wall. Absolute nonsense. “What about this?” “No.” “This?” “What if it were this or this or this or this?” “What about this?” And the last five minutes [are] like, “I just had an idea.” “We all love it. Yes, go.”
The “Naming of the Year” episodes, where we talk about what the theme of the year is going to be, [are an] example of our creative process where it’s us spiraling into madness for 95% of the time, where nothing is right and nothing feels good. Maybe we’ve never been funny in our whole lives. Maybe everything we’ve ever done is bad. And then in like the last minute, it’s like, “Oh wait, what about this?” “Yeah, great!” And it’s like that every time. Never once has any one of us or the combination of us sat down and said, “Here’s my fully thought-through idea.” And the other ones were like, “Sounds great,” and then we walk away from the call. It’s never happened
Nerds and Beyond: Never ended a meeting early in your life.
TM: Nope.
Nerds and Beyond: Well, as I mentioned, y’all have written books and graphic novels (and I know Griffin has a choose-your-own-adventure book coming out in March). How do you find writing for print differs from writing for audio, and do you find one affects or influences the other?
TM: Yeah, I definitely think that it was a big change. Justin and I had a really hard time converting the podcast to the graphic novel script, because I’ve never been able to sit down and just write something. I have to talk it through. As soon as I sit down to write, my incredibly overactive brain is completely blank. But I could narrate a whole book out loud. Just sort of like, oh, this could happen, then that. And so what ended up happening was we’d have these big conversations where we’d talk about like the adaptation of the books, and then Dad and Griffin would go away and write them and come back. And then Justin and I would be like, “Okay, great. Here’s four pages of notes.” And they’d be like, “Okay.” And then Carrie would illustrate it. And then Justin and I would be like, great, now we understand what it is. Now I can see it. And [this is] where we really start, because we’re thinking about it from our characters’ point of view, from the audience’s point of view, and everything. And Justin and I aren’t really writers in that way, [but] where we are really good at looking at it is after the fact. When it’s like, “Sit down and just write the thing,” I can’t, but I can read it and really try to see it from the point of view of the person reading it, or from the character’s point of view, and curate that experience.
And so I think that was the biggest transition. There’s a reason all of our stuff is audio podcast, because we’re good at talking, right? We talk for a living, we do it a lot. Griffin, I think, is great at writing. Dad is great at writing. Justin and I maybe could be. I think we’ve both written stuff that we’re very proud of, but as far as natural sit down and the words flow out of your hands onto paper, I don’t think that’s where Justin and I thrive.
Nerds and Beyond: Going back to fandom for a second – I know that Lin-Manuel Miranda has said that he’s a fan of you and your family. So what was it like realizing somebody at his level was a fan of yours?
TM: I was actually just talking about this the other day. I was still working at Cincy Shakes, the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company. I was their technical director, master carpenter, and I also designed some sets and stuff. And I was in the middle of a build and I [was] sitting in the theater and Justin texted me, “Oh my God, Lin-Manuel Miranda is a fan of My Brother, My Brother and Me!” And I said, “Oh, that’s great. Who’s that?” Because this was before Hamilton, and I do not keep up all that well with Broadway news. Or any news, really. I’m not good at keeping up with anything thanks to ADHD. And he was like, “He wrote In the Heights and won a bunch of Tonys,” and said “He’s amazing.” I was like, “Oh, that’s so cool. That’s great.” And then we did live shows in New York and Lin came. We met [and he] was super nice dude, it was awesome. And then we had him on the show. He was recording from The Public while they were working on Hamilton. So then, while Hamilton was at The Public in its off-Broadway run, Justin and Griffin were going to New York for a thing with Polygon, and then they were gonna go see Hamilton while they were there. And I was like, “Oh, man, I wanna go.” So I messaged Lin and I was like, “Hey, if I buy plane tickets, can I come see Hamilton with Justin and Griffin?” And he was like, “Yeah, man.” So two days later, I was in New York and it was St. Patrick’s Day weekend, and Justin and Griffin and I went and saw Hamilton. And at intermission, the three of us stepped outside and were like, “How do we talk to him from now on?” Up till now, he has been our bud Lin, who wrote In the Heights. Good, talented dude. And now we’re like, “Well, that’s one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen in my life.” We were only at intermission! And we’re like, “Oh my God, now this is all I wanna talk about.” So then we go back in for Act Two. And after the show, the bar in The Public was not open for the night, but Lin got permission for the four of us to hang out there after the show. At that point, Justin and Sidney and Lin and his wife both had babies that were about the same age, about five or six months. And that’s all he wanted to talk about. Like, “How do you deal with this? And what’s this like?” And like the three of us are sitting there like, “Uh-huh, yeah, babies, man, that’s crap, yeah.” He is not a dude who wants to have praise loaded on him for the stuff that he’s done. He wants to just hang out and be buds. And he is a remarkably thoughtful and down-to-earth guy who’s excited to show dumb ideas he’s had and excited to take part in the dumb ideas we have. He did a song called Shrimp Heaven Now from a bit that we did at My Brother, My Brother and Me at a live show in New York. He came like hour and a half, hour and 45 minutes in New York traffic to come do it, and then before the show started, when people were waiting outside, he went and ran the line of people giving high fives and saying hi and stuff because he was excited to do it. He’s an absolute goober and he’s great.
Nerds and Beyond: Have there been other moments where famous fans have reached out and your mind is blown?
TM: Matthew Lillard’s kids like The Adventure Zone, and it feels so cyclical to where I’m just like, “Yeah, but you’re Matthew Lillard from Scream and Scooby-Doo. My kids like the stuff you do.” And I’m like, “I like the stuff you do. This is wild.” Rob Corddry – who was on The Daily Show – his kid is an Adventure Zone fan and he and I have struck up a friendship, and he is just an absolute sweetheart and a cool dude to talk to. It’s a lot of people’s kids know who we are that have then introduced them to us. It feels so good.
Like getting to meet John Hodgman. I remember going on a road trip, and we went to Gatlinburg and drove from Huntington. It was a six-hour drive and we listened to The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman. On the way there, we’re cracking up, losing it the whole way. So then fast forward to when we joined [the] Max Fun [podcast] and John Hodgman was there. And [we loved] getting to meet him and [he was] an absolute sweetheart of a guy. I remember going to a party after San Francisco Sketch Fest at Adam Savage’s workshop and getting to hang out there. And Hodgman was introducing me to people as, “This is Travis McElroy. He’s more famous than me.” And to which I was like, “John, I don’t know if that’s true.” Adam Savage – another one, absolute delight. Just a huge nerd and just excited to show you all of his toys and talk about making them and down to do whatever. Yeah, man, it’s great.
Nerds and Beyond: With that, you kind of touched on it earlier, but do you ever think about who might be listening now when you record, or do you try not to think about it?
TM: You know, this is where the positive side of the thing I was saying earlier about why we do conventions comes in. Because once we start recording, I’m thinking about Justin and Griffin. The only time I think I ever think about who might be listening is when we need cameos for Candlenight specials, or we have to do a book reading of The Adventure Zone and we need someone to read Lucretia – who’s available? Is Jean Grey available is usually my first question. And then like going through and being like, okay, great, we need somebody for this, who do I know that listens to my thing? Or being somewhere and someone comes up and is like, “I love your stuff.” And I’m like, “I love your stuff. That’s wild,” which is always fun. My favorite thing is when I will hyperfixate on a YouTube channel or a podcast or a book series or something, and then I’ll post somewhere about it like, “I love this. I can’t stop watching it.” And then that creator will be like, “I love The Adventure Zone!” I’m like, “Oh, awesome. I’m so glad that worked out. I forgot you might also know who I was.”
Nerds and Beyond: I know we’ve touched on your eight bajillion projects, but are there still any creative goals that you still want to tackle? Is there something totally different that you’ve never done before that you want to try?
TM: We have poked at the idea of some kind of like animated show a couple times. I think, honestly, one of the things that we’ve never really gotten to do is have a big ensemble of people doing a thing with us. Even when we did the show on Seeso, it ended up mostly being me, Justin and Griffin and, like, Dad in every episode. So we’ve just never gotten the chance to be like, “Here’s us and 12 of our talented friends voicing a thing together.” Or doing a show together. I think that would be very exciting. That would be very fun. I don’t know, man. I’d like to take up sculpting. No, I think doing some kind of triumphant return to streaming television would be amazing.
Nerds and Beyond: What you were saying triggered me to think about Good Mythical Morning and how they’ve expanded their universe.
TM: Yeah, I was talking about this to somebody the other day. Another nice thing about now having been content creators for a decade and a half is that there are people, frankly, more talented than us who are starting to lay out the roadmap of like, “Hey, so you’ve been doing this for 20 years. Great. Here’s what the next thing is.” I’m 42, and we’ve been doing this for a while, and I now know all of these people who are incredibly talented. When I did Twenty-Sided Tavern, every single person there in the cast and crew was so talented and so fun to work with. My main takeaway was, “I have to find a way to make sure everyone knows who these people are, because they’re so fun and cool and great. They should all be way more famous than me. Everyone should know who they are. Everybody should be knocking on their doors to work with them. What can I do to like help them?” That kind of thing – creating opportunities for people, and creating more space for people to create and and us just being there like, “I’m proud of you. You’re doing great.” I think that would be ideal.
You know, to touch back to Lin-Manuel Miranda – here in my twilight years of 42, I think about my legacy, but more of wanting to use whatever level of success we have to create more success for other people. But also, the the tricky part of that is, it’s always just been the three of us, or the four of us or the two of us, depending on what combination of McElroy you’re talking about. And we don’t really have a structure built for here’s other people that aren’t us and trying to figure out a way to do that.
To be fair, I’ve been having fun with Champions Grove, the weekend-long gaming event that I host every Memorial Day at Ravenwood Castle in Hocking Hills, Ohio. And it’s very exciting to me because every year I get to think, “Who can I bring to this?” It’s an event that I created to be something that’s fun for guests, fun for hosts, fun for the like castle staff. I don’t want them to hate having us there. It’s not at all a money-making endeavor for me, but it’s just become a year-long, full-time job. But I get to say, like, “Okay, this person is incredibly passionate, incredibly talented, super fun to be around, [but] I don’t know if they have any name recognition that would sell tickets, but I’m not worried about that. I want people to learn about them. I want them to become a household name.” And someone doesn’t become a household name without the chance to do the stuff. So [I’m] trying to create those opportunities and have fun with it and create a space where people get to just have fun and be themselves and have a great time. I also promised my co-founder of Champions Grove that I would mention it during the interview. She said, “Make sure you talk about Champions Grove.” And I said, “I will, Alice. I promise.” It’s on sale now. Championsgrove.com. We’re over halfway sold out. I think there are only six or seven packages left at this point.
Nerds and Beyond: I was gonna give you a second at the end to plug everything!
TM: I’m doing it right now, Haylee! [Laughs] Bring some friends or come and make some friends. Bring some enemies. It doesn’t matter to me.
Nerds and Beyond: My last question – before I give you the opportunity to plug everything – is what advice would you give to somebody who wants to start a podcast, especially one that has built the same kind of like loyal, kind community that y’all have?
TM: I think whether it’s a podcast or YouTube channel or TikTok channel or anything – especially online, or maybe because it’s online – the one thing that the internet has given us is the ability for people to find shared interests. There are things that, 30 years ago, may have been so niche that you could like walk around your entire high school senior class and be like, “Is anybody else interested in abandoned amusement parks?” And everybody would be like, “What are you talking about? What do you mean interested?” And then the internet comes along and you know what? One in every 20,000 people might be interested in this. And out of the 7 billion people on earth, that’s an audience. So then you get something like Defunctland, which is one of my favorite YouTube channels. And no matter where you are, no matter where the listener is, they can find more and more specific content that they’re into. If you went to a TV network 30 years ago and said, “I want to do a TV show about abandoned amusement parks,” they’d be like, “In what way? What are you talking about? Who would watch that?” But [now], you don’t need somebody to approve the topic. You don’t need somebody to give you notes on the thing, you can start right now. You could start today and put out a podcast about something you’re interested in. And the other nice thing is, if you let go of success being, “I was able to quit my job and do this full time” and you just see success as, “I like making this, I look forward to it. And there are people that enjoy it,” you could do that so easily. The only cost for putting up a podcast is the hosting fee for whatever podcast site you put it out on. And so you could put it out and have an audience of a hundred, but those hundred people listen to every episode you put out. And then they start a Discord channel talking about the show with each other, or they start a subreddit talking about it. And that’s your audience, right? And you don’t need to hit numbers to keep doing it. As long as you enjoy talking about it and they enjoy listening to it, you’re doing it.
I think that oftentimes, you will come across shows where the person clearly doesn’t care about the content. They thought it would be popular, so they started doing it. And it’s like, you’re not invested in this, so why should I be invested in this? And it’s like, man, talk about the things you’re interested in, ’cause then at least you’re having fun learning about it and talking about it. But if you’re doing a thing purely to be popular or to try to make money, the slog to grow an audience to get there is going to just crush you.
Nerds and Beyond: Well like I said, here’s the opportunity for you to plug all of your upcoming projects now that we’re at the end.
TM: Championsgrove.com. We’re also doing our Candlenights holiday show back in our hometown of Huntington, [and more info can be found at] bit.ly/candlenights2025. December 6th is the live show. You can get tickets to see that, or we’ll also be filming the show and releasing it as a Video On Demand stream on December 19th, which will then be available through January 4th. Every in-person ticket includes the streaming, and all the proceeds from that go to Harmony House in our hometown, which is a great organization aiming to end homelessness in the Huntington area through a lot of wonderful programs and outreach. Pre-orders for the final Adventure Zone graphic novel are open now. You can also go to themcelroy.family to find out all the stuff that we do – all the projects, all the podcasts – and check out our YouTube channel, The McElroy Family.
That was all from memory, too. Look at me, I wasn’t even looking at a copy.
Nerds and Beyond: It’s like you’ve done this before!
TM: You’d think that would guarantee I could do it from memory, but sometimes you just have to take a run at it.
