TKO: Let Them Eat (Birthday) Cake! (Hour 2)

Good morning, Wisconsin.

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Sing it, mom.

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I am joined by Melissa.

Good morning.

Seth.

Good morning.

And the best listeners in radio.

Thanks so much for joining us, everybody.

Entertainment news coming up for you.

What is the most mispronounced names?

We'll get into that too.

That's all coming up for you.

All of that is in store, but it is a Monday and the 9 o'clock hour.

You know what that means.

Good morning and welcome to the kitchen's open on WFHR for this Monday, February 17th.

February seems to be birthday month among the families here at our station.

We've got two birthdays in our household.

That's right.

Laura has two birthdays in hers, and one of us here has a birthday coming up later this week.

I'm not doing this one.

I probably should have told you guys beforehand.

I'm not playing along with this one.

I don't know what you're talking about.

There's no birthday among the staff here.

Uh-huh.

Yeah, sure, James.

Uh-huh.

With said birthdays comes one of the traditions we have grown up loving.

The birthday cake.

Ah, yes.

The old birthday cake.

Well, most of us have grown up loving.

What?

Well, I like cake.

Even though you're the head of the party.

Well, when I was younger, I was more into cake.

Okay, all right.

As my palate matured, I just became more involved with pie.

There you are.

Wait a minute.

You were not born a pie lover.

I know.

I wasn't talking, isn't it?

Hmm.

I'm pretty sure I'm all in now.

I thought you had to be born a pie lover in order to be in a charge of this.

Just rock my room, rocking as well.

So what were those things about cakes that you liked when you were growing up?

Well, most of the time we had a homemade one.

My mom usually made the cake at the house.

And she would, you know, we weren't that inventive.

You know, I know Beth here asks our kids, you know, what kind of cake do you want?

And they'd say, you're like, I want double, triple, chocolate, swirl,

you know, all these kind of things.

Like, basically, would you want yellow cake this year, dear?

Yes.

Okay.

Maybe we could mix things up and do chocolate, you know?

Although one of my favorite cakes is actually a spice cake.

Yes.

With a cream cheese affrosting on it.

Oh, I love spice cake.

And fun fact, when you put strawberries in it, it tastes like rhubarb.

That's true.

So I've been told.

We found that out when you did that once.

It was shocking.

It was like, this tastes like rhubarb.

Oh, this is amazing.

Yeah.

Well, one of the reasons I do that with our boys is that's what my mom always did with us.

Growing up is, and my favorite was always red velvet cake.

That was always my choice.

But here is a pro tip.

If you have a one-year-old having cake for the first time, do not let it be red velvet cake.

Oh, boy.

Oh, wow.

We made that mistake with our eldest.

And yeah, we got to get rid of a certain outfit.

Yeah, we destroyed the outfit.

Yeah, it was hilarious.

We loved it, which was great.

But yeah.

The picture's got to be great.

Oh, it is.

Yes.

So, yes, although I am the chair of the pie council, I do know a thing or two about birthday treats.

For instance, the first food used to celebrate birthdays were cookies.

That's right.

And I know shocking, isn't it?

When I started to look into the history of the birthday cake, I was surprised to find out that cake wasn't the first sweet treat used to celebrate that milestone.

According to an article on sugar.org entitled The Sweet History of Birthday Cakes, great title.

Historians believe that ancient Egyptians were the first to celebrate birthdays because Egyptians believed that pharaohs became gods when they were crowned.

Coronations were considered the quote-unquote birth of a god and celebrated.

Food, drink, and festivities occurred when each new pharaoh was born similar to birthday parties like today.

For the citizens of Egypt, cock, cookies were also commonly served on their birthdays to honor the sun god, Ra, symbolizing another successful year around the sun.

The cookies are mild in flavor.

Consisting a flower, butter, sugar, nutmeg, vanilla, cinnamon, and milk.

The cock cookies are still commonly used to this day.

That explains it. That is it. That's why I love cookies so much. It's out of my controls in my genes.

That's right. Literally in my DNA.

Don't fight it, James. Just give right into it.

I'm just going to give in.

So when did it go from cookies to cake, right?

So the article goes on to share about the transition to cake.

Cakes are also common birthday celebratory foods in ancient Greece and ancient Rome.

Ancient Romans typically served cakes at birthdays and weddings.

The circle cakes were made of from flower, nuts, leavengeese, and honey.

Honey is what provides a sweet flavor for these cakes.

Ancient Greece celebrated birthdays with cakes specifically the sixth day of every lunar year with moon-shaped cakes that included lit candles.

Cool.

The cakes were offered up for ancient Greece's goddess of the moon, Artemis.

The lit candles represented the moon's shine.

Artemis' candles were considered the first birthday candles.

Cake candles continued to be used in other ancient pagan cultures.

Pagan cultures believed that fire from the lit candles scared away evil spirits.

And the smoke from the candles carried prayers to the gods.

People made noise and lit candles to ward off evil spirits on a person's birthday.

What do you want to do?

You don't want any evil spirits on your birthday.

That's what you want to do.

And a similar article on food and wine.com entitled A Brief History of the Birthday Cake.

The use of candles changed through the centuries.

It says the Germans probably first celebrated birthdays in a manner similar to how we do today.

In the 18th century, Kinderfesta, which sounds like a great name for a German theme park, that's a cake-based yet, was a party held for a child.

In the morning, a cake was topped with lit candles.

The child did not blow them out, though.

Instead, they were left to burn all day until after dinner when the cake was eaten.

They must have had much bigger candles.

I get to burn them all day long.

Not the small little ones of these.

No, no, no, no, no.

That's hilarious.

It's just this 18-foot cake.

Yes, it stick right there.

Yeah, the cake.

See, there's nice, big, tapered candles.

That's right.

But it doesn't specify how many candles are on the cake.

So that tradition actually was connected with the...

has a connection to the Moravian.

Very cool, yeah.

So when I looked several websites, said the same thing about birthday candles,

and most of them shared this same story.

For instance, countingcandles.com in its article, Tradition of the Birthday Candles, shares the idea of counting candles on a birthday cake dates back to the Germans.

In 1746, there was a large birthday festival in honor of Count Ludwig Wonson's and Dorf's birthday.

For the ball, a large cake was made with one candle in the middle,

and candles all around representing each year of the Count's life.

The large candle in the middle is believed to be representing the light of life in German culture.

So here's how it's connected to the Moravians.

Count Zinsendorf was a German count who allowed a refugee group of the Unitist Fraudstrom,

which is known as the Unity of the Brethren, to settle in this new community called Heronhut, on his estate.

The Unitist Fraudstrom, or what is called in German Brudergemein, would eventually be known as the Moravian Church.

That's right.

So Moravians known for candles and stars, and now birthday cakes.

Because of Count Zinsendorf, yeah.

I am such a sucker for things like the history of things.

And I cannot help but do everything I do has to have a double meaning to it or whatever and everything.

And I can't help that.

But I will say that one of the things that I appreciate about my brain that it works that way is,

the pride that you can take in little things.

I take pride in things that have nothing to do with my culture all the time and stuff.

I find other cultures beautiful and interesting, but there's a little bit of added pride when you learn something like,

oh, cookies come from Egyptians or something along those lines.

I'm curious if there's something along those lines for you, Beth, when you were doing this,

and if you knew it already or not, when it comes to birthday cakes in the Moravian Church and that connection there,

because I would take a little pride in that.

I think that's interesting.

It's actually one of the reasons why I wanted to do an episode on birthday cakes.

I don't know what I was looking at watching some type of YouTube video or something like that,

and this came up that it was Count Zinsendorf that did the birthday candles.

I'm like, wait, wait, wait, what did they just say the name that I think they just said?

And certainly it was, and it doesn't surprise me that that candle in the middle was the light of life

and for the, he was a Lutheran, actually, but had a huge influence on the Moravian Church.

That light of life would have been the symbol for Jesus.

So the connection that Jesus is a part of our life from birth to death,

that doesn't surprise me that that would be the center, larger candle, and then the other candles around it.

And it just goes to show, I mean, how much so many things we do take from German culture in general in this country.

I mean, we take Christmas trees and all these, especially when it comes to celebrations,

which I find really fascinating.

And that's hilarious.

It's kind of funny when you think about some ways, just with these stereotypes that could be of German people

and German people.

And I bring this up just in kind of a local tie in here.

Whenever I talk about a store point boss, and we've talked about them a bit today and everything,

they're trying to keep history alive.

There's so much pride, I think, that locals can take in that area over there

and in the soil, in the land, wherever you are.

Right, exactly.

It's the same thing with what we're talking about here.

And just these things that can, I think, built in that, not only we can take pride in,

but that we can share with others and share in that pride.

Right.

This has me saying I need to go back to using one candle for each year rather than using the candle numbers.

No.

Wow.

Yeah.

It's easier though.

Go back to my roots.

I like it.

No.

But that does bring up also though about when did the candles start to get blown out?

That is an excellent question.

So the tradition actually comes from one of Seth's ancestors.

That's right.

It's an article from sugar.com shares that in Switzerland, in 1881,

the first account of blowing out candles is recorded.

The candles on birthday cakes each represent, of course, a year of life,

and we're blown out one by one.

So we like to do, or we have done.

I guess I don't know if a lot of people do this.

You don't try to blow them all at once, right?

Yeah.

You take your make your wish, make your birthday wish, and then try to blow out all the candles at once

and then it'll supposedly come true, right?

Right.

I guess that was mine.

No.

I'm putting mine on other people.

That's what we got to.

Okay.

And I didn't even think to go into, okay, when did that become the tradition rather than blowing it from one out by one?

So now everybody, you have homework to do.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Type into your Google or whatever search engine you like.

When did you start blowing out candles to make a wish?

When was that connection made?

It's a fascinating question.

Good one.

I get, please.

Any answers anybody gets?

We need them.

Please give them to us, everybody.

I can't research it.

I'm too busy at sugar.org.

I've never heard of this website.

I know.

That's awesome.

Maybe I'll have an answer and answer on my article on our next newsletter,

which you can sign up for at the FHR website.

Yeah.

That's very good.

Do that.

So it wasn't until much later that the birthday cake tradition was enjoyed by the masses, though.

You know, usually you had to have somebody to do it.

And an article by Melanie Fincher on allrecipes.com entitled,

Why Do We Eat Birthday Cake?

Prior to the Industrial Revolution, cakes were considered a luxury good.

But mass production made it possible for everyone, not just the wealthy,

to partake in cake on their birthday.

Ingredients became more widely available, which allows bakeries to offer pre-made cakes at lower prices.

And not to mention, this is my thought, loving mothers who do their best to make their child's favorite cake.

Yeah.

Exactly.

There is something special about that.

Any parent who wants to make the cake for the birthday.

They say, like Beth jokes about, you know, make it with love, right?

That makes it that much better.

It makes it taste.

It really does.

You put love into the cake.

And it tastes better.

And I have boys that like to challenge me.

I've been asked to make a strawberry cake.

And there are very few recipes out there.

And I don't like to do the box ones, because I don't want to do the food coloring that's in there.

Yeah.

And plus the amount of sugar, I can kind of substitute some stevia or slenda,

kind of make it a little bit less unhealthy.

But my oldest whose birthday is later this week wants a caramel cake.

Oh, nice.

A caramel swirl cake.

You're up the challenge is on.

We do have to wrap the segment here in a second.

But I do want to add to this that I sent a lot of this to my sister.

Okay.

My sister is a social butterfly.

And with her two boys and they're young.

And she just doesn't get out of the house at all.

I'm being able to do things.

And she hasn't had a whole lot of creative outlets.

So I would say about a year or so ago, maybe even longer than that.

She just somewhere or another started making cakes.

Oh, cool.

Like a cookie monster cake and things like that.

And just really gets into it.

And it has been a huge creative outlet for her.

She has run into other people online that do this.

And so she's had a little bit of a, you know, social connection there with and everything.

Cakes are amazing.

Yeah, right.

And there's really cool stuff going on with that and everything.

She sends me pictures all the times of these ones that she makes.

And she, I have to put her in touch with you guys because she can empathize with everything you boys are doing.

Her boys are doing the same thing.

Yeah.

Maybe you can share notes and notes.

Oh, excellent, excellent.

And the decorating of the cake is probably the hardest part.

They're baking not so much.

But I mean, just go to what was it?

A YouTube thing called nailed it.

And you can see some, you know, wonderful attempts that just don't quite get there.

All right.

I can only say this because Melissa can't answer.

I guess cakes are all right.

Yeah.

Oh, nice.

We got it.

But she is listening.

So it's common.

The whole point of this segment was to get him out on and go admit that we got it.

All right.

Well, we'd love to celebrate your business by having you become a sponsor for this segment where you will be highlighted

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715-424-1300.

Speak with Pam.

She'll put you in touch with Ashley to work out all the details.

That number once more, 715-424-1300.

And with that, we'll close the kitchen.

Yeah.

Excellent.

Great segment.

That was a lot of fun.

Yeah.

That was a lot of fun.

All about cakes.

And I'm going to be diving into a couple of the questions we had there and the sugar.org website.

Yeah.

Very cool.

While I'm doing that, Beth, I did want to remind everybody that coming up this Sunday, you got a big event going on.

We do.

It is the trivia night for walk off school debt being sponsored by the Greater Rapids Area Churches for Humanism.

I could say that well now when I was trying to voice track, it was not going to be interesting.

Oh, it happens.

It is going to be happening from 2 to 4 p.m. down at two doors down Brewing Company on East Grand Avenue.

It's a corner of East Grand and first street in Wisconsin or Rapids.

And I happen to know that there are a couple of people that are going to be kind of emceeing this event that are kind of familiar voices.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Just found out about it.

So Seth and I will be doing the trivia part of it.

We'll be reading the questions and stuff.

There will also be a silent auction and the station has kindly donated a overnight at Chulivista Resort.

Chulivista Resort.

As one of those, there's going to be some more swag with that.

There's a Mary K basket that we're trying to get.

So there's a lot of work.

We're going to figure we'll have about 10 to 20 baskets available.

So it's a great chance to just come.

All of the proceeds go to help pay off school food service step for our students specifically for our seniors first and then going down.

So that our seniors can walk in graduation and get their transcripts so that they can start that new chapter in their lives with a clean slate.

It's a great opportunity to put into the future of our community and help out and have a good time while you're at it.

Yeah.

Shout out to two doors down, brewing for opening their doors.

They do this with a lot of nonprofits.

A lot of, I think that's really cool.

Right.

I appreciate the gang over there.

And if you don't have any money, you are still welcome to come.

And there is no charge to participate in the trivia.

There will be a free will offering for whatever people would like to give.

Find out more.

Be sure to look at the Meravian Church's website.

Just type in your search bar.

Wisconsin's Ravitson Meravian Church.

And our WR Meravian to find their website and then find them on social media like Facebook or anything.

Type in your search bar.

Wisconsin Ravitson Meravian Church.

And be a part of the event.

Everybody will be talking more about it throughout the week.

Great job, Beth.

Thank you.

We'll be back in more show coming up on the morning show.

Welcome back, everybody.

Morning show here at WFHR, locally grown radio.

Melissa, Seth and James hanging out with you.

Thanks so much for joining us.

Okay, having a great Monday morning out there.

Diving into some entertainment news.

Last September, we got teased with some false rumors of a goonies sequel.

But it is happening for real this time.

Okay.

Wow.

Warner Brothers announced that Steven Spielberg and Chris Columbus are returning to produce.

Chris wrote the screenplay for the 85 original in Spielberg.

Of course, it's his story.

It's his vision.

It's a completely original story by Steven Spielberg.

Okay.

There isn't a director yet or any plot detail.

So it's pretty early on.

But this time it seems promising.

I imagine that, and in fact, I will put my name on it.

Everybody who loved from that movie that's grown up now is going to be a part of that movie.

In some way for shape or form.

Yeah.

This is whether it's Josh Brolin or it's Sean Aston or Kequan or any of these actors.

When they talk about this movie, you can see it in their eyes.

It was a different time.

It was a different moment for them.

And they all go back and appreciate that time in that moment.

I just a real quick side note to this.

Imagine Steven Spielberg's producing this.

Chris Columbus directing it.

I don't care who you are as a director.

That's a lot to walk into.

Those particular names hanging over you as a director.

I can't imagine what that might be like.

Steven just showing up at the show.

Hey, how's it going over here?

Hey, it seems like there's a different type of pressure with that.

Then I would love.

I think a good director would embrace.

But it's still a lot.

I mean, that's Steven Spielberg.

I don't put many people ahead of Martin Scorsese or certain directors.

Spielberg's at the top of the list for me.

As far as overall great directors.

It's a little intimidating.

It's just a little bit.

And I'm with everybody else.

I am so tired of sequels and prequels and all of this.

I am too.

I am with everybody on that.

I will say there is something to be said for.

Hey, we're making tons of movies anyway.

And it's not as if that we're making this movie.

And there's so much that depends on it.

The studio will fall apart if this movie isn't successful.

Or careers will be, you know, vanquished or something like that.

It's a silly sequel.

If you go into it and everything, I think it can be fun.

Right.

What I think a lot of the problem is, a lot of the pomp and circumstance

that gets put on some of these things.

And we take them too seriously.

Or we get our own personal emotions tied into it.

Like they made the movie for us.

Right.

And got to remember that this is not just about you.

That there's others.

And one other thing about this that I actually like,

when it comes to, I'll look at the Star Wars universe.

Okay.

You know, Seth and I are whole childhoods begging for anything of Star Wars.

Right.

And now our kids' kids are just flooded with Star Wars stuff.

Right.

There's too much.

And for everything that we like, there's 20 things that you can go on Reddit

and find a million hate problems about everything.

Right, right, right.

And all of it's good.

All of it's a good thing.

It keeps this around for younger generations.

And the younger generations get to enjoy this stuff.

And then they get to go online to say if they don't like a dislike or whatever and everything.

And it keeps this stuff in the lexicon.

It keeps it out there.

Right.

I think one of the problems in James that you kind of touched on about all these sequels that we do is

that they're trying to recapture something.

And I think you can't go into it like that.

Because this was a problem for me when I watched recently Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.

They were trying to recapture whatever it was that made the first film so, you know, a memorable and fun.

And it didn't quite work.

And I think if you approach it as, you know, yeah, it's a continuation.

But let's try to not try to go back to the same thing.

Let's try to make something new and different with it.

Even with the same characters or connections to the same characters.

Well, however they do it, you know, if they can try to come up with something more original

and not try to go back to whatever it was that made that one special.

I think they have a better chance of making this one more special.

And they almost saw it.

They almost have to because some of the things in the original goonies

didn't age.

Right, no, that's not age.

Great point.

Great point.

I didn't even think of that.

Of course they're going to have to make some, yes, you are so right.

That's true.

I didn't think of that though.

Absolutely.

But the original movie only cost 19 million.

I mean, only.

It's still.

That's a chunk of change.

But they grow 125 million worldwide.

I mean, back then, the 19 was still not a huge budget.

You know, it was a decent size one, but you're so right.

And I will say this.

The audience is proven.

They want a sequel or a reimagination than a prequel.

People are done with prequels.

For the love of all that is stop at the prequels.

People have just done with that.

They want you to advance the story.

They don't want to rewind.

They already know how the story ends.

You don't need a prequel to Titanic.

I know how that one ends.

I'm pretty sure I got an idea.

I don't know.

I don't know, James.

I would love personally to see a prequel to Titanic, you know, building the ship everything.

I think you would be riveting.

That's awesome.

I love the idea of James Cameron doing that.

I got it, Seth.

James didn't, but I got it.

That's all right.

Riveting.

It was really good.

It was really good.

It was so great.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm just that smart enough.

That was over by him.

Sorry.

It was good though.

It was a deliberate pun and it just sometimes doesn't land.

No, it was great.

It was not you.

It was the audience.

Sorry.

It was me on that one.

Sorry, I didn't mean to tuck over you, James.

I just couldn't help it.

I didn't mean to be done.

I didn't mean to be done.

Because Seth needs to be celebrated today.

Because Seth likes cake.

Seth loves cake.

Seth loves cake.

She heard me.

She heard me.

She heard me.

I thought this was an interesting one.

I wanted to take a moment for this.

Maya Hawke is the daughter of Ethan and Uma Herman.

Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman.

You'd think that that, you know, books a lot of roles in itself.

But now in the age of social media, the amount of followers an actor has matters.

And so this is part of why it's being brought up.

This is something I've touched on a little bit on the air here and everything.

But there is something that has happened in the last decade with the rise of social media

and with the acting community.

And where, as an actor now, for my, I've only had my sad cards and so wait.

I haven't had it for that long.

But in the, I would say, the first 10 years of my career, your focus is,

hit the ground, get every audition you can, work on your craft, work on your monologues,

devour them, get them down better than the original people that did them,

everything all of the above, sell yourself, all these things.

Now, how big is your Instagram page?

How many followers do you have?

I have casting directors and agents that started out asking me that.

They don't ask anymore because they just look it up.

And I've had, I've been told, and this isn't with my previous, my current agent,

but I've been told by my previous agent that I've been, I have missed out on roles

because I only have like 300 some followers on Instagram or something like that.

I've been told this before I even get a chance to show what I got.

They don't even let me in the room.

And I'm one person out of the thousands and thousands of people

auditioning around the world and everything to do this stuff.

At numbers game.

It matters so much more now.

So when you're tired of seeing my selfies, trust me, nobody's more tired of it than me.

I have no confidence.

None.

What's so ever?

But I do this stuff because I'm trying to get a dang acting career.

I'm working at this.

I'm going to keep doing that stuff.

If it means I got to take a dang selfie, I'm going to do it.

Because this is the kind of stuff that matters now.

And to the point of it, my hawk is a good actor and has famous parents.

And she is lost out on roles because she doesn't care about social media that much.

And she's not that big on there and everything.

So even with nepotism, it doesn't help you.

Nepotism doesn't matter as much as your Twitter followers now.

But that's crazy.

Isn't that crazy?

That's crazy.

And it's weird.

So Maya said, quote, I don't care about Instagram, Instagram sucks.

But just so you know, if you have over this many followers,

you can get the money movie funded.

So the funding for movie producers, directors, other people are doing this.

We talked with other directors we've had on the air what directors play out.

And stuff about this.

True.

The rise of this.

And she says the line between an actor's quality of work and who they are is getting blurred.

Yes.

Quote directors have even told her, quote, just so you know,

when I'm casting a movie with some producers, they hand me a sheet with the amount of collective followers I have

to get to the cast that I cast.

Wow.

So well before you're even going to even have a chance at an audition,

they've already made a decision on whether or not you're worthy of being in interviewed.

What happened to talent?

What happened to being good at this?

Right.

And this isn't surprising.

No.

We've lowered the bar.

We, and I mean the collective we, of course.

But for every person that decides instead of watching a scripted TV show,

I want to watch the real housewives of Albuquerque.

Every time you choose to watch the voice, every time you choose to watch a dancing with the stars

or American Idol or any of these shows or a YouTube personality, right?

Yep.

They're too, yeah.

This is lowering the bar.

They producers who only see things in black, who own in the black.

Oh, that's money.

That's all they see.

That's all they're seeing.

They're seeing, well, it's cheaper to make this and I'm getting the ratings.

Why else, why would I not do this?

Right.

But if you're not happy with this and the same thing with the dumbing down of our news and some of that,

if you're unhappy with all this stuff, we got nobody to blame but ourselves.

But here's the positive.

We can fix it ourselves.

Demand better.

Demand more.

If you don't like this, they will hear you.

This is, they will listen.

Right.

We've seen plenty of evidence, even in the recent history of this.

So you just have to be heard.

You have to demand better.

You have to expect more.

100%.

And, you know, we've been, we have talked about that, you know, about the, you know,

this is going to be a sure fire hit, right?

And nothing, you know, it bombs at the box office and everyone's scratching their head.

Well, why did that do that?

Well, maybe you don't know the audience like you think you do.

The greatest example of this is the movie Morbius that bombed horribly and is a horrible mood.

It's top five one of the worst movies I've ever seen in my life.

It's horrible.

And Sony understood that it was bad.

Okay, we're pulling it from theaters.

But people online thought it was hilarious.

The idea of this movie and everything.

So they start making a bunch of memes and it becomes very popular online to shredding and making fun of this movie.

Right.

But Sony, because they live in a bubble and they only care about the black.

Oh, wait, we can make a couple bucks.

They put it back in theaters and then they lose even more money because they didn't get the joke.

No, they just saw that people were talking about it.

They didn't see that they were making fun of it.

Right.

And the numbers don't always pan out the way you want them to or expect them to.

Exactly.

What about bots?

Yeah.

Oh, I mean, how many followers of that have these inflated numbers?

How many of them are real people?

Well, that's great point.

I've had friends, like actor friends, like send me links where you can sign up for this thing.

And hey, James, you know, you can have 10,000 followers.

Like all you got to do is sign up for this thing and you get 10,000 followers or 20,000 followers or whatever number you want.

They can do that nowadays.

There's where they say, yeah, yeah.

I refuse to do that.

I may only have like 300 some followers, but they're all real at least.

Like I thought that.

Some integrity, right?

I'm doing this wrong.

I'm saying it out loud and I'm realizing, holy, I've done this all wrong.

And just to all of this point, I joke around my followers and I'm giving you the actual number.

I really have like 300 some four inches of followers or something like that.

And Maya, who this story started with, she was being told and she's being told by casting directors.

She doesn't have enough followers.

She has 8.9 million Instagram followers, but that's not enough.

That's not enough.

But apparently that's not a famous name and two incredibly talented, very famous parents.

Yeah.

And still all that.

What the what, man?

And this isn't about feeling sorry for Maya.

This isn't about that.

She's not asking for sympathy here.

She's doing fine.

No, she's pointing out what's wrong with the index.

Exactly.

And again, that we can fix this.

We can fix this.

We just got to demand more and expand more.

You got it.

We are going to take a quick news.

Sports and partner break.

We'll come back.

And what is the most mispronounced name around the world?

What are the most mispronounced names?

Oh, this will be fun.

Coming up on the morning show here at WFA Draw.

Welcome back, everybody.

Morning show at WFA Draw.

Melissa, Seth and James hanging out with you.

Thanks so much for joining us, everybody.

These weren't the top names we expected when we...

I saw this headline or anything.

Okay.

But someone found the most mispronounced names in English by looking at how often they look...

They look up the pronunciation site.

Farvo.

Farvo.

Farvo.

I can't even pronounce the name of the website.

They analyze more than 12,000 names.

And the two that people have the hardest time with are...

Audience, would you like to take a guess?

715-424-2600.

715-424-2600.

You guys, of course, have seen this list already.

Right.

But are there names that you commonly mispronounce?

Are there names...

I tended like my best friend growing up, Chris, spells his name, K-H-R-I-S.

Okay.

And Chris is running to this where people curse.

You know, they try to add the H in there.

Usually it's CH.

Right, yeah.

If you don't see K-H together very often.

And if you do, it's usually like a cuck, you know, sound more...

Yeah, it sounds...

Yeah.

You know the one that comes to mind for me is Jeanie.

Oh, good one.

Because it looks like Jeanne Ann.

Yep.

Oh, oh, here's one.

The one I've always had.

Alisha, Alisha.

Oh, yeah.

Alisha.

Alisha.

Alisha.

So many ways you could say that.

Yes.

Excuse me.

I had one of those in my class growing up where everyone would always get her name wrong

when they first saw it.

Because it was Alisa, but everyone called her Alisa.

Or Alisha, you know.

So.

So the names are Ann and James.

What?

What?

Yeah.

It's because they include...

It's because they included searches from all over the world, not just the US.

Oh, that makes sense.

Yeah.

Names we think of as straightforward aren't that obvious everywhere else.

Now, here before we get to the list real quick, how you would mispronounce these names.

I think it's fun if you do this in your head.

Right.

It is.

Yeah, exactly.

Well Ann, because it's about with an E would be Annie.

Yeah.

Or even Anna.

Or Annie.

Or Annie.

That would...

You're right.

I hadn't thought of that one.

That's a good one.

Or Annie.

Yeah.

My godson growing up used to call me Uncle Yams.

Uncle Yams.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Of course in Spanish.

You know, it's a Yams.

Hello Yams.

Yeah.

So I could see that.

Jamie's?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Jamie's.

Every once in a while I've had Jamie.

Every once in a while I've been called that one.

There.

I mean, it's...

I mean, it's the same thing as a, you know, as in Scotland.

Jamie is James, basically.

So, yeah.

And Jokamo.

Jokamo is...

Italian version.

It's Italian version.

Jokamo is so cool.

Which I should have been called.

We were Italian.

Why can't we change it?

We couldn't have done that.

So Anne and James are the top names.

And then there's Lauren.

Evelyn.

Christian.

Evelyn.

Yes.

Exactly.

Right.

See, I said Evelyn because the character I played was named Evelyn.

And that's how they spelled it.

Yes.

Absolutely.

Actually, Evelyn.

Yeah.

You know what the...

Melissa's right.

Yeah.

It's actually Evelyn.

The way they're going.

I'm sorry.

That was on me.

You should just mispronounce them.

I got it.

I should just leave it to you.

Eleanor.

Eleanor, I can see that.

Okay.

Ashley.

Ashley.

Ashley.

Robert.

Robert.

Robert.

I guess I mean that's a different way of saying it.

So, yeah.

Jane.

John.

Like I said, I don't know how you mispronounce it.

I'm trying to think.

Jane.

You know what the...

Yes.

Or Jan.

A lot of James...

Jane names here.

Yeah.

Rapping up.

Joan.

Yep.

Yeah.

Wow.

A few more that made the top 20.

Heather.

Hugh.

Gary.

Lisa.

Jack.

Katie.

And Sion.

C-Y-A-N.

Sion.

Jack.

Jack.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's got to be the...

Yeah.

It's got to be the...

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's got to be the...

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, that would be like, well, what's wrong with...

You know, these are perfectly normal names.

And we'd be like, all of those are weird.

Right.

Exactly.

Yeah.

That's the thing.

Because it's...

The difference is with language and culture, which is just so cool.

Exactly.

I love that there are, you know, the same name, you know, the names are connected.

And different things.

So, you've got, you know, like...

Like, we were just talking, you know, Jacobal.

And Jamie.

You know, different cultures.

Where they're all basically James.

That's the...

At least that's for being English speakers.

That's our base for it, right?

Yeah.

But their base is different.

I think that's really cool.

You know why he did this story, right, Seth?

Because it's James?

Right.

Because our names aren't in it.

That's just his.

Oh, I didn't even notice that.

Wow.

Hey.

Let's take...

Sorry.

I really quick.

I think the caller, we lost him.

Oh, no.

But my name has been mispronounced.

I had a friend in college whose father could not say my name right.

I was Seth.

Oh, jeez.

He couldn't do that.

For whatever reason, he had a block where he couldn't say Seth.

It was always Seth.

The only...

That's ever happened to me.

That's right.

It's only four letters.

I might just call you that from now on, Seth.

I kind of like that.

I kind of actually like that.

You calling him that.

It's your superhero name, Seth.

Yeah, that's all true.

Sounds more like a villain, actually.

It's a super villain, yeah.

Oh, you're funny.

Oh, that's good.

I know, right?

Malaysia.

Nice.

And cake is your kryptonite.

Oh, this...

We got a story here.

We're coming up with something.

I don't know.

What it is.

Catchphrase.

What is the worst you've heard your name mispronounced?

I've kind of given mine already.

Yeah.

What does that...

I feel like you've given yours.

Yeah, that's about as close as you can.

Yeah.

Anybody ever mispronounced you?

Yeah.

Yeah.

What does that...

I feel like you've given yours.

Yeah, that's about as close as you can.

Anybody ever mispronounced yours real bad?

Well, I get called a lot of other names besides Melissa because I go by Mal as a nickname.

So I get called Melanie or...

Oh, I suppose, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Michelle.

Sometimes I've been called Michelle.

If I remember correctly, isn't, like, Missy tends to be a common nickname for Melissa.

Yeah, it was a childhood nickname.

Right.

And if you are not family and you call me that now...

Oh, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I was not introducing you.

Because that's what happens to you that I can't say on the radio.

I feel the same way about Jimmy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We got to be close.

We got to be a certain level of comfort for you to call me Jimmy.

Only get the pass if you're family.

Yeah.

I will respond to Jim.

I completely respect that when I'll be fine with it.

I'll think you're talking to my dad, but I'll probably respond to Jimmy.

You've got...