Holly and Janet attempt to introduce themselves, the podcast, and their love of pop culture in less than 5 hours. We tried.
Find show notes and the transcript here
Holly and Janet attempt to introduce themselves, the podcast, and their love of pop culture in less than 5 hours. We tried.
Find show notes and the transcript here
I'm Holly and I'm Janet and this is Gilmore Gays Gilmore Gays
Because my brain is a wild jungle full of scary gibberish.
I'm writing a letter.
I can't write a letter.
Why can't I write a letter?
I'm wearing a green dress.
I wish I was wearing my blue dress.
My blue dress is at the cleaners.
The Germans wore gray, you wore blue.
Casablanca, Casablanca is such a good movie.
Casablanca, the White House, Bush.
Why don't I drive a hybrid car?
I should really drive a hybrid car.
I should really take my bicycle to work.
Bicycle, unicycle, unitard, hockey puck, rattlesnake, monkey monkey underpants.
Well, we both have ADHD and that is what my brain sounds like.
Exactly.
I've never like,
Okay, so this is our very first episode and we're just introducing ourselves and the podcast.
There are many Gilmore Girls podcasts.
Many.
So many.
I've only listened to a few.
You've listened some more.
I've listened to the first episode of all of the ones I could find on Pocket Cast, which is my chosen podcast app.
That was a really good sponsorship voice.
So when we get ads, like just throwing that out there, we'll be really good at them.
Yeah, I'll be great.
Amazing.
I use Spotify, like a plebeian, but whatever.
It's fine.
Yeah, I've listened to the first episode of almost all of the Gilmore Girls podcasts.
And they're fine.
There's a lot of them.
Yeah, and I listen to a bit of like a few.
And I guess they're also fine.
But I honestly don't care that much about celebrities.
And I really, really don't like youth pastor energy.
And that's what a lot of those bring.
And a lot of straight energy as well.
You know, like,
Christian girl fall.
That's what it is.
That's exactly fine.
That's fine.
You have your riding boots and your Starbucks.
I love Starbucks.
Whatever.
No, but no horses.
Well, they've really stolen horses from the gays in my opinion.
But anyway, what are we doing?
We got to figure it out.
This is us figuring it out.
I know a lot about the history of pop culture and media.
Old Hollywood is kind of my specialty.
I basically have the taste of an elderly gay man.
So Judy Garland, Cher, Barbara Streisand, Ethel Merman.
You really, really do.
Like, I feel like you missed your time, you know, to shine there.
But I don't know what I know a lot about.
Literature.
Yeah, but I know a lot about Gilmore Girls.
I know a lot about literature.
and yeah um I know a lot of weird facts about the uh about the cast so if you want your fun facts I've got those and I know a lot about all of the references in the show uh Holly you know more about the books I know more about the movies and pop culture I think and together our combined knowledge
means that we're smarter than everyone else.
I'm just joking, kind of talking about the show.
We both did this weird thing when we were children, where we looked up the references.
And I looked up words in the dictionary while we were watching.
So I used to watch the episodes and write down every single reference that I didn't know what it was pop culture reference.
And then I would, if I didn't know what it was, look it up or watch it.
Thankfully, I had the DVD so I would use the little books.
But I used my leapfrog digital dictionary and that's how my vocabulary expanded.
Thankfully, I wasn't reading the words because that's how I Yeah, I didn't mispronounce them.
Anyway, so the format of this podcast, like every other podcast about a TV show is a recap.
And again, this is going to be different, somehow.
We will have different little repeating segments, right?
Like every episode we will compile all the gay references because for a show that's like so extremely homophobic, they reference RuPaul within the first three seconds.
So like what like because Amy Sherman Palladino also an elderly gay man, right?
Yes, absolutely.
And she there are so many missed opportunities in this show to make it gayer and she goes so close to the line.
Exactly, if she was just a gay man, it would be so good.
Like, I'm just like, just give it up already.
But anyway, yeah, so we're gonna do that, like, gay references.
Um, we're going to talk about all of the books referenced in this show, and probably make fun of many of them because I'm sorry, but Rory has very bad taste in literature.
We will definitely be making fun of them.
It's her fault I tried to read Ayn Rand in eighth grade and for that I will never forgive her or Amy or it was probably Dan.
All the bad stuff was Dan's fault.
If you look it up, it's true.
Like it's really correlates.
Um, and what will you be talking about?
I will be talking about the fact that the show is a modern day screwball comedy intentionally.
based on 1930s movies.
And the references reflect that.
The fast talking reflects that, how thick the scripts were and how much dialogue they jammed into a short TV episode.
Also, I think Lorelai is just a screwball heroine, like herself.
She 100% is.
She is, yeah.
Why are we weird?
Okay, we need to talk about how we got into Gilmore Girls.
Okay.
Yes, our origin stories.
Yes.
One million years ago.
Wait, I have the exact date, but October 2005.
When ABC Family started showing the reruns, they had a lot of promos.
And I was on there watching like seventh heaven reruns at the time.
So I was prepped all summer I knew that they were going to do a marathon and then I was going to start.
And so I did.
And I'd only ever seen one episode before that.
It was Rory's study tree episode because it came on right before Charmed.
And I wasn't exactly enamored by Rory and her study tree, but I was enamored by like,
someone reading near a tree like I was like wow other people read books
and so you know it sucks me in but tragically I went to my father's house who did not have cable over Christmas break and I missed the whole third season I missed Rory and Jess so I was really pissed and started collecting the DVDs so pissed like I tried to get my mom to tape record it every day for two weeks she declined which fair and
I eventually caught up but um another tragedy befell me and my dance classes were on Tuesday nights when Gilmore Girls premiered so I did have my poor sweet Aunt Ellen recording it on a VHS tape every Tuesday now this was not 1995 this was like 2007 we were just like I don't know we barely had the internet like so I watched the I probably have like
Blank Tapes with Weird Gilmore Girls Episodes
I mean, all the like, Gen Z girls on like, Instagram and TikTok or whatever, like dark academia, light academia, Taylor Swift academia, blah, blah, blah, how to wear a Rory Gilmore sweater no one fucking cared about.
I was like, just give me boots and a fucking book and stop being stupid.
And so I feel like it was really compelling, even though Rory is bad.
But I didn't know that that I was like, Rory has books.
Books are good.
Books will save you.
They don't save you.
That's Roy's tragic flaw.
They don't.
They did not save her.
I think the glue gun is what saved Paris, but anyway.
Yeah.
The craft corner.
I had a craft corner too in college, my glitter corner.
I wasn't allowed to glitter out of my glitter corner.
I'm not surprised.
I was making quote posters.
There was a lot of Sylvia Plath involved.
Anyways, oh, and I briefly helped run a Gilmore Girls blog on Gilmore Girls and public history, which is really funny, because we posted like six things, but the six things we did post were really good.
So we can link that even though it's embarrassing.
My friend tracked like in the first three seasons every reference to like public history or like performed history, reenactments, etc.
Like literally in a spreadsheet and did like graphs.
We were fucking weirdos.
It was like 2015.
I don't know.
That is something I would have done too.
I know.
I know.
I was supposed to help with the graph and then I just wrote about Sylvia Plath because that's what I do.
Okay, how did you get into Gilmore Girls?
So the first time I watched it was actually my parents were watching it live as it was airing when I was a little kid, like in the early 2000s.
And I caught it in the background occasionally.
And it was just like part of my life, them watching it.
They also did this with One Tree Hill.
My parents really liked teen shows.
Your parents are way cooler than mine.
Yeah, my parents would watch- I love you mom.
My parents would watch any of the teen shows that were on basically and I caught them in the background.
I would like sit on the stairs behind the living room and sometimes watch parts of the episode and I'd be like, ooh, what's happening there?
But I wasn't like actually watching it.
And then when it came on ABC Family, that's when I started catching it.
But I caught it around 2007 is when I started actually watching it consecutively from season one reruns on ABC Family.
So it was already like ending, right?
Like that's when it ended.
Well, it was the last season was airing when I started actually watching the from the beginning.
I think I had like three season like I started watching in the fifth season.
Like, yeah, I'm pretty sure mine was right before.
The seventh season was like about to start airing.
I started watching the reruns on ABC Family and I would get home from school, turn it on immediately, like eat my snack and watch it.
And I would talk to my childhood best friend.
Shout out to Mimi.
I would talk to her on the phone like we would like watch it together at each other's houses on the landline.
What time zone were you in?
Central.
Okay, Texas.
So it's just a little bit because it was like five so it was very stressful because that's when my mom got home from work and started cooking and I was like, everyone needs to use their inside voices, because we had one TV and I was like,
Every single day.
It was stressful for me too, but we had my grandma's little box TV.
It was like 10 inches and the dials were on the TV, didn't have a remote.
And that was our second TV.
We inherited that from my grandmother.
So we both basically grew up in like the 1970s.
Yeah, you had to get up and turn the dials manually.
Oh, yeah, we had that until at my dad's house until it literally like blew up like there was like Like smoke coming from it and he bought a box TV.
And I was just like 2006 or 2000 Why like just but like whatever I know TVs are cheaper now, but like Jesus Christ like yeah No, my family will keep everything until it is like so broken.
You can't fix it
Yeah, we do that sometimes and I don't know.
It's really miraculous.
It's kind of like that scene where like Luke's watching baseball on the tiny TV in the diner while Jess is like listening to Screamo like sleeping.
Yeah, Jess.
My lesbian love.
Anyway, as you refer I loved Jess as well.
That's how we know Jess is truly a lesbian anyway.
It's true.
It's okay.
So this is called Gilmore Gays.
Why is that?
because we're gay and we like Gilmore Girls.
And we like alliteration.
And alliteration is good for titles.
See Gilmore Girls and Golden Girls and Gossip Girl.
See, right?
Like we're just in a long line.
All the girls and gays love alliterations.
Neither of us identify as girls, but it's fine.
Important point to make.
Yeah.
We are gays, not girls.
So anyways, oh, and we're both neurodivergent.
Yes, if you could not tell.
Obviously, because this is a mess.
We'll try to figure it out later.
It's just gonna be a mess, Janet.
It's us.
I think that's what makes it fun.
So every week we'll do a different episode, but we'll pull out all of the gay references and also anything homophobic because ew.
And we will judge the taste in books of every character.
We will talk about the movies.
Is there anything else we're gonna like?
I mean, we're gonna talk about what we think about the show, the scenes and the characters.
Yeah, I just met like our little segments.
So those are, I don't remember what what our segments were supposed to be.
It's okay.
They were that's gay.
What the fuck, Amy, the books.
And I don't know some sort of Paris worship when she's around, like, just like, we love Paris.
Oh, yeah, that's something we need to get straight right off the bat.
We are team Paris.
Oh yeah, um, Rory should be with Paris, I should be with Jess.
That is where we stand.
Okay.
I'm sorry, he's beautiful.
Oh, another thing, when I started watching Gilmore Girls in middle school as a young gay Janet, I became obsessed with Lauren Graham to the point where I was friends with her on Myspace.
And I still remember that her, remember when you put like a, like a playlist on your Myspace page and you had like a favorited song or whatever?
Yes Hers was The Shins, Australia The Taste And I remember that, I got into The Shins because of Lauren Graham Not because of the OC, like, or Gossip Girl, like the rest of us Nope You never told, oh my god, that's beautiful
I was very attracted to her.
She's a very attractive woman.
So did you already know you were gay?
Oh, yeah.
I mean, I wasn't positive.
I just assumed everybody thought that women were hot.
Well, I mean, no, I didn't know that because that's why I asked my mom.
So it's normal to look at boobs anyway.
But by the time I was 13, I was like pretty positive I was at least by and probably into women more than men.
That's crazy.
Yeah, I think it's easier when you're not interested in men and you are assigned female at birth, because then you're like, oh, like, like, there's no other something here.
There's no like, I'm not straight.
Yeah, I think I was confused because I was like, but like, Jess Mariano.
I definitely had like male TV crushes like Jess, but I wasn't actually really that attracted to Jess.
I kind of related to him.
That I mean tracks too.
I did too.
Okay, I have a theory that Jess is autistic.
Um, because he's so obsessed with his music and his he can't sleep without the super loud music.
He's always reading but he's shit at school.
He's super smart, but he's shit at school.
Like he's an asshole.
He has like a uniform of the same things.
I think Jess is autistic.
This is why I relate to him.
Exactly.
Also because he kind of like is a lesbian, but we'll get there later.
Well, he has a chip on his shoulder.
And when I was a kid, I kind of did too.
And he also is kind of like, very anti authority.
He likes to read, but he's bad at school.
Like this was me as a kid.
That was not me.
That was everyone I was in love with.
Like you had to be smart, but you had to wear like jeans that were like really big and like listen to loud music and like probably at least get C's like, but I got A's.
No, I got A's, but I was definitely not, you know, your normal straight A's.
I was a Paris, I was not a Rory.
Let's just say that.
Yeah, I would not have thought you were a Rory.
I wanted to be I thought I was and then slowly I realized Paris with her, you know, bag of pharmaceuticals and her craft corner was like much more the vibe also my insane competitive streak that my friend my friends including you have to like restrain me from creating a burn book like once a week.
So I mean, that is true.
I could Paris Geller like grad school man like that'd be so fun like the new girl.
Yeah, you kind of are a Periscaler though, and you're in grad school.
So I mean, but I could like do like what she does to Rory in high school.
Oh, I see what you're saying.
I see what you're saying.
You could be a bully.
I could, but I'm not.
Because I have friends who restrict me.
But anyway, I don't know.
I think children's probably harder than grad school anyway.
Yeah, yeah, I went to private school for three out of four years of my high school, but it was the opposite private school to Chilton.
It was literally not even in the same universe as Chilton.
I interviewed at a ton of private schools in ninth grade and they were all too like artsy or like
We want to expand children's minds and there are three people in this school and I was like where is the plaid skirt?
How many Ivy League students do your students get into?
Where are the books?
I was like no.
Literally was too snobby for the private schools in my area.
And I was like, Mom, can I go to school in Baltimore?
That was an hour away.
And she was like, No.
So I am a proud alum of Red Lion Area Senior High School, which is, I'm pretty sure still falling into the hill it was built into.
So you know, I think it's the actual Hellmouth.
But yeah, Lake Travis High School was pretty bad.
My public school.
She's from Austin.
I'm not, to clarify.
I just live here now.
Although I was made fun of for fitting in to Austin the other day.
I was like, yeah, I'm not.
I was like, well, because I was like, yeah, I'm not like an Austin person.
I don't like it that much.
And they were like, Holly, you kind of do.
Yeah.
And then they were like, you pretend not to.
How much waterloo is in your fridge?
What is in your nose?
And I was just like, this, like, this is you look like an Austinite you support local businesses.
I don't go to brunch.
No one in Austin cares about brunch.
That's never been an Austin thing.
It's not an Austin thing.
It's like a new Austin thing.
I don't like the new Austin things.
I like the old Austin things, but you really have to like find them.
You like my Austin.
I know, but like, it's real hard to find it.
It took me a while.
And it was just funny, because I was like, I'm not an Austin person.
And they were like, Okay, I was like, fine, I won't tell you all the cool movie things you can do here.
You'll just have to find out on your own.
Would Rory live here?
Where would Rory live?
In Austin?
Yeah.
I feel like Rory would live.
She's too dumb for New York.
She wouldn't make that much money.
And she's even though but she What about Boston?
She'd go to Boston, that's where the boring white people go.
No offense, Jenny.
No, no, no, I agree.
I mean, I have family from there, but, um, sorry.
No, it's, it's fine.
It's just like, I think that, yeah, because she would go to Boston.
She's too, like... What about, like, Providence?
Providence is too weird.
Providence is like... You're right.
She's not weird enough for Providence.
You're right.
She's not weird.
That's the problem with Rory.
Like, everyone's like, oh, she's so weird.
She's not fucking weird.
No, because the reasons that people get for her being weird is like she reads all these books and it's it's not weird.
To be fair, when you go to public school, it may seem weird, but then you grow up and you find the other people who.
Yeah, I think what's weirder is her.
Like intense knowledge of like really old pop culture, but she gets it from Lorelei or like even her knowledge of like
80s bands really except like all this music like that She gets from Lorelei and Lane like she like kind of like just feels other people Well when you're raised by someone You get their taste.
I mean my parents are boomers and I definitely got a lot of that 70s folk like I'm a huge John Baez fan.
There's a poster of her right over there.
I
I really don't know.
I guess horses and John Waters.
Yeah.
OK, so next time on Gilmore Gays, we're going to be doing recaps.
We aren't Christian Girl Fall or Youth Pastor Energy.
Important.
We're crazy.
True.
We're team Paris.
Always.
Oh, wait, which characters do we think we are?
I don't know.
Who are you?
We've discussed this.
I feel like I am most.
Likely a combination of Luke and Lorelei.
And I also relate to Jess, and those are the only characters that I see myself in pretty much.
OK, are you ready for this?
I don't know if you're going to agree.
I'm ready.
OK, Paris, Lorelei, Emily combined.
I 100% see it.
I do.
I see that for you.
I do, because okay, you've got you've got the judgy kind of bully energy of Emily, but it's subdued by the by the loreline Paris is also a judgy bully.
She's just- Yeah, but Paris is like has like a heart of gold.
I feel like like she's very, she grows on you.
Well, she also changes dramatically as she grows up.
She has the most character growth, maybe.
Yes.
Well, because Rory has backwards character growth.
So Jess also has really good character growth.
Oh, my God.
Yeah.
He's a truncheon books swoon.
But yeah.
And I think Paris is just like undiagnosed neurodivergent with horrible parents.
Yeah.
But everyone loves Lorelai and everybody loves you, I feel like.
But then you've got the Emily and Paris energy in there, too.
OK, but but remember when like
The girl wrote the thing on Rory's door and Paris is like, okay, I've narrowed my list down to 10 potential people in this building.
That's awesome.
Because like, not everybody loves me.
That is true.
But then it was Rory.
It wasn't Paris.
I know.
But I'm just saying like, either love me or you like, really, really don't.
Yeah.
But I see the Luke for you, and I see the Lorelai with her interests, but I don't see the personality of Lorelai.
That makes sense.
I can see like a Jess and Luke kind of thing.
I agree with that.
I think Lorelai is more outgoing than I am.
That's what I would say, yes.
And she also has that like, I don't know, the particular way in which Lorelai won't shut up is different from the way you talk a lot, I think.
Yeah, I won't shut up about my special interests, which is a neurodivergent trait.
She just won't ever.
Yeah, she won't shut up about anything ever.
So it is different.
I'm thoughtful about what I say, I feel like.
She and I share the not being thoughtful about what we say.
But like,
I can join the G.I.R.
I would be so good at that.
Get to pour the first cup of tea.
I would not.
Oh, if I tried, you know, I would like.
Well, my other thing is like Lorelei and Jess are basically the same, I feel like.
They both have this like anti-authority kind of rebellious spirit just for the sake of rebellion.
Jess is like a mosey shitty mom, no dad, grew up poor in New York.
Lorelai is like, boo hoo, my parents made me wear a white dress once.
That is very true.
Point taken.
Yeah, Lorelai was privileged.
And then I think that's the but they do have like I think that's why they immediately just like each other.
But like they have similar attitudes, but.
I think Jess's attitude is earned and hers is kind of like her growth was very stunted.
She's kind of stuck.
behaving like a teenager, I feel like.
Yeah, she was raised by Rory.
And then Rory decided to be a kid and steal a fucking young.
Yeah.
Have a baby with a Yeti.
Yeah.
But her knowledge of pop culture is what I relate to.
Yes.
But I think that's different than like the personality, I guess.
but you definitely have that and you're not like but like Jess also knows it's so weird like what 17 year old is like making those references but anyway Charlie McCarthy like Ingrid Berg I'm like okay I mean when I was a freshman in high school I would walk around the high school making very obscure 1940s big band references and no one understood them and then I would proceed to explain them to people
I went from public school being pretty unpopular to weird art school where I kind of got along with everybody.
I mean, we all did a lot of drugs, which probably helped.
was like, I realized in retrospect, people were trying to be my friends, but I was like, unaware that that's what they were doing.
And I was kind of like, Why are you like speaking to me?
Like, what do you want?
What is your ulterior motive?
Like, and like 10 years later, I was like, they were just trying to be my friend.
But I didn't know.
I wasn't hated, I was just too dense to realize that people other than my best friend want to be friends with me.
And of course, my best friend is also neurodivergent and also queer and just generally like a delightful weirdo.
So of course, like we found each other, but Gilmore Gays, we're weird.
Yay.
And then I'm definitely using that in our thing.
Just so you know.
Buy our t-shirts so we can get six dollars.
Hell yeah.
It's good to see you, by the way.
I know I missed you.
I miss you, too.
Come back.
No, don't.
Your job is cool.
We should tell people what your job is, Janet.
Oh, oh, we should say, like, I don't know, our credentials.
Pridential?
Okay, let's do it.
But you should say where you work.
I know you don't like to, but like, that's cool.
And people will recognize you.
I work for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
That's my ASMR voice.
Jesus Christ.
What do you do there?
I'm a traffic specialist.
I work in film traffic.
Do you wear like a vest?
I do not, no.
I do have a vaults jacket because the vaults are cold.
That's fun.
Because that's where the film is stored.
That makes sense.
Like an Amish freezer in a grocery store that you walk in.
Totally.
You have to wear a coat.
Yeah, it's just like that.
I'm from Central Pennsylvania.
How'd you know?
I know.
I know.
I know.
I know what you're talking about, actually.
I'm just like, but sometimes I'm like, dear God.
Where did you go to school?
I studied English literature at Stevens College.
I have a B.A.
in English literature.
And then I studied media studies at the University of Texas at Austin, where we met.
Yes.
So Holly, what's your background?
What's your education background?
Where do you work?
Where do I work?
I went to Temple University in North Philadelphia, which I loved.
Um, and then I got my BA in history and political science, the political science part I have never once used since then, except on election night when I like to pretend I'm, um, what's his name with the khaki pants on MSNBC, who points, does the graphs.
Anyway, so, Steve.
Oh, yes.
That dude on the Rachel Maddow show.
That's the only person's name I remember on that show.
Yes.
So he, that is who I pretend to be once a year.
But other than that, I've never used my political science degree because no.
Um, and then I moved to Columbia, South Carolina, and I got my master's in history at the University of South Carolina, yay Gamecocks.
And I am a PhD candidate, sixth year in American Studies at UT.
I've been here forever.
And I write about like prison art and literature and other pop culture as resistance to incarceration.
And I also write a lot of weird shit about American Girl dolls and Quakers and not together separate things just to clarify.
Also, YA novels.
I don't know, Taylor Swift, a lot of stuff.
And I have one million jobs.
I am teaching a class on haunting and I'm a ghost tour guide and I'm an underwriter influencer and I have a substack and I facilitate a program in the Women's Studies Department.
And I'm very, very tired.
Yes, we have that in common, the tired part.
Yes.
Oh, chronic illness.
Hello.
Anyway.
Yeah, I mean, I just write about queer media, basically.
I love that for you.
Oh, I write really depressing poetry and make deranged collages.
Tuna?
No.
Tuna is my cat, by the way.
I'm not like yelling at fish.
Just if you don't cut all of those out, just to clarify.
We got this.
Go team.
Should we sing a song?
I don't know.
My guitar is right over there.
I can't sing a song.
I could play ever long.
The acoustic version.
The acoustic version because I have an acoustic guitar.
Good night, Holly.
Monkey Monkey Underpants.
My brain is a wild jungle of scary gibberish.
I'm writing a letter.
I can't write a letter.
Why can't I write a letter?
I'm wearing a green dress.
I wish I was wearing my blue dress.
My blue dress is at the cleaners.
The Germans wore gray.
You wore blue.
Casablanca is such a good movie.
Casablanca, the White House, Bush.
Why don't I drive a hybrid car?
I should really drive a hybrid car.
I should really take my bicycle to work.
Bicycle, unicycle, unitard, hockey puck, rattlesnake, monkey monkey underpants.