Dads on Books

Mike Walker (00:01.294)
I'm Mike Walker.

I'm David Patrick.

Dad's on books, too late. But we are dads on books. We're addicted to books. We sit on books and we even talk about books.

Welcome to another episode of Dads on Books. Welcome to another episode of Dads on Books. Buh! Two minutes later! Buh! Doo doo doo! That's us. Dad's on, I'm Mike Walker. I thought you were Davey.

Dad's on books!

David Patrick (00:33.314)
Dad's on boooo

David Patrick (00:38.926)
And I'm David Patrick. Don't go Davey on me again. At least I'm not Theodore or Ted.

Teddy or Dr. Seuss as our author this week is. Man, I've been reading this book too much.

I know, it's quite the tongue trouble, if you will.

Indeed, it twists and turns.

It does indeed, and it's very plot-driven, character-based, etc. So I gotta be honest with you, Mike, when I was reading Fox and Socks, because very often when you and I do these episodes, one or the other of us chooses a book. And we've known for a long time we're gonna do Dr. Seuss, so we kind of left it, let's wait and see which one to do and why and when. Well, I know which one we're doing, and I when we're doing it, but I forgot why we chose Fox and Socks for our very first Dr. Seuss book.

Mike Walker (01:13.489)
Absolutely.

Mike Walker (01:24.321)
Indeed.

Mike Walker (01:41.218)
As you can tell by my long pause, I don't remember either.

I didn't know if you were pausing for dramatic effect. I was. Or if you're... And the result is... Me too!

So, you know, when we talked about it, I'm not... I don't remember what we...

I think it came up in the last episode because we did spend a lot of time talking about books we might do and all this.

Yes, we went through a whole litany of books and then we just finally decided, let's do Fox and Socks. I think because we both had it and we knew we had it. I think that's really the reason.

David Patrick (02:17.176)
So the really, really tough criteria to meet is each of us has the book and we know where it is.

Exactly. Wow. Which is funny because I totally knew I had the book, you know, going back to episode one, I know I have this book and I looked and looked and looked and looked and looked. My beard grew very long and gray. yes. And I could not find it to save my life. Wow. And then as you were commenting before we started recording,

I now have a 16 year old as my youngest daughter. So we had some friends of hers over on Sunday night and Kim and I went downstairs because we, you know, leave the 16 year olds alone. Sure. And, so we were sitting down on the, on the couch in the basement and I was like, I just, I don't, I can't figure out why I can't find Fox in socks. And she's like,

Where did you look? I'm like, I swear I looked everywhere. And then she looks over at the bookshelf and goes, it's right there. Like you've gotta be kidding me. Nope. It was right there. this is sitting on the outside of like a row of books slanted over so you could see it if you walked by. And I'm like, but I looked on these shelves. I guess I didn't look close enough, did I?

Sure didn't! that's hilarious.

Mike Walker (03:50.956)
Yeah, so anyway, so Fox and Sox. book. Awesome. Very interesting. My favorite part is the very first page. Okay. Not of the story, the very first page of at least my book where it says, take it slowly. This book is dangerous.

I love it. Well, I went one page back because that's on the I think it's the front end sheet is what this is called. Yep, I have the exact same thing. But for my yearbook publishing days, this paper that kind of holds the signatures in place is called the front end sheet, which is kind of funny because it's an end sheet and yet it's in the front. But on the actual cover.

because that's

Mike Walker (04:28.472)
Okay.

David Patrick (04:35.918)
I think I showed you this when we talked about the book. Does yours have this fine print here? Yeah. Yeah. And it says, this is a book you read aloud in all caps to find out just how smart your tongue is. The first time you read it, don't go fast. This fox is a tricky fox. He'll try to get your tongue in trouble. And so I thought, that's cute and funny. That's a warning. And then I opened up, like, no, there's the warning. This is almost the one on the front is the lawyers decided that disclaimer had to be there. Yeah.

does.

Mike Walker (04:57.998)
There's the warning.

Mike Walker (05:05.794)
You don't want to have a slip of the tongue and get sued.

huge liability issues. But yeah, it's awesome. It's so fun. And it's a beginner book. And I don't know if that, you know, a beginner book is Division of Random House or something. And I don't know if Dr. Seuss thought of, hey, it's a beginner book. When he was writing, he probably was just like, hey, I'm just going to have fun. I don't care. Yeah. Did you do the research and find out that?

no, no, I did not because I didn't even look up in the corner because I don't look in corners. Why would I pay attention to something? Well, probably because I could then research it, I did this and yes, it is a book from the division of random house and I will not get on Google right now and look it up.

good for you. if any of you out there feel strongly about this, about the history of did Dr. Seuss compartmentalize his books or not, let us know. If you don't care, then just listen and enjoy.

I would have to imagine that A, somebody knows. Yes. B, most of everybody listening to this is like, why are you even talking about that? Because we don't care. Talk about the book. Yes. right. OK. Yes. Back to the book. Good segue. Or to the book in the beginning. Yes. Fox sucks, box knocks.

David Patrick (06:27.052)
Well, what were you gonna say?

Nothing. Nothing?

Well, what I was going to say besides, well, and, is I, for a second, so I think I had, for some reason, I had hop on pop on the stairwell at home.

it over some so I can see it a little better. And up a little, and okay.

Okay. Okay, right there. Perfect. Perfect. The scratch is gone. The itch is gone. Thank you. Excellent. Thank you. Okay. Anyway, so this is a very similar book and I was getting them mixed up because I thought that Fox in Socks had all kinds of, you know, long tongue twisters and stuff and the opening is very much like Hop on Pop. Fox, Socks, Box, Knox. But then quite quickly, it gets into all of the tongue twisters and stuff.

David Patrick (07:17.16)
And I think this would make a great vocal warm-up book.

That's so funny, I thought the same thing. Did you? Yes. Well, I guess we are actors. Yeah.

I guess so. I even wrote down it's like Fox and Sox, aka Ted... I'm not gonna pronounce this correctly. Jeezel?

That's a good question because I didn't. hang on. think pronunciation. Nope, that didn't help. Hang on. Let's see. Geisel. Geisel. Geisel. Yes, I'm on the Wikipedia page on the interwebs. And it looks like it's in all black and white because that's the picture of Dr. Seuss. there's blue. Sorry, my bad. So Geisel is his last name.

That's his name. Okay.

Mike Walker (08:05.514)
And I don't think that this is true. I don't know, it says Theodore Seuss Geisel. Maybe Seuss was his middle name. Actually, it does say, born Theodore Seuss Geisel. Huh! Huh!

don't think so.

David Patrick (08:23.086)
I just thought it was a regular gnome de plume. Just some fun made-up name.

I did too, but I guess, you know, his family was German of German descent. And I guess Seuss was a real name. Who knew? I didn't. that's, that's crazy. I thought it was the same as you that he just made that up. Nope. He did not.

No kid's gonna read a book by Theodore Geisel. I better come up with something funny.

And actually, that is not why he changed his name.

my goodness, tell me why. Why did he change his name?

Mike Walker (08:57.176)
Well, David, let me tell you. Funny that you should ask. I was doing a little research because I have that same question and I was like, it's such a odd thing to just change your name. You know, obviously your name looks a little different and might be hard for people to say, but then isn't Seuss? Like if you look at Seuss, it's like Seews or something.

Funny I should ask.

Mike Walker (09:26.018)
So you think, well, how do you even say that? But we all know because we've been reading his books for years. Anyway, back to the point at hand is that he was at Dartmouth College and this is during Prohibition. He wrote for the school paper called the Dartmouth Jack-o'-lantern. Eventually he was the editor in chief. And while he was there, he was caught

drinking chin with nine of his friends in his room.

Wow. So that's even worse than when we allegedly did or did not do that in college, but when it was illegal to have alcohol in the country, it was even worse.

So they did not kick him out of school, however they did make him stop all of his extracurricular activities, including being on the jack-o-lantern. Wow! So he was inspired by one of his writing professors to change his name and continue writing articles for the paper. That... Awesome! That is how he became Dr. Seuss.

is

David Patrick (10:36.93)
That's a great story, I love that!

Yes, although I don't know about the doctor part. That may have been a whole different thing.

They've been suspicious had there been a doctor writing an undergrad newspaper, although knowing his sense of humor, maybe he's like, let's just do that and see if anybody notice. Yeah. See if anyone notices that I, you know, it's a fake name. Exactly. Who knows? All right.

So that's my little bit of history, which has not much to do with this book.

That is really cool.

David Patrick (11:06.03)
But, and I'm not necessarily going to say that Dr. Seuss will be our first author to be done twice on our show, but he definitely has lots of books, tons of books, and it's a brand. Dr. Seuss, I don't know why I rolled that up.

You know, one day we might do some discussions about musicals, because sometimes we do that, and we can bring up Suzuko, the musical.

I am not familiar with it. I've never seen it.

I am not either. think maybe that can be an outing. We can record an episode while we're watching it Very strange anyway, so the musical indeed so cold

Mike Walker (11:53.422)
Back to the book. Fox and Sox. What would you like to talk about with Fox and Sox?

Well, there's one thing I wrote down first, but I want to save that for later. Back to the theater warm up, the vocal warm ups. Yes. It is so fun to read this. I, again, it's a common theme. I don't remember any specifics, but I do know that I read this to my girls a lot and had a blast.

I started reading out loud because, well, it's hard not to. But I had the same problem. I was like, wait, when did I read this to them? How did I read this to them? And as soon as I started reading it out loud, it came back to me. Really? Yeah. Just the whole... I had two different characters who were speaking, and I had distinct voices for each of them.

Were they kind of charactery voices or what were they like?

Yes, because, you know, now wait a minute, Mr. Sox Fox. One of foxes in a bottle where the Tweedle Beetle's battle and their paddle's in the puddle in the noodle-eating poodle.

Mike Walker (13:03.66)
I know.

It's more fun to watch the video of this because it's slightly off and I'm like, what is he doing? I have to call Kim. Go to the basement, Mike's in trouble.

David Patrick (13:16.137)
We were warned, Mike, we were warned.

We were warned in the very beginning on the front page.

And on the front end, front back cover, this book is dangerous. Well, it's funny, I didn't do a character voice per se, but I definitely had fun having them be two different people. And I almost forgot, again, in the confusion of, wait, is this Hop on Pop? Is this Fox on Pop? Is this Pop on Socks? But very quickly, I remembered, this is two characters. is, you know, Fox and what's his name? Knox throughout the entire book.

I didn't make them different voices, just the different emotions. Because Mr. Knox's frustration that grows so much is actually one of the more fun things about the book. You thought the same thing? Another question for you.

Absolutely.

Mike Walker (14:07.342)
Question me, I'll answer.

Okay, so which part, and for those of who have not read this, it's just really, there are parts that have lots of similar rhyming and things in them. Which one was the hardest for you?

That is a good, good, I'm flipping through and I think it got harder as it went on, but for some reason the who sews crows clothes was tough. But also the other one that I had issues with, is it? They're in the goo. Here it is. Luke luck likes lakes. as it.

Always the hardest for me.

David Patrick (14:49.55)
Look at the L's.

gets

For me, the problem was a lot of the freezy breeze, three, three, trees, tree, threes, freeze. That was tough. And then what would happen on lots of them, whether they were hard or easy, is I would get lulled into, this one's easy. And at the end, go, bap, and mess it up and go, doh, and be mad at myself. And yes, like you, I was reading these out loud. You can't not read them out loud.

You have to. mean, it really, it doesn't really need a disclaimer on the front of the book telling you to read it aloud. But maybe people who are not like us need that. But it is so much fun to read and hard.

Yes, and I still love the beetle, buttle, paddle, muddle.

Mike Walker (15:46.67)
poodle poodle part in a poodle yeah on a poodle with a moodle and a subtle muddle daddle waddle

every single one of those. And it must have been really fun for him to write. But I think this is one of those things where he probably had a really good time writing it, but he also probably worked really, really hard to get it just right. And I've never read about any of his process, but like, is he reading it out loud? I know that he was married forever, but they never had kids, I believe. So was he bouncing it off his wife and telling, you know, having her listen to it? But, you know.

A combination of work and fun. I can totally see his process with that. And a little comment on the art, because we cannot, unless there's a book with no pictures, we cannot not discuss the art.

Absolutely.

Mike Walker (16:33.672)
Let's get to the art, please. so- Because I've been waiting, because I love when you talk about art. Yay. So I can hear what you think. I love it.

Yes.

David Patrick (16:43.992)
So first of all, his style, it's just there's no doubt that it's his and I any of our listeners are going, golly, what's he talking about? I've never seen a Dr. Seuss book. But it just, what his style almost always is, it's very simple, because it is pencil or ink, probably ink, and colors. There's no shading. There are different shades of blue and red and pink and yellow, but...

No.

David Patrick (17:09.748)
Everything is, it's almost like a computer where you touch a certain shape and it becomes that color. Yeah. It's that throughout. Yep. Always. Yep. And I love it. It's so cool. And yet you can really see texture in the blue goo parts. You can just, you want to get the guches. You want to jump in and pull that blue and does it break? Can it stretch? You want to have fun with it. At least I do.

yeah.

Mike Walker (17:31.884)
Me too. Okay, good. It's like a fun taffy poll. Exactly. Except that it's a pond of taffy.

Exactly. So yeah, it's just again, this is classic Dr. Seuss and it's super super fun to read and I love it.

so much fun. I was thinking about it when I was getting ready for the episode and I was like, my gosh, I don't know how you don't like pick out things to read, but then I'm like, I can't, like I couldn't pick one thing out that's my favorite.

Mm-hmm. Yes, that's a good point. As soon as you pick one, you're like, wait, but that's good too. Yeah. Well, there is one thing that I realize I do like a lot. I love reading a lot of the Mr. Knox part, or both of them actually, but the Mr. Foxer, Mr. Knoxer. Yeah. I don't like this trick, sir. It's quick or slick, sir. And how he does all those rhymes by saying sir a lot. And I had a lot of fun.

Yes, and I found as I went along because you know now that we're doing this I have to think about what Mr. Knox is saying a little bit more. I didn't think about how by the end of the book he goes off on his all of the the rhymy stuff and it just kind of cracked me up when I started thinking about it and looking back at

Mike Walker (18:58.466)
He actually is still doing it on the other ones. It's just kind of sneakily snuck in there. Yeah.

And then by the end he's banging you over the head with a giant bat. And it's more subtle at the beginning and it's an, what do you think of that?

Maybe it's Bim's broom. They both broke, so...

or it's Ben's broom. And they were both happy. It was weird. And that is one that also gave me, when you said that, I'm like, okay, he said Ben. Do I say Ben? my gosh, what do I say? You scared me, Mike. I got scared. I got scared.

That is weird.

Mike Walker (19:33.614)
Well, you know, that's what I'm here for.

So the thing I was gonna say at the beginning that I realized at the beginning that I will say now towards the end, we will do a shorter recording for this shorter, simple, lovely book. There was a sketch at the Second City, and of course you know what that is. For those of you listening who don't, it's a famous improv sketch comedy theater in Chicago. We will not tell you the story that that is actually how Mike and I met, because I met his wife Kim in an improv class.

I thought you weren't gonna tell them.

I wasn't going to tell them the long version. That was ridiculously short. I'm talking more about it than actually telling the story, which is they had a show there on one of their stages where a guy was on a date with a girl. I believe it was Adam McKay was the he played. He played the guy. Traditional casting. I know.

That was.

Mike Walker (20:12.974)
Anyway. Anyway.

David Patrick (20:29.65)
And he is making her sing the lyrics to American Pie. And every time she messes up, she has to start over again. And the scene is a callback. It pops up later in this SketchReview show to where he's kind of got her tied up. And he's like got a gun. And he's, you know, it's like, no, start over. I mean, it gets really dark. But it's the idea of if you mess up, you start over. And I thought.

Bye bye.

Mike Walker (20:56.536)
I would never get through this book.

That's the point, and I thought in college, this could be a fun drinking game. Where if you mess up, you drink, you gotta start over, and you get to page three and it's over.

Everyone's passed out.

Yeah, because you really I had fun when I was reading it out loud of slowing down and trying to get it right It was a lot of work and a of

Yes.

Mike Walker (21:23.264)
I tried that and it did not happen at all.

And the only time it happened to me, like I told you earlier, it went lowly into a sense of, I got this, this is easy. And then right at the end, within sight of the finish line, I'd fall flat on my face.

Absolutely. It really is amazing the stuff that he wrote in here. Yep. It's really fun. Yep. Really fun. And the characters are fun and their expressions.

And even the arc, mean, Sox builds and builds and builds and then, you know, spoiler alert, something happens and stuff like that. So.

Nox, I can't blab such blubber blubber. My tongue isn't made of rubber!

David Patrick (22:04.938)
I love it! My tongue's in a minute, proper? See? Harumph! Harumph! So, totally recommend it. Kill... Kill. When you take children and kids and merge those words the wrong way, chids may have been better than kill. I think you shall. Well, maybe we'll have, you know, it'll be dustbins of scripts and scraps and slips and slaps.

Hurrum-Furrum.

Mike Walker (22:19.572)
I think I'm gonna cut that out.

Mike Walker (22:27.65)
Hey, don't rhyme. Not this time. I'm no mime. Nice.

You have noticed though, there are some Dr. Seuss books that were clearly not written by him. Yeah. And were written by, you know, people or whatever in his style. And it's not as good. The rhymes are so stilted and kind of forced in his.

Yeah, this is just... wow. I really like the book. I found it interesting doing some research on him. this fox is a tricky fox.

It really is. He'll get your tongue in trouble. Or at least he'll try.

Yes. which brings me to the end end cover. Is that the front? Is the front end cover?

David Patrick (23:08.908)
You know what? They actually, I do remember what it's called. There's the front end cover and the back end cover.

why can't it be the end-to-end cover? that would be... Because end-to-end cover... end-end cover is kind of hard to say.

to find.

David Patrick (23:22.83)
Yeah, it turns your tongue to rubber. And they tried it. At least high school Yrbik editors, their tongues turned to rubber and blubber and they got sued.

and then can flubber. Yes. That was a good movie. Anyway, the end cover, blubber, fubber says, now is your tongue numb? And every time I got to that, I was like, oh, yes. Indeed.

Hahaha!

David Patrick (23:47.832)
Yes indeed. And I loved it too because when you get to the end of the actual story you're like, okay that's the end. And then you turn and there's Fox being, ta-da! And then I'm like, wait, I see something through this blank white page. I can tell there's letters there. There's something else. Something else there. now is your tongue numb? And it makes you laugh every time. I love it.

than their

Mike Walker (24:15.782)
And I wonder, so going back to Fox on that very clear white page, Fox is standing there. I wonder if that's where Vanna White got her signature moves.

yeah, he's got the hands! I love it!

And this can be all yours! that's the wrong show. But!

That's right, if you can

David Patrick (24:39.751)
And I was gonna say, in the form of a question, so we can both do the wrong show.

Absolutely. Well, this was really fun. I loved it. Me too. Great book. Yep. I highly recommend it unless you're a mime.

Yes, that would be bad. not really. The book is old. It's older than me even.

Did you have anything else you wanted to talk about?

Mike Walker (25:02.178)
Yeah? Whoa, that's old. Yeah.

Once again, I would love to do research on Dr. Seuss and the timing and the history of his books.

It's actually really interesting and I won't get into it too much because we're, we're having a fun time. but there, there's a lot of controversy behind him and some of the books that are no longer being printed because the Sue's, Dr. Seuss's whatever estate or company that is still around decided not to print them anymore because

there were some questionable, questionable, very questionable things in them. And looking at stuff that he did before he was writing children's books. Also, it really gets, you know, it's good to learn these things and know these things, but we don't really need to talk about it too much here on our show, where we have fun.

Have fun. Yes, I will say this though. My knee jerk reaction is always like, no, we should look at that stuff. But I do think unlike say in Little House on the Prairie books, Little House in the Big Woods, the audience who's reading those books typically can handle the material that was controversial. And it's a good thing to have as a conversation with parents or teachers. I'm guessing that given

Mike Walker (26:27.83)
Yes.

the nature of a child who's young enough that could just grab a Seuss book by him or herself and come across some stuff. Maybe there's more to it in terms of you. You can't assume that a parent or a librarian or a teacher is going to be, you know, policing the, you know what I mean? I'm generally against censorship and whitewashing and canceling, but I can also see as a parent, it's like, ironically, it goes back to parental control and safety, which I'm a big fan of for their kids' books.

Yes.

Mike Walker (26:47.95)
Totally.

David Patrick (27:00.781)
Right.

Right. But I do think as a parent, think it would be the who view to look at the history and his history, like some of it is funny, like the whole reason he got his Dr. Seuss is funny. then you get into some of the stuff and you see some of the cartoons that he drew and you're like, whoa, okay, now I really get

why they were, you know, why they were saying, this is not so good.

Can you put that pin down and nobody gets hurt? Well, the funny thing, Mike, is I, despite the fact that you're always the research guy and I'm the guy who comments on the art, I love to read books. I also love to read about books. I do love that kind of stuff. So that is one of the many things I'll be getting out of this. And there's another thing that I got out of it this morning. So my daughter Delaney, the rising high schooler, we were going home from her mile run for band.

hahaha

David Patrick (28:05.494)
and we stopped by the Keller Public Library and I'd forgotten that I had signed up for their summer reading program because adults are allowed. And the woman who's in charge of it is sitting at a desk out in the lobby of the library. said, Zalini, do want to join? She goes, no. I'm like, well, I joined. And I said something like, how do I log my book? She goes, well, just, for every day you read, you get something. And I said, And she goes, how many days have you read? I'm like, all of them. I have a podcast called Dad's Own Books. And she goes, I remember that.

She remembered that I had told her that and she said, then you get three treats and there's this rack of like candy and stuff. I was like, yeah.

You took it and you ate something in front of your kid, I teased her with it. none for you.

Bye.

David Patrick (28:52.078)
I wish I had done that. But the problem with having kids, as you know, Mike, is you have to do the things you tell them to do and be the person you want them to be. it's so- Yeah. Delaney said, can I have one? And I said, yes. The littles, her sisters, were not with us. So instead of grabbing two Reese's peanut butter cups for me, I grabbed a Starburst for them. So everybody got something. Now, the moral of the story is, yes, girls, you will sign up and you will read every-

for...

Mike Walker (29:22.168)
whether you like it or not. So. And really, if you sit and listen to me read Fox and Socks, that could count.

Exactly.

David Patrick (29:32.162)
Well, yeah, did you read today,

Well, yes, I did. Cause I I read Fox and Socks for a probably third or fourth time since we decided on this book last week. When I could not find this, I actually checked it out on Libby and then I found it. So I had to read it in person. And then this morning I went through it again. So at least three times I did read it. think actually I might've read it twice.

three times more than me

Mike Walker (30:04.522)
on my phone. Okay, so you're very hard to do because it's so small.

I can only imagine. You need to log all of that and sign up for the Keller Public Library Summer Reading Program and get down here before the end of the summer. This is peanut butter cups.

Okay, so where do I sign up for that? Is it at the Keller library dot org?

I don't know look at a freak as I did it at the killer library 20th century I'm sure you can sign up online Mike. I will do that and if you look below I'll put it in a link and if this were a YouTube channel thing there would be a link but right I'm just pointing at nothing and our listeners are like what what's he doing come on fool David Pat My girls do that now you'll be shocked

Old school

Mike Walker (30:45.102)
Come on Davey! Come on! Davey! What are you doing?

Mike Walker (30:54.232)
my gosh, how funny.

That's good stuff. Well, yeah, so great book. Lots of fun. And yeah, Dr. Seuss.

Great book, enjoy. And everybody out there, enjoy reading.

Good reading everyone, check it out.

Check it out. Check it out, yo. And always listen to Dad's on Books, because Dad's on Books.

David Patrick (31:15.726)
That's a box.

on.