#093 Financial Lessons We Learned From "Friends" Without Knowing It

It’s hard to find a show that has had a greater cultural impact on American life than the 90s television sitcom "Friends." From “The Rachel” haircut, to the holiday armadillo, “Smelly Cat”, and even the “I’ll Be There for You” theme song, "Friends" is a show that continues to feel relevant and relatable – even though it’s been more than a decade since the finale aired in May 2004! So relatable that the Talk Wealth to Me crew brought on a guest that wasn't born until 2008!

What does "Friends" have to do with personal finance? It turns out, so many things that the six twenty-somethings encountered in their lives resembled real life; financial decisions and situations were no different. Today, we Shoot the Financial $h!t about many of these classic scenes and topics. That guest? Clayton Peckham, who has watched every episode from season 1-10, multiple times starting at the age of 10. Sit back and reminisce with us!

Transcript

Intro 0:00

Welcome to Talk Wealth To Me, a safe space podcast, where we chat about anything and everything related to personal finance, the information contained in this podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. It does not constitute as accounting, legal tax or other professional advice.

Chase Peckham 0:33

Hi guys, what's going on?

Felipe Arevalo 0:36

Hey, Chase. How are you doing?

Chase Peckham 0:37

I'm doing great. Katie. So glad to have you back with us today.

Katie Utterback 0:41

Yeah. I'm glad to be back in, you know, like we talked about last time, just trying to dodge those Instagram ads.

Chase Peckham 0:49

Yeah. I can understand that. Can you imagine if, uh, Ross and Rachel and Monica had Instagram and the days that they did the show Friends, can you imagine what that show would be like?

Katie Utterback 0:59

They would've had a lot less money They would have a lot less money.

Felipe Arevalo 1:02

It would have been a good feed to follow,

Chase Peckham 1:04

Right? I mean, but it's always so funny. I always wondered how much money these people made in the first place. And you wrote an incredible blog about this very topic. Um, not too long ago, that you can find a debtwave.org, uh, in the general financial tips area of the blog. And it's eight financial red flags from the show Friends. And I will tell you, um, I am a confessed, huge fan of Friends and I was in my twenties and early thirties actually. Yeah, twenties and early thirties, when that show was big. Um, in 2004, yeah. I was middle twenties to middle thirties. I was about the age of the entire cast. So for me, that show was incredible. And the article that you wrote on this is just absolutely hysterical. Cause I always used to say, there is no way that Monica and Rachel live in that apartment for first of all, the size of that apartment, if you've ever been in New York City, you know that the sizes of apartments can vary greatly, but they're mostly on the very small end, especially for what they said. They were paying in rent. And I don't care if it's rent control or not. That place is crazy, huge, and beautiful. Uh, and it was so cool that article that you wrote. So tell us a little bit what brought us into that.

Katie Utterback 2:29

Well, um, you know, you guys often talk on this show about Friends and Chase. You mentioned that your kids love the show friends.

Chase Peckham 2:37

They do, I'm a bad parent.

Katie Utterback 2:39

You're not a bad parent. I was a kid that I started watching Friends with my grandma, like my grandma would just have it on. And I was like, what is this adult show? I was little when friends first started is in 2014 or 2004. I was like 14.

Chase Peckham 2:56

I think 2004 was the end of the show. Right? That was like the last season.

Felipe Arevalo 3:01

Yeah it ended in 04.

Chase Peckham 3:02

Yeah. The show started, I believe in 94, 93, 94. And, you know, you heard another voice here. And so when we were going to talk about this topic, I was super excited and I talked to you guys and I said, we've, we've got to have an expert come in and talk about this, and you are going to laugh. But my 13 year old son has probably seen every episode and every season, nine, 10 times?

Clay Peckham 3:27

Yeah 10, 11, or something like that.

Chase Peckham 3:28

He's watched them from beginning to end, at least 10 or 11 times. And he can almost verbatim.

Clay Peckham 3:34

Yeah.

Chase Peckham 3:35

So Clay Peckham, um, I'm very, very happy to have you here because we want to get a different viewpoint of, of the generations that this show has brought in. And not only does he love it, he sucked my little daughter into it. And even though she doesn't understand half of it, and you don't as a parent, I think when I was watching it, I didn't realize how adult it is. I didn't realize how many adult themes there are in that show, which for twenties and 30 somethings, it's just part of our life. So it just kind of goes right over our head. And we think it's funny and everything else. But when you, how old were you? You're 13. Now, how old were you when you first started watching that?

Clay Peckham 4:12

Probably third or fourth grade? Probably like, uh, um, I don't know. I was like eight or nine.

Chase Peckham 4:17

Eight or nine. And you say, this is your favorite show?

Clay Peckham 4:20

Definitely. My favorite show of all time.

Chase Peckham 4:21

How, remind me, how did we get into this in the first place? How did I become such a terrible parent?

Clay Peckham 4:26

You're not a bad parent. Actually, you kind of are. Um, so we were watching TV one morning, like before school. So dad always took us to school every morning. So like the channels were on. And at first I was actually just watching the MLB channel cause like, MLB Central was on or whatever. And they were talking baseball

Chase Peckham 4:44

And this was what, fourth grade?

Clay Peckham 4:47

Fourth or third grade. And, um, Friends was on DirecTV. So I was just flipping channels and that goes, oh, Clay, this is like my favorite, one of my favorite shows of all time. I was like, oh, whoa, cool. And, um, whatever. So we were starting watching it and it was probably like, I think it was season 10, maybe the end of season nine when they were all in Barbados.

Chase Peckham 5:07

Season nine very good.

Clay Peckham 5:10

So, oh yeah. They're all in Barbados. And I remember watching that and I was like, dad, what's Barbados? And I like, didn't like, like I didn't get any of it until probably like the seventh or eighth time I started watching it again.

Chase Peckham 5:20

Wasn't that the episode where they peed on Monica, because she got stung?

Clay Peckham 5:23

No, that, that, that wasn't, um, that was in the beach in New York.

Chase Peckham 5:30

See.

Katie Utterback 5:30

Friends fact check.

Chase Peckham 5:30

Yeah, no, I'm serious. This is the way it goes. And that's why I wanted to bring him into this because it is so interesting as you, when I was reading your article and thinking about you pick eight and there are so many more that I was thinking of as we were going through this that I'm like, I got to bring Clay on. Cause he's going to remember even more. But one of the biggest things, uh, that is so interesting was the first one that we were talking about was the rent controlled apartment. It's number two on your list. But we were talking about that, that it was only$200 a month. And if I remember correctly, it was Monica's grandmother's apartment, right. That she took over.

Clay Peckham 6:07

Yeah.

Katie Utterback 6:09

We're going to default to clay for all of our fact checking. Yeah, I believe it was her grandmother's apartment and somehow it had been transferred to her. So I don't know, Clay can fill in details,

Clay Peckham 6:24

I can kind of like fill in details about that. So, um, they were living there, so her grandma and her grandpa were living there, her grandpa died and she ended up moving in with Monica and Ross', parents for awhile, because she was like lonely or whatever. And I remember this was backstory from, I don't even know where I got this backstory. I think I got it from the friends, um, bloopers and stuff like that and executive stuff. So anyway, um, then Ross ended, Ross actually moved there first in the summer of his last college year, before they were all a friend group and Ross left Monica finished college, couple years later, moved in and then that's when they pick up pretty much the whole storyline and season one episode one starts and that's the pilot. So that's how it's kind of started with them.

Katie Utterback 7:20

I forgot about the Ross thing. Wasn't he like a dancer of somethin?

Clay Peckham 7:23

Yeah. He was trying to be a dancer in college. And he moved in.

Chase Peckham 7:27

Katie you said that there was something you almost, you, you wanted to move to New York at one point because of that show.

Katie Utterback 7:33

Yeah. I mean, most of my life I wanted to move to California. And so everything I watched was revolved around California and except for Friends, it was the one show that I watched that was on the east coast. And then seeing that apartment, I mean the California housing is so beautiful that I was like, okay, maybe I could do it. I could live in New York if my apartment was sizable. If I had my own room and I wasn't, you know, marking off my area with a shower curtain, but it's not realistic. And then when I found out that friends was filmed in Los Angeles anyway, like, oh, nevermind.

Chase Peckham 8:12

You know what's really funny about that. It was filmed right next door to, uh, the, the West Wing. They, they were partner. They had like, right. Their studios were right next to each other.

Felipe Arevalo 8:21

It's something where I know it was a while ago, but I'm on apartments.com right now. And I just looked up some apartments. Uh, there's one in New York in East Village.

Clay Peckham 8:33

That's actually where they lived.

Felipe Arevalo 8:35

Yeah. I had to Google it. I didn't know that off the top of my head, but I had to Google it. Um, the current monthly rent for this very spacious 490 foot square foot apartment is a$2200. So this one's not, not horrible, but it is just, uh, a closet.

Chase Peckham 8:53

It's basically got a bed that probably folds up into the wall.

Clay Peckham 8:56

and a bathroom,

Chase Peckham 8:57

a kitchenette and a toilet. And maybe a shower.

Felipe Arevalo 8:59

It's got, yeah, it's got one little counter square, a small mini stove, a miniature, um, sink, and then a, maybe full-size refrigerator? Um, that's pretty much it looks like a closet.

Clay Peckham 9:20

We're kind of realizing that, um, that$200 is not really,

Chase Peckham 9:25

Even in, even in the early nineties.

Felipe Arevalo 9:28

That was the cheapest one I could find.

Clay Peckham 9:30

That's the cheapest?

Felipe Arevalo 9:30

Um, they obviously, yeah, they obviously, uh, increase in price vary drastically from there.

Chase Peckham 9:36

I would imagine they do that's probably on the bottom floor too.

Felipe Arevalo 9:39

That was definitely on the bottom floor. Yes. You can tell from the window.

Chase Peckham 9:43

So Clay, You mentioned it at the beginning where we go into the pilot and Katie, this is where you take off with the first financial flag. Yeah. And take us from there, uh, on, on what made you see the, that part of the show?

Katie Utterback 10:00

You know, I was actually watching the pilot, um, cause the Friends reunion was coming up when I was writing it. So I was kind of going down memory lane and I was kind of watching this from a different perspective when you just are sitting down and watching it, it's kind of comical that there's like this runaway bride, who's like stoked. And she's like looking for somebody in the coffee shop because she doesn't know who else to go to. Um, but like in my personal life, if I flipped it around to what would I do if I was in a coffee shop and all of a sudden somebody I knew from high school walked in and they wanted to stay with me, I would be freaked out. Like, how did you find me? Why did you come find me? Like, why do you think that I will to be taking care of you like, if I just had all of these financial questions.

Chase Peckham 10:49

Absolutely. And you think about what did, what was it the Chandler said right when he, she came through the door?

Clay Peckham 10:55

Um, oh yeah. I remember. So Ross was like, like really depressed because he had just like had the divorce with Carol and um, he was like, I just want to be married again. And then Rachel walks in and she was like, and I just want a million dollars.

Chase Peckham 11:11

That's it? I mean, we did that stage that I just got to tell you, but that's exactly it. You want to talk about the way that th th the way that finally that they pulled that together was so hysterical because those characters at that time, when they're starting a pilot, right. They have to have the funny guy, they've got to have the spoiled, rich girl. They've got to have the girl, that's a little bit of a scent[inaudible] eccentric, the hot, you know, kind of cool guy. Uh, and then the geeky guy. Right. And so they all had their parts to play and they did it so beautifully right. From the beginning. And you're so right, because after they're in the coffee house, where do they find us, but in that apartment. Right. And what do we see? First thing, uh, when they go, they cut to the, the apartment.

Clay Peckham 11:55

Um,

Chase Peckham 11:57

Do you guys remember?

Clay Peckham 11:58

Oh, I don't really blank a lot. I'm kind of blanking right now.

Chase Peckham 12:02

Oh, that doesn't happen very often. Katie, do you guys remember?

Clay Peckham 12:05

I'll remember it probably.

Chase Peckham 12:07

Are you talking about cutting up credit cards? That's exactly what's happening, but that's after, but what happens when they cut to the actual, to the actual apartment where all they're all sitting around, it's Rachel doing what?

Clay Peckham 12:19

Oh, she was just, she had just finished like shopping and she was like, Right?

Chase Peckham 12:25

No, this is that's after, but that's good.

Clay Peckham 12:27

If you remember, just tell us.

Chase Peckham 12:28

And this is what this is all about. You're right. I should do that. This is terrible podcasting. And you're exactly right. But we find her when they cut to it, she's on the phone with her father trying to explain that she left.

Clay Peckham 12:37

The shoe,

Chase Peckham 12:38

The shoe, it's a shoe daddy. It's a metaphor. Remember? Okay. So, but then it was after that, she talks about it and she's like, oh, I just don't love him. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then she went to go look for these things called a job. And I think I'm going to stay with Monica. And then Monica says, well,

Clay Peckham 12:55

Uh, yeah, I guess

Chase Peckham 12:57

She was saying with Monica, right? Yeah. Yeah. And all of a sudden, she's got a new roommate where she had this apartment by herself. Right. Apparently. And so

Katie Utterback 13:05

Yeah can we just pause right there, Clay, what would you do if somebody like from school came up to you and I was like, I'm just going to come stay with you,

Clay Peckham 13:13

Someone from high school like that I hadn't talked to in years. I don't even know. And especially, it's even weirder because she didn't even, like, I remember at the beginning of the show, she was like, oh, Monica, like, I can't believe you're here. Oh my gosh. Hi. And she was like, she was like, oh my gosh. Maybe I can come stay with you, whatever. And she's like, and I'm the one who didn't even get invited to your wedding.

Chase Peckham 13:36

You're right. I mean, that's odd. That's gotta be awkward.

Clay Peckham 13:38

That's odd. It's weird. It's actually, I think it's against the law now.

Chase Peckham 13:43

It's against the law now. I don't think it's,

Clay Peckham 13:45

I'm pretty, I'm pretty sure it's against the law to just, she didn't like, yes. Technically Monica said yes, because it's a show or whatever.

Chase Peckham 13:52

So basically Rachel could have been squatting before there was, they knew what Squatting is.

Katie Utterback 13:57

He's got a good point. Squatter's rights.

Chase Peckham 13:57

Squatter's rights that's incredible. So it's funny because in that first episode that she goes and looks for a job, but she was like, she'd never had one. And the first thing she comes back and she says, but I feel better because I couldn't find my jobs. Boots, boots. Is that what it was? Uh,

Clay Peckham 14:17

Yeah, not,

Chase Peckham 14:17

She bought boots.

Clay Peckham 14:17

Yeah. She, she was like, like my work boots, my boots boots, and like my fancy boots. And she had like all these pairs of boots because her dad was still paying because she like remembered it remembered the credit card,

Chase Peckham 14:29

She had daddies credit card.

Clay Peckham 14:30

Still daddy's card memorized. Yeah. And, uh, pretty weird.

Chase Peckham 14:34

And that's when they talked to her about cutting up the card,

Clay Peckham 14:37

That's when they cut the cards, they got her own car, own bank account. She went to find a job. She ended up working at the coffee house and the rest was history for the next couple of seasons.

Felipe Arevalo 14:46

Clay have you memorized, have you memorized your dad's credit card number?

Clay Peckham 14:49

No. I remember as my mom's Amex, I think.

Felipe Arevalo 14:52

Okay.

Clay Peckham 14:54

I don't use it, but I memorized it I remember it because she always makes me order food with it.

14:58

Inaudible

Clay Peckham 15:03

It's on the Chick-fil-A app dad.

Chase Peckham 15:05

Um, another funny one that I absolutely had totally forgot about was, and I think it's probably one of the more famous.

Clay Peckham 15:13

Oh yeah.

Chase Peckham 15:15

Is when, um, when Ross goes to buy a couch and I just love that one.

Clay Peckham 15:24

Pivot dad

Chase Peckham 15:26

Pivot.

Clay Peckham 15:27

Yeah.

Chase Peckham 15:28

But why, but why did we get to pivot? I mean, that's the most beautiful part of this. So how did we get to pivot? Because it wouldn't have ever gotten to that.,

Clay Peckham 15:35

They were they were talking about. I remember it was in the couch store and, uh, Ross was trying to buy a new couch for his bachelor pad. And, um, he was, he bought it and like the delivery fee was actually more than the couch was or close to more or whatever. So he said, oh no, no, no, we'll just take it. So he had him and Rachel just walked out of the store, whatever walked out the store, got to his building. And they as Chandler well actually, they were going to ask Joey, but that didn't happen because he had to like a.

Chase Peckham 16:09

Because Joey's stronger probably.

Clay Peckham 16:10

Yeah. And then so they ask Chandler. And so they were all going up. They were trying to get up the stairs because it wouldn't fit in the elevator. So when they're getting up the stairs, Ross and Chandler and Rachel were trying to get the couch up into Ross's room. So that's when the whole"pivot" thing starts.

Chase Peckham 16:28

Absolutely hysterical. But all that happens because Ross is cheap. And I think.

Clay Peckham 16:32

Ross is definitely cheap.

Chase Peckham 16:33

Clay and I were talking about this earlier, when we were talking about doing it. If you think about the Ross' character through this whole thing, he had a financial personality. Phil, we talk about this all the time. Can you guys remember what his financial personality? Can you tell us what you guys think it is? Because it shows throughout the show.

Clay Peckham 16:52

He, but he differs dad. He's cheap.

Katie Utterback 16:56

Ross is an interesting one because he, unlike his sister, Monica is financially supported by his parents. Yeah. Even more than she is. So in a way he has like this inability to be a saver when she does it. Because like for college, for example, like his student loans, I'm assuming were paid by his parents because he never really talks about having student debt. And the parents mentioned, Clay's going to have to fact check me here. They spent some of Monica's money that they put aside for her. Was it on Ross or was it no.

Clay Peckham 17:33

So they spent Monica's college money. Most of it on refurnishing, the Porsche.

Chase Peckham 17:41

Or no buying the Porsche?

Clay Peckham 17:42

No. Yes, yes. Buying the Porsche. And then once they bought it, it got covered in water. And, uh, they use the rest of our college money into refurbish, the porch porch. So.

Chase Peckham 17:55

That's a recurring theme in the show.

Clay Peckham 17:57

It's a recurring theme. It's like, Monica is the least favorite child, which is very obvious if you watch the show. And, um,

Chase Peckham 18:05

And also you pointed it out. I think didn't, they were asking if there was money for her wedding.

Clay Peckham 18:12

Yes. That was, that was it too the Porsche. I was all the Porsche. They refurbished the Porsche at least three times.

Chase Peckham 18:18

Oh. So also not only did her college money go to the Porsche.

Clay Peckham 18:22

wedding too.

Chase Peckham 18:23

And a condo. If I remember correctly.

Clay Peckham 18:25

Yes. Refurnishing the beach house. Yes. They spent so much of her money And.

Chase Peckham 18:31

because why, why did.

Clay Peckham 18:32

so they weren't she wasn't the favorite.

Felipe Arevalo 18:35

So the parents were like financial enablers.

Chase Peckham 18:38

Oh, for sure.

Felipe Arevalo 18:39

Yeah.

Chase Peckham 18:40

For sure. Ross could do no wrong.

Felipe Arevalo 18:42

Ross was the, the receiver of the financial, the beneficiary, um, which I forgot the term just now I just did a SWYM live on it, but I forgot the term for it at the moment,

Clay Peckham 18:53

Bur I guess like all's well, that ends well, because Monica ended up getting the Porsche.

Katie Utterback 18:57

Tat's right.

Chase Peckham 18:57

So it all tied together. Yeah. She ended up getting it, which is hysterical. And then they did talk about that too, because Chandler was a super saver and put away all kinds of money.

Clay Peckham 19:12

Besides paying for Joey,

Chase Peckham 19:14

Because he loved her so much, he said, you know, cause she always wanted that wedding. Right. And they, by the way, always refurbished the money for that. They set aside for a wedding because they figured she just was never going to get married. I remember there was a whole episode on the fact that she didn't yeah, that was poor. Monica just got the hosed.

Clay Peckham 19:32

And like, I don't think Ross even realized it much.

Chase Peckham 19:36

No.

Clay Peckham 19:36

He's like, I mean,

Chase Peckham 19:39

Yeah, it's amazing how oblivious he was through the whole thing,

Clay Peckham 19:42

but he was cheap And not cheap. Sometimes he would always, he would, he's very cheap.

Chase Peckham 19:48

Like remember hotels, he would never check out,

Clay Peckham 19:51

Never check out.

Chase Peckham 19:51

Until the last second. He paid for that time. So he was good if he, if he had to check out at noon, he was going to check out at noon.

Clay Peckham 19:59

and He would get all this like necessities out of the hotel. Cause he paid for the hotel. So it's technically his

Katie Utterback 20:03

Even the remote batteries.

Clay Peckham 20:06

Yeah. I don't know if anyone like remembered when Chandler and Ross w well, it's supposed to be for Ross. I mean, dang it, Chandler and Monica, they were going to go to like a romantic in, in Vermont. And Ross just told him to go. Cause there was like white, white river rafting and whatever on like on the boat at night. And, um, they had no reservation for them. So they had to pay like$800 for a suite. So they made sure to get their money's worth. And they took like everything in the hotel, batteries, salt, shakers, oh. They took apples from the front desk. Uh, and then at the end, when they check out everything falls out and they get like in super big trouble and Ross is on like a sugar high, if anyone remembers that from maple candy and yeah, Ross was very cheap and you don't really realize it until you re-watch the show.

Chase Peckham 21:01

So many things as you look at this, and that's why this article that you wrote, Katie is so brilliant that you see all of the different personalities that come in. And if any of these shows that you looked at, um, you could, and then it even got down to, uh, when you look at like insurance, there was a couple of different episodes where insurance, medical insurance came into play in this. And one of them I believe was with Rachel.

Clay Peckham 21:26

Uh, yeah. So Rachel would ha okay. So Monica wa it was probably, I think in season three and Monica was asking Rachel to take out or like put the Christmas lights away. Cause they still had it on their terrace.

Chase Peckham 21:43

How do you remember this stuff?

Clay Peckham 21:44

And it was like, it was still February or so. It was like February and it was crazy and they still hadn't done it. So Rachel had finished, she dropped a pillow, she went to grab it and she fell off the landing onto another landing and broke her foot. So they went to the hospital and Rachel didn't have health insurance.

Chase Peckham 22:01

And she didn't even know.

Clay Peckham 22:02

what insurance was really.

Chase Peckham 22:03

Right.

Clay Peckham 22:04

And so she had to use Monica's

Chase Peckham 22:06

Cause like it was going to be really,

Clay Peckham 22:08

Really expensive if she didn't use insurance. So she had used Monica's

Chase Peckham 22:11

Which is by the way, everybody knows this, but that's breaking the law highly, highly illegal.

Clay Peckham 22:18

And then they also and made it even worse for TV sake. They met these two nurses at the doctor's office. So Rachel was Monica and Monica was Rachel,

Chase Peckham 22:30

They weren't nurses. They were doctors.

Clay Peckham 22:32

Okay. Same thing,

Chase Peckham 22:35

Same thing?

Clay Peckham 22:36

They were guiding

Felipe Arevalo 22:37

Don't tell that, don't tell that to a doctor.

Chase Peckham 22:40

Do you guys remember who the doctors were?

Katie Utterback 22:42

Oh, I d o G eorge Clooney was one of them.

Chase Peckham 22:45

George Clooney and Noah Wiley. We're both in ER, which was also a show that was, uh, a neighbor to the Friends studio.

Clay Peckham 22:54

Yeah. So I'm guessing that's why they're on. And um,

Chase Peckham 22:57

They are also very popular at the time and also on NBC. Ding ding ding

Clay Peckham 23:01

Anyway. So they met them and Rachel was Monica and Monica was Rachel cause their insurance stuff. So it kind of went back and bit them in the butt and it was pretty bad. And like when they invited them over for dinner and they like forgot their names. Cause there were still like switching it up. And then once they told them the whole story, they thought they were crazy and left. So I mean, yeah, I financially it's. Finance stuff comes up a lot in friends and you don't realize it.

Chase Peckham 23:31

The other one, does anybody remember what the other health insurance one was? Katie. Phil?

Clay Peckham 23:37

I do.

Katie Utterback 23:37

Is it Joey lose his health insurance?

Clay Peckham 23:39

Yeah.

Chase Peckham 23:42

Dang you fifteens.

Katie Utterback 23:45

What is did he say? He's like, oh, I don't remember doing a movie called benefits expired or something like that.

Chase Peckham 23:52

That's right. Yeah. And he's laying down and he had let his expire cause he hadn't been working enough. Right? Is that

Clay Peckham 23:57

Yeah, he was um, so chairman like found mail for him and he was in the room and he was like, um, oh, let me see that. Maybe it's a check. And to be open to his, I haven't done a movie called benefits and expired and he goes, and Chandler goes, buddy, that's your health insurance has expired because you haven't been working enough. And he's like, he rushes out there. Oh, I got to find a job. And he goes to Estell's, but uh, Estell thought that Joey had left her. So Estelle was bad. Mouthing him all over town so he couldn't get any jobs. So

Chase Peckham 24:32

I forgot about that completely.

Clay Peckham 24:33

Got a job. He got A job at an audition for all of these and he was in terrible pain cause he had a hernia and he didn't get any of the parts. And there was one last called dying man. Then the movie called dying man and he all he had to do was die and they paid him money and got his insurance back. And um,

Chase Peckham 24:53

Oh, that's the episode where the kid won't cry when he's supposed to be crying.

Clay Peckham 24:56

The kid won't cry.

Chase Peckham 24:56

And then finally Chandler's like, this is ridiculous. They're like on like take 15 And so Chandler pulls back the thing, it shows them the hernia and the kid starts balling and they, and they wrap it.

Clay Peckham 25:05

Then they rolled the tape and Joey got his health insurance back.

Chase Peckham 25:09

he could go get fixed. It is the funniest thing because those are, I mean, yeah,

Clay Peckham 25:13

Especially with Joey because Joey, he never had money over the course of the show. Of course the show besides once like one day. And I think, uh, Katie wrote about it in her article. It was, it said when Joey is rich for a day, because of Days of Our Lives, he started getting a lot of money. And then since he got all this money, he was like feeling good about himself and he oh yeah, right there.

Chase Peckham 25:36

Is that when they decided they were going to move out?

Clay Peckham 25:38

Yeah. So Joey was on days of our lives and he got all this money and he was like, this is, I don't need a roommate anymore. They were both mad at each other. Joey moved down to a really nice apartment that on, that was one of his costars apartments. And um, he thought so much of himself. Like I'm a, I'm a rich guy now. So he went to work. And he's said to, um, soap, opera digest that he writes all of his own, some of his own own lines and the writers didn't take too kindly to this and they killed him off the show.

Chase Peckham 26:13

When I was watching it with my kids, I just thought about all the very adult things that I didn't realize were in it, let alone the financial lessons of it all. But he also, if I remember correctly moved out and in furnished an apartment, he never lived by himself. And then he furnished his own apartment and that was a disaster, wasn't It?

Clay Peckham 26:32

Yeah. He bought like a crazy amount of, um, like paintings and art, art, art. And like that was like Thousands of dollars for that huge dog,

Chase Peckham 26:43

Which made it through the rest of it,

Clay Peckham 26:44

Made it through the whole show, like the whole show at the end of the, one of the last scenes that dog was in the last one of the last scenes.

Chase Peckham 26:51

Do you remember the, do you remember.

Clay Peckham 26:52

Yeah the line was Monica is like, I'll give you all, I'll give you the 20 If that doesn't make it on the truck. And I'm not just how the show ended pretty much. And it shows that she has values honestly. A nd it just shows how crazy, well, Joey went crazy with his spending b ecause he didn't know what to do. H e'd been poor and,

Chase Peckham 27:14

But he never acted poor. Did you guys ever think, I mean, you kind of knew it, but.

Clay Peckham 27:17

We knew he was poor because Chandler always. He always asks Chandler for money.

Chase Peckham 27:20

Yeah, that's true.

Katie Utterback 27:22

Truthfully, I just started to believe that there were people in the world that paid for things. And then there were people in the world that just were always like, can you get this for me?

Clay Peckham 27:32

Yeah. There's people like that though. The weirdly. And um, it's just, yeah, Joey, was rich for a day and he bought thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars in art and painting. And we got killed off the show. He got evicted because he couldn't pay his bills anymore. That's a, so they took all this stuff.

Chase Peckham 27:54

We don't see that in Friends, but we do see that in real life all the time.

Clay Peckham 27:58

Yeah we do.

Chase Peckham 27:58

I mean, we see it in the show Friends, but we see that in real life where people will do that and they'll get a nice raise or they'll do things like that. And they'll,

Felipe Arevalo 28:06

Or they'll get a bonus.

Chase Peckham 28:08

Right.

Clay Peckham 28:08

And they'll spend it on a car. Right.

Felipe Arevalo 28:10

2020 People got stimulus checks and they spent them wildly. Sometimes, you know, some people needed him to get by, but other people who didn't really need them, you know, went out and spent them on things that maybe they normally would not have spent their money on. Um, you know, and, and it was, you know, like maybe, uh, exercise equipment. I don't know who would do that? Um, that's me, by the way, if you haven't listened to that episode. Uh, but uh, you know, it's, sometimes people come across that windfall and then they just throw their budget to the wind and go for it. That's a dangerous spot to be in.

Chase Peckham 28:53

I the one Katie, I think the one I'd love you to take over here. Cause this is it's, it's an episode I completely forgot about, but Monica loses her identity in one of the shows, right. Doesn't somebody take or doesn't lose it, but she takes it. She, somebody gets steals. It,

Clay Peckham 29:07

Someone stole her identity.

Katie Utterback 29:09

Yeah. So she's, I believe she's sitting at the table kind of reviewing her credit card statement. And she was like, I didn't take tap dance classes. Like there's a couple of other items on this, on her credit card bill that she doesn't know where they came from. And long story short, she finds out that there's a woman going around town pretending to be Monica Geller. And instead of being upset that someone is taking her money, spending her money, she actually is like, dang, why is this person having such an enjoyable life as Monica? I'm not doing any of this fun stuff. So instead of, you know, like calling the credit card company or the bank and putting a stop to it or alerting someone to the fraud, Monica tries to go meet the person who's pretending to be Monica so that she can kind of take some like confidence or I don't know what it is she wants from this lady, but it's definitely not to tell her to stop using her credit card.

Chase Peckham 30:07

That was crazy. And the fact that most, I mean, you would in real life, you, that could be a, no is a disaster. That could be one that woman's going to jail. If they catch her,

Clay Peckham 30:17

They did, she didn't go to jail.

Chase Peckham 30:18

Right. Oh, She did? I forgot that part. And then two trying to clear that up would be very difficult.

Felipe Arevalo 30:27

Yeah. Unless it was just credit card charges.

Chase Peckham 30:29

That's true.

Felipe Arevalo 30:30

Credit card charges and you know, you just give it a call and, and get those taken care of. And you know, I think in today's world, they've gotten so much better at fraud. I mean, that was still within the city, so they may not have flagged it. Uh, but they've gotten so much better with fraud detection that sometimes you do something you just don't do on a regular basis and they might flag you. You might get flagged yourself, you know, for making a purchase like, oh, is that really you traveling? And you know, cause you have to put travel notifications and whatnot. So, um, it would be interesting to see if in today's world, someone could get away with so much of that because technology has changed.

Katie Utterback 31:09

I mean last year, not last year, two years ago, somebody charged more than a thousand dollars worth of gas. The one like the east coast on one of my credit cards I live in California. I don't know why that wasn't flagged. It was like two weeks.

Chase Peckham 31:24

Oh wow. That's crazy. I mean, I get flagged and somebody tells me I got a call in when I was buying Clay, some stuff with Phil and I, when we were in Orlando.

Felipe Arevalo 31:33

Yeah.

Chase Peckham 31:33

They wouldn't, they wouldn't do my purchase because I was buying it probably a way to have expensive Cars deal.

Felipe Arevalo 31:40

At the Disney store.

Chase Peckham 31:41

At the Disney store

Felipe Arevalo 31:44

At a financial literacy conference.

Chase Peckham 31:45

At a Financial Literacy conference. That's right. Yeah. That's right.

Clay Peckham 31:50

I remember that. I remember you brought that home for me.

Chase Peckham 31:54

Yeah. You were little.

Clay Peckham 31:55

You bought me like a huge cars truck.

Chase Peckham 31:58

That's right. Mac wasn't his name Mac.

Clay Peckham 32:00

I don't know. It's still in my room and I bet it cost you like$200.

Chase Peckham 32:04

No, I love you I don't love you that much,

Clay Peckham 32:07

Dad. I was like six.

Chase Peckham 32:09

Yeah. I think you were younger than that.

Felipe Arevalo 32:12

I, you remember though, and we were at the Disney store,

Chase Peckham 32:17

It was packed.

Felipe Arevalo 32:17

Long line, financial literacy conference, probably wearing a SDFLC polo shirt and then card didn't go through. Now he's sitting there with his phone, trying to talk to his bank is calling him. Is this really you?

Chase Peckham 32:34

I'm like, yes, I'm in Orlando and yes, I'm buying something at the Disney store. But thank for checking. It actually made me feel pretty good about it.

Felipe Arevalo 32:41

Right.

Katie Utterback 32:42

This would have been an amazing friends episode if like when they were in Barbados, Ross was trying to buy a gift for his son, Ben. Right.

Felipe Arevalo 32:52

Yeah that would have been a great Friends episode. That is absolutely true.

Katie Utterback 32:56

So I mean, I think, you know, the thing that I'm picking up on all of us is that we were able to relate to the show friends in some capacity, no matter what stage you are at in life.

Chase Peckham 33:08

Yes. Well, I mean, it's the reason I wanted to bring clay on who stepped away for a second, uh, is the fact that he is, I mean, generations and generations away from that show actually airing and because of where we are in technology today and where the fact that he was so drawn to it and loved it, even though clay has no nothing but cell phones and internet and where they were using real phones. I mean, if there's an episode talking about expenses where Phoebe stays on the line the whole time. Right. And, and, and it's, it's long distance. So she's sitting there, she doesn't want to hang up, but she's on the phone for like two days. If I remember correctly,

Clay Peckham 33:52

Two days it was like Joey's premiere of his theater premiere

Chase Peckham 33:55

That's right. But she didn't want to get off because of, I forget why she was wanting to hold, but it ended up and it was on Monica's phones

Speaker 5 34:03

So that cost so much money.

Chase Peckham 34:05

That was, those were the days where you didn't have unlimited packages, right. You had to pay for long distance and you

Felipe Arevalo 34:09

Had to check rates between the different carriers to see who had the best long distance rates or certain hours where if you wanted to call during certain hours, it was going to be more expensive than if you called. And like, they had the free after seven or whatever.

Chase Peckham 34:26

Right.

Katie Utterback 34:27

And on weekends.

Chase Peckham 34:28

On weekends it was cheaper. All of that.

Felipe Arevalo 34:32

Unlimited weekends was a big thing

Katie Utterback 34:35

Like going back to the phone days of play, you don't remember this, but you'd have to like, on-ramp yourself from the code line.

Chase Peckham 34:45

If you wanted to walk with your phone, that was like, you had to have a really long cord,

Felipe Arevalo 34:49

but you had to call. Like Clay, you don't remember this, but you could just pick up your phone and call your friends, you know, or something like that. But it was, you had to call their house and then you had to talk to their parents and be like, Hey, is Harrison home?

Chase Peckham 35:06

There was phone etiquette.

Felipe Arevalo 35:07

Trying to talk to a girl is a Susie home. Like, oh, who's this. Oh man. I was really hoping she'd answered. Now I have to talk to her parents.

Clay Peckham 35:16

Yeah. I mean, I remember I got a new phone a couple of weeks ago and I asked the T-Mobile like employee. And I was like, when did the first cellphone come out? It came out like right after I was born, like couple months after I was born.

Chase Peckham 35:32

The smartphones.

Clay Peckham 35:33

So all the smartphones, the first iPhone came out after I was born.

Chase Peckham 35:38

Cause I was, I used to have one that was like the size of a rocket ship that I would put to my belt back in the day when I worked for the Padres. And you had to pull up.

Felipe Arevalo 35:46

Pull the antenna up?

Chase Peckham 35:46

And by the way, I thought it was the coolest guy ever.

Clay Peckham 35:51

And now you have a phone that you can just pick up and go through all these apps.

Chase Peckham 35:55

It's a whole different world. And that's what I was getting back to. Is I just, the way that that show has. And it's so popular on streaming now still, it's huge.

Felipe Arevalo 36:03

It's one of those products of Netflix where it's not on Netflix anymore. I know.

Clay Peckham 36:09

I miss it.

Chase Peckham 36:09

HBO Max now.

Felipe Arevalo 36:09

That kind of brought it to, it made sure those kinds of shows, you know, Friends, The Office and, and those that are just became like big hits where younger generations were able to binge watch them.

Clay Peckham 36:25

Yeah.

Felipe Arevalo 36:25

Otherwise, you know, other than if streaming wasn't around, unless you have the DVD set, sitting around like, like we do, because there is a big fan. Um, you know, you wouldn't be able to watch it, you know, back in the day, but you know, thanks to streaming. It's all, it's all there.

Chase Peckham 36:43

If nobody has had the chance to go, go to debtwave.org, go to the blog section and read this article because it's phenomenal. And the way you tied it together at the end, uh, with the I'll be there for you. Was I just, it was brilliant. I don't know how you put it together.

Katie Utterback 37:00

Oh, thank you. Well, I think, you know, it's kind of one of those things like life is messy. Your finances can be, we don't always know what we're doing with it. And that means that our friends and our family don't always know what they're doing either. And so that's why I think the show, like, even though they made so many financial mistakes, some of which we talked about on this show, some of which we didn't get a chance to do, but at the end of the day, they were always there for each other.

Chase Peckham 37:31

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right. That one thing that we can take away from that show besides the fact that it was just brilliant and the acting and the writing was so good, but it had so many lessons that we all took away from it. And Katie, I think you hit it, right. We, we all just in our own way, one way or the other related to those characters and those stories and, uh, that, that financially with the world can be messy and we all have to make those decisions. And sometimes they go well for us and sometimes they don't, but you want to make the most educated decisions you can possibly make. And so I want to thank you guys for being here today to talk about that Clay, thanks for sitting in today and giving us the expert

Felipe Arevalo 38:10

Your knowledge is impressive.

Clay Peckham 38:12

Yeah. I mean, it was fun. One of my favorite shows ever. It's pretty easy to talk about. Thank you.

Chase Peckham 38:19

All right, guys,

Clay Peckham 38:20

We'll have to bring you back for video games, baseball or something. Okay. Sounds good.

Chase Peckham 38:25

Oh we can talk, oh boy.

Clay Peckham 38:26

I could talk about days,

Chase Peckham 38:28

but we can talk about contracts and all that stuff forever,

Clay Peckham 38:32

But yeah. Thank you.

Chase Peckham 38:32

Thanks guys. Very much.